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第13章 矮脚怪驯养的牲畜

这会儿，国王留下来照看公主的每个侍卫都有理由怀疑自己的眼睛，因为他们从来没见过这么奇怪的东西。它们是某种动物，但是长得模样怪异、奇丑无比，不像是自然界里的动物，倒像是小孩子在画板上的涂鸦。侍卫们只有晚上在屋子附近站岗时，才见到过那些家伙。第一个说自己看到怪物的侍卫是这么描述的——当时他正慢慢地绕着屋子巡逻，虽然光线很暗，但他还是看见月光下有个怪物后腿直立，前腿趴在窗台上，正盯着窗户里面看。侍卫觉得它的身体有点像狗，又有点像狼，但他以名誉担保，这怪物的脑袋圆得像个皮球，而且按照身体比例，比正常的脑袋足足大了一倍。怪物转身逃跑的时候，侍卫瞧见了它的脸，他觉得那张脸就跟小男孩儿刻的、用来放蜡烛的萝卜一个样儿，除此之外，他实在想不出那张脸还能像什么。怪物冲进花园，侍卫朝它射了一箭。他觉得自己一定是射中了，因为怪物发出一声可怕的哀嚎，连同那枝箭一起消失不见了。侍卫在它消失的地方仔细搜寻了一番，但什么都没找到。其他侍卫听了都笑话他，说他一定是喝了太多酒，弄得他再也不提这件事了。

可是没过两天，就有人证实了他的说法。那名侍卫也看到了奇怪的东西，只不过他看到的和前一个侍卫说的又不太一样。第二名侍卫描述的怪物长得更丑、更匪夷所思。其他侍卫都笑话他们俩，但是每过一个晚上，就会有一个侍卫证实他们的说法。到了最后，就只剩下一个侍卫在笑话其他人。两天过去了，他什么都没看到；但是到了第三天晚上，他冲出花园，朝屋子前的另外两个侍卫跑去。现在轮到那两个人笑话他了，他们说呀，他激动得头发都竖了起来，把头盔直往上顶，弄得系在下巴上的带子都断了。他们俩同他一起朝花园跑去，就是我前面提到的那个地方，看见那里有二十来个怪物。这些怪物的名字他们一个都叫不出，而且每个怪物都长得不一样。它们披着月光，在草坪上蹦来蹦去，那样子又可怕又滑稽。它们的脸与其说是长得不可思议，倒不如说是丑得异乎寻常。有些怪物腿长脖子也长；有些怪物腿短脖子也短，还有些怪物要么腿短，要么脖子短。就像我说过的那样，侍卫们虽然都对看到了什么没有异议，但还是不相信自己的眼睛。他们也不相信自己的耳朵，因为怪物发出的声音虽然不大，但听上去就跟它们的长相一样粗野狂放、各不相同。那声音既不是哼唧声，也不是咆哮声；既不像嘶喊；又不像尖叫；既不是吱吱叫、嗷嗷叫、汪汪叫，也不是呱呱叫、喵喵叫、嘶嘶声；而是像把这些声音混在一起，弄出一种又可怕又刺耳的声响。侍卫们躲在暗处，在被那群丑陋的怪物发现之前，稍稍镇定了一下心神。可是突然之间，那些怪物像说好了一样逃向一块巨大的岩石，侍卫们还没回过神想起来要追，它们就消失不见了。

CHAPTER 13 The Cobs' Creatures

About this time the gentlemen whom the king had left behind him to watch over the princess had each occasion to doubt the testimony of his own eyes, for more than strange were the objects to which they would bear witness. They were of one sort—creatures—but so grotesque and misshapen as to be more like a child's drawings upon his slate than anything natural. They saw them only at night, while on guard about the house. The testimony of the man who first reported having seen one of them was that, as he was walking slowly round the house, while yet in the shadow, he caught sight of a creature standing on its hind legs in the moonlight, with its forefeet upon a window-ledge, staring in at the window. Its body might have been that of a dog or wolf, he thought, but he declared on his honour that its head was twice the size it ought to have been for the size of its body, and as round as a ball, while the face, which it turned upon him as it fled, was more like one carved by a boy upon the turnip inside which he is going to put a candle than anything else he could think of. It rushed into the garden. He sent an arrow after it, and thought he must have struck it; for it gave an unearthly howl, and he could not find his arrow any more than the beast, although he searched all about the place where it vanished. They laughed at him until he was driven to hold his tongue, and said he must have taken too long a pull at the ale-jug.

But before two nights were over he had one to side with him, for he, too, had seen something strange, only quite different from that reported by the other. The description the second man gave of the creature he had seen was yet more grotesque and unlikely. They were both laughed at by the rest; but night after night another came over to their side, until at last there was only one left to laugh at all his companions. Two nights more passed, and he saw nothing; but on the third he came rushing from the garden to the other two before the house, in such an agitation that they declared—for it was their turn now—that the band of his helmet was cracking under his chin with the rising of his hair inside it. Running with him into that part of the garden which I have already described, they saw a score of creatures, to not one of which they could give a name, and not one of which was like another, hideous and ludicrous at once, gambolling on the lawn in the moonlight. The supernatural or rather subnatural ugliness of their faces, the length of legs and necks in some, the apparent absence of both or either in others, made the spectators, although in one consent as to what they saw, yet doubtful, as I have said, of the evidence of their own eyes—and ears as well; for the noises they made, although not loud, were as uncouth and varied as their forms, and could be described neither as grunts nor squeaks nor roars nor howls nor barks nor yells nor screams nor croaks nor hisses nor mews nor shrieks, but only as something like all of them mingled in one horrible dissonance. Keeping in the shade, the watchers had a few moments to recover themselves before the hideous assembly suspected their presence; but all at once, as if by common consent, they scampered off in the direction of a great rock, and vanished before the men had come to themselves sufficiently to think of following them.