五十包纸

五十包纸

Fifty Packs of Paper

邮递员知道。我只剩十四天了。

The postman knew, and I had fourteen days left.

星期三晚上,我给 Dana 写了笔记。每次过了很顺利的一天,我都这样做:把我知道的一切按顺序写下来,让我的编辑看到这个故事在长大。我写了盒子、圣器室、带拐杖的脚印。我写了两种笔迹。我还写了邮递员,他天亮时在广场上走,而且不会说谎。

On Wednesday night I wrote up my notes for Dana. It was what I always did after a good day: everything I knew, in order, so that my editor could see the story growing. I wrote about the box and the vestry and the footprints with the stick. I wrote about the two hands. And I wrote about the postman, who walked the square at dawn and couldn’t lie.

“可能:N 不是一个人,而是两个人。一位年老的写信人,和一位模仿笔迹的年轻帮手。回信是亲手送的,没有邮票,在八点以前。本地邮递员 Ben Carter,34 岁,走这条路线九年,显然知道。他甚至可能就是第二个写信人。一个天亮时送没有邮票的信的邮递员:这是一幅好画面。”

“Possible: N. is not one person but two. An old writer, and a younger helper who copies the hand. The answers are delivered by hand, without stamps, before eight. The local postman, Ben Carter, 34, nine years on this round, clearly knows. He may even be the second writer himself. A postman delivering unstamped letters at dawn: that’s a picture.”

我读了两遍。我想起 Ben 在十四号门口,对那个穿睡衣的小男孩说圣尼古拉从来没有忘记过谁。然后我按了发送。我对自己说,这只是笔记。Dana 每个星期都会收到我的笔记。除了她,没有人会看。

I read it twice. I thought about Ben at number fourteen, telling the boy in pyjamas that Saint Nicholas had never forgotten anyone. Then I pressed send. It was only notes, I told myself. Dana got notes from me every week. Nobody would read them but her.

后来我常常想起那一刻。我真希望能把那一刻收回来。可是我发了,是在十二月九日星期三十一点四十分,而一封邮件是收不回来的。

I have thought about that moment many times since. I wish I could take that moment back. But I did, at eleven forty on Wednesday the ninth of December, and you cannot take an email back.

星期三和星期四早上六点,我又跟 Ben 走了他的路线,他什么也没告诉我,瞒得很糟。星期三白天,我拿着一个自己的信封,去了市中心的三家文具店。前两家,没有人见过这样的纸。第三家最老,柜台后面的女士把信封举到灯下,摸了摸,又闻了闻。我以前不知道,原来有人会这样对一张纸。

On Wednesday and Thursday I walked Ben’s round with him again at six, and he told me nothing, very badly. In between, on Wednesday, I took one of my own envelopes to three stationery shops in the city centre. In the first two, nobody had seen paper like it. In the third, the oldest, the woman behind the counter held it up to the light and touched it and smelled it, which I didn’t know people did with paper.

“是棉纸,”她说,”厚,奶白色,边很软。真好。现在没有人做这种纸了。那家公司九十年代就关门了。”她把信封还给我。”在这个城市,只有一家店卖过。Fenwick 文具店,在圣尼古拉广场。2010 年老 Fenwick 先生退休,店就关了。”

“Cotton,” she said. “Heavy, cream, with a soft edge. This is lovely. Nobody makes this any more. The firm closed in the nineties.” She gave it back to me. “In this city, only one shop ever sold it. Fenwick’s, on St Nicholas Square. They closed in 2010, when old Mr Fenwick retired.”

Fenwick 文具店。我记得它。一家小小的、暗暗的店,在药店旁边,橱窗里有钢笔,门上有一个像我爸爸店里那样的铃。现在它是一家手机店。

Fenwick’s. I remembered it. A small dark shop next to the chemist’s, with pens in the window and a bell like my father’s. It was a phone shop now.

我打了一上午电话,才找到 Fenwick 先生。他九十一岁,住在公园另一边的一家养老院里。星期四我给他带去一盒我爸爸做的饼干,和他一起坐在一间暖和的、有汤味的房间里。

It took me one morning of phone calls to find Mr Fenwick. He was ninety-one, and he lived in a care home on the other side of the park. On Thursday I took him a box of my father’s biscuits and sat with him in a warm room that smelled of soup.

他很小,很精神。他把我的信封拿在手里很久,翻来翻去地看。

He was very small and very bright. He held my envelope in his hands for a long time, turning it over.

“对,”他说,”对,这是我的纸。我卖了三十年。想要的人不多。它很贵。”他笑了。”可是有一位女士买了很多。一位老师。我告诉她公司要关门了,她就把我剩下的纸全买走了。五十包。”

“Yes,” he said. “Yes, that’s mine. I sold this paper for thirty years. Not many people wanted it. It was expensive.” He smiled. “But one lady bought a lot of it. A teacher. When I told her the firm was closing, she bought every pack I had left. Fifty packs.”

“五十包?写信纸?”

“Fifty packs? Of writing paper?”

“五十包。我说,你要这么多纸做什么?她说是给她的孩子们。”他笑了,是一种又轻又干的笑。”我说,你一定有很多孩子。她说,一年大概三十个。”

“Fifty. I said, what will you do with all that? And she said it was for her children.” He laughed, a thin dry laugh. “I said, you must have a lot of children. And she said, about thirty a year.”