Sanyukta Chaudhuri

杨舟选译

Poltu was wide awake in his bed. He had had a good dream in which he had won thefootball match in the inter-school competition. He was getting ready to receive the trophy lwhen the alarm rang. So loudly that he was woken up.

波尔图在床上完全清醒过来。他做了一个美妙的梦，梦见自己在校际足球比赛中获胜。他正准备领取奖杯时，闹钟响了。声音太大，他被吵醒了。

But Poltu wasn't too unhappy at the intrusion 2. He ran straight to his study table. There，in an empty jam bottle， was the treasure.A colourful little butterfly. How difficult it had beento catch it.It had kept flying away from his grasp. But he did catch it.Without a net. too.And now it was going to be part of his biology project in school.

但波尔图对这次打扰并没有太大不满。他径直跑到书桌旁。在那里，在一个空果酱瓶里，有他的宝藏。那是一只彩色的小蝴蝶。抓住它是多么困难呀。它一直想从他的手中飞走，但他抓住了它，也没有用网。现在它将成为他在学校生物课题的一部分。

The biology prOJect required Poltu to hand in a report of the study of a living creatureevery month. Most of his classmates drew diagrams3 from their books as part of this exercise.But Poltu was going to do something different. He was going to present a live creature-thisbutterfly.

生物课题要求波尔图每月提交一份关于某个生物的研究报告。他的大多数同学都照着书本上的一些图表画，作为这个练习的一部分。但是波尔图要做些与众不同的事情。他要展示一个活生生的生物——这只蝴蝶。

Poltu loved the different colours on the wings of the butterfly. Red， green and blue. Howbeautiful it looked when it fluttered4 the wings. Poltu had made a few holes on the cap of thebottle to let air pass through， and added tender5 leaves for the butterfly. He might havetrapped the creature， but he cared for it.

波尔图喜欢蝴蝶翅膀上不同的颜色。红、绿、蓝。当它振动翅膀时，它看起来多么美丽啊。波尔图在瓶盖上打了几个洞让空气流通，还为这只蝴蝶加了些嫩叶。他困住了这个生物，但他很关心它。

Excited about showing his butterfly to the biology teacher， Poltu dressed hurriedly， andleft for school. His school was walking distance from his house. He took a short cut throughthe backyard of Aunty Sinha's house. a stretch he loved walking through. The breeze 6 wasvery pleasant as it had rained slightly the night before. The garden smelt of sweet-smellingflowers. Poltu glanced at his bottle every now and then and smiled at the butterfly flutteringt its

波爾图对于向生物老师展示他的蝴蝶这件事儿感到兴奋，他匆匆穿好衣服，动身去上学。学校离他家仅几步之遥。他抄近路穿过辛哈阿姨家的后院，这是他喜欢走的一段路。微风很宜人，因为前一晚稍微下了点雨。花园里飘荡着花的芬芳。波尔图时不时地瞥一眼他的瓶子，对着那只振翅的蝴蝶笑。

When he reached school， gate wasn't wholly open yet. For once Poltu was early toschool.A few boys were playing football in the field. Any other day you would have seen Poltujoining them without a second thought. But today. he walked straight into his class. He openedthe window and placed the bottle on the windowsi117.

当他到达学校时，大门还没完全打开。波尔图这一次到校很早。几个男孩正在操场上踢足球。其他任何一天你都会看到波尔图不假思索地加入他们。……