Coraline waved him goodbye. They went to the department store to buy the school clothes.
查看中文翻译
Her mother ignored her; she was talking to the shop assistant. They were talking about which kind of pullover to get for Coraline, and were agreeing that the best thing to do would be to get one that was embarrassingly large and baggy, in the hope that one day she might grow into it.
查看中文翻译
Coraline saw some Day-glo green gloves she liked a lot. Her mother refused to get them for her, preferring instead to buy white socks, navy-blue school underpants, four grey blouses, and a dark grey skirt.
查看中文翻译
"But Mum, everybody at school's got grey blouses and everything. NobodyÕs got green gloves. I could be the only one."
查看中文翻译
Coraline wandered off, and looked at a display of Wellington boots shaped like frogs and ducks and rabbits. Then she wandered back.
查看中文翻译
The next day the sun shone, and Coraline's mother took her into the nearest large town to buy clothes for school. They dropped her father off at the railway station. He was going into London for the day to see some people.
查看中文翻译
"Not unless you can walk through bricks, dear."
查看中文翻译
In the car on the way back home, Coraline said, "What's in the empty flat?"
查看中文翻译
"Yes, dear. Now, I think you could do with some more hairclips, don't you?"
查看中文翻译
Coraline didn't say anything.
查看中文翻译
They got home around lunchtime. The sun was shining, although the day was cold. Coraline's mother looked in the fridge, and found a sad little tomato and a piece of cheese with green stuff growing on it. There was only a crust in the bread bin.
查看中文翻译
"I was kidnapped by aliens," said Coraline. "They came down from outer space with ray guns, but I fooled them by wearing a wig and laughing in a foreign accent, and I escaped."
查看中文翻译
"I don't know. Nothing, I expect. It probably looks like our flat before we moved in. Empty rooms."
查看中文翻译
"Do you think you could get into it from our flat?"
查看中文翻译
"I'd better dash down to the shops and get some fishfingers or something," said her mother. "Do you want to come?"
查看中文翻译
"Well, let's say half a dozen, to be on the safe side," said her mother.
查看中文翻译
"No."
查看中文翻译
"Coraline? Oh, there you are. Where on earth were you?"
查看中文翻译
"Oh."
查看中文翻译
She flipped through a book her mother was reading about native people in a distant country; how every day they would take pieces of white silk and draw on them in wax, then dip the silks in dye, then draw on them more in wax and dye them some more, then boil the wax out in hot water, and then, finally, throw the now-beautiful cloths on a fire and burn them to ashes.
查看中文翻译
Coraline was bored.
查看中文翻译
"Suit yourself," said her mother, and left. Then she came back and got her purse and car keys and went out again.
查看中文翻译
It seemed particularly pointless to Coraline, but she hoped that the people enjoyed it. She was still bored, and her mother wasn't yet home.
查看中文翻译
"No," said Coraline.
查看中文翻译
Coraline got a chair and pushed it over to the kitchen door. She climbed on to the chair, and reached up. She clambered down, and got a broom from the broom cupboard. She climbed back on the chair again, and reached up with the broom.
查看中文翻译
Chink. She climbed down from the chair and picked up the keys. She smiled triumphantly. Then she leaned the broom against the wall and went into the drawing room.
查看中文翻译
Then Coraline put her hand on the doorknob and turned it; and, finally, she opened the door.
查看中文翻译
The family did not use the drawing room. They had inherited the furniture from Coraline's grandmother, along with a wooden coffee table, a side table, a heavy glass ashtray and the oil painting of a bowl of fruit. Coraline could never work out why anyone would want to paint a bowl of fruit. Other than that, the room was empty: there were no knick-knacks on the mantelpiece, no statues or clocks; nothing that made it feel comfortable or lived-in.
查看中文翻译
It opened on to a dark hallway. The bricks had gone, as if they'd never been there. There was a cold, musty smell coming through the open doorway: it smelled like something very old and very slow.
查看中文翻译
The old black key felt colder than any of the others. She pushed it into the keyhole. It turned smoothly, with a satisfying clunk.
查看中文翻译
Coraline stopped and listened. She knew she was doing something wrong, and she was trying to listen for her mother coming back, but she heard nothing.
查看中文翻译
Coraline walked down the corridor uneasily. There was something very familiar about it.
查看中文翻译
The carpet beneath her feet was the same carpet they had in their flat. The wallpaper was the same wallpaper they had. The picture hanging in the hall was the same that they had hanging in their hallway at home.
查看中文翻译
Coraline went through the door.
查看中文翻译
She shook her head, confused.
查看中文翻译
She knew where she was: she was in her own home. She hadn't left.
查看中文翻译
The picture they had in their own hallway showed a boy in old-fashioned clothes staring at some bubbles. But now the expression on his face was different -- he was looking at the bubbles as if he was planning to do something very nasty indeed to them. And there was something peculiar about his eyes.
查看中文翻译
She stared at the picture hanging on the wall: no, it wasn't exactly the same.
查看中文翻译
She almost had it when somebody said, "Coraline?" It sounded like her mother.
查看中文翻译
She wondered what the empty flat would be like -- if that was where the corridor led.
查看中文翻译
Coraline stared at his eyes, trying to work out what exactly was different.
查看中文翻译
Coraline went down the hall, to where her father's study was. She opened the door. There was a man in there, sitting at the keyboard, with his back to her.
查看中文翻译
The man turned round. His eyes were buttons -- big and black and shiny.
查看中文翻译
"Coraline?" the woman said. "Is that you?"
查看中文翻译
"Well, go on." said the woman.
查看中文翻译
Coraline went into the kitchen, where the voice had come from. A woman stood in the kitchen with her back to Coraline. She looked a little like Coraline's mother. Only É
查看中文翻译
And then she turned round. Her eyes were big black buttons.
查看中文翻译
Only her skin was white as paper.
查看中文翻译
"Lunchtime, Coraline," said the woman.
查看中文翻译
"I'm your other mother," said the woman. "Go and tell your other father that lunch is ready." She opened the door of the oven.
查看中文翻译
Only her fingers were too long, and they never stopped moving, and her dark-red fingernails were curved and sharp.
查看中文翻译
Only she was taller and thinner.
查看中文翻译
Suddenly Coraline realised how hungry she was. It smelled wonderful.
查看中文翻译
"Who are you?" asked Coraline.
查看中文翻译
"Hello," said Coraline. "I-I mean, she said to say that lunch is ready."
查看中文翻译
Coraline shovelled the food into her mouth. It tasted wonderful.
查看中文翻译
"Hello, Coraline," he said. "I'm starving."
查看中文翻译
He got up and went with her into the kitchen.
查看中文翻译
"We've been waiting for you for a long time," said Coraline's other father.
查看中文翻译
They sat at the kitchen table and Coraline's other mother brought them lunch. A huge, golden-brown roasted chicken, fried potatoes, tiny green peas.
查看中文翻译
"Yes," said the other mother. "It wasn't the same here without you. But we knew you'd arrive one day, and then we could be a proper family. Would you like some more chicken?"
查看中文翻译
"For me?"
查看中文翻译
She took some more chicken.
查看中文翻译
It was the best chicken that Coraline had ever eaten. Her mother sometimes made chicken, but it was always out of packets, or frozen, and was very dry, and it never tasted of anything. When Coraline's father cooked chicken he bought real chicken, but he did strange things to it, like stewing it in wine, or stuffing it with prunes, or baking it in pastry, and Coraline would always refuse to touch it on principle.
查看中文翻译
"I didn't know I had another mother," said Coraline cautiously.
查看中文翻译
"The rats?"
查看中文翻译
"Of course you do. Everyone does," said the other mother, her black-button eyes gleaming. "After lunch I thought you might like to play in your room with the rats."
查看中文翻译
Coraline had never seen a rat, except on television. She was quite looking forward to it. This was turning out to be a very interesting day after all.
查看中文翻译
After lunch her other parents did the washing-up, and Coraline went down the hall to her other bedroom.
查看中文翻译
It was different from her bedroom at home. For a start it was painted in an off-putting shade of green and a peculiar shade of pink.
查看中文翻译
"From upstairs."
查看中文翻译
Coraline decided that she wouldn't want to have to sleep in there; but that the colour scheme was an awful lot more interesting than the one in her own bedroom.
查看中文翻译
There were all sorts of remarkable things in there she'd never seen before: wind-up angels that fluttered around the bedroom like startled sparrows; books with pictures that writhed and crawled and shimmered; little dinosaur skulls that chattered their teeth as she passed. A whole toybox filled with wonderful toys.
查看中文翻译
This is more like it, thought Coraline. She looked out of the window.
查看中文翻译
Something black scurried across the floor and vanished under the bed.
查看中文翻译
"Well," asked Coraline, "what do you do?"
查看中文翻译
The rats formed a circle.
查看中文翻译
Outside, the view was the same one she saw from her own bedroom: trees, fields and, beyond them, on the horizon, distant purple hills.
查看中文翻译
"Can you talk?" she asked.
查看中文翻译
The rats began to sing, in high, whispery voices,
查看中文翻译
They came out from under the bed, blinking their eyes in the light. They had short, soot-black fur, little red eyes, pink paws like tiny hands, and pink, hairless tails like long, smooth worms.
查看中文翻译
Coraline got down on her knees and looked under the bed. Fifty little red eyes stared back at her.
查看中文翻译
"Hello," said Coraline. "Are you the rats?"
查看中文翻译
Then they began to climb on top of each other, carefully but swiftly, until they had formed a pyramid with the largest rat at the top.
查看中文翻译
The largest, blackest of the rats shook its head. It had an unpleasant sort of smile, Coraline thought.
查看中文翻译
We have teeth and we have tails We have tails, we have eyes We were here before you fell you will be here when we rise.
查看中文翻译
Then the pyramid fell apart, and the rats scampered, fast and black, towards the door.
查看中文翻译
The other crazy old man upstairs was standing in the doorway, holding a tall black hat in his hands. The rats scampered up him, burrowing into his pockets, into his shirt, up his trouser-legs, down his neck.
查看中文翻译
"Hello, Coraline," said the other old man upstairs. "I heard you were here. It is time for the rats to have their dinner. But you can come up with me, if you like, and watch them feed."
查看中文翻译
In seconds the only evidence that the rats were there at all were the restless lumps under the man's clothes, forever sliding from place to place across him; and there was still the largest rat, who stared down, with glittering red eyes, at Coraline from the man's head.
查看中文翻译
The old man put his hat on, and the last rat was gone.
查看中文翻译
It wasn't a pretty song. Coraline was sure she'd heard it before, or something like it, although she was unable to remember exactly where.
查看中文翻译
The largest rat climbed on to the old man's shoulders, swung up on the long grey moustache, past the big black-button eyes, and on to the top of the man's head.
查看中文翻译
Her other parents stood in the kitchen doorway as she walked down the corridor, smiling identical smiles, and waving slowly.
查看中文翻译
"Have a nice time outside," said her other mother.
查看中文翻译
There was something hungry in the old man's button eyes that made Coraline feel uncomfortable. "No, thank you," she said. "I'm going outside to explore."
查看中文翻译
The old man nodded, very slowly. Coraline could hear the rats whispering to each other, although she couldn't tell what they were saying.
查看中文翻译
She was not certain that she wanted to know what they were saying.
查看中文翻译
Coraline walked outside, and down the steps.
查看中文翻译
"We'll just wait here for you to come back," said her other father.
查看中文翻译
When Coraline got to the front door, she turned back and looked at them. They were still watching her, and waving, and smiling.
查看中文翻译