英国惊悚故事：《门廊鬼影》

Back in the early 1980s my aunt lived in a house that was literally located in the middle of nowhere.It used to really creep my younger brother and me out, but we loved to go there because my aunt had four children.

在上个世纪80年代早期，我姑妈家住的房子基本上可以说是位于荒郊野外。那是一个曾经使我和弟弟毛骨悚然的地方，但我们还是喜欢去她那儿，因为姑妈家有四个孩子。

The house was very old, and it had all wooden floors. There was always an uneasy feeling when you were inside. For the most part not much happened that was out of the ordinary when we were there. There were a lot of noises during the night, though. On several occasions I heard floorboards creaking, as if someone were walking around. Most of this seemed to be coming from upstairs, and sometimes in the hallway downstairs that connects the front of the house to the back rooms. Sometimes I also heard a thumping sound from upstairs at night. The thing is, no one stayed upstairs ever. There was just a spare room, a bathroom and some small storage spaces up there.

这栋房子已经非常有年头了，地板都是木制的，只要你呆在里边，就总会感到有些不自在。尽管在夜里有这样那样的叫声，但是我们在那里呆的绝大部分时间内并没有发生什么不正常的事情。有好几次，我都听到地板在吱嘎吱嘎的响，好像是有人在上面行走一样，这种情况下大部分是从楼上传来的，有些时候是来自楼下连接楼前楼后房间的走廊。但事实是：楼上什么人也没有，那里只有一间空房，一个洗手间，此外，在上面还有一些不大的储藏间。

My aunt’s room was downstairs, and we all stayed in a room down the hall from hers. I told myself that the sounds were caused by the wind, or the fact that the house was so old, and really never thought twice about it. I refused to ever go upstairs though. The thought that the place could be haunted never really crossed my mind. I just thought it was a creepy old house. That is, until one night in particular.

姑妈的房间在楼下，我们几个都呆在她南面的那个房间里。我经常告诫自己这些声音是由风引起的，或者是因为这些房子年久的缘故。虽然我不愿意到楼上去看看，但我真得是没有考虑过还有别的原因。我觉得这只是一所让人不寒而栗的老房子，真得从来没产生过房子里会闹鬼这样的想法。但是，在一天夜里，出现了特别。

Bedtime had come a long time ago, but us being kids we stayed awake and goofed around for a while. Eventually we all fell asleep. This night I seemed to have a lot of trouble staying asleep though. I kept waking up periodically for no apparent reason. On about the fourth time waking up, I thought I felt a poke on the heel of my foot, which is what woke me. I rolled over and looked around the room, but nothing was out of the ordinary.

那天夜里，早就应该睡觉了，但我们这些孩子们仍然很清醒，在一起又玩了一会。但最终，我们还是都睡着了。不过，那天夜里对我来说是有点麻烦，老睡不熟，无缘无故的隔一段时间就醒来一次。在我第四次醒来时，觉得好像脚跟被戳了一下，接着我就醒了，我翻过身来，打量了一下房间，没发现什么异常的。

I lay back down and tried to go back to sleep. After I had lain there for about 5 minutes, I started to hear a tapping sound. I listened for a minute, and that was when I realized that the sound was coming from underneath my bed! I was too afraid to look under it, so I just tried to ignore it and go to sleep. After it did it for almost 10 minutes, the tapping suddenly stopped. What happened next I will never forget for as long as I live.

于是，我又躺回去，抓紧时间睡觉。在我躺下不到五分钟，就开始听到有轻轻的叩击声从我床底下传来，吓得我也不敢下去看，只好置之不理，继续睡觉。就这样过了足足十分钟，敲击声突然停了，而接下来发生了一件令我今生难忘的事情!

There was a lone window in the room, and that night the curtains were pulled back. I was facing the window, and just moments after the tapping stopped, a white transparent figure slowly moved past the window from right to left. It seemed to be walking on the front porch, which covered the entire front of the house. The figure appeared to have a glow to it, kind of like the moon has. Needless to say, I was horrified. I froze in terror, with my eyes fixed on the window. Fortunately I didn’t see it again. I tried to rationalize what I had just seen, but I couldn’t. We were in the middle of nowhere! There were no roads, no cars, no nothing, just a long dirt road and a bunch of trees. Everyone else was asleep, so I was the only one who saw this. I was too scared to sleep after that, so I just lay there for the rest of the night. The next morning I was thinking about what I had seen, and I remembered that sometimes my aunt would hang clothes out to dry on the front porch. This must have been what I had seen, right? Maybe it was a sheet or something. I asked her at breakfast if she had left any clothes out on the porch last night. She said she didn’t dry anything at all yesterday! There was no other explanation for what I had seen. Honestly, I really didn't think a sheet could have looked like that, anyway. This thing’s movement was too animated to be a sheet. I guess I just wanted to think that.

这间屋子有一个很高的窗户，那天夜里窗帘没拉上，而我就正对着窗户。在敲击声刚刚结束的瞬间，一个白色的、轮廓明显的身影就慢慢地从右向左经过了窗前，看上去好像是沿着前面的门廊走了过去，房子的前面都用这种门廊遮盖着，这个身影看上去带着跟月光一样的亮光。毫无疑问，我被吓呆了，我愣在那里，两眼直勾勾的紧盯着窗户，幸运的是，我没有再看到他。我想给我刚才所看到的找一个合理的解释，但是，我做不到。我们是在一个荒无人烟的地方，这儿没有公路，没有汽车，什么都没有，只有一条长长的土路和树丛。当时，他们几个都睡着了，而我是唯一一个看到这个影子的人，第二天早上我还在琢磨昨晚我看到的那一幕，突然想起来姑妈有时候会在前面的门廊上晒衣服，是不是我看错了呢?也许，那只是一张床单或者其它什么的。于是在吃早饭时，我问姑妈昨晚上她有没有在前面门廊上留下衣服。她说昨天一天她什么也没有晒!我再找不到什么可以用来解释我所看到的这一切了。说实话，不管怎样，我打心眼里也不认为床单看上去会是那个样子，床单不会像它这样活生生地动啊!我觉得也许我只是那么想而已。