The Sign That Lost a Letter

The sign above the lobby door of the Lantern Street Rink had always read NO WISHING ON THE ICE. Until that Tuesday, Osman had never given it a second thought. The letters were made of pale blue iron, each one as long as his forearm. The rink's founder had bolted them to the beam more than a century ago. Every new skater asked about it. Every old skater smiled and said nothing.

灯笼街溜冰场大厅门上方的招牌，一直写着“NO WISHING ON THE ICE”，意思是冰上禁止许愿。直到那个星期二以前，奥斯曼从没多想过它。那些字母是淡蓝色的铁铸成的，每一个都有他的前臂那么长。溜冰场的创始人一个多世纪前把它们栓在了横梁上。每个新来的滑冰者都要问起它，每个老滑冰者都只笑笑，什么也不说。

The rink had been frozen from a spring that ran beneath the building, and the spring was not ordinary water. Anyone who said the word wish while skating found that the ice listened. Most of the time this caused only small trouble. A teenager who wished to skate faster would shoot across the rink like a stone from a sling. A woman who wished her feet were warmer would melt a puddle the size of a dinner plate. Years ago, a man had wished for a quiet life and had been found asleep on the boards for three days.

溜冰场的冰是用建筑物底下的一股泉水冻成的，而这股泉水并不寻常。滑冰时只要有人说出“许愿”这个词，冰就会听见。大多数时候，这只会带来一点小麻烦：想滑得更快的少年，会像弹弓射出的石子一样飞过冰场；希望脚暖和一点的女人，会融出一个餐盘大小的水坑。多年前，有个男人许愿想要过上平静的生活，结果被人发现在护栏边睡了整整三天。

So the sign stood as a kind of lock. As long as its letters were whole, the spring was calm, and the ice behaved like ice.

所以，招牌就像一把锁。只要上面的字母完整，泉水就平静，冰也就规规矩矩地像冰。

On Tuesday morning, Osman unlocked the front door and glanced up out of habit. Then he stopped.

星期二早上，奥斯曼打开前门，习惯性地抬头看了一眼，然后愣住了。

The sign said NO WI HING ON THE ICE. Spoken aloud, it sounded like "No wi-hing on the ice", because the S of WISHING was gone.

招牌上写着“NO WI HING ON THE ICE”。大声念出来，就成了“No wi-hing on the ice”，因为“WISHING”里的S不见了。

In the gap, a pale square of beam showed where the letter had been. A thin line of frost was creeping out of the hole, spreading across the wood like a crack in a window. Beneath the sign, a coat lay in a heap on the tiles, its hanging loop torn.

缺口处露出一块浅色的方形横梁，那里原本是那个字母。一道细细的霜线正从洞里往外爬，像窗玻璃上的裂纹一样在木头上蔓延。招牌下面的瓷砖地上，堆着一件外套，挂环被扯断了。

"Ula!" Osman shouted.

“乌拉！”奥斯曼喊道。

Ula appeared from the back office, rubbing her eyes with one hand and holding half a sandwich in the other. She worked the night shift, driving the machine that smoothed the ice after closing. She lived on sandwiches and silence, and she was rarely seen before noon.

乌拉从后面的办公室里走出来，一只手揉着眼睛，另一只手拿着半个三明治。她上夜班，开机器在打烊后把冰面磨平。她靠三明治和安静过日子，中午以前很少有人见到她。

"What is it?" she asked.

“怎么了？”她问。

Osman pointed. Ula followed his finger and chewed slowly, and the colour drained out of her face.

奥斯曼指了指。乌拉顺着他的手指看去，慢慢地嚼着，脸色渐渐白了。

"Ah," she said.

“啊，”她说。

"What does 'ah' mean?"

“‘啊’是什么意思？”

"It means that last night, when I was hanging up my coat…" She swallowed. "I used the S as a hook. It looked like a hook. I did not think."

“意思是，昨晚我挂外套的时候……”她咽了一下，“我把那个S当成挂钩了。它看起来像个挂钩。我没多想。”

"You hung your coat on the founder's sign."

“你把外套挂在创始人的招牌上了。”

"A sign that looked a lot like a coat hook," said Ula weakly.

“一块看起来很像衣帽钩的招牌，”乌拉有气无力地说。

Osman closed his eyes and counted to five. When he opened them, two children were already standing in the doorway with their skates over their shoulders. A third was pointing at the frost on the beam. Behind them, in the rink, somebody laughed, and the sound had a strange echo to it, as though the ice was repeating it back.

奥斯曼闭上眼睛数到五。他睁开眼时，门口已经站着两个孩子，冰鞋搭在肩上。第三个孩子指着横梁上的霜。在他们身后的冰场里，有人笑了一声，那笑声带着奇怪的回音，仿佛冰面把它又重复了一遍。

"We open at nine," Osman said. "It is ten to nine. Find that letter."

“我们九点开门，”奥斯曼说，“现在是八点五十。找到那个字母。”

They searched the lobby, the coat room, and the floor around the sign. They searched the bucket where the cleaning cloths lived. Ula even climbed a ladder and checked the beam itself, running her hands along the dusty wood. All she found was a single iron bolt, still warm.

他们搜遍了大厅、衣帽间和招牌周围的地面，又找了放抹布的水桶。乌拉甚至爬上梯子，检查了横梁本身，用手摸过积满灰尘的木头，只找到一枚铁螺栓，还是温的。

"It must have fallen into the rink," she said.

“它一定掉到冰场里去了，”她说。

"Then we will have to look on the ice."

“那我们只好到冰上去找了。”

"We cannot go on the ice right now. The wishes are already leaking." Ula pointed through the glass doors. "Look."

“现在不能上冰，愿望已经在往外漏了。”乌拉指着玻璃门外，“看。”

A small shape was drifting across the rink, hanging a handspan above the surface. It was a boy of about eight, still wearing his hat. His arms were stretched wide, and his mouth was open in perfect delight. As Osman watched, the boy rose a little higher, turned a slow circle, and settled back down on his skates with a gentle bump.

一个小小的身影正飘过冰场，离冰面有一拃高。那是个八岁左右的男孩，还戴着帽子，双臂张得很开，嘴巴张着，满脸欢喜。奥斯曼看着他又升高了一点，慢悠悠地转了个圈，然后“咚”的一声轻轻落回冰鞋上。

"I only wished I could fly," the boy said happily. "Just a bit."

“我只是希望自己能飞，”男孩高兴地说，“就一小会儿。”

"That is exactly what we are afraid of," Osman muttered.

“我们担心的就是这个，”奥斯曼嘀咕道。

Ula was already looking at the letters that remained. "The S is gone, and we cannot buy another," she said. "The founder cast them from the same iron as the rink's old skate blades. There is no foundry left in town that knows how."

乌拉已经在看剩下的字母了。“S没了，我们又买不到新的，”她说，“创始人是用溜冰场旧冰刀的同一种铁铸的，镇上现在没有哪家铸造厂还会这门手艺。”

Osman thought about this. He looked at the blue letters, at the frost spreading along the beam, and at the gap in the sign.

奥斯曼想了想。他看看那些蓝色的字母，看看沿着横梁蔓延的霜，又看看招牌上的缺口。

Then he looked at Ula's coat, lying crumpled beneath the gap, with the hanging loop torn in two.

然后他看向乌拉的外套，它皱巴巴地躺在缺口下面，挂环断成了两截。

"Iron from skate blades," he said slowly.

“用冰刀铁铸的，”他缓缓地说。

"Yes. What of it?"

“对啊，怎么了？”

"Where do we keep the old blades?"

“旧冰刀我们放在哪儿？”

Ula stared at him. Her eyes moved to the workshop door at the back of the lobby. Inside it stood a rusty barrel full of retired skates, left behind over the decades by people who had outgrown them.

乌拉盯着他。她的目光移向大厅后面的工作间的门。里面有一只生锈的木桶，装满了退役的冰鞋，是几十年来长大后穿不上的人留下的。

They worked fast. Ula dragged out the barrel while Osman cleared the workbench. From the pile, Osman chose a long, curved blade from a pair of figure skates. The steel was dark and already slightly bent, as if it remembered being an S in a former life. He clamped it in the vise. Ula took the heaviest hammer from the wall and began to tap it into shape. One patient blow after another, she rounded the top curve and flattened the lower tail.

他们动作飞快。乌拉把桶拖出来，奥斯曼清理工作台。从那一堆里，奥斯曼挑了一把花样滑冰鞋上又长又弯的冰刀。钢材颜色发暗，已经有点弯曲，仿佛还记得自己前世是个S。他把它夹在台虎钳上。乌拉从墙上取下最重的锤子，开始一下一下把它敲成形。她耐心地一锤接一锤，把顶部的弧线敲圆，把下面的尾巴敲平。

"Watch the rivet holes," Osman said.

“当心铆钉孔，”奥斯曼说。

"I am watching."

“我在看着。”

"You are talking to the hammer."

“你在跟锤子说话。”

"The hammer understands me."

“锤子懂我。”

At four minutes to nine, the new letter was done. It was not as pale as the others, and the curve was a little uneven. Still, when Osman held it up, it was unmistakably an S. They carried it back to the lobby on a folded cloth, as though it might spill. Ula climbed the ladder again, and Osman handed up the bolts one at a time.

差四分钟九点，新字母做好了。它没有其他字母那么浅，弧线也有点不均匀。不过当奥斯曼举起它时，毫无疑问，那是一个S。他们用一块折好的布托着它走回大厅，仿佛它会洒出来。乌拉又爬上梯子，奥斯曼一颗一颗把螺栓递上去。

It took three tries to hold the letter in place. On the third, Ula's hand shook, and the bolt rang against the iron with a clear, ringing note. The frost on the beam stopped. For a moment the whole lobby seemed to hold its breath.

试了三次才把字母固定住。第三次，乌拉的手抖了一下，螺栓撞在铁上，发出一声清脆响亮的音。横梁上的霜停住了。有那么一刻，整个大厅似乎都屏住了呼吸。

Then the cold seeped slowly back out of the wood, and the blue letters glowed once, softly, and went dull.

然后，寒气慢慢从木头里退了出来，蓝色的字母柔和地亮了一下，便黯淡下去。

Out on the rink, the boy settled onto his skates with a final, graceful bump.

冰场上，男孩最后一次优雅地“咚”了一下，落回冰鞋上。

"I think it worked," Ula said from the ladder.

“我想成功了，”乌拉在梯子上说。

"I think so too." Osman took a step back to look at the sign. NO WISHING ON THE ICE, it said again, with one letter a little darker than the rest. Some people would notice. Most would not. He decided that was fair, and that the founder would have agreed.

“我也这么想，”奥斯曼退后一步看着招牌。上面又写着“NO WISHING ON THE ICE”，只是有一个字母比其他的颜色深一点。有些人会注意到，大多数人不会。他认为这样很公平，也相信创始人会同意。

He glanced at his watch, and then at the doors, behind which a line of skaters was already growing. He pulled the keys from his pocket and handed them to Ula.

他瞥了一眼手表，又看了看大门，门外滑冰的人已经排起了队。他从口袋里掏出钥匙，递给乌拉。

"Open up," he said. "And next time, Ula, read the sign before you hang your coat on it."

“开门吧，”他说，“还有，乌拉，下次挂外套之前，先把招牌读一读。”