Ice Spray and the Shaking Scale- 適合中高級的英語短篇故事

Cyrus pressed his palm against a coil of dock rope and found it oddly slimy. Salt that usually formed a stiff crust had turned to greasy film under dripping ice melt. The weighing station buzzed around him while June updated the clipboard chain with steady pencil strokes. To read the hanging scale clearly, Cyrus needed the pointer to stop shaking inside the glass ring. The harbour wind blew straight through the open side of the hut, lifting loose papers and tugging at Cyrus’s sleeves. He dragged an empty ice-box lid, set it upright like a short screen, and the swing lessened but still crossed five marks. Meltwater rolled off the lid and trickled along a shallow cut in the granite surface. It slipped beneath a loosened briar twig that had fallen from a net bundle nearby. The brown thorny stick floated forward, riding the small stream toward the mooring ropes nearby. A tabby cat perched on top of the sunlit crates, watching the drifting twig below.

A sharper gust swept along the quay and spun the hanging scale again wildly about. Cyrus fetched a second lid from the ice stack and wedged it beside the first. The pointer slowed to three marks either side of zero on the swaying scale frame. The deflected wind scattered droplets from melting ice on the lid in sharp bursts today. The spray pattered over the cat, which sprang across the dock like an intrepid explorer leaping from stone to stone. Above them, a gull dipped and rose like a hiker feeling rejuvenated after a hard climb. The animal’s landing rattled a carabiner clipped to the scale frame, and the bright ping echoed across the water. Even that faint knock reached the pointer, and the needle shivered again for a moment.

The gust still pressed on the station, so Cyrus crouched for the last lid nearby. Cold water had been dripping through its crack, leaving only a thin gleam across its surface; it was the final usable shield. He raised it, feeling its weight lessen as most of the ice had already slid away. He braced it above the other two, forming a narrow roof over the pointer now. Together, the three lids formed an uneven wall, and at that instant the needle froze on twelve kilograms. The wind kept pressing, yet no extra lids remained on the busy midday dock today. The third and final panel flexed like a thin sail, its edge trembling toward the harbour mouth.

賽勒斯把手掌按在碼頭的纜繩上，意外發現它竟然滑膩。通常會結成硬鹽殼的鹽分，被滴落的冰水沖成油亮薄膜。稱重區一片忙碌，瓊用穩定的筆畫在鏈住的夾板上記錄數字。為了看清懸掛式秤的指針，賽勒斯需要讓它停止在玻璃圈裡搖動。港口風從小屋敞開的一側直灌進來，掀動鬆散的紙張，也扯動他的袖口。他搬來一塊空冰箱蓋，豎在秤旁當短屏風，擺動減少卻仍晃過五格。融水從蓋子邊緣滑下，沿花崗岩表面的淺縫流動。水流鑽過一截從網堆掉落的野薔薇枝。那根帶刺棕枝順著細流漂向繫纜區。曬太陽的木箱頂上，一隻虎斑貓盯著枝條滑動。

一陣更猛烈的風掠過碼頭，把懸秤再度猛力旋轉。賽勒斯取來第二塊蓋子，塞在第一塊旁邊。指針在零點左右僅剩三格擺幅。被擋偏的風把蓋子上的冰水濺成細點。水珠落在貓身上，牠像無畏探險家般躍過甲板木條。頭頂上一隻海鷗俯衝再上升，就像經長途攀爬後感到煥然一新的健行者。貓落地時，碰得扣在秤框上的登山扣發出清脆叮響，聲音在水面回盪。即使這樣的輕敲也傳到指針，讓它又抖了一下。

強風仍推著秤台，賽勒斯蹲下抓住最後一塊蓋子。裂縫中不斷滴水，只剩薄薄一道水痕；這是唯一可用的最後屏障。他舉起蓋子，感覺重量因冰屑滑落而變輕，隨即把它架在另外兩塊上方，形成狹窄屋頂。三塊蓋子湊成不平整的牆面，指針瞬間停在十二公斤。風還在吹，可碼頭上再也沒有多餘蓋子。第三片也是最後一片蓋子像薄帆般彎曲，它的邊緣向港口出口顫抖前伸。