黑獅粉墨登場
Enter Leonoir

說完南美遇犬記，再折回來說說本書的主角：黑獅和小黃。After straying to a Montevideo stray, let me return to Leonoir and Gingerlet, protagonists of this book.

我母親給黑獅起了個外號——“黑衣紳士”。因為他全身烏黑透亮，唯獨胸口鑲一朵白色，正面看很像穿黑西裝、打白領(lǐng)結(jié)的瀟灑紳士！My mother nicknamed Leonoir ‘Dark-Suited Gentleman’, because he was jet-black all over, save for a white patch on his chest resembling a white bow tie matching a sleek dark suit. 整體而言，這位“黑衣紳士”文質(zhì)彬彬，頗具紳士風(fēng)范，只是對陌生人有點兇，對小黃也時不時欺負(fù)一番，兄弟鬩墻談不上，充其量是無聊或妒忌。This dark-suited gentleman was well-mannered, by and large, not unlike a respectable squire. But strangers would have preferred a little less hostility from him and a little less bullying would have made Gingerlet's life more agreeable（albeit less stimulating perhaps）. The bullying part was motivated not so much by sibling rivalry turning nasty as by boredom or plain jealousy.

黑獅。Leonoir.

有一次，我爸的一位外地同事到我家做客。My father had a work associate who lived in another town. He came to visit one day. 黑獅一反常態(tài)，他老遠(yuǎn)看到那人，低吼了一聲，呼地沖出去，一口咬住他的腳踝不放。The guest was still quite far from our house when Leonoir saw him. Then something unusual happened. With a guttural growl, Leonoir whizzed towards the guest like a flash and held one of his ankles between his teeth. 客人大叫，我立即出去喝止，但黑獅沒有馬上松口，他四腳用力撐住，死死拽住那人，不讓這個疑似入侵者掙脫，同時口中惡狠狠的嗚嚕聲不絕。The poor guy cried for help. I went to his rescue and yelled at Leonoir. But Leonoir did not let go of his ankle right away. He secured his bite while firmly pushing against the ground with all four legs, digging his heels in, so to speak, so the suspected intruder could not get away. The threatening growl continued. 他抬眼看著我，意思是：你真的信任此人嗎？In the meantime, he looked up at me, seeking confirmation: ‘Are you sure this person can be trusted?’我用語言和眼神告訴他：“趕緊松開！”他這才松開。I said to him, both with words and with the glower in my eyes, ‘Yes, let go of him, now!’He complied. 我罵他，讓他快滾，他二話不說，低眉順眼灰溜溜地走開了。As I was berating him and telling him to make himself scarce, he slunk off in silence, ears flopping down, eyes looking down, his tail between his legs. 送走客人后，我爸說：“這個人我的確不大喜歡，但黑獅怎么知道的呢？”Later, when the visitor had left, my father remarked, ‘I don't really like this guy, but how could Leonoir possibly know that?’他又說：“不過黑獅也不應(yīng)該一見著主人不喜歡的人就上去咬啊，這實在說不通，也太尷尬了?！盚e continued, ‘But just because I don't like someone doesn't mean our dog should bite them. That was so embarrassing.’

對陌生人目如鷹隼的黑獅，此刻眼神熱切，他似乎知道我們正在說他，也察覺出是不帶好氣的。對此我們確信無疑。他使勁搖著尾巴，盯著我們，仿佛在說：“嗯，我聽話，不搗蛋。我看家護(hù)院全力以赴，因為我疼你們?！彪y道他真的聽懂了我們褒揚他的具體內(nèi)容嗎？這個問題我們也無從解答。Leonoir, the eagle-eyed blitzing watchdog, was now eager-eyed as he listened attentively to my father's comment. He knew we were discussing him and was aware of the mood of the conversation. That much we knew for sure. He stared at us while wagging his tail with abandon, as if saying, ‘Yes, I'm a good boy. Yes, I do try, because I love you.’ Did he understand exactly what was said about him? The question defies a definitive answer.?

但不管怎么說，每次一提起黑獅的名字，只要他在場，他馬上就有反應(yīng)。In fact, Leonoir was so sensitive to the sound of his name that whenever it came up in our conversation, he knew right away as long as he was within earshot.

那段日子，我們雖然住在興化縣城，但一家三口交談時，用的卻是一種以吳方言為主料、興化縣城和三泰方言為輔料的自創(chuàng)混合型家庭語體。Although we were living in the county town of Xinghua at the time, the language we spoke at home was a hybrid familial vernacular, combining elements of my parents' own dialects from their respective hometowns in Greater Shanghai, crossed with accents and usages of Xinghua and the Three Tai region. 且慢，何謂“三泰”？三泰是指泰州、泰興、泰縣（姜堰）。我們曾在興化下屬的戴南公社生活過五年，而戴南臨近泰州，戴南人的口音更接近泰州方言，跟興化縣城的口音，有很大的差異。Hang on, Three Tai? What Three Tai? It refers to the region of Taizhou, Taixing and Taixian（aka Jiangyan）. Within the administrative hierarchy, there was a commune（now called a ‘township’）subordinate to Xinghua, but located quite far from Xinghua's county seat. This commune, Dainan, borders the city of Taizhou. People in Dainan and Taizhou speak more or less the same dialect, quite distinct from that of Xinghua proper. We had once lived in Dainan for five years. 無論是興化話還是以吳語系為主的季家方言，都沒有卷舌音，“獅”的發(fā)音與“絲”無異。In both Xinghua dialect and the vernacular of the Ji's, retroflexed（or cacuminal, i.e. with the tip of the tongue curled up towards the hard palate）consonants are absent, so zh, ch and sh are pronounced as alveolar affricates（dz and ts）and the lingua-alveolar fricative（s）. I think I need to expand on this a little en passant, for the benefit of learners like my son: In Putonghua（Mandarin Chinese）, retroflexed consonants, zh, ch and sh, sound like dj, ch and sh in English, except that they are ‘drier’. This dryness is achieved by placing the tip of the tongue in a slightly different place on the hard palate. For example, in English, ch is pronounced with the upper side of the tongue's front part pressed against the mid part of the hard palate. Air is then pushed through a relatively large area of contact between the tongue and the hard palate. But in Putonghua, the ch sound is created by making the very tip of the tongue touch the borderline between the hard palate and the soft palate. Air passes through a much smaller area of contact between the tip of the tongue and the ceiling of the oral cavity. That explains why some native speakers of Putonghua pronounce the ‘ch’ in ‘China’ much too ‘dry’. As I said earlier, my parents and I, when speaking at home, replaced ‘zh’, ‘ch’ and ‘sh’ with ‘dz’, ‘ts’ and ‘s’. 因此，我每回喊黑獅，只需微啟雙唇發(fā)出“咝”音即可，哪怕相隔幾十米，他也會立即跑過來，用眼神試探性地問：“主人，您找我？”That means when I wanted to have Leonoir's attention, all I needed to do was make an ‘s’ sound（corresponding to the ‘sh’ in his name Heishi, Black Lion）. He would come running up to me from dozens of yards away and enquire with his eyes: ‘Master, anything I can do for you?’