Captain Boomer tells his story. Last season on the Line, he was working a pod when a massive whale surfaced—white head, white hump, scarred with wrinkles. Harpoons jutted from his flank. Ahab recognizes his own irons. Boomer had attacked, but Moby Dick’s tail rose and smashed his boat to splinters. The second harpoon’s barb caught Boomer below the shoulder and dragged him under. Only when the iron tore free along the length of his arm did he surface, half-drowned and bleeding.
ブーマー船長は物語を語った。前の季節、赤道上で、彼は一群れの作業をしていたとき、巨大なクジラが浮上してきた——白き頭、白きこぶ、皺だらけの傷跡。銛が彼の脇腹から突き出ていた。アハブは自分の鉄の銛だと分かった。ブーマーは攻撃したが、モビィ・ディックの尾が立ち上がり、彼の艇を粉々に粉砕した。二本目の銛の返しがブーマーの肩の下を捉え、彼を水中へ引きずり込んだ。銛が腕の長さに沿って剥がれ離れたとき、ようやく彼は溺れかけた血まみれで浮かび上がった。
Dr. Bunger, the ship’s surgeon, recounts the aftermath. The wound blackened with gangrene. He amputated, but the ivory arm was Boomer’s own notion—a hammer-headed club the captain meant for cracking skulls.
機関の外科医バンガー博士が後始末を述べた。傷は壊疽で黒くなった。切断したが、象牙の腕はブーマー自身の考えだった——船長が頭蓋を砕くためのハンマー型の棍棒だった。
Ahab cuts through the banter. What became of the White Whale? Boomer admits he crossed the whale’s wake twice since, but chose not to strike. One limb is surely enough. Moby Dick does not bite so much as swallow. Bunger offers a macabre joke: give the whale your left arm as bait to recover the right. Boomer refuses. The whale is welcome to what he has taken. No more White Whales. There would be glory in killing him, and a shipload of sperm, but he is best left alone—is that not so? He glances at Ahab’s ivory leg.
アハブは冗談を遮った。白きクジラの成り行きは？ブーマーはそれ以来二度もそのクジラの航跡を横切ったが、撃つことを選んだと認めた。一つの肢体で十分だ。モビィ・ディックは噛むよりむしろ飲み込む。バンガーは不気味な冗談を言った——右腕を取り戻すために左腕を餌としてクジラに与えろ。ブーマーは拒否した。クジラに取られたものはくれてやればいい。もう白きクジラの狩りはしない。奴を殺せば栄光もあり、積んだ分の鯨油も入るが、放置しておくのが最善だ——そうだろ？彼はアハブの象牙の脚を一瞥した。
Ahab agrees the whale is best left alone. Yet he will still be hunted. What should be avoided often exerts the strongest pull. The White Whale is all magnet. Which way was he heading?
アハブはクジラは放置しておくのが最善だと同意した。しかし彼はそれでも狩られることになる。避けるべきものが最も強い引力を及ぼすことが多い。白きクジラのすべては磁石だ。奴はどちらへ向かっていた？
Bunger circles Ahab suspiciously, sniffing. This man’s blood boils—his pulse makes the deck planks thrum! He approaches with a lancet. Ahab shoves him against the bulwarks and roars for his boat. The English captain whispers to Fedallah: Is your captain mad? Fedallah presses a finger to his lip and slips over the side. Ahab swings himself into the tackle, drops to his boat, and stands in the stern with his back to the Samuel Enderby, his gaze fixed hard toward the Pequod, steering east.
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