English Original
You are not going to believe this story. But it is a true story, as true as I sit here writing it—as true as I will die in the morning. Yes, this story ends with my end, with my death tomorrow.
I have always been a kind and loving person—everyone will tell you this. They will also tell you that I have always loved animals more than anything. When I was a little boy, my family always had many different animals round the house. As I grew up, I spent most of my time with them.
I married when I was very young, and I was happy to find that my wife loved all of our animal friends as much as I did. We had all sorts of birds, goldfish, a fine dog, and a cat.
The cat was a very large and beautiful animal. He was black, black all over, and very intelligent. He was so intelligent that my wife often laughed about what some people believe; some people believe that all black cats are evil, enemies in a cat's body.
Pluto—this was the cat's name—was my favourite. It was always I who gave him his food, and he followed me everywhere. For years, he and I lived happily together, the best of friends.
But during those years I was slowly changing. It was that evil enemy of Man called Drink who was changing me. I grew more and more selfish. I was often suddenly angry about unimportant things. I began to use bad language, most of all with my wife. I even hit her sometimes. And by that time, I was often doing horrible things to our animals. I hit all of them—but never Pluto. But my illness was getting worse—oh yes, drink is an illness! Soon I began to hurt my dear Pluto too.
I remember that night very well. I came home late, full of drink again. I could not understand why Pluto was not pleased to see me. The cat was staying away from me. I caught him and picked him up, holding him strongly. He was afraid of me and bit my hand.
Suddenly, I was not myself any more. Someone else was in my body: someone evil, and mad with drink! I took my knife from my pocket, held the poor animal by his neck and cut out one of his eyes.
The next morning, my mind was full of pain and horror when I woke up. I was deeply sorry. But drink soon helped me to forget.
Slowly the cat got better. There was now only an ugly dry hole where the eye once was. He began to go round the house as usual again. He never came near me now, of course, and he ran away when I went too close.
I knew he didn't love me any more. At first I was sad. Then, slowly, I started to feel angry, and I did another terrible thing . . .
I had to do it—I could not stop myself. I did it with a terrible sadness in my heart—because I knew it was evil. And that was why I did it—yes! I did it because I knew it was evil. What did I do? I caught the cat and hung him by his neck from a tree until he was dead.
That night I woke up suddenly—my bed was on fire. I heard people outside shouting, 'Fire! Fire!' Our house was burning! I, my wife and our servant were lucky to escape. We stood and watched as the house burned down to the ground.
There was nothing left of the building the next morning. All the walls fell down during the night, except one - a wall in the middle of the house. I realized why this wall did not burn: because there was new plaster on it. The plaster was still quite wet.
I was surprised to see a crowd of people next to the wall. They were talking, and seemed to be quite excited. I went closer and looked over their shoulders. I saw a black shape in the new white plaster. It was the shape of a large cat, hanging by its neck.
I looked at the shape with complete horror. Several minutes passed before I could think clearly again. I had to know why it was there.
I remembered hanging the cat in the garden of the house next door. During the fire the garden was full of people. Probably, someone cut the dead cat from the tree and threw it through the window—to try and wake me. The falling walls pressed the animal's body into the fresh plaster. The cat burned completely, leaving the black shape in the new plaster. Yes, I was sure that was what happened.
But I could not forget that black shape for months. I even saw it in my dreams. I began to feel sad about losing the animal. So I began to look for another one. I looked mostly in the poor parts of our town where I went drinking. I searched for another black cat, of the same size and type as Pluto.
One night, as I sat in a dark and dirty drinking-house, I noticed a black object on top of a cupboard, near some bottles of wine. I was surprised when I saw it. 'I looked at those bottles a few minutes ago,' I thought, 'and I am sure that object was not there before . . .'
I got up, and went to see what it was. I put my hand up, touched it, and found that it was a black cat - a very large one, as large as Pluto. He looked like Pluto too - in every way but one: Pluto did not have a white hair anywhere on his body; this cat had a large white shape on his front.
He got up when I touched him, and pressed the side of his head against my hand several times. He liked me. This was the animal I was looking for! He continued to be very friendly and later, when I left, he followed me into the street. He came all the way home with me— we now had another house - and came inside. He immediately jumped up on to the most comfortable chair and went to sleep. He stayed with us, of course. He loved both of us and very soon he became my wife's favourite animal.
中文翻译
你不会相信这个故事。但这是一个真实的故事，真实得如同我坐在这里写下它——真实得如同我明早即将死去。是的，这个故事以我的终结，以我明日的死亡而告终。
我一直是个善良有爱心的人——每个人都会告诉你这一点。他们还会告诉你，我爱动物胜过一切。当我还是个小男孩时，家里总是养着许多不同的动物。随着我长大，我把大部分时间都花在它们身上。
我很年轻就结婚了，并且很高兴地发现我的妻子和我一样爱我们所有的动物朋友。我们有各种各样的鸟、金鱼、一条好狗和一只猫。
那只猫体型很大，非常漂亮。它全身乌黑，而且非常聪明。它聪明到我的妻子常常嘲笑一些人的迷信；有些人认为所有的黑猫都是邪恶的，是披着猫皮的敌人。
普鲁托——这是那只猫的名字——是我的最爱。总是我给它喂食，它到处跟着我。多年来，我和它快乐地生活在一起，是最好的朋友。
但在那些年里，我慢慢地变了。是那个叫做“酒”的人类邪恶敌人改变了我。我变得越来越自私。我常常为一些无关紧要的事情突然发怒。我开始说脏话，尤其是对我的妻子。我有时甚至打她。到了那个时候，我也开始对我们的动物做可怕的事情。我打它们所有——但从不打普鲁托。但我的病越来越重——哦，是的，酗酒是一种病！很快，我也开始伤害我亲爱的普鲁托。
我清楚地记得那个夜晚。我又喝得醉醺醺地很晚回家。我不明白为什么普鲁托见到我不高兴。那只猫在躲着我。我的普鲁托不想靠近我！我抓住它，把它抱起来，紧紧地抓着它。它害怕我，咬了我的手。
突然，我不再是我自己了。另一个人占据了我的身体：一个邪恶的、被酒精逼疯的人！我从口袋里掏出刀，抓住那可怜动物的脖子，挖出了它的一只眼睛。
第二天早上醒来时，我的心中充满了痛苦和恐惧。我深感懊悔。但酒精很快帮助我忘记了。
慢慢地，猫好起来了。原来眼睛的地方只剩下一个丑陋的干洞。它又开始像往常一样在房子里走动。当然，它现在再也不靠近我了，我一走得太近它就逃跑。
我知道它不再爱我了。起初我很伤心。然后，慢慢地，我开始感到愤怒，于是我又做了一件可怕的事情……
我不得不做——我无法控制自己。我怀着心中巨大的悲伤做了这件事——因为我知道这是邪恶的。而这正是我做的原因——是的！我做了，因为我知道这是邪恶的。我做了什么？我抓住那只猫，把它吊在树上，直到它死去。
那天晚上我突然醒来——我的床着火了。我听到外面的人在喊：“着火了！着火了！”我们的房子在燃烧！我、我的妻子和我们的仆人幸运地逃了出来。我们站着，看着房子烧成平地。
第二天早上，建筑什么都没剩下。所有的墙都在夜里倒塌了，除了一面——房子中间的一堵墙。我明白为什么这堵墙没有烧毁：因为上面有新抹的灰泥。灰泥还很湿。
我惊讶地看到墙边围着一群人。他们在交谈，似乎相当兴奋。我走近些，从他们肩膀上看过去。我看到新抹的白灰泥上有一个黑色的形状。那是一只大猫的形状，脖子上吊着。
我惊恐万分地看着那个形状。过了好几分钟，我才又能清晰地思考。我必须知道它为什么在那里。
我记得我把猫吊在了隔壁房子的花园里。火灾时花园里挤满了人。很可能，有人把死猫从树上割下来，从窗户扔了进来——想叫醒我。倒塌的墙壁把猫的尸体压进了新鲜的灰泥里。猫被完全烧毁了，在新灰泥上留下了黑色的形状。是的，我确信事情就是这样发生的。
但几个月来，我都无法忘记那个黑色的形状。我甚至在梦中都看到它。我开始为失去那只动物感到难过。于是我开始寻找另一只。我主要在我们镇上我去喝酒的贫困地区寻找。我寻找另一只黑猫，要和普鲁托同样大小、同样品种。
一天晚上，当我坐在一个又黑又脏的酒馆里时，我注意到一个橱柜顶上，靠近几瓶酒的地方，有一个黑色的物体。看到它时我很惊讶。“我几分钟前刚看过那些瓶子，”我想，“我敢肯定那个物体之前不在那里……”
我站起来，走过去看那是什么。我伸出手，摸了摸，发现那是一只黑猫——一只非常大的猫，和普鲁托一样大。它看起来也像普鲁托——除了一点：普鲁托身上一根白毛都没有；这只猫的胸前有一大块白色的形状。
我摸它时，它站了起来，用头侧蹭了我的手好几次。它喜欢我。这正是我在寻找的动物！它一直非常友好，后来我离开时，它跟着我上了街。它一路跟着我回了家——我们现在有了另一所房子——并进了屋。它立刻跳上最舒服的椅子睡着了。当然，它和我们住在一起。它爱我们俩，很快它就成了我妻子最喜欢的动物。