本文选自印第安人女作家伊丽莎白．库克-林创作的反映印第安人生活的同名小说。印第安人在美国倍受歧视，多数仍生活在政府为他们划定的、边远贫瘠的居留地内。六七十年代，在轰轰烈烈的黑人民权运动的影响下，印第安人也掀起了反对种族歧视、争取合法权益的斗争。1968年美国印第安人争取民权的战斗组织“美国印第安人运动”正式成立，要求经济独立，复兴传统文化，保护合法权利，特别是印第安人部落的地区自制和恢复他们认为被非法剥夺的土地。当时印第安人为抗议政府违反协议，占领了阿尔卡特拉斯岛（1969~1971），并于1972年向华盛顿进军，占领了印第安人事务局的办公大楼。各地印第安人的民权运动如火如荼。故事的主人公、年轻的印第安人喜鹊的思想也产生了很大变化，他从向往到大学学习、进入主流社会，发展到积极参加民权运动、抗议政府对印第安人的歧视。喜鹊思想的变化和他被无故枪杀，不能不引起我们对美国所标榜的“人权”、“自由”、“平等”的深思。

When I go to Crow Creek,Magpie was not home.I talked to his wife Amelia.

"I need to find Magpie"I said,"I've really got some good news for him."I pointed to the briefcase I was carrying."I have his poems and a letter of acceptance from a University in California where they want him to come and participate in the Fine arts program they have started for Indians"

"Do you know that he was on parole?"

"Well,no,not exactly,"I said hesitantly."I haven't kept in touch with him but I heard that he was in some kind of trouble."She smiled to me and said ,"He's gone a lot,It's not safe around here for him,you know,His parole officer really watches him all the time and so somewhere"

"Do you mean in Chamberlain?"

"Yes,I live here with his sister and she said that she saw him there,quite a while ago ,But Magpie would not go to California.He would never leave here even if you saw him and talked to him about it."

"But he did before ,"I said"He went to the University of Seattle."

"Yeah,but...well,that was before,"she said ,as though to finish the matter.

"Don't you want him to go?"I asked.

Quickly ,she responded ,"Oh,it's not up to me to say.He is fone from me now,I'm just telling you that you are in for a disappointment,He no longer needs the things that people like you want him to need"she said positively.

When she saw that i didn't like her reference to "people like you ",she stopped for a monment and then put her hand on my arm."Listen,"she said,"Magpie is happy now,finally .He is in good spirits,handsome and free and strong.He sits at the drum and sings with his brothers:he's okay now,When he was saying all those things against the government and against the council,he became more and more ugly and embittered and I used to be afraid for him.But I'm not now,please,why don't you just leave it alone now?"

I was sitting at the cafe with Salina.Abruptly she said ,"I don't know where Magpie is,I haven't seen hime in four days".

"I have got his poems here with me,"I said,"He has a good chane of going to a Fine Arts school in Califormnia,But I have to takl with him and get him to fill out some papers.I know that he is interested."

"No,he isn't "she broke in ,"He doesn't have those worthless,shitty dreams anymore."

"Don't it say that ,Salina,This is a good chance for him."

"Well,you can think what you want ,but         have you talked to him lately?Do you know him as he is now?"

"I know he is good,I know he has such talent."

"He's indian,and he's back here to stay this time."

"Would you drive into Chamberlain with me?"I asked.

She said notheing.

"If he is Indian as you say,whatever that means ,and if he is back here to stay this time and if he tells me that himself,I'll let it go.But Salina."I urged,"I must talk to him and ask him what he wants to do.You see that ,don't you?"

"Yes,"she said finally."HE has a right to know about this,but you'll see..."

Her heels clicked on the sidewalk in front of the cafe as w left,and she became agitated as she talked,"After all that trouble he got into during that protest at Custer when the courthouse was burned,he was in jail for a year.He is still on parole and he will be on parole for another five years--and they didn't even prove anything against him!Five years!Can you believe that?People these days can commit murder and not get that kind of a sentence."

Elgie was standing on the corner near the Bank as we drove down the main street of Chamberlain,and both Salina and Iknew without speaking that this man,this good friend of Magpie's,would know of his whereabouts.We parked the car,Elgie came over and settled himself in the back seat of the car.A police car moved slowly to the corner where we where we were parked and the patrolmen looked at the three of us intently and we pretended not to notice.The patrol car inched down the empty street and I turned cautiously toward Elgie.Before I could speak,Salina said ,"She's got some papers for Magpie,He has a chance to go to a writer's school in California."

Always tentative about letting you know what he was really think,Elgie said ,"Yeah?"

Btu Salina wouldn't let him get away so noncommitally "Eggie,"She scoffed."You know he wouldn't go!"

"Well,you know,"Elgie began,"one time when Magpie and me were hiding out after that Custer thing,we ended up on the Augustana College Campus."We got some friends there,Ad he started talking about freedom and Inever forget that ,and then after he went to the pen it became his main topic of conversation.Freedom,He wants to be free and you can't be that,man,when they're watching you all the time,Man ,that freak that's his parole officer is some mean watch-dog."

"You think he might go for the scholarship?"Iasked,hopefully.

"I don't know,Maybe"

"Where is he?"Iasked.

There was a long silene,Thn Elgie said a last ,"I think it's good that you've come,because Magpie needs some relief from this constant surveillance,constant checking up.Infact,that's what he always talks about.""If i have to associate with the whites,then i'm not free:there is no liberty in that for Indians"you should talk to him now,He's changed,He's for complete separation,segregation,total isolation from the whites."

"Isn't that a bit too radical?Too unrealistic?"I asked.

"I don't know Damn if I know "

"Yeah,"said Salina,"Just what do you think it would be like for him at that university in California?"

"But it's a chance for hime to study,to write,?He can find a kind of satisfying isolation in that ,I think."

After a few moments,Elgie said ,"YEah,I think you are right." Soon he got out of the back seat and said,"I'm going to walk over the bridge,it's about three blocks down there,There is an old ,white two-story house on the left side just before you cross the bridge,Magpie's brother just got out of the Nebraska State Reformatory and he is staying there with his old lady,and that's where Magpie is."

At last !Now I could really talk to him and let him make his decision for himself.

"There are things about this though,"Elgie said."Magpie shouldn't have been there,see,because it's a part of the condition of his parole that he stays away from friends and relatives and exconvicts and just about everybody.But Jesus,this is his brother.Wait until just before sundown and then come over.Park your car at the service station just around the block from there and walk to the back entrance of the house and then you can talk to Magpie about all this ,"

Salina was talking,telling me about Magpie's trturn to Crow Creek after months in exile and how his relatives went to his sister's house and welcomed him home."They came to hear him sing with his brothers,and they sat in chairs around the room and laughed and sang with him."

Several cars were parked in the yard of the old house as we approached,and Salina,keeping her voice low,said,"Maybe they are hving a party."

But the silence which hung about the place filled me with apprehension,and when we walked in the back door which hung open,we saw people standing in the kitchen,I asked carefully,"What's wrong?"

Nobody spoke but Elgie came over,his bloodshot eyes filled with sorrow and misery,He stood in front of us for a moment and then gestured us to go int othe living room.The room was filled with people sitting in silence ,and finally Elgie said,quietly,"They shot him."

"They picked him up for breaking the conditions of his parole and they put him in jail and...they shot him."

"But why?"I cried."How could this have happened?"

"They said thy thought he was resisting and that they wee afraid of him."

"Afraid?"I asked,incredulously,"But ...but ...was he armed?"

"No,Elgie said ,seated now,"his arm on his knees,his head down."No,he wasn't armed."

I held hte poems tightly in my hands,pressing my thuumbs,first one and then the other,against the smoothness of the cardboard folder.  

abridged       adj      删节的，节略的

agitate      v      使焦虑不安，困扰

bloodshot      adj      （眼镜）充血的

briefcase       n      公事包

Chamberlain        钱伯林

click      v      发出咔哒声，恰好吻合 n      咔哒一声

crow      n      乌鸦

Crow Creek      鸦溪

embitter       v      怨恨

fine arts       艺术

folder        n       纸夹，文件夹

freak      n      畸形的人（或动植物），任性的举动，反常现象 adj      反常的，奇特的

hesitant      adj      犹豫的，踌躇的

hesitantly      adv      犹豫地，踌躇地

incredulously      adv      不相信地，表示怀疑地

intently     adv     专注地，目不转睛地

magpie     n     喜鹊

noncommittally     adv     不置可否地，态度不明朗地

parole     n     vt     假释，有条件的释放，假释

parole officer     假释监督官

pen      n     教养所，监狱 （为penitentiary之口语形式）

reformatory     v     教养院

scoff      v     n      嘲弄，嘲笑，

segregation     n     分离，隔离，种族分离

shitty      adj     该死的，讨厌的

tentative     adj       试探性的，尝试性的

whereabouts     n     下落，行踪，所在