Thirteen equals one

十三等于一

Our vicar is always raising money for one cause or another, but he has never managed to get enough money to have the church clock repaired. The big clock which used to strike the hours day and night was damaged many years ago and has been silent ever since.

One night, however, our vicar work up with a start: the clock was striking the hours! Looking at his watch, he saw that it was one o'clock, but the bell struck thirteen times before it stopped. Armed with a torch, the vicar went up into the clock tower to see what was going on. In the torchlight, he caught sight of a figure whom he immediately recognized as Bill Wilkins, our local grocer.

'Whatever are you doing up here Bill?' asked the vicar in surprise.

'I'm trying to repair the bell,' answered Bill. 'I've been coming up here night after night for weeks now. You see, I was hoping to give you a surprise.'

'You certainly did give me a surprise!' said the vicar. 'You've probably woken up everyone in the village as well. Still, I'm glad the bell is working again.'

That's the trouble, vicar,' answered Bill. 'It's working all right, but I'm afraid that at one o'clock it will strike thirteen times and there's nothing I can do about it."

We'll get used to that, Bill,' said the vicar. "Thirteen is not as good as one, but it's better than nothing. Now let's go downstairs and have a cup of tea.'

我們教區(qū)的牧師總是為各種各樣的事籌集資金。但始終未能籌足資金把教堂的鐘修好。教堂的鐘很大，以前不分晝夜打點(diǎn)報(bào)時(shí)，但很多年前遭到毀壞，從此便無(wú)聲無(wú)息了。

一天夜里，我們的牧師突然被驚醒了，大鐘又在“打點(diǎn)”報(bào)時(shí)了!他一看表，才1點(diǎn)鐘，可是那鐘一邊敲了13下才停。牧師拿著一支電筒走上鐘樓想去看看究竟發(fā)生了什么事情。借著電筒光。他看見(jiàn)一個(gè)人，馬上認(rèn)出那是本地雜貨店主經(jīng)比爾.威爾金斯。

“你究竟在這上面干什么，比爾?”牧師驚訝地問(wèn)。

“我想把這口鐘修好，”比爾回答說(shuō)。“好幾個(gè)星期了，我天天夜里到鐘樓上來(lái)。嗯，我是想讓你大吃一驚。”

“你確實(shí)使我大吃了一驚!”牧師說(shuō)，“也許同時(shí)你把村里所有的人都吵醒了。不過(guò)，鐘又能報(bào)時(shí)了，我還是很高興的。”

“問(wèn)題就在這里，牧師，”比爾回答說(shuō)。“不錯(cuò)，鐘能報(bào)時(shí)了，但是，恐怕每到1點(diǎn)鐘，它總要敲13下，對(duì)此我已無(wú)能為力了。”

“大家慢慢就習(xí)慣了，比爾，”牧師說(shuō)。“13下是不如1下好，但總比1下也不敲強(qiáng)。來(lái)，咱們下樓去喝杯茶吧。”

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