深夜小狗神秘事件

十五歲的克里斯托弗·布恩擁有超強的記憶力和邏輯思維能力，他知道世界上所有國家及其首都的名稱，能說出7057以內的全部質數，可以輕松解開復雜的數學問題；但他卻無法理解常人的情感和交流方式，不能忍受噪音和人群，厭惡別人碰觸他的身體，喜歡單獨待在狹小安靜的空間里；他固執地用規律、秩序和可預見性在這雜亂的世界上為自己營造出一片安全地帶——他是一名自閉癥患者。

一天夜里，克里斯托弗發現鄰居家的狗威靈頓慘遭謀殺。他決意要查出真兇，并以這本書來記錄他的探案經過。但在追查真相的過程中，他卻無意間與自己家庭的深重危機迎面相撞，他努力構建的小小世界也遇到了前所未有的沖擊……

看書的標題和情節介紹，你會以為這是一本推理懸疑小說，但稍稍“劇透”一下，其實謎底在讀到一半的時候就已經揭曉了；看書的題材和那貌似稚嫩的語言，你又會覺得這或許就是一本單純的兒童小說，但讀著讀著就知道沒那么簡單；讀到后來，你甚至會想：這就是一本很好的心理學書籍嘛，把一個自閉癥少年的內心世界寫得如此真實可感……盡管不知這本書該歸為何類，但從克里斯托弗異于常人的視角和口吻、那以質數命名的章節名，還有散落在書中的各種表情符號、圖表、智力題、清單、照片等等文字之外的元素來看，這都是一本特別的書，等待你的將是一場獨特而深刻的閱讀體驗。

I pulled the fork out of the dog and lifted him into my arms and hugged him. He was leaking blood from the fork holes.

I like dogs. You always know what a dog is thinking. It has four moods. Happy， sad， cross and concentrating. Also， dogs are faithful and they do not tell lies because they cannot talk.

I had been hugging the dog for 4 minutes when I heard screaming. I looked up and saw Mrs. Shears running towards me from the 1）patio. She was wearing pajamas and a housecoat. Her toenails were painted bright pink and she had no shoes on.

She was shouting， “What in f**k’s name have you done to my dog？”

I do not like people shouting at me. It makes me scared that they are going to hit me or touch me and I do not know what is going to happen.

“Let go of the dog，” （she shouted.）“Let go of the dog for Christ’s sake.”

I put the dog down on the lawn and moved back 2 meters.

She bent down. I thought she was going to pick the dog up herself， but she didn’t. Perhaps she noticed how much blood there was and didn’t want to get dirty. Instead she started screaming again.

I put my hands over my ears and closed my eyes and rolled forward till I was 2）hunched up with my forehead pressed onto the grass. The grass was wet and cold.

Then the police arrived. I like the police. They have uniforms and numbers and you know what they are meant to be doing. There was a policewoman and a policeman. The policewoman had a little hole in her 3）tights on her left ankle and a red scratch in the middle of the hole. The policeman had a big orange leaf stuck to the bottom of his shoe which was poking out from one side.

The policewoman put her arms round Mrs. Shears and led her back towards the house.

I lifted my head off the grass.

The policeman 4）squatted down beside me （and said，） “Would you like to tell me what’s going on here， young man？”

I sat up （and said，） “The dog is dead.”

“I’d got that far，” （he said.）

（I said，） “I think someone killed the dog.”

“How old are you？” （he asked.）

（I replied，） “I’m 15 years and 3 months and 2 days.”

“And what， precisely， were you doing in the garden？”（he asked.）

“I was holding the dog，” （I replied.）“And why were you holding the dog？”（he asked.）

This was a difficult question. It was something I wanted to do. I like dogs. It made me sad to see that the dog was dead.

I like policemen， too， and I wanted to answer the question properly， but the policeman did not give me enough time to work out the correct answer.

“W h y w e r e y o u holding the dog？” （he asked again.）

“I like dogs，”（I said.）

“Did you kill the dog？” （he asked.）

（I said，） “I did not kill the dog.”

“Is this your fork？” （he asked.）

（I said，） “No.”

“You seem very upset about this，” （he said.）

He was asking too many questions and he was asking them too quickly. They were stacking up in my head like loaves in the factory where Uncle Terry works. The factory is a bakery and he operates the slicing machine. And sometimes the slicer is not working fast enough but the bread keeps coming and there is a 5）blockage. I sometimes think of my mind as a machine， but not always as a bread-slicing machine. It makes it easier to explain to other people what is going on inside it.

（The policeman said，） “I am going to ask you once again...”

I rolled back onto the lawn and pressed my forehead onto the ground again and made the noise that Father calls groaning. I make this noise when there is too much information coming into my head from the outside world. It is like when you are upset and you hold the radio against your ear and you tune it halfway between two stations so that all you get is white noise and then you turn the volume right up so that this is all you can hear and then you know you are safe because you cannot hear anything else.

The policeman took hold of my arm and lifted me onto my feet.

I didn’t like him touching me like this.

And this is when I hit him.

我把鐵叉從狗身上拔出來，把狗抱進懷里。