Peggy and her boyfriend Tommy were driving down a lonely stretch of highway at dusk when a thunderstorm came crashing down on them. Tommy slowed the car and they crept their way past a formidable abandoned house. Plastered all over the fences and trees were No Trespassing signs. A mile past the house, the car hydroplaned. Peggy screamed as the car slid off the road, plunging down into a gully. The car slammed into a large boulder, throwing Peggy violently into the door, before it came to a rest under a pecan tree. Her head banged against the window, and a stabbing pain shot through her shoulder and arm.

黄昏时分，佩琪和她的男友汤米驱车行驶在一支高速路的延伸段上，周围没有其他车。忽然天降暴雨，汤米放慢车速，像是爬行般的向前驶去。期间经过一间可怕的荒宅，栅栏和树上糊满了“禁止入内”的标志。在驶过这间屋子一英里，车子突然失控，滑出路面，佩琪尖叫着，车子摔进沟，撞上一块大石头，巨大的惯性，让佩琪撞到门上，最后撞到一棵山核桃树，佩琪的头又撞上玻璃，好在整个车子总算停了下来。一股钻心的疼痛贯穿着佩琪的肩膀和手臂。

Tommy turned to her. “Are you all right? You’re bleeding!” “Arm, shoulder. Feel bad,” Peggy managed to gasp. Tommy glanced cautiously at her right arm. “I think your arm is broken,” he said, and he tore a strip off his shirt and pressed it to the cut on her head. “I’m going to call for help,” he said when it became obvious that the bleeding was not going to stop right away. But neither of them had their cell phones. “That house we just passed will have a phone I can use.” Tommy said. Peggy’s eyes popped wide open at this statement. Despite her pain, she remembered the creepy abandoned house. “Stay here. A . . . car . . . will come,”

汤米转向她问：“你感觉还好么？你都在流血了！”“手臂和肩膀，感觉很糟。”佩琪勉强喘气说道。汤米仔细查看她的右臂，我想你的手臂骨折了，说着从自己的衬衫上扯下一条布，将它绑在她头上的伤口上。他看着佩琪的伤势，很明显流血不可能马上停止，“我要去找人帮忙。”然而他们两个人都没有带手机。“我们刚刚经过的那幢房子，肯定有电话可以用。”汤米说。佩琪听到不禁睁大眼睛，尽管身有伤痛，那是一想起那座阴森恐怖的弃宅，还是心有余悸。“在这儿别走...会有车经过。”

“I can’t stay, Peggy,” Tommy said, “It could take hours for another car to come, and you‘re losing too much blood.” He tore another strip of his shirt and placed it gently on the cut on her head. Then he went out and retrieved a couple of blankets from the trunk to cover her with. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.” He raced out into the storm, shutting the dented car door behind him.

“佩琪，我不能等，说不定要等上好几个小时才会有车经过，而你失血太多了。“说着他又从衬衣上扯下一段，轻轻地绑在她头上的伤口上面，接着从后备箱拿出几条毯子盖在佩琪的身上，“我去去就回”，他说着消失在风雨中，顺便带上了表面已经凹坑不平的车门。

Peggy drifted in a kind of daze. Something at the back of her mind was making her uneasy. She slid down on to the floor and put her head on the seat, completely covering herself with the blankets, head and all. Feeling safer, she allowed the weariness caused by the wounds to take over and fell asleep.

佩琪渐渐陷入恍惚。潜意识里某种东西让她感到惶恐不安。她整个身体躺了下来，她把头躺在座位上，把毯子将整个身体包括头遮盖起来。感觉到安心一点以后，受伤之后的疲累袭来，她很快就睡着了。

Peggy wasn’t sure what woke her. Had a beam of light shown briefly through the blanket? Did she hear someone curse outside? She strained eyes and ears, but heard nothing save the soft thudding of the rain, and no light shown through the blanket now. If Tommy had arrived with the rescue squad, there surely would be noise and light and many voices. But she heard nothing save the swish of the rain and an occasional thumping noise which she put down to the rubbing of the branches of the pecan tree in the wind. The sound should have been comforting, but it was not. Goosebumps crawled across her arms – even the broken one -- and she almost ceased breathing for some time as some deep part of her inner mind instructed her to freeze and not make a sound.

佩琪也不确定到底是什么将她吵醒，是透过毛毯的光线？还是外面有人在咒骂？她睁大眼睛，伸长耳朵，除了轻轻的雨声，没有其他声响和光线。如果汤米找到救援队，肯定会有各种声响、灯光还有人声嘈杂。但是她只听到雨中飒飒的风声，和偶尔发出的巨大声响，她想应该是山核桃枝干相互摩擦的声音，本来这些声音应该是让人安心的，但是现在看来不是这样。鸡皮疙瘩在她的手臂上蔓延，甚至是那条受伤的手臂。有一会她甚至有意识地摒住呼吸，仿佛是听从她内心深处的指挥，要她一动不动，不做声响。

She did not know how long fear kept her immobile. But suddenly the raw terror ceased, replaced by cold shivers of apprehension and a sick coil in her stomach that had nothing to do with her injuries. Something terrible had happened, she thought wearily, fear adding yet more fatigue to her already wounded body. Then she scolded herself for a ninny. It was just her sore head making her imagine things. Somewhat comforted by this thought, she dozed again, only vaguely aware of a new sound that had not been there before; a soft thud-thud sound as of something gently tapping the roof. Thud-thud. Pattering of the rain. Thud-thud. Silence. Sometimes she would almost waken and listen to it in a puzzled manner. Thud-thud. Patter of rain. Thud-thud. Had a branch dislodged from the tree?

她不知道自己因为恐惧而一动不动了多长时间。突然这种原生性的恐惧停止了，取而代之的是不安引起的冷颤以及胃里的翻江倒海。这样对她的伤势一点好处都没有，刚才肯定发生了什么可怕的事情，她无力的想到。恐惧的情绪让她的伤势雪上加霜，她嘲笑自己真是个傻瓜，那些只不过是头痛引起的胡思乱想。多少给自己一点安慰后，她又睡去，迷迷糊糊听到了之前没有听到过的声响，轻轻的哒-哒声，像是有什么东西在拍打着车顶，哒-哒， 雨声吧，哒-哒，然后又是寂静。有时候她甚至不明就里地醒来专门听这个声音，哒-哒，雨继续下，哒-哒。是不是哪棵树的树枝脱节了？

Peggy wasn’t sure how long she’d been unconscious when she was awakened by a bright light blazing through the window of the car and the sound of male voices exclaiming in horror. A door was wrenched open, and someone crawled inside. She lifted her head and looked up at a young state policeman. “Miss, are you all right?” he asked and then turned over his shoulder to call for help. Peggy told the officers her story and begged them to look for Tommy. They deftly avoided answering her and instead called the paramedics.

佩琪不知道过了多久，突然她被从车窗照入的一道亮光惊醒，是一群男人们的声音，仿佛在议论什么可怕的事情。车门被撬开了，有人爬了进来，她抬起头看到一位年轻的警官，“小姐，你没事吧？”警官问到，然后转过头呼叫支援。佩琪告诉了他整个事情的始末，央求他去找汤米。警官没有正面回答她，而是叫来了医护人员。

As the paramedics carried her carefully up the slope of the incline, Peggy looked back at the car—and saw a grotesque figure hanging from a branch of the pecan tree. For a moment, her brain couldn’t decipher what she was seeing in the bright lights of the police car parked at the side of the road. Then she heard a thud-thud sound as the foot of the figure scraped the top of the totaled car, and she started screaming over and over in horror. One of the police officers hastened to block her view and a paramedic fumbled for some valium to give her as her mind finally registered what she had seen. Tommy’s mangled, dead body was hanging from the pecan tree just above the car, and nailed to the center of his chest was a No Trespassing sign.

医护人员将她倾斜着小心翼翼的抬出了车子，她回头看了下车子，发现山核桃树上挂着一个奇怪的东西，警车停在路边，车灯发出亮光，一瞬间她不太理解自己看到了什么，大脑一片空白。然后她又听到了哒-哒的声音，那是这个挂在树上的人的脚摩擦车顶的声音，她惊恐大声尖叫起来一声接着一声，其中一个警官挡住了她的视线，医护人员手忙脚乱给她注射安定。她终于确定她看到了什么。汤米血肉模糊的尸体被挂在树上，下面就是他们的车子，他的胸前正中心被订上了“禁止入内”的牌子。