Paul D moaned, surprised to find himself exactly where he was the last time he looked.
"Don't tell me I slept in this chair the whole night."
Sethe laughed. "Me? I won't say a word to you."
"Why didn't you rouse me?"
"I did. Called you two or three times. I gave it up around midnight and then I thought you went outsomewhere."
He stood, expecting his back to fight it. But it didn't. Not a creak or a stiff joint anywhere. In facthe felt refreshed. Some things are like that, he thought, good-sleep places. The base of certain treeshere and there; a wharf, a bench, a rowboat once, a haystack usually, not always bed, and here,now, a rocking chair, which was strange because in his experience furniture was the worst placefor a good-sleep sleep.
The next evening he did it again and then again. He was accustomed to sex with Sethe just aboutevery day, and to avoid the confusion Beloved's shining caused him he still made it his business totake her back upstairs in the morning, or lie down with her after supper. But he found a way and areason to spend the longest part of the night in the rocker. He told himself it must be his back —something supportive it needed for a weakness left over from sleeping in a box in Georgia.
保罗·D哼了哼，吃惊地发现自己还待在原来待的地方。
"别跟我说我在这张椅子上睡了一整夜。"
塞丝笑了起来。"我吗？我什么也不会跟你说的。"
"你怎么没把我叫起来？"
"我叫了。叫了你两三遍呐。到了半夜我才决定拉倒，我以为你上外头什么地方去了。"
他站起来，以为后背会很难受。可是没有。哪里都没有咯吱作响，也没感到关节麻木。实际上他倒觉得振奋。有些东西就是那样，他想，真是个睡觉的好地方。随便什么地方的树脚下；一个码头，一条长椅，有一次是只小船，通常是一垛干草堆，不总是床；可现在这回，居然是一把摇椅，很是莫名其妙，因为凭他的经验，要睡个好觉，家具可是最糟糕的地方了。
第二天晚上他又这样睡了，接着又睡了一夜。他已经习惯了几乎每天和塞丝性交，为了避免自己被宠儿的光芒迷惑，他仍然自觉地每天早晨回到楼上与塞丝云雨一番，或者晚饭以后和她一起躺倒。然而为了在摇椅上过夜，他找到了一个办法，一个理由。他告诉自己，肯定是因为他的后背——在佐治亚的匣子里落下的后遗症，使它需要什么东西支撑。