24

其實，作家先生已經出了黑流蘇之丘！
什麼時候？讓我們把時間推回到搜索隊撤退的那個半夜。
黑暗中，流蘇叢沙沙沙的晃動，把一個小老頭吐了出來，落在土地上
起碼有一百條皺紋，深深地綁住他的臉頰，還有手和腳，令他看起來好老好老。
他靜靜的在地上坐了一陣子，疲倦的轉動四肢，輕微的擺動腦袋瓜子，好像辛苦的憑著回憶思索出該往那個方向走。然後，他緩緩站了起來，開始往酣聲大做的鎮上走去。

As a matter of fact, Mr. writer had have left Black Tassel Hill already.
When did he…? Let's back to the midnight where search team withdrew from the hill. In darkness, the tassels shook with the sound “za~za~za~” and split out a little old man on earth. There were at least one hundred wrinkles deeply tied up on his face, hands and legs, making him incredible old. Sitting on the ground for a while, he moved limbs and head slightly, like he was making sure that he was back to living world and tried very hard to remember where shall he return. And then, he slowly stood up walking toward the snoring village houses.

23

「阿呦呦！搜索員太太實在太可憐了。」庫庫的媽媽舀了一匙豆子湯說。
「對呀！」爸爸回應道。
「太可怕了！而且竟然還被衛生官帶走，不知道什麼時候才能回來呦～」
「衛生官…為什麼要帶走她們？」餐桌上庫庫問。
「哼！為了國王的大柱子」爸爸嗤之以鼻。
「柱子怎麼了？」
「柱子髒了，需要又黑又硬的流蘇去刷乾淨！還好你老爸沒妄想去加入什麼搜索隊！不然他就完啦！」媽媽忿忿說道
「是呀，好險」剛才很有氣勢的爸爸變得很小聲
「什麼，你還真的有想過加入搜索隊呀？」
「沒有呀，沒有呀」
庫庫忍不住想像長大以後，萬一自己丈夫是搜索隊員，自己被黑流蘇怪物詛咒長出長長腋毛的樣子…

“Oh…those wives, they are so pathetic…”said KuKu's mom.
“Exactly…”responded her dad.
“And the entire thing is just terrifying! They were even caught away by the cruel government minister. God knows when would they be sent back?”
“The government took them away?” asked KuKu.
“Um huh! All about the pillars.” dad sniffed.
“What?”
“They need something really tough to clean the dirty palace pillars. Unfortunately, the tassels do strong enough. Thank god your father isn't that stupid getting involved with it, or he would be dead meat.”
“Yeah…That was close.”
“Oh. No! You did think about that.”
“Nope. Of course not! Come on.”
At the moment, KuKu started wondering what kind of cursed tassel would she get under arms if she were one of the poor ladies.

22

號角聲響起，宣示著政府大官的駕到！隨扈駕馬在前，加長型轎車尾隨在後。車門打開，走出穿著華麗的高大衛生官，他掃視過廣場上禁聲的毛毛婦女們，然後一手把鎮長招來，勉強彎著腰讓鎮長在他耳邊傾吐來龍去脈。接著，他走向那一排可憐的婦女，挑起幾根婦女腋下的黑流蘇低頭檢視。
「很好！不錯！」衛生官一邊檢查，一邊對鎮長滿意的點頭。他檢查完後，手下吹了一聲號角，宣佈道：「婦女們將加入衛生部皇宮清潔工作計畫！」
「那是什麼計劃？」
「清潔皇宮？」
「我們這身黑流蘇怎麼辦呀？」婦女們緊張的嘰嘰喳喳起來。
「這身黑流蘇用來刷宮廷長年汙垢的大柱子，正合適！」衛生官冷酷地說了這麼一句。到時候，這些太太會被塞進頂端有圓環的鐵棒子，由地面上的僕役揣住鐵棒，奮力地上下左右移動，而太太們必須雙手高舉，徹徹底底裸露出堅硬的黑流蘇，讓黑流蘇磨蹭去牆上、柱上、天花板上的髒垢。等到她們腋下的流蘇被磨到平以後，問題解決了，才是她們可以離開皇宮返家的時候。做丈夫的也只能勉強安慰太太，這是最好的的辦法了…

21

太太要求丈夫拿剪子來剪掉這可怕的黑流蘇，怎知一剪掉，立刻又長出來。換另一邊胳子窩試試看，也是一樣！請別鎮醫生來看診，醫生只是搖搖頭說：「很抱歉，我束手無策！」丈夫們除了接受責難別無他法，最後他們前往高塔，向鎮長求助。鎮長皺著眉聽完陳述後，跑進房裡打了一通長途電話，才再度回到他們面前。

「嗯嗯，各位先生們，政府掌管衛生的部門，會替我們解決這件事」鎮長說。
「他們打算怎麼解決？」
「這他們沒有吐露…」
「這樣呀…那什麼時候會來處理呢？」丈夫們追問。
「今天下午就會派人來了！」
「那好吧…」丈夫們只能半信半疑的打道回府。


The wives asked their husbands to cut off the horrible underarm tassels, but once they were cut off, immediately growing up lots of new ones instead. They even fetch a doctor to check these hairy patients, but the doctor said “Sorry, there is nothing I can do.” The husbands could do nothing, either, but accepting the harsh blames, then finally they went to Mayor’s tower for seeking help. Knitting his brows through the whole story, Mayor made a long-distance call in the room, then went back to them with an announcement
”Gentlemen, government’s department of health will take charge of this …disaster. ”
”How they gonna do?”
”Um…they did not mention on the phone.”
”Oh… when they gonna take action?”
”Person in charge will be sent here this afternoon.”
”Okey….”the husbands remained in doubt and headed home.

20

隔天早晨，一聲長長的尖叫劃破寧靜，把沉睡的小鎮從夢中喚醒。
那是女人的叫聲。
接著，又一聲尖叫傳出。接著，又一聲、又一聲、又一聲、又一聲、又一聲！

這下所有人、所有狗、所有金魚，全清醒了！人們往尖叫聲找尋，很快的發現，全是搜索隊員的家裡傳出來的。七位搜索隊太太們腋下的流蘇在半夜偷偷摸摸的變長了！她們站在床邊捂著臉尖叫啜泣，埋怨都是丈夫的錯。她們胳子窩底下的黑流蘇一路流瀉到地上，就像穿著尺寸過大的黑色蓬蓬袖，隨著肩膀上上下下地顫抖，流蘇也起伏不停地抖動好像在竊笑。

Next morning, a long loud scream rent the silence, waking up the town from its dream.
It was a shout of a woman. And it was followed by another scream. Then the second scream was followed by the third, the forth, the fifth, the sixth, and the final seventh.

All the town people and dogs and goldfishes woke up now! They followed the sound and found it coming from the houses of seven search team members. To everyone's surprise, it was the tassels under their wives' arms overgrowing in the midnight that resulted in the breathtaking screams. Those ladies stood on bedside, buried tearful faces in hands, and blamed their husbands for offending the hill evil. The bushy tassels of each of them went all way down to the floor shivering up and down as if they were laughing when the ladies sobbed in grief.

19

巨大黑絲絨布準確的在七點整掩蓋了天空，此刻在黑流蘇之丘上一點天光也沒得仰賴了，手電筒的光也降到了只能照亮前面人屁股的地步，搜索隊努力了兩個小時準備撤退，他們累壞了，結果卻是什麼也沒找到！擺頭擺腦黑流蘇們，像壁虎斷尾巴一樣，紛紛自斷一截黑色碎屑滑入大漢的衣領、飄進大漢的背包、黏住大漢的發汗的手心，等搜索隊員的太太們在山丘外領取一個接著一個出來的丈夫時，它們已經作好了記號。

等夜深，在他們安然入睡的時候，黑流蘇才要展開報復…

A piece of huge dark velvet covered the sky precisely in seven of the evening, no more daylight could they depend on then, even the flashlight so reduced that it could only light up the bu tt of the person going in front of you!
Anyway, the exhausted team prepared to head back after two-hour searching.
Meanwhile, the tassels were aware of this, and then they cut off their own tip parts like geckos cut off their tails for survival. The tiny black ends drifted into men’s collars, bags, and stuck upon their sweaty palms as marks. because they would like to wait until midnight to take revenge.

18

強壯的腳步踏在濕濕濃濃的黑色土地上，發出悶悶的聲響，突然一股龐大的臭味籠罩而來，包圍搜索隊七位大漢，大家立刻掩住口鼻，說時遲剎時快，其中一人被手電筒的帶子纏住了，來不及掩鼻而吸入了臭氣，他忍耐憋氣漲紅了臉「噗～嗑！嗑！嗑！」還是咳了出來，嚇得其他人轉頭衝過來摀住他的嘴，領頭人皺起眉頭把食指比在嘴巴前，警告不要再發出聲音了。

隨著他們每一步前進，黑流蘇們都以肉眼無法辨識的些微角度輕輕的回頭，彷彿流蘇末端長了眼直定定勾住他們的身影。剛才嗆到的大漢比其他人更敏銳地觀察四周，他懷疑流蘇在看人，但每次回頭，流蘇們又一動也不動，他在心裡盤算，要是能佯裝倒著走路，就能證實這一點。但還是算了，因為兄弟們一定會說「別傻了！那只是風吹動了流蘇而已。」時間一分一秒的過去，沒有傳出任何歡喜的喊叫聲，或悲悽的哀號聲，只有七顆心臟穩定地傳出頻率不一的砰砰心跳聲。當然，沒有人聽得到，除了隱身在黑流蘇叢深處的怪物。

Walking on the dark damp ground made their footsteps sound muffled. Without preparation, they were enveloped in a stinky mist which smelled exactly like human armpit! Seven men covered their noses with hands immediately, but one’s hand trapped by flashlight stripe and he breathed in the air. His cheeks plumped and face turned red. Although trying very hard to hold the breath, he coughed out eventually. The others turned back toward him and put hands over his mouth in a hurry. The chief placed his first finger upon lips with a frowned face to warn them against making noises.

As the search team moved on, the tassels turned with hardly-noticed angles to follow them as if there were eyes on their pointed ends. The one who had just choked earlier paid more attention than others on environment and he suspected the tassels were staring behind their back. But when turning back, he found them stayed untouched.
“I can confirm this if I walk backwards in disguise.” he thought to himself but gave up soon, because he could imagine what they might say ”Don’t be silly! It’s just wind blowing. ” As time went by, neither cheers nor wails burst out, only seven hearts beat in different frequency. Of course, no one could hear the heartbeats bumping against their chests, except the monster.