The Adventures of Kathleen the Great and Mark the Meek 英勇凱薩琳與害羞馬克歷險記

Mark's musical debut 馬克的首場音樂會

After three hours of shopping at the mall, Mark was beat.

"I've got to sit down. Meet me in the food court when you're done," he told Kathleen.

All the food court seats were taken, but there was an empty bench in front of a

player piano

. Mark sat down and fell asleep.

A few minutes later an orchestra

conductor

ran through the food court. He was late for a concert he was giving at the mall's concert hall.

"That elephant is a master musician," he thought. "I wish I had time to speak to him."

When the conductor got to the concert hall, his own piano player called.

"Sir, I'm stuck in traffic and am going to be late."

The conductor

anxiously

called mall security.

"Bring the elephant at the piano in the food court to the concert hall immediately!"

Security woke Mark up and escorted him to the concert hall.

"Sir, we have no piano player. To you, the piece we're playing should be easy," the conductor said as he led Mark to the piano.

Before Mark knew what was happening, he was seated at a piano with a large crowd behind him and the sheet music for Beethoven's Fifth

Symphony

in front of him. He began sweating … (Michael Kearney, STAFF WRITER)

在購物中心逛了三小時後，馬克已經累到不行。

他跟凱薩琳說：「我得坐下來休息。等妳逛完了，再到美食街來找我吧。」

美食街裡座無虛席，但自動鋼琴前剛好有張長凳沒有人坐。馬克於是坐了下來，結果還睡著了。

幾分鐘後，一名樂隊指揮跑過美食街。準備在購物中心音樂廳舉行音樂會的他已經遲到了。

「那隻大象真是位出色的音樂家，」他心想：「我希望有時間跟他談談。」

就在這名指揮抵達音樂廳的時候，他的鋼琴師打電話來了。「先生，我被卡在車陣中，可能趕不上音樂會了。」

指揮先生焦急地打電話給購物中心的保全。「立刻把美食街鋼琴那邊的那隻大象帶到音樂廳來！」

保全人員叫醒馬克，然後一路護送他到音樂廳。

「先生，我們需要一位鋼琴師。我們將要演奏的曲目對您而言，應該非常簡單，」這名指揮一邊說一邊帶著馬克走到鋼琴旁。

馬克還來不得及搞清楚狀況，就已經坐在鋼琴前了，後方不但有一大群觀眾，眼前也擺著貝多芬《第五號交響曲》的樂譜。馬克開始冒汗...（翻譯：林倩如）