In an art exhibition the other day I saw a painting that had been sold for $5,000. —
几天前，在一次艺术展览上，我看到了一幅以5000美元的价格售出的画作。 —

The painter was a young scrub out of the West named Kraft, who had a favourite food and a pet theory. —
这位画家叫克拉夫特，是一个出自西部的年轻人，他有一种最喜欢的食物和一种宠物似的理论。 —

His pabulum was an unquenchable belief in the Unerring Artistic Adjustment of Nature. —
他的理论是对自然的无误艺术调整怀有不可抑制的信念。 —

His theory was fixed around corned-beef hash with poached egg.
他的理论围绕着腌牛肉哈希和水煮蛋。

There was a story behind the picture, so I went home and let it drip out of a fountain-pen. —
这幅画背后有一个故事，所以我回家后用钢笔把它细细析出。 —

The idea of Kraft–but that is not the beginning of the story.
克拉夫特的想法——但这不是故事的开始。

Three years ago Kraft, Bill Judkins (a poet), and I took our meals at Cypher’s, on Eighth Avenue. I say “took.” When we had money, Cypher got it “off of” us, as he expressed it. We had no credit; —
三年前，克拉夫特、比尔·朱金斯（一位诗人）和我在第八大道上的赛弗餐厅吃饭。我说“吃”。当我们有钱时，赛弗会让我们掏腰包，他用这种方式来表达。我们没有信用； —

we went in, called for food and ate it. —
我们进去，点餐，然后吃。 —

We paid or we did not pay. —
我们付款，或者不付款。 —

We had confidence in Cypher’s sullenness end smouldering ferocity.
我们对赛弗的阴沉和悸动的残暴心灵有信心。

Deep down in his sunless soul he was either a prince, a fool or an artist. —
在他黑暗的灵魂深处，他是一个王子、一个傻瓜或者一个艺术家。 —

He sat at a worm-eaten desk, covered with files of waiters’ checks so old that I was sure the bottomest one was for clams that Hendrik Hudson had eaten and paid for. —
他坐在一张虫蛀的桌子前，桌上堆满了已经是那么旧以至于我确信最下面一张是亨德里克·哈德逊吃掉并支付的蛤蜊账单的文件。 —

Cypher had the power, in common with Napoleon III. and the goggle-eyed perch, of throwing a film over his eyes, rendering opaque the windows of his soul. —
赛佛拥有和拿破仑三世以及大眼睛鲈鱼一样的能力，可以在他的眼睛上抛下一层薄膜，使得他的灵魂之窗变得不透明。 —

Once when we left him unpaid, with egregious excuses, I looked back and saw him shaking with inaudible laughter behind his film. —
有一次我们抛下他不付工钱，借口荒谬至极，我回过头看到他在薄膜后面无声地笑着。 —

Now and then we paid up back scores.
现在和以前我们偶尔还会归还旧账。

But the chief thing at Cypher’s was Milly. Milly was a waitress. —
但是赛佛的重要之处在于米莉。米莉是一名服务员。 —

She was a grand example of Kraft’s theory of the artistic adjustment of nature. —
她是克拉夫特关于自然艺术调整理论的一大典范。 —

She belonged, largely, to waiting, as Minerva did to the art of scrapping, or Venus to the science of serious flirtation. —
她与等待紧密相连，就像米内尔瓦与争吵艺术相连，或者维纳斯与认真调情科学相关。 —

Pedestalled and in bronze she might have stood with the noblest of her heroic sisters as “Liver-and-Bacon Enlivening the World.” She belonged to Cypher’s. —
她可以像雕塑一样栩栩如生地站在底座上，与她那些崇高英勇的姐妹们共同展示“肝脏和培根点亮世界”。她属于赛佛的。 —

You expected to see her colossal figure loom through that reeking blue cloud of smoke from frying fat just as you expect the Palisades to appear through a drifting Hudson River fog. —
你预期能够看到她巨大的身影从滚烫的烟雾中逐渐显现出来，就像你期待着从漂浮在哈德逊河上的雾气中看到帕利塞德山一样。 —

There amid the steam of vegetables and the vapours of acres of “ham and,” the crash of crockery, the clatter of steel, the screaming of “short orders,” the cries of the hungering and all the horrid tumult of feeding man, surrounded by swarms of the buzzing winged beasts bequeathed us by Pharaoh, Milly steered her magnificent way like some great liner cleaving among the canoes of howling savages.
在那里，蔬菜的蒸汽和大片的“火腿和”气味中，碗碟的碰撞声，铁器的哗啦声，短命订单的尖叫声，饥饿者的呐喊声以及一切喂养者的可怕喧嚣声中，Milly像一艘巨轮穿行在嘶吼着的野蛮人的独木舟之间。

Our Goddess of Grub was built on lines so majestic that they could be followed only with awe. —
我们的美食女神威严非凡，如此惊人的身材只能让人敬畏。 —

Her sleeves were always rolled above her elbows. —
她的袖子总是卷到肘部以上。 —

She could have taken us three musketeers in her two hands and dropped us out of the window. —
她能够用双手把我们三个剑客握住，然后从窗户扔出去。 —

She had seen fewer years than any of us, but she was of such superb Evehood and simplicity that she mothered us from the beginning. —
她比我们三个都年轻，但她是如此高贵纯朴，从一开始就像我们的母亲一样照料着我们。 —

Cypher’s store of eatables she poured out upon us with royal indifference to price and quantity, as from a cornucopia that knew no exhaustion. —
Cypher的零食店，她毫不在乎价格和数量地将货物倒出来，仿佛宝藏般永远不会用尽。 —

Her voice rang like a great silver bell; —
她的声音像一口巨大的银钟响起； —

her smile was many-toothed and frequent; —
她的笑容多齿而频繁， —

she seemed like a yellow sunrise on mountain tops. —
就像山顶上的黄昏。 —

I never saw her but I thought of the Yosemite. And yet, somehow, I could never think of her as existing outside of Cypher’s. —
我从未见过她，但我总是会想起优胜美地。然而，不知何故，我从未能将她看作存在于Cypher的外部。 —

There nature had placed her, and she had taken root and grown mightily. —
那里是她的归宿，她在那里扎根并茁壮成长。 —

She seemed happy, and took her few poor dollars on Saturday nights with the flushed pleasure of a child that receives an unexpected donation.
她似乎很快乐，每个星期六晚上她带着激动的喜悦拿走她微薄的几十美元，就像接受到了意外捐赠的孩子一样。

It was Kraft who first voiced the fear that each of us must have held latently. —
首次有人表达了我们每个人都潜在担心的恐惧，这个人是Kraft。 —

It came up apropos, of course, of certain questions of art at which we were hammering.
当然，这与我们正在争论的某些艺术问题有关。

One of us compared the harmony existing between a Haydn symphony and pistache ice cream to the exquisite congruity between Milly and Cypher’s.
我们中的一个人将海顿交响乐与抹茶冰淇淋之间的和谐比作Milly与Cypher的绝妙一致。

“There is a certain fate hanging over Milly,” said Kraft, “and if it overtakes her she is lost to Cypher’s and to us.”
“米莉身上有一种命运正在悬挂，如果它降临在她身上，她将会失去Cypher和我们。”

“She will grow fat? “asked Judkins, fearsomely.
“她会变得肥胖吗？”朱德金斯恐惧地问道。

“She will go to night school and become refined?” I ventured anxiously.
“她会去夜校变得优雅吗？”我焦虑地猜测道。

“It is this,” said Kraft, punctuating in a puddle of spilled coffee with a stiff forefinger. —
克拉夫特用僵硬的食指在洒满咖啡的水坑里断断续续地说道：“就是这个。” —

“Caesar had his Brutus–the cotton has its boliworm, the chorus girl has her Pittsburger, the summer boarder has his poison ivy, the hero has his Carnegie medal, art has its Morgan, the rose has its–”
“凯撒有他的布鲁图斯 - 棉花有它的铃虫，合唱女孩有她的匹兹堡人，夏季寄宿游客有毒葛，英雄有卡内基奖章，艺术有摩根，玫瑰有它的 -”

“Speak,” I interrupted, much perturbed. —
我打断道，心烦意乱地说： —

“You do not think that Milly will begin to lace?”
“你不会认为米莉开始束缚吧？”

“One day,” concluded Kraft, solemnly, “there will come to Cypher’s for a plate of beans a millionaire lumberman from Wisconsin, and he will marry Milly.”
“总有一天，”克拉夫特庄重地结束道，“会有一个来自威斯康星的百万富翁木材商来Cypher家吃一份豆子，然后他会娶米莉。”

“Never!” exclaimed Judkins and T, in horror.
“绝不可能！”朱德金斯和我惊恐地说道。

“A lumberman,” repeated Kraft, hoarsely.
“一个木材商，”克拉夫特嘶哑地再次重复道。

“And a millionaire lumberman!” I sighed, despairingly.
“还是个百万富翁木材商！”我绝望地叹了口气。

“From Wisconsin!” groaned Judkins.
“来自威斯康星！”朱德金斯呻吟着。

We agreed that the awful fate seemed to menace her. —
我们一致认为这可怕的命运似乎在威胁着她。 —

Few things were less improbable. —
很少有事情比这更不可思议。 —

Milly, like some vast virgin stretch of pine woods, was made to catch the lumberman’s eye. —
米莉，就像一片广阔的处女松林，注定会吸引伐木工人的眼球。 —

And well we knew the habits of the Badgers, once fortune smiled upon them. —
我们清楚知道奇迹一经降临，土拨鼠的习性就很容易改变。 —

Straight to New York they hie, and lay their goods at the feet of the girl who serves them beans in a beanery. —
他们径直赶往纽约，将他们的货物摆在一个餐馆里给他们提供豆子的女孩的脚下。 —

Why, the alphabet itself connives. —
你知道，连字母表都在默默发挥作用。 —

The Sunday newspaper’s headliner’s work is cut for him.
星期日报纸的头条新闻为此特别准备好了。

“Winsome Waitress Wins Wealthy Wisconsin Woodsman.
“迷人的女服务员赢得了富有的威斯康星伐木工人。”

For a while we felt that Milly was on the verge of being lost to us.
有一段时间，我们觉得米莉快要离开我们了。

It was our love of the Unerring Artistic Adjustment of Nature that inspired us. —
正是我们对大自然的精确调和艺术的热爱激发了我们。 —

We could not give her over to a lumberman, doubly accursed by wealth and provincialism.
我们不能把她交给一个既富有又保守的伐木工人。

We shuddered to think of Milly, with her voice modulated and her elbows covered, pouring tea in the marble teepee of a tree murderer. No! —
想到米莉用调整过声音，蒙着胳膊肘，给杀树的人在大理石的帐篷里倒茶，我们感到恐惧。不行！ —

In Cypher’s she belonged–in the bacon smoke, the cabbage perfume, the grand, Wagnerian chorus of hurled ironstone china and rattling casters.
在Cypher的烟熏风中，她属于那儿–有培根的烟熏味，卷心菜的香气，嘈杂的铁质瓷器和碌碌车轮的华尔兹舞曲。

Our fears must have been prophetic, for on that same evening the wildwood discharged upon us Milly’s preordained confiscator–our fee to adjustment and order. —
我们的恐惧可能是预见的，因为就在那个晚上，荒野释放了米莉注定的没收者–我们对调整和秩序的费用。 —

But Alaska and not Wisconsin bore the burden of the visitation.
但病难的发生地并非威斯康星，而是阿拉斯加。

We were at our supper of beef stew and dried apples when he trotted in as if on the heels of a dog team, and made one of the mess at our table. —
当他跑进来时，我们正在吃牛肉炖菜和干苹果，他就像跟在狗队后面一样，加入了我们的餐桌。 —

With the freedom of the camps he assaulted our ears and claimed the fellowship of men lost in the wilds of a hash house. —
拥有营地的自由，他冲击着我们的耳朵，要求与迷失在小餐馆中的人们交朋友。 —

We embraced him as a specimen, and in three minutes we had all but died for one another as friends.
我们把他当作一个样本，三分钟后，我们几乎已经为彼此死去，成为朋友。

He was rugged and bearded and wind-dried. —
他粗犷、胡须蓄势待发，被风吹干。 —

He had just come off the “trail,” he said, at one of the North River ferries. —
他说自己刚从北河渡轮上的“小径”走下来。 —

I fancied I could see the snow dust of Chilcoot yet powdering his shoulders. —
我想我仍然可以看到Chilcoot的雪尘洒在他的肩上。 —

And then he strewed the table with the nuggets, stuffed ptarmigans, bead work and seal pelts of the returned Kiondiker, and began to prate to us of his millions.
然后他在桌子上撒满了回来的Kiondiker的金块、填塞的柳雉、珠花作品和海豹皮毛，并开始向我们吹嘘他的百万财富。

“Bank drafts for two millions,” was his summing up, “and a thousand a day piling up from my claims. —
“银行汇票价值两百万美元，每天积攒一千美元来自我的金矿。 —

And now I want some beef stew and canned peaches. —
现在我想要一些牛肉炖菜和罐装桃子。 —

I never got off the train since I mushed out of Seattle, and I’m hungry. —
我从西雅图出发后就没有下过火车，我饿了。 —

The stuff the niggers feed you on Pullmans don’t count. —
黑人给你们在普尔曼车上吃的不算。 —

You gentlemen order what you want.”
你们绅士们点你们想要的。

And then Milly loomed up with a thousand dishes on her bare arm– loomed up big and white and pink and awful as Mount Saint Elias–with a smile like day breaking in a gulch. —
接着，米莉一只手臂上挂满了上千个盘子—她巨大、白皙、红润的样子就像是圣伊莱亚斯山—她露出笑容，就像是峡谷里破晓的阳光。 —

And the Kiondiker threw down his pelts and nuggets as dross, and let his jaw fall half-way, and stared at her. —
Kiondiker将他的皮毛和金块扔在地上，视为垃圾，他的下巴略微下垂，凝视着她。 —

You could almost see the diamond tiaras on Milly’s brow and the hand-embroidered silk Paris gowns that he meant to buy for her.
你几乎可以看到Milly额头上的钻石头饰，以及他打算给她买的手工刺绣的丝绸巴黎礼服。

At last the bollworm had attacked the cotton–the poison ivy was reaching out its tendrils to entwine the summer boarder–the millionaire lumberman, thinly disguised as the Alaskan miner, was about to engulf our Milly and upset Nature’s adjustment.
最后棉花被棉铃虫侵袭了-毒藤蔓伸出蔓藤，欲缠住夏季住客-富豪木材商，伪装成阿拉斯加矿工，将吞没我们的米莉，打破了大自然的平衡。

Kraft was the first to act. —
克拉夫特第一个行动起来。 —

He leaped up and pounded the Klondiker’s back. —
他跳起来，拍着克朗代克的背。 —

“Come out and drink,” he shouted. —
“出来喝酒吧，”他喊道。 —

“Drink first and eat afterward.” Judkins seized one arm and I the other. Gaily, roaringly, irresistibly, in jolly-good-fellow style, we dragged him from the restaurant to a cafe, stuffing his pockets with his embalmed birds and indigestible nuggets.
“先喝酒，然后再吃饭。”朱金斯抓住他一只胳膊，我抓住另一只胳膊。我们欢快地、咆哮般地、不可抗拒地像好哥们一样把他从餐馆拖到一家咖啡馆，把他的口袋塞满了他的防腐鸟和难消化的金块。

There he rumbled a roughly good-humoured protest. —
于是他愉快地发出了一声粗糙但充满好意的抗议。 —

“That’s the girl for my money,” he declared. —
“这个女孩就是我钱的主意， —

“She can eat out of my skillet the rest of her life. —
”他说。“她可以用我的锅炒菜一辈子。” —

Why, I never see such a fine girl. —
我从来没有见过这样好的女孩。 —

I’m going back there and ask her to marry me. —
我要回去找她，向她求婚。 —

I guess she won’t want to sling hash any more when she sees the pile of dust I’ve got.”
我猜她看到我堆积如山的金尘后，就不会再想当个厨子了。

“You’ll take another whiskey and milk now,” Kraft persuaded, with Satan’s smile. “I thought you up-country fellows were better sports.”
“你现在可以再来一杯威士忌牛奶了，”克拉夫特带着魔鬼般的微笑说道。“我以为你们乡下人更爱玩乐呢。”

Kraft spent his puny store of coin at the bar and then gave Judkins and me such an appealing look that we went down to the last dime we had in toasting our guest.
克拉夫特用他微薄的存款在酒吧里花光了，然后他那种乞求的眼神让朱金斯和我用尽最后一角钱来敬维也纳。

Then, when our ammunition was gone and the Klondiker, still somewhat sober, began to babble again of Milly, Kraft whispered into his ear such a polite, barbed insult relating to people who were miserly with their funds, that the miner crashed down handful after handful of silver and notes, calling for all the fluids in the world to drown the imputation.
然后，当我们的弹药用完时，那个肯洛德克尔，在还有些清醒的状态下，又开始闲聊起米丽来，克拉夫特耳语着对他的一个礼貌但刻薄的侮辱，跟那些小气的人有关，于是那个矿工仍然一把接一把地抛出银币和钞票，叫嚷着要用尽所有液体来淹死他的羞辱。

Thus the work was accomplished. —
这样工作就完成了， —

With his own guns we drove him from the field. —
我们用他自己的枪将他赶出战场。 —

And then we had him carted to a distant small hotel and put to bed with his nuggets and baby seal-skins stuffed around him.
然后我们把他拉到一家远离的小旅店里，用他的金块和海豹绒帽子将他放在床上。

“He will never find Cypher’s again,” said Kraft. “He will propose to the first white apron he sees in a dairy restaurant to-morrow. —
“他再也找不到赛弗斯了，”克拉夫特说。“他明天会向第一个在乳酪餐厅里看到的白围裙的女孩求婚。” —

And Milly–I mean the Natural Adjustment–is saved!”
那么Milley，我是指自然调整，就得救了！

And back to Cypher’s went we three, and, finding customers scarce, we joined hands and did an Indian dance with Milly in the centre.
我们三人回到Cypher’s，客人稀少，于是我们手牵手，在中间与Milley一起跳起了印第安舞。

This, I say, happened three years ago. —
我说，这发生在三年前。 —

And about that time a little luck descended upon us three, and we were enabled to buy costlier and less wholesome food than Cypher’s. —
大约在那个时候，我们三个人有了一点运气，买得起比Cypher’s更昂贵、不那么健康的食物。 —

Our paths separated, and I saw Kraft no more and Judkins seldom.
我们的道路分开了，我再也没有见过Kraft，很少见到Judkins。

But, as I said, I saw a painting the other day that was sold for $5,000. —
但是，正如我所说的，前几天我看到一幅画以5000美元的价格售出。 —

The title was “Boadicea,” and the figure seemed to fill all out-of-doors. —
标题是《波阿迪切亚》，画中的人物似乎占满了整个室外空间。但是在所有欣赏这幅画的人中，我相信只有我渴望波阿迪切亚从画框中走出来， —

But of all the
给我带来加了水煮蛋的咸牛肉茶。

picture’s admirers who stood before it, I believe I was the only one who longed for Boadicea to stalk from her frame, bringing me corned-beef hash with poached egg.
我急忙走去找Kraft。他那恶魔般的眼神依旧，头发更乱了，但他的衣服是裁缝做的。

I hurried away to see Kraft. His satanic eyes were the same, his hair was worse tangled, but his clothes had been made by a tailor.
“我不知道，”我对他说。

“I didn’t know,” I said to him.
“我们用这笔钱在布朗克斯买了一座小屋，晚上7点随时来。”他说。

“We’ve bought a cottage in the Bronx with the money,” said he. “Any evening at 7.”

“Then,” said I, “when you led us against the lumberman–the– Klondiker–it wasn’t altogether on account of the Unerring Artistic Adjustment of Nature?”
“那么，”我说，“当你带领我们对抗伐木工人——科隆达克人时，不完全是因为自然的毫无瑕疵的艺术调整吗？”

“Well, not altogether,” said Kraft, with a grin.
“嗯，不完全是，”克拉夫特笑着说。