The morning of the funeral I went up to New York to see Meyer Wolfshiem; I couldn’t seem to reach him any other way. The door that I pushed open on the advice of an elevator boy was marked ‘The Swastika Holding Company’ and at first there didn’t seem to be any one inside. But when I’d shouted ‘Hello’ several times in vain an argument broke out behind a partition and presently a lovely Jewess appeared at an interior door and scrutinized me with black hostile eyes.
出殡那天的早晨，我到纽约去找迈耶·沃尔夫山姆。似乎用任何别的办法都找不到他。在开电梯的指点之下，我推开了一扇门，门上写着“囗字控股公司”，可是起先里面好像没有人，但是，我高声喊了几声“喂”也没人答应之后，一扇隔板后面突然传出争辩的声音，接着一个漂亮的犹太女人在里面的一个门口出现，用含有敌意的黑眼睛打量我。
‘Nobody’s in,’ she said. ‘Mr. Wolfshiem’s gone to Chicago.’
The first part of this was obviously untrue for someone had begun to whistle ‘The Rosary,’ tunelessly, inside.
‘Please say that Mr. Carraway wants to see him.’
‘I can’t get him back from Chicago, can I?’
“没人在家，”她说，“沃尔夫山姆先生到芝加哥去了。”
前一句话显然是撒谎，因为里面有人已经开始不成腔地用口哨吹奏《玫瑰经》。
“请告诉他卡罗威要见他。”
“我又不能把他从芝加哥叫回来，对不对?”
At this moment a voice, unmistakably Wolfshiem’s called ‘Stella!’ from the other side of the door.
‘Leave your name on the desk,’ she said quickly. ‘I’ll give it to him when he gets back.’ ‘But I know he’s there.’
She took a step toward me and began to slide her hands indignantly up and down her hips.
‘You young men think you can force your way in here any time,’ she scolded. ‘We’re getting sick and tired of it. When I say he’s in Chicago, he’s in Chicago.’
I mentioned Gatsby.
正在这时有一个声音，毫无疑问是沃尔夫山姆的声音，从门的那边喊了一声“斯特拉”。 “你把名字留在桌上，”她很快地说，“等他回来我告诉他。”“可是我知道他就在里面。”
她向我面前跨了一步，开始把两只手气冲冲地沿着臀部一上一下地移动。
“你们这些年轻人自以为你们随时可以闯进这里来，”她骂道，“我们都烦死了。我说他在芝加哥，他就是在芝加哥。”
我提了一下盖茨比的名字。
‘Oh—h!’ She looked at me over again. ‘Will you just— what was your name?’
She vanished. In a moment Meyer Wolfshiem stood solemnly in the doorway, holding out both hands. He drew me into his office, remarking in a reverent voice that it was a sad time for all of us, and offered me a cigar.
“哦⋯⋯啊!”她又打量了我一下，“请您稍⋯⋯您姓什么来看?”
她不见了。过了一会，迈耶·沃尔夫山姆就庄重地站在门口，两只手都伸了出来。 他把我拉进他的办公室，一面用虔诚的口吻说在这种时候我们大家都很难过，一面敬我一支雪茄烟。
‘My memory goes back to when I first met him,’ he said. ‘A young major just out of the army and covered over with medals he got in the war. He was so hard up he had to keep on wearing his uniform because he couldn’t buy some regular clothes. First time I saw him was when he come into Winebrenner’s poolroom at Forty-third Street and asked for a job. He hadn’t eat anything for a couple of days. ‘Come on have some lunch with me,’ I sid. He ate more than four dollars’ worth of food in half an hour.’
“我还记得我第一次见到他的情景，”他说，“刚刚离开军队的一名年轻的少校，胸口挂满了在战场上赢得的勋章。他穷得只好继续穿军服，因为他买不起便服。我第一次见到他是那天他走进四十三号街怀恩勃兰纳开的弹子 房找工作。他已经两天没吃饭了。‘跟我一块吃午饭去吧。’我说。不到半个钟头他就吃了四块多美元的饭菜。”
‘Did you start him in business?’ I inquired.
‘Start him! I made him.’
‘Oh.’
‘I raised him up out of nothing, right out of the gutter. I saw right away he was a fine appearing, gentlemanly young man, and when he told me he was an Oggsford I knew I could use him good. I got him to join up in the American Legion and he used to stand high there. Right off he did some work for a client of mine up to Albany. We were so thick like that in everything—’ He held up two bulbous fingers ‘—always together.’
“是你帮他做起生意来的吗?”我问。
“帮他!我一手造就了他。”
“哦”
“是我把他从零开始培养起来，从阴沟里捡起来的。我一眼就看出他是个仪表堂堂、文质彬彬的年轻人，等他告诉我他上过牛劲，我就知道我可以派他大用场。我让他加入了美国退伍军火协会，后来他在那平面地位挺高的。他一出马就跑到奥尔巴尼①去给我的一个主顾办了一件事。我们俩在一切方面都像这样亲密，”他举起了两个肥胖的指头，“永远在一起。”
①奥尔巴尼 (Albany)，纽约州首府。
I wondered if this partnership had included the World’s Series transaction in 1919.
‘Now he’s dead,’ I said after a moment. ‘You were his closest friend, so I know you’ll want to come to his funeral this afternoon.’
‘I’d like to come.’
‘Well, come then.’
The hair in his nostrils quivered slightly and as he shook his head his eyes filled with tears.
‘I can’t do it—I can’t get mixed up in it,’ he said.
我心里很纳罕，不知这种搭档是否也包括一九一九年世界棒球联赛那笔交易在内。
“现在他死了，”我隔了一会才说，“你是他最知己的朋友，因此我知道今天下午你一定会来参加他的葬礼的。”
“我很想来。”
“那么，来就是啦。”
他鼻孔里的毛微微颤动，他摇摇头，泪水盈眶。 “我不能来⋯⋯我不能牵连进去。”
‘There’s nothing to get mixed up in. It’s all over now.’ ‘When a man gets killed I never like to get mixed up in it in any way. I keep out. When I was a young man it was different—if a friend of mine died, no matter how, I stuck with them to the end. You may think that’s sentimental but I mean it—to the bitter end.’
I saw that for some reason of his own he was determined not to come, so I stood up.
‘Are you a college man?’ he inquired suddenly.
他说。 “没有什么事可以牵连进去的。事情现在都过去了。” “凡是有人被杀害，我总不愿意有任何牵连。我不介入。我年轻时就大不一样——如果一个朋友死了，不管怎么死的，我总是出力出到底。你也许会认为这是感情用事，可是我是说到做到的——一直拼到底。”
我看出了地决意不去，自有他的原因。于是我就站了起来。
“你是不是大学毕业的?”他突然问我。
For a moment I thought he was going to suggest a ‘gonnegtion’ but he only nodded and shook my hand.
‘Let us learn to show our friendship for a man when he is alive and not after he is dead,’ he suggested. ‘After that my own rule is to let everything alone.’
有一会儿工夫我还以为他要提出搞点什么“关系”，可是他只点了点头，握了握我的手。
“咱们大家都应当学会在朋友活着的时候讲交情，而不要等到他死了之后，”他表示说，“在人死以后，我个人的原则是不管闲事。”
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