Лучшие рассказы О. Генри = The Best of O. Henry. О. Генри

in the next house to me. I thought you said ‘Smithers.’”

      Morley looked at his watch. You must have a watch. You can do it for a dollar. Better go hungry than forego a gunmetal or the ninety-eight-cent one that the railroads – according to these watchmakers – are run by.

      “The Bishop of Long Island,” said Morley, “was to meet me here at 8 to dine with me at the Kingfishers’ Club. But I can’t leave the father of my friend Sol Smothers alone on the street. By St. Swithin, Mr. Smothers, we Wall Street men have to work! Tired is no name for it! I was about to step across to the other corner and have a glass of ginger ale with a dash of sherry when you approached me. You must let me take you to Sol’s house, Mr. Smothers. But, before we take the car I hope you will join me in” —

      An hour later Morley seated himself on the end of a quiet bench in Madison Square, with a twenty-five-cent cigar between his lips and $140 in deeply creased bills in his inside pocket. Content, light-hearted, ironical, keenly philosophic, he watched the moon drifting in and out amidst a maze of flying clouds. An old, ragged man with a low-bowed head sat at the other end of the bench.

      Примечания

      1

      The Four Million – at the time when the stories were written, the population of New York City was 4 million people

      2

      Coney – Coney Island, an amusement area in New York City

      3

      County Sligo – a county in northeastern Ireland

      4

      Punch and Judy – popular characters in the Punch-and-Judy puppet show; Punch is brutal and deceitful, and Judy is his wife.

      5

      palmist – a person who reads character, fate and the future by the lines of the palm

      6

      segar = cigar

      7

      the Dagoes – a contemptuous name of the Italians, Spaniards and the Portuguese

      8

      meerschaum – white clay-like substance, and a pipe made of it

      9

      idiosyncrasies – idiosyncrasy is a way of behavior or thinking peculiar to a person

      10

      physiognomy – the study of psychological characters by the features of the face and body structure

      11

      the Queen of Sheba (10th century BC) – in the Old Testament, a ruler of the Kingdom of Saba in Arabia who visited the legendary King Solomon of Israel to test his wisdom, and brought a caravan of gold, jewels and spices with her

      12

      a mammoth task = a tremendous task

      13

      cosmopolite – a person with wide experience of the world, free from national prejudices

      14

      garçons = waiters (French)

      15

      mélange = mixture (French)

      16

      Würzburger – a sort of beer

      17

      Mauch Chunk – a town in the state of Pennsylvania

      18

      table d’hôte – here: a set meal with a fixed price

      19

      Hyderabad – a city in south-central India

      20

      Kanakas – the Kanaka people, the South Pacific islanders

      21

      Presto! = Quickly!

      22

      ‘Dixie’ – a popular song written by Daniel Emmett (1815–1904) in 1859; during the American Civil War (1861–1865) it used to be the anthem of the Confederacy of the South.

      23

      hie = hurry (archaic)

      24

      Mosby – John Singleton Mosby (1833–1916), a Confederacy guerrilla band leader during the American Civil War

      25

      Upernavik – a town in Greenland

      26

      Cincinnati – a town in Ohio

      27

      Battle Creek – a town in the state of Michigan

      28

      Yokohama – a city and port southwest of Tokyo in Japan

      29

      Zulus – the largest ethnic group in South Africa, a branch of the Bantu people

      30

      Patagonians – residents of Patagonia, a region in southern Argentina

      31

      the Kaw River – a river in Vietnam

      32

      Titans – in Greek mythology, giants, the children of Heaven and Earth

      33

      Maine – the US state in the north-east of the country

      34

      answers to Lawson – here: court decisions

      35

      Bohemians – representatives of Bohemia, usually an