Everything Is to Be Payed for 物有所值

By Sheilah Nelson ■王妤 选注

Helen was a very successful businesswoman. She had always liked nice clothes, and when she had left school she had gone and worked in a shop which sold them, not far from her home. After a few experiments she showed that she was very successful at designing the sorts of things that women want to buy,1 so after a few years the owner of the shop, who was an oldish lady, offered to make her a partner.2 "It's something I should have done long ago," she told Helen with a smile.

Helen was very pleased, of course, and when the old lady retired, Helen bought her share and became the sole owner of the shop.3 Now she had her independence.

Ever since she had started in the shop she had had to travel around to see what attractive things her rivals in the clothes trade4 were producing, to attend fashion shows and so on. She had always stayed at small cheap hotels, because she dared not spend too much money when she was saving up5 to buy a shop of her own.

But when she at last became the owner of the shop, and it was making good profits,6 she found that she had plenty of money, and she felt she should now stay in the best hotels whenever she travelled. "Then the people who buy good clothes can see that your business is successful," she said to herself, "and therefore more of them think they should buy the clothes you make."

So when she had to go to the next fashion show, which was in Rome, she stayed at a very good hotel. She had a nice big room with beautiful furniture in which she could entertain customers, and there were also fine public rooms where she could, to her great pride, hold small fashion shows of her own.7 The room service8 was excellent, and so was the dining-room, which had a band9 every evening for dancing. Helen had never before dared to stay in such a splendid place.

She could see from the bills she signed for everything that the prices in the hotel were high, but she was still rather surprised when, just before she left, she was given a bill of several pages, written on beautiful headed paper.10

She checked the bill carefully, and was happy with everything except the last line, which said "Paper...L 1800", which was about 75p in British money.11 She could not remember having had any paper from the hotel, so she thought she should go to the cashier and ask him about it.

"That, Madam," said the cashier, "is for the paper your bill is written on."

1. 经过几次尝试之后，她证实了自己能成功地设计出使女士们掏腰包的那些东西。
2. 几年后，店主——一位颇有点年纪的女士主动提议让她成了店铺的合伙人。oldish:上了点年纪的，表示not very old, but not young either，注意下一段中用的是the old lady，相对oldish lady年纪要大一些；offer to:（主动）表示愿意（做某事）；partner: 合伙人，股东。
3. 海伦把她的股份买了下来，成了店铺的惟一股东。
4.服装行业中的竞争对手。rival: 竞争对手，敌手。
5. save up: 储蓄，攒钱。
6. make good profits: 获利颇丰。
7.她住的是一个有着漂亮家具的舒适的大房间，她可以在那儿接待顾客。宾馆里还有一些很雅致的对公众开放的房间，她可以在那儿举办自己的小型服装展，这也正是她引以为豪的。entertain: 款待，招待。
8. room service: （宾馆等送餐到客人房间的）客户用餐服务。
9. band: 伴舞乐队。
10.有着漂亮抬头的纸。
11. L是lira/#li2r2/(意大利里拉)的简写，p是penny（英国便士）的简写。