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Portuguese to English: Memorias de un perro amarillo General field: Art/Literary Detailed field: Poetry & Literature
Source text - Portuguese The Gift of the Magi
ONE DOLLAR AND EIGHTY-SEVEN CENTS. That was all. And sixty
cents of it was in pennies. Pennies saved one and two at a time by
bulldozing the grocer and the vegetable man and the butcher
until one's cheek burned with the silent imputation of parsimony
that such close dealing implied. Three times Della counted it.
One dollar and eighty-seven cents. And the next day would be
Christmas.
There was clearly nothing left to do but flop down on the
shabby little couch and howl. So Della did it. Which instigates the
moral reflection that life is made up of sobs, sniffles, and smiles,
with sniffles predominating.
While the mistress of the home is gradually subsiding from the
first stage to the second, take a look at the home. A furnished flat
at $8 per week. It did not exactly beggar description, but it certainly had that word on the look-out for the mendicancy squad.
In the vestibule below was a letter-box into which no letter
would go, and an electric button from which no mortal finger
could coax a ring. Also appertaining thereunto was a card bearing
the name 'Mr. James Dillingham Young.'
The 'Dillingham' had been flung to the breeze during a former
period of prosperity when its possessor was being paid $30 per
week. Now, when the income was shrunk to $20, the letters of
'Dillingham' looked blurred, as though they were thinking seriously of contracting to a modest and unassuming D. But whenever
Mr. James Dillingham Young came home and reached his flat
above he was called 'Jim' and greatly hugged by Mrs. James
Dillingham Young, already introduced to you as Della. Which is
all very good.
Delia finished her cry and attended to her cheeks with the
powder rag. She stood by the window and looked out dully at a
grey cat walking a grey fence in a grey backyard. To-morrow
would be Christmas Day, and she had only $1.87 with which to
buy Jim a present. She had been saving every penny she could for
2 O HENRY - 100 SELECTED STORIES
months, with this result. Twenty dollars a week doesn't go far.
Expenses had been greater than she had calculated. They always
are. Only $1.87 to buy a present for Jim. Her Jim. Many a happy
hour she had spent planning for something nice for him. Something fine and rare and sterling - something just a little bit near to
being worthy of the honour of being owned by Jim.
There was a pier-glass between the windows of the room. Perhaps you have seen a pier-glass in an $8 flat. A very thin and very
agile person may, by observing his reflection in a rapid sequence
of longitudinal strips, obtain a fairly accurate conception of his
looks. Della, being slender, had mastered the art.
Suddenly she whirled from the window and stood before the
glass. Her eyes were shining brilliantly, but her face had lost its
colour within twenty seconds. Rapidly she pulled down her hair
and let it fall to its full length.
Now, there were two possessions of the James Dillingham
Youngs in which they both took a mighty pride. One was Jim's gold
watch that had been his father's and his grandfather's. The other
was Della's hair. Had the Queen of Sheba lived in the flat across the
airshaft, Della would have let her hair hang out the window some
day to dry just to depreciate Her Majesty's jewels and gifts. Had
King Solomon been the janitor, with all his treasures piled up in the
basement, Jim would have pulled out his watch every time he
passed, just to see him pluck at his beard from envy.
So now Della's beautiful hair fell about her, rippling and shining like a cascade of brown waters. It reached below her knee and
made itself almost a garment for her. And then she did it up again
nervously and quickly. Once she faltered for a minute and stood
still while a tear or two splashed on the worn red carpet.
On went her old brown jacket; on went her old brown hat.
With a whirl of skirts and with the brilliant sparkle still in her
eyes, she fluttered out of the door and down the stairs to the
street.
Where she stopped the sign read: 'Mme. Sofronie. Hair Goods
of All Kinds.' One flight up Della ran, and collected herself, panting. Madame, large, too white, chilly, hardly looked the 'Sofronie.'
'Will you buy my hair?' asked Della.
'I buy hair,' said Madame. 'Take yer hat off and let's have a
sight at the looks of it.'
Down rippled the brown cascade.
'Twenty dollars,' said Madame, lifting the mass with a practised
hand.
O HENRY - 100 SELECTED STORIES 3
'Give it to me quick,' said Della.
Oh, and the next two hours tripped by on rosy wings. Forget
the hashed metaphor. She was ransacking the stores for Jim's
present.
She found it at last. It surely had been made for Jim and no one
else. There was no other like it in any of the stores, and she had
turned all of them inside out. It was a platinum fob chain simple
and chaste in design, properly proclaiming its value by substance
alone and not by meretricious ornamentation - as all good things
should do. It was even worthy of The Watch. As soon as she saw it
she knew that it must be Jim's. It was like him. Quietness and
value - the description applied to both. Twenty-one dollars they
took from her for it, and she hurried home with the 87 cents.
With that chain on his watch Jim might be properly anxious about
the time in any company. Grand as the watch was, he sometimes
looked at it on the sly on account of the old leather strap that he
used in place of a chain.
When Della reached home her intoxication gave way a little to
prudence and reason. She got out her curling irons and lighted the
gas and went to work repairing the ravages made by generosity
added to love. Which is always a tremendous task, dear friends - a
mammoth task.
Within forty minutes her head was covered with tiny, closelying curls that made her look wonderfully like a truant schoolboy.
She looked at her reflection in the mirror long, carefully, and
critically.
'If Jim doesn't kill me,' she said to herself, 'before he takes a
second look at me, he'll say I look like a Coney Island chorus girl.
But what could I do - oh! what could I do with a dollar and
eighty-seven cents?'
At seven o'clock the coffee was made and the frying-pan was on
the back of the stove, hot and ready to cook the chops.
Jim was never late. Della doubled the fob chain in her hand and
sat on the corner of the table near the door that he always entered.
Then she heard his step on the stair away down on the first flight,
and she turned white for just a moment. She had a habit of saying
little silent prayers about the simplest everyday things, and now
she whispered: 'Please God, make him think I am still pretty.'
The door opened and Jim stepped in and closed it. He looked
thin and very serious. Poor fellow, he was only twenty-two - and
to be burdened with a family! He needed a new overcoat and he
was without gloves.
4 O HENRY - 100 SELECTED STORIES
Jim stepped inside the door, as immovable as a setter at the
scent of quail. His eyes were fixed upon Della, and there was an
expression in them that she could not read, and it terrified her. It
was not anger, nor surprise, nor disapproval, nor horror, nor any
of the sentiments that she had been prepared for. He simply stared
at her fixedly with that peculiar expression on his face.
Della wriggled off the table and went for him.
'Jim, darling,' she cried, 'don't look at me that way. I had my
hair cut off and sold it because I couldn't have lived through
Christmas without giving you a present. It'll grow out again - you
won't mind, will you? I just had to do it. My hair grows awfully
fast. Say "Merry Christmas!" Jim, and let's be happy. You don't
know what a nice - what a beautiful, nice gift I've got for you.'
'You've cut off your hair?' asked Jim, laboriously, as if he had
not arrived at that patent fact yet even after the hardest mental
labour.
'Cut it off and sold it,' said Della. 'Don't you like me just as
well, anyhow? I'm me without my hair, ain't I?'
Jim looked about the room curiously.
'You say your hair is gone?' he said with an air almost of idiocy.
'You needn't look for it,' said Della. 'It's sold, I tell you - sold
and gone, too. It's Christmas Eve, boy. Be good to me, for it went
for you. Maybe the hairs of my head were numbered,' she went on
with a sudden serious sweetness, 'but nobody could ever count my
love for you. Shall I put the chops on, Jim?'
Out of his trance Jim seemed quickly to wake. He enfolded his
Della. For ten seconds let us regard with discreet scrutiny some
inconsequential object in the other direction. Eight dollars a week
or a million a year - what is the difference? A mathematician or a
wit would give you the wrong answer. The magi brought valuable
gifts, but that was not among them. This dark assertion will be
illuminated later on.
Jim drew a package from his overcoat pocket and threw it upon
the table.
'Don't make any mistake, Dell,' he said, 'about me. I don't think
there's anything in the way of a haircut or a shave or a shampoo
that could make me like my girl any less. But if you'll unwrap that
package you may see why you had me going awhile at first.'
White fingers and nimble tore at the string and paper. And then
an ecstatic scream of joy; and then, alas! a quick feminine change to
hysterical tears and wails, necessitating the immediate employment
of all the comforting powers of the lord of the flat.
Translation - English 1
El regalo de los Reyes Magos
UN DÓLAR Y OCHENTA Y SIETE CENTAVOS. Eso era todo. Y sesenta
centavos estaban en centavos. Centavos ahorrados uno y dos a la vez por
arrasando con el tendero, el verdulero y el carnicero hasta que la mejilla ardía por la
silenciosa imputación de parsimonia que implicaba un trato tan estrecho. Della lo contó
tres veces.
Un dólar y ochenta y siete centavos. Y al día siguiente sería Navidad.
Estaba claro que no había nada más que hacer que dejarse caer en el pequeño y
destartalado sofá y aullar. Así que Della lo hizo. Lo que instiga la reflexión moral de
que la vida se compone de sollozos, mocos y sonrisas, con predominio de los mocos.
Mientras la dueña de casa pasa poco a poco de la primera etapa a la segunda, echa un
vistazo al hogar. Un piso amueblado a 8 dólares por semana. No mendigaba
exactamente la descripción, pero ciertamente tenía esa palabra al acecho de la brigada
de mendicidad.
En el vestíbulo de abajo había un buzón en el que ninguna carta y un botón eléctrico
del que ningún dedo mortal podía hacer sonar un anillo. También había una tarjeta con
el nombre de "Mr. James Dillingham Young".
El "Dillingham" había sido arrojado a la brisa durante un anterior período de
prosperidad, cuando a su poseedor le pagaban 30 dólares por semana. Ahora, cuando
los ingresos se redujeron a 20 dólares, las letras de 'Dillingham' se veían borrosas, como
si estuvieran pensando seriamente en contraerse a una modesta y poco llamativa D. Pero
siempre que el Sr. James Dillingham Young volvía a casa y llegaba a su piso arriba le
llamaban 'Jim' y le abrazaban mucho la Sra. James Dillingham Young, ya presentada
como Della. Lo cual es todo muy bueno.
Delia terminó su llanto y atendió sus mejillas con el trapo de polvo. Se paró junto a la
ventana y miró con desazón a un gato gris caminando por una valla gris en un patio
trasero gris. Mañana mañana sería el día de Navidad, y sólo tenía 1,87 dólares para
comprarle un regalo a Jim.
comprarle un regalo a Jim. Había estado ahorrando cada centavo que podía para
meses, con este resultado. Veinte dólares a la semana no dan para mucho.
Los gastos habían sido mayores de lo que ella había calculado. Siempre lo son.
Sólo 1,87 dólares para comprar un regalo para Jim. Su Jim. Muchas horas felices
2
horas que había pasado planeando algo bonito para él. Algo fino, raro y de calidad, algo
que estuviera cerca de ser digno del honor de ser propiedad de Jim.
Había un espejo de muelle entre las ventanas de la habitación. Tal vez haya visto un
pier-glass en un piso de 8 dólares. Una persona muy delgada y muy una persona muy
delgada y ágil puede, observando su reflejo en una rápida secuencia de tiras
longitudinales, obtener un concepto bastante preciso de su aspecto. Della, siendo
delgada, había dominado el arte.
De repente, se apartó de la ventana y se puso delante del cristal. Sus ojos brillaban
intensamente, pero su rostro había perdido su color en veinte segundos. Rápidamente,
se soltó el pelo y lo dejó caer en toda su longitud.
Ahora, había dos posesiones de los James Dillingham
James Dillingham de las que ambos se sentían muy orgullosos. Una era el reloj de oro
de Jim que había sido de su padre y de su abuelo. La outra era el pelo de Della. Si la
Reina de Saba hubiera vivido en el piso al otro lado del conducto de aire, Della habría
dejado que su pelo colgara por la ventana algún día para que se secara sólo para
depreciar las joyas y los regalos de Su Majestad.
Si Rey Salomón hubiera sido el conserje, con todos sus tesoros apilados en el sótano,
Jim habría sacado su reloj cada vez que pasaba, sólo para verle arrancarse la barba de
envidia.
Así que ahora el hermoso cabello de Della caía a su alrededor, ondulando y brillando
como una cascada de aguas marrones. Le llegaba por debajo de la rodilla y se convirtió
casi en una prenda para ella. Y luego se lo volvió a recoger con nerviosismo y rapidez.
Una vez vaciló durante un minuto y se quedó quieta mientras una o dos lágrimas
salpicaban la gastada alfombra roja.
Se puso su vieja chaqueta marrón; se puso su viejo sombrero marrón.
Con un torbellino de faldas y con el brillo de sus ojos, salió aleteando por la puerta y
bajó las escaleras hacia la calle.
Donde se detuvo, el cartel decía: "Mme. Sofronie. Artículos para el cabello de todo
tipo". Un tramo más arriba, Della corrió y se recogió, jadeando. La señora, grande,
demasiado blanca, fría, apenas parecía la 'Sofronie'.
¿Comprará mi pelo?", preguntó Della.
Yo compro el pelo", dijo la señora. "Quítate el sombrero y echemos un vistazo a su
aspecto" a ver cómo se ve".
La cascada castaña se onduló hacia abajo.
"Veinte dólares", dijo Madame, levantando la masa con una mano
3
'Give it to me quick,' said Della. Oh, and the next two hours tripped by on rosy wings.
Forget the hashed metaphor. She was ransacking the stores for Jim's present. She found
it at last. It surely had been made for Jim and no one else. There was no other like it in
any of the stores, and she had turned all of them inside out. It was a platinum fob chain
simple and chaste in design, properly proclaiming its value by substance alone and not
by meretricious ornamentation - as all good things should do. It was even worthy of
The Watch. As soon as she saw it she knew that it must be Jim's. It was like him.
Quietness and value - the description applied to both. Twenty-one dollars they took
from her for it, and she hurried home with the 87 cents. With that chain on his watch
Jim might be properly anxious about the time in any company. Grand as the watch was,
he sometimes looked at it on the sly on account of the old leather strap that he used in
place of a chain. When Della reached home her intoxication gave way a little to
prudence and reason. She got out her curling irons and lighted the gas and went to work
repairing the ravages made by generosity added to love. Which is always a tremendous
task, dear friends - a mammoth task. Within forty minutes her head was covered with
tiny, closelying curls that made her look wonderfully like a truant schoolboy. She
looked at her reflection in the mirror long, carefully, and critically. 'If Jim doesn't kill
me,' she said to herself, 'before he takes a second look at me, he'll say I look like a
Coney Island chorus girl. But what could I do - oh! what could I do with a dollar and
eighty-seven cents?' At seven o'clock the coffee was made and the frying-pan was on
the back of the stove, hot and ready to cook the chops. Jim was never late. Della doubled
the fob chain in her hand and sat on the corner of the table near the door that he always
entered. Then she heard his step on the stair away down on the first flight, and she
turned white for just a moment. She had a habit of saying little silent prayers about the
simplest everyday things, and now she whispered: 'Please God, make him think I am
still pretty.' The door opened and Jim stepped in and closed it. He looked thin and very
serious. Poor fellow, he was only twenty-two - and to be burdened with a family! He
needed a new overcoat and he was without gloves
4
Jim entró en la puerta, tan inmóvil como un cazador ante el olor de la codorniz. Sus
ojos estaban fijos en Della, y había unaexpresión en ellos que ella no podía leer, y la
aterrorizó.
No era ira, ni sorpresa, ni desaprobación, ni horror, ni ninguno de los sentimientos para
los que ella estaba preparada. Simplemente la miró fijamente con esa peculiar expresión
en su rostro.
Della se levantó de la mesa y fue hacia él.
Jim, querido", gritó, "no me mires así. Me corté el pelo.
Me corté el pelo y lo vendí porque no podía pasar la.
Navidad sin darte un regalo. Volverá a crecer no te importará, ¿verdad? Tenía que
hacerlo. Mi pelo crece terriblemente rápido. Di "¡Feliz Navidad!" Jim, y seamos felices.
No sabes
No sabes qué bonito... qué bonito y bonito regalo tengo para ti".
"¿Te has cortado el pelo?", preguntó Jim, trabajosamente, como si no hubiera como si
aún no hubiera llegado a ese hecho patente, incluso después de la más dura labor mental.
"Lo cortó y lo vendió," dijo Della. " No me gusta usted apenas bien, de todos modos?
Soy yo sin mi pelo, ¿no?
Jim miró alrededor del cuarto curiosamente.
¿Usted dice que su pelo se ha ido?" él dijo con un aire casi de la idiotez.
"Usted no necesita buscarlo," dijo Della. ' Es vendido, yo le dice – vendido y se ha ido,
también. Es Nochebuena, muchacho. Sé bueno conmigo, porque fue por ti. Tal vez los
cabellos de mi cabeza estaban contados,' continuó con una repentina y seria dulzura,
'pero nadie podría contar mi amor por ti. ¿Pongo las chuletas, Jim?
Jim pareció despertar rápidamente de su trance. Él envolvió su
Della. Durante diez segundos miramos con discreto escrutinio algún objeto
intrascendente en la otra dirección. Ocho dólares a la semana o un millón al año, ¿cuál
es la diferencia? Un matemático o un ingenio te darían la respuesta equivocada. Los
magos trajeron valiosos regalos, pero eso no estaba entre ellos. Esta oscura afirmación
será iluminada más adelante.
Jim sacó un paquete del bolsillo de su abrigo y lo arrojó sobre la mesa.
No te equivoques, Dell", dijo, "sobre mí.
No creo que haya nada en la forma de un corte de pelo o un afeitado o un champú que
pueda hacer que me guste menos mi chica. Pero si desenvuelves ese paquete, verás por
qué me has hecho perder el tiempo al principio".
Unos dedos blancos y ágiles rasgaron la cuerda y el papel. Y entonces un grito extático
de alegría; y luego, ¡ay! un rápido cambio femenino a a lágrimas y lamentos histéricos,
que requirieron el empleo inmediato de todos los poderes reconfortantes del señor del
piso.
5
Porque allí yacían Los Peines - el conjunto de peines, de lado y de espalda, que
Della había adorado durante mucho tiempo en un escaparate de Broadway. Hermoso
peines, de puro carey, con bordes enjoyados - justo el tono para llevar en el hermoso
cabello desvanecido. Eran peines caros, ella lo sabía, y su corazón simplemente los
había anhelado y anhelaba sin la menor esperanza de posesión. Y ahora eran suyos,
pero los mechones que deberían haber adornado los codiciados adornos habían no
estaban.
Pero ella los abrazó a su pecho, y al final fue capaz de con los ojos apagados y una
sonrisa y decir: "¡Mi pelo crece tan rápido, Jim! rápido, Jim".
Y entonces Della saltó como un pequeño gato chamuscado y gritó: "¡Oh! oh!
Jim aún no había visto su hermoso regalo. Ella se lo tendió
Lo sostuvo ansiosamente sobre su palma abierta. El aburrido metal precioso parecía
reflejar su espíritu brillante y ardiente.
¿No es una maravilla, Jim? He buscado por toda la ciudad para encontrarlo. queTendrás
que mirar la hora cien veces al día. Dame tu reloj. Quiero ver cómo se ve en él".
En lugar de obedecer, Jim se tumbó en el sofá y se puso las manos bajo la nuca y sonrió.
Dell", dijo, "vamos a guardar nuestros regalos de Navidad y a mantenerlos durante un
tiempo".
Son demasiado bonitos para usarlos ahora. Vendí el reloj para conseguir el dinero para
comprar tus peines. Y ahora supongamos que te pones las peinetas".
Los magos, como sabes, eran hombres sabios - maravillosos hombres sabios - que
llevaron regalos al Niño en el pesebre. Ellos inventaron el arte de dar regalos de
Navidad. Siendo sabios, sus regalos eran sin duda sin duda sabios, posiblemente con el
privilegio del intercambio en caso de duplicación. Y aquí les he relatado, sin esfuerzo,
la crónica de dos niños insensatos en un piso que sacrificaron, muy imprudentemente,
el uno por el otro, los mayores tesoros de su casa. sacrificaron el uno por el otro los
mayores tesoros de su casa. Pero en una última palabra a los sabios de estos días, que
se diga que de todos los que dan regalos, estos dos fueron los más sabios. De todos los
que dan y reciben regalos, ellos son los más sabios. En todas partes son los más sabios.
Ellos son los magos
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