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Mike and I picked up our things from the store and waved goodbye to Mrs. Martin. We went back to the park, to the same picnic bench, and spent several more hours thinking and talking.
我和邁克收拾好東西與馬丁太太道了別。我們走回公園，又坐到那張長椅上，花了幾個小時考慮和討論富爸爸的話。
We spent the next week at school thinking and talking, too. For two more weeks, we kept thinking, talking, and working for free.
在接下來的一個星期里，我和邁克一直在思考和討論這些問題。又過了兩個星期，我們仍舊在思考、討論，同時免費為富爸爸工作。
At the end of the second Saturday, I was again saying goodbye to Mrs. Martin and looking at the comic-book stand with a longing gaze. The hard thing about not even getting 30 cents every Saturday was that I didn’t have any money to buy comic books. Suddenly, as Mrs. Martin said goodbye to Mike and me, I saw her do something I’d never seen her do before.
在第二個星期六工作結束時，我向馬丁太太道別，依依不舍地看著架子上的連環畫。每星期六沒有了30美分的收入，我就沒有錢去買連環畫了。而就在馬丁太太和我們說再見時，她做了一件我以前從未見她做過的事，我的意思是我以前也見她這樣做過，只是我沒太在意。
Mrs. Martin was cutting the front page of the comic book in half. She kept the top half of the comic book cover and threw the rest of the book into a large cardboard box. When I asked her what she did with the comic books, she said, “I throw them away. I give the top half of the cover back to the comic-book distributor for credit when he brings in the new comics. He’s coming in an hour.”
馬丁太太把連環畫的封面撕成兩半，然后把上面一半留下，下面一半扔進了棕色的書櫥。我問她這是做什么，她說：“我要把這些沒有賣掉的舊書扔掉。等書商送新書來，我會把這半邊封面交給他，作為沒有賣掉的證明。他一小時后就到。”
Mike and I waited for an hour. Soon the distributor arrived, and I asked him if we could have the comic books. To my delight, he said, “You can have them if you work for this store and do not resell them.”
我和邁克等了一個小時，書商終于來了。我問他能否把那些他不要的連環畫送給我們。他回答：“如果你們在這家店干活，而且保證不把它們賣掉，我就送給你們。”
Remember our old business partnership? Well, Mike and I revived it. Using a spare room in Mike’s basement, we began piling hundreds of comic books in that room. Soon our comic-book library was open to the public. We hired Mike’s younger sister, who loved to study, to be head librarian. She charged each child 10 cents admission to the library, which was open from 2:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. every day after school. The customers, the children of the neighborhood, could read as many comics as they wanted in two hours. It was a bargain for them since a comic cost 10 cents each, and they could read five or six in two hours.
于是，我們成交了。邁克家的地下室里有個空房間，我們把它清理出來，把幾百本連環畫搬了進去。很快我們的連環畫閱覽室就開始營業了。我們雇了邁克的妹妹——她很愛讀書——來做圖書管理員。她向每個來閱覽室看書的孩子收10美分，每天從下午2點30分到4點30分，閱覽室都會開放。讀者呢，包括鄰家的孩子，他們可以在這兩個小時內看個夠。對于他們來說這是相當便宜的，因為10美分只能買1本連環畫，而兩小時足夠他們看五六本了。
Mike’s sister would check the kids as they left to make sure they weren’t borrowing any comic books. She also kept the books, logging in how many kids showed up each day, who they were, and any comments they might have. Mike and I averaged $9.50 per week over a three-month period. We paid his sister one dollar a week and allowed her to read the comics for free, which she rarely did since she was always studying.
邁克的妹妹在讀者離開時要負責檢查，確保他們不把書帶走。她還要保管書，記錄每天有多少人來、他們的名字以及他們有什么意見。我和邁克在以后三個月里平均每星期能賺9.5美元，我們付給邁克的妹妹1美元，而且允許她免費看書，但她很少看，因為她總是在學習。
Mike and I kept our agreement by working in the store every Saturday and collecting all the comic books from the different stores. We kept our agreement to the distributor by not selling any comic books. We burned them once they got too tattered. We tried opening a branch office, but we could never quite find someone as trustworthy and dedicated as Mike’s sister. At an early age, we found out how hard it was to find good staff.
我和邁克仍然每星期六去小店干活，從各個店收集賣不出去的連環畫。我們恪守了對書商的諾言，沒有賣一本連環畫，如果書太破了我們就燒掉。我們想開一家分店，但實在找不到一個像邁克的妹妹那樣盡職盡責、值得信任的管理員。小小年紀，我們就已經發現找個好職員有多么困難了。
Three months after the library first opened, a fight broke out in the room. Some bullies from another neighborhood pushed their way in, and Mike’s dad suggested we shut down the business. So our comic-book business shut down, and we stopped working on Saturdays at the convenience store. But rich dad was excited because he had new things he wanted to teach us. He was happy because we had learned our first lesson so well: We learned to make money work for us. By not getting paid for our work at the store, we were forced to use our imaginations to identify an opportunity to make money. By starting our own business, the comic-book library, we were in control of our own finances, not dependent on an employer. The best part was that our business generated money for us, even when we weren’t physically there. Our money worked for us.
閱覽室開張3個月后，發生了一場爭斗，附近的小流氓盯上了這樁生意。富爸爸建議我們關門，所以我們的連環畫生意就此結束了，同時我們也不去小店工作了。不管怎樣，富爸爸十分興奮，因為他可以教我們新東西了。他很欣慰，因為我們的第一課學得這么好。我們已經學會怎樣讓錢為我所用了。由于沒有從小店的工作中得到報酬，我們就不得不發揮想象力去尋找掙錢的機會。通過經營我們自己的連環畫閱覽室，我們就掌控了自己的財務，而不是依賴雇主。最棒的是我們的生意讓我們賺了錢，甚至當我們不在那兒時，它也照樣賺錢，我們的錢為我們工作了。
Instead of paying us money, rich dad had given us so much more.
雖然富爸爸沒有付給我們工錢，卻給了我們更多的東西。
