1. Anders couldn't get to the bank until just before it closed, so of course the line was endless and he got stuck behind two women whose loud, stupid conversation put him in a murderous temper. He was never in the best of tempers anyway, Anders - a book critic known for his elegant savagery with which he reviewed.
安德斯來到銀行時，銀行快要關門了，所以窗口前自然已經排起了長長的隊。他排在兩個女人身后，她們之間大聲而愚蠢的交談令他極為厭煩。不過，他從來就沒有過什么好脾氣，畢竟，他是安德斯，一位以他那優雅而又粗暴的觀點而聞名的書評家。
2. With the line still very long, one of the tellers stuck a "POSITION CLOSED" sign in her window and walked to the back of the bank, where she leaned against a desk and began to pass the time with a man shuffling papers. The women in front of Anders watched the teller with hatred. "Oh, that's nice," one of them said. She turned to Anders and added, confident: "One of those little human touches that keep us coming back for more."
排隊的人依舊很多。此時，其中一名銀行柜員在她的窗口前掛起了“暫停服務”的牌子，然后走到銀行的后面，靠在一張桌子上，開始和一個男子一起翻弄著桌子上的文件，以此來打發時間。排在安德斯前面的那兩個女人用惡狠狠的目光盯著這名柜員。“哦，太棒了，”其中一個人說道。然后，她轉向安德斯，自信地補充說：“這種缺乏人情味的服務態度，又得讓咱們白來一趟。”
3. Anders felt his own towering hatred of the teller, but he immediately turned it to the cry-baby in front of him. "Damned unfair," he said. "Tragic, really." She stood her ground. "I didn't say it was tragic," she said. "I just think it's a very lousy way to treat your customers." "Unforgivable," Anders said. "Heaven will take note." She simply stared past him and said nothing. Anders saw that the other woman, her friend, was looking in the same direction. And then the tellers stopped what they were doing, and the customers slowly turned, and silence came over the bank.
安德斯內心對這個柜員的厭惡已經到了極點，但他這種厭惡的感覺立刻轉移到了在他前面愛發牢騷的人身上上。“可惡，這太不公平了，”他說。 “真夠慘的。”她堅持自己的立場。 “我并不是說這件事很慘，”她說，“我只是覺得這種對待顧客的方式很糟糕。” “不可原諒，”安德斯說，“相信老天會長眼的。”她沒有作答，目光從他身邊經過，直勾勾朝一個方向看去。安德斯看到另一個女人（那個跟她交談的朋友）也正朝著同一個方向看去。然后，柜員們也停止了他們手頭的工作，顧客們慢慢轉過身來，一片死寂蔓延至銀行的每個角落。
4. Two men wearing black ski masks and blue business suits were standing to the side of the door. One of them had a pistol pressed against the guard's neck. The other man had a shotgun. "Keep your big mouth shut!" the man with the pistol said, though no one had spoken a word. "One of you tellers hits the alarm, you're all dead meat. Got it?"
兩名身著藍色西裝，戴著黑色滑雪面罩的男子此時正站在銀行大門的一側。其中一人用手槍頂在一名保安的脖子上，另一個人手持一桿獵槍。“閉嘴！”拿手槍的男子說，盡管此時并沒有人說話。“你們這些柜員中，如果有一個人按下報警按鈕，你們就都死定了，知道嗎？”
5. The tellers nodded. "Oh, bravo, " Anders said. "Dead meat." He turned to the woman in front of him. "Great script, eh?" The man with the shotgun went over to the tellers, handing each of them a hefty bag. When he came to the empty position he asked: "Whose slot is that?" Anders watched the teller. She turned to the man pointing at herself with a trembling finger. "Mine," she said. "Then get your ugly feet in action and fill that bag." "There you go," Anders said to the woman in front of him. "Justice is done." "Hey! Bright boy! Did I tell you talk?" "No," Anders said. "Then shut your trap." "Did you hear that?" Anders said. "'Bright boy.' Right out of 'The Killers'."
柜員們紛紛點頭。 “哦，好極了，”安德斯說，“死定了。”他轉向身前的那個女人。“很棒的劇本，是吧？”拿獵槍的男子走向柜員，給他們每人一個大袋子。當走到那個空窗口時，他問道：“這是誰的位置？”安德斯看著那個柜員。她轉向那個正用顫抖的手指指著自己的男子。“我的，”她說。“那就動動你那雙丑腳，過來把袋子裝滿。” “老天終于開眼了，”安德斯對他身前的那個女人說，“正義得到了伸張。” “嘿！聰明的男孩！我說過讓你說話了嗎？” “沒有，”安德斯回答說。“那就閉上你的臭嘴！” “你聽到他說什么了嗎？”安德斯說，“聰明的男孩。這可是出自殺手之口哦。”
6. "Please be quiet," the woman said. "Hey, you deaf or what?" The man with the shotgun walked over to Anders. He poked the weapon into Anders' gut. "You think I'm playing games?' "No," Anders said, staring into the man's eyes, which were clearly visible behind the holes in the mask: pale blue, and rawly red-rimmed. The man's left eyelid kept twitching. He breathed out a piercing, ammoniac smell that shocked Anders more than anything that had happened.
“您還是別說話了，”那個女人說。“嘿，你是聾了，還是怎么著？”手持獵槍的男子走向安德斯。他用獵槍戳在安德斯的肚子上。 “你以為我在跟你鬧著玩嗎？” “不，”安德斯說，與此同時盯著那個男子的面罩上那兩個孔后面的那雙清晰可見的眼睛：它們是淡藍色，眼眶有些泛紅。男子的左眼瞼在不停地抽搐。他呼出了一股安德斯從來沒聞過的刺鼻的氨氣味。

7. "You like me, bright boy?" he said. "No," Anders said. "Then stop looking at me." Anders fixed his gaze on the man's shiny shoes. "Not down there. Up there." He stuck the pistol under Anders' chin and pushed it upward until Anders was looking at the ceiling. "You think you can mess with me?" "No." "mess with me again, you're history. Capiche?" Anders burst out laughing. He covered his mouth with both hands and said, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry," then snorted helplessly through his fingers and said, " Capiche - oh, God, capiche," and at that the man with the pistol raised the pistol and shot Anders right in the head.
“你喜歡我，聰明的男孩？”他問道。“不，”安德斯說。“那就別再盯著我看。”安德斯把目光鎖定在那個男子閃亮的鞋子上。“別低頭，抬起頭來。”他把手槍頂在安德斯的下巴上，然后向上推，直到安德斯看向天花板。“你覺得你可以找我麻煩？” “不是的。” “再找我麻煩，你就沒命了，懂嗎？”安德斯突然大笑起來。他用雙手捂住嘴說：“對不起，對不起，”然后，沒忍住，從手指間發出了一個輕蔑的哼聲，并繼續說道：“沒命了——哦，上帝，沒命了。”就在此時，那個拿手槍的男子舉起手槍，正對著安德斯的頭部扣下了扳機。
8. The bullet smashed Anders' skull and ploughed through his brain and exited behind his right ear. Once in the brain, the bullet made Anders suddenly think of a scene that "passed before his eyes." It brought back memories of one summer afternoon some forty years ago.
子彈打碎了安德斯的頭骨，鉆進了他的腦袋，然后從他的右耳后飛了出來。就在子彈進入他腦袋的那一剎那，一個他曾經目睹的場景突然閃過他的腦海，給他帶回了大約四十年前一個夏日午后的記憶。
9. It is worth noting what Anders did not remember. He did not remember his first lover, Sherry, or what he had most madly loved about her, before it came to irritate him. Anders did not remember his wife, whom he had also loved before she exhausted him with her predictability, or his daughter, now a sullen professor of economics. He did not remember standing just outside his daughter's door as she lectured her bear about his naughtiness and described the truly appalling punishments ‘Paws’ would receive unless he changed his ways.
值得注意的是安德斯沒記起什么——他沒記起他的初戀情人雪莉，沒記起他為什么當時那么瘋狂地愛著她，也沒記起這些令他瘋狂地愛著她的理由之后又是如何激怒他的；他沒記起他的妻子，那個他同樣曾經愛過，但之后因為太缺乏神秘感而令他感到疲憊乏味的女人，也沒記起他那已成為整天陰沉著臉的經濟學教授的女兒； 他沒記起他曾經站在女兒的門外，偷看她訓誡她的淘氣的玩具熊，并向他講述如果他不知錯就改，就會真的對他使用那可怕的“打熊掌”懲罰。
10. Anders did not remember his dying mother saying of his father, "I should have stabbed him in his sleep." He did not remember deliberately crashing his father's car in to a tree, or waking himself up with laughter. He did not remember when he began to dread the heap of books on his desk with boredom and dread, or when he grew angry at writers for writing them. He did not remember when everything began to remind him of something else.
安德斯沒記起他垂死的母親提到他父親的那句話：“我應該在他睡覺時捅他一刀。”他沒記起自己開著父親的汽車故意撞向一棵樹，也沒記起這件事曾讓他從睡夢中笑著醒來；他沒記起自己從什么時候開始害怕書桌上那無聊且可怕的書堆，也沒記起從什么時候開 始對寫這些書的作者變得憤怒；他沒記起從什么時候開始每件事都在提醒他這件事還有著另外一面。
11. This is what he remembered: heat. A baseball field. Yellow grass, the whirr of insects, himself leaning against a tree as the boys of the neighbourhood gather and start to quarrel about their positions in a ball game. He looks on as the others argue. It has become tedious to Anders: an oppression, like the heat. "Shortstop," the boy says. "Short's the best position they is." Anders turns and looks at him. The others will think he's being a jerk, ragging the kid for his grammar. But that isn't it, not at all - it's that Anders is strangely roused by those final two words, by their pure unexpectedness. He starts repeating them to himself.
他只記得：炎熱的天氣、棒球場、黃色的草地、昆蟲發出的呼呼聲、自己靠在一棵樹上，與此同時，鄰居的男孩們聚集在一起，開始爭吵他們在球賽中的位置。當其他人爭吵時，他只是在一旁觀看。對安德斯來說，這一切都已變得非常乏味——就像炎熱的天氣一樣沉悶。“三壘手，”一個男孩說，“三壘手是他們的最佳位置。”安德斯轉過身來，看著他。其他人會認為他是一個蠢貨，并用他那糟糕語法戲弄他。但這并不是原因所在，完全不是——而是因為安德斯不可思議地被那個男孩最后說出的那兩個單詞激起了興趣，這純粹是個意外。然后，他開始一遍遍地自言自語那兩個單詞。
12. The bullet is already in the brain; it will do its work and leave the troubled skull behind. That can't be helped. But for now Anders can still make time. Time for the shadows to lengthen on the grass, time for the tethered dog to bark at the flying ball, time for the boy in the field to softly chant, “They is, they is, they is”.
子彈已經進入了大腦；然后，它將完成自己的使命，并留下被它擾亂的頭顱。這一切已無濟于事。不過，現在安德斯仍然有時間做點兒什么——有時間看著自己的身影在草地上變長；有時間看著帶著牽引繩的狗朝著飛在空中的球吠叫；有時間聽著那個男孩在球場上輕輕地哼唱： “They is, they is, they is”。