這位對他的小海軍軍官候補生感到自豪的船舶儀器制造商的家庭生活中的許多細小情節，也加深和突出這樣一種幻覺。他的熟人主要是船具商之類的人，所以他在餐桌上經常擺放著許多真正在船上吃的餅干。餐桌上也經常有肉干和舌干，散發出繩子麻線的氣味；酸菜是用很大的批發的壇子端到餐桌上來的，壇子上貼著印有“經銷船上各種食品”字樣的標簽；烈酒是用沒有瓶頸的方瓶子端上的。墻上掛著的畫框中是描繪船舶的老版畫，船舶上的字母是指明各種秘密的；盤子上畫著在前進中的韃靼快速帆船；壁爐架上裝飾著奇異的貝殼、海藻和苔蘚；裝有護壁板的小后客廳，像船艙一樣，光線是從天窗中射進來的。

Here he lived too, in skipper-like state, all alone with his nephew Walter: a boy of fourteen who looked quite enough like a midshipman, to carry out the prevailing idea. But there it ended, for Solomon Gills himself (more generally called old Sol) was far from having a maritime appearance. To say nothing of his Welsh wig, which was as plain and stubborn a Welsh wig as ever was worn, and in which he looked like anything but a Rover, he was a slow, quiet-spoken, thoughtful old fellow, with eyes as red as if they had been small suns looking at you through a fog; and a newly-awakened manner, such as he might have acquired by having stared for three or four days successively through every optical instrument in his shop, and suddenly came back to the world again, to find it green. The only change ever known in his outward man, was from a complete suit of coffee-colour cut very square, and ornamented with glaring buttons, to the same suit of coffee-colour minus the inexpressibles, which were then of a pale nankeen. He wore a very precise shirt-frill, and carried a pair of first-rate spectacles on his forehead, and a tremendous chronometer in his fob, rather than doubt which precious possession, he would have believed in a conspiracy against it on part of all the clocks and watches in the City, and even of the very Sun itself. Such as he was, such he had been in the shop and parlour behind the little Midshipman, for years upon years; going regularly aloft to bed every night in a howling garret remote from the lodgers, where, when gentlemen of England who lived below at ease had little or no idea of the state of the weather, it often blew great guns.

他像小商船的船長一樣，和他的外甥沃爾特住在這里，沒有別的人。沃爾特是一位十四歲的男孩子，他那副神態活像是一位海軍軍官候補生，這也進一步加深了上述總的印象。但事情到這里也就完結了，因為所羅門·吉爾斯本人（人們通常更喜歡管他叫老所爾），根本沒有一位航海人員的外貌。他那威爾士假發自然不消說了，那是威爾士假發中最普通、最難梳理的，他帶上它看上去一點也不像海盜。從其他方面來看，他是個慢條斯理，講話平平靜靜，并喜愛思考的老人；他的眼睛紅紅的，仿佛是穿過迷霧看著您的小太陽；他的神態像是剛剛被喚醒的樣子，如果他通過店中每一架光學儀器連續凝視三、四天之后，突然重新回到周圍的世界上，發現它一片綠色的話，那么他就可能呈現出這樣的神態。他的外表中唯一可以看到的變化是，他原來全身上下穿著一套咖啡色的服裝，裁剪得寬松肥大，上面裝飾著發亮的扣子，現在則仍舊穿著那同樣咖啡色的上衣，但褲子卻換成顏色較淡的本色布做的了。他襯衫的褶邊整整齊齊；前額上架著一副最上等的眼鏡；褲上的表袋中裝著一只很大的精密計時表，他寧肯相信倫敦城里所有的鐘表，甚至太陽都共同密謀來跟它作對，也決不會對他這個寶貴的財產產生懷疑。他現在就像過去一樣，年復一年地這樣待在這個小小的海軍軍官候補生身后的店鋪中和客廳里；每天夜里他定時爬上遠離其他房客的一個凄涼的頂樓中去睡覺，當安安逸逸住在下面的英國的先生們很少想到，或根本沒有想到天氣怎樣的時候，這頂樓上卻常常刮大風。

注釋：conspiracy n. 陰謀；共謀；陰謀集團
例句：
1. Like most conspiracy stories, "13 Bankers" contains a kernel of truth.
與多數陰謀故事一樣，《13位銀行家》也蘊含真相。
2.Most accidents can be explained by cock-up rather than conspiracy theory.
大多數意外是碰巧撞上而不是蓄意的。