又感觉自己脑袋往石头上撞。

Her father warned her again: "Why don't you get yourself a beau, Connie? Do you all the good in the world.” That winter Michaelis came for a few days. He was a young Irishman who had already made a large fortune by his plays in America. He had been taken up quite enthusiastically for a time by smart society in London, for he wrote smart society plays. Then gradually smart society realized that it had been made ridiculous at the hands of a down-at-heel Dublin street-rat, and revulsion came. Michaelis was the last word in what was caddish and bounderish. He was discovered to be anti-English, and to the class that made this discovery this was worse than the dirtiest crime. He was cut dead, and his corpse thrown into the refuse can.

父亲再次提醒她：“你为什么不给自己找个情人，康妮？这样做对你而言大有好处。”那天冬天，米凯利斯来拉格比小住过几天。这个爱尔兰青年是位剧作家，编写的剧本在美国公演，让他赚得盆满钵满。曾几何时，因为写了几部时兴的社会剧，他一度成为伦敦时髦社交圈的风云人物。可当社交名流们慢慢发觉，自己竟然被这个不入流的都柏林小混混所嘲弄，对他的态度也来了个一百八十度大转弯。米凯利斯也成为下流粗鄙的代名词。有人揭发他有反英情绪，而对于捅出此事的贵族阶层而言，这简直比最恶劣的犯罪还难以宽宥。他遭到伦敦上流社会最无情的唾弃。

Nevertheless Michaelis had his apartment in Mayfair, and walked down Bond Street the image of a gentleman, for you cannot get even the best tailors to cut their low-down customers, when the customers pay.

尽管臭名昭著，米凯利斯仍在梅费尔区（注：伦敦西部的高级住宅区）拥有自己的公寓，当他在邦德街徜徉，绅士派头依然不减。因为只要付钱，即使身份卑微，也能让最棒的裁缝乖乖为你服务。

Clifford was inviting the young man of thirty at an inauspicious moment in this young man's career. Yet Clifford did not hesitate. Michaelis had the ear of a few million people, probably; and, being a hopeless outsider, he would no doubt be grateful to be asked down to Wragby at this juncture, when the rest of the smart world was cutting him. Being grateful, he would no doubt do Clifford 'good' over there in America. Kudos! A man gets a lot of kudos, whatever that may be, by being talked about in the right way, especially "over there". Clifford was a coming man; and it was remarkable what a sound publicity instinct he had.

克利福德却向这个已过而立、正处事业低谷的年轻人发出邀请。然而对此，克利福德没有半点犹豫。米凯利斯差不多拥有数百万