遲付款的戒指

張祖平

One day， the boss of a gold shop received a letter. As he was very busy， the letter was on his desk till dinner time. When he opened it， a $1000 note fell out onto the desk. With the note was a short letter：

Dear Sir，

I got married forty years ago. Unfortunately1， at that time there was a lot of unemployment2 and I got no job. I was out of work for about six months before I got another one. Of course I was very short of money.

I came to your shop to buy a wedding ring one day. The assistant brought some rings for me to have a look， later she was called away for a moment， and then I put one of the rings into my pocket. When she came back， I said I did not know the size of my girlfriends finger. So I left the shop with the ring but I didnt pay for it. My wife died a month ago， and the fact that I never paid for her ring has been on my conscience3 all these years. I always feel guilty4 about that. At that time the ring cost $100， and I think that is about ten times at todays price.

Now， I am sending you that amount.

Yours truly，

A customer

After reading the letter， the boss said， “Well， life is always full of surprise！”

一天，一家金店的老板收到一封信。因?yàn)樗苊?，這封信一直放在桌上，直到吃飯的時(shí)候才打開那封信，一張1000美元的支票掉到桌上，除了支票，還有一封短信：

尊敬的先生：

40年前我要結(jié)婚的時(shí)候，不幸那時(shí)失業(yè)率很高，我沒有了工作。在我找到另一份工作之前，我已經(jīng)六個(gè)月沒有工作了。當(dāng)然，我當(dāng)時(shí)非常缺錢。

一天，我來到你的店里想買結(jié)婚戒指。店員拿給我一些戒指讓我看，后來她離開了一會兒，然后，我把其中一枚戒指裝進(jìn)了自己的口袋。當(dāng)她回來時(shí)，我說我不知道我女朋友手指的尺寸，于是沒有付錢就走出了店。一個(gè)月之前，我的妻子去世了，我始終沒有付這個(gè)戒指的錢，這件事讓我的良心這些年一直受到譴責(zé)，我常常為此感到愧疚。那時(shí)，那枚戒指值100美元，我想現(xiàn)在的價(jià)錢是當(dāng)初的十倍吧。

現(xiàn)在，我把這筆錢送還給你。

你一位忠實(shí)的顧客

讀完這封信，金店的老板說道：“生活總是充滿驚喜??！”endprint