So now Della’s beautiful hair fell about her, rippling and shining |сверкая, окутали ее| like a cascade of brown waters. It reached below her knee and made itself almost a garment |одеяние| for her. And then she did it up |подняла их| again nervously and quickly. Once she faltered |засомневалась. Сейчас в речи в этом смысле чаще используется слово ”to doubt”| for a minute and stood still |to stand still – замереть| while a tear or two splashed on the worn red carpet.
On went her old brown jacket; on went her old brown hat |О. Генри часто пользуется приемом инверсии – переставляет слова в предложении так, что оно получается не вполне стандартным для английского языка. On went her old brown jacket – это инверсия. Обычное предложение выглядело бы “her old brown jacket went on” – она надела| With a whirl of skirts and with the brilliant sparkle still in her eyes, she cluttered out |устремилась| of the door and down the stairs to the street.
Where she stopped the sign read |буквально – на знаке читалось|: “M-me Sofronie. Hair Goods of All Kinds.” One flight up Della ran |взбежала на один пролет, а значит, на второй этаж|, and collected herself, panting |перевела дух|. Madame, large, too white, chilly, hardly looked the “Sofronie |не выглядела сообразно своему имени|.”
“Will you buy my hair?” asked Della.
“I buy hair,” said Madame. «Take yer |это не опечатка. О. Генри передает произношение мадам| hat off and let’s have a sight at the looks of it.”
Down rippled the brown cascade.
“Twenty dollars,” said Madame, lifting the mass with a practised hand.
“Give it to me quick” said Della.
Oh, and the next two hours tripped by on rosy wings |пролетели на розовых крыльях|. Forget the hashed metaphor |Буквально – забудьте грубую метафору. Лучше – простите за избитую метафору|. She was ransacking |рыскала| the stores for Jim’s present.
She found it at last |наконец|. It surely had been made |было сделано| for Jim and no one else. There was no other like it in any of the stores, and she had turned all of them inside out |вывернула их на изнанку в поисках|. It was a platinum fob chain |цепочка для часов| simple and chaste |строгая| in design, properly proclaiming its value by substance alone and not by meretricious ornamentation |ценная самим материалом, а не показушными орнаментами| – as all good things should do. It was even worthy of The Watch. As soon as she saw it she knew that it must be Jim’s. It was like him |Это была его вещь|. Quietness and value – the description applied to both. Twenty-one dollars they took from her for it, and she hurried home with the 78 cents. With that chain on his watch Jim might be properly anxious |может переживать о времени| about the time in any company. Grand as the watch was, he sometimes looked at it on the sly on account of the old leather strap |украдкой из-за кожаного ремешка…| that he used in place of a chain.
When Della reached home her intoxication |тут О. Генри имеет в виду не интоксикацию в буквальном смысле, а нечто вроде воодушевления, на смену которому пришел разум| gave way a little to prudence and reason. She got out her curling irons and lighted the gas and went to work repairing the ravages made by generosity added to love |последствия великодушия и любви|. Which is always a tremendous task |огромная задача| dear friends —a mammoth |громадная| task.
Within forty minutes her head was covered with tiny, close-lying curls that made her look wonderfully like a truant schoolboy |школьника, удравшего с уроков|. She looked at her reflection in the mirror long, carefully, and critically.
“If Jim doesn’t kill me,” she said to herself, “before he takes a second look at me, he’ll say I look like a Coney Island chorus girl |на хористку с Кони Айленда. Кони Айленд, кстати, у О. Генри будет часто появляться