The facts are much duller. Strickland, a boy fresh from school, went into a broker's office without any feeling of distaste. Until he married he led the ordinary life of his fellows, gambling mildly on the Exchange, interested to the extent of a sovereign or two on the result of the Derby or the Oxford and Cambridge Race. I think he boxed a little in his spare time. On his chimney-piece he had photographs of Mrs. Langtry and Mary Anderson. He read Punch and the Sporting Times. He went to dances in Hampstead.

It matters less that for so long I should have lost sight of him. The years during which he was struggling to acquire proficiency in a difficult art were monotonous, and I do not know that there was anything significant in the shifts to which he was put to earn enough money to  . An account of them would be an account of the things he had seen happen to other people. I do not think they had any effect on his own character. He must have acquired experiences which would form abundant material for a picaresque novel of modern Paris, but he remained aloof, and judging from his conversation there was nothing in those years that had made a particular impression on him. Perhaps when he went to Paris he was too old to fall a victim to the glamour of his environment. Strange as it may seem, he always appeared to me not only practical, but immensely matter-of-fact. I suppose his life during this period was romantic, but he certainly saw no romance in it. It may be that in order to realise the romance of life you must have something of the actor in you; and, capable of standing outside yourself, you must be able to watch your actions with an interest at once detached and absorbed. But no one was more single-minded than Strickland.

但是事实却远没有我想象的这么动人。思特里克兰德一出校门就投身于一家经纪人的事务所，他对这种生活并没有什么反感。直到结婚，他过的就是从事这一行业的人那种平凡庸碌的生活，在交易所干几宗输赢不大的投机买卖，关注着达尔贝赛马或者牛津、剑桥比赛的结果，充其量不过一两镑钱的赌注。我猜想思特里克兰德在工作之余可能还练习练习击拳；壁炉架上摆着朗格瑞夫人①同玛丽·安德逊②的照片；读的是《笨拙》杂志和《体育时代》；到汉普斯台德去参加舞会。

①原名爱米丽·夏洛特·勒·布利顿（1852～1929），英国演员，以美貌著称，后嫁与爱德华·朗格瑞。

②玛丽·安德逊（1859—1940），美国女演员。

有很长一段时间我没有再见到过他，这一点关系也没有。这些年间，他一直在努力奋斗，力图掌握一门极其困难的艺术，生活是非常单调的；有时为了挣钱糊口，他不得不采取一些权宜的手段，我认为这也并没有什么值得大书特书的地方。即使我能够把他这一段生活记载下来，也不过是他所见到的发生在别人身上的各种事件的记录。我不认为他在这一段时间内的经历对他自己的性格有任何影响。如果要写一部以现代巴黎为背景的冒险小说，他倒可能积累了丰富的素材。但是他对周围的事物始终采取一种超然物外的态度；从他的谈话判断，这几年里面并没有发生任何给他留下特别印象的事。很可能在他去巴黎的时候，年纪已经太大，光怪陆离的环境对他已经没有引诱力了。说来也许有些奇怪，我总觉得他这个人不仅非常实际，而且简直可以说是木头木脑的。我想他这一段生活是很富于浪漫情调的，但是他自己却绝对没有看到任何浪漫的色彩。或许一个人如果想体会到生活中的浪漫情调就必须在某种程度上是一个演员；而要想跳出自身之外，则必须能够对自己的行动抱着一种既超然物外又沉浸于其中的兴趣。但是思特里克兰德却是个心无二用的人，在这方面谁也比不上他。