Downstairs—He sighed, and refilled his glass. There was the time element to consider, too. Helene had seen Tuesday alive, sitting at his desk, just after their arrival. That had been at five minutes after four. She had just e downstairs when the maid was sent to Tuesday’s room and found him dead. That had been at twenty-five minutes after four. During those twenty minutes in which Tuesday had been killed, Mona McClane had been downstairs—he had been in the same room with her—Helene, Lotus Allen, young McLaurin, Tidewell, and Louella White had been upstairs. The Vennings had been out walking on the Drive during most of that time. When they came in—he had heard them himself—they had e straight into the living room, without going upstairs.
杰克打断了他的沉思，非常随意地问道：“你没有收到海伦的任何消息吧？”
Jake interrupted his reverie, asking very casually, “You haven’t heard anything from Helene, have you?”
“你觉得我会收到海伦的消息吗？”
“Would you expect me to hear from Helene?”
杰克的脸微微泛红，说：“嗯，我以为她可能会从哈瓦那寄张明信片给你。”
Jake turned faintly pink and said. “Well, I thought she might have sent you a postcard from Havana.”
“她可能还没时间，” 马龙告诉他，“你知道那些古巴人是什么样的。”
“She probably hasn’t had time,” Malone told him. “You know what those Cubans are.”
把海伦的名字排除在报纸对这起谋杀案的报道中费了点周折，但马龙还是做到了。他认为这些努力是值得的。
Keeping Helene’s name out of the newspaper accounts of the murder had taken a little doing, but Malone had managed it. He considered it well worth the effort.
这位小律师对目前的情况有了非常明确的看法。一直阻碍杰克和海伦进展的绊脚石是骄傲，骄傲不仅是一种罪恶，而且是一种非常愚蠢的行为。然而，事实就是如此。他推断，如果能让他们避免过早地相遇，一切都会好起来的。与此同时，让他们分开将是一件棘手的任务，而这正是他喜欢的那种事情。
The little lawyer had e to a very positive conviction about the situation. The rock in Jake and Helene’s progress had been pride, which was not only a sin, but a lot of damned foolishness. However, there it was. If, he reasoned, they could be kept from running into each other too soon, everything would be all right. In the meantime, keeping them apart was going to be a tricky business, which was just the kind of business he liked.
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