When Guido put a refrigerator outside his shop, he wanted to do something good for the street. He painted it green and wrote "Take what you need, leave what you can" on the door. Neighbors brought vegetables, bread and jars of soup. For the first week, he felt proud every time he walked past it.
吉多在他的店门外放了一台冰箱，是想为这条街做点好事。他把它漆成绿色，在门上写着：“按需取用，量力留下。”邻居们送来了蔬菜、面包和一罐罐汤。头一个星期，他每次走过它，都觉得自豪。
Then the problem started. Every morning at about eight, the fridge was almost empty. Guido arrived at half past eight to find one lonely carton of milk and maybe a lemon. The food that people had left the night before was gone.
然后问题就来了。每天早上八点左右，冰箱几乎就空了。吉多八点半到店，只看到孤零零的一盒牛奶，也许还有一个柠檬。人们前一晚留下的食物都不见了。
"Someone is taking everything," he told his wife on the phone. "That is not sharing. That is shopping."
“有人把所有东西都拿走了，”他在电话里对妻子说，“这不叫分享。这叫购物。”
By Thursday, he was angry enough to make a plan. He bought a thick marker and a large piece of card, and he wrote: "ONE ITEM PER PERSON." He was about to tape it to the door when he stopped. He wanted to see the problem with his own eyes before he made a rule for everyone.
到周四，他气得足以定下一个计划。他买了一支粗记号笔和一大块卡纸，写下：“每人限取一件。”他正要把它贴到门上，却停住了。他想先亲眼看到问题，再为所有人定规矩。
On Friday, he came to the shop at half past six. He waited behind the window with a coffee. At ten to eight, a woman arrived with a large cloth bag. A small boy walked beside her, carrying a loaf of bread from home. She looked tired. She opened the fridge, filled the bag carefully, and closed the door as softly as she could.
周五，他六点半就来到店里。他端着一杯咖啡，躲在窗后等着。七点五十分，一个女人拿着一只大布袋来了。一个小男孩走在她身旁，手里拿着一条从家里带来的面包。她看上去很疲惫。她打开冰箱，小心地把袋子装满，又尽可能轻地关上了门。
Guido went outside before she could leave. "Excuse me," he said, sounding sterner than he meant to. "Do you know that other people live on this street too?"
她还没来得及离开，吉多就走到了外面。“打扰一下，”他说，语气比他本意的更严厉，“你知道这条街上还住着别人吗？”
The woman looked at him calmly. "Yes," she said. "That is why I take so much."
女人平静地看着他。“知道，”她说，“所以我才拿这么多。”
Her name was Salome, and she explained everything in a few quiet sentences. Every morning, she carried the food to three neighbors who could not walk to the fridge. One was an old man with a broken hip. The other two were sisters in their eighties. They lived on the fifth floor of a building with no elevator.
她名叫萨洛梅，用几句轻声的话把一切都解释了。每天早上，她把食物送给三位走不到冰箱这儿来的邻居。一位是髋骨骨折的老先生。另外两位是八十多岁的姐妹。她们住在一栋没有电梯的楼的五楼。
"I knock on their doors before I take my son to school," she said. "I thought somebody would tell me to stop."
“我在送儿子上学之前去敲他们的门，”她说，“我还以为有人会叫我别拿了。”
Guido looked at the card in his hand. It suddenly felt heavy and a little stupid. He folded it in half and put it in his pocket.
吉多看着手里的卡纸。它突然显得沉甸甸的，还有点蠢。他把它对折，放进口袋。
"Nobody is going to stop you," he said. "I think I need a different sign."
“没有人会叫你停的，”他说，“我想，我需要换一块不同的牌子。”
That afternoon, he wrote a new one. It said: "Take what you need. If you can carry some to a neighbor, thank you." He taped it to the door, and then he went inside to find a bigger bag.
那天下午，他写了一块新的。上面写着：“按需取用。如果你能帮忙把一些带给邻居，谢谢你。”他把它贴到门上，然后进屋去找一只更大的袋子。
