My 14-year-old son, John, and I spotted the coat simultaneously. It was hanging on a rack at a secondhand clothing store in Northampton Mass,crammed in with shoddy trench coats and an assortment of sad, woollen overcoats -- a rose among thorns.

• 在马萨诸塞州北安普顿市的一家出售二手服装的店里，我和我14岁的儿子约翰同时盯上了那件大衣。它就挂在衣架上，夹在劣质的军用风雨衣和各式各样寒酸的羊毛大衣当中，然而它却像荆棘丛中的一朵玫瑰。