Kitabı oku: «The Great Gatsby / Великий Гэтсби. Книга для чтения на английском языке»

 
Then wear the gold hat, if that will move her;
If you can bounce high, bounce for her too,
Till she cry ‘Lover, gold-hatted, high-bouncing lover,
I must have you!’
 

– THOMAS PARKE D’INVILLIERS

Chapter I

In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I’ve been turning over in my mind since then.

“Whenever you want to criticize any one,” he told me, “just remember that all the people in this world haven’t had the advantages that you’ve had.”

He didn’t say any more, but we’ve always understood each other without words, and I knew that he meant much more than that. As a result, I’m inclined to reserve all judgments¹, that’s why many curious natures have opened their secrets to me; but also I became the victim of many experienced bores. In college I was unjustly accused of being a politician², because I could keep the secret grieves of unknown men. I didn’t want most of the confidences – often I have feigned sleep, preoccupation, or a hostile levity when I realized by some unmistakable sign that somebody wants to reveal an intimate secret.

And, after boasting this way of my tolerance, I decided that it has a limit. When I came back from the East last autumn I felt that I didn’t want to look into the human heart anymore. Only Gatsby, the man who gives his name to this book, was an exception – Gatsby, who represented everything for which I have an unaffected scorn³. If personality is an unbroken series of successful gestures, then there wassomething gorgeous about him; some heightened sensitivity to the promises of life. He had an extraordinary gift for hope, a romantic readiness such as I have never found in any other person. No – Gatsby turned out all right at the end.

My family has been well-known, rich people in this Middle Western city for three generations. The Carraways are something of a clan, and we have a tradition that we come from the Dukes of Buccleuch⁴, but the actual founder of my line was my grandfather’s brother. I never saw this great-uncle, but everybody says I look like him because of his portrait that hangs in father’s office. I graduated from New Haven⁵ in 1915 and a little later I participated in the Great War. I enjoyed the counter-raid so thoroughly that I came back restless⁶.

The Middle West now seemed like the edge of the universe – so I decided to go East and learn the bond business. All my aunts and uncles talked it and finally said, “Why – ye-es,” with very serious, unsure faces. Father agreed to finance me for a year, and after all I came East, forever, I thought, in the spring of twenty-two.

The practical thing was to find rooms in the city. A young man at the office suggested that we take a house together in a nearby town. He found the house, a weather-beaten bungalow at eighty a month, but at the last minute the firm sent him to Washington, and I went out to the country alone. I had an old Dodge⁷ and a Finnish woman, who made my bed and cooked breakfast and muttered Finnish wisdom⁸ to herself over the electric stove.

It was lonely for a day or so until one morning some man asked helplessly the way. I told him. And as I walked on I was lonely no longer. I was a guide, a pathfinder, an original settler. And so with the sunshine I had that familiar feeling that life was beginning over again with the summer.

It was by chance that I have rented a house in one of the strangest communities in North America. Twenty miles from the city a pair of enormous eggs, identical in contour, were separated only by a bay. They are not perfect ovals but their physical alikeness, I think, is very confusing to the gulls that fly overhead.

I lived at West Egg, the – well, the less fashionable of the two. My house was at the very tip of the egg, and squeezed between two huge places. The one on my right was a colossal thing by any standard with a tower on one side, a marble swimming pool, and more than forty acres of lawn and garden. It was Gatsby’s mansion. My own house was an eyesore, but it was a small eyesore, and it had been overlooked, so I had a view of the water and a partial view of my neighbor’s lawn – all for eighty dollars a month.

Across the bay the white palaces of fashionable East Egg shone along the water, and the history of the summer really begins on the evening I drove over there to have dinner with the Tom Buchanans⁹. Daisy was my second cousin and I’d known Tom in college. And just after the war I spent two days with them in Chicago.

Her husband had been one of the most powerful fellows that ever played football at New Haven – a national figure in a way. His family were enormously rich – even in college his freedom with money was criticized – but now he’d left Chicago and come East in a fashion that rather took your breath away; for example, he’d brought down a string of polo ponies¹⁰ from Lake Forest.

Why they came East I don’t know. They had spent a year in France and then moved here. And so it happened that on a warm windy evening I drove over to East Egg to see two old friends whom I hardly knew at all. Their house was a cheerful red-and-white Georgian Colonial mansion, overlooking the bay. The lawn started at the beach and ran toward the front door for a quarter of a mile. There was a line of French windows in front and Tom Buchanan in riding clothes was standing with his legs apart on the front porch.

He had changed since his New Haven years. Now he was a strong straw-haired man of thirty with a rather hard mouth and a supercilious manner¹¹. Two shining arrogant eyes dominated on his face and gave him the appearance of always leaning aggressively forward. His riding clothes couldn’t hide the enormous power of that body and you could see a great pack of muscle shifting when his shoulder moved. It was a body capable of enormous strength – a cruel body.

His speaking voice added to the impression of irritation. There was a touch of paternal contempt¹² in it, even toward people he liked – and there were men at New Haven who had hated his character. We were never intimate, I always had the impression that he approved of me and wanted me to like him.

We talked for a few minutes on the sunny porch. Then he turned me around, politely and abruptly. “We’ll go inside.”

We walked into a bright rosy-colored room. The windows were shining white against the fresh grass outside. A breeze blew through the room, curtains were flying in and out like pale flags, twisting up toward the ceiling, and then falling over the wine-colored rug, making a shadow on it.

The only completely stationary object in the room was an enormous couch on which two young women were lying as though upon a shaky balloon. They were both in white, and their dresses were rippling and fluttering¹³. Tom Buchanan shut the back windows and the caught wind died out about the room, and the curtains and the rugs and the two young women ballooned slowly to the floor.

The younger of the two was a stranger to me. She was lying full length at her end of the divan, completely motionless, and with her chin raised a little, as if she were balancing something on it, which could fall. If she saw me out of the corner of her eyes she didn’t show it – indeed, I was so surprised that I wanted to apologize for my coming in.

The other girl, Daisy, tried to rise then she laughed, an absurd, charming little laugh, and I laughed too and came forward into the room.

“I’m p-paralyzed with happiness.”

She laughed again, as if she said something very witty, and looked up into my face, and it seemed that I was the only one in the world she so much wanted to see. That was a way she had. She murmured that the surname of the balancing girl was Baker. (I’ve heard it said that Daisy’s murmur was only to make people lean toward her; an irrelevant criticism that made it no less charming.)

At any rate, Miss Baker’s lips moved a little, she nodded at me with exhibition of complete self-suf-ficiency¹⁴. I looked back at my cousin, who began to ask me questions in her low, thrilling voice. Her face was sad and lovely with bright things in it, bright eyes and a bright passionate mouth.

I told her how I had stopped off in Chicago for a day on my way East, and how a dozen people had sent their love through me.

“Do they miss me?” she cried ecstatically.

“The whole town is desolate. All the cars have the left rear wheel painted black as a mourning wreath, and there’s a persistent wail all night along the north shore.¹⁵”

“How gorgeous! Let’s go back, Tom. Tomorrow!” Then she added irrelevantly: “You ought to see the baby.”

“I’d like to.”

“She’s asleep. She’s three years old. You ought to see her. She’s —”

Tom Buchanan, who had been walking restlessly about the room, stopped and put his hand on my shoulder.

“What you doing, Nick?”

“I’m a bond man¹⁶.”

“Who with?”

I told him.

“Never heard of them,” he remarked decisively.

This annoyed me.

“You will,” I answered shortly. “You will if you stay in the East.”

“Oh, I’ll stay in the East, don’t you worry,” he said, glancing at Daisy. “I’d be a God damned fool to live anywhere else.”

At this point Miss Baker said: “Absolutely!” with such suddenness that I started¹⁷ – it was the first word she had said since I came into the room. I think it surprised her as much as it did me because she yawned and stood up into the room.

“I’m stiff,” she complained, “I’ve been lying on that sofa for as long as I can remember.”

I looked at Miss Baker. I enjoyed looking at her. She was a slim, small-breasted girl. Her gray sun-strained eyes looked back at me with polite curiosity out of a charming, discontented face.¹⁸ It seemed to me now that I had seen her, or a picture of her, somewhere before.

“You live in West Egg,” she remarked contemptuously. “You must know Gatsby.”

“Gatsby?” asked Daisy. “What Gatsby?”

Before I could answer that he was my neighbor dinner was announced. The two young women showed us the way onto a rosy-colored porch, open toward the sunset, where four candles were lit on the table.

“Why candles?” objected Daisy, frowning. She snapped them out with her fingers. “In two weeks it’ll be the longest day in the year.”

“We ought to plan something,” yawned Miss Baker, sitting down at the table as if she were getting into bed.

“All right,” said Daisy. “What’ll we plan?” She turned to me helplessly: “What do people plan?”

Before I could answer her eyes focused on her little finger.

“Look!” she complained; “I hurt it. You did it, Tom,” she said accusingly. “I know you didn’t want to, but you did do it. That’s what I get for marrying a brute of a man, a great, big, hulking physical specimen¹⁹ of a —”

“I hate that word hulking,” objected Tom angrily, “even in kidding.”

“Hulking,” insisted Daisy.

Sometimes she and Miss Baker talked at once, but that was never quite chatter, that was as cool as their white dresses and their impersonal eyes in the absence of all desire. They were here, and they accepted Tom and me, making only a polite pleasant effort to entertain or to be entertained²⁰.

“You make me feel uncivilized, Daisy,” I confessed on my second glass of impressive wine. “Can’t you talk about crops or something?” I meant nothing special by this phrase, but the reaction was unexpected.

“Civilization’s going to pieces,” said Tom violently. “I’ve gotten to be a terrible pessimist about things. If we don’t look out the white race will be – will be completely underwater. It’s all scientific stuff; it’s been proved.”

“Tom’s getting a very deep thinker,” said Daisy, with an expression of unthoughtful sadness. “He reads deep books with long words in them.”

“Well, these books are all scientific,” insisted Tom, glancing at her impatiently. “This fellow has worked out the whole thing. It’s up to us²¹, who are the dominant race, to watch out or these other races will have control of things.”

“We’ve got to beat them down,” whispered Daisy, winking ferociously toward the fervent sun²². Suddenly, the telephone rang inside and the butler left the porch. Daisy leaned toward me.

“I’ll tell you a family secret,” she whispered enthusiastically. “It’s about the butler’s nose. Do you want to hear about the butler’s nose?”

“That’s why I came over tonight.”

“Well, he wasn’t always a butler; he used to be the silver polisher for some people in New York that had a silver service for two hundred people. He had to polish it from morning till night, until finally it began to affect his nose. Things went from bad to worse, until finally he had to give up his position.”

The butler came back and murmured something close to Tom’s ear; Tom frowned, pushed back his chair, and without a word went inside. As if his absence quickened something within her, Daisy leaned forward again, her voice enthusiastic and singing.

“I love to see you at my table, Nick. You remind me of a – of a rose, an absolute rose. Doesn’t he?” She turned to Miss Baker for confirmation: “An absolute rose?”

This was untrue. I am not even faintly like a rose. She was only improvising. Then suddenly she threw her napkin on the table, excused herself and went into the house.

Miss Baker and I exchanged a short glance without any meaning. I was about to speak when she said “Sh!” in a warning voice. A subdued murmur was audible²³ in the room beyond, and Miss Baker leaned forward unashamed, trying to hear. The murmur trembled on the verge of understandability, sank down, mounted excitedly, and then ended altogether.

“Is something happening?” I asked innocently.

“You mean to say you don’t know?” said Miss Baker, honestly surprised. “I thought everybody knew. Tom’s got some woman in New York. She might have the decency²⁴ not to telephone him at dinner time. Don’t you think?”

Almost before I had understood her meaning there was the flutter of a dress and the crunch of leather boots, and Tom and Daisy were back at the table. Daisy sat down and cried with tense gayety: “I looked out-doors for a minute. There’s a nightingale singing away —” Her voice sang: “It’s romantic, isn’t it, Tom?”

“Very romantic,” he said, and then miserably to me: “If it’s light enough after dinner, I want to take you down to the stables.”

The telephone rang inside, startlingly, and, as Daisy shook her head decisively at Tom, the subject of the stables and all other subjects, disappeared into air. I realized that I wanted to look directly at every one, and yet to keep off all eyes. I couldn’t guess what Daisy and Tom were thinking, but I doubt if even Miss Baker was able to put the fifth guest out of mind.

The horses, needless to say, were not mentioned again. Tom and Miss Baker walked back into the library, while, trying to look pleasantly interested, I followed Daisy to the porch in front, where we sat down side by side on a wicker settee²⁵.

Daisy took her face in her hands and her eyes moved gradually out into the velvet twilight. I saw that unquiet emotions possessed her, so I asked what I thought would be some calming questions about her little girl.

“We don’t know each other very well, Nick,” she said suddenly. “Even if we are cousins. You didn’t come to my wedding.”

“I wasn’t back from the war.”

“That’s true.” She hesitated. “Well, I’ve had a very bad time, Nick, and I’m pretty cynical about everything.”

Evidently she had reason to be. I waited but she didn’t say any more, and after a moment I returned rather weakly to the subject of her daughter.

“I suppose she talks, and – eats, and everything.”

“Oh, yes.” She looked at me absently. “Listen, Nick; let me tell you what I said when she was born. Would you like to hear?”

“Very much.”

“It’ll show you how I’ve gotten to feel about – things. Well, she was less than an hour old and Tom was God knows where. I woke up out of the ether with an utterly abandoned feeling²⁶, and asked the nurse right away if it was a boy or a girl. She told me it was a girl, and so I turned my head away and cried. ‘All right,’ I said, ‘I’m glad it’s a girl. And I hope she’ll be a fool – that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.’ ”

“You see I think everything’s terrible anyhow,” she went on in a convinced way. “Everybody thinks so. And I know. I’ve been everywhere and seen everything and done everything.” She laughed with thrilling scorn. “Sophisticated – God, I’m sophisticated!”

I felt the basic insincerity of what she had said²⁷. It made me worried, as though the whole evening had been a trick of some sort to get some emotion from me.

Inside, the crimson room bloomed with light. Tom and Miss Baker sat at either end of the long couch and she read aloud to him from The Saturday Evening Post. When we came in she held us silent for a moment with a lifted hand²⁸.

“To be continued,” she said, throwing the magazine on the table, “in our very next issue.” She stood up. “Ten o’clock,” she remarked, as though finding the time on the ceiling. “Time for this good girl to go to bed.”

“Jordan’s going to play in the tournament tomorrow,” explained Daisy.

“Oh – you’re Jordan Baker.”

I knew now why her face was familiar – its pleasing contemptuous expression had looked out at me from many pictures of the sporting life at Hot Springs and Palm Beach²⁹. I had heard some unpleasant story of her too, but what it was I had forgotten long ago.

“Good night,” she said softly. “Wake me at eight, won’t you?”

“If you’ll get up.”

“I will. Good night, Mr. Carraway. See you anon³⁰.”

“Of course you will,” confirmed Daisy. “In fact, I think I’ll arrange a marriage. Come over often, Nick, and I’ll sort of – oh – fling you together³¹. You know – lock you up accidentally in linen closets and push you out to sea in a boat —”

“Good night,” called Miss Baker from the stairs. “I haven’t heard a word.”

“She’s a nice girl,” said Tom after a moment. “Her family oughtn’t to let her run around the country this way.”

“Her family is one aunt about a thousand years old. Besides, Nick’s going to look after her, aren’t you, Nick? She’s going to spend lots of week-ends out here this summer. I think the home influence will be very good for her.”

Daisy and Tom looked at each other for a moment in silence.

“Did you give Nick a little heart-to-heart talk on the veranda?” demanded Tom suddenly.

“Did I?” She looked at me. “I can’t seem to remember, but I think we talked about the Nordic race. Yes, I’m sure we did. And first thing you know —”

“Don’t believe everything you hear, Nick,” he advised me.

I said lightly that I had heard nothing at all, and a few minutes later I got up to go home. As I started my motor Daisy called: “Wait! I forgot to ask you something, and it’s important. We heard you were engaged to a girl out West.”

“That’s right,” agreed Tom kindly. “We heard that you were engaged.”

“It’s a libel. I’m too poor.”

Of course I knew what they were referring to, but I wasn’t even vaguely engaged. This gossip was one of the reasons I had come East. You can’t stop going with an old friend because of rumors, and on the other hand I didn’t want the rumors to make me marry anyone.

Their interest touched me – nevertheless, I was confused and a little disgusted as I drove away. It seemed to me that the thing for Daisy to do was to rush out of the house, child in arms – but apparently there were no such thoughts in her head.

When I reached my house at West Egg I sat for a while on an abandoned grass roller³² in the yard. The silhouette of a moving cat was seen across the moonlight, and turning my head to watch it, I saw that I was not alone – fifty feet away a figure had appeared from the shadow of my neighbor’s mansion and was standing with his hands in his pockets looking at the silver pepper of the stars. Something in his lazy movements and the secure position of his feet upon the lawn suggested that it was Mr. Gatsby himself.

I decided to call to him. Miss Baker had mentioned him at dinner, and that would do for an introduction³³. But I didn’t call to him, as he gave a sudden sign that he was content to be alone – he stretched out his arms toward the dark water in a curious way, and, far as I was from him, I could have sworn³⁴ he was trembling. Automatically I glanced seaward – and could see nothing except a single green light that maybe was the end of a dock. When I looked once more for Gatsby he had disappeared, and I was alone again in the unquiet darkness.

Exercises

1. Read the chapter and answer if these statements are true, false or there is no information in the text.

1. The Carraways – Nick’s family – are poor.

2. When Nick wanted to go East after the War, his relatives were not sure, but agreed at last.

3. A woman from Finland used to come to cook for Nick.

4. The place where Nick rented the house was called West Egg because there were a lot of farms with chickens in the neighborhood.

5. Tom and Daisy Buchanans married five years ago.

6. When Nick came, Daisy was waiting for him on the porch.

7. Nick didn’t know Daisy’s guest.

8. During the dinner somebody rang, but Tom refused to answer the phone.

9. Jordan Baker was a successful tennis player who had won many tournaments.

10. When Nick returned home he saw Mr. Gatsby standing in the darkness and looking somewhere.

2. Practice the pronunciation of these words.

vulnerable [ˈvʌlnərəbl]

advantage [ədˈvɑːntɪʤ]

curious [ˈkjʊərɪəs]

politician [ˌpɒlɪˈtɪʃən]

feign [feɪn]

hostile [ˈhɒstaɪl]

gesture [ˈʤesʧə]

gorgeous [ˈgɔːʤəs]

heighten [haɪtn]

thoroughly [ˈθʌrəlɪ]

bungalow [ˈbʌŋgələʊ]

familiar [fəˈmɪljə]

squeeze [skwiːz]

enormously [ɪˈnɔːməslɪ]

Buchanan [ˈbju:kənən]

supercilious [ˌsjuːpəˈsɪlɪəs]

muscle [mʌsl]

stationary [ˈsteɪʃnərɪ]

murmur [ˈmɜːmə]

exhibition [ˌɛksɪˈbɪʃən]

self-sufficiency [sɛlf səˈfɪʃənsɪ]

passionate [ˈpæʃənɪt ]

ecstatically [ɪksˈtætɪk(ə)lɪ]

desolate [ˈdesəlɪt]

wreath [riːθ]

decisively [dɪˈsaɪsɪvlɪ]

yawn [jɔːn]

ferociously [fəˈrəʊʃəslɪ]

contemptuously [kənˈtemptjʊəslɪ]

neighbor [ˈneɪbə]

announced [əˈnaʊnst]

accusingly [əˈkjuːzɪŋlɪ]

uncivilized [ʌnˈsɪvɪlaɪzd]

enthusiastically [ɪnˌθjuːzɪˈæstɪk(ə)lɪ]

hesitate [ˈhezɪteɪt]

ether [ˈiːθə]

sophisticated [səˈfɪstɪkeɪtɪd]

insincerity [ˌɪnsɪnˈserɪtɪ]

influence [ˈɪnflʊəns]

vaguely [ˈveɪglɪ]

3. Fill in the blanks with the following adverbs.

Accusingly, contemptuously, helplessly, ecstatically, miserably, honestly, abruptly, decisively, politely, impatiently, ferociously.

1. It was lonely for a day or so until one morning some man asked … the way.

2. Then he turned me around, … and … .

3. “Do they miss me?” she cried … .

4. “Never heard of them,” he remarked … .

5. “You live in West Egg,” she remarked … .

6. “I hurt it. You did it, Tom,” she said … .

7. “Well, these books are all scientific,” insisted Tom, glancing at her … .

8. “We’ve got to beat them down,” whispered Daisy, winking … toward the fervent sun.

9. “You mean to say you don’t know?” said Miss Baker, … surprised.

10. “Very romantic,” he said, and then … to me: “If it’s light enough after dinner, I want to take you down to the stables.”

4. The following are sentences paraphrased from the text. Look through the chapter to fi nd the original ones.

1. I didn’t want to listen to private secrets, so I pretended to be asleep, busy or careless.

2. My own house was a thorn, but it was a small thorn, and it wasn’t noticed.

3. Two shining haughty eyes were notable on his face and he looked aggressive as if he was always bending forward.

4. Tom Buchanan, who had been hanging uneasily about the room, halted and put his hand on my shoulder.

5. We followed the two young women out onto a pink-colored porch, which gave a view on the sunset, where four candles were glowing on the table.

6. His duty was to polish silver all day long, until finally it began to influence his nose.

7. We could hear a muted murmur in the room beyond, and Miss Baker bent forward without any shame, attempting to hear.

8. Almost before I managed to catch what she meant we heard the sounds of rustling dress and crunchy boots, and Tom with Daisy were back at the table.

9. I saw that she was very worried, so I asked what I thought would be some calming questions about her little daughter.

10. Now I understood why I recognized her face – I had seen its nice disdainful expression on many photos of the sporting life at Hot Springs and Palm Beach.

5. Fill in the blanks with prepositions.

1. My father gave me some advice that I’ve been turning … in my mind ever since.

2. I’m inclined … reserve all judgments.

3. In college I was unjustly accused … being a politician.

4. I graduated … New Haven in 1915.

5. He’d left Chicago and come East in a fashion that rather took your breath … .

6. Daisy leaned … again, her voice enthusiastic and singing.

7. His speaking voice added … the impression of irritation.

8. I always had the impression that he approved … me and wanted me to like him.

9. It’s up … us, who are the dominant race, to watch … or these other races will have control of things.

10. “We’ve got to beat them … ,” whispered Daisy.

11. You remind me … a rose, an absolute rose. Doesn’t he?

12. The murmur trembled on the verge … understandability.

13. I doubt if even Miss Baker was able to put the fifth guest … of mind.

14. We heard you were engaged … a girl out West.

15. Of course I knew what they were referring … , but I wasn’t even vaguely engaged.

6. Find derivatives in the text. Who were described with the use of these words?

Chapter II

About half way between West Egg and New York the motor road joins the railroad and runs beside it for a quarter of a mile. This is a valley of ashes – a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens; where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke.

But above the gray land and the spasms of cheerless dust which move endlessly over it, you notice, after a moment, the eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg. These eyes are blue and gigantic. There is no face, but, instead, the eyes look from a pair of enormous yellow glasses which pass over a non-existent nose. Evidently some wild joker of an oculist set them there to fatten his practice, and then sank down himself into eternal blindness³⁵, or forgot them and moved away. But his eyes, that became a little paler because of many paintless days under sun and rain, overhang over the solemn ground.

The valley of ashes is bounded on one side by a small foul river, and, when the drawbridge is up to let barges go through, the passengers on waiting trains can stare at the sad scene for half an hour. It was because of this that I first met Tom Buchanan’s mistress.

Everyone who knew him insisted upon the fact that Tom had an affair. His acquaintances were shocked by the fact that he turned up in popular restaurants with her. Though I was curious to see her, I had no desire to meet her – but I did. I went up to New York with Tom on the train one afternoon and when we stopped by the ash heaps he jumped to his feet and, taking me by the elbow, literally forced me from the car³⁶.

“We’re getting off,” he insisted. “I want you to meet my girl.”

I think he’d eaten a lot for lunch, and violently wanted to take me with him. I followed him and we walked back a hundred yards along the road under Doctor Eckleburg’s persistent stare. The only building in sight was a small block of yellow brick. It contained three shops; one of them was for rent and another was an all night restaurant; the third was a garage – Repairs. George B. Wilson, Cars bought and sold – and I followed Tom inside.

The interior was poor and bare; the only car visible was a dust-covered Ford. The owner himself appeared in the door of an office, wiping his hands on a piece of waste³⁷. He was a blond, spiritless man, weak, and faintly handsome. When he saw us a shade of hope appeared in his light blue eyes.

“Hello, Wilson, old man,” said Tom, slapping him cheerfully on the shoulder. “How’s business?”

“I can’t complain,” answered Wilson unconvincingly. “When are you going to sell me that car?”

“Next week; I’ve got my man working on it now.”

“Works pretty slow, don’t he?³⁸”

“No, he doesn’t,” said Tom coldly. “And if you feel that way about it, maybe I’d better sell it somewhere else after all.”

“I don’t mean that,” answered Wilson quickly. “I just meant —”

His voice faded off and Tom looked impatiently around the garage. Then I heard footsteps on a stairs, and in a moment the thickish figure of a woman blocked out the light from the office door³⁹. She was in the middle thirties, and faintly fat, but she carried her overweight body sensuously as some women can. Her face contained no shade of beauty, but there was an immediate vitality about her that you couldn’t miss. She smiled slowly and, walking through her husband as if he were a ghost, shook hands with Tom, looking him right in the eye. Then she wet her lips, and without turning around spoke to her husband in a soft, coarse voice:

“Get some chairs, why don’t you, so somebody can sit down.”

“Oh, sure,” agreed Wilson hurriedly. A white ashen dust veiled his dark suit and his pale hair as it veiled everything in the vicinity⁴⁰ – except his wife, who moved close to Tom.

“I want to see you,” said Tom imperatively. “Get on the next train.”

“All right.”

We waited for her down the road and out of sight.

“Terrible place, isn’t it,” said Tom, exchanging a frown with Doctor Eckleburg.

“Awful.”

“It does her good to get away. Wilson thinks she goes to see her sister in New York. He’s so stupid he doesn’t know he’s alive.”

So Tom Buchanan and his girl and I went up together to New York. She had changed her dress to a brown figured muslin, which stretched tight over her rather wide hips as Tom helped her to the platform in New York⁴¹. At the news-stand she bought a copy of Town Tattle⁴², and in the station drugstore some cold cream and a small flask of perfume. Upstairs, she let four taxicabs drive away before she chose a new one, lavender-colored, and in this we climbed into. But immediately she turned sharply from the window and tapped on the front glass.⁴³

“I want to get one of those dogs for the apartment,” she said imperatively.

We backed up to a gray old man who was selling very recent puppies of a doubtful breed.

“What kind are they?” asked Mrs. Wilson eagerly.

“All kinds. What kind do you want, lady?”

“I’d like to get one of those police dogs; I don’t think you got that kind?”

The man looked doubtfully into the basket, plunged in his hand and drew one up⁴⁴.

“That’s no police dog,” said Tom.

“No, it’s not exactly a police dog,” said the man with disappointment in his voice. “It’s more of an Airedale⁴⁵. Look at that coat. That’s a dog that’ll never catch cold, so you don’t need to worry about it.”

“I think it’s cute,” said Mrs. Wilson enthusiastically. “How much is it?”

“That dog?” He looked at it admiringly. “That dog will cost you ten dollars.”

The Airedale (without any doubts, there was an Airedale among the dog’s ancestors, though its feet were surprisingly white) changed hands and settled down into Mrs. Wilson’s lap, where she fondled the weatherproof coat with rapture⁴⁶.

“Is it a boy or a girl?” she asked delicately.

“That dog? That dog’s a boy.”

“Here’s your money. Go and buy ten more dogs with it,” said Tom decisively.

We drove over to Fifth Avenue.

“Hold on,” I said, “I have to leave you here.”

“No, you don’t,” said Tom quickly. “Myrtle’ll be hurt if you don’t come up to the apartment. Won’t you, Myrtle?”

“Come on,” she said. “I’ll telephone my sister Catherine. People who ought to know say she’s very beautiful.”

“Well, I’d like to, but —”

The cab stopped at one of apartment houses. Throwing a homecoming glance around the neighborhood, Mrs. Wilson gathered up her dog and other things she bought, and went haughtily in.

The apartment was on the top floor – a small living room, a small dining room, a small bedroom, and a bath. The living room was crowded to the doors with a set of tapestried furniture entirely too large for it⁴⁷, so that to move about was to stumble continually over. The only picture was an over-enlarged photograph of what seemed to be a hen, but when you saw it from a distance it transformed into a bonnet with an old lady looking from under it. Several old copies of Town Tattle lay on the table. Mrs. Wilson was first busy with the dog. A lazy elevator boy went for a box full of straw and some milk. Meanwhile Tom brought out a bottle of whiskey from a locked bureau door.

I have been drunk just twice in my life, and the second time was that afternoon; so everything that happened was like in the mist. Sitting on Tom’s lap Mrs. Wilson called up several people on the telephone; then there were no cigarettes, and I went out to buy some. When I came back they had disappeared, so I sat down discreetly in the living room. Just as Tom and Myrtle (after the first drink Mrs. Wilson and I called each other by our first names) reappeared, company began to arrive at the apartment door.

The sister, Catherine, was a slim, chatty girl of about thirty, with a solid, sticky bob of red hair, and a complexion powdered milky white⁴⁸. She had plucked her eyebrows and then drew them again at a more frivolous angle but nature tried to return their previous form so her face looked indistinctly. When she moved about there was a continuous clicking thanks to pottery bracelets that jingled up and down upon her arms.

Mr. McKee was a pale, feminine man from the flat below. He had just shaved, for there was a white spot of lather on his cheekbone, and he was most respectful in his greeting to everyone in the room. Later I got to know that he was a photographer and had made the photo of Mrs. Wilson’s mother – the old lady in the bonnet – which was on the wall. His wife was shrill, languid, handsome, and horrible. She told me with pride that her husband had photographed her a hundred and twenty-seven times since they had been married.

Mrs. Wilson had changed her costume some time before, and was now dressed in an elegant afternoon dress of cream-colored chiffon, which gave out a continual rustle as she walked about the room. With the influence of the dress her personality had also changed. The intense vitality that had been so remarkable in the garage turned into impressive arrogance. Her laughter, her gestures became more violently feigned moment by moment.

“My dear,” she told her sister in a high, mincing shout, “most of these fellas will cheat you every time. All they think of is money. I had a woman up here last week to take care of my feet, and when she gave me the bill I was shocked.”

“I like your dress,” remarked Mrs. McKee, “I think it’s adorable.”

Mrs. Wilson rejected the compliment by raising her eyebrow in contempt.

“It’s just a crazy old thing,” she said. “I just put it on sometimes when I don’t care what I look like.”

“But it looks wonderful on you, if you know what I mean,” continued Mrs. McKee. “If Chester could make a photo of you in that pose I think the result would be something special.”

We all looked in silence at Mrs. Wilson, who moved a strand of hair away from her eyes and looked back at us with a brilliant smile. Mr. McKee viewed her intently with his head on one side, and then moved his hand back and forth slowly in front of his face.

“I should change the light,” he said after a moment. We all looked at the subject again, after that Tom Buchanan yawned audibly and got to his feet.

“You McKees have something to drink,” he said. “Get some more ice and mineral water, Myrtle, before everybody goes to sleep.”

“I told that boy about the ice.” Myrtle raised her eyebrows in despair. “These people! You have to keep after them all the time.” She looked at me and laughed pointlessly.

The sister Catherine sat down beside me on the couch.

“Do you live down on Long Island, too?” she asked. “I live at West Egg.”

“Really? I was down there at a party about a month ago. At a man named Gatsby’s. Do you know him?”

“I live next door to him.”

“Well, they say he’s a nephew or a cousin of Kaiser Wilhelm’s⁴⁹. That’s where all his money comes from.”

“Really?”

She nodded.

Mrs. McKee pointed suddenly at Catherine:

“Chester, I think you could do something with her,” she said, but Mr. McKee only nodded in a bored way, and turned his attention to Tom.

“I’d like to do more work on Long Island, if I could get the entry. All I ask is that they should give me a start.⁵⁰”

“Myrtle, you’ll give McKee a letter of introduction to your husband, so he can do some studies of him.” Tom’s lips moved silently for a moment as he invented “George B. Wilson at the Gasoline Pump, or something like that.”

Catherine leaned close to me and whispered in my ear:

“Neither of them can stand the person they’re married to⁵¹.”

“Can’t they?”

“Can’t stand them.” She looked at Myrtle and then at Tom. “What I say is, why go on living with them if they can’t stand them? If I was them I’d get a divorce and get married to each other right away.”

“Doesn’t she like Wilson either?”

The answer to this was unexpected. It came from Myrtle, who had overheard the question, and it was violent and rude.

“You see,” cried Catherine triumphantly. She lowered her voice again. “It’s really his wife who is in their way. She’s a Catholic, and they don’t believe in divorce.”

Daisy was not a Catholic, and I was a little shocked at the elaborateness of the lie.

“When they do get married,” continued Catherine, “they’re going West to live for a while until it blows over.”

“It would be more sensible to go to Europe.”

“Oh, do you like Europe?” she asked surprisingly. “I just got back from Monte Carlo. I went over there with another girl. We had over twelve hundred dollars when we started, but we lost all money in two days in the private game rooms. We had an awful time getting back, I can tell you.”

The late afternoon sky bloomed in the window for a moment like the blue honey of the Mediterranean⁵² – then the high voice of Mrs. McKee called me back into the room.

“I almost made a mistake, too,” she continued energetically. “I almost married a little kike⁵³ who’d been after me for years. I knew he was below me. But if I hadn’t met Chester, he could be my husband now.”

“Well, I married him,” said Myrtle, ambiguously. “And that’s the difference between your case and mine.”

“Why did you, Myrtle?” asked Catherine. “Nobody forced you to.”

“I married him because I thought he was a gentleman,” she answered. “I thought he knew something about good manners but he wasn’t fit to lick my shoe⁵⁴.”

“You were crazy about him for a while,” said Catherine.

“Crazy about him!” cried Myrtle with anger. “Who said I was crazy about him? I never was any more crazy about him than I was about that man there.”

She pointed suddenly at me, and everyone looked at me accusingly. I tried to show by my expression that I had played no part in her past.

“The only crazy I was when I married him. I knew right away I made a mistake. He borrowed somebody’s best suit to get married in, and never even told me about it, and the man came to get it back one day when he was out.” She looked around to see who was listening. “ ‘Oh, is that your suit?’ I said. This is the first I ever heard about it. But I gave it to him and then I lay down and cried so much all afternoon.”

“She really ought to get away from him,” told me Catherine. “They’ve been living over that garage for eleven years. And Tom’s the first sweetie she ever had.”

The bottle of whiskey – a second one – was now constantly wanted by all present people, excepting Catherine, who “felt just as good on nothing at all.” Tom rang for the janitor and sent him for some famous sandwiches, which were a complete supper in themselves. I wanted to get out and walk eastward toward the Park through the soft twilight, but each time I tried to go I became involved in some wild argument which pulled me back into my chair.

Myrtle sat close to me, and suddenly her warm breath told me the story of her first meeting with Tom.

“It was on the two little seats facing each other that are always the last ones left on the train.⁵⁵ I was going up to New York to see my sister and spend the night. He had on a dress suit and leather shoes, and I couldn’t keep my eyes off him, but every time he looked at me I had to pretend to be looking at the advertisement over his head. When we came into the station he was next to me, and his white shirt-front pressed against my arm, and so I told him I’d have to call policeman, but he knew I lied. I was so excited that when I got into a taxi with him I didn’t hardly know I wasn’t getting into a subway train. All I kept thinking about, over and over, was ‘You can’t live forever; you can’t live forever.’ ”

She turned to Mrs. McKee and the room rang full of her artificial laughter.

“My dear,” she cried, “I’m going to give you this dress as soon as I’m tired of it. I’ve got to get another one tomorrow. I’m going to make a list of all the things I’ve got to get. A massage and a hair wave, and a collar for the dog, and a wreath with black silk flowers for mother’s grave that’ll last all summer. I got to write down a list so I won’t forget all the things I got to do.”

It was nine o’clock – then I looked at my watch and found it was ten. Mr. McKee was asleep on a chair with his fists on his lap, like a photograph of an important man. The little dog was sitting on the table looking with blind eyes through the smoke, and from time to time groaning weakly. People disappeared, reappeared, made plans to go somewhere, and then lost each other, searched for each other, found each other a few feet away. Some time toward midnight Tom Buchanan and Mrs. Wilson stood face to face, discussing in passionate voices if Mrs. Wilson had any right to mention Daisy’s name.

“Daisy! Daisy! Daisy!” shouted Mrs. Wilson. “I’ll say it whenever I want to! Daisy! Dai —”

Making a short skilled movement, Tom Buchanan broke her nose with his open hand⁵⁶.

Then there were bloody towels upon the bathroom floor, and women’s voices scolding, and a high voice full of pain over all this noise. Mr. McKee awoke from his sleep and went toward the door. When he had gone halfway he turned around and looked at the scene – his wife and Catherine were scolding and calming Myrtle and constantly stumbling here and there among the crowded furniture. They tried to help despairing figure on the couch, who was bleeding fluently. Then Mr. McKee turned and continued on out the door. Taking my hat, I followed.

“Come to lunch some day,” he suggested, as we went down in the elevator.

“Where?”

“Anywhere.”

“All right,” I agreed, “I’ll be glad to.”

…I was standing beside his bed and he was sitting up in his underwear, with a great portfolio in his hands.

“Beauty and the Beast… Loneliness… Old Grocery Horse… Brook’n Bridge⁵⁷…”

Then I was lying half asleep in the cold lower level of the Pennsylvania Station, staring at the morning Tribune⁵⁸, and waiting for the four o’clock train.

Exercises

1. Read the chapter and choose the right answer.

1. Nick first met Tom Buchanan’s mistress because

a) Tom drove him specially to her house to acquaint them.

b) They went to New York by train and it occasionally stopped near her house.

c) She came to Tom’s house.

2. Mr. Wilson wanted

a) to buy one of Tom’s cars.

b) to repair Tom’s car.

c) to sell a car to Tom.

3. How old was Mrs. Wilson?

a) about 25

b) about 30

c) about 35

4. What pet did Mrs. Wilson buy in New York?

a) a puppy

b) a kitten

c) a parrot

5. How many times in his life had Nick been drunk?

a) only one time

b) two times

c) three or four times

6. Chester McKee was

a) a painter.

b) a designer of dresses.

c) a photographer.

7. Why did Myrtle marry Mr. Wilson?

a) because she thought he was rich.

b) because she loved him.

c) because she thought he was a gentleman.

8. Tom and Myrtle first met

a) sitting opposite each other in the train to New York.

b) trying to catch a taxi.

c) getting into a subway train.

9. When Myrtle continued to repeat Daisy’s name Tom

a) shouted at her.

b) slapped her in the cheek.

c) hit her on the nose.

10. Nick ended the party sleeping

a) on Myrtle’s couch.

b) on the bed at the McKees’.

c) on the train station.

2. Practice the pronunciation of these words.

grotesque [grəʊˈtesk]

enormous [ɪˈnɔ:məs]

solemn [ˈsɒləm]

acquaintances [əˈkweɪntənsɪz]

persistent [pəˈsɪstənt]

impatiently [ɪmˈpeɪʃəntlɪ]

sensuously [ˈsensjʊəslɪ]

vitality [vaɪˈtælɪtɪ]

doubtful [ˈdaʊtfʊl]

enthusiastically [ɪnˌθjuːzɪˈæstɪk(ə)lɪ]

indistinctly [ɪndɪˈstɪŋktlɪ]

feminine [ˈfemənən]

languid [ˈlæŋgwəd]

arrogance [ˈærəgəns]

adorable [əˈdɔ:rəbl]

nephew [ˈnevju]

twilight [ˈtwaɪlaɪt]

advertisement [ədˈvε:təsmənt]

artificial [ˌɑ:təˈfɪʃəl]

furniture [ˈfε:rnɪʧə]

tapestried [ˈtæpɪstrɪd]

despair [dɪsˈpεə]

triumphantly [traɪˈʌmfəntlɪ]

elaborateness [ɪˈlæbərɪtnəs]

ambiguously [æmˈbɪgjuəslɪ]

massage [məˈsɑ:ʒ]

wreath [ri:θ]

violent [ˈvaɪələnt]

unconvincingly [ˌʌnkənˈvɪnsɪŋlɪ]

overweight [ˈəʊvərˌweɪt]

bureau [ˈbjʊrəʊ]

frivolous [ˈfrɪvələs]

interior [ɪnˈtɪrɪər]

haughtily [ˈhɔːtɪlɪ]

3. Fill in the blanks with the following adverbs and translate.

Pointlessly, haughtily, endlessly, admiringly, ambiguously, unconvincingly, accusingly, sensuously, intently, imperatively.

1. But above the gray land and the spasms of cheerless dust which move … over it, you notice, after a moment, the eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg.

2. “I can’t complain,” answered Wilson … .

3. She was in the middle thirties, and faintly fat, but she carried her overweight body … as some women can.

4. “I want to see you,” said Tom … .

5. “That dog?” He looked at it … .

6. Mrs. Wilson gathered up her dog and other things she bought, and went … in.

7. Mr. McKee viewed her … with his head on one side.

8. “Well, I married him,” said Myrtle, … .

9. She looked at me and laughed … .

10. She pointed suddenly at me, and everyone looked at me … .

4. Fill in the blanks with prepositions.

1. His acquaintances were shocked by the fact that he turned … in popular restaurants with her.

2. His voice faded … and Tom looked impatiently … the garage.

3. We backed … to a gray old man who was selling very recent puppies of a doubtful breed.

4. The living-room was crowded to the doors with a set of tapestried furniture entirely too large for it, so that to move about was to stumble continually … .

5. “I just put it … sometimes when I don’t care what I look like.”

6. You have to keep … them all the time.

7. “They’re going West to live for a while until it blows … .”

8. “I almost married a little kike who’d been … me for years.”

9. He had on a dress suit and leather shoes, and I couldn’t keep my eyes … him.

10. Then I was lying half asleep in the cold lower level of the Pennsylvania Station, staring … the morning Tribune.

5. Find in the text the sentences in which the following word combinations are used. Make up your own sentences using them.

To fatten the practice, to sink down, to force somebody, a persistent stare, to slap somebody, a thickish figure, to block out, an immediate vitality, to wet somebody’s lips, a coarse voice, to exchange a frown, discreetly, shrill and languid, the influence of something, a mincing shout, to view somebody intently, to turn somebody’s attention to something, elaborateness, an artificial laughter, passionate voices.

6. Find in the text the English equivalents of the following words and word combinations. Make up your own sentences using them.

Пепел, бесконечно, несуществующий, разводной мост, любовница, любовная связь, знакомые, настаивать, жаловаться, широкие бедра, торопливо, забраться, сомнительная порода, уважительный, впечатляющее высокомерие, отклонить, отчаяние, развод, отвести глаза, завивка, ошейник, скулить, спотыкаться.

7. Put the verbs in brackets into Past Perfect and explain why it is used.

1. She … (change) her dress to a brown figured muslin.

2. When I came back they … (disappear).

3. She … (pluck) her eyebrows and then drew them again.

4. He … just … (shave), for there was a white spot of lather on his cheekbone.

5. She told me with pride that her husband … (photograph) her a hundred and twenty-seven times since they had been married.

6. Mrs. Wilson … (change) her costume some time before.

7. The intense vitality that … (be) so remarkable in the garage turned into impressive arrogance.

8. It came from Myrtle, who … (overhear) the question, and it was violent and rude.

9. I tried to show by my expression that I … (play) no part in her past.

10. When he … (go) halfway he turned around.

8. Who said the following words? Under what circumstances?

1. “Works pretty slow, don’t he?”

2. “I want to get one of those dogs for the apartment.”

3. “I’ll telephone my sister Catherine. People who ought to know say she’s very beautiful.”

4. “If Chester could make a photo of you in that pose I think the result would be something special.”

5. “Really? I was down there at a party about a month ago. At a man named Gatsby’s. Do you know him?”

6. “I’d like to do more work on Long Island, if I could get the entry. All I ask is that they should give me a start.”

7. “Neither of them can stand the person they’re married to.”

8. “I almost married a little kike who’d been after me for years. I knew he was below me. But if I hadn’t met Chester, he could be my husband now.”

9. “Who said I was crazy about him? I never was any more crazy about him than I was about that man there.”

10. “I’ll say it whenever I want to! Daisy! Dai —”

9. Answer the following questions.

1. Where was the valley of ashes? What was special about it? Why did passengers have to stare at it for half an hour?

2. Did Nick want to see Tom’s mistress? Who forced him to? Where did she live?

3. What can you say about Mr. Wilson? Was he a strong successful man?

4. What did Mrs. Wilson buy after coming to New York?

5. Describe Mrs. Wilson’s apartment. Did Myrtle have good taste? Prove it.

6. Whom did Myrtle invite to the party? Tell some words about every guest.

7. How did Mrs. Wilson react to all compliments? Had her behavior changed since the garage?

8. What did Catherine say about the relationships in the Wilson and Buchanan families? Did Myrtle love her husband? Why, in Catherine’s opinion, couldn’t Tom get a divorce? Was it true?

9. How did Tom and Myrtle get acquainted?

10. What happened in the end of the evening? Who did Nick leave with? Where did they go?

10. Tell about the party from the person of:

a) Myrtle Wilson;

b) Catherine;

c) Mr. McKee.