WEBVTT

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Chapter nine of the Great Gatsby by
F. Scott Fitzgerald. After two years,

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I remember the rest of that day, and that night and the next

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day only as an endless drill of
police and photographers and newspapermen in and out

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of Gatsby's front door. A rope
stretched across the main gate, and a

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policeman by it kept out the curious, but little boys soon discovered that they

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could enter through my yard, and
there were always a few of them clustered,

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open mouthed about the pool. Someone
with a positive manner, perhaps a

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detective, used the expression madman as
he bent over Wilson's body that afternoon,

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and the adventitious authority of his voice
set the key for the newspaper reports next

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morning. Most of those reports were
a nightmare, grotesque, circumstantial, eager,

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and untrue. When Michaelis's testimony at
the inquest brought to light Wilson's suspicions

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of his wife, I thought the
whole tale would shortly be served up in

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racy pasquinade. But Catherine, who
might have said anything and say a word,

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she showed a surprising amount of character
about it, too, looked at

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the corner with determined eyes under that
corrected brow of hers, and swore that

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her sister had never seen Gatsby,
that her sister was completely happy with her

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husband, that her sister had been
into no mischief whatever. She convinced herself

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of it, and cried into her
handkerchief, as if the very suggestion was

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more than she could endure. So
Wilson was reduced to a man deranged by

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a grief in order that the case
might remain in its simplest form, and

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it rested there. But all this
part of it seemed remote and unessential.

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I found myself on Gatsby's side and
alone. From the moment I telephoned news

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of the catastrophe to West Egg village. Every surmise about him, and every

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practical question was referred to me.
At first I was surprised and confused.

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Then, as he lay in his
house and didn't move or breathe or speak

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our an hour, it grew upon
me that I was responsible because no one

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else was interested. Interested, I
mean, with that intense personal interest to

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which everyone has some vague right.
At the end, I called up Daisy

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half an hour after we found him, called her instinctively and without hesitation,

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But she and Tom had gone away
early that afternoon and taken baggage with them.

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Left no address, no say when
they'd be back, no any idea

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where they are. How I could
reach them, I don't know, can't

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say. I wanted to get somebody
for him. I wanted to go into

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the room where he lay and reassure
him I'll get somebody for you. Gatsby,

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don't worry. Just trust me,
and I'll get somebody for you.

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Meyer Wolfshein's name wasn't in the phone
book. The butler gave me his office

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address on Broadway, and I called
Information, but by the time I had

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the number, it was long after
five, and no one answered the phone.

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Will you ring again, I've rung
three times. It's very important.

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Sorry, I'm afraid no one's there. I went back to the drawing room

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and thought for an instant that they
were chance visitors, all these official people

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who suddenly filled it. But though
they drew back the sheet and looked at

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Catsby with shocked eyes, his protest
continued in my brain. Look here,

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old Sport, You've got to get
somebody for me. You've got to try

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hard. I can't go through this
alone. Somebody started asking questions but I

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broke away, and, going upstairs, looked hastily through the unlocked parts of

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his desk. He'd never told me
definitely that his parents were dead, But

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there was nothing, only the picture
of Dan Cody, a token of forgotten

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violence, staring down from the wall. Next morning, I sent the butler

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to New York with a letter to
Wolfsheim, which asked for information and urged

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him to come out on the next
train. That request seemed superfluous when I

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wrote it. I was sure he'd
start when he saw the newspapers, just

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as I was sure there'd be a
wire from Daisy before noon. But neither

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a wire nor Wolfsheim arrived. No
one arrived except more police and photographers and

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newspapermen. When the butler brought back
Wolfsheim's answer, I began to have feelings

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of defiance, of scornful solidarity between
Gatsby and me against them all. Dear

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mister Carroway, this has been one
of the most terrible shocks of my life.

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To me, I hardly can believe
it that it is true at all.

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Such a mad act as that man
did should make us all think.

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I cannot come down now, as
I am tied up in some very important

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business and cannot get mixed up in
this thing. Now. If there's anything

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I can do a little later,
let me know. In a letter by

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Edka, I hardly know where I
am when I hear about a thing like

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this, and I am completely knocked
down and out yours truly a wolf shine,

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and then hastily addenda beneath, let
me know about the funeral, etc.

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Do not know his family at all. When the phone rang that afternoon

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and long distance said Chicago was calling, I thought this would be Daisy at

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last, but the connection came through
as a man's voice, very thin and

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far away. This is Slago speaking. Yes, the name was unfamiliar.

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Hell of a note, isn't it
get my wire? There haven't been any

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wires, young pox and trouble,
he said rapidly. They picked him up

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when he handed the bonds over the
counter. They got a circular from New

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York giving him numbers just five minutes
before. What do you know about that?

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Hey, you never can tell in
these hick towns. Hello, I

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interrupted, breathlessly. Look here,
this isn't mister Gatsby. Mister Gatsby's dead.

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There was a long silence on the
other end of the wire, followed

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by an exclamation, then a quick
squawk as the connection was broken. I

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think it was on the third day
that a telegram signed Henry C. Gats

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arrived from a town in Minnesota.
It said only that the sender was leaving

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immediately and to postpone the funeral until
he came. It was Gatsby's father,

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a solemn old man, very helpless
and dismayed, bundled up in a long,

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cheap ulster against the warm September day. His eyes leaked continuously with excitement,

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and when I took the bag and
umbrella from his hands, he began

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to pull so incessantly at his sparse
gray beard that I had difficulty in getting

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off his coat. He was on
the point of collapse. So I took

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him into the music room and made
him sit down while I sent for something

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to eat. But he wouldn't eat, and the glass of milk spilled from

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his trembling hand. I shot in
the Chicago newspaper. He said, it

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was all into Chicago newspaper. I
started right away. I didn't know how

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to reach you. His eyes,
seeing nothing, moved ceaselessly about the room.

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It was a madman. He said, you must have been mad.

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Wouldn't you like some coffee? I
urged him, I don't want anything.

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I'm all right now, mister Carraway, well, I'm all right now.

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Where have they got Jimmy? I
took him into the drawing room where his

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son lay and left him there.
Some little boys had come up on the

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steps and were looking into the hall. When I told them who had arrived,

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they went reluctantly away. After a
little while, mister Gatts opened the

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door and came out his mouth ajar. His face flushed slightly, his eyes

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leaking isolated in unpunctual tears. He
had reached an age where death no longer

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has the quality of ghastly surprise.
And when he looked around him now for

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the first time, and saw the
height and splendor of the hall and the

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great rooms opening out from it into
other rooms, his grief began to be

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mixed with an odd pride. I
helped him to a bedroom upstairs while he

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took off his coat and vest I
told him that all arrangements had been deferred

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until he came. I didn't know
what you'd want, mister Gatsby. Gatch

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is my name, mister gats I
thought you might want to take the body

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west. He shook his head.
Jimmy always liked it better down east.

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He rose up to his position in
the east. Were you a friend of

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my boysh mister, we were close
friends. He had a big future beforehim.

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You know, he was only a
young man, but he had a

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lot of brain power. Here he
touched his head impressively, and I nodded.

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If he'd lived, he'd have been
a great man, a man like

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James Jay Hill. He'd have helped
build up the country. That's true,

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I said, uncomfortably. He fumbled
at the embroidered coverlet, trying to take

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it from the bed, and lay
down stiffly. Was instantly asleep. That

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night, an obviously frightened person called
up and demanded to know who I was.

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Before he give his name. This
is mister Carraway, I said all.

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He sounded relieved. This is Kilp
Springer. I was relieved too,

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for that seemed to promise another friend
at Gatsby's grave. I didn't want it

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to be in the papers and draw
a sightseeing crowd, so I'd been calling

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up a few people myself. They
were hard to find. The funerals tomorrow,

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I said, three o'clock here at
the house. I wish you'd tell

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anybody who'd be interested. Oh I
will, he broke out hastily. Of

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course I'm not likely to see anybody, but if I do, his tone

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made me suspicious. Of course you'd
be there yourself. Well, i'll certainly

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try. What I called up about
is wait a minute, I interrupted,

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how about saying you'll come? Well, the fact is, the truth of

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the matter is that I'm staying with
some people up here in Greenwich, and

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they rather expect me to be with
them tomorrow. In fact, there's a

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sort of picnic or something. Of
course, i'll do my best to get

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away. I ejaculated and unrestrained.
Huh, And he must have heard me,

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for he went on nervously. What
I called up about was a pair

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of shoes I left there. I
wonder if it'd be too much trouble to

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have the butler send them on.
You see their tennis shoes, and I'm

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sort of helpless without them. My
address is care of b F. I

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didn't hear the rest of the name
because I hung up the receiver. After

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that, I felt a certain shame
for Gatsby. One gentleman to whom I

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telephoned, implied that he had got
what he deserved. However, that was

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my fault, for he was one
of those who used to sneer most bitterly

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at Gatsby on the courage of Gatsby's
liquor, and I should have known better

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than to call him. The morning
of the funeral, I went up to

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New York to see Meyer Wolfsheim.
I couldn't seem to reach him any other

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way. The door that I pushed
open on the advice of an elevator boy

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was marked the Swastika Holding Company,
and at first there didn't seem to be

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anyone inside. But when I'd shouted
hello several times in vain, an argument

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broke out behind a partition, and
presently a lovely jewess appeared at an interior

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door and scrutinized me with black,
hostile eyes. Nobody's in, she said,

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mister wolf Shim's gone to Chicago.
The first part of this was obviously

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untrue, for someone had begun to
whistle the rosary tunelessly inside. Please say

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that mister Carroway wants to see him. I can't get him back from Chicago,

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can I? At this moment,
a voice, unmistakably wolf Shims called

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Stella from the other side of the
door. Leave your name on the desk,

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she said quickly. I'll give it
to him when he gets back,

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but I know he's there. She
took a step toward me and began to

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slide her hand indignantly up and down
her hips. You young men think you

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could force your way in here any
time, she scolded. We're getting sick

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and tired of it. When I
say he's in Chicago, he's in Chicago,

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I mentioned Gadsby. Oh. She
looked at me over again. Will

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you just what was your name?
She vanished In a moment Meyer wolfsheim stood

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solemnly in the doorway, holding out
both hands. He drew me into his

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office, remarking in a reverent voice
that it was a sad time for all

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of us, and offered me a
cigar. My memory goes back to when

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I first met him, he said, a young major, just out of

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the army and covered over with mentals. He got into war. He was

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so hard up he had to keep
on bearing his uniform because he couldn't buy

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some regular clothes. First time I
saw him was when he came into vine

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Brenda's pool room at forty third Street
and asked for a job. He hadn't

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eat anything for a couple of days. Come on, have some lunchers me,

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I said, he ate more than
four dollars of food in half an

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hour. Did you start him in
business? I inquired, start him?

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I made him. Oh. I
raised him up out of nothing, right

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out of the gutter. I saw
right away that he was a fine appearing

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gentleman, the young man. And
when he told me he was at Oxford,

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I knew I could use him good. I got him to join the

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American Legion, and he used to
stand high there. Right off. He

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did some work for a client of
mind up to Albany. Were so thick

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like that in everything he held up
two bulbous fingers, always together. I

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wondered if this partnership had included the
World Series transaction in nineteen nineteen. Now

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he's dead, I said, after
a moment. You were his closest friends,

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so I know you want to come
to his funeral this afternoon. I'd

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like to come. Well, come. Then the hair and his nostrils quivered

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slightly, and as he shook his
head, his eyes filled with tears.

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I can't do it. I can't
get mixed up in it, he said,

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there's nothing to get mixed up in. It's all over now when a

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man gets killed. I never like
to get mixed up in it in any

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way, I keep out. When
I was a young man, it was

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different if a friend of mine died, no matter how I stuck with him

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to the end. You may think
that sentimental, but I mean it twos

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a bit of end. I saw
that, for some reason of his own,

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he was determined not to come,
so I stood up. Are you

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a college man, he inquired Suddenly. For a moment I thought he was

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going to suggest a connection, but
he only nodded and shook my hand.

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Let us learn to show our friendship
for a man when he is alive,

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and not after he is dead,
he suggested. After that, My own

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rule is to let everything alone.
When I left his office, the sky

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had turned dark, and I got
back to West Egg in a drizzle.

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After changing my clothes, I went
next door and found mister Gatts walking up

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and down excitedly in the hall.
His pride in his and in his son's

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possessions was continually increasing, and now
he had something to show me Jimmy shent

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me this picture. He took out
his wallet with trembling fingers. Look there.

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It was a photograph of the house, cracked in the corners and dirty.

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With many hands, he pointed out
every detail to me eagerly. Look

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there, and then he sought admiration
from my eyes. He had shown it

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so often that I think it was
more real to him now than the house

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itself. Jimmy sent it to me. I think it's a very pretty picture.

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It shows up well, very well. Had you seen him lately.

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He come out to Shee me two
years ago and bought me the house I

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live in now. Of course,
we was broke when he run off from

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home, but I she now there
was reason for it. He knew he

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had a big future in front of
him, and ever since he made a

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success. He was very generous with
me. He seemed reluctant to put away

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the picture, held it for another
minute, gingerly before my eyes. Then

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00:16:00.919 --> 00:16:04.559
he returned the wallet and pulled from
his pocket a ragged old copy of a

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00:16:04.600 --> 00:16:10.279
book called hop Along Cassidy. Look
there, this is a book he had

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00:16:10.320 --> 00:16:14.080
when he was a boy. It
just shows you. He opened it at

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00:16:14.080 --> 00:16:17.960
the back cover and turned it around
for me to see. On the last

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00:16:18.039 --> 00:16:22.000
fly leaf was printed the word schedule
and the date September twelfth, nineteen o

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00:16:22.200 --> 00:16:27.840
six, and underneath rise from bed
six am, dumbell exercise in wall,

219
00:16:27.879 --> 00:16:33.159
scaling six fifteen to six thirty am, study electricity seven to fifteen to eight

220
00:16:33.200 --> 00:16:38.799
fifteen am. Work eight thirty to
four thirty pm. Baseball in sports.

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00:16:40.000 --> 00:16:45.240
Four thirty to five PM, practice
elocution, poison, how to attain it?

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Five to six pm. Study needed
inventions seven to nine pm. General

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resolves. No wasting time at shafters
or a name indecipherable. No more smoking

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or chewing every other day. Read
one improving book or magazine per week,

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save five dollars crossed out three dollars
per week. Be better to parents.

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I came acrossish book by accident,
said the old man. It just shows

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00:17:14.799 --> 00:17:18.799
you, don't it. It just
shows you. Jimmy was bound to get

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00:17:18.799 --> 00:17:22.920
ahead. He always had some resolves
like this or something. Do you notice

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00:17:22.960 --> 00:17:26.839
what he's got about improving his mind? He was always great for that.

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He taught me I ate like a
hog once, and I beat him for

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it. He was reluctant to close
the book, reading each item aloud,

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and then looking eagerly at me.
I think he rather expected me to copy

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down the list for my own use. A little before three, the Lutheran

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00:17:42.079 --> 00:17:47.519
Minister arrived from Flushing, and I
began to look involuntarily out the windows for

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other cars. So did Gatsby's father, And as the time passed and the

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00:17:52.160 --> 00:17:55.920
servants came in and stood waiting in
the hall, his eyes began to blink

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00:17:56.000 --> 00:17:59.680
anxiously, and he spoke of the
rain in a worried, uncertain way.

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00:18:00.200 --> 00:18:03.759
The Minister glanced several times at his
watch, so I took him aside and

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00:18:03.839 --> 00:18:07.279
asked him to wait for half an
hour. But it wasn't any use.

240
00:18:07.039 --> 00:18:14.160
Nobody came. About five o'clock our
procession of three cars reached the cemetery and

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00:18:14.400 --> 00:18:18.880
stopped in a thick drizzle beside the
gate. First a motor hearse, horribly

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00:18:18.960 --> 00:18:22.160
black and wet. Then mister gats
and the Minister and me in the limousine,

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00:18:22.559 --> 00:18:26.319
and a little later four or five
servants and the postman from West Egg

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00:18:26.640 --> 00:18:32.240
in Gatsby's station wagon, all wet
to the skin. As we started through

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00:18:32.279 --> 00:18:34.160
the gate into the cemetery, I
heard a car stop, and then the

246
00:18:34.200 --> 00:18:38.599
sound of someone splashing after us over
the soggy ground. I looked around.

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00:18:38.920 --> 00:18:44.480
It was the man with Allied glasses, whom I had found marveling over Gatsby's

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books in the library one night,
three months before. I'd never seen him

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00:18:48.680 --> 00:18:52.359
since then. I don't know how
he knew about the funeral or even his

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00:18:52.480 --> 00:18:56.440
name. The rain poured down his
thick glasses, and he took them off

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00:18:56.480 --> 00:19:00.440
and wiped them to see the protecting
canvas unrolled from gatsby his grave. I

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00:19:00.519 --> 00:19:04.119
tried to think about Gatsby then for
a moment, but he was already too

253
00:19:04.160 --> 00:19:08.720
far away, and I could only
remember without resentment, that Daisy hadn't sent

254
00:19:08.799 --> 00:19:14.839
a message or a flower. Dimly
I heard someone murmur, blessed are the

255
00:19:14.920 --> 00:19:19.079
dead that the rain falls on,
And then the Allied man said, amen

256
00:19:19.200 --> 00:19:25.400
to that in a brave voice.
We straggled down quickly through the rain to

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00:19:25.480 --> 00:19:29.559
the cars. Allies spoke to me
by the gate. I couldn't get to

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00:19:29.640 --> 00:19:33.359
the house, he remarked, neither
could anybody else. Go on, he

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00:19:33.480 --> 00:19:37.799
started, why my god, they
used to go there by the hundreds.

260
00:19:38.359 --> 00:19:44.160
He took off his glasses and wiped
them again outside and inn the poor son

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00:19:44.200 --> 00:19:48.119
of a bitch, he said.
One of my most vivid memories is of

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00:19:48.200 --> 00:19:52.880
coming back west from prep school and
later from college at Christmas time. Those

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00:19:52.920 --> 00:19:56.119
who went farther than Chicago would gather
in the old dim Union station at six

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00:19:56.160 --> 00:20:00.640
o'clock of a December evening with a
few Chicago go friends already caught up into

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00:20:00.680 --> 00:20:06.359
their own holiday gaieties, to bid
them a hasty goodbye. I remember the

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00:20:06.359 --> 00:20:10.400
fur coats of the girls returning from
miss this or that, and the chatter

267
00:20:10.440 --> 00:20:14.240
of frozen breath, and the hands
waving overhead as we caught sight of old

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00:20:14.279 --> 00:20:18.240
acquaintances, and the matchings of invitations. Are you going to? The Ordways,

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00:20:18.319 --> 00:20:22.680
the Herseys, the Schultzes, and
the long green tickets clasped tight in

270
00:20:22.720 --> 00:20:27.839
our gloved hands. And last the
murky yellow cars of the Chicago, Milwaukee

271
00:20:27.880 --> 00:20:33.559
and Saint Paul Railroad, looking cheerful
as Christmas itself on the tracks beside the

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00:20:33.599 --> 00:20:37.759
gate. When we pulled out into
the winter night and the real snow,

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00:20:37.920 --> 00:20:41.319
our snow began to stretch out beside
us and twinkle against the windows, and

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00:20:41.400 --> 00:20:47.240
the dim lights of small Wisconsin stations. Moved by a sharp, wild brace,

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00:20:47.359 --> 00:20:51.279
came suddenly into the air we drew
in deep breaths of it as we

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00:20:51.319 --> 00:20:56.279
walked back from dinner through the cold
vestibules, unutterably aware of our identity with

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00:20:56.400 --> 00:21:03.039
this country for one strange hour before
we melted distinguishably into it again. That's

278
00:21:03.079 --> 00:21:07.599
my Middle West. Not the weed
or the prairies or the lost Swede towns,

279
00:21:07.960 --> 00:21:11.680
but the thrilling returning trains of my
youth, and the street lamps and

280
00:21:11.720 --> 00:21:15.119
sleigh bells in the frosty dark,
and the shadows of holly wreaths thrown by

281
00:21:15.240 --> 00:21:19.799
lighted windows on the snow. I
am part of that, a little solemn,

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00:21:19.799 --> 00:21:23.559
with the feel of those long winters, a little complaisant from growing up

283
00:21:23.559 --> 00:21:29.400
in the caraway house in a city
where dwellings are still called through decades by

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00:21:29.440 --> 00:21:33.440
a family name. I see now
that this has been a story of the

285
00:21:33.519 --> 00:21:37.160
West. After all, Tom and
Gatsby, Daisy and Jordan and I were

286
00:21:37.200 --> 00:21:44.160
all Westerners, and perhaps we possessed
some deficiency in common which made us suddenly

287
00:21:44.359 --> 00:21:48.720
unadaptable to Eastern life, even when
the East excited the most, even when

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00:21:48.720 --> 00:21:53.480
I was most keenly aware of its
superiority to the board, sprawling, swollen

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00:21:53.559 --> 00:21:59.960
towns beyond the Ohio, with their
interminable inquisitions, which spared only the children

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00:22:00.119 --> 00:22:03.400
and the very old. Even then, it had always for me a quality

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00:22:03.440 --> 00:22:10.279
of distortion. West Egg especially still
figures in my more fantastic dreams. I

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00:22:10.359 --> 00:22:14.680
see it as a night scene by
el Greco. A hundred houses at once

293
00:22:14.759 --> 00:22:19.680
conventional and grotesque, crouching under a
sullen, overhanging sky and a lustreless moon.

294
00:22:21.640 --> 00:22:25.319
In the foreground. Four solemn men
in dress suits are walking along the

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00:22:25.359 --> 00:22:29.400
sidewalk with a stretcher, on which
lies a drunken woman in a white evening

296
00:22:29.519 --> 00:22:33.799
dress. Her hand, which dangles
over the side, sparkles cold with jewels.

297
00:22:34.680 --> 00:22:38.160
Gravely, the men turn in at
a house, the wrong house,

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00:22:38.640 --> 00:22:44.839
but no one knows the woman's name, and no one cares. After Gadsby's

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00:22:44.880 --> 00:22:48.000
death, the East was haunted for
me like that, distorted beyond my eye's

300
00:22:48.119 --> 00:22:52.119
power of correction. So when the
blue smoke of brittle leaves was in the

301
00:22:52.160 --> 00:22:56.839
air, and the wind blew the
wet laundry stiff on the line, I

302
00:22:56.920 --> 00:23:00.319
decided to come back home. There
was one thing to be done before I

303
00:23:00.400 --> 00:23:06.440
left, an awkward, unpleasant thing
that perhaps had better have been let alone.

304
00:23:07.160 --> 00:23:10.079
But I wanted to leave things in
order, and not just trust that

305
00:23:10.119 --> 00:23:15.440
obliging an indifferent sea to sweep my
refuse away. I saw Jordan Baker and

306
00:23:15.519 --> 00:23:19.359
talked over and around what had happened
to us together and what had happened afterward

307
00:23:19.400 --> 00:23:23.920
to me. And she lay perfectly
still, listening in a big chair.

308
00:23:25.799 --> 00:23:29.160
She was dressed to play golf,
and I remember thinking she looked like a

309
00:23:29.200 --> 00:23:33.680
good illustration, her chin raised a
little jauntily, her hair the color of

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00:23:33.680 --> 00:23:37.839
an autumn leaf, her face the
same brown tint as the fingerless glove on

311
00:23:37.880 --> 00:23:41.039
her knee. When I had finished, she told me, without comment that

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00:23:41.119 --> 00:23:47.240
she was engaged to another man.
I doubted that, though there were several

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00:23:47.279 --> 00:23:49.559
she could have married at the knot
of her head, but I pretended to

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00:23:49.599 --> 00:23:53.240
be surprised. For just a minute. I wondered if I was making a

315
00:23:53.319 --> 00:23:57.359
mistake. Then I thought it all
over again quickly and got up to say

316
00:23:57.400 --> 00:24:03.440
goodbye. Ever less, you did
throw me over, said Jordan. Suddenly,

317
00:24:03.839 --> 00:24:07.480
you threw me over on the telephone. I don't give a damn about

318
00:24:07.559 --> 00:24:10.880
you now, but it was a
new experience for me, and I felt

319
00:24:10.880 --> 00:24:15.000
a little dizzy for a while.
We shook hands. Oh, and do

320
00:24:15.119 --> 00:24:18.519
you remember, she added, the
conversation we had once about driving a car.

321
00:24:19.279 --> 00:24:23.599
Why not exactly? You said a
bad driver was only safe until she

322
00:24:23.640 --> 00:24:29.640
meant another bad driver. Well,
I meant another bad driver, didn't I?

323
00:24:29.640 --> 00:24:32.279
I mean it was careless of me
to make such a wrong guess.

324
00:24:32.839 --> 00:24:36.720
I thought you were rather an honest, straightforward person. I thought it was

325
00:24:36.759 --> 00:24:41.359
your secret pride. I'm thirty,
I said, I'm five years too old

326
00:24:41.400 --> 00:24:45.759
to lie to myself and call it
on her. She didn't answer. Angry

327
00:24:45.799 --> 00:24:48.880
and half in love with her,
and tremendously sorry, I turned away.

328
00:24:51.480 --> 00:24:55.839
One afternoon laden October, I saw
Tom Buchanan. He was walking ahead of

329
00:24:55.839 --> 00:24:59.400
me along Fifth Avenue in his alert, aggressive way, his hands out a

330
00:24:59.400 --> 00:25:03.160
little from his body as if to
fight off interference, his head moving sharply

331
00:25:03.200 --> 00:25:07.559
here and there, adapting itself to
his restless eyes. Just as I slowed

332
00:25:07.640 --> 00:25:11.839
up to avoid overtaking him, he
stopped and began frowning into the windows of

333
00:25:11.880 --> 00:25:17.279
a jewelry store. Suddenly he saw
me and walked back, holding out his

334
00:25:17.359 --> 00:25:21.000
hand. What's the matter, Nick? Do you object to shaking hands with

335
00:25:21.039 --> 00:25:25.440
me? Yes? You know what
I think of you. You're crazy,

336
00:25:25.519 --> 00:25:29.160
Nick, he said, quickly,
crazy as hell. I don't know what's

337
00:25:29.160 --> 00:25:33.160
the matter with you, Tom,
I inquired, what did you say to

338
00:25:33.200 --> 00:25:37.680
Wilson that afternoon? He stared at
me without a word, and I knew

339
00:25:37.720 --> 00:25:41.000
I had guessed right about those missing
hours. I started to turn away,

340
00:25:41.039 --> 00:25:45.839
but he took a step after me
and grabbed my arm. I told him

341
00:25:45.880 --> 00:25:48.400
the truth. He said he came
to the door while we were getting ready

342
00:25:48.400 --> 00:25:52.279
to leave, and when I sent
down word that we weren't in, he

343
00:25:52.359 --> 00:25:56.799
tried to force his way upstairs.
He was crazy enough to kill me if

344
00:25:56.839 --> 00:26:00.839
I hadn't told him who owned the
car. His hand was on a revolver

345
00:26:00.920 --> 00:26:04.079
in his pocket every minute he was
in the house. He broke off defiantly.

346
00:26:04.880 --> 00:26:08.079
What if I did tell him that
Fellow had a coming to him?

347
00:26:08.279 --> 00:26:11.640
He threw dust into your eyes like
he did in daisies, But he was

348
00:26:11.680 --> 00:26:15.000
a tough one. He ran over
myrtle like you'd run over a dog,

349
00:26:15.039 --> 00:26:19.480
and never even stopped his car.
There was nothing I could say except the

350
00:26:19.519 --> 00:26:25.240
one unutterable fact that it wasn't true. And if you think I didn't have

351
00:26:25.359 --> 00:26:29.160
my share of suffering, look here. When I went to give up that

352
00:26:29.240 --> 00:26:33.440
flat and saw that damn box of
dog biscuits sitting there on the sideboard.

353
00:26:33.759 --> 00:26:37.200
I sat down and cried like a
baby. By God, it was awful.

354
00:26:38.079 --> 00:26:41.319
I couldn't forgive him or like him, but I saw that what he

355
00:26:41.319 --> 00:26:48.279
had done was to him entirely justified. It was all very careless and confused.

356
00:26:48.799 --> 00:26:52.839
They were careless people, Tom and
Daisy. They smashed up things in

357
00:26:52.880 --> 00:26:56.839
creatures and then retreated back into their
money, or their vast carelessness, or

358
00:26:56.880 --> 00:27:00.640
whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the

359
00:27:00.680 --> 00:27:04.680
mess they had made. I shook
hands with him. It seemed silly not

360
00:27:04.839 --> 00:27:08.200
to, for I felt suddenly as
though I were talking to a child.

361
00:27:08.880 --> 00:27:12.920
Then he went into the jewelry store
to buy a pearl necklace, or perhaps

362
00:27:14.000 --> 00:27:18.720
only a pair of cuff buttons.
Rid of my provincial squeamishness. Forever,

363
00:27:19.599 --> 00:27:23.319
Gatsby's house was still empty when I
left. The grass on his lawn had

364
00:27:23.359 --> 00:27:27.079
grown as long as mine. One
of the taxi drivers in the village never

365
00:27:27.119 --> 00:27:32.960
took a fare past the entrance gate
without stopping for a minute and pointing inside.

366
00:27:33.480 --> 00:27:36.640
Perhaps it was he who drove Daisy
and Gaspy over to East Egg the

367
00:27:36.759 --> 00:27:40.480
night of the accident, and perhaps
he hadn't made a story about it all

368
00:27:40.519 --> 00:27:44.119
his own. I didn't want to
hear it, and I avoided him when

369
00:27:44.119 --> 00:27:47.920
I got off the train. I
spent my Saturday nights in New York,

370
00:27:47.960 --> 00:27:52.759
because those gleaming, dazzling parties of
his were with me so vividly that I

371
00:27:52.799 --> 00:27:56.599
could still hear the music in the
laughter, faint and incessant from his garden,

372
00:27:56.880 --> 00:28:02.000
and the cars going up and down
his drive. One night, I

373
00:28:02.119 --> 00:28:06.400
did hear a material car there and
saw its lights stop at his front steps,

374
00:28:07.000 --> 00:28:11.400
but I didn't investigate. Probably it
was some final guest who had been

375
00:28:11.440 --> 00:28:14.720
away at the ends of the earth
and didn't know that the party was over.

376
00:28:15.920 --> 00:28:18.480
On the last night, with my
trunk packed and my car sold to

377
00:28:18.480 --> 00:28:22.559
the grocer, I went over and
looked at the huge, incoherent failure of

378
00:28:22.599 --> 00:28:27.960
a house once more. On the
white steps. An obscene word scrawled by

379
00:28:29.039 --> 00:28:33.359
some boy with a piece of brick
stood out clearly in the moonlight, and

380
00:28:33.480 --> 00:28:37.640
I erased it, drawing my shoe
raspingly along the stone. Then I wandered

381
00:28:37.680 --> 00:28:41.599
down to the beach and sprawled out
on the sand. Most of the big

382
00:28:41.640 --> 00:28:47.000
shore places were closed now, and
there were hardly any lights except the shadowy

383
00:28:47.079 --> 00:28:51.599
moving glow of a ferryboat across the
sound, and as the moon rose higher,

384
00:28:51.599 --> 00:28:56.200
the inessential houses began to melt away, until gradually I became aware of

385
00:28:56.240 --> 00:29:00.519
the old island here that flowered once
for Dutch Sailor's eye, a fresh green

386
00:29:00.759 --> 00:29:06.279
breast of the new world. Its
vanished trees, the trees that had made

387
00:29:06.279 --> 00:29:10.960
way for Gatsby's house had once pondered
in whispers to the last and greatest of

388
00:29:11.000 --> 00:29:15.799
all human dreams. For a transitory, enchanted moment, man must have held

389
00:29:15.839 --> 00:29:19.440
his breath in the presence of this
continent, Compelled into an esthetic contemplation.

390
00:29:19.720 --> 00:29:25.680
He neither understood nor desired, face
to face for the last time in history,

391
00:29:25.720 --> 00:29:30.839
with something commensurate to his capacity for
wonder. And as I sat there,

392
00:29:30.880 --> 00:29:34.960
brooding on the old unknown world,
I thought of Gatsby's wonder when he

393
00:29:36.000 --> 00:29:40.359
first picked out the green light at
the end of Daisy's dock. He had

394
00:29:40.400 --> 00:29:42.920
come a long way to this blue
lawn, and his dream must have seemed

395
00:29:42.960 --> 00:29:47.920
so close that he could hardly fail
to grasp it. He did not know

396
00:29:48.039 --> 00:29:52.440
that it was already behind him,
somewhere back in that vast obscurity beyond the

397
00:29:52.480 --> 00:29:56.319
city, where the dark fields of
the Republic rolled on under the night.

398
00:29:56.279 --> 00:30:00.759
Gatsby believed in the green light the
orgas stick future, that year by year

399
00:30:00.839 --> 00:30:07.480
recedes before us. It eluded us
then, but that's no matter. Tomorrow

400
00:30:07.519 --> 00:30:11.319
we will run faster, stretch out
our arms further, and one fine morning

401
00:30:12.720 --> 00:30:18.880
so we beat on boats against the
current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

402
00:30:21.200 --> 00:30:25.880
End of Chapter nine, End of
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald