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Chapter one of the Great Gatsby.
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

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Once again, tis Zelda, Then
where the gold hat? If that

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will move her? If you can
bounce high, bounce for her too,

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till she cry, lover, gold
hatted, high bouncing lover, I must

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have you, Thomas Parke d'anvilliers,
chapter one. In my younger and more

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vulnerable years, my father gave me
some advice that I've been turning over in

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my mind ever since. Whenever you
feel like criticizing anyone, he told me,

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just remember that all the people in
this world haven't had the advantages that

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you've had. He didn't say any
more, but we've always been unusually communicative

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in a reserved way, and I
understood that he meant a great deal more

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than that. In consequence, I'm
inclined to reserve all judgments, a habit

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that has opened up many curious natures
to me and also made me the victim

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of not a few veteran bores.
The abnormal mind is quick to detect and

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attach itself to this quality when it
appears in a normal person, and so

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it came about that in college I
was unjustly accused of being a politician.

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Because I was privy to the secret
griefs of wild, unknown men. Most

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of the confidences were unsought. Frequently
I have feigned sleep, preoccupation or a

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hostile levity when I realized by some
unmistakable sign that an intimate revelation was quivering

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on the horizon. For the intimate
revelations of young men, or at least

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the terms in which they expressed them, are usually plagiaristic and marred by obvious

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suppressions. Reserving judgments is a matter
of infinite hope. I am still a

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little afraid of missing something if I
forget that, as my father snobbishly suggested,

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and I snobbishly repeat, a sense
of the fundamental decencies is parceled out

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unequally at birth. And after boasting
this way of my tolerance, I come

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to the admission that it has a
limit. Conduct may be founded on the

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hard rock or the wet marshes,
but after a certain point I don't care

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what it's founded on. When I
came back from the East last autumn,

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I felt that I wanted the world
to be in uniform and at a sort

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of moral attention forever. I wanted
no more riotous excursions with privileged glimpses into

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the human heart. Only Gatsby,
the man who gives his name to this

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book, was exempt from my reaction. Gatsby, who represented everything for which

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I have an unaffected scorn. If
personality is an unbroken series of successful gestures,

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then there was something gorgeous about him, some heightened sensitivity to the promises

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of life, as if he were
related to one of those intricate machines that

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register earthquakes ten thousand miles away.
This responsiveness had nothing to do with that

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flabby impressionability which is dignified under the
name of the creative temperament. It was

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an extraordinary gift for hope or romantic
readiness, such as I have never found

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in any other person, and which
it is not likely I shall ever find

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again. No Gatsby turned out all
right at the end. It is what

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preyed on Gatsby, what foul dust
floated in the wake of his dreams,

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that temporarily closed out my interest in
the abortive sorrows and short winded elations of

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men. My family have been prominent, well to do people in this middlewestern

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city for three generations. The carraways
are something of a clan, and we

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have a tradition that we're descended from
the Dukes of Bucclu. But the actual

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founder of my line was my grandfather's
brother, who came here in fifty one,

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sent us substitute to the Civil War, and started the wholesale hardware business

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that my father carries on today.
I never saw this great uncle, but

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I'm supposed to look like him,
with special reference to the rather hard boiled

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painting that hangs in father's office.
I graduated from Newhaven in nineteen fifteen,

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just a quarter of a century after
my father, and a little later I

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participated in that delayed Teutonic migration known
as the Great War. I enjoyed the

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counter raid so thoroughly that I came
back restless. Instead of being the warm

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center of the world, the Middle
West now seemed like a ragged edge of

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the universe. So I decided to
go east and learned the bond business.

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Everybody I knew was in the bond
business, so I supposed it could support

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one more single man. All my
aunts and uncles talked it over as if

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they were choosing a prep school for
me, and finally said, why yes,

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with very grave hesitant faces father agreed
to finance me for a year,

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and after various delays, I came
east permanently. I thought in the spring

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of twenty two the practical thing was
to find rooms in the city. But

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it was a warm season, and
I had just left a country of wide

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lawns and friendly trees. So when
a young man at the office suggested that

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we take a house together in a
commuting town, it sounded like a great

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idea. He found the house,
a weather beaten cardboard bungalow at eighty a

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month, but at the last minute
the firm ordered him to Washington, and

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I went out to the country alone. I had a dog, at least

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I had him for a few days
until he ran away, and an old

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dodge, and a finishwoman who made
my bed and cooked breakfast and muttered Finnish

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wisdom to herself over the electric stove. It was lonely for a day or

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so until one morning some man more
recently arrived than I stopped me on the

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road. How do you get to
West Egg Village, he asked, helplessly.

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I told him, And as I
walked on, I was lonely.

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No longer. I was a guide, a pathfinder, an original settler.

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He had casually conferred on me the
freedom of the neighborhood. And so with

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the sunshine and the great bursts of
leaves growing on the trees, just as

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things grow in fast movies, I
had that familiar conviction that life was beginning

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over again with the summer. There
was so much to read, for one

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thing, and so much fine health
to be pulled down out of the young,

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breath giving air. I bought a
dozen volumes on banking and credit and

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investment securities, and they stood on
my shelf and reading gold, like new

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money from the mint, promising to
unfold the shining secrets that only Midas and

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Morgan and messinists knew. And I
had the high intention of reading many other

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books. Besides, I was rather
literary in college. One year I wrote

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a series of very solemn and obvious
editorials for the Yale News. And now

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I was going to bring back all
such things into my life and become again

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that most limited of all specialists,
the well rounded man. This isn't just

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an epigram. Life is much more
successfully looked at from a single window.

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After all, it was a matter
of chance that I should have rented a

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house in one of the strangest communities
in North America. It was on that

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slender, riotous island, which extends
itself due east of New York, and

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where there are, among other natural
curiosities, two unusual formations of land twenty

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miles from the city. A pair
of enormous eggs, identical in contour and

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separated only by a courtesy bay,
jut out into the most domesticated body of

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salt water in the Western Hemisphere,
the great wet Barnyard of Long Island Sound.

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They are not perfect ovals, like
the egg in the Columbus story.

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They are both crushed flat at the
contact end, but their physical resemblance must

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be a source of perpetual wonder to
the gulls that fly overhead to the wingless.

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A more interesting phenomena is their dissimilarity
in every particular except shape and size.

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I lived at West Egg, the
well, the less fashionable of the

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two, though this is a most
superficial tag to express the bazaar, and

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not a little sinister contrast between them. My house was at the very tip

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of the Egg, only fifty yards
from the sound, and squeezed between two

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huge places that rented for twelve or
fifteen thousand a season. The one on

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my right was a colossal affair by
any standard. It was a factual imitation

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of some hotel de Ville in Normandy, with a tower on one side,

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spanking new under a thin beard of
raw ivy, and a marble swimming pool,

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and more than forty acres of lawn
and garden. It was Gatsby's mansion,

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or rather, as I didn't know
mister Gatsby, it was a mansion

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inhabited by a gentleman of that name. My own house was an eyesore,

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but it was a small eyesore,
and it had been overlooked. So I

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had a view of the water,
a partial view of my neighbor's lawn,

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and the consoling proximity of millionaires,
all for eighty dollars a month. Across

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the courtesy bay, the white palaces
of fashionable East Egg glittered along the water,

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and the history of the summer really
begins. On the evening I drove

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over there to have dinner with the
Tom Buchanans. Daisy was my second cousin,

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once removed, and I had known
Tom in college, and just after

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the war I spent two days with
them in Chicago, her husband, among

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various physical accomplishments, had been one
of the most powerful ends that ever played

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football at New Haven, a national
figure in a way, one of those

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men who reached such an acute limited
excellence at twenty one that everything afterwards savors

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of anti climax. His family were
enormously wealthy. Even in college, his

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freedom with money was a matter for
reproach. But now he'd left Chicago and

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come East in a fashion that rather
took your breath away. For instance,

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he'd brought down a string of polo
ponies from Lake Forest. It was hard

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to realize that a man in my
own generation was wealthy enough to do that.

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Why they came east, I don't
know. They had spent a year

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in France for no particular reason,
and then drifted here and there unrestfully,

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wherever people played polo and were rich
together. This was a permanent move,

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said Daisy over the telephone. But
I didn't believe it. I had no

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sight into Daisy's heart, but I
felt that Tom would drift on forever,

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seeking a little wistfully for that dramatic
turbulence of some irrecoverable football game. And

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so it happened that on a warm
windy evening, I drove over to East

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Egg to see two old friends whom
I scarcely knew at all. Their house

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was even more elaborate than I expected, a cheerful, red and white Georgian

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colonial mansion overlooking the bay. The
lawns started at the beach and ran towards

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the door for a quarter of a
mile, jumping over sun dials and brick

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walks and burning gardens. Finally,
when it reached the house, drifting up

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the side in bright vines, as
though from the momentum of its run.

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The front was broken by a line
of French windows, glowing now with reflected

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gold and wide open to the warm, windy afternoon. And Tom Buchanan,

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in riding clothes, was standing with
his legs apart on the front porch.

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He had changed since his new Haven
years. Now he was a sturdy,

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straw haired man of thirty, with
a rather hard mouth and a supercilious manner.

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Two shining, arrogant eyes had established
dominance over his face and gave him

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the appearance of always leaning aggressively forward. Not even the effeminate swank of his

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riding clothes could hide the enormous power
of that body. He seemed to fill

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those glistening boots until he strained the
top lacing, and you could see a

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great pack of muscle shifting when his
shoulder moved under the thin coat. It

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was a body capable of enormous leverage, a cruel body. His speaking voice,

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a gruff, husky tenor, added
to the impression of fractiousness. He

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conveyed. There was a touch of
paternal contempt in it, even toward people

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he liked, and there were men
in Newhaven who had hated his guts.

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Now, don't think my opinion on
these matters is final, he seemed to

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say, just because I'm stronger and
more of a man than you are.

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We were in the same senior society, and while we were never intimate,

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I always had the impression that he
had approved of me and wanted me to

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like him, with some harsh,
defiant wistfulness of his own. We talked

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for a few minutes on the sunny
porch. I've got a nice place here,

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he said, his eyes flashing about
restlessly. Turning me around by one

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arm, he moved a broad,
flat hand along the front vista, including

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in its sweep a sunken Italian garden, a half acre of deep, pungent

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roses, and a snub nosed motor
boat that bumped the tide off shore.

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It belonged to Domaine, the oil
man. He turned me around again,

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politely and abruptly. We'll go inside. He walked through a high hallway into

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a bright, rosy colored space,
fragilely bound into the house by French windows

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at either end. The windows were
ajar and gleaming white against the fresh grass

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outside that seemed to grow a little
way into the house. A breeze blew

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through the room, blew curtains in
at one end and out the other like

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pale flags, twisting them up toward
the frosted wedding cake of the ceiling,

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and then rippled over the wine colored
rug, making a shadow on it as

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wind does on the sea. The
only completely stationary object in the room was

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an enormous couch on which two young
women were buoyed up as though upon an

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anchored balloon. They were both in
white, and their dresses were rippling and

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fluttering, as if they had just
been blown back in. After a short

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flight around the house, I must
have stood for a few moments listening to

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the wisp and snap of the curtains, and the groan of a picture on

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the wall. Then there was a
boom as Tom Buchanan shut the rear windows,

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and the caught wind died out about
the room and the curtains and the

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rugs, and the two young women
ballooned slowly to the floor. The younger

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of the two was a stranger to
me. She was extended full length at

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her end of the divan, completely
motionless, and with her chin raised a

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little, as if she were balancing
something on it, which was quite likely

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to fall if she saw me out
of the corner of her eyes. She

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gave no hint of it. Indeed, I was almost surprised into murmuring an

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apology for having disturbed her by coming
in. The other girl, Daisy,

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made an attempt to rise. She
leaned slightly forward with a conscientious expression.

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Then she laughed an absurd, charming
little laugh, and I laughed too,

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and came forward into the room.
I'm pa paralyzed with happiness. She laughed

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again, as if she said something
very witty, and held my hand for

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a moment, looking up into my
face, promising that there was no one

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in the world she so much wanted
to see that was a way she had.

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She hinted in a murmur that the
surname of the balancing girl was Baker.

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I've heard it said that Daisy's murmur
was only to make people lean toward

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her, an irrelevant criticism that made
it no less charming at any rate.

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Miss Baker's lips fluttered. She nodded
at me, almost imperceptibly, and then

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quickly tipped her head back again.
The object she was balancing had obviously tottered

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a little and given her something of
a fright. Again, a sort of

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apology arose to my lips, almost
an exhibition of complete self sufficiency draws a

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stun tribute from me. I looked
back at my cousin, who began to

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ask me questions in her low,
thrilling voice. It was the kind of

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voice that the ear follows up and
down, as if each speech is an

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arrangement of that will never be played
again. Her face was sad and lovely,

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with bright things in it, bright
eyes and a bright, passionate mouth.

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But there was an excitement in her
voice that men who had cared for

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00:16:11.360 --> 00:16:18.440
her found difficult to forget, a
singing compulsion, a whispered listen I promise

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00:16:18.559 --> 00:16:22.440
that she had done gay exciting things
just a while since, and that there

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were gay exciting things hovering in the
next hour. I told her how I

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00:16:27.159 --> 00:16:30.879
had stopped off in Chicago for a
day on my way east, and how

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00:16:30.919 --> 00:16:34.639
a dozen people had sent their love
through me. Do they miss me?

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00:16:36.000 --> 00:16:40.720
She cried ecstatically. The whole town
is desolate. All the cars have left,

211
00:16:40.759 --> 00:16:45.080
rear wheel painted black as a morning
wreath, and there's a persistent whale

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00:16:45.159 --> 00:16:51.039
all night along the north shore.
How gorgeous. Let's go back tom tomorrow.

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00:16:51.759 --> 00:16:56.639
Then she added, irrelevantly. You
ought to see the baby, I'd

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00:16:56.679 --> 00:17:00.960
like to She's asleep. She's three
years old. Haven't you ever seen her?

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00:17:00.600 --> 00:17:06.119
Never? Well, you ought to
see her. She's Tom Buchanan,

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00:17:06.160 --> 00:17:10.160
who had been hovering restlessly about the
room, stopped and rested his hand on

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00:17:10.240 --> 00:17:15.240
my shoulder. What are you doing, Nick, I'm a bondman who with

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00:17:15.240 --> 00:17:21.279
I told him, never heard of
them, he remarked decisively. This annoyed

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00:17:21.319 --> 00:17:25.039
me. You will, I answered
shortly. You will if you stay in

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00:17:25.039 --> 00:17:27.759
the east. Oh, I stay
in the East. Don't you worry,

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00:17:27.880 --> 00:17:30.920
he said, glancing at Daisy and
then back at me, as if he

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00:17:30.920 --> 00:17:36.759
were alert for something more. I'd
be a goddamn fool to live anywhere else.

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00:17:37.640 --> 00:17:41.440
At this point, Miss Baker said
absolutely, with such sudden as that

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00:17:41.519 --> 00:17:45.279
I started. It was the first
word she had uttered since I came into

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00:17:45.319 --> 00:17:49.000
the room. Evidently it surprised her
as much as it did me, for

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00:17:49.119 --> 00:17:53.480
she yawned and with a series of
rapid, deft movements stood up into the

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room. I'm stiff, she complained. I've been lying on that sofa as

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00:18:00.240 --> 00:18:04.200
long as I can remember. Don't
look at me, Daisy retorted, I've

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00:18:04.200 --> 00:18:08.680
been trying to get you to New
York all afternoon. No thanks, said

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00:18:08.680 --> 00:18:14.400
Miss Baker to the four cocktails just
in front of the pantry. I'm absolutely

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00:18:14.440 --> 00:18:19.079
in training. Her host looked at
her incredulously. You are, He took

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00:18:19.119 --> 00:18:22.960
down his drink, as if it
were a drop in the bottom of glass.

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00:18:22.839 --> 00:18:26.960
How you ever get anything done is
beyond me. I looked at Miss

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00:18:27.039 --> 00:18:32.839
Baker, wondering what it was she
got done. I enjoyed looking at her.

235
00:18:33.039 --> 00:18:36.720
She was a slender, small breasted
girl with an erect carriage, which

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00:18:36.920 --> 00:18:41.319
she accentuated by throwing her body backward
at the shoulders like a young cadet.

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00:18:41.000 --> 00:18:45.720
Her gray sunstrained eyes looked back at
me with polite, reciprocal curiosity out of

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00:18:45.759 --> 00:18:51.519
a low, charming, discontented face. It occurred to me now that I

239
00:18:51.559 --> 00:18:56.079
had seen her, or a picture
of her somewhere before. You live in

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00:18:56.119 --> 00:19:00.359
the West, egg, she remarked, contemptuously. I know somebody there.

241
00:19:00.640 --> 00:19:06.960
I don't know a single You must
know Gatsby. Gatsby, demanded Daisy,

242
00:19:07.440 --> 00:19:11.640
what Gatsby? Before I could reply
that he was my neighbor, dinner was

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00:19:11.640 --> 00:19:17.079
announced, wedging his tense arm imperatively
under mine, Tom Buchanan compelled me from

244
00:19:17.079 --> 00:19:22.039
the room as though he were moving
a checker to another square, slenderly,

245
00:19:22.200 --> 00:19:26.799
languidly, their hands set lightly on
their hips, the two young women preceded

246
00:19:26.880 --> 00:19:32.160
us out onto the rosy colored porch
opened toward the sunset, where four candles

247
00:19:32.200 --> 00:19:37.480
flickered on the table in the diminished
wind. Why candles, objected Daisy,

248
00:19:37.599 --> 00:19:41.839
frowning, she snapped them out with
her fingers. In two weeks, it'll

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00:19:41.880 --> 00:19:45.640
be the longest day in the year, She looked at us all radiantly.

250
00:19:45.559 --> 00:19:48.720
Do you always watch for the longest
day of the year and then miss it?

251
00:19:49.519 --> 00:19:52.200
I always watch for the longest day
in the year, and then Miss

252
00:19:52.240 --> 00:19:56.759
it, we ought to plan something, yawned Miss Baker, sitting down at

253
00:19:56.759 --> 00:20:02.079
the table as if she were getting
into bed. All right, said Daisy,

254
00:20:02.319 --> 00:20:07.119
what'll we plan? She turned to
me helplessly, what do people plan?

255
00:20:07.920 --> 00:20:11.759
Before I could answer, her eyes
fastened with an odd expression on her

256
00:20:11.799 --> 00:20:17.440
little finger look. She complained,
I heard it. We all looked.

257
00:20:17.720 --> 00:20:21.480
The knuckle was black and blue.
You did it, Tom, she said,

258
00:20:21.480 --> 00:20:25.119
accusingly. I know you didn't mean
to, but you did do it.

259
00:20:25.599 --> 00:20:27.039
That's what I get for marrying a
brute of a man, a great,

260
00:20:27.039 --> 00:20:32.480
big, hulking physical specimen of a
I hate that word hulking, objected

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00:20:32.519 --> 00:20:38.759
Tom crossly. Even in kitting hulking, insisted Daisy. Sometimes she and Miss

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00:20:38.799 --> 00:20:44.519
Baker talked at once, unobtrusively and
with a bantering in consequence that was never

263
00:20:44.599 --> 00:20:48.319
quite chatter, that was as cool
as their white dresses and their impersonal eyes.

264
00:20:48.359 --> 00:20:52.480
In the absence of all desire.
They were here, and they accepted

265
00:20:52.519 --> 00:20:56.559
Tom and me making only a polite, pleasant effort to entertain or to be

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00:20:56.759 --> 00:21:02.160
entertained. They knew that presently dinner
would be over, and a little later

267
00:21:02.279 --> 00:21:06.759
the evening too would be over,
and casually put away. It was sharply

268
00:21:06.799 --> 00:21:11.319
different from the West, where an
evening was hurried from phase to phase toward

269
00:21:11.400 --> 00:21:17.200
its close in a continually disappointed anticipation, or else in sheer nervous dread of

270
00:21:17.240 --> 00:21:21.880
the moment itself. You make me
feel uncivilized, Daisy, I confessed,

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00:21:21.880 --> 00:21:26.759
on my second glass of corky but
rather impressive, Claret, Can you talk

272
00:21:26.799 --> 00:21:30.160
about crops or something? I meant
nothing in particular by this remark, but

273
00:21:30.200 --> 00:21:36.160
it was taken up in an unexpected
way. Civilization's going to pieces, broke

274
00:21:36.200 --> 00:21:40.759
out Tom violently. I've gotten to
be a terrible pessimist about things. Have

275
00:21:40.920 --> 00:21:45.799
you read The Rise of the Colored
Empires by this man Goddard? Why no,

276
00:21:45.160 --> 00:21:49.480
I answered, rather surprised by his
tone. Well, it's a fine

277
00:21:49.559 --> 00:21:53.119
book, and everybody ought to read
it. The idea is, if we

278
00:21:53.200 --> 00:21:59.920
don't look out, the white race
will be utterly submerged. It's all signed

279
00:22:00.000 --> 00:22:04.519
typic stuff. It's been proved.
Tom's getting very profound, said Daisy,

280
00:22:04.559 --> 00:22:10.839
with an expression of unthoughtful sadness.
He reads deep books with long words in

281
00:22:10.880 --> 00:22:15.480
them. What was that word?
We will? These books are all scientific,

282
00:22:15.599 --> 00:22:19.359
insisted Tom, glancing at her impatiently. This fellow has worked out the

283
00:22:19.400 --> 00:22:22.640
whole thing. It's up to us, who are the dominant race, to

284
00:22:22.720 --> 00:22:27.079
watch out, or these other races
will have control of things. We've got

285
00:22:27.119 --> 00:22:33.480
to beat them down, whispered Daisy, winking ferociously toward the fervent sun.

286
00:22:33.319 --> 00:22:37.519
You ought to live in California,
began Miss Baker, but Tom interrupted her

287
00:22:37.559 --> 00:22:42.599
by shifting heavily in his chair.
This idea is that were Nordics. I

288
00:22:42.680 --> 00:22:48.400
am, and you are, and
you are. And after an infinitesimal hesitation,

289
00:22:48.720 --> 00:22:52.680
he included Daisy with a slight nod, and she winked at me again.

290
00:22:52.359 --> 00:22:57.359
And we've produced all the things that
go to make civilization old, science

291
00:22:57.400 --> 00:23:02.400
and art and all that. Do
you see? There was something pathetic in

292
00:23:02.440 --> 00:23:07.200
his concentration, as if his complacency, more acute than of old, was

293
00:23:07.279 --> 00:23:11.400
not enough to him anymore. When
almost immediately the telephone rang inside and the

294
00:23:11.440 --> 00:23:17.559
butler left the porch, Daisy seized
upon the momentary interruption and leaned towards me.

295
00:23:18.240 --> 00:23:22.960
I'll tell you a little family's secret, she whispered, enthusiastically. It's

296
00:23:22.000 --> 00:23:26.480
about the butler's nose. Do you
want to hear about the butler's nose.

297
00:23:26.359 --> 00:23:30.799
Well, that's why I came over
tonight. Well, he wasn't always a

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00:23:30.839 --> 00:23:34.559
butler. He used to be the
silver polisher for some people in New York

299
00:23:34.599 --> 00:23:38.759
that had a silver service for two
hundred people. He had to polish it

300
00:23:38.799 --> 00:23:44.559
from morning till night, until finally
it began to affect his nose. Things

301
00:23:44.599 --> 00:23:48.200
went from bad to worse, suggested
Miss Baker. Yes, things went from

302
00:23:48.240 --> 00:23:53.400
bad to worse until finally he had
to give up his position for a moment.

303
00:23:53.640 --> 00:23:59.319
The last sunshine fell with a romantic
affection upon her glowing face. Her

304
00:23:59.400 --> 00:24:03.799
voice held me forward breathlessly as I
listened. Then the glow faded, each

305
00:24:03.920 --> 00:24:08.799
light, deserting her with a lingering
regret, like children leaving a pleasant street.

306
00:24:08.839 --> 00:24:14.519
At dusk, the butler came back
and murmured something close to Tom's ear,

307
00:24:14.880 --> 00:24:18.880
whereupon Tom frowned, pushed back his
chair, and without a word,

308
00:24:18.000 --> 00:24:23.440
went inside. As if his absence
quickened something within her, Daisy leaned forward

309
00:24:23.480 --> 00:24:29.039
again, her voice glowing and singing, I love to see you at my

310
00:24:29.160 --> 00:24:33.200
table. Nick, you remind me
of a rose, an absolute rose,

311
00:24:33.440 --> 00:24:38.200
doesn't he? She turned to Miss
Baker for confirmation, an absolute rose.

312
00:24:40.319 --> 00:24:44.480
This was untrue. I'm not even
faintly like a rose. She was only

313
00:24:44.519 --> 00:24:48.000
extemporizing, but a stirring warmth flowed
from her, as if her heart was

314
00:24:48.079 --> 00:24:52.799
trying to come out to you,
concealed in one of those breathless, thrilling

315
00:24:52.880 --> 00:24:56.920
words. Then suddenly she threw her
napkin on the table and excused herself and

316
00:24:57.119 --> 00:25:03.079
went into the house. Miss and
I exchanged a short glance, consciously devoid

317
00:25:03.119 --> 00:25:06.759
of meaning. I was about to
speak, when she sat up alertly and

318
00:25:06.839 --> 00:25:11.359
said shi in a warning voice.
A subdued, impassioned murmur was audible in

319
00:25:11.359 --> 00:25:15.640
the room beyond, and Miss Baker
leaned forward, unashamed, trying to hear

320
00:25:17.480 --> 00:25:22.160
the murmur, trembled on the verge
of coherence, sank down, mounted excitedly,

321
00:25:22.359 --> 00:25:26.519
and then ceased altogether. Now this, mister Gadsby, you spoke of

322
00:25:26.559 --> 00:25:30.319
as my neighbor. I began,
don't talk. I want to hear what

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00:25:30.400 --> 00:25:34.400
happens. Is something happening? I
inquired, innocently. You mean to say

324
00:25:34.440 --> 00:25:40.119
you don't know, said Miss Baker, honestly, surprised. I thought everybody

325
00:25:40.200 --> 00:25:45.960
knew. I don't why, she
said hesitantly, Tom's got some woman in

326
00:25:45.039 --> 00:25:52.319
New York got some woman, I
repeated blankly. Miss Baker nodded she might

327
00:25:52.400 --> 00:25:55.559
have the decency not to telephone him
at dinner time, don't you think.

328
00:25:56.359 --> 00:26:00.000
Almost before I had grasped her meaning, there was the flutter of a dress

329
00:26:00.279 --> 00:26:03.519
and the crunch of leather boots,
and Tom and Daisy were back at the

330
00:26:03.559 --> 00:26:07.799
table. It couldn't be helped,
cried Daisy, with tense gaiety. She

331
00:26:07.920 --> 00:26:12.240
sat down, glanced searchingly at Miss
Baker and then at me, and continued.

332
00:26:12.839 --> 00:26:17.880
I looked outdoors for a minute,
and it's very romantic outdoors. There's

333
00:26:17.880 --> 00:26:19.839
a bird on the lawn that I
think must be a nightingale. Come over

334
00:26:19.920 --> 00:26:25.680
on the Cunard or White Star line. He's singing away. Her voice sang.

335
00:26:26.240 --> 00:26:30.640
It's romantic, isn't it. Tom, Very romantic, he said,

336
00:26:30.880 --> 00:26:34.200
and then miserably to me, If
it's light enough after dinner, I want

337
00:26:34.200 --> 00:26:38.839
to take you down to the stables. The telephone rang inside, startlingly,

338
00:26:40.079 --> 00:26:42.839
and as Daisy shook her head decisively
at Tom, the subject of the stables,

339
00:26:44.000 --> 00:26:48.759
in fact, all subjects, vanished
into air. Among the broken fragments

340
00:26:48.799 --> 00:26:52.440
of the last five minutes at table, I remember the candles being lit again,

341
00:26:52.680 --> 00:26:56.240
pointlessly and I was conscious of wanting
to look squarely at everyone and yet

342
00:26:56.279 --> 00:27:02.519
to avoid all eyes. Couldn't guess
what Tom and Daisy were thinking. But

343
00:27:02.599 --> 00:27:06.599
I doubt if even Miss Baker,
who seemed to have mastered a certain hearty

344
00:27:06.680 --> 00:27:11.839
skepticism, was able to utterly put
this fifth guest's shrill, metallic urgency out

345
00:27:11.880 --> 00:27:17.039
of mind. To a certain temperament, the situation might have seemed intriguing.

346
00:27:17.759 --> 00:27:22.160
My own instinct was to telephone immediately
for the police. The horses, needless

347
00:27:22.200 --> 00:27:26.039
to say, were not mentioned again. Tom and Miss Baker, with several

348
00:27:26.079 --> 00:27:30.079
feet of twilight between them, strolled
back into the library as if to a

349
00:27:30.200 --> 00:27:36.400
vigil, beside a perfectly tangible body, while trying to look pleasantly interested in

350
00:27:36.440 --> 00:27:40.920
a little deaf I followed Daisy around
a chain of connecting verandas to the porch

351
00:27:40.960 --> 00:27:45.000
in front, in its deep gloom, we sat down side by side on

352
00:27:45.039 --> 00:27:48.400
a wicker settee. Daisy took her
face in her hands, as if feeling

353
00:27:48.400 --> 00:27:52.880
its lovely shape, and her eyes
moved gradually out to the velvet dusk.

354
00:27:53.599 --> 00:27:57.759
I saw that turbulent emotions possessed her, so I asked what I thought would

355
00:27:57.759 --> 00:28:03.039
be some sedative question about her a
little girl. We don't know each other

356
00:28:03.160 --> 00:28:06.599
very well, Nick, she said
suddenly, even if we are cousins,

357
00:28:06.839 --> 00:28:10.960
you didn't come to my wedding.
I wasn't back from the war. That's

358
00:28:11.079 --> 00:28:15.119
true, she hesitated. Well,
I've had a very bad time, Nick,

359
00:28:15.359 --> 00:28:18.519
and I'm pretty cynical about everything.
Evidently she had reason to be.

360
00:28:19.000 --> 00:28:22.400
I waited, but she didn't say
anymore, and after a moment I returned

361
00:28:22.480 --> 00:28:27.200
rather feebly to the subject of her
daughter. I suppose she talks and eats

362
00:28:27.240 --> 00:28:33.119
and everything. Oh yes, she
looked at me absently. Listen, Nick,

363
00:28:33.480 --> 00:28:36.039
let me tell you what I said
when she was born. Would you

364
00:28:36.079 --> 00:28:41.039
like to hear very much? It'll
show you I've gotten to feel about things.

365
00:28:41.079 --> 00:28:45.039
Well, she was less than an
hour old, and Tom was god

366
00:28:45.039 --> 00:28:48.359
knows where. I woke up out
of the ether with an utterly abandoned feeling

367
00:28:48.880 --> 00:28:52.599
and asked the nurse right away if
it was a boy or a girl.

368
00:28:52.200 --> 00:28:56.559
She told me it was a girl, and so I turned my head away

369
00:28:56.559 --> 00:29:00.839
and wept. All right. I
said, I'm glad it's a girl,

370
00:29:00.039 --> 00:29:03.200
and I hope she'll be a fool. That's the best thing a girl can

371
00:29:03.240 --> 00:29:07.960
be in this world, A beautiful
little fool. You see. I think

372
00:29:08.000 --> 00:29:14.200
everything's terrible anyhow, she went on, in a convinced way. Everybody thinks,

373
00:29:14.200 --> 00:29:18.880
so, the most advanced people.
And I know I've been everywhere and

374
00:29:18.960 --> 00:29:22.680
seeing everything and done everything. Her
eyes flashed around her in a defiant way,

375
00:29:23.039 --> 00:29:30.160
rather like Tom's, and she laughed
with thrilling scorn. Sophisticated. God,

376
00:29:30.319 --> 00:29:34.400
I'm sophisticated. The instant her voice
broke off, ceasing to compel my

377
00:29:34.480 --> 00:29:40.160
attention, my belief. I felt
the basic insincerity of what she had said.

378
00:29:40.880 --> 00:29:44.200
It made me uneasy, as though
the whole evening had been a trick

379
00:29:44.240 --> 00:29:48.880
of some sort to exact a contributory
emotion from me. I waited, and

380
00:29:48.039 --> 00:29:52.000
sure enough, in a moment,
she looked at me with an absolute smirk

381
00:29:52.039 --> 00:29:56.720
on her lovely face, as if
she had asserted her membership in a rather

382
00:29:56.839 --> 00:30:03.480
distinguished secret society to which she and
Tom belong. Inside the Crimson room bloomed

383
00:30:03.480 --> 00:30:06.920
with light. Tom and Miss Baker
sat at either end of the long couch,

384
00:30:06.920 --> 00:30:10.640
and she read aloud to him from
the Saturday Evening Post, the words

385
00:30:10.720 --> 00:30:15.400
murmurous and uninflected running together in a
soothing tune. The lamplight, bright on

386
00:30:15.480 --> 00:30:19.559
his boots and dull on the autumn
leaf. Yellow of her hair glinted along

387
00:30:19.640 --> 00:30:23.039
the paper as she turned the page
with a flutter of slender muscles in her

388
00:30:23.160 --> 00:30:26.839
arms. When we came in,
she held as silent for a moment,

389
00:30:26.839 --> 00:30:32.920
with a lifted hand. To be
continued, she said, tossing the magazine

390
00:30:32.960 --> 00:30:37.400
on the table in our very next
issue. Her body asserted itself with a

391
00:30:37.519 --> 00:30:41.920
restless movement of her knee, and
she stood up. Ten o'clock, she

392
00:30:42.039 --> 00:30:47.000
remarked, apparently finding the time on
the ceiling. Time for this good girl

393
00:30:47.079 --> 00:30:51.160
to go to bed. Jordan's going
to play in the tournament tomorrow, explained

394
00:30:51.200 --> 00:30:57.079
Daisy over at Westchester, Oh,
your Jordan Baker. I knew now why

395
00:30:57.160 --> 00:31:02.799
her face was familiar. It's pleasing, contemptuous expression had looked out at me

396
00:31:02.880 --> 00:31:07.559
for many a rhodogravier pictures of the
sporting life at Asheville and Hot Springs and

397
00:31:07.680 --> 00:31:11.319
Palm Beach. I had heard some
story of her, too, a critical,

398
00:31:11.400 --> 00:31:15.079
unpleasant story, but what it was
I had forgotten long ago. Good

399
00:31:15.200 --> 00:31:18.400
Night, she said, softly,
wake me at eight, won't you?

400
00:31:19.039 --> 00:31:22.640
If you'll get up, I will. Good Night, mister caraway see you

401
00:31:22.680 --> 00:31:27.279
Anon. Of course you will,
confirmed Daisy. In fact, I think

402
00:31:27.279 --> 00:31:30.359
I'll arrange a marriage. Come over
often, Nick, and I'll sort of

403
00:31:30.599 --> 00:31:36.119
oh fling you together, you know, lock you up accidentally in linen closets

404
00:31:36.119 --> 00:31:38.000
and push you out to sea in
a boat and all that sort of thing.

405
00:31:40.039 --> 00:31:44.039
Good night, called miss Baker from
the stairs. I haven't heard a

406
00:31:44.039 --> 00:31:48.799
word. She's a nice girl,
said Tom, after a moment. They

407
00:31:48.839 --> 00:31:52.559
oughtn't to let her run around the
country this way? Who oughtn't to,

408
00:31:52.920 --> 00:31:57.359
inquired Daisy coldly. Her family?
Her family is one aunt about a thousand

409
00:31:57.480 --> 00:32:00.599
years old. Besides, Nick's going
to look after her, aren't you,

410
00:32:00.720 --> 00:32:05.359
Nick. She's going to spend lots
of weekends out here this summer. I

411
00:32:05.400 --> 00:32:08.400
think the home influence will be very
good for her. Daisy and Tom looked

412
00:32:08.400 --> 00:32:12.960
at each other for a moment in
silence. Is she from New York,

413
00:32:13.079 --> 00:32:17.119
i asked quickly. From Louisville?
Our white girlhood was passed together there,

414
00:32:17.119 --> 00:32:21.680
our beautiful white Did you give Nick
a little heart to heart talk on the

415
00:32:21.799 --> 00:32:24.920
Verandah, demanded Tom. Suddenly,
did I? She looked at me.

416
00:32:25.720 --> 00:32:30.599
I can't seem to remember, but
I think we talked about the Nordic race.

417
00:32:30.960 --> 00:32:32.759
Yes, I'm sure we did.
It sort of crept up on us.

418
00:32:32.759 --> 00:32:36.480
And the first thing, you know, don't believe everything you hear,

419
00:32:36.599 --> 00:32:39.440
Nick, he advised me. I
said lightly that I had heard nothing at

420
00:32:39.440 --> 00:32:43.799
all, and a few minutes later
I got up to go home. They

421
00:32:43.799 --> 00:32:46.319
came to the door with me and
stood side by side in a cheerful square

422
00:32:46.319 --> 00:32:52.480
of light. As I started my
motor, Daisy peremptorily called wait, I

423
00:32:52.559 --> 00:32:54.960
forgot to ask you something, and
it's important. We heard you were engaged

424
00:32:54.960 --> 00:33:00.279
to a girl out west. That's
right, corroborated Tom. We heard that

425
00:33:00.359 --> 00:33:06.319
you were engaged. It's a libel. I'm too poor, but we heard

426
00:33:06.359 --> 00:33:09.200
it, insisted Daisy, surprising me
by opening up again in a flower like

427
00:33:09.400 --> 00:33:13.799
way. We heard it from three
people, so it must be true.

428
00:33:14.480 --> 00:33:16.880
Of course I knew what they were
referring to, but I wasn't even vaguely

429
00:33:16.920 --> 00:33:22.000
engaged. The fact that Gossip had
published the bands was one of the reasons

430
00:33:22.039 --> 00:33:24.720
I had come east. You can't
stop going with an old friend on account

431
00:33:24.759 --> 00:33:29.799
of rumors. And on the other
hand, I had no intention of being

432
00:33:29.880 --> 00:33:35.359
rumored into marriage. Their interest rather
touched me and made them less remotely rich.

433
00:33:36.119 --> 00:33:38.920
Nevertheless, I was confused and a
little disgusted as I drove away.

434
00:33:39.559 --> 00:33:43.680
It seemed to me that the thing
for Daisy to do was to rush out

435
00:33:43.720 --> 00:33:46.920
of the house child in arms,
But apparently there were no such intentions in

436
00:33:46.920 --> 00:33:52.240
her head. As for Tom,
the fact that he had some woman in

437
00:33:52.279 --> 00:33:55.599
New York was really less surprising than
that he had been depressed by a book.

438
00:33:57.279 --> 00:34:00.319
Something was making him nibble at the
edge of stale, I'd he is,

439
00:34:00.599 --> 00:34:06.400
as if his sturdy physical egotism no
longer nourished his peremptory heart. Already

440
00:34:06.400 --> 00:34:09.719
it was deep summer on road house
roofs and in front of wayside garages,

441
00:34:10.000 --> 00:34:14.840
where new red petrol pumps sat out
in pools of light. And when I

442
00:34:14.880 --> 00:34:17.519
reached my estate at West Egg,
I ran the car under its shed and

443
00:34:17.639 --> 00:34:22.119
sat for a while on an abandoned
grass roller in the yard. The wind

444
00:34:22.159 --> 00:34:27.000
had blown off, leaving a loud, bright night, with wings beating in

445
00:34:27.039 --> 00:34:30.679
the trees and a persistent organ sound
as the full bellows of the earth blew

446
00:34:30.719 --> 00:34:36.519
the frogs full of life. The
silhouette of a moving cat wavered across the

447
00:34:36.559 --> 00:34:39.280
moonlight, and turning my head to
watch it, I saw that I was

448
00:34:39.320 --> 00:34:44.800
not alone. Fifty feet away,
a figure had emerged from the shadow of

449
00:34:44.880 --> 00:34:49.920
my neighbor's mansion and was standing with
his hands in his pockets regarding the silver

450
00:34:50.039 --> 00:34:54.639
pepper of the stars. Something in
his leisurely movements and the secure position of

451
00:34:54.679 --> 00:35:00.360
his feet upon the lawn suggested that
it was mister Gatsby himself, come out

452
00:35:00.360 --> 00:35:05.280
to determine what share was his of
our local heavens. I decided to call

453
00:35:05.360 --> 00:35:07.719
to him. Miss Baker had mentioned
him at dinner, and that would do

454
00:35:07.840 --> 00:35:12.840
for an introduction. But I didn't
call for him, for he gave a

455
00:35:12.920 --> 00:35:16.639
sudden intimation that he was content to
be alone. He stretched out his arms

456
00:35:16.679 --> 00:35:22.079
toward the dark water in a curious
way, and far as I was from

457
00:35:22.159 --> 00:35:28.199
him, I could have sworn he
was trembling involuntarily. I glanced seaward and

458
00:35:28.280 --> 00:35:32.280
distinguished nothing except a single green light, minute and far away that might have

459
00:35:32.320 --> 00:35:37.119
been the end of a dock.
When I looked once more for Gatsby,

460
00:35:37.480 --> 00:35:43.559
he had vanished, and I was
alone again in the unquiet darkness. End

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00:35:43.599 --> 00:35:45.199
of Chapter one