【有声英语文学名著】了不起的盖茨比 第7章（1）

 The Great Gatsby

by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Chapter 7 - Part 1
 
  It was when curiosity about Gatsby was at its highest that the lights in his house failed to go on one Saturday night—and, as obscurely as it had begun, his career as Trimalchio was over. Only gradually did I become aware that the automobiles 1 which turned expectantly into his drive stayed for just a minute and then drove sulkily away. Wondering if he were sick I went over to find out—an unfamiliar 2 butler with a villainous face squinted 3 at me suspiciously from the door.
“Is Mr. Gatsby sick?”
“Nope.” After a pause he added “sir.” in a dilatory 4, grudging 5 way.
“I hadn’t seen him around, and I was rather worried. Tell him Mr. Carraway came over.”
“Who?” he demanded rudely.
“Carraway.”
“Carraway. All right, I’ll tell him.” Abruptly 6 he slammed the door.
My Finn informed me that Gatsby had dismissed every servant in his house a week ago and replaced them with half a dozen others, who never went into West Egg Village to be bribed 7 by the tradesmen, but ordered moderate supplies over the telephone. The grocery boy reported that the kitchen looked like a pigsty 8, and the general opinion in the village was that the new people weren’t servants at all.
Next day Gatsby called me on the phone.
“Going away?” I inquired.
“No, old sport.”
“I hear you fired all your servants.”
“I wanted somebody who wouldn’t gossip. Daisy comes over quite often—in the afternoons.”
So the whole caravansary had fallen in like a card house at the disapproval 9 in her eyes.
“They’re some people Wolfsheim wanted to do something for. They’re all brothers and sisters. They used to run a small hotel.”
“I see.”
He was calling up at Daisy’s request—would I come to lunch at her house to-morrow? Miss Baker 10 would be there. Half an hour later Daisy herself telephoned and seemed relieved to find that I was coming. Something was up. And yet I couldn’t believe that they would choose this occasion for a scene—especially for the rather harrowing scene that Gatsby had outlined in the garden.
The next day was broiling 11, almost the last, certainly the warmest, of the summer. As my train emerged from the tunnel into sunlight, only the hot whistles of the National Biscuit Company broke the simmering hush 12 at noon. The straw seats of the car hovered 13 on the edge of combustion 14; the woman next to me perspired 15 delicately for a while into her white shirtwaist, and then, as her newspaper dampened under her fingers, lapsed 16 despairingly into deep heat with a desolate 17 cry. Her pocket-book slapped to the floor.
“Oh, my!” she gasped 18.
I picked it up with a weary bend and handed it back to her, holding it at arm’s length and by the extreme tip of the corners to indicate that I had no designs upon it—but every one near by, including the woman, suspected me just the same.
“Hot!” said the conductor to familiar faces. “Some weather! hot! hot! hot! Is it hot enough for you? Is it hot? Is it . . . ?”
My commutation ticket came back to me with a dark stain from his hand. That any one should care in this heat whose flushed lips he kissed, whose head made damp the pajama pocket over his heart!
. . . Through the hall of the Buchanans’ house blew a faint wind, carrying the sound of the telephone bell out to Gatsby and me as we waited at the door.
“The master’s body!” roared the butler into the mouthpiece. “I’m sorry, madame, but we can’t furnish it—it’s far too hot to touch this noon!”
What he really said was: “Yes . . . yes . . . I’ll see.”
He set down the receiver and came toward us, glistening 19 slightly, to take our stiff straw hats.
“Madame expects you in the salon 20!” he cried, needlessly indicating the direction. In this heat every extra gesture was an affront 21 to the common store of life.
The room, shadowed well with awnings 22, was dark and cool. Daisy and Jordan lay upon an enormous couch, like silver idols 23 weighing down their own white dresses against the singing breeze of the fans.
“We can’t move,” they said together.
Jordan’s fingers, powdered white over their tan, rested for a moment in mine.
“And Mr. Thomas Buchanan, the athlete?” I inquired.
Simultaneously 24 I heard his voice, gruff, muffled 25, husky, at the hall telephone.
Gatsby stood in the centre of the crimson 26 carpet and gazed around with fascinated eyes. Daisy watched him and laughed, her sweet, exciting laugh; a tiny gust 27 of powder rose from her bosom 28 into the air.
“The rumor 29 is,” whispered Jordan, “that that’s Tom’s girl on the telephone.”
We were silent. The voice in the hall rose high with annoyance 30: “Very well, then, I won’t sell you the car at all. . . . I’m under no obligations to you at all . . . and as for your bothering me about it at lunch time, I won’t stand that at all!”
“Holding down the receiver,” said Daisy cynically 31.
“No, he’s not,” I assured her. “It’s a bona-fide deal. I happen to know about it.”
Tom flung open the door, blocked out its space for a moment with his thick body, and hurried into the room.
“Mr. Gatsby!” He put out his broad, flat hand with well-concealed dislike. “I’m glad to see you, sir. . . . Nick. . . .”
“Make us a cold drink,” cried Daisy.
As he left the room again she got up and went over to Gatsby and pulled his face down, kissing him on the mouth.
“You know I love you,” she murmured.
“You forget there’s a lady present,” said Jordan.
Daisy looked around doubtfully.
“You kiss Nick too.”
“What a low, vulgar girl!”
“I don’t care!” cried Daisy, and began to clog 32 on the brick fireplace. Then she remembered the heat and sat down guiltily on the couch just as a freshly laundered 33 nurse leading a little girl came into the room.
“Bles-sed pre-cious,” she crooned, holding out her arms. “Come to your own mother that loves you.”
The child, relinquished 34 by the nurse, rushed across the room and rooted shyly into her mother’s dress.
“The bles-sed pre-cious! Did mother get powder on your old yellowy hair? Stand up now, and say—How-de-do.”
Gatsby and I in turn leaned down and took the small, reluctant hand. Afterward 35 he kept looking at the child with surprise. I don’t think he had ever really believed in its existence before.
“I got dressed before luncheon 36,” said the child, turning eagerly to Daisy.
“That’s because your mother wanted to show you off.” Her face bent 37 into the single wrinkle of the small, white neck. “You dream, you. You absolute little dream.”
“Yes,” admitted the child calmly. “Aunt Jordan’s got on a white dress too.”
“How do you like mother’s friends?” Daisy turned her around so that she faced Gatsby. “Do you think they’re pretty?”
“Where’s Daddy?”
“She doesn’t look like her father,” explained Daisy. “She looks like me. She’s got my hair and shape of the face.”
Daisy sat back upon the couch. The nurse took a step forward and held out her hand.
“Come, Pammy.”
“Good-by, sweetheart!”
With a reluctant backward glance the well-disciplined child held to her nurse’s hand and was pulled out the door, just as Tom came back, preceding four gin rickeys that clicked full of ice.
Gatsby took up his drink.
“They certainly look cool,” he said, with visible tension.
We drank in long, greedy swallows.
“I read somewhere that the sun’s getting hotter every year,” said Tom genially 38. “It seems that pretty soon the earth’s going to fall into the sun—or wait a minute—it’s just the opposite—the sun’s getting colder every year.
“Come outside,” he suggested to Gatsby, “I’d like you to have a look at the place.”
I went with them out to the veranda 39. On the green Sound, stagnant 40 in the heat, one small sail crawled slowly toward the fresher sea. Gatsby’s eyes followed it momentarily; he raised his hand and pointed 41 across the bay.
“I’m right across from you.”
“So you are.”
Our eyes lifted over the rose-beds and the hot lawn and the weedy refuse of the dog-days along-shore. Slowly the white wings of the boat moved against the blue cool limit of the sky. Ahead lay the scalloped ocean and the abounding 42 blessed isles 43.
“There’s sport for you,” said Tom, nodding. “I’d like to be out there with him for about an hour.”
We had luncheon in the dining-room, darkened too against the heat, and drank down nervous gayety with the cold ale.
“What’ll we do with ourselves this afternoon?” cried Daisy, “and the day after that, and the next thirty years?”
“Don’t be morbid,” Jordan said. “Life starts all over again when it gets crisp in the fall.”
“But it’s so hot,” insisted Daisy, on the verge 44 of tears, “and everything’s so confused. Let’s all go to town!”
Her voice struggled on through the heat, beating against it, molding its senselessness into forms.
“I’ve heard of making a garage out of a stable,” Tom was saying to Gatsby, “but I’m the first man who ever made a stable out of a garage.”
“Who wants to go to town?” demanded Daisy insistently 45. Gatsby’s eyes floated toward her. “Ah,” she cried, “you look so cool.”
Their eyes met, and they stared together at each other, alone in space. With an effort she glanced down at the table.
“You always look so cool,” she repeated.
She had told him that she loved him, and Tom Buchanan saw. He was astounded 46. His mouth opened a little, and he looked at Gatsby, and then back at Daisy as if he had just recognized her as some one he knew a long time ago.