Великий Гэтсби / The Great Gatsby

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

I followed him over a low white-washed railroad fence. I saw a garage – Repairs. GEORGE B. WILSON. Cars Bought and Sold[25 - Repairs. GEORGE B. WILSON. Cars Bought and Sold – Джордж Уилсон. Автомобили. Покупка, продажа и ремонт.] – and I followed Tom inside.

“Hello, Wilson, old man,” said Tom, “How’s business?”

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

“Next week.”

Then I saw a woman. She was in the middle thirties[26 - She was in the middle thirties. – Она была лет тридцати пяти.], and faintly stout[27 - faintly stout – с наклонностью к полноте], but she carried her surplus flesh sensuously as some women can. She smiled slowly and walking through her husband as if he were a ghost shook hands with Tom. Then she spoke to her husband in a soft, coarse voice:

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

“Oh, sure,” agreed Wilson and went toward the little office.

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

“All right.”

“I’ll meet you by the news-stand.”

She nodded and moved away from him.

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

“Terrible place, isn’t it,” said Tom.

“Awful.”

“It does her good to get away[28 - It does her good to get away. – Она и бывает рада проветриться.].”

“Doesn’t her husband object?”

“Wilson? He thinks she goes to see her sister in New York. “

“Myrtle’ll[29 - Myrtle – Миртл] be hurt if you don’t come up to the apartment,” said Tom.

I have been drunk just twice in my life and the second time was that afternoon. Some people came – Myrtle’s sister, Catherine, Mr. McKee, a pale feminine man from the flat below, and his wife. She told me with pride that her husband had photographed her a hundred and twenty-seven times since they had been married.

The sister Catherine sat down beside me on the couch.

“Where do you live?” she inquired.

“I live at West Egg.”

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

“I live next door to him.”

“Well, they say he’s a nephew or a cousin of Kaiser Wilhelm’s[30 - Kaiser Wilhelm – кайзер Вильгельм]. That’s where all his money comes from.”

“Really?”

She nodded.

“I’m scared of him. I’d hate to have him get anything on me.”

Catherine leaned close to me and whispered in my ear: “Neither of them can stand the person they’re married to.” She looked at Myrtle and then at Tom.

The answer to this came from Myrtle.

“I made a mistake,” she declared vigorously. “I married him because I thought he was a gentleman, but he wasn’t fit to lick my shoe[31 - He wasn’t fit to lick my shoe. – Он мне в подмётки не годился.].”

Chapter 3

There was music from my neighbour’s house through the summer nights. In his blue gardens men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings and the champagne and the stars. In the afternoon I watched his guests diving from the tower of his raft or taking the sun on the hot sand of his beach. On week-ends his Rolls-Royce[32 - Rolls-Royce – «Роллс-ройс»]