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Tender Is the Night - Book Three
by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Chapter 8
She bathed and anointed herself and covered her body with a layer of powder, while her toes crunched1 another pile on a bath towel. She looked microscopically2 at the lines of her flanks, wondering how soon the fine, slim edifice3 would begin to sink squat4 and earthward. In about six years, but now I'll do—in fact I'll do as well as any one I know.
She was not exaggerating. The only physical disparity between Nicole at present and the Nicole of five years before was simply that she was no longer a young girl. But she was enough ridden by the current youth worship, the moving pictures with their myriad5 faces of girl-children, blandly6 represented as carrying on the work and wisdom of the world, to feel a jealousy7 of youth.
She put on the first ankle-length day dress that she had owned for many years, and crossed herself reverently8 with Chanel Sixteen. When Tommy drove up at one o'clock she had made her person into the trimmest of gardens.
How good to have things like this, to be worshipped again, to pretend to have a mystery! She had lost two of the great arrogant9 years in the life of a pretty girl—now she felt like making up for them; she greeted Tommy as if he were one of many men at her feet, walking ahead of him instead of beside him as they crossed the garden toward the market umbrella. Attractive women of nineteen and of twenty-nine are alike in their breezy confidence; on the contrary, the exigent womb of the twenties does not pull the outside world centripetally10 around itself. The former are ages of insolence11, comparable the one to a young cadet, the other to a fighter strutting12 after combat.
But whereas a girl of nineteen draws her confidence from a surfeit13 of attention, a woman of twenty-nine is nourished on subtler stuff. Desirous, she chooses her apéritifs wisely, or, content, she enjoys the caviare of potential power. Happily she does not seem, in either case, to anticipate the subsequent years when her insight will often be blurred15 by panic, by the fear of stopping or the fear of going on. But on the landings of nineteen or twenty-nine she is pretty sure that there are no bears in the hall.
Nicole did not want any vague spiritual romance—she wanted an "affair"; she wanted a change. She realized, thinking with Dick's thoughts, that from a superficial view it was a vulgar business to enter, without emotion, into an indulgence that menaced all of them. On the other hand, she blamed Dick for the immediate17 situation, and honestly thought that such an experiment might have a therapeutic18 value. All summer she had been stimulated19 by watching people do exactly what they were tempted20 to do and pay no penalty for it—moreover, in spite of her intention of no longer lying to herself, she preferred to consider that she was merely feeling her way and that at any moment she could withdraw… .
In the light shade Tommy caught her up in his white-duck arms and pulled her around to him, looking at her eyes.
"Don't move," he said. "I'm going to look at you a great deal from now on."
There was some scent21 on his hair, a faint aura of soap from his white clothes. Her lips were tight, not smiling and they both simply looked for a moment.
"Do you like what you see?" she murmured.
"Parle français."
"Very well," and she asked again in French. "Do you like what you see?"
He pulled her closer.
"I like whatever I see about you." He hesitated. "I thought I knew your face but it seems there are some things I didn't know about it. When did you begin to have white crook22's eyes?"
She broke away, shocked and indignant, and cried in English:
"Is that why you wanted to talk French?" Her voice quieted as the butler came with sherry. "So you could be offensive more accurately23?"
She parked her small seat violently on the cloth-of-silver chair cushion.
"I have no mirror here," she said, again in French, but decisively, "but if my eyes have changed it's because I'm well again. And being well perhaps I've gone back to my true self—I suppose my grandfather was a crook and I'm a crook by heritage, so there we are. Does that satisfy your logical mind?"
He scarcely seemed to know what she was talking about.
"Where's Dick—is he lunching with us?"
Seeing that his remark had meant comparatively little to him she suddenly laughed away its effect.
"Dick's on a tour," she said. "Rosemary Hoyt turned up, and either they're together or she upset him so much that he wants to go away and dream about her."
"You know, you're a little complicated after all."
"Oh no," she assured him hastily. "No, I'm not really—I'm just a—I'm just a whole lot of different simple people."
Marius brought out melon and an ice pail, and Nicole, thinking irresistibly24 about her crook's eyes did not answer; he gave one an entire nut to crack, this man, instead of giving it in fragments to pick at for meat.
"Why didn't they leave you in your natural state?" Tommy demanded presently. "You are the most dramatic person I have known."
She had no answer.
"In any society there are certain—" She felt Dick's ghost prompting at her elbow but she subsided26 at Tommy's overtone:
"I've brutalized many men into shape but I wouldn't take a chance on half the number of women. Especially this 'kind' bullying—what good does it do anybody?—you or him or anybody?"
Her heart leaped and then sank faintly with a sense of what she owed Dick.
"I suppose I've got—"
"You've got too much money," he said impatiently. "That's the crux27 of the matter. Dick can't beat that."
She considered while the melons were removed.
"What do you think I ought to do?"
For the first time in ten years she was under the sway of a personality other than her husband's. Everything Tommy said to her became part of her forever.
They drank the bottle of wine while a faint wind rocked the pine needles and the sensuous28 heat of early afternoon made blinding freckles29 on the checkered30 luncheon31 cloth. Tommy came over behind her and laid his arms along hers, clasping her hands. Their cheeks touched and then their lips and she gasped32 half with passion for him, half with the sudden surprise of its force… .
"Can't you send the governess and the children away for the afternoon?"
"They have a piano lesson. Anyhow I don't want to stay here."
"Kiss me again."
A little later, riding toward Nice, she thought: So I have white crook's eyes, have I? Very well then, better a sane33 crook than a mad puritan.
His assertion seemed to absolve34 her from all blame or responsibility and she had a thrill of delight in thinking of herself in a new way. New vistas35 appeared ahead, peopled with the faces of many men, none of whom she need obey or even love. She drew in her breath, hunched36 her shoulders with a wriggle37 and turned to Tommy.
"Have we got to go all the way to your hotel at Monte Carlo?"
"No!" he answered. "And, my God, I have never been so happy as I am this minute."
They had passed through Nice following the blue coast and begun to mount to the middling-high Corniche. Now Tommy turned sharply down to the shore, ran out a blunt peninsula, and stopped in the rear of a small shore hotel.
Its tangibility39 frightened Nicole for a moment. At the desk an American was arguing interminably with the clerk about the rate of exchange. She hovered40, outwardly tranquil41 but inwardly miserable42, as Tommy filled out the police blanks—his real, hers false. Their room was a Mediterranean43 room, almost ascetic44, almost clean, darkened to the glare of the sea. Simplest of pleasures—simplest of places. Tommy ordered two cognacs, and when the door closed behind the waiter, he sat in the only chair, dark, scarred and handsome, his eyebrows45 arched and upcurling, a fighting Puck, an earnest Satan.
Before they had finished the brandy they suddenly moved together and met standing46 up; then they were sitting on the bed and he kissed her hardy47 knees. Struggling a little still, like a decapitated animal she forgot about Dick and her new white eyes, forgot Tommy himself and sank deeper and deeper into the minutes and the moment.
… When he got up to open a shutter48 and find out what caused the increasing clamor below their windows, his figure was darker and stronger than Dick's, with high lights along the rope-twists of muscle. Momentarily he had forgotten her too—almost in the second of his flesh breaking from hers she had a foretaste that things were going to be different than she had expected. She felt the nameless fear which precedes all emotions, joyous49 or sorrowful, inevitable50 as a hum of thunder precedes a storm.
Tommy peered cautiously from the balcony and reported.
"All I can see is two women on the balcony below this. They're talking about weather and tipping back and forth51 in American rocking-chairs."
"Making all that noise?"
"The noise is coming from somewhere below them. Listen."
"Oh, way down South in the land of cotton
Look away—"
"It's Americans."
Nicole flung her arms wide on the bed and stared at the ceiling; the powder had dampened on her to make a milky53 surface. She liked the bareness of the room, the sound of the single fly navigating54 overhead. Tommy brought the chair over to the bed and swept the clothes off it to sit down; she liked the economy of the weightless dress and espadrilles that mingled55 with his ducks upon the floor.
He inspected the oblong white torso joined abruptly56 to the brown limbs and head, and said, laughing gravely:
"You are all new like a baby."
"With white eyes."
"I'll take care of that."
"It's very hard taking care of white eyes—especially the ones made in Chicago."
"I know all the old Languedoc peasant remedies."
"Kiss me, on the lips, Tommy."
"That's so American," he said, kissing her nevertheless. "When I was in America last there were girls who would tear you apart with their lips, tear themselves too, until their faces were scarlet57 with the blood around the lips all brought out in a patch—but nothing further."
Nicole leaned up on one elbow.
"I like this room," she said.
"I find it somewhat meagre. Darling, I'm glad you wouldn't wait until we got to Monte Carlo."
"Why only meagre? Why, this is a wonderful room, Tommy—like the bare tables in so many Cézannes and Picassos."
"I don't know." He did not try to understand her. "There's that noise again. My God, has there been a murder?"
He went to the window and reported once more:
"It seems to be two American sailors fighting and a lot more cheering them on. They are from your battleship off shore." He wrapped a towel around himself and went farther out on the balcony. "They have poules with them. I have heard about this now—the women follow them from place to place wherever the ship goes. But what women! One would think with their pay they could find better women! Why the women who followed Korniloff! Why we never looked at anything less than a ballerina!"
Nicole was glad he had known so many women, so that the word itself meant nothing to him; she would be able to hold him so long as the person in her transcended58 the universals of her body.
"Hit him where it hurts!"
"Yah-h-h-h!"
"Hey, what I tell you get inside that right!"
"Come on, Dulschmit, you son!"
"Yaa-Yaa!"
"YA-YEH-YAH!"
Tommy turned away.
"This place seems to have outlived its usefulness, you agree?"
She agreed, but they clung together for a moment before dressing59, and then for a while longer it seemed as good enough a palace as any… .
Dressing at last Tommy exclaimed:
"My God, those two women in the rocking-chairs on the balcony below us haven't moved. They're trying to talk this matter out of existence. They're here on an economical holiday, and all the American navy and all the whores in Europe couldn't spoil it."
He came over gently and surrounded her, pulling the shoulder strap60 of her slip into place with his teeth; then a sound split the air outside: Cr-ACK—BOOM-M-m-m! It was the battleship sounding a recall.
Now, down below their window, it was pandemonium61 indeed—for the boat was moving to shores as yet unannounced. Waiters called accounts and demanded settlements in impassioned voices, there were oaths and denials; the tossing of bills too large and change too small; passouts were assisted to the boats, and the voices of the naval62 police chopped with quick commands through all voices. There were cries, tears, shrieks63, promises as the first launch shoved off and the women crowded forward on the wharf64, screaming and waving.
Tommy saw a girl rush out upon the balcony below waving a napkin, and before he could see whether or not the rocking Englishwomen gave in at last and acknowledged her presence, there was a knock at their own door. Outside, excited female voices made them agree to unlock it, disclosing two girls, young, thin and barbaric, unfound rather than lost, in the hall. One of them wept chokingly.
"Kwee wave off your porch?" implored65 the other in passionate66 American. "Kwee please? Wave at the boy friends? Kwee, please. The other rooms is all locked."
"With pleasure," Tommy said.
"'By, Charlie! Charlie, look up!"
"Send a wire gen'al alivery Nice!"
"Charlie! He don't see me."
One of the girls hoisted67 her skirt suddenly, pulled and ripped at her pink step-ins and tore them to a sizable flag; then, screaming "Ben! Ben!" she waved it wildly. As Tommy and Nicole left the room it still fluttered against the blue sky. Oh, say can you see the tender color of remembered flesh?—while at the stern of the battleship arose in rivalry68 the Star-Spangled Banner.
They dined at the new Beach Casino at Monte Carlo … much later they swam in Beaulieu in a roofless cavern69 of white moonlight formed by a circlet of pale boulders70 about a cup of phosphorescent water, facing Monaco and the blur14 of Mentone. She liked his bringing her there to the eastward71 vision and the novel tricks of wind and water; it was all as new as they were to each other. Symbolically72 she lay across his saddle-bow as surely as if he had wolfed her away from Damascus and they had come out upon the Mongolian plain. Moment by moment all that Dick had taught her fell away and she was ever nearer to what she had been in the beginning, prototype of that obscure yielding up of swords that was going on in the world about her. Tangled73 with love in the moonlight she welcomed the anarchy74 of her lover.
They awoke together finding the moon gone down and the air cool. She struggled up demanding the time and Tommy called it roughly at three.
"I've got to go home then."
"I thought we'd sleep in Monte Carlo."
"No. There's a governess and the children. I've got to roll in before daylight."
"As you like."
They dipped for a second, and when he saw her shivering he rubbed her briskly with a towel. As they got into the car with their heads still damp, their skins fresh and glowing, they were loath75 to start back. It was very bright where they were and as Tommy kissed her she felt him losing himself in the whiteness of her cheeks and her white teeth and her cool brow and the hand that touched his face. Still attuned76 to Dick, she waited for interpretation77 or qualification; but none was forthcoming. Reassured78 sleepily and happily that none would be, she sank low in the seat and drowsed until the sound of the motor changed and she felt them climbing toward Villa79 Diana. At the gate she kissed him an almost automatic good-by. The sound of her feet on the walk was changed, the night noises of the garden were suddenly in the past but she was glad, none the less, to be back. The day had progressed at a staccato rate, and in spite of its satisfactions she was not habituated to such strain.
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1
crunched
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| v.嘎吱嘎吱地咬嚼( crunch的过去式和过去分词 )；嘎吱作响；（快速大量地）处理信息；数字捣弄 | |
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microscopically
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| 显微镜下 | |
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edifice
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| n.宏伟的建筑物(如宫殿，教室) | |
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squat
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| v.蹲坐，蹲下；n.蹲下；adj.矮胖的，粗矮的 | |
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myriad
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| adj.无数的；n.无数，极大数量 | |
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blandly
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| adv.温和地，殷勤地 | |
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jealousy
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| n.妒忌，嫉妒，猜忌 | |
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reverently
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| adv.虔诚地 | |
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arrogant
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| adj.傲慢的，自大的 | |
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centripetally
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| adv.向心地 | |
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insolence
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| n.傲慢；无礼；厚颜；傲慢的态度 | |
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12
strutting
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| 加固，支撑物 | |
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surfeit
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| v.使饮食过度；n.(食物)过量，过度 | |
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blur
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| n.模糊不清的事物；vt.使模糊，使看不清楚 | |
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blurred
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| v.（使）变模糊( blur的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）难以区分；模模糊糊；迷离 | |
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din
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| n.喧闹声，嘈杂声 | |
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immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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therapeutic
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| adj.治疗的，起治疗作用的；对身心健康有益的 | |
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stimulated
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| a.刺激的 | |
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tempted
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| v.怂恿（某人）干不正当的事；冒…的险（tempt的过去分词） | |
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scent
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| n.气味，香味，香水，线索，嗅觉；v.嗅，发觉 | |
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22
crook
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| v.使弯曲；n.小偷，骗子，贼；弯曲(处) | |
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23
accurately
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| adv.准确地，精确地 | |
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irresistibly
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| adv.无法抵抗地，不能自持地；极为诱惑人地 | |
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25
scoffed
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| 嘲笑，嘲弄( scoff的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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26
subsided
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| v.（土地）下陷（因在地下采矿）( subside的过去式和过去分词 )；减弱；下降至较低或正常水平；一下子坐在椅子等上 | |
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crux
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| adj.十字形；难事，关键，最重要点 | |
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sensuous
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| adj.激发美感的；感官的，感觉上的 | |
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freckles
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| n.雀斑，斑点( freckle的名词复数 ) | |
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checkered
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| adj.有方格图案的 | |
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luncheon
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| n.午宴，午餐，便宴 | |
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32
gasped
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| v.喘气( gasp的过去式和过去分词 )；喘息；倒抽气；很想要 | |
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sane
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| adj.心智健全的，神志清醒的，明智的，稳健的 | |
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34
absolve
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| v.赦免，解除（责任等） | |
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vistas
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| 长条形景色( vista的名词复数 )； 回顾； 展望； （未来可能发生的）一系列情景 | |
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hunched
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| （常指因寒冷、生病或愁苦）耸肩弓身的，伏首前倾的 | |
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wriggle
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| v./n.蠕动，扭动；蜿蜒 | |
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38
squeak
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| n.吱吱声，逃脱；v.（发出）吱吱叫，侥幸通过；（俚）告密 | |
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39
tangibility
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| n.确切性 | |
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40
hovered
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| 鸟( hover的过去式和过去分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫 | |
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41
tranquil
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| adj. 安静的, 宁静的, 稳定的, 不变的 | |
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42
miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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43
Mediterranean
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| adj.地中海的；地中海沿岸的 | |
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44
ascetic
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| adj.禁欲的；严肃的 | |
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45
eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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46
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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47
hardy
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| adj.勇敢的，果断的，吃苦的；耐寒的 | |
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48
shutter
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| n.百叶窗；(照相机)快门；关闭装置 | |
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49
joyous
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| adj.充满快乐的；令人高兴的 | |
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50
inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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51
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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52
bum
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| n.臀部；流浪汉，乞丐；vt.乞求，乞讨 | |
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milky
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| adj.牛奶的，多奶的；乳白色的 | |
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54
navigating
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| v.给（船舶、飞机等）引航，导航( navigate的现在分词 )；（从海上、空中等）横越；横渡；飞跃 | |
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55
mingled
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| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
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abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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scarlet
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| n.深红色，绯红色，红衣；adj.绯红色的 | |
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transcended
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| 超出或超越（经验、信念、描写能力等）的范围( transcend的过去式和过去分词 )； 优于或胜过… | |
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59
dressing
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| n.(食物)调料；包扎伤口的用品，敷料 | |
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strap
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| n.皮带，带子；v.用带扣住，束牢；用绷带包扎 | |
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61
pandemonium
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| n.喧嚣，大混乱 | |
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62
naval
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| adj.海军的，军舰的，船的 | |
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shrieks
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| n.尖叫声( shriek的名词复数 )v.尖叫( shriek的第三人称单数 ) | |
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wharf
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| n.码头，停泊处 | |
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implored
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| 恳求或乞求（某人）( implore的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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66
passionate
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
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67
hoisted
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| 把…吊起，升起( hoist的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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68
rivalry
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| n.竞争，竞赛，对抗 | |
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69
cavern
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| n.洞穴，大山洞 | |
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70
boulders
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| n.卵石( boulder的名词复数 )；巨砾；（受水或天气侵蚀而成的）巨石；漂砾 | |
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71
eastward
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| adv.向东；adj.向东的；n.东方，东部 | |
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72
symbolically
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| ad.象征地，象征性地 | |
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73
tangled
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| adj. 纠缠的，紊乱的 动词tangle的过去式和过去分词 | |
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74
anarchy
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| n.无政府状态；社会秩序混乱，无秩序 | |
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75
loath
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| adj.不愿意的；勉强的 | |
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76
attuned
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| v.使协调( attune的过去式和过去分词 )；调音 | |
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77
interpretation
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| n.解释，说明，描述；艺术处理 | |
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78
reassured
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| adj.使消除疑虑的；使放心的v.再保证，恢复信心( reassure的过去式和过去分词) | |
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79
villa
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| n.别墅，城郊小屋 | |
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