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Tender Is the Night - Book Three
by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Chapter 4
The Divers1 would return to the Riviera, which was home. The Villa2 Diana had been rented again for the summer, so they divided the intervening time between German spas and French cathedral towns where they were always happy for a few days. Dick wrote a little with no particular method; it was one of those parts of life that is an awaiting; not upon Nicole's health, which seemed to thrive on travel, nor upon work, but simply an awaiting. The factor that gave purposefulness to the period was the children.
Dick's interest in them increased with their ages, now eleven and nine. He managed to reach them over the heads of employees on the principle that both the forcing of children and the fear of forcing them were inadequate3 substitutes for the long, careful watchfulness4, the checking and balancing and reckoning of accounts, to the end that there should be no slip below a certain level of duty. He came to know them much better than Nicole did, and in expansive moods over the wines of several countries he talked and played with them at length. They had that wistful charm, almost sadness, peculiar5 to children who have learned early not to cry or laugh with abandon; they were apparently6 moved to no extremes of emotion, but content with a simple regimentation7 and the simple pleasures allowed them. They lived on the even tenor8 found advisable in the experience of old families of the Western world, brought up rather than brought out. Dick thought, for example, that nothing was more conducive9 to the development of observation than compulsory10 silence.
Lanier was an unpredictable boy with an inhuman11 curiosity. "Well, how many Pomeranians would it take to lick a lion, father?" was typical of the questions with which he harassed12 Dick. Topsy was easier. She was nine and very fair and exquisitely13 made like Nicole, and in the past Dick had worried about that. Lately she had become as robust14 as any American child. He was satisfied with them both, but conveyed the fact to them only in a tacit way. They were not let off breaches15 of good conduct—"Either one learns politeness at home," Dick said, "or the world teaches it to you with a whip and you may get hurt in the process. What do I care whether Topsy 'adores' me or not? I'm not bringing her up to be my wife."
Another element that distinguished16 this summer and autumn for the Divers was a plenitude of money. Due to the sale of their interest in the clinic, and to developments in America, there was now so much that the mere17 spending of it, the care of goods, was an absorption in itself. The style in which they travelled seemed fabulous18.
Regard them, for example, as the train slows up at Boyen where they are to spend a fortnight visiting. The shifting from the wagon-lit has begun at the Italian frontier. The governess's maid and Madame Diver's maid have come up from second class to help with the baggage and the dogs. Mlle. Bellois will superintend the hand-luggage, leaving the Sealyhams to one maid and the pair of Pekinese to the other. It is not necessarily poverty of spirit that makes a woman surround herself with life—it can be a superabundance of interest, and, except during her flashes of illness, Nicole was capable of being curator of it all. For example with the great quantity of heavy baggage—presently from the van would be unloaded four wardrobe trunks, a shoe trunk, three hat trunks, and two hat boxes, a chest of servants' trunks, a portable filing-cabinet, a medicine case, a spirit lamp container, a picnic set, four tennis rackets in presses and cases, a phonograph, a typewriter. Distributed among the spaces reserved for family and entourage were two dozen supplementary19 grips, satchels20 and packages, each one numbered, down to the tag on the cane21 case. Thus all of it could be checked up in two minutes on any station platform, some for storage, some for accompaniment from the "light trip list" or the "heavy trip list," constantly revised, and carried on metal-edged plaques22 in Nicole's purse. She had devised the system as a child when travelling with her failing mother. It was equivalent to the system of a regimental supply officer who must think of the bellies23 and equipment of three thousand men.
The Divers flocked from the train into the early gathered twilight24 of the valley. The village people watched the debarkation25 with an awe26 akin27 to that which followed the Italian pilgrimages of Lord Byron a century before. Their hostess was the Contessa di Minghetti, lately Mary North. The journey that had begun in a room over the shop of a paperhanger in Newark had ended in an extraordinary marriage.
"Conte di Minghetti" was merely a papal title—the wealth of Mary's husband flowed from his being ruler-owner of manganese deposits in southwestern Asia. He was not quite light enough to travel in a pullman south of Mason-Dixon; he was of the Kyble-Berber-Sabaean-Hindu strain that belts across north Africa and Asia, more sympathetic to the European than the mongrel faces of the ports.
When these princely households, one of the East, one of the West, faced each other on the station platform, the splendor28 of the Divers seemed pioneer simplicity29 by comparison. Their hosts were accompanied by an Italian major-domo carrying a staff, by a quartet of turbaned retainers on motorcycles, and by two half-veiled females who stood respectfully a little behind Mary and salaamed30 at Nicole, making her jump with the gesture.
To Mary as well as to the Divers the greeting was faintly comic; Mary gave an apologetic, belittling31 giggle32; yet her voice, as she introduced her husband by his Asiatic title, flew proud and high.
In their rooms as they dressed for dinner, Dick and Nicole grimaced33 at each other in an awed34 way: such rich as want to be thought democratic pretend in private to be swept off their feet by swank.
"Little Mary North knows what she wants," Dick muttered through his shaving cream. "Abe educated her, and now she's married to a Buddha35. If Europe ever goes Bolshevik she'll turn up as the bride of Stalin."
Nicole looked around from her dressing36-case. "Watch your tongue, Dick, will you?" But she laughed. "They're very swell37. The warships38 all fire at them or salute39 them or something. Mary rides in the royal bus in London."
"All right," he agreed. As he heard Nicole at the door asking for pins, he called, "I wonder if I could have some whiskey; I feel the mountain air!"
"She'll see to it," presently Nicole called through the bathroom door. "It was one of those women who were at the station. She has her veil off."
"What did Mary tell you about life?" he asked.
"She didn't say so much—she was interested in high life—she asked me a lot of questions about my genealogy40 and all that sort of thing, as if I knew anything about it. But it seems the bridegroom has two very tan children by another marriage—one of them ill with some Asiatic thing they can't diagnose. I've got to warn the children. Sounds very peculiar to me. Mary will see how we'd feel about it." She stood worrying a minute.
At dinner Dick talked to Hosain, who had been at an English public school. Hosain wanted to know about stocks and about Hollywood and Dick, whipping up his imagination with champagne42, told him preposterous43 tales.
"Billions?" Hosain demanded.
"Trillions," Dick assured him.
"I didn't truly realize—"
"Well, perhaps millions," Dick conceded. "Every hotel guest is assigned a harem—or what amounts to a harem."
"Other than the actors and directors?"
"Every hotel guest—even travelling salesmen. Why, they tried to send me up a dozen candidates, but Nicole wouldn't stand for it."
Nicole reproved him when they were in their room alone. "Why so many highballs? Why did you use your word spic in front of him?"
"Excuse me, I meant smoke. The tongue slipped."
"Dick, this isn't faintly like you."
"Excuse me again. I'm not much like myself any more."
That night Dick opened a bathroom window, giving on a narrow and tubular court of the château, gray as rats but echoing at the moment to plaintive44 and peculiar music, sad as a flute45. Two men were chanting in an Eastern language or dialect full of k's and l's—he leaned out but he could not see them; there was obviously a religious significance in the sounds, and tired and emotionless he let them pray for him too, but what for, save that he should not lose himself in his increasing melancholy46, he did not know.
Next day, over a thinly wooded hillside they shot scrawny birds, distant poor relations to the partridge. It was done in a vague imitation of the English manner, with a corps47 of inexperienced beaters whom Dick managed to miss by firing only directly overhead.
"Father, you said tell you immediately if we were near the sick boy."
Nicole whirled about, immediately on guard.
"—so, Mother," Lanier continued, turning to her, "the boy takes a bath every evening and to-night he took his bath just before mine and I had to take mine in his water, and it was dirty."
"What? Now what?"
"I saw them take Tony out of it, and then they called me into it and the water was dirty."
"But—did you take it?"
"Yes, Mother."
"Heavens!" she exclaimed to Dick.
He demanded: "Why didn't Lucienne draw your bath?"
"Lucienne can't. It's a funny heater—it reached out of itself and burned her arm last night and she's afraid of it, so one of those two women—"
"You go in this bathroom and take a bath now."
Dick went in and sprinkled the tub with sulphur; closing the door he said to Nicole:
"Either we speak to Mary or we'd better get out."
She agreed and he continued: "People think their children are constitutionally cleaner than other people's, and their diseases are less contagious50."
Dick came in and helped himself from the decanter, chewing a biscuit savagely51 in the rhythm of the pouring water in the bathroom.
"Tell Lucienne that she's got to learn about the heater—" he suggested. At that moment the Asiatic woman came in person to the door.
"El Contessa—"
"Is the little sick boy better?" he inquired pleasantly.
"That's too bad—I'm very sorry. But you see our children mustn't be bathed in his water. That's out of the question—I'm sure your mistress would be furious if she had known you had done a thing like that."
"I?" She seemed thunderstruck. "Why, I merely saw your maid had difficulty with the heater—I told her about it and started the water."
"I?"
"She mustn't get up on western civilization at our expense," he said grimly.
At dinner that night he decided56 that it must inevitably57 be a truncated58 visit: about his own country Hosain seemed to have observed only that there were many mountains and some goats and herders of goats. He was a reserved young man—to draw him out would have required the sincere effort that Dick now reserved for his family. Soon after dinner Hosain left Mary and the Divers to themselves, but the old unity59 was split—between them lay the restless social fields that Mary was about to conquer. Dick was relieved when, at nine-thirty, Mary received and read a note and got up.
"You'll have to excuse me. My husband is leaving on a short trip—and I must be with him."
Next morning, hard on the heels of the servant bringing coffee, Mary entered their room. She was dressed and they were not dressed, and she had the air of having been up for some time. Her face was toughened with quiet jerky fury.
"What is this story about Lanier having been bathed in a dirty bath?"
Dick began to protest, but she cut through:
"What is this story that you commanded my husband's sister to clean Lanier's tub?"
She remained on her feet staring at them, as they sat impotent as idols60 in their beds, weighted by their trays. Together they exclaimed: "His sister!"
"That you ordered one of his sisters to clean out a tub!"
"You spoke to Hosain's sister."
Dick could only say: "I supposed they were two maids."
"You were told they were Himadoun."
"What?" Dick got out of bed and into a robe.
"I explained it to you at the piano night before last. Don't tell me you were too merry to understand."
"Was that what you said? I didn't hear the beginning. I didn't connect the—we didn't make any connection, Mary. Well, all we can do is see her and apologize."
"See her and apologize! I explained to you that when the oldest member of the family—when the oldest one marries, well, the two oldest sisters consecrate62 themselves to being Himadoun, to being his wife's ladies-in-waiting."
"Was that why Hosain left the house last night?"
Mary hesitated; then nodded.
"He had to—they all left. His honor makes it necessary."
Now both the Divers were up and dressing; Mary went on:
"And what's all that about the bathwater. As if a thing like that could happen in this house! We'll ask Lanier about it."
Dick sat on the bedside indicating in a private gesture to Nicole that she should take over. Meanwhile Mary went to the door and spoke to an attendant in Italian.
"Wait a minute," Nicole said. "I won't have that."
"You accused us," answered Mary, in a tone she had never used to Nicole before. "Now I have a right to see."
"I won't have the child brought in." Nicole threw on her clothes as though they were chain mail.
"That's all right," said Dick. "Bring Lanier in. We'll settle this bathtub matter—fact or myth."
Lanier, half clothed mentally and physically63, gazed at the angered faces of the adults.
"Listen, Lanier," Mary demanded, "how did you come to think you were bathed in water that had been used before?"
"Speak up," Dick added.
"It was just dirty, that was all."
"Couldn't you hear the new water running, from your room, next door?"
Lanier admitted the possibility but reiterated64 his point—the water was dirty. He was a little awed; he tried to see ahead:
"It couldn't have been running, because—"
They pinned him down.
"Why not?"
He stood in his little kimono arousing the sympathy of his parents and further arousing Mary's impatience—then he said:
"The water was dirty, it was full of soap-suds."
"When you're not sure what you're saying—" Mary began, but Nicole interrupted.
"Stop it, Mary. If there were dirty suds in the water it was logical to think it was dirty. His father told him to come—"
"There couldn't have been dirty suds in the water."
Lanier looked reproachfully at his father, who had betrayed him. Nicole turned him about by the shoulders and sent him out of the room; Dick broke the tensity with a laugh.
Then, as if the sound recalled the past, the old friendship, Mary guessed how far away from them she had gone and said in a mollifying tone: "It's always like that with children."
Her uneasiness grew as she remembered the past. "You'd be silly to go—Hosain wanted to make this trip anyhow. After all, you're my guests and you just blundered into the thing." But Dick, made more angry by this obliqueness65 and the use of the word blunder, turned away and began arranging his effects, saying:
"It's too bad about the young women. I'd like to apologize to the one who came in here."
"If you'd only listened on the piano seat!"
"But you've gotten so damned dull, Mary. I listened as long as I could."
"Be quiet!" Nicole advised him.
"I return his compliment," said Mary bitterly. "Good-by, Nicole." She went out.
After all that there was no question of her coming to see them off; the major-domo arranged the departure. Dick left formal notes for Hosain and the sisters. There was nothing to do except to go, but all of them, especially Lanier, felt bad about it.
"I insist," insisted Lanier on the train, "that it was dirty bathwater."
"That'll do," his father said. "You better forget it—unless you want me to divorce you. Did you know there was a new law in France that you can divorce a child?"
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1
divers
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| adj.不同的；种种的 | |
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villa
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| n.别墅，城郊小屋 | |
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inadequate
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| adj.(for,to)不充足的，不适当的 | |
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watchfulness
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| 警惕，留心； 警觉（性） | |
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peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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regimentation
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| n.编组团队；系统化，组织化 | |
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tenor
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| n.男高音（歌手），次中音（乐器），要旨，大意 | |
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conducive
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| adj.有益的，有助的 | |
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compulsory
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| n.强制的，必修的；规定的，义务的 | |
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inhuman
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| adj.残忍的，不人道的，无人性的 | |
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harassed
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| adj. 疲倦的，厌烦的 动词harass的过去式和过去分词 | |
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exquisitely
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| adv.精致地；强烈地；剧烈地；异常地 | |
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robust
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| adj.强壮的，强健的，粗野的，需要体力的，浓的 | |
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breaches
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| 破坏( breach的名词复数 )； 破裂； 缺口； 违背 | |
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distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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fabulous
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| adj.极好的；极为巨大的；寓言中的，传说中的 | |
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supplementary
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| adj.补充的，附加的 | |
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satchels
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| n.书包( satchel的名词复数 ) | |
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cane
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| n.手杖，细长的茎，藤条；v.以杖击，以藤编制的 | |
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plaques
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| （纪念性的）匾牌( plaque的名词复数 )； 纪念匾； 牙斑； 空斑 | |
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bellies
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| n.肚子( belly的名词复数 )；腹部；（物体的）圆形或凸起部份；腹部…形的 | |
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twilight
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| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
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debarkation
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| n.下车，下船，登陆 | |
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awe
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| n.敬畏，惊惧；vt.使敬畏，使惊惧 | |
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akin
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| adj.同族的，类似的 | |
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splendor
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| n.光彩；壮丽，华丽；显赫，辉煌 | |
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simplicity
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| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
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salaamed
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| 行额手礼( salaam的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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belittling
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| 使显得微小，轻视，贬低( belittle的现在分词 ) | |
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giggle
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| n.痴笑，咯咯地笑；v.咯咯地笑着说 | |
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grimaced
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| v.扮鬼相，做鬼脸( grimace的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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awed
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| adj.充满敬畏的，表示敬畏的v.使敬畏，使惊惧( awe的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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Buddha
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| n.佛；佛像；佛陀 | |
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dressing
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| n.(食物)调料；包扎伤口的用品，敷料 | |
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swell
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| vi.膨胀，肿胀；增长，增强 | |
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warships
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| 军舰，战舰( warship的名词复数 )； 舰只 | |
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salute
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| vi.行礼，致意，问候，放礼炮；vt.向…致意，迎接，赞扬；n.招呼，敬礼，礼炮 | |
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genealogy
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| n.家系，宗谱 | |
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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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champagne
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| n.香槟酒；微黄色 | |
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preposterous
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| adj.荒谬的，可笑的 | |
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plaintive
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| adj.可怜的，伤心的 | |
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flute
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| n.长笛；v.吹笛 | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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corps
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| n.(通信等兵种的)部队；(同类作的)一组 | |
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suite
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| n.一套(家具)；套房；随从人员 | |
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doorway
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| n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径 | |
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contagious
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| adj.传染性的，有感染力的 | |
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savagely
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| adv. 野蛮地，残酷地 | |
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beckoned
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| v.（用头或手的动作）示意，召唤( beckon的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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eruptions
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| n.喷发，爆发( eruption的名词复数 ) | |
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entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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sob
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| n.空间轨道的轰炸机；呜咽，哭泣 | |
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decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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inevitably
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| adv.不可避免地；必然发生地 | |
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truncated
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| adj.切去顶端的，缩短了的，被删节的v.截面的( truncate的过去式和过去分词 )；截头的；缩短了的；截去顶端或末端 | |
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unity
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| n.团结，联合，统一；和睦，协调 | |
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idols
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| 偶像( idol的名词复数 )； 受崇拜的人或物； 受到热爱和崇拜的人或物； 神像 | |
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spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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consecrate
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| v.使圣化，奉…为神圣；尊崇；奉献 | |
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physically
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| adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律 | |
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reiterated
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| 反复地说，重申( reiterate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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obliqueness
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| 倾度，歪斜 | |
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unified
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| (unify 的过去式和过去分词)； 统一的； 统一标准的； 一元化的 | |
参考例句： |
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