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‘I didn’t know what you’d want, Mr. Gatsby —’
‘Gatz is my name.’
‘ – Mr. Gatz. I thought you might want to take the body West.’
He shook his head.
‘Jimmy always liked it better down East. He rose up to his position in the East. Were you a friend of my boy’s, Mr. – ?’
‘We were close friends.’
‘He had a big future before him, you know. He was only a young man, but he had a lot of brain power here.’
He touched his head impressively, and I nodded.
‘If he’d of lived, he’d of been a great man. A man like James J. Hill[98]. He’d of helped build up the country.’
‘That’s true,’ I said, uncomfortably.
He fumbled at the embroidered coverlet, trying to take it from the bed, and lay down stiffly – was instantly asleep.
That night an obviously frightened person called up, and demanded to know who I was before he would give his name.
‘This is Mr. Carraway,’ I said.
‘Oh!’ He sounded relieved. ‘This is Klipspringer.’
I was relieved too, for that seemed to promise another friend at Gatsby’s grave. I didn’t want it to be in the papers and draw a sightseeing crowd, so I’d been calling up a few people myself. They were hard to find.
‘The funeral’s tomorrow,’ I said. ‘Three o’clock, here at the house. I wish you’d tell anybody who’d be interested.’
‘Oh, I will,’ he broke out hastily. ‘Of course I’m not likely to see anybody, but if I do.’
His tone made me suspicious.
‘Of course you’ll be there yourself.’
‘Well, I’ll certainly try. What I called up about is —’
‘Wait a minute,’ I interrupted. ‘How about saying you’ll come?’
‘Well, the fact is – the truth of the matter is that I’m staying with some people up here in Greenwich, and they rather expect me to be with them tomorrow. In fact, there’s a sort of picnic or something. Of course I’ll do my very best to get away.’
I ejaculated an unrestrained ‘Huh!’ and he must have heard me, for he went on nervously:
‘What I called up about was a pair of shoes I left there. I wonder if it’d be too much trouble to have the butler send them on. You see, they’re te
I didn’t hear the rest of the name, because I hung up the receiver.
After that I felt a certain shame for Gatsby – one gentleman to whom I telephoned implied that he had got what he deserved. However, that was my fault, for he was one of those who used to sneer most bitterly at Gatsby on the courage of Gatsby’s liquor, and I should have known better than to call him.
The morning of the funeral I went up to New York to see Meyer Wolfshiem; I couldn’t seem to reach him any other way. The door that I pushed open, on the advice of an elevator boy, was marked ‘The Swastika Holding Company’, and at first there didn’t seem to be anyone inside. But when I’d shouted ‘hello’ several times in vain, an argument broke out behind a partition, and presently a lovely Jewess appeared at an interior door and scrutinized me with black hostile eye.
‘Nobody’s in,’ she said. ‘Mr. Wolfshiem’s gone to Chicago.’
The first part of this was obviously untrue, for someone had begun to whistle ‘The Rosary’, tunelessly, inside.
‘Please say that Mr. Carraway wants to see him.’
‘I can’t get him back from Chicago, can I?’
At this moment a voice, unmistakably Wolshiem’s called ‘Stella!’ from the other side of the door.
‘Leave your name on the desk,’ she said quickly. ‘I’ll give it to him when he gets back.’
‘But I know he’s there.’
She took a step toward me and began to slide her hands indignantly up and down her hips.
‘You young men think you can force your way in here any time,’ she scolded. ‘We’re getting sickantired of it. When I say he’s in Chicago, he’s in Chicago.’
I mentioned Gatsby.
‘Oh-h!’ She looked at me over again. ‘Will you just – What was your name?’
She vanished. In a moment Meyer Wolfshiem stood solemnly in the doorway, holding out both hands. He drew me into his office, remarking in a reverent voice that it was a sad time for all of us, and offered me a cigar.
‘My memory goes back to when first I met him,’ he said. ‘A young major just out of the army and covered over with medals he got in the war. He was so hard up he had to keep on wearing his uniform because he couldn’t buy some regular clothes. First time I saw him was when he come into Winebre
‘Did you start him in business?’ I inquired.
‘Start him! I made him.’
‘Oh.’
‘I raised him up out of nothing, right out of the gutter. I saw right away he was a fine-appearing, gentlemanly young man, and when he told me he was an Oggsford I knew I could use him good. I got him to join up in the American Legion and he used to stand high there. Right off he did some work for a client of mine up to Albany. We were so thick like that in everything’ – he held up two bulbous fingers – ‘always together.’
I wondered if this partnership had included the World’s Series transaction in 1919.
‘Now he’s dead,’ I said after a moment. ‘You were his closest friend, so I know you’ll want to come to his funeral this afternoon.’
‘I’d like to come.’
‘Well, come then.’
The hair in his nostrils quivered slightly, and as he shook his head his eyes filled with tears.
‘I can’t do it – I can’t get mixed up in it,’ he said.
‘There’s nothing to get mixed up in. It’s all over now.’
‘When a man gets killed I never like to get mixed up in it in any way. I keep out. When I was a young man it was different – if a friend of mine died, no matter how, I stuck with them to the end. You may think that’s sentimental, but I mean it – to the bitter end.’
I saw that for some reason of his own he was determined not to come, so I stood up.
‘Are you a college man?’ he inquired suddenly.
For a moment I thought he was going to suggest a ‘go
‘Let us learn to show our friendship for a man when he is alive and not after he is dead,’ he suggested. ‘After that my own rule is to let everything alone.’
When I left his office the sky had turned dark and I got back to West Egg in a drizzle. After changing my clothes I went next door and found Mr. Gatz walking up and down excitedly in the hall. His pride in his son and in his son’s possessions was continually increasing and now he had something to show me.
‘Jimmy sent me this picture.’ He took out his wallet with trembling fingers. ‘Look there.’
It was a photograph of the house, cracked in the corners and dirty with many hands. He pointed out every detail to me eagerly. ‘Look there!’ and then sought admiration from my eyes. He had shown it so often that I think it was more real to him now than the house itself.
‘Jimmy sent it to me. I think it’s a very pretty picture. It shows up well.’
‘Very well. Had you seen him lately?’
‘He come out to see me two years ago and bought me the house I live in now. Of course we was broke up when he run off from home, but I see now there was a reason for it. He knew he had a big future in front of him. And ever since he made a success he was very generous with me.’
He seemed reluctant to put away the picture, held it for another minute, lingeringly, before my eyes. Then he returned the wallet and pulled from his pocket a ragged old copy of a book called Hopalong Cassidy[99].
‘Look here, this is a book he had when he was a boy. It just shows you.’
He opened it at the back cover and turned it around for me to see. On the last fly-leaf was printed the word SCHEDULE, and the date September 12, 1906. And underneath:
98
James J. Hill (1838—1916) – America financier and founder of Great Northern Railway Company (1890)
99
Hopalong Cassidy – a fictional cowboy created by Clarence E. Mulford (1883–1917), who later appeared in a number of American TV series, westerns and radio programs