09

Chapter 1

‘Good night,’ she said softly. ‘Wake me at eight, won’t you.’ “ 明天见，”她轻声说，“八点叫我，好吧？”

‘If you’ll get up.’ “ 只要你起得来。”

‘I will. Good night, Mr. Carraway. See you anon(不久,很快).’ “ 我一定可以。晚安，卡罗威先生。改天见吧。”

 ‘Of course you will,’ confirmed Daisy. ‘In fact I think I’ll arrange a marriage. Come over often, Nick, and I’ll sort of—oh—fling(抛；掷) you together. You know—lock you up accidentally in linen(亚麻) closets(壁橱) and push you out to sea in a boat, and all that sort of thing——‘ “ 你们当然会再见的，”黛西保证道，“说实在，我想我要做个媒。多来几趟，尼克，我就想办法——呃——把你们俩拽到一起。比方说，无意间 把你们关在被单储藏室用啦，或者把你们放在小船上往海里一推啦，以及诸如此类的方法……”

‘Good night,’ called Miss Baker from the stairs. ‘I haven’t heard a word.’ “ 她是个好孩子，”过了一会几汤姆说，“他们不应当让她这样到处乱跑。”

 ‘She’s a nice girl,’ said Tom after a moment.‘They oughtn’t to let her run around the country this way.’ “ 明天见，”贝克小姐从楼梯上喊道，“我一个字也没听见。”

 ‘Who oughtn’t to?’ inquired Daisy coldly. “ 是谁不应当？”黛西冷冷地问。

‘Her family.’

‘Her family is one aunt about a thousand years old. Besides, Nick’s going to look after her, aren’t you, Nick? She’s going to spend lots of week-ends out here this summer. I think the home influence will be very good for her.’ “ 她家里只有一个七老八十的姑妈。再说，尼克以后可以照应她了，是 不是，尼克？她今年夏天要到这里来度许多个周末。我想这里的家庭环境对 她会大有好处的。”

Daisy and Tom looked at each other for a moment in silence.黛西和汤姆一声不响地彼此看了一会儿。

‘Is she from New York?’ I asked quickly. “ 她是纽约州的人吗？”我赶快问。

‘From Louisville. Our white girlhood was passed together there. Our beautiful white——‘“ 路易斯维尔人。我们纯洁的少女时期是一道在那里度过的。我们那 美丽纯洁的……”

‘Did you give Nick a little heart to heart talk on the veranda(阳台)?’ demanded Tom suddenly. “ 你在阳台上是不是跟尼克把心里话都讲了？”汤姆忽然质问。

‘Did I?’ She looked at me.‘I can’t seem to remember, but I think we talked about the Nordic race. Yes,I’m sure we did. It sort of crept(creep爬行) up onus and first thing you know——‘“ 我讲了吗？”她看着我，“我好像不记得，不过我们大概谈到了日耳曼 种族。对了，我可以肯定我们谈的是那个。它不知不觉就进入了我们的话题，你还没注意到哩……”

‘Don’t believe everything you hear, Nick,’ he advised me. “ 别听到什么都信以为真，尼克。”他告诫我道。

I said lightly that I had heard nothing at all, and a few minutes later I got up to go home. 我轻松地说我什么都没听到，几分钟之后我就起身告辞了。They came to the door with me and stood side by side in a cheerful square of light. As I started my motor Daisy peremptorily(专横的) called ‘Wait! 我轻松地说我什么都没听到，几分钟之后我就起身告辞了。他们把我 送到门口，两人并肩站在方方一片明亮的灯光里。我发动了汽车，忽然黛西命令式地喊道：“等等！

‘I forgot to ask you something,and it’s important. We heard you were engaged to a girl out West.’ “ 我忘了问你一件事，很重要的。我们听说你在西部跟一个姑娘订婚了。”

‘That’s right,’ corroborated(证实,佐证) Tom kindly. ‘We heard that you were engaged.’ “ 不错，”汤姆和蔼地附和说，“我们听说你订婚了。”

‘It’s libel(诽谤). I’m too poor.’ “ 那是造谣诽谤。我太穷了。”

‘But we heard it,’insisted Daisy, surprising me by opening up again in a flower-like way. ‘We heard it from three people so it must be true.’ “ 我们听三个人说过，所以一定是真的。”

Of course I knew what they were referring to, but I wasn’t even vaguely(模糊的)engaged. 我当然知道他们指的是什么事，但是我压根儿没有订婚。The fact that gossip(八卦) had published the banns (结婚公告)was one of the reasons I'd come east. 流言蜚语传 播说我订了婚，这正是我之所以到东部来的一个原因。

You can’t stop going with an old friend on account of rumors(谣言) and on the other hand I had no intention of being rumored into marriage. 你不能因为怕谣言就 和一个老朋友断绝来往，可是另一方面我也无意迫于谣言的压力就去结婚。

Their interest rather touched me and made them less remotely rich—nevertheless, I was confused and a little disgusted as I drove away. 他们对我的关心倒很使我感动，也使他们不显得那么有钱与高不可攀了。虽然如此，在我开车回家的路上，我感到迷惑不解，还有点厌恶。

It seemed to me that the thing for Daisy to do was to rush out of the house, child in arms—but apparently there were no such intentions in her head. 我觉得，黛西应该做的事是抱着孩子跑出这座房子——可是显然她头脑里丝毫没 有这种打算。As for Tom, the fact that he ‘had some woman in New York’ was really less surprising than that he had been depressed by a book. 至于汤姆，他“在纽约有个女人”这种事倒不足为怪，奇怪的是他会因为读了一本书而感到沮丧。

Something was making him nibble (一小口)at the edge of stale(陈旧) ideas as if his sturdy physical egotism(利己主义) no longer nourished(滋养) his peremptory(专横的) heart. 不知什么东西在使他从陈腐的学说里摄取精神食粮，仿佛他那壮硕的体格的唯我主义已经不再能滋养他那颗唯我独尊的心了。

Already it was deep summer on roadhouse roofs and in front of wayside garages, where new red gas-pumps sat out in pools of light, and when I reached my estate(庄园,工业区) at West Egg I ran the car under its shed and sat for a while on an abandoned grass roller in the yard. 一路上，小旅馆房顶上和路边汽油站门前已经是一片盛夏景象，鲜红的加油机一台台蹲在电灯光圈里。我回到我在西卵的住处，把车停在小车棚之后，在院子里一架闲置的刈草机上坐了一会儿。

The wind had blown off, leaving a loud bright night with wings beating in the trees and a persistent organ sound as the full bellows of the earth blew the frogs full of life. 风已经停了，眼前是一片嘈杂、明亮的夜景，有鸟雀在树上拍翅膀的声音，还有大地的风箱使青蛙鼓足了气力发出的连续不断的风琴声。

The silhouette(剪影) of a moving cat wavered across the moonlight and turning my head to watch it I saw that I was not alone—fifty feet away a figure had emerged from the shadow of my neighbor’s mansion and was standing with his hands in his pockets regarding the silver pepper of the stars. 一只猫的侧影在月光中慢慢地移动，我掉过头去看它的时候，发觉我不是一个人——五十英尺之外一个人已经从我 邻居的大厦的阴影里走了出来，现在两手插在口袋里站在那里仰望银白的星光。

Something in his leisurely movements and the secure position of his feet upon the lawn suggested that it was Mr. Gatsby himself, come out to determine what share was his of our local heavens. 从他那悠闲的动作和他那两脚稳踏在草坪上的姿态可以看出他就是盖茨 比先生本人，出来确定一下我们本地的天空哪一片是属于他的。

I decided to call to him.Miss Baker had mentioned him at dinner, and that would do for an introduction. 我打定了主意要招呼他。贝克小姐在吃饭时提到过他，那也可以算作介绍了。But I didn’t call to him for he gave a sudden intimation that he was content to be alone—he stretched out his arms toward the dark water in a curious way, and far as I was from him I could have sworn(swear过去分词) he was trembling. 但我并没招呼他，因为他突然做了个动作，好像表示他满足于独自 待着——他朝着幽暗的海水把两只胳膊伸了出去，那样子真古怪，并且尽管 我离他很远，我可以发誓他正在发抖。

Involuntarily(身不由己的) I glanced seaward—and distinguished nothing except a single green light, minute and far away, that might have been the end of a dock. When I looked once more for Gatsby he had vanished, and I was alone again in the unquiet darkness. 我也情不自禁地朝海上望去——什么都看不出来，除了一盏绿灯，又 小又远，也许是一座码头的尽头。等我回头再去看盖茨比时，他已经不见了，于是我又独自待在不平静的黑夜里。