F. Scott Fitzgerald: Complete Works. F. Scott Fitzgerald
“Be careful. The children are inside.”
“But I can’t be careful. Now that life’s begun all over again, I’ve forgotten all the caution that I learned in the other life, the one that’s past.”
“Sh-h-h!”
Somewhat irritated, he glanced at her closely. Her face, unmoved and unresponsive, seemed vaguely older than it had yesterday; she was white and tired. But he dismissed the impression with a low, exultant laugh.
“Alice, I haven’t slept as I slept last night since I was a little boy, except that several times I woke up just for the joy of seeing the same moon we once knew together. I’d got it back.”
“I didn’t sleep at all.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I realized about two o’clock or three o’clock that I could never go away from my children—even with you.”
He was struck dumb. He looked at her blankly for a moment, and then he laughed—a short, incredulous laugh.
“Never, never!” she went on, shaking her head passionately. “Never, never, never! When I thought of it I began to tremble all over, right in my bed.” She hesitated. “I don’t know what came over me yesterday evening, John. When I’m with you, you can always make me do or feel or think just exactly what you like. But this is too late, I guess. It doesn’t seem real at all; it just seems sort of crazy to me, as if I’d dreamed it, that’s all.”
John Jackson laughed again, not incredulously this time, but on a menacing note.
“What do you mean?” he demanded.
She began to cry and hid her eyes behind her hand because some people were passing along the road.
“You’ve got to tell me more than that,” cried John Jackson, his voice rising a little. “I can’t just take that and go away.”
“Please don’t talk so loud,” she implored him. “It’s so hot and I’m so confused. I guess I’m just a small-town woman, after all. It seems somehow awful to be talking here with you, when my husband’s working all day in the dust and heat.”
“Awful to be talking here?” he repeated.
“Don’t look that way!” she cried miserably. “I can’t bear to hurt you so. You have children, too, to think of—you said you had a son.”
“A son.” The fact seemed so far away that he looked at her, startled. “Oh, yes, I have a son.”
A sort of craziness, a wild illogic in the situation had communicated itself to him; and yet he fought blindly against it as he felt his own mood of ecstasy slipping away. For twenty hours he had recaptured the power of seeing things through a mist of hope—hope in some vague, happy destiny that lay just over the hill—and now with every word she uttered the mist was passing, the hope, the town, the memory, the very face of this woman before his eyes.
“Never again in this world,” he cried with a last despairing effort, “will you and I have a chance at happiness!”
But he knew, even as he said this, that it had never been a chance; simply a wild, desperate sortie from two long-beleaguered fortresses by night.
He looked up to see that George Harland had turned in at the gate.
“Lunch is ready,” called Alice, raising her head with an expression of relief. “John’s going to be with us too.”
“I can’t,” said John Jackson quickly. “You’re both very kind.”
“Better stay.” Harland, in oily overalls, sank down wearily on the steps and with a large handkerchief polished the hot space beneath his thin grey hair. “We can give you some iced tea.” He looked up at John. “I don’t know whether these hot days make you feel your age like I feel mine.”
“I guess—it affects all of us alike,” said John Jackson with an effort. “The awful part of it is that I’ve got to go back to the city this afternoon.”
“Really?” Harland nodded with polite regret.
“Why, yes. The fact is I promised to make a speech.”
“Is that so? Speak on some city problem, I suppose.”
“No; the fact is”—the words, forming in his mind to a senseless rhythm, pushed themselves out—“I’m going to speak on What Have I Got Out of Life.”
Then he became conscious of the heat indeed; and still wearing that smile he knew so well how to muster, he felt himself sway dizzily against the porch rail. After a minute they were walking with him toward the gate.
“I’m sorry you’re leaving,” said Alice, with frightened eyes. “Come back and visit your old town again.”
“I will.”
Blind with unhappiness, he set off up the street at what he felt must be a stumble; but some dim necessity made him turn after he had gone a little way and smile back at them and wave his hand. They were still standing there, and they waved at him and he saw them turn and walk together into their house.
“I must go back and make my speech,” he said to himself as he walked on, swaying slightly, down the street. “I shall get up and ask aloud ‘What have I got out of life?’ And there before them all I shall answer, ‘Nothing.’ I shall tell them the truth; that life has beaten me at every turning and used me for its own obscure purposes over and over; that everything I have loved has turned to ashes, and that every time I have stooped to pat a dog I have felt his teeth in my hand. And so at last they will learn the truth about one man’s heart.”
V
The meeting was at four, but it was nearly five when he dismounted from the sweltering train and walked toward the Civic Club hall. Numerous cars were parked along the surrounding streets, promising an unusually large crowd. He was surprised to find that even the rear of the hall was thronged with standing people, and that there were recurrent outbursts of applause at some speech which was being delivered upon the platform.
“Can you find me a seat near the rear?” he whispered to an attendant. “I’m going to speak later, but I don’t—I don’t want to go up on the platform just now.”
“Certainly, Mr. Jackson.”
The only vacant chair was half behind a pillar in a far corner of the hall, but he welcomed its privacy with relief; and settling himself, looked curiously around him. Yes, the gathering was large, and apparently enthusiastic. Catching a glimpse of a face here and there, he saw that he knew most of them, even by name; faces of men he had lived beside and worked with for twenty years. All the better. These were the ones he must reach now, as soon as that figure on the platform there ceased mouthing his hollow cheer.
His eyes swung back to the platform, and as there was another ripple of applause he leaned his face around the corner to see. Then he uttered a low exclamation—the speaker was Thomas MacDowell. They had not been asked to speak together in several years.
“I’ve had many enemies in my life,” boomed the loud voice over the hall, “and don’t think I’ve had a change of heart, now that I’m fifty and a little grey. I’ll go on making enemies to the end. This is just a little lull when I want to take off my armor and pay a tribute to an enemy—because that enemy happens to be the finest man I ever knew.”
John Jackson wondered what candidate or protégé of MacDowell’s was in question. It was typical of the man to seize any opportunity to make his own hay.
“Perhaps I wouldn’t have said what I’ve said,” went on the booming voice, “were he here today. But if all the young men in this city came up to me and asked me ‘What is being honorable?’ I’d answer them, ‘Go up to that man and look into his eyes.’ They’re not happy eyes. I’ve often sat and looked at him and wondered what went on back of them that made those eyes so sad.