thegreatgatsby.org
The Great Gatsby | Chapter 5
http://www.thegreatgatsby.org/5.html
When I came home to West Egg that night I was afraid for a moment that my house was on fire. Two o’clock and the whole corner of the peninsula was blazing with light, which fell unreal on the shrubbery and made thin elongating glints upon the roadside wires. Turning a corner, I saw that it was Gatsby’s house, lit from tower to cellar. Your place looks like the World’s Fair, I said. Well, suppose we take a plunge in the swimming-pool? I haven’t made use of it all summer. I’ve got to go to bed. Oh, it isn’...
thegreatgatsby.org
The Great Gatsby | Chapter 2
http://www.thegreatgatsby.org/2.html
The valley of ashes is bounded on one side by a small foul river, and, when the drawbridge is up to let barges through, the passengers on waiting trains can stare at the dismal scene for as long as half an hour. There is always a halt there of at least a minute, and it was because of this that I first met Tom Buchanan’s mistress. We’re getting off, he insisted. I want you to meet my girl. Hello, Wilson, old man, said Tom, slapping him jovially on the shoulder. How’s business? Works pretty slow, don’t he?
thegreatgatsby.org
The Great Gatsby | Chapter 6
http://www.thegreatgatsby.org/6.html
About this time an ambitious young reporter from New York arrived one morning at Gatsby’s door and asked him if he had anything to say. Anything to say about what? Why any statement to give out. It transpired after a confused five minutes that the man had heard Gatsby’s name around his office in a connection which he either wouldn’t reveal or didn’t fully understand. This was his day off and with laudable initiative he had hurried out to see. As though they cared! No, thanks. A little champagne? Nothing ...
thegreatgatsby.org
The Great Gatsby | Chapter 4
http://www.thegreatgatsby.org/4.html
On Sunday morning while church bells rang in the villages alongshore, the world and its mistress returned to Gatsby’s house and twinkled hilariously on his lawn. He’s a bootlegger, said the young ladies, moving somewhere between his cocktails and his flowers. One time he killed a man who had found out that he was nephew to Von Hindenburg and second cousin to the devil. Reach me a rose, honey, and pour me a last drop into that there crystal glass. All these people came to Gatsby’s house in the summer.
thegreatgatsby.org
The Great Gatsby | Chapter 3
http://www.thegreatgatsby.org/3.html
Every Friday five crates of oranges and lemons arrived from a fruiterer in New York every Monday these same oranges and lemons left his back door in a pyramid of pulpless halves. There was a machine in the kitchen which could extract the juice of two hundred oranges in half an hour if a little button was pressed two hundred times by a butler’s thumb. Welcome or not, I found it necessary to attach myself to some one before I should begin to address cordial remarks to the passers-by. That was for the golf ...
thegreatgatsby.org
The Great Gatsby | Chapter 8
http://www.thegreatgatsby.org/8.html
I couldn’t sleep all night; a fog-horn was groaning incessantly on the Sound, and I tossed half-sick between grotesque reality and savage, frightening dreams. Toward dawn I heard a taxi go up Gatsby’s drive, and immediately I jumped out of bed and began to dress I felt that I had something to tell him, something to warn him about, and morning would be too late. Crossing his lawn, I saw that his front door was still open and he was leaning against a table in the hall, heavy with dejection or sleep. That f...
thegreatgatsby.org
The Great Gatsby | Chapter 9
http://www.thegreatgatsby.org/9.html
I called up Daisy half an hour after we found him, called her instinctively and without hesitation. But she and Tom had gone away early that afternoon, and taken baggage with them. Say when they’d be back? Any idea where they are? How I could reach them? I don’t know. Can’t say. I wanted to get somebody for him. I wanted to go into the room where he lay and reassure him: I’ll get somebody for you, Gatsby. Don’t worry. Just trust me and I’ll get somebody for you. Will you ring again? Some one started to a...
thegreatgatsby.org
The Great Gatsby | Chapter 7
http://www.thegreatgatsby.org/7.html
Is Mr Gatsby sick? Nope After a pause he added sir. in a dilatory, grudging way. I hadn’t seen him around, and I was rather worried. Tell him Mr. Carraway came over. Carraway. All right, I’ll tell him. Abruptly he slammed the door. Next day Gatsby called me on the phone. No, old sport. I hear you fired all your servants. I wanted somebody who wouldn’t gossip. Daisy comes over quite often in the afternoons. So the whole caravansary had fallen in like a card house at the disapproval in her eyes. I picked i...