Читать книгу The Complete Works of F. Scott Fitzgerald онлайн

1284 страница из 1457

He beckoned to the waiter.

“Hey!” he remarked conversationally. “This is funny money you got here, ain’t it?”

But the waiter spoke no English and was unable to satisfy Jim Cooley’s craving for companionship. Never mind. His nerves were at rest now—body was glowing triumphantly from top to toe.

“This is the life,” he muttered to himself. “Only live once. Might as well enjoy it.” And then aloud to the waiter, “’Nother one of those big cognacs. Two of them. I’m set to go.”

He went—for several hours. He awoke at dawn in a bedroom of a small inn, with red streaks in his eyes and fever pounding in his head. He was afraid to look in his pockets until he had ordered and swallowed another cognac, and then he found that his worst fears were justified. Of the ninety-odd dollars with which he had got off the train only six were left.

“I must have been crazy,” he whispered to himself.

There remained his watch. His watch was large and methodical, and on the outer case two hearts were picked out in diamonds from the dark solid gold. It had been part of the booty of Jim Cooley’s heroism, for when he had located the paper in the German officer’s pocket he had found it clasped tight in the dead hand. One of the diamond hearts probably stood for some human grief back in Friedland or Berlin, but when Jim married he told Milly that the diamond hearts stood for their hearts and would be a token of their everlasting love. Before Milly fully appreciated this sentimental suggestion their enduring love had been tarnished beyond repair and the watch went back into Jim’s pocket where it confined itself to marking time instead of emotion.