Читать книгу The Complete Works of F. Scott Fitzgerald онлайн

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Anthony: Seven.

Maury:(His eyes narrowing—not unpleasantly, but to express a faint disapproval) Drove me crazy the other day.

Anthony: How?

Maury: That habit of taking notes.

Anthony: Me, too. Seems I’d said something night before that he considered material but he’d forgotten it—so he had at me. He’d say “Can’t you try to concentrate?” And I’d say “You bore me to tears. How do I remember?”

(Maury laughs noiselessly, by a sort of bland and appreciative widening of his features.)

Maury: Dick doesn’t necessarily see more than any one else. He merely can put down a larger proportion of what he sees.

Anthony: That rather impressive talent—

Maury: Oh, yes. Impressive!

Anthony: And energy—ambitious, well-directed energy. He’s so entertaining—he’s so tremendously stimulating and exciting. Often there’s something breathless in being with him.

Maury: Oh, yes.

(Silence, and then:)

Anthony: (With his thin, somewhat uncertain face at its most convinced) But not indomitable energy. Some day, bit by bit, it’ll blow away, and his rather impressive talent with it, and leave only a wisp of a man, fretful and egotistic and garrulous.