Читать книгу The Complete Works of F. Scott Fitzgerald онлайн

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“What do you think of it up here?” demanded Harry eagerly. “Does it surprise you? Is it what you expected, I mean?”

“You are, Harry,” she said quietly, and reached out her arms to him.

But after a brief kiss he seemed anxious to extort enthusiasm from her.

“The town, I mean. Do you like it? Can you feel the pep in the air?”

“Oh, Harry,” she laughed, “you’ll have to give me time. You can’t just fling questions at me.”

She puffed at her cigarette with a sigh of contentment.

“One thing I want to ask you,” he began rather apologetically; “you Southerners put quite an emphasis on family, and all that—not that it isn’t quite all right, but you’ll find it a little different here. I mean—you’ll notice a lot of things that’ll seem to you sort of vulgar display at first, Sally Carrol; but just remember that this is a three-generation town. Everybody has a father, and about half of us have grandfathers. Back of that we don’t go.”

“Of course,” she murmured.

“Our grandfathers, you see, founded the place, and a lot of them had to take some pretty queer jobs while they were doing the founding. For instance, there’s one woman who at present is about the social model for the town; well, her father was the first public ash man—things like that.”