The Great Gatsby — Page 24

他们陪我走到门口，并肩站在一片明亮温馨的方形灯光里。当我发动引擎时，黛西急切地喊道：「等一下！

They came to the door with me and stood side by side in a cheerful square of light. As I started my motor Daisy peremptorily called: "Wait!

「我忘了问你一件事，而且很重要。我们听说你和西部的一个女孩订婚了。」

"I forgot to ask you something, and it's important. We heard you were engaged to a girl out West."

「没错，」汤姆好心地附和道。「我们听说你订婚了。」

"That's right," corroborated Tom kindly. "We heard that you were engaged."

「那是谣言。我太穷了，娶不起。」

"It's a libel. I'm too poor."

「但我们确实听说了，」黛西坚持道，她像花儿绽放般再次开口，令我颇感意外。「我们从三个人那里听说的，所以一定是真的。」

"But we heard it," insisted Daisy, surprising me by opening up again in a flower-like way. "We heard it from three people, so it must be true."

我当然知道他们指的是什么，但我根本没有订婚，连模糊的意向都没有。流言蜚语已经把婚事传得沸沸扬扬，这也正是我来东部的原因之一。你不能因为谣言就与老朋友断交，但另一方面，我也绝不打算被谣言逼进婚姻的殿堂。

Of course I knew what they were referring to, but I wasn't even vaguely engaged. The fact that gossip had published the banns was one of the reasons I had come East. You can't stop going with an old friend on account of rumours, and on the other hand I had no intention of being rumoured into marriage.

他们的关切让我颇为感动，也让他们显得不那么遥不可及，不再那么富贵难亲——尽管如此，当我驾车离去时，我心里还是有些困惑，也有些不是滋味。在我看来，黛西应该做的事是抱起孩子冲出那栋房子——但她脑子里显然没有这样的念头。至于汤姆，他「在纽约有个女人」这件事，其实远不如他曾被一本书搞得郁郁寡欢这件事来得令人惊讶。

Their interest rather touched me and made them less remotely rich—nevertheless, I was confused and a little disgusted as I drove away. It seemed to me that the thing for Daisy to do was to rush out of the house, child in arms—but apparently there were no such intentions in her head. As for Tom, the fact that he "had some woman in New York" was really less surprising than that he had been depressed by a book.