30

For a while I lost sight of Jordan Baker.and then in midsummer I found her again.At first I was flattered togo places with her.because she was a golf champion,and every one knew her name.

Then it was something more.I wasn't actually in love,but I felt a sort of tender curiosity.The bored haughtyface that she turned to the world concealed somethingmost affectations conceal something eventually.eventhough they don't in the beginningand one day I found what it was.When we were on a house-party

together up in Warwick.she left a borrowed car out in the rain with the top down.and then lied about itandsuddenly I remembered the story about her that had eluded me that night at Daisy's.At her first big golftournament there was a row that nearly reached the newspapersa suggestion that she had moved her ballfrom a bad lie in the semi-final round.The thing approached the proportions of a scandalthen died away.Acaddy retracted his statement.and the only other witness admitted that he might have been mistaken.

The incident and the name had remained together in my mind.

Jordan Baker instinctively avoided clever.shrewd men.and now I saw that this was because she felt safer ona plane where any divergence from a code would be thought impossible.She was incurably dishonest.Shewasn't able to endure being at a disadvantage and.given this unwillingness,I suppose she had begun dealingin subterfuges when she was very young in order to keep that cool.insolent smile tured to the world and yetsatisfy the demands of her hard,jaunty body.

It made no difference to me.Dishonesty in a woman is a thing you never blame deeplyl was casually sorry,and then I forgot.It was on that same house party that we had a curious conversation about driving a car.Itstarted because she passed so close to some workmen that our fender flicked a button on one man's coat.

"You're a rotten driver,"I protested.

"Either you ought to be more careful,or you oughin't to drive at all.

"I am careful."

"No.you're not."

"Well.other people are,"she said lightly.

"What's that got to do with it?"

"They'll keep out of my way."she insisted.

"It takes two to make an accident."

"Suppose you met somebody just as careless as yourself."

"I hope I never will,"she answered.

"I hate careless people.That's why I like you."Her gray.sun-strained eyes stared straight ahead,but she haddeliberately shifted our relations,and for a moment I thought I loved her.But I am slow-thinking and full ofinterior rules that act as brakes on my desires,and I knew that first I had to get myself definitely out of thattangle back home.