Nick and Jake

by Jonathan Richards

  So far it’s all just scraps and fragments. Have sketched out a few plot lines, a few novel ideas, but not sure any of them are going anywhere. Here’s a story I’ve been thinking about: a guy, maybe a war vet, living in the suburbs in the house with the wife and the kids and the dog. He’s doing okay doing something he likes, but he wants more. You know, more stuff, bigger house, bigger car, bigger dog. So he takes an executive job in a corporation, puts on a gray flannel suit, and starts negotiating the corporate ladder. Compromises, sells out, drinks too much, learns valuable lessons about self and society. Whaddya think? I know, I can hear you saying it.

  Crap.

  Which is why I’m doing this by letter. If I tried out something like that to your face I’d get about as far as “a guy.”

  Wilson’s back in town--Sloan Wilson, you remember him? Nice young writer chap from Connecticut or Casablanca or one of those exotic places that starts with a ‘C.’ He was with that young crowd at Jimmy Jones’s flat that night you got so tight you passed out in the pissoir. Come to think of it, you probably don’t remember him. He’s been in Germany, heading back to Connecticut or Casablanca. I’ll run the idea past him over steak frites at Balzar tonite. If he likes it, I’ll know it’s shit.

  God will sort it all out when He wakes up. In the meantime, let’s get together soon. The booze doesn’t taste right without you.

  Your Devoted Friend,

  Nick (of the Gillette Nicks)

  FROM THE DESK OF:

  Jake Barnes

  April 12, 1953

  by messenger

  Nick my lad,

  About fucking time, is all I can say. Stay with it. Scraps and fragments are where it all starts. Don’t throw any of them out, at least not yet. You never know where that one true sentence that starts it all off is going to come from, and sometimes you don’t recognize when you write it ... days or weeks or months later, you’ll open up an old notebook, and then it’s Geez, I wrote that? Don’t even remember ... I must be a fucking genius.

  But I don’t think the chap in the gray flannel suit is the way to go. It feels like something you already wrote and rejected-almost like Trimalchio in West Egg without the Gatsby character. Like resurrecting the other guy twenty years later, and who’d want to read that?

  And what else would you put into it? You’d be writing out of memory, and out of anger.

  You need a love-hate relationship with your characters. You’ve got to take pure sadistic delight in watching them get hit by baseballs and trains and flying gash, but you’ve got to love ’em at the same time. I don’t see you loving this fellow.

  Get a little farther outside yourself. Find a character you know, but don’t understand. And stay with it. Let’s pass up the Deux Magots this evening. Keep your ass in the chair and write.

  Conscience regards,

  Ye Olde Jake

  (ENCRYPTED AND DECODED)

  (4/13)

  FROM: NICHOLAS CARRAWAY

  TO: ALLEN DULLES

  THANKS FOR CONCERN AND REASSURANCE. LIFE IN TATTERS, FRIENDS GONE, MARRIAGE OVER. WELL, ILL WIND THAT BLOWS NO GOOD. WHAT DO YOU MEAN, BRING BARNES IN? THOUGHT I WAS OUT OF THIS. BARNES IS A FRIEND. HAD NOT BEEN DEVELOPING HIM AS SOURCE, OR AGENT. WHY DIDN’T YOU TELL ME SOONER? NOT SURE IT CAN BE DONE NOW.

  CARRAWAY

  (ENCRYPTED AND DECODED)

  ((4/13)

  FROM: ALLEN DULLES

  TO: NICHOLAS CARRAWAY

  TELLING YOU NOW. STOP WHINING. BRING BARNES IN. PLAN UNCHANGED. COORDINATE NEWSPAPERS, STREET DEMONSTRATIONS, MILITARY UNREST, GOVERNMENT INSECURITY IN PARIS. START PLANTING STORIES.

  DULLES

  Paris

  April 14, 1953

  Dear Chris,

  So, now that you’re a woman, you can’t keep a secret?

  I heard from your Dr. Hamburger. For once in my life I don’t know what the hell to say. You know, I told you that night that you were my first man, and you told me that it didn’t really count, because you weren’t really a man. At first I put it down to fag talk, but it turned out that you were just telling it straight.

  I wasn’t. There was one other time.

  It was not long after the war. The first war. Those years I didn’t know what the hell I was. Half man, half mad. I went after gash like a fury. God knows why. I kept taking girls to bed. And they’d laugh. Or get angry. Or worst of all, be sensitive and understanding.

  I’d been playing tennis with this guy named Robert. He wasn’t one of us. That made it easier. He was built like a tough guy-he’d been a boxer in college. Middleweight champion of Princeton. That didn’t mean much to me, but it meant a lot to Robert. Pretty, looked a bit like Mel Ferrer. He told me it was his first time, too, but he seemed to know what he was doing. Then hated himself when the lights were on.

  It was just that one time. Hell, that was enough to tell me it wasn’t what I wanted, though it felt good while it was happening. Christ, anything feels good while it’s happening.

  Robert wouldn’t leave me alone after that. Started hanging around with my friends. Strutted and flexed his muscles a lot. Invited himself along on trips. Made a play for Brett. She went to bed with him a couple of times. She told me. She always tells me. She dropped him for the bullfighter and he made a total ass of himself, and then we didn’t see him anymore.

  And after that, nothing. Hell, nobody was fucking anyway, in the Thirties. Everyone getting married, or getting into politics, or worrying about war. Brett would come up sometimes and crawl in bed with me. Mostly, she just wanted to be held. That’s something women think is swell, being held. Let me know if it starts appealing to you, and then I’ll know you’ve really made the switch.

  It was a damn good time to be a journalist in Europe, You could still talk to the crazies around Hitler, as long as you weren’t a kike--Christ, I am living in the past, aren’t I? After I spent a little time with Goebbels and Speer and those bastards, I stopped using words like that.

  The War was something else. Everything was raw, everything on the edge. Murrow told me that when he was broadcasting up on those rooftops--“This is London”--and the bombs were crashing around him, there were women literally crawling after him out on the roofs.

  But no more sex for me. Until that night I met you. What did we do? Whatever it was, it seemed to work. And whatever it was, I guess we couldn’t do it again the same way, could we? And what are we to each other, now? Friends? That doesn’t seem to cover it. All I know is, since that night, Brett doesn’t break my heart any more.

  Fuck it. I can’t live like this, and you get the blame. Or the credit. I’m going to Copenhagen.

  Love,

  Jake

  4/14/53

  FROM: LADY BRETT ASHLEY

  GRAND HOTEL

  NEW DELHI

  TO: LARRY DARRELL

  TEHERAN

  DONT WORRY ABOUT KID STOP HES RIPE STOP ONE SESSION WITH CRANSTON AND HES YOURS STOP JUST ONE THING DARLING DONT EVER ASK ME TO GO TO BED WITH CRANSTON AGAIN STOP HES TOO KINKY EVEN FOR ME

  BRETT

  4/14/53

  TO: REzA PAHLAVI

  TEHERAN

  REzA HONEY STOP SIT TIGHT STOP BY THIS TIME NExT WEEK WILL BE SITTING IN YOUR LAP ON PEACOCK THRONE

  LOVE BRETT

  Apartment C

  14½ MacDougal Street

  New York

  April 14, 1953

  Dear Nick,

  First of all, let me start out by saying that I never thought of you as old. I’ve always thought of you as my rock, though, from way back when Snicklepoo and the Baby Sitter was just starting--and wow, does that ever seem like a long time ago!--a whole lifetime or two. When things were going wrong on the set-anything from cameras breaking down to worries about the schedule to was I wearing the right color dress, I always knew, and everyone always knew, that you’d solve the problem. But did you know that whenever you passed through the set, all the girls--the makeup girl, the head writer, everyone--would turn their heads aroun
d just to watch you, and they’d giggle and whisper, “He’s so sexy.”

  And you know, I was so naïve back then, I’m not sure I even knew what sexy was, exactly, except maybe Eddie Fisher. So, you see, my first definition of sexy was you! I guess you think that’s pretty silly, coming from a mere girl. But it’s true.

  And you’re not old.

  Yours always,

  Ronnie

  Margery Pyle

  40125 Oak Park Drive

  Oak Park, Illinois

  April 14, 1953

  Nicholas,

  I am back from Reno, and the divorce is final. In the absence of any compelling argument from your lawyer, the judge granted all my property settlement and alimony requests.

  I am making a new life for myself. I’ve met a fine man. His name is William Fromme, he’s an executive with Welch’s Grape Juice, and he’s been working with Mr. Welch to start a new anti-Communist society that will continue Senator McCarthy’s fine work. He has a little daughter, Lynette, and he’s raising her to be a real patriotic American. We won’t make the same mistakes with her that we did--that you did--with our son.

  Anyway, I just want to tell you that if I ever had any questions about your manhood--and I did--and I know you did --I just want to reassure you. You don’t measure up to a real man.

  Margery

  Apartment C

  14½ MacDougal Street

  New York

  April 14, 1953

  Dear Nick,

  I found Trimalchio in West Egg at the Strand Bookstore, and I read it through in one sitting, and I loved it! It’s everything that I love like so much about you-beautiful language, wise insights, and such wonderful sympathy for how people can make mistakes, and it only makes them more human. I can just feel the love you have for all your characters, even the awful ones, like Tom. I wonder--was Jordan based on Mrs. Carraway at all?

  You’re a wonderful writer! I just wish you had written more novels. Well, it’s not too late. I believe there can be second acts in all of our lives.

  Ruth--Ruth Brown, her full name is--took me to a recording session yesterday. I was secretly hoping she’d ask me to sing backup on it, but then I got there, and I listened to the musicians Jerry had there, and the backup singers, and I was praying they wouldn’t. Needless to say, they didn’t.

  She recorded four songs. I loved them all, but the one I liked best was called “Mama, He Treats Your Daughter Mean.” Now, I can sing about mamas and daughters, but not like that. When Ruth sang it, you just knew she wasn’t really calling her Mama for help. It’s like, when she sings “Mama!” she’s just telling the world she’s got problems with a no-good man, but she’s proud that she’s woman enough to handle them. I wonder if I’ll ever be woman enough to sing a song like that.

  After the session, she took me up to a night club in Harlem called Smalls Paradise. There was a jazz quartet playing there, and they asked Ruth to get up and sing a number with them. She sang “Willow, Weep For Me,” and it took my breath away. It’s so different from the way she sings at the recording session. It seemed ... oh, here’s where I realize I don’t know anything about music, and I have so much to learn, but it seemed to me like it was different with the musicians. In the recording studio, singing the blues, she seemed to be listening to the rhythm section, and singing with them, but at Smalls Paradise she seemed to be listening to all the instruments, and almost becoming one of them.

  I’ve never felt music like I felt it last night. I don’t know if I could ever learn to do it, not the way Ruthie does. But there’s something about New York that makes you feel like you can reinvent yourself, and everything is possible. I wish you were here.

  Wishing,

  Ronnie

  PS. Jerry has given me records by Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Dinah Washington, Chris Connor, and Anita O’Day, and I’m spending the day listening to them.

  (ENCRYPTED AND DECODED)

  (4/15)

  FROM: IRVING KRISTOL

  TO: LARRY DARRELL

  HERE’S THE LATEST BATCH OF HEADLINE STORIES, NEWS FEATURE ITEMS, AND EDITORIALS FOR THE TEHERAN PRESS. WE’LL NEED A CHECKLIST ON OUR PLANS. REMEMBER, THIS CAN’T GO WRONG. WE’LL ONLY GET ONE CHANCE AT THAT CRYING COMMIE.

  KRISTOL

  (ENCRYPTED AND DECODED)

  (4/15)

  FROM: LARRY DARRELL

  TO: IRVING KRISTOL

  STORIES DISPATCHED TO THE LOCAL PRESS. MILITARY SALTED WITH OUR MEN, READY FOR THE COUP. GANG OF THUGS ROAMING THE STREETS BREAKING WINDOWS, SHOUTING “DOWN WITH MOSSADEGH!” NOW WE’VE UNLEASHED A SECOND GANG OF BIGGER, UGLIER THUGS TO BEAT UP THE FIRST GANG AND SHOUT “MOSSADEGH FOREVER! COMMUNISM FOR IRAN!” SYMPATHY FOR THE ANTI-M THUGS, CHAOS AND PANIC IN THE STREETS.

  DARRELL

  (ENCRYPTED AND DECODED)

  (4/15)

  FROM: IRVING KRISTOL

  TO: LARRY DARRELL

  IT HAD BETTER BE ENOUGH.

  KRISTOL

  (ENCRYPTED AND DECODED)

  (4/15)

  FROM: LARRY DARRELL

  TO: IRVING KRISTOL

  IRVING, YOU’RE TURNING INTO AN OLD WOMAN.

  DARRELL

  Hotel de l’Odeon

  Paris

  April 15, 1953

  By messenger to the Paris Herald Tribune

  Jake--

  Notes, ideas, pieces. I don’t remember Trimalchio being this hard to lift off the ground. It was hard to sustain, Lord knows, although even then, huge chunks of it seemed to write themselves, until I went back and looked at them, and discovered that they needed a whole lot more help from me before they were ready to go out into the world. But I never had any doubts about what I wanted to write, or where it was heading. Maybe it had to do with being young and foolish. But mostly, I suspect, it was because I really didn’t know I was going to be writing a novel. I just knew I had this story that I had to lay out in front of me. Now it’s just the reverse. I know I want to write something. I want to find characters and let them loose on a story. I want to hold a mirror up to the world. I want to make a difference. I want to explore corners of the human psyche, and I want to unleash the power of words to illuminate the darkness and find paths around corners and discover uncharted islands where the natives practice customs no one has ever heard of before. I want words that will seduce women and turn grown men into boys again. I know that it matters.

  And I don’t have a story.

  Ideas, by all means. Will-’o-the wisp ideas, prickles of current waiting to turn of a sudden to St. Elmo’s fire and turn my typewriter into a blaze of light. And you’re right, I don’t want to turn a microscope on the flea circus of advertising. They can make you itch, but magnified to the hundredth degree, they’re still just performing fleas.

  So I’m looking for a character. I’ve been thinking about Alden ... he’s the one I perhaps need most to understand. I wonder if I could write a novel from the point of view of a young man like him ... of a boy in the process of becoming a young man. I was thinking of the year that we sent Alden to an eastern prep school, which he left abruptly before the end of the semester, went into New York and wandered around, haunted by the sense that the world was full of phonies.

  There’s a character ... maybe not a character I know well enough. And is it enough of a story?

  Or do I need a story at all? What if I create the Nick that never was? Did you know that after Jimmy Gatz died, and I went home and moved back in with my parents and did all that soul-searching that wound up being Trimalchio, I almost said the hell with it all? I was on the brink of just dropping everything and hobo-ing it around the country. I wonder if I could recreate that alter ego. Maybe make him younger, change the time frame ... a World War II vet, chasing along on the road from one end of the country to the other.

  What do you think? Do I have anything yet? Anything worth pursuing? I keep thinking I’ll know it when I hit it, but what if I don’t?

  Spinning like a top,

  Nick
/>
  Kempinksi Hotel

  Berlin

  April 16, 1953

  Jake dear,

  You silly old bear. If you can’t say it, I can.

  I love you.

  Even if it’s the love that wouldn’t even begin to know how to speak its name.

  Thank you for telling me more about yourself. I treasure it, I really do. I want to know all about you.

  I’ll be traveling for a couple of speaking engagements, but I’ll get back to see you as soon as I can. Dr. Hamburger is a dear. A big, brawny, outdoorsy Scandinavian type--you’d like him. And a sports fan. He says his ambition is to be the Stein Ericksen of sex surgery. A little jealous, dear? No need. He’s too young for me. You know I prefer old grizzly bears like you.

  I don’t understand war, and I suppose I never will. When I was thirteen and the war was just starting, I jumped up and down a lot and yelled about wanting to go over and kill Japs, but inside I knew I didn’t really mean it.

  I’ve always been drawn to the intensity of experience, and I’ve always held back from it. Sex ... well, how could I open myself up completely when I didn’t know who I was? I didn’t want to make love to women, and I didn’t want to make love to the kind of man who wanted to make love to a man.

  I was too late for the war. I was drafted right after the armistice. I was relieved, and I was disappointed. I don’t think I’m a physical coward, though I was always a sissy. I never minded being beaten up as a kid, as much as I minded that they wanted to do it. I wouldn’t have been afraid of being hurt, or even of dying, as much as the possibility that I’d have to kill someone. I know you were a medical corpsman in the first war, and a journalist in the second, so you weren’t directly involved in the business of killing people, except to the extent that everyone in a war is in that business. And you always knew that you might have to kill someone.

  There was a sergeant in my basic training at Fort Dix. He’d been at Anzio, won the Silver Star with clusters. He was the toughest guy I’d ever met, and probably the bravest. And he had his secrets, and his torments. Including the one you’re maybe thinking, but that was almost the least of it.