"Hemingway, Ernest - The Sun Also Rises" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hemingway Ernest)

"What did you do?"
"Oh, went out, of course." She spoke in a sort of imitation joyful manner. "I always keep my appointments. No one keeps theirs, nowadays. I ought to know better. How are you, Jake, anyway?"
"Fine."
"That was a fine girl you had at the dance, and then went off with that Brett one."
"Don't you like her?" Cohn asked.
"I think she's perfectly charming. Don't you?"
Cohn said nothing.
"Look, Jake. I want to talk with you. Would you come over with me to the Dome? You'll stay here, won't you, Robert? Come on, Jake."
We crossed the Boulevard Montparnasse and sat down at a table. A boy came up with the _Paris Times_, and I bought one and opened it.
"What's the matter, Frances?"
"Oh, nothing," she said, "except that he wants to leave me."
"How do you mean?"
"Oh, he told every one that we were going to be married, and I told my mother and every one, and now he doesn't want to do it."
"What's the matter?"
"He's decided he hasn't lived enough. I knew it would happen when he went to New York."
She looked up, very bright-eyed and trying to talk inconsequentially.
"I wouldn't marry him if he doesn't want to. Of course I wouldn't. I wouldn't marry him now for anything. But it does seem to me to be a little late now, after we've waited three years, and I've just gotten my divorce."
I said nothing.
"We were going to celebrate so, and instead we've just had scenes. It's so childish. We have dreadful scenes, and he cries and begs me to be reasonable, but he says he just can't do it."
"It's rotten luck."
"I should say it is rotten luck. I've wasted two years and a half on him now. And I don't know now if any man will ever want to marry me. Two years ago I could have married anybody I wanted, down at Cannes. All the old ones that wanted to marry somebody chic and settle down were crazy about me. Now I don't think I could get anybody."
"Sure, you could marry anybody."
"No, I don't believe it. And I'm fond of him, too. And I'd like to have children. I always thought we'd have children."
She looked at me very brightly. "I never liked children much, but I don't want to think I'll never have them. I always thought I'd have them and then like them."
"He's got children."
"Oh, yes. He's got children, and he's got money, and he's got a rich mother, and he's written a book, and nobody will publish my stuff, nobody at all. It isn't bad, either. And I haven't got any money at all. I could have had alimony, but I got the divorce the quickest way."
She looked at me again very brightly.
"It isn't right. It's my own fault and it's not, too. I ought to have known better. And when I tell him he just cries and says he can't marry. Why can't he marry? I'd be a good wife. I'm easy to get along with. I leave him alone. It doesn't do any good."
"It's a rotten shame."
"Yes, it is a rotten shame. But there's no use talking about it, is there? Come on, let's go back to the cafй."
"And of course there isn't anything I can do."
"No. Just don't let him know I talked to you. I know what he wants." Now for the first time she dropped her bright, terribly cheerful manner. "He wants to go back to New York alone, and be there when his book comes out so when a lot of little chickens like it. That's what he wants."
"Maybe they won't like it. I don't think he's that way. Really."
"You don't know him like I do, Jake. That's what he wants to do. I know it. I know it. That's why he doesn't want to marry. He wants to have a big triumph this fall all by himself."
"Want to go back to the cafй?"
"Yes. Come on."
We got up from the table--they had never brought us a drink-- and started across the street toward the Select, where Cohn sat smiling at us from behind the marble-topped table.
"Well, what are you smiling at?" Frances asked him. "Feel pretty happy?"
"I was smiling at you and Jake with your secrets."
"Oh, what I've told Jake isn't any secret. Everybody will know it soon enough. I only wanted to give Jake a decent version."
"What was it? About your going to England?"
"Yes, about my going to England. Oh, Jake! I forgot to tell you. I'm going to England."
"Isn't that fine!"
"Yes, that's the way it's done in the very best families. Robert's sending me. He's going to give me two hundred pounds and then I'm going to visit friends. Won't it be lovely? The friends don't know about it, yet."
She turned to Cohn and smiled at him. He was not smiling now.
"You were only going to give me a hundred pounds, weren't you, Robert? But I made him give me two hundred. He's really very generous. Aren't you, Robert?"
I do not know how people could say such terrible things to Robert Cohn. There are people to whom you could not say insulting things. They give you a feeling that the world would be destroyed, would actually be destroyed before your eyes, if you said certain things. But here was Cohn taking it all. Here it was, all going on right before me, and I did not even feel an impulse to try and stop it. And this was friendly joking to what went on later.
"How can you say such things, Frances?" Cohn interrupted.
"Listen to him. I'm going to England. I'm going to visit friends. Ever visit friends that didn't want you? Oh, they'll have to take me, all right. 'How do you do, my dear? Such a long time since we've seen you. And how is your dear mother?' Yes, how is my dear mother? She put all her money into French war bonds. Yes, she did. Probably the only person in the world that did. 'And what about Robert?' or else very careful talking around Robert. 'You must be most careful not to mention him, my dear. Poor Frances has had a most unfortunate experience.' Won't it be fun, Robert? Don't you think it will be fun, Jake?"
She turned to me with that terribly bright smile. It was very satisfactory to her to have an audience for this.