CHAPTER 4

but now he'd left Chicago and come east in a manner that was rather breathtaking: for

instance, he'd brought a string of polo ponies from Lake Forest. It was hard to believe that a man in my own generation was wealthy enough to do that.

Why they came east, I don't know. They had spent a year in France, for no particular reason, and then drifted here and there restlessly wherever people played polo and were

wealthy together. This was a permanent move, said Lily over the telephone, but I didn't believe it—I had no insight into Lily's heart, but I felt that Max would continue drifting

forever, seeking a little wistfully for the dramatic excitement of some irretrievable football game.

And so it happened that on a warm, windy evening, I drove over to East Egg to see two old friends whom I barely knew at all.

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Their home was even more extravagant than I had anticipated, a lively red and white Georgian Colonial mansion overlooking the bay. The lawn began at the beach and

extended toward the front door for a quarter of a mile, weaving around sundials and brick paths and flourishing gardens—finally, as it approached the house, climbing up the

side in vibrant vines as if propelled by its own momentum. The facade was interrupted by a row of French windows, now glowing with reflected gold, and wide open to the

warm, breezy afternoon, where Max Caldwell, in riding attire, stood with his legs apart on the front porch.