| The Final Solution |
| The chauffeur--he was one of
Wolfshiem's protégés--heard
the shots--afterward he could only say that he hadn't thought anything
much about them. I drove from the station directly to Gatsby's
house and my rushing anxiously up the front steps was the first thing
that alarmed anyone. But they knew then, I firmly believe.
With scarcely a word said, four of us, the chauffeur, butler, gardener
and I, hurried down to the pool.
There was a faint, barely perceptible movement of the water as the fresh flow from one end urged its way toward the drain at the other. With little ripples that were hardly the shadows of waves, the laden mattress moved irregularly down the pool. A small gust of wind that scarcely corrugated the surface was enough to disturb its accidental course with its accidental burden. The touch of a cluster of leaves revolved it slowly, tracing, like the leg of a compass, a thin red circle in the water. It was after we started with Gatsby toward the house that the gardener saw Wilson's body a little way off in the grass, and the holocaust was complete. |