That locality was always vaguely disquieting, even in the broad glare of afternoon, and now I turned my head as though I had been warned of something behind. Over the ashheaps the giant eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg kept their vigil but I perceived, after a moment, that other eyes were regarding us with peculiar intensity from less than twenty feet away.
In one of the windows over the garage the curtains had been moved aside a little and Myrtle Wilson was peering down at the car. So engrossed was she that she had no consciousness of being observed and one emotion after another crept into her face like objects into a slowly developing picture. Her expression was curiously familiar—it was an expression I had often seen on women’s faces but on Myrtle Wilson’s face it seemed purposeless and inexplicable until I realized that her eyes, wide with jealous terror, were fixed not on Tom, but on Jordan Baker, whom she took to be his wife.

There is no confusion like the confusion of a simple mind, and as we drove away Tom was feeling the hot whips of panic. His wife and his mistress, until an hour ago secure and inviolate, were slipping precipitately from his control. Instinct made him step on the accelerator with the double purpose of overtaking Daisy and leaving Wilson behind, and we sped along toward Astoria at fifty miles an hour, until, among the spidery girders of the elevated, we came in sight of the easygoing blue coupé.

那一带地方一向隐隐约约使人感到心神不安，甚至在下午耀眼的阳光里也一样，因此现在我掉过头去，仿佛有人要我提防背后有什么东西。在灰堆上方，T·J·埃克尔堡大夫的巨眼在守望着，但是过了一会我觉察另外一双眼睛正在从不到二十英尺以外聚精会神地注视着我们。在车行上面一扇窗户面前，窗帘向旁边拉开了一点，茉特尔·威尔逊正在向下窥视着这辆车子。她那样全神贯注，因此她毫不觉察有人在注意她，一种接一种的感情在她脸上流露出来，好像物体出现在一张慢慢显影的照片上。她的表情熟悉得有点蹊跷——这是我时常在女人脸上看到的表情，可是在茉特尔·威尔逊的脸上，这种表情似乎毫无意义而且难以理解，直到我明白她那两只充满妒火、睁得大大的眼睛并不是盯在汤姆身上，而是盯在乔丹·贝克身上，原来她以为乔丹是他的妻子。一个简单的头脑陷入慌乱时是非同小可的，等到我们车子开走的时候，汤姆感到惊慌失措，心里像油煎一样。他的妻子和情妇，直到一小时前还是安安稳稳、不可侵犯的，现在却猛不防正从他的控制下溜走。本能促使他猛踩油门，以达到赶上黛西和把威尔逊抛在脑后的双重目的，于是我们以每小时五十英里的速度向阿斯托里亚飞驰而去。直到在高架铁路蜘蛛网似的钢架中间，我们才看见那辆逍遥自在的蓝色小轿车。