The Catcher in the Rye

by J. D. Salinger

  It was pretty early when I got there. I sat down at the bar—it was pretty crowded—and had a couple of Scotch and sodas before old Luce even showed up. I stood up when I ordered them so they could see how tall I was and all and not think I was a goddam minor. Then I watched the phonies for a while. Some guy next to me was snowing hell out of the babe he was with. He kept telling her she had aristocratic hands. That killed me. The other end of the bar was full of flits. They weren’t too flitty-looking—I mean they didn’t have their hair too long or anything—but you could tell they were flits anyway. Finally old Luce showed up.

  Old Luce. What a guy. He was supposed to be my Student Adviser when I was at Whooton. The only thing he ever did, though, was give these sex talks and all, late at night when there was a bunch of guys in his room. He knew quite a bit about sex, especially perverts and all. He was always telling us about a lot of creepy guys that go around having affairs with sheep, and guys that go around with girls’ pants sewed in the lining of their hats and all. And flits and Lesbians. Old Luce knew who every flit and Lesbian in the United States was. All you had to do was mention somebody—anybody—and old Luce’d tell you if he was a flit or not. Sometimes it was hard to believe, the people he said were flits and Lesbians and all, movie actors and like that. Some of the ones he said were flits were even married, for God’s sake. You’d keep saying to him, “You mean Joe Blow’s a flit? Joe Blow? That big, tough guy that plays gangsters and cowboys all the time?” Old Luce’d say, “Certainly.” He was always saying “Certainly.” He said it didn’t matter if a guy was married or not. He said half the married guys in the world were flits and didn’t even know it. He said you could turn into one practically overnight, if you had all the traits and all. He used to scare the hell out of us. I kept waiting to turn into a flit or something. The funny thing about old Luce, I used to think he was sort of flitty himself, in a way. He was always saying, “Try this for size,” and then he’d goose the hell out of you while you were going down the corridor. And whenever he went to the can, he always left the goddam door open and talked to you while you were brushing your teeth or something. That stuff’s sort of flitty. It really is. I’ve known quite a few real flits, at schools and all, and they’re always doing stuff like that, and that’s why I always had my doubts about old Luce. He was a pretty intelligent guy, though. He really was.

  He never said hello or anything when he met you. The first thing he said when he sat down was that he could only stay a couple of minutes. He said he had a date. Then he ordered a dry Martini. He told the bartender to make it very dry, and no olive.

  “Hey, I got a flit for you,” I told him. “At the end of the bar. Don’t look now. I been saving him for ya.”

  “Very funny,” he said. “Same old Caulfield. When are you going to grow up?”

  I bored him a lot. I really did. He amused me, though. He was one of those guys that sort of amuse me a lot.

  “How’s your sex life?” I asked him. He hated you to ask him stuff like that.

  “Relax,” he said. “Just sit back and relax, for Chrissake.”

  “I’m relaxed,” I said. “How’s Columbia? Ya like it?”

  “Certainly I like it. If I didn’t like it I wouldn’t have gone there,” he said. He could be pretty boring himself sometimes.

  “What’re you majoring in?” I asked him. “Perverts?” I was only horsing around.

  “What’re you trying to be—funny?”

  “No. I’m only kidding,” I said. “Listen, hey, Luce. You’re one of these intellectual guys. I need your advice. I’m in a terrific—”

  He let out this big groan on me. “Listen, Caulfield. If you want to sit here and have a quiet, peaceful drink and a quiet, peaceful conver—”

  “All right, all right,” I said. “Relax.” You could tell he didn’t feel like discussing anything serious with me. That’s the trouble with these intellectual guys. They never want to discuss anything serious unless they feel like it. So all I did was, I started discussing topics in general with him. “No kidding, how’s your sex life?” I asked him. “You still going around with that same babe you used to at Whooton? The one with the terrific—”

  “Good God, no,” he said.

  “How come? What happened to her?”

  “I haven’t the faintest idea. For all I know, since you ask, she’s probably the Whore of New Hampshire by this time.”

  “That isn’t nice. If she was decent enough to let you get sexy with her all the time, you at least shouldn’t talk about her that way.”

  “Oh, God!” old Luce said. “Is this going to be a typical Caulfield conversation? I want to know right now.”

  “No,” I said, “but it isn’t nice anyway. If she was decent and nice enough to let you—”

  “Must we pursue this horrible trend of thought?”

  I didn’t say anything. I was sort of afraid he’d get up and leave on me if I didn’t shut up. So all I did was, I ordered another drink. I felt like getting stinking drunk.

  “Who’re you going around with now?” I asked him. “You feel like telling me?”

  “Nobody you know.”

  “Yeah, but who? I might know her.”

  “Girl lives in the Village. Sculptress. If you must know.”

  “Yeah? No kidding? How old is she?”

  “I’ve never asked her, for God’s sake.”

  “Well, around how old?”

  “I should imagine she’s in her late thirties,” old Luce said.

  “In her late thirties? Yeah? You like that?” I asked him. “You like ’em that old?” The reason I was asking was because he really knew quite a bit about sex and all. He was one of the few guys I knew that did. He lost his virginity when he was only fourteen, in Nantucket. He really did.

  “I like a mature person, if that’s what you mean. Certainly.”

  “You do? Why? No kidding, they better for sex and all?”

  “Listen. Let’s get one thing straight. I refuse to answer any typical Caulfield questions tonight. When in hell are you going to grow up?”

  I didn’t say anything for a while. I let it drop for a while. Then old Luce ordered another Martini and told the bartender to make it a lot dryer.

  “Listen. How long you been going around with her, this sculpture babe?” I asked him. I was really interested. “Did you know her when you were at Whooton?”

  “Hardly. She just arrived in this country a few months ago.”

  “She did? Where’s she from?”

  “She happens to be from Shanghai.”

  “No kidding! She Chinese, for Chrissake?”

  “Obviously.”

  “No kidding! Do you like that? Her being Chinese?”

  “Obviously.”

  “Why? I’d be interested to know—I really would.”

  “I simply happen to find Eastern philosophy more satisfactory than Western. Since you ask.”

  “You do? Wuddaya mean ‘philosophy’? Ya mean sex and all? You mean it’s better in China? That what you mean?”

  “Not necessarily in China, for God’s sake. The East I said. Must we go on with this inane conversation?”

  “Listen, I’m serious,” I said. “No kidding. Why’s it better in the East?”

  “It’s too involved to go into, for God’s sake,” old Luce said. “They simply happen to regard sex as both a physical and a spiritual experience. If you think I’m—”

  “So do I! So do I regard it as a wuddayacallit—a physical and spiritual experience and all. I really do. But it depends on who the hell I’m doing it with. If I’m doing it with somebody I don’t even—”

  “Not so loud, for God’s sake, Caulfield. If you can’t manage to keep your voice down, let’s drop the whole—”

  “All right, but listen,” I said. I was getting excited and I was talking a little too loud. Sometimes I talk a little loud when I get excited. “This is what I mean, though,” I said. “I know it’s supposed to be physical and spiritual, and arti
stic and all. But what I mean is, you can’t do it with everybody—every girl you neck with and all—and make it come out that way. Can you?”

  “Let’s drop it,” old Luce said. “Do you mind?”

  “All right, but listen. Take you and this Chinese babe. What’s so good about you two?”

  “Drop it, I said.”

  I was getting a little too personal. I realize that. But that was one of the annoying things about Luce. When we were at Whooton, he’d make you describe the most personal stuff that happened to you, but if you started asking him questions about himself, he got sore. These intellectual guys don’t like to have an intellectual conversation with you unless they’re running the whole thing. They always want you to shut up when they shut up, and go back to your room when they go back to their room. When I was at Whooton old Luce used to hate it—you really could tell he did—when after he was finished giving this sex talk to a bunch of us in his room we stuck around and chewed the fat by ourselves for a while. I mean the other guys and myself. In somebody else’s room. Old Luce hated that. He always wanted everybody to go back to their own room and shut up when he was finished being the big shot. The thing he was afraid of, he was afraid somebody’d say something smarter than he had. He really amused me.

  “Maybe I’ll go to China. My sex life is lousy,” I said.

  “Naturally. Your mind is immature.”

  “It is. It really is. I know it,” I said. “You know what the trouble with me is? I can never get really sexy—I mean really sexy—with a girl I don’t like a lot. I mean I have to like her a lot. If I don’t, I sort of lose my goddam desire for her and all. Boy, it really screws up my sex life something awful. My sex life stinks.”

  “Naturally it does, for God’s sake. I told you the last time I saw you what you need.”

  “You mean to go to a psychoanalyst and all?” I said. That’s what he’d told me I ought to do. His father was a psychoanalyst and all.

  “It’s up to you, for God’s sake. It’s none of my goddam business what you do with your life.”

  I didn’t say anything for a while. I was thinking.

  “Supposing I went to your father and had him psychoanalyze me and all,” I said. “What would he do to me? I mean what would he do to me?”

  “He wouldn’t do a goddam thing to you. He’d simply talk to you, and you’d talk to him, for God’s sake. For one thing, he’d help you to recognize the patterns of your mind.”

  “That what?”

  “The patterns of your mind. Your mind runs in—Listen. I’m not giving an elementary course in psychoanalysis. If you’re interested, call him up and make an appointment. If you’re not, don’t. I couldn’t care less, frankly.”

  I put my hand on his shoulder. Boy, he amused me. “You’re a real friendly bastard,” I told him. “You know that?”

  He was looking at his wrist watch. “I have to tear,” he said, and stood up. “Nice seeing you.” He got the bartender and told him to bring him his check.

  “Hey,” I said, just before he beat it. “Did your father ever psychoanalyze you?”

  “Me? Why do you ask?”

  “No reason. Did he, though? Has he?”

  “Not exactly. He’s helped me to adjust myself to a certain extent, but an extensive analysis hasn’t been necessary. Why do you ask?”

  “No reason. I was just wondering.”

  “Well. Take it easy,” he said. He was leaving his tip and all and he was starting to go.

  “Have just one more drink,” I told him. “Please. I’m lonesome as hell. No kidding.”

  He said he couldn’t do it, though. He said he was late now, and then he left.

  Old Luce. He was strictly a pain in the ass, but he certainly had a good vocabulary. He had the largest vocabulary of any boy at Whooton when I was there. They gave us a test.

  20

  I KEPT SITTING THERE getting drunk and waiting for old Tina and Janine to come out and do their stuff, but they weren’t there. A flitty-looking guy with wavy hair came out and played the piano, and then this new babe, Valencia, came out and sang. She wasn’t any good, but she was better than old Tina and Janine, and at least she sang good songs. The piano was right next to the bar where I was sitting and all, and old Valencia was standing practically right next to me. I sort of gave her the old eye, but she pretended she didn’t even see me. I probably wouldn’t have done it, but I was getting drunk as hell. When she was finished, she beat it out of the room so fast I didn’t even get a chance to invite her to join me for a drink, so I called the headwaiter over. I told him to ask old Valencia if she’d care to join me for a drink. He said he would, but he probably didn’t even give her my message. People never give your message to anybody.

  Boy, I sat at that goddam bar till around one o’clock or so, getting drunk as a bastard. I could hardly see straight. The one thing I did, though, I was careful as hell not to get boisterous or anything. I didn’t want anybody to notice me or anything or ask how old I was. But, boy, I could hardly see straight. When I was really drunk, I started that stupid business with the bullet in my guts again. I was the only guy at the bar with a bullet in their guts. I kept putting my hand under my jacket, on my stomach and all, to keep the blood from dripping all over the place. I didn’t want anybody to know I was even wounded. I was concealing the fact that I was a wounded sonuvabitch. Finally what I felt like, I felt like giving old Jane a buzz and see if she was home yet. So I paid my check and all. Then I left the bar and went out where the telephones were. I kept keeping my hand under my jacket to keep the blood from dripping. Boy, was I drunk.

  But when I got inside this phone booth, I wasn’t much in the mood any more to give old Jane a buzz. I was too drunk, I guess. So what I did, I gave old Sally Hayes a buzz.

  I had to dial about twenty numbers before I got the right one. Boy, was I blind.

  “Hello,” I said when somebody answered the goddam phone. I sort of yelled it, I was so drunk.

  “Who is this?” this very cold lady’s voice said.

  “This is me. Holden Caulfield. Lemme speaka Sally, please.”

  “Sally’s asleep. This is Sally’s grandmother. Why are you calling at this hour, Holden? Do you know what time it is?”

  “Yeah. Wanna talka Sally. Very important. Put her on.”

  “Sally’s asleep, young man. Call her tomorrow. Good night.”

  “Wake ’er up! Wake ’er up, hey. Attaboy.”

  Then there was a different voice. “Holden, this is me.” It was old Sally. “What’s the big idea?”

  “Sally? That you?”

  “Yes—stop screaming. Are you drunk?”

  “Yeah. Listen. Listen, hey. I’ll come over Christmas Eve. Okay? Trimma goddam tree for ya. Okay? Okay, hey, Sally?”

  “Yes. You’re drunk. Go to bed now. Where are you? Who’s with you?”

  “Sally? I’ll come over and trimma tree for ya, okay? Okay, hey?”

  “Yes. Go to bed now. Where are you? Who’s with you?”

  “Nobody. Me, myself and I.” Boy was I drunk! I was even still holding onto my guts. “They got me. Rocky’s mob got me. You know that? Sally, you know that?”

  “I can’t hear you. Go to bed now. I have to go. Call me tomorrow.”

  “Hey, Sally! You want me trimma tree for ya? Ya want me to? Huh?”

  “Yes. Good night. Go home and go to bed.”

  She hung up on me.

  “G’night. G’night, Sally baby. Sally sweetheart darling,” I said. Can you imagine how drunk I was? I hung up too, then. I figured she probably just came home from a date. I pictured her out with the Lunts and all somewhere, and that Andover jerk. All of them swimming around in a goddam pot of tea and saying sophisticated stuff to each other and being charming and phony. I wished to God I hadn’t even phoned her. When I’m drunk, I’m a madman.

  I stayed in the damn phone booth for quite a while. I kept holding onto the phone, sort of, so I wouldn’t pass out. I wasn’t feeling too marvelou
s, to tell you the truth. Finally, though, I came out and went in the men’s room, staggering around like a moron, and filled one of the washbowls with cold water. Then I dunked my head in it, right up to the ears. I didn’t even bother to dry it or anything. I just let the sonuvabitch drip. Then I walked over to this radiator by the window and sat down on it. It was nice and warm. It felt good because I was shivering like a bastard. It’s a funny thing, I always shiver like hell when I’m drunk.

  I didn’t have anything else to do, so I kept sitting on the radiator and counting these little white squares on the floor. I was getting soaked. About a gallon of water was dripping down my neck, getting all over my collar and tie and all, but I didn’t give a damn. I was too drunk to give a damn. Then, pretty soon, the guy that played the piano for old Valencia, this very wavy-haired, flitty-looking guy, came in to comb his golden locks. We sort of struck up a conversation while he was combing it, except that he wasn’t too goddam friendly.

  “Hey. You gonna see that Valencia babe when you go back in the bar?” I asked him.

  “It’s highly probable,” he said. Witty bastard. All I ever meet is witty bastards.

  “Listen. Give her my compliments. Ask her if that goddam waiter gave her my message, willya?”

  “Why don’t you go home, Mac? How old are you, anyway?”

  “Eighty-six. Listen. Give her my compliments. Okay?”

  “Why don’t you go home, Mac?”

  “Not me. Boy, you can play that goddam piano,” I told him. I was just flattering him. He played the piano stinking, if you want to know the truth. “You oughta go on the radio,” I said. “Handsome chap like you. All those goddam golden locks. Ya need a manager?”