A SHORT DIGEST OF A LONG NOVEL

BY BUDD SCHULBERG

Her legs were shapely and firm and when she crossed them and smiled with the
self-assurance that always delighted him, he thought she was the only person he
knew in the world who was unblemished. Not lifelike but an improvement on life,
as a work of art, her delicate features were chiseled from a solid block. The wood-
sculpture image came easy to him because her particular shade of blonde always
suggested maple polished to a golden grain. As it had been from the moment he
stood in awe and amazement in front of the glass window where she was first
exhibited, the sight of her made him philosophical. Some of us appear in beautiful
colors, too, or with beautiful grains, but we develop imperfections. Inspect us very
closely and you find we're damaged by the elements. Sometimes we're only nicked
with cynicism. Sometimes we're cracked with disillusionment. Or we're split with
fear.
When she began to speak, he leaned forward, eager for the words that were like
good music, profundity expressed in terms that pleased the ear while challenging
the mind.
"Everybody likes me," she said. "Absolutely everybody."
It was not that she was conceited. It was simply that she was only three. No one
had ever taken her with sweet and whispered promises that turned into morning-
after lies, ugly and cold as unwashed dishes from last night’s dinner lying in the
sink. She had never heard a dictator rock her country to sleep with peaceful
lullabies one day and rock it with bombs the next. She was undeceived. Her father
ran his hands reverently through her soft yellow hair. She is virgin, he thought, for
this is the true virginity, that brief moment in the time of your life before your
mind or your body has been defiled by acts of treachery.
It was just before Christmas and she was sitting on her little chair, her lips pressed
together in concentration, writing a last-minute letter to Santa Claus. The words
were written in some language of her own invention but she obligingly translated
as she went along.
Dear Santa, I am a very good girl and everybody likes me. So please don't forget to
bring me a set of dishes, a doll that goes to sleep and wakes up again, and a
"washing machine. I need the washing machine because Raggedy Ann's dress is so
dirty.
After she finished her letter, folded it, and asked him to address it, he tossed
her up in the air, caught her and tossed her again, to hear her giggle.
"Higher, Daddy, higher," she instructed. His mind embraced her
sentimentally: She is a virgin island in a lewd world. She is a winged seed of
innocence blown through the wasteland. If only she could root somewhere.
If only she could grow like this.
"Let me down, Daddy," she said when she had decided that she had
indulged him long enough, "I have to mail my letter to Santa."
"But didn't you see him this afternoon?" he asked. "Didn't you ask for
everything you wanted? Mommy said she took you up to meet him and you
sat on his lap."
"I just wanted to remind him," she said. "There were so many other
children."
He fought down the impulse to laugh, because she was not something to
laugh at. And he was obsessed with the idea that to hurt her feelings with
laughter was to nick her, to blemish the perfection.
"Daddy can't catch me-ee," she sang out, and the old chase was on,
following the pattern that had become so familiar to them, the same wild
shrieks and the same scream of pretended anguish at the inevitable result.
Two laps around the dining-room table was the established course before he
caught her in the kitchen. He swung her up from the floor and set her down
on the kitchen table. She stood on the edge, poised confidently for another of
their games. But this was no panting, giggling game like tag or hide-and-
seek. This game was ceremonial. The table was several feet higher than she
was. "Jump, jump, and Daddy will catch you," he would challenge. They
would count together, one, two, and on three she would leap out into the air.
He would not even hold out his arms to her until the last possible moment.
But he would always catch her. They had played the game for more than a
year and the experience never failed to exhilarate them. You see, I am
always here to catch you when you are falling, it said to them, and each time
she jumped, her confidence increased and their bond deepened.
They were going through the ceremony when the woman next door came in
with her five-year-old son, Billy. "Hello, Mr. Steevers," she said. "Would
you mind if I left Bill with you for an hour while I do my marketing?"
"No, of course not, glad to have him," he said and he mussed Billy's hair
playfully. "How's the boy, Billy?"
But his heart wasn't in it. This was the only afternoon of the week with her
and he resented the intrusion. And then too, he was convinced that Billy was
going to grow up into the type of man for whom he had a particular
resentment. A sturdy, good-looking boy, big for his age, aggressively
 unchildlike, a malicious, arrogant, insensitive extrovert. I can just see him
drunk and red-faced and pulling up girls' dresses at Legion Conventions, Mr.
Steevers would think. And the worst of it was, his daughter seemed blind to
Billy's faults. The moment she saw him she forgot about their game.
"Hello, Billy-Boy," she called and ran over to hug him.
"I want a cookie," said Billy.
"Oh, yes, a cookie; some animal crackers, Daddy."
She had her hostess face on and as he went into the pantry, he could hear the
treble of her musical laughter against the premature baritone of Billy's
guffaws.
He swung open the pantry door with the animal crackers in his hand just in
time to see it. She was poised on the edge of the table. Billy was standing
below her, as he had seen her father do. "Jump and I'll catch you," he was
saying.
Smiling, confident and unblemished, she jumped. But no hands reached out
to break her flight. With a cynical grin on his face, Billy stepped back and
watched her fall.
Watching from the doorway, her father felt the horror that possessed him the
time he saw a parachutist smashed like a bug on a windshield when his chute
failed to open. She was lying there, crying, not so much in pain as in
disillusionment. He ran forward to pick her up and he would never forget the
expression on her face, the new expression, unchildlike, unvirginal,
embittered.
"I hate you, I hate you," she was screaming at Billy through hysterical sobs.
Well, now she knows, thought her father, the facts of life. Now she's one of
us. Now she knows treachery and fear. Now she must learn to replace
innocence with courage.
She was still bawling. He knew these tears were as natural and as necessary
as those she shed at birth, but that could not overcome entirely the heavy
sadness that enveloped him. Finally, when he spoke, he said, a little more
harshly than he had intended, "Now, now, stop crying. Stand up and act like
a big girl. A little fall like that can't hurt you."

Task 1.
Vocabulary Definitions
1.Unblemished a. to make something dirty or no longer pure
2. chisel b. depth, being serious, great
3. maple c. connected with sex that people find offensive
4. awe d. a tall tree
5. grains e. to make something less beautiful
6. disillusionment f. in a way showing great respect
7. profundity g. lines on wood, patterns
8. conceited h. scream
9. undeceived i. not spoiled
10. reverently j. disappointment when expectations are not met
11. defiled k. intending to harm
12. treachery l. make someone happy
13. lewd m. being impressed, feel respect and fear
14. indulged n. loud cry
15. blemish o. hurting someone who trusts you
16. shrieks p. cut, shape
17. exhilarate q. being too proud of yourself, what you do
18. mussed r. strong and healthy
19. resentment s. loud laughter
20. sturdy t. to make somebodies clothes and hair untidy
21. malicious u. to be generous in allowing smb to have or do whatever they like
22. guffaws v. not cheated
23. bawling w. a feeling of anger about something you feel is unfair

Task 2. Make 15 sentences on new words

Task 3
Comprehension questions:
1. In the beginning what does the father compare his daughter to? Why?
2. How is the “jumping game” different from other children’s games? What role does
jumping game play in the little girl’s life?
3. What are the father’s complaints to Billy?
4. How does the daughter react to Billy?
5. How does this reaction make the father feel? Why?
6. How does Billy betray the little girl?
7. Why does Billy betray the little girl?
8. What does the father compare the betrayal to?
9. Why does the father speak angrily with the girl?
10. Is the father’s jealousy reasonable? Understandable?
11. Is the father’s belief in the daughter’s innocent perfection realistic?
12. Should fathers be protective of their children?

Task 4:

Comment on theme, idea, images, plot and composition.