The Great Whitebait

'I met him once, you know?' slurred Whitebait, wiping alcohol from his impressive white moustache. 'I may not look much now, but back in the war, I was quite the hero.' He wasn't lying, although he was far from a small man, it was obvious he had neither the strength or will to back it up, and I couldn't tell if it was the drink or the dangers of old age but it was clear his crooked legs couldn't support his substantial gut.

'They made us majors together' he continued 'us and about 500 other people. For extreme courage in the face of death, so they said, more like extreme courage in the face of life, if you understand what I'm saying'. Even though there was little I understood less at that moment, other than of course the nature of the man whose house I was stood in, I nodded politely, in the hope that doing so would lead the rosy red face before me to bring me closer to solving both mysteries

'Did you ever talk to him?' I asked, for although I was doubtful of the authenticity of the story I was being told, I was still interested to hear more

'I'm afraid not. Nobody did. Not even at the party afterwards, if you can believe that!' I acknowledged what I hoped was his joke. 'No, he just stood at the side, staring into the distance. It almost seemed like he wanted to be back in the field, knee deep in mud, away from his thoughts. I shook his hand though, quite limp, he was a very thin man, if my memory serves me correctly. Good haircut though. He was a man who spoke through his eyes rather than his mouth if you know what I mean.'

'His eyes?'

'Yes, they were quite blue. I'm not saying he was a rude man, or anything of the sort! After all, why would I attend the party of someone who did me wrong?' He took another sip from his drink, as if to prove a point. 'No, I'm just saying that he was the sort of man who thought more than he said. Like his soul was greater than his mind. I remember thinking that'. The more he spoke I felt like the less I knew about Gatsby, not only were his inane ramblings the kind of nonsensical drawl you'd expect to find in the mind of a madman, but there was no way in hell that this drunken fool could recall a brief encounter with one of five hundred men that occurred ten years ago, when he was a 50 year old major in the American Army. Naturally I was doubtful that this encounter had ever even happened.