We discover Tom's "girl" and their not-so-secret life together during this chapter. Almost a mirror image of the affairs in The House of Mirth, the married couples in The Great Gatsby, plagued by discontent steal away for a few nights with their lovers in another city to spend time together. Here, Nick learns that Tom and Myrtle cannot be together because Daisy is catholic and doesn't believe in divorce. To which Nick refutes in his mind, "Daisy was not a Catholic, and I was a little shocked at the elaborateness of the lie," (Fitzgerald, 33). This begs the question: why is Daisy lying? We have obviously seen Tom's cutting manner towards her in public and his physical abuse which is introduced in the first chapter with Daisy's finger and furthered by his breaking of Myrtle's nose in the second. Does Daisy think that she is protecting herself or her daughter by staying with him? Or does she simply know that she has no where else to turn as she is not nearly as eligible in her thirties with a child from another marriage? Her depth in weaving this lie is in immediate contradiction with the way she acts and speaks in public, leaving the reader wondering: who is Daisy?
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