Tender Is the Night

Abe North, slightly drunk, tells Rosemary the tale of how the duel came about. While carpooling together after the Divers’ dinner party the previous night, Violet McKisco continued trying to explain what shocking thing she had witnessed inside the Divers’ villa, only to be told repeatedly by Tommy Barban to keep quiet. Finally, after Barban had insulted Violet, Mr. McKisco suggested the idea of a duel.

Finishing his story, Abe tells Rosemary that the Divers remain unaware the duel is really about them (since Barban was trying to silence Violet from disclosing what she saw in the Divers’ home). Rosemary accompanies Abe upstairs to go see McKisco, who is nervously, half-drunkenly awaiting his duel with Barban.

McKisco bewails the fact that he never finished his novel and that there is no way out of the duel since his wife no longer respects him. Their marriage has suffered ever since the loss of their seven-year-old daughter. Abe encourages him and the two make preparations for the duel. Rosemary leaves them.

In the lobby, Rosemary finds Luis Campion, who invites her to the duel. When Rosemary suggests he go with Mr. Dumphry, Campion says he never wants to see him again.

When Rosemary goes back to her room, she tells her mother all about it. Mrs. Speers encourages her daughter to go watch the duel. Even though she does not want to, Rosemary goes out of devotion to her mother.

Rosemary carpools with Luis Campion to a nearby golf course, the location of the duel. From a distance, they watch Abe and McKisco walk over to Barban. At the critical moment, both duelists shoot, and both shots miss. Barban immediately calls for a rematch but Abe talks him out of it. Both combatants leave the scene, but as McKisco walks off with Abe he begins to feel remorse over having faced his opponent while intoxicated, and badgers Abe to assuage his sense of cowardice. One of Barban’s men comes over and demands a fee for medical expenses, which Abe pays before sneaking off to a bush and throwing up.

Not far off, watching the entire scene, Campion is beside himself with tension and Rosemary distractedly and eagerly wonders about the next chance she will get to see the Divers.

The narrative jumps forward. Sitting together in a restaurant and waiting for Nicole to appear, Rosemary, Dick, and Abe North make a game out of spotting how tense everybody else in the restaurant seems compared to Dick. Rosemary has been with the Divers in Paris for two days.

Nicole arrives, and each of the three women present (Nicole, Rosemary, and Mary North) seem to represent different varieties of the American middle class. Rosemary enjoys their lunch at the restaurant.

When she goes to make a phone call, Rosemary overhears Dick and Nicole talking intimately with one another. She hears Nicole affirm her love for Dick and Dick asking his wife for sex. According to what Rosemary hears, the couple makes a plan to be together back at the hotel (presumably for intimate time alone) at four o’ clock.

Rosemary spends the rest of the afternoon shopping with Nicole, whose purchases are numerous and extravagant. As four o’ clock approaches, Rosemary becomes nervous that Nicole will keep Dick waiting, but when she sees Nicole suddenly remember and leave in a hurry, Rosemary feels a mix of emotion.

Dick, Abe North, and Rosemary visit a World War I site near Amiens. Dick is visibly moved by the tragic loss of human life, and Rosemary follows Dick’s emotional lead. Dick argues that the immense sacrifice that occurred on this battlefield represented “the last love battle” (57), and Rosemary defers to him with increasingly desperate infatuation.

On their way back into town, the group passes by a young woman who has lost her way among the graves, searching for her brother’s tombstone so that she might lay a wreath there. They stop, and Dick advises the lost girl to place the wreath at a random grave. She rides the train with them back to Paris.

In Paris with the Divers and the Norths, Rosemary goes to a restaurant while Nicole stays in (it is stated that Rosemary has developed a small fear of Nicole). She observes Abe North’s proclivity for drinking and his wife’s deference in following her husband’s lead. Rosemary even has a glass of champagne, to the surprise of everyone there, and she announces that yesterday was her 18th birthday. The group plans to celebrate the next night.

While Abe is making jokes, Dick lets slip that he may not be finishing his “scientific treatise” after all. The news generates some shock around the table; however, he mitigates the situation by quickly saying he will work on a different one. Rosemary observes, in contrast to Abe and Mary North, that Dick does not drink too much.

On the taxi ride home alone with Dick, Rosemary hears about Dick’s profession as a doctor but that he is not practicing currently. Then, Rosemary lavishly declares her love for both Dick and Nicole and holds out her face to receive a kiss. Dick kisses her but does so with displeasure and a forlorn recognition that Rosemary is still innocent about the world. Rosemary begins to cry, telling Dick again how much she loves him but that she is planning to give him up. Dick kisses her again.

Back at the hotel, Rosemary persuades Dick to come into her room as a birthday gift so that they can talk briefly. Once inside, Rosemary propositions Dick, and Dick begins answering carefully with a list of reasons why it would not work. Rosemary tries hard to persuade him, throwing herself into the romance like a role she might play in a movie. Dick still refuses her, though the entire scene leaves him feeling confused. Rosemary cries, and after Dick says goodnight and leaves her, she brushes her hair in front of a mirror.

The next day, Rosemary goes shopping with Nicole and watches her closely, admiring her body and remembering that her mother had also expressed admiration for Nicole. On their way driving to join the others, Rosemary and Nicole pass places in Paris where each of them lived before. The place that Nicole points out is a dingy hotel. Nicole explains to Rosemary some things about her past, including that her mother was German but born in America and that Nicole was raised in Chicago.

When they meet together, Rosemary makes eye contact with Dick and immediately discerns that he has fallen in love with her. This makes her exceedingly happy. She decides to phone Collis Clay, an old boyfriend who is in town and who took Rosemary out to prom the year before. They go to a movie, with Rosemary sitting between Collis and Dick.

The movie is “Daddy’s Girl,” Rosemary’s star role. Rosemary relishes that, once the movie starts and the lights go dim, she can, to a certain extent, be alone with Dick. “Daddy’s Girl” is an extravagantly sentimental movie that borders on the cliché and insincere; however, Dick compliments Rosemary when it ends.

As a special surprise for Dick, Rosemary has arranged a screen test. Dick refuses to participate, even though his wife and Mary North jokingly tell him he should. Nicole leaves with the Norths, who must prepare to leave Paris at last, and Dick and Rosemary drive together and drop off Collis. In the car, Rosemary explains that she arranged the screen test in an effort to get Dick approved for Hollywood so he could be her leading man in a movie someday. Collis gradually becomes aware that Rosemary does not notice him at all in Dick’s presence, and they drop him off hastily.