The Catcher in the Rye

Holden stays at the bar until very late, getting drunk by himself and imagining he’s been shot. Importantly, he’s concealing his wound from others in his imagined scenario. Eventually, he calls Sally again; she can tell he’s drunk and wants little to do with him. He goes into the men’s room and dunks his head in water; then, after being confronted by the piano player, he collects his coat and the record for Phoebe and heads out into the night.

He decides to go see about the ducks in the lagoon. On the way, he drops Phoebe’s record, shattering it, and collects the pieces. He wanders around the lagoon looking for ducks but doesn’t find any, then finally sits down on a bench and imagines freezing to death. He thinks about everyone who would attend his funeral, and then he recalls Allie’s funeral, which he missed because he was hospitalized after hurting his hand. He would rather be dumped in a river than have a funeral and proper burial.

Holden counts the money he has left; there’s very little, and he decides to skip his change across the unfrozen parts of the lagoon. Then, he decides that he’ll go home and sneak into his family apartment to see Phoebe.

At the apartment building, there’s a new elevator operator, so Holden lies and says he’s there to see his neighbors. After he gets upstairs, he sneaks into his home and quietly heads to Phoebe’s room; he forgot that she sleeps in D. B.’s room now, so he sneaks through the apartment again to find her.

Holden gets into D. B.’s room, turns on the light, and watches Phoebe sleep for a little while. He takes a moment to look around the room and see all of Phoebe’s things laid out, which makes him feel less sad; her notebooks make him happy, especially when he sees she’s using a fake middle name, Weatherfield, because she doesn’t like her real one.

Holden wakes Phoebe; she’s thrilled to see him, and they chat about a play she was in and the movies she’s seen lately. Holden is distracted, trying to find out when his parents are coming home, and she tells him they’ll be back very late. Holden gives her the pieces of the record then, and she decides she’s going to keep them. They continue talking about Phoebe’s life until she realizes he’s not supposed to be home yet. When she realizes he’s been kicked out, she becomes upset and puts a pillow over her head. Holden tries to tell her it will be okay, but she won’t listen; finally, he goes into the living room and takes some cigarettes from his parents’ supply.

Phoebe has come out from under her pillow when Holden returns, but she’s still upset, and she wants to know why he got kicked out again. He tells her there were a lot of reasons, but he goes into detail about the students and how much he hated them, particularly because of the secret fraternity they kept Ackley out of. He also tells her about Mr. Spencer sucking up to Thurber and about an old veteran who came to their dorm to see if his initials were still carved; all these things depress Holden, though he can’t quite articulate why.

Phoebe chides him, saying that he never likes anything, then challenges him to name something he likes. He agrees to it, but he can’t come up with anything; he’s suddenly struck by the memory of a classmate, James Castle, who upset another classmate, Phil Stable. Phil and his friends went to James’s room and bullied him relentlessly, so much so that James jumped out the window to his death. Holden didn’t know James well, but he’d loaned him a turtleneck, which James was wearing when he died. The students were expelled, but they didn’t get in any other trouble, and Holden was left thinking about his tangential connection to James, who he only thought of as the boy before him during roll call.

Phoebe presses Holden, and he admits he likes Allie; they argue over this, and Holden asserts that he can still like someone who is gone. She then asks him what he’d like to be, and he doesn’t know. She suggests a lawyer, like their father, and Holden is troubled by the idea that most lawyers do their jobs not because it’s right but because they’re good at it. He finally tells her that he’d like to be a person in a rye field at the edge of a cliff, keeping kids who are playing from plunging over the side; he’s based this idea on the song he heard the little boy singing in Chapter 16. Phoebe sits quietly for a time, then repeats that their father is going to kill Holden. Holden gets up then, saying he wants to go call Mr. Antolini, an old teacher of his who is at NYU now. Before he goes, Phoebe asks him to listen to her, as she’s been practicing belching; it’s not impressive, but it’s something.

On the phone, Mr. Antolini tells Holden to come over; Holden trusts Antolini both because he was a kind teacher and because he was the one who scooped up James Castle after he leaped from the window. Holden speaks with him for a moment, then returns to the bedroom, where Phoebe has put on a record player.

The two dance. Phoebe is a very good, very serious dancer, which makes Holden happy. She also shows him a trick to make her forehead very hot; it doesn’t work, but Holden plays along, and he enjoys getting to kid around with her. They’re interrupted by the sound of the front door.

Holden hides in the closet while his mother enters the room and talks to Phoebe. Phoebe says she couldn’t sleep, and she covers for Holden when their mother smells cigarette smoke in the room, saying she lit one for just a moment out of curiosity. Their mother insists Phoebe get in bed, then leaves the room.

Holden decides to leave right away while his parents are both distracted. He asks Phoebe if he can borrow a bit of money until he’s supposed to come home on Wednesday, and she gives him all her Christmas money, saying he can bring what’s left to the play she’s going to be in later in the week. Holden starts to cry and can’t stop himself, which scares Phoebe. Finally, he calms down; she tries to get him to stay the night in D. B.’s room, but he says Mr. Antolini is waiting. He gives her his red hunting cap and sneaks out the door, no longer afraid of being caught.