"This was Brett, that I had felt like crying about. Then I thought of her walking up the street and stepping into the car, as I had last seen her, and of course in a little while I felt like hell again. It is awfully easy to be hard-boiled about everything in the daytime, but at night it is another thing." (p. 42)
The conflict throughout the novel is obvious here in this quote. It is not directly stated her, but clearly Jake is in love with Brett, though he believes it to be for the best if he lets her go. This internal conflict continues on throughout the story, no matter the man that Brett may be with. I believe that Jake and Brett in these stories are similar to the knight and the damsel in distress, only with a spin on the classic tales. Jake is a representation of the perfect knight, and Brett is the damsel, only the thing that is holding her back is alcohol and her relationships with men. Consistently these relationships fail and she looks for comfort in Jake. In this way, Jake feels the instinct to protect her, because of her love for her. Eventually, however, this constant need and the loss of need by Brett may become tiring to Jake, which is where the inner turmoil plays out. Should he convince her to stay or let her go? This question is never directly stated in the novel, but I feel it is important. By the end of the novel though, we still have no clear answer.
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