Holden Caulfield began his narrative from some rest facility where he had been recovering after a breakdown the previous December. He refused to share his entire life story, dismissing it as "David Copperfield kind of crap," and instead focused on the events leading to his collapse. He mentioned his brother D.B., a talented short story writer who had "sold out" by moving to Hollywood to write for movies, which Holden despised. The main action started on a Saturday afternoon at Pencey Prep, a prestigious boarding school in Pennsylvania, during the last football game of the year. Holden stood alone on Thomsen Hill instead of attending the game because he had just returned from New York where he had managed the fencing team and lost all their equipment on the subway. He had been expelled from Pencey for failing four subjects and not applying himself, making this his fourth school expulsion. On this cold December day, Holden was heading to say goodbye to his history teacher, Mr. Spencer, who had requested to see him before he left. Throughout the chapter, Holden's cynical voice emerged as he critiqued everything from Pencey's false advertising to the phoniness of its headmaster, establishing his deep alienation from the world around him.

Holden visited his history teacher, Mr. Spencer, who was sick with the flu in his home off campus. The elderly teacher, around seventy years old, lived modestly with his wife. When Holden entered Spencer's bedroom, he immediately regretted coming, as the room smelled of Vicks Nose Drops and the sight of the sick, elderly man in his ratty bathrobe was depressing. Spencer attempted to lecture Holden about his poor academic performance and his expulsion from Pencey. He reminded Holden that Dr. Thurmer, the headmaster, had told him that "life is a game" that should be played by the rules. Holden privately disagreed, thinking it was only a game if you were on the winning side. Spencer then humiliated Holden by reading aloud his terrible essay exam about the Egyptians, including the apologetic note Holden had written at the end. While Spencer tried to make Holden understand the seriousness of being expelled from yet another school, Holden's mind wandered to thoughts about the ducks in Central Park's lagoon and where they went when the water froze. The visit became increasingly uncomfortable, and Holden eventually made excuses about needing to get equipment from the gym. They parted with a handshake, and Spencer likely called out "Good luck!" which Holden hated hearing.

Holden revealed his tendency to lie compulsively, admitting he hadn't actually needed to go to the gym at all. He returned to his room in the Ossenburger Memorial Wing, named after a wealthy Pencey alumnus who made his fortune in the undertaking business and whom Holden viewed as a phony. Alone in his room, Holden put on his distinctive red hunting hat, which he had bought in New York that morning, and began reading "Out of Africa" by Isak Dinesen. He shared his thoughts about reading, explaining that his favorite books were ones that made him wish the author was a friend he could call. His roommate's neighbor, Robert Ackley, soon interrupted him. Ackley was a senior with terrible personal hygiene, including mossy teeth, pimples, and generally unpleasant habits. He barged into Holden's room uninvited, as he often did, and began his usual routine of picking up Holden's personal belongings and asking annoying questions. Their interaction was interrupted when Holden's roommate, Ward Stradlater, returned from the football game in a hurry. Stradlater, a handsome and athletic student whom Holden described as a "secret slob," asked to borrow Holden's hound's-tooth jacket for a date. Ackley quickly left when Stradlater arrived, as the two disliked each other, and Stradlater went to shave before his date.

Holden followed Stradlater to the bathroom while his roommate shaved and prepared for his date. In the hot, steamy bathroom, Holden sat on a washbowl and observed Stradlater's grooming ritual. Despite always looking presentable, Stradlater was a "secret slob" who used a rusty, dirty razor but was vain and obsessed with his appearance. Stradlater asked Holden to write a descriptive composition for his English class, as he had a hundred pages of history reading to do. Holden, ironically the one flunking out, agreed to consider it. The conversation took a dramatic turn when Stradlater revealed that his date was Jean Gallagher. Holden became extremely excited and agitated, as he knew Jane (not Jean) well from two summers ago when they lived near each other. He enthusiastically told Stradlater about Jane: how she played checkers and kept all her kings in the back row, how she practiced ballet for two hours daily, and how she had a difficult childhood with a divorced mother married to an alcoholic who ran around the house naked. Stradlater showed little interest except in the sexual implications. Holden kept saying he should go down to say hello to Jane but never did, claiming he wasn't in the mood. Before leaving, Holden asked Stradlater not to tell Jane he'd been kicked out and to ask her about the checkers, which Stradlater agreed to but probably wouldn't remember.

On Saturday night, Pencey served its weekly steak dinner, which Holden described as a sham designed to impress visiting parents despite the poor quality of the food. After dinner, it was snowing heavily, and Holden, along with his friend Mal Brossard and reluctantly Ackley, went into town to get hamburgers and possibly see a movie. However, Brossard and Ackley had already seen the film playing, so they just ate and played pinball before returning to the dorm. Back at Pencey, Ackley invaded Holden's room again and lay on his bed, talking monotonously about an alleged sexual encounter that Holden knew was fabricated. Eventually, Holden told Ackley he needed to write the composition for Stradlater. Once alone, Holden put on his pajamas, bathrobe, and red hunting hat and began writing. Unable to think of a room or house to describe as Stradlater requested, he instead wrote about his deceased younger brother Allie's baseball mitt. Allie, who had been left-handed, had written poems in green ink all over his glove so he would have something to read when no one was at bat. Allie had died of leukemia on July 18, 1946, at age eleven. He had been highly intelligent, kind, and red-haired. When Allie died, thirteen-year-old Holden broke all the windows in the garage with his fist in grief, breaking his hand in the process. Holden spent about an hour writing this deeply personal composition about his brother's mitt.

Holden anxiously awaited Stradlater's return from his date with Jane, worrying intensely about what might have happened. When Stradlater finally came back around ten-thirty, he complained about the cold but didn't mention Jane at all. He thanked Holden for the jacket and then read the composition Holden had written. Stradlater became angry when he discovered it was about a baseball glove instead of a room or house as requested. He accused Holden of always doing things backwards and said it was no wonder he was flunking out. Holden angrily grabbed the composition and tore it up. The tension escalated as Holden began asking about the date. Stradlater revealed they had just sat in Ed Banky's car, the basketball coach's vehicle that Stradlater had borrowed. When Stradlater made suggestive comments and refused to say whether he had "given her the time," Holden tried to punch him in the face but missed, only grazing his head. Stradlater, much stronger than Holden, pinned him to the floor. Holden kept calling him a moron and making accusations about Jane, which further enraged Stradlater. Finally, Stradlater punched Holden hard, causing his nose to bleed profusely. After Stradlater left for the bathroom, Holden found his hunting hat and examined his bloody face in the mirror, thinking he looked tough despite being a self-described pacifist who had lost both fights he'd ever been in.

With blood covering his face, Holden went through the shower curtains into Ackley's room. Ackley was awake and startled by Holden's appearance. Holden asked to play Canasta, but Ackley refused because it was late and he had to attend Mass in the morning. Holden then asked if he could sleep in Ackley's roommate Ely's bed, as Ely had gone home for the weekend. Ackley was characteristically unhelpful, saying he couldn't give permission for someone to sleep in Ely's bed. Holden called him a "prince" sarcastically. Feeling intensely lonely and depressed, Holden lay on Ely's bed thinking obsessively about Jane and Stradlater together in Ed Banky's car. He knew Stradlater's seduction technique from having double-dated with him before. Eventually, Ackley fell asleep and began snoring. Holden briefly considered joining a monastery but dismissed the idea. After a tense exchange with Ackley about religion, Holden left the room. Alone in the quiet, depressing corridor, he suddenly decided to leave Pencey immediately rather than wait until Wednesday. He planned to get a cheap hotel room in New York and relax for a few days until his parents received the letter about his expulsion and had time to digest it. He returned to his room, packed his bags while Stradlater slept, and sold his typewriter to Frederick Woodruff for twenty dollars. Before leaving, he stood in the corridor, put on his red hunting hat, and yelled "Sleep tight, ya morons!" then left Pencey.

It was too late to call a cab, so Holden walked through the cold, snowy night to the train station, his luggage banging against his legs. He washed the blood off his face with snow while waiting about ten minutes for the train. On the nearly empty train, Holden normally would have enjoyed reading magazines and eating a ham sandwich, but this time he felt too depressed to do anything. At Trenton, an attractive woman in her forties sat next to him despite many empty seats. She noticed the Pencey Prep sticker on his suitcase and revealed that her son, Ernest Morrow, attended Pencey. Holden knew Morrow as "the biggest bastard that ever went to Pencey," someone who enjoyed snapping wet towels at people. However, Holden introduced himself as "Rudolf Schmidt" (the name of his dorm's janitor) and proceeded to tell elaborate lies about Ernest. He claimed Ernest was one of the most popular boys at school, describing him as shy and modest, and invented a story about Ernest refusing to run for class president because of his humble nature. Mrs. Morrow was charmed by these fabrications. When she asked why he was leaving school early, Holden invented another lie about having a brain tumor that required surgery. She wished him luck with his operation and invited him to visit Ernest at their beach house in Gloucester, Massachusetts, during the summer. Holden declined, saying he was going to South America with his grandmother, though he wouldn't visit "that sonuvabitch Morrow for all the dough in the world."

Holden arrived at Penn Station in New York and went into a phone booth, wanting to call someone but unable to think of anyone appropriate. He considered calling his younger sister Phoebe, Jane Gallagher's mother, Sally Hayes, or Carl Luce, but found reasons not to call any of them. After twenty minutes, he gave up and took a cab. Out of habit, he initially gave his home address but then remembered his plan to stay at a hotel. He asked the cab driver about the ducks in Central Park's lagoon, but the driver thought he was crazy. Holden checked into the Edmont Hotel, removing his distinctive red hunting hat first so he wouldn't look like a "screwball." From his crumby room, he watched bizarre activities in the windows across from him: a man dressing in women's clothing and a couple squirting water at each other's faces. These observations both fascinated and disgusted him, leading to reflections about his confused feelings toward sex and girls. Feeling horny and bored, he found an address for Faith Cavendish, a woman he had been told would "not mind doing it once in a while." He called her late at night, claiming to be a friend of Eddie Birdsell from Princeton. Though initially angry at being woken up, she became friendlier but ultimately declined his invitation for drinks, saying her roommate was ill. Holden realized he had fouled up the conversation.

Not tired enough to sleep, Holden changed his shirt and went downstairs to the Lavender Room, the hotel's nightclub. He thought about calling his ten-year-old sister Phoebe, whom he described with deep affection as smart, pretty, skinny like him, and perceptive beyond her years. He recounted how Phoebe was straight-A student who wrote incomplete detective stories about a character named "Hazle Weatherfield" and knew movies by heart. In the Lavender Room, the band was terrible, and Holden was refused alcohol despite trying to order a Scotch and soda. Three women around thirty from Seattle sat at the next table. Though he found them mostly unattractive and unintelligent, Holden introduced himself as "Jim Steele" and asked them to dance. The blonde, Bernice, turned out to be an excellent dancer, and Holden admitted he fell "half in love with her" despite her stupidity. The three women spent the entire evening looking for movie stars and talking in clich\u00e9s. They told Holden about their plan to wake up early to see the first show at Radio City Music Hall, which deeply depressed him. After buying them drinks, they left. Holden paid the thirteen-dollar check and felt sorry for them with their "sad, fancy hats," finding it depressing that they came all the way from Seattle just to see a show at Radio City. He left the club soon after, feeling lonely and depressed.

Sitting alone in the hotel lobby, Holden couldn't stop thinking about Jane Gallagher and Stradlater. He reminisced extensively about the summer he met Jane two years earlier when her Doberman pinscher relieved itself on his family's lawn. After his mother complained, Holden later saw Jane at the club and eventually won her over. They spent the summer playing tennis every morning and golf every afternoon, developing an intimate but non-physical relationship. Holden described Jane as "funny" rather than strictly beautiful, with a mouth that "went in about fifty directions" when she talked. She was intellectual, read good books and poetry, and was the only person outside his family to whom he showed Allie's baseball mitt. He recounted one significant afternoon when they were playing checkers on her porch and her stepfather came out asking for cigarettes. When Jane wouldn't respond to him, a tear fell on the checkerboard, and Holden sat next to her and kissed her all over her face except her mouth. He asked her if her stepfather, Mr. Cudahy, had ever tried anything with her, but she said no. Holden never found out what was wrong. He remembered holding hands with her at movies and described it as making him genuinely happy. Thinking about these memories while imagining her with Stradlater nearly drove him crazy, making him feel depressed and restless enough to leave the hotel.

Holden took a cab to Ernie's, a Greenwich Village nightclub his brother D.B. used to frequent. The cab driver, Horwitz, was more talkative than the previous driver. Holden again asked about the ducks in Central Park's lagoon, but Horwitz became irritated and instead insisted on talking about the fish, arguing that they stayed frozen in the ice all winter with their pores open, taking in nutrition through the seaweed. The conversation grew heated, with Horwitz becoming increasingly touchy and excited, nearly crashing the cab. When Holden invited him for a drink, Horwitz asked why he wasn't home in bed at his age. At Ernie's, the club was jampacked with prep school and college students. Ernie, described as a fat Black piano player and terrible snob, was performing when Holden arrived. Though Ernie was technically skilled, Holden found his playing phony and show-offy, full of unnecessary flourishes. The crowd gave him a standing ovation, which disgusted Holden, who felt people always applauded for the wrong reasons. Seated at a terrible table behind a post, Holden ordered a Scotch and soda and observed the jerks around him. Suddenly, Lillian Simmons, an ex-girlfriend of D.B.'s, appeared with a Navy officer. She was pushy and phony, mainly interested in D.B.'s Hollywood career. To escape sitting with them, Holden claimed he had to meet somebody and left, angry that people were always ruining things for him.

Holden walked forty-one blocks back to his hotel in the freezing cold, wearing his red hunting hat with the earflaps down. As he walked, he reflected on his "yellowness"--his inability to confront people physically. He imagined what would happen if he confronted someone who stole his gloves at Pencey, concluding he would never actually punch the thief despite wanting to. This self-analysis depressed him further. Back at the hotel lobby, which smelled of dead cigars, the elevator operator Maurice propositioned him, offering to send a prostitute to his room for five dollars. Despite it being against his principles, Holden agreed in his depressed state. He went to his room and nervously prepared, brushing his teeth and changing his shirt. He revealed that he was still a virgin, despite several opportunities, because he always stopped when girls asked him to. He hoped this experience would give him practice for marriage. When the young prostitute named Sunny arrived, she seemed around his age and very nervous. She quickly removed her dress, but Holden felt depressed rather than sexy. He tried to make conversation, asking where she was from and about her life. Feeling peculiar and sad, especially when he hung up her dress in the closet, Holden told her he had recently had an operation and couldn't go through with it. He offered to pay her five dollars anyway, but she insisted it cost ten, which he refused. She left angrily, calling him a "crumb-bum."

After Sunny left, Holden felt miserable and depressed. He began talking out loud to his dead brother Allie, something he did when very depressed. He remembered a time when he had refused to let Allie join him and Bobby Fallon on a bike trip, and he still felt guilty about it. He got into bed and tried to pray but couldn't, describing himself as "sort of an atheist." He liked Jesus but disliked most of the Bible, especially the Disciples, whom he felt constantly let Jesus down. He discussed his religious views, including his belief that Jesus wouldn't have sent Judas to Hell. He explained that his parents were different religions and all the children were atheists, and he couldn't stand ministers with their phony "Holy Joe voices." While lying in bed unable to pray, Sunny and Maurice knocked on his door again, demanding another five dollars. Maurice, a huge man in his elevator operator's uniform, forced his way into the room with Sunny. They argued about the price, with Maurice claiming he had said ten dollars. When Holden refused to pay, calling Maurice a moron, Maurice punched him hard in the stomach. While doubled over in pain, Sunny took five dollars from his wallet. After they left, Holden lay on the floor for a long time, then fantasized about being shot and seeking revenge on Maurice in a movie-style scenario where Jane would bandage his wounds. He recognized how movies had corrupted his thinking. Feeling suicidal, he took a bath and eventually got back into bed.

Holden woke around ten o'clock feeling hungry. He was afraid Maurice might bring his breakfast, so he didn't call room service. He called Sally Hayes instead, arranging to meet her for a matinee that afternoon. Though he wasn't "too crazy about her," he had known her for years and used to think she was intelligent because she knew about theater and literature, though necking with her had clouded his judgment. After checking out of the hotel and taking a cab to Grand Central Station, he stored his bags in a locker. In a sandwich bar, he had a large breakfast and encountered two nuns with cheap suitcases waiting for a train. This triggered a reflection about his former roommate Dick Slagle, who was insecure about his inexpensive luggage and called Holden's expensive Mark Cross suitcases "bourgeois." Holden helped the nuns with their bags and struck up a conversation. They were teachers heading to a convent on 168th Street. One taught English and the other history. Holden gave them a ten-dollar donation for their charity work. He discussed Romeo and Juliet with the English teacher, explaining that he felt sorrier for Mercutio than for Romeo and Juliet because Mercutio's death was someone else's fault. The conversation was pleasant, though Holden worried they might ask if he was Catholic. When saying goodbye, he accidentally blew cigarette smoke in their faces, which embarrassed him. Afterward, he regretted only giving them ten dollars, as he needed money for his date with Sally.

After breakfast, Holden took a long walk, unable to stop thinking about the two nuns and their beat-up straw basket. He contrasted them with his mother, aunt, and Sally Hayes's mother, none of whom would do charity work without being well-dressed and receiving recognition. He admired the nuns' humility, which made him sad. Walking toward Broadway, he searched for a record store open on Sunday to buy "Little Shirley Beans," a rare record about a child ashamed to go outside because she lost her front teeth. He wanted to give it to his sister Phoebe, who often roller-skated in Central Park on Sundays. On the way, he saw a family leaving church, and their young son walking in the street singing "If a body catch a body coming through the rye" cheered him up. On Broadway, the Sunday movie crowds depressed him--all the people dressed up and eager to get to the theaters. He found the record for five dollars and tried calling Jane Gallagher, but her mother answered so he hung up. He bought two tickets to "I Know My Love" starring the Lunts, knowing Sally would love it despite his own dislike of theater and actors. He took a cab to Central Park to find Phoebe but she wasn't there. A young girl told him Phoebe might be at the Museum of Natural History. This triggered extensive nostalgic memories of his school trips to the museum with Miss Aigletinger, describing the exhibits in loving detail. He reflected on how the museum never changed, but visitors did--"you'd just be different, that's all." When he actually reached the museum, he suddenly decided not to go in and took a cab to meet Sally instead.

Holden arrived early at the Biltmore Hotel to meet Sally Hayes. While watching girls waiting for their dates, he reflected philosophically on how most would probably marry "dopey guys" who talk about cars and are boring. He thought about his former roommate Harris Macklin, who was a terrible bore but an excellent whistler, leading him to conclude he didn't understand boring people. When Sally arrived looking "terrific" in a black coat and beret, Holden impulsively felt like marrying her despite not even liking her much. They took a cab to see the Lunts perform in "I Know My Love." During the ride, they kissed, and Holden told her he loved her, which was a lie though he meant it when he said it. The play bored Holden, who found the Lunts too polished and show-offy. At intermission, they encountered phonies smoking and discussing the play pretentiously. Sally recognized an Andover student named George, and their fake, enthusiastic greeting disgusted Holden. George had a phony Ivy League voice and discussed the play as though the Lunts were "angels." After the show, Sally suggested ice-skating at Radio City. They were terrible skaters, with Sally's ankles bending painfully. Inside for drinks, Holden suddenly poured out his feelings about hating school and New York's phoniness. He impulsively proposed they run away to Massachusetts and Vermont, get married, and live in a cabin. Sally thought it was a ridiculous, immature idea. Their argument escalated until Holden called her a "pain in the ass," making her cry. He apologized but then laughed at the situation, angering her further. He left alone, later admitting he probably wouldn't have taken her anyway but meant it when he asked.

After leaving Sally, Holden went to a drugstore for a Swiss cheese sandwich and malted milk. He tried calling Jane Gallagher again but got no answer. With the whole evening free, he looked through his near-empty address book and called Carl Luce, an intellectual former student adviser from Whooton School who was three years older and now at Columbia. Luce had previously given sex talks to younger students, discussing perverts and homosexuals. Though Holden had once called him a "fat-assed phony," Luce agreed to meet him at ten o'clock at the Wicker Bar. To kill time, Holden went to see a movie at Radio City Music Hall, which he described as "probably the worst thing I could've done." He watched the Rockettes, a roller-skating comedian, and a Christmas show with angels and crucifixes that he found phony and un-religious. He thought Jesus would have preferred the kettle drummer, whom Holden and Allie used to watch. The movie itself was "putrid"--a sentimental war story about an amnesiac duke that disgusted him. A woman next to him cried throughout the phony film while ignoring her young son who needed to use the bathroom, proving to Holden that people who cry at movies are often "mean bastards at heart." Walking to the Wicker Bar afterward, he thought about war and how he hated the Army, referencing his brother D.B.'s service and his conflicted feelings about books like "A Farewell to Arms." He concluded that if there's another war, he'd volunteer to sit on the atomic bomb.

At the Wicker Bar, described as a swanky, phony place with terrible entertainment by French singers Tina and Janine, Holden arrived early and had a couple of Scotch and sodas. When Carl Luce showed up, he immediately said he could only stay briefly as he had a date. Holden tried to engage him in conversation about sex and Luce's current girlfriend. Luce revealed he was dating a Chinese sculptress in her late thirties from Shanghai, explaining that he found Eastern philosophy more satisfactory than Western regarding sex as both physical and spiritual. Luce became increasingly irritated with Holden's persistent, personal questions, calling them "typical Caulfield questions" and asking when he would grow up. When Holden admitted his sex life was terrible because he could only get excited about girls he really liked, Luce suggested he see a psychoanalyst, specifically Luce's father who was one. Luce explained that analysis would help Holden "recognize the patterns of your mind." Throughout their conversation, Luce was condescending and dismissive, wanting to control the intellectual discussion. When Holden tried to ask if Luce's father had analyzed him, Luce said his father had helped him "adjust" but an extensive analysis hadn't been necessary. Despite Holden's plea that he was "lonesome as hell" and asking him to stay for another drink, Luce left. Holden recognized that Luce was "strictly a pain in the ass" but acknowledged he had an excellent vocabulary, the largest of any boy at Whooton.

After Luce left, Holden stayed at the Wicker Bar until around one o'clock, getting very drunk while listening to a new singer named Valencia. He tried to get Valencia to join him but his message was probably never delivered. As he got drunker, he fantasized again about having a bullet in his guts. He left the bar wanting to call Jane but instead drunkenly called Sally Hayes, waking up her grandmother. When Sally got on the phone, he slurred that he would come trim her Christmas tree, barely coherent and still pretending to be shot by "Rocky's mob." She told him to go to bed and hung up. Holden stayed in the phone booth to avoid passing out, then went to the men's room and dunked his head in cold water. He sat on a radiator, soaking wet and shivering. Valencia's piano player came in and suggested Holden go home, asking how old he was. When Holden went to leave, he was crying though he didn't know why, feeling depressed and lonesome. The hat-check girl was very nice, refusing his tip and insisting he go home to bed. She made him put on his red hunting hat since his hair was wet. Outside, Holden started walking to Central Park to see what the ducks were doing. On the way, he dropped Phoebe's record and it broke into fifty pieces, which devastated him. In the dark park, he searched for the lagoon and the ducks but found none. Sitting on a bench, shivering with ice in his hair, he worried about getting pneumonia and dying. He pictured his funeral and felt sorry for his parents, especially his mother who hadn't gotten over Allie's death. Thinking about Phoebe's reaction if he died, he decided to sneak home to see her. He walked all the way home through the cold, empty streets.

Holden got an enormous break when he arrived home because the regular elevator operator Pete wasn't working. He told the new, somewhat dim-witted operator to take him to the Dicksteins' apartment on his floor, but when the operator said they were at a party, Holden claimed to be their nephew and invented a story about having a bad leg that needed to be in a certain position. Once the elevator left, he limped to his family's apartment and quietly let himself in with his key, thinking he should have been a crook. The foyer had a distinctive smell that made him know he was home. He carefully avoided the noisy hangers in the closet and crept past his parents' bedroom, knowing his father was a sound sleeper but his mother had hearing like a bloodhound and was nervous, staying up all night smoking. He found Phoebe sleeping in D.B.'s room instead of her own, as she preferred the larger space with the enormous desk and bed. She looked peaceful sleeping with her mouth open. Holden felt wonderful for a change as he looked at her neat clothes and examined her school notebooks, which were filled with notes to friends, homework questions, and signatures with her adopted middle name "Weatherfield" instead of Josephine. The notebooks delighted him. After reading them and smoking his last cigarette, he woke Phoebe. She immediately recognized him, was thrilled to see him, and affectionately hugged him. She excitedly told him about her play where she would be Benedict Arnold and asked if he would come. However, her excitement turned to alarm when she realized he was home early from school and deduced he had been expelled again, saying "Daddy'll kill you" and refusing to take the pillow off her head in anger and distress.

When Phoebe finally removed the pillow from her head, she remained angry, turning away and ostracizing Holden just as the fencing team had done when he lost the equipment. When he tried to discuss it, she kept insisting "Daddy's gonna kill you." Holden explained he might go work on a ranch in Colorado, but Phoebe called him out, saying he couldn't even ride a horse. She acted like a schoolteacher, asking if he had failed every subject, and was hurt when she asked "why did you do it?" Holden tried to explain that Pencey was full of phonies and mean guys who excluded people like Robert Ackley from their secret fraternities. He described how even good teachers like Mr. Spencer became phonies when Headmaster Thurmer visited, and recounted a depressing Veterans' Day story about an old alumnus searching for his initials in a bathroom stall door. When Phoebe said "You don't like anything that's happening," it depressed Holden further. She challenged him to name one thing he liked. Struggling to concentrate, he could only think of the two nuns and James Castle, a boy at Elkton Hills who jumped out a window rather than take back something he said about a conceited student. Castle had been wearing Holden's turtleneck sweater when he died. When Phoebe pressed him, Holden said he liked Allie and sitting with her right then. Phoebe rejected Allie as an answer because he was dead. When she asked what he wanted to be, Holden revealed his fantasy of being "the catcher in the rye"--standing at the edge of a cliff in a field where children play, catching them before they fall off. He misquoted the Robert Burns poem, but explained he wanted to save children from danger. Afterward, he called his former English teacher Mr. Antolini, who invited him over immediately.

Mr. Antolini was warm and welcoming on the phone, even joking about Holden flunking out of Pencey. Back in D.B.'s room, Holden found Phoebe listening to dance music on the radio. He taught her to dance when she was little, and she had become excellent. They danced together for four numbers, with Phoebe seriously maintaining position between songs and staying perfectly in rhythm despite their height difference. After dancing, Phoebe playfully demonstrated how she could make her forehead hot by crossing her legs, holding her breath, and thinking of something hot. She was learning belching from a friend. Suddenly, they heard the front door open. Holden quickly turned off the light, stubbed out his cigarette, and hid in the closet as his parents came home from their party in Connecticut. His mother entered to check on Phoebe, who was awake. When Mrs. Caulfield smelled cigarette smoke, Phoebe claimed she had lit one briefly and thrown it out the window. After some conversation about the movie Phoebe had seen and dinner, Mrs. Caulfield finally left with a headache. Holden emerged from the closet, bumping into Phoebe in the dark. He told her he needed to leave and asked to borrow money. Though it was her Christmas shopping money, Phoebe insisted he take all $8.65. As she counted it out in the dark, Holden suddenly started crying uncontrollably, scaring Phoebe. She tried to comfort him, but he couldn't stop for a long time. When he finally composed himself, he gave Phoebe his red hunting hat, which she loved. He promised to call her and said Mr. Antolini was waiting. Leaving the apartment was easier than entering, and he almost didn't care if his parents caught him anymore.

Mr. and Mrs. Antolini lived in a swanky Sutton Place apartment. Mr. Antolini, whom Holden considered the best teacher he'd ever had, was young, witty, and had been the one who picked up James Castle's body after his suicide, covering him with his own coat without caring about the blood. Mrs. Antolini was much older and wealthy. Feeling dizzy when he left home, Holden took a cab to their apartment. Mr. Antolini, already somewhat drunk in his bathrobe with a highball, greeted him warmly with his characteristic witty remarks. The apartment showed signs of a recent party. Over coffee, Holden explained he had passed English but flunked Oral Expression because he disliked when students yelled "Digression!" at speakers who wandered from their topics. He preferred the digressions, especially from a nervous boy named Richard Kinsella whose personal stories were more interesting than his assigned topics. Mr. Antolini, getting progressively more intoxicated, delivered a serious lecture warning that Holden was "riding for some kind of terrible, terrible fall" where he would keep falling without ever hitting bottom. He wrote down a quote from psychoanalyst Wilhelm Stekel: "The mark of the immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of the mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one." He encouraged Holden to apply himself in school and discover his intellectual capacity, explaining that educated men leave more valuable records behind. Exhausted, Holden could barely stay awake. They made up the couch and Holden went to sleep. Later, he woke to find Mr. Antolini sitting on the floor in the dark, petting his head. Terrified and embarrassed, thinking it was a sexual advance, Holden hastily dressed and left despite Mr. Antolini's protests, shaking and sweating as he fled into the night.

Outside at dawn, Holden walked to Grand Central Station and slept on a bench in the waiting room until nine o'clock when crowds forced him to sit up. He felt more depressed than ever and obsessively reconsidered the incident with Mr. Antolini, wondering if he had misinterpreted the gesture and should have stayed. This uncertainty deepened his depression. He read a magazine article about hormones that made him worry he looked unhealthy, and another about cancer that convinced him a sore in his mouth meant he was dying. Feeling sick, he went for a walk and bought doughnuts and coffee but couldn't swallow the food. On Fifth Avenue near Christmas, he looked for the two nuns but didn't see them. He thought about shopping with Phoebe the previous Christmas. Suddenly, walking became terrifying--every time he stepped off a curb, he felt he would disappear and never reach the other side. He began praying to Allie at each corner: "Allie, don't let me disappear." Finally reaching the Sixties past the zoo, he sat on a bench and decided to leave New York permanently, hitchhike west, get a job at a gas station, and pretend to be a deaf-mute to avoid conversations. He would build a cabin and possibly marry a deaf-mute woman. Excited by this plan, he wanted to say goodbye to Phoebe first. He bought paper and wrote her a note to meet him at the Museum of Art at 12:15 to return her Christmas money. At Phoebe's school, which he had attended as a child, he saw "Fuck you" written on the wall. Enraged, imagining how it would affect young children, he rubbed it off. He delivered the note through the principal's office, then found another obscenity scratched into a wall, realizing it was hopeless to erase them all. At the museum, he helped two young boys find the mummies, but they fled when frightened. Even in the tomb, he found another "Fuck you" written in red crayon, concluding there was no peaceful place anywhere. After briefly passing out in the bathroom, he waited for Phoebe outside. When she arrived wearing his red hunting hat and dragging a suitcase, she announced she was coming with him. Holden was devastated, almost ready to hit her. She cried, and he cruelly reminded her about her play. He took her suitcase to check it and told her he had changed his mind about leaving, but she turned her back on him angrily and refused to return to school. They walked separately to the zoo, Phoebe on one side of the street refusing to look at him. At the zoo, she gradually softened as they watched the sea lions and bears. At the carousel, Holden bought her a ticket. She gave him back his money, saying "please" in a way that depressed him. As she rode the carousel in the rain, reaching for the gold ring, Holden sat on a bench getting soaked, wearing his hunting hat that she had returned to him. Watching Phoebe go around and around in her blue coat, he felt so happy he nearly cried, though he didn't know why.

Holden concluded his narrative by refusing to share what happened after he went home, how he got sick, or details about the school he was supposed to attend next fall. He explained that such information didn't interest him much. He was currently in some kind of rest facility where a psychoanalyst kept asking if he would apply himself when he returned to school in September, which Holden considered a stupid question because nobody knows what they'll do until they actually do it. His brother D.B. visited the previous Saturday with an affected but attractive English woman who was in his new movie. When she left the room, D.B. asked Holden what he thought about everything he had just recounted. Holden didn't know what to say or think about it all. His final reflection was surprising: he was sorry he had told so many people about his experiences because now he sort of missed everybody he had talked about, even Stradlater, Ackley, and Maurice. He concluded with a warning and observation that captured his entire predicament: "Don't ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody." This brief, enigmatic chapter brought Holden's story full circle, returning to the present moment in the facility where he began his narrative, leaving his future uncertain and his emotional state unresolved, though perhaps with a greater understanding of his connections to others and the complexity of human relationships.