badezimmer modern mosaik

chapter xvi the certainty that he was not going to beaccepted by the mckelveys made babbitt feel guilty and a little absurd. but he went more regularly to the elks; ata chamber of commerce luncheon he was oratorical regarding the wickedness ofstrikes; and again he saw himself as a prominent citizen. his clubs and associations were foodcomfortable to his spirit. of a decent man in zenith it was requiredthat he should belong to one, preferably two or three, of the innumerous "lodges"and prosperity-boosting lunch-clubs; to the

rotarians, the kiwanis, or the boosters; to the oddfellows, moose, masons, red men,woodmen, owls, eagles, maccabees, knights of pythias, knights of columbus, and othersecret orders characterized by a high degree of heartiness, sound morals, andreverence for the constitution. there were four reasons for joining theseorders: it was the thing to do. it was good for business, since lodge-brothers frequently became customers. it gave to americans unable to becomegeheimrate or commendatori such unctuous honorifics as high worthy recording scribeand grand hoogow to add to the commonplace distinctions of colonel, judge, andprofessor.

and it permitted the swaddled americanhusband to stay away from home for one evening a week. the lodge was his piazza, his pavementcafe. he could shoot pool and talk man-talk andbe obscene and valiant. babbitt was what he called a "joiner" forall these reasons. behind the gold and scarlet banner of hispublic achievements was the dun background of office-routine: leases, sales-contracts,lists of properties to rent. the evenings of oratory and committees andlodges stimulated him like brandy, but every morning he was sandy-tongued.week by week he accumulated nervousness.

he was in open disagreement with hisoutside salesman, stanley graff; and once, though her charms had always kept himnickeringly polite to her, he snarled at miss mcgoun for changing his letters. but in the presence of paul riesling herelaxed. at least once a week they fled frommaturity. on saturday they played golf, jeering, "asa golfer, you're a fine tennis-player," or they motored all sunday afternoon, stoppingat village lunchrooms to sit on high stools at a counter and drink coffee from thickcups. sometimes paul came over in the eveningwith his violin, and even zilla was silent

as the lonely man who had lost his way andforever crept down unfamiliar roads spun out his dark soul in music. iinothing gave babbitt more purification and publicity than his labors for the sundayschool. his church, the chatham road presbyterian,was one of the largest and richest, one of the most oaken and velvety, in zenith.the pastor was the reverend john jennison drew, m.a., d.d., ll.d. (the m.a. and the d.d. were from elbertuniversity, nebraska, the ll.d. from waterbury college, oklahoma.)he was eloquent, efficient, and versatile.

he presided at meetings for thedenunciation of unions or the elevation of domestic service, and confided to theaudiences that as a poor boy he had carried newspapers. for the saturday edition of the eveningadvocate he wrote editorials on "the manly man's religion" and "the dollars and sensevalue of christianity," which were printed in bold type surrounded by a wiggly border. he often said that he was "proud to beknown as primarily a business man" and that he certainly was not going to "permit theold satan to monopolize all the pep and punch."

he was a thin, rustic-faced young man withgold spectacles and a bang of dull brown hair, but when he hurled himself intooratory he glowed with power. he admitted that he was too much thescholar and poet to imitate the evangelist, mike monday, yet he had once awakened hisfold to new life, and to larger collections, by the challenge, "my brethren, the real cheap skate is the manwho won't lend to the lord!" he had made his church a true communitycenter. it contained everything but a bar. it had a nursery, a thursday evening supperwith a short bright missionary lecture

afterward, a gymnasium, a fortnightlymotion-picture show, a library of technical books for young workmen--though, unfortunately, no young workman everentered the church except to wash the windows or repair the furnace--and asewing-circle which made short little pants for the children of the poor while mrs.drew read aloud from earnest novels. though dr. drew's theology waspresbyterian, his church-building was gracefully episcopalian. as he said, it had the "most perdurablefeatures of those noble ecclesiastical monuments of grand old england which standas symbols of the eternity of faith,

religious and civil." it was built of cheery iron-spot brick inan improved gothic style, and the main auditorium had indirect lighting fromelectric globes in lavish alabaster bowls. on a december morning when the babbittswent to church, dr. john jennison drew was unusually eloquent.the crowd was immense. ten brisk young ushers, in morning coatswith white roses, were bringing folding chairs up from the basement. there was an impressive musical program,conducted by sheldon smeeth, educational director of the y.m.c.a., who also sang theoffertory.

babbitt cared less for this, because somemisguided person had taught young mr. smeeth to smile, smile, smile while he wassinging, but with all the appreciation of a fellow-orator he admired dr. drew's sermon. it had the intellectual quality whichdistinguished the chatham road congregation from the grubby chapels on smith street. "at this abundant harvest-time of all theyear," dr. drew chanted, "when, though stormy the sky and laborious the path tothe drudging wayfarer, yet the hovering and bodiless spirit swoops back o'er all the labors and desires of the past twelvemonths, oh, then it seems to me there

sounds behind all our apparent failures thegolden chorus of greeting from those passed happily on; and lo! on the dim horizon we see behind dolorous clouds the mighty massof mountains--mountains of melody, mountains of mirth, mountains of might!""i certainly do like a sermon with culture and thought in it," meditated babbitt. at the end of the service he was delightedwhen the pastor, actively shaking hands at the door, twittered, "oh, brother babbitt,can you wait a jiffy? want your advice." "sure, doctor!you bet!"

"drop into my office.i think you'll like the cigars there." babbitt did like the cigars. he also liked the office, which wasdistinguished from other offices only by the spirited change of the familiar wall-placard to "this is the lord's busy day." chum frink came in, then william w.eathorne. mr. eathorne was the seventy-year-oldpresident of the first state bank of zenith. he still wore the delicate patches of side-whiskers which had been the uniform of bankers in 1870.

if babbitt was envious of the smart set ofthe mckelveys, before william washington eathorne he was reverent.mr. eathorne had nothing to do with the smart set. he was above it.he was the great-grandson of one of the five men who founded zenith, in 1792, andhe was of the third generation of bankers. he could examine credits, make loans,promote or injure a man's business. in his presence babbitt breathed quicklyand felt young. the reverend dr. drew bounced into the roomand flowered into speech: "i've asked you gentlemen to stay so i canput a proposition before you.

the sunday school needs bucking up. it's the fourth largest in zenith, butthere's no reason why we should take anybody's dust.we ought to be first. i want to request you, if you will, to forma committee of advice and publicity for the sunday school; look it over and make anysuggestions for its betterment, and then, perhaps, see that the press gives us some attention--give the public some reallyhelpful and constructive news instead of all these murders and divorces.""excellent," said the banker. babbitt and frink were enchanted to joinhim.

iii if you had asked babbitt what his religionwas, he would have answered in sonorous boosters'-club rhetoric, "my religion is toserve my fellow men, to honor my brother as myself, and to do my bit to make lifehappier for one and all." if you had pressed him for more detail, hewould have announced, "i'm a member of the presbyterian church, and naturally, iaccept its doctrines." if you had been so brutal as to go on, hewould have protested, "there's no use discussing and arguing about religion; itjust stirs up bad feeling." actually, the content of his theology wasthat there was a supreme being who had

tried to make us perfect, but presumablyhad failed; that if one was a good man he would go to a place called heaven (babbitt unconsciously pictured it as rather like anexcellent hotel with a private garden), but if one was a bad man, that is, if hemurdered or committed burglary or used cocaine or had mistresses or sold non-existent real estate, he would be punished. babbitt was uncertain, however, about whathe called "this business of hell." he explained to ted, "of course i'm prettyliberal; i don't exactly believe in a fire- and-brimstone hell. stands to reason, though, that a fellowcan't get away with all sorts of vice and

not get nicked for it, see how i mean?"upon this theology he rarely pondered. the kernel of his practical religion wasthat it was respectable, and beneficial to one's business, to be seen going toservices; that the church kept the worst elements from being still worse; and that the pastor's sermons, however dull theymight seem at the time of taking, yet had a voodooistic power which "did a fellow good--kept him in touch with higher things." his first investigations for the sundayschool advisory committee did not inspire him. he liked the busy folks' bible class,composed of mature men and women and

addressed by the old-school physician, dr.t. atkins jordan, in a sparkling style comparable to that of the more refined humorous after-dinner speakers, but when hewent down to the junior classes he was disconcerted. he heard sheldon smeeth, educationaldirector of the y.m.c.a. and leader of the church-choir, a pale but strenuous youngman with curly hair and a smile, teaching a class of sixteen-year-old boys. smeeth lovingly admonished them, "now,fellows, i'm going to have a heart to heart talk evening at my house next thursday.we'll get off by ourselves and be frank

about our secret worries. you can just tell old sheldy anything, likeall the fellows do at the y. i'm going to explain frankly about thehorrible practises a kiddy falls into unless he's guided by a big brother, andabout the perils and glory of sex." old sheldy beamed damply; the boys lookedashamed; and babbitt didn't know which way to turn his embarrassed eyes. less annoying but also much duller were theminor classes which were being instructed in philosophy and oriental ethnology byearnest spinsters. most of them met in the highly varnishedsunday school room, but there was an

overflow to the basement, which wasdecorated with varicose water-pipes and lighted by small windows high up in theoozing wall. what babbitt saw, however, was the firstcongregational church of catawba. he was back in the sunday school of hisboyhood. he smelled again that polite stuffiness tobe found only in church parlors; he recalled the case of drab sunday schoolbooks: "hetty, a humble heroine" and "josephus, a lad of palestine;" he thumbed once more the high-colored text-cards whichno boy wanted but no boy liked to throw away, because they were somehow sacred; hewas tortured by the stumbling rote of

thirty-five years ago, as in the vastzenith church he listened to: "now, edgar, you read the next verse.what does it mean when it says it's easier for a camel to go through a needle's eye? what does this teach us?clarence! please don't wiggle so!if you had studied your lesson you wouldn't be so fidgety. now, earl, what is the lesson jesus wastrying to teach his disciples? the one thing i want you to especiallyremember, boys, is the words, 'with god all things are possible.'

just think of that always--clarence, pleasepay attention--just say 'with god all things are possible' whenever you feeldiscouraged, and, alec, will you read the next verse; if you'd pay attention youwouldn't lose your place!" drone--drone--drone--gigantic bees thatboomed in a cavern of drowsiness-- babbitt started from his open-eyed nap,thanked the teacher for "the privilege of listening to her splendid teaching," andstaggered on to the next circle. after two weeks of this he had nosuggestions whatever for the reverend dr. drew. then he discovered a world of sunday schooljournals, an enormous and busy domain of

weeklies and monthlies which were astechnical, as practical and forward- looking, as the real-estate columns or theshoe-trade magazines. he bought half a dozen of them at areligious book-shop and till after midnight he read them and admired. he found many lucrative tips on "focusingappeals," "scouting for new members," and "getting prospects to sign up with thesunday school." he particularly liked the word "prospects,"and he was moved by the rubric: "the moral springs of the community's lifelie deep in its sunday schools--its schools of religious instruction and inspiration.

neglect now means loss of spiritual vigorand moral power in years to come.... facts like the above, followed by astraight-arm appeal, will reach folks who can never be laughed or jollied into doingtheir part." babbitt admitted, "that's so. i used to skin out of the ole sunday schoolat catawba every chance i got, but same time, i wouldn't be where i am to-day,maybe, if it hadn't been for its training in--in moral power. and all about the bible.(great literature. have to read some of it again, one of thesedays)."

how scientifically the sunday school couldbe organized he learned from an article in the westminster adult bible class:"the second vice-president looks after the fellowship of the class. she chooses a group to help her.these become ushers. every one who comes gets a glad hand.no one goes away a stranger. one member of the group stands on thedoorstep and invites passers-by to come in." perhaps most of all babbitt appreciated theremarks by william h. ridgway in the sunday school times:

"if you have a sunday school class withoutany pep and get-up-and-go in it, that is, without interest, that is uncertain inattendance, that acts like a fellow with the spring fever, let old dr. ridgway writeyou a prescription. rx. invite the bunch for supper."the sunday school journals were as well rounded as they were practical. they neglected none of the arts. as to music the sunday school timesadvertised that c. harold lowden, "known to thousands through his sacred compositions,"had written a new masterpiece, "entitled 'yearning for you.'

the poem, by harry d. kerr, is one of thedaintiest you could imagine and the music is indescribably beautiful.critics are agreed that it will sweep the country. may be made into a charming sacred song bysubstituting the hymn words, 'i heard the voice of jesus say.'"even manual training was adequately considered. babbitt noted an ingenious way ofillustrating the resurrection of jesus christ:"model for pupils to make. tomb with rolling door.--use a squarecovered box turned upside down.

pull the cover forward a little to form agroove at the bottom. cut a square door, also cut a circle ofcardboard to more than cover the door. cover the circular door and the tombthickly with stiff mixture of sand, flour and water and let it dry. it was the heavy circular stone over thedoor the women found 'rolled away' on easter morning.this is the story we are to 'go-tell.'" in their advertisements the sunday schooljournals were thoroughly efficient. babbitt was interested in a preparationwhich "takes the place of exercise for sedentary men by building up depleted nervetissue, nourishing the brain and the

digestive system." he was edified to learn that the selling ofbibles was a hustling and strictly competitive industry, and as an expert onhygiene he was pleased by the sanitary communion outfit company's announcement of "an improved and satisfactory outfitthroughout, including highly polished beautiful mahogany tray. this tray eliminates all noise, is lighterand more easily handled than others and is more in keeping with the furniture of thechurch than a tray of any other material." ivhe dropped the pile of sunday school

journals.he pondered, "now, there's a real he-world. corking! "ashamed i haven't sat in more.fellow that's an influence in the community--shame if he doesn't take part ina real virile hustling religion. sort of christianity incorporated, youmight say. "but with all reverence. "some folks might claim these sunday schoolfans are undignified and unspiritual and so on.sure! always some skunk to spring things likethat!

knocking and sneering and tearing-down--somuch easier than building up. but me, i certainly hand it to thesemagazines. they've brought ole george f. babbitt intocamp, and that's the answer to the critics! "the more manly and practical a fellow is,the more he ought to lead the enterprising christian life.me for it! cut out this carelessness and boozing and--rone! where the devil you been?this is a fine time o' night to be coming in!" >

chapter xvii ithere are but three or four old houses in floral heights, and in floral heights anold house is one which was built before 1880. the largest of these is the residence ofwilliam washington eathorne, president of the first state bank. the eathorne mansion preserves the memoryof the "nice parts" of zenith as they appeared from 1860 to 1900. it is a red brick immensity with graysandstone lintels and a roof of slate in

courses of red, green, and dyspepticyellow. there are two anemic towers, one roofedwith copper, the other crowned with castiron ferns. the porch is like an open tomb; it issupported by squat granite pillars above which hang frozen cascades of brick.at one side of the house is a huge stained- glass window in the shape of a keyhole. but the house has an effect not at allhumorous. it embodies the heavy dignity of thosevictorian financiers who ruled the generation between the pioneers and thebrisk "sales-engineers" and created a

somber oligarchy by gaining control ofbanks, mills, land, railroads, mines. out of the dozen contradictory zenithswhich together make up the true and complete zenith, none is so powerful andenduring yet none so unfamiliar to the citizens as the small, still, dry, polite, cruel zenith of the william eathornes; andfor that tiny hierarchy the other zeniths unwittingly labor and insignificantly die. most of the castles of the testy victoriantetrarchs are gone now or decayed into boarding-houses, but the eathorne mansionremains virtuous and aloof, reminiscent of london, back bay, rittenhouse square.

its marble steps are scrubbed daily, thebrass plate is reverently polished, and the lace curtains are as prim and superior aswilliam washington eathorne himself. with a certain awe babbitt and chum frinkcalled on eathorne for a meeting of the sunday school advisory committee; withuneasy stillness they followed a uniformed maid through catacombs of reception-roomsto the library. it was as unmistakably the library of asolid old banker as eathorne's side- whiskers were the side-whiskers of a solidold banker. the books were most of them standard sets,with the correct and traditional touch of dim blue, dim gold, and glossy calf-skin.

the fire was exactly correct andtraditional; a small, quiet, steady fire, reflected by polished fire-irons. the oak desk was dark and old andaltogether perfect; the chairs were gently supercilious. eathorne's inquiries as to the healths ofmrs. babbitt, miss babbitt, and the other children were softly paternal, but babbitthad nothing with which to answer him. it was indecent to think of using the"how's tricks, ole socks?" which gratified vergil gunch and frink and howardlittlefield--men who till now had seemed successful and urbane.

babbitt and frink sat politely, andpolitely did eathorne observe, opening his thin lips just wide enough to dismiss thewords, "gentlemen, before we begin our conference--you may have felt the cold in coming here--so good of you to save an oldman the journey--shall we perhaps have a whisky toddy?" so well trained was babbitt in all theconversation that befits a good fellow that he almost disgraced himself with "ratherthan make trouble, and always providin' there ain't any enforcement officers hiding in the waste-basket--" the words diedchoking in his throat.

he bowed in flustered obedience.so did chum frink. eathorne rang for the maid. the modern and luxurious babbitt had neverseen any one ring for a servant in a private house, except during meals. himself, in hotels, had rung for bell-boys,but in the house you didn't hurt matilda's feelings; you went out in the hall andshouted for her. nor had he, since prohibition, known anyone to be casual about drinking. it was extraordinary merely to sip histoddy and not cry, "oh, maaaaan, this hits me right where i live!"

and always, with the ecstasy of youthmeeting greatness, he marveled, "that little fuzzy-face there, why, he could makeme or break me! if he told my banker to call my loans--! gosh!that quarter-sized squirt! and looking like he hadn't got a single bitof hustle to him! i wonder--do we boosters throw too manyfits about pep?" from this thought he shuddered away, andlistened devoutly to eathorne's ideas on the advancement of the sunday school, whichwere very clear and very bad. diffidently babbitt outlined his ownsuggestions:

"i think if you analyze the needs of theschool, in fact, going right at it as if it was a merchandizing problem, of course theone basic and fundamental need is growth. i presume we're all agreed we won't besatisfied till we build up the biggest darn sunday school in the whole state, so thechatham road presbyterian won't have to take anything off anybody. now about jazzing up the campaign forprospects: they've already used contesting teams, and given prizes to the kids thatbring in the most members. and they made a mistake there: the prizeswere a lot of folderols and doodads like poetry books and illustrated testaments,instead of something a real live kid would

want to work for, like real cash or aspeedometer for his motor cycle. course i suppose it's all fine and dandy toillustrate the lessons with these decorated book-marks and blackboard drawings and soon, but when it comes down to real he- hustling, getting out and drumming up customers--or members, i mean, why, you gotto make it worth a fellow's while. "now, i want to propose two stunts: first,divide the sunday school into four armies, depending on age. everybody gets a military rank in his ownarmy according to how many members he brings in, and the duffers that lie down onus and don't bring in any, they remain

privates. the pastor and superintendent rank asgenerals. and everybody has got to give salutes andall the rest of that junk, just like a regular army, to make 'em feel it's worthwhile to get rank. "then, second: course the school has itsadvertising committee, but, lord, nobody ever really works good--nobody works welljust for the love of it. the thing to do is to be practical and up-to-date, and hire a real paid press-agent for the sunday school-some newspaper fellowwho can give part of his time." "sure, you bet!" said chum frink.

"think of the nice juicy bits he could getin!" babbitt crowed. "not only the big, salient, vital facts,about how fast the sunday school--and the collection--is growing, but a lot ofhumorous gossip and kidding: about how some blowhard fell down on his pledge to get new members, or the good time the sacredtrinity class of girls had at their wieniewurst party. and on the side, if he had time, the press-agent might even boost the lessons themselves--do a little advertising for allthe sunday schools in town, in fact.

no use being hoggish toward the rest of'em, providing we can keep the bulge on 'em in membership. frinstance, he might get the papers to--course i haven't got a literary training like frink here, and i'm just guessing howthe pieces ought to be written, but take frinstance, suppose the week's lesson is about jacob; well, the press-agent mightget in something that would have a fine moral, and yet with a trick headline that'dget folks to read it--say like: 'jake fools the old man; makes getaway with girl andbankroll.' see how i mean?that'd get their interest!

now, course, mr. eathorne, you'reconservative, and maybe you feel these stunts would be undignified, but honestly,i believe they'd bring home the bacon." eathorne folded his hands on hiscomfortable little belly and purred like an aged pussy: "may i say, first, that i have been verymuch pleased by your analysis of the situation, mr. babbitt. as you surmise, it's necessary in myposition to be conservative, and perhaps endeavor to maintain a certain standard ofdignity. yet i think you'll find me somewhatprogressive.

in our bank, for example, i hope i may saythat we have as modern a method of publicity and advertising as any in thecity. yes, i fancy you'll find us oldsters quitecognizant of the shifting spiritual values of the age.yes, oh yes. and so, in fact, it pleases me to be ableto say that though personally i might prefer the sterner presbyterianism of anearlier era--" babbitt finally gathered that eathorne waswilling. chum frink suggested as part-time press-agent one kenneth escott, reporter on the advocate-times.

they parted on a high plane of amity andchristian helpfulness. babbitt did not drive home, but toward thecenter of the city. he wished to be by himself and exult overthe beauty of intimacy with william washington eathorne. iia snow-blanched evening of ringing pavements and eager lights.great golden lights of trolley-cars sliding along the packed snow of the roadway. demure lights of little houses.the belching glare of a distant foundry, wiping out the sharp-edged stars.

lights of neighborhood drug stores wherefriends gossiped, well pleased, after the day's work. the green light of a police-station, andgreener radiance on the snow; the drama of a patrol-wagon--gong beating like aterrified heart, headlights scorching the crystal-sparkling street, driver not a chauffeur but a policeman proud in uniform,another policeman perilously dangling on the step at the back, and a glimpse of theprisoner. a murderer, a burglar, a coiner cleverlytrapped? an enormous graystone church with a rigidspire; dim light in the parlors, and

cheerful droning of choir-practise. the quivering green mercury-vapor light ofa photo-engraver's loft. then the storming lights of down-town;parked cars with ruby tail-lights; white arched entrances to movie theaters, likefrosty mouths of winter caves; electric signs--serpents and little dancing men of fire; pink-shaded globes and scarlet jazzmusic in a cheap up-stairs dance-hall; lights of chinese restaurants, lanternspainted with cherry-blossoms and with pagodas, hung against lattices of lustrousgold and black. small dirty lamps in small stinkinglunchrooms.

the smart shopping-district, with rich andquiet light on crystal pendants and furs and suave surfaces of polished wood invelvet-hung reticent windows. high above the street, an unexpected squarehanging in the darkness, the window of an office where some one was working late, fora reason unknown and stimulating. a man meshed in bankruptcy, an ambitiousboy, an oil-man suddenly become rich? the air was shrewd, the snow was deep inuncleared alleys, and beyond the city, babbitt knew, were hillsides of snow-driftamong wintry oaks, and the curving ice- enchanted river. he loved his city with passionate wonder.he lost the accumulated weariness of

business--worry and expansive oratory; hefelt young and potential. he was ambitious. it was not enough to be a vergil gunch, anorville jones. no."they're bully fellows, simply lovely, but they haven't got any finesse." no. he was going to be an eathorne;delicately rigorous, coldly powerful. "that's the stuff.the wallop in the velvet mitt. not let anybody get fresh with you. been getting careless about my diction.slang.

colloquial.cut it out. i was first-rate at rhetoric in college. themes on--anyway, not bad.had too much of this hooptedoodle and good- fellow stuff.i--why couldn't i organize a bank of my own some day? and ted succeed me!"he drove happily home, and to mrs. babbitt he was a william washington eathorne, butshe did not notice it. iiiyoung kenneth escott, reporter on the advocate-times was appointed press-agent ofthe chatham road presbyterian sunday

school. he gave six hours a week to it.at least he was paid for giving six hours a week. he had friends on the press and the gazetteand he was not (officially) known as a press-agent. he procured a trickle of insinuating itemsabout neighborliness and the bible, about class-suppers, jolly but educational, andthe value of the prayer-life in attaining financial success. the sunday school adopted babbitt's systemof military ranks.

quickened by this spiritual refreshment, ithad a boom. it did not become the largest school inzenith--the central methodist church kept ahead of it by methods which dr. drewscored as "unfair, undignified, un- american, ungentlemanly, and unchristian"-- but it climbed from fourth place to second,and there was rejoicing in heaven, or at least in that portion of heaven included inthe parsonage of dr. drew, while babbitt had much praise and good repute. he had received the rank of colonel on thegeneral staff of the school. he was plumply pleased by salutes on thestreet from unknown small boys; his ears

were tickled to ruddy ecstasy by hearinghimself called "colonel;" and if he did not attend sunday school merely to be thus exalted, certainly he thought about it allthe way there. he was particularly pleasant to the press-agent, kenneth escott; he took him to lunch at the athletic club and had him at thehouse for dinner. like many of the cocksure young men whoforage about cities in apparent contentment and who express their cynicism insupercilious slang, escott was shy and lonely. his shrewd starveling face broadened withjoy at dinner, and he blurted, "gee

whillikins, mrs. babbitt, if you knew howgood it is to have home eats again!" escott and verona liked each other. all evening they "talked about ideas."they discovered that they were radicals. true, they were sensible about it. they agreed that all communists werecriminals; that this vers libre was tommy- rot; and that while there ought to beuniversal disarmament, of course great britain and the united states must, on behalf of oppressed small nations, keep anavy equal to the tonnage of all the rest of the world.

but they were so revolutionary that theypredicted (to babbitt's irritation) that there would some day be a third party whichwould give trouble to the republicans and democrats. escott shook hands with babbitt threetimes, at parting. babbitt mentioned his extreme fondness foreathorne. within a week three newspapers presentedaccounts of babbitt's sterling labors for religion, and all of them tactfullymentioned william washington eathorne as his collaborator. nothing had brought babbitt quite so muchcredit at the elks, the athletic club, and

the boosters'. his friends had always congratulated him onhis oratory, but in their praise was doubt, for even in speeches advertising the citythere was something highbrow and degenerate, like writing poetry. but now orville jones shouted across theathletic dining-room, "here's the new director of the first state bank!" grover butterbaugh, the eminent wholesalerof plumbers' supplies, chuckled, "wonder you mix with common folks, after holdingeathorne's hand!" and emil wengert, the jeweler, was at lastwilling to discuss buying a house in

dorchester. ivwhen the sunday school campaign was finished, babbitt suggested to kennethescott, "say, how about doing a little boosting for doc drew personally?" escott grinned."you trust the doc to do a little boosting for himself, mr. babbitt! there's hardly a week goes by without hisringing up the paper to say if we'll chase a reporter up to his study, he'll let us inon the story about the swell sermon he's going to preach on the wickedness of short

skirts, or the authorship of thepentateuch. don't you worry about him. there's just one better publicity-grabberin town, and that's this dora gibson tucker that runs the child welfare and theamericanization league, and the only reason she's got drew beaten is because she hasgot some brains!" "well, now kenneth, i don't think you oughtto talk that way about the doctor. a preacher has to watch his interests,hasn't he? you remember that in the bible about--aboutbeing diligent in the lord's business, or something?"

"all right, i'll get something in if youwant me to, mr. babbitt, but i'll have to wait till the managing editor is out oftown, and then blackjack the city editor." thus it came to pass that in the sundayadvocate-times, under a picture of dr. drew at his earnestest, with eyes alert, jaw asgranite, and rustic lock flamboyant, appeared an inscription--a wood-pulp tabletconferring twenty-four hours' immortality: the rev. dr. john jennison drew, m.a.,pastor of the beautiful chatham road presbyterian church in lovely floralheights, is a wizard soul-winner. he holds the local record for conversions. during his shepherdhood an average ofalmost a hundred sin-weary persons per year

have declared their resolve to lead a newlife and have found a harbor of refuge and peace. everything zips at the chatham road church.the subsidiary organizations are keyed to the top-notch of efficiency.dr. drew is especially keen on good congregational singing. bright cheerful hymns are used at everymeeting, and the special sing services attract lovers of music and professionalsfrom all parts of the city. on the popular lecture platform as well asin the pulpit dr. drew is a renowned word- painter, and during the course of the yearhe receives literally scores of invitations

to speak at varied functions both here andelsewhere. vbabbitt let dr. drew know that he was responsible for this tribute.dr. drew called him "brother," and shook his hand a great many times. during the meetings of the advisorycommittee, babbitt had hinted that he would be charmed to invite eathorne to dinner,but eathorne had murmured, "so nice of you- -old man, now--almost never go out." surely eathorne would not refuse his ownpastor. babbitt said boyishly to drew:

"say, doctor, now we've put this thingover, strikes me it's up to the dominie to blow the three of us to a dinner!""bully! you bet! delighted!" cried dr. drew, in his manliestway. (some one had once told him that he talkedlike the late president roosevelt.) "and, uh, say, doctor, be sure and get mr.eathorne to come. insist on it.it's, uh--i think he sticks around home too much for his own health." eathorne came.it was a friendly dinner.

babbitt spoke gracefully of the stabilizingand educational value of bankers to the community. they were, he said, the pastors of the foldof commerce. for the first time eathorne departed fromthe topic of sunday schools, and asked babbitt about the progress of his business. babbitt answered modestly, almost filially.a few months later, when he had a chance to take part in the street traction company'sterminal deal, babbitt did not care to go to his own bank for a loan. it was rather a quiet sort of deal and, ifit had come out, the public might not have

understood. he went to his friend mr. eathorne; he waswelcomed, and received the loan as a private venture; and they both profited intheir pleasant new association. after that, babbitt went to churchregularly, except on spring sunday mornings which were obviously meant for motoring. he announced to ted, "i tell you, boy,there's no stronger bulwark of sound conservatism than the evangelical church,and no better place to make friends who'll help you to gain your rightful place in thecommunity than in your own church-home!" chapter xviii

i though he saw them twice daily, though heknew and amply discussed every detail of their expenditures, yet for weeks togetherbabbitt was no more conscious of his children than of the buttons on his coat-sleeves. the admiration of kenneth escott made himaware of verona. she had become secretary to mr. gruensbergof the gruensberg leather company; she did her work with the thoroughness of a mindwhich reveres details and never quite understands them; but she was one of the people who give an agitating impression ofbeing on the point of doing something

desperate--of leaving a job or a husband--without ever doing it. babbitt was so hopeful about escott'shesitant ardors that he became the playful parent. when he returned from the elks he peeredcoyly into the living-room and gurgled, "has our kenny been here to-night?" he never credited verona's protest, "why,ken and i are just good friends, and we only talk about ideas.i won't have all this sentimental nonsense, that would spoil everything." it was ted who most worried babbitt.

with conditions in latin and english butwith a triumphant record in manual training, basket-ball, and the organizationof dances, ted was struggling through his senior year in the east side high school. at home he was interested only when he wasasked to trace some subtle ill in the ignition system of the car. he repeated to his tut-tutting father thathe did not wish to go to college or law- school, and babbitt was equally disturbedby this "shiftlessness" and by ted's relations with eunice littlefield, nextdoor. though she was the daughter of howardlittlefield, that wrought-iron fact-mill,

that horse-faced priest of privateownership, eunice was a midge in the sun. she danced into the house, she flungherself into babbitt's lap when he was reading, she crumpled his paper, andlaughed at him when he adequately explained that he hated a crumpled newspaper as hehated a broken sales-contract. she was seventeen now.her ambition was to be a cinema actress. she did not merely attend the showing ofevery "feature film;" she also read the motion-picture magazines, thoseextraordinary symptoms of the age of pep- monthlies and weeklies gorgeously illustrated with portraits of young womenwho had recently been manicure girls, not

very skilful manicure girls, and who,unless their every grimace had been arranged by a director, could not have acted in the easter cantata of the centralmethodist church; magazines reporting, quite seriously, in "interviews" plasteredwith pictures of riding-breeches and california bungalows, the views on sculpture and international politics ofblankly beautiful, suspiciously beautiful young men; outlining the plots of filmsabout pure prostitutes and kind-hearted train-robbers; and giving directions for making bootblacks into celebrated scenarioauthors overnight.

these authorities eunice studied. she could, she frequently did, tell whetherit was in november or december, 1905, that mack harker? the renowned screen cowpuncherand badman, began his public career as chorus man in "oh, you naughty girlie." on the wall of her room, her fatherreported, she had pinned up twenty-one photographs of actors. but the signed portrait of the mostgraceful of the movie heroes she carried in her young bosom. babbitt was bewildered by this worship ofnew gods, and he suspected that eunice

smoked cigarettes.he smelled the cloying reek from up-stairs, and heard her giggling with ted. he never inquired.the agreeable child dismayed him. her thin and charming face was sharpened bybobbed hair; her skirts were short, her stockings were rolled, and, as she flewafter ted, above the caressing silk were glimpses of soft knees which made babbitt uneasy, and wretched that she shouldconsider him old. sometimes, in the veiled life of hisdreams, when the fairy child came running to him she took on the semblance of eunicelittlefield.

ted was motor-mad as eunice was movie-mad. a thousand sarcastic refusals did not checkhis teasing for a car of his own. however lax he might be about early risingand the prosody of vergil, he was tireless in tinkering. with three other boys he bought a rheumaticford chassis, built an amazing racer-body out of tin and pine, went skidding roundcorners in the perilous craft, and sold it at a profit. babbitt gave him a motor-cycle, and everysaturday afternoon, with seven sandwiches and a bottle of coca-cola in his pockets,and eunice perched eerily on the rumble

seat, he went roaring off to distant towns. usually eunice and he were merelyneighborhood chums, and quarreled with a wholesome and violent lack of delicacy; butnow and then, after the color and scent of a dance, they were silent together and alittle furtive, and babbitt was worried. babbitt was an average father.he was affectionate, bullying, opinionated, ignorant, and rather wistful. like most parents, he enjoyed the game ofwaiting till the victim was clearly wrong, then virtuously pouncing.he justified himself by croaking, "well, ted's mother spoils him.

got to be somebody who tells him what'swhat, and me, i'm elected the goat. because i try to bring him up to be a real,decent, human being and not one of these sapheads and lounge-lizards, of course theyall call me a grouch!" throughout, with the eternal human geniusfor arriving by the worst possible routes at surprisingly tolerable goals, babbittloved his son and warmed to his companionship and would have sacrificed everything for him--if he could have beensure of proper credit. iited was planning a party for his set in the senior class.babbitt meant to be helpful and jolly about

it. from his memory of high-school pleasuresback in catawba he suggested the nicest games: going to boston, and charades withstew-pans for helmets, and word-games in which you were an adjective or a quality. when he was most enthusiastic he discoveredthat they weren't paying attention; they were only tolerating him.as for the party, it was as fixed and standardized as a union club hop. there was to be dancing in the living-room,a noble collation in the dining-room, and in the hall two tables of bridge for whatted called "the poor old dumb-bells that

you can't get to dance hardly more 'n halfthe time." every breakfast was monopolized byconferences on the affair. no one listened to babbitt's bulletinsabout the february weather or to his throat-clearing comments on the headlines. he said furiously, "if i may be permittedto interrupt your engrossing private conversation--juh hear what i said?""oh, don't be a spoiled baby! ted and i have just as much right to talkas you have!" flared mrs. babbitt. on the night of the party he was permittedto look on, when he was not helping matilda with the vecchia ice cream and the petitsfours.

he was deeply disquieted. eight years ago, when verona had given ahigh-school party, the children had been featureless gabies. now they were men and women of the world,very supercilious men and women; the boys condescended to babbitt, they wore evening-clothes, and with hauteur they accepted cigarettes from silver cases. babbitt had heard stories of what theathletic club called "goings on" at young parties; of girls "parking" their corsetsin the dressing-room, of "cuddling" and "petting," and a presumable increase inwhat was known as immorality.

to-night he believed the stories.these children seemed bold to him, and cold. the girls wore misty chiffon, coral velvet,or cloth of gold, and around their dipping bobbed hair were shining wreaths. he had it, upon urgent and secret inquiry,that no corsets were known to be parked upstairs; but certainly these eager bodieswere not stiff with steel. their stockings were of lustrous silk,their slippers costly and unnatural, their lips carmined and their eyebrows penciled. they danced cheek to cheek with the boys,and babbitt sickened with apprehension and

unconscious envy.worst of them all was eunice littlefield, and maddest of all the boys was ted. eunice was a flying demon.she slid the length of the room; her tender shoulders swayed; her feet were deft as aweaver's shuttle; she laughed, and enticed babbitt to dance with her. then he discovered the annex to the party.the boys and girls disappeared occasionally, and he remembered rumors oftheir drinking together from hip-pocket flasks. he tiptoed round the house, and in each ofthe dozen cars waiting in the street he saw

the points of light from cigarettes, fromeach of them heard high giggles. he wanted to denounce them but (standing inthe snow, peering round the dark corner) he did not dare.he tried to be tactful. when he had returned to the front hall hecoaxed the boys, "say, if any of you fellows are thirsty, there's some dandyginger ale." "oh! thanks!" they condescended. he sought his wife, in the pantry, andexploded, "i'd like to go in there and throw some of those young pups out of thehouse! they talk down to me like i was the butler!

i'd like to--" "i know," she sighed; "only everybody says,all the mothers tell me, unless you stand for them, if you get angry because they goout to their cars to have a drink, they won't come to your house any more, and we wouldn't want ted left out of things, wouldwe?" he announced that he would be enchanted tohave ted left out of things, and hurried in to be polite, lest ted be left out ofthings. but, he resolved, if he found that the boyswere drinking, he would--well, he'd "hand 'em something that would surprise 'em."

while he was trying to be agreeable tolarge-shouldered young bullies he was earnestly sniffing at them twice he caughtthe reek of prohibition-time whisky, but then, it was only twice-- dr. howard littlefield lumbered in.he had come, in a mood of solemn parental patronage, to look on.ted and eunice were dancing, moving together like one body. littlefield gasped.he called eunice. there was a whispered duologue, andlittlefield explained to babbitt that eunice's mother had a headache and neededher.

she went off in tears. babbitt looked after them furiously."that little devil! getting ted into trouble! and littlefield, the conceited old gas-bag,acting like it was ted that was the bad influence!"later he smelled whisky on ted's breath. after the civil farewell to the guests, therow was terrific, a thorough family scene, like an avalanche, devastating and withoutreticences. babbitt thundered, mrs. babbitt wept, tedwas unconvincingly defiant, and verona in confusion as to whose side she was taking.

for several months there was coolnessbetween the babbitts and the littlefields, each family sheltering their lamb from thewolf-cub next door. babbitt and littlefield still spoke inpontifical periods about motors and the senate, but they kept bleakly away frommention of their families. whenever eunice came to the house shediscussed with pleasant intimacy the fact that she had been forbidden to come to thehouse; and babbitt tried, with no success whatever, to be fatherly and advisory withher. iii"gosh all fishhooks!" ted wailed to eunice, as they wolfed hotchocolate, lumps of nougat, and an

assortment of glace nuts, in the mosaicsplendor of the royal drug store, "it gets me why dad doesn't just pass out from beingso poky. every evening he sits there, about half-asleep, and if rone or i say, 'oh, come on, let's do something,' he doesn't even takethe trouble to think about it. he just yawns and says, 'naw, this suits meright here.' he doesn't know there's any fun going onanywhere. i suppose he must do some thinking, same asyou and i do, but gosh, there's no way of telling it. i don't believe that outside of the officeand playing a little bum golf on saturday

he knows there's anything in the world todo except just keep sitting there-sitting there every night--not wanting to go anywhere--not wanting to do anything--thinking us kids are crazy--sitting there-- lord!" ivif he was frightened by ted's slackness, babbitt was not sufficiently frightened byverona. she was too safe. she lived too much in the neat littleairless room of her mind. kenneth escott and she were always underfoot.

when they were not at home, conductingtheir cautiously radical courtship over sheets of statistics, they were trudgingoff to lectures by authors and hindu philosophers and swedish lieutenants. "gosh," babbitt wailed to his wife, as theywalked home from the fogartys' bridge- party, "it gets me how rone and that fellowcan be so poky. they sit there night after night, wheneverhe isn't working, and they don't know there's any fun in the world.all talk and discussion--lord! sitting there--sitting there--night afternight--not wanting to do anything--thinking i'm crazy because i like to go out and playa fist of cards--sitting there--gosh!"

then round the swimmer, bored by strugglingthrough the perpetual surf of family life, new combers swelled. v babbitt's father- and mother-in-law, mr.and mrs. henry t. thompson, rented their old house in the bellevue district andmoved to the hotel hatton, that glorified boarding-house filled with widows, red- plush furniture, and the sound of ice-waterpitchers. they were lonely there, and every othersunday evening the babbitts had to dine with them, on fricasseed chicken,discouraged celery, and cornstarch ice

cream, and afterward sit, polite and restrained, in the hotel lounge, while ayoung woman violinist played songs from the german via broadway.then babbitt's own mother came down from catawba to spend three weeks. she was a kind woman and magnificentlyuncomprehending. she congratulated the convention-defyingverona on being a "nice, loyal home-body without all these ideas that so many girlsseem to have nowadays;" and when ted filled the differential with grease, out of pure love of mechanics and filthiness, sherejoiced that he was "so handy around the

house--and helping his father and all, andnot going out with the girls all the time and trying to pretend he was a societyfellow." babbitt loved his mother, and sometimes herather liked her, but he was annoyed by her christian patience, and he was reduced topulpiness when she discoursed about a quite mythical hero called "your father": "you won't remember it, georgie, you weresuch a little fellow at the time--my, i remember just how you looked that day, withyour goldy brown curls and your lace collar, you always were such a dainty child, and kind of puny and sickly, and youloved pretty things so much and the red

tassels on your little bootees and all--andyour father was taking us to church and a man stopped us and said 'major'--so many of the neighbors used to call your father'major;' of course he was only a private in the war but everybody knew that was becauseof the jealousy of his captain and he ought to have been a high-ranking officer, he had that natural ability to command that sovery, very few men have--and this man came out into the road and held up his hand andstopped the buggy and said, 'major,' he said, 'there's a lot of the folks around here that have decided to support colonelscanell for congress, and we want you to

join us.meeting people the way you do in the store, you could help us a lot.' "well, your father just looked at him andsaid, 'i certainly shall do nothing of the sort.i don't like his politics,' he said. well, the man--captain smith they used tocall him, and heaven only knows why, because he hadn't the shadow or vestige ofa right to be called 'captain' or any other title--this captain smith said, 'we'll make it hot for you if you don't stick by yourfriends, major.' well, you know how your father was, andthis smith knew it too; he knew what a real

man he was, and he knew your father knewthe political situation from a to z, and he ought to have seen that here was one man he couldn't impose on, but he went on tryingto and hinting and trying till your father spoke up and said to him, 'captain smith,'he said, 'i have a reputation around these parts for being one who is amply qualified to mind his own business and let otherfolks mind theirs!' and with that he drove on and left the fellow standing there inthe road like a bump on a log!" babbitt was most exasperated when sherevealed his boyhood to the children. he had, it seemed, been fond of barley-sugar; had worn the "loveliest little pink

bow in his curls" and corrupted his ownname to "goo-goo." he heard (though he did not officiallyhear) ted admonishing tinka, "come on now, kid; stick the lovely pink bow in yourcurls and beat it down to breakfast, or goo-goo will jaw your head off." babbitt's half-brother, martin, with hiswife and youngest baby, came down from catawba for two days.martin bred cattle and ran the dusty general-store. he was proud of being a freebornindependent american of the good old yankee stock; he was proud of being honest, blunt,ugly, and disagreeable.

his favorite remark was "how much did youpay for that?" he regarded verona's books, babbitt'ssilver pencil, and flowers on the table as citified extravagances, and said so. babbitt would have quarreled with him butfor his gawky wife and the baby, whom babbitt teased and poked fingers at andaddressed: "i think this baby's a bum, yes, sir, ithink this little baby's a bum, he's a bum, yes, sir, he's a bum, that's what he is,he's a bum, this baby's a bum, he's nothing but an old bum, that's what he is--a bum!" all the while verona and kenneth escottheld long inquiries into epistemology; ted

was a disgraced rebel; and tinka, agedeleven, was demanding that she be allowed to go to the movies thrice a week, "likeall the girls." babbitt raged, "i'm sick of it!having to carry three generations. whole damn bunch lean on me. pay half of mother's income, listen tohenry t., listen to myra's worrying, be polite to mart, and get called an oldgrouch for trying to help the children. all of 'em depending on me and picking onme and not a damn one of 'em grateful! no relief, and no credit, and no help fromanybody. and to keep it up for--good lord, howlong?"

he enjoyed being sick in february; he wasdelighted by their consternation that he, the rock, should give way. he had eaten a questionable clam.for two days he was languorous and petted and esteemed.he was allowed to snarl "oh, let me alone!" without reprisals. he lay on the sleeping-porch and watchedthe winter sun slide along the taut curtains, turning their ruddy khaki to paleblood red. the shadow of the draw-rope was denseblack, in an enticing ripple on the canvas. he found pleasure in the curve of it,sighed as the fading light blurred it.

he was conscious of life, and a little sad. with no vergil gunches before whom to sethis face in resolute optimism, he beheld, and half admitted that he beheld, his wayof life as incredibly mechanical. mechanical business--a brisk selling ofbadly built houses. mechanical religion--a dry, hard church,shut off from the real life of the streets, inhumanly respectable as a top-hat. mechanical golf and dinner-parties andbridge and conversation. save with paul riesling, mechanicalfriendships--back-slapping and jocular, never daring to essay the test ofquietness.

he turned uneasily in bed. he saw the years, the brilliant winter daysand all the long sweet afternoons which were meant for summery meadows, lost insuch brittle pretentiousness. he thought of telephoning about leases, ofcajoling men he hated, of making business calls and waiting in dirty anterooms--haton knee, yawning at fly-specked calendars, being polite to office-boys. "i don't hardly want to go back to work,"he prayed. "i'd like to--i don't know."but he was back next day, busy and of doubtful temper.

chapter xix the zenith street traction company plannedto build car-repair shops in the suburb of dorchester, but when they came to buy theland they found it held, on options, by the babbitt-thompson realty company. the purchasing-agent, the first vice-president, and even the president of the traction company protested against thebabbitt price. they mentioned their duty towardstockholders, they threatened an appeal to the courts, though somehow the appeal tothe courts was never carried out and the officials found it wiser to compromise withbabbitt.

carbon copies of the correspondence are inthe company's files, where they may be viewed by any public commission. just after this babbitt deposited threethousand dollars in the bank, the purchasing-agent of the street tractioncompany bought a five thousand dollar car, he first vice-president built a home in devon woods, and the president wasappointed minister to a foreign country. to obtain the options, to tie up one man'sland without letting his neighbor know, had been an unusual strain on babbitt. it was necessary to introduce rumors aboutplanning garages and stores, to pretend

that he wasn't taking any more options, towait and look as bored as a poker-player at a time when the failure to secure a key-lotthreatened his whole plan. to all this was added a nerve-jabbingquarrel with his secret associates in the deal. they did not wish babbitt and thompson tohave any share in the deal except as brokers.babbitt rather agreed. "ethics of the business-broker ought tostrictly represent his principles and not get in on the buying," he said to thompson."ethics, rats! think i'm going to see that bunch of holygrafters get away with the swag and us not

climb in?" snorted old henry."well, i don't like to do it. kind of double-crossing." "it ain't.it's triple-crossing. it's the public that gets double-crossed. well, now we've been ethical and got it outof our systems, the question is where we can raise a loan to handle some of theproperty for ourselves, on the q. t. we can't go to our bank for it. might come out.""i could see old eathorne. he's close as the tomb.""that's the stuff."

eathorne was glad, he said, to "invest incharacter," to make babbitt the loan and see to it that the loan did not appear onthe books of the bank. thus certain of the options which babbittand thompson obtained were on parcels of real estate which they themselves owned,though the property did not appear in their names. in the midst of closing this splendid deal,which stimulated business and public confidence by giving an example ofincreased real-estate activity, babbitt was overwhelmed to find that he had a dishonestperson working for him. the dishonest one was stanley graff, theoutside salesman.

for some time babbitt had been worriedabout graff. he did not keep his word to tenants.in order to rent a house he would promise repairs which the owner had not authorized. it was suspected that he juggledinventories of furnished houses so that when the tenant left he had to pay forarticles which had never been in the house and the price of which graff put into hispocket. babbitt had not been able to prove thesesuspicions, and though he had rather planned to discharge graff he had neverquite found time for it. now into babbitt's private room charged ared-faced man, panting, "look here!

i've come to raise particular merry hell,and unless you have that fellow pinched, i will!" "what's--calm down, o' man.what's trouble?" "trouble!huh! here's the trouble--" "sit down and take it easy! they can hear you all over the building!""this fellow graff you got working for you, he leases me a house. i was in yesterday and signs the lease, allo.k., and he was to get the owner's signature and mail me the lease last night.well, and he did.

this morning i comes down to breakfast andthe girl says a fellow had come to the house right after the early delivery andtold her he wanted an envelope that had been mailed by mistake, big long envelope with 'babbitt-thompson' in the corner ofit. sure enough, there it was, so she lets himhave it. and she describes the fellow to me, and itwas this graff. so i 'phones to him and he, the poor fool,he admits it! he says after my lease was all signed hegot a better offer from another fellow and he wanted my lease back.now what you going to do about it?"

"your name is--?" "william varney--w. k. varney.""oh, yes. that was the garrison house."babbitt sounded the buzzer. when miss mcgoun came in, he demanded,"graff gone out?" "yes, sir." "will you look through his desk and see ifthere is a lease made out to mr. varney on the garrison house?"to varney: "can't tell you how sorry i am this happened. needless to say, i'll fire graff the minutehe comes in.

and of course your lease stands.but there's one other thing i'd like to do. i'll tell the owner not to pay us thecommission but apply it to your rent. no! straight!i want to. to be frank, this thing shakes me up bad. i suppose i've always been a practicalbusiness man. probably i've told one or two fairy storiesin my time, when the occasion called for it--you know: sometimes you have to laythings on thick, to impress boneheads. but this is the first time i've ever had toaccuse one of my own employees of anything more dishonest than pinching a few stamps.honest, it would hurt me if we profited by

so you'll let me hand you the commission?good!" iihe walked through the february city, where trucks flung up a spattering of slush andthe sky was dark above dark brick cornices. he came back miserable. he, who respected the law, had broken it byconcealing the federal crime of interception of the mails.but he could not see graff go to jail and his wife suffer. worse, he had to discharge graff and thiswas a part of office routine which he feared.

he liked people so much, he so much wantedthem to like him that he could not bear insulting them. miss mcgoun dashed in to whisper, with theexcitement of an approaching scene, "he's here!""mr. graff? ask him to come in." he tried to make himself heavy and calm inhis chair, and to keep his eyes expressionless. graff stalked in--a man of thirty-five,dapper, eye-glassed, with a foppish mustache."want me?" said graff.

"yes. sit down."graff continued to stand, grunting, "i suppose that old nut varney has been in tosee you. let me explain about him. he's a regular tightwad, and he sticks outfor every cent, and he practically lied to me about his ability to pay the rent--ifound that out just after we signed up. and then another fellow comes along with abetter offer for the house, and i felt it was my duty to the firm to get rid ofvarney, and i was so worried about it i skun up there and got back the lease.

honest, mr. babbitt, i didn't intend topull anything crooked. i just wanted the firm to have all thecommis--" "wait now, stan. this may all be true, but i've been havinga lot of complaints about you. now i don't s'pose you ever mean to dowrong, and i think if you just get a good lesson that'll jog you up a little, you'llturn out a first-class realtor yet. but i don't see how i can keep you on." graff leaned against the filing-cabinet,his hands in his pockets, and laughed. "so i'm fired!well, old vision and ethics, i'm tickled to

death! but i don't want you to think you can getaway with any holier-than-thou stuff. sure i've pulled some raw stuff--a littleof it--but how could i help it, in this office?" "now, by god, young man--""tut, tut! keep the naughty temper down, and don'tholler, because everybody in the outside office will hear you. they're probably listening right now.babbitt, old dear, you're crooked in the first place and a damn skinflint in thesecond.

if you paid me a decent salary i wouldn'thave to steal pennies off a blind man to keep my wife from starving. us married just five months, and her thenicest girl living, and you keeping us flat broke all the time, you damned old thief,so you can put money away for your saphead of a son and your wishywashy fool of adaughter! wait, now!you'll by god take it, or i'll bellow so the whole office will hear it! and crooked--say, if i told the prosecutingattorney what i know about this last street traction option steal, both you and mewould go to jail, along with some nice,

clean, pious, high-up traction guns!" "well, stan, looks like we were coming downto cases. that deal--there was nothing crooked aboutit. the only way you can get progress is forthe broad-gauged men to get things done; and they got to be rewarded--""oh, for pete's sake, don't get virtuous on me! as i gather it, i'm fired.all right. it's a good thing for me. and if i catch you knocking me to any otherfirm, i'll squeal all i know about you and

henry t. and the dirty little lickspittledeals that you corporals of industry pull off for the bigger and brainier crooks, andyou'll get chased out of town. and me--you're right, babbitt, i've beengoing crooked, but now i'm going straight, and the first step will be to get a job insome office where the boss doesn't talk about ideals. bad luck, old dear, and you can stick yourjob up the sewer!" babbitt sat for a long time, alternatelyraging, "i'll have him arrested," and yearning "i wonder--no, i've never doneanything that wasn't necessary to keep the wheels of progress moving."

next day he hired in graff's place fritzweilinger, the salesman of his most injurious rival, the east side homes anddevelopment company, and thus at once annoyed his competitor and acquired anexcellent man. young fritz was a curly-headed, merry,tennis-playing youngster. he made customers welcome to the office. babbitt thought of him as a son, and in himhad much comfort. iiian abandoned race-track on the outskirts of chicago, a plot excellent for factorysites, was to be sold, and jake offut asked babbitt to bid on it for him.

the strain of the street traction deal andhis disappointment in stanley graff had so shaken babbitt that he found it hard to sitat his desk and concentrate. he proposed to his family, "look here,folks! do you know who's going to trot up tochicago for a couple of days--just week- end; won't lose but one day of school--knowwho's going with that celebrated business- ambassador, george f. babbitt? why, mr. theodore roosevelt babbitt!""hurray!" ted shouted, and "oh, maybe the babbitt menwon't paint that lil ole town red!" and, once away from the familiarimplications of home, they were two men

together. ted was young only in his assumption ofoldness, and the only realms, apparently, in which babbitt had a larger and moregrown-up knowledge than ted's were the details of real estate and the phrases ofpolitics. when the other sages of the pullmansmoking-compartment had left them to themselves, babbitt's voice did not dropinto the playful and otherwise offensive tone in which one addresses children but continued its overwhelming and monotonousrumble, and ted tried to imitate it in his strident tenor:

"gee, dad, you certainly did show up thatpoor boot when he got flip about the league of nations!" "well, the trouble with a lot of thesefellows is, they simply don't know what they're talking about.they don't get down to facts.... what do you think of ken escott?" "i'll tell you, dad: it strikes me ken is anice lad; no special faults except he smokes too much; but slow, lord!why, if we don't give him a shove the poor dumb-bell never will propose! and rone just as bad.slow."

"yes, i guess you're right.they're slow. they haven't either one of 'em got ourpep." "that's right.they're slow. i swear, dad, i don't know how rone gotinto our family! i'll bet, if the truth were known, you werea bad old egg when you were a kid!" "well, i wasn't so slow!" "i'll bet you weren't!i'll bet you didn't miss many tricks!" "well, when i was out with the girls ididn't spend all the time telling 'em about the strike in the knitting industry!"

they roared together, and together lightedcigars. "what are we going to do with 'em?"babbitt consulted. "gosh, i don't know. i swear, sometimes i feel like taking kenaside and putting him over the jumps and saying to him, 'young fella me lad, are yougoing to marry young rone, or are you going to talk her to death? here you are getting on toward thirty, andyou're only making twenty or twenty-five a week.when you going to develop a sense of responsibility and get a raise?

if there's anything that george f. or i cando to help you, call on us, but show a little speed, anyway!'" "well, at that, it might not be so bad ifyou or i talked to him, except he might not understand.he's one of these high brows. he can't come down to cases and lay hiscards on the table and talk straight out from the shoulder, like you or i can.""that's right, he's like all these highbrows." "that's so, like all of 'em.""that's a fact." they sighed, and were silent and thoughtfuland happy.

the conductor came in. he had once called at babbitt's office, toask about houses. "h' are you, mr. babbitt!we going to have you with us to chicago? this your boy?" "yes, this is my son ted.""well now, what do you know about that! here i been thinking you were a youngsteryourself, not a day over forty, hardly, and you with this great big fellow!" "forty?why, brother, i'll never see forty-five again!""is that a fact!

wouldn't hardly 'a' thought it!" "yes, sir, it's a bad give-away for the oldman when he has to travel with a young whale like ted here!""you're right, it is." to ted: "i suppose you're in college now?" proudly, "no, not till next fall.i'm just kind of giving the diff'rent colleges the once-over now." as the conductor went on his affable way,huge watch-chain jingling against his blue chest, babbitt and ted gravely consideredcolleges. they arrived at chicago late at night; theylay abed in the morning, rejoicing, "pretty

nice not to have to get up and get down tobreakfast, heh?" they were staying at the modest eden hotel,because zenith business men always stayed at the eden, but they had dinner in thebrocade and crystal versailles room of the regency hotel. babbitt ordered blue point oysters withcocktail sauce, a tremendous steak with a tremendous platter of french friedpotatoes, two pots of coffee, apple pie with ice cream for both of them and, forted, an extra piece of mince pie. "hot stuff!some feed, young fella!" ted admired.

"huh! you stick around with me, old man,and i'll show you a good time!" they went to a musical comedy and nudgedeach other at the matrimonial jokes and the prohibition jokes; they paraded the lobby,arm in arm, between acts, and in the glee of his first release from the shame which dissevers fathers and sons ted chuckled,"dad, did you ever hear the one about the three milliners and the judge?"when ted had returned to zenith, babbitt was lonely. as he was trying to make alliance betweenoffutt and certain milwaukee interests which wanted the race-track plot, most ofhis time was taken up in waiting for

telephone calls.... sitting on the edge of his bed, holding theportable telephone, asking wearily, "mr. sagen not in yet?didn' he leave any message for me? all right, i'll hold the wire." staring at a stain on the wall, reflectingthat it resembled a shoe, and being bored by this twentieth discovery that itresembled a shoe. lighting a cigarette; then, bound to thetelephone with no ashtray in reach, wondering what to do with this burningmenace and anxiously trying to toss it into the tiled bathroom.

at last, on the telephone, "no message, eh?all right, i'll call up again." one afternoon he wandered through snow-rutted streets of which he had never heard, streets of small tenements and two-familyhouses and marooned cottages. it came to him that he had nothing to do,that there was nothing he wanted to do. he was bleakly lonely in the evening, whenhe dined by himself at the regency hotel. he sat in the lobby afterward, in a plushchair bedecked with the saxe-coburg arms, lighting a cigar and looking for some onewho would come and play with him and save him from thinking. in the chair next to him (showing the armsof lithuania) was a half-familiar man, a

large red-faced man with pop eyes and adeficient yellow mustache. he seemed kind and insignificant, and aslonely as babbitt himself. he wore a tweed suit and a reluctant orangetie. it came to babbitt with a pyrotechniccrash. the melancholy stranger was sir geralddoak. instinctively babbitt rose, bumbling, "how're you, sir gerald? 'member we met in zenith, at charleymckelvey's? babbitt's my name--real estate." "oh! how d' you do."sir gerald shook hands flabbily.

embarrassed, standing, wondering how hecould retreat, babbitt maundered, "well, i suppose you been having a great trip sincewe saw you in zenith." "quite. british columbia and california and allover the place," he said doubtfully, looking at babbitt lifelessly."how did you find business conditions in british columbia? or i suppose maybe you didn't look into'em. scenery and sport and so on?""scenery? oh, capital.

but business conditions--you know, mr.babbitt, they're having almost as much unemployment as we are."sir gerald was speaking warmly now. "so? business conditions not so doggonegood, eh?" "no, business conditions weren't at allwhat i'd hoped to find them." "not good, eh?" "no, not--not really good.""that's a darn shame. well--i suppose you're waiting for somebodyto take you out to some big shindig, sir gerald." "shindig?oh. shindig.

no, to tell you the truth, i was wonderingwhat the deuce i could do this evening. don't know a soul in tchicahgo. i wonder if you happen to know whetherthere's a good theater in this city?" "good?why say, they're running grand opera right now! i guess maybe you'd like that.""eh? eh? went to the opera once in london. covent garden sort of thing.shocking! no, i was wondering if there was a goodcinema-movie." babbitt was sitting down, hitching hischair over, shouting, "movie?

say, sir gerald, i supposed of course youhad a raft of dames waiting to lead you out to some soiree--""god forbid!" "--but if you haven't, what do you say youand me go to a movie? there's a peach of a film at the grantham:bill hart in a bandit picture." "right-o! just a moment while i get my coat." swollen with greatness, slightly afraidlest the noble blood of nottingham change its mind and leave him at any streetcorner, babbitt paraded with sir gerald doak to the movie palace and in silent

bliss sat beside him, trying not to be tooenthusiastic, lest the knight despise his adoration of six-shooters and broncos.at the end sir gerald murmured, "jolly good picture, this. so awfully decent of you to take me.haven't enjoyed myself so much for weeks. all these hostesses--they never let you goto the cinema!" "the devil you say!" babbitt's speech had lost the delicaterefinement and all the broad a's with which he had adorned it, and become hearty andnatural. "well, i'm tickled to death you liked it,sir gerald."

they crawled past the knees of fat womeninto the aisle; they stood in the lobby waving their arms in the rite of putting onovercoats. babbitt hinted, "say, how about a littlesomething to eat? i know a place where we could get a swellrarebit, and we might dig up a little drink--that is, if you ever touch thestuff." "rather! but why don't you come to my room?i've some scotch--not half bad." "oh, i don't want to use up all yourhootch. it's darn nice of you, but--you probablywant to hit the hay."

sir gerald was transformed.he was beefily yearning. "oh really, now; i haven't had a decentevening for so long! having to go to all these dances.no chance to discuss business and that sort of thing. do be a good chap and come along.won't you?" "will i?you bet! i just thought maybe--say, by golly, itdoes do a fellow good, don't it, to sit and visit about business conditions, after he'sbeen to these balls and masquerades and banquets and all that society stuff.

i often feel that way in zenith.sure, you bet i'll come." "that's awfully nice of you."they beamed along the street. "look here, old chap, can you tell me, doamerican cities always keep up this dreadful social pace?all these magnificent parties?" "go on now, quit your kidding! gosh, you with court balls and functionsand everything--" "no, really, old chap! mother and i--lady doak, i should say, weusually play a hand of bezique and go to bed at ten.bless my soul, i couldn't keep up your

beastly pace! and talking!all your american women, they know so much- -culture and that sort of thing.this mrs. mckelvey--your friend--" "yuh, old lucile. good kid.""--she asked me which of the galleries i liked best in florence.or was it in firenze? never been in italy in my life! and primitives.did i like primitives. do you know what the deuce a primitive is?""me? i should say not!

but i know what a discount for cash is." "rather!so do i, by george! but primitives!""yuh! primitives!" they laughed with the sound of a boosters'luncheon. sir gerald's room was, except for hisponderous and durable english bags, very much like the room of george f. babbitt;and quite in the manner of babbitt he disclosed a huge whisky flask, looked proud and hospitable, and chuckled, "say, when,old chap." it was after the third drink that sirgerald proclaimed, "how do you yankees get

the notion that writing chaps like bertrandshaw and this wells represent us? the real business england, we think thosechaps are traitors. both our countries have their comic oldaristocracy--you know, old county families, hunting people and all that sort of thing--and we both have our wretched labor leaders, but we both have a backbone ofsound business men who run the whole show." "you bet.here's to the real guys!" "i'm with you! here's to ourselves!" it was after the fourth drink that sirgerald asked humbly, "what do you think of

north dakota mortgages?" but it was nottill after the fifth that babbitt began to call him "jerry," and sir gerald confided, "i say, do you mind if i pull off myboots?" and ecstatically stretched his knightly feet, his poor, tired, hot,swollen feet out on the bed. after the sixth, babbitt irregularly arose. "well, i better be hiking along.jerry, you're a regular human being! i wish to thunder we'd been betteracquainted in zenith. lookit. can't you come back and stay with me awhile?"

"so sorry--must go to new york to-morrow.most awfully sorry, old boy. i haven't enjoyed an evening so much sincei've been in the states. real talk.not all this social rot. i'd never have let them give me the beastlytitle--and i didn't get it for nothing, eh?--if i'd thought i'd have to talk towomen about primitives and polo! goodish thing to have in nottingham,though; annoyed the mayor most frightfully when i got it; and of course the missuslikes it. but nobody calls me 'jerry' now--" he wasalmost weeping. "--and nobody in the states has treated melike a friend till to-night!

good-by, old chap, good-by! thanks awfully!""don't mention it, jerry. and remember whenever you get to zenith,the latch-string is always out." "and don't forget, old boy, if you evercome to nottingham, mother and i will be frightfully glad to see you. i shall tell the fellows in nottingham yourideas about visions and real guys--at our next rotary club luncheon." iv babbitt lay abed at his hotel, imaginingthe zenith athletic club asking him, "what

kind of a time d'you have in chicago?" andhis answering, "oh, fair; ran around with sir gerald doak a lot;" picturing himself meeting lucile mckelvey and admonishingher, "you're all right, mrs. mac, when you aren't trying to pull this highbrow pose. it's just as gerald doak says to me inchicago--oh, yes, jerry's an old friend of mine--the wife and i are thinking ofrunning over to england to stay with jerry in his castle, next year--and he said to me, 'georgie, old bean, i like lucilefirst-rate, but you and me, george, we got to make her get over this highty-tightyhooptediddle way she's got."

but that evening a thing happened whichwrecked his pride. vat the regency hotel cigar-counter he fell to talking with a salesman of pianos, andthey dined together. babbitt was filled with friendliness andwell-being. he enjoyed the gorgeousness of the dining-room: the chandeliers, the looped brocade curtains, the portraits of french kingsagainst panels of gilded oak. he enjoyed the crowd: pretty women, goodsolid fellows who were "liberal spenders." he gasped.he stared, and turned away, and stared again.

three tables off, with a doubtful sort ofwoman, a woman at once coy and withered, was paul riesling, and paul was supposed tobe in akron, selling tar-roofing. the woman was tapping his hand, mooning athim and giggling. babbitt felt that he had encounteredsomething involved and harmful. paul was talking with the rapt eagerness ofa man who is telling his troubles. he was concentrated on the woman's fadedeyes. once he held her hand and once, blind tothe other guests, he puckered his lips as though he was pretending to kiss her. babbitt had so strong an impulse to go topaul that he could feel his body uncoiling,

his shoulders moving, but he felt,desperately, that he must be diplomatic, and not till he saw paul paying the check did he bluster to the piano-salesman, "bygolly-friend of mine over there--'scuse me second--just say hello to him."he touched paul's shoulder, and cried, "well, when did you hit town?" paul glared up at him, face hardening."oh, hello, george. thought you'd gone back to zenith."he did not introduce his companion. babbitt peeped at her. she was a flabbily pretty, weaklyflirtatious woman of forty-two or three, in

an atrocious flowery hat.her rouging was thorough but unskilful. "where you staying, paulibus?" the woman turned, yawned, examined hernails. she seemed accustomed to not beingintroduced. paul grumbled, "campbell inn, on the southside." "alone?"it sounded insinuating. "yes! unfortunately!" furiously paul turned toward the woman,smiling with a fondness sickening to babbitt."may! want to introduce you.

mrs. arnold, this is my old-acquaintance,george babbitt." "pleasmeech," growled babbitt, while shegurgled, "oh, i'm very pleased to meet any friend of mr. riesling's, i'm sure." babbitt demanded, "be back there later thisevening, paul? i'll drop down and see you.""no, better--we better lunch together to- morrow." "all right, but i'll see you to-night, too,paul. i'll go down to your hotel, and i'll waitfor you!" chapter xx

ihe sat smoking with the piano-salesman, clinging to the warm refuge of gossip,afraid to venture into thoughts of paul. he was the more affable on the surface assecretly he became more apprehensive, felt more hollow. he was certain that paul was in chicagowithout zilla's knowledge, and that he was doing things not at all moral and secure. when the salesman yawned that he had towrite up his orders, babbitt left him, left the hotel, in leisurely calm.but savagely he said "campbell inn!" to the taxi-driver.

he sat agitated on the slippery leatherseat, in that chill dimness which smelled of dust and perfume and turkish cigarettes. he did not heed the snowy lake-front, thedark spaces and sudden bright corners in the unknown land south of the loop. the office of the campbell inn was hard,bright, new; the night clerk harder and brighter."yep?" he said to babbitt. "mr. paul riesling registered here?" "yep.""is he in now?" "nope.""then if you'll give me his key, i'll wait

for him." "can't do that, brother.wait down here if you wanna." babbitt had spoken with the deference whichall the clan of good fellows give to hotel clerks. now he said with snarling abruptness:"i may have to wait some time. i'm riesling's brother-in-law.i'll go up to his room. d' i look like a sneak-thief?" his voice was low and not pleasant.with considerable haste the clerk took down the key, protesting, "i never said youlooked like a sneak-thief.

just rules of the hotel. but if you want to--"on his way up in the elevator babbitt wondered why he was here.why shouldn't paul be dining with a respectable married woman? why had he lied to the clerk about beingpaul's brother-in-law? he had acted like a child.he must be careful not to say foolish dramatic things to paul. as he settled down he tried to look pompousand placid. then the thought--suicide.he'd been dreading that, without knowing

paul would be just the person to dosomething like that. he must be out of his head or he wouldn'tbe confiding in that--that dried-up hag. zilla (oh, damn zilla! how gladly he'dthrottle that nagging fiend of a woman!)-- she'd probably succeeded at last, anddriven paul crazy. suicide. out there in the lake, way out, beyond thepiled ice along the shore. it would be ghastly cold to drop into thewater to-night. or--throat cut--in the bathroom-- babbitt flung into paul's bathroom.it was empty.

he smiled, feebly. he pulled at his choking collar, looked athis watch, opened the window to stare down at the street, looked at his watch, triedto read the evening paper lying on the glass-topped bureau, looked again at hiswatch. three minutes had gone by since he hadfirst looked at it. and he waited for three hours. he was sitting fixed, chilled, when thedoorknob turned. paul came in glowering."hello," paul said. "been waiting?"

"yuh, little while.""well?" "well what?just thought i'd drop in to see how you made out in akron." "i did all right.what difference does it make?" "why, gosh, paul, what are you sore about?""what are you butting into my affairs for?" "why, paul, that's no way to talk! i'm not butting into nothing.i was so glad to see your ugly old phiz that i just dropped in to say howdy.""well, i'm not going to have anybody following me around and trying to boss me.

i've had all of that i'm going to stand!""well, gosh, i'm not--" "i didn't like the way you looked at mayarnold, or the snooty way you talked." "well, all right then! if you think i'm a buttinsky, then i'lljust butt in! i don't know who your may arnold is, but iknow doggone good and well that you and her weren't talking about tar-roofing, no, norabout playing the violin, neither! if you haven't got any moral considerationfor yourself, you ought to have some for your position in the community. the idea of your going around placesgawping into a female's eyes like a love-

sick pup! i can understand a fellow slipping once,but i don't propose to see a fellow that's been as chummy with me as you have gettingstarted on the downward path and sneaking off from his wife, even as cranky a one aszilla, to go woman-chasing--" "oh, you're a perfectly moral littlehusband!" "i am, by god! i've never looked at anywoman except myra since i've been married-- practically--and i never will!i tell you there's nothing to immorality. it don't pay. can't you see, old man, it just makes zillastill crankier?"

slight of resolution as he was of body,paul threw his snow-beaded overcoat on the floor and crouched on a flimsy cane chair. "oh, you're an old blowhard, and you knowless about morality than tinka, but you're all right, georgie.but you can't understand that--i'm through. i can't go zilla's hammering any longer. she's made up her mind that i'm a devil,and--reg'lar inquisition. torture.she enjoys it. it's a game to see how sore she can makeme. and me, either it's find a little comfort,any comfort, anywhere, or else do something

a lot worse. now this mrs. arnold, she's not so young,but she's a fine woman and she understands a fellow, and she's had her own troubles.""yea! i suppose she's one of these hens whose husband 'doesn't understand her'!" "i don't know.maybe. he was killed in the war." babbitt lumbered up, stood beside paulpatting his shoulder, making soft apologetic noises."honest, george, she's a fine woman, and she's had one hell of a time.

we manage to jolly each other up a lot.we tell each other we're the dandiest pair on earth. maybe we don't believe it, but it helps alot to have somebody with whom you can be perfectly simple, and not all thisdiscussing--explaining--" "and that's as far as you go?" "it is not!go on! say it!" "well, i don't--i can't say i like it, but--" with a burst which left him feeling large and shining with generosity, "it'snone of my darn business!

i'll do anything i can for you, if there'sanything i can do." "there might be. i judge from zilla's letters that 've beenforwarded from akron that she's getting suspicious about my staying away so long. she'd be perfectly capable of having meshadowed, and of coming to chicago and busting into a hotel dining-room andbawling me out before everybody." "i'll take care of zilla. i'll hand her a good fairy-story when i getback to zenith." "i don't know--i don't think you better tryit.

you're a good fellow. but i don't know thatdiplomacy is your strong point." babbitt looked hurt, then irritated."i mean with women! with women, i mean. course they got to go some to beat you inbusiness diplomacy, but i just mean with women.zilla may do a lot of rough talking, but she's pretty shrewd. she'd have the story out of you in notime." "well, all right, but--" babbitt was stillpathetic at not being allowed to play secret agent.

paul soothed:"course maybe you might tell her you'd been in akron and seen me there.""why, sure, you bet! don't i have to go look at that candy-storeproperty in akron? don't i?ain't it a shame i have to stop off there when i'm so anxious to get home? ain't it a regular shame?i'll say it is! i'll say it's a doggone shame!""fine. but for glory hallelujah's sake don't goputting any fancy fixings on the story. when men lie they always try to make it tooartistic, and that's why women get

suspicious. and--let's have a drink, georgie.i've got some gin and a little vermouth." the paul who normally refused a secondcocktail took a second now, and a third. he became red-eyed and thick-tongued. he was embarrassingly jocular andsalacious. in the taxicab babbitt incredulously foundtears crowding into his eyes. ii he had not told paul of his plan but he didstop at akron, between trains, for the one purpose of sending to zilla a postcard with"had to come here for the day, ran into

paul." in zenith he called on her. if for public appearances zilla was over-coiffed, over-painted, and resolutely corseted, for private misery she wore afilthy blue dressing-gown and torn stockings thrust into streaky pink satinmules. her face was sunken. she seemed to have but half as much hair asbabbitt remembered, and that half was stringy. she sat in a rocker amid a debris of candy-boxes and cheap magazines, and she sounded

dolorous when she did not sound derisive.but babbitt was exceedingly breezy: "well, well, zil, old dear, having a goodloaf while hubby's away? that's the ideal i'll bet a hat myra nevergot up till ten, while i was in chicago. say, could i borrow your thermos--justdropped in to see if i could borrow your thermos bottle.we're going to have a toboggan party--want to take some coffee mit. oh, did you get my card from akron, sayingi'd run into paul?" "yes. what was he doing?""how do you mean?" he unbuttoned his overcoat, sat tentativelyon the arm of a chair.

"you know how i mean!"she slapped the pages of a magazine with an irritable clatter. "i suppose he was trying to make love tosome hotel waitress or manicure girl or somebody.""hang it, you're always letting on that paul goes round chasing skirts. he doesn't, in the first place, and if hedid, it would prob'ly be because you keep hinting at him and dinging at him so much.i hadn't meant to, zilla, but since paul is away, in akron--" "he really is in akron?i know he has some horrible woman that he

writes to in chicago.""didn't i tell you i saw him in akron? what 're you trying to do? make me out a liar?""no, but i just--i get so worried." "now, there you are!that's what gets me! here you love paul, and yet you plague himand cuss him out as if you hated him. i simply can't understand why it is thatthe more some folks love people, the harder they try to make 'em miserable." "you love ted and rone--i suppose--and yetyou nag them." "oh. well.that.

that's different. besides, i don't nag 'em.not what you'd call nagging. but zize saying: now, here's paul, thenicest, most sensitive critter on god's green earth. you ought to be ashamed of yourself the wayyou pan him. why, you talk to him like a washerwoman.i'm surprised you can act so doggone common, zilla!" she brooded over her linked fingers."oh, i know. i do go and get mean sometimes, and i'msorry afterwards.

but, oh, georgie, paul is so aggravating! honestly, i've tried awfully hard, theselast few years, to be nice to him, but just because i used to be spiteful--or i seemedso; i wasn't, really, but i used to speak up and say anything that came into my head- -and so he made up his mind that everythingwas my fault. everything can't always be my fault, canit? and now if i get to fussing, he just turnssilent, oh, so dreadfully silent, and he won't look at me--he just ignores me.he simply isn't human! and he deliberately keeps it up till i bustout and say a lot of things i don't mean.

so silent--oh, you righteous men!how wicked you are! how rotten wicked!" they thrashed things over and over for halfan hour. at the end, weeping drably, zilla promisedto restrain herself. paul returned four days later, and thebabbitts and rieslings went festively to the movies and had chop suey at a chineserestaurant. as they walked to the restaurant through astreet of tailor shops and barber shops, the two wives in front, chattering aboutcooks, babbitt murmured to paul, "zil seems a lot nicer now."

"yes, she has been, except once or twice.but it's too late now. i just--i'm not going to discuss it, buti'm afraid of her. there's nothing left. i don't ever want to see her.some day i'm going to break away from her. somehow." chapter xxi the international organization of boosters'clubs has be come a world-force for optimism, manly pleasantry, and goodbusiness. chapters are to be found now in thirtycountries.

nine hundred and twenty of the thousandchapters, however, are in the united states. none of these is more ardent than thezenith boosters' club. the second march lunch of the zenithboosters was the most important of the year, as it was to be followed by theannual election of officers. there was agitation abroad. the lunch was held in the ballroom of theo'hearn house. as each of the four hundred boostersentered he took from a wall-board a huge celluloid button announcing his name, hisnick name, and his business.

there was a fine of ten cents for calling afellow booster by anything but his nickname at a lunch, and as babbitt jovially checkedhis hat the air was radiant with shouts of "hello, chet!" and "how're you, shorty!"and "top o' the mornin', mac!" they sat at friendly tables for eight,choosing places by lot. babbitt was with albert boos the merchanttailor, hector seybolt of the little sweetheart condensed milk company, emilwengert the jeweler, professor pumphrey of the riteway business college, dr. walter gorbutt, roy teegarten the photographer,and ben berkey the photo-engraver. one of the merits of the boosters' club wasthat only two persons from each department

of business were permitted to join, so thatyou at once encountered the ideals of other occupations, and realized the metaphysical oneness of all occupations--plumbing andportrait-painting, medicine and the manufacture of chewing-gum. babbitt's table was particularly happy to-day, because professor pumphrey had just had a birthday, and was therefore open toteasing. "let's pump pump about how old he is!" saidemil wengert. "no, let's paddle him with a dancing-pump!"said ben berkey. but it was babbitt who had the applause,with "don't talk about pumps to that guy!

the only pump he knows is a bottle!honest, they tell me he's starting a class in home-brewing at the ole college!" at each place was the boosters' clubbooklet, listing the members. though the object of the club was good-fellowship, yet they never lost sight of the importance of doing a little morebusiness. after each name was the member'soccupation. there were scores of advertisements in thebooklet, and on one page the admonition: "there's no rule that you have to tradewith your fellow boosters, but get wise, boy--what's the use of letting all this

good money get outside of our happyfambly?" and at each place, to-day, there was apresent; a card printed in artistic red and black: service and boosterismservice finds its finest opportunity and development only in its broadest anddeepest application and the consideration of its perpetual action upon reaction. i believe the highest type of service, likethe most progressive tenets of ethics, senses unceasingly and is motived by activeadherence and loyalty to that which is the essential principle of boosterism--goodcitizenship in all its factors and aspects.

dad petersen.compliments of dadbury petersen advertising corp. "ads, not fads, at dad's"the boosters all read mr. peterson's aphorism and said they understood itperfectly. the meeting opened with the regular weekly"stunts." retiring president vergil gunch was in thechair, his stiff hair like a hedge, his voice like a brazen gong of festival. members who had brought guests introducedthem publicly. "this tall red-headed piece ofmisinformation is the sporting editor of

the press," said willis ijams; and h. h.hazen, the druggist, chanted, "boys, when you're on a long motor tour and finally get to a romantic spot or scene and draw up andremark to the wife, 'this is certainly a romantic place,' it sends a glow right upand down your vertebrae. well, my guest to-day is from such a place,harper's ferry, virginia, in the beautiful southland, with memories of good oldgeneral robert e. lee and of that brave soul, john brown who, like every goodbooster, goes marching on--" there were two especially distinguishedguests: the leading man of the "bird of paradise" company, playing this week at thedodsworth theater, and the mayor of zenith,

the hon. lucas prout. vergil gunch thundered, "when we manage tograb this celebrated thespian off his lovely aggregation of beautiful actresses--and i got to admit i butted right into his dressing-room and told him how the boosters appreciated the high-class artisticperformance he's giving us--and don't forget that the treasurer of the dodsworthis a booster and will appreciate our patronage--and when on top of that we yank hizzonor out of his multifarious duties atcity hall, then i feel we've done ourselves proud, and mr. prout will now say a fewwords about the problems and duties--"

by rising vote the boosters decided whichwas the handsomest and which the ugliest guest, and to each of them was given abunch of carnations, donated, president gunch noted, by brother booster h. g.yeager, the jennifer avenue florist. each week, in rotation, four boosters wereprivileged to obtain the pleasures of generosity and of publicity by donatinggoods or services to four fellow-members, chosen by lot. there was laughter, this week, when it wasannounced that one of the contributors was barnabas joy, the undertaker. everybody whispered, "i can think of acoupla good guys to be buried if his

donation is a free funeral!" through all these diversions the boosterswere lunching on chicken croquettes, peas, fried potatoes, coffee, apple pie, andamerican cheese. gunch did not lump the speeches. presently he called on the visitingsecretary of the zenith rotary club, a rival organization. the secretary had the distinction ofpossessing state motor car license number 5. the rotary secretary laughingly admittedthat wherever he drove in the state so low

a number created a sensation, and "thoughit was pretty nice to have the honor, yet traffic cops remembered it only too darn well, and sometimes he didn't know but whathe'd almost as soon have just plain b56,876 or something like that. only let any doggone booster try to getnumber 5 away from a live rotarian next year, and watch the fur fly! and if they'd permit him, he'd wind up bycalling for a cheer for the boosters and rotarians and the kiwanis all together!" babbitt sighed to professor pumphrey, "bepretty nice to have as low a number as

that!everybody 'd say, 'he must be an important guy!' wonder how he got it?i'll bet he wined and dined the superintendent of the motor license bureauto a fare-you-well!" then chum frink addressed them: "some of you may feel that it's out ofplace here to talk on a strictly highbrow and artistic subject, but i want to comeout flatfooted and ask you boys to o.k. the proposition of a symphony orchestra forzenith. now, where a lot of you make your mistakeis in assuming that if you don't like

classical music and all that junk, youought to oppose it. now, i want to confess that, though i'm aliterary guy by profession, i don't care a rap for all this long-haired music. i'd rather listen to a good jazz band anytime than to some piece by beethoven that hasn't any more tune to it than a bunch offighting cats, and you couldn't whistle it to save your life! but that isn't the point.culture has become as necessary an adornment and advertisement for a city to-day as pavements or bank-clearances. it's culture, in theaters and art-galleriesand so on, that brings thousands of

visitors to new york every year and, to befrank, for all our splendid attainments we haven't yet got the culture of a new york or chicago or boston--or at least we don'tget the credit for it. the thing to do then, as a live bunch ofgo-getters, is to capitalize culture; to go right out and grab it. "pictures and books are fine for those thathave the time to study 'em, but they don't shoot out on the road and holler 'this iswhat little old zenith can put up in the way of culture.' that's precisely what a symphony orchestradoes do.

look at the credit minneapolis andcincinnati get. an orchestra with first-class musickers anda swell conductor--and i believe we ought to do the thing up brown and get one of thehighest-paid conductors on the market, providing he ain't a hun--it goes right into beantown and new york and washington;it plays at the best theaters to the most cultured and moneyed people; it gives suchclass-advertising as a town can get in no other way; and the guy who is so short- sighted as to crab this orchestraproposition is passing up the chance to impress the glorious name of zenith on somebig new york millionaire that might-that

might establish a branch factory here! "i could also go into the fact that for ourdaughters who show an interest in highbrow music and may want to teach it, having ana1 local organization is of great benefit, but let's keep this on a practical basis, and i call on you good brothers to whoop itup for culture and a world-beating symphony orchestra!"they applauded. to a rustle of excitement president gunchproclaimed, "gentlemen, we will now proceed to the annual election of officers."for each of the six offices, three candidates had been chosen by a committee.

the second name among the candidates forvice-president was babbitt's. he was surprised.he looked self-conscious. his heart pounded. he was still more agitated when the ballotswere counted and gunch said, "it's a pleasure to announce that georgie babbittwill be the next assistant gavel-wielder. i know of no man who stands more stanchlyfor common sense and enterprise than good old george.come on, let's give him our best long yell!" as they adjourned, a hundred men crushed into slap his back.

he had never known a higher moment.he drove away in a blur of wonder. he lunged into his office, chuckling tomiss mcgoun, "well, i guess you better congratulate your boss!been elected vice-president of the boosters!" he was disappointed.she answered only, "yes--oh, mrs. babbitt's been trying to get you on the 'phone." but the new salesman, fritz weilinger,said, "by golly, chief, say, that's great, that's perfectly great!i'm tickled to death! congratulations!"

babbitt called the house, and crowed to hiswife, "heard you were trying to get me, myra.say, you got to hand it to little georgie, this time! better talk careful!you are now addressing the vice-president of the boosters' club!""oh, georgie--" "pretty nice, huh? willis ijams is the new president, but whenhe's away, little ole georgie takes the gavel and whoops 'em up and introduces thespeakers--no matter if they're the governor himself--and--"

"george!listen!" "--it puts him in solid with big men likedoc dilling and--" "george! paul riesling--""yes, sure, i'll 'phone paul and let him know about it right away.""georgie! listen! paul's in jail.he shot his wife, he shot zilla, this noon. she may not live." chapter xxii

ihe drove to the city prison, not blindly, but with unusual fussy care at corners, thefussiness of an old woman potting plants. it kept him from facing the obscenity offate. the attendant said, "naw, you can't see anyof the prisoners till three-thirty-- visiting-hour." it was three.for half an hour babbitt sat looking at a calendar and a clock on a whitewashed wall.the chair was hard and mean and creaky. people went through the office and, hethought, stared at him. he felt a belligerent defiance which brokeinto a wincing fear of this machine which

was grinding paul--paul---- exactly at half-past three he sent in hisname. the attendant returned with "riesling sayshe don't want to see you." "you're crazy! you didn't give him my name!tell him it's george wants to see him, george babbitt.""yuh, i told him, all right, all right! he said he didn't want to see you." "then take me in anyway.""nothing doing. if you ain't his lawyer, if he don't wantto see you, that's all there is to it."

"but, my god--say, let me see the warden." "he's busy.come on, now, you--" babbitt reared over him.the attendant hastily changed to a coaxing "you can come back and try to-morrow. probably the poor guy is off his nut." babbitt drove, not at all carefully orfussily, sliding viciously past trucks, ignoring the truckmen's curses, to the cityhall; he stopped with a grind of wheels against the curb, and ran up the marble steps to the office of the hon. mr. lucasprout, the mayor.

he bribed the mayor's doorman with adollar; he was instantly inside, demanding, "you remember me, mr. prout? babbitt--vice-president of the boosters--campaigned for you? say, have you heard about poor riesling? well, i want an order on the warden orwhatever you call um of the city prison to take me back and see him.good. thanks." in fifteen minutes he was pounding down theprison corridor to a cage where paul riesling sat on a cot, twisted like an oldbeggar, legs crossed, arms in a knot,

biting at his clenched fist. paul looked up blankly as the keeperunlocked the cell, admitted babbitt, and left them together.he spoke slowly: "go on! be moral!" babbitt plumped on the couch beside him."i'm not going to be moral! i don't care what happened!i just want to do anything i can. i'm glad zilla got what was coming to her." paul said argumentatively, "now, don't gojumping on zilla. i've been thinking; maybe she hasn't hadany too easy a time.

just after i shot her--i didn't hardly meanto, but she got to deviling me so i went crazy, just for a second, and pulled outthat old revolver you and i used to shoot rabbits with, and took a crack at her. didn't hardly mean to--after that, when iwas trying to stop the blood--it was terrible what it did to her shoulder, andshe had beautiful skin--maybe she won't die. i hope it won't leave her skin all scarred. but just afterward, when i was huntingthrough the bathroom for some cotton to stop the blood, i ran onto a little fuzzyyellow duck we hung on the tree one

christmas, and i remembered she and i'dbeen awfully happy then--hell. i can't hardly believe it's me here."as babbitt's arm tightened about his shoulder, paul sighed, "i'm glad you came. but i thought maybe you'd lecture me, andwhen you've committed a murder, and been brought here and everything--there was abig crowd outside the apartment house, all staring, and the cops took me through it-- oh, i'm not going to talk about it anymore." but he went on, in a monotonous, terrifiedinsane mumble. to divert him babbitt said, "why, you got ascar on your cheek."

"yes. that's where the cop hit me.i suppose cops get a lot of fun out of lecturing murderers, too. he was a big fellow.and they wouldn't let me help carry zilla down to the ambulance.""paul! quit it! listen: she won't die, and when it's allover you and i'll go off to maine again. and maybe we can get that may arnold to goalong. i'll go up to chicago and ask her. good woman, by golly.and afterwards i'll see that you get

started in business out west somewhere,maybe seattle--they say that's a lovely city." paul was half smiling.it was babbitt who rambled now. he could not tell whether paul was heeding,but he droned on till the coming of paul's lawyer, p. j. maxwell, a thin, busy,unfriendly man who nodded at babbitt and hinted, "if riesling and i could be alonefor a moment--" babbitt wrung paul's hands, and waited inthe office till maxwell came pattering out. "look, old man, what can i do?" he begged. "nothing.not a thing.

not just now," said maxwell."sorry. got to hurry. and don't try to see him.i've had the doctor give him a shot of morphine, so he'll sleep."it seemed somehow wicked to return to the office. babbitt felt as though he had just comefrom a funeral. he drifted out to the city hospital toinquire about zilla. she was not likely to die, he learned. the bullet from paul's huge old .44 armyrevolver had smashed her shoulder and torn

upward and out. he wandered home and found his wife radiantwith the horified interest we have in the tragedies of our friends. "of course paul isn't altogether to blame,but this is what comes of his chasing after other women instead of bearing his cross ina christian way," she exulted. he was too languid to respond as hedesired. he said what was to be said about thechristian bearing of crosses, and went out to clean the car. dully, patiently, he scraped linty greasefrom the drip-pan, gouged at the mud caked

on the wheels. he used up many minutes in washing hishands; scoured them with gritty kitchen soap; rejoiced in hurting his plumpknuckles. "damn soft hands--like a woman's. aah!"at dinner, when his wife began the inevitable, he bellowed, "i forbid any ofyou to say a word about paul! i'll 'tend to all the talking about thisthat's necessary, hear me? there's going to be one house in thisscandal-mongering town to-night that isn't going to spring the holier-than-thou.

and throw those filthy evening papers outof the house!" but he himself read the papers, afterdinner. before nine he set out for the house oflawyer maxwell. he was received without cordiality."well?" said maxwell. "i want to offer my services in the trial. i've got an idea.why couldn't i go on the stand and swear i was there, and she pulled the gun first andhe wrestled with her and the gun went off accidentally?" "and perjure yourself?""huh? yes, i suppose it would be perjury.

oh--would it help?""but, my dear fellow! perjury!" "oh, don't be a fool!excuse me, maxwell; i didn't mean to get your goat. i just mean: i've known and you've knownmany and many a case of perjury, just to annex some rotten little piece of realestate, and here where it's a case of saving paul from going to prison, i'dperjure myself black in the face." "no. aside from the ethics of the matter,i'm afraid it isn't practicable. the prosecutor would tear your testimony topieces.

it's known that only riesling and his wifewere there at the time." "then, look here! let me go on the stand and swear--and thiswould be the god's truth--that she pestered him till he kind of went crazy.""no. sorry. riesling absolutely refuses to have anytestimony reflecting on his wife. he insists on pleading guilty.""then let me get up and testify something-- whatever you say. let me do something!""i'm sorry, babbitt, but the best thing you can do--i hate to say it, but you couldhelp us most by keeping strictly out of

it." babbitt, revolving his hat like adefaulting poor tenant, winced so visibly that maxwell condescended: "i don't like to hurt your feelings, butyou see we both want to do our best for riesling, and we mustn't consider any otherfactor. the trouble with you, babbitt, is thatyou're one of these fellows who talk too readily.you like to hear your own voice. if there were anything for which i couldput you in the witness-box, you'd get going and give the whole show away.sorry.

now i must look over some papers--sosorry." iihe spent most of the next morning nerving himself to face the garrulous world of theathletic club. they would talk about paul; they would belip-licking and rotten. but at the roughnecks' table they did notmention paul. they spoke with zeal of the coming baseballseason. he loved them as he never had before. iiihe had, doubtless from some story-book, pictured paul's trial as a long struggle,with bitter arguments, a taut crowd, and

sudden and overwhelming new testimony. actually, the trial occupied less thanfifteen minutes, largely filled with the evidence of doctors that zilla wouldrecover and that paul must have been temporarily insane. next day paul was sentenced to three yearsin the state penitentiary and taken off-- quite undramatically, not handcuffed,merely plodding in a tired way beside a cheerful deputy sheriff--and after saying good-by to him at the station babbittreturned to his office to realize that he faced a world which, without paul, wasmeaningless.

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