Classic Audiobook Collection - Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis ~ Full Audiobook [comedy]

Episode Date: August 17, 2023

Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis audiobook. Genre: comedy In the booming Midwestern city of Zenith, George F. Babbitt seems to have everything a successful American businessman should want: a solid home, a respectable family, a wide circle of civic-minded friends, and a thriving career selling real estate. He prides himself on being practical, optimistic, and up to date, repeating the slogans of prosperity and progress that surround him. But beneath the confident talk and the carefully maintained routines, Babbitt feels a nagging restlessness - a sense that his life is being lived according to rules he never chose. As the demands of business, social clubs, and public opinion tighten around him, he begins to question the values that once felt unquestionable. Drawn toward people and ideas labeled improper by Zenith's guardians of respectability, Babbitt tests the limits of conformity and discovers how quickly a community can reward obedience and punish deviation. With sharp wit and piercing observation, Sinclair Lewis turns one man's unease into a sweeping satire of status, consumer culture, and the cost of fitting in. For ad-free listening try our premium subscription Chapters (Approximate) (00:00:00) Chapter 01 (00:26:39) Chapter 02 (00:47:31) Chapter 03 (01:16:47) Chapter 04 (01:42:34) Chapter 05 (02:17:57) Chapter 06 (03:05:54) Chapter 07 (03:30:47) Chapter 08 (04:10:11) Chapter 09 (04:30:17) Chapter 10 (05:00:35) Chapter 11 (05:13:09) Chapter 12 (05:21:25) Chapter 13 (05:59:27) Chapter 14 (06:30:06) Chapter 15 (06:55:26) Chapter 16 (07:15:20) Chapter 17 (07:37:49) Chapter 18 (08:01:17) Chapter 19 (08:30:51) Chapter 20 (08:44:11) Chapter 21 (08:56:43) Chapter 22 (09:07:04) Chapter 23 (09:27:19) Chapter 24 (09:52:29) Chapter 25 (10:09:03) Chapter 26 (10:25:43) Chapter 27 (10:43:10) Chapter 28 (11:04:58) Chapter 29 (11:41:40) Chapter 30 (12:04:59) Chapter 31 (12:20:38) Chapter 32 (12:42:33) Chapter 33 (13:03:15) Chapter 34 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis, Chapter 1. 1. The towers of Zenith aspired above the morning mist, austere towers of steel and cement and limestone, sturdy as cliffs and delicate as silver rods. They were neither citadels nor churches, but frankly and beautifully office buildings. The mist took pity on the fretted structures of the earlier generations. The post office with its shingled, tortured, mansored,

The red brick ministers of hulking old houses, factories with stingy and sooted windows, wooden tenements colored like mud. The city was full of such grotesqueries. But the clean towers were thrusting them from the business center and on the further hills were shining new houses, homes, they seemed for laughter and tranquility. Over a concrete bridge fled a limousine of long sleek hood

and noiseless engine. These people and evening clothes were returning from an all-night rehearsal of a little theater play, an artistic adventure, considerably illuminated by champagne. Below the bridge curved a railroad, a maze of green and crimson lights.

The New York flyer boomed past and 20 lines of polished steel leaped into the glare. In one of the skyscrapers, the wires of the Associated Press were closing down. The telegraph operators were really raised her sulleloid eye shades after a night of talking with Paris and

Peking. Through the building crawled to scrub women, yawning their old shoes slapping. The dawn mist spun away. Cues of men with lunchboxes clumped toward the immensity of new factories, sheets of glass and hollow tile, glittering shops where 5,000 men work beneath one roof, pouring out the honest wares that would be sold up the Euphrates and across the the veldt. The whistles rolled out in greeting, a chorus cheerful as the April dawn, the song of labor in a city built, it seemed for giants. Two. There was nothing of the giant in the aspect of the man who was beginning to awaken on the sleeping porch of a Dutch colonial house in the residential district of Zenith, known as Floral Heights. His name was George F. Babette. He was

46 years old now in April, 1920, and he made nothing in particular, neither butter nor shoes nor poetry, but he was nimble in the calling of selling houses for more than people could afford to pay. His large head was pink, his brown hair thin and dry. His face was babyish and slumbered despite his wrinkles, and the red spectacle dents on the slopes of his nose. He was not fat, but he was exceedingly well fed. His cheeks were pads, and the unruffened hand, which lay hopeless on the khaki-colored blanket,

was slightly puffy. He seemed prosperous, extremely married, and unromantic. And altogether unromantic appeared this sleeping porch, which looked on one sizable elm, two respectable grass plots, a cement driveway, in a corrugated iron garage.

Yet Babette was again dreaming, of the Fairy Child, a dream more romantic than Scarlet Pagodas by a Silver Sea. For years, the Fairy Child had come to him. Where others saw but Georgie Babbit? She discerned gallant youth. She waited for him in the darkness beyond mysterious groves. When at last he could slip away from the crowded house he darted to her. His wife, his clamoring friends, sought to follow, but he escaped.

The girl fleet beside him, and they crouched together on a shadowy hillside. She was so slim, so white, so eager. She cried that he was gay and valiant, that she would wait for him, that they would sail. Rumble and bang in the milk truck! Babbit moaned, turned over, struggled back toward his dream. He could see only her face now, beyond misty waters. Furnace man slammed the basement door. The dog barked in the next yard.

As Babbit sank blissfully into a dim, warm tide, the paper carrier went by whistling and the rolled-up advocate thumped the front door. Babbit roused his stomach constricted with alarm. As he relaxed, he was pierced by the familiar and irritating rattle of someone cranking a ford. Snippa! Snibba! Snabha! Himself, a pious motorist, Babbitt cranked with the unseen driver. With him waited through tot hours for the roar of the starting engine. With him, agonized as the roar ceased and again began.

The infernal patient, that, a round, flat sound, a shivering cold morning sound, a sound infuriating and inescapable. Not till the rising voice of the motor told him that the Ford was moving, was he released from the panting tension. He glanced once at his favorite tree, elm twigs against the gold patina of sky, and fumbled for sleep as a drug. He, who had been a boy very credulous of life, was no longer greatly interested in the possible and improbable adventures of each new day. He escaped from reality till the alarm clock rang at 7.20. 3.

It was the best of nationally active. advertised and quantitatively produced alarm clocks, with all modern attachments, including cathedral chime, intermittent alarm, and phosphorescent dial. Babbitt was proud of being awakened by such a rich device. Socially, it was almost as credible as buying expensive cord tires. He sulkily admitted now that there was no more escape,

but he lay and detested the grind of the real estate business and disliked his family and disliked himself for disliking them. The evening before, he had played poker at Virgil Gunch's till midnight, and after such holidays he was irritable before breakfast. It may have been the tremendous home-brewed beer of the prohibition era and the cigars to which that beer enticed him. May have been resentment of return from this fine, bold man-world to a restricted region of wives and stenographers

and of suggestions not to smoke so much. From the bedroom beside the sleeping porch, his wife's detestably cheerful, time to get up, Georgie boy! And the itchy sound, the brisk and scratchy sound of combing hairs out of a stiff brush. He grunted.

He dragged his thick legs and faded baby blue pajamas from under the khaki blanket. He sat on the edge of the corner, caught, running his fingers through his wild hair, while his plumped feet mechanically felt for his slippers. He looked regretfully at the blanket, forever a suggestion to him of freedom and heroism. He'd bought it for a camping trip which had never come off.

Symbolized gorgeous loafing, gorgeous cursing, veril flannel shirts. He creaked to his feet groaning at the waves of pain which passed behind his eyeballs. Though he waited for their scorching recurrence, he looked blurly out at the yard. It delighted him, as always. It was the neat yard of a successful businessman of Zenith. That is, it was perfection. It made him also perfect. He regarded the corrugated iron garage.

For the 365th time in a year, he reflected, No class to that tin shack. Have to build me a frame garage. But by golly, it's the only thing on the place that isn't up to date. While he stared, he thought of a community garage for his acreage development, Glenn Oriel. He stopped puffing and jiggling. His arms were akimbo.

His petulant sleep-swollen face was set in harder lines. He suddenly seemed capable and official. A man to contrive, to direct, to get things done. On the vigor of his idea, he was carried down the hard-clean, unused-looking hall into the bathroom. Though the house was not large, it had, like all houses on floral heights, an altogether royal bathroom of porcelain and glazed tile and metal sleek as silver. The towel rack was a rod of clear glass set in nickel. The tub was long enough for a Prussian guard,

and above the bowl was a sensational exhibit of toothbrush holder, shaving brush holder, soap dish, sponge dish, and medicine cabinet, so glittering and so ingenious that they resembled an electrical instrument board. But the babbit, whose god was modern appliances, was not pleased. The air of the bathroom was thick with the smell of a heathen toothpaste. Verona been at it again. Instead of sticking to libidol, like I've repeatedly asked her, She's gone and gotten some confound stinkum stuff that makes you sick.

The bath mat was wrinkled and the floor mat was wet. His daughter, Verona, eccentricly took bath in the morning. Now and then. He slipped on the mat and slid against the tub. He said, damn. Furiously, he snapped up his tube of shaving cream. Furiously, he lathered with a belligerent slapping of the uncudious brush.

Furiously, he raked his plump cheeks with a safety. razor. It pulled. The blade was dull. He said, damn, oh, damn it. He hunted through the medicine cabinet for a packet of new razor blades, reflecting as invariably, be cheaper to buy one of those dinguses and strop your own blades. And when he discovered the packet behind the round box of bicarbonate of soda, he thought ill of his wife for putting it there in very well of himself for not saying damn. But he did say it immediately afterward, when, with wet and soap-slippery fingers, he tried to remove the horrible little envelope and crisp clinging oiled paper from the new blade.

Then there was the problem, oft-pondered, never solved, of what to do with the old blade, which might imperil the fingers of his young. As usual, he tossed it on top of the medicine cabinet with a mental note that some day he must remove the fifty or sixty other blades that were also temporarily piled up there. He finished his shaving in a growling testiness, increased by a spinning headache and by the emptiness in his stomach. When he was done his round face smooth and steamy in his eyes stinging from soapy water, he reached for a towel. The family towels were wet, wet, and clammy and vile, all of them wet. He found as he blindly snatched him his own face towel, his wife, Verona's, Ted's, Tinkas,

and the lone bath towel with a huge welt of initial. Then George F. Babbitt did a dismaying thing. He wiped his face on the guest towel. It was a pansy embroidered trifle, which always hung there to indicate that the babbets were in the best of floral heights society. No one had ever used it. No guest had even dared to. Guest secretly took a corner of the nearest regular towel. He was raging.

By golly, here they go and use up all the towels. Every dunk on one of them. And they use them and get them all wet and sopping and never put out a dry one for me. Of course, I'm the goat. And then I want one. And I'm the only person in a doggone house that's got the slightest doggone bit of consideration for other people and thoughtfulness and consider there may be others that may want to use the doggone bathroom after me and consider.

He was pitching the chill abominations into the bathtub, pleased by the vindictiveness of the desolate flopping sound. And in the midst his wife, Surreilly trotted in, observed Sirrilly. Why, Georgie, dear, what are you doing? Are you going to wash out the towels? Why, you'd need wash out the towels? Oh, Georgie. Didn't go and use a guest towel, did you?

It is not recorded that he was able to answer. For the first time in weeks, he was sufficiently roused by his wife to look at her. 4. Myra Babbitt, Mrs. George F. Babbitt, was definitely mature. She had creases from the corner of her mouth to the bottom of her chin, and her plump neck bagged. But the thing that marked her as having passed a line was that she no longer had reticences before her husband, and no longer worried about not having reticences. She was in her petticoat now, in corsets which bulged and unaware of being seen in bulgy corses.

she had become so dully habituated to married life that in her full matriornness she was as sexless as an anemic nun she was a good woman a kind woman diligent woman but no one save perhaps tinka her ten-year-old was at all interested in her or entirely aware that she was alive after rather thorough discussion of all the domestic and social of towels, she apologized to Babbitt for his having an alcoholic headache, and he recovered enough to endure the search for a BVD undershirt, which had he pointed out malevolently been concealed among his clean pajamas. He was fairly amiable in the conference on his brown suit. What do you think, Maya? He pawed at the clothes hunched on a chair in the bedroom, while she moved about mysteriously adjusting and patting her petticoat and to his jaundiced eye never seeming to get on with her dressing.

How about it? Shall I wear the brown suit another day? Well, it looks awfully nice on you. I know, but gosh, it needs pressing. That's so, perhaps it does. It certainly could stand being pressed all right. Yes, perhaps it wouldn't hurt it to be pressed. But, gee, the coat doesn't need pressing, no sense of having the whole darn suit pressed,

when the coat doesn't need it. That's so. But the pants certainly need it all right. Look at them. Look at those wrinkles. Pants certainly do need pressing. That's so. Oh, Georgie, why couldn't you wear the brown coat with the blue trousers? We were wondering what we'd do with them.

Good Lord, did you ever in all my life know me to wear the coat of one of suit and the pants of another? What do you think I am? A busted bookkeeper? Well, why don't you put on the dark gray suit today and stop in a tithe-a? to tailor and leave the brown trousers. Well, they certainly need. Now wear the devil is that gray suit. Oh, yes, here we are. He was able to get through the other crisis of dressing with comparative

resoluteness and calm. His first adornment was the sleeveless dimity BVD undershirt, in which he resembled a small boy humorously wearing a cheesecloth tabard at a civic pageant. He never put on BVDs without thanking the God of progress, that he didn't wear tight, long, old-fashioned undergarments like his father-lawn partner, Henry Thompson. His second embellishment was combing and slicking back his hair. It gave him a tremendous forehead, arching up two inches beyond the former hairline, but most wonder-working of all was the dawning of his spectacles. There is character in spectacles,

the pretentious tortoise-shell, the meek-pinsnes of the schoolteacher. the twisted, silver-framed glasses of the old villager. Babbit spectacles had huge, circular, frameless lenses of the very best glass. The earpieces were thin bars of gold. In them, he was the modern businessman, one who gave orders to clerks and drove a car and played occasional golf and was scholarly in regard to salesmanship. His head suddenly appeared not babyish, but weighty, and you noted his heavy, blunt nose, his straight mouth and thick, long upper lip,

his chin overfleshy but strong. With respect, you beheld him, put on the rest of his uniform as a solid citizen. The gray's suit was well cut, well made, and completely undistinguished. It was a standard suit, white piping on the v of the vest, added a flavor of law and learning. His shoes were black-laced boots, good boots,

honest boots, standard boots, extraordinarily uninteresting boots. The only frivolity was his purple-knitted scarf, with considerable comment on the matter to Mrs. Babbitt, who, acrobatically fastening the back of her blouse to her skirt with the safety pin did not hear a word he said. He chose between the purple scarf and a tapestry effect with dringless brown harps among brown palms,

and into it he thrust a snake-head pin with oval eyes. A sensational event was changing from the brown suit to the gray the contents of his pockets. He was earnest about these objects. They were of internal importance, like baseball or the Republican Party. They included a fountain pen and a silver pencil, always lacking a supply of new leads, which belonged in the right-hand upper vest pocket. Without them, he would have felt naked.

On his watch chain were a gold penknife, silver cigar cutter, seven keys, the use of two of which he had forgotten, and, incidentally, a good watch, depending from the chain was a large yellowish elks tooth, proclamation of his membership in the benevolent and protective order of elks. Most significant of all was his loose-leaf pocket notebook, that modern and efficient notebook, which contained the addresses of people whom he had forgotten, prudent memorabilia of postal money orders,

which had reached their destinations months ago, stamps which had lost through mucilage, clippings of verses by T. Chamberly Frank, and of newspaper editorials from which Babbitt got his opinions and his polysyllables, notes to be sure and do things which he did not intend to do, and one curious inscription, D-S-D-M-Y-P-D-F.

But he had no cigarette case. No one had ever happened to give him one, so he hadn't the habit. And people who carried cigarette cases, he considered infeminite. Last, he stuck in his lapel, the Boosters Club button. With the consciousness of great heart,

the button displayed two words. Boosters, Pep. It made Babbitt feel loyal and important. It associated him with good fellows, with men who were nice and human, and important in business circles. It was his VC, his legion of honor ribbon,

his Phi Beta Kappa Key. With the subtleties of dressing ran other complex worries. We'll kind of punk this morning, he said. I think I had too much dinner last evening. You oughtn't to serve those heavy banana fritters. But you ask me to have some. I know, but I tell you, when a fellow gets past forty, he has to look after his digestion.

There's a lot of fellows that don't take proper care of themselves. I'd tell you, at forty, a man's a fool. or his doctor, I mean his own doctor, folks don't give enough attention to this matter of dieting. Now I think, to course, man ought to have a good meal after the day's work, but it would be a good thing for both of us if we took lighter lunches. But, Georgie, here at home, I always do have a light lunch. Mean to imply I make a hog of myself eating downtown? Yeah, sure. You'd have a swell time if you had to eat the truck that new Stuart hands to us

at the Atlantic Club. But I certainly do feel out of sorts this morning. Funny, I got a pain down here on the left side. No, that wouldn't be appendicit, would it? Last night, I'm not driving over to verge gunches? I felt a pain in my stomach, too. Right here, there's kind of a sharp shooting pain. Where'd that dime go to?

Why don't you serve more prunes at breakfast? Of course, I eat an apple every evening, an apple a day, keeps doctor away. But still, you ought to have more prunes, and not all those fancy darts. do-dads. Last time I had prunes you didn't eat them. Well, I didn't feel like eating on the spoof.

Matter of fact, I think I did eat some of them anyway. I'll tell you, it's mighty important to. I was saying to verge gunch. Just last evening. Most people don't take sufficient care of their to just... Should we have the gunches sort for dinner next week? Why, sure you bet. Now see here, George.

I want you to put on your nice dinner jacket that evening. Rats, rest of them won't want to dress. Of course they will. You remember when you didn't dress for the Littlefield's supper party and all the rest did? And how embarrassed you were? Embarrassed, hell. I wouldn't embarrassed.

Everybody knows I can put on as expensive a tux as anybody else. And I should worry if I don't happen to have it on sometimes. All a darn nuisance anyway. All right for a woman. That stays around the house all the time. But when a fellow's work like the ducats. Dickens all day. He doesn't want to go out and hustle his head off, getting into the soup and fish for a lot of folks that he's seen in just regular ordinary clothes that same day.

You know you enjoy being and seen in one. The other evening you admitted you were glad I'd insisted on your dressing. You said you felt a lot better for it. And, oh, Georgie, I do wish you wouldn't say tucks. It's dinner jacket. Ratch, what's the odds? Well, it's what all the nice folks say. Suppose Lucille McEvely heard you calling it a tux. Well, that's all right now. Lucille McCevill can't pull anything on me. Her folks are common as mud,

even if her husband and her dad are millionaires. I suppose you're trying to rub in your exalted social position. Well, let me tell you that your Reverend paternal ancestor, Henry T, doesn't even call it a tux. He calls it a bob-tailed jacket for a ring-tailed monkey. And you couldn't get him into one unless you chloroformed him. Now, don't be horrid, George. Well, I don't want to be horrid, but Lord, you're getting as fussy as Verona.

Ever since she got out of college, she's been too rambunctious to live with. Doesn't know what she wants. Well, I know what she wants. All she wants is to marry a millionaire and live in Europe, and hold some preacher's hand and simultaneously at the same time stay right here in Zenith and be some blooming kind of socialist agitator

or boss charity work or some damn thing. Lord, and Ted is just as bad. He wants to go to college, and he doesn't want to go to college. Only one of the three that knows her own mind is Tinka. Simply can't understand how ever came to have a pair of shilly-shally-shallying children like Ron and Ted. I may not be any Rockefeller or James J. Shakespeare, But I certainly do know my own mind, and I do keep right on plugging along in the office,

and do you know the latest? Far as I can figure out, Ted's new B is he'd like to be a movie actor, and here I've told him a hundred times if he'll go to college and law school and make good, I'll set him up in business, and Verona, just exactly as bad. Don't know what she wants. Well, well, come on. Aren't you ready yet? The girl rang the bell three minutes ago.

Bye. Before he followed his wife, Babbitt stood at the westernmost window of the room. This residential settlement, Floral Heights, was on a rise. And though the center of the city was three miles away, Zenith had between three and four hundred thousand inhabitants now. He could see the top of the second National Tower, an Indiana limestone building of 35 stories. Its shining walls rose against April sky to a simple cornice

like a streak of white fire. Integrity was in the tower, decision. It bored strength lightly as a tall soldier. As Babbitt stared, the nervousness was soothed from his face, his slack chin lifted in reverence. All he articulated was, that's one lovely sight. But he was inspired by the rhythm of the city.

His love of it renewed. He beheld the tower as a temple spire of the religion of business, a faith, passionate, exalted, surpassing common men, and as he clumped down to breakfast, he whistled the ballad, Obaji, obagarsh by jingo.

As though it were a hymn, melancholy, and noble. End of Chapter 1. Chapter 2 of Babbit. This Leavervox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti, Mike Vendetti.com. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis.

Chapter 2 Relieved of Babbitt's bumbling and the soft grunts with which his wife expressed the sympathy she was too experienced to feel and much too experienced not to show, their bedroom settled instantly into impersonality. It gave on the sleeping porch. It served both of them as dressing-room, and on the coldest nights, Babette luxuriously gave up the duty of being manly, and retreated to the bed inside to curl his toes in the warmth and laugh at the January gale. The room displayed a modest and pleasant color scheme,

after one of the best standard designs of the decorator who did the interiors, for most of the speculative builder's houses in Zenith. The walls were gray, the woodwork white, the rug, a serene blue, and very much like mahogany was the furniture. The bureau, with its great clear mirror, Mrs. Babbitt's dressing table with toilet articles of almost solid silver, a plain twain twin beds, between them a table holding a standard electric bedside lamp, a glass for water, and a standard bedside book with colored illustrations. What particular book it was cannot be ascertained, since no one had never opened it. The mattresses were firm, but not hard, triumphant modern mattresses, which had cost a great deal of money. The hot water radiator

was of exactly the proper scientific surface for the cubic contents of the room. The windows were large and easily opened, with the best catches and cords, and holl and roller shades guaranteed not to crack. It was a masterpiece among bedrooms, right out of cheerful modern houses for medium incomes. Only it had nothing to do with the Babbits, nor with anyone else. If people had ever lived and loved there, read thrillers at midnight and lain in beautiful indolence on a Sunday morning, there were no signs of it. had the air of being a very good room in a very good hotel.

One expected the chambermaid to come in and make it ready for people, who would stay but one night. Go without looking back and never think of it again. Every second house in Floral Heights had a bedroom precisely like this. The Babbitt's house was five years old. It was all as competent and glossy as this bedroom. It had the best of taste, the best of inexpensive rugs, a simple and laudable architecture and the latest conveniences.

Throughout electricity took the place of candles and slatantly hearth fires. Along the bedroom baseboard were three plugs for electric lamps concealed by little brass doors. In the halls were plugs for the vacuum cleaner and in a living room, plugs for the piano lamp for the electric fan. The trimmed dining room was its admirable oak buffet, its leaded glass cupboard, its creamy plaster walls, its modest scene of a salmon, expiring upon a pile of oysters,

had plugs which supplied the electric percolator and the electric toaster. In fact, there was but one thing wrong with the Babbitt house. It was not a home. Two. Often of a morning, Babbitt came bouncing and jesting into breakfast, but things were mysteriously awry today. As he pontifically treaded the upper hall,

he looked into Verona's bedroom and protested. "'What's a user-giving family a high-class house? "'When they don't appreciate it, "'tend to do business and get down to brass tacks.' "'He marched upon them. "'Berona, dumpy brown-haired girl, 22, "'just out of Brian Meyerer, "'given whose solicitudes about duty and sex and God

"'and the unconquerable bagginess of the gray sports suit "'she was not wearing. "'Ted. "'Theodore Roosevelt, Babbabit, a decorative boy of 17. Tinka. Catherine, still a baby at ten. With radiant red hair and a thin skin which hinted of too much candy and too many ice cream sodas. Babbitt did not show his vague irritation as he tramped in. He really disliked being a family tyrant, and his nagging was as meaningless as it was frequent.

He shouted at Tinket. Well, kitty doodle! It was the only pet name in his vocabulary except for the deer and hun. with which he recognized his wife and he flung at it tinka every morning he gulped a cup of coffee in the hope of pacifying his stomach and his soul his stomach ceased to feel as though it did not belong to him but verona began to be conscientious and annoying and abruptly there returned to babbitt the doubts regarding life and families and business which had clawed at him when his dream life and the slim fairy girl had fled said. Verona had for six months been filing clerk at the Grosburg Leather Company offices, with a prospect of becoming secretary to Mr. Grunzberg, and thus, as Babbitt defined it, getting some good out of your expensive college education, till you're ready to marry and settle down.

But now, said Verona, father, I was talking to a classmate of mine that's working for the associated charities. Oh, dad, there's the sweet little babies that come to the milk station there and feel as though I ought to be doing something worthwhile like that. I mean worthwhile. If you get to be Gutenberg's secretary, and maybe you would if you kept up your shorthand and then go sneaking off to concert and talk fest every evening, I guess you'll find 35 or 40 bones a week worthwhile. I know, but I want to contribute.

I wish I were working in a settlement house. I wonder if I could get one of the department stores to let me put in a welfare department and a nice restroom and chinsias and wicker chairs and so on and so forth, or I could. Now you look here, the first thing you've got to understand is that all this uplift and flip-flop and settlement work and recreation is nothing in God's world but the entering wedge for socialism. Sooner a man learns he isn't going to be coddled, and he needn't expect a lot of free grub and all these free classes and flip-flop and do-dads for the kids unless he earns them, but as sooner he'll get up on the job and produce, produce, produce.

That's what the country needs, and not all this fancy stuff that just enfeebles the willpower of the working man, and gives his kids a lot of notions above their class, and you, if you'd tend to business instead of fooling and fussing all the time, when I was a young man, I made up my mind what I wanted to do, and stuck to it through thick and thin, and that's why I'm where I am today. Myra, what do you let this girl chop the toast up into these dinky little chunks for? Can't get your fist on to him. Half cold anyway.

Ted Babbitt, Jr. in the Great East Lake High School, had been making hiccup-like sounds of interruption. He put her now. Say, Rhone. You're going to. Rona World. Ted. Will you kindly not interrupt this one,

talking about serious matters? Ah, punk, said Tech judiciously. Ever since somebody slipped up and led you out of college, ammonia. You've been pulling these nut conversations about what-nots and so on and so forth. Are you going to? I want to use the car tonight. Babbit snored. I knew.

May I wanted myself. Rona Potrusted. Oh, what you do, Mr. Smarty? I'm going to take it myself. Tinker wailed. "'Oh, Papa, you said maybe you'd drive us down to Rosdale,' "'Mrs. Babbitt. "'Careful, Tinka, your sleeve is in the butter.'

They glared and Verona hurled. "'Ted, you're a perfect pig about the car.' "'Course, you're not. Not at all.' Ted could be maddingly bland. You just want to grab it off right after dinner and leave it in front of some skirts house all evening while you sit and gas about literature and the highbrows. You're going to marry.

if they only propose. Well, Dad oughtn't to ever let you have it. You and those beastly Joan boys drive like maniacs. The idea if you're taking that turn on the Chippewa place at 40 miles an hour. Ah, what do you get all that stuff? You're so darn scared of the car that you drive uphill with the emergency brake on. I do not. And you, always talking about how much you know about the motors,

and Eudos Liddeville told me, you said the battery fed the generator. Ew. Oh, why am I good woman? You don't know a generator from a differential. Not unreasonably was Ted Lofty with her. He was a natural mechanic, a maker and tinkerer of machines. He lifts thin blueprints for the blueprints came. That'll do now, Babbit flung in mechanically,

as he lighted the gloriously satisfying first cigar of the day and tasted the exhilarating drug of the Advocate Times headlines. Ted negotiated. Gee, honest, Rohn, I don't want to take that old boat, but I promised a couple of girls here in my class. I'd drive them down to the rehearsal of the school chorus, and, gee, I don't want to, but a gentleman's got to keep his social engagements. Well, upon my word, you and your social engagements in high school.

Oh, ain't we select since we went to the Henn College. Let me tell you, there isn't a private school in the state that's got to swell a bunch of guys we got in gamma-di-gama this year. There's two fellows that your dads are millionaires. Say, gee, I ought to have a car on my own, like lots of the fellows. Babbit almost rose. A car of your own. Don't you want a yacht, in a house, and a lot?

That pretty nearly takes the cake. Boy, that can't pass on his Latin exam. like any other boy ought to, and he expects me to give him a motor car. And I suppose a chauffeur and an aeroplane, maybe, as a reward for the hard work he puts in going to the movies with Eunice Littlefield. Well, when you see me giving you... Somewhat later, after diplomacy's, Ted persuaded Verona to admit that she was merely going to the armory of the evening

to see the dog and cat show. She was then, Ted planned, to park the car in. in front of the candy store across from the armory, and he would pick it up. There were masterly arrangements regarding leaving the key and making the gasoline tank filled, and passionately, devotees of the great God motor. They hemmed a patch on the spare inner tube and the lost jack handle. Their truce dissolving, Ted observed that her friends were a scream of a bunch of stuck-up Gabby foreflusures.

His friends, she indicated, were disgusting. imitation sports and hoar little shrieking ignorant girls further it's disgusting of you to smoke cigarettes and so on and so forth and those clothes you've got on this morning they're too utterly ridiculous honestly simply disgusting ted balanced over to the low-beveled mirror on the buffet regarding his charms and smirked his suit the latest thing in old elie togs was skin tight with skimpy trousers to the tops of his gleaming tan and boots, a chorus man waistline, pattern of agitated check, and across the back a belt which belted nothing. His scarf was an enormous black silk wad. His flaxen hair was ice smooth,

paced it down without parting. When he went to school he would add a cap with a long visor, like a shovel blade. Proudest of all was he of his waistcoat, saved for, begged for, plotted for, a real fancy vest of fawn with pocodots of a decayed red the points astoundingly long on the lower edge but he wore a high school button a class button and a fraternity pin and none of it mattered he was supple and swift and flushed his eyes which he believed to be cynical were candidly eager but he was not over-gentle he waved his hand at poor dumpy verona and drawled Yes, I guess you're pretty ridiculous and disgusting us, and I rather guess our new necktie is some smear. Babbit bark, it is, and while you're admiring yourself, let me tell you, it might add to your manly beauty

if you wiped some of that egg off your mouth. Verona giggled momentarily Victor in the greatest of great wars, which is the family war. Ted looked at her hopelessly, and shrieked at ten, Tinka. For love a peak, quit pouring the whole sugar bowl on your corn flakes. When Verona and Ted were gone, and Ticka upstairs, Babbitt groaned to his wife. Nice family, I must say. I don't pretend to be a ball lamb, and maybe I'm a little cross-grained at breakfast sometimes. But the way they go on jab, jab, jab, jabbering, I simply can't stand it.

I swear, I feel like going off someplace where I can get a little piece. I do think after a spend his lifetime trying to give his kids a chance and a decent education. It's pretty discouraging to hear them all the time scramping like a bunch of hyaena's never and never. Curious, here in the paper it says, never silent for one more. See the morning paper yet? No dear. In 23 years of married life, Mrs. Babette had seen the paper before her husband just 67 times. Lots of news. Terrible but tornado in the south. Hard luck all right. right, but this say this is quarking. Beginning of the end for those fellows. New York Assembly has passed some bills that ought to completely outlaw the Socialists, and there's an elevator

runner strike in New York, and a lot of college boys are taking their places. That's a stop, and mass meeting in Birmingham's demanded that this Mick agitator, this fellow de Villera, be deported, dead right, by golly. All those agitators paid with German. in gold anyway, and we got no business interfering with the Irish or any other foreign government. Keep our hands strictly off. And there's another, well, authenticated rumor from Russia that Lenin is dead. That's fine. Beyond me, why we don't just step in there and kick those Bolshevik cusses out. That's so, added Mrs. Babette. And it says here, a fellow is inaugurated mayor in overalls, a preacher too. What do you think of that?

Hmm, well. He searched for an attitude, but neither as a Republican, a Presbyterian, an elk, nor a real estate broker did he have any doctrine about preacher mayor laid down for him. So he grunted and went on. She looked sympathetic and did not hear a word. Later she would read the headlines, the society columns, and the department store advertisements. Where do you know about this, Charlie McKivley, still doing his society stint as heavy as ever.

Here's what that gushy woman reporter says about last night. Never is society with the big, big ass, more flattered than when they are bidden to partake of good cheer at the distinguished and hospitable residents of Mr. and Mrs. Charles L. McHively, as they were last night. Sent in its spacious lawns and landscaping, one of the notable sites crowning Royal Ridge, but Mary and Home-like, despite its mighty stone walls and its fast, rooms, famed for their decoration. Their home was thrown open last night for a dance in honor of Mr. McEvley's notable guest, Miss Jay Sneeth Wove, Washington. The wide hall is so generous in its proportions that it made a perfect ballroom, its hardwood floor reflecting the charming pageant above its polished surface. Even the delights of dancing paled before the alluring opportunities of Tata Tays and invited the soul to loaf in the long,

library before the baronial fireplace or in the drowning room with its deep comfy armchairs. Its shaded lamps just made for a sly whisper of pretty nothing's odd-do, or even in the billiard room, where one could take a cue and show up prowess at still another game that sponsored by Cupid and Tropic Score. There was more, a great deal more. In the best urban journalistic style of Miss Ilona Pearl Bates, the popular Society editor of the Advocate Times, but Babbit could not abide it, he grunted. He wrinkled a newspaper, he protested. Can you beat it? I'm willing to hand a lot of credit to Charlie

McElroy when we were in college together. He was just as hard up as any of us, and he made a million good bucks out of the contracting and hasn't been any dishonester or bought any more city council than was necessary. And that's a good house of his. though it ain't any mighty stone walls, and it ain't worth the ninety thousand to cost him, but when it comes to his talking as though Charlie McCandley and all that booze hoisting set of his or any blooming bunch of Vanderbilt, why it makes me tired. Tim a leaf from Mrs. Babbitt. I would like to see the inside of their house, though. It must be lovely. I've never been inside.

I have lots a couple of times to see Chas about business. the steels in the evening. It's not so much. I wouldn't want to go there for dinner with that gang of high binders. And I'll bet I'm making a whole lot more money than some of those tin horns that spend all they got on dress suits and haven't got a decent suit of underwear to their name. Hey, what do you think of this? Mrs. Babbitt was strangely unmoved by the tidings from the real estate and building column of the Advocate Times. Ashdabula Street, 496 J, K, Dawson to Thomas Mullaney, April 17, 157 by 112.2, Mortgage 4,000, nom. And this morning, Babbit was too disquieted to entertainer with items from mechanics

liens, mortgage was recorded, and contracts awarded. He rose, as he looked at her, his eyebrows seemed shaggier than usual, suddenly. Yep, maybe. Some kind of shame to not keep in touch with folks like the McCevillies. We might try inviting them to dinner some evening, huh, Thunder. It's not waste our time thinking about them. Our little bunch has a lot liveryer times than those plutes. Just compare a real human like you

with those neurotic birds like Lucille McCavilly, all high-brow talk and dressed up like a plush horse. You're a great old girl, hon. He covered his betrayal of softness with the complaining. Say, don't let Tinker go, and eat any more of those poison nut fudge. For heaven's sake, try to keep her from ruin her digestion. I tell you, most folks don't appreciate how important it is to have good digestion and

regular habits. Be back about usual time, I guess. He kissed her. He didn't quite kiss her. He laid unmoving lips against her unflushing cheek. He hurried out to the garage muttering, Lord, what a family. Now Myra's going to get pathetic on me because we don't train with a millionaire outfit. Oh, Lord, sometimes.

I'd like to quit the whole game. And the office worry and detail just as bad. And I act cranky and I don't mean to, but I get so darn tired. End of Chapter 2. Chapter 3 of Babbit. This Liverpool box recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti. Mikevendetti.com.

Babbitt. By Sinclair Lewis, Chapter 3. To George F. Babbitt as to most prosperous citizens of the zenith. His motor car was poetry and tragedy, love and heroism. The office was his pirate ship, but to Carr, his perilous excursion ashore. Among the tremendous crises of each day, none was more dramatic than starting the engine. It was slow on cold mornings. There was the long, anxious whir of the starter, and sometimes he had to drip ether into the cocks of the cylinders, which was,

so very interesting that at lunch he would chronicle it drop by drop and orally calculate how much each drop had cost him. This morning he was darkly prepared to find something wrong and he felt belittled when the mixture exploded sweet and strong and the car didn't even brush the door jam, gouged and splintery with many bruisings by fenders as he backed out of the garage. He was confused. He shouted, morning, to Sam doppelbrow. with more cordiality than he had intended. Babbitt's green and white Dutch colonial house was one of three on that block of Chatham Road. To the left of it was the residence of Mr. Samuel Doppelou,

secretary of an excellent firm of bathroom fixture jobbers. His was a comfortable house with no architectural manners whatever, a large wooden box with a squat tower, a broad porch and glossy paint yellow as a yoke. Babbit disapproved of Mr. and Mrs. Doppelieu as bohemian. From their house came midnight music and obscene laughter. There were neighborhood rumors of bootleg whiskey and fast motor rides. They furnished Babbitt with many happy evenings of discussion during which he announced firmly. I'm not straight-laced, and I don't mind seeing a fellow throw a drink once in a while,

but when it comes to deliberately trying to get away with a lot of hell-raising, all the while like the doppelrose do. It's too rich for my blood. On the other side of Babbit lived Howard Littlefield, Ph.D. In a strictly modern house whereof the lower part was dark and red tapestry brick with a leaded orio, the upper part of pale stucco, like spattered clay, and the roof red-tiled.

Littlefield was the great scholar of the neighborhood, the authority on everything in the world except babies cooking and motors. He was a Bachelor of Arts of Logic College and a doctor of philosophy and economics of Yale. He was the employment manager and publicity council of the Zenith Street Traction Company. He could, on ten hours' notice, appear before the Board of Alderman or the state legislature, and prove absolutely with figures all in rows, and with precedence from Poland and New Zealand, that the streetcar company loved the public and yearned over its employees,

that all its stock was owned by widows and orphans, and that whatever it desired to do would benefit property owners by increasing rental values and help the poor by lowering rents. All his acquaintances turned to Littlefield when they desired to know the date of the Battle of Saragosa, the definition of the word sabotage, the future of the German mark,

the translation of Henk Illéé la Courmagne, or the number of products of coal tar. The odd Babbitt by confessing that he often sat up till midnight, reading the figures and footnotes in government reports or skimming, with amusement at the author's mistakes, the latest volumes of chemistry, archaeology, and eciology. But Littlefield's great value was as a spiritual example. Despite his strange learnings, he was as strict a Presbyterian

and as firm a Republican as George F. Babbitt. He confirmed the businessmen in the faith, where they knew only by passionate instinct that their system of industry and manners was perfect. Dr. Howard Littlefield proved it to them, out of history, economics, and the confessions of reformed radicals. Babbitt had a good deal of honest pride in being the neighbor of such a savant.

And in Ted's intimacy with Eunice Littlefield, at 16, Eunice was interested in no statistics save those regarding the ages and salaries of motion picture stars. But as Babbitt definitively put it, she was her father's daughter. The difference between a light man

like Sam Doppelieu and a fairly fine character like Littlefield was revealed in their appearances. Dauperleu was disturbingly young for a man of 48. He wore his derby on the back of his head and his red face was wrinkled with meaningless laughter.

But Littlefield was an old man of 42. He was tall, broad, thick. His gold-rimmed spectacles were engulfed in the folds of his long face. His hair was a tossed mass of greasy blackness. He puffed and rumbled as he talked. His five bit of capuchy shone against the spotty black vest. He smelled of old pipes. He was altogether funeral and archidonels.

and to real estate brokerage and the jobbing of bathroom fixtures, he added an aroma of sanctity. This morning he was in front of his house inspecting the grass parking between the curb and the broad cement sidewalk. Babbit stopped his car and leaned out to shout, Morning! Littlefield lumbered over and stood with one foot up on the running board. Fine morning, said Babbitt, lighting illegally early, his second secretary. gar of the day. Yes, it's a mighty fine morning, said Littlefield. Spring, come along fast now. Yes, it's real spring now, all right, said Littlefield. Still cold nights, though. Had to have a couple

blankets on the sleeping porch last night. Yes, it wasn't any too warm last night, said Littlefield. But I don't anticipate we'll have any more real cold weather now. No, but still, there was snow at Taffis, Montana yesterday, said the scholar. And you remember the blizzard they had out west three days ago, 30 inches of snow in Greeley, Colorado. And two years ago, we had a snow swall right here in Zenith on the 25th of April. There's that a fact. Say, oh man, what do you think about the Republican candidate? Who they nominate for president? Don't you think it's about time we had a real business administration? In my opinion, what the country needs first and foremost is a good sound business-like conduct of its affairs. What we need is

a business administration, said Littlefield. I'm glad to hear you say that. I certainly am glad to hear you say that. I don't know how you'd feel about it with all your associations, with colleges and so on, and I'm glad you feel that way. What the country needs just at this present juncture is neither a college president nor a lot of monkeying with foreign affairs, but a good, sound, economical business administration that will give us a chance to have something like a decent turnover. Yes, it doesn't generally realize that even in China, the schoolmen are giving way to more practical men,

and, of course, you can see what that implies. It is a fact. Well, breathe babbitt, feeling much calmer and much happier about the way things were going in the world. Well, it's been nice to stop and parley-vous a second. Guess I'll have to get down to the office now and sting a few clients. Oh, so long, oh man. See you tonight. It's long. Two. They had labored these solid citizens twenty years before. The hill on which floral heights was spread with its bright roofs and immaculate turf and amazing comfort had been a wilderness of rank second-growth elms and oaks and maples. Along the precise streets were

still a few wooded vacant lots in the fragment of an old orchard. It was brilliant today. The apple boughs were lit with fresh leaves like torches of green fire, the first white of cherry blossoms, flickered down a gully, and Robbins clamored. Babbit sniffed the earth, chuckled at the hysteric Robbins, as he would have chuckled at kittens or at a comic movie. He was, to the eye, the perfect office-going executive, a well-fed man in a correct brown soft hat and frameless spectacles, smoking a large cigar, driving a good motor along a semi-suburban parkway. But in him was some genus of authentic love for his neighborhood, his city, his clan. The winter was over, the time has come for the building, the visible growth, which to him was glory.

He lost his dawn depression. He was rudely cheerful, and he stopped on Smith Street to leave the brown trousers and to have the gasoline tank filled. the familiarity of the right fortified him the sight of the tall red iron gasoline pump the hollow tile and terra-cotta garage the window full of the most agreeable accessories shiny casing spark plugs and immaculate porcelain jacklets tire chains of gold and silver he was flattered by the friendliness with which sylvester moon dirtiest and most skilled of mortar mechanics came out to serve him "'Morning, Mr. Babbitt,' said Moon, and Babbitt himself felt person of importance, one whose name even busy garageman remembered. Not one of those cheap sports flying around in flivers. He admired the ingenuity of the automatic dial, clicking off gallon by gallon, admired the smartness of the sign. A fill in time saves getting stuck, gas to-day,

31 cents, admired the rhythmic gurgle of the gasoline as it flowed into the tank, and the mechanical regularity with which Moon turned the handle. How much we're taken today? Ask Moon in a manner which combined the independence of a great specialist, the friendliness of a familiar gossip, and respect for a man of weight in the community, like George F. Babbitt. Fill her up. Who are you rooting for a Republican candidate, Mr. Babbitt?

It's too early to make any predictions yet, after all, There's still a good month and two weeks. No, three weeks. Must be almost three weeks. Well, there's more than six weeks in all before the Republican convention, and I feel a fellow ought to keep an open mind and give all the candidates a show. Look them all over and size them up, and then decide carefully. That's a fact, Mr. Babbit. But I'll tell you, and my stand on this is just the same as it was four years ago and eight years ago, and it'll be my stand four years from now, yes, and eight years from now. What I tell everybody, and it can't be too generally understood, is that what we need first, last, and all the time is a good sound business administration.

By golly, that's right. How do those front tires look to you? Fine, fine. Wouldn't be much work for garages if everybody looked after their cars the way you do. Well, I do try to have some sense about it. Babbit paid his bill, said adequately. Oh, keep to change, and drove off in an ecstasy of honest self-appreciation. It was with the manner of a good Samaritan that he shouted to a respectable-looking man

who was waiting for a trolley car. Have a lift! As the man climbed in, Babit condescended. Going clear downtown, whenever I see a fellow waiting for a trolley, always make it a practice to give him a lift, unless, of course, he looks like a bum. Wish there were more folks that were so generous with their machines, dutifully said the victim of benevolence. Ah, no, taint a question of generosity hardly. In fact, I always feel I was saying to my son

just the other night. It's a fellow's duty to share the good things of his world with his neighbors, and he gets my goat when a fellow gets stuck on himself and goes around tooting his horn, merely because he's charitable. The victim seemed unable to find the right answer. Babbit boomed on. Pretty punk service the company giving us on these car lines. Nonsense only run the Portland road cars once every seven minutes. Fellow gets mighty cold on a winter morning, waiting on a street corner with the wind

nipping at his ankles. That's right. The streetcar company doesn't care a damn what kind of a deal they give us. Something ought to happen to him. Babbitt was alarmed. But still, of course, it won't do to just keep knocking the traction company and not realize the difficulties they're operating under, like these cranks that want municipal ownership.

The way these workmen hold up the company for high wages is simply a crime. And, of course, the burden falls on you and me that have to pay a seven-cent fare. In fact, there is remarkable service on all their lines, considering... Well, uneasily. Darn fine morning, Babbitt explained. Spring coming along fast. Yes, it's a real spring now. The victim had no originality, no wit,

and Babit fell into a great silence and devoted himself to the game of beating trolley cars to the corner, a spurt, a tail chase, nervous speeding between the huge yellow side of the trolley and the jagged rove parked cars, shooting past just as the trolley stopped, a rare game and valiant.

And all the while he was conscious of the loveliness of Zenith. For weeks together he noticed nothing but clients and the vexing to rent signs of rival brokers. Today, in mysterious my lease, he raged or rejoiced with equal nervousness, swiftness, and today the light of spring was so winsome that he lifted his head and saw. He admired each district along his familiar route to the office,

the bungalows and shrubs, and winding of regular drives of floral heights, the one-story shops on Smith Street, a glare of plate glass, and new yellow brick, groceries and laundries and drugstores, to supply the more immediate needs of east side housewives. The market gardens and Dutch hollow, their shanties patched with corrugated tin and stolen doors, billboards with crimson godliness, nine feet tall, advertising cinema films, pipe tobacco, and talcum powder. The old mansions along 9th Street southeast, like aged dandies in filthy linen, wooden castles turned into boarding houses, with muddy walks and rusty hedges, jostled by fast-intruding garages, cheap apartment houses and fruit stands conducted by bland, sleek Athenians.

Across the belt of railroad tracks, factories with high-perched water tanks, and tall stacked factories, producing condensed milk, paper boxes, lighting fixtures, motorcars, then the business. the thickening, daring traffic, the cram trolleys unloading the high doorways of marble and polished granite. It was big, and Babbitt respected bigness in anything in mountains, jewels, mussels, wealth, or words. He was, for a spring enchanted moment, the lyric and almost unselfish lover of Zenith. He thought of the outlying factory suburbs, of the Chastalusa River, with its strongly eroded banks. of the orchard-tappled Tawadana hills to the north, and all the fat dairy land and big barns and comfortable herds.

As he dropped his passenger, he cried, Gosh, you feel pretty good this morning. Three. Epical as starting the car was the drama of parking it before he entered his office. As he turned from Oberlin Avenue round the corner onto 3rd Street northeast, he peered ahead for a space in the line of parked cars.

He angrily just missed a space as a rival driver slid into it, Ahead another car was leaving the curb, and Babbitt slowed up, holding out his hand to the cars pressing on him from behind, agitatedly, motioning an old woman to go ahead, avoiding a truck which bore down on him from one side, with front wheels nicking the wrought iron bumper of the car in front. He stopped feverishly, cramped his steering wheel, slid back into the vacant space, and, with 18 inches of room maneuvered, to bring the car level with the curb. It was a vile adventure masterfully executed. with satisfaction. He locked a thief-proof steel wedge on the front wheel

and crossed the street to his real estate office on the ground floor of the Reeves building. The Reeves building was as fireproof as a rock and as efficient as a typewriter. Fourteen stories of yellow-pressed brick with clean, upright, unornamented lines. It was filled with the offices of lawyers, doctors, agents for machinery, for emery wheels,

for wire fencing, for mining stock. Their gold signs shone on the windows. The entrance was too modern and to be flamboyant with pillars. It was quiet, shrewd, neat. Along the third street side were a Western Union telegraph office, the Blue Delph Candy Shop, Shotwell's Stationery Shop, and the Babbitt Thompson Realty Company. Babbitt could have entered his office from the street, as customers did,

but it made him feel an insider to go through the corridor of the building and enter by the back door. Thus he was greeted by the villagers. The little unknown people who inhabited the Reve Building corridors, elevator runners, starter, engine, superintendent, and the doubtful-looking lame man who conducted the news and cigar stand. They were in no way city dwellers, they were rustics, living in a constricted valley,

interested only in one another and in the building. Their main street was the entrance hall with the stone floor, severe marble ceiling, and the inner window of the shop. The liveliest place on the street was the Reeves building barbershop, but this was also Babbitt's one embarrassment. Himself, he patronized the glittering pomegan barber shop in the Hotel Thornlow, and every time he passed the reef shop ten times a day, a hundred times,

he felt untrue to his own village. Now, as one of the squirearchy, greeted with honorable salutation by the villagers, he marched into his office, and peace and dignity were upon him. And the morning's dissonance is all unheard. They were heard again immediately. Stan the Graf, the outside salesman,

was talking on the telephone with tragic lack of that firm manner, which disciplines clients. Say, uh, I think I got the house that would suit you, the Percival house in Linton. Oh, you've seen it? Well, how'd it strike you? Huh? Oh, oh.

Irresolutely. Oh, I see. As Babbitt marched into his private room, a coop with semi-partition of oak and frosted glass, at the back of the office he reflected how hard it was to find employees, who had his own faith that he was going to make sales. There were nine members of the staff besides Babbitt, and his partner and father-in-law, Henry Thompson, who rarely came into the office. The nine were Stanley Graff, the outside salesman,

A youngish man given to cigarettes in the playing of pool. Old Matt Peniman, General Utility Man, collector of rents and salesman of insurance, broken, silent gray. A mystery. Reputed to have been a crack real estate man with the firm of his own in haughty Brooklyn. Chester Kirby Laylock, resident salesman, out at the Glen Oriole, Ackridge Development.

An enthusiastic person with a silky mustache and much family. Mitched Teresa McElland, a swift and rather pretty stenographer, Miss Wilberta Benigan, the thick, slow, laborious accountant and file clerk, and four freelance part-time commission salesman. As he looked from his own cage into the main room, Babbit Morned, McGowan's a good stenog, smart as a whip, but stand graft, and all those bumps, the zest of the spring morning was smothered in the stale office air. Normally admired the office with a pleased surprise that he could have created this sure lovely thing.

Normally, he was stimulated by the clean newness of it and the air of bustle, but today it seemed flat. The tile floor, like a bathroom, the ochre-colored metal ceiling, the faded maps on the hard plaster walls, the chairs of varnished pale oak, the desks and filing cabinets of steel painted an olive drab. It was a vault. a steel chapel where loafing and laughter were raw sin. He hadn't even any satisfaction in the new water-cooler, and it was the very best water-coolers, up-to-date, scientific and right-thinking.

It had cost a great deal of money, in itself a virtue. It possessed a non-conducting fiber ice container, a porcelain water jar, guaranteed hygienic, a dripless, non-crowging, sanitary faucet, and machine-painted decorations in two tones of gold. He looked down the relentless stretch of tile floor at the water-cooler and assured himself that no tenant of the Reeves building had a more expensive one, but he could not recapture the feeling of social superiority it had given him.

He astoundingly grunted, "'I'd like to beat it off to the woods right now, loaf all day. Go to grunches again tonight, play poker, and cuss as much it feel like, and drink a hundred and nine thousand bottles of beer. He sighed. He read through his mail. He shouted Miss Gowan,

which meant Miss McGowan, and began to dictate. This was his own version of his first letter. Omar Gribble. Send it to his office, Miss McGowan. Yours of twentieth to hand in and reply would say, look here. Gribble, I'm awfully afraid if we go on shilly-shallowing like this, we'll just naturally lose the Allen sale. I had Alan up on the

carpet day before yesterday, got right down to cases and think I can assure you. Uh, uh, uh, no, change that. All my experience indicates he is all right, means to do business. Looked into financial record, which is fine. That sentence seemed to be a little bald up. Miss Gown, make a couple of sentences out of it, if you have to, period new paragraph. He is perfectly willing to pro-rate the special assessment and strikes me, I'm dead sure, there will be no difficulty in getting him to pay for title insurance. So now, for heaven's sake, let's get busy. No, make it that.

So now let's go to it and get down. No, that's enough. You can tie those sentences up a little better when you type them. Miss McGowan, yours sincerely, etc. This is the version of his letter which he received type from Miss McGowan. that afternoon. Babbitt Thompson Realty Company. Homes for Folks. Reeves Building, Oberlin Avenue, and 3rd Street, Northeast, Zenith. Omar Gribble Esquire, 376 North American Building, Zinath. Dear Mr. Gribble. Your letter of the 20th to hand, I must say I'm awfully afraid

that if we go on shilly-shallowing like this, we'll just naturally lose Alan's sale. I had Alan up on the carpet day before yesterday, and got right down to cases. All my experience indicates that he means to do business. I have also looked into his financial record, which is fine. He is perfectly willing to prorate the special assessment, and there will be no difficulty in getting him to pay for title insurance. So let's go, yours sincerely. As he read and signed it in his correct flowing business college hand, Babette reflected, now that's a good strong letter, and clear the bell. Now, what I never told McGowan to make a third paragraph here, wish he'd quit trying to improve on my dictation, but what I can't

understand is why can't Stan Graf or Chetlaby write a letter like that, with punch, with kick? The most important thing he dictated that morning was the fortnightly form letter to be mimmigrafted and sent out to a thousand prospects. It was diligently imitative of the best literary models of the day, of heart-to-heart-talk advertisements, sales, pulling letters, disclosures on the development of willpower, and handshaking house organs, as richly poured forth by the new school of poets of business. He had painfully written out the first draft, and he intoned it now like a poet, delicate, and disdain. "'Say, old man, I just wanted to know. Can I do you a wail of a favor?'

Honest, no kidding. I know you're interested in getting a house, not merely a place where you hang up the old bonnet, but a love-nest for the wife and kitties, and maybe for the fliverer out beyond. Be sure to spell B-E-Y-A-N-T, Miss McGowan. The Spudgarden say, did you ever stop to think that we're here to save you trouble? That's how I make a living. Folks don't pay us for our lovely beauty. Now take a look. Sit down at that handsome car, mahogany eschatire, and shoot us a line telling us just what you want. And if we can find it, we'll come hopping down to your lane with the good tidings, and if we can't, we won't bother you. To save your time, just fill

out the blank enclosed. On request, we'll also send blank recording store properties in Floral Heights, Silver Grove, Linton, Bellevue, and all east side residential district. Yours for service. P.S. Just a hint of some plums we can pick for you. Some genuine bargains that Came in today. Silver Grove, cute, four-room California bungalow, AMI garage, dandy shade tree, swell neighborhood, handy car line. $3,700, $780 down and balance, liberal. Babette Thompson, terms cheaper than rent. Dorchester, a corker, artistic two-family house, all oak trim, parquet floors, lovely gas log, big porches, colonial, heated all-weather garage, a bargain, $11,250.

Dictation over, with its need of sitting and thinking instead of bustling around and making a noise, and really doing something. Babbitt sat crickily back in his revolving desk chair and beamed on Miss McGowan. He was conscious of her as a girl, of black bobbed hair, against demure cheeks, a longing which was indistinguishful from loneliness enfeebled him. While he waited, tapping a long precise pencil point on the desk tablet, but he half-identified her with the fairy girl of his dreams. He imagined their eyes meeting with terrifying recognition.

Imagine touching her lips with frightened reverence, and she was chirping. Any more, Mr. Babbitt? He grunted. That winds it up, I guess, turned heavily away. For all his wandering thoughts, they had never been more intimate than this. He often reflected,

Never forgot how old Jake Offutt, said a one, wise bird never goes love-making in his own office or his own home. Start trouble, sure, but... In twenty-three years of married life, he had peered uneasily at every graceful ankle, every soft shoulder, and thought he had treasured them. But not once had he hazard respectability by adventuring. Now, as he calculated the cost of repapering the Stikes' house,

he was restless again, discontented about nothing and everything. ashamed of his discontentment and lonely for the fairy girl. End of chapter three. Chapter 4 of Babbit. This leverbox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Bendetti, Mike Bendetti.com. Babbit by Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 4.

It was a morning of artistic creation. Fifteen minutes after the purple prose of Babbitt's form letter, Chester Kirby Laylock, the resident salesman at Glen Oriel, came in to report a sale and suburb. and advertisement. Babbit disapproved of Laylock, who sang in choirs, and was married home over games of hearts and old maid. He had a tenor voice, wavy chestnut hair, and a mustache like a camel's hairbrush. Babbitt considered it excusable in a family man to growl. "'Seeing this new picture of the kid?

Husky little devil, huh?' But Laylock's domestic confidence were as bubbling as a girl's. "'Say, I think I got a peach of an ad for the Glenn, Mr. Babbett. Why don't we try something in poetry, honest? It'd have wonderful pulling power, listen. Mid pleasures and palaces wherever you may roam. Just provide the little bride, and we'll provide the home. Do you get it? See? Like home sweet home, don't you? Yes, yes, hell yes, of course I get it.

But I think we better use something more dignified and forceful like. We lead, others follow, or eventually, why not now? Of course, I believe in using poetry and humor and all that junk when it turns the trick, but with a high-class restricted development like the Glen, we better stick to the more dignified approach. See how I mean? Well, I guess that's all this morning, Chet. Two.

By a tragedy, familiar to the world of art, the April enthusiasm of Chet Lelock served only to stimulate the talent of the older craftsman, George F. Babbitt. He grumbled to Stanley Graff. That tan-colored voice of Chet's gets on my nerves. Yet he was aroused, and in one swoop, he wrote, Do you respect your loved ones? When the last sad rites of bereavement are over?

Do you know for certain you've done your best for their departed? You haven't, unless they lie in the cemetery beautiful, Lyndon Lane, the only strictly up-to-date burial place in or near Zenith, where exquisitely garden plots look from daisy-dotted hill slopes across the smiling fields of Dorchester. Soul agents? Babbit Thompson Realty Company, Reef's Building.

He rejoiced. I guess that'll show you tan mott in his weedy old wildwood cemetery. Something about modern merchandising. Three. He sent Matt Peniman to the recorder's office to dig out to names of the owners of houses which were displaying for rent signs of other brokers.

He talked to a man who desired to lease a store building for a pool room. He ran over the list of home leases which were about to expire. He sent Thomas Baywaters, a streetcar conductor, who played at real estate in spare time to call on side street prospects, who were unworthy the strategies of Stan the Graff, but he had spanned his credulous excitement of creation, and these routine details annoyed him. One moment of heroism he had in discovering a new way of stopping smoking.

He stopped smoking at least once a month. He went through it like the solid citizen he was, admitted the evils of tobacco, courageously made resolves, laid out plans to check the vice, tapered off his lounds of cigars, and expounded the pleasures of virtuousness to everyone he met. He did everything, in fact, except stopped smoking. Two months before, by ruling out a schedule noting down the hour the minute of each smoke

and statically increasing the intervals between smokes, he had brought himself down to three cigars a day. Then he had lost the schedule. A week ago, he had invented a system of leaving his cigar case and cigarette box in an unused drawer at the bottom of the correspondence file in the outer office. "'I'll just naturally be ashamed to go poking in there all day long, making a fool of myself before my own employees,' he reasoned. By the end of three days he was trained to leave his desk, walk to the file,

take out unlight a cigar, without knowing that he was doing it. This morning it was revealed to him that it had been too easy to open the file. Lock it. That was a thing. Inspired, he rushed out and locked up his cigars, his cigarettes, and even his box of safety matches, and the key to the file drawer he hid in his desk. But the crusading passion of it made him so tobacco-hungry

that he immediately recovered the key, walked with forbidding dignity to the file, took out a cigar in a match. But only one match. If old cigar goes out, it'll, by golly, have to stay out. Later, when the cigar did go out, he took one more match from the file, And when a buyer and a seller came in for a conference at 1130,

naturally he had to offer them cigars. His conscience protested, Why, you're smoking with him. But he bullied it. Ah, shut up. I'm busy now. Of course, by and buy. There was no buy-and-by,

yet his belief that he had crushed the unclean habit, made him feel noble and very happy. When he called up Paul Riesling, he was in his moral splendor. her. Unusually eager. He was fonder of Paul Reisling than anyone on earth, except himself and his daughter Tinka. They had been classmates, roommates in the State University, but always he thought of Paul Reisling, with his dark slimness, his precisely parted hair, his noseglasses, his hesitant speech, his moodiness, his love of music, as a younger brother, to be petted and protected.

Paul had gone into his father's business after graduation. He was now a wholesaler and small manufactured of prepared paper roofing, but Babbitt strenuously believed and lengthily announced to the world of Goodfellows that Paul could have been a great violinist or painter or writer. Why say, the letters of that boy sent me on his trip to the Canadian Rockies, they just absolutely make you see the place. as if you were standing there. Believe me, he could have given any of those Blooming authors a whale of a run for their money. Yet on the telephone, he said only,

South 343. No, no, no, I said South. South 343. Say, operator, what the Dickens is of trouble. Can't you get me South 343? Why, certainly they'll answer, oh, hello, 343? Want to speak Mr. Riesling. Mr. Babbitt talking. Hello, Paul. Yeah. Ask George speaking. Yeah. How's old socks?

Fair Midland. How are you? Fine, fabulous. Well, what do you know? Oh, nothing much. Where have you been keeping yourself? Oh, just sticking around. What's up, Georgie?

How about a little lunch? Say noon? Be all right with me, I guess. Club? Yeah. Meet you there at 12.30. All right. right twelve thirty it's long george four his morning was not sharply marked into divisions interwoven

with correspondence and advertisement writing were a thousand nervous details calls from clerks who were incessantly and hopefully seeking five furnished rooms in a bath at sixty dollars a month advice to matt benjamin on getting money out of tenants who had no money babb's virtues as a real estate broker as the servant of society in the department of finding houses for families and shops for distributors of food were steadiness and diligence. He was conventionally honest. He kept his records of buyers and sellers complete. He had experience with leases and titles and an excellent memory for prices. His shoulders were broad enough, his voice deep enough, his relish of hearty humor strong enough to establish him as one of the ruling cast of Goodfellows.

Yet his eventual importance to mankind was perhaps lessened. By his large and complacent ignorance of all architecture save the types of houses turned out by speculative builders. All landscape gardening save the use of curving roads, grass, and six ordinary shrubs, and all the commonest axioms of economics. He serenely believed that the one purpose of the real estate business was to make money for George F. Babbitt. Druid was a good advertisement at Boosters Club lunches

and all the varieties of annual banquets to which Goodfellows were invited. To speak sonorously of unselfish public service, the broker's obligation to keep involuntate the trust of his clients and a thing called ethics, whose nature was confusing, but if you had it, you were a high-class realtor, and if you didn't, you were a sheister, a piker, and a fly-by-night. These virtues awakened confidence, and enabled you to handle bigger propositions,

but they didn't imply that you were to be impractical and refused to take twice the value of a house if a buyer was such an idiot that he didn't drew you down, on the asking price. Babbit spoke well, and often, at these orgies of commercial righteousness about the realtors function as a seer of the future development of the community

and as a prophetic engineer, clearing the pathway for inevitable changes, which meant that a real estate broker could make money by guessing which way the town would grow. This guessing, he called Vision. In an address to the Boosters Club, he had admitted, It is at once the duty unprivilege of the realtor to know everything about his own city and its environs where a surgeon is a specialist on every vein and mysterious cell in the human body,

and the engineer upon electricity in all its phases, or every bolt of some great bridge majestically arching over a mighty flood. The realtor must know his city inch by inch, and all its faults and virtue. Though he did not know the market price inch by inch of certain districts of Zenith, he did not know whether the police force was too large or too small, or whether it was in alliance with gambling and prostitution. He knew the means of fireproofing buildings and the relation of insurance rates to fireproofing, but he did not know how many firemen there were in the city,

how they were trained and paid, or how complete their apparatus. He sang eloquently the advantages of proximity of school buildings to rentable homes, but he did not know. He did not know that it was worthwhile to know. Rather, the city school rooms were properly heated, lighted, ventilated, furnished. He did not know how the teachers were chosen, and, though he chanted one of the boasts of Zenith, is that we pay our teachers adequately. That was because he had read the statement in the advocate times.

Himself, he could not have given the average salary of teachers in Zenith or anywhere else. He had heard it said that conditions in the county jail and the Zenith City Prison were not very scientific. He had, with indignation at the criticism of Zenith, skimmed through a report in which the notorious pessimist Seneca Donne, the radical lawyer, asserted that to throw boys and young girls into a bullpen crammed with men suffering from syphilis, delirium torments, and insanity, was not the perfect way of educating them. He had controverted the report by growling, "'Folks that think a jail ought to be a blooming hotel, ther no, make me sick. If people don't like a jail, let them behave themselves and keep out of it.

Besides, these reform cranks always exaggerate it.' That was the beginning and quite completely the end of his investigation into Zenith charities and corrections. And as to the vice districts, he brightly expressed it, Those are things that no decent man monkeys with. Besides, matter of fact, I'll tell you confidentially, it's a protection to our daughters and to decent women to have a district where tough nuts can raise cane, keeps them away from our own homes. As to industrial conditions, however,

Babbitt had thought a great deal, and his opinions may be coordinated as follows. A good labor union is of value because it keeps out radical unions, which would destroy property. No one ought to be forced to belong to a union, however. All labor agitators who try to force men to join a union should be hanged. In fact, just between ourselves,

there oughtn to be any unions allowed at all. And as it's the best way of fighting the unions, every businessman ought to belong to an employer's association and to the Chamber of Commerce. In Union, there is strength. So any Selfies Hogg who doesn't join the Chamber of Commerce ought to be forced to. In nothing, as the expert on whose advice families

moved to new neighborhoods to live there for a generation, was Babbitt, more splendidly innocent than in the science of sanitation. He did not know a malaria-bearing mosquito from a bat. He knew nothing about tests of drinking water, and in the matters of plumbing and sewage, he was as unlearned as he was vulnerable. He often referred to the excellence of the bathrooms in the houses he sold. He was fond of explaining why it was that no European ever bathed.

Someone had told him when he was 22 that all cesspools are unhealthy, and he still denounced him. If a client impertinently wanted him to sell a house, which had a cesspool, Abbott always spoke about it, before accepting the house and selling it. When he laid out the Glen Oriole acreage development, when he ironed woodland and dipping meadow into a glenless, orioless, sunburnt, flat, prickly, with small boards displaying the names of imaginary streets, he righteously put in a complete suede system.

It made him feel superior. It enabled him to sneer privately at the Martin Lamsman development, Abenola, which had a cesspool, and it provided a chorus for the full-page advertisements in which he announced the beauty, convenience, cheapness, and super-ogatory healthfulness of Glen Oriole. The only flaw was that Glen Orioles sewers had insufficient outlet, so the waste remained in them, not very agreeably, while the Avenola cesspool was a warring septic tank.

The whole of the Glen Oriel project was a suggestion that Babbitt, though he really did not hate men recognized as swindlers, was not too unreasonably honest. Operators and buyers prefer that brokers should not be in competition with them as operators and buyers themselves, but attend to their client's interests only. It was supposed that the Babette Thompson Company were merely agents for Glen Oriel,

serving the real owner, Jake Offit. But the fact was that Babbitt and Thompson owned 62% of the Glen. The president and purchasing agent of the Xeneth Street Traction Company owned 28% and Jake Offit, a gang politician, a small manufacturer, a tobacco-chewing old fact store, who enjoyed dirty politics, business diplomacy, and cheating at poker, at only 10%, which Babbitt and the traction officials had given to him for fixing health inspectors and fire inspectors and a member of the State Transportation Commission.

But Babbitt was virtuous. He advocated, though he did not practice, the prohibition of alcohol. He praised, though he did not obey the laws against motor speeding. He paid his debts. He contributed to the Church, the Red Cross, and the YMCA. He followed the custom of his clan. and cheated only as it was sanctified by precedent, and he never descended into trickery, though as he explained to Paul Reisling,

"'Course, I don't mean to say that I ever had to write it literally true, or that I always believe everything I say when I give some buyer a good strong selling-speal. You see, you can see it like this. In the first place, maybe the owner of the property exaggerated when he put it into my hand, and it certainly is my place to go proving my principal a liar. And then most folks are so darn crooked themselves that they expect a fellow to do a little lying. So if I was fool enough to never whoop and ante,

I'd get the credit for lying anyway in self-defense. I got to to toot Moanhorn like a lawyer defending his client. It's burdened duty, ain't it, to bring out the poor Dub's good points, why the judge himself would bawl'd out. a lawyer if he didn't, even if they both knew the guy was guilty. But even so, I don't pad down to truth like Cecil Rontree, or Thayer, or the rest of those realers, fact I think a fellow that's willing to deliberately up and profit by lying ought to be shot. Fabot's value to his clients was rarely better shown than this morning. In the conference at 11.30 between himself,

Conrad Lighty and Archibald Purdy. 5. Conrad Lighty was a real estate speculator. He was a nervous speculator. Before he gambled, he consulted bankers, lawyers, architects, contracting builders, and all of their clerks and sternographers who were willing to be cornered and give him advice. He was a bold entrepreneur,

and he desired nothing more than complete safety in his investments, freedom from attention to details, and a 30 or 40% profit, which, according to all authorities, a pioneer deserves for his risks and foresight. He was a stubby man with a cap-like mass of short gray curls and clothes which no matter how well cut seemed shaggy. Blowie's eyes were semicircular hollows, as though silver dollars had been pressed against them and left an imprint. particularly and always Lighty consulted Babbitt and trusted in his slow cautiousness. Six months ago, Babbett had learned that one Archibald Purdy, a grocer, in the indecisive residential district known as Linden, was talking of opening a butcher shop besides his grocery.

Looking up the ownership of adjoining parcels of land, Babbitt found that Purdy on his present shop but did not own the one available lot adjoining. He advised Conrad Lighty to purchase this lot for $11,000. The own appraisal on basis of rents did not indicate its value as above $9,000. The rents declared Babbitt were too low, and by waiting they could make Purdy come to their price. This was vision. He had to bully Lytte into buying. His first act as agent for Lytte was to increase the rent of the battered store building on the lot.

The tenant said a number of rude things, but he paid. Now, Bertie seemed ready to buy, and his delay was going to cost him $10,000 extra dollars. The reward paid by the community to Mr. Conrad Lighty for the virtue of employing a broker who had vision and who understood talking points, strategic values, key situation, underappraisals, and the psychology of salesmanship. Lytty came to the conference exultantly. He was fond of Babbitt this morning and called him old hoss. Purdy the grocer, a long-nosed man and solemn,

seemed to care less for Babbitt and for vision, but Babbitt met him at the street door of the office and guided him toward the private room with the affectionate little cries of, This way, brother Purdy! He took from the correspondence file the entire box of cigars and forced them on his guests. He pushed their chairs two inches forward and three inches back, which gave a hospitable note,

then leaned back on his desk chair and looked plump and jolly. But he spoke to the weakling grocer with firmness. Well, brother Purdy, we've been having some pretty tempting offers from butchers and a slew of other folks for that lot next to your store. But I perspated, Brother Delighty, that we ought to give you a shot at the property first. I said Delighty, it'd be right. in shame. I said, if somebody went and opened a combination grocery and meat market right next door and ruined Purdy's nice little business, especially. Babbitt leaned forward and his voice

was harsh. It would be hard luck if one of those cash and carry chain stores got in there and started cutting prices below cost till they got rid of competition for a shoe to the wall. Purdy snatched his thin hands from his pockets, pulled up his trousers. thrust his hands back into his pockets, tilted in the heavy oak chair, and tried to look amused as he struggled. Yes, sir, bad competition, but I guess you don't realize

the pulling power that personality has in a neighborhood business. The great babbitt smiled. That's so, just as you feel, old man. We thought we'd give you first chance, all right, then. Now look here, purdy wailed. I know for a fact that a piece of property bought same size right in there sold for less than 8,500. 22 years ago, and here you fellows are asking me $24,000. Why, I'd have a mortgage.

I wouldn't mind so much paying $12,000, but why, good God, Mr. Babbitt. You're asking more than twice its value, and threatened to ruin me if I don't take it. Bertie, I don't like your way of talking. I don't like it one little bit. Supposing Lytty and I were stinking enough to want to ruin any fellow human. Don't you suppose? We know it's to our own selfish interest

to have everybody in Zenith prosperous. But all this is beside the point. Tell you what we'll do. We'll come down to 23,500 down, and the rest on mortgage. And if you want to wreck the old shack and rebuild, I guess I can get Liddy here to loosen up for a building mortgage on good liberal terms. Heavens, man. We'd be glad to oblige you.

We don't like those foreign grocery trusts any better than you do. But it isn't reasonable to expect us to sacrifice eleven thousand or more just for neighbors, is it? How about it, Lyddy? You willing to come down? By warmly taking Purdy's part, Babbitt persuaded the benevolent Mr. Lytty to reduce his price to $21,000. At the right moment, Babbitt snatched from a drawer the agreement. He had Miss McGowan type out a week ago and thrust it into Purdy's hands. He genuinely shook his fountain pen to make certain that was flowing, handed it to Purry, and approvingly watched him sign.

The work of the world was being done. Lighty had made something over $9,000. Babbitt had made a $450 commission. Purdy had, by the sensitive mechanism of modern finance, been provided with a business building and soon the happy inhabitants of Linden, would have meat lavished upon them at prices only a little higher than those downtown. It had been a manly battle, but after it babbitt drooped. This was the only really amusing contest he had been planning.

There was nothing ahead save details of leases, appraisals, and mortgages. He muttered. Makes me sick to think of light he carrying off most of the profit when I did all the work, the old skinflint. And what else have I got to do today? Like to take a good long vacation, motor trip, or something. He sprang up, rekindled by the thought of lunching with Paul Reisling. End of Chapter 5 of Babbitt.

This leverbox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti, Mike Vendetti.com. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis, Chapter 5. Babbett's preparations for leaving the office to its feeble self during the hour and a half of his lunch period were somewhat less elaborate than the plans for a general European war. He fretted to Miss McGowan, What time are you going to lunch?

Well, make sure Miss Bannigan is in, then. Explain to her that if Winfelt calls up, she's to tell him I'm already having this title traced. And, oh, by the way, remind us, me tomorrow to have penam and trace it. No, if anybody comes in looking for a cheap house, remember, we got to shove that bangor road place off onto somebody. If you need me, I'll be at the athletic club and, uh, uh, I'll be back by two. He dusted the scar ashes off his vest. He placed a difficult, unanswered letter on the pile of unfinished work that he might not

fail to attend to it that afternoon. For three noons now he had placed that same letter on the unfinished pile. He scrawled on a sheet of yellow backing paper, the memorandum. See about apartment H. D.R.S. Which gave him an agreeable feeling of having already seen about the apartment house doors. He discovered that he was smoking another cigar. He threw it away, protesting. Darn it. Thought you'd put the damn smoking. He courageously returned to the scar box to the correspondence file, locked it up, hid the key in a more difficult place and raged. I ought to take care of it myself.

Need more exercise. Walk to the club every single noon. Just what I'll do. Cut out there's motoring all the time. The resolution made him feel exemplatory. Immediately after he decided that this noon it was too late to walk. It took but little more time to start his car and edge it into the traffic than it would have taken to walk the three and a half blocks to the club.

Two. As he drove, he glanced with fondness of familiarity at the building. A stranger suddenly dropped into the business center of Zenith. Could not have told whether he was in a city of Oregon or Georgia, Ohio, or Maine, Oklahoma, or Manitoba. But to Babbit, every inch was individual and stirring. As always, he noted that the California building across the way was three stories lower, therefore three stories less beautiful than his own Reeves building.

As always, when he passed the Parthenon Shoe Shoe Shine parlor, A one-story hut, which, beside the granite and red-brick ponderness of the old California building, resembled a bathhouse under a cliff, he commented, "'Bush, ought to get my shoes shine this afternoon. Keep forgetting it.' At the Simplex Office Furniture Shop, the National Cadge Registry Agency, he yearned for a dictum, for a typewriter, which would add and multiply as a poet yearns for quattros or a physician for radium. At the newbie men's wearer's shop, he took his left hand off the steering wheel to touch his

scarf and thought well of himself as one who bought expensive ties and could pay cash for him, too. By golly. And at the United's cigar store, with its crimson and gold alertness, he reflected, I wonder ever needs some of cigars. Idiot, plump forgot. Going to cut down my fool smoking. He looked at his bank, the miners and drover's national. and considered how clever and solid he was to bank with so marbled an establishment his high moment came in the clash of traffic when he was halted at the corner beneath the lofty second national tower his car was banked with four others in a line of steel restless as cavalry

while the cross-town traffic limousines and enormous moving vans and insistent motorcycles poured by on the further corner pneumatic riveters rang on the sun-plated skeleton of a new building and out of this tornado flashed the inspiration of a familiar face, and a fellow booster shouted, Hey, how are you, Georgie? Babbit, waved in neighborly affection, and slid on with the traffic as the policeman lifted his hand. He noted how quickly his car picked up. He felt superior and powerful, like a shuttle of polished steel, darting in a vast machine. As always, he ignored the next two blocks, decayed blocks, not yet reclaimed, from the grime and shabbiness of the Zemoth of 1885. While it was passing the five-and-ten-cent store,

the Dakota Lodging House, Concordia Hall with its lodgrooms, and the offices of fortune-tellers and chiropractors. He thought of how much money he made, and he boasted a little and worried a little, and did old familiar sums. Four hundred fifty plunks this morning from the land deal, but taxes do. Let's see. How'd to pull out eight.

thousand net this year and save fifteen hundred of that now not if i put up the garage and let's see six hundred and forty clear last month and twelve times six forty makes makes let's see six times twelve is seventy two hundred and rats anyway i'll make eight thousand gina that's not so bad mighty good fellows pulling down eight thousand dollars a year eight thousand good hard iron dollars but there isn't more than 5% of the people and the whole United States that make more than Uncle George does, by and gully, right up at the top of the heap,

but my expenses are, family wasting gasoline, always dressed like millionaires, and sending that 80-a-month the mother, and all these sternographers and salesmen gouging me for every cent they can get. The effect of his scientific budget planning was that he felt at once

triumphantly wealthy and perisly poor. And in the midst of these dissertations, he stopped his car, rushed into a small news and miscellany shop, and bought the electric cigar lighter which he had coveted for a week. He dodged his conscience by being jerky and noisy, and by shouting at the clerk, "'Guess that'll pretty pretty pay for itself and match it, eh?' It was a pretty thing, a nickel-scylinder,

with an almost silvery socket. to be attached to the dashboard of his car. It was not only as the placard on the counter observed, a dainty little refinement lending the last touch of class to the gentleman's auto, but a priceless time-saver. By freeing him from halting the car to light a match, it would in a month or too easily saved ten minutes. As he drove on, he glanced at it.

Pretty nice. Always wanted one, said wistfully. The one thing a smoker needs, too. Then he remembered that he had given up smoking. Darn it! Morned. Oh, well, I guess I'll hit a cigar once in a while and be a great convenience for other folks. Might make just a difference in getting chummy with some fellow that would put over sailing. Certainly looks nice there.

Certainly a mighty clever little jigger. Gives the last touch of refinement and class, and by golly, I guess I can afford it if I want to. Not going to be the only member of this family. never has a single doggone luxury. Thus, laden with treasurer, after three and a half blocks of romantic adventurer, he drove up to the club. Three. The Zenith Athletic Club is not athletic, and it isn't exactly a club.

But it is zenith in perfection. It has an active and smoked-misted billiard room. It is represented by baseball and football teams. And in the pool and gymnasium, a tenth of the members sporadically try to reduce. But most of its 3,000 members use it as a cafe in which to lunch, play cards, tell stories, meet customers, and entertain out-of-town uncles at dinner. It is the largest club in the city, and its chief hatred is the conservative union club, which all sound members of the athletic call a rotten, snobbish, dull, expensive old hole.

Not one good mixer in the place. You couldn't hire me to join. Statistics show that no member of that. Athletic has ever refused election to the Union, and of those who are elected, 67% resign from the Athletic, and thereafter heard to say in a drowsy sanctity of the Union lounge. Oh, the Athletic would be a pretty good hotel if it were more exclusive. The Athletic Club building is nine stories high, yellow brick with glossy roof garden above the portico of huge limestone columns below. The lobby with its thick pillars of porous kinning stone

its pointed vaulting in a brown glazed tile floor, like well-baked bread crust, is the combination of Cathedral Cripped and Ratskeller. The members rush into the lobby as though they were shopping and had much time for it. Thus did Babbitt enter, and to the group standing by the cigar counter, he whooped, How's the boys? How's the boys? Well, well, fine day. Jovelty, they whooped back. Virgil Gunched, the coal dealer. Sidney Finkelstein, the ladies ready to wear buyer for Partcher and Stern's department store, and Professor Joseph K. Pompery, owner of the right-way business college and instructor in public

speaking, business English, scenario writing, and commercial law. Though Babbitt admired the savant and appreciated Sidney Finkelstein as a mighty smart buyer and a good liberal spender, it was to Virgil Gunch that he turned with enthusiasm. Mr. Gunch was the president of the Boosters Club, a weekly lunch club, global chapter, of a national organization which promoted sound business and friendliness among regular fellows. He was also, no less an official than esteemed leading night in the benevolent and protective order of the Elks. And it was rumored that at the next election he would be a candidate for exalted ruler.

He was a jolly man, given to oratory and too chumminess with the arts. He called on the famous actors and vaudeville artists when they came to town, gave them cigars, addressed them by their first names, and sometimes succeeded in bringing them to the booster club lunches to give the boys a free entertainment. He was a large man with Heron Bross, and he knew the latest jokes, but he played poker close to the chest. It was at his party that Babbitt had sucked in the virus of today's restlessness.

Grunt shouted, "'How was the old Bolshevsky? How do you feel the morning after the night before?' "'Oh, boy, somehead. That was a regular party you through, Verge. "'Hope you haven't forgotten I took that last cute little jackpot,' babid-bellowed. He was three feet from grunch. "'That's all right now. What I'll hand you next time, Georgie, say. "'Do you notice in the paper the way the New York Assembly stood up to the Reds?' "'You bet I did. That was full.

Fine, nice day to day. Yes, it's one mighty fine spring day, but night's still cold. Yeah, you're right they are. Had to have a couple blankets last night on the sleeping ports. Say, Sid, Babbitt, turned to Finkelstein, the buyer. Got something I want to ask you about. I went out and bought me an electric cigar lighter for the car this noon and... Good hunch, said Finkelstein.

While even the learned professor, Pumperoy, a bulbous man, with a pepper and salt cut away and a pipe organ voice, commented, "'That's a dandy accessory. "'Cigarette lighter gives tone to the dashboard.' "'Yip, finally decided to buy me one. "'Got the best on the market, "'clerc said it was,

"'paid five bucks for it, "'just wondering if I got stuck. "'Well, they charged for them at your store, said.' "'Fingleston asserted that five dollars "'was not too great a sum, "'not for a really high-class lighter, "'which was subtly-nickled "'and provided with connections

"'of the very best quality. I always say, and believe me, I'm based it on a pretty fairly extensive mercantile experience. The best is the cheapest in the long run. Of course, if a fellow wants to be a Jew about it, he could get cheap junk, but in the long run, the cheapest thing is the best you can get. Now you take this the other day I got a new top from old boat and some of poultry, and I paid out $1.26.50. And, of course, a lot of fellows would say that was too much.

Lord, if the old folks, they live in one of these hick towns upstate, and they simply can't get on to the way a city fellow's mind works. And then, of course, there are Jews, and they'd lie down and die if they knew that Sid addied up 126 bones. But I don't figure I was stuck. George, not a bit. Machine looks brand new. Not that it's so darned old, of course.

It's had less than three years, but I give it a hard service, never drive less than a hundred miles on Sunday, oh, I really don't think you got stuck, George. In the long run, the best is, you might say, it's unquestionably the cheapest. That's right, said Virgil Gunch. That's the way I look at it. If a fellow is keyed up to what you might call intensive living, the way you get it here in Zenith, all the hustle and mental activity that's going on with a bunch of live wires like the boosters and here at the ZAC, why he's got to save his nerves by having the best. Babbitt nodded his head at every fifth word in the roaring rhythm and the conclusion in Gunch's renowned humorous vein. He was enchanted.

Still at that, George, don't know as you can afford it. I've heard your business is kind of under the eye of the government since you stole the tale of Ethorne Park and sold it. "'Oh, you're a great little Joshier, Verge. "'But when it comes to kidding, how about this report "'that you stole the black marble debts off the post office "'and sold them for a high-grade coal?' "'Indolite, babbid, padded, gunch his back and stroked his arm. "'That's all right, but what I want to know

"'is who's the real estate shark that bought that coal "'for his apartment houses?' "'I guess I'll hold you for a while, Georgie,' said Finkelstein. "'I'll tell you, though, boys, what I did here, George's Mrs. went into the Jenswear department at Parchers to buy him some collars, and before she could give his neck size, the clerk slips her some thirteen's. How's you know the size, says Miss Babbitt? And the clerk says, men that let their wives buy collars for him always wear thirteen, madam.

How's that? That's pretty good, eh? How's that, eh? I guess that'll about fix you, George. Aye, aye, aye. Babbitt sought for amiable insults and answer. He stopped, stared at the door. Paul Riesling was coming in. Babbitt cried,

See you later, boys! And hastened across the lobby. He was just then, neither the sulky child of the sleeping porch, the domestic tyrant of the breakfast table, the crafty money-changer of the lighty pre-conference, nor the blaring good fellow, the joshier and regular guy of the athletic club. He was an older brother to Paul Rydling,

swift to defend him admiring him with proud and credulous love, passing the love of women. Paul and he shook hands solemnly, They smiled as shyly as though they had been parted three years, not three days, and they said, "'How's the old horse thief?' "'All right, I guess. How are you, you poor shrimp?' "'I'm first-rate, you second-hand hunk of cheese,'

reassured thus of their fondness. Babbit grunted, "'You're a fine guy, you aren't ten minutes late,' rising slap. "'Well, you're lucky to have a chance to have lunch with a gentleman.' They grinned and went into the Norwegian watch-room, where a line of men bent over the bowls, insert along a, stidious slab of marble, as in religious prostation before their own images, in the massy mirror. Voices thick, satisfied, authoritative, hurled along the marble walls, bounded from the ceiling

of lavender-colored milky tiles, while the lords of the city, the barons of insurance and law and fertilizers and motor tires, laid down the law for Zenith, announced that the day was warm, indeed, indisputably, of spring, that wages were too high, and the interest. on mortgages too low, that Babe Ruth, the eminent player of baseball, was a noble man and that those two nuts at the climax Vodville Theater this week certainly are a slick pair of actors. Babbitt, though ordinarily his voice was the surest and most episcopal of all, was silent, in the presence of the slight dark reticence of Paul Rising. He was awkward. He desired to be quiet and firm and deft.

The entrance lobby of the athletic club was Gothic, the washroom, Roman Imperial, the lounge Spanish mission, and the reading room in Chinese Chippendale, but the gem of the club was the dining room, the masterpiece of Ferdinand Reitman, Zenith's busiest architect. It was lofty and half-timbered with two-door leaded casements and oriole, a somewhat musician-less musicians' gallery, and tapestries believed to illustrate the granting of Magna Carta. The open beams had been hand-as, by Jake Offutt's car bodyworks, the hinge were of hand-wrought iron, the waistcoat studded with handmade wooden pegs, and at one end of the room was a heraldic and hooded stone fireplace, which the club's advertising pamphlet asserted not only to be

larger than any of the fireplaces in European castles, but of a draught incomparably more scientific. It was also much cleaner, as no fire had ever been built in it. Half of the tables were mammoth slabs, which seated 20 or 30 men. Babbitt usually sat at the one near the door, with a group including Gunch Finkelstein Professor Pompfrey, Howard Littlefield, his neighbor T. Garmoldi Fink, the poet and advertising agent, and Orville Jones, whose laundry was in many ways the best in Zenith. They composed a club within the club. Then merrily called themselves the roughnecks.

Today, as he passed their table, the roughnecks greeted him. "'Wa-down! You and Paul are too proud to feed with poor folks? Afraid somebody might stick you for a bottle of bevo. George strikes me as you swells are getting awful darn exclusive.' He thundered. You bet. We can't afford to have our reps ruined by being seen with you tightwads. And guided Paul to one of the small tables beneath the musicians' gallery.

He felt guilty. At the Zenith Athletic Club, privacy was very bad for him. But he wanted Paul to himself. That morning he had advocated lighter lunches, and now he ordered nothing but English mutton chop, radishes, peas, deep dish, apple pie, a bit of cheese and a pot of coffee with cream, adding, as he did invariably,

and, uh, you might give me an order of French fried potatoes. When the chop came, he vigorously peppered it and salted it. He always peppered and salted his meat, and vigorously before tasting it. Paul and he took up the spring-like quality of the spring, the virtues of the electric cigar lighter, and the action of the New York State Assembly. It was not until Babbitt was thick and disconsolate with mutton grease that he flung out,

I wound up a nice little deal with Conrad Lighty this morning and put 500 good plunks in my pocket. Pretty nice, pretty nice. Yet, I don't know what's the matter with me today. Maybe it's an attack of spring fever or staying up too late at verge grunches, or maybe it's just the winter's work piling up. But I felt kind of down in the mouth all day long. Of course, I wouldn't beef about it to fellows at the roughneck table there, but you?

Ever feel that way, Paul? kind of comes over me here. I've pretty much done all the things I ought to do. Support my family, got a good house, a six-sinder car. Filled up a nice little business. I have any vices, especially except smoking. And I'm practically cutting that one out. By the way, and I belong to the church and play enough golf to keep interim,

and I only associate with good decent fellows. And yet, even so, I don't know that I'm entirely satisfied. It was drawn out, broken by shouts from the... the neighboring tables by mechanical love-making to the waitresses, by strenuous grunts as the coffee filled him with dizziness and indigestion. He was apologetic and doubtful, and it was Paul, with his thin voice who pierced the fault. Good Lord, George. You don't suppose it's any novelty to me to find that we hustlers that think we're so all-fired successful, aren't getting much out of it. You look as if you expected me to report you as sedacious. You know what my own life's been.

I know, man. I'm to have been a fiddler, and I'm a peddler of tar roofing. And Zilia? Oh, I don't want to squail, but you know as well as I do about how inspiring a wife she is, typical instance last evening. We went to the movies. There was a big crowd waiting in the lobby, a such a tail end. She began to push right through it with her, Sir, how dare you, manner? Honestly, sometimes when I look at her and see how she's always so made up and stinking of perfume

and looking for trouble and kind of always yelping, I'll tell you, I'm a lady, damn you. Why, I want to kill her. Well, she keeps elbowing through the crowd, me after her, feeling good and ashamed till she's almost up at the velvet rope and ready to be next let in. But there was a little squirt of a man there

probably been waiting half an hour. I kind of admired the little cuss, and he turns to zillion and says, Perfect of plight. Madam, why are you trying to push past me? And she simply, God, I was so ashamed, she rips out in him,

you're no gentleman, and she drags me into it and hoars, Paul, this person insulted me, and the poor skate, he got ready to fight. I made out, I hadn't hurt him. Sure, same as you wouldn't hear of a boiler factory, and tried to look away.

I can tell you exactly how every tile looks in the ceiling of that lobby. There's one with brown spots on it like the face of the devil, and all the time the people there, they were packed in like sardines. They kept making remarks about us, and Zilli went right on talking about the little chap and screeching that folks like him oughtn't be admitted in a place that's supposed to be for ladies and gentlemen.

And Paul, well, you kindly call the manager, so I can report this dirty rat, and maybe I wasn't glad when I could sneak inside and hide in the dark. After 24 years of that kind of thing, you don't expect me to fall down and foam at the mouth when you hint that this sweet, clean, respectable moral life isn't all it's cracked up to be, do you? I can't even talk about it, except you, because anybody else would think I was yellow. Maybe I am. Don't care any longer. Gosh, you've had to start. stand a lot of whining for me. First and last, Georgie. Rats. Now, Paul, you'll never really

what you could call whine. Sometimes I'm always blowing on Myra and the kids about that whale of a realtor I am, and yet sometimes I get a snicking idea. I'm not such a peer point Morgan as I let on to be. But if I ever do help by jawing you along, old Paulinsky, I guess maybe St. Pete may let me in after all. Yeah, you're a blowhard, Georgie, you cheerful cutthroat, but you certainly kept me going. Why don't you divorce, Celia? Why don't I? If I only could, if she'd just give me the chance.

You couldn't hire her to divorce me no nor desert me. She's too fond of her three squares and a few pounds of nut-centered chocolates in between. If she'd only be what they call. all unfaithful to me, George. I don't want to be too much of a stinker back in college. I'd have thought a man who could say that ought to be shot at sunrise, but honestly, I'd be tickled to death if she'd really go making love with somebody. Fat chance, of course. She'll flirt with anything, but you know how she holds her hands and laughs, that laugh, that horrible brassy laugh, the way she yaps, you naughty man, you better be careful or my big

husband will be after you, and the guy looking me over and thinking, why, you cute little thing, you run away now or I'll spank you, and she'll let him go just far enough so she gets some excitement out of it, and then she'll begin to do the injured, innocent, and have a beautiful time wailing. I don't think you were that kind of a person. They talk about the demi-virgeys of stories. They what? But the wise, hard, could force us. at old married women like Zilia, are worse than any bobbed hair girl that ever went boldly out in this here storm of life

and kept her umbrella slid up her sleeve. But rats, you know what Zilla is? How she nags, nags, nags, how she wants everything I can buy her, and a lot that I can't. And how absolutely unreasonable she is and what I get sore and try to have it out on her she plays the perfect lady,

so well that even I get fooled, and get all tangled up and a lot of why did you say's and I didn't means. I'll tell you, Georgie. You know my taste are pretty fairly simple, in a matter of food, at least. Of course, as you're always complaining, I do like decent cigars, not those flora decadigals you're smoking. That's all right now. That's good too-for.

By the way, Paul, did I tell you I decided to practically cut out, smoke? Yes, you, at the same time, if I can't get what I like, why I can do without it. I don't mind sitting down to burnt steak with canned peaches and store cake for a thrilling little dessert afterwards, but I do draw the line at having to sympathize with Zillia because she's so rotten, bad-tempered that the cook has quit, and she's been so busy sitting in a dirty-laced negligee all afternoon, reading about some brave, manly Western hero that she hasn't indeed had time to do any cooking. You're always talking about morals,

meaning monogamy, I suppose. You've been the rock of ages to me, all right, but you're essentially a sim, you... What do you get that sim, little man? Let me tell you. Love to look earnest and inform the world that it's the duty of responsible businessmen to be strictly moral, as an example to the community.

In fact, you're so earnest about morality, old George, that I hate to think how essentially immoral you must be underneath. All right, you can... Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, not. Now what's... Talk about morals all you want to, old thing, but believe me, if it hadn't been for you and an occasional evening playing of the violin to Terrell O'Farrell's Ocello,

and three or four darling girls that let me forget this beastly joke they call respectable life, I'd have killed myself years ago. And business, the roofing business. Roofs for cow sheds. Oh, I don't mean I haven't had a lot of fun out in the game. out of putting it over on the labor unions and seeing the big check coming in and the business increasing.

But what's the use of it? You know my business isn't distributing roofing. It's principally keeping my competitors from distributing roofing. Same as with you. All we do is cut each other's throats and make the public pay for it. Oh, look here now, Paul,

you're pretty darn near talking socialism. Oh, yes, of course. I don't really exactly mean that. Suppose, of course, competition brings out the best, survival of the fittest, but, but I mean, take all those fellows we know that kind right here in the club, now that seem to be perfectly content with their home life and their businesses, and that boosts zenith in the Chamber of Commerce and a haul for a million population. I bet if you could cut into their heads,

you'd find that one-third of them are sure enough satisfied with their wives and kids and friends in their offices, and one-third feel kind of wreathsless, but won't admit it, and one-third are miserable and know it. They hate the whole peppy-boosting go-ahead game, and they're bored with their wives, and think their families are fools. At least when they come to forty-five, they're bored, and they hate business, and they go.

Why do you suppose there's so many mysterious suicides? Why do you suppose so many substantial citizens jumped right into the war? Think it was all patriotism? Vabbitt snorted. What do you expect think we were sending to the world to have a soft time and what is it? Flood on flowery beds of eaves. Think man was made just to be happy?

Why not? Though I've never discovered anybody that knew what the deuce man really was made for. Well, we know, not just in the Bible alone, but it stands to reason. A man who doesn't buckle down and do his duty, even if it does bore him sometimes is nothing but, well, He's simply a weakling, mollycoddle, in fact. And what do you advocate? Come down to cases. If a man is bored by his wife,

do you seriously mean he has a right to chuck her and take a sneak or even kill himself? Good Lord, I don't know what's right man has. And I don't know the solutions of boredom. If I did, I'd be the one philosopher that had the cure for living. But I do know that about ten times, as many people find their lives dull and unnecessarily dull as ever admitted. And I do believe that if we busted out and admitted it, sometimes instead of being nice and patient and loyal for 60 years,

and then nice and patient and dead for the rest of eternity, why, maybe possibly, we might make life more fun. They drifted into a maze of speculation. Babbitt. Was Elphanlishly uneasy? Paul was bold, but not quite sure about what he was being bold. Now and then, Babbitt suddenly agreed with Paul in an admission which contradicted all his defensive duty in Christian patience,

and at each admission he had a curious, reckless joy. He said at last, "'Look here, old Paul, you do a lot of talking about kicking things in the face, but you never kick, why don't you?' "'No, what he does. Habit too strong, but Georgie?' I've been thinking of one mile bat, oh, don't worry, old pillar of monogony, it's highly proper. It seems to be settled now, isn't it?

Though, of course, Zilia keeps rooting for a nice expensive vacation in New York and Atlantic City with the bright lights and the bootleg cocktails and a bunch of lounge lizards to dance with. But the babbats and the riselings are sure enough going to Lake Sunoskwam, aren't we? Why couldn't you and I make some excuse, say business in New York, and get up to Maine four or five days before they do and just loaf by ourselves and smoke and cuss and be natural? Great, great idea, Babbit admired. Not for fourteen years had he taken a holiday without his wife,

and neither of them quite believed they could commit this audacity. Many members of the athletic club did go camping without their wives, but they were officially dedicated to fishing and hunting, whereas the sacred and unchangeable sports of Babbitt and Paul Riesling were golfing, motoring, and bridge. For either the fishermen or the golfers to have changed their habits would have been an infraction of their self-imposed discipline, which would have shocked all right-thinking and regularized citizens.

Babbitt blustered, Why don't we just put her foot down and say, We're going ahead of you, and that's all there is. is to it. Nothing criminal, and simply say to Zilia? Don't say anything to Zilia simply. Why, Georgie, she's almost as much of a moralist as you are, and if I told her the truth, she'd believe we were going to meet some dames in New York and even Myra. She never nags you the way Zillia does, but she'd worry, she'd say, don't you want me to go to Maine with you? I shouldn't dream of going unless you wanted me,

and you'd give in to save her feelings. Oh, the devil, let's have a shot at Duckpins. During the game of Duckpins, a juvenile form of bowling, Paul was silent. As they came down the steps of the club, not more than half an hour after the time at which Babbitt had sternly told Miss McGowan he would be back. Paul sighed, look here, old man. Oughton to talk about Zaly the way I did. Rats, old man lifts off steam.

Oh, I know, after spending all noon sneering at the conventional stuff, I'm conventional enough to be ashamed of saving my life by busting out with my fool troubles. Oh, Paul, your nerves are kind on the bum. I'm going to take you away. I'm going to rig this thing. I'm going to have an important deal in New York, and sure, of course, I'll need you to advise me on the roof of the building. And the old deal will fall through, and there'll be nothing for us but go on ahead to Maine. I, uh, Paul, when it comes right down to it, I don't care whether you bust loose or not. I do like having a rep for being one of the bunch,

but if you ever need me, I'd chuck it and come out for you every time. Not, of course, but what your, of course, I don't mean you'd ever do anything that would put a decent position on the fritz, but, so I mean, I'm kind of a clumsy old codger, and I need your fine I elitian hand, We, oh, hell, I can't stand here gassing all day.

On the job, s' long. Don't take any wood and nickels, Paulibitz. See you soon. Slong. End of chapter 5. Chapter 6 of Babit. This Sleeper Vox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti, Mike Vendetti.com.

Babet by Sinclair Lewis, Chapter 6. He forgot Paul Reisling in an afternoon of not unagreable details. After a return to his office, which seemed to have staggered on without him, he drove a prospect out to view a four-flat tenement in the Linton district. He was inspired by the customer's admiration of the new cigar-lighter. Thrice, its novelty made him use it, and thrice he hurled half-smoked cigarettes from the car, protesting,

I've got to quit smoking, so blame much. For ample discussion of every detail of the cigar-lighter led them to speak of electric flat-irons and bed-warmers. Fabit apologized for being so. shabbily old-fashioned is still to use a hot water bottle, and he announced that he would have the sleeping porch wired at once. He had enormous and poetic admiration, though very little understanding, of all mechanical devices. They were his symbols of truth and beauty. Regarding each new intricate mechanism, metal lathe, two-jet carburetor, machine gun, oxytelan welder, he learned one good realistic sounding phrase and used it over.

over and over with a delightful feeling of being technical and initiated. The customer joined him in the worship of machinery, and they came buoyantly up to the tenement and began that examination of plastic slate roof, calamine doors, and seven-eighth-inch blind-nailed flooring, began those diplomacy of hurt surprise and readiness to be persuaded to do something they had already decided to do which would someday result in a sale. On the way back, Babbitt picked up his partner and father-in-law, Henry T. Thompson, and his kitchen cabinet works. And they drove through South Zenith, a high-colored, banging, exciting region, new factories

of paholo tile with gigantic wireglass windows, surly old red brick factories, stained with tar, high-perched water tanks, big red trucks like locomotives, and on a score of hectic side tracks, far-wandering freight cars from the New York. York Central and Apple Orchards, the Great Northern, and Wheat Plateaus, the Southern Pacific, and Orange Groves. They talked to the secretary of the Zenith Foundry Company about an interesting artistic project, a cast iron fence for Linden Lane Cemetery. They drove on to the Zico Motor Company and interviewed the sales manager, Noel Riland, about a discount on a Zico car for Thompson. Babbitt and Royland were fellow members of the Boosters Club,

and no booster felt right if he bought anything from another booster without receiving a discount. But Henry Thompson growled, Oh, to hell with them, I'm not going to crawl around mooching discounts, not from nobody. It was one of the differences between Thompson, the old-fashioned, lean Yankee, rugged, traditional stage-tripe of American businessman and Babbitt, the plump, smooth.

efficient, up to the minute, and otherwise perfected modern. Whenever Thompson twanged, Put your John Hancock on that line. Babbitt was as much amused by the antiquated provincialism as any proper Englishman by any American. He knew himself to be of a breeding altogether more aesthetic and sensitive than Thompson's. He was a college graduate. He played golf. He often smoked cigarettes instead of cigars, and when he went to Chicago, he took a room with a private bath.

The whole thing is, he explained to Paul Reisling, these old codgers lack the subtlety that you have to have today. This advance in civilization could be carried too far, Babbitt perceived. Noel Rylind's sales manager of the Zico was a frivolous graduate of Princeton, while Babbitt was a sound and standardware from the great department store, the State University. Ireland wore spats. He wrote long letters about city planning and community singing, and though he was a booster, he was known to carry in his pockets small volumes of poetry in a foreign language. All this was going

too far. Henry Thompson was the extreme of insularity, and Noel Rylund, the extreme of frothiness, while between them, supporting the state, defending the evangelicals churches, and domestic brightness and sound business were Babbitt and his friends. With this just estimate of himself and with the promise of a discount on Thompson's car, he returned to his office in triumph. But as he went through the corridor of the Reeves building, he sighed, "'Poor old Paul, I got to—' "'Ah, damn, Noel Ryland, damn Charlie McKimity.

"'Just because they make more money than I do, "'they think they're so superior. "'I wouldn't be found dead. in their stuffy old union glove. Somehow, today, I don't feel like going back to work. Oh, well. Two.

He answered telephone calls. He read the four o'clock mail. He signed his morning's letters. He talked to a tenant about repairs. He fought with Stanley Graff. Young Graf, the outside salesman, was always hinting that he deserved an increase of commission. And today, he complained,

I think I ought to get a bonus if I put through the healer's sale. I'm chasing around and working on it every single evening, almost. Babbit frequent remarked to his wife, that it was better to con your office help along and keep them happy instead of jumping on them and poking him up. Get more work out of them that way. But this unexampled lack of appreciation hurt him, and he turned on graph.

Look here, Stan. Let's get this clear. You've got an idea somehow that it's you that do all the selling. Where'd you get that stuff? Where'd you think you'd be if it wasn't for our capital behind you, and our lists of properties, and all the prospects we find for you? All you got to do is follow up our tips and close the deal. The Hall Porter could sell Babit-Thompson listings. You say you're engaged to a girl, but have to put in your evenings chasing for buyers. Well, why the devil shouldn't you? What do you want to do? Sit around holding her hand?

Let me tell you, Stan, if your girl is worth her salt, she'll be glad to know you're out hustling, making some money to furnish the home nest instead of doing the lovy-dovey. The kind of fellow that kicks about working over time that wants to spend his evenings reading trashy novels or spawning and exchanging a lot of nonsense and foolishness with some girl, he ain't the kind of upstanding energetic young man with the future? And with vision that we want here, how about it? What's your ideal anyway? Do you want to make money and be a responsible member of the community? Or do you want to be a loafer with no inspiration or pep? Graff was not so amiable to vision and ideals as usual. You bet I want to make money. That's why I'm

I want that bonus. Honest, Mr. Babbitt. I don't want to get fresh, but this Heller House is a terror. Nobody will fall for it. The flooring is rotten and the walls are full of cracks. That's exactly what I mean, to a salesman with a love for his profession. It's hard problems like that that inspire him to do his best. Besides, Stan, matter of fact, Thompson and I are against bonuses as a matter of principle. We like you and we want to help you so you can get married. But we can't be unfair to the others on the staff. If we start giving you bonuses, don't you see we're going to hurt the feelings and be unjust to peniman and laylock? Rights right, and discrimination is unfair, and there ain't going to be any of it in this office.

Don't get the idea stand that because during the war salesmen were hard to hire. Now, when there's a lot of men out of work, there aren't a slew of bright young fellows that would be glad. Glad to step in and enjoy your opportunities and not act as if Thompson and I were his enemies and not do any work except for bonuses. How about it, eh? How about it? Oh, well, gee, of course, sighed, as he went out crab-wise. Babette did not often squabble with his employees.

He'd like to like the people about him. He was dismayed when they did not like him. it was only when they attacked the skagrid purse that he was frightened into a fury. But then, being a man given to oratory and high principles, he enjoyed the sound of his own vocabulary and the warmth of his own virtue. Today he had so passionately indulged in self-approval that he wondered whether he had been entirely just. After all, Stan isn't the boy anymore, oughtn't to call him so hard.

But rats got to haul folks over the coals now and then for their own good. Unpleasant duty, but I wonder if Stan is sore. She's saying to McGowan out there. So chill a wind of hatred blew from the outer office that the normal comfort of his evening home going was ruined. He was distressed by losing that approval of his employees to which an executive is always slave. Ordinarily he left the office with a thousand enjoyable fussy directions to the effect that there would undoubtedly be important task tomorrow, and Miss McGowan and Miss Banigan would do well to be there early, and for heaven's sake remind him to call up Cornell Lighty.

So as he came in, tonight he departed with feigned and apologetic liveliness. He was as afraid of his still-faced clerks of the eyes focused on him. Miss McGowan, stammering with head lifted from her typing, Miss Spanagan looking over her ledger, Matt Peniman, craning around at his desk in the dark alcove, Stanley Graff, sullenly expressionless, as a parvoe before the bleak promontory of his butler. He hated to expose his back to their laughter,

and in his efforts to be casually merry, he stammered and was rackiously friends, and oozed wretchedly up the door. But he forgot his misery when he saw from Smith Street the charms of floral heights, the roofs of red tile and green slate, the shining new sun parlors, and the stainless walls. Three.

He stopped to inform Howard Littlefield, his scholarly neighbor, that though the day had been springlight, the evening might be cold. He went in to shout, "'Where are you?' "'And his wife, with no very definite desire to know where she was, "'he examined the lawn to see whether the furnace man had raked it properly. "'With some satisfaction and a good deal of discussion of the matter with Mrs. Babbitt,

"' Ted and Howard Littlefield, he concluded that the furnace man had not raked it properly. "'He cut two tufts of wild grass with his wife's largest dress-making scissors. "'He informed Ted that it was all nonsense having, a furnace man. Big Husky fellow like you, you ought to do all the work around the house. And privately he meditated that it was agreeable to have it known throughout the neighborhood, that he was so prosperous that his son never worked around the house. He stood on the sleeping porch and did his days exercises, arms outside ways for two minutes, up for two minutes, while he muttered, "'Hourna, take more exercise, keep in shape.'

Then went in to see whether his collar needed to. changing before dinner. As usual, it apparently did not. The Lettish Croyd made a powerful woman, beat the dinner gong. The roast beef, roasted potatoes, and string beans were excellent this evening, and after an adequate sketch of the day's progressive weather states, his $450 fee, his lunch with Paul Reisling, and the proven merits of the new cigar lighter, he was moved to a benign, Sort of thinking about buying a new car. Don't believe we'll get one till next year, but still we might. Verona, the older daughter, cried,

Oh, Dad, if you do, why don't you get a sedan? That would be perfectly slick. A closed car is so much more comfy than an open one. Well, I don't know about that. I kind of like an open car. You get more fresh air that way. Oh, shoot. Just because you've never tried a sedan.

Let's get one. It's got a lot more class, said Ted. A closed car does keep the clothes nicer, from Mrs. Babbitt. You don't get your hair all blown to pieces, from Verona. It's a lot sportier, from Ted. And from Tinker the youngest.

Oh, let's have a sedan. Mary Ellen's father had got one. Ted wound up. Oh, everybody's got a closed car now, except us. Babbitt faced him. I guess you've got nothing very terrible to complain about anyway. I don't keep a car just to enable you children to look like millionaires, and I like an open car so you can put the top down on summer evenings and go out for a drive,

get some good fresh air. Besides, closed car costs more money. Ah, gee whiz, if the Lopadores can afford a closed car, I guess we can, brought it, Ted. I make $8,000 a year to his seven. but I don't blow it all in and waste it and throw it around the way he does. Don't believe in this business of going and spending a whole lot of money to show off and... They went with a door and some thoroughness into the matters of streamlined bodies,

hill climbing power, wire wheels, chrome steel, ignition systems, and body colors. It was much more than a study of transportation. It was an aspiration for nightly rank. In the city of Zenith, in the barbarous 20th century, a family motor indicated its social rank as precisely as the grades of the prairies determined the rank of an English family, indeed more precisely. Considering the opinion of old country families

upon newly created brewery barons in woollen-mill viscants, the details of precedents were never officially determined. There was no court to decide rather the second son of a piercero limousine, should go for dinner before the first son of a Buick roadster. But of the respective social importance, there was no doubt, and where Babette as a boy had aspired to the presidency, his son aspired to a Packard twin six,

and an established position in the motor gentry. The favor which Babbitt had won from his family by speaking of a new car evaporated, as they realized he didn't intend to buy one this year. Ted lamented, "'Ah, punk. The old boat looks as if it had fleas and been scratching its varnish off.'

Mrs. Babbitt said abstractedly, "'It's no way to talk to your father.' Babbit raged. If you're too much of a high-class gentleman and you belong to a bontan and so on, why, you needn't take the car out this evening,' Ted explained. I didn't mean and dinner dragged on with normal domestic delight

to the inevitable point at which Babbitt protested, "'Come, come, come now, we can't sit here all evening. Give the girl a chance to clear away the table.' He was fretting. What a family. I don't know how we all get to scrapping this way. Like to go off someplace and be able to hear myself think. Paul, Maine, wear old pants, loaf, and cuss.

He said cautiously to his wife, "'I've been in correspondence with a man in New York.' wants thee to seem about a real estate trade. May not come off till summer. Hope it doesn't break just when we and the Riesling get together to go to Maine. Be a shame. Couldn't make the trip there together. Well, no use worrying now.

Perona escaped immediately after dinner with no discussion, save an automatic. Why don't you ever stay home? From Babbitt. In the living room in a corner of the Davenport, Ted settled down to his homestead. study, plain geometry, Cicero, and the agonizing metaphors of Comus. I don't see why they give us this old-fashioned junk by Milton and Shakespeare and Wordsworth

and all these has-beens, he protested. I guess I could stand to see a show by Shakespeare if they had swell scenery and put on a lot of dog, but to sit down in cold blood and read them. These teachers, how do they get that way? Mrs. Babbitt, Darning Sock speculated. Yes, I wonder why. Of course, I don't want to fly in the face of the professors and everybody, but I do think there's things in Shakespeare. Not that I read him much, but when I was young,

the girls used to show me passages that weren't really, they weren't at all nice. Babette looked up irritably from the comic strips in the evening advocate. They composed his favorite literature and art, these illustrated chronicles in which Mr. Mutt hit Mr. Jeff with a rotten egg, and mother corrected father's vulgarisms by means of a rolling pen. With the solemn face of a devotee breathing heavily through his open mouth, he plotted nightly through every picture, and during the right, he detested interruptions. Furthermore, he felt that on the subject of Shakespeare he wasn't really an authority. Neither the

Advocate Times, the evening advocate, nor the bulletin of the Zenith Chamber of Commerce, had ever had an editorial on the matter. And until one of them had spoken, he found it hard to form an original opinion. But even at risk of floundering in strange bogs, he could not keep out of an open controversy. I'll tell you why you have to study Shakespeare and those. It's because they're required for college entrance,

and that's all there is to it. Personally, I don't see myself why they stuck them into an up-to-day, date high school system like we have here in this state. Be a good deal better if you took business English and learned how to write an ad or letters that would pull. But there it is. And there's no tall argument or discussion about it. Trouble with you, Ted, is you always want to do something different. If you're going to law school, and you are, I never had a chance to, but I'll see that you do. Why, you'll want to lay in all the English and Latin you can get. Oh, punk, I don't see what's the use of law school,

or even finishing high school. I don't want to go to college specially. Honest, there's a lot of fellows that have graduated from colleges that don't even begin to make as much money as fellows that went to work early. Old Shimmy Peters that teaches Latin in the high. He's a what is it from Columbia, and he sits up all night reading a lot of crazy books, and he's always spieling about the value of languages, and the poor silk doesn't even make but 1,800 a year. And no traveling salesman would think of working for that. I know what I'd like to do. I'd like to be an aviator, or own a cork and big garage, or else a fellow was telling me about it yesterday. I'd like to be one of those fellows that the standard oil company sends out to China, and you live

in a compound, and you don't have to do anywhere, and you get to see the world and pagodas and the ocean and everything. And then I could take up correspondence courses. That's real stuff. You don't have to recite to some frosty-faced old dame that's trying to show off to the principal, and you can study any subject you want to. Just listen to this. I clip these ads of some swell courses. He snatched from the back of his geometry half a hundred advertisements of those home study courses which the energy and foresight of American commerce have contributed to the science of education. The first displayed the portrait of a young man with a pure brow, an iron jaw, silk socks, and hair like patent leather, standing with one hand in his trouser pocket and the other

extended with chiding forefinger. He was bewitching an audience of men with gray beard, paunches, bald heads, and every other sign of wisdom and prosperity. Above the picture was an inspiring educational symbol, no antiquated lamp or torch or owl or manoeuvre. but a row of dollar signs. The text ran, Power and prosperity and public speaking, a yarn told at the club. Who do you think I ran into the other evening at the Deluxe restaurant?

Well, Freddy Durkey, that used to be a dead or a live shipping clerk in my old place, Mr. Mouseman, we used to laugh and we called the dear fellow. One time he was so timid, he was plumb scared of the super, and never got credit for the dandy work he did. Him at the Deluxe. And if he wasn't ordering a Tony feed,

with all the fixin from celery to nuts, and instead of being embarrassed by the waiters like he used to be at the little dump where we lunched in old Lang Zine, he was bossing them around like he was a millionaire. I cautiously asked him what he was doing. Freddy laughed and said, "'Say, old chum,

I guess you're wondering what's come over me. You'll be glad to know I am now an assistant super at the old shop and right on high road to prosperity and domination. And I look forward with confidence to a 12-cylinder car, and the wife is making things hum in the best society and the kiddies getting a first-class education. What we teach you. How to address your lodge.

How to give toast. How to tell dialect stories. how to propose to a lady, how to entertain banquets, how to make convincing selling talks, how to build a big vocabulary, how to create a strong personality, how to become a rational, powerful, and original thinker, how to be a master man.

Prof W. F. Pete author of the Shortcut Course in Public Speaking is easily the foremost figure in practical literature, psychology and oratory, a graduate of some of our leading universities, lecturer, extensive traveler, author of books, poetry, etc. A man with a unique personality of the masterminds. He is ready to give you all the secrets of his culture and hammering force in a few easy lessons that will not interfere with other occupation.

Here's how it happened. I ran across an ad of a course that claimed to teach people how to talk easily on their feet. and to answer complaints, how to lay a proposition before the boss, how to hit a bank for a loan, how to hold a big audience spellbound with wit, humor, and accede, inspiration, etc. It was compiled by the master orator, Professor Waldo F. Pete. I was skeptical too, but I wrote,

just on a postcard with name and address to the publisher for the lessons. Sent on trial. Money back. If you're not absolutely satisfied. There were eight simple lessons in plain language anybody could understand, and I studied them just a few hours a night, then started practicing on the wife. Soon found I could talk right up to the super and get due credit for all the good work I did. They began to appreciate me and advance me fast and say, oh, do you think they're paying me now? Six thousand five hundred dollars per year and say, I find I can keep a big audience fascinated speaking on any topic. As a friend, old boy, I advise you to send for circular, no obligation, and valuable free art picture to

Shortcut Educational Publishing Company, Desk W.A. Sanpitt, Iowa. Are you a 100% or a 10%? Babbitt was again without a cannon which would enable him to speak with authority. Nothing in motoring or real estate had indicated what a solid citizen and regular fellow ought to think about culture by mail. He began with hesitation. Well, sounds as if it covered the ground certainly is a fine thing to be able to orate.

I sometimes thought I had a little talent that way myself. And I know darn well than one reason why a four-flushing old back number like Chan Mott can get away with it in real estate, it's just because he can make a good talk, even when he hasn't got a doggone thing to say. And it certainly is pretty cute the way they get out all those courses on various topics and subjects nowadays. I'll tell you, though, no need to blow a lot of good money on this stuff when you can get a first-rate course in eloquence in English and all that right now in your own school. And one of the biggest school

buildings in the entire country. That's so, said Mrs. Babbitt comfortably while Ted complained. Yeah, but Dad, they just teach a lot of old junk that isn't any practical use except the manual training and

typewriting and basketball and dancing, and in these correspondence courses, gee, you can get all kinds of stuff that would come in handy. Say, listen to this one. Can you play a man's part? If you are walking with your mother, sister, or best girl, and someone passes a sliding remark or uses improper language, won't you be ashamed if you can't take her part? Well, can you? We teach boxing and self-defense by mail. Many pupils have written saying that after a few lessons,

they've outboxed bigger and heavier opponents. The lessons start with simple movements, practice before your mirror, holding out your hand for a coin, the breaststroke in swimming, etc. Before you realize it, you are striking scientifically, ducking, guarding, and feigning, just as if you had a real opponent before you. Oh, baby, maybe I wouldn't like that, Ted chanted. I'll tell the world, gosh, I'd like to take one fellow I know in school that's always shooting off his mouth and catch him alone. Nonsense. The idea most use the thing I ever heard of. Babbit, flaminated. Well, just suppose I was walking with Mama or Rhone, and somebody passed a sliding remark or used improper language.

What would I do? Well, you'd probably bust the record for the hundred-yard dash. I would not. I'd stand right up to any mucker that passed a sliding remark on my sister, and I'd show him. Look here, young Dempsey, if I ever catch you fighting a wily everlasting daylight's out of you, and I'll do it without practice and holding out my hand for a coin before a mirror, too. Why, Ted dear, Mrs. Babbitt said placidly,

"'It's not at all nice you're talking of fighting this way.' "'Well, gosh, almighty, that's a fine way to appreciate, and then suppose I was walking with you, Ma, and somebody passed a sliding remark.' "'Nobody's going to pass no sliding remarks on nobody,' Babbitt observed. "'None if they stay home and study their geometry and mind their own affairs instead of hanging out around a lot of pool rooms and soda fountains and places where nobody got any business to be. But, God, if they did, Mrs. Babbit chirped.

Well, if they did, I wouldn't do them the honor of paying any attention to them. Besides, they never do. You always hear about these women that get followed and insulted and all, but I don't believe a word of it, or it's their own fault, the way some women look at a person. certainly never have been insulted by, oh, shoot, mother, just suppose you were sometime. Just suppose. Can't you suppose something?

Can't you imagine things? Certainly I can imagine things, the idea. Certainly mother can imagine things and suppose things. Think you're the only member of this household that's got imagination? Babbitt demanded. But what's the use of a lot of supposing? Supposing never get you anywhere. No sense supposing when there's a lot of.

lot of real facts to take into a considerer. Look here, Dad, suppose, I mean, just, just suppose you were in your office and some rival real estate man. Realtor. Some realtor that you hated came in. I don't hate any realtor. But suppose you did. I don't intend to suppose anything of the kind.

There's plenty of fellows in my profession that stoop and hate their competitors. But if you were a little older and understood business, instead of always going on to the movies and running around with a lot of fool girls with their dresses up to their knees and powdered and painted and rouged and God knows what all is if they were chorus girls, then you'd know. And you'd suppose that if there's any one thing I stand for

in the real estate circles of Xenus, it is that we ought to always speak of each other only in the friendliest terms and institute a spirit of brotherhood and cooperation. And so I certainly can't suppose, and I can't imagine. hating any other realtor not even that dirty forflush and society sneak Cecil roundtree But and there's no if and or but about it

But if I were going to lambass somebody I wouldn't require any fancy ducks or swimming strokes before a mirror Or any of the doodads of flip-flops suppose you were out someplace and a fellow called you vile names Think you'd want to box and jump around like a dancing master You'd just lame out cold, least I certain to hope any son of mine would, and then you'd dust off your hands and go on about your business. And that's all there is to it. And you aren't going to have any boxing lessons by mail either. Well, but yes, I just wanted to show how many different kinds of correspondence courses there are instead of all that camber they teach us in the high. But I thought they'd taught you boxing in the school gymnasium. It's different. They stick you up in some big stiff.

amuses himself pounding the stuffins out of you before you have a chance to learn. Not any, but... Anyway, listen to some of these others. The advertisements were truly philanthropic. One of them bore the rousing headline, Money, Money, Money. The second announced that Mr. PR, formerly making only 18 a week in a barbershop, writes to us that since taking our course,

he is now pulling down 5,000 as an osteo-vitalic physician, and the third that Miss J.L., recently a rapper in a store, is now getting ten real dollars a day, teaching our Hindu system of fibratory breathing and mental control. Ted had collected 50 or 60 announcements from annual reference books from Sunday School Periodical Fiction Magazines and journals of discussion. One benefactor implored, Don't be a wallflower, be more popular and make more money.

You can, ukulele or sing yourself. into society. By the secret principles of a newly discovered system of music, teaching, anyone, man, lady, or child can, without tiresome exercises, special training, or long-drawn-out study, and without waste of time, money, or energy, learn to play by note, piano, banjo, coronet, clarinet, saxophone, violin, or drum, and learn sight singing. The next under the wistful appeal, Fingerprint detectives wanted, big incomes, confided, you, red-blooded men and women, This is the profession you have been looking for. There's money in it. Big money. And that rapid change of scene, that entrancing and compelling interest and fascination

in which your active mind and adventure spirit clave. Think of being the chief figure and directing factor in solving strange mysteries and baffling crimes. This wonderful profession brings you into contact with influential men on the basis of equality and often calls upon you to travel everywhere, maybe to distant lands, all expenses paid, no special education required. Oh boy, I guess that wins a fire brick necklace. Wouldn't it be swell to travel everywhere and nap some famous crook? Whoop, Ted? Well, I don't think much of that. Doggone likely to get hurt. Still, that music study stunt might be pretty fair, though. There's no reason why if efficiency experts put their minds to it the way they have to routing products in a factory, they couldn't

figure out some schemes so a person wouldn't have to monkey with all this practicing and exercising that get in music. Babbitt was impressed, and he had a delightful parental feeling that they, too, the men of the family, understood each other. He listened to the notices of mailbox universities which taught short-story writing, improving the memory, motion picture acting, and developing the soul power, banking, and Spanish, cheropody and photography, electrical engineering, and window trimming, poultry racing, and chemistry. Wow, well, Babbitt sought for adequate expression of his admiration. I'm a son of a gun.

I know this correspondent school business had become a mighty profitable game, makes suburban real estate look like two cents, but I didn't realize it had got to be such a key industry. Must rank right up there with groceries and movies. I always figured somebody had come along with the brains not to leave education to a lot of bookworms than impractical theorists, but make a big thing out of it. Yes, I can see how a lot of those courses might interest you.

I must ask the fellows of athletics if they ever realized. But same time, Ted, you know how advertisers, I mean, some advertisers exaggerate. I don't know as they'd be able to jam you through those courses as fast as they claim they can. Oh, sure, Dad, of course. Ted had the immense and joyful maturity of a boy who is respectfully listened to by his elders. concentrated on him with grateful affection. I can see what an influence these courses might have on the whole educational works. Of course, I had never admitted publicly, a fellow like myself, a state U graduate.

It's only decent and patriotic for him to blow his horn and boost in alma mater. But smarter of fact, there's a whole lot of valuable time lost even at the U, studying poetry and French and subjects that never brought in anybody a cent. I don't know, but what, maybe these correspondence courses might prove to be one of the most important American inventions. Trouble a lot of folks, they're so blamed material. They don't see the spiritual and mental side of American supremacy. They think that inventions like the telephone and airplane and wireless. No, that was a whopping invention, but anyway, they think these mechanical improvements are all that we stand for, whereas to a real thinker, he sees that spiritual and, uh, dominating movements like efficiency and rotarianism and prohibition and democracy are what compose our deepest and truest wealth. And maybe this new principle and education at home may

be another way of, be another factor. I'll tell you, Ted, we've got to have vision. I think those correspondence courses are terrible. The philosophers gasped. It was Mrs. Babbitt who had made this discord in their spiritual harmony, and one of Miss Babbitt's virtues was that except during dinner parties, when she was transformed into a raging hostess, she took care of the house and didn't bother the males by thinking. She went on firmly. It sounds awful to me the way they coaxed these poor young folks to think they're learning something, and nobody round to help them, and you two learn so quick.

But me, I always was slow, but just the same. Babette attended to her. Nonsense. Get just as much studying at home. You don't think. a fellow learns anymore because he blows in his father's hard-earned money and sits around in morris chairs in a swell harvard dormitory with pictures and shields and table covers and no do-dads do you i tell you i'm a college man i know there is one objection you might make though i certainly

do protest against any effort to get a lot of fellows out of barbershops and factories into the professions they're too crowded already and what will we do for work men if all those fellows go and get educated Ted was leaning back, smoking a cigarette without reproof. He was, for the moment, sharing the high, thin air of Babbitt's speculation as though he were a Paul Riesling or even Dr. Howard Littlefield, he hit it. Well, what do you think, then, Dad? Wouldn't it be a good idea if I could go off to China or some peppy place and study engineering or something by mail?

No, and I'll tell you why, son. I've found out it's a mighty nice thing to be able to say you're a BA. some client that doesn't know what you are and thinks you're just a plug businessman. He gets to shooting off his mouth about economics or literature or foreign trade conditions, and you just ease in something like, when I was in college, of course I got my BA in sociology and all that junk. Oh, it puts an awful crimp in their style, but there wouldn't be any class to saying I got the degree of sticker liquor from Benz's mail order university,

You see? My dad was a pretty good old coot, but he never had much style to him, and I had to work darn hard to earn my way through college. Well, it's been worth it, to be able to associate with the finest gentleman in Zenith at the clubs and so on. And I wouldn't want you to drop out of the gentleman class, the class that are just as red-blooded as common people, but still have power and personality. It would kind of hurt me if you did that, old man. I know, Dan. Sure. All right. I'll stick to it. Say, gosh, gee whiz. I forgot all about those kids I was going to take to the chorus rehearsal. I'll have to duck. But you haven't done your homework. Do it first thing in the morning. Well, six times in the past 60 days, babbitt had stormed. You will not do it first thing in the morning. You'll do it right now. But tonight he said, well, better hustle. His smile was the rare shy radiance he kept for Paul Reisling. Four. Ted's a good boy, he said to Miss Babbit.

Oh, he is. Who these girls are going to pick up? Are they nice, decent girls? I don't know. Oh, dear. Ted never tells me anything anymore. I don't understand what's come over with the children of this generation. I used to have to tell Papa and Mama everything,

but seems like the children today have just slipped away from all control. Oh, they're decent girls. Of course, Ted's no longer. a kid and I wouldn't want him to get mixed up and everything. George, I wonder if you had not to take him aside and tell him about things? She blushed and lowered her eyes. Well, I don't know. We I figured, Mara, no sense suggesting a lot of things to a boy's mind.

Think up enough devilment by himself, but I wonder. It's kind of a hard question. Wonder what Littlefield thinks about it. Of course, Papa agrees with you. He says all this instruction is he says tisn't decent. Oh, he does, does he? Well, let me tell you that whatever Henry T. Thompson thinks about morals, I mean, though, of course, you can't beat the old duffer.

Why, what a way to talk of Papa. Simply can't beat him at getting in on the ground floor of a deal. But let me tell you, whenever he springs any ideas about higher things and education, then I know I think just the opposite. You may not regard me as any great brain shark, but believe me, I'm a regular college president compared to Henry T. Yes, sir, by golly. I'm going to take Ted aside and tell him why I lead strictly moral life. Oh, will you? When?

When? What's the use of trying to pin me down to when and why and where and how and when? That's the trouble with women. That's why they don't make a high-class executives. They haven't any sense of diplomacy. when the proper opportunity in occasion arises so it just comes in natural why then i'll have a friend little talk with him and was that tinkah hollering upstairs she ought to be asleep long ago he prowled through the living-room and stood in the sun-parlour that glass-walled room of wicker chairs and swinging couch in which they loafed on sunday afternoons outside only the light of doppelbrow's house and the dim present of babbitt's favorite elm broke the softness of April night.

Good business with the void, getting over feeling crankily the way I did this morning, and restless. Though by golly, I will have a few days alone with Paul in Maine, and that devil's zilla. But dead's all right, whole family's all right, and good business. Now many fellows make 450 bucks practically half of a thousand dollars easy as I did today. Maybe when we all get to Rowan, it's just as much my fault as it is theirs. to get grouchy like a do but wish i'd been a pioneer same as my granddad then wouldn't have a house like this oh gosh i don't know

he thought moodily of paul risling of their youth together of the girls they had known when babbitt had graduated from the state university twenty-four years ago he had intended to be a lawyer he had been a ponderous debater in college he felt that he was an orator he He saw himself becoming governor of the state. While he read law, he worked as a real estate salesman. He saved money, lived in a boarding house, supped on poach, Deg and hash. The lively Paul Riesling, who was going off to Europe to study by a lynn next month or next year, was his refuge till Paul was bespelled by Zila Colbeck, who laughed and danced and drew men after her plump and gaily wagging finger. Babbitt's evenings were barren then, and he found comfort only in Paul's second cousin,

Ira Thompson, a sleek and gentle girl who showed her capacity by agreeing with the ardent young Babbitt that, of course, he was going to be governor some day. Where Zillia mocked him as a country boy, Myra said indignantly that he was ever so much soldier than the young dandies, who had been born in the great city of Zenith, an ancient settlement in 1897, 105 years old, with 200,000 population, the queen and wonder of all the state, and to the Catawabba boy, George Babbitt, so vast and thunderous and luxurious that he was flattered to know a girl, ennobled by birth and zenith. Of love there was no talk between them. He knew that if he was to study law he could not marry for years, and Myra was

distinctly a nice girl. One didn't kiss her, one didn't think about her, that way, at all, unless one was going to marry her. But she was a dependable companion. She was always ready to go skating, walking, always content to hear his discourses on the great things he was going to do, the distressed poor, whom he would defend against the unjust rich, the speeches he would make at banquets. the inactitudes of popular thought, which he would correct.

One evening, when he was weary and soft-minded, he saw that she had been weeping. She had been left out of a party given by Zelia. Somehow her head was on his shoulder, and he was kissing away her tears, and she raised her head to say, trustingly, Now that we're engaged, shall we be married? Sooner or shall we wait?

Engaged! it was his first hint of it his affection for this brown tender woman went cold and fearful but he could not hurt her could not abuse her trust he mumbled something about waiting and escaped he walked for an hour trying to find a way of telling her that it was a mistake often in the month after he got near to telling her but it was pleasant to have a girl in his arms and less and less could he insult her by blurting out that he didn't love her he himself had no doubt the evening before his marriage was an agony and the morning wild with a desire to flee she made him what is known as a good wife she was loyal industrious and at rare times merry she passed from a feeble discussed at their closer relations into what promised to be an ardent affection, but it drooped into bored routine. Yet she existed only for him and for the children, and she was as sorry, as worried as himself, when he gave up the law, and trudged on in a rut of listing real estate.

"'Poor kid, she hadn't had much better time than I have,' Babbitt reflected, standing in the dark sun-parlour. But I wish I could have had a whirl at law and politics. Seen what I could do. Well, maybe I've made more money as it is. He returned to the living room, but before he settled down, he smoothed his wife's hair, and she glanced up, happy and somewhat surprised.

End of Chapter 6. Chapter 7 of Babet. This Libravox recording is in the public domain, recording by Mike Vindetti, mikevindetti.com. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis, Chapter 7. Part 1. He solemnly finished the last copy of the American magazine while his wife sighed, laid away or darning, and looked enviously at the lingerie designs in a woman's magazine. The room was very still. It was a room which observed the best floral height standards. The gray walls were divided into artificial paneling by strips of white enameled pine. From the

Babbitt's former house had come too much carved rocking chairs, but the other chairs were new, very deep and restful, upholstered in blue and gold-stripped velvet. A blue velvet Davenport faced a fireplace, and behind it was a cherry-wood table and a tall piano lamp with a shade of golden silk. Two out of every three houses in floral heights had before the fireplace, a Davenport, a mahogany table real or imitation, and a piano lamp or reading lamp with a shade of yellow or rose silk. On the table was a runner of gold-threaded Chinese fabric, four magazines, a silver box containing cigarette crumbs, and three gift books, large, expensive editions of fairy tales illustrated by English artists, and as yet unread by any babbitt save Tinka.

In a corner by the front windows was a large cabinet-fixie. Trolla. Eight out of every nine Floral Heights houses had a cabinet phonograph. Among the pictures hung in the exact center of each gray panel were a red and black imitation engling hunting print,

an anemic imitation boudoir print, with a French caption of whose morality Babbitt had always been rather suspicious and a hand-colored photograph of a colonial room. Rag-rug, Maiden Spinning, Cat de Mure before a white fireplace.

Nineteen out of every twenty houses in floral heights had either a hunting print, a Madame Fijla Toilete print, a colored photograph of a New England house, a photograph of a Rocky Mountain, or all four. It was a room as superior in comfort to the parlor of Babit's boyhood as his motor was superior to his father's buggy. Though there was nothing in the room that was interesting, There was nothing that was offensive.

It was as neat and as negative as a block of artificial ice. The fireplace was unsoftened by downy ashes or sooty brick. The brass fire irons were of immaculate polish, and the grenadier and irons were like samples in a shop, desolate, unwanted, lifeless things of commerce. Against the wall was a piano, with another piano lamp, but no one used it, save Tinka. The hard briskness of the phonograph contented them. Their store of jazz records made them feel wealthy and cultured. And all they knew of creating music was the nice adjustment of a bamboo needle.

The books on the table were unspotted and laid in rigid parallels. Not one corner of the carpet rug was curled and nowhere. Was there a hockey stick, a torn picture book, an old cap, or a gregarious and disorganizing dog? Two. At home, Babbit never read with absorption. He was concentrated enough at the office, but here he crossed his legs and fidgeted. When his story was interesting, he read the best. That was the funniest paragraphs to his wife. When it did not hold him, he coughed, scratched his ankles and his right ear, thrust his left thumb into his vest's pocket, jingled his silver, whirled the cigar cutter and keys on one end of his watch chain,

rubbed his nose and found errands to do. He went upstairs to put on his slippers, his elegant slippers of sealed brown, shaped like medieval shoes. He brought up an apple from the barrel, which stood by the trunk closet in the basement. Apple Day keeps the doctor away, he enlightened Mrs. Babbitt, for quite the first time in 14 hours.

That's so. An apple is nature's best regulator. Yes, Sid. Trouble of women is, they never have sense enough to form regular health, habits. Well, hi. Always nibbling and eating between meals. George, she looked up from her reading. Did you have a light lunch today, like you were going to? I did. This malicious and unprovoked attack astounded him. Well, maybe it wasn't light as went to lunch with Paul and didn't have much chance to diet.

Oh, you needn't grin like a Chessy Cat. If it wasn't for me watching out and keeping an eye on our diet, I'm the only member of this family that appreciates the value of oatmeal for breakfast. She stooped over her story while he piously sliced and gulped down the apple. Discoursing. One thing I've done, cut down my smoking. Had kind of a run-in-with-graf in the office, he's getting too darn fresh. I'll stand for a good deal, but once in a while I got to assert my authority, and I jumped him, stand. I said, well, I told him just exactly where to get off.

off. Funny kind of day. Makes me feel restless. Well, I'm the sleepiest sound in the world, the terminal yawn. Mrs. Babbit yawned with it, and look graceful as he droned. How about going to bed, eh? Don't suppose Rone and Ted will be in till all hours. Yep, funny kind of day, not terribly warm, but yet, gosh, I'd like, someday I'm going to take a long motor trip. Yes, sweet, enjoy that, she yawned. He looked away from her as he realized that he did not wish to have her go with him. As he locked the doors and tried windows and set the heat regulator so that the furnace drafts would open automatically in the morning,

he sighed a little heavily with the lonely feeling which perplexed and frightened him. So absent-minded was he that he could not remember which window catches he had inspected, and through the darkness, fumbling at unseen perilous chairs, he crept back to try them all over again. His feet were loud on the steps as he clumped upstairs at the end of his great and treacherous day of veiled rebellions. Three. Before breakfast, he always reverted to upstate village boyhood

and shrank from the complex urban demands of shaving, bathing, deciding whether the current shirt was clean enough for another day. Whenever he stayed home in the evening, he went to bed early, and Thriftfully got ahead in those dismal duties. It was his luxurious custom to shave while sitting snugly in a tub full of hot water. He may be viewed tonight as a plump, smooth, pink, baldish, podgy, good man, robbed of the importance of spectacles,

squatting in breast-high water, scraping his lather-smeared cheeks with a safety razor, like a tiny lawnmower, and with melancholy dignity, clawing through the water to recover a slippery and active piece of soap. He was lulled to dreaming by the caressing warmth. The light fell on the inner surface of the tub in a pattern of delicate, record lines,

which slipped with a green sparkle over the curving porcelain as the clear water trembled. Babbitt lazily watched it. Noted that along the silhouette of his legs against the radiance on the bottom of the tub, the shadows of air bubbles clinging to the hairs were reproduced as strange jungle-mob. He patted the water, and reflected light capsized and leaped and volleyed.

He was content and childish. He played. He shaved a swath down the calf of one plump leg. The drain pipe was dripping, a dulcate and lively song. Drip-drip-drip-dribble, drippity, drip-drip. He was enchanted by it. He looked at the solid tub, the beautiful nickel tabs. The tiled walled. of the room and felt virtuous in the possession of this splendor. He roused himself and spoke gruffly to his bath-thing. Come here, you've done enough, fooling. He reproved the treacherous soap and defied the scratchy nail brush with,

Oh, you would, would you? He soaped himself and rinsed himself, and austerily rubbed himself. He noted a hole in the Turkish towel, and meditatively thrust a finger through it, and marched back to the bedroom, a grave and unbending citizen. There was a moment of gorgeous abandon, a flash of melodrama such as he found in traffic driving, when he laid out a clean collar, discovered that it was frayed in front, torn up, with magnificent yin sound.

Most important of all was the preparation of his bed and the sleeping porch. It is not known whether he enjoyed his sleeping porch because of the fresh air or because it was the standard thing to have a sleeping porch. just as he was an elk, a booster, and a member of the Chamber of Commerce, just as the priests of the Presbyterian Church determined his every religious belief and the senators who control the Republican Party decided in the smoky rooms in Washington what he should think about disarmament, tariff, and Germany, so did the large national advertisers fix the surface of his life,

fixed what he believed to be individuality. These standard advertised wares, toothpings, Faced, socks, tires, cameras, instantaneous hot water heaters, were his symbols and proofs of excellence. At first, the signs, then the substitutes for joy and passion and wisdom. But none of these advertised tokens of financial and social success was more significant than a sleeping porch with a sun parlor below. The rights of preparing for bed were elaborate and unchanging.

The blankets had to be tucked in at the foot of his cot, also the reason why the maid hadn't tucked in the blanket's head to be discussed with Mrs. Babbitt. The rag rug was adjusted so that his bare feet would strike it when he arose in the morning. The alarm clock was wound, the hot water bottle was filled, and placed precisely two feet from the bottom of the cot. These tremendous undertakings yielded to his determination, one by one they were announced to Mrs. Babbitt, and smashed through to accomplishment. At last his brow cleared, and in his night rang rural power. But there was yet need of courage.

As he sank into sleep just at the first exquisite relaxation, the dopplero car came home. He bounced into waitfulness, lamenting, Why the devil can't some people never get to bed at a reasonable hour? So familiar was he with the process of putting up his own car that he awaited each step like an able executioner condemned to his own rack. The car, insultingly cheerful in the driveway. The car door opened and banged shut.

Then garage door slid open, grating on the sill, and the car door again. The motor raced for the climb up into the garage and raced once more, explosively, before it was shut off. a final opening and slamming of the car door silence then a horrible silence filled with waiting till the leisurely mr dapperlew had examined this state of his tires and had at last shut the garage door instantly for babbitt a blessed state of oblivion four at that moment in the city of zenith horace updyke was making love to lusel mcleverley in their mob drawing-room on royal ridge after the city of zenith horace updyke was making love to lus mccleveli in their mob drawing-room on royal ridge after the the return from a lecture by the eminent English novelist Updike was Zenith's professional bachelor, a slim-wasted man of 46, with an infeminate voice in taste in flowers, cretones, and flappers. Mrs. McEvely was red-haired, creamy, discontented, exquisite, rude and honest.

Updike tried his invariable first maneuver, touching her nervous wrist. "'Don be need it,' she said. Do you mind awfully? No. That's what I mind. He changed to conversation. He was famous at conversation. He spoke reasonably of psychoanalysis, Long Island Podu,

and the Ming platter he had found in Vancouver. She promised to meet him in Deerville, the coming summer, though she sighed, becoming too dreadfully banal, nothing but Americans and frowsy English baronesses. And at that moment, moment in Zenith, a cocaine runner and a prostitute. We're drinking cocktails in Healyhansson Saloon on Front Street. Since national prohibition was now in force and since Zenith was notoriously

law-abiding, they were compelled to keep cocktails innocent by drinking them out of teacups. The lady threw her cup at the cocaine runner's head. He worked his revolver out of the pocket in his sleep and casually murder her. At that moment in Zenith, two men sat in a laboratory. For 37 hours now they had been working on a report of their investigations of synthetic rubber. At that moment in Zenith, there was a conference of four union officials as to rather the 12,000 coal miners within 100 miles of the city should strike. Of these men, one resembled a testy and prosperous grocer, one a Yankee carpenter, one a soda jerk, and one a Russian Jewish actor. The Russian Jew quoted Kovsky, Jean Debs, and Abraham Lincoln. At that moment, a G-A-R veteran was dying.

He had come from the Civil War straight to a farm, which, though it was officially within the city limits of Zenith, was primitive as the backwoods. He had never ridden in a motor car, never seen a bathtub, never read any book save the Bible, McGuffie's readers and religious tracks, and he believed that the earth is flat, that the English are the lost ten tribes of Israel,

and that the United States is a democracy. At that moment, the steel and cement town which composed the factory of the Pullmore Tractor Company of Zenith was running on night shift to fill an order of tractors for the Polish Army. It hummed like a million bees, glared through its wide windows like a volcano. Along the high wire fences, searchlights played on the cinderline yard, switch tracks and arm guards on patrol. At that moment, Mike Mundy was finishing a meeting, Mr. Mundy, the distinguished events. The Evangelist, the best-known Protestant pontiff in America, had once been a prize-fighter. Satan had not dealt justly with him.

As a prize-fighter, he gained nothing but his crooked nose, his celebrated vocabulary, and his stage presence. The service of the Lord had been more profitable. He was about to retire with a fortune. It had been well earned for, to quote his last report, Reverend Mr. Mundy, the prophet with a punch, has shown that he is a world's greatest sailman of salvation, and that by efficient organization.

The overhead of spiritual regeneration may be kept down to an unprecedented rock-bottom basis. He has converted over 200,000 lost and priceless souls, at an average cost of less than $10 a head. Of the larger cities of the land, only Zenith had hesitated to submit its vices to Mike Mundy and his expert reclamation corps. The more enterprising organizations of the city had voted to invite him, Mr. George F. Babbitt had once praised him in a speech at the Boosters Club. But there was opposition from certain Episcopalian and Congregationalist ministers,

those renegades whom Mr. Mundy so finely called, a bunch of gospel pushers with dishwater instead of blood, a gang of squealers that need more dust on their knees of their pants, and more hair on their skinny old chest. This opposition had been crushed when the Secretary of the Chamber of Commerce had reported to a committee of manufacturers that in every city he had appeared,

Mr. Mundy had turned the minds of workmen from wages and hours to hire things, and thus averted strikes. He was immediately invited. An expense fund of $40,000 had been underwritten. Out on the county fairgrounds, a Mike Mundy tabernacle had been reversed, directed, to seat 15,000 people.

In it, the prophet was at this moment, concluding his message. There are a lot of smart college professors and tea-guzzling slabs in this burg that say I'm a roughneck and it never waser, and my knowledge of history is not yet. Oh, there's a gang of woolly-whiskered book lice that think they know more than Almighty God and prefer a lot of Han science and smutty German criticism. to the straight and simple word of God. Oh, there's a swell bunch of Lizzie boys and lemon suckers and pie faces and infandals and beer-blooded scribblers that love to fire off their filthy mouth

and yip that Mike Mundy is vulgar and full of mush. Those pups are saying now that I hog the gospel show, that I'm in it for the coin. Well, now listen, folks, I'm going to give those birds a chance. They can stand up here and tell me to my face that I'm a galute and a liar and a hick. Only if they do. If they do, don't faint with surprise if some of them whose rum-dum-dum liars get one good swift poke from Mike, with all the kick of God's flaming righteousness behind the wallop. Well, come on, folks.

Who says it? Who says Mike Mundy is a foreflushing a Yahoo? Huh? I didn't see anybody standing up. Well, there you are. Now I guess the folks in this town will quit listening to all the koo-yotting from behind the fence. I guess you'll quit listening to the guys that pan and roast and kick and beef and vomit out, filthy atheism, and all of you come in with every grain of pep and reverence you got, and boost altogether for Jesus Christ and His everlasting VIII.

mercy and tenderness. At that moment, Senka Don, the radical lawyer, and Dr. Kurt Yakovic, the histologist, whose report on the destruction of epithelial cells under radium, had made the name of Zenith, known in Munich, Prague, and Rome. We're talking in Don's library.

Zenith's the city with gigantic power, gigantic buildings, gigantic machines, gigantic transportation, meditated Don. I hate your city. It has standardized all the beauty out of life. It is one big, railroad station with all the people taking tickets for the best cemeteries. Dr. Yavich said placidly. Don't roused. I'm hanged if it is. You make me sick, Kurt, with your perpetual wine about

standardization. Don't you suppose any other nation is standardized? Is anything more standardized in England, with every house that can afford it? Having the same muffins at the same tea hour and every retired general going to exactly the same even song at the same Greystone Church with a square tower, and every golfing prig in Harris Tweed saying, Right you are! To every other prosperous ass, yet I love England. And for standardization, look at the sidewalk cafes in France and the love-making in Italy. Standardization is excellent per se.

When I buy an Inglesaw watch or a Ford, I get a better tool for less money, and I know precisely what I'm getting. And that leaves me more time and energy to be individual in. And I remember once in London I saw a lot of money, a picture of an American suburb in a toothpaste ad on the back of the Saturday evening post, an elm-lined snowy street of these new houses, Georgian some of them, or with low raking roofs, the kind of streets you'd find here in zenith, say in floral heights, open trees, grass, and I was homesick. There's no other country in the world that has such pleasant homes,

and I don't care if they are standardized. It's a quarking standard. No, what I fight in Zenith is standardization of thought, and of course the traditions of competition. The real villains of the peace are the clean, kind, industrious family men, who use every known brand of trickery and cruelty to ensure the prosperity of their cubs. The worst thing about these fellows is that they're so good and their work, at least so intelligent. You can't hate them properly, and yet their standardized minds are the enemy. Then this boasting, sneakingly, I have a notion that Zenith is a better place to live in than Manchester or Glasgow or Lyons or Berlin or Turin.

It is not, and I have lived in most of them, demurred Dr. Yavich. Well, matter of taste personally, I prefer a city with a future so unknown that it excites my imagination. But what I particularly want—' You, said Dr. Yavich, are a minimum. road liberal, and you haven't the slightest idea of what you want. I, being a revolutionist, know exactly what I want, and what I want now is a drink. Six. At that moment in Zenith, Jake Offutt, the politician, and Henry T. Thompson were in conference. Offutt suggested,

The thing to do is get your fool son-in-law Babbitt to put it over. He's one of those patriotic guys. When he grabs a piece of property for the gang, he makes it look, like we were dying of love for the dear peepful. And I do love to buy respectability, reasonable. Wonder how long we can keep it up, Hank. We're safe as long as the good little boys like Georgie Babbitt and all the nice respectable label readers think you and me are rugged patriots. They're swell picking for an honest politician here, Hank. A whole city working to provide cigars and fried chickens and dried martinis for us, and rallying to our banner with indignation, old fierce indignation, whenever some squealer like this fellow,

Seneca Done comes along. Honest, Hank, a smart codger like me ought to be ashamed of himself if he didn't milk cattle like them. When they come around moving for it? But the traction gang can't get away with grand larceny like it used to. I wonder when, Hank, I wish we could fix some way to run this fellow. Well a Seneca don't out of town, to hammer us. At that moment in Zenith,

340 or 50,000 ordinary people were asleep, a vast, unpenetrated shadow. In the slum beyond the railroad track, a young man who for six months had sought work turned on the gas and killed himself and his wife. At that moment, Lloyd Malam, the poet, owner of the Hafts Bookshop, was finishing a rendez to show how diverting was life

amid the feuds of medieval Florence, but how dull it was in so obvious a place as seen it. And at that moment, George F. Babbitt turned ponderously in bed, the last turn, signifying that he'd had enough of this worried business of falling asleep and was about it in earnest. Instantly, he was in the magic dream.

He was somewhere among unknown people who laughed at him. He slipped away, ran down the path of a midnight, night garden, and at the gate the fairy child was waiting. Her dear and tranquil hand caressed his cheek. He was gallant and wise and well-beloved. Warm ivory were her arms, and beyond perilous moors, the brave sea, glittered. End of Chapter 7. Chapter 8 of Babit. This Liebervox recording is in the public domain, recording by Mike vendetti.com. Babbitt. By Sinclair Lewis, Chapter 8. The great events of Babbit Spring were the secret buying of real estate options in Linton for certain street traction officials before the public announcement that the Linton Avenue

car line would be expanded, and ate dinner, which was, as he rejoiced to his wife, not only a regular society spread, but a real, sure-nough affair, with some of the keenest intellects and the brightest bunch of little women in town. It was so absorbing occasion that he almost forgot his desire to run off to Maine with Paul Raysling, though he had been born in the village of Catawaba. Babbit had risen to that metropolitan social plain on which hosts have as many as four people at dinner without planning it for more than an evening or two. But a dinner for twelve with flowers from the florist and all the cut glass out,

staggered even the babbets. For two weeks they studied debauched. abated and arbitrated the list of guests. Babbit marveled, "'Of course we're up to date ourselves, but still, think of us entertaining a famous poet like Chomfink, a fellow that on nothing but a poem or so every day and just writing a few advertisements,

pulls down 15,000 berries a year.' "'Yes, and Howard Littlefield, do you know the other evening Eunice told me her papa speaks three languages, said Mrs. Babbitt. That's nothing. So do I. American baseball and poker. I don't think it's nice to be funny about a matter like that. Think how wonderful it must be to speak three languages that's so useful, and with people like that, I don't see why we invite the Orville Joneses.

Well, now, Orville is a mighty up-and-coming fellow. Yes, I know, but a laundry? I'll admit laundry hasn't got the class of poetry or real estate, but just the same Orvey is mighty deep. Ever start him spilling about gardening? Say that fellow can tell you the name of every kind of tree, and some of their Greek and Latin names, too. Besides, we owe the Joneses of dinner.

Besides, garsh, we got to have some boob for audience, when a bunch of hot-air artists like Frank and Littlefield getting, going. Well, dear, I meant to speak of this. I do think that as a host you ought to sit back and listen and let your guests have a chance to talk once in a while. Oh, you do, do you? Sure, I talk all the time, and I'm just a businessman. Oh, sure. I'm no Ph.D. like Littlefield and no poet, and I haven't anything to spring. Well, let me tell you, just the other day your darned chum-frink. comes up to me at the club begging to know what I thought about the Springfield School bond issue. And who told him? I did. You bet your life I told him. Little me, I certainly did.

He came up and asked me, and I told him all about it. You bet. And he was darn glad to listen to me. Duty as a host. I guess I know my duty as a host and let me tell you. In fact, the Orville Joneses were invited. Two. On the morning of the dinner, Mrs. Babbitt was restive. Now, George, I want you to be sure and be home early tonight. Remember, you have to dress. Uh, I see by the advocate that the Presbyterian General Assembly

is voted to quit the interchurch world movement, that... George, did you hear what I said? You must be home in time to dress, tonight. Dress, hell, I'm dressed now. Think I'm going down the office in my BVDs? I will not have you talking indecently before the children, and you do have to put on your dinner jacket.

I guess you mean my tucks, I'll tell you, of all the doggone nonsensical noisances that was ever invented. Three minutes later, after Babbitt had wailed, I don't know whether I'm going to dress or not, in a manner which showed that he was going to dress. The discussion moved on. Now, George, you mustn't forget to call it back he is on the way home and get ice cream. Their delivery wagon is broken down, and I don't want to trust them to send it by.

All right, you told me that for breakfast. Well, I don't want you to forget. I'll be working my head off all day long, training the girl as to help with the dinner. Oh, nonsense, anyway, hiring an extra girl for the feed. Matilda could perfectly, well... And I have to go out and buy flowers and fix them and set the table, and order the salted almonds and look at the chickens and arrange the children to have their supper upstairs,

and I simply must depend on you to go to Beggias for ice cream. All right, gosh, I'm going to get it. All you have to do is go in and say you want the ice cream that Mrs. Babbitt ordered yesterday by phone, and it will be all ready for you. at ten thirty she telephoned him not to forget the ice-cream from veckias he was surprised and blasted then by a thought he wondered rather floral heights dinners were worth the hideous toil involved but he reprinted the sacrilege in the excitement of buying the materials for cocktails now this was the manner of obtaining alcohol under the reign of righteousness and prohibition he drove from the severe rectangular streets of the modern business center into the the tangled byways of Old Town.

Jagged blocks filled with sooty warehouses and lofts, on into the arbor, once a pleasant orchard, but now a morass of lodging houses, tenements, and brothels. Exquisite shivers chilled up his spine and stomach, and he looked at every policeman with intense innocence as one who loved the law and admired the force, and longed to stop and play with him.

He parked his car, a block from the Healy-Hanson saloon, worrying. Well, rats, if anybody did see me, they'd think I was out here on business. He entered a place curiously like the saloons of anti-prohibition days, with a long, greasy bar with sawdust in front and streaky mirror behind, a pine table at which a dirty old man dreamed over a glass of something which resembled whiskey, and with two men at the bar drinking something which resembled beer, and giving that impression of forming a large crowd which two men always given a saloon, the bartender, a tall, pale swede with a diamond

in his lilac scarf, stirred at Babbitt as he stalked plumply up to the bar and whispered, "'I'd a friend of Hanson sent me here. Like to get some gin?' The bartender gazed down on him in a manner of an outraged bishop. "'I guess you've got the wrong place, my friend. We sell nothing but soft drinks here.' He cleaned the bar with a rag, which would itself have done with with a little cleaning and glared across his mechanically moving elbow. The old dreamer at the table petitioned the bartender. Say, Oscar, listen.

Oscar did not listen. Ah, say Oscar, listen, will you say listen? The decayed and drowsy voice of the loafer, the agreeable stink of beer dregs, threw a spell of initiation over Babbitt. The bartender moved grimly toward the crowd of two men. Babbitt followed him as delicately as a cat, and wheedled. Hey, Oscar, I want to speak to Mr. Hanson. What you want to see him for?

I just want to talk to him. Here's my card. It was a beautiful card, an engrave card, a card in the blackest black and the sharpest red, announcing that Mr. George F. Babbitt was estates, insurance, rents? The bartender held it as though it weighed ten pounds and read it as though it were a hundred words long.

He did not bend from his Episcopal dignity, but he growled, I'll see if he's around. From the back room, he brought an immensely old young man, a quiet, sharp-eyed man in tan silk shirt, chuckered vest hanging open, and burning brown trousers,

Mr. Healy Hanson. Mr. Hanson said only, Yeah, but his implacable and contemptuous eyes queried Babbit's soul, and he seemed not at all impressed by the new dark gray suit for which, as he had admitted to every acquaintance at the athletic club, Babbitt had paid $125. Glad to meet you, Mr. Hanson, and say,

I'm George Babbitt of the Babbitt Thompson Realty Company. I'm a great friend of Jake Hoffitz. I'm out of it. Say, I'm going to have a party, and Jake told me you'd be able to fix me up with a little gin. An alarm, in obsequious, as Hanson's eyes grew more bored. "'You, uh, telephone to Jake about me if you want to!' Hanson answered by jerking his head to indicate the entrance to the back room and strolled away.

Babbitt, mellowed dramatically, crept into an apartment containing four round tables, eleven chairs, a brewery calendar, and a smell. He waited. Thrice he saw Healy Hanson saunter through humming hands in pockets. ignoring him. By this time, Babbitt had modified his valiant morning bow. I don't pay one cent over seven dollars a quart. Two. I might pay ten. On Hanson's next weary entrance, he besought, could you fix that up? Hanson scowled and grated. Just a minute, Pete's sake, just a minute. In growing meekness, Babbitt went on waiting till Hansen casually reappeared with a court of gin, what is euphemistically known as a court, in his disdainting

full of long, white hands." Twelve bucks. He snapped. "'Say, uh, but say, uh, Captain Jake thought you'd be able to fix me up for eight or nine a bottle.' Nope. Twelve. This is the real stuff smuggled from Canada.

There's none of your natural spirits with a drop in juniper extract." The honest merchant said virtuously. "'Twall bones if you wanted. Of course, she understand. I'm just doing this in ways a friend of Jake's. Sure, sure, I understand.' babbitt gratefully held out twelve dollars he felt honored by a contract with greatness as hanson yawned stuffed the bills uncounted into his radiant vest and swaggered away he had a number of titulations out of concealing the gin bottle under his coat and out of hiding it in his desk all afternoon he snorted and chuckled and gurgled over his ability to give the boys a real shot in the arm to-night he was in fact so accelerated that he was within a block of his house before he remembered that there was a certain matter mentioned by his wife

a fetching ice-cream from vekias he explained ah darn it drove back feckia was not a caterer he was the caterer of sena most coming-out parties were held in the white and gold ballroom of the Macian Vecchio. At all nice teas, the guest recognized the five kinds of Vecca sandwiches, and the seven kinds of Veccaques. And all really smart dinners ended, as on a resolving cord, Vecchio, Neapolitan ice cream, in one of the three reliable molds, the melon mold, the round mold like a layer cake, and the long brick. Vecchio shop had pale blue woodwork, tracery of plaster roses,

attendants in frilled aprons and glass shelves of kisses, with all the refinement that inheres in whites of eggs. Babbitt felt heavy, thick, amid this professional daintiness, and as he waited for the ice cream, he decided, with hot prickles at the back of his neck, that a girl customer was giggling at him. He went home in a touchy temper. The first thing he heard was his wife's agitated,

George, did you remember to go to Vecchias and get ice cream? Say, look here, do I ever forget to do things? Yes, often. Well, now it's darn seldom I do, and it certainly makes me tired after going into a pink tea joint like Vecas, and having to stand around looking at a lot of half-naked young girls, all rouged up like they were sixty and eating a lot of stuff that simply ruins their stomachs.

Oh, it's too bad about you. I have noticed how you hate to look at pretty girls. With a jar, Babbit realized that his wife was too busy to be impressed by that moral indignation, with which males rule the world, and he went humbly upstairs to dress. He had an impression of a glorified dining room, of cut glass, candles, polished wood, lace, silver roses, with the odd swelling of the heart suitable to so grave a business

as giving a dinner. He slew the temptation to wear his plated dress shirt for the fourth time, took out an entirely fresh one, tightened his black bow, and rubbed his patent leather pumps with a handkerchief. He glanced with pleasure at his garnet and silver studs. He smoothed and patted his ankles, transformed by silk socks from the sturdy shanks of George Babbitt to the elegant limbs of what is called a club man. He stood before the pure glass, viewing his trim dinner coat, his beautiful triple-braided trousers, and murmured in lyric beatitude. By golly, I don't look bad. I certainly don't look like Catawaba. If the Hicks back home could see me in this rig, they'd ever fit. He moved majestically down to mix the cocktails.

As he chipped ice, as he squeezed oranges, as he collected vast stores of bottles, glasses and spoons at the sink in the pantry. He felt as authoritative as the bartender at Healy Hansen's saloon. True. Mrs. Babbitt said he was underfoot, and Matilda and the maid hired for the evening, brushed by him, elbowed him, shrieked. Please open the door, as they trotted through with trays. But in his high moment, he ignored them. Besides the new bottle of gin, his cellar consisted of one-half bottle of bourbon whiskey, a quarter of a bottle of Italian vermouth, and approximately only 100 drops of orange bitters. He did not possess a cocktail shaker.

A shaker was proof of dissipation, the symbol of a drinker, and Babbitt disliked being known as a drinker, even more than he liked to drink. He mixed by pouring from an ancient gravy boat into a handeless picture. He poured with noble dignity, holding his Olympics high

beneath the powerful Mazda Globe, his face hot, his shirt front a glaring white, The copper sink a scoured red gold. He tasted the sacred essence. Now, by golly, if that isn't pretty near one fine old cocktail, kind of a Bronx and yet like a Manhattan, hmm, hey, Myra, want a little nip before the folks come?

Bustling into the dining room, moving each glass a quarter of an inch, rushing back with resolution, implacable on her face, her gray and silver lace party frock, protected by a denim towel. Mrs. Babbitt glared at him and rebuked him. Certainly not. Well, in a loose, jocose manner, I think the old man will.

The cocktail filled him with a whirling exhilaration beyond which he was aware of devastating desires. To rush places in fast motors, to kiss girls, to sing, to be witty. He sought to regain his lost dignity by announcing to Matilda. I'm going to stick this picture of cocktails in the refrigerator. Be sure you don't upset any of them.

Yeah. Well, be sure now. Don't go putting anything on the top shelf. Yeah. Well, me. He was dizzy. His voice was thin in distance. We.

With enormous impressiveness, he commanded, Well, be sure now. And minced into the safety of the living room. He wondered whether he could persuade. as slow as bunch as Mara and the little fields to go someplace to have dinner and raise cane and maybe dig up some more booze. He perceived that he had gifts of profligacy, which had been neglected. By the time the guest had come, including the inevitable late couple for whom the others waited,

with painful immobility. A great gray emptiness had replaced the purple swirling in Babbitt's head, and he had to force. the tumultuous greetings suitable to a host on floral heights. The guests were Howard Littlefield, the doctor of philosophy, who furnished publicity and comforting economics to the street traction company, Virgil Gunch, a coal dealer, equally powerful in the elk, and in the boosters club.

Eddie Swanson, the agent for the javelin motor car, who lived across the street and Orville Jones, owner of the Lily White Laundry, which justly announced itself the biggest, busiest, bullies-clinaries shop in Zenith. But naturally, the most distinguished of all was T. Charmali Fink, who was not only the author of Polenimus, which syndicated daily in 67 leading newspapers,

gave him one of the largest audiences of any poet in the world, but also an optimistic lecturer and the creator of ads that, add. Despite the searching philosophy and high morality of his verses, they were humorous and easily understood by any child of twelve, and it added a neat air of pleasantry to them that they were set not as verse, but as prose. Mr. Frank was known from coast to coast as chum. With them were six wives, more or less. It was hard to tell, so early in the evening as at first glance they all looked alike, and as they all said, oh, isn't this nice? in the same tone of determined liveliness.

To the eye the men were less similar, Littlefield, a hedge-collar, tall and horse-faced. Chum Frank, a trifle of a man, with soft and mouse-like hair, advertising his profession as poet by a silk cord on his eyeglasses. Virgil Gunch, broad with coarse black hair, embross Eddie Swanson, a bald and bouncing young man, who showed his taste for elegance by an evening waistcoat

of figured black silk with glass buttons. Orville Jones, a steady-looking, stubby, not very memorable person with a hemp-colored toothbrush mustache. Yet they were all so well-fed and clean, they all shouted, Evenin, Georgie, with such robustness that they seemed to be cousins. And the strange thing is that longer one knew the women,

the less alike they seemed. While the longer one knew the men, the more alike their bold, patterns appeared. The drinking of the cocktails was as canonical as right as the mixing. The company waited uneasily, hopefully, agreeing in a strained manner that the weather had been rather warm and

slightly cold, but still Babbitt said nothing about drinks. They became despondent. But when the late couple, the Swanson's had arrived, Babbitt hinted, "'Well, folks, you think we could stand breaking the law, little?' They looked like chum, Frank. the recognized Lord of Language. Frank pulled at his eyeglass cord as if a bell-rope.

He cleared his throat and said that which was the custom. I'll tell you, George, I'm a law-abiding man, but they do say Burge Gunch is a regular yeg, and of course he's bigger than I am, and I just can't figure out what I'd do if he tried to force me and do anything criminal. Gunch was roaring. Well, I'll take a chance. when Frank held up his hand and went on, so a virgin you insist,

Georgie, I'll park my car on the wrong side of the street because I take it for granted. That's the crime you're hinting at. There was a great deal of laughter, Mrs. Jones asserted. Mr. Fink is simply too killing. He'd think he was so innocent. Fabbert clamored. How did you guess it, chum?

Well, you all just wait a moment while I go out and get the keys to your cars. Through a froth of merriment, he brought the shining promise, the mighty tray of glasses with the cloudy yellow cocktails in the glass pitcher in the center. The men babbled, Oh, gosh, have a look. And this gets me right where I live, and let me at it. But Chum Frank, a traveled man and not unused to woes, was stricken by the thought that the potion might be merely fruit juice. With a little natural spirits, he looked timid.

as babbid a moist and aesthetic almanor, held out of glass. But as he tasted it, he plied, Oh, man, let me dream on. It ain't true, but don't waken me. Just let me slumber. Two hours before Frank had completed a newspaper lyric beginning, I sat alone and groused and thunk, and scratched my head and sighed and wonk, and groaned.

There are still boot-a-black, who liked the old-time gin millback, that den that makes a sage a loon, the vile and smelly old saloon. I'll never miss her poison booze, whilst the bubbling spring I can use. That leaves my head at Mary Mourn as clear as any babe newborn. Babit drank with the others.

His moment's depression was gone. He perceived that these were the best fellows in the world. He wanted to give them a thousand cocktails. "'Think you could stand another?' he cried. The wives refused with giggles, but the men, speaking in a wide, elaborate, enjoyable manner, gloated, "'Well, sooner than have you get sore to me, Georgie?' "'You got a little divident coming,' said babbitt to each of them, and each in tone. "'Squise it, Georgie, squeeze it, George, squeeze it.'

When beyond hope the pitcher was empty, they stood and talked about prohibition. The men leaned back on their heels. put their hands in their trousers pocket, and proclaimed their views with the booming profidity of a prosperous male repeating a thoroughly hackneyed statement about a matter of which he knows nothing whatever. Now, I'll tell you, said Virgil Gunch, the way I figured is this,

and I can speak by the book because I've talked to a lot of doctors and fellows that ought to know, and the way I see it is that it's a good thing to get rid of the saloon. but they ought to let a fellow have beer and light wines. Howard Littlefield observed, What isn't generally recognized is that it's a dangerous proposition to invade the rights of personal liberty. Now, take this for instance.

The king of Bavaria, I think it was Bavaria, yes, Bavaria it was in 1862, March 1862. He issued a proclamation against public grazing of livestock. The peasantry had stood for overtaxation, without the slightest complaint, but when this proclamation came out, they rebe out. Or it may have been Saxony, but it just goes to show the dangers

of invading the rights of personal liberty. That's it. No one got a right to invade personal liberty, said Orville Jones. Just the same, you don't want to forget prohibition is a mighty good thing for the working class, keeps them from wasting their money and lowering their productiveness, said Virgil Grunch.

Yes, that's so, but the trouble is the manner of enforcement, insisted Howard Littlefield. Congress didn't understand the right system. Now, if I'd been running the thing, I'd have arranged it so the drinker himself was licensed, and then we could have taken care of the shiftless workmen, keep him from drinking, and yet not have interfered with the rights, with the personal liberty of fellows like ourselves. They bobbed their heads, looked admiringly at one another, and stated, "'That's so. That wouldn't be a stunt. "'Tang no worries me is a lot of these guys will take to cocaine,' sighed Eddie Swanson.

"'They bobbed more violently and groan. "'That's so. There's his danger of that.' "'Chom, Frank chanted, "'we'll say, I got a hold of a swell-new recipe for homemade beer the other day. "'You take—' "'Gunchie interrupted. "'Wait, let me tell you mine.' "'Little field snorted.

"'Bear rats. Things to do to ferment cider.' jones insisted i've got the recipe that does the business swanson begged oh say let me tell you the story but frank went on resolutely you take and save the shells from peas and pour six gallons of water on a bushel of shells and boil the mixture till mrs babbitt turned them with yearning sweetness frank hastened to finish even his best beer recipe and she said gaily dinner is served There was a good deal of friendly argument among the men as to which should go in last. And while they were crossing the hall from the living room to the dining room, Richard Gunch made them laugh by thundering, "'If I can't sit next to Myra Babbitt and hold her hand at the table, I won't play. I'm going home.'

In the dining room they stood embarrassed while Mrs. Babbitt fluttered. "'Now let me see. Oh, I was going to have some nice hand-painted place cards for you, but, oh, let me see. Mr. Frank, would you say, sit here? The dinner was in the best style of women's magazine art, whereby the salad was served in hollowed apples, and everything but the invincible fried chicken resembled something else. Ordinarily, the men found it hard to talk to the women. Flirtation was an art unknown on floral heights, and the realms of offices and of kitchens had no alliances, but under the inspiration of cocktails, conversation was violent. Each of the men still had a number of.

of important things to say about prohibition. And now that each had a loyal listener in his dinner partner, he burst out. I'm on the place where I can get all the hooch I want at eight a quart. Did you read about this fellow that went and paid a thousand dollars for ten cases of red-eye that proved to be nothing but water? Seems a fellow was standing on the corner and the fellow comes up to him. They say there's a whole raft of stuff being smuggled across at Detroit. What I always say is what a lot of folks don't realize about prohibition. And then when you get all this awful poison stuff, wood alcohol and everything?

Of course, I believe in it on principle, but I don't propose that have anybody tell me what I got to think and do. No American will understand for that. But they all felt that it was rather in bad taste for Orwell Jones, and he not recognized as one of the wits of the occasion anyway to say, in fact, the whole thing about prohibition is this. It isn't the initial cost. It's a humidity.

Not till the one required topic had been dealt with did the conversation become general. It was often, and admittedly, said a Virgil Gunch. Gee, that fellow can get away with murder, why he can pull a raw one in mixed company, and all the ladies will laugh their heads off, but me, gosh, if I crack anything that's just the least bit off color, I get razz for fair. Now, Gunch, delighted them by crying to Mrs. Eddie Swanson, youngest of the women. Luella, I managed to pinch Eddie Dorky out of his pocket, and, uh, what say you we sneak across the street when the folks aren't looking? Got something with a gorgeous leer,

awful important to tell you. The women wriggled and babbitt was stirred to like naughtiness. Say, folks, I wish I dared to show you a book I borrowed from Doc Pattern. "'Now, George, the idea,' Mrs. Babbitt warned him. "'This book, racy isn't the word. It's some kind of anthropological report about customs in the South Seas, and what it doesn't say, it's a book you can't buy. "'Burge, I'll lend it to you.' "'Me first,' insisted Eddie Swanson. Sounds spicy,' Orville Jones announced. "'Say, I heard a good one the other day about a couple of Swedes and their wives.'

And in the best Jewish accent, he resolutely carried the good one to a slightly disinfected ending. Gunch capped it. But the cocktails waned, the seekers dropped back into cautious reality. Chumpfink had recently been on a lecture tour among the small towns, and he chuckled, "'Awful good to get back to civilization. I certainly been seeing some hick towns. I mean, towards the folks there are the best on earth. But gee whiz, those Main Street burghers are.

slow. And you fellows can't hardly appreciate what it means to be here with a bunch of live ones. You bet, exalted Orville Jones. They're the best folks on earth, those small town folks, but oh, mama, what conversation. Why, say, they can't talk about anything but the weather and the Neal Ford by Hackleman. That's right. They all talk just about the same things, said Eddie Swanson. Don't they, though. They just say the same things over and over, said Virgil Gunch. Yes, it's really remarkable. They seem to lack all power of looking at things impersonally. They simply go over and over

the same talk about Fords and the weather and so on, said Howard Littlefield. Still at that, you can't blame them. They haven't got any intellectual stimulus such as you get up here in the city, said Chumfink. That's right, said Babbitt. I don't want you highbrows to get stuck on yourself, but I must say it keeps a fellow right up on his toes to sit with a poet and with Howard, the guy that put the con in economics, but these small town boobs with nobody but each other to talk to, no wonder they get so sloppy and uncultured in their speech and so

balled up in their thinking. Orville Jones commented, and then take our other advantages, the movies, for instance. Those Japville sports think they're all get-out if they have one change of bill a week. where here in the city you got your choice of a dozen different movies any evening you want to name. Sure, the inspiration we get from rubbing up against high-class hustlers every day and getting jam full of ginger, said Eddie Swanson. Same time, said Babbitt, no sense excusing those Rube Berg's too easy. Fellow's own fault if he don't show the initiative to up and beat it to the city, like we done did. And just speaking of confidence among friends,

They're jealous as a devil of a city man. Every time I go up to Catawaba, I have to go around apologizing to the fellows I was brought up with because I've more or less succeeded and they haven't. And if you talk natural to them the way we do here and show finesse and what you might call a broad point of view, why they think you're putting on the side. There's my own half-brother Martin,

runs the little old general store my dad used to keep. Say, I'll bet he don't know there is such a thing as a tux, as a dinner jacket. If he was to come up here now, he'd think we were a bunch of, of, why, gosh, I swear, he wouldn't know what to think. Yes, sir, they're jealous.

Chum Frank agreed. That's so, but what I mind is their lack of culture and appreciation of the beautiful. If you'll excuse me for being highbrow, now I like to give a high-class lecture and read some of my best poetry, not the newspaper stuff, but the magazine things.

But say, when I get in the tall, grass, there's nothing we'll take but a lot of cheesy old stories and slang and junk that if any of us were to indulge in it here, he'd get the gate so fast it would make his head swim. Bertrandt summed up. The fact is, we're mighty lucky to be living among a bunch of city folks that recognize artistic things and business bunch equally. We'd feel pretty glum if we got stuck in some Main Street burg and tried to wise up the old codgers to a kind of life we're used to here.

But by golly, there's this you've got to say for them. Every small American town is trying to get population and modern ideals. And darn if a lot of them don't put it across. Somebody starts planning a Rube crossroads, telling how he was here in 1900, and it consisted of one muddy street, count them, one, and 900 human clams. Well, you go back there in 1920,

and you find pavement. in a swell little hotel and a first-class lady's ready to wear a shop, real perfection, in fact. You don't want to just look at what these small towns are. You want to look at what they're aiming to become, and they all got an ambition that in the long run is going to make them the finest spots on earth. They all want to be just like Zenith.

Three, however intimate they might be with T. T. Chmaldi Chinke as a neighbor, as a borrower of lawnmowers and monkey wrenches, they knew that he was also a famous poet and a distinguished advertising agent, that behind his easiness were sultry literary mysteries, which they could not penetrate. But tonight, in the gin evolved confidence,

he admitted them to an arcanum. I've got a literary problem that's worrying me to death. I'm doing a series of ads for the Zico car, and I want to make each of them a real little gem, regular stylistic stuff. I'm all for this theory of that perfection is the stunt, or nothing at all.

And these are as tough things as I've tackled. You might think it'd be harder to do my poems. All these heart topics, home and fireside and happiness, but they're cinches. You can't go wrong on them. And you know what sentiments any decent go-ahead fellow

must have if he plays the game, and you stick right to him. but the poetry of industrialism. Now there's a literary line where you got to open up new territory. Do you know the fellow who's really the American genius? The fellow who you don't know his name, and I don't either, but his work ought to be preserved

so future generations can judge our American thought and originality today. Why, the fellow that writes the Prince Albert Tobacco ads. Just listen to this. It's PA that jam such a. joy in chimney pipes, say, bet you've often bent an ear to that spill of speech about hopping from five to fifty per by stepping on her a bit. Guess that's going some all right, but just among ourselves, you'd better start a rapid whiz system to keep tabs as to how fast you'll buzz from low smoke spirits to tip top high. Once you line up behind a chimney pipe, it's all aglow with such a

peach of a pal, Prince Albert. Prince Albert is John on the job. Always joyously moreish in flavor, always delightfully cluel and fragrant. For a fact, you never hooked such a double-deck copper-ributed two-fisted smoke enjoyment. Go to a pipe. Speedo quick like you light on a good thing. Why, packed with Prince Albert? You can play a joyously jimmy straight across the boards, and you know what that means. Now that, Carol Motor Agent Eddie Swenson, that's what I call he literature, that Prince Albert fellow. Though gosh, there can't be just one fellow that writes him, must be a big board of classy ink slingers in conference. But anyway, now him, he doesn't write for long-haired

pikers. He writes for regular guys. He writes for me, and I tip my beanie to him. The only thing is, I wonder if it sells the goods. Of course, like these poets, this Prince Albert fellow, lets his idea run away with him. It makes elegant reading, but it don't say nothing. I never go out and buy Prince Albert tobacco after reading it, because it doesn't tell me anything about this stuff. It's just a bunch of fluff.

Frank faced him. Well, you're crazy. Have I got to sell you the idea of style? Anyway, that's the kind of stuff I'd like to do for this. Zico, but I simply can't, so I decided to stick to the straight poetic, and I took a shot at a high-brow ad for the Zico. How do you like this? The long white trail is calling.

Calling? And it's over the hills and far away for every man or woman that has red blood in his veins, and on his lips the ancient song of the buccaneers. It's a way with dull drudging, and a fig for care speed, glorious speed. It's more than just a moment's exhilaration. It's life for you and me. This great new truth, the makers of Zico Carr, have considered as much as price and style.

It's fleet as the antelope, smooth as the glide of a swallow, yet powerful as the charge of a bull elephant. Class, breathe in every line. Listen, brother, you'll never know what the high art of hiking is till you try life zipping a zest, the Zico. Yes, Frank mused.

That's got an elegant color to it if I do say so, but it ain't got the originality of spill of speech. The whole company side with sympathy and admiration. End of chapter eight. Chapter 9 of Babit. The Sleeper-Vox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vindetti.com.

Babet. By Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 9. 1. Babbit was fond of his friends. He loved the importance of being host and shouting, "'Certainly you're going to have some more chicken, the idea!' And he appreciated the genius of tea, Charmolundi Fink.

But the figure of the cocktails was gone, and the more he ate, the less joyful he felt. Then the amnity of the dinner was destroyed by the nagging of the Swanson's. In floral heights and the other prosperous sections of Zenith, especially in the young married set. There were many women who had nothing to do, though they had few servants,

yet with gas stoves, electric ranges, and dishwashers, and vacuum cleaners, and tile kitchen walls. Their houses were so convenient that they had little housework, and much of their food came from bakeries and delicatessons. They had but two, one, or no children, and despite the myth that the Great War had made work respectable,

Their husbands objected to their wasting time and getting a lot of crank ideas, in unpaid social work, and still, more to their causing, a rumor by earning money, that they were not adequately supported. They worked perhaps two hours a day, and the rest of the time they ate chocolates, went to the motion pictures, went window-shopping, went in gossiping twos and threes to card parties, read magazines thought timorously of the lovers who never appeared, and accumulated a splendid restlessness,

which they got rid of by nagging their husbands. The husbands nagged back. Of these naggers, the Swanson's were perfect specimens. Throughout the dinner, Eddie Swanson had been complaining publicly about his wife's new frock. It was he submitted too short, too low, too immodestly thin, and much too expensive. He appealed to Babbitt.

Honest, George, what do you think of that rag, Louetta, went and bought. Don't you think it's the limit? What's eating you, Eddie? I called a swell little dress. Oh, it is, Mr. Swanson. It's a sweet frock, Mrs. Babbitt protested. There now, do you see, Smarty?

You're such an authority on clothes, Loretta raged, while the guests ruminated and peeped at her shoulders. It's all right now, said Swanson. I'm authority enough, so I know it was a waste of money, and it makes me tired to see you not wearing out a whole closet full of clothes you got already. I've expressed my idea about this before, and you know good and well you don't pay the least bit of attention. I have to camp on your trail to get you to do anything. There was much more of it, and they all assisted, but Babbitt, everything about him was dim except his stomach,

and that was a bright scarlet disturbance. "'Had too much grub oughtn't to eat our stuff,' he groaned, while he went on eating, while he gulped down a chill and gluttonous slice of ice-cream brick, and coconut cake as oozy as shaving cream. He felt as though he had been stuffed with clay, his body was bursting, his throat was bursting, his brain was hot mud, and only with agony did he continue to smile and shout as became a host of floral heights. He would, except for his guests, have fled outdoors and walked off the intoxication of food.

But in the haze which filled the room, they sat forever, talking, talking, while he agonized. "'Darn, fool to be eating all this? Not another mouthful.' And discovered that he was again tasting the sickly welter of melted ice cream on his plate. There was no magic in his friends. He was not uplifted, when Howard Littlefield produced from his treasure house of scholarship? The information that the chemical symbol for raw rubber is C-10-H-16, which turns into is is is C-5H-8. Suddenly, without precedent, Babbitt was not merely bored, but admitting that he was bored, it was ecstasy to escape from the table, from the torture of a straight chair, and loll on the Davenport in the living room. The others from their fitful,

unconvincing talk, their expressions of being slowly and painfully smothered, seemed to be suffering from the toil of social life and the horror of good food as much as himself, all of them accepted with relief, the suggestion of bridge. Babette recovered from the feeling of being boiled. He wanted Bridge. He was again able to endure Virgil Gunch's inexorable hardiness, but he pictured loafing with Paul Reithling beside a lake in Maine. It was as overpowering and imaginative as homesickness. He had never been to Maine, yet he beheld the shrouded mountains of the tranquil lake of evening. That boy Paul's worth all these Balahoo and highbrows put together, he muttered,

and I'd like to get away from everything. Even Loretta Swanson did not rouse him. Mrs. Swanson was pretty and plaint. Babbitt was not an analyst of women, except as to their taste in furnished houses to rent. He divided them into real ladies, working women, old cranks, and fly chickens. He mooned over their charms, but he was of opinion that all of them, save the women of his own family, were different and mysterious. Yet he had known by instinct that Luetta Swanson could be approached.

Her eyes and lips were moist, her face tapered from a broad forehead to a point. pointed chin, her mouth was thin but strong and avid, and between her brows were two out-curving and passionate wrinkles. She was thirty, perhaps, or younger. Gossip had never touched her, but every man naturally and instantly rose to flirtatious when he spoke to her, and every woman watched her with stilled blankness. Between games sitting on the Davenport, Babbitt spoke to her, with the requisite gallantry, that sonorous floral heights gallantry, which is Not flirtation, but a terrified flight from it. You're looking like a soda-found tonight, Luetta.

Am I? Old Eddie kind of on the rampage? Yes, I get so sick of it. Well, when you get tired of hubby, you can run off with Uncle George. If I ran away, oh well. Anybody ever tell you your hands are awful pretty? She looked down at them. She pulled the lace of her sleeves over them,

but otherwise she did not heat him. She was lost in unexpressed imaginings. Babbitt was too languid this evening to pursue his duty of being a captivating, though strictly moral, male. He ambled back to the bridge tables. He was not much thrilled when Mrs. Fink, a small twittering woman, proposed that they try to do some spiritualism and table-tipping. You know, chum can make the spirits come honest.

He just scares me. The ladies of the party had not emerged all evening. But now is the sex given to things of the spirit, while the men warred against base things material, they took command and cried, Oh, let's! In the dimness the men were rather solemn and foolish, but the good wives quivered and adored as they sat about the table. They laughed, Now you be good, or I'll tell, when the men took their hands in the circle. Babette tingled with a slight return of interest in life,

as Loretta Swanson's hand closed on his, with quiet. firmness. All of them hunched over intent. They startled as someone drew a strained breath. In a dusty light from the hall they looked unreal. They felt disembodied. Mrs. Gunch squeaked, and they jumped with unnatural jockelty, but at Frank's hiss they sank into subdued awe.

Suddenly, incredibly, they heard a knocking. They stared at Frank's half-revealed hands and found them lying still. They wiggled and pretended. and pretended not to be impressed. Frank spoke with gravity. Is someone there? A thud. Is one not to be the sign for yes?

A thud. And two for no? A thud. Now, ladies and gentlemen, shall we ask the guide to put us into communication with the spirit of some great one passed over? Frank mumbled.

Mrs. Orville Jones begged, Oh, let's talk to Dante. We studied him at the reading circle. You know who he was, Orby? Certainly I know who he was, the Wop poet. Where do you think I was raised? From her insulted husband. Sure, the fellow that took the cooks tour to hell.

I've never waited through his poetry, but we learned him about him at the you, said Babbitt. Page, Mr. Dundee, intoned Eddie Swanson. You ought to get him easy, Mr. Frank. You and he being fellow poets, said Lovet. Willis Swanson. Fellow poet's rats! Where'd you get that stuff, protested Virgil Gunch?

I suppose Dante showed a lot of speed for an old-timer. Not that I've actually read him, of course, but to come right down to hard facts, he wouldn't stand a one, two, three, if he had to buckle down to practical literature and turn out a poem for the newspaper syndicate every day like Chum does. That's so, from Eddie Swanson. Those old birds could take their time.

Judas, priest, I could write poetry myself if I had a whole year to do it, and just wrote about that old-fashioned junk like Donny wrote about. Frank demanded, hush now, I'll call him. O laughing eyes emerged forth from the ultimate, and bring hither the spirit of Tante, that we mortals may list to his words of wisdom. You forgot to give him the address, 1558, Brimstone Avenue. Fiery Heights, hell, Grinch chuckled, but the others felt that this was

irreligious. And besides, probably it was just chum making the knocks. But still, if there did happen to be something to all this, be exciting to talk to an old fellow belonging to way back in early years. A thud. The spirit of Dante had come to the parlor of George F. Babbitt. He was, it seemed, quite ready to answer the questions. He was glad to be with them this evening. Frank spelled out the messages by running through the alphabet till the spirit interpreter knocked at the right letter. Littlefield asked in a learned tone,

Do you like it in paradise, Miss Eyre? We are very happy on the higher plane, Signore. We are glad that you are studying this great truth of spiritualism, Dante replied. The circle moved with an odd creaking of stays and shirt fronts. Suppose, suppose where there were something

to this? Babbitt had a different worry. Suppose Chum Frank was really one of those spiritualists. Chum had for a literary fellow. Always seemed to be a regular guy. He belonged to the Chatham Road Presbyterian Church, went to the booster's lunches

and like cigars and motors and racy stories. But suppose that secretly after all, you never could tell about the darn highbrows. and to be an out-and-out-out-spiritualist would be almost like being a socialist. No one could long be serious in the president of Virgil Gunch. Ask Dante how Jack Shakespeare an old verge. The guy they named after me are getting along,

and don't they wish they could get into the movie game? He blared and instantly all was mirth. Mrs. Jones shrieked, and Eddie Swanson desired to know whether Dante didn't catch cold with nothing on but his wreath. The pleased, Dante made humble answer. But Babbit, the cursed discontent, was torturing him again, and heavily in the impersonal darkness he pondered. I don't. We're all so flip and think we're so smart. There'd be a fellow like Dante. I wish I'd read some of his pieces. I don't suppose I ever will now. He had, without explanation, the

impression of a slaggy cliff, and on it in silhouette against menacing clouds, a lone and austere figure. He was dismayed by a sudden contempt for his surest friends. He grasped Loetta Swenson's hand and found the comfort of human warmth. Habit came, a veteran warrior, and he shook himself. But the deuce is the matter with me this evening. He patted Luetta's hand to indicate that he hadn't meant anything improper by squeezing it, and demanded a Frank. See, see if you can get old Dante to spiel of some of his poetry. Talk up to him. Tell him, Buena gona, signor. Come, sava, we get'st. Get our little poem, signor. Two. The lights were switched on. The women sat on the front of their chairs in the determined

suspense, whereby a wife indicates that as soon as the present speaker was finished, she is going to remark brightly to her husband. Well, dear, I think perhaps it's about time for us to be saying good night. For once, Babbitt did not break out in blustering efforts to keep the party going. He had. There was something he wished to think out. But the physical research that started them off again, Why don't they go home?

Why didn't they go home? Though he was impressed by the profoundity of the statement, he was only half enthusiastic when Howard Littlefield lectured. The United States is the United States as the United States, the only nation in which the government is a moral ideal and not just a social arrangement. True, true, they weren't ever going home. He was usually delighted to have an inside view of the momentous world of motors, but tonight he scarcely listened to Eddie Swanson's revelation.

If you want to go above the javelin class, the Zico is a mighty good buy. A couple of weeks ago, and mind you, this was a fair square test. They took a Zico stock touring car, and they slid up the townsend out of the hill on high, and fellow told me, Zico's good boat, but were they planning to stay all night? They really were going with a flutter of, Oh, we did have the best time. Most aggressively friendly of all was Babbitt.

Yet as he burbled he was reflecting, I got through it, but for a time there, I didn't hardly think, I'd last out. He prepared to taste the most delicate pleasure of the host, making fun of his guest in the relaxation of midnight. As the door closed, he yawn voluptorously, chest out, shoulders wiggling, and turned cynically to his wife. She was beaming. Oh, it was nice, wasn't it? I know they enjoyed every minute of it. Don't you think so? He couldn't do it. He couldn't mock. It would have been like sneering at a happy child. He lied ponderously.

You bet. Best party this year. By a long shot. Wasn't the dinner good, and honestly, I thought the fried chicken was delicious. You bet. Fried to the queen's taste. Best chicken I've tasted in Farrakoun's age.

Didn't Matilda fry it beautifully? And don't you think the soup was simply delicious? It certainly was. It was corking. Best soup I've tasted since. was a pup. But his voice was seeping away. They stood in the hall under the electric light in its square box like shade of red glass bound with nickel. She stared at him. Why, George, you sound as if you hadn't really enjoyed it. Sure did. Of course I did.

George, what is it? Oh, I'm kind of tired, I guess. Been pounding pretty hard at the office. Need to get away and rest up a little. Well, we're going to Maine in just a few weeks now, dear. Yeah. Then he was pouring it out nakedly, robbed of reticence. Mara, I think it would be a good thing for me to get up there early. But you have this man you have to meet in New York about business. What man?

Oh, sure, him. Oh, that's all off. But I want to hit Maine early. Get in a little fishing. Catch me a big trout, by golly. A nervous artificial laugh. Well, why don't we do it? Verona and Matilda can run the house between them,

and you and I can go any time if you think we can afford it. But that's... I've been feeling so jumpy lately I thought maybe it might be good thing if I got kind of off by myself and sweat it out of me. George, don't you want me to go along? She was too wretchedly in earnest to be tragic, or gloriously insulted, or anything saved dumpy and defenseless and flushed to the red steamingness of a boiled beet. Of course I do. It just meant.

Remembering that Paul Reisling had predicted this, he was as desperate as she. I mean, sometimes it's a good thing for an old grouch like me to go off and get it out of his system. He tried to sound parental. Then when you and the kids arrive, I figured maybe I might skip up to Maine just a few days ahead of you. I'd be ready for a real bat. See how I mean? He coaxed her with large booming sounds, with affable smiles like a popular preacher, blessing an Easter congregation, like a humorous lecturer, compelling his stint of eloquence,

like all perpetrators of masculine wiles. She stared at him. The joy of festival drained from her face. Do I bother you when we go on vacation? Do I add anything to your fun? He broke. Suddenly, dreadfully, he was hysterical. He was a yelping baby.

Yes, yes, hell yes. But can't you understand? I'm shot to pieces. I'm all in. I got to take care of myself. I got to. I'm sick of everything and everybody. I got to.

It was she who was mature and protective now. Why, of course. You shall run off by yourself. Why don't you get Paul to go along, and you boys just fish and have a good time. She patted his shoulder, reaching up to it, while he shook with palsied helplessness, and in that moment was not merely by habit fond of her,

but clung to her strength. She cried cheerily, Now upstairs you go and pop into bed. We'll fix it all up. I'll see to the doors. Now skip. For many minutes, for many hours, for a bleak eternity, he lay awake, shivering, reduced to primitive terror.

comprehending that he had one freedom and wondering what he could do with anything so unknown and so embarrassing as freedom. End of Chapter 9. Chapter 10 of Babit. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti.com Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 10. No apartment house in Seneth had more resolutely experimented in condescending station, then the Revelstroke Arms, in which Paul and Zilla Riesling had a flat. By sliding the beds into low closets, the bedrooms were converted into living rooms. The kitchens were cupboards, each containing an electric range, copper sink, a glass refrigerator, and very intermittently a balkan mate. Everything about the arms was excessively modern, and everything

was compressed, except the garages. The babbets were calling on the rislings at the arms. It was a speculative venture to call on the riselings, interesting and sometimes disconcerning. Zela was an active, strident, full-blown, high-blossom blonde. When she condescended to be good-humored, she was nervously amusing. Her comments on people were saltily satiric and penetratively of accepted hypocrisies. But so, you said and looked sheepish she danced wildly and called on the world to be merry but in the midst of it she would turn indignant she was always becoming indignant life was a plot against her and she exposed it furiously she was affable to-night she merrily hinted that orville jones wore to pay that mrs t charmaldi frank's singing resembled a ford going into high and that the hon oedes debel mayor of zenith and candidate for congress was a flacculent fool, which was quite true. The Babbets and Riesling sat doubtfully on stone-hard

brocade chairs in the small living-room of the flat, with its mantle unprovided with a fireplace, and its strip of heavy gilt fabric upon a glaring new player piano, till Mrs. Risling shrieked, "'Come on, let's put up some pep in it. Get out your fiddle, Paul, and I'll try to make Georgie dance decently.' The babbots were inertest. They were plotting for the escape to Maine, but when Mrs. Babbitt hinted with plump smilingness, "'Does Paul get as tired after the winter's work as Georgie does?' Then Zilia remembered an injury, and when Zilia Riesling remembered an injury, the world stopped till something had been done about it.

"'Does he get tired? No, he doesn't get tired. He just goes crazy, that's all. You'd think Paul so reasonable, oh yes, and he loves to make out. He's a little lamb, but he's stubborn as a mule.' Oh, if you had to live with him, you'd find out how sweet he is. He just pretends to be meek so he can have his own way. And me? I get to credit for being a terrible old crank, but if I didn't blow up once in a while and get something started,

we'd die of dry rot. He never wants to go any place, and why last evening, just because the car was out of order, and that was his fault too, because he oughtn to have taken it to the service station and had the battery looked at, and he didn't want to go down to the movies on the truck. But we went, and then there was one of those impudent conductors, and Paul wouldn't do a thing. I was standing on a platform, waiting for the people to let me into the car, and this beast of a

conductor hollered at me. Come on, you move up! Why, I've never had anybody speak to me that way in all my life. I was so astonished. I just turned to him and said, I thought there must be some mistake, and so I said to him perfectly pleasant. Well, are you speaking to me? And he went on and bellowed at me.

Yes, I was. You're keeping the whole car from starting, he said, and then I saw he was one of those dirty, ill-bred hogs that kindness is wasted on, and so I stopped and looked right at him, and I said, I beg your pardon? I am not doing anything of the kind. I said, it's the people of the head of me who won't move up, I said, and furthermore,

let me tell you, young man, that you're a low-down, foul-mouth, impertinent skunk. I said, and you're no gentleman. I certainly intend to report you, and we'll see, I said, whether a lady is to be insulted by any drunken, bomb that chooses to put on a ragged uniform, and I thank you, I said, to keep your filthy abuse to yourself.

And then I waited for Paul to show that he was half a man, and come to my defense. And he just stood there and pretended he hadn't heard a word. And so I said to him, well, I said, Oh, cut it, cut it, Zill. Paul groaned, we all know I'm Molly Cottle and you're a tender bud. And let's let it go at that. Let it go!

Zilia's face was wrinkled like the Medusa. Her voice was a dagger of corroded brass. She was full of the joy of righteousness and bad temper. She was a crusader, and like every crusader, she exalted in the opportunity to be vicious in the name of virtue. Let it go! If people knew how many things I've let go! Oh, quit being such a bully. Yes, a fine figure you'd cut if I didn't bully you, you'd lie a bed till noon and play your idiotic fiddle till midnight.

You're born lazy, and you're born shiftless, and you were born cowardly. Paul Riesling? Oh, now don't say that, Zillia. You don't mean a word of it, protested Mrs. Babbitt. I will say that, and I mean every last word of it. Oh, now Zilia, the idea. Mrs. Babbitt was maternal and fussy. She was no older than Zela, but she seemed so at first.

She was placid and puffy and mature, where Zelia, at 45, was so bleached and tight corseted that you knew only that she was older than she looked. The idea of talking to poor Paul like fat. Poor Paul is right. We're both poor. We'd be in the poor house if I didn't jazz him up. Why, now, Zelia, Georgie and I were just saying how hard Paul's been working all year, and we were thinking it would be lovely if the boys could run off by themselves. I've been coaching George to go up to Maine ahead of the rest of us

and get the tired out of his system before we come. and I think it would be lovely if Paul could manage to get away and join him. At this exposure of his plot to escape, Paul was startled out of impassitivity. He rubbed his fingers, his hands twitched. Celia Braid, yes, you're lucky. You can let George go and not have to watch him. Fat old George, never peeps at another woman, hasn't got the spunk. The hell I haven't?

Pabbitt was fervently defending his priceless immorality. when Paul interrupted him and Paul looked dangerous. He rose quickly. He said to Zilia. I suppose you imply I have a lot of sweethearts. Yes, I do. Well, then, my dear, since you ask for it, there hasn't been a time in the last ten years why I haven't found some nice little girl to comfort me, and as long as you continue your amiability, I shall probably continue to deceive you. It isn't hard. You're so stupid. Zilla glabbered, she howled, words could not be distilled. distinguished in her slaver of abuse. Then the bland George F. Babbitt was transformed.

If Paul was dangerous, if Zela was a snake-locked fury, if the neat emotions suitable to the revels-like arms had been slashed into raw hatreds, it was Babbitt, who was the most formidable. He leaped up. He seemed very large. He seized Zela's shoulder. The cautions of the broker were wiped from his face, and his voice was cruel.

I've had enough of this damn nonsense. I've known you for 25 years, Zill, and I never knew you to miss a chance to take your disappointments out on Paul. You're not wicked, you're worse, you're a fool. And let me tell you that fall is the finest boy God ever made. Every decent person is sick and tired of you're taking advantage of being a woman and springing every mean innuendo you can think of. Who the hell are you?

You that a person like Paul should have to ask your permission to go with me. You act like you were a combination of Queen Victoria and Cleopatra. You fool. Can't you see how people snicker at you and sneer at you? Silla was sobbing. I've never, I've never, I've never been talked like this done all my life. No, but that's the way they talk behind your back always. They say you're a scolding woman, oh, by God.

God, that cowardly attack broke her. Her eyes were blank, she wept. But Babbit glared stolidly. He felt that he was the all-powerful official in charge, that Paul and Mrs. Babette looked on him with awe, that he alone could handle this case. Zill arrived, she begged, Oh, they don't. They certainly do. I've been a bad woman. I'm terribly sorry. I'll kill you. myself, I'll do anything all? What do you want?' She abased herself completely. Also, she enjoyed it, to the connoisseur of scenes.

Nothing is more enjoyable than a thorough, melodramatic, egotistic humility. I want you to let Paul beat it off to Maine with me, Babbit demanded. How can I help his going? You've just said I was an idiot, and nobody paid any attention to me. Oh, you can help him. all right, all right. What you got to do is cut out hinting that the minute he gets out of your side he'll go chasing after some petticoat. Matter of fact, that's the way you start the boy off wrong. You ought to have more sense. Oh, I will. Honestly, I will, George. I know I was bad. Well,

forgive me. All of you forgive me. She enjoyed it. So did Babbitt. He condemned magnificently, and forgave piously. And he went parading out with his wife. He was grandly explanatory to her. Kind of ashamed, bully, Zilla, but, of course, it was the only way to handle her. Gosh, I certainly did have her crawling. She said calmly, yes, you were horrid. You were showing off. You were having a lovely time thinking what a great fine person you were. Well, by golly, can you beat it? Of course I might have expected you to not stand by me. I'm I might have expected you'd stick up for your own sex."

Yes, poor as alien, she's so unhappy. She takes it out on Paul. She hasn't a single thing to do in that little flat, and she broods too much, and she used to be so pretty and gay, and she resents losing it, and you were just as nasty and as mean as could be. I'm not a bit proud of you, or of Paul, boasting about his horrid love affairs.

He was so coldly silent. He maintained his bad temper at a high, level of outraged nobility, all the four blocks home. At the door he left her, in self-approving haughtiness, and tramped the lawn. With a shock it was revealed to him. Gosh, I wonder if she was right, if she was partially right. Overwork must have flayed him to abnormal sensitiveness. It was one of the few times in his life when he had queried his eternal excellence, and he perceived the summer night, smell the wet grass. Then, I don't care. I've pulled it off. We're going to have our spree, and for Paul, I'd do anything.

Two. They were buying their main tackle at Ijim's brothers, the sporting goods mart, with the help of Willis Ijams, fellow member of the booster club. Babbit was completely mad. He trumpeted and danced, he muttered to Paul. Say, this is pretty good, eh? To be buying the stuff, eh? And good old Willis Ijams. himself, coming down to on the floor to wait on us. Hey, if those fellows that are getting their kit for the North Lakes knew we were clear up in Maine, they'd have a fit, eh? Well, come on, brother Ijin, Willis, I mean.

Here's your chance. We're a couple of easy marks. Woo, let me at it. I'm going to buy out the store. He gloated on fly rods and gorgeous rubber hip boots on tents with celluloid windows and folding chairs and iceboxes. He simple-heartedly wanted to buy all of them. It was the Paul whom he was vaguely protecting who kept him from his drunken desires. But even Paul lightened when Willis Ijim's, as salesman with poetry and diplomacy discussed flies. Now, of course you boys know, he said,

the great scrap is between dry flies and wet flies. Personally, I'm for dry flies, more sporting. "'That's so. A lot more sporting,' Fomel needed Babbitt, who knew very little about flies either wet or dry. "'Now, if you'll take my advice, George, you'll stock up well on these pale evening dims and silver sedges, and red ants. Oh, boy, there's a fly that red ant. You bet that's what it is, a fly,' rejoiced Babbitt. "'Yes, sir, that red ant,' said Eindsams. "'Is a real honest to God fly.' "'Oh, I guess old Mr. Trout won't come a hustling "'then I drop one of the red ants on the water?' "'Asserted Babbitt, and his thick rest made a rapturous motion of casting.

"'Yes, and the landlocked salmon will take it too,' said Ijams, "'who had never seen a landlock salmon?' "'Sammon, Trout? Say, Paul, can you see Uncle George "'with his khaki pants on hauling them in? "'Some more than about seven. "'Whee!' "'Three.' "'They were on the New York.

Express, incredibly bound from Maine, incredibly without their families. They were free in a man's world, in the smoking compartment of the Pullman. Outside of the car window was a glaze of darkness, stepped with the gold and infrequent mysterious lights. Babbit was immensely conscious, into a sway and authority platter of the train, of going, of going on, leaning toward Polly grunted, gosh, very nice to be hiking, eh? A small room with its walls of ochre-colored steel was filled mostly with the sort of men he classified as the best fellows who'll ever meet, real good mixers. There were four of them on the long

seat, a fat man with a shrewd fat face, a knife-edged man, in a green balur hat, a very young man with an imitation amber's cigarette holder and babbid facing them. on two movable leather chairs were paul and a lanky old-fashioned man very cunning with wrinkled bracketing his mouth they all read newspapers or trade journals boot and shoe journals crockery journals and waited for the joys of conversation it was the very young man now making his first journey by pullman who began it say gee i had a wild time in zenith he gloried say if a fellow knows the ropes there he can have as wild a time as he can't in New York. Yeah, I bet you simply raised the old Ned. I figured you were a bad man when I saw you get on the train, chuckled the fat one.

The others delightedly laid down their papers. Well, that's all right. Guess I've seen some things in the arbor you never seen, complained the boy. Oh, I bet you did. I bet you lapped up the malted milk like a regular little devil. Then the boy, having served his introduction, they ignored him and charged. into real talk. Only Paul, sitting by himself, reading at a serial story in a newspaper, failed to join them, and all but Babit regarded him as a snob, an eccentric, a person of no

spirit. Which of them said which has never been determined, it does not matter, since they all had the same ideas and expressed them always with the same ponderous and brassy assurance. If it was not Babad who was delivering any given verdict, at least he was beaming on the Chancellor, who did deliver it. And that, though, announced the first, they're selling quite some booze in Zenith. Guess they are everywhere. I don't know how you fellows feel about prohibition,

but the way it strikes me is that it's a mighty beneficial thing for the poor sob. That hasn't got any willpower, but for fellows like us, it's an infringement of personal liberty. That's the fact. Congress has got no right to interfere with a fellow's personal liberty, contended the second.

A man came in from the car, but as all the seats were filled, he stood up while he smoked his cigarette. He was an outsider. He was not one of the old families of the smoking compartment. They looked upon him bleakly, and after trying to appear at ease, by examining his chin in the mirror, he gave up and went out in silence.

"'Just been making a trip through the South. "'Business condition is not very good down there,' said one of the council. "'S that a fact. Not very good, eh?' "'No, it didn't strike me they were up to normal.' "'Not up to normal, huh?' "'Nah, I wouldn't hardly say they were.' The whole council nodded Sajeline, decided,

"'Hep, not hardly up to snuff. "'Well, business conditions ain't what they ought to be out west, neither, "'not by a long shot. "'That's the fact, and I guess the hotel business feels it. That's one good thing, though. These hotels, they've been charging five bucks a day, yes, and maybe six, seven, or a rotten room or going darn good to get four,

and maybe give you a little service. What's the fact? Well, spend about hotels. I hit that St. Francis in San Francisco for the first time the other day, and say, it certainly is a first-class place. You're right, brother. The St. Francis is a swell place, absolutely A-1.

That's a fact. I'm right with you. It's a first-class place. Yeah, but say, any of you fellows ever stay at Rippleton in Chicago? I don't want to knock. I believe in boosting whenever you can, but say, of all the rotten dumps that pass themselves off his first-class hotel, that's the worst.

I'm going to get those guys one of these days, and I told him so. You know how I am? Well, maybe you don't know, but I'm accustomed to first-class accommodations, and I'm perfectly willing to pay reasonable price. I get into Chicago late the other night, and Rippleton's near the station. I'd never been there before, but I says to the taxi drivers,

always believe in taking a taxi when you get in late. It may cost a little more money, but gosh, it's worth it when you got to be up early next morning and outselling, a lot of crabs. And I said to him, Oh, just drive me over to the Rippleton. Well, we got there, and I breezed up to the desk and says to the clerk, well brother got a nice room with bath for cousin bill say you'd a thought i'd sold him a second or ask him to work on yom kipper he hands me the cold-boiled stare and yaps i don't know friend i'll see And he ducks behind the rim of the jig.

They keep track of the rooms on. Well, I guess he called up their credit association in American Security Lurg to see if I was all right. He certainly took long enough. Or maybe he just went to sleep. But finally, he comes out and looks at me like it hurts him. And croaks, I think I can let you have a room and bath. Well, that's awful nice of you.

Sorry to trouble you. How much you'll send me back, I says real sweet. It'll cost you seven bucks a day, friend. He says. Well, it was late, and anyway. It went down on my expense account. Gosh, if I'd been paying it instead of the firm, I'd be trampled to the streets all night before I'd be

let a hick tamber and slick me seven, eight, or big round dollars, believe me. So I'll let it go at that. Well, the clerk wakes a nice young bellhop, fine lad. Not a day over 79 years old. Fought at the Battle of Gettysburg and doesn't know it's over yet. Thought I was one of the Confederates, I guess, from the way he looked at me, and Rip Van Winkle took me up to something. I found out

afterwards they called it a room. But first I thought there had been some mistake. I thought they were putting me in the Salvation Army collection box at seven per each and every damn. Gosh. Yeah, I heard of the Rippleton was pretty cheesy. Now, when I went to Chicago, always stay at Blackstone or LaSalle, first-class places. Say, any of you fellows ever estate, at Birchdale at Terre Haught? How is it? Oh, at Berchtdale, First Class Hotel. Twelve minutes of conference on the state of hotels in South Bend, Flint, Dayton, Tulsa, Wichita, Fort Worth, Winona, Erie, Fargo, and Boost John.

Speaking about prices, the man in the Lvoire had observed, fingering the elk tooth on his heavy watch chain, I'd like to know where they get this stuff about clothes coming down. Now you take this suit I got on, he pinched the trouser leg. Four years ago, paid $4.250 for it, and it was real, sure enough value. Well, here the other day I went into a store back home and asked to see a suit, and the fellow yanks out some hand-me-downs, that honest. I wouldn't put on a hired man. Just out of curiosity, asking me, what's you charge you for that junk?

Junk, he says. What do you mean, junk? That's a swell piece of goods, all wool. Like hell, it was nice vegetable wool right off the old plantation. "'It's all wool,' says, and we get 67-90 for it. "'Oh, you do, do you?' I says. "'Not for me, you don't. "'I says, I walks right out on him.

"'You bet,' I says to the wife, "'Well, I said, as long as your strength holds out "'and you can go on putting a few more patches on Papa's pants, "'we'll just pass up buying clothes.' "'That's right, brother. "'And just look at collard, for instance.' "'Hey, wait,' fat man protested. What's the matter with collars? I'm selling collars.

You realize the cost of labor on a collar is 207% above? They voted that if their old friend the fat man sold collars, then the price of collars was exactly what it should be. But all other clothing was tragically too expensive. They admired and loved one another now. They went profoundly into the science of business and indicated that the purpose of manufacturing a plow or a brick was so that it might be sold.

To them, the romantic hero was no longer than, night, the wandering poet, the cowpuncher, the aviator, nor the brave young district attorney, but the great sales manager, who had an analysis of merchandising problems on his glass-top desk, whose title of nobility was go-getter, and who devoted himself and all his young samurai to the cosmic purpose of selling, not of selling anything in particular, for to be anybody in particular, but pure selling. The shop talk roused Paul Reelthing. Though he was a player of violins and an interestingly unhappy husband,

he was also a very able salesman of tar roofing. He listened to the fat man's remarks on the value of house organs and bulletins as a method of jabbing up the boys on the road, and he himself offered one or two excellent thoughts on the use of two cents stamps on circulars. Then he committed an offense against the holy law of the clan of good fellows. He became highbrow. They were entering a city. On the outskirts they passed a steel mill,

which flared in scarlet and orange flame, but licked at the cadaverous stacks, at the iron sheathed walls and sullen converters. Why, Lord, look at that. Beautiful, said Paul. You bet it's beautiful, friend. That's the Shelling Horton steel plant. And they tell me, old John Shelling made a good three million bones

out of munitions during the war. The man with a belure hat, said reverently. I didn't mean, I mean, it's lovely the way the light pulls that picturesque yard, all littered with junk right out of the darkness, said Paul. He stared at him while Babbitt crowed. Paul, there has certainly got to one of the great little eye for picturesque places and quaint sights and all that stuff. It'd been an author or something if he hadn't gone into the roofing line. Paul looked annoyed.

Babbitt sometimes wondered if Paul appreciated his loyal boosting. The man in the Lurahat grunted. Well, personally, I think Schelling Horton kept their works awfully dirty, bum-routing. But I don't suppose there's any law against calling them picturesque if it gets you that way. Paul Suckily returned to his newspaper and the conversation logically moved on to trains. For time we get into Pittsburgh, asked Babette. Pittsburgh? I think we get in it. No, that was last year's schedule. Wait a minute. Let's see.

Got a timetable right here. One or four on time. Yeah, sure, we must be about on time. No, we aren't. We are seven minutes late. Last station. We were? Straight? My gosh, I thought we were right on time. No, we're about seven minutes late. Yep, that's right. Seven minutes late. The porter entered a Negro and white jacket with brass buttons. "'How late are we, George?' growled the fat man. "'Deed, I don't know, sir, I think about on time,' said the porter, folding towels and deftly tossing them up on the rack above the washbowls. The council stared at him gloomily, and when he was gone, they wailed.

"'I don't know what's come over these niggers nowadays. They never give you a civil answer.' "'That's a fact. They're getting so they don't have a single bit of respect for you. The old-fashioned coon was a fine old cuss. He knew his plight. But these young dinghies don't want to be porters or cotton figures? Oh, no. They got to be lawyers, professors, and Lord knows what all. I'll tell you, it's becoming a pretty serious problem. We ought to get together and show the black man yes, and the yellow man his place.

I haven't got one particle brace prejudice. I'm the first one to be glad when a nigger succeeds. So long as he stays where he belongs and doesn't try to usurp the rightful authority and business ability of the white man. That's that. And another thing we got to do, said the man with the velour hat, whose name was Koplinsky, is to keep those damn foreigners out of the country. Thank the Lord they're putting a limit on immigration.

Those diggos and honkies have got a lot to learn this is a white man's country, and they ain't wanted here. When we've assimilated the foreigners, we got here now and learned them the principles of Americanism and turned them into regular folks. Well, maybe we'll let it. in a few more. You bet, that's a fact, they observed, and passed on to lighter topics. They rapidly reviewed motor car prices, tire mileage, oil stocks, fishing, and the prospects

for the wheat crop in Dakota. But the fat man was impatient at this waste of time. He was a veteran traveler and free of illusions. Already he had asserted that he was an old he won. He leaned forward, gathered in all their attention by his expression of sly humor and grumbled, oh hell boys let's cut out the formality and get down to the stories. They became very lively and intimate. Paul and the boy vanished.

The others slid forward on the long seat, unbuttoned their vest, thrust their feet up on the chairs, pulled the stately brass cuspidors nearer, and ran the green window shade down on its little trolley to shut them from the uncomfortable strangeness of night. After each bark of laughter, they cried, Hey, did you ever hear the one about? Babbit was expansive and virile.

When the train stopped in an important station, the four men walked up and down the cement platform, under the vast smoky train shed roof, like a stormy sky under the elevated footways, beside crates of ducks and sides of beef, in the mystery of an unknown city. They strolled abreast, old friends and well-content. At the long-drawn, all aboard!

Like a mountain call it dusk. they hastened back into the smoking compartment and till two in the morning continued to droll tails their eyes damp with cigar smoke and laughter when they parted they shook hands and chuckled well sir it's been a great session sorry to bust it up mighty glad to meet you babbitt lay awake in the close hot tomb of his pulman berth shaking with remembrance of the fat man's lumer about the lady who wished to be wild he raised the shade he lay with a puffy arm tucked between his head and a skimpy pillow looking out on the sliding silhouettes of trees and village lamps like exclamation points he was very happy end of chapter ten chapter eleven of babet this libervox recording is in the public domain Recording by Mike Vendetti. Mike Vendetti.com, Babbett by Sinclair Lewis, Chapter 11. 1. They had four hours in New York between trains.

The one thing Babbitt wished to see was the Pennsylvania Hotel, which had been built since his last visit. He stared up at it, muttering. 2,200 rooms and 2,200 bath. That's got everything in World Beat. Lord, their turnover must be, well, suppose price of rooms is $4 to $8 a day, and I suppose maybe some 10, and four times $2,200, say six times $2,200. Well, anyway, with restaurants and everything, say

summers between $8,000 and $15,000 a day, every day. I never thought I'd see a thing like that, some town. Of course, the average fellow in Zenith has got more individual initiative than the four flushers here, but I got to hand it to a new, york yes sir town you're all right some ways well old paulinsky i guess we've seen everything that's worth while hell we kill the rest of the time movie but paul desired to see a liner i always wanted to go to europe and by thunder i will too some day before i passed out he sighed from a wharf on the north river they started to the stern of the antiqua and her stacks and wireless antenna lifted above the dockhouse which shut her in "'By golly!' Babbit droned. "'Wouldn't it be so bad to go over to the old country

"'and take a squint at all those ruins "'in the place where Shakespeare was born, "'and think of being able to order a drink "'whenever you wanted one. "'Just range up to a bar and holler out loud. "'Give you a cocktail! "'Darn the police. "'Not bad at all.

"'What'd you like to see over there, Paul Lippus?' Paul did not answer. Babbit turned. Paul was standing with clenched fits, head drooping, staring at the liner as in terror. His thin body, seen against the summer-glarring planks of the wharf, was childishly meager. Again,

What would you hit for on the other side, Paul? Scowling at the steamer, his breast heaving. Paul whispered, Oh, my God. While Babbit watched him anxiously, he snapped, Come on, let's get out of this, and asin down the wharf not looking back. That's funny, considered Babbitt. Boy didn't care for seeing the ocean boats after all, I thought he'd be arrested in him.

Two. Though he exalted and made sage speculations about locomotive horsepower, as their train climbed the main mountain ridge and from the summit, he looked down the shining way among the pines. though we remarked, Oh, by golly! When he discovered that the station at Kada Kumchuk, the end of the line, was an aged freight car.

Babbitt's moment of impassioned release came when they sat on a tiny wharf on Lake Sonskwam, awaiting the launch from the hotel. A raft had floated down the lake between the logs and the shore. The water was transparent, thin-looking, flashing with minnows, a guide in black felt hat with trout flies in the band and flannel shirt of a peculiar daring blue, saturn a log and whittled and was silent.

A dog, a good country dog, black and woolly gray, a dog rich in leisure, and in meditation, scratched and grunted and slept. The thick sunlight was lavish on the bright water. On the rim of gold-green blossom boughs, the silver birches and tropic ferns and across the lake it burned on the sturdy shoulders of the mountains. Over everything was a holy peace. Silent, they loafed on the edge of the wharf, swinging their legs above the water.

The immense tenderness of the place sank into Babbitt, and he murmured, I'd just like to sit here the rest of my life and whittle and sit, and never hear typewriter, or stand graft fussing on the phone, Rone and Ted scrapping, just sit. Gosh. He patted Paul's shoulder. How does it strike, you old snoozer?

Oh, it's darn good, Georgie. There's something sort of eternal about it. For once, Babbitt understood him. Three. The launch rounded the bend at the head of the lake. Under a mountain slope, they saw the little central dining shack, their hotel in the crescent of squat-logged. cottages which served as bedrooms.

They landed and endured the critical examination of the habituates, who had been at the hotel for a whole week. In their cottage, with its high stone fireplace, they hastened. As Babbitt expressed it, "'To get some regular heatogs!' They came out, Paul in an old gray suit and soft white shirt, Babbitt in khaki shirt and vast and flapping khaki trousers. It was excessively new khaki, his rimless spectator.

belonged to a city office, and his face was not tanned but a city pink. He made a discordant noise in the place, but with infinite satisfaction he slapped his legs and crowed, "'Say, this is getting back home, eh?' They stood on the wharf before the hotel. He winked at Paul and drew from his back pocket a plug of chewing tobacco, a vulgarism forbidden in the babit home. He took a chew, beam him in wagging his head as he tugged at it.

"'M-M-M, maybe I haven't been hungry for a wad of eating tobacco. Have some!' They looked at each other in a grin of understanding. Paul took the plug, gnawed at it. They stood quiet, their jaws working. They solemnly spat one after the other into the placid water. They stretched voluptlessly, with lifted arms and arched backs. From beyond the mountains came the shuffling sound of a far-off train.

A trout leaped, and fell back in a silver circle. They sighed together. Four. They had a week before their families came. Each evening they planned to get up early and fish before breakfast. Each morning they lay a bed till the breakfast bell pleasantly conscious that there was no efficient wives to rouse them. The mornings were cold, the fire was kindly as they dressed. Paul was distressingly clean.

But Babette reveled in a good, sound dirtiness. In not having to shave till his spirit was moved to it. He treasured every grease-spot and fish gale on his new khaki trousers. All morning they fished

unenergetically or tramped the dim and aquaise-lighted trails along the rank ferns and moss sprinkled with crimson bells. They slept all afternoon until midnight played stud poker

with the guides. Poker was a serious business to the guides. They did not. gossip, they shuffled the thick, greasy cards with a deft ferocity, menacing to the sports, and Joe Paradise, King of the Guides, was sarcastic to loiterers, who halted the game even to scratch. At midnight as Paul and he blundered to their cottage over the pungent wet grass and pine roots confusing in the darkness, Babbit rejoiced that he did not have to explain to his wife

where he had been all evening. They did not talk much, the nervous, though Caciati and opinionation of the Zenith Athletic Club dropped from them. But when they did talk, they slipped into the naive intimacy of college days. Once they drew their canoe up to the bank of the Susqueam water, a stream walled by the dense green of hardhack. The sun roared on the green jungle, but the shade was sleepy peace, and the water was golden and rippling. Babbitt drew his hand through the cool flood,

and mused. We never thought we'd come to Maine together. No, we never done anything the way we thought we would. I expected to live in Germany with my granddad's people and study the fiddle. That's so. Remember how I wanted to be a lawyer, going to politics? I still think I might have made a go at it. I'm kind of got the gift of gab.

Anyway, I can think on my feet and make some kind of a spiel on most anything, And, of course, that's the thing you need in politics, by and gully. Ted's going to law school, even if I didn't. Well, I guess it's worked out all right. Myra's been a fine wife, and she'll means well, Pallibus. Yes, up here. I figure out all sorts of plans to keep her amused. I kind of feel like a life is going to be different.

Now that we're getting good rest and can go back and start over again. I hope so, old boy. Shiley. "'They, gosh, it's been awful nice to sit around and loaf and gamble and act regular with you along. You old horse thief!' "'Well, you know what it means to me, Georgie. Save my life.' The shame of emotion overpowered them.

They cursed a little to prove they were good, rough fellows. And in a mellow silence, babbit whistling while Paul hummed, they paddled back to the hotel. Five. Though it was Paul who seemed overwrought, Babbit who had been the protecting Big Brother, Paul became clear-eyed and merry, while Babbit sank into irritability. He uncovered layer on layer of hidden weariness. At first, he had played nimble gesture to Paul, and for him, sought amusements. By the end of the week, Paul was nurse, and Babette accepted favors with the condescension.

One always shows a patient nurse. The day before the families arrived, the women guest at the hotel bubbled. Oh, isn't it nice, you must be so excited. The proprietors compelled Babette and Paul to look excited, but they went to bed early and grumpy. When Myra appeared, she said at once, Now we want you boys to go on playing around just as if we weren't here. The first evening he stayed out for poker with the guides,

and she said in placid merrimus, "'My, you're a regular bad one.' "'The second evening,' she grown sleepily. "'Good heavens, are you going to be out every single night?' The third evening he didn't play poker. He was tired now in every cell. "'Funny. Vacation doesn't seem to have done me a bit of good,' he lamented. "'Paul's friskey is a colt, but I swear I'm crankier

and nervouser than when I came up here.' weeks in Maine. At the end of the second week, he began to feel calm and it rested in life. He planned an expedition to climb Sham Mountain and wanted to camp overnight at Boxcar Pond. He was curiously weak yet cheerful, as though he had cleansed his veins of poisonous energy and was filling them with wholesome blood. He ceased to be irritated by Ted's infatuation with a waitress, his seventh tragic affair this year. He played catch with Ted, and with pride taught him to cast a fly in the pine-shadowed silence of Skumwet Pond. He hadn't the end, he sighed.

Hang it. I'm just beginning to enjoy my vacation, but, well, I feel a lot better, and it's going to be one great year. Maybe the real estate board will elect me president instead of some fuzzy old-fashioned figure like Chan Mott. On the way home, whenever he went into the smoking compartment, he felt guilty at discerning his wife,

and angry at being expected. to feel guilty. But each time he triumphed, Oh, this is going to be a great year, a great old year. End of Chapter 11. Chapter 12 of Babbit. This Lieber Vox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti. Mike Vendetti.com. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 12. One. All the way home from Maine, Babbitt was certain that he was a changed man.

He was converted to serenity. He was going to cease worrying about business. He was going to have more interests, theaters, public affairs, reading, and suddenly, as he finished an especially heavy cigar, he was going to stop smoking. He invented a new and perfect method. He would buy no tobacco. He would depend on borrowing it.

And, of course, he would be ashamed to borrow often. In a spasm of righteousness, he flung his cigar case out of the smoking compartment window. He went back and was kind to his wife about nothing in particular. He admired his own purity and decided, Absolutely simple, just a matter of willpower. He started a magazine serial about a scientific detective. Ten miles on, he was conscious that he desired to smoke. He ducked his head like a turtle, going into a magazine.

to a shell. He appeared uneasy. He skipped two pages in his story and didn't know it. Five miles later, he leaped up and sought the porter. "'Eh, uh, George, have you got a?' The porter looked patient. "'We've got a timetable?' Babbitt finished. At the next stop, he went out and bought a cigar. Since it was to be his last before he reached Zenith, he finished it down to an inch stub. Four days later, he again remembered that he had stopped smoking, but he was too busy catching up with his office work to keep it remembered. Two. Baseball, he determined, would be an excellent hobby.

No sense a man's working his fool head off. I'm going out to the game three times a week, besides, for a lot to support the home team. He did go and support the team, and enhance the glory of Zenith by yelling, better boy and rotten. He performed the rights scrupously. He wore a cotton handkerchief about his collar.

He became sweaty. He opened his mouth in a wide, loose grin, and drank lemon soda out of a bottle. He went to the game three times a week, for one week. Then he compromised by watching the Advocates Times bulletin board. He stood in the thickest and steamyest of the crowd, and as the boy up on the lofty platform recorded the achievements of Big Bill Bostwick the picture, Babbitt remarked to complete strangers,

Very nice, good work, and hastened back to the office. He honestly believed that he loved baseball. It is true that he hadn't in 25 years himself played any baseball except back-lot catch with Ted, very gentle and strictly limited to ten minutes. But the game was a custom. of his clan. And it gave outlet for the homicidal and sides-taking instincts

which Babbitt called patriotism and love of sport. As he approached the office, he walked faster and faster, muttering, Just better hustle. All about him, the city was hustling, for hustling's sake. Men and motors were hustling to pass one another in the hustling traffic.

Men were hustling to catch trolleys, with another trolley a minute behind, and to leap from trolleys, to gallop across the sidewalk, to hurl themselves into buildings, into hustling express elevators? Men and dairy lunches were hustling to gulp down the food, which cooks had hustled to fry. Men and barbershops were snapping. Just shave me once over, got to hustle. Men were feverishly getting rid of visitors and offices adorned with signs,

This is my busy day. And the Lord created the world in six days. You can spiel all you got to say in six minutes. men who had made 5,000 year before last and 10,000 last year were urging on nerve-yelping bodies and parched brains so they might make 20,000 this year, and the men who had broken down immediately after making their $20,000 were hustling to catch trains to hustle through the vacations

which the hustling doctors had ordered. Among them, Babbitt hustled back to his office to sit down with nothing much to do except See that the staff looked as though they were hustling. Three. Every Saturday afternoon he hustled out to his country club and hustled through nine holes of golf as a rest after the week's hustle.

In Zenith, it was as necessary for a successful man to belong to a country club as it was to wear a linen collar. Babbitts was the Outing Golf and Country Club, a pleasant gray-shingled building with a broad porch on a daisy-starred cliff above Lake Kenapalooz. There was another, the Tonawada Country Club, to which belonged Charles McEverley, Horace Updike,

and the other rich men who lunched not at the athletic club, but at the Union Club. Babbitt explained with frequency, You couldn't hire me to join the Tonawanda, even if I did have 180 bucks to throw away on the initiation fee. At the outing, you've got a bunch of real human fellows, and the finest lot of little women in town, just as good at joshing as the men.

But at the Tonawana, there's nothing but these wood-bees in New York get-ups, drinking tea, too much dog altogether. Well, I wouldn't join the Tonawana, even if they... I wouldn't join it on a bet. When he played four or five holes, he relaxed a bit. His tobacco fluttering heart beat more normally, and his voice slowed to the drawing

of his hundred generations of pebble. present ancestors. Four. At least once a week, Mr. and Mrs. Babbot and Tinka went to the movies. Their favorite motion picture was the Chateau, which had 3,000 spectators and had an orchestra of 50 pieces,

which played arrangements from the operas and sweets portraying a day on the farm or a four-alarm fire in the stone rotunda, decorated with crown-embroidered velvet chairs and almost medieval tempestries. parakeet sat on gilded lattos columns with exclamations of whoa my golly and you got to go some to beat this dump babbitt admired the chateau as he stared across the thousands of heads a gray plain in the dimness as he smelled good clothes and mild perfume and chewing gum he felt as when he had first seen a mountain and realized how very very much earth and rock there was in it.

He liked three kinds of film. Pretty bathing girls with bare legs, policemen or cowboys, and an industrious shooting of revolvers, and funny fat men who ate spaghetti. He chuckled with immense moist-eyed sentimentality at interludes portraying puppies, kittens, and chubby babies,

and he wept at deathbeds and old mothers being patient in mortgage cottages. Mrs. Babbitt preferred the picture in which handsome young women and elaborate frocks moved through sets ticketed as the drawing-rooms of New York millionaires. As for Tinka, she preferred or was believed to prefer what her parents told her to. All his relaxations, baseball, golf, movies, bridge motoring long talks with Paul at the athletic club, or at the good red beef and old English chop house, were necessary to Babbitt, where he was entering a year of such activity as he had never known.

End of Chapter 12. Chapter 13 of Babbitt. This Libra Vox recording is in the public domain, recording by Mike Vendetti.com. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis, Chapter 13. 1. It was by accident that Babbitt had his opportunity to address the S-A-R-E-B. the S-A-R-E-B, as its members called it, with the universal passion for mysterious and important-sounding initials was the State Association of Real Estate Boards, the Organization of Brokers and Operators.

It was to hold its annual convention at Monarch, Zenith, chief rival among the cities of the state. Babette was an official delegate. Another was Cecil Roundtree, whom Babette admired for his picturesque speculative building and hated for his social position. For being present at the smartest dances on Royal Ridge, Roundtree was chairman of the convention program committee. Babbit had growled to him, "'Makes me tired the way these doctors and profs and preachers put on lugs about being professional men.

A good realtor has to have more knowledge and finesse than any of them.' "'Right you are,' I say. Why don't you put that into a paper and give it at the S-A-R-E-B, suggested Roundtree? Well, if it would help, you're making up the program. Tell you, the way I look at it is this. First place, we ought to insist that folks call us realtors, not real estate men. Sounds more like a regular profession. Second place.

What is it distinguishes a profession from a mere trade, business, or occupation. What is it? Why, it's the public service and the skill, the train skill, and the knowledge, and, uh, all that, whereas the fellow that merely goes out for the jack never considers the public service and trained skill and so on. Now as a professional. Rather, that's perfectly bully, perfectly cooking. Now you write it in a paper, said Roundtree, as he rapidly and firmly moved away. Two.

However, accustomed to be. to the literary labors of advertisements and correspondence. Babbit was dismayed on the evening when he sat down to prepare a paper, which would take a whole ten minutes to read. He laid out a new fifteen-cent school exercise book on his wife's collapsible sewing table, set up for the event in the living room. The household had been bullied into silence.

Verona and Ted requested to disappear, and Tinker threatened with, If I hear one sound out of you, If you haul her for a glass of water one single solitary time, you better not. That's all. Mrs. Babbitt sat over by the piano, making a knot gown, and gazing with respect,

while Babbitt wrote in the exercise book to the rhythmical wriggling and squeaking of the sewing table. When he rose, damp and jumpy, and his throat dusty from cigarettes, she marveled, I don't see how you can just sit down and make up things right out of your own head. Oh, it's a training and constructive imagination that a fellow gets in modern business life. He had written seven pages, whereof the first page set forth?

Illustration admitted consists of several doodles and, one, a profession. Two, not just a trade crossed out. Three, skill and vision. Three, should be called realtor and not just real estate man. The six other pages, rather like the first. For a week he went about looking important. Every morning is he dressed, he thought aloud, "'Jever stopped to consider, Myra,

that before a town can have buildings or prosperity or any of these things, some realtor has got to sell them the land. All civilization starts with him. Did you ever realize that?' Half the athletic club, he led unwilling men aside to include, inquire. Say, if you had to read a paper before a big convention, would you start in with

funny stories or just kind of scatter them and thall through? He asked Howard Littlefield for a set of statistics about real estate sales, something good and impressive. And Littlefield provided something exceedingly good and impressive. But it was to T. Charmoldy Frank that Babbitt most often turned. He caught Frank at the club every noon and demanded while Frank looked hunted and invasive. Say, chum, you're a shark on this writing thing. How would you put this sentence? See here in my manuscript? Manuscript now, where the deuce is that? Ah, yes, here. Would you say we ought not also to alone think, or we ought also not to think alone, or one evening when he's wife was away, and he had no one to impress.

Babbitt forgot about style, order, and other mysteries, and scrawled off what he really thought about the real estate business and about himself. And he found a paper written. When he read it to his wife, she yearned, Why, dear, it's splendid, beautifully written, and so clear and interesting, and such splendid ideas, why it's just, it's just splendid. it. Next day he cornered Chump Frank and crowed. Well, old son, I finished it last evening. Just lambed it out. I used to think you writing guys

must have had a hard job making up pieces, but Lord, it's a cinch. Pretty soft for you, fellows. You certainly earn your money easy. Someday, when I get ready to retire, guess I'll take to writing and show you boys how to do it. I always used to think I could write better stuff and more punch and originality than all this stuff you see printed and now I'm doggone sure of it. He had four copies of the paper typed in black with gorgeous red title,

had them bound in a pale blue manila, and affably presented one to old Ira Runyon, the managing editor of the Advocate Times who said yes indeed yes. He was very glad to have it, and he certainly would read it all through as soon as they could find time. Mrs. Babbitt could not go to Monarch.

She had a women's club meeting. Babbitt said he was very sorry. Three. Besides they have five official delegates to the convention, Babbitt, Roundtree, W.A. Rogers, Alvin Thayer, and Albert Wing, there were 50 unofficial delegates, most of them with their wives. They met at the Union Station for the Midnight train to Monarch. All of them, save Cecil Roundtree, who was such a snob that he never wore badges,

displayed celluloid buttons the size of dollars and lettered, We zoom for Zenith. The official delegates were magnificent with silver and magenta ribbons. Martin Lumsum's little boy Willie carried a tassel banner inscribed Zenith, the Zip City, Zeal Zest and Zawi, $1 million in 1935. As the delegates arrived, not in taxi cabs, but in the family automobile driven by the oldest son or by cousin Fred. they formed impromptu processions through the station waiting-room.

It was a new and enormous waiting-room, with marble pilasters and farsiscus depicting the exploration of the Chalusuf River Valley by Pierre-Emir Fort O'Oll in 1740. The benches were shelves of ponderous mahogany, the new stand of marble kiosk with brass grill. Down the echoing spaces of the hall, the delegates paraded after Willie Lumpson's banner. the men waving their cigars, the women, conscious of their new frocks and strings of beads,

all singing to the tune of old Ag-Zine, the official city song written by Chum Frank. Good old Zenith, our kin with kith, wherever we may be, hats in the ring, we blithely sing of thy prosperity. Warren Wilby, the broker, who had a gift of verse for banquets and birthdays, had added to Frank City's song a special verse for the Realtors Convention. Oh, here we come. The fellows from Zinath the Zip City. We wish the state, in real estate. There's none so live as we. Babbit was stirred to a hysteric patriotism. He leaped on a bench, shouting it to the crowd. What's the matter with Zinath? She's all right.

What's best old town in the USA? Zinnus! Patient poor people waiting for the midnight train stared in unenvious wonder. Italian women and shawls, old weary men with broken shoes, roving roadsways, boys, and suits, which had been flashy when they were new, but which were faded now and wrinkled. Babette perceived that as an official delegate, he must be more dignified. With Wing and Rogers, he tramped up and down the cement platform beside the waiting

Pullmans. Motor-driven baggage truck and red-cap porters, carrying bags sped down the platform with an agreeable effect of activity. Arc lights glared and stammered overhead. The glossy yellow sleeping car shone impressively. Babbitt made his voice to be measured and lordly. He thrust out his abdomen and rumbled, We got to see to it that the convention lets the legislature understand just where they get off in this matter of taxing, royalty transfers. Wing uttered approving grunts, and Babbitt swelled, gloated. The blind of a Pullman compartment was raised, and Babbitt looked into an unfamiliar world. The occupant of the compartment was Lucille McCelbley, the pretty wife of the millionaire contractor.

Possibly, Babbitt thrilled. She was going to Europe. On the seat beside her was a bunch of orchids and violets, and a yellow paper-bound book which seemed foreign. While he stared, she picked up the book, then glanced out the window as though she was bored. She must have looked straight at him, and he had met her, but she gave no sign. She languidly pulled down the blind, and he stood still, a cold feeling of insignificance in his heart.

But on a train his pride was restored by meeting delegates from Sparta, Pioneer, and other smaller cities of the state who listened respectfully when as a magnifico, from the metropolis of zenith. He explained politics, and the value of a good, sound business administration.

They fell joyfully into chop-talk, the purest and most rapturous form of conversation. How'd this fellow round-tree make-out with his big apartment hotel he was going to put up? What'd he do? Get out bonds to finance it? Ask a Spartan broker. Well, I'll tell you, said Babbitt. Now, if I'd been handling it.

So, Ibert Wing was droning, I hired this shop window for a week and put up a big sign, toward town for tiny tots, and stuck in a lot of dollhouses and some dinky little trees. And then down at the bottom, baby liked this dolly dale. But Papa and Mama will prefer our beautiful bungalows, and you know that certainly got folks talking, and first week we sold.

The trucks sang lick-d-lick-lick-lick-lick as the train ran through the factory district. Furnaces spurted flame and power hammers were clanging. Red lights, green lights, furious white lights rushed past, and Babbitt was important again and eager. Four. He did a voluptuous thing. He had his clothes pressed on the train. In the morning half an hour before they reached monarch, the porter came to his birth and whispered,

There's a drawing-room bacon, sir. I'll put your suit in there. In tan autumn overcoat over his pajamas, Babbit slipped down the green curtain-lined aisle to the glory of his first private compartment. The porter indicated that he knew Babbitt was used to a man-servant. He held the ends of Babette's trousers that the beautifully sponge garment might not be soiled,

filled a bowl in a private washroom, and waited with a towel. To have a private washroom was luxurious. however enlivening a Pullman smoking compartment was by night. Even to Babette, it was depressing in the morning. When it was jammed with fat men and woolen undershirts, every hook filled with wrinkled cottony shirts, the leather seat piled with dingy toilet kits, and the air nauseating with the smell of soap and toothpaste.

Babid did not ordinarily think much of privacy, but now he reveled in it, reveled in his valet and purred with pleasure as he gave the man a tip of a dollar and a half. He rather hoped that he was being noticed, as in his newly pressed clothes, with the adoring porter carrying his suitcase, he disembarked at Monarch. He was to share a room at the Hotel Sedgwick with W.A. Rogers, that shrewd, rustic-looking zenith dealer in farmlands. Together they had a noble breakfast with waffles and coffee,

not in exiguous cups, but in large pots. Babbit grew expansive and told Rogers about the art of writing. He gave a bellboy a quarter to fetch a morning newspaper from the lobby, and sent Tinka a postcard. Papa wishes you were here to bat around with him. Five. The meetings of the convention were held in the ballroom of the Allen House. In an ante-room was the office of the chairman of the executive committee.

He was the busiest man in the convention. He was so busy, he got nothing done whatever. He sat at a market table in a room littered with crumpled paper and all day long. Town boosters and lobbyists and orators, who wished to lead debates, came and whispered to him, whereupon he looked vague and said rapidly, Yes, yes, that's fine idea. We'll do that. And instantly forgot all about it.

Lighted a scar and forgot that, too. while the telephone rang mercilessly, and about him men kept beseeching, say, Mr. Chairman, say, Mr. Chairman, without penetrating his exhausted hearing. In the exhibit room were plans of the new suburb of Sparta, pictures of the new state capital at Gallup Divash, and large ears of corn with the label Nature's Gold from Shelby County, the garden spot of God's own country. The real convention consisted of men,

muttering in hotel bedrooms or in groups amid the bad spotted crowd in the hotel lobby. But there was a show of public meetings. The first of them opened with a welcome by the mayor of Monarch. The pastor of the First Christian Church of Monarch, a large man, with a long, damp frontal lock, informed God that the real estate men were here now. The venerable mini-magnetic realtor Major Carlton Took read a paper in which he denounced cooperative stores. William A. Larkin of Eureka gave a comforting prognosis of the prospects for increased construction

and reminded them that plate glass prices were two points lower. The convention was on. The delegates were entertained incessantly and firmly. The Monarch Chamber of Commerce gave them a banquet and the Manufacturers Association and afternoon reception at which a chersathrimum was presented to each of the ladies and to each of the men a leather billfold inscribed from monarchs the mighty motor mart. Mrs. Crosby-Nolton, wife of the manufacturer of Fleet Wing automobiles, opened her celebrated Italian garden and served tea. 600 real estate men and wives ambled down the automobile paths. Perhaps 300 of them were quietly inconspicuous, perhaps 300, vigorously exclaimed.

This is pretty slick, eh? Cereptatialcy picked the late aster's, and concealed them in their pockets, and tried to get near enough to Mrs. Nolton to shake her lovely hand. Without request, the Zenith delegates, except Roundree, gathered round a marble dancing nymph, and sang, Here we come the fellows from Zenith the Zip City. It chanced that all the delegates from Pioneer belonged to the brotherly and protective order of elks, and they produced an enormous banner-lettered B-P-O-E. Best People on Earth.

Boost Pioneer Oh, Eddie. Nor was Gallup DeVinch, the state capital to be slighted. The leader of the Gallup DeVinch delegation was a large reddish-roundish man, but active. He took off his coat, hurled his broad black felt hat on the ground, rolled up his sleeves, climbed upon the sundial, spat and bellowed, We'll tell the world and the good lady who's giving the show this afternoon that the Bonnius Burg in this man's state is Gallup D. Veench.

You boys can talk about your zip, but just let me murmur. That old Gallup has the largest proportion of home-owning citizens in the state, and when folks own their own homes, they ain't starting labor troubles, and they're raising kids instead of raising hell. Gallup de Vitch, the town for homie folks. The town that eats them alive, oh, Bosco, will tell the world. The guest drove off the garden shivered into quiet.

But Mrs. Crosby Nolton sighed as she looked at the marble seat, warm from 500 summers of Amphilly, on the face of a winged sphinx, which supported it someone had drawn a mustache and lead pencil. Crumpled paper napkins were dumped among the mitchelmonds, daisies, on the walk, like shredded lovely flesh, were the petals of the last gallant rose. Cigarette stubs floated into goldfish pool, trailing an evil stain as they swelled and disintegrated, and beneath the marble seat the fragments carefully put together was a smashed teacup.

6. As he rode back to the hotel, Babbit reflected, Marr would have enjoyed all this social agony. For himself, he cared less for the garden party than for the motor tours which the Monarch Chamber of Commerce had arranged. Indecidably, he viewed water reservoirs, suburban trolley stations, and tanneries. He devoured the statistics which were given to him,

and marveled to his roommate, W.A. Rogers, of course, is towned in the patch on Zenith. It hasn't got our outlook and natural resources, but did you know, I never did till today that they manufactured 763 million feet of lumber last year. What do you think of that? He was nervous as the time for reading his paper approached. When he stood on the low platform before the convention, he trembled and saw only a purple haze.

But he was in earnest, and when he finished the formal paper, he talked to them, his hands in his pockets, his spectacle face, a flashing disc, like a little. a plate set up on edge in the lamplight. They shouted, "'What's the stuff?' And in the discussion afterwards, they reflected with impressiveness to our friend and brother, Mr. George F. Babbitt.

He had in 15 minutes changed from a minor delegate to a personage, almost as well known as that diplomatic business, Cecil Roundtree. After the meeting, delegates from all over the state said, "'How are you, brother, Babbitt?' sixteen complete strangers called him george and three men took him into corners to confine mighty glad you had the courage to stand up and give the profession a real boost now i've always maintained

next morning with tremendous casualness babbitt asked the girl at the hotel newsstand for the newspaper from zenith there was nothing in the press but in the advocate times on the third page he gasped they had printed his picture and a half-concorned account. The heading was Sensation at annual Land Men's Convention, G. F. Babbitt, prominent Zip Town Realtor, Keynoter in fine address. He murmured reverently.

I guess some of the folks on Floral Heights will sit up and take notice now. Pay a little attention to old Georgie. Seven. It was the last meeting. The delegations were presenting the claims of their several cities to

next year's conventions. Orators were announcing that Gallup de Vais, the capital city, the site of Fremmer College, and the Upholtz knitting works, is the recognized center of culture and high-class enterprise, and at Hamburg, the big little city with a logical location where every man is open-handed and every woman a heaven-born hostess throws wide to you her hospitable gates. In the midst of these more diffident invitations, the golden doors of the ballroom opened with a battling of trumpets and a circus parade rolled in. It was composed of the Zenith Brokers,

dressed as cowpunchers, bareback riders, Japanese jugglers. At the head was Big Warren Whidbey in the bare skin and gold and crimson coat of a drum major. Behind him, as a clown, beating a brass drum, extraordinary happy and noisy,

was Babbitt. Warren Witteby leaped to the platform, made merry play of his baton and observed, "'Boyses and girlseys, the time has come to get down to cases. A dyed-in-the-wool zenithite sure loves his neighbors, but we've made up our minds to grab this convention off our neighbor bergs like we've grabbed the condensed milk business and the paper-box business and—' Harry J. Barnhill, the convention chairman, hinted, We're grateful to you, Mr.

Uh, but you must give the other boys a chance to hand in their bids now. A fog-hoeing voice blared. Enrica, we'll promise free motor rides through the prettiest country. Running down the aisle, clapping his hands, a lean, bald young man cried, I'm from Sparta. Our Chamber of Commerce has wired me. They've set aside $8,000 of real money for entertainment at the convention. A clerical-looking man rose to clamor. Money talks.

Move, we accept the bid from Sparta. It was accepted. Eight. The Committee on Resolutions was reporting. They said that whereas Almighty God in his beneficent mercy had seen fit to remove to a spear of higher usefulness some 36 realtors of the state the past year, therefore it was the sentiment of this convention assembled

that they were sorry God had done it, that the secretary should be and hereby was instructed to spread these resolutions on the minutes and to console the brief families by sending them each a copy. A second resolution authorized the president of the S-A-R-E-B to spend $15,000 in lobbying for sane tax measures in the state legislature. This resolution had a good deal to say about menaces to sound businesses and clearing the wheels of progress from ill-advised and short-sighted obstacles. The Committee on Committees reported, and with startled awe,

Babbitt learned that he had been appointed a member of the Committee on Turin's titles. He rejoiced. I said it was going to be a good year. George, old son, you got big things ahead of you. You're a natural born orator and a good mixer, and Zawai. T. 9. There was no formal entertainment provided for the last evening.

Babbit had planned to go home, but that afternoon the Jared Sassinger's of Pioneers suggested that Babbitt and W.A. Rogers have tea with them at the Chattalupa Inn. T's were not known to Babbitt, his wife and he earnestly attended them at least twice a year, but they were sufficiently exotic to make him feel important. He sat at a glass-covered table in the art room of the inn,

with its painted rabbits, models lettered in birch bark, and waitresses being artistic in Dutch caps. He ate insufficient lettuce sandwiches and was lively and naughty with Mrs. Sassengberger, who was as smooth and large eyes as a cloak model. Sassaburger and he had met two days before, so they were calling each other Georgie and Sassy. Sassberger said prayfully,

say, boys, before you go, seeing this is the last chance, I've got it up in my room. And Miriam here is the best little mixologist in the Stitos Unitos, like us Italians, eh? With wide-flowering gestures, Badgebet and Rogers followed the Sassaburger's to the room. Mrs. Sassaburger shrieked, Oh, how terrible!

When she saw that she had left a shame, mease of sheer lavender crape on the bed. She tucked it into a bag while Babbit giggled. Don't mind us. We're a couple of little devils. Sassberger telephoned for ice and a bellboy who brought it said, prosically and unprompted. Highball glasses or cocktail. Merriam Sassberger mixed the cocktails in one of those dismal,

nakedly white water pitchers which exist only in hotels. When they had finished the first round, she proved by intoning, "'Think you boys could stand another? You got a dividend coming.' That though she was but a woman, she knew the complete and perfect right of cocktail drinking. Outside, Babbitt hinted to Rogers.

"'Hey, W.A. old rooster, it comes over me that I could stand it if we didn't go back to the loving wives, this handsome abend. But just kind of stayed in monarch and threw a party, eh? George, you speak with the tongue of wisdom and shiver-shrer-vers. Oh, Wing's wife has gone to Pittsburgh. Let's see if we can't gather him in. At half-past seven, they sat in the room with Albert Wing,

and two upstate delegates. Their coats were off, vests open, their faces red, their voices emphatic. They were finishing a bottle of corrosive bootleg whiskey and imploring the bellboy. Hey, son, can you get us more? of this embalming fluid? They were smoking large cigars and dropping ashes and stubs on the carpet.

With windy guffaws, they were telling stories. They were, in fact, males in a happy state of nature. Babbitt sighed. I don't know how it strikes you, Helions, but personally, I like this busting loose for a change

and kicking over a couple of mountains and climbing up the North Pole and waving the Aurora Borealis around. The man from Sparta a grave, intense youngster, babbled. I guess I'm good a husband is to run the mill, but, God, I do get so tired of going home every evening and nothing to see but the movies.

That's why I go out and drill with the National Guard. I guess I got the nicest little wife in my burg, but say, know what I wanted to do as a kid? Know what I want to do? Wanted to be a big chemist. That's what I want to do, but Dad chased me out on the road selling, kitchenware. And here I'm settled down, settled for lunch.

life, not a chance. Oh, who and the devil started this funeral talk? How about another little drink? Another drink or a-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-run. Yeah, cut the snobs up, said W.A. Rogers, genially. The boys know I'm the village songster. Come on, now sing up. Said the old Abadaya to the young Abadaya, I'm a dry, Abadaya, I am dry. Say the young Abadaya, to the old Abadaya, so am I, Abadaias, oh am I. After dinner at the Moorish grill room of the Hotel Sedgwick, somewhere, somehow, they seemed to have gathered in two other comrades, a manufacturer of flypaper and a dentist.

They all drank whiskey from teacups, and they were humorous, and never listened to one another except when W.A. Rogers kidded the Italian waiter. "'Eh, Juxepi,' he said in a sleigh, "'I want a couple of fried elephants' ears.' "'Sorry, sir, we haven't any.' "'Huh? No elephant's ears?' "'What do you know about that?' Rogers turned to babbid.

"'Bedroes says the elephant's ears are all out.' "'Well, I'll be switched,' said the man from Sparta with difficulty, hyrini's laughter. "'Well, in that case, Carlo, "'just bring me a hunk of steak "'and a couple of bushels of French-fried potatoes and some peas,' "'Rogers went on. "'I suppose back in dear sunny old...

Italians, get their fresh garden peas on the can. No, sir, we have mighty nice peas in Italy. There's that a fact. George did you hear that? They get their fresh garden peas on the garden in Italy. By golly, you live and learn, don't you? Antonio, you certainly do live and learn if you live long enough to keep your strength, all right.

Geobaldi, just shoot me that steak. With about two printer reams of French fries spuds, or the promenade deck comprehensive vuz, Mischavich Angelooney. After Albert Wing admired, Gee, you certainly did have that poor dago going, W.A. He couldn't make you on it at all. In the monarch Harold, Babbitt found an advertisement which he read aloud, to applause and laughter.

Old Colony Theater. Shake the old dogs to the rollicking wrens, the bonny as bevy of his babing beauties in Berlin. Pete Muity and his OG kids. This is the straight steer, Benny, the painless chicklets of the rollicking wrens are the cuddlest bunch that ever hit town. Steer the feet, get the cardboard, and twist the pupils to the PDQ a show ever. You'll get 111% on your kale in the fun fest.

The Carlos' sisters are sure some lookers and will give you a run for your guilt. Sirberstein is one of the pepper lads and slips you a dose of real laughter. Shoot the up and downs to Jackson and West graceful trappers. They run one, two under the wire, proven and Adams will blow the blues in their high skit Hoochman. Something doing, boys? Listen to what the Hepbird twitters. Sounds like a juicy show to me, let's take it in, said Babbitt. But they put off departure as long as they could. They were safe while they sat here, legs firmly crossed under the table,

but they felt unsteady. They were afraid of navigating the long and slippery floor of the grill room under the eyes of the other guests and two attentive waiters. When they did venture, tables got in their way, and they sought to cover embarrassment by heavily jocularity at the coat-room. As the girl handed out their hats, They smiled at her and hoped that she, a cool, an expert judge, would feel that they were gentlemen. They croaked at one another, Who owns the bum lid?

And you take the good one, George, I'll take what's left. And the check girl, they stammered. Better come along, sister, wide and fancy evening ahead. All of them tried to tip her urging one another. No, no, wait, here, I got it, I got it. Among them, they gave her three dollars. 11. Flamboyantly smoking cigars, they sat in a box at the burlesque show,

their feet up on the rail, while a chorus of twenty dobed worries and inextinguishably respectable grand arms swung their legs in the more elementary chorus-line evolutions, and a Jewish comedian made vicious fun of Jews. In the interests, they met other lone delegates, a dozen of them went in taxi cabs, out to bright blossom in, where the blossoms were made of dusty paper festooned along a room low

and stinking, like a cow stable no longer widely used. Here, whiskey was served openly in glasses. Two or three clerks, who, on payday, longed to be taken for millionaires, she visually danced with telephone girls and manicured girls in the narrow space between the tables. Fantastically whirled the professionals, a young man in sleek evening clothes, and a slim mad girl in emerald silk, with amber hair flung up as jaggedly as flames. Babbit tried to dance with her. He shuffled along the floor too bulky to be guided,

his steps unrelated to the rhythm of the jungle music, and in his staggering would have fallen had she not held him up with supple, kindly strength. He was blind and deaf from Prohibition-era alcohol. He could not see the tables, the faces, but he was overwhelmed by the girl and her. young, pliant warmth. When she had firmly returned him to his group, he remembered by a connection quite untraceable,

that his mother's mother had been scotch, and with head thrown back, eyes closed, wide mouth, indicating ecstasy, he sang very slowly and richly, Locke Lohman. But that was the last of his mellowness and jolly companionship. The man from Sparta said he was a bum singer, and for ten minutes,

Babbitt quarreled with him in a loud, unsteady, heroic indignation. They called for drinks till the manager insisted that the place was closed. All the while, Babbitt felt a hot, raw desire for more brutal amusements. When W.A. Rogers drawled, What say we go down the line and look over the girls? He agreed savagely. Before they went, three of them secretly made appointments with the professional dancing girl who agreed.

Yes, sir, yes, sir, sure, darling. to everything they said and amidably forgot them. As they drove back through the outskirts of monarch, down streets of small brown wooden cottages of workmen, characterless to cells as they rattled across warehouse districts, which by drunken knights seemed vast and perilous, as they were born toward the red lights in violent, automatic pianos, and the stocky women, whose simpered Babbitt was frightened.

He wanted to leap from the taxi cab, but all his body was a murky fire, and he groaned, Too late to quit now, and knew that he did not want to quit. There was, they felt, one very humorous incident on the way, a broker from many magnetic said, Monarch is a lot sportier than Zenith. You Zenith-type wads haven't got any joints like these here, babbit rage. That's a dirty lie. Nothing you can't find in Zenith. Believe me, we got more houses and hooch parlors

and all kinds of dives than any burg in the state. He realized they were laughing at him. He desired to fight and forgot it in such musty, unsatisfying experiments as he had not known since college. In the morning, when he returned to Zenith, his desire for rebellion was partially satisfied. He had retrograded to a shame-faced contentment. He was irritable.

He did not smile when W.A. Rogers complained, Oh, what a head. I certainly do feel like the wrath of God this morning. Say, I know what was the trouble? Somebody went and put alcohol in my booze last night. Babbitt's excursion was never known to his family, nor to anyone in Zinas, save Rogers and wing. It was not officially recognized even by himself.

If it had any consequences, they have not been discovered. End of Chapter 11. Chapter 14 of Babbitt. This leverbox recording is in the public domain, recording by Mike Vendetti. Mike Vendetti.com. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis, Chapter 14. This autumn, a Mr. W.G. Harding of Marion, Ohio, was appointed president of the United States, but Zineth was less interested in the national campaign than in the local election.

Seneca Dome. Though he was a lawyer and a graduate of the state university was a candidate for mayor of Zenith on an alarming labor ticket. To oppose him, the Democrats and Republicans united on Lucas Prout, a mattress manufacturer with a perfect record for sanity. Mr. Prout was supported by the banks, the Chamber of Commerce, all the decent newspapers, and George F. Babbitt. Babette was precinct leader on Floral Heights,

but his district was safe. and he longed for stouter battling. His convention paper had given him the beginning of a reputation for oratory. So the Republican Democratic Central Committee sent him to the Seventh Ward in South Zenith to address small audiences of workmen and clerks and wives uneasy with their new votes.

He acquired a fame enduring for weeks. Now and then a reporter was present at one of his meetings and the headlines, though they were not very long, indicated that George F. Babbitt had addressed a cheering throng and distinguished men of affairs had pointed out the fallacies of Donne. Once in the Road Review section of the Sunday Advocate Times, there was a photograph of Babbitt and a dozen other businessmen, with the caption Leaders of Zenith Finance and Commerce, who back Prout. He deserved his glory. He was an excellent

campaigner. He had faith. He was certain that if Lincoln were alive, he would be electioneering for Mr. W. G. Harding, unless he came to Zenith and electioneered for Lucas Prout. He did not confuse audiences by subtly subtleties. Prout represented honest industry. Seneca Done represented whining laziness, and you could take your choice. With his broad shoulders and vigorous voice, he was obviously a good fellow, and rarest of all, he really liked people. He almost liked common workmen. He wanted them to be well-paid, and able to afford high rents, though naturally they must not interfere with the reasonable profits of stockholders.

Thus nobly endowed and keyed high by the discovery that he was a natural orator, he was popular with audiences, and he raged through the campaign, renowned, not only in the seventh and eighth wards, but even in parts of the 16th. Two. Crowdered in his car, they came driving up to Turavan Hall, South Zenith. babbitt his wife verona ted and paul and zela risling the hall was over a delicatessen shop in a street banging withdrawing cars and smelling of onions and gasoline and fried fish a new appreciation of babbitt filled all of them including babbitt don't know how you keep it up talking to three bunches and one evening wish i had your strength said paul and ted exclaimed to verona the old man certainly does know how to kid the these rough-necks along.

Men and black satine shirts, their faces new-washed, but with a hint of grime under their eyes, were loiting on the broad stairs up to the hall. Babbitt's party politely edged through them and into the white-washed room, at the front of which was a deus, with a red-plush throne and pine altar, painted watery blue, as used nightly to the grandmasters in supreme pontitates of unimaginable lodges. The hall was full, as Babbit pushed through the fringe. Standing at the back, he heard the precious tribute. That's him!

The chairman bustled down the center aisle with an impressive... The speaker? Already, sir? Uh, let's see. What's the name, sir? Then Babbitt slid into a sea of eloquence. Ladies and gentlemen of the 16th Ward, there is one who cannot be with us here tonight. a man than whom there is no more stalwart Trojan in all the political arenas. I refer to our leader, the Honorable Lucas Prout,

standard bearer of the city and county of Zenith. Since he is not here, I trust that you will bear with me, as a friend and neighbor, as one who is proud to share with you the common blessing of being a resident of the great city of Zenith. I tell you in all candor, honestly, and sincerity, how the issues of this critical campaign appear to one plain man of business, to one who brought up to the blessings of poverty and of manual labor, has, even when fate condemned him to sit at a desk, yet never forgotten how it feels by heck, to be up at 5.30 and at the factory with the old dinner-paying

in his hardened mitt when the whistle blew it seven, unless the owner sneaked in ten minutes on us and blew it early. Laughter. To come down to the basics and fundamental issues of this campaign, the great error insincerity promulgated by Seneca Donne. There were workmen who jeered young cynical workmen, for the most part foreigners, Jews, Swedes, Irishmen, Italians, but the older men, the patient, bleached, stupid,

Carpenter's mechanics cheered him, and when he worked up to his antecedent of Lincoln, their eyes were wet. Modestly, busily, he hurried out of the hall on delicious applause, and sped off to his third audience of the evening. "'Ted you better drive,' he said. Kind of all in and after that spiel. "'Well, Paul, how'd it go? Did I get him?' "'Fully, corking, you had a lot of pet.' Mrs. Babbitt worshipped. Oh, it was fine, so clear and interesting and such nice ideas.

When I hear you orating, I realize, I don't appreciate how profoundly you think and what a splendid brain and vocabulary you have. Just splendid. But Verona was irritating. Dad, she worried, How do you know that public ownership of utilities and so on and so forth will always be a failure.

Mrs. Babette reproved. Rohn, I think you should see and realize that your father's all worn out with orating. It's no time to expect him to explain these complicated subjects. I'm sure when he's rested, he'll be glad to explain it all to you. Now, let's all be quiet and give Papa a chance to get ready for his next speech. Just think right now they're gathering in Maccabee Temple and waiting for us. three mr lucas prout and sound business defeated mr seneca doane and class rule and zenith was again saved babbitt was offered several minor appointments to distribute amongst poor relations but he preferred advance information about the extension of paved highways and this a grateful administration gave to him also he was one of only nineteen speakers at the dinner with which the chamber of commerce celebrated the victory of righteousness

reputation for oratory established at the dinner of the Zenith Real Estate Board he made the annual address. The Advocate Times reported this speech with unusual fullness. One of the liveliest banquets that has recently been pulled off occurred last night in the annual get-together fest of the Zenith Real Estate Board, held in the Venetian ballroom of the O'Hurne House. Mine host Gil O'Hurne had as usual done himself proud and those assembled feasted on such an assemblage of plates as could be rivaled nowhere west of New York, if there, and washed down the plenteous feed with a cup which inspired but did not inebred in the shape of cider from the farm of Chandler-Mott, president of the board,

and who acted as witty and efficient chairman. As Mr. Mott was suffering from slight infection and sore throat, G. F. Babbitt made the principal talk, besides outlining the progress of touristing real estate titles, Mr. Babbitt spoke in part as follows. In rising to address you with my impromptu speech carefully tucked into my vest pocket, I am reminded of the story of two Irishmen, Mike and Pat, who were riding on the Pullman. Both of them, I forgot to say, were sailors in the Navy. It seems Mike had to lower berth and by and by, he heard a terrible racket from the upper.

And when he yelled up to find out what the trouble was, Pat answered, I sure and behead, and now can I ever get a night's sleep at all, at all? I've been trying to get in this darn little hammock ever since eight bells. Now, gentlemen, standing up here before you, I feel a good deal like Pat, and maybe after I've spailed along for a while, I may feel so darn small that I am able to crawl into a Pullman hammock with no trouble at all. Gentlemen, it strikes me that each year at this annual occasion, when friend and foe get together and lay down the battle-axe

and let the waves of good fellowship wharf them up the flowery slopes of amnity, it behooves us standing together eye to eye and shoulder to shoulder as fellow citizens of the best city in the world to consider where we are both as regards ourselves and the common well. It is true that even with our 361,000 or practically 362,000 population, there are, by the last census, almost a score of larger cities in the United States. But gentlemen, if by the next census we do not stand at least 10th, then I'll be the first to request any knocker to remove my shirt and eat the same with the compliments of G.F. Babbage. Esquire. It may be true that New York, Chicago, and Philadelphia will continue to keep ahead of us in size, but aside from these three cities, which are notoriously so overgrown that no decent

white man, nobody who loves his wife and kiddies, and God's good out of doors, and likes to shake the hand of his neighbors and greeting would want to live in them. And let me tell you right here now. I wouldn't trade a high-class Zenith acreage development for the whole length and breadth of Broadway or State Street. Aside from these three, it's evident. To anyone with a head for facts that Zenith is the finest example of American life and prosperity to be found anywhere. I don't mean to say we're perfect. We've got a lot to do in the way of extending and paving the motor boulevards. For believe me, It's a fellow with four to ten thousand years, say, in an automobile, and a nice little family in a bungalow on the edge of town that makes the wheels of progress go round.

That's the type of fellow that's ruling America today. In fact, it's the ideal type to which the entire world must tend. If there's to be a decent, well-balanced Christian go-ahead future for this little old planet. Once in a while, I just naturally sit back and sign a... up this solid American citizen with a wail of a lot of satisfaction. Our ideal citizen, I picture him first and foremost, is being busier than a bird dog, not wasting a lot of time in daydreaming or going to society teas or kicking about things that are none of his business, but putting the zip into some store or profession or art.

At night he lights up a good cigar and climbs into a little old bus, and maybe cusses the carburetor and shoots out home. He mows the lawn or sneaks in some practice putting, and then he's ready for dinner. After dinner, he tells the Giddies' story, or takes the family to the movies, or plays a few fists of bridge or reads the evening paper, and a chapter or two of some good lively Western novel,

if he has a taste for literature. And maybe the folks next door drop in, and they sit and visit about their friends and the topics of the day. Then he goes happily to bed, his conscience clear, having contributed his might to the prosperity of the city

and to his own bank account. In politics and religion, this sane citizen is the canniest man on earth, and in the arts, he invariably has the natural taste which makes him pick out the best, every time. In no country in the world

will you find so many reproductions of the old master, and the well-known paintings on parlor walls as in these United States. No country has anything like our number of phonographs, with not only dance records and comic, but also the best operas such as Verdi, rendered by the world's highest paid singers. In other countries, art and literature are left to a lot of shabby bums,

living in addicts and feeding on booze and spaghetti. But in America, the successful writer or picture painter is indistinguishable from any other decent businessman. And I, for one, am only too glad that the man who has the rare skill to season his message with interesting reader matter and who shows both Purper's and Pep in handling his literary wares has a chance to drag down his 50,000 bucks a year, to mingle with the biggest executive on terms of perfect equality, and to show as big a house, as swell a car as any captain of industry. But mind you, it's the appreciation of the regular guy who I have been depicting, which has made this possible, and you got to hand as much credit to him as to the authors themselves.

Finally, but most important, our standardized citizen, even if he is a bachelor, is a lover of the little ones, a supporter of the hearthstone, which is the basic foundation of our civilization. First, last, and all the time. And the thing that most distinguishes us from the decayed nations of Europe. I have never yet toured Europe, and as a matter of fact, I don't know that I yet. care to such an awful lot, as long as there's our own mighty cities and mountains to be seen. But the way I figured out, there must be a good many of our own sort of folks abroad. Indeed, one of the most enthusiastic Rotarians I ever met boasted the tenants of 100% pep in

a burr that smacked of Bonnie Scotland, and all ye Bonnie Braves, Bonnie Bruins, but same time, one thing that distinguishes us from our good brothers, the hustlers over there, is they're willing to take a lot off the snobs and journalists and politicians? While the modern American businessman knows how to talk right up for himself, knows how to make it good and plenty clear that he intends to run the works, he doesn't have to call in some high-brow hired man when it's necessary for him to answer the crooked critics of the sane and efficient life. He's not dumb. Like the old-fashioned merchant, he's got a vocabulary and a punch. With all modesty, I want to stand up here as a representative

businessman and gently whisper, here's our kind of folks. Here's the specifications of the standardized American citizen. Here's the new generation of Americans, fellows with hair on their chest and smiles in their eyes and adding machines in their offices. We're not doing any boasting, but we like ourselves first-rate, and if you don't like us, look out. Better get undercover before the cyclone hits town. So, in my clumsy way, I have tried to sketch the real he-man, the fellow was zip and bang, and because Zenith has so large a proportion of such men that it's most stable, the greatest of our cities. New York also has its thousands of real folks, but New York is cursed

with unnumbered foreigners. So are Chicago and San Francisco. Oh, we have a golden roster of cities, Detroit and Cleveland, with their renowned factories, Cincinnati with its great machine tool and soap products, Pittsburgh and Birmingham, with their steel, Kansas City and Minneapolis, and Omaha that opened their Bountiful Gates on the bosom of the ocean-like wheatlands and countless other magnificent sister cities, for by the last sentence, there were no less than 68 glorious American bergs with a population of over 100,000, and all these cities stand together for power and purity, and against foreign ideas and communism. Atlanta, with Hartford, Rochester, with Denver, Milwaukee, with Indianapolis, Los Angeles, with Scranton, Portland, Maine, and Portland, Oregon. A good live wire from Baltimore or Seattle

or Duluth, the twin brother of every like fellow booster from Buffalo or Akron, Fort Worth, or Okalusa. But it's here in Zenith, the home for manly men and womanly women and bright kids, that you find the largest proportion of these regular guys, and that's what sets it in a class by itself. That's why Zenith will be remembered in history as having set the pace for a civilization that shall endure when the old-time killing ways are gone forever, and the day of earnest-efficient endeavor shall have dawned all round the world. Some time I hope folks will quit handling all the credit to a lot of moth-eaten, mildewed, out-of-date old European dumps, and give their proper credit to the famous Zenith spirit, that clean fighting determination to win.

Success that has made our little old Zip City celebrated in every land and climb, wherever condensed milk and pasteboard cartons are known. Believe me, the world has fallen too long for these worn-out countries that aren't producing anything but boot blacks and scenery and booze, that haven't got one bathroom per hundred people, and then don't know a loose leaf ledger from a slip cover, and it's just about time for some Zenithite to get his back up and holler for a showdown.

I'll tell you, Zenith and her sister cities are producing a new type of civilization. There are many resemblances between Zenith and these other bergs, and I'm darn glad of it. The extraordinary growing insane standardization of stores, offices, streets, hotel, clothes, and newspapers throughout the United States, shows how strong and enduring type is ours. I always like to remember a piece that Chum Frank wrote for the newspaper about his lecture

tours. It is doubtful familiar to many of you, but if you will permit me, I'll take a chance and read it. It's one of the classiest poems like if by Kipling or Ella Wheeler-Wilocks's the man worthwhile, and I always carry this clipping of it in my notebook. When I am out upon the road, a poet with a peddler's load, I mostly sing a hearty song and take a chew and hike along, a handling out my samples fine of Cheerio brand of sweet sunshine, and peddling optimistic pokes in stable lines of japs and jokes to lyceums and other folks, to Rotary's Gowanus clubs and, Feel I ain't like other dubs?

And then, O Major Silas Staten, A brainy cuss who's always waiting, He gives his tail a lively quirk, And gets it quick his dirty work. He fills me up with mulligrubs my hair the backward way he rubs. He makes me lonier than a hound on Sunday when the folks ain't around. And then, Bagash, I prefer to never be a lecturer, of riding round in classic cars and smoking fifty-cent cigars.

And never more I want to roam. I simply went to be back home. I eaten flapjack's hash and ham with folks who's savvy, whom I am. But when I get that lonely spell, I simply seek the best hotel. No matter in what town I be, St. Paul, Toledo, or K.C. In Washington, Schenectady, in Louisville or Albany. And at that end it hits my dome that I am right at home.

If I should stand a lengthy spell in front of that first-class hotel that the drummer loves to cater across from some big film theater. If I should look round and buzz and wonder in what town I was, I swear that I could never tell, for all the crowd would be so swell. In just the same fine sort of jeans they wear at home and all the queens with spiffy bonnets on their beans. And all the fellows standing round of talking always,

all be bound the same good, jolly kind of guff about Otto's politics and stuff, and baseball players of renown that nice guys talk in my hometown. Then when I entered that hotel, I looked around and say, Well, well, for there would be some newsstand, some magazine and candies grand,

some smokes of famous standard brand, I'd find it home, I'll tell. And when I saw the jolly bunch come waltzing in for eats at lunch, and squaring up in nanny duds to platters large of French-fried spuds, why then I'd stand right up and ball. I've never left my home at all, and all replete I'd sit down beside some guy in Derby Brown, upon a lobby chair of plush and murmur to him under rush,

"'Hello, Bill, tell me, good old scout, How is your stock a holding out? Then we'd be off, two solid pals chatting like giddy-gals of flippers, weather, home and wives, lodge brothers, and for all our lives. So when Sam Satan makes you blue good friend, that's what I'd up and do.

For in these states where you roam, you never leave your home's weed home. Yes, sir, these other bergs are our true partners in the great game of vital living. But let's not have any mistake about this. I claim that Zenith is the best partner and a faster-grown partner of the whole caboodle. I trust I may be pardoned if I give a few statistics to back up my claims. If they're old stuff to any view, yet the tidings of prosperity like the good news of the Bible,

never become tedious to the ears of the real hustler. No matter how off the sweet story is told. Every intelligent person knows that Zenith manufactures, more condensed milk and evaporated cream, more paper boxes, and more lighting fixtures than any other city in the United States, if not the world. But it is not so universally known that we also stand second in the manufacture of package butter, sixth in the giant realm of motors and automobiles, and somewhere about third in cheese, leather findings, tar roofing, breakfast food, and overalls. Our greatness, however, lies not alone in punchful prosperity, but equally in that public spirit,

that forward-looking idealism and brotherhood, which has marked Zenith ever since its foundation by the fathers. We have a right. Indeed, we have a duty toward our fair city, to announce broadcast the facts about our high schools characterized by their complete plants and the finest school ventilating systems in the country, bar none. Our magnificent new hotels and banks and the paintings and carved marble

in their lobbies, and the second National Tower, the second highest business building in any inland city in the entire country. When I add that we have an unparalleled number of miles of paved streets, bathroom vacuum cleaners,

and all the other signs of civilization. That our library and art museum are well supported and housed in convenient and roomy buildings, that our park system is more than up to par, with its handsome driveways adorned with grass shrubs and statuary. Then I give but a hint of the all-around, unlimited greatness of Zenith.

I believe, however, in keeping the best to last, when I reminded you that we have one marty car for every five-and-seventh-eighth person in the city. Then I give a rock-ribbed, practical indication of the kind of progress and braininess, which is synonymous with the name Zenith. But the way of the righteous is not all roses. Before I close, I must call your attention to a problem we have to face this coming year. The worst menace to sound government is not the avowed socialist, but a lot of cowards

who work undercover. the long-haired gentry who call themselves liberals and radicals and nonpartisan and intelligentsia, and God only knows how many other trick names. Irresponsible teachers and professors constitute the worst of this whole gang, and I am ashamed to say that several of them are on the faculty of our great state university. The U is my own alma mater, and I am proud to be. be known as an alumni. But there are certain instructors there who seem to think we ought to turn the conduct of the nation over to hobos and roustabouts. These props are the snakes

to be scotched. They and all their milk and water ilk. The American businessman is generous, to a fault, but one thing he does demand of all teachers and lecturers and journalists, if we're going to pay them our good money, they've got to help us by selling. efficiency and whooping it up for national prosperity. And when it comes to these blab-mouth fault-finding pessimistic

cynical university teachers, let me tell you that during this golden coming year, it is just as much our duty to bring influence to have these cusses fired as it is to sell all the real estate and gather in all

the good shekels we can. Not till this is done, will our sons and daughters see the ideal of American manhood, and culture isn't a lot of cranks sitting around chewing the rag about their rights or wrongs, but a God-fearing, hustling, successful, two-fisted regular guy, who belongs to some church with pep and piety to it, who belongs to the boosters or rotarians or the cawanas,

to the elks or moose, or red men or knights of Columbus, or any one of a score of organizations of good, jolly kidding, laughing, sweating, upstanding Linda-handing, royal good fellows, who plays hard and works hard, and whose answer to his critics is a square-toed boot that'll teach the grouches and smart aleks to respect the he-man, and get out and root for Uncle Samuel, USA. 4. Babbitt promised to become a recognized orator.

He entertained a smoker of men's club of the Chatham Road Presbyterian Church with Irish, Jewish, and Chinese dialect stories. But in nothing was he more clearly revealed as the prominent citizen than in his lecture on brass tax facts on real estate, as delivered before the class in sales methods at the Zenith YMCA. The Advocate Times reported the lecture's so fully. That Virgil Gunch, said to Babbitt, "'You're getting the one to be the classiest spellbinders in town. Seems as if I couldn't

pick up a paper without reading about your well-known eloquence. All this guff ought to bring a lot of business into your office. Good work, keep it up.' "'Ah, go on and quit you kidding,' said Babette feebly. But at this tribute from Gunch himself, a man of no mean oratorical fame, He expanded with delight and wondered in how, before his vacation, he could have questioned the joys of being a solid citizen. End of Chapter 14 Chapter 15 of Babit. This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vindetti.com

Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 15 His March to Greatness was not without disastrous stumbling. Fame did not bring the social advancement which the Babbitts deserved. They were not asked to join the Tonawanda Country Club, nor invited to the dances at the Union. Himself, Babit fretted he didn't care a fat hoot for all those high rollers, but the wife would kind of like to be among those present. He nervously awaited his university class dinner and an evening of furious intimacy

with such social leaders as Charles McKelvey, the millionaire contractor, Max Kruger, the banker, Irving Tate the tool manufacturer, and Adlerbock Dobson, the fashionable interior decorator. Theoretically, he was their friend, as he had been in college, and when he encountered them, they still called him Georgie, but he didn't seem to encounter them often, and he never invited him to dinner, with champagne and a butler at their houses on Royal Ridge. All the week before the class dinner, he thought of them. No reason why they shouldn't become real chummy now. 2. Like all true American diversions and spiritual outpourings,

the dinner of the men of the class of 1896 was thoroughly organized. The dinner committee hammered like a sales corporation. Once a week, they sent out reminders. Tickler number three. Old man, are you going to be with us at the liveliest friendship feed the alumni of the good O. You have ever known? The alumni of O8 turned out 60% strong. Are we boys going to be beaten by a bunch of skirts? Come on, fellows, let's work up some real genuine enthusiasm, and all boost together for the snappiest dinner yet. Elegant east, short ginger talks,

and memory shared together of the brightest, gladdest days of life. The dinner was held in a private room at the Union Club. The club was a dingy building. Three Petrentice old drawings knocked together, and the entrance hall resembled a potato cellar, yet the babbid, who was free of the magnificence of the athletic club, entered with embarrassment. He nodded to the doorman, an ancient, proud negro, with brass buttons and a blue tailcoat, and paraded through the hall, trying to look like a member. Sixty men had come to dinner. They made islands and eddies in the hall. They packed the elevator in the corners of the private dining room.

They tried to be intimate and enthusiastic. They appeared to one another exactly as they had in college, as raw youngsters whose present mustaches, baldness, paunches, and wrinkles were but jovial disguises put on for the evening. You haven't changed a particle, they marveled. The men whom they could not recall, they addressed, Well, well, great to see you again, old man. What are you?

still doing the same thing? Someone was always starting a cheer or college song, and it was always thinning into silence. Despite the resolution to be democratic, they divided into two sets. The men with dressed clothes and the men without, Babit, extremely in dressed clothes, went from one group to the other.

Though he was, almost frankly, out for social conquest, he sought Paul Riesling first. He found him alone, neat and silent. Paul sighed. I'm no good at this handshaking. Well, look who's here, bunk. Rats, now, Paulibus, loosen up, be a mixer. Find this bunch of boys on earth. Say, you seem kind of glum. What's matter? Oh, the usual run-in with Delia. Come on. Let's wait in and forget our troubles.

He kept Paul beside him, but worked toward the spot where Charles McKelbley stood warming his admirers like a furnace. La Kelvey had been the hero of the class of 96, not only football captain and hammer thrower, but debater, and passable in what the state university considered scholarship. He had gone on and captured the construction company once owned by the Dodsworth, best-known pioneer family of Zenith. He built state capitals, skyscrapers, railway terminals. He was a heavy-shoulder, big-chested man, but not sluggish. There was a quiet, humor in his eyes, a sharp, smooth quickness in his speech which intimidated politicians and warned reporters, and in his presence the most intelligent scientist or the most sensitive

artist, felt thin-blooded, unworldly, and a little shabby. He was particularly when he was influencing legislators or hiring labor spies, very easy and lovable and gorgeous. He was Barronial. He was a peer in the rapidly crystallizing American aristocracy, inferior only to the haughty old families in Zenith. An old family is one which came to town before 1840. His power was the greater because he was not hindered by scruples by either the vice or the virtue of the older Puritan tradition. McElvey was being placidly merry now with the great the manufacturers and bankers, the landowners and lawyers and surgeons, who had chauffeurs and went to Europe. Babbit squeezed among them.

He liked McKelvey's smile as much as the social advancement to be had from his favor. If in Paul's company he felt ponderous and protective. With McKelvey, he felt slight and adoring. He heard McElvey say to Max Crooker the banker, Yes, we'll put up, Sir Gerald Doak. Babbitt's democratic love for titles became a rich relish. You know, he's one of the biggest iron men in England, Max, horribly well off. Why, hello, old Georgie.

Say, Max, George Babbitt's getting fat or nigham. The chairman shouted, Take your seats, fellas. That will make a move, Charlie, Babbitt said casually to McCabley. Right, hello, Paul. How's the old fiddler? Planning to sit anywhere special, George? Come on, let's grab some seat.

Come on, Max, Georgie. I read about your speeches in the campaign, bully work. After that, Babbitt would have followed him through fire. He was enormously busy during the dinner, now bumblingly cheering Paul, now approaching McKelvey. Here you're going to build some peers in Brooklyn. Now noting how envisely the failures of the class, sitting by themselves in a weedy group, looked up to him,

in his association with the nobility, now warming himself in the society talk of McElbly and Max Kruger. They spoke of a jungle dance. for which Mona Dodsworth had decorated her house with thousands of orchids. They spoke with an excellent imitation of casualness of a dinner in Washington at which McHelvey had met a senator, a Balkan princess, and an English major general. McHelvey called the princess Jenny and let it be known that he had danced with her. Babette was thrilled, but not so waited with awe as to be silent

if he was not invited by them to dinner. He was yet accustomed to talking with bank presidents, congressmen, and clubwomen who entertained poets. He was bright and referential with McElvey. Say, Charlie, do you remember in junior year how we chartered a seagong hack and chased down to Riverdale to the big show Madame Brown used to put on? Remember how you beat up that hit constable that tried to run us in? And we pinched the pants pressing sign and took and hung it on PrEP Morrison's door? Oh, gosh, those were the days.

Those, McElvey agreed, were the days. Babbitt had reached, It isn't the books you study in college, but the friendship you make the counts. When the man at head of the table broke into song, he attacked McKelvey. It's a shame, a shame, to drift apart because our business activities lie in different fields.

I've enjoyed talking over the good old days, you and Mrs. McKelvey, must come to dinner some night. Vagely? Yes, indeed. I'd like to talk to you about the growth of real estate out beyond your Grangeville warehouse. I might be able to tip you off to a thing or two, possibly.

Splendid, we must have dinner, Georgie. Just let me know, and it will be a great pleasure to have your wife and you it at the house, said McCovely, much less vaguely. Then the chairman's voice, that prestigious voice, which once had roused them to cheer defiance at Routers from Ohio or Michigan or Indiana whooped. Come on, you wombatts, all together in a long yell. Babbitt felt that life would never be sweeter than now.

When he joined with Paul Reisling and the newly recovered hero, McCleley in, Battle Axe, get an axe, backs, get an axe. Who, who, the you, who roo, Three. The Babbitts invited the McEvelies to dinner in early December, and the McEvelies not only accepted, but after changing the date once or twice, actually came. The Babbitts somewhat thoroughly discussed the details of the dinner, from the purchase of a bottle of champagne to the number of salted almonds to be placed before each person. Especially did they mention the matter of the other guests. To the last, Babette held out for giving Paul Reisling the benefit of the benefit of

of being with the McEveley's. Well, Charlie would like Paul and Verge Gunch. Better than some high-flutin' willy-boy, he insisted, but Mrs. Babbitt interrupted his observation with, Yes, perhaps, I think I'll try to get some Linyhaven oysters, and when she was quite ready, she invited Dr. J.T. Angus, the oculist, and a dismally respectable lawyer named Maxwell, with their glittering wives.

Neither Agnes nor Maxwell belonged to the Elks or the athletic club. Neither of them had ever called Babbitt brother, or asked his opinions on carbators. The only human people they invited, Babit raged with Littlefields, and Howard Littlefields at time became so statistical that Babbitt longed for the refreshment of gunches. Well, old lemon pie face, what the good word! Immediately after lunch, Mrs. Babette began to set the table for the 7.30 dinner to the MacKivley's. and Babbitt was, by order, home at four. But they didn't find anything for him to do,

and three times Mrs. Babbit scolded, "'Do please try to keep out of the way.' He stood in the door of the garage, his lips drooping, and wished that Littlefield or Sam Doppelow, or somebody would come along and talk to him. He saw Ted sneaking around the corner of the house. "'What's matter, old man?' said Babbitt.

"'Is that you thin old one? Gee, Ma's certainly is on the warpath. I told her Roe and I would just soon not be let in on the fiesta tonight, and she bit me. She says I got to take a bath, too, but say, the Babbitt men will be some lookers tonight, little Theodore in a dress suit. The Babbitt men. Babbitt liked the sound of it. He put his arm about the boy's shoulder.

He wisted Paul Riesling had a daughter, so that Ted might marry her. "'And your mother is kind of rouncing around, all right,' he said. And they laughed together and sighed together and dutifully went into dress. McEbbly's were less than fifteen minutes late. Babbitt hoped that the doppelroes would see the McEvley's limousine and their uniform chauffeur waiting in front. The dinner was well-cooked and incredibly plentiful, and Mrs. Babette had brought out her grandmother's silver candlesticks.

Babette worked hard. He was good. He told none of the jokes he wanted to tell. He listened to the others. He started Maxwell off with a resounding, Let's hear about your trip to Yellowstone. He was laudatory, extremely laudatory. He found opportunities to remark that Dr. Agnes was a benefactor to humanity.

Maxwell and Howard Littlefield, profound scholars. Charles McEvely, an inspiration to ambitious youth and Mrs. McEveley, an adornment to the social circles of Zenith. Washington, New York, Paris, and numbers of other places. But he could not stir them. It was a dinner without a soul. For no reason that was clear to babbit. Heaviness was over them, and they spoke laboriously and unwillingly.

He concentrated on Lucille McCably, carefully not looking at her blanched, lovely shoulder, and the tawny silken-bearer, which supported her frock. "'I suppose you'd be going to Europe pretty soon, won't you?' he invited. I'd like awfully to run over to Rome for a few weeks. I suppose you see a lot of pictures and music and curios and everything there. No, what I really go for is there's a little tartaria on the Villa della Scorapa, where you get the best fetaccini in the world.

Oh, I ask, that must be nice to try that, yes. At a quarter to ten, McKelby discovered with profound regret that his wife had a headache. He said blithely, as Babbitt helped him with his coat. We must lunch together sometime and talk over the old days. When the others had labored out at half-past ten, Babbitt turned to his wife pleading,

Charlie said he had a corking good time and we must lunch. Said they wanted to have us up to their house for dinner before long. She achieved. Oh, it's been one of those quiet evenings that are often so much more enjoyable than noisy parties, where everybody talks at once and doesn't really settle down to nice quiet enjoyment. But from the cot on the sleeping porch,

he heard her weeping slowly, without hope. For a month, they watched the social columns and waited for a return dinner invitation. As the hosts of Sir Gerald Doak, the McEvely's were headlined all the week after the Babbitt's dinner. Zenith ardently received Sir Gerald, who had come to America to buy coal.

The newspapers interviewed him on prohibition, Ireland, unemployment, naval aviation, the rate of exchange, tea drinking versus whiskey drinking, and psychology of American women and daily life as lived in English country families. Sir Gerald seemed to have heard of all these topics. The McClevely's giving Miss Singley's dinner. And Miss Eleanor Pearl Bates, Society Editor for the Advocate Times, rose to her highest lark note. Babit read aloud at breakfast table. and Oriental decorations, the strange and delicious food, and the personalities both of the distinguished guest and the charming hostess and the noted host, never has Zenith seen a more

rechise affair than the Ceylon dinner dance given last evening by Mr. and Mrs. Charles McCavilly to Sirle-Gerald Doke. We thought, as we fortunate one, were privileged to view that fairy and foreign scene, nothing at Monte Carlo or the choice of. ambassadorsorial sets of foreign capitals could be more lovely. It is not for nothing that Zenith is in matters social rapidly becoming known as the choosiest inland city in the country. Though he is too modest to admit it, Lord Doak gives a cachet to our smart quarter such as it has not received since the ever memorable visit of the Earl of Sittingbourne. Not only is he the British

peerage, but he is also on-dit a leader of the British metal industries. As he comes from Nottingham, a favorite haunt of Robin Hood, though now we are informed by Lord Doak, a live modern city of 275,573 inhabitants, and important lace as well as other industries. We like to think that perhaps, through his veins runs some of the blood, both verrel red and boomy-blue of the earlier lord of the good a greenwood the roguish robin. The lovely Mrs. McEverley never was more fascinating than last evening in her black net gown,

relieved by dady bands of silver, and at her exquisite waist, a glowing cluster of Aaron Ward roses. Babbitt said bravely, hope they don't invite us to meet this Lord Dope guy. Darnside rather just have a nice, quiet little dinner with Charlie and the Misses. At the Zineth Athletic Club,

they disgusted amply. I suppose. We'll have to call MacGivley Lord Chaz from now on, said Sidney Finkelstein. It beats all get out, meditated that man of data, Howard Littlefield. How hard it is for some people to get things straight. Here they call this fellow Lord Doke, when it ought to be Sir Gerald. Abbott marbled. Is that a fact?

Wow, well, Sir Gerald, eh? That's what you call him. Well, sir, I'm glad to know that. Later he informed his salesman, "'It's fun'n' to goat the way some folks that just because they happen to lay up a big wad, go entertaining for him as foreigners. Don't have any more idea in a rabbit how to address him,

so to make them feel at home.' That evening as he was driving home he passed McKelphley's limousine and saw Sir Gerald, a large ruddy, pop-eyed, taitonic Englishman, whose dribble of yellow mustache gave him an aspect, and doubtful. Babbit drove on slowly, oppressed by futility. He had a sudden, unexplained and horrible conviction that the McEvillies were laughing at him. He betrayed his depression by the violence with which he informed his wife. Folks that really tend to business

haven't got the time to waste on a bunch like the McEvelays. This society's stuff is like any other hobby. If you devote yourself to it, you get in. But I like to have a chance. a visit with you and the children instead of all this idiotic chasing around. They did not speak of the McCablies again. Five. It was a shame at this worried time to have to think about the Overbrooks. Ed Overbrook was a classmate of Babbitt who had been a failure. He had a large family and a feeble insurance business out in the suburb of Dorchester.

He was gray and thin and unimportant. He had always been grain thin and unimportant. He was a person whom, in any group, he forgot to introduce, then introduced with extra enthusiasm. He had admired Babbitt's good fellowship in college, had admired ever since his power in real estate, his beautiful house and wonderful clothes. It pleased Babbitt, though it bothered him,

with a sense of responsibility. At the class dinner he had seen poor Overbrook in a shiny blue surge business suit, being diffident in a corner with three other failures. He had gone over and been cordial. Well, hello, young Erard. I hear you're writing the all-insurance in Dorchester now, bully work. They recalled the good old days when Overbrook used to write poetry. Overbrook embarrassed him by blurting,

"'Say, George, I hate to think of how we've been drifting apart. I wish you and Mrs. Babbit would come to dinner some night. Babbit boomed. Fine, sure. Just let me know. And the wife and I want to have you at our house. He forgot it, but unfortunately, Ed Overbrook did not. Repeatedly he telephoned to Babbitt inviting him to dinner. Might well go and get it over, Babbitt groaned to his wife. But don't it simply amaze you the way the poor fish doesn't know the first thing about social etiquette. Thank of him phoning me instead of his wife, sitting down and writing us a regular bid.

Well, I guess we're stuck with it. That's the trouble with all this class brother hoop-a-doodle. He accepted Overbrook's next plaintiff invitation for an evening two weeks off, a dinner two weeks off. Even a family dinner never seemed so appalling till the two weeks have astoundedly disappeared, and one comes dismayed to the ambushed hour. They had to change the date because of their own dinner to the McEvely's, but at last they gloomily drove out to the Overbrook's house in Dorchester. It was miserable from the beginning.

The Overbrooks had dinner at 6.30 while the Babbitt's never dined before seven. Babbitt permitted himself to be ten minutes late. Let's make it as short as possible. I think we'll duck out quick. I'll say I have to be in the office early tomorrow. He planned. The Overbrook house was depressing. It was the second story of a wooden two-family dwelling,

a place of baby carriages, old hats hung in the hall, cabbage smell, and a family Bible on the parlor table. Ed Overbrook and his wife were as awkward and as threadbare as usual, and the other guests were two dreadful families whose name Babbitt never caught, never desired to catch. But he was touched and disconcerted by the tactless way in which Overbrook praised him. We're mighty proud to have old George here tonight.

Of course you've all read about his speeches and oratory in the papers, and the boy's good-looking, too, eh? But what I always think of is back in college, and what a great old mixer he was, and one of the best swimmers in the class. Babbitt tried to be jovial. He worked at it, but he could find nothing to interest him in Overbrook's timorous,

the blankness of the other guests, or the drained stupidity of Mrs. Overbrook, with her spectacles drab skin and tight-drawn hair. Told his best Irish story and sank like soggy cake. Most blurry moment of all was when Miss Overbrook, peering out of her fog of nursing eight children and cooking and scrubbing, tried to be conversational. I suppose you go to Chicago and New York right along, Mr. Babbit, she prodded.

Well, I'll get to Chicago fairly often. Must be awfully interesting, I suppose you take in all the theaters. Well, tell you the truth, Miss Overbrook, saying it hits me best as a great big beefsteak at Dutch restaurant in the loop. They had nothing more to say. Babbit was sorry, but there was no hope. The dinner was a failure. At ten, rousing out of the stupor of meaningless talk, he said as cheerily as he could.

Great, we got to be starting, and I got a fellow coming in to see me early tomorrow. As Overbrook helped him with his coat, Babbitt said, Nice to rub up on the old days. We must have lunch together, PDQ. Mrs. Babbitt sighed on their drive home. It was pretty terrible how Mr. Overbrook does admire you. Yep, poor Cuss seems to think I'm a little tin archangel and the best-looking man in Zenith.

You're certainly not that. Oh, Georgie, don't suppose we have. to invite them to dinner to our house now, do we?" Oh, I hope not." See here now, George, you didn't say anything about it to Mr. Overbrook, did you? Oh, gee, no, honest. I didn't. Just made a bluff about having him to lunch sometime.

Well, oh dear, I don't want to hurt their feelings, but I don't see how I could stand another evening like this one. And suppose somebody like Dr. and Mrs. Angus came in when we had the Overbrooks there and thought they were friends. thought they were friends of ours? For a week they worried. We really ought to invite Edanney's wife, poor devils. But as they never saw the overbrooks, they forgot them.

And a month or two, they said, It really was the best way just to let it slide. It wouldn't be kind to them to have them here. They'd feel so out of place and hard up in our house. They did not speak of the overbrooks again. End of Chapter 15. Chapter 16 of Babbit. This Libravox recording is in the public domain, recording by Mike Vendetti.com.

Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis, Chapter 16. The certainty that he was not going to be accepted by the McEvelys made Babbitt feel guilty and a little absurd. But he went more regularly to the Elks and a Chamber of Commerce luncheon he was oratorical regarding the wickedness of strikes, and again he saw himself as a prominent citizen. His clubs and associations were food comfortable to his spirit. Of a decent man in Zenith,

it was required that he should belong to one, preferably two or three, of the innumerous lodges and prosperity-boasting lunch clubs. To the Rotarians, the Kiwanans, or the boosters, to the oddfellows, moose, masons, red men, woodmen, owls, eagles, maccabees knights of pithias knights of columbus and other secret orders characterized by a high degree of heartiness sound morals and reverence for the constitution there were four reasons for joining these orders it was the thing to do it was good for business since lodge brothers frequently became customers it gave to americans unable to become jehemreid or commodore such you cautious honorifices high worthy recording scribe and grand hugo to add to the commonplace distinctions of Colonel Judge and Professor.

And it permitted the swaddled American husband to stay away from home for one evening a week. The lodge was his pizzeria or pavement cafe. He could shoot pool and talk man talk, be obscene and valiant. Fabit was what he called a joiner for all these reasons. Behind the gold and scarlet banner of his public achievements was the done background of office routine, leases, sales contracts, lists of properties to rent. The evenings of oratory and committees and lodges stimulated him like brandy, but every morning he was sandy-tonged, week by week.

He accumulated nervousness. He was in open disagreement with his outside salesman, Stan the Graff, and once, though her charms had all of her charms had all, always kept him knickerly polite to her he snarled at miss McGone for changing his letters. But in the presence of Paul Reisling, he relaxed. At least once a week they fled from maturity. On Saturday they played golf during, As a golfer, you're a fine tennis player. Or they mortared all Sunday afternoon, stopping at village lunchrooms to sit on high stools at a counter and drink coffee from thick cups.

Sometimes Paul came over in the evening with his violin, and even Zira, was silent as the lonely man who had lost his way and forever crept down unfamiliar roads spun out his dark soul and music. 2. Nothing gave Babbitt more purification and publicity than his labors for the Sunday school. 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 Jonathan Drew, M.A. D.D., L.D., L.D.

The M.A. and the D.D. were from Albert University, Nebraska, and the L.L.D. from Waterbury College, Oklahoma. He was eloquent, efficient, and versatile. He presided at meetings for the denunciation of unions or the elevation of domestic service and confided to the audience that as a poor boy, he had carried newspapers. For the Sunday edition of the Evening Advocate, he wrote editorials on the Manly Man's Religion and the Dollars and Sense value of Christianity, which were printed in bold type surrounded by a regular reporter. He often said that he was proud to be known as primarily a businessman and that he certainly

was not going to permit old Satan to monopolize all the pep and punch. He was a thin, rustic-faced young man, with gold spectacles and the world. a bang of dull brown hair. But when he hurled himself into oratory, he glowed with power. He admitted that he was too much the scholar and poet to imitate the evangelist Mike Mundy, and he had once awakened his fold to new life and to larger collections by the challenge. My brethren, the real cheap skate is the man who won't lend to the Lord. He had made his church a true community center. It contained everything but a bar. It had a nursery, a Thursday evening supper with a short bright missionary lecture afterwards, a gymnasium,

a fortnightly motion picture show, a library of technical books for young workmen, though unfortunately no young workman ever entered the church except to wash the windows or repair the furnace, in a sewing 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 was Presbyterian, his church building was gracefully Episcopalian. As he said, it had the most pernable features of those noble, ecclesical monuments of Grand Old England, which stand as symbols of the eternity of faith, religious and civil. It was built of cheery iron-spot brick in an improved Gothic style, and the main auditorium had indirect lighting from electric globes in lavish alabaster bowls.

On a December morning when the Babbats went to church, Dr. John Jonathan Drew, was unusually eloquent. Their crowd was immense, ten brisk young ushers in morning coats with white roses, were bringing folding chairs up from the basement. There was an impressive musical program conducted by Sheldon Smeath, educational director of the YMCA,

who also sang the operatory. Babbitt cared less for this because some misguided person had taught young Mr. Smith to smile, smile, smile, while he was singing. But with all the, the appreciation of a fellow orator he admired Dr. Drew's sermon. It had the intellectual quality which distinguished the Chathen Road congregation from the grubby chapels on Smith Street.

At this abundant harvest time of all the year, Dr. Drew chanted, when, though stormy the sky and laborious the path to the drudging wayfarer, yet the hovering and bodiless spirit swoops back o'er all the labors and desires of the past twelve months. Oh, then it seems to me, there are sounds behind all our apparent failures, the golden chorus of greeting from those passed happily on, and lo on the dim horizon. We see behind Dolores clouds the mighty mass of 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 delighted when 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 was distinguished from other offices, only by the spirited change of the familiar wall placard to, This is the Lord's busy day. Chom Frank came in, then William W. Ethorne. Mr. Ethorne was the 71-year-old president 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 of the McCleys before William Washington Eithorne, He was reverent. Mr. Ethorne 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. And he was of the third generation of bankers. He could examine credits, make loans, promote or injure a man's business. In his presence, Babit breathed quickly and felt young. The Reverend Dr. Drew bounced into the room and flowered into speech. I have asked you gentlemen to stay so I can put on a proposition before you.

The Sunday school needs bucking up. It's the fourth largest in Zenith, but there's no reason why we should take anybody's dust. We ought to be first. I want to request you, if you will, to form a committee of advice and publicity for the Sunday school. Look it over and make any suggestions for its betterment, and then, perhaps, see that the press gives us some attention. give the public some really helpful and constructive news instead of all these murders and divorces. Excellent, said the banker.

Babbitt and Frank were enchanted to join him. Three. If you had asked Babette what his religion was, he would have answered in Sonora's Booster Club rhetoric, My religion is to serve my fellow man, to honor my brother as myself, and to do my bit to make life happier for one and all. If you had pressed him for more detail, he would have announced, I'm a member of the Presbyterian Church, and naturally I accept its doctrines. If you had been so brutal as to go on, he would have protested,

There's no use discussing and arguing about religion. It just stirs up bad feeling. Actually, the content of his theology was that there was a supreme being who had tried to make us perfect, but presumably had failed, that if one was a good man, he would go to a place called heaven. Babbit unconsciously pictured it as a rather like an excellent hotel with a private garden. But if one was a bad man, that is, if he murdered or committed burglary, or used cocaine or had a mistress, or sold non-existent real estate, he would be punished.

Babit was uncertain, however, about what he called this business of hell. He explained to Ted, Of course, I'm pretty liberal I don't exactly believe in fire and brimstone hell. Stands to reason, though, that a fellow can't get away with all sorts of vice and not get knicked for it. Do you know I mean? Upon this theology, he rarely pondered. The colonel of his practical religion was that it was respectable and beneficial to one's business. To be seen going to services that the church kept the worst elements from being still worse,

and that the pastor's sermons, however dull, they might 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 Sunday School 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 with that of the more, refined humorous after-dinner speakers, but when he went down to the junior classes, he was disconcerted. He heard Sheldon Smith, educational director of the YMCA and leader of the

church choir, a pale and but strenuous young man with curly hair and a smile, teaching a class of 16-year-old boys. Smith lovingly admonished him. Now, fellas, I'm going to have a heart-to-heart talk, everything at my house next Thursday. We'll get off by ourselves and be frank about what our secret worries. You can just tell old Sheldie anything, like all the fellas do with the why. I'm going to explain frankly about the horrible practices a kid he falls into unless he's guided by a big brother, and about the perils and glory of sex. Old Sheldie beamed damply. The boys looked amused, and Babette didn't know which way to turn his embarrassed eyes. Less annoying, but also much duller. Were the minor classes which were being instructed.

constructed in philosophy and oriental ethnology by Ernest Spinster's. Most of them met in the highly varnished Sunday school room, but there was an overflow to the basement, which was decorated with barricose water pipes and lighted by small windows high up in the oozing wall. What Babbitt saw, however, was the first congregational church of Catawaba. He was back in the Sunday school of his boyhood. He smelled again that polite stuffiness to be found only in church parlor,

He recalled the case of Drab's Sunday school books, Eddie, a humble heroine, and Josephus, a lad of Palestine. He thumbed once more the high-colored text cards, which no boy wanted, but no boy could throw away, because they were somehow sacred. He was tortured by the stumbling rote of 35 years ago, as in the vast Sinith church he listened to.

Now, Edgar, you read that next verse. What does it mean? when it says it's easier for a camel to go through a needle's eye. What does it 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 was trying to teach his disciples? The one thing I want you to especially remember, boys, is the words, With God, all things are possible.

Just think of that always. Clarence, please pay attention. Just say, with God, all things are possible. whenever you feel discouraged, and, Alec, will you read the next verse? If you'd pay attention, you wouldn't lose your place. Drone, drone, drone, giant bees had boomed in a cazarin of drowsiness. Babbit started from his open-eyed nap, thanked the teacher for the privilege of listening to her splendid teaching, and staggered on to the next circle.

After two weeks of this, he had no suggestion whatsoever for the Reverend Dr. Drew. Then he discovered the world of Sunday school journals, an enormous and busy domain of weeklies and monthlies, which were as technical and practical as forward-looking as the real estate columns or the shoe trade magazines. He bought half a dozen of them at a religious bookshop, and till after midnight he read them and admired. He found many lucrative tips on focusing appeals, scouting for new members, and getting prospects to sign up with the Sunday school. He particularly liked the word prospects, and he was moved by the rubric.

The moral springs of the community's life lie deep in its Sunday schools, its schools of religious instruction and inspiration. Neglect now means loss of spiritual vigor and moral power in years to come. Facts like the above, followed by a straight-arm appeal, will reach folks who can never be laughed or jollied into doing their part.

Babbitt admitted. And so, I used to skin out of the old Sunday school at Catawab every chance of God. But same time, I wouldn't be where I am today, maybe if it hadn't been for its training in a moral power. And all about the Bible. Great literature have to read some of it again, one of these days. How scientifically the Sunday school could be 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. Everyone who comes gets a glad hand. No one goes away a stranger. One member of the group stands on the doorstep and invites passers-by to come in. Perhaps most of all, Babbitt appreciated the remarks by William H. Ridgeway in the Sunday School Times. If you have a Sunday school class without any pep and get up and go in it, that is, without

interest, that is uncertain in attendance, that acts like a fellow with the spring fever. Let old Dr. Ridgeway write you a prescription, R.X. 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 Times advertised that C, Harold Loudon, known to thousands through his sacred compositions, had written a new masterpiece entitled, Earning for You, the poem by Harry D. Kerr, is one of the d. Deauteous 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 by substituting the hymn words, I heard the voice of Jesus say.

Even manual training was adequately considered. Babid noted an ingenious way of illustrating the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Model for pupils to make a tomb with rolling door. Use a square covered box turned upside down. Pull the cover forward a little to form a groove at the bottom. Cut a square door, also cut a circle of cardboard to more than cover the door. Cover the circular door and the tomb thickly with. stiff mixture of sand, flour, and water, and let it dry.

It was the heavy circular stone over the door the woman found rolled away on Easter morning. This is the story we are to go tell. In their advertisements, the Sunday School journals were thoroughly efficient. Babbitt was interested in a preparation which takes the place of exercise for sedentary men by building up depleted nerve tissue nourishing the brain and the digestive system. He was edified to learn that the selling of Bibles was a hustling and strictly competitive industry, and as an expert on hygiene, he was pleased by the sanitary communion outfit. Company's announcement of an improved and satisfactory outfit throughout,

including highly polished beautiful mahogany tray. This tray eliminates all noise, is lighter and more easily handled than others, and is more in keeping with the furniture of the church than a tree. tray of any other material. Four. He dropped the pile of Sunday school journals, he pondered. Now there's a real he world, corking. Shamed I haven't sat in more. Fellow that's an influence in the community,

shame if he doesn't take part in a real burl-hustling religion. Sort of Christianity Incorporated, you might say. But with all reverence, some folks might claim these Sunday school fans are undignified and unspiritual, and so on. Sure. Always some skunk to spring things like that. Knocking and sneering and tearing down, so much easier than building up. But me, I certainly hand it to these magazines. They've brought old George F. Babbitt into camp, 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 Roan, where to devil you been? There's a fine time of night to be coming in. Chapter 17 of Babbitt. This Liebervox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti, Mike Vendetti.com. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 17.

1. There are but three or four old houses in Floral Heights. And in floral heights, an old house is one which was built before 1880. The largest of these is the resident. of William Washington-Ethorn, president of the First State Bank. The Ethorn Mansion preserves the memory of the nice parts of zenith, as they appeared from 1860 to 1900.

It is a red brick immensity with gray sandstone lentils and a roof of slate in courses of red, green, and dyseptic yellow. There are two anemic towers, one roofed with copper, the other crowned with cast-iron ferns. The porch is like an open tomb. It is supported 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 all humorous. It embodies the heavy dignity of those Victorian financiers who ruled the generation between the pioneers and the brisk sales engineers and created a somber oligarchy by gaining control of banks, mills, land, railroads, mines. Out of the dozen contradictory zeniths, which together make up the true and complete zenith, none is so powerful and enduring, yet none so unfamiliar to the citizens as the small, still dry, polite, cruel zenith of the William Easthorns.

And for that, tiny hierarchy, the other zeniths unwittingly labor and insignificantly die. Most of the castles of the Testy Victorian Terrarchs are gone now or decayed into boarding houses, but the Ethorn Mansion remains, virtuous and aloof, reminiscent of London, Black Bay, Ritenhouse Square, its marble steps are scrubbed daily, the brass plate is reverently polished, and the lace curtains are as prim and superior as William Washington, Ethorn, himself. With a certain awe, Babbitt and Chum Frank

called on Ethorne for a meeting of the Sunday School Advisory Committee. With uneasy stillness, they followed a uniform made through the catacombs of reception rooms to the library. It was as unmistakably the library of a solid old banker as ethorn's side whiskers were the side whiskers of a solid old 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 and traditional. A small, quiet, steady fire, reflected by polished fire irons.

The oak desk was dark and old and altogether perfect. The chairs were gently supercilious. Ethorne's inquiries as to the health of Mrs. Babbitt, Miss Babbitt, and the other children were softly parental, but Babbitt had nothing with which to answer him. It was indecent to think of using the Hose-Ricks' old socks, which gratified Virgil Gunch and Frank,

and Howard Littlefield, men who till now had seemed successful in urbane, Babbard and Frank sat politely, and politely did Ethorne observe, opening his thin lips just wide enough to dismiss the words. "'Gentlemen? Before we begin our conference, you may have felt the cold incoming in here, so good of you to save an old man the journey. Shall he perhaps have a whiskey-totty?' So well-trained was Babbitt in all the conversation that befits a good fellow, that he

almost disgraced himself with, rather than make trouble and always providing there ain't any enforcement of officers hiding in the wastebasket. The words died choking in his throat. He bowed and flustered obedience, so did Chum Frank. Ethorn rang for the maid. The modern and luxurious babbitt had never seen 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 and shouted for her, nor had he, since prohibition, known anyone to be casual about drinking. It was extraordinary, merely to sip, his toddy and not cry. Oh, mama, this hits me right where I live. And always with the ecstasy of youth, meeting greatness.

He marveled. A little fuzzy face there why he could make me or break me if he told my banker to call my loan. Gosh, that quarter-sized squirt and looking like he hadn't got a single bit of hustle in him. I wonder, do we boosters throw too many fits about Pep? From this thought he shuddered away

and listened devoutly to Ethorn's idea on the advancement of the Sunday school, which were very clear and very bad. Definitely, Babbit outlined his own suggestions. I think if you analyze the needs of the school, in fact, going right at it is as if it were a merchandising problem. The course of the one basic and fundamental need is growth. I presume we're all agreed we won't be satisfied

till we build up the biggest darn Sunday school in the whole state. So the Chatham Road Presbyterian won't have to take anything off anybody. Now about jazzing up the campaign for prospects. They've already used contesting teams and given prizes to the kids that bring in the most members. And they made a mistake there. The prizes were a lot of fold rolls and doodads like poetry books and illustrated testaments instead of something a real-life kid would want to work for. like real cash or a speedometer for his motorcycle.

Of course, I suppose it's all fine and dandy to illustrate the lessons with those decorated bookmarks and blackboard drawings and so on, but when it comes down to the real he hustling, getting out and drumming up customers or members, I mean, why you got to make it worth a fellow while. Now want to propose two stunts. First, divide the Sunday school into four,

armies depending on age. Everybody gets a military rank in his own army according to how many members he brings in. And the duffers that lie down on us don't bring in any. They remains privates. The pastor and superintendent rank as generals, and everybody has got to give salutes and all the rest of that junk, just like a regular army to make them feel it's worthwhile to get ranked. Then second, of course the school has its advertising committee, but, Lord, nobody ever really works good. Nobody works well just for the love of it. The thing to do is be practical and up to date, and hire a real paid press agent for the Sunday school, some newspaper fellow who can give part of his time.

Sure, you bet, said Chom Frank. Like of the nice, juicy bits he could get in, Babbitt crowed. Not only the big, salient vital facts, but how fast is Sunday school and the collection. growing. But a lot of humorous gossip and kidding, how about some blow-heart fell down on his pledge to get new members, or the good time the Sacred Trinity girls had, at their Wainhurst party? And on the side, if he had time, press agent might even boost the lessons themselves, to little advertising for all the Sunday schools in town. In fact, no use being hoggy's towards the rest of them, providing we can keep the bulge on them in membership. For instance,

instance, he might get the papers to, of course, I haven't got a literary training like Frank here, and I'm just guessing how the pieces ought to be written, but take, for instance, suppose the week's lesson is about Jacob. Well, the press agent might get in something that would have a fine moral, and yet with a trick headline that it'd get folks to read it. Say, like, Jake fools the old man, makes get away with girl and bankroll. So I mean? That'd get the your interest. Now, of course, Mr. Ethorn, you're conservative, and maybe you feel these stunts would be undignified,

but honestly, I believe they'd bring home the bacon. Ethorn folded his hands on his comfortable little belly and purred like an aged pussy. I say that, I have been very much pleased by your analysis of the situation, Mr. Babbitt. As you surmise, it's necessary in my position to be conservative, and perhaps endeavor to maintain a certain standard of dignity. Yet I think you'll find me somewhat progressive in our bank, for example. I hope I may say that we have as modern a method of publicity and advertising as any in the city.

Yes, I fancy you'll find our soulsters quite cognizant of the shifting spiritual values of the age. Yes, oh yes, and so in fact it pleases me to be able to say that, though personally I might prefer the sterner Presbyterian of an earlier era. Babbitt finally gathered that Ethorne was willing. Chum Frank suggested as part-time press agent one Kenneth Escott, reporter for the Advocate Times. They parted on a high plane of amnity and Christian helpfulness. Babbitt did not drive home, but toward the center of the city he wished to be by himself,

and exalt over the beauty of intimacy with William Washington-Ethorn. 2. A snow-blanched evening of ringing pavements and eager lights. Great golden lights of trolley cars sliding along the packed snow of the roadway. Timure lights of little houses. A bleaching glare of a distant foundry. Wiping out the sharp-edged stars. Lights of neighborhood drugstores where friends gossiped,

well pleased after the day's work. The green light of a police station and greener radiance on the snow, the trauma of a patrol wagon, gonged beating like a terrified heart, headlights scorching the crystal sparking street, driver, not a chauffeur, but a policeman, proud in uniform, another policeman, perisly dangling on the step at the back in a glimpse of the prisoner, a murderer, a murderer, a coiner, cleverly trapped. An enormous greystone church with a rigid spire,

dim light in the parlors and cheerful throng of choir practice, the quivering green mercury vapor light of a photo-engravers loft. Then the storming lights of downtown, parked cars with ruby tail lights, white-arched entrances to movie theaters, like frosty mouth of winter caves, electric signs, serpents, and little dancing men of fire. pink shaded globes, and scarlet jazz music in a cheap upstairs dance hall. Lights of Chinese restaurants,

lanterns painted with cherry blossoms and with pagodas, hung against lattices of lustrous gold and black, small dirty lamps and small, stinking lunchrooms, the smart shopping district with rich and quiet light on crystal pendants and furs and suave surfaces of polished wood in velvet-hung, reticent windows. High above the street and unexpected square hanging in the darkness, the window of an office where someone was working late, for a reason unknown and stimulating.

A man meshed in bankruptcy, an ambitious boy, an oilman suddenly become rich. The air was shrewd, the snow was deep and uncleared alleys, and beyond the city Babit New, were hillsides of snowdrift among wintry oaks and the curving ice-encrusted river. He loved his city with passionate wonder. He lost the accumulated weariness of business, worry, and expansive oratory.

He felt young and pottenial. He was ambitious. It was not enough to be a Virgil Gunch and Orville Jones, no. They're bully fellows simply lovely, but they haven't got any finesse. No, he was going to be an ethorn, delicately rigorous. coldly powerful. That's the stuff, the wallop and 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. Thames on, anyway, not bad, had too much of this hoop-a-doodle and good-fellow stuff. Why couldn't I organize a bank of my own someday? And Ted succeeded me.

He drove happily home, to Mrs. Babbitt was a William Washington-Ethorn, but she did not notice it. Three. Young Kenneth Escott, reporter on the Advocate Times, was appointed press agent of the 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 Gazette, and he was not officially known as a press agent. He procured a trickle of insinuating items about neighborliness and the Bible about class suppers, jolly but educational, and the value of their prayer life in attaining financial success. The Sunday school adopted Babette's system of military ranks, quickened by this spiritual refreshment. It had a boom.

It did not become the largest school in Zena, the Central Methodist Church kept ahead of by methods which Dr. Drew scored 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 in the parsonage of Dr. Drew, while Babbitt had much praise and good repute. He had received the rank of colonel on the general staff of the school. He was plumply pleased by salutes on the street from unknown small boys. His ears were tickled to ruddy ecstasy by hearing himself called Colonel, and if he did not attend Sunday school merely to be thus exalted, certainly thought about it all the way there. He was particularly

pleasant to the press agent, Kenneth Escott. He took him to lunch at the athletic club and had him to the house for dinner. Like many of the cocksure young men who forge about cities in apparent contentment, and who expressed their cynicism in supercilious slang, Escott was shy and lonely. shrewd, starveling face, broadened with joy at dinner, and he blurted, Gee, Willigan, Miss Babbitt, if you knew how good it is to have home-eats again. Scott 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 communist were criminals, that this verse lebray was Tommy Rot, and that while there ought to be universal

disarmament, of course Great Britain and the United States must on behalf of oppressed small nations keep a Navy equal in the tonnage of all the rest of the world, but they were so revolutionary that they predicted to Babbitt's irritation, that there would someday be a third party, which would give trouble to the Republicans and Democrats. Eskett shook hands with Babbitt three times at parting. Babbitt maintained his extreme fondest for Earthorn. Within a week, three newspapers presented accounts of Babbitt's sterling labors for religion, and all of them tactfully mentioned William Washington Erthorn, as his collaborator. Nothing had brought Babbit quite so much credit at the Elks, the Athletic Club, and the Boosters.

His friends had always congratulated him on his oratory, but in their praise was doubt for even in speeches advertising the city, there was something high-brow and degenerate, like writing poetry. But now Orville Jones shouted across the athletic dining room. Here's the new director of the first state bank. Grover Butterbaugh, the eminent wholesaler of plumber supplies, chuckled. Wonder you mix with common folks after holding a thorn's hand, and Emil Wengrit, the jeweler, was at last willing to discuss buying a house in Dorchester.

Four. When the Sunday school campaign was finished, Babbitt suggested to Kenneth Escott, 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. Babbett? There's hardly week goes by without his ringing up the paper to say if we'll chase a reporter up to his study, he'll let us in on the story about the swell sermon he's going to preach on the wickedness of short skirts, or the authorship of the pentarach.

Don't you worry about him. There's just one better publicity grabber in town, and that's this Dora Gibson Tucker that runs the child welfare and the Americanization League. And the only reason she's got Drew beaten is because she has got some brains. Well, now, Kenneth, I don't think you ought to talk that way about the doctor. Preacher has to watch his interest, hadn't he?

You remember that in the Bible, about being diligent in the Lord's business or something. All right, I'll get something in it for you if you want me to, Mr. Babbitt, but I'll have to wait till the managing editor is out of town and then blackjack the city editor. Thus it came to pass that in the Sunday Advocate Times under a picture of Dr. Drew at his earnestness with eyes alert, jaws granite, and rustic lock flamboyant appeared in an inscription,

a wood pulp tablet, conferring 24 hours, Immortality. The Reverend Dr. John Jenison Drew, M.A., pastor of the beautiful Catham Road Presbyterian Church in lovely Floral Heights is a wizard's soul winner. He holds the local record for conversions. During his shepherdhood, an average of almost a hundred sin-wary persons per year have declared the resolve to lead a new life and have found a harbor of refuge in peace. Everything zips at the Catham 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 every meeting, and the special sing services attract

lovers of music and professionals from all parts of the city. On the popular lecture platform, as well as in the pulpit, Dr. Drew is a renowned word painter, and during the course of the year, he receives literally scores of invitations to speak at varied functions, both here and elsewhere. Five. Babbit 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 advisory committee, Babbett had hinted that he would be charmed to invite Ethorn to dinner,

but Ethorn had murmured, So nice of you, old man now, almost never go out. Surely Ethorn would not refuse his own pastor, Babbitt said boyishly to Drew. "'Hey, doctor, now we've put this thing over. Strikes me, it's up to the Dominita blow the three of us for a dinner.' "'Pully, you bet, delighted,' cried Dr. Drew. In his manifest way, someone had once told him that he talked like the late President Roosevelt. "'And say, doctor, be sure to get Mr. Ethorn to come.

Insist on it. It's, uh, I think he sticks around home too much for his own. own health. Eithorn came. It was a friendly dinner. Babbit spoke gracefully of the stabilizing and educational value of bankers to the community. They were, he said, the pastors of the fold of commerce. For the first time, Ethorne departed from the topic of Sunday schools and asked Babbitt about the progress of his business. Babbitt answered modestly, almost philily. A few months later, when he had a chance to take part in the street traction company's terminal deal? Babbit did not care to go to his own bank for a loan.

It was rather a quiet sort of deal, and if it had come out, public might not have understood. He went to his friend Mr. Ethorn. He was welcome and received the loan as a private venture, and they both profited in their pleasant new association. After that, Babette went to church regularly, except in 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. Then the Evangelical Church, in no better place to make friends who will help you gain your rightful place in the community than in your own church home.

End of Chapter 17. Chapter 18 of Babit. This Lebervox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti, Mike Vendetti.com. Babit by Sinclair Lewis, Chapter 18. One. Though he saw them twice daily, though he knew and amply discussed

every detail of their expenditures, yet for weeks together, Babbitt was no more conscious of his children than of the buttons on his coat-sleeves. The admiration of Kenneth Escott made him aware of Verona. She had become secretary to Mr. Grunzburg of the Grunzberg

leather company. She did her work with the thoroughness of a mind which reveres details and never quite understands them. But she was one of the people who gave an agitating impression of being on the point of doing something desperate, of leaving a job or a husband without ever doing it. Babbitt was so hopeful about Escott's hesitant adores

that he became the playful parent. When he returned from the Alks, he peered coyly into the living room and gurgled, Has your Kenny been here tonight? He never credited Verona's protest. Like Ken and I are just good friends and we only talk about ideas, I don't have all this sentimental nonsense that would spoil everything. It was Ted, who most worried, Babbitt, with conditions in Latin and English,

but with a triumphant record in manual training, basketball, and organization of dances. Ted was struggling through his senior year in the East Sons. High School. At home he was interested only when he was asked to trace some subtle ill in the ignition system of the car. He repeated to his tut-tutting father that he did not wish to go to college or law school in Babbitt was equally disturbed by his shiftlessness and by Ted's relations with Eunice Littlefield next door. Though she was the daughter of Howard Littlefield, that wrought iron in fact, well, that horse-faced priest of private ownership.

Eunice was a midge in the sun. She danced into the house. She plung herself into Babbitt's lap when he was reading. She crumpled his paper and laughed at him when he adequately explained that he hated a crumpled newspaper as he hated a broken sales contract. She was 17 now. Her ambition was to be a cinema actress. She did not merely attend the showing of every feature film.

also read the motion picture magazines, those extraordinary symptoms of the age of pep monthlies and weeklies, gorgeously illustrated with portraits of young women who had recently been manicure girls, not very skillful manicure girls, and who unless their every grimace had been arranged by a director could not have acted in the Easter cantana of the Central Methodist Church. Magazines reporting quite seriously in interviews. plastered with pictures and riding breeches and California bungalows. The views on sculpture and international politics of blankly beautiful, suspiciously beautiful young men

outlined the plots of films about pure prostitutes and kind-hearted train robbers and giving directions for making boot blacks into celebrated scenario authors overnight. These authorities Eunice studied. She could. She frequently did. rather it was in November or December, 1905,

that Mack Harker, the renowned screen cowpuncher and bad man, began his public career as a chorus man in, Oh, you naughty girlie. On the wall of her room, her father reported she had pinned up 21 photographs of actors, but the signed portrait of the most graceful of the movie heroes she carried in her young bosom. Babette was bewildered by this worship of the new gods, and he suspected that euna smoked cigarettes. He smelled the cloying reek from upstairs,

Anne heard her giggling with Ted. He never inquired the agreeable child dismayed him. Her thin, charming face was sharpened by bobbed hair, her skirts were short, her stockings were rolled, and as she flew after Ted, above the caressing silk were glipses of soft knees, which made babit uneasy. Anne wretched that she should consider him old. Sometimes, in the veiled life of his dreams

when the fairy child came running to him, she took on the semblance of Eunice Littlefield. Ted was motor-mad as Eunice was movie-mad. A thousand sarcastic refusals did not check his teasing for a car of his own. However, lax he might be about early rising in the prosodity of Virgil, he was tireless and tinkering. With three other boys, he bought a romantic Ford chap.

Built an amazing racer body out of tin and pine went skidding around corners in the perilous craft and sold it at a profit. Babbit gave him a motorcycle and every Saturday 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 merely neighborhood chums and quarreled with a wholesome and violent lack of delicacy. But now and then, after the color and scent of a dance, they were silent together and a little puritive. Babbitt was worried. Babbitt was an average father.

He was affectionate, bullying, opinionated, ignorant, and rather wistful. Like most parents, he enjoyed the game of waiting till the victim was clearly wrong, then virtuously pouncing. He justified himself by croaking. Well, Ted's mother spoils him good. to be somebody who tells him what's what, and me. I'm elected the goat, because I try to bring him up a real, decent human being, and not with those sap heads, lounge lizards. Of course, they all call me a grouch. Throughout, with the eternal human genius for arriving by the

worst possible routes at surprisingly tolerable goals, Babette loved his son and warned to his companionship, and would have sacrificed everything for him, if he could have been sure of proper credit. Two. Ted 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 pleasures back in Catawaba. He suggested the nicest games going to Boston

and charades with stupans for helmets, and word games in which you were an adjective or quality. When he was most enthusiastic, he discovered that They weren't paying attention. They were only tolerating him. As for the party, it was as fixed and standardized as the Union Club hop. There was to be dancing in the living room, a noble coalition in the dining room, and in the hall two tables of bridge for what Ted called the poor old dumbbells

that you can't get to dance hardly more than half the time. Every breakfast was monopolized by conferences on the offensive. fair. No one listened to Babbitt's bulletins about the February weather or to his throat-clearing comments on the headlines. He said furiously, If I may be permitted to interrupt your engrossing private conversation, do you hear what I said? Don't be a spoiled baby. Ted and I have just as much right to talk as you have, flared Mrs. Babbett. On the night of the party, he was permitted to look on. when he was not helping Matilda with the Vichia ice cream and a petit-forz.

He was deeply disquieted eight years ago when Verona had given a high school party. The children had been fearless Gabby's. 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 hot hair, they accepted cigarettes from silver cases. Babbitt had heard stories of what the Atlantic Club called Goings-on at young parties, of girls parking their corsets in the dressing room, of cuddling and petting, and with a presumable increase in what was known as immorality.

Tonight he believed the stories. These children seem 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 courses were known to be parked upstairs, but certainly these eager bodies were not stiff with steel. Their stockings were of lustrous silk,

their slippers costly and unnatural, their lips carmine and their eyebrows penciled. They danced cheek to cheek with the boys, and Babbitt, sickened with apprehensioned, and unconscious envy. Worst of them all was Eunice Littlefield, and maddest of all of the boys was Ted. Eunice was a flying demon.

She slid the length of the room. Her tender shoulders swayed, her feet were defted as a weaver 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 of their drinking together from hip-pocket flasks.

He tiptoed around the house, and in each of a dozen cars waiting in the street, he saw the points of light from cigarettes, from each of them, hearing high giggles. He wanted to denounce them, but standing in the snow, peering around the dark corner,

he did not dare. He tried to be tactful. When he returned to the front hall, he coaxed the boys. Say, if any of you fellows are thirsty, there's some dandy dintrail. No, thanks. They condescended.

He sought his wife in the pantry and exploded. I'd like to go out there and throw some of those young pups out of the house. They talked 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 go out on their cars and have a drink, they won't come to your house anymore.

And we wouldn't want Ted left out of things, would we? He announced that he would be enchanted to have Ted left out of things and hurried back in to be polite, lest Ted be left out of things. But he resolved if he found that the boys were drinking, he would. Well, he'd hand him something that would surprise him. While he was trying to be agreeable to large-shouldered young bullies, he was earnestly sniffing at them. Twice he caught the reek of Prohibition Time whiskey,

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 dialogue, and Littlefield explained to Babbitt that Eunice's mother had a headache and needed her.

She went off in tears. Babbitt looked after them furiously. "'That little devil!' Getting Ted into trouble in Littlefield a conceited old gasbag, acting like it was Ted that was the bad influence. Later he smelled whiskey on Ted's breath. After the civil farewell to the guest, the row was terrific. A thorough family scene like an avalanche, devastating, and without reticences.

Babbit thundered, Mrs. Babbit wept, Teb was unconvincedly defiant, and Verona in confusion, as to whose side she was taking. For several months, there was coolness between the Babbets and the Littlefields, each family sheltering their lamb from the wolf-cub next door. Babbitt and Littlefield still spoke in pontifical periods

about motors and the Senate, but they kept bleakly away from mention of their families. Whenever Eunice came to the house, she discussed with pleasant intimacy the fact that she had been forbidden to come to the house, and Babbitt tried with, no success whatever, to be fatherly and advisory to her.

Three. Gosh, all fishhugs. Ted wailed to Eunice as they wolf-taught chocolate, lumps of Nugent, and an assortment of glazed nuts in the mosaic splendor of the royal drugstore. It gets me why Dad doesn't just pass out from being so pokey. Every evening he sits there, about half asleep. And if, roan or I say, Oh, come on, let's do something.

he doesn't even take the trouble to think about it. He just yawns and says, "'Nah, this suits me right here. He doesn't know there's any fun going anywhere. I suppose he must be thinking same as you and I do, but gosh, there's no way of telling it. I don't believe that outside the office and playing a little bum golf on Saturday,

he knows there's anything in the world to do except just keeps sitting there and sitting there every night, not wanting to go anywhere, not wanting to do anything. thinking us kids are crazy, sitting there, Lord. Four. If he was frightened by Ted Slackness, Babette was not sufficiently frightened by Verona. She was too safe.

She lived too much in the neat little airless room of her mind. Kenneth Escott and she were always underfoot. When they were not at home, conducting their cautiously radical courtship over sheets of statistics, they were trudging off to lectures by authors and Hindu philosophers and Swedish lieutenants. Gosh, Babbitt wailed to his wife as they walked home from the Fogarty's bridge party.

It gets me how row and that fellow can be so pokey. They sit there night after night whenever he isn't working, and they don't know if there's any fun in the world, all talk and discussion. Lord, sitting there, sitting there, night after night, not wanting to do anything, thinking, I'm crazy because I like to go out and play a fist of cards, sitting there, garch. Then around the swimmer board by struggling through the perpetual surf of family life, Newcomers swelled.

Five. Babbitt's father and mother-in-law, Mr. and Mrs. Henry T. Thompson, rented their old house in the Bellevue district and moved into the Hotel Hatton. That glorified boarding house filled with widows, red plush, furniture, and the sound of ice-water pitchers. They were lonely there, and every Sunday evening the Babbets had to dine with them, on friccassied chicken, discouraged celery, and cornstarch ice cream, and afterwards sit polite and restained in the hotel lounge,

while a young woman violin displayed songs from the German via Broadway. Then Babette's own mother came down from Catawaba to spend three weeks. She was a kind woman and magnificently uncomprehending. She congratulated the convention defying Verona as being a nice, loyal homebody without all these ideas that so many girls seem to have nowadays. And when Ted filled the differential with grease out of pure love of mechanics and filthiness, she rejoiced that he was so handy around the house, and helping his father and all in not.

not going out with the girls all the time and trying to pretend to be a society fellow. Babbitt loved his mother, and sometimes he rather liked her. But he was annoyed by her Christian patience, and he was reduced to pulpiness when she discoursed about a quite mythical hero called, Your father. You won't remember it, Georgie. You were such a little fellow at the time. My, I remember just how you looked that day.

With your goldy brown curls and your lace collar, you always were such a tainty child and kind of a punion sickly. And you loved pretty things so much, and the red tassels of your little booties and all. And your 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 he was because of the jealousy of his captain, and he ought to have been a high-ranking officer. He had the natural ability to command that so very few men have. And this man came out into the road and held up his hand and stopped the bugging, said, Major, he said, there's a lot of folks around here that have decided to support Colonel Scandal for Congress.

and we want you to join us, meeting people the way you do in the store. You could help us a lot. While your father just looked at him and said, I certainly shall do nothing of the sort. I don't like his politics, he said. Well, the man, Captain Smith, they used to call him, and heaven only knows why,

because he had the shadow of vestige of a 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 your friends, Major. Well, you know how your father was, and this Smith knew it too. He knew what a real man he was, and he knew your father,

knew the 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 trying 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 other folks mind theirs. And with that he drove on and left the fellows standing there in the road like a bump on a log. Babbitt was most exasperated when she revealed his boyhood to the children. He had it seemed been fond of barley sugar, had worn the loveless little pink bow

in his curls, and corrupted his own name to Gugu. He heard, though he did not officially hear, Ted admonishing Tinga. Come on now, kid, stick the lovely pink bow in your curls and beat it down to breakfast, or Gougu will jaw your head off. Babbitt's half-brother Martin and his wife and youngest baby

came down from Catooba for two days. Martin bred cattle, and they ran the dusty general store. He was proud of being a free-born, independent American of the good old Yankee stock. He was proud of being honest, blunt, ugly, and disagreeable. His favorite remark was, How much pay for that? He regarded Verona's books, Babbitt's silver pencil, and flowers on the table as citified extravagances, and said so. Babette would have quarreled with him but for his gawky wife and the baby whom Babette teased and poked fingers at, and addressed.

I think this baby's the bum, yes, sir, I think this little baby's the bum, he's a bum, yes, sir, he's a bum, yes sir, he's a bum, that's what he is, he's a bum, he's nothing but a bum, that's what he is a bum. All the while Verona and Kenneth Escott held long inquiries into espionymology. Ted was a disgraced rebel, and Tinka, aged 11, was demanded that she'll be allowed to go to the movies, thrice a week, like all the girls. Babbitt raised. I'm sick of it. I'd have to carry three generations. Whole damn bunch lean on me. Pay half of mother's income.

Listen to Henry T. Listen to myers worrying. People ain't to mad. And get called and old grouch for trying to help the children. All of them depending on me and picking on me. And not a damn one of them, grateful. No relief.

No credit. And no help from anybody. And to keep it up for good Lord knows how long. He enjoyed being sick in February. He was delighted 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.

"'Lorm, me low, without repraisals. He lay on the sleeping porch and watched the winter sun slide along the tot curtains, turning the rusty khaki to pale blood red. The shadow of the drawrope was... in an enticing ripple on the canvas. He found pleasure in the curve of it, sighed as the fading light blurted. He was conscious of life and a little sad, with no Virgil glenches before whom to set his face in resolute optimism

were beheld, and half admitted that he beheld his way of life as incredibly mechanical, mechanical business, a brisk selling of badly 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 and bridge and conversation. Save with Paul Riesling, mechanical friendships, back-slapping and jocular, never daring to essay the test of quietness. He turned uneasily in bed. He saw the years, the brilliant winter days and all the long sweet afternoons, which were meant for Summary Meadows, lost in such brittle pretentiousness.

He thought of telephoning about leases, of cajoling men he hated, of making business calls and waiting in dirty ante-rooms, hat-on knee, yawning at fly-spec calendars, being polite 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 the next day, busy and a doubtful temper. End of Chapter 18. Chapter 19 of Babbit. The Sleeper Fox recording is in the public domain.

Recording by Mike Vendetti, Mike Vendetti.com. Babit by Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 19. 1. The Zenith Street Traction Company planned to build car repair shops in the suburb of Dorchester. but when they came to buy the land, 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 the Babbitt price.

They mentioned their duty toward stockholders. They threatened an appeal to the courts, though somehow the appeal to the courts was never carried out, and the officials found it wiser to compromise with Babbitt. Carbon copies of the correspondence are in the company's files where they may be viewed. by any public commission. Just after this, Babbitt deposited $3,000 in the bank. The purchasing agent of the traction company bought a $5,000 car. He, first vice president, built a home in Devon Woods, and president was appointed minister to a foreign country. To obtain the options to tie up one man's land without letting his neighbor know had been an unusual

strain on Babbitt. It was necessary to introduce rumors about planning garages and to pretend that he wasn't taking any more options. To wait and look as bored as a poker player at a time when the failure to secure a key lot threatened the whole plan. To all this was added a nerve-jabbing quarrel with his secret associates in the deal. They did not wish Babette and Thompson

to have any share in the deal except as brokers. Babbitt rather agreed, Ethics of the business broker ought to strictly represent his principles, and not get in on the business. the buying, he said to Thompson. Ethics rats. Think I'm going to see that bunch of holy grafters get away with a 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 a public that gets double-crossed. Well, now we've been ethical and got it out of our systems. The question is, where can we raise a loan to handle some of the property for ourselves on the QT? We can't go to our bank for it, might come out. I can see old Ethorn, he's close as the tomb. That's the stuff.

Ethorne was glad, he said, to invest in character to make Babbitt the loan, and see to it that the loan did not appear on the books of the bank. Thus, certain of the options which Babbett and 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 of increased real estate activity, Babette was overwhelmed to find that he had a dishonest person working for him.

The dishonest one was Stanley Graff, the outside salesman. For some time, Babette had been worried about 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 juggled inventories of furnished houses so that when the tenant left he had to pay for articles which had never been in the house and the price of which Graff put in his pocket.

Babbitt had not been able to prove these suspicions and though he had rather planned to discharge Graff, he had never quite found time for it. Now into Babbitt's private room charged a red-faced man panning, Look here, I've come to raise particularly merry hell, and unless you have the fellow pinched, I will. What, well, calm down, old man, what's trouble? Trouble, huh?

Here's trouble. Sit down and take it easy. They can hear you all over the building. This fellow, Graf, you got working for you? He leases me a house. I was in it yesterday and signs the lease. Oh, okay? And he was to get the owner's signature and mail the lease last night.

Well, and he did. This morning I comes down to breakfast, and a girl says a fellow had come to the house right after the early delivery and told her he wanted an envelope that had been mailed by mistake. Big long envelope, with Babbitt Thompson in the corner of it. Sure enough, there it was. So she lets him have it. And she describes the fellow to me, and it was this graph. So I've phones to him, and the poor fool, he admits it.

He says after my lease was all signed, he got a better offer from another fellow and he wanted my lease back. Now what you going to do about it? Your name is William Varnie. W. K. Varney. Oh, yes, that was the Garrison House. Babbitt sounded the buzzer. When Miss McGowan came in, he demanded, Graff gone out. Yes, sir. We look through with his desk and see if there is a lease made out to Mr. Varney on the Garrison house. DeVarney? Can't tell you how sorry I am this happened. Needless to say, I'll fire Graff the minute he comes in. And, of course, there are least stands.

But there's one other thing I'd like to do. I'll tell the owner not to pay the... the commission, 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 practical businessman. Probably I've told one or two fairy stories in my time when the occasion called for it, but you know, sometimes you have to lay things on thick to impress boneheads. But this is the first time I've ever had to accuse one of my own employees of anything more dishonest and pinching a few stamps. Honest. It would hurt me if we profited by it, so you'll let me hand you the commission? Good.

Two. He walked through the February City, where trucks flung up a spattering of slush, and the sky was dark above dark brick cornices. He came back miserable. He who respected the law had broken it by concealing the federal crime of Interception of the Mail, but he could not see Graf go to jail his wife suffer. worse, he had to discharge Graff, and this was a part of office routine, which he feared. He liked people so much. He so much wanted them to like him that he could not bear insulting them.

Miss McGowan dashed into whisper with the excitement of an approaching scene. He's here. Mr. Graff? Asked him to come in. He tried to make himself heavy and calm in his chair, and to keep his eyes expressionless. Graff stalked in, a man of 35, dapper, glass-eyed, with a foppy mustache. Watney said, Graff? Yes, sit down.

Graff continued to stand grunting. I suppose that old mud Varney has been in to see you. Let me explain about him. He's a regular tightwad, and he sticks out for every cent, and he practically lied about his ability to pay rent. I found that out just after he signed up, and then another fell comes along with a better offer off for the house, and I felt it was my duty to the firm to get rid of Varney,

and I was so worried about it I scun up there and got back the lease. Honest, Mr. Babbitt, I didn't intend to pull anything crooked. I just wanted the firm to have all the commission. Wait, now, Stan, this may all be true, but I've been having a lot of complaints about you. Now, I don't suppose you ever mean to do wrong, and I think if you just get a good lesson, that'll jog you up a little.

You'll turn 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 pocket, and laughed. So I'm fired. Well, oh, vision and ethics. I'm tickled to death, but I don't want you to think you can get away

with any holier-than-nouth stuff. Sure, I've pulled some raw stuff, a little of it. But how could I help it in this office? Now, by God, young man, tut-tut, keep the naughty temper down, and don't holler because everybody in the outside office will hear you. They're probably listening right now, babbit old dear.

You're crooked in the first place and a damned skin flint in a second. If you paid me a decent salary, I wouldn't have to steal pennies off a blind man to keep my wife from starving. Us married just five months and her the nicest girl living, and you keeping us flat broke all the time, you damned old thief. So you can put money at you. away for your sap head of a son and your wishy-washy fool of a daughter. Wait now. You'll buy God ticket, or I'll bellow so the whole office will hear it. And crooked. Say, if I told the prosecuting attorney what I know about this last retraction option steal, both you and me would go to

jail along with some nice, clean, pious, high-up traction guns. Well, Stan, looks like we're coming down to cases. That deal? There was nothing crooked about it. The only way you can get progress is for the broad-gaged men to get things done, and they got to be rewarded. Oh, for Pete's sake, don't get virtuous with 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 other firm,

I'll squeal all I know about you and Henry T. And the dirty little lip-spittal deals that you corporals of industry pull off the bigger and brain your crooks. And you'll get chased out of town. And me, you're right, I've been going crooked, but now I'm going straight. And the first step will be to get a job in some office where the boss doesn't talk about ideals.

Bad luck, old dear. And you can stick that job up the sewer. Babbitt sat for a long time, alternately raging. I'll have him arrested, and yearning. I wonder, no, I've never done anything that wasn't necessary to keep the wheels of progress moving. Next day he hired in Graff's place, Fritz Wellinger, the salesman of his most injurious rival,

the Eastside Homes and Development Company, and thus at once annoyed his competitor and quired an excellent 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 him had much comfort. Three. An abandoned rice track on the outskirts of Chicago,

a plot, excellent for factory sites, was to be sold and Jake Ours. Offit asked Babbit to bid on it for him. The strain of the street traction deal and his disappointment in Stanley Graff had so shaken Babbit that he found it hard to sit at his desk and concentrate. He proposed to his family, Oh, look here, folks. Do you know who's going to trot up to Chicago for a couple of days?

Just a weekend, won't lose but one day of school. Know who's going with the celebrated business ambassador, George F. Babette? Why, Mr. Theater Roosevelt Babette? "'Aray,' Ted shouted. "'Oh, maybe the Babbit men won't paint that old town red.' And once away from the familiar implications of home, they were two men together. Ted was young only in his assumption of oldness,

and the only realms apparently in which Babit had a larger and more grown-up knowledge than Ted's were the details of real estate and the phrases of politics. When the other sages of the Pullman smoking compartment had left them to themselves, Babbit voice did not drop into the playful and otherwise offensive tone in which one addresses children, but continued its overwhelming and monotonous rumble, and Ted tried to imitate it in his strident tenor.

Gee, Dad, you certainly did show that poor boot when he got flip about the League of Nations. Well, trouble with a lot of fellows is they simply don't know what they're talking about. They don't get down to facts. What do you think of Ken Eskot? I'll tell you, Dad, it strikes me, Ken is a nice lad, no special faults, except he smokes too much, but slow, Lord. Why, if we don't give him a shove,

the poor Dumbel never will propose. And Rhone is just as bad, slow. F's, guess you're right, they're slow. They haven't either one of them got our pep. That's right, they're slow, I swear, Dad. I don't know how Rhone got into our family. I'll bet if the truth were known, You were a bad old egg when you were a kid.

Well, it wasn't slow. But you weren't. I'll bet you didn't miss many tricks. Well, when I was out with the girls, I didn't spend all the time telling about the strike in the knitting industry. They roared together, and together lighted cigars. What are we going to do with them? Babbit consulted.

Gosh, I don't know, I swear. Sometimes I feel like taking Ken aside and putting him over the jumps and saying to him, Young fellow, me lad, are you going to marry young Rhone, or are you going to talk her to death? Here you are, getting on toward 30 and you're only making $20 or $25 a week? When you're going to develop a sense of responsibility and get a raise? If there's anything that George F. or I can do to help you, call on us, but show a little speed anyway. Well, at that, it might not be so bad if you or I talk to him, except he might not understand.

and he's one of those highbrows. He can't come down to cases and lays cards on the table and talk straight out from the shoulder, like you and I can. That's right. He's like all those highbrows. That's so like all of them. That's fact. They sighed and were silent and thoughtful and happy.

The conductor came in. He had once called Babbitt's office to ask about houses. All right, Mr. Babbitt. We're going to have you with us to Chicago. This are your boy? "'Yes, this is my son, Ted. "'Well, now, what do you know about that? "'Here I've been thinking you were a youngster yourself,

"'not a day over forty, hardly, "'and you with this great big fellow. "'40, why, brother, I'll never see forty-five again. "'Is that a fact? "'Wouldn't hardly have thought it. "'Yes, sir, it's a bad giveaway for the old man "'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. Broadly, no, not till next fall. I'm just kind of giving the different 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 considered colleges. They arrived at Chicago late at night. They lay a bed in the morning, rejoicing.

Pretty nice not to have to get up and get down to breakfast, eh? They were staying at the modest Eldon Hotel because Zenith businessman always stayed it to Aden. But they had dinner in the brocade and crystal versa room of the Regency Hotel. Babbitt ordered Blue Point oysters with cocktail sauce, a tremendous steak, with a tremendous platter of French fried potatoes, two pots of coffee, apple pie with ice cream for both of them. And for Ted, an extra piece of mince pie. Hot stuff, some feed, young fellow.

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 nudged each other at the matrimonial jokes and the prohibition jokes. They paraded the lobby, arm and arm between acts, and in the glee of his first release from the shame which to sever his fathers and sons, Ted chuckled.

Dad, did you ever hear the one about the three mail-waters and the judge? When Ted had returned to Zenith, Babbitt was lonely. As he was trying to make alliance between Offutt and certain Milwaukee interest, which wanted the racetrack plot, most of his time was taken up in waiting for telephone calls, sitting on the edge of his bed, holding the portable telephone, asking rarely, Mr. Sagan, not in yet? Didn't he leave any message for me? All right, I'll hold the wire. Staring at a stain on the wall, reflecting that it resembled a shoe, and being bored by his 20th discovery that it resembled a shoe, lighting a cigarette, then bound to the telephone with

no ashtray in reach, wondering what to do with this burning menace, 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 the snow-rutted streets of which he had never heard, streets of small tenements in two-family houses, and marooned cottages. It came to me. It came to him that he had nothing to do, that was nothing he wanted to do. He was bleakly lonely in the evening. When he dined by himself at the Regency's hotel, he sat in the lobby afterward in a plush chair but decked with the Saxe-Koburg arms, lighting a cigar and looking for someone

who would come and play with him and save him from thinking. In the chair next to him, showing the arms of Lithuania, was a half-familiar man, a large red-faced man with Popeye, and and a deficient yellow mustache. He seemed kind of and insignificant, and as lonely as Babbitt himself. He wore a tweed suit and a reluctant orange tie. Came to Babbitt with a pyrotechnic crash. The melancholy stranger was Sir Gerald Doak.

Instinctly Babbitt rose, bumbling, How are you, Sir Gerald? Remember we met in Zenith at Charlie McCleys? Babbitt's my name, real estate. Oh, how do you do? Sir Gerald shook hands flabbily. Embarrassed, standing, wondering how he could retreat. Babbit, meandered. Well, I suppose you've been having a great trip since we saw you in Zenith.

Quite. British Columbia and California, and all over 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 him? scenery and sport and so on. Seamy? 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 doggone good, eh? No, business conditions weren't at all what I had hoped to find them. No, good, eh? No, not. Not really good. That's a darn shame. Well, I suppose.

you're waiting for somebody to take you out to some big shindig, Sir Gerald. Shindig? Oh, Shindig. No, to tell you the truth, I was wondering what the deuce I could do this evening. Don't know a soul in Chicago? Wonder if you happen to know whether there's a good theater in this city. Good. Why say, they're running Grand Opera tonight.

I guess maybe you'd like that? Eh, yeah, went to the opera once in London, Covenant Garden sort of thing. Shocking. I was wondering if there was a good cinema show. Babbitt was sitting down, hitching his share over, shouting, "'Movie!' Say, Sir Gerald, "'I suppose, of course, you had a raft of dames wanting to lead you out to some sorray. "'God forbid. But if you haven't, what do you say we go to a movie? "'There's a peach of a film at the Grantham.

"'Bill Hart in a bandit picture. "'Ratto, just a moment while I get my coat.' Swollen with greatness, slightly afraid lest the noble blood of Nottingham change its mind and leave him at any street corner, Fabot paraded with Sir Gerald Doak, to the movie palace, and in silent bliss sat beside him, trying not to be too enthusiastic, lest the knight despise his adoration of six-shooters and Broncos. At the end, Sir Gerald murmured, John a good picture, this so awful decent of you to take me. Haven't enjoyed myself so much, in weeks. All those hostesses and they never let you go to the cinema. The devil, you say. Babbitt's speech had lost a delicate refinement and all the broad A's, with which he had adorned it,

and became hearty and natural. Well, I'm tickled to death you liked it, Sir Gerald. They crawled past the knees of a fat woman into the aisle. They stood in the lobby, waving their arms in their right of putting on overcoats. Babbitt hidden. "'Eh, yeah, how about a little something to eat? I know a place where we could get a swell, rabbit. And we might dig up a little drink, that is, if you ever touch this stuff.' "'Rother, but why not? Come to my room. I have some scotch, not half bad.'

"'Oh, I don't want to use up all your hooch. It's darn nice of you, but you probably want to hit the hay.' Sir Gerald was transformed. He was beefily yearning. Oh, really, now, I haven't had a decent, evening for so long, having to go to all those dances, no chance to discuss business and that sort of thing. You'll be a good chap and come along, won't you? Well, I, you bet. I just thought maybe, say, by golly, it does do a fellow good, don't it? To sit and visit about business condition after he's been to all these balls and masquerades and banquets and all

that society stuff. I often feel that way in Zena. 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, do American cities always keep up this dreadful social pace? All these magnificent parties? Go on, now quit, you're kidding. Gosh, you with court balls and functions and everything?

No, really, old chap, mother and I, Lady Doak, I should say, we usually play a hand of Basique, and go to bed at ten. Bless my soul, I couldn't keep up your beastly pace. and talking. All you are American women they know so much, culture and that sort of thing. This Mrs. McClellan, your friend? Oh, Lucille, good kid. She asked me which of the galleries I like best in Florence, or was it Ferrenzi? Never been to Italy in my life, and primitives? Did I like primitives?

Do you know what the deuce of primitive is? Me? I should say not, but I know what a, a discount for cash is. Rather, so do I. By George, but primitives? The primitives. They laughed with the sound of a booster's luncheon. Sir Gerald's room was except for his ponderous and durable English bags,

very much like the room of George F. Babbitt, and quite in the manner of Babbitt, he disclosed a huge whiskey flask, looked proud and hospitable and chuckled. They went, old chap. It was after the third. third drink that Sir Gerald proclaimed, how do you Yankees getting the notion that writing chaps like Bernard Shaw and this

Wells represent us? The real business, England. We think these chaps are traitors. Both our countries have their comics, old aristocracy, you know, old country families, hunting people and all that sort of thing. And we both have our wretched labor leaders. But we both have a backbone of sound businessmen 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 Sir Gerald asked humbly, What do you think of North Dakota mortgages? But it was not till after the fifth drink that Babbitt began to call him Jerry and Sir Gerald confided.

Or say, do you mind if I pull off my boots? And ecstatically stretched his nightly-furted. feet. His poor tired, hot, swollen feet. Out on the bed. After the sixth, Babbat irregularly rose. Oh, I'd better get to hiking along, Jerry. You're a regular human being. I wish to thunder we'd been better acquainted in Zenith. Look it. Can't you come back and stay with me for a while? So sorry. Must go to New York tomorrow. Most awfully sorry, old boy. I haven't enjoyed an evening so much since I've been in the States. Real talk. not all this social rot.

I'd never have let them give me the beastly title, and I didn't get it for nothing, eh? If I thought I'd have to talk to women about primitives and polo. Goodly thing to have in Nottingham, though annoyed the mayor most frightfully when I got it. And, of course, the missus likes it, but nobody calls me Jerry now. He was almost weeping,

and nobody in the States has treated me like a friend till tonight. Goodbye, old chap. Thanks awfully. No mention it, Jerry, and remember, whenever you get to Zenith, the latch string is always out. And don't forget, old boy, if you ever come to Nottingham,

mother and I will be frightfully glad to see you. I shall tell the fellows in Nottingham your ideas about visions and real guys at our next Rotary Club luncheon. Four. Babbitt lay a bed at his hotel imagining the Zenith Athletic Club asking him, What kind of time do you have in Chicago, in his answering?

I fair, ran around with Sir Gerald Doak a lot, picturing himself meeting Lucille McEvely in the Monashire. All right, Mrs. Mack, when you aren't trying to pull this high-brow pose? It's just as Gerald Doak says to me in Chicago. Oh, yes, Jerry's an old friend of mine. The wife and I are thinking of running over to England to stay with Jerry in his castle next year. He said to me, George Old Bean, I like Lucille first-rate, but you know who and me, Georgie?

We got to make her get over this hidey-tidey hoop-a-dittle the way she's got. But that evening a thing happened which wrecked his pride. Five. At the Regency Hotel Cigar Counter, he fell to talking with a salesman of pianos, and they dined together. Babbitt was filled with friendliness and well-being. He enjoyed the gorgeousness of the dining room, the chandeliers, the loop brocade curtains, the portraits of French kings, the guest paneled of gilded oak.

He enjoyed the crowd, pretty women, good solid fellows who were liberal spenders. He gasped, he stared, and turned away, stared again. Three tables off, with a doubtful sort of woman, a woman at once coy and withered, was Paul Reisling. And Paul was supposed to be an Akron, selling tar roofing.

The woman was tapping his hand, moaning at him, and giggling. Babbitt felt that he had encountered something involved and harmful. Paul was talking with the rapt earnestness of a man who was telling his troubles. He was concentrated on the woman's faded eyes. Once he held her hand and once blind to the other guests, he puckered his lips as though he was pretending to kiss her. Babbit had so strong an impulse to go to Paul 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. By a gone friend of mine over there. Excuse me a second. Just say hello to him. He touched Paul's shoulder and cried, When did you hit town? Paul glared up at him, face hardening. Oh, hello, George.

Thought you'd gone back to Zena. He didn't introduce his companion. Babbitt peeped at her. She was a flabbily, pretty, weakly, flirtatious woman of 42 or three in an atrocious flowery hat. Her rooging was thorough, but unskilful. "'Where you stayin, Paul, Abyss?'

The woman turned, yawned, examined her nails. She seemed accustomed to not being introduced, Paul grumbled. Campbell in on the south side. "'Alone?' It sounded insinuating. "'Yes, unfortunately.' Fudorously, Paul turned toward the woman, smiling with a fondness sickening to babb it. May, I want to introduce you.

Mrs. Arnold, this is my old acquaintance, George Babbitt. Where you meet you? growled Babbitt, while she gurgled. Oh, I'm pleased to meet you any friend of Mr. Risling's, I'm sure. Babbett demanded. Be back there later this evening, Paul. I'll drop down and see you. No better. We better lunch together tomorrow. All right, but I'll see you tonight, too, Paul. I'll go down to your hotel and I'll wait for you.

End of Chapter 19. Chapter 20 of Babbett. This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti, Mikevendetti.com. Babbitt. By Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 20. 1. He sat smoking with a piano salesman clinging to the warm refuge of gossip.

For a venture into the thoughts of Paul, he was the more affable on the surface as secretly he became more apprehensive, felt more hollow. He was certain that Paul was in Chicago without Zillia's knowledge, and that he was doing things not at all moral and secure. When the salesman yawned that he had to write up his orders, Babit left him, left the hotel in leisurely calm, but savagely he said,

Gamble in, to the taxi driver. He sat agitated on the slippery leather seat in that chill dimness which smelled of dust and perfume and turkily. cigarettes. He did not heed the snowy lakefront, the dark 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 Babette. Mr. Paul Reisling registered here. Yep. Is he here 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 want to.

Babbit had spoken with a deference which all the clan of good fellows give to hotel clerks. Now he said with snarling abruptness, I may have to wait sometime, I'm Rysling's brother-in-law. I'll go up to his room. Did I look like a sneak thief? His voice was low and not pleasant. With considerable haste, the clerk took down the key, protesting. Never said you looked like a sneak thief.

Just rules to 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 being Paul'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 pompous and placid.

Then he thought, suicide. He'd been dreading that without knowing it. Paul would be just the person to do something like that. He must be out of his head. or he wouldn't be confiding in that, dried up old hag. Zilla, oh damn Zilla now, how gladly he'd throttle that nagging fiend of a woman. She'd probably succeed at last and driven Paul crazy. Suicide.

Out there on a lake, way out, beyond the piled ice along the shore. Becastly cold to drop into the water tonight. Or throat cut in the bathroom. Babbit flung into Paul's bathroom. It was empty. He smiled feebly. He pulled at his choking collar, looked at his watch, opened the window to stare down the street,

looked at his watch, tried to read the evening paper laying on the glass-top bureau, looked again at his watch. Three minutes had gone by since he had first looked at it. And he waited for three hours. He was sitting fixed, chilled when the doorknob turned. Paul came in, glowering. Hello, Paul said.

Been waiting? Well, a little while. Well? Well, what? Just thought I'd drop in to see how you made out in Akron. Did all right. The difference does it make. My gosh, Paul, what are you sore about?

What are you butting into my affairs for? Well, Paul, that's no way to talk. I'm not budding into nothing. I was so glad to see your ugly old fizz that I just dropped by 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. Oh, gosh, I'm not.

I didn't like the way you looked at May Arnold, or the snooty way you talked. Well, all right, then. If you think I'm a Buninsky, then I'll just butt in. I don't know who your May Arnold is, but I know doggone good and well that you and her weren't talking about tar roofing. know nor about playing the violin neither. If you haven't gotten any moral consideration for yourself, you ought to have some for your position in the community.

The idea of you going around places guapping in a female's eyes like a lovesick 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, getting started on the downward path, and sneaking off from his wife, even as cranky as one as zealia to go woman-chasing. Oh, you're a perfectly moral little husband.

And by God, I never looked at a woman except Myra since I've been married, practically, and I never will. I'll tell you there's nothing to immortality. Don't pay. Can't you see, old man? It just makes Zillia still crankier. Slide of resolution as he was of body, Paul threw his snow-beated overcoat on the floor and crouched on a flimsy cane chair. Oh, you're an old blow-heart, and you know less about morality. than Tinka. But you're all right, Georgie. But you can't understand that I'm through. I can't go

zilias hammering any longer. She's made up her mind that I'm a devil. Regular inquisition torture. She enjoys it. It's a game to see how sore she can make me and me. Either it's find a little comfort, any comfort anywhere, or else do something a lot worse. Now this Miss Arnold, she's not so young, but she's a fine woman, and she understands a fella, and she's had her own troubles. Yeah, suppose she's one of those hens whose husband doesn't understand her. I don't know, maybe. He was killed in the war. Babbit lumbered up, stood beside Paul, patting 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 a lot. We tell each other we're

the dandiest pair on earth. Maybe we don't believe it, but it helps a lot to have somebody with whom you can be perfectly simple, and not all this discussing, explaining, and that's as far as you go. It is not gone, say it. Well, I don't. I can't see. I like it, but with a burst which left him feeling large

and shining with generosity. None of my darn business. I'll do anything I can for you, if there's anything I can do. It might be I judge from Zilius letters that I've been forwarded from Macron, that she's getting suspicious about my staying away so long. She'd be perfectly capable of having me shadowed

and of coming to Chicago and bursting into a hotel dining room and bawling me out before everybody. I'll take care of Zelia. I'll hand her a good fairy story when I get back to Zinath. I don't know. I don't think you better try it. You're a good fellow. But I don't know that diplomacy is your strong point.

Babbitt looked hurt, then irritated. I mean with Wimitt, With women, with women, I mean. Of course, they got to go some to beat you in business diplomacy, but I just mean with women. Zillie may do a lot of rough talking, but she's pretty shrewd. She'd have the story out of you in no time. Well, all right, but Babbitt was still pathetic at not being allowed to play secret agent, Paul Soothed. Of course, maybe you might tell her you'd been in Akron and seen me there.

Oh, sure, you bet. Don't I have to look at... a candy store property in Akron, didn'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 go putting any fancy fixings on the story. When men lie, they always try to make it too artistic, 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 second cocktail took a second now and a third. He became red-eyed and thick-tongued. He was embarrassingly jocular and salacious. In a taxi cabbbit incredulously found tears

crowding into his eyes. Two. He had not told Paul of his plan, but he did stop at Akron between trains for the one purpose of sending a postcard to Zilla with, had to come here for the day ran into Paul. In Zenith, he called on her. If for public appearances, Zela was over-quafed, over-painted, and resolutely corseted. For private misery, she wore a filthy blue dressing-gown and torn stockings, thrust into streaky pink satin mules. Her face was sunken. She seemed to have but half as much hair as by but remembered, and that half was stringy. She sat in a rocker amid debris of candy boxes and cheap magazines. And she sounded dolorous when she did not sound derisive. But Babbitt was exceedingly breezy.

Well, well, Zill, oh dear, having a good loaf while other peas away? That's the ideal all bit a hat. Myra never got up till ten while I was in Chicago. Say, could I borrow your thermos? Just dropped in to see if I could borrow your thermos bottle. We're going to have a toboggan party. want to take some coffee, mid. Oh, did you get my card from Akron saying I'd run into Paul? Yes, what was he doing? How do you mean? He unbuttoned his overcoat, sat tentatively on the arm of a chair.

You know what I mean. She slapped the pages of a magazine with an irritable clatter. I suppose he was trying to make love to some hotel waitress or manicure girl or somebody. Hang it, you're always letting on that, Paul, goes around chasing skirts. He doesn't, in the first place. And if he did, it would probably be because you keep hitting at him and dingling at him so much.

I hadn't meant to, Zila, but since Paul is away in Akron? He really is in Akron. I know he has some horrible woman that he writes to him in Chicago. Didn't I tell you I saw him in Akron? What are you trying to do? Make me out a liar? No, but I get so worried.

Now there you are. That's what gets me. Here you love Paul, and you plague him and cuss him out as if you hated him. I simply can't understand why it is that the more some folks love people, the harder they try to make them miserable. You love Ted and Rhone, I suppose, and you nag them. Oh, well, that's different, besides, I don't nag them. Not what you'd call nagging, but just saying, now here's Paul the nicest, most sensitive critter on God's Green Earth. You ought to be ashamed of yourself the way you pan him. Why, you talk to him like a

washerwoman. I'm surprised you can act so doggone common, Zeela. She brooded over her linked fingers. Oh, no, I do go and get mean sometimes, and I'm sorry afterwards, but, oh, Georgie, Paul is so aggravating. Honestly, I've tried awfully hard these last few years to be nice to him, but just because I used to be spiteful, or I seem so. 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 everything was my fault. Everything can't always be my fault, can it? And now if I get to fussing, he just turned silent,

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 bust out and say a lot of things I don't mean. and so silent. Oh, you righteous men, how wicked you are! How rotten, wicked!

They thrashed things over and over for half an hour. At the end, weeping, deribly, Zillard promised to restering yourself. Paul returned four days later, and the babbets and Rayslings went festively to the movies and had chop suey at a Chinese restaurant. As they walked to the restaurant through a street of tailor shops and barbershops, the two wives' in front,

chattering about cooks. Babbit murmured to Paul. It all seemed 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, but I'm afraid of her. There's nothing left. I don't ever want to see her. Someday I'm going to break away from her. Somehow. End of Chapter 20.

Chapter 21 of Babit. This Labor Vox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 21 The International Organization of Boosters Clubs has become a world force for optimism, mainly pleasantry, and good business. Chapters are to be found now in 30 countries. 920 of the thousand chapters, however, are in the United States. None of these is more ardent than the Zenith Boosters Club.

The second March launch of the Zenith Boosters was the United States. the most important of the year, as it was to be followed by the annual election of officers. There was agitation abroad. The lunch was held in the ballroom of the O'Hern House. As each of the four hundred boosters entered he took from a wallboard, a huge cellulite button announcing his name, his nickname, and his business. There was a fine of ten cents for calling a fellow booster by anything but his nickname at a lunch. And as Babbitt joyfully checked his hat, the air, was radiant with shouts of, Oh, Chut!

And, ho, you, shorty! And top of the morning, Mac! They sat at friendly tables for eight, choosing places by lot. Babbitt was with Abbott Booze, the merchant tailor, Hector Sey Bolt of the little sweetheart condensed milk company,

Emo Wingret, the jeweler Professor Pomproy of the Wright Way Business College, Dr. Walter Gorbett, Roy, Tegarden, the photographer, and Ben Berkeley, the photo engraver. One of the merits of the booster club was that only two persons from each department of business were permitted to join, so that you at once encountered the ideals of other

occupations and realized the metaphysical oneness of all occupations, plumbing and portrait painting, medicine, and the manufacture of chewing gum. Babbitt's table was particularly happy today because Professor Pomproy had just had a birthday and was therefore open to tea. teasing. Let's pump-pump about how old he is, said Emil Wendgert. Now, let's paddle him with a dancing pump, said Ben Berkeley. 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 old college. At each place was the Booster Club booklet listing the members. Though the object of the club, which

good fellowship, yet they never lost sight of the importance of doing a little more business. After each name was the member's occupation, there were scores of advertisements in the booklet, and on one page the abdamation, there's no rule that you have to trade with your fellow boosters, but get wise, boy. What's the use of letting this good money go outside our happy family? And at each place today, there was a present, a card printed in artistic red and black. Service and boosterism. Service finds its finest opportunity and development only in its broadest and deepest application, and the consideration of its perpetual action upon reaction.

I believe the highest type of service, like the most progressive tenets of ethics, senses unceasingly and is motivated by active adherence and loyalty to that which is the essential principle of boosterism. Good citizenship. its factors and aspects. Dad Peterson Compliments of Dadbury Peterson Advertising Corporation. Ads, not fads,

and dads. The boosters all read Mr. Peterson's aphorism and said they understood it perfectly. The meeting opened with the regular weekly stunts. Retiring President Virgil Gunch was in his chair, his stiff hair like a hedge,

his voice like a brazen gong of festival. Members who had brought guests introduced them publicly. This tall redidated piece of misinformation is the sporting editor of the press, said Willis Jemmis. 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 drop and remark to the wife,

this is certainly a romantic place. It sends a glow right up and down your vertebrae. Well, my guest today is from such a place, Harper's Ferry, Virginia. in the beautiful Southland, with memories of good old General Robert E. Lee and that brave soul, John Brown, who, like every good booster, goes marching on. There were two especially distinguished guests,

the leading man of the Bird of Paradise, company playing his week, at the Dodsworth Theater and the Mayor of Zenith, the Honorable Lucas Prout. Virgil Guth's thundered, When we managed to grab 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 artistic performance he's

giving us, and don't forget that the treasurer of the Dodsworth is a booster, and we'll appreciate our patronage. And when on top of that, we yank his honor out of the malfecious duties at City Hall, then I feel we've done ourselves proud, and Mr. Prout will now say a few words. about the problems and duties. By rising vote, the booster decided which was the handsomest and which the ugliest guest, and to each of them was given a bunch of carnations, donated, President G. Colch noted by Brother Booster H. G. Yeager, the Jennifer Avenue florists. Each week in rotation, four boosters were privileged to obtain the pleasures of generosity and publicity

by donating goods or services to four fellow members, chosen by lot, There was laughter this week when one of the contributors was announced as Barnabas Joy, The Undertaker. Everybody whispered, I can think of a couple of good guys to be buried if his donation is a free funeral. Through all these diversions, the boosters were lunching on chicken croquettes, peas, fried potatoes, coffee, apple pie, and American cheese. Gunch did not lump the speeches.

Presently, he called on the visiting secretary of the Scenes Rotary Club, a rival organization, The secretary had the distinction of possessing state motor car license number five. The rotary secretary laughingly admitted that wherever he drove in the state, so low a number created a sensation, and though it was pretty nice to have the honor, yet traffic cops remembered it only too darn well, and sometimes he didn't know, but what he'd almost as soon have just plain B5-6-8-7-6, or something like that.

Only let any doggone booster try to get number five away from a live Rotarian next year and watch the fur fly. And if they'd permit him, he'd wind up calling for a cheer for the boosters and Rotarians and the Kiwanis altogether. Babbitt sighed to Professor Pumfrey. Be pretty nice to have a low number as that. Everybody'd say, you must be an important guy. Wonder how he got it. I'll bet he whined and dined the superintendent of Motor License Bureau. to fare you well.

Then Chumpfranc addressed them. Some of you may feel that it's out of place here to talk on a strictly high-brow and artistic subject, but I want to come out flat-footed and ask you boys to okay the proposition of a symphony orchestra for Zenith. Now, where a lot of you make your mistake is, assuming that if you don't like classical music and all that junk, you ought to oppose it.

Now I want to confess that, though I'm a literary guy, by profession, I don't care our rap for all this long-haired music. I'd rather listen to a good jazz band at any time to some piece by Beethoven that hasn't any more tuned to it than a bunch of fighting cats. And you couldn't whistle it to save your life. But that isn't a point. Culture has become as necessary an endornment and advertisement for a city today as pavements or bank clearances. It's culture and theaters and art galleries and so on that brings thousands of visitors to New York every year. And to be frank, 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't get the credit

for it. The thing to do then, as a live bunch of go-getters, is to capitalize culture, to go right out and grab it. Pictures and books are fine for it. for those that have the time to study him. But they don't shoot out on the road and holler. This is what little old zenith can put up in the way of culture. That's precisely what a symphony orchestra does. Look at the credit Minneapolis and Cincinnati get, an orchestra with first-class musicers and a swell conductor.

And I believe we ought to do the thing up brown and get one of the highest paid conductors on the market, providing he ain't a hun. It goes right into Bean Town in New York and Washington It plays at the best theaters to the most cultured and moneyed people It gives such class advertising as a town can get in no other way And the guy who is so short-sighted as to crib his orchestra of proposition Is passing up the chance to impress the glorious name of Zenith on some big New York millionaire

That might that might establish a branch factory here I could also go into the fact that for our daughters who show an interest in high-brow music and may want to teach it, having an A1 local organization is of great benefit. But let's keep this on a practical basis. And I call on you good brothers to whoop it up for culture and a world-beating symphony orchestra. They applauded. To a rustle of excitement, President Gunch proclaimed, Gentlemen, we will now proceed to the annual election of officers for each of

of the six offices, three candidates had been chosen by a committee. The second name among the candidates for vice president was Babbitts. He was surprised. He looked self-conscious, his heart pounded. He was still more agitated than when the ballots were counted, and Gunche's head, it's a pleasure to announce that Georgie Babbitt will be the inest assistant gavel-wielder. I know of no man who stands more staunchly for 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 to Miss McGowan. Well, I guess you better congratulate your boss. Been elected vice president of the boosters. He was disappointed, she answered only, Yes, oh, Mrs. Babette, been trying to get you on the phone. But to new salesman, Fritz Winkert 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 his wife. Heard you're trying to give 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 Ijems is a new president, but when he's away, little old Georgie takes a gavel and whoops, I'm up. and introduces the speakers, no matter of thorough the governor himself and... George, listen. It puts him in solid with big men like Doc Dilling and...

George, Paul Riesling. Yeah, sure, I'll phone Paul and let him know about it right away. George, he, listen. Paul's in jail. He shot his wife. He shot Celia this noon. She may not live. End of Chapter 21.

Chapter 22 of Babbitt. This Leaprovox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti, Mike Vendetti.com Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 22 1. He drove to the city prison not blindly, but with unusually fussy carrot corners,

the fussiness of an old woman potting plants. It kept him from facing the obscenity of fate. The attendant said, No, you can't see any of the prison. till 3.30, visiting hour. It was three. For half an hour, Babbit sat looking at a calendar and a clock on the whitewashed wall. The chair was hard and mean and creaky. People went through the office, and he thought stared at him. He felt a belligerent defiance, which broke into a winting fear of this machine which was grinding Paul. Paul. Exactly at half-past three he sent in his

name. The attendant returned with, Reisling says he don't want to see you. You're crazy. He didn't give him my name. Tell him as George wants to see him. George Babbitt. Yeah, 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 want to 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!' Babbit reared over him. The attendance hastily changed to a coaxing, "'You can come back and try tomorrow. Probably the poor guy is off his nut.' Babbit drove, not at all carefully or fussily, sliding viciously past trucks, ignoring the trucker's

curses to the city hall. He stopped with a grind of wheels against the curb, and ran up the marble steps to the office of the Honorable Mr. Lucas Prouk's. the mayor. He bribed the mayor's doorman with a dollar. He was instantly inside, demanding, "'You remember me, Mr. Prout Babbitt, Vice President of the Boosters? Campaign for you. Say, "'Have you heard about poor Riesling? Well, I want an order on the warden, or whatever you call him, of the city prison, to take me back and see him. Good, thanks.' In fifteen minutes he was pounding down the prison corridor to a cage where Paul Riesling sat on a cot, twisted, like an old beggar, his legs crossed, arms and a knot, fighting at his clenched fist.

Paul looked up blankly as the keeper unlocked the cell, admitted Babbitt, and left him 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 Zilliot got what was coming to her.' Paul said argumentatively, Now don't go jumping on Zila.

I've been thinking about maybe she hadn't had any too easy a time. Just after I shot her, I didn't hardly mean to, but she got to deviling me so I went crazy just for a second and pulled out that old revolver you and I used to shoot rabbits with and took a crack at her. Didn't hardly mean to after that. When I was trying to stop the blood, it was terrible what I did to her shoulder, and she had beautiful skin.

Maybe she won't die. I hope it won't leave her skin all scarred. But just afterward, when I was hunting through the bathroom for some cotton to stop the blood, I ran onto the fuzzy little yellow duck we hung on the tree one Christmas, and I remembered she and I had been awfully happy then. Hell, I can't hardly believe it's me here. As Babbitt's arm tightened, about his shoulder of Paul's side, I'm glad you came, but I thought maybe you'd lecture me, and when you've committed a murder

and been brought here and everything, there was a big crowd outside the apartment house all staring and the cops took me through it. I'm not going to talk about it anymore. But he went on in a monotonous, terrified, insane mumble. To divert him, Babbitt said, Well, you got a scar 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 all over.

You and I'll go off to Maine again, and maybe we can get that May Arnold to go along. 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 it's a lovely city. Paul was half smiling. It was Babette, who rambled. now. He could not tell whether Paul was heating, 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 Risling and I could be alone for a moment.

Babbitt wrung Paul's hands and waited in the 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 to doctor give him a shot of morphine so he'll sleep. It seems somehow wicked to return to the office. Babbitt felt as though he had just come from a funeral. He drifted out to the city hospital to inquire about Zilla. She was not likely to die, he learned.

The bullet from Paul's old 44 army revolver had smashed her shoulder and torn upward and out. He wandered home and found his wife radiant with the horrified 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 another woman instead of bearing his cross in a Christian way, she exalted. He was too languid to respond as he desired. He said what was to be said about the Christian bearing of crosses and went out to clean the car. Dully, patiently, he scrapped linty grease from the drip pan, gouged at the mud cake on the wheels. He used up many minutes in washing his hands,

scoured them with gritty kitchen soap, rejoiced in hurting his plump knuckles. Damn soft hands like a woman. At dinner when his wife began the inevitable, he bellowed, I forbid any of you to say a word about Paul. I'll tend to all the talking about this that's necessary. Hear me? There's going to be one house in this scandal-mongering town tonight,

that isn't going to spring the whole year than now and throw those filthy evening papers out of the house. But he himself read the papers after dinner. Before nine he set out for the house of lawyer Maxwell. He was received without cordiality. Well, said Maxwell, I ought 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 a gun first, and he wrestled with her, and the gun would off. accidentally and perjure yourself. Huh? Yes, I suppose it would be perjury. Wouldn't 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 known many and many a case of perjury just to annex some rotten little piece of real estate. And here where it's a case of saving Paul from

going to prison, I'd perjure myself black in the face. No, aside from the ethics of the matter, I'm afraid it isn't practical. The prosecutor would tear your testimony to pieces. It's known that only Riesling and his wife were there at the time. And look here, let me go on to stand and swear, and this would be the God's truth that she pestered him till he kind of went crazy. No, sorry, Riesling absolutely refuses to have any testimony. testimony reflecting on his wife. He insists on pleading guilty.

"'Well, let me go 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 could help us most by keeping strictly out of it.' Babbit revolving his hat like a defending poor tenant, winched so visibly that Maxwell condescended. "'I don't like to hurt your feelings, but, you see, we both want to do it. are best for risling, and we mustn't consider any other factor. The trouble with you, Babbitt, is that you're one of those fellows who talk too readily.

You like to hear your own voice. If there were anything for which I could put you in the witness box, you'd get going and give the whole show away. Sorry. Now I must look over some papers. So sorry. Two. He spent most of the next morning,

nerving himself to face the garrulous world of the athletic club. They would talk about Paul. They would be lip-licking and rotten. But at the rough-next table, they did not mention Paul. They spoke with zeal of the coming baseball season. He loved them as he never had before. Three. He had doubtless from some storybook pictured Paul's trial as a long struggle,

with bitter arguments a taught crowd and sudden and overwhelming new testimony. Actually, trial occupied less than 15 minutes, largely filled with the evidence of doctors that Zilla would recover and that Paul must have been temporarily insane. Next day, Paul was sentenced to three years in the state penitentiary and taken off, quite undramatically, not handcuffed, merely plotting in a tired way beside a cheerful deputy sheriff. And after saying goodbye to him at the station, Babbitt returned to his office

to realize that he faced a world which, without Paul, was meaningless. End of Chapter 22. Chapter 23 of Babbit. This Liberbox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti. Mike Vendiddy.com. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 23.

1. He was busy from March to June. He kept himself from the bewilderment of thinking. His wife and the neighbors were generous. Every evening he played bridge or attended the movies. and the days were blank of face and silent. In June, Mrs. Babbitt and Tinka went east to stay with relatives, and Babbitt was free to do.

He was not quite sure what. All day long after their departure, he thought of the emancipated house in which he could, if he desired, go mad and curse the gods without having to keep up a husbandly front. He considered, I could have a regular party tonight, stay out till two, and not do any explaining afterward. "'Chears!'

He telephoned to Virgil Gudge. To Eddie Swanson, both of them were engaged for the evening, and suddenly he was bored by having to take so much trouble to be riotous. He was silent at dinner unusually kindly to Ted and Verona, hesitating but not disproving them when Verona stated her opinion of Kenneth Escott's opinion of Dr. John Jenethon's drew opinion of the opinions of the evolutionists.

Ted was working in a garage to the summer vacation, and he related his daily triumphs, how he had found a crack ball race, what he had said to the old grouch, what he had said to the foreman about the future of wireless telephony. Ted and Verona went to a dance after dinner. Even the maid was out.

Rarely had Babbitt been alone in the house for an entire evening. He was restless. He vaguely wanted something more diverting than the newspaper comic strict to read. He ambled up to Verona's room, sat on her maidenly blue and white bed, humming and grunting in a solid citizen mamner, as he examined her books,

Conrad's Rescue, a volume strangely named, Figures of Earth, Poetry, quite irregular poetry, Babbett thought, by Vachel Lindsay, and essays by H. L. Mankin, highly improper essays, making fun of the church and all the decencies. He liked none of the books.

In them he felt a spirit of rebellion against niceties and solid citizenship. These authors, and he supposed they were famous too, did not seem to care about telling a good story which would enable a fellow to forget his troubles. He sighed. He noted a book, The Three Black Pennies, by Joseph Hergham-Sharmor.

Ah, that was something like it. It would be an adventure story, maybe about counterfeiting, detective. sneaking up on the old house at night. He tucked the book under his arm. He clumped downstairs and solemnly began to read under the piano lamp. A twilight-like blue dust sifted into the shallow fold

of the thickly wooded hills. It was early October, but a crisping frost had already stamped the maple trees with gold. The Spanish oaks were hung with patches of wine red. The sumac was brilliant in the darkening underbrush, a pattern of wild geese. flying low and unconcerned above the hills, wavered against the serene ashen evening.

Howitt Penny, standing in the contemplative clearing of a road, decided that the shifting regular flight would not come close enough for a shot. He had no intention of hunting the geese. With the drooping of day his keenness had evaporated, an habitual indifference strengthened, permeating him. There it was again discontent. with the good common ways. Babbit laid down the book and listened to the stillness.

The inner doors of the house were open. He heard from the kitchen the steady drip of the refrigerator, a rhythm demanding and disquieting. He roamed to the window. The summer evening was foggy and seen through the wire screen, the street lamps were crosses of pale fire. The whole world was abnormal. While he brooded, Verona and Ted came in and went up to bed.

silence thickened in the sleeping house. He put on his hat, his respectable derby, lighted a cigar, and walked up and down before the house, a portly, worthy, unimaginative figure humming silver threads among the gold. He casually considered, "'Might call it Paul!' Then he remembered he saw Paul in a jailbird uniform. But while he agonized he didn't believe the tale.

It was part of the unreality of this. fog-enchanted evening. If she were here, Myra would be hinting, "'Isn't it late, Georgie?' He tramped in forlorn and unwanted freedom. Fog hit the house now. The world was uncreated, a chaos without turmoil or desire. Through the mist came a man at so fever he should have pace that he seemed to dance with fury as he entered the orb of glow from a street lamp. At each step he brandished his stick and brought it down with a crash. His glasses on their broad, pretentious ribbon

banged against his stomach. Babbitt incredulously saw that it was chum Frank. Frank stopped, focused his vision and spoke with gravity. There's another fool. George Babbitt lives for renting house shares, houses. Know who I am. I am traitor to poetry. I'm drunk.

I'm talking too much. I don't care. Know what I could have been. I could have been a Jean Field or a Jane Whitcomb Riley, maybe Stevenson. I could have whimsy, magno, listen, listen to this, just made it up. Glittering summary meadow noise of beetles and bums and respectable boys. Hear that? Wisnizabeth Wendy, I made that up.

I don't know what it means. Beginning good verse. Child's garden verses. and what I write, tripe. Cheer up poems, all tripe. Could have written too late. He darted on with an alarming plunge, seeming always to pitch forward yet never quite falling.

Babbit would have been no more astonished and no less had a ghost skipped out of the fog carrying his head. He accepted Frank with vast apathy. He grunted, poor boob! And straight away forgot him. He plodded into the, the house deliberately went to the refrigerator and rifled it. When Mrs. Babbitt was at home, this was one of the major household crimes.

He stood before the covered laundry tubs, eating a chicken leg, and half a saucer of raspberry jelly, and grumbling over a clammy, cold, boiled potato. He was thinking it was coming to him that perhaps all life as he knew it and vigorously practice it was futile. That heaven, as portrayed by the Reverend Dr. John, John Genison drew was neither probable nor very interesting, that he hadn't much pleasure out of making money, that it was of doubtful worth to rear children merely that they might rear children who would rear children.

What was it all about? What did he want? He blundered into the living room, lay on the Davenport, hands behind his head. What did he want? wealth, social position, travel, servants, yes, but only incidentally. I give it up, he sighed. But he did know that he wanted the presence of Paul Reisling and from that he stumbled into the admission that he wanted the fairy girl in the flesh.

If there had been a woman whom he loved, he would have fled to her, humbled his forehead on her knees. He thought of his stenor. photographer, Ms. McGowan. He thought of the prettiest of the manicure girls at the Hotel Thornlaw Barbershop. As he fell asleep on a Davenport, he felt that he had found something in life, and that he had made a terrifying, thrilling break with everything that was decent and normal. 2. He had forgotten next morning that he was a conscious rebel, but he was irritable in the office and at 11 o'clock, drive of telephone calls and visitors,

he did something he had often desired and never dared. He left the office without excuses to those slave drivers, his employees, and went to the movies. He enjoyed the right to be alone. He came out with a vicious determination to do what he pleased. As he approached the rough-necks table at the club, everybody laughed. Well, here's the millionaire, said Sidney Finkelstein. "'Yes, I saw him in his locomobile,' said Professor Pumpery.

"'Garish, it must be great to be a smart guy like Georgie,' moaned Virgil Gunch. "'He's probably stolen all of Dorchester. I'd hate to leave a poor little defenseless piece of property lying around where he could get his hooks on it.' They had Babbitt perceived something on him. Also, they had their kidding clothes on. Ordinarily he would have been delighted at the honor implied in being chafed. But he was suddenly touching, he grunted, "'Here, sure, maybe I'll take you guys on his office, boys.'

He was impatient as the jest deliberately rolled on to its denouncement. "'Of course, he may have been meeting a girl,' they said. "'Nah, I think he was waiting for his old roommate, sir, Jerusalem, Doke.' He exploded. Oh, spring it, spring it, you boneheads. What's the great joke? Hooray, George is peeped, snickered, said Dave Finkelstein.

While a grin went round the table, Gunch revealed the shocking truth. He had seen Babbitt coming out of a motion picture theater at noon. They kept it up. With a hundred variations, a hundred guffaws, they said that he had gone to the movies during business hours. He didn't so much mind Gunch, but he was annoyed by Sidney Finkelstein,

that brisk, lean, red-headed explainer of jokes. He was bothered, too, by the lump of ice and his glass of water. It was too large. It spun round and burned his nose when he tried to drink. He raged that Finkelstein was like that lump of ice. But he won, though.

He kept up his banner till they grew tired of the superlative jest and turned to the great problems of the day. He reflected, "'What's the matter with me today? Seems like I've got an awful grouch. Only they talk so darn much, but I better steer careful and keep my mouth shut.'

As they lighted their cigars, he mumbled. "' Gotta get back.' And on a chorus of, "'If you will go spending your mornings with Lady Usher's at the movies.' He escaped. He heard them giggling. He was embarrassed. while he was most bombastically agreeing with the coat man

that the weather was warm, he was conscious that he was longing to run childishly with his troubles to the comfort of the fairy child. Three. Get Miss McGowan after he had finished dictating. He searched for a topic which would warm her office in personality into friendliness. Where you going on your vacation?

He purred. Oh, go upstate to a farm. Do you want me to have the sentence lease copied this afternoon? Oh, no hurry about it. I suppose you have a great time when you get away from us cranks in the office. She rose and gathered her pencils. Oh, nobody's cranky here. I think I can get it copied after I do the letters.

She was gone. Babbitt utterly repudiated the view that he had been trying to discover how approachable was Miss McGowan. Of course. No, there was nothing doing, he said. Four. Eddie Swanson, the motorcar agent who lived across the street from Babbitt, was giving a Sunday supper, his wife, Loretta,

young Loretta, who loved jazz and music and enclosed and laughter, was at her wildest, she cried, We'll have a real party, as she received the guest. Babbitt had uneasily felt that too many men she might be alluring. Now he admitted that to himself she was overwhelmingly alluring. Mrs. Babbitt had never quite approved of Luella. Babbitt was glad that she was not here this evening. He insisted on helping Llewetta in the kitchen,

taking the chicken croquettes from the warming oven, the lettuce sandwiches from the icebox. He held her hand once and she, depressingly, didn't notice it. She caroled, You're a good little mother's helper, Georgie. Now try it in with that tree and leave it on the side table. He wished that Eddie Swanson would give them cocktails that Luetta would have one.

He wanted to be one of those bohemians you read about, studio parties, wild, lovely girls, who were independent, not necessarily bad, certainly not, but not tame like floral heights. How he'd ever stood it all. these years. Eddie did not give them cocktails, true they supped with mirth, and with several repetition by Orville Jones of any time Luetta wants to come in, sit on my lap, I'll tell this sandwich to beat

it. But they were respectable as befitted Sunday evening. Babbitt had discreetly preempted a place besides Luetta on the piano bench. While he talked about motors, while he listened with a fixed smile to her. account of the film she had seen last Wednesday, while he hoped that she would hurry up and finish her description of the plot, the beauty of the leading man and the luxury of the setting, he studied her. Slim waist girdled with raw silk, strong brows, Ardenai's hair parted above a broad forehead. She met youth to him and a charm which saddened. He thought of how valiant a

companion she would be on a long motor tour. exploring mountains, picnicking in a pine grove high above a valley. Her frailness touched him he was angry at Eddie Swanson for the incessant family bickering. All at once he identified Luena with the fairy girl. He was startled by the conviction that they had always had a romantic attraction for each other. I suppose you're leading a simply terrible life. Now you're a widower, she said.

You bet, I'm a bad little fellow and proud of it. Some evening you slip Eddie some dope in his coffee and sneak across the road and I'll show you how to mix a cocktail, he roared. Well, now I might do that. You never can tell. Well, whenever you're ready, you just hang a towel on the attic window and I'll jump for the gin. Everyone giggled at his naughtiness. In a pleased way, Eddie Swanson stated that he would have a physician analyze his coffee daily. The others were diverted to a discussion of the more agreeable recent murders. But Bamba drew Luetta back to personal things.

That's the prettiest dress I ever saw in my life. Do you honestly like it? Like it. Why, say, I'm going to have Kenneth Escott put a piece in the paper saying that the swellest dressed woman in the U.S. is Mrs. E. Luetta Swanson. Now you stop teasing me, but she beamed. Let's dance a little, George. You've got to dance with you.

me. Even as he protested, oh, you know what a rotten dancer I am. He was lumbering to his feet. I'll teach you. I can teach anybody. Her eyes were moist, her voice was jagged with excitement. He was convinced that he had won her. He clasped, were conscious of her smooth warmth, and solemnly he circled in a heavy version of the one step. He bumped into only one or two people. Gosh, I'm not doing so bad, hitting them up like a regular stage dancer, he gloated, and she answered, Bisley, yes, yes, I told you I could teach anybody. Don't take such long steps. For a moment he was robbed of confidence with fearful concentration. He sought to keep time to the music, but he was enveloped again by her enchantment. She's got to like me. I'll make her.

He vowed. He tried to kiss the lock beside her. ear. She mechanically moved her head to avoid it, and mechanically, she murmured, don't. For a moment, he hated her, but after a moment he was as urgent as ever. He danced with Mrs. Orville Jones, but he watched Luetta swooping down the length of the room with her husband. Careful, you're getting foolish, he cautioned himself. The while he hoped and bent his solid knees and dalliance with Mrs. Jones, and to that worldly lady rumbled, he is hot. Without reason, he thought of Paul in that shadowy place where men never dance. I'm crazy tonight. Better go home.

He worried, but he left Mrs. Jones and dashed to Loretta's lovety side, demanding. Next is mine. Oh, I'm so hot. I'm not going to dance this one. Then, bowling, come out and sit on the porch, and we'll get all nice and cool. Well, in the tender darkness with the clamor in the house behind them, he resolutely took her hand. She squeezed his once, then relaxed. Loretta, I think you're the nicest thing I know.

I think you're very nice, do you? You got to like me. I'm so lonely. Oh, you'll be all right when your wife comes home. No, I'm always lonely. She clasped her hands under her chin so that he dared not touch her. He sighed. When I feel punk, and he was about to bring in the tragedy of Paul,

but that was too sacred for even the diplomacy of love. When I get tired at the office and everything, I like to look across the street and think of you. Do you know I dreamed of you one time? Was it a nice dream? Lovely. Well, they say dreams go by opposites. Now I must run in.

She was on her feet. "'Oh, don't go in yet, please, Loyal. "'Yes, I must. I have to look out for my guests.' "'Let them look out for themselves.' "'I couldn't do that.' She carelessly tapped his shoulder and slipped away. But after two minutes of shamed and childish longing to sneak home, he was snorting, "'Certainly I wasn't trying to get chummy with her.

"'Knew there was nothing doing all the time.' And he ambled in to dance with Mrs. Orville Jones, and to avoid Luetta, virtuously and conspicuously. End of Chapter 23. Chapter 24 of Babbit. This LeBrovox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti.

Mike Vendetti.com. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis, Chapter 24. 1. His visit to Paul was as unreal as his night of fog and questioning. Unseeing, he went through prison corridors, stinking, of carbolic acid to a room line with pale yellow settees pierced in rosettes, like the shoe store benches he had known as a boy. The guard led Paul in. Above his uniform of linty gray, Paul's face was pale and without expression. He moved timorously in response to the guard's commands. He meekly pushed Babbitt's gifts of tobacco and magazines across the table to the

guard for examination. He had nothing to say, but, oh, I'm getting used to it. And I'm working in the tailor shop. Stuff hurts my fingers. Babbitt knew that in this place of death, Paul was already dead. And as he pondered on the train home,

something in his own self seemed to have died, a loyal and vigorous faith in the goodness of the world, a fear of public disfavor, a pride and success. He was glad that his wife was away. He admitted without justifying it. He did not care. Two.

Her card read, Mrs. Daniel Judeaic. Babit knew of her as the widow of a wholesale paper dealer. She must have been forty or forty-two, but he thought her younger when he saw her in the office that afternoon. She had come to inquire about renting an apartment. and he took her away from the unskilled girl accountant.

He was nervously attracted by her smartness. She was a slender woman in a black Swiss frock, dotted with white, a cool-looking graceful flock. A broad black hat shaded her face. Her eyes were lustrous. Her soft chin of an agreeable plumpness, and her cheeks and even rose. Babette wondered afterward if she was made up,

but no man living knew less of such a little. She sat revolving her violet parasol. Her voice was appealing without being coy. I wonder if you can help me. Be delighted. I've looked everywhere and I want a little flat, just a bedroom or perhaps two, and sitting room in kitchenette and bath. But I want one that really has some charm to it, not these dinchy places or these new ones with terrible gaudy chandeliers. And I can't pay so dreadfully much. My name is Tannis Judik. I think, maybe I've got just the thing for you. Would you like to chase around and look at it now? Yes, I have a couple of hours. In the new Cavendash apartments, Babbitt had a flat which

he had been holding for Sidney Finkelstein. But at the thought of driving beside this agreeable woman, he threw over his friend Finkelstein, and, under with a note of gallantry, proclaimed. I'll let you see what I can do. He dusted the seat of the car for her, and twice he risked death in showing off his driving. You do know how to handle a car, she said. He liked her voice.

There was, he thought, music in it, and a hint of culture, not a bouncing giggle-like Luetta Swanson's. He boasted, You know, there's a lot of these fellows that are so scared and drive so slow, that take it in everybody's way. The safest driver is a fellow that knows how to handle his machine

and yet isn't scared to speed up when it's necessary, don't you think so? Oh, yes. I bet you drive like who is. Oh, no. I mean, not really. Of course, we had a car, I mean, before my husband passed on, and I used to make believe drive it, but I don't think any woman ever learns to drive like a man.

Well, now there's some mighty good women drivers. Of course, these women that try to imitate men and play golf and everything and ruin their complexions and spoil their hands. That's so I never did like these manish females. I mean, of course, I admire them dreadfully, and I feel so weak and useless beside them. Oh, rats now, I bet you play the piano like a whiz. Oh, no, I mean not really. Well, I'll bet you do. He glanced at her smooth hands, her diamond and ruby,

rings, she caught the glance, snuggled her hands together with a kittenish curving of slim white fingers which delighted him, and yearned. I do love to play. I mean, I like to drum on the piano, but I haven't had any real training, Mr. Judig. Used to say I would have been a good pianist if I had any training, but then I guess he was just flattering me. I'll bet he wasn't. I bet you've got temperament.

Oh, do you like music? Mr. Babbitt? You bet I do, only I don't know as I care so much for all this classical stuff. Oh, I do. I just love Chopin and all feels. Do you, honest? Well, of course. I go to lots of these high-brow concerts, but I do like a good jazz orchestra right up on its toes, with the fellows that plays the bash fiddle, spinning around and beating it up with the bow. Well, I know. I do love good dance music. I love to dance music. I love to dance, don't you, Mr. Babbitt?

Sure, you bet. Not that I'm very darn good at it, though. Oh, I'm sure you are. You ought to let me teach you. I can teach anybody to dance. Would you give me a lesson sometime? Indeed I would. Better be careful, or I'll be taking you up on that proposition. I'll be coming up to your flat and making you give me that lesson.

Yes, she was not offended, but she was not committal. He warned himself, "'Haven't since, now you chump, "'don't go make it a fool of yourself again.' "'And with loftiness, he discoursed. "'I wish I could dance like some of those young fellows, "'but I'll tell you, I feel it's a man's place to take a full. "'You might say creative share of the world's work,

"'in mold conditions, and have something to show for his life. "'Don't you think so?' "'Oh, I do.' "'And so I have to sacrifice some of the things I might like to tackle, "'though I do, by golly. play about a good game of golf as the next fellow. Oh, I'm sure you do. Are you married? Uh, yeah.

And, of course, official duties, I'm the vice president of the Boosters Club, and I'm running one of the committees of the State Association of Real Estate boards, and that makes a lot of work and responsibility, and practically no gratitude for it. Oh, I know. Public men never do get proper credit.

They looked at each other with a high degree of mutual respect, and at the Cavendash apartments he helped her out in a courtly manner, waved his hand at the house as though he were presenting it to her, and ponderously ordered the elevator boy to hustle and get the keys. She stood close to him in the elevator, and he was stirred but cautious. It was a pretty flat of white woodwork and soft blue walls. Mrs. Judik gushed with pleasure as she agreed to take it, and as they walked down the hall to the elevator, she touched his sleeve, caroling. Oh, I'm so glad I went to you. It's such a privilege to meet a man who really understands.

Oh, the flats some people have showed me. He had a sharp, instinctive belief that he could put his arm around her. But he rebuked himself, and with excessive politeness, he saw her to the car, drove her home, all the way back to his office he raged. Glad I had some sense for once. Curse it, I wish I'd tried. She's a darling. Quarker, regular charmer.

Lovely eyes and darling lips and that trim waist. Never get sloppy, like some women. No, no, no. She's a real cultured lady. One of the brightest little women I've met these many moons. Understands about the public topics and, but darn it. Why didn't I try? Tannis.

Three. He was Harris. puzzled by it, but he found that he was turning toward youth as youth. The girl who especially disturbed him, though he had never spoken to her, was the last manicure girl on the right in the Pompanian barber shop. She was small, swift, black-haired, smiling, she was 19, perhaps, or 20. She wore thin salmon-colored blouses which exhibited her shoulders and her black ribbon camisoles.

He went to the Pompeon for his fortnightly hair trim. As always, he felt disloyal at deserting his neighbor, the Reef's building barbershop. Then, for the first time, he overthrew his sense of guilt. Doggone it, I don't have to go here if I don't want to. I don't own the Reef's building. These barbers got nothing on me. I'll doggone well get my hair cut where I doggone well want to. Don't want to hear anything more about it.

I'm through standing by people unless I want to. It doesn't get you anywhere and I'm through. The Pompeian Barbershop was in the basement. of the Hotel Thornley. Largest and most dynamically modern hotel in Zenith. Curving marble steps with a rail of polished brass led from the hotel lobby down to the barbershop. The interior was of black and white crimson tiles

with a sensational ceiling of burnished gold and a fountain in which a massive nymph forever emptied a scarlet cornucopia. Forty barbers and nine manicure girls worked desperately, and at the door six colored porters lurked to greet the customers to care reverently for their hats and collars, to lead them to a place of waiting where, on a carpet like a tropic aisle, in the stretch of white stone floor were a dozen leather chairs and a table heaped with magazines. Babette's porter was an obsequious gray-haired negro, who did him an honor highly esteemed in the land of Zenith, greeted him by name.

Yet Babette was unhappy. His bright particular manicure girl was engaged. She was doing the nails of an overdressed man and giggling with him. Babette hated him. He thought of waiting, but to stop the powerful system of the Pompeian was inconceivable, and he was instantly waved into a chair. About him was luxury, rich and delicate. The Voteroy was having a violet-ray facial treatment,

the next an oil shampoo. Boys wheeled about miraculous electrical massage machines. The barber snatched steaming towels from machine like a howitzer of polished nickel and disdainly flung them away after a second shoes. On the vast marble shelf facing the chairs were hundreds of tonics, amber and ruby and emerald. It was flattering to Babbitt to have two personal slaves at once, the barber and the bootblack.

He would have been completely happy if he could have had, added the manicure girl. The barber snipped at his hair and asked his opinion of the R of the Grace races, the baseball season, and Mayor Prout. The young Negro boot-black

hummed the camp meeting blues and polished in rhythm to his tune, drawing the shiny shoe rag so taut at each stroke that it snapped like a banjo string. The barber was an excellent salesman. He made Babbitt feel rich and important by his manner of inquiring.

What's your favorite tonic, sir? Have you time today for a facial massage? Your scalp was a little tight. Shall I give you a scalp massage? Babbitt's best thrill was the shampoo. The barber made his hair creamy with thick soap. Then, as Babette bent over the bowl, muffled in towels, trenched it with hot water, which prickled along his scalp.

And at last ran the water ice cold. At the shock, the sudden burning cold on his skull, Babette's heart thumped, his chest heaved, and his spine was an electric wire. It was a sensation which broke the monotony of life. He looked grandly about this shop as he sat up. The barber, obsequically, rubbed his wet hair and bound it in a towel as in a turban,

so that Babbitt resembled a plump pink caliph in a ingenious and adjustable throne. The barber begged, in the manner of one who was a good fellow, yet was overwhelmed by the splendors of the caliph, "'How about the little El Dorado oil rub, sir? "'Very beneficial to the scalp, sir. "'Didn't I give you one the last time?' "'He hadn't, but Babbit agreed, well, all right.'

"'With quaking eagerness, he saw that his manicure girl was free. "'I don't know, I guess I'll have a manicure after all.' He droned and excitedly watched her coming, dark-haired, smiling, tender little. The manicuring would have to be finished at her table, and he would be able to talk to her without the barber listening. He waited contentedly, not trying to peep at her, while she filed his nails and the barber shaved him and smeared on his burning cheeks all the interesting mixtures,

which the pleasant minds of barbers have devised through the revolving ages. When the barber was done and he sat opposite the girl at her table, he admired the marble slab of it, admired the sunken set bowl, with its tiny silver taps, and admired himself for being able to frequent so costly a place. When she withdrew his wet hand from the bowl, it was so sensitive from the warm, soapy water,

that he was abnormally aware of the clasp of her firm little paw. He delighted in the pickness and glossiness of her nails. Her hands seemed to him more adorable than Mrs. Judeaix, thin fingers, and more elegant. He had a certain ecstasy in the pain when she nod at the cuticle of his nails with a sharp knife. He struggled not to look at the outline of her young bosom and her shoulders, the more apparent under a film of pink chiffon.

He was conscious of her as an exquisite thing, and when he tried to impress his personality on her, he spoke as awkwardly as a country boy at his first party. "'Oh, it's kind of hot to be working today.' "'Oh, yes, it is hot. You cut your own nails last time, didn't you? Yes, guess I must have. You always ought to get a manicure.

Yes, maybe that's so. There's nothing look so nice as nails that are looked after good. I always think that's the best way to spot a real gent. There was an auto salesman in here yesterday that claimed you could always tell a fellow's class by the car he drove, but I says to him, don't be silly. I says the Weisenheimer's grab a look in a fellow's nail. when they want to tell if he's a tin horn or a real gent.

Yeah, maybe there's something to that. Of course, that is, with a pretty kitty like you, a man can't help coming to get his mitts done. Yeah, I may be a kid, but I'm a wise bird, and I know nice folks when I see him. I can read character at a glance, and I never talk so frank with a fellow if I couldn't see he was a nice fellow. She smiled. Her eyes seemed to him as gentle as April Pools.

With great seriousness, informed himself that there was some roughnecks who would think that just because a girl was a manicure girl and maybe not awful well educated, she was no good, but for him, he was a Democrat and understood people, and he stood by the assertion that this was a fine girl, a good girl, but not too uncomfortably good. He inquired in a voice quick with sympathy. I suppose you have a lot of fellows who try to get fresh with you. Say, gee, I do. Say, listen, there's some of these cigar store sports

that think because a girl's working in a barbershop. They can get away with anything. The things they say. But believe me, I know how to hop these birds. I just give them the north and south and ask them, say, who do you think you're talking to? And they fade away like love's young nightmare, and oh, don't you want a box of nail paste?

It will keep your nails as shiny as when first manicured, harmless to apply and last for days. Sure, I'll try some. Say, say, it's funny I've been coming in here ever since the shop opened and with Arch Surprise. I don't believe I know your name. Don't you? My, that's funny.

I don't know yours. Now you quit kidding me. What's the nice little name? Well, it ain't so darn nice. It's kind of a kike. But my folks did kikes. My papa's papa was a nobleman in Poland, and there was a gentleman in here one day.

He was kind of a count or something. Kind of a no-count, I guess that's what you mean. Who's telling us stories, Marty? And he said he knew my papa's folks in Poland, and they had a dandy big house right on the lake, duffly. Maybe you don't believe it? Sure. No, really, sure I do.

Why not? Don't think I'm kidding you, honey, but every time I've noticed you, I've said to myself, That kid has blue blood in her veins. Didn't you? Honest? Honest, I did. Well, come on. Now we're friends.

What's darling's name? Ida Putnik. It ain't so much a name. I always say to Ma. Ma. Why didn't you name me Dolores or something with some class in it? Well, now I think it's a scrumptious name, Ida. I bet I know your name.

Well, now, not necessarily. course. Oh, it isn't so especially well known. Aren't you, Mr. Soundheim, that travels for the Cracker Jack Kitchen Cutley Company? I am not. I'm Mr. Babbitt, the real estate broker. Oh, excuse me, of course. You mean herein's Enneth. Yep, with the briskness of one whose feelings have been hurt. Oh, sure, I've read your ads. They're swell. Well, you might have read about my speeches. Of course I have. I don't get much time to read, but I guess you think I'm an awfully silly little knit? I think you're a little darling. Well, there's one nice thing about this job. It gives a girl a chance to meet some awfully nice gentlemen and improve her mind with conversation.

And you get so you can read a guy's character at the first glance. Look here, Ida. Please don't think I'm getting fresh. He was hotly reflecting that it would be humiliating to be rejected by this child and dangerous to be accepted if he took her to dinner, if he were seen by centuress friends, but he went on ardently. Don't think I'm getting fresh if I suggest it would be nice for us to go out and have little dinner together some evening. I don't know as I ought to, but my gentleman friend's always wanting me to take me out, but maybe I could tonight. Four. There was no reason he reassured himself. Why

he shouldn't have a quiet dinner with a poor girl who would benefit by association with an educated and mature person like himself. But, lest some ones see them and not understand, he would take her to Biddlemyers Inn on the outskirts of the city. They would have a pleasant drive this hot, lonely evening, and he might hold her hand. No, he wouldn't even do that. Ida was complicit, and her bare shoulders showed it only too clearly. But he'd be hanged if he'd make love to love. He'd make love her merely because she expected it. Then his car broke down. Something had happened to the ignition.

And he had to have the car this evening. Furiously, he tested the spark plugs, stared at the commutator. His angry as flower did not seem to stir the sulky car. And in disgrace, it was hauled off to a garage. With a renewed thrill, he thought of a taxicam. There was something at once well. and interestingly wicked about a taxi cab.

But when he met her on a corner two blocks from the hotel Thornleigh, she said, "'A taxi? Why, I thought you owned a car?' "'I do. Of course I do. But it's out of commission tonight.' "'Hum,' she remarked, as one who had heard that tale before. All the way out to Biddlemire's Inn, he tried to talk as an old friend, but he could not pierce the wall of her words. With interminable indignation, she named,

narrated her retorts to the fresh head barber, and drastic things she would do to him if he persisted in saying that she was better at gassing than hoof-paring. At Biddlemire's Inn, they were unable to get anything to drink. The head waiter refused to understand who George F. Babbitt was. They sat steaming before a vast mixed grill and made conversation about baseball. When he tried to hold Ida's hand, she said with bright friendliness, "'Careful. That fresh waiter is rubbering. But they came out into a treacherous summer night,

the air, lazy, and a little moon above transfigured maples. "'Let's try some other place where we can get a drink and dance,' he demanded. "'Sure, some other night, but I promised mine I'd be home early tonight. "'Rats, too nice to go home.' "'I'd just love to, but Mom would give me fits.' He was trembling. She was everything that was young. and exquisite. He put his arm about her. She snuggled against his shoulder, unafraid, and he was triumphant. Then she ran down the steps of the end singing,

"'Come on, Georgie! We'll have a nice drive and get cool!' It was the night of lovers. All along the highway into Zenith under the low and gentle moon, motors were parked and dim figures were clasped and revelry. He held out hungry hands to Ida, and when she patted them he was grateful. There was no sense of struggle in transition. He kissed her, and simply she responded to his kiss. They two behind the stolid back of the chauffeur. Her hat fell off, and she broke from his embrace to reach for it.

Oh, let it be, he implored. Huh, my hat, none a chance. He waited till she had pinned it on, then his arm sank about her. She drew away from it, and said with maternal soothing, Now don't be a silly boy. Mustn't make it a mama's gold. Just sit back, dearie, and see what a swell night it is. If you're a good boy, maybe I'll kiss you when we say good night.

Now, give me a cigarette. He was solicitous about lighting her cigarette and inquiring as to her comfort. Then he sat as far from her as possible. He was cold with failure. No one could have told Babbitt that he was a fool with more vigor precision and intelligence than he himself displayed. He reflected that from the standpoint of Reverend Dr. John Jenison drew, he was a wicked man, and from the standpoint of Miss Ida Putnik, an old boar who had to be endured,

as the penalty attached to eating a large dinner. Derry, you aren't going to get peevish, are you? She spoke pertly. He wanted to spank her. He brooded. I don't have to take anything off this gutter pup, darn immigrant. Well, let's get it over as quick as we can and sneak home and kick ourselves for the rest of the night. He snorted.

Huh? Meet peevish? Why, you baby? Why should I be peevish? Now, listen, Ida. Listen to Uncle George. I want to put you wise about this scrapping with your head barber all the time. I've had a lot of experience with employees, and let me tell you, it doesn't pay.

to antagonize. At the drab wooden house in which she lived, he said goodnight briefly and amortably. But as the taxi cab drove off, he was praying, Oh my God. End of Chapter 24. Chapter 25 of Babit.

This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti.com. Babit by Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 25. One. He awoke to stretch cheerfully as he listened to the sparrows, then to remember that everything was wrong, that he was determined to go astray and not in the least enjoying the process. Why he wondered, should he be in rebellion?

What was it all about? Why not be sensible, stop all this idiotic running around, and enjoy himself with his family, his business, the fellows at the club? What was he getting out of rebellion? Misery and shame? the shame of being treated as an offensive small boy by a rangamuffin like Ida Putnik, and yet always he came back to, and yet, whatever the misery, he could not regain contentment with a world which, once doubted, became absurd. Only, he assured himself he was, through with chasing after girls.

By noontime, he was not so sure even if that, If in Miss McGowan, Louetta Swanson, and Ida, he had failed to find the lady kind and lovely, it did not prove that she did not exist. He was haunted by the ancient thought that somewhere must exist the not impossible, she who would understand him, value him, and make him happy. Two. Mrs. Babbitt returned in August. On her previous absences he had Mr. R.

reassuring Buzz and her arrival he had made a feat. Now, though he dared not hurt her by letting a hint of it appear in his letters, he was sorry that she was coming before he had found himself, and he was embarrassed by the need of meeting her by and looking joyful. He loaded down to the station he studied the summer resort posters, lest he have to speak to acquaintances and expose his uneasiness. But he was well trained. When the train clanked in, he was out on a cement platform, peering into the chair cars,

and as he saw her in the line of passengers moving toward the vestibule, he waved his hat. At the door he embraced her and announced, Well, well, well, well, by golly, you look fine, you look fine. Then he was aware of Tinka. Here was something. This child, with her absurd little nose and lively eyes that loved him, believed him great, and as he clasped her, lifted and held her till she squealed,

he was for the moment come back to his old steady self. Take a sat beside him in the car, with one hand on the steering wheel, pretending to help him drive, and he shouted back to his wife, I bet the kid will be the best chauffeur in the family. She holds a wheel like an old professional. All the while he was dreading the moment

when he would be alone with his wife, and she would patiently expect him to be ardent. Three. There was about the house an unofficial theory that he was to take his vacation alone, to spend a week or ten days in Catawaba. But he was nagged by the memory that a year ago he had been with Paul in Maine.

He saw himself returning, finding peace there, and the presence of Paul in a life primitive and heroic. Like a shock came the thought that he actually could go, only he couldn't really. He couldn't leave his business, and Myra would think it's sort of funny his going away off there alone. Of course, he decided to do what every damn pleased from now on, but still, go way off to Maine? He went after lengthy meditations. With his wife, since it was inconceivable to explain that he was going to seek Paul's spirit in the wilderness, he frugally employed the life prepared over a year ago and scarcely used it at a

at all. He said that he had to see a man in New York on business. He could not have explained even to himself why he withdrew from the bank several hundred more dollars than he needed, nor why he kissed Tinka so tenderly and cried, "'God bless you, baby!' From the train he waved to her till she was but a scarlet spot beside the brown bulkier presence of Mrs. Babbitt, at the end of a steel and cement aisle, ending in vast bar gates. With melancholy he looked back, the last suburb of Zenith. All the way north, he pictured the main guides,

simple and strong and daring, jolly as they played stud poker in their unsealed jack. Wise in woodcraft as they tramped the forest and shot the rapids. He particularly remembered Joe Paradise, half Yankee, half Indian. If he could but take up a backwood's claim with a man like Joe, work hard with his hands, be free and noisy in a flannel shirt, and never come back to this dull decency.

We're like a trapper in a Northern Canada movie. Plunge through the forest, make camp in the Rockies, a grim and wordless caveman. Why not? He could do it. There'd be enough money at home for the family to live on until Verona was married and Ted self-supporting. Old Henry T. would look out for them.

Honestly. Why not? Really live. He longed for it, admitted that he longed for it, admitted that he longed for it, then almost believed that he was going to do it. Whenever common sense snorted, nonsense, folks don't run away from decent families and partners just simply don't do it, that's all. Then Babbitt answered pleadingly,

Well, it wouldn't take any more nerve than for Paul to go to jail, and, Lord, how I'd like to do it. Moccus and six-gun front-tier town gamblers sleep under the store. Be a regular man. with the he-men like Joe Paradite. Gosh. So he came to Maine again, stood on the wharf before the camp hotel,

again spat heroically into the delicate and shivering water. While the pines rustled, mountains glowed, and a trout lipped and fell in a sliding circle. He hurried to the guy-jack, as to his real home, his real friends, long missed. They would be glad to see him. They would stand up and shout, Why, here's Mr. Babette.

He ain't one of these ordinary sports. He's a real guy. In their boarded and rather littered cabin, the guide sat about the greasy table playing stud poker with greasy cards. Half a dozen wrinkled men in old trousers and easy felt hats. They glanced up and nodded. Joe Paradise, a swart aging man with a big mustache gun and, How do? Back again.

Silence except for the clatter of chips. Babbitt stood beside them very lonely. He hinted after a period of highly concentrated playing, "'Yes, I might take a hand, Joe. Sure, sit in, how many chips do you want?' "'Let's see. You were here with your wife last year, aren't you?' said Joe Paradise. That was all of Babbitt's welcome to the old home.

He played for half an hour before he spoke again. His head was reeking with the smoke of pipes and cheap cigars, and he was weary of pears and four flushes, resentful of the way in which they ignored him. He flung at Joe. Working now? Nope. Like to guide me for a few days?

Well, just soon I ain't engaged till the next week. Only thus did Joe recognize the friendship Babbit was offering him. Babbitt paid up his losses and left the shack brother childlessly. Joe raised his head from the coils of smoke like a seal rising from surf, grunted. How come around tomorrow. and dive down to his three aces. Neither in the voiceless cabin, fragrant with planks of new-cut pine,

nor along the lake, nor in the sunset clouds which presently eddied behind the lavender-misted mountains, could Babbitt find the spirit of Paul as a reassuring presence. He was so lonely that after supper he stopped to talk with an ancient old lady, a gasping and steadily discoursing old lady by the stove in the hotel office. He told her of Ted's presumable future triumphs in the State University and of Tinka's remarkable

vocabulary till he was homesick for the home he had left forever. Through the darkness, through that northern pine-walled silence, he blundered down to the lakefront and found a canoe. There was no paddle in it with a board sitting awkwardly amid ships and poking at the water rather than paddling. He made his way far out on the lake. The lights of the hotel and the cottages became yellow dots. The cluster of glowworms at the base of Sacia Mountain, larger and even more impennerable, was the mountain in the star-filtered darkness, and the lake a limitless pavement of black marble. He was dwarfed and dumb and a little odd, but that insignificance freed him from the pomposities of being Mr. George F. Fabit of Zenith.

Saddened freed his heart. Now he was conscious of the presence of Paul, fancied him, rescued from prison from Zilia, and the brisk exactitudes of the tar-roofing business. Playing his violin at the end of the canoe, he vowed, I will go on, I'll never go back. Now that Paul's out of it, I don't want to see any of those damn people again.

I was a fool to get sore because Joe Paradise didn't jump up and hug me. He's one of these woodsmen, too wise to go yelping and talking your arm off like a city man. But get him back in the mountains, out on the trail? That's real living. Four. Joe reported at Babbitt's cabin at nine the next morning. Babbitt greeted him as a fellow caveman. Well, Joe, how'd you feel about hitting a trail and getting away from these darn soft summaries and women and all?

All right, Mr. Babbitt. What do you say we go over to boxcar pond? They tell me the shack there isn't being used and camp out. Well, all right, Mr. Babbitt, but it's near to Salket Pond, and you can get just about as good fishing there. Oh, I want to get out into real wilds. Well, all right. We'll put the old packs on our backs and get into the woods and really hike.

I think maybe it would be easier to go by water through Lake Shog. We can go all the way by motorboat, flat-bottom boat with never nude. No, sir, bust up the quiet with a chugging motor? Not on your life. You just throw a pair of socks in the old pack and tell them what you want for eats. I'll be ready as you are. Most of the sports go by boat, Mr. Babbitt. It's a long walk.

Look here, Joe, are you objecting to walking? Oh, no, I guess I can do it. But I haven't trapped for 16 years. Most of the sports go by boat, but I can do it if you say so. I guess Joe walked away in sadness. Babbit had recovered from his touchy wrath. Before Joe returned, he pictured him as warming up and telling the most entertaining stories. But Joe had not yet warmed up when they took the trail.

He persistently kept behind Babbitt. And however much his shoulders ached from the pack, however sorely he panted, Babbitt could hear his guide panting equally. But the trail was satisfying a path brown with pine needles and rough with roots among the balsams and ferns of sudden groves of white birch. He became credulous again and rejoiced in sweating. When he stopped to rest, he chuckled. Guess we're hitting it up pretty good for a couple old birds, huh?

Uh-huh, admitted Joe. This is a mighty pretty place. Look, you can see the lake down through the trees. I tell you, Joe, you don't appreciate how lucky you are to live in the woods like this, instead of in a city with trolleys, grinding with typewriters, clacking, and people bothering a life out of you all the time. I wish I knew the woods like you do. Say, what's the name of that little red flower?

Rubbing his back, Joe regarded the flower resentfully. Well, some folks call it one thing, and some folks call another. I guess I just call it a pink flower. Babbit, blessedly ceased thinking. as tramping turned into blind plotting. He was submerged in weariness. His plump legs seemed to go on by themselves without guidance, and he mechanically wiped away the sweat which stung his eyes.

He was too tired to be consciously glad as after sun-scourged mile of corduroy tote rode through the swamp where flies hovered over a hot waste of brush. They reached the cool shore of Boxcar Pond. When he lifted the pack from his back, he staggered from the change in balance, and for a moment could not stand erect. He lay beneath an ample blossom maple tree

near the gas shack and joyously felt sleep running through his veins. He awoke towards dusk and to find Joe efficiently cooking bacon and eggs and flapjacks for supper. And his admiration of the woodman returned. He sat on a stump and felt pearl. Joe, what would you do if you had a lot of money?

Would you stick to guiding, or would you take a claim way back in the woods and be independent of people? For the first time, Joe Brightened. He'd chewed his cut a second and bubbled. I'm off thought about that if I had the money. I'd go down to Tinker's Falls and open a swell shoe store. After supper, Joe proposed a game of stud poker, but Babbitt refused with brevity, and Joe contentedly went to bed at eight. Babbitt sat on the stump, facing the dark pond, slapping mosquitoes. save the snoring guide, there was no other human being within ten miles.

He was lonier than he had ever been in his life. Then he was in Zenith. He was worrying as to whether Miss McGowan wasn't paying too much for carbon paper. He was at once resenting and missing the persistent teasing at the roughnucks table. He was wondering what Zela Riesling was doing now. He was wondering whether, after the summer's maturity of being a garage man, Ted would get busy in the university he was thinking of his wife. If she would only if she wouldn't be so darn satisfied with just settling down.

No, I won't. I won't go back. I'll be 50 in three years, 60 and 13 years. I'm going to have some fun before it's too late. I don't care of Will. He thought of Ida Putnik and Luella Swanson, of the nice widow, What was her name, Tannis Jodig, the one for whom he'd found the flag? He was enmeshed in imaginary conversations then.

I can't seem to get away from thinking about folks. Lest it came to him merely to run away with folly, because he could never run away from himself. That moment he started for Zenith, and his journey there was no appearance of flight, but he was fleeing, and four days afterwards he was on the zenith train. He knew that he was slinking back,

not because it was what he longed to do, but because it was all he could do. He scanned again his discovery that he could never run away from zenith and family and office. Because in his own brain he bore the office and the family, and every street and disquiet and illusion of zenith. But I'm going to, oh, I'm going to start something.

He vowed, and he tried to make it valiant. End of Chapter 25. Chapter 26 of Babbitt. This leave of box recording is in the public domain, recording by Mike Vendetti, Mike Vendetti.com. Babbett by Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 26. One.

As he walked through the train looking for familiar faces, he saw only one person whom he knew, and that was Seneca don't. The lawyer who, after the blessings of being in Babbitt's own class at college and of become a corporation council, had turned crank, had headed farmer labor tickets and fraternized with admitted socialists. Though he was in rebellion naturally, Babbitt did not care to be seen talking with such a fanatic, but in all the Pullman's he could find no other acquaintance, and reluctantly hollowed. Seneca Done was a slight, thin-haired man. Rather like Chum Frank, except that he hadn't Frank's grin. He was reading a book called The Way of All Flesh.

It looked religious to Babbitt, and he wondered if Done could possibly have been converted and turned decent and patriotic. Well, hello, Dome, he said. Done looked up, his voice was curiously kind. Oh, how do, Babbitt? Been away, eh? Yes, I have been in Washington.

Washington, eh? How's the old government making out? It's... Won't you sit down? Thanks. Don't care for due. Well, well, been quite a while since I had a good chance to talk to you, Don. I was sorry you didn't turn up at the last-class dinner.

Oh, thanks. How's the union's coming? Going to run for mayor again? Donn seemed restless. He was fingering the pages of his book. He said, I might. As though it didn't mean any. thing in particular, and he smiled.

Babbitt liked that smile and hunted for conversation. Saw bang-up cabaret in New York, the Good Morning Cutie Bunch at Hotel Minton. Yes, they're pretty girls. I danced there one evening. Oh, like dancing. Naturally, I like dancing

and pretty women and good food better than anything else in the world. Most men do. By gosh, don't. I thought you fellows wanted to take all the good eats and everything. from us. No, not all. What I'd like to see is the meetings of the garment workers held at the ritz, with a dance afterwards. Isn't that reasonable? It might be a good idea, all right, well, shame, I haven't seen more of you recent years. Oh, say, I hope you haven't held it against me, my bucking you as mayor, going on the stump for Prout. You see, I'm an organization Republican,

and I kind of felt. There's no reason why you. shouldn't fight me. I have no doubt you're good for the organization. I remember in college, you were an unusually liberal-sensitive chap. I can still recall you're saying to me that you were going to be a lawyer and take the cases of the poor for nothing and fight the rich. And I remember I said I was going to be one of the rich myself and buy paintings and live at Newport. I'm sure you inspired us all. Well, well, I've always aimed to be liberal. Babette was was enormously shy and proud and self-conscious. He tried to look like the boy he had been a quarter-century ago,

and he shone upon his old friend Seneca Donne as he rumbled. Trouble with a lot of these fellows, even the live wires and some of them that think they're forward-looking. They aren't broad-minded and liberal. Now, I always believe in giving the other fellow a chance and listening to his ideas. That's fine. Tell you how I figure it.

A little opposition is good for all of us, so a fellow, especially if he's a businessman, and engaged in doing the work of the world, ought to be liberal. Yes? I always say a fellow ought to have vision and ideals. I guess some of the fellows in my business think I'm pretty visionary, but I just let them think what they want to think and go right on, same as you do.

By golly, it's nice to sit and visit and kind of. You might say, brush up on our ideals. But, of course, the visionaries do rather get beaten. Doesn't it bother you? Not a bit. Nobody can dictate to me what I think. You're the man. I want to help me.

I want you to talk to some of the businessmen and try to make them a little more liberal in their attitude towards poor Beecher Ingraham. Ingram? But why, he's this nut preacher that got kicked out of the congregational church, isn't he? And preaches free love and sedition? This Don't explained was indeed the general concept of Beecher Ingram,

but he himself saw Beecher Ingram as a priest of the Brotherhood of Man, of which Babbitt was notoriously an upholder. So would Babbitt keep his acquaintances from hounding Ingram and his forlorn little church? You bet I'll call down any of the boys I hear getting funny about Ingram. Babette said affectionately to his dear friend Donne. Don't warmed up and became reminiscent. He spoke of student days in Germany, of lobbying for single tax in Washington,

of international labor conferences. He mentioned his friends, Lord Wycombe, Colonel Wedgwood, Professor Pickley, Babbitt had always supposed that Donn associated only with the IWW. But now he nodded gravely, as one who knew Lord Wycom's by the score, and he got two references to Sir Gerald Doak.

He felt daring and idealistic and cosmopolitan. Suddenly, in his new spiritual grandeur, he was sorry for Zela Riesling and understood her as those ordinary fellows at the Booster Club never could. Two. Five hours after he had arrived in Zenith, he told his wife how hot it was in New York.

He went to call on Zilla. He was buzzing with ideas and forgiveness. He'd get Paul released. He'd do things vague but highly benevolent things. for Zila. He'd be as generous as his friend Seneca Dohn. He had not seen Zeele since Paul had shot her, and he still pictured her as buxom, high-colored, lively, and a little blowsy. As he drove up to her boarding-house in a depressing back street below the wholesale district, he stopped in discomfort. At an upper window leaning on her elbows was a woman with the features of Zila,

but she was bloodless and aged like a yellow wad of old paper crumpled into wrinkles. Whereas Zela had bounded and jiggled, this woman was dreadfully still. He waited half an hour before she came into the boarding-house parlor. Fifty times he opened the book of photographs of the Chicago World's Fair of 1893. Fifty times he looked at the picture of the Court of Honor. He was startled to find Zela in the room. She wore a black, streaky gown, which she had tried to board. brightened with a girdle of crimson ribbon. The ribbon had been torn and patiently mended.

He noted this carefully because he did not wish to look at her shoulders. One shoulder was lower than the other, one arm she carried in contorted fashion as though it were paralyzed, and behind a high collar of cheap lace there was a gouge in the anemic neck, which had once been shining and softly plump. Yes, she said. Well, well, old Zillio. By golly, it's good to see you again. He can send his messages through a lawyer. Why, Rad, I didn't come here just because of him. Came as an old friend.

He waited long enough. Well, you know how it is. Figured you wouldn't want to see a friend of his for quite some time and sit down, honey. Let's be sensible. We've all of us done a bunch of things that we had not to, but maybe we can sort of start over again. Hon, Azelia, I'd like to do something to make you

both happy. Know what I thought today? Mind you, Paul doesn't know thing about this. Doesn't know I was going to come to see you. I got to thinking, Celia's a fine, big-hearted woman, and she'll understand that Paul had his lesson now. Why wouldn't it be a fine idea if you asked the governor to pardon him? Believe he would if it came from you. No, wait, just think how good you'd feel if you were generous. Yes, I wished to be generous. She was sitting primly, speaking nicely. For that reason, I wished to keep him in prison as an example to evil doers. I've gotten religion, George, since the terrible thing that man did to me,

sometimes I used to be unkind, and I wished for worldly pleasures, for dancing in the theater. But when I was in the hospital, the pastor of the Pentecostal communion faith used to come to see me. And he showed me, right from the prophecies written, in the word of God, that the day of judgment is coming, and all the members of the order or other churches are going straight to eternal damnation, because they only do lip service and swallow the world, the flesh, and the devil. For 15 wild minutes she talked, pouring out admonitions to flee the wrath to come, and her face flushed, her dead voice recaptured something of the shrill energy of the old Zela. She wound up with her.

with it furious, it's the blessing of God himself that Paul should be in prison now and torn and humbled by punishment so that he may yet save his soul, and so other wicked men these horrible chasers of women and lust may have an example. Babbitt had itched and twisted, as in church he dared not move during the sermon, so now he felt he must seem attentive. though her screeching denunciations flew past him like carrion birds. He sought to be common brotherly. Yes, I know Zelia, but gosh, it certainly is the essence of religion to be charitable, isn't it?

Let me tell you how I figured. What we need in the world is liberalism, liberally. It were going to get anywhere. I've always believed in being broad-minded and liberal. You, liberal? It was very much the old Zelia. When George Babbitt, you're as about as broad-minded and liberal as a razor blade. Oh, I am, am I, well, just let me tell you, just let me tell you.

You are, I'm by golly, liberal, as you are religious, anyway. You religious? I am so. Our pastor says I sustain him in the faith. I'll bet you do with Paul's money. But just to show you how liberal I am, I'm going to send a check for ten bucks to this Beecher Ingram, because a lot of fellows are saying the poor cuss preaches sedation and free love,

and they're trying to run him out of town. And they're right. They ought to run him out of town, why he preaches, if you can call it preaching in a theater, in the house of Satan, you don't know what it is to find God, to find peace, to behold the snares that the devil's breath. out at our feet. Oh, I'm so glad to see the mysterious purposes of God in having Paul harm me

and stop my wickedness. And Paul's getting his. Good and plenty for the cruel things he did to me, and I hope he dies in prison. Babbit was up, hat and hand growling. Well, that's what you call being at peace for heaven's sake. Just warn me before you go to war. will you? Three. Vast is the power of cities to reclaim the wanderer. More than mountains or the shore devouring sea, a city retains its characters,

imperturbable, cynical, holding behind apparent changes in essential purpose. Though Babbitt had deserted his family and dwelt with Joe Paradise in the wilderness, though he had become a liberal, though he had been quite sure on a night before he reached Zenith that neither he nor the city would be the same again.

Ten days after Heard's return, he could not believe that he had ever been away. Nor was it at all evident to his acquaintances that there was a new George F. Babbitt, save that he was more irritable under the incessant shaving at the athletic club, and once when Virgil Gunch observed that Seneca Done ought to be hanged, Babbitt snorted,

"'Ah, rats, you're not so bad.' At home, he grunted, eh, crossed the newspaper to his commentatory wife and was delighted by Tinka's new red Tamashanter and announced, No class to that corrugated iron garage, have to build me a nice frame one. Verona and Kenneth Escott appeared really to be engaged. In his newspaper, Escott had conducted a pure food crusade against commission houses. As a result, he had been given an excellent job in a commission house, and he was making a salary on which he could marry,

and denouncing irresponsible reporters who wrote stories criticizing commission houses without knowing what they were talking about. This September, Ted had entered the state university as a freshman in the College of Arts and Sciences. The university was at Mojallus, only 15 miles from Zenith, and Ted often came down for the weekend. Babbitt was worried.

Ted was going in for everything but books. He had tried to make the football team as a light halfback. He was looking forward to the basketball season. He was on the committee for the freshman hop. And as a xenothite, an aristocrat among yokels, he was being riced by two fraternities, but of his studies, Babbitt could learn nothing, Sable mumbled.

Oh, these old stints of teachers give you a lot of junk about literature and economics. One weekend, Ted proposed, Say, Dan, why can't I transfer over from the college of the School of Engineers and take mechanical engineering? You always holler that I never study, but honest. I would study there. No, the engineering school hasn't got standing of the college has, Freddibbitt. I'd like to know how it hasn't.

The engineers can play on any of the teams. There was much explanation of the dollars and cents values of being known as a college man when you go into the law, and truly oratorical account of the lawyer's life. Before he was through with it, Babbitt had Ted a United States senator. Among the great lawyers he mentioned was Seneca Doan. But gee whiz, Ted marveled,

I thought you always said this Don was a regular nut. That's no way to speak of a great man. Don's always been a good friend of mine. In fact, I helped him in college. I started him out, and you might say, fired him, just because he's sympathetic with the aims of labor. A lot of chumps that lack liberty and broad-mindedness think he's a crank. But let me tell you, there's mighty few of them that rake in the fees he does,

and he's a friend of some of the strongest, most conservative men in the world, like Lord Wycombe, this big English nobleman that's so well-known, and, you know, which would you rather be, in with a lot of greasy mechanics and laboring men, or chum up to a real fellow like Lord Wycombe, and get invited to his house for parties. Well, gosh, sighed Ted. The next weekend he came joyously with,

Say, Dad, why couldn't I take mining engineering instead of the academic course? You talk about standing. Maybe there isn't much in mechanical engineering, but the miners, gee, they got seven out of eleven of the new elections in New Tao II. End of Chapter 26. Chapter 27 of Babbitt.

This Libra Fox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti. Mike Vendetti.com. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 27. 1. The strike which turned Zenith into two belligerent camps, white and red, began late in September with a walkout of telephone girls and linemen

in protest against a reduction of wages. The newly formed union of Derry and the newly formed Union of Derry's product workers went out partially in sympathy and partially in demand for a 44-hour week. They were followed by the truck drivers union. Industry was tied up, and the whole city was nervous with talk of a trolley strike. A printer strike? A general strike. Furious citizens trying to get telephone calls through strike-breaking girls danced helplessly. Every truck that made its way from the factories to the freight stations was guarded by a policeman trying to look stuaggle, besides the scab driver.

A line of 50 trucks from the Zena Steel and machinery company was attacked by strikers, rushing out from the sidewalk, pulling drivers from the seats, smashing carburetors and commutators, while telephone girls cheered from the walk and small boys heaved bricks. National Guard was ordered out, Colonel Nixon, who in private life was Mr. Caleb Nixon,

secretary of the Pullmore Tractor Company, put on a long khaki coat, and stalked through crowds with a 44 automatic in his hand. Even Babbitt's friend Clarence Drum, the shoe merchant. A round and merry man who told stories at the athletic club and who strangely resembled a Victorian pug dog was to be seen as a waddling but ferocious captain, with his belt tied about his comfortable little belly

and his round little mouth petulant, as he piped to chattering groups on corners, move on now, I can't have any of this loitering. Every newspaper in the city, save one, was against the strikers. When mobs raided the newsstands at each was stationed a militiaman, a young, embarrassed citizen soldier with eyeglasses, bookkeeper, or grocery clerk in private life, trying to look dangerous while small boys yelped, "'Get on to detain soldier!' and striking truck drivers inquired tenderly.

"'Hey, Joe, when I was fighting in France, was you in camp in the States, or was you doing sweet, exercises in the YMCA. Be careful that being in end now. You'll cut yourself. There was no one in Xeneth who talked of anything but the strike, and no one who did not take sides. You were either a courageous friend of labor,

or you were a fearless supporter of the rights of property, and in either case, you were belligerent, and ready to disown any friend who did not hate the enemy. A condensed milk plant was set of fire, Each side charged the other, and the city was hysterical. And Babbitt chose this time to be publicly liberal. He belonged to the sound, sane, right-thinking wing, and at first he agreed that the crooked agitators ought to be shot.

He was sorry when his friend, Seneca Doan, defended arrested strikers, and he thought of going to Donne and explaining about these agitators. But when he read a broadside alleging that, even on their former wages the telephone girls had been hungry. He was troubled. All lies and fake figures, he said, but in a doubtful croak.

For the Sunday after, the Chatham Road Presbyterian Church announced a sermon by Dr. John Jonathan Drew on how the Savior would end strikes. Babbitt had been negligent about church going lately, but he went to the service, hopeful that Dr. Drew really did have the information as to what the divine powers thought about strikes.

Beside Babbitt in the large curving, glossy velvet upholster pew, was Chum Frank. Frank whispered, Hope the talk gives the striker's hell. Ordinarily, I don't believe in a preacher budding into political matters. Let him stick to straight religion and save souls and not stir up a lot of discussion. But at a time like this, I do think he ought to stand up and ball off those pug uglies in a fair you well. Yeah, well, said Babbitt.

The Reverend Dr. drew his rustic bang, flopping with the intensity of his poetic and sociologic adore trumpeted during the untoward series of industrial dislocations which have let us be courageous and admit it boldly. Throttled the business life of our fair city these past days. There has been a great deal of loose talk about scientific prevention of scientific. Scientific.

Now let me tell you that the most unscientific thing in the world is science. Take the attacks on the established fundamentals of the Christian Creed, which were so popular with the scientists a generation ago. Oh, yes, they were mighty fellows and great pubhas of criticism. They were going to destroy the church. they were going to prove the world was created and has been brought to its extraordinary level of morality and civilization by blind chance.

Yet the church stands just as firmly today as ever, and the only answer a Christian pastor needs make to the long-haired opponents of his simple faith is just a pitying smile. And now the same scientist want to replace the natural conditions, of free competition by crazy systems which no matter what high-sounding names they are called are nothing but a despotic paternalism. Naturally, I am not criticizing labor courts, injunctions against men have proven to be striking

unjustly, or those excellent unions in which the men and the boss get together. But I certainly am criticizing the system in which the free and fluid motivation of independent labor is to be replaced by crooked-up wage scales and minimum salaries, and government commissions and labor federations, and all that poppycock. What is not generally understood is that this whole industrial matter isn't a question of economics. It's essentially and only a matter of love and of the practical application of the Christian religion. Imagine a factory. Instead. of committees of workmen, alienating the boss.

The boss goes among them smiling and they smile back. The elder brother and the younger. Brothers. That's what they must be, loving brothers. And then strikes would be as inconceivable as hatred in the home. It was at this point that Babbitt muttered, "'A rot!' "'huh?' said Chelm-Frank.

"'He doesn't know what he's talking about.' Just as clear as mud. Doesn't made a darn thing. Maybe, but... Frank looked at him doubtfully. Through all the service, kept glancing at him doubtfully, till Babit was nervous. Two.

The strikers had announced a parade for Tuesday morning, but Colonel Nixon had forbidden it, the newspaper said. When Babette drove west from his office at ten that morning, he saw a drove of shabby men heading towards the tangled dirty district beyond courthouse square. He hated them. because they were poor, because they made him feel insecure. Bam, loafers, wouldn't be common workmen if they had any pep, he complained.

He wondered if there was going to be a riot. He drove toward the starting point of the parade a tangle of limp and faded grass known as Moore Street Park and halted his car. The park and streets were buzzing with strikers, young men and blue damn shirts, old men with caps, threw them, keeping them stirred like a boiling pot, move the militiamen. Babbit could hear the soldiers monotonous orders,

Keep moving, move on, bow. Keep your feet warm. Babbit admired their stolid good temper. The crowd shouted, Ten soldiers and dirty dogs, servants of the capitalist. But the militiamen grinned and answered only, That's right, keep moving, Billy.

Babbitt thrilled over the citizen soldiers, hated the scoundrels who were obstructing the pleasant ways of prospect. admired Colonel Nixon's striding contempt for the crowd, and as Captain Clarence Drum, the rather puffing shoe dealer, came raging by, Babbitt respectively, it clamored, Great work, Captain! Don't let them march! He watched the strikers failing from the park. Many of them bore posters with, They Can't Stop Are Peacefully Walking. The militia men tore away the posters, but the strikers fell in behind their leaders, and straggled off, a thing.

then unimpressive trickle between steel-glending lines of soldiers. Babbitt saw with disappointment that there wasn't going to be any violence, nothing interesting at all. Then he gasped. Among the marchers beside the bulky young workman was Seneca Done, smiling, content. In front of him was Professor Brockbank, head of the History Department in the State University,

an old man and white-bearded, known to come from a distinguished Massachusetts family. "'My gosh,' Babbit marbled. "'A swell like him, and with the strikers, and good old Sennie Don. "'They're fools to get mixed up with this bunch. "'They're parlor socialist, but they have got nerve, "'and nothing in it for them, not a cent, and I don't know. "'It's all the strikers look as such tough nuts. "'Look just about like anybody else to me.'

"'The militia man were turning the parade to wound aside. Street. They got just as much right to march as anybody else. They own the street as much as Clarence Drum over the American Legion does. Babbit grumbled, because they're a bad element, but, oh, rats. At the athletic club, Babbit was silent during lunch, while the others fretted. I don't know what the world's coming to. Or solaced their spirits with kidding. Captain Clarence's drum came swinging by, splendid and khaki. "'Out it going, Captain?' inquired Virgil Gunch. "'Oh, we got them stopped. We worked them off on side streets and separated them,

and they got discouraged and went home. Fine work. No violence.' "'Fine work, nothing,' groaned Mr. Drum. "'If I had my way, there'd be a whole lot of violence, and I'd start it. And then the whole thing would be over. I don't believe in standing back and went nursing these fellows and letting the disturbance drag. on. I'd tell you these strikers are nothing in God's world but a lot of bomb-throwing socialists and thugs. And the only way to handle them is with a club. That's what I do. Beat up the whole lot of them. Babbitt heard himself saying, "'Ah, rats! Clarence, they look just about like you and me,

and I certainly didn't notice any bombs.' Drum complained. "'Oh, you didn't, eh? Well, maybe you'd like to take charge of the strike. Just tell Colonel Nixon what innocence the strikers are. He'd be glad to hear about it, drums strode on, while all the tables stared at Babbitt. What's the idea? Do you want us to give those hellhounds love and kisses, or what? Said Orville Jones.

Do you defend a lot of hoodlums that are trying to take the bread and butter away from our families? Raged Professor Bumpery. Virgil Gunch intimidatingly said nothing. He put on sternness like a mask. His jaw was hard. His bristly short hair seemed cruel in his silence was a ferocious thunder. While the others assured Babbitt that they must have misunderstood him, Gunch looked as though he had understood only too well.

Like a robe judge, he listened to Babbitt's stammering. No, sure, of course they're a bunch of tough. But I just mean strikes me as bad policy to talk about. about clubbing them. Cabe Nixon doesn't. He'd got to find Italian hand. And that's why he's Colonel. Clarenne drone is jealous of him.

Well, said Professor Pumfrey, you hurt Clarence's feelings, George. He's been out there all morning getting hot and dusty, and no wonder he wants to beat the tar out of those sons of guns. Gunch said nothing, and watched,

and Babbitt knew that he was being watched. Three. As he was leaving the club, Babbitt heard Chum Frank protesting to Gunch. Don't know what's got into him. Last Sunday, Doc Drew preached a quirking sermon about decency and business, and Babbitt kicked about that, too. Near as I can figure out. Babbitt was vaguely frightened.

Four. He saw a crowd listening to a man who was talking from the rostrum of a kitchen chair. Stopped his car. From newspaper pictures, he knew that the speaker must be the notorious his freelance preacher, Beecher Ingram, of whom Seneca Donne had spoken. Ingram was a gaunt man with flamboyant hair, with their beaten cheeks, and worried eyes. He was pleading, if those telephone girls can hold out, living on one meal a day, doing their own washing, starving and smiling, you big hunkling men, ought to be able.

Babbitt saw that from the sidewalk Virgil Gunch was watching him. In vague disquiet, he started the car and mechanically drove on, while Gunch's hostile eyes seemed to follow him all the way. Five. Her love these fellows, Babbitt was complaining to his wife. The thank-if workmen go on strike their regular bunch of fiends. Now, of course, it's a fight between sound business and a destructive element, and we got to lick the rough stuffins out of them when they challenge us.

But doggone, if I see why we can't fight like gentlemen and not go calling them dirty dogs and saying they ought to be shot down. Why, George? She said placidly. I thought you always insisted that all strikers ought to be put in jail. Never did. Well, I mean, some of them, of course, they're responsible leaders, but I mean a fellow ought to be broad-minded and liberal about things like,

But, dearie, I thought you always said these so-called liberal people were the worst of... Rats! Women never can understand the different definitions of a word. Depends on how you mean it. And it don't pay to be too cocksure about anything. Now, these strikers, honest, they're not such bad people, just foolish. They don't understand the complications of merchandising and profit, the way we businessmen do. But sometimes I think they're about like the rest of us.

and no more hogs for wages than we are for profits. George, if people were to hear you talk like that, of course I know you. I remember what a wild crazy boy you were. I know you don't mean a word you say. But if people that don't understand you were to hear you talking like that, they'd think you were a regular socialist. What, I care what anybody thinks.

And let me tell you right now, I want you to disdain't. distinctly understand. I never was a wild, crazy kid. And when I say a thing, I mean it. I stand by it and honest. Do you think people would think I was too liberal if I said the strikers were decent?

Of course they would. But don't worry, dear. I know you don't mean a word of it. Time to trot up to bed now. Have you enough covers for tonight? On the sleeping porch he puzzled. She doesn't understand me. Hardly understands myself.

Why can't I take things easy the way I used to? Wish I could go out to Sandy Dunn's house and talk things over with him. No, suppose Verge Gunch saw me going in there. Wish I knew some really smart woman and nice that would be see what I'm trying to get at. Let me talk to her and wonder if Myra's right. Could the fellows think I've gone nutty just because I'm broad-minded and liberal? way verge looked at me.

End of chapter 27. Chapter 28 of Babbit. This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Bendetti, Mike vendetti.com. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 28. 1. Miss McGon came into his private office at three in the afternoon with,

Listen, Mr. Babit, there's a Mrs. Judik on the phone, wants to see about some repairs. and the salesmen are all out. Want to talk to her? All right. The voice of Tennis Judik was clear and pleasant. The black cylinder of the telephone receiver seemed to hold a tiny animated image of her, lustrous eyes, delicate nose, gentle chin. This is Mrs. Juddick. Do you remember me?

You drove me up here to the Cabindash Apartments and helped me find such a nice flat. Sure, I bet I remember. What can I do for you? Why, it's just a little eye-dolling. I don't know that I ought to bother you, but the janitor doesn't seem to be able to fix it. You know my flat is on the top floor with these autumn rains. The roof is beginning to leak, and I'd be awfully glad if— Sure, I'll come up and take a look at it, nervously. When do you expect to be in?

Why, I'm in every morning. Be in this afternoon in an hour or so? Yes, perhaps I could give you a cup of tea. I think I ought to. After all your trouble? Fine. I'll run up there as soon as I can get away. He meditated,

Now there's a woman that's got refinement, savvy, class. After all your trouble, give you a cup of tea. She'd appreciate a fellow. I'm a fool, but I'm not such a bad cuss. Get to know me. And not so much a fool as they think. The great strike was over. The strikers beaten, accepted Virgil Gunch,

seemed less cordial, there were no visible effects of Babbas treachery to the clan. The oppressive fear of criticism was gone, but a different loneliness remained. Now he was so accelerated that to prove he wasn't, he droned about the office for fifteen minutes looking at blueprints, explaining to Miss McGon that this Mr. Scott wanted more money for her house, had raised the asking price, raised it from $7,000 to $8,500, would Miss McGowan, be sure to put it down on the card. Mrs. Scott's house, raise.

When he had thus established himself as a person, unemotional and interested only in business, he sauntered out. He took a particularly long time to start his car. He kicked the tires, dusted the glass of the speedometer, and tightened the screws holding the windshield spotlight. He drove happily off towards the Bellevue district, conscious of the presence of Mrs. Juddick, as a brilliant light on the horizon.

The maple leaves had fallen, and they lined the gutters of the asphalted streets. It was a day of pale gold and faded green, tranquil and lingering. Fabit was aware of the meditative day and of the barrenness of Bellevue. Blocks of wooden houses, garages, little shops, weedy lots.

Needs pepping up needs the touch that people like Mrs. Judeeck could give a place. He ruminated as he rattled through, the long, crude, airy streets. The wind rose, enlivening, keen, and in a blaze of well-being he came to the flat of Tannis D'Eyke. She was wearing, when she, flatteringly admitting him, a frock of black chiffon cut modestly round at the base of her pretty throat.

She seemed to him very sophisticated. He glanced at the Bretons and colored prints in her living room, and gurgled, "'Gush, you've fixed the place up nice!' It takes a clever woman to know how to make a home all right. You really like it. I am so glad. But he've neglected me scandalously. You promised to come up some time and learn to dance.

Rather unsteadily, oh, but you didn't mean it seriously. Perhaps not, but you might have tried. Well, here I've come for my lesson, and you might just as well prepare to have me stay for supper. They both laughed in a manner which indicated that, of course, he didn't mean it. But first of my guess, a better look at the leak. She climbed with him to the flat roof of the apartment house, a detached world of slatted wooden walks, clothes-lined water tank in a penthouse.

He poked at things with his toe and sought to impress her by being learned about copper gutters, the desirability of passing plumbing pipes through a lead collar and sleeve and flashing them with copper and the advantages of cedar over boiler iron for roof tanks. You have to know so much in real estate, she admired. He promised that the roof should be repaired within two days. Do you mind my phoning from your apartment, he asked? Heaven's no. He stood for a moment at the coping,

looking over land of hard little bungalows with abnormally large porches in new apartment houses, small but brave with variegated brick walls and terracotta trimmings. Beyond them was a hill with a gouge of yellow clay like a vast wound. Behind every apartment house beside each dwelling were small garages. It was a world of good little people, comfortable, industrious, credulous. In the autumn light, the flat newness was mellowed, and the air was a sun-tinted pool. "'Golly, it's one fine afternoon.

You get a great view here, right up Tanner's Hill,' said Babbitt. "'Yes, it's nice and open.' "'So darn few people appreciate a view.' "'Don't you go raising my rent on that account?' "'Oh, that was naughty of me. I was just teasing. Seriously, though, there are so few people who respond, who react to views, I mean. They haven't any feeling of poetry and beauty.'

That's a fact they haven't, he breathed, admiring her slenderness and they absorbed airy way in which she looked toward the hill, chin lifted lips smiling. Well, guess I'd better telephone the plumbers, so they'll get on the job first thing in the morning. When he had telephoned, making it conspicuously authoritative and gruff and masculine, he looked doubtful and sighed, "'Suppose I better be—'

oh you must have a cup of tea first well it would go pretty good at that it was luxurious to loll in a deep green rep chair his legs thrust out before him to glance at the black chinese telephone stand in the colored photograph of mount vernon which he had always liked so much while in the tiny kitchen so near mrs eudyke sang my creole queen in an intolerable sweetness a contentment so deep that he was wistfully discontented. He saw magnolias by moonlight and heard plantation darkies crooning to the banjo. He wanted to be near her on pretense of helping her, yet he wanted to remain in his still ecstasy. Languidly he remained.

When she bustled in with tea, he smiled up at her. This is awfully nice. For the first time, he was not fencing. He was quietly and securely friendly, and friendly and quiet was her aunt. answer. It's nice to have you here. You were so kind helping me to find this little home. They agreed that the weather would soon turn cold. They agreed that prohibition was prohibitive.

They agreed that art in the home was cultural. They agreed about everything. They even became bold. They hinted that these modern young girls, well, honestly, their short skirts, were short. They were proud to find that they were not shocked by such frank speaking. Tannis ventured, I know you'll understand. I mean, I don't quite know how to say it, but I do think that girls who pretend, they're bad by the way they dress,

really never go any further. They give away the fact that they haven't the instincts of a womanly woman. Remembering Ida Putink, the manicure girl, and how ill she had used him, And Babbitt agreed with enthusiasm, remembering how ill all the world had used him. He told of Paul Riesling of Zillev, Seneca Dohn, of the strike. See, I was? Of course I was as anxious to have these beggars licked to a standstill as anybody else.

But, gosh, no reason for not seeing their side for a fellow of his own sake. He's got to be broad-minded and liberal. Don't you think so? Oh, I do. Sitting on the hard little couch, she clasped her hands beside her. leaned toward him, absorbed him, and in a glorious state of being appreciated? You proclaimed, "'So I've up and said to the fellows at the club.

Look, here I—' "'Do you belong to the Union Club? I think it's—' "'No, the Athletic tell you. "'Course, they're always asking me to join the Union, but I always say no. "'No, sir. "'Nothing doing. "'I don't mind the expense, but I can't stand all the old fogies.'

"'Oh, yes, that's old. "'But tell me—' What did you say to them? Oh, you don't want to hear it. I'm probably boring you to death with my troubles. You wouldn't hardly think I was an old duffer. I sound like a kid. Oh, you're a boy yet.

I mean, you can't be a day over 45. Well, I'm not much, but by golly, I begin to feel middle age sometimes, all these responsibilities and all. Oh, I know. Her voice caressed him. It cloaked him like warm silk. And I feel lonely, so lonely some days, Mr. Babbitt. We're a sad pair of birds, but I think we're pretty darn nice.

Yes, I think we're a lot nicer than most people I know. They smiled. But please, tell me what you said at the club. Well, it was like this. Of course, Seneca, Donn is a friend of mine. They can say what they want to. They can call him anything they please. But what most folks are you.

don't know is that Sennie is the bosom pal of some of the biggest statesmen in the world, Lord Wycombe, for instance. You know, this big British nobleman? My friend Sir Gerald Doakom told me that Lord Wycombe is one of the biggest guns in England. Well, Doakom, or somebody told me, Oh, do you know, Sir Gerald? The one that was here at McEvley's? Know him. Well, say, I know him just well enough so we call each other George and Jerry, and we got so pickled in Chicago. That must have been fun, but—' She shook a finger at him. I can't have you getting pickled. I'll have to take you in hand. Wish you would. Well, Zay Singh. You see, I happen to know what a big noise Sunny Done is outside

of Zenith. But of course the prophet hasn't got any honor in his own country, and Sennie, darnie's old hide, he's so blamed modest. that he never lets folks know the kind of an outfit he travels with when he goes abroad. Well, during the strike, Clarence drum comes per-rating up to our table, all dolled up, fit to kill in his nice little cap' and uniform, and somebody says to him, busting their strike, Clarence, well, he swells up like a powder pigeon, and he hollers, so you could hear him, way up in the reading room. Yeah, sure, I told the strike leaders where they got off, and so they went home. Well, I says to him, glad there wasn't any violence. Yes, he says, but if I hadn't

kept my eyeskin, there would have been. All those fellows had bombs in their pockets. They're regular anarchists. Oh, rats, Clarence, I says. I looked them all over carefully, and they didn't have any more bombs than a rabbit, I says. Of course, I says, they're foolish, but they're good deal like you and me, after all. And then Virgil Gunch or somebody, you know, it was Chum Frank, you know the famous poet, great pal of mine. He says to me, look here, he says, do you mean to say you advocate these strikes? Well, I was so disgusted with a fellow whose mind worked that way that I swear. I had a good mind to not explain it all, just ignore him. Oh, that's so wise, said Mrs. Judiak. But finally I explains to him,

if you'd done as much as I have on chamber commerce committees and all, it says, then you'd have the right to talk. But same time, I says, I believe in treating your opponent like a gentleman. Well, sir, that held him, Frank. John, I always call him. He didn't have another word to say, but at that, I guess some of them kind of thought I was too liberal. What do you think?

Oh, you were so wise and courageous. I love a man to have the courage. of his convictions. But do you think it was a good stunt? After all, some of these fellows are so darn cautious and narrow-minded that they're prejudiced against the fellow that talks right out by meaning. What do you care? In the long run, they're bound to respect a man who makes them think.

And with your reputation for oratory you? What do you know about my reputation for oratory? Oh, I'm not going to tell you everything I know, but seriously. You don't realize what a famous man you are. Well, though I haven't done much orating this fall, too kind of bothered by this Paul Riesling business, I guess, but do you know you're the first person that's really understood what I was getting at? Tannis, listen to me, will you?

Fat nerve I've got calling you, Tannis. Oh, do, and shall I call you, George? Don't you think it's awfully nice when two people have so much, what shall I call it, so much analysis that they can discard all the stupid conventions and understand each other and become acquainted right away like ships that pass in the night? I certainly do, I certainly do. He was no longer acquiesin his chair. He wandered about the room.

He dropped on the couch beside her, but as he awkwardly stretched his hands toward her, her fragile, immaculate fingers, she said brightly. Do give me a cigarette. Would you think poor Tannis was dreadfully naughty if she smoked? Lord, no, I like it! He had often, and weightily pondered flappers smoking in Zenith restaurants. But he knew only one woman who smoked, Mrs. Sam Dopperu, this flighty neighbor.

He ceremoniously lighted Tennis's cigarette. Like for a place to deposit at the burnt match, and dropped it to tea. into his pocket. I'm sure you want a cigar. Poor man, she crooned. Do you mind one? Oh, no, I love the smell of a good cigar, so nice and, so nice and like a man. You'll find an ash tray in my bedroom on the table beside the bed, if you don't mind getting it. He was embarrassed by her bedroom, the broad couch with a cover of violet silk, moth curtain striped with gold Chinese Chippendale Bureau and an amazing row of slippers with ribbon-wound shoe trees and primrose stockings lying across them. His manner of bringing the ashtray had just the right note of easy friendliness. He felt

a boob-like Virgil Gunch would try to get funny about seeing her bedroom, but I take it casually. He was not casual afterward. The contentment of companionship was gone and he was restless with desire to touch her hand. But whenever he turned toward her, the cigarette was in his way. It was a shield between them. He waited till she would have finished, but as he rejoiced at the quick crushing of its light on the ashtray, she said, don't you want to give me another cigarette?

And hopelessly he saw the screen of pale smoke and her graceful, tilted hand again between them. He was not merely curious now to find out whether she would let him hold her hand, all in the purest friendship naturally, but agonized with need of it. On the surface appeared none of all this retro drama. They were talking cheerfully of motors of trips to California of Chum Frank. Once he said delicately, I do hate these guys, I hate these people that invite themselves to meals,

but I seem to have a feeling I'm going to have supper with the lovely Mrs. Tannis Judeyke tonight. But I suppose you probably already have seven dates already. Well, I was thinking of some of going to the movies. Yes, I really think I ought to get out and get some fresh air. She did not encourage him to stay, but never did she discourage him. He considered, I better take a sneak. She will let me stay.

There is something doing, and I mustn't get mixed up with. I mustn't. I've got to beat it then. No, it's too late now. Suddenly, at seven, brushing her cigarette away, briskly taking her hand. Dennis, stop teasing me, you know we. Here we are a couple of lonely birds, and we're awfully happy together. Anyway, I am.

Never been so happy. Do let me stay. I'll gallop down to the delicatessen and buy some stuff, cold chicken maybe, or cold turkey, and we can have a nice little supper and afterwards if you want to chase me I'll be good and go like a lamb." Well, yes, it would be nice, she said. Nor did she withdraw her hand. He squeezed it trembling and blundered toward his coat.

At the delicatessen, he bought preposterous stores of food, chosen on the principle of its expensiveness, from the drugstore across the street he telephoned to his wife. Uh, got to get a fellow to sign a lease before he leaves town on the midnight. won't be home till late. Don't wait up for me, kiss Tanka good night. He expectantly lumbered back to the flat. Oh, you bad thing!

You buy so much food! Was her greeting, and her voice was gay, her smile, acceptant. He helped her in the tiny white kitchen. He washed the lettuce, he opened the olive bottle. She ordered him to set the table, and as he trotted into the living room, as he hunted through the buffet for knives and forks, he felt utterly at home.

Now the only other thing he announced Is what you're going to wear I can't decide whether you're to put on your swellest evening gown Or let your hair down and put on short skirts And make believe you're a little girl I'm going to dine just as I am in this old chiffon rag And if you can't stand poor Tannis that way You can go to the club for dinner

Stand you he patted her shoulder Child you're the brainiest and the loveliest of finest woman I've ever met. Come now, Lady Wycombe. If you'll take the Duke of Zenith's arm, we will perambulate to the magnolius feed. Oh, you do say the funniest and nicest things. When they had finished the picnic supper,

he thrust his head out of the window and reported, It's turned awful chilly, and I think it's going to rain. You don't want to go to the movies. Well... I wish we had a fireplace and I wish it was raining like, oh, get out tonight. And I wish we were in a funny little old-fashioned cottage, and the trees thrashing like everything outside and a great big log fire. And I'll tell you, let's draw this couch up to the radiator and stretch our feet out and pretend

it's a wood fire. Oh, I think that's pathetic, you big child. But they did draw up to the radiator and prop their feet against it. his clumsy black shoes, her patent leather slippers. In the dimness they talked of themselves of how lonely she was, how bewildered he, and how wonderful that they had found each other. As they fell silent in the room

was stiller than a country lane. There was no sound from the streets save the whir of motor tires, the rumble of a distant freight train. Self-contained was a room, warm, secure, insulated from the harassing world. He was absorbed by a rapture in which all fear and doubting were smothered away, and when he reached home at dawn, the rapture had mellowed to contentment.

Serene and full of memories. End of Chapter 28. Chapter 29 of Babbit. This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti. Mike Vendetti.com Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 29

One The assurance of Tannis Judeaic's friendship fortified Babbitt's self-approval. At the athletic club, he became experimental. Though Virgil Gunch was silent, the others at the rough-next table came to accept Babbitt as having, for no visible reason, turned crank.

They argued wenderly with him, and he was cocky and enjoyed the spectacle of his interesting martyrdom. He even praised Seneca Don't. Professor of Humphrey said that was carrying a joke too far, but Babbitt argued. No, fact. I tell you he's got one of the keenest intellects in the country. Why, Lord Wycombe said that, oh, who the hell at Lord Wycombe?

What you always lugging him in for? You've been touting him for the last six weeks, protested Orville Jones. George ordered him from Sears Roebuck. You can get those English high-muck-and-mucks by mail for two bucks a piece, suggested Sidney Finkelstein. That's all right now. Lord Wycombe, he's one of the biggest intellects in English political life. As I was saying, of course, I'm conservative myself, but I appreciate a guy like Sonny Donne, because Virgil Gunch interrupted harshly. I wonder if you are so conservative.

I find I can manage to run my own business without any skunks and reds like don't in it, the grimness of Gunch's voice, the hardness of his jaw. Disconcerted bad. but he recovered and went on till they looked bored then irritated then as doubtful as gunch two he thought of tannis always with a stir he remembered her every aspect his arms yearned for her I've found her I've dreamed of her all these years and now I've found her he exulted he met her at the movies in the morning he drove out to her flat in the late afternoon or on evenings when he was believed to be at the Elks. He knew her financial affairs and advised her about them.

When she lamented her feminine ignorance and praised his masterfulness and proved to know much more about bonds than he did, they had remembrances and laughter over old times, once they quarreled and he raged that she was as bossy as his wife and far more whining when he was inattentive, but that passed safely. Their high hour was a tramp on a ringing December afternoon, through snow-drifted meadows down to the icy Chalus River. She was exotic in an ashterton cap and a short beaver coat. She slid on the ice and shouted, and he panted after her,

rotund with laughter. Myra Babbitt never slid on the ice. He was afraid that they would be seen together. In Zenith, it is impossible to lunch with a neighbor's wife, without the fact being known before nightfall in every house in your circle. But Tannis was beautifully discreet. However appealingly, she might turn to him when they were alone. She was gravely detached when they were abroad.

And he hoped that she would be taken for a client. Orville Jones once saw them emerging from a movie theater, and Babette bumbled, let me make you acquainted with Mrs. Jodic. Now here's a lady who knows the right broker to come to, Orby. Mr. Jones, though he was a man censorious of morals and of laundry machinery, seemed satisfied. His predominant fear, not from any especial fondness for her, but from the habit of propriety,

was that his wife would learn of the affair. He was certain that she knew nothing specific about Tannis, but he was also certain that she suspected something indefinite. For years she had been bored by anything more affectionate than a farewell kiss, yet she was hurt by any slacking in his irritable periodic interest, and now he had no interest, rather a revulsion. He was completely faithful to Tannis. He was distressed by the side of his wife's slack plumpness,

by her puffs and billows of flesh, by the tattered petticoat, which she was always meaning and always forgetting to throw away. But he was aware that she, so long attuned to him, caught all his repulsions. He elaborately, heavily, jockely tried to check them. He couldn't. They had a tolerable Christmas. Kenneth Escott was there, admittedly engaged to Verona. Mrs. Babbitt was cheerful and called Kenneth her new son.

Babbitt was worried about Ted, because he had ceased complaining of the state university and become suspiciously acquiescent. He wondered what the boy was planning and was too shy to ask. Himself, Babbitt slipped away on Christmas afternoon to take his present, a silver cigarette box, to Tannis. When he returned, Mrs. Babette asked much too innocently,

did you go out for a little fresh air? Yes, just a little drive, he mumbled. After New Year's his wife proposed, I heard from my sister today, George, she isn't well. I think perhaps I ought to stay with her for a few weeks. Now, Mrs. Babbitt was not accustomed to leave home during the winter except on violently demanding occasions, and only the summer before she had been gone for weeks,

nor was Babbitt one of the detachable husbands who take separations casually. He liked to have her there. She looked after his clothes. She knew how his steak ought to be cooked, and her clucking made him. feel secure, but he could not drum up even a dutiful, Oh, she doesn't really need you, does she? When he tried to look regretful.

While he felt that his wife was watching him, he was filled with exultant visions of Tannis. Do you think I better go? She said sharply. You got to decide, honey, I can't. She turned away, sighing, and his forehead was damp. Till she went four days later, she was curious. still, he cumbrously affectionate, her train left at noon. As he saw it grow small beyond

the train shed, he longed to hurry to Tannis. No, by God, I won't do that, he vowed. I won't go near her for a week. But he was at her flat at four. Three, he who had once controlled or seemed to control his life in a progress unimpassioned but diligent and sane was for that fort night born on a current of desire and very bad whiskey, and all the complications of new acquaintances, those furious new intimates who demanded so much more attention than old friends. Each morning he gloomily recognized his idiocies of the evening before, with his head throbbing his tongue and lips stinging from cigarettes, he incredulously counted the number of drinks he had taken and groan, I gotta quit.

He had ceased saying, I will quit. For however resolute he might be at dawn, he could not for a single evening check his drift. He had met tennis's friends he had with the ardent taste of the midnight people who drink and dance and rattle and are ever afraid to be silent, been adopted as a member of her group,

which they called the bunch. He first met them after day when he had worked particularly hard and when he hoped to be quiet with Tannis and slowly sip her admiration. From down the hall he could hear shrieks and the grind of a phonograph. As Tannis opened the door, he saw fantastic figures dancing in a haze of cigarette smoke. The tables and chairs were against the wall. Oh, isn't this dandy? She grabbed at him. Carrie Nork had the loveliest idea. She decided it was time for a party. and she's phoned the bunch and told him to gather round.

George, this is Carrie. Carrie was in the less desirable aspects of both, at once matronly and spincherish. She was perhaps forty, her hair was an unconvincing ash blonde, and if her chest was flat, her hips were ponderous. She greeted Babette with a giggling, "'Welcome to our little midst.

Tanna says you're a great sport.' He was apparently expected to dance to be boyish and gay with Carrie. And he did his unforgiving best. He told her about the room bumping into other couples, into the radiator, into chair legs, cunningly ambushed.

As he danced, he surveyed the rest of the bunch, a thin young woman who looked capable, conceited, and sarcastic, another woman who he could never quite remember, three overdressed and slightly effeminate young men, so to fountain clerks, or at least born for that profession. A man of his own age, immovable,

self-satisfied, resentful of Babbitt's presence. When he had finished his dutiful dance, Tannis took him aside and begged, Dear, wouldn't you like to do something for me? I'm all out of booze and the bunch wants to celebrate. Can you just skip down to Healy Hanson and get some? Sure, he said, trying not to sound sullen. I'll tell you, I'll get many Sontag to drive down with you.

Tannis was pointing to the thin, sarcastic young woman. Miss Sontag greeted him. him with the astringent. How do you do, Mr. Babbitt? Tennis tells me you're a very prominent man. I'm honored to be allowed to drive with you. Of course, I'm not accustomed to associating with society people like you, so I don't know how to act in such exalted circles.

Thus, Miss Sontang talked all the way down to Healy Hansons. To her jibes, he wanted to reply, Oh, go to the devil! But he never quite nerved himself to do that. reasonable comment. He was resenting the existence of the whole bunch. He had heard Tannis speak of Darling Carey and Min Sontang. She's so clever you'll adore her.

But they had never been real to him. He had pictured Tannis as living in a rose-tinted vacuum, waiting for him, free of all the complications of the floral heights. When they returned, he had to endure the patronage of the young soda clerks. They were as damply friendly as Miss Sontag. was dryly hostile. They called him,

Old Georgie, and shot it. Come on, now sport, shake a leg. Boys in belted coats, pimply boys as young as Ted, and as flabby as chorusmen, but powerful to dance and to mind the phonograph and smoke cigarettes and patronized Tannis.

He tried to be one of them, he cried. Good work, Pete. But his voice creaked. Tannis apparently enjoyed the companionship of the dancing darlings. She bridled to their bland flirtation and casually kissed them at the end of each dance. Babbit hated her for the moment. He saw her as middle-aged.

He studied the wrinkles and the softness of her throat, the slack flesh beneath her chin. The taut muscles of her youth were loose and drooping. Between dances she sat in the largest chair, waving her cigarette, summoning her callow admirers to come and talk to her. She thinks she's a looming queen, growled Babette. She chanted to Miss Santon. Isn't my little studio sweet? Studio rats, it's a plain old maid and chow-dog flat.

Oh, God, I wish I was home. I wonder if I can't make a get-away now. His vision glue blurred, however, as he plied himself to Helie Hanson's raw but vigorous whiskey. He blended with the bunch. He began to rejoice that Carrie Norke and Pete, the most nearly intelligent of the nimble youth, seemed to like him, and it was enormously important to win over the surly older man who proved to be a railway clerk named Fulton Bemis.

The conversation of the bunch was exclamatory, high-colored, full of references to people whom Babbitt did not know. Apparently they thought very comfortably of themselves. They were the bunch, wise and beautiful and amusing. They were bohemians and urbanites, accustomed to all the luxuries of Zena, dance halls, movie theaters, and roadhouses, and in a cynical superiority to people who were slow, or tightwad. They cackled. Oh, Pete, did I tell you what that dub of a cashier said when I came in late yesterday? Oh, it was perfectly priceless.

Oh, but wasn't T.D. Stude say he was simply ossified? What did they glad to say to him? Think of the nerve of Bob Bixford trying to get us to come to his house, say the nerve of him, Can you beat it for nerve? Some nerve I call it. Did you notice how Donny was dancing? Gee, wasn't she the limit. Babbit was to be heard sonoriously agreeing with the once hated Miss Mimmy Sontang

that persons who let a night go by without dancing to jab zimic were crabs, pikers, and poor fish. And he roared, You bet! When Mrs. Carrie Nort gurgled, Don't you love to sit on the floor? It's so bohemian. He began to think extremely well.

of the bunch. When he mentioned his friend, Sir Gerald Dork, Lord Whitcomb, William Washington, Erthorn, and Chum Frank, he was proud of their condescending interest. He got so thoroughly in the Jockeland spirit that he didn't much mind seeing Tannis drooping against the shoulder of the youngest and milkiest of the young men, and he himself desired to hold Carrie Nork's pulpy hand and dropped it only because Tannis looked angry. When he went home at two, he was fully a member of the bunch. And all the week thereafter, he was bound by the exceedingly strained conventions, the exceedingly wearing demands of their life, of pleasure and freedom. He had to go to their parties. He was involved in the agitation when everybody telephoned to

everybody else that she hadn't meant what she'd said when she'd said that. And anyway, why was Pete going around saying she'd said it? Never was a family more in. on learning one another's movements, then were the bunch, all of them volibly new, or indignantly desired to know where all the others had been every minute of the week. Babbitt found himself explaining to Carrie or Fulton Bemis,

just what he had been doing, that he should not have joined them till ten o'clock, and apologizing for having gone to dinner with a business acquaintance. Every member of the bunch was expected to telephone to every other member at least once a while, week. Why haven't called me up? Babbit was asked, accusingly, not only by Tannis and Kerry, but presently by new ancient friends, Jenny and Captony and Toots. If, for a moment, he had seen Tannis as withering and sentimental, he lost that impression at Carrie Norke's dance.

Mrs. Norke had a huge house and a small husband. To her party came all of the bunch, perhaps 35 of them, when they were completely mobilized, Babbitt, under the name of Old Georgie, was now a pioneer of the bunch, since each month it changed half its membership, and he who could recall the prehistoric days of a fortnight ago before Mrs. Absalom, the food demonstrator, had gone to Indianapolis, and Mack had got sore at Minnie,

was a veritable leader and able to condescend to new Peets and Minnie's and Gladyses. At Cary's, Tannis did not have to work at being hostess. She was dignified and sure a clear, fine figure in the black chiffon frock he had always loved, and in the wider spaces of the ugly house, Babbitt was able to sit quietly with her. He repented of his first revulsion, mooned at her feet, and happily drove her home. Next day, he bought a violent yellow tie to make himself young for her.

He knew a little sadly that, he could not make himself beautiful. He beheld himself as heavy, hinting of fatness. But he danced, he dressed, he chatted, to be as young as she was, as young as she seemed to be. Four. As all converts, whether to a religion, love, or gardening,

find as by magic that, though hitherto these hobbies have not seemed to exist, now the whole world is filled with their fury. So once he was converted to dissipation, Babbitt discovered agreeable opportunities for it everywhere. He had a new view of his sporting neighbor, Sam Doppeloo. Doppelous were respectable people, industrious people, prosperous people, whose ideal of happiness was an eternal cabaret.

Their life was dominated by suburban bacchanola of alcohol, nicotine, gasoline, and kisses. They in their set were capable. all the week. And all week looked forward to Saturday night when they would, as he expressed it, throw a party. And the thrown party grew noisier and noisier up to Sunday dawn, and usually included an extremely rapid motor expedition to nowhere in particular. One evening when Tannis was at the theater, Babbitt found himself being lively with the doppler brows, pledging friendship with men whom he had for years privately denounced to Mrs. Babbitt as a rotten bunch of tin horns that I wouldn't go out with rot if they were the last people on earth.

That evening he had sulkily come home and poked about the front of the house, chipping off the walk the ice-clots like fossil footprints, made by the steps of passerby during the recent snow. Howard Littlefield came up snuffling. So little, Roy George. Yep, cold again tonight. What do you hear from the wife? He's feeling fine, but her sister's still pretty sick.

He better come in and have dinner with us tonight, George. Oh, thanks. Have to go out. Suddenly he could not endure Littlefield's recitals of the more interesting statistics about totally uninteresting problems. He scraped at the walk and grunted. Sam Doppel you appeared. Even and babb it, working hard.

Yep, little exercise. Cold enough for you tonight? Well, just about. Still a widower? Uh-huh. Say, Babbit, while she's away, I know you don't care much for booze fights, but the missus and I'd be awful glad if you would come in some night. Think you could stand a good cocktail for once?

Stand it, young fellow. I bet old Uncle George can mix the best cocktail in these United States. O'Re! That's the way to talk. Look here. There's some folks coming to the house tonight, Luetta Swanson and some other live ones. And I'm going to open up a bottle of pre-war gin, and maybe we'll dance a while.

Why don't you drop in, jazz it up a little, just for a change. Well, what time are they coming? He was at the Sam Doppurus at nine. It was the third time he had entered the house. By ten he was calling Mr. Dauperu, Sam, old hoss. At eleven they all drove out to the old farm inn.

Babbitt sat in the back of Doppuroo's car with Lueda Swanson. Once he had timorously tried to make love to her. Now he did not try, he merely made love. And Luetta dropped her head on his shoulder, told him what a nager eddy was, and accepted Babbitt as a decent and well-trained Libertine. With the assistance of Tannis's bunch,

the doppleros and other companions in forgetfulness, there was not an evening for two weeks when he did not return home late and shaky. With his other faculties blurred, he yet had the motorist gift of being able to drive when he could scarce walk, of slowing down at corners and allowing for approaching cars. He came wobbling into the house, if Verona and Kenneth Escott were about, he got past them with a hasty greeting, horribly aware of their level young glances, and hit himself upstairs.

He found when he came into the warm house that he was hazier than he had believed. His head whirled. He dared not lie down. He tried to soak out the alcohol in the hot bath. For the moment his head was clearer, but when he moved about the bathroom, his calculations of distance were wrong, so that he dragged down the towels

and knocked over the soap dish with a clatter, which he feared would betray him to the children. Chileney's dressing down, he tried to read the evening paper. He could follow every word. He seemed to take in the sense things, but a minute afterward he could not have told what he'd been reading. When he went to bed, his brain flew in circles, and he hastily sat up, struggling for self-control.

At last, he was able to lie still, feeling only a little sick and dizzy, and enormously ashamed. To hide his condition from his own children, to have danced and shouted with people whom he despised, to have said foolish things, sung idiotic songs, tried to kiss silly gregers. Girls. Incredulously, he remembered that he had, by his roaring familiarity with them, laid himself open to the patronizing of youth whom he would have kicked out of his office, that by dancing too ardently he had exposed himself to rebukes from the radiest of withering women. As it came relentlessly back to him, he snarled, "'I hate myself. God, how I hate myself!'

But he raged. "'I'm through, no more. Had enough, plenty.' He was even sure about it the morning after, when he was trying to be grave and paternal with his daughters at breakfast. At noontime he was less sure. He did not deny that he had been a fool. He saw it almost as clearly as at midnight, but anything he struggled was better than going back to a life of barren heartiness.

At four he wanted to drink. He kept a whiskey flask in his desk now, and after two minutes of battle, he had his drink. Three drinks later he began to see the bunch as tender and amusing friends, and by six he was with them, and the tale was to be told all over. Each morning his head ached a little less, a bad head bifford drinks, had been his safeguard, but the safeguard was crumbling.

Presently he could be drunk at dawn, yet not feel particularly wretched in his conscience or in his stomach when he awoke at eight. No regret, no desire to escape the toil of keeping up with the idious merriment of the bunch was so great as his feeling of social inferiority when he failed to keep up.

To be the liveliest of them was as much his ambition now as it had been to excel at making money at playing golf, at motor driving, at oratory, at climbing to the McCevilley set, but occasionally he failed. He found that Pete and the other young men

considered the bunch too austerely polite and the carry who merely kissed behind doors, too embarrassingly monogamic. As Babbitt sneaked from the floral heights down to the bunch, so the young gallants snaked from the properties of the bunch off to times with bouncing young women whom they picked up in department stores and at hotel coat rooms. Once Babette tried to accompany them. There was a motor car, a bottle of whiskey, and for him a grubby shrieking cash girl from Partcher and Steins. He said, sat beside her and worried. He was apparently expected to jolly her along, but when she sang

out, Hey, Lengo, quit crushing me, cootie garage. He did not quite know how to go on. They sat in the back room of a saloon, and Babbitt had a headache. He was confused by their new slang, looked at them benevolently, wanted to go home, and had a drink, a good many drinks. Two evenings after, Fulton Bemis, the surly older man of the bunch, took Babbitt aside. and grunted, look, here's none of my business, and God knows I always lap up my share of the hooch, but don't you think you better watch yourself? You're one of the enthusiastic chumps that always overdo things. Do you realize you're throwing in the booze as fast as you can, and you eat one cigarette right after the other. Better cut it out for a while. Babette tearfully said that good old

fault was a prince, and yes, he certainly would cut it out, and thereafter he lighted a cigarette and took a drink and had a horrific quarrel with Tannis when she caught him being affectionate with Carrie Nork. Next morning he hated himself that he should have sunk into a position where a 15th raider like Fulton Bemis could rebuke him. He perceived that since he was making love to every woman possible,

Tannis was no longer his one pure star, and he wondered whether she had ever been anything more to him than a woman. and if Bemis had spoken to him, were other people talking about him? He suspiciously watched the men at the athletic club at noon. It seemed to him they were uneasy. They had been talking about him then? He was angry. He became belligerent.

He not only defended Seneca Donne, but even made fun of the YMCA. Virgil Gunch was rather brief in his answers. Afterward, Babbitt was not angry. He was afraid. He did not go to the next lunch of the Boosters Club, but hid in a cheap restaurant, and while he munched a ham-and-eague sandwich and sip coffee from a cup on the arm of his chair, he worried. Four days later, when the bunch were having one of their best parties,

Babbitt drove them to the skating rink, which had been laid out on the Chilissa River. After a thaw, the streets had frozen in smooth ice. down those wide, endless streets, the wind rattled between the roads of wooden houses, and the whole Bellevue district seemed a frontier town. Even with skid change on all four wheels, Babbitt was afraid of sliding, and when he came to the long slide of a hill,

he crawled down, both brakes on. Slewing around a corner came a less cautious car. It skidded. It almost raked them with its rear fenders. In relief, at their escape the bunch, Tanis, Minnie, Sontag, Pete, Fulton, Bemis, shouted,

Oh, baby, and waved their hands to the agitated other driver, then Babbitt saw Professor Pumfrey, Labordsley, crawling uphill, a foot, staring owlishly at the revelers. He was sure that Pumfrey recognized him and saw Tannis kiss him,

as she crowed, You're such a good driver. At lunch the next day he probed Pumfrey with, Out last night with my brother and some friends of his. Gosh, what driving, slippery glass, thought I saw you hiking up the Bellevue Avenue Hill. No, I wasn't. I didn't see you, said Pumfrey hastily rather guiltily. Perhaps two days afterward, Babbitt took Tannis to lunch at the hotel Thornley.

She, who had seemed well content to wait for him at her flat, had begun to hint with melancholy smiles that he must think but little of her, if he never introduced her to his friends. If he was unwilling to be seen with her except at the movies, he thought of taking her to the ladies' annex of the athletic club. But that was too dangerous.

He would have to introduce her, and, oh, people might misunderstand, and he compromised on the Thornleigh. She was unusually smart, all in black, small black, tricone hat, short black caracal coat, loose and swinging an austere high-necked black velvet frock at a time when most street costumes were like evening gowns. Perhaps she was too smart. Everyone in the gold and oak restaurant of the

Thurnal was staring at her as Babette followed her to a table. He had easily hoped that the head waiter would give them a discreet place behind a pillar, but they were stationed on the center aisle. Tennis seemed not to notice her admirers. She smiled at Babette with the lavish Oh, isn't this nice? What a peppy-looking orchestra. Babbit had difficulty in being lavish in return. For two tables away, he saw Virgil Gunch. All through the meal, Gunch watched them,

while Babbitt watched himself being watched and lugubriously tried to keep from spoiling tennis's gaiety. I feel like a spree to-day, she rippled. I love the thornlight, don't you? It's so live and yet so refined. He made talk about the Thornley, the service, the food, the people he recognized in a restaurant, all but virtual Gunch. There did not seem to be anything else to talk of.

He smiled conscientiously at her fluttering jest. He agreed with her that Minnie Sontang was so hard to get along with, and young Pete, such a silly, lazy kid, really just no good at all. But he himself had nothing to say. He considered telling her his worries about Gunch, but Oh, gosh, it was too much work to go into the whole thing and explain about Verge and everything. He was relieved when he put Tannis on a trolley.

He was cheerful in the familiar simplicities of his office. At 4 o'clock, Virgil Gunch called on him. Babbitt was agitated, but Gunch began in a friendly way. How's the boy? Today, some of us are getting up a scheme. We'd kind of like to have you come in on... Fine, Virch shoot! You know, during the war, we had the undesirable element, the Reds,

and walking delegates, and just the plain common grouches, dead to rights. And so did we for quite a while after the war, but folks forgot about the danger, and that gives these cranks a chance to begin working underground again, especially a lot of these parlor socialist. Well, it's up to the folks that do a little sound thinking to make a conscious effort to keep bucking these fellows. Some guy back east has organized a society called the Good Citizens League for just that purpose.

Of course, the Chamber of Commerce and the American Legion, and so do a fine work in keeping the decent people in the saddle. But they're devoted to so many other causes that they can't attend to this one problem properly. But the Good Citizens League, the GCL, they stick right to it. Oh, the GCL has to have some other questionable purposes. For instance, here in Zenith, I think it ought to support the Park Extension Project and the City Planning Committee.

And then, too, it should have a social aspect, being made up of the best people. Ab dancers and so on, especially as one of the best ways it can put the cabosh on cranks is to apply this social boycott business to folks big enough, so you can't reach them otherwise. Then, if that don't work, the GCL can finally send a little delegation around to inform folks that get too flip, that they got to conform to decent standards and quit shooting off their mouths.

So free. Don't it sound like the organization could do great work? We've already got some of the strongest men in town. And, of course, we want you in. How about it? Babbitt was uncomfortable. He felt a compulsion back to... all the standards he had so vaguely yet so desperately been fleeing.

He fumbled. I suppose you'd specially light on fellows like Seneca Done and try to make them... You bet your sweet life we would. Look here, old Georgie. I have never for one moment believed you met it when you've defended Done and the strikers and so on at the club. I knew you were simply kidding those poor galutes like Sid Finkelstein. At least I certainly hope.

I hope you were kidding. Oh, well, sure, of course, you might say. Babbit was conscious of how feeble he sounded, conscious of gunches, mature, and relentless eye. Gosh, you know where I stand? I'm no labor agitator. I'm a businessman, first, last, and all the time. But, but honest, I don't think don't mean so badly,

and you got to remember, he's an old friend of mine. George, when it comes right down to a struggle between decency and the security of our homes on the one hand and Red Ruin and those lazy dogs plotting for free beer on the other, you got to give up even old friendships. He that is not with me is against me. I suppose. How about it?

Going to join us in the Good Citizens League? I'll have think it over, Verge. All right, just as you say. Babbitt was relieved to be let off so easy, but Grunch went on. George, I don't know what's come over you. None of us do. And we've talked a lot about you. For a while we figured out you'd been upset by what happened to poor Riesling.

And we forgive you for any fool thing you said, but it's old stuff now, George. We can't make out what's got into you personally. I've always defended you, but I must say, it's getting too much for me. All the boys at the athletic club and the boosters are sore. The way you go on deliberately touting Donne and his bunch of hellhounds, and talking about being liberal,

which means being wishy-washy, and even saying this preacher guy, Ingram, isn't a professional free love artist. And then the way you've been carrying on personally, Joe Pumphrey says he saw you out the other night with a gang of toddies, all stewed to the gills. And here today, coming right into Thornlow with a, well,

she may be all right and a perfect lady, but she certainly did look like a pretty gay skirt for a fellow with his wife out of town to be taken to lunch. Didn't look well. The devil's come over you, George. Strikes me that there's a lot of fellow that know more about my personal business than I do myself.

And don't go getting sore at me because I came out flat-footed like a friend and say what I think instead of tattling behind your back the way a whole lot of them do. Tell you, George, you got a position in a community and a community expects you to live up to it, and better think over joining the Good Citizens League. See about it later. He was gone.

That evening, Babbitt dined alone. He saw all the clan of Goodfellows peering through the restaurant window, lying on him. Fear sat beside him. And he told himself that tonight he would not go to tennis's flat. And he did not go till late. End of chapter 29. Chapter 30 of Babette. This Sleeper-Vox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti, Mikevindetti.com. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 30. 1. The summer before Mrs. Babbitt's letters had cracked with desire to return to Zenith.

Now they said nothing of returning, but a wistful, I suppose everything is going to be all right without me. Among her dry chronicles of weather and sickness hinted to Babette that he hadn't been very urgent about her coming. He worried it. If she were here and I went on raising cane like I've been doing, she'd have a fit. I've got to get hold of myself.

I got to learn to play around. and yet not make a fool of myself. I can do it, too. Folks like Verge-Gunch. Let me alone and Myr'll stay away, but poor kid, she sound lonely. Lord, I don't want to hurt her. Impulsively, he wrote that they missed her.

And her next letter said happily that she was coming home. He persuaded himself that he was eager to see her. He bought roses for the house, he ordered Squab for dinner. He had the car cleaned and polished, all the way home from the station with her he was adequate in his accounts of Ted's success in basketball at the university.

But before they reached floral heights, there was nothing more to say. And already he felt the force of her stolity. Wondered whether he could remain a good husband and still, sneak out of the house this evening for half an hour with the bunch. When he had housed the car, he blundered upstairs into the familiar Talcum's scented warmth of her presence, blurring, help you unpack your bag? No, I can do it.

Slowly she turned, holding up a small box, and slowly she said, I brought you a present, just a new cigar case. I didn't know if you'd care to have it. She was the lonely girl, the brown appealing Myra Thompson, whom he had married, and he almost wept for pity as he kissed her and besought, Oh, honey, care to have it. Of course I do. I'm awful proud you brought it to me. And I needed a new case badly. He wondered how he would get rid of the case he had bought the week before. And you really aren't glad to see me back? Why, you poor kitty, what you've been worrying about? Well, you didn't seem to miss me very much. By the time he had finished his stint of lying, they were firmly bound again. By ten that evening it seemed improbable that she had ever been away. There was but one difference, the problem of remaining a respectable husband,

a Floral Heights husband, yet seeing Tannis and the bunch with frequency. He had promised to telephone to Tannis that evening, and now it was mellowed dramatically impossible. He prowled about the telephone impulsively thrusting out a hand to lift the receiver, but never quite daring to risk it. Nor could he find a reason for slipping down to the drugstore on Smith Street with its telephone booth. He was laden with responsibility

till he threw it off with the speculation. Why the deuce should I fret so about being able to phone Tannis? She can get along without me. I don't know her anything. She's a fine girl. But I've given her just as much as she has me. Oh, damn these women in the way they get all tied up in complications. Two.

For a week he was attentive to his wife, took her to the theater to dinner at the little, Fields. Then the old, weary, dodging and shifting began, and at least two evenings a week he spent with the bunch. He still made pretense of going to the Elks and to committee meetings, but less and less did he trouble to have his excuses in teresting less and less did she affect to believe him. He was certain that she knew he was associating with what Floral Heights called a sporty crowd. Yet neither of them acknowledge it. In matrimonial geography, the distance between the first mute recognition of a break and the admission thereof is as great as the distance between the first naive faith

and the first doubting. As he began to drift away, he also began to see her as a human being, to like and dislike her instead of accepting her as a comparatively movable part of the furniture. and he compassionate that husband and wife relation which, in 25 years of married life, had become a separate and real entity. He recalled their highlights, the summer vacation in Virginia Meadows under the blue wall of the mountains, their motor toured through Ohio and the exploration of Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Columbus, the birth of Verona, their building of this new house,

planned to comfort them through a happy old age, chokingly, they had said that it might be the last home even them would ever have. Yet his most softening remembrance of those dear moments did not keep him from barking at dinner, "'Yip, going out a few hours, don't sit up for me.' He did not dare now to come home drunk. And though he rejoiced in his return to high morality and spoke with gravity to Pete and Fulton Bemis, about their drinking, he prickled at Myra's unexpressed criticisms and sulkily meditated that a fellow couldn't ever learn to handle himself if he was always bossed by a lot of women.

He no longer wondered if Tannis wasn't a bit worn and sentimental. In contrast to the complacent Myra, he saw her as swift and airborne and radiant, a fire spirit, tenderly stooping to the hearth, and however pitifully he brooded on his wife. He longed to be with Tannis. Then Mrs. Babbitt tore the decent cloak from her unhappiness and the astounded male discovered that she was having a small, determined rebellion of her own. Three. They were beside the fireless fireplace in the evening.

Georgie? She said. You haven't given me the list of your household expenses while I was away. No, I haven't. I haven't made it out yet. Very affably. Gosh, we must try to keep down expenses this year. That's so.

I don't know where all the money goes. I try to economize, but it just seems to evaporate. I suppose I oughtn't spend so much on cigars. Don't know, but what I'll cut down with smoking, maybe cut it out entirely. I was thinking of a good way to do it the other day, start on these shrewb cigarettes, and they'd kind of disgust me with smoking. Oh, I do wish you would. It isn't that I care, but honestly, George,

it is so bad for you to smoke so much. Don't you think you could reduce the amount? And, George, I notice now when you come home from these lodgy and all, and sometimes you smell of whiskey. Deary, you know I don't worry so much about the moral side of it, but you have a weak stomach and you can't stand all this drinking. Weak stomach, hell, I guess I can carry my booze about as well as most folks. Well, I do think you ought to be careful, don't you see, dear?

I don't want you to get sick. Sick, rats, I'm not a baby. I guess I ain't going to get sick just because maybe once a week I shoot a highball. That's the trouble with women. They always exaggerate so. George, I don't think you ought to talk that way when I'm just speaking for your own good. I know, gosh, all fish hooks, that's the trouble with women. They're always criticizing and commenting.

and bringing things up, and then they say it's bringing your own good. Why, George, that's not a nice way to talk, to answer me so short. Well, I didn't mean to answer short, but, gosh, talking as if I was a kindergarten brat not able to tote one highball without calling for the St. Mary's ambulance, fine idea you must have a me. Oh, isn't that, it's just I don't want to see you get sick, and my, I didn't know it was so late, don't forget to give me those household accounts for the time while I was away. Oh, thunder, what's he used to take into trouble make him now? Let's just skip him for that period.

Why, George Babbitt, in all the years we've been married, we've never failed to keep a complete account of every penny we've spent. Oh, maybe that's the trouble with us. What are the world you mean? Well, I don't mean anything, only sometimes I get so darn sick and tired of all the routine and the accounting at the office and expenses at home and fussing and stewing and fretting and wearing myself out, worrying over a lot of junk that doesn't really mean a doggone thing, and being so careful and good Lord, what do you think I'm made for? I could have been a darn good orator, and here I fuss and fret and worry. Don't you suppose I ever get tired of fussing?

I get so bored with ordering three meals a day, 365 days a year, and ruining my eyes over that horrid sewing machine. And looking after your clothes in Roans and Teds and Tinkas and everybody's in the laundry, darning socks, and going down to the piggy-wiggly to market and bringing my basket home to save money on the cash

and carry-in. Everything. Oh, gosh, with a certain astonishment. I suppose maybe you do, but talk about here I have to be in the office every single day while you can go out all afternoon and see folks and visit with the neighbors.

and do any blanking thing you want to. Yes, and a fine lot of good that does me, just talking over the same old things with the same old crowd, while you have all sorts of interesting people coming in to see you at the office. Interesting. Cranky old dames that want to know why I haven't rented their dear precious homes for about seven times their value, a bunch of old crabs,

panning the everlasting daylights out of me because they don't receive every cent of their rentals. by three GM on the second of the month. Sure, interesting. Just as interesting as a small box. Now, George, I will not have you shouting at me that way. Well, it gets my goat the way women figure out that a man doesn't do a darn thing, but sit in his chair and have lovety-dovey conferences with a lot of classy dames

and give them the glad eye. I guess you managed to give them a glad-enough eye when they do. come in? What you mean? Mean I'm chasing flappers? I should hope not at your age. Now you look here. You may not believe it. Of course, all you see is fat little George Babbitt. Sure, handyman around the house fixes a furnace when the furnace man doesn't show up. Pays of bills, but dull, awful dull. Well, you may not believe it, but there are some women that think old George Babette isn't such a bad scout. They think he's not so bad looking, not so bad that it hurts anyway. And he's got a pretty good line of guff, and some of them even think he shakes a darn wicked walkover dancing.

Yes, she spoke slowly. I haven't much doubt of that when I'm away. You managed to find people who properly appreciate you. Well, I just mean, he protested with a sound of denial. Then he was angered into semi-honesty. You bet I do. I find plenty of folks and doggone nice ones that don't think I'm a weak stomach baby. That's exactly what I was saying. You can run around with anybody you please, but I'm supposed to sit here and wait for you. You have the chance to get all the sorts of culture and everything, and I just stay home. Well, gosh, Almighty, there's nothing to prevent your reading books and going to lectures and all that junk, is there? George, I told you I won't have you shouting at me like that.

I don't know what's come over you. You never used to speak to me in this cranky way. I didn't mean to sound cranky, but gosh, it certainly makes me sore to get the blame because you don't keep up with things. I'm going to. Will you help me? Sure, anything I can do to help you in the culture grabbing line. Yours to oblige, G.F. Babbitt.

Very well, then. I want you to go to Miss Mudge's New Thought, meeting with me next Sunday afternoon. Well, who, which? Mrs. Opel Emerson Budge, the field lecturer for the American New Thought League. She's going to speak on cultivating the sun spirit before the league of her higher illumination at the Thornleigh. Oh, punk. New Thought hashed Thought and a poach day cultivating it sounds like, why is the mouse when it spins? That's a fine spiel for a good Presbyterian to be going to.

when you can hear Doc Drew. Reverend Drew is a scholar and a pulpit orator and all that, but he hasn't got the inner ferment, as Miss Mudge calls it. He hasn't any inspiration for the new era women need inspiration now. So I want you to come as you promised. Four. The zenith branch of the League of the Higher Illumination met in the smaller ballroom at the Hotel Thornleigh,

a refined apartment with pale green walls and plaster wreaths of roses, refined parquet flooring, and ultra-refined, frail, gilt chairs. Here were gathered 65 women and 10 men. Most of the men slouched in their chairs and wiggled, while their wives sat rigidly at attention, but two of them, red-neck meaty men, were as respectably devout as their wives. They were newly rich contractors who, having bought houses,

motors, hand-painted pictures, and gentlemanness, were now buying a refined, ready-made philosophy. It had been a toss-up with them whether to buy new thought, Christian science, or a good standard high-church model of Episcopalianism. In the flesh, Mrs. Opel Emerson Mudge fell somewhat short of a prophetic aspect. She was pony-built and plump, with the face of a haughty pecanese, a button of a nose, and arms so short, that despite her most indignant endeavors, she could not clasp her hands in front of her as she sat on the platform waiting, her frock of taffeta and green velvet. With three strings of glass beads and large folding eyeglasses dangling from a black ribbon was a triumph of refinement.

Mrs. Mudge was introduced by the president of the League of the Hira Illumination, an old-ish young woman, with a yearning voice, white spats, and a mustache. She said, that Mrs. Mudge would now make it plain to the simplest intellect how the sun spirit could be cultivated and they who had been thinking about cultivating one would do well to treasure Mrs. Mudge's words because even Zinath, and everybody knew that Zinath stood in the van of spiritual and new thought progress, didn't often have the opportunities to sit at the feet of such an inspiring optimist and metaphysical seer as Mrs. Opel Emerson Mudge, who had lived the life of wider usefulness through concentration, and in the silence found those secrets of mental control

and the inner key, which were immediately going to transform and bring peace, power, and prosperity to the unhappy nations. And so, friends, would they, for this precious gem-studded hour forget the illusions of this seeming real and in the actualization of the deep-lying Ferretus pass along with Mrs. Opel Emerson Mudge to the realm beautiful. If Mrs. Mudge was rather pudgier than one would like one's swamis, yogi, seers, and initiates, yet her voice had the real professional note. It was refined and optimistic. It was overpoweringly calm. it flowed on relentlessly without one comma till Babbitt was hypnotized. Her favorite word was always, which she pronounced,

Alouis. Her principal gesture was a pontifical, but thoroughly ladylike blessing with two stubby fingers. She explained about this matter of spiritual saturation. There are those. Of those she made a linked sweetness long drawn out, a far-off delicate call in a twilight minor. It chastely rebuked the restless husbands,

yet brought them a message of healing. There are those who have seen the rim and outer seeming of the logos. There are those who have glimpsed and enthusiasm possessed themselves of some segment and portion of the logos. There are those who thus flicked but not penetrated and radioactiveed by the dionage. Gnimos go always to and fro, assertedative, that they possess and are possessed of the logos, and the medici psychos.

But the word I bring you this concept, I enlarge that those that are not utter, are not even inceptive, and that holiness is in its definitive essence. Always, always, always. wholeness and It proved that the essence of the sun's spirit was truth But its aura and affixion Were cheerfulness

Face always the day with the dawn laugh With the enthusiasm of the initiate Who perceives that all works together In the revolutions of the wheel And whose answers The strictures of the soured souls Of the destructionists With a glad affirmation

It went on for about an hour and seven minutes. At the end, Mrs. Mudge spoke with more vigor and punctuation. Now let me suggest to all of you the advantages of the theosophical and pathistic oriental reading circle, which I represent, our object is to unite all the manifestations of the new era into one cohesive whole, new thought, Christian science, Theospe, Vendanta, Bahaism, and the other sparks from one new light. The subscription is but $10 a year, and for this mere piteous,

the members receive not only the monthly magazine, pearls of healing, but the privilege of sending right to the president, our Reverend Mother Dobbs. Any question regarding spiritual progress, matrimonial problems, health and well-being questions, financial difficulties, and. They listened to her with adoring attention. They looked genteel. They looked ironed out.

They coughed politely and crossed their legs with quietness. And inexpensive linen handkerchiefs, they blew their noses with a delicacy altogether, optimistic and refined. As for Babbitt, he sat and suffered. When they were blessedly out in the air again, when they drove home through a wind, smelling of snow and honest sun,

He dared not speak. They had been too near to quarreling these days. Mrs. Babbitt forced it. Did you enjoy Mrs. Mudge's talk? What did you get out of it? Oh, it starts a person thinking. It gets you out of a routine of ordinary thoughts. Well, I'll hand it to Opo.

She's an ordinary, but gosh, honest, did that stuff mean anything to you? Of course, I'm not trained in metaphysics. And there was lots I couldn't quite. quite grasped, but I feel it was inspiring, and she speaks so readily. I do think you ought to have got something out of it. Well, I did not swear. I was simply astonished the way those women lapped it up.

Why the dickens they want to put in their time listening to all that blah when they... It's certainly better for them than going to roadhouses and smoking and drinking. I don't know whether it is or not. Personally, I don't see a whole lot of difference. In both cases, they're trying to get away from themselves. Most everybody is these days, I guess. And I certainly got a whole lot more out of hoofing in a good, lively dance, even in some dive than sitting looking at my collar that was too tight,

and feeling too scared to spit and listening to Opel chewing her words. I'm sure you do. You're very fond of dives, no doubt. You saw a lot of them while I was away. Look here. You've been doing a hell of a lot of insane. continuing and hinting about lately as if I were leading a double life or something, and I'm damn sick of it, and I don't want to hear anything more about it.

Why, George, Pabbitt, do you realize what you're saying? Why, George, in all our years together, you've never talked to me like that. It's about time, then. Lately you've been getting worse and worse, and now finally, you're cursing and swearing at me and shouting at me, and your voice is so ugly and hateful. I just shudder. "'Ah, rats, quit exaggerating. I wasn't shouting or swearing either.'

"'I wish you could hear your own voice. Maybe you don't realize how it sounds. But even so, you never used to talk like that. You simply couldn't talk this way, if something dreadful didn't happen to you.' His mind was hard, with amazement he found that he wasn't particularly sorry. It was only with an effort that he made himself more agreeable. "'Well, gosh, I don't mean to get sore.' george do you realize that we can't go on like this getting further and farther apart and you rooter and root her to me i just don't know what's going to happen he had a moment's pity for her bewilderment he thought of how many deep and tender things would be hurt if they really couldn't go on like this but his pity was impersonal and he was wondering

Wouldn't it maybe be a good thing if not a divorce and all that, of course, but kind of a little more independence? While she looked at him pleadingly, he drove on in a dreadful silence. End of Chapter 30. Chapter 31 of Babette. The Sleeper-Vox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti, Mike Vendetti.com. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis, Chapter 31. 1.

When he was away from her while he kicked about the garage and swept the snow off the running board and examined a cracked hose connection, he repented. He was alarmed and astonished that he could have flared out at his wife, and thought fondly how much more lasting she was than a bloody bunch. He went in to mumble that he was sorry and didn't mean to be grouchy, and to inquire as to her interest in a movie.

But in the darkness of the movie theater, he brooded that he'd gone and tied himself up to Myra all over again. He had some satisfaction in taking it out on Tannis Judeaq. Hang, Tannis anyway, why she'd gone and got him into these mix-ups, made him all jumping, nervous, and cranky. Too many complications. Cut him out. He wanted peace. For ten days he did not see Tannis nor telephone to her. and instantly she put upon him the compulsion which he hated when he had stayed away from her for five days,

hourly taking pride in his resoluteness and hourly, picturing how greatly Tanus must miss him. Miss McGuwen reported, Mr. Deek on the phone, like to speak to you about some repairs? Tannis was quick and quiet. Mr. Babbitt? Oh, George, this is Tannis.

I haven't seen you for weeks, days, anyway. You aren't sick, are you? No, just been terribly rushed. I think there'll be a big revival of building this year. Got to, uh, got to work hard. Of course, my man, I want you to. You know, I'm terribly ambitious for you much more than I am for myself. I just don't want you to forget poor Tannis.

Will you call me up soon? Sure, sure, you bet. Please do. I shan't call you again. He mediated. Poor kid. But gosh, she oughtn't to phone me at the office. She's a wonder, sympathy, ambitious for me.

But gosh, I won't be made and compelled to call her up till I get ready. Darn these women, the way they make demands. It'll be one long old time before I see her. But gosh, I'd like to see her tonight. Sweet little thing, huh? Cut that, son. now you broken away be wise. She did not telephone him again, nor he,

but after five more days she wrote to him. Have I offended you? You must know, dear, I didn't mean to. I'm so lonely and I need somebody to cheer me up. Why didn't you come to the nice party we had at Carey's last evening? I remember she invited you. Can't you come around here tomorrow, Thursday evening? I shall be alone and hope to see you.

His reflections were numerous. Doggone it, why can't she let me alone? Why can't women ever learn a fellow hates to be bulldozed? And they always take advantage of you by yelling how lonely they are. Now it isn't nice of you, young fella. She's a fine, square, straight girl, and she does get lonely. She writes a swell hand, nice-looking, stationary, plain, refined. I guess I'll have to go see her.

Well, thank God I got till tomorrow night for you. of her. Anyway, she's nice, but hang it, I won't be made to do things. I'm not married to her, nor by golly going to be. Oh, rats, I suppose I better go see her. Two. Thursday, the tomorrow of Tannis's note, was full of emotional crises. At the roughneck table at the club, Verge Gunch, talked of the Good Citizens League, and it seemed to Babbitt deliberately left him out of the invitations to join old Matt Pinneman and the general utility man at Babbitt's office, had troubles, and came in to groan about them. The oldest boy was no good and wife were sick, and he had quarreled with his brother-in-law. Conrad Lighty also had troubles, and since Lighty was

one of his best clients, Babbitt had to listen to him. Mr. Lighty, it appeared, was suffering from a peculiarly interesting neuralgia, and, the garage had overcharged him. When Babbit came home, everybody had troubles. His wife was simultaneously thinking about discharging the impudent new maid and worried, lest the maid leave. Antigua, desired to denounce her teacher.

Oh, quit fussing, Babbit fussed. You never hear me whining about my troubles, and yet if you had to run a real estate office, why, today I found Miss Benningin was two days behind with her accounts, and I pitched my finger in my daughter, desk and lighty was in and just as unreasonable as ever. He was so vexed that after dinner, when it was time for a tactful escape to Tannis, he merely grumped to his wife, gotta go out, be back by eleven, should think.

Oh, you're going out again? Again, what do you mean again? Haven't hardly been out of the house for a week. Are you, uh, are you going to the Elks? Nope, got to see some people. though this time he heard his own voice and knew that it was curt, though she was looking at him with wide-eyed reproach. He stumped into the hall, jerked on his ulster,

and fur-lying gloves, and went out to start the car. He was relieved to find Tannis cheerful, unreproachful, and brilliant in a frock of brown net over gold tissue. You poor man, having to come out on a night like this. It's terribly cold. Don't you think a small highball would be nice? Now, by golly, there's a woman with Sammy. I think we could more or less stand a highball if it wasn't too tall of a one,

not more than a foot tall. He kissed her with careless heartiness. He forgot the compulsion of her demands. He stretched in a large chair and felt that he had beautifully come home. He was suddenly loquacious. He told her what a noble and misunderstood man he was, and how superior to Pete Fulton Bemis

and the other men of their acquaintance, and she, bending forward, chin and charming hand, brightly agreed. But when he forced himself to ask, Well, honey, how's things with you? She took his duty question seriously, and he discovered that she too had troubles. Oh, all right, but I did get so angry with Carrie.

She told many that I told her that many was an awful tight wad and many told me Carrie had told her and of course I told her I hadn't said anything of the kind and then Carrie found Minnie had told me and she was simply furious because Minnie had told me and of course I was just boiling because Carrie had told her I'd told her and then we all met up at Fultons his wife is away thank heavens oh there's the dandiest floor in his house to dance on. And we were all of us simply furious at each other, and, oh, I do hate that kind of a mix-up, don't you? I mean, it's so lacking in refinement, but, and mother wants to come and stay with me for a whole month, and of course I do love her, I suppose I do, but honestly,

she'll cramp my style something dreadful. She never can learn, not comment, and she always wants to know where I'm going when I go out evenings, and if I light her, she always spies around and ferrets around and finds out where I've been. And then she looks like patience on a monument, till I could just scream. And, oh, I must tell you, you know I never talk about myself. I just hate people who do, don't you?

But I feel so stupid tonight, and I know I must be boring you with all this. What would you do about mother? He gave her factual masculine advice. She was to put off her mother's stay. She was to tell Kerry to go to the deuce. For these valuable revelations she thanked him, and they ambled into the familiar gossip of the bunch,

of what a sentimental fool was Carrie, of what a lazy brat was pete, of how nice Fulton Bemis could be. Of course, lots of people think he's a regular old grouch when they meet him because he doesn't give him the glad hand, the first crack out of the box, but when they get to know him, he's a corker. But as they had gone,

conscientiously through each of these analysis before the conversation staggered, Babbit tried to be intellectual and deal with general topics. He said some thoroughly sound things about disarmament and broad-mindedness and liberalism, but it seemed to him that general topics interested Tannis only when she could apply them to Pete, Kerry, or themselves. He was distressingly conscious of their silence. He tried to stir her into chatting again, but silence wrote. rose like a gray presence and hovered between them.

Uh, he labored. It strikes me, it strikes me that unemployment is lessening. Maybe Pete will get a decent job then. Silence. Desperately, he essayed, What's the trouble, old honey? You seem kind of quiet tonight. Am I?

Well, I'm not, but do you really care whether I am or not? Care, sure, of course I do. Do you really? She swooped on him, sat on the arm of his chair. He halted the emotional drain of having to appear fond of her. He stroked her hand, smiling up at her dutifully, and sank back. George, I wonder if you really like me at all. Of course I do, silly.

Do you really precious? Do you care a bit? Well, certainly, you don't suppose I'd be here if I didn't. Now see here, young man, I won't have you speaking to me in that Huffy way. I am mean to sound Huffy, I just, an injured in rather childish tones. Gosh, almighty, it makes me tired the way everybody says I sound Huffy, and I just talk natural. Do they expect me to sing it or something?

What do you mean by everybody? How many other ladies have you been consoling? Oh, and I won't have this hinting. humbly. I know, dear, I was only teasing. I know I didn't mean to talk Huffy. It was just tired. Forgive bad Tannis.

But say you love me, say it. Love you, of course I do. Yes, you do, cynically. Oh, darling, I don't mean to be rude, but I get so lonely, I feel so useless. Nobody needs me, nothing I can do for anybody. And you know, dear, I'm so active I could be if there was something to do, and I am young, aren't I? I'm not an old thing. I'm not old and stupid, am I?

He had to assure her. She stroked his hair, and he had to look pleased under that touch, the more demanding in its beguiling softness. He was impatient. He wanted to flee out to a hard, sure, unemotional man-world. through her delicate and caressing fingers she may have caught something of his shrugging distaste. She left him, he was for the moment buoyantly relieved. She dragged a footstool to his feet and sat looking beseechingly up at him. But as in many men, the cringing of a dog, the flinching of a frightened child,

roused not pity but a surprised and jerky cruelty. So her humility only annoyed him, and he saw, saw her now as middle-aged, as beginning to be old. Even while he detested his own thoughts, they rode him. She was old, winched, old. He noted how the soft flesh was creasing into webby folds beneath her chin, below her eyes at the base of her wrists. A patch of her throat had a minute roughness,

like the crumbs from a rubber eraser. Old, she was younger and years than himself, Yet it was sickening to have her yearning up to him with rolling great eyes, as if, he shuddered, his own aunt were making love to him. He fretted inwardly. I'm through with his assinine fooling around. I'm going to cut her out. She's a darn decent, nice woman, and I don't want to hurt her,

but it'll hurt her a lot less to cut her right out, like a good, clean, surgical operation. He was on his feet. He was speaking urgently. by every rule of self-esteem he had to prove to her and to himself. That was her fault. I suppose maybe I'm kind of out of sorts tonight, but honest, honey, when I stayed away for a while to catch up on work and everything

and figure out where I was at, you ought to have been cannier and waited till I came back. Can't you see, dear, when you made me come, I being about an average bullheaded chump, my tendency was to resist. Listen, dear. I'm going now. Not for a while, precious.

No? Yep, right now. And then sometime we'll see about the future. What do you mean, dear, about the future? Have I done something I ought to do? Oh, I'm so dreadfully sorry. He resolutely put his hands behind him. Not a thing.

God bless you, not a thing. You're as good as they make him, but it's just good, Lord, do you realize? I've got things to do. in the world. I've got a business to attend to, and you might not believe it, but I've got a wife and kids that I'm awfully fond of. Then only during the murder he was committing was he able to feel nobly virtuous. I want us to be friends, but gosh, I can't go on this way feeling I got to come up here every so often. Oh, darling, darling, and I've always told you so carefully that you were

absolutely free. I just wanted you to come around when you were tired and wanted to talk to me, or when you could enjoy our parties. She was so reasonable. She was so gently right. It took him an hour to make his escape with nothing settled and everything horribly settled. In a barren freedom of icy northern wind he sighed, Thank God it's over. Poor Tannis, poor darling decent Tannis. But it is over. Absolute. On free.

End of Chapter 31. Chapter 32 of Babbitt. This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti. Mikevindetti.com. Babbitt. By Sinclair Lewis. Chapter 32.

One. His wife was up when he came in. You have a good time? She sniffed. I had not had a rotten time. Anything else I got to explain? "'George, how can you speak like that? "'Oh, I don't know what's come over you.'

"'Good Lord, there's nothing come over me. "'Why do you look for trouble all the time?' "'He was warning himself. "'Careful, stop being so disagreeable. "'Course she feels it, being left alone here all evening.' "'But he forgot his warning as she went on. "'Why do you go out and see all sorts of strange people? "'I suppose you'll say you've been to another committee meeting this evening.'

"'Nope. on a woman. We sat by the fire and kidded each other and had a whale of a good time, if you want to know. Well, in the way you say it, I suppose it's my fault. You went, or I probably sent you. You did. Well, upon my word. You hate strange people, as you call them. If you had your way, I'd be as much of an old stick in the mud as Howard Littlefield. You never want to have anybody with any get at the house. You want a bunch of old stiffs that sit around and gas about the weather. You're doing your level best to make me old. Well, let me tell you I'm not going to have. Overwhelmed, she bent to his unprecedented tirade, and in answer she mourned,

Oh, dearest, I don't think that's true. I don't mean to make you old. I know perhaps you're partly right. Perhaps I am slow about getting acquainted with new people. But when you think of all the dear good times we have, the supper parties, and the movies, and all. With true masculine wiles, he not only convinced himself that she had injured him, but, by the loudness of his voice and the brutality of his attack, he convinced her also.

And presently, Haye had her apologizing for his having spent the evening with Tannis. He went up to bed well pleased, not only the master, but the martyr of the house. For a distasteful moment after he had lain down, he wondered if he had been altogether just, "'Ought to be ashamed bullying her. Maybe there is her side to things. Maybe she hasn't had such a blooming hectic time herself. I don't care good for her to get waked up a little, and I'm going to keep free of her and Tannis, and the fellows at the club and everybody, I'm going to run my own life.'

"'Two.' In this mood he was particularly, objectionable at the Boosters Club lunch next day. They were addressed by a congressman who had just returned from an exhaustive three-month study of the finances, ethnology, political systems, linguistic divisions, mineral resources, and agricultures of Germany, France, Great Britain, Italy, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, and Bulgaria. He told them all about those subjects, together with three funny stories about European misconceptions of America and some spirited words on the necessity of keeping ignorant foreigners out of America. Say, that was a mighty informative talk.

Real he stuff, said Sidney. Finklstein. But the dissatisfied Babbitt grumbled, "'Flecher, bunch of hot air. And what's the matter with immigrants? Gosh, they aren't all ignorant, and I got a hunch. We're all descended from immigrants ourselves.' "'How you make me tired,' said Mr. Finkelstein. Babbit was aware that Dr. A. I. Dilling was sternly listening from across the table.

Dr. Dilling was one of the most important men in the boosters. He was not a physician, but a surgeon, a more romantic and sounding occupation. He was an intense large man with a boiling of black hair and a thick black mustache. The newspapers often chronicled his operations. He was professor of surgery in the State University. He went to dinner at the very best houses on Royal Ridge, and he was said to be worth several hundred thousand dollars. It was dismaying to Babbitt to have such a person glower at him.

He hastily praised the congressman's wit to Sidney Finkelstein, but for Dr. Dillings benefit. Three. That afternoon, three men shouldered into Babbitt's office with the air of a vigilante committee in Frontier Days. They were large, resolute, big-jawed men, and they were all high lords in the land of zenith. Dr. Dilling, the surgeon, Charles McClevelly, the contractor, and most dismaying of all, the white-bearded Colonel Rutherford Snow, owner of the Advocate Times.

In their whelming presence, Babbit felt small and insignificant. "'Well, well, great pleasure. Have chairs. What can I do for you?' he babbled. They neither sat nor offered observations on the weather. Babbitt, said Colonel Snow, we've come from the Good Citizens League. We've decided we want you to join. Virgil Gunch says you don't care to,

but I think we can show you a new light. The League is going to combine with the Chamber of Commerce and a campaign for the open shop, so it's time for you to put your name down. In his embarrassment, Babbitt could not recall his reasons for not. wishing to join the league, if indeed he had ever definitely known them, but he was passionately certain that he did not wish to join, and at the thought of their forcing him he felt a stirring of anger against even these princes of commerce.

Sorry, Colonel. Have to think of it over for a little, he mumbled. McEbbly snarled. That means you're not going to join, George. Something black and unfamiliar and ferocious spoke from Babbitt. Hey, look here, Charlie, I'm damned as if I'm going to be bullying it into joining anything, not even by you plutes. We're not bullying anybody, Dr. Dillon began, but Colonel Snow thrust him aside with,

certainly we are. We don't mind a little bullying if it's necessary. Babbitt, the GCL has been talking about you a good deal. You're supposed to be a sensible, clean, responsible man. You always have been. But here lately, for God knows what reason, I hear from all sorts of sources that you're running around with a loose crowd, and what's a whole lot worse. You've actually been advocating and supporting some of the most dangerous elements in town, like this fellow don't. Girl, that strikes me as my private business. Possibly. But we want to have an understanding. You've stood in. You and your father-in-law, with some of the most substantial and forward-looking interest in town. like my friends at the street traction company and my papers have given you a lot of good booth well you can't expect the decent citizens to go on aiding you if you intend to side with precisely the people who are trying to undermine us

Babbitt was frightened, but he had an agonized instinct that if he yielded in this, he would yield in everything, he protested. You're exaggerating, Colonel, I believe in being broad-minded and liberal, but, of course, I am just as much again the cranks and blackskirts, labor unions, and so on as you are, but fact is, I belong to so many organizations now that I can't do them justice, and I want to think over before I decide about coming into the GCL. Colonel Snow condescended.

Oh, no, I'm not exaggerating. Why the doctor here heard you cussing out and defaming one of the finest types of Republican congressmen just this noon. And you have entirely the wrong idea about thinking overjoining. We're not begging you to join the GCL. We're permitting you to join. I'm not sure, my boy.

But what if you put it off? It'll be too late. I'm not sure we'll want you then. Better think quick. Better think quick. The three vigilantes, formidable in their righteousness, stared at him in a taut silence.

Babbitt waited through. He thought nothing at all. He merely waited. While in his echoing head buzzed, I don't want to join, I don't want to join, I don't want to. All right, sorry for you, said Colonel Snow, and the three men abruptly turned their beefy backs. Four.

As Babbitt went out to his car that evening, he saw Virgil Gunch coming down the block. He raised his hand in salutation, but Gunch ignored it, and crossed the street. He was certain that Gunch had seen him. He drove home in sharp discomfort. His wife attacked at once. Georgie dear, Muriel Fink was in this afternoon, and she says that Chum says,

the committee of this Good Citizens League especially ask you to join and you wouldn't. Don't you think it would be better? You know all the nicest people belong, and the league stands for, I know what the league stands for. It stands for the suppression of free speech and free thought and everything else. I don't propose to be bullied and rushed into joining anything. And it isn't a question of whether it's a good league or a bad league,

or what the hell kind of a league it is. It's just a question of my refusing to be told a guy got to... But dear, if you don't join, people might criticize you. I don't criticize. But I mean nice be it. Rats. As a matter of fact, this whole league is a... It's like all those other organizations that start off with such a rush and let on they're going to

change the whole works. Pretty soon, they peter out and everybody forgets all about them. But if that's the fad now, don't you think you? No, I don't. Oh, Myra, please quit nagging me about it. I'm sick of hearing about the confounded GCL. I almost wish I'd join them when Verge first came around. Got it over.

Maybe I'd have come in today if the committee had to be. and tried to bully rag me, but by God, as long as I'm a free-born independent American sit— Huh, George? You're talking exactly like the German Furnace man. Oh, I am I? Then I won't talk at all. He longed that evening to see Tannis Judik, to be strengthened by her sympathy. When the family were upstairs, he got as far as telephoning to her apartment house. But he was agitated about it when the janitor answered. He blurted, "'Nor mind, I'll call him. later and hung up the receiver. Five.

If Babbit had not been certain about Virgil Gunches avoiding him, there could be little doubt about William Washington-Ethorn next morning. When Babette was driving down to the office, he overtook Ethorn's car, with the great bankers sitting in anemic solemnity behind the chauffeur. Babbett waved at him and cried, "'Morning!' Ethorne looked at him deliberately, hesitated, and gave him a nod more contemptuous than a direct cut.

Babbitt's partner and father-in-law came in at ten. George, what's this, sir, here about some song and dance you gave Colonel Snow, about not wanting to join the GCL? What the dickens you're trying to do, wreck the firm? You don't suppose those big guns will stand for your bucking them and springing all this liberal poppy cock you've been getting off lately, do you? All rats, Henry T. You've been reading bum fiction. There ain't any such a thing as these plots to keep folks from being liberal.

This is a free country. Man can do anything he wants to do. Of course, there ain't any plots. Who said they was? Only if folks got an idea, you're scattered-brained and unstable. You don't suppose they'll want to do business with you, do you? One little rumor about your being a crank

would do more to ruin this business than all the plots and stuff that those full storywires could think up in a month of Sundays. That afternoon when the old reliable Conrad Lighty, the Mary Miser, Conrad Lighty appeared, and Babbitt suggested his buying a parcel of land in the new residential section of Dorchester. Lydie said hastily, too hastily, No, no, don't want to go into anything new just now.

A week later, Babette learned through Henry Thompson that the officials of the street traction company were planning another real estate coup, and that Sanders, Tory, and Wing. not the Babbitt Thompson Company were to handle it for them. I figure that Jake Offutt is kind of lorry about the way folks are talking about you. Of course, Jake is a rock, ribbed, or old diehard, and he probably advised attraction fellows to get some other broker.

George, you got to do something, trembled Thompson. And in a rush, Babette agreed. All nonsense the way the people misjudged him, but still, he determined to join the Good Citizens League the next time he was asked, and in a furious resignation he waited. He wasn't asked. They ignored him. He did not have the courage to go to the league and beg in,

and he took refuge in a shaky boast that he had gotten away with bucking the whole city. Nobody could dictate to him how he was going to think and act. He was jarred as by nothing else when the paragon of stenographers, Miss McGuin, suddenly left him. Though her reasons were excellent, she needed to rest her sister. was sick. She might not do any more work for six months. He was uncomfortable with her successor, Miss Havstad. What Miss Havstead's given name was, no one in the office ever knew. It seemed improbable that she had a given name, a lover, a powder puff, or a digestion. She was so

impersonal this slight pale, industrious swede that it was vulgar to think of her as going to an ordinary home to eat hash. She was a perfectly oiled and enameled machine, and she ought each evening to have been dusted off and shut in her desk, beside her too slim, too frail pencil points. She took dictation swiftly, her typing was perfect, but Babbitt became jumpy when he tried to work with her. She made him feel puffy, and at his best-beloved daily jokes, she looked gently inquiring. He longed for Miss McGowan's return and thought of writing to her. Then he heard that Miss McGowan had a week after leaving him gone over to his dangerous competitors, Sanders, Tori, and Wing.

He was not merely annoyed, he was frightened. Why'd you quit, then? He worried. Did she have a hunch my business is going on the rocks? And it was Sanders, got the street traction deal, rats sinking ship. Gray fear loomed always by him now. He watched Fritz Wellinger, the young salesman, and wondered if he too would leave. Daily he fancied slights. He noted that, he was not asked to speak at the annual Chamber of Commerce dinner. When Orville Jones gave a large poker party and he was not invited, he was certain that he had been snubbed.

He was afraid to go to lunch at the athletic club and afraid not to go. He believed that he was spied on, that when he left the table, they whispered about him. Everywhere he heard the rustling whispers in the offices of clients, in the bank, when he made an deposit, in his own office, in his own home. Interimably, he wondered what they were saying of him. All day long in imaginary conversations he caught them marveling.

Babbit? Why, I'd say he's a regular anarchist. He got to admire the fellow for his nerve, the way he turned liberal and, by gully, just absolutely runs his life to suit himself. But say, he's dangerous. That's what he is. And he's got to be shown up.

He was so twitchy that when he rounded a corner and chanced on two acquaintances talking, whispering, his heart leaped, and he stalked by like an embarrassed schoolboy. When he saw his neighbors, Howard Littlefield, and Orville Jones together, he peered at them, went indoors to escape their spying and was miserably certain that they had been whispering, plotting, whispering. Through all his fear ran defiance, he felt stubborn. Sometimes he decided that he had been a very devil of a fellow, as bold as Seneca Done, Sometimes he planned to call on Don and tell him what a revolutionist he was. Never got beyond the planning.

But just as often, when he heard the soft whispers enveloping him, he wailed, "'Good Lord, what have I done? Just played with a bunch and called down Clare's drum about being such a high and mighty sodger. Never catch me criticizing people and trying to make them accept my ideas.' He could not stand the strain. Before long he admitted that he would like to flee back to the security of conformity, provided there was a decent and incredible way to return. But stubbornly, he would not be forced back.

He would not, he swore, eat dirt. Only in spirited engagements with his wife did these turbulent fears rise to the surface. She complained that he seemed nervous, that she couldn't understand why he did not want to, drop in at the Littlefields for the evening. He tried, but he could not express to her the nebulous facts of his rebellion and punishment. And, with Paul and Tannis lost, he had no one to whom he could talk. Good Lord, Tinker is the only real friend to have these days.

He sighed, and he clung to the child, played floor games with her all evening. He considered going to see Paul in prison, but though he had a pale, curt note from him every week, he thought of Paul is dead. It was Tannis for whom he was longing. I thought I was so smart and independent, cutting Tannis out. And I need her. Lord how I need her, he raged. Myra simply can't understand all she sees in life is getting along

by being just like other folks. But Tannis, she'd tell me I was all right. Then he broke, and one evening late he did run to Tannis. He had not dared to hope for it, but she was in. and alone. Only she wasn't Tannis. She was a courteous, bow-lifting, ice-armored woman who looked like Tannis. She said, yes, George, what is it? In even and uninterested tones, and he crept away whipped. His first comfort was from Ted and Eunice Littlefield. They danced in one evening when Ted was home from the university, and Ted chuckled,

What says I hear from uni, Dad? She says her dad says her dad says, as you raised cane by boosting old Seneca Don. Hot dog, give him fit, stir him up. This old Berg is asleep. Eunice plumped down on Babbitt's lap, kissed him, nestled her bobbed hair against his chin and crowed. I think you're lots nicer than Howard. Why is it? Confidentially.

That Howard is such an old grouch. The man is a good heart, and honestly, he's awfully bright, but he never will learn to step on the gas, after all the training I've given him. Don't you think we could do something with him, dearest? Why, Eunice, that isn't a nice way to speak of your papa, Babbit observed in the best Floral Heights manner. But he was happy for the first time in weeks. He pictured himself as the veteran liberal,

strengthened by the loyalty of the young generation. They went out to rifle the icebox. Babbitt gloated, If your mother caught us at this, we'd certainly get our comeuppance. And Eunice became maternal, scrambled a terrifying number of eggs for them. kissed Babbitt on the ear, and in the voice of a brooding abyss, marveled, it beats the devil why feminists like be go on nursing these men.

Thus stimulated, Babbitt was reckless when he encountered Sheldon Smith, educational director of the YMCA and choir leader of the Chatham Road Church. With one of his damp hands, Smith imprisoned Babbitt's thick paw. While he chatted, Brother there, Babbit, we haven't seen you at church very often lately. I know you're busy with a multitude of details, but you mustn't forget your good friends at the old church home.

Babbitt shook off the affectionate clasp. Sheldie liked to hold hands for a long time, the snarled. Well, I guess you fellows can run the show without me. Sorry, Smith. Gotta beat it. Good day. But afterward he winced. If that white worm had the nerve to try to drag me back to the old church home, then the holy outfit must have been doing a lot of talking about me too.

He heard them whispering, whispering. Dr. John Jinnison drew, Jamaldi Frank, even William Washington, Earthorn. The independence seeped out of him, and he walked the streets alone, afraid of men's cynical eyes and the incessant hiss of whispering. End of Chapter 32. Chapter 33 of Babbitt. This Libra Vox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti, Mike Vendetti.com.

Babbitt. By Sinclair Lewis, Chapter 33. 1. He tried to explain to his wife as they prepared for bed how objectable was Sheldon Smeath, but all her answer was, he has such a beautiful voice so spiritual, I don't think you ought to speak of him like that

just because you can't appreciate music. He saw her then as a stranger. He stared bleakly at this plump and fussy woman with the broad bare arms and wondered how she had ever come here. In his chilly cot, turning from aching side to side, He pondered of tanness. He'd been a fool to loser. He had to have somebody he could really talk to.

He'd bust if he went on stewing about things by himself. And Myra? Useless to expect her to understand. More rats. No use dodging the issue. Damn shame for two married people to drift apart after all these years, darn rotten shame. but nothing could bring them together now,

as long as he refused to let Zenith bully him into taking orders. And he was, by golly, not going to let anybody bullying him into anything, or wheedle him, or coax him either. He woke at three, roused by a passing motor, and struggled out of bed for a drink of water. As he passed through the bedroom, he heard his wife groan. His resentment was night blurred.

He was solicitous in inquiring. Oh, it's trouble, huh? I got such a pain down here on my side. It just, it tears at me. Bad indigestion? Shall I get you some bicarb? Don't think that would help. I felt funny last evening and yesterday, and then it passed away, and I got to sleep,

and that auto woke me up. Her voice was laboring like a ship in a storm. He was alarmed. I better call a doctor. No. No, no, it'll go away, but maybe you might give me an ice bag? He stalked to the bathroom for the icebag, down to the kitchen for ice. He felt dramatic in this late-night expedition,

but as he gouged the chunk of ice with the dagger-like pick, he was cool, steady, mature. And the old friendliness was in his voice as he patted the ice-bag into place on her groin rumbling. There, there, that'll be better now. He retired to bed, but he did not sleep. He heard her groan again. Instantly, he was up, soothing her.

Still pretty bad, honey? Yes, it just grips me, and I can't get to sleep. Her voice was faint. He knew her dread of doctors' verdicts, and he did not inform her, but he creaked downstairs, telephoned to Dr. Earl Patton, and waited shivering, trying with fuzzy eyes to read a magazine,

till he heard the doctor's car. The doctor was youngest and professionally breezy. He came in as though it were sunny noontime. Well, George, little trouble, eh? How is she now? He said busily as with tremendous and rather irritating cheerfulness, he tossed his coat on a chair and warmed his hands at a radiator. He took charge of the house.

Babette felt ousted and unimportant as he followed the doctor up to the bedroom. And it was the doctor who chuckled. Oh, just a little stomachache. Verona peeped through her door begging, "'What is it, Dad? What is it?' To Mrs. Babbitt, the doctor said with amiable belligerence after his examination, "'Kind of a bad old pain, eh?

I'll give you something to make you sleep, and I think you'll feel better in the morning. I'll come in right after breakfast. But to Babbitt, laying in wait in the lower hall, the doctor's side, I don't like the feeling there in her belly. There's some rigidity and some inflammation. She's never had her appendix out, has she? Hmm.

Well, no use worrying. I'll be here first thing in the morning, and meantime she'll get some rest. I give her hypo. Good night. Then was Babbitt caught up in the Black Tempest. Instantly, all the indignations which had been dominating him and the spiritual dramas through which he had struggled,

became pallid and absurd. before the ancient and overwhelming realities, the standard and traditional realities, of sickness and menacing death, the long night, and the thousand steadfast implications of married life. He crept back to her as she drowsed away in the tropic languor of Morphia.

He sat on the edge of her bed holding her hand, and for the first time in many weeks, her hand abode trustfully in his. He draped himself grotesquely in his tolling bathrobe In a pink and white couch cover And sat lumpishly in a wing chair The bedroom was uncanny in its half-light Which turned the curtains to lurking robbers

The dressing table to a turtid castle It smelled of cosmetics, of linen, of sleep He napped and woke, napped and woke a hundred times He heard her move and sigh and slumber He wondered if there wasn't some officious, brisk thing he could do for her. And before he could quite form the thought, he was asleep, racked and aching. The night was infinite.

When dawn came and the waiting seemed at an end, he fell asleep, and was vexed to have been caught off guard, to have been aroused by Verona's entrance and her agitated, Oh, what is it, Dad? His wife was awake, her face, sallow and lifeless. in the morning light. But now he did not compare her with Tannis. She was not merely a woman

to be contrasted with other women, but his own self, and though he might criticize her and nag her, it was only as he might criticize and nag himself. Interrestedly, unpatarizingly, without the expectation of changing or any real desire to change. The eternal essence.

With Verona he sounded fatherly again and firm. He consoled Tinka, who satisfactorily pointed the excitement of the hour by wailing. He ordered early breakfast and wanted to look at the newspaper and felt somehow heroic and useful in not looking at it. But there was still crawling and totally unheroic hours of waiting before Dr. Patton returned. Don't see much change, said Patton. I'll be back about eleven, and if you don't mind,

I think I'll bring some other world-famous pill peddler for consultation, just to be on a safe side. Now, George, there's nothing you can do. I'll have Verona keep the icebag filled. Might as well leave that on, I guess. And you? You better beat it to the office instead of standing around her looking as if you were the patient.

The nerve of husbands. A lot more derotic than women. They always have to horn in and get all the credit for feeling bad when their wives are ailing. Now have another nice cup of coffee and get. Under this derision, Babbit became more matter of fact. He drove to the office, tried to dictate letters, tried to telephone, and, before the call was answered, forgot to whom he was telephoning.

At a quarter after ten, he returned home. As he left the downtown traffic and sped up the car, his face was as grimly creased as the mask of tragedy. His wife greeted him with surprise. Why, did you come back, dear? I think I'd feel a little better. I told Verona to skip off to her office. Was it wicked of me to go and get sick?

He knew that she wanted petting, and she got it, joyously. They were curiously happy when he heard Dr. Patton's car in front. He looked out of the window. He was frightened. With Patton was an impatient man with turbulent black hair

and a hussar mustache. Dr. A.I. Dilling, the surgeon. Babbit sputtered with anxiety, tried to conceal it, and hurried down to the door. Dr. Patton was profusely casual. Don't want to worry, old man, but I thought it might be a good stunt to have Dr. Dilling examine her. He gestured toward Dilling as toward a master. Dilling nodded in his Curtis manner and strode upstairs. Babette tramped the living room in agony.

except for his wife's confinements, there had never been a major operation in the family, and to him surgery was at once a miracle and an abomination of fear. But when Dilling and Patton came down again, he knew that everything was all right, and he wanted to laugh, for the two doctors were exactly like

the bearded physicians in a musical comedy, both of them rubbing their hands and looking foolishly sagacious. Dr. Dilling spoke. I'm sorry, old man, but it's acute appendicitis. We ought to operate. Of course, you must decide, but there's no question as to what has to be done. Babbitt did not get all the force of it, he mumbled.

Well, I suppose we get ready in a couple of days. Probably Ted ought to come down from the university just in case anything happened. Dr. Dilling growled, nope, if you don't want paratinoidus to set in. We have got to operate right away. I must advise it strongly. If you say, go ahead, I'll phone for the St. Mary's ambulance at once, and we'll have her on the table in three quarters of an hour. Of course, I suppose you know what, but great God, man, I can't get her clothes ready and everything in two seconds, you know, and in her state, so rot up and weak. Just throw her hairbrush and comb and toothbrush in a bag.

That's all she'll need for a day or two, said Dr. Dilling, and went to the telephone. Babbitt galloped desperately upstairs. He sent the frightened tinker out of the room. He said gaily to his wife, Well, the doc thinks maybe we better have a little operation and get it over. Just take a few minutes, not half as serious as a confinement, and you'll be all right in a jiffy. She gripped his hand till the fingers ached.

She said patiently like a coward child, I am afraid to go into the dark hall alone. Maturity was wiped from her eyes. They were pleading and terrified. You stay with me. Darling, you don't have to go to the office now, do you? Could you just go down to the hospital with me? Could you come see me this evening if everything's all right?

You won't have to go out this evening, will you? He was on his knees by the bed. While she feebly ruffled his hair, he saw, He kissed the lawn of her sleeve and swore, Oh, well, honey, I'd love you more than anything in the world. I've kind of been worried by business and everything, but that's all over now, and I'm back again. Are you really, Georgie?

I was thinking lying here, maybe it would be a good thing if I just went. I was wondering if anybody really needed me or wanted me. I was wondering what was the use of my living. I've been getting so stupid and ugly. Why, you old humbug, fishing for compliments, when I ought to be packing your bag, me, sure, I'm young and handsome and a regular village cut up, and he could not go on.

He sobbed again, and in muttered incoherencies, they found each other. As he packed, his brain was curiously clear and swift. He'd have no more wild evenings, he realized. He admitted that he would regret them. A little grimly, he perceived that this had been his last despiring fling before the paralyzed contentment of middle age. Well, and he grinned impusciously,

It was one doggone good party while it lasted. And how much was the operation going to cost? I ought to have fought that out with Dilling, but no, damn it, I don't care how much it cost. The motor ambulance was at the door. Even in his grief, the Babbitt who admired all technical excellences, was interested in the kindly skill with which the attendant slid Mrs. Babbitt upon a stretcher and carried her downstairs.

The ambulance was a huge, suave, varnished white thing. Mrs. Babbitt moaned. It frightens me. It's just like a hearse. Just like being put in a hearse. I want you to stay with me. I'll be right up front with her driver. Babbit promised,

"'I want you to stay inside with me,' to the attendants. "'Can he be inside?' "'Sure, ma'am, you bet. There's a fine little camp-stool in there,' the older attendant said, with professional pride. He sat beside her in the traveling cabin with its cot, its stool, its active little electric radiator, and its quite unexplained calendar,

displaying a girl eating cherries and the name of an enterprising grocer. But as he flung out his hand in hopeless, cheerfulness. It touched the radiator, and he squealed. Oh, Jesus! My George Babbitt, I won't have you cursing and swearing and blaspheming. Oh, awful, sorry, but gosh, all facehooks. Look how I burned my hand. Gee whiz, it hurts. It hurts. It hurts like mischief. Why, that damn radio is hot as it's hot as, it's hotter than the hinges I hate it. Look, you can see a mark. So, as they drove up to St. Mary's hospital with the nurses already laying out the instruments for an operable,

to save her life, it was she who consoled him and kissed the place to make it well. And though he tried to be gruff and mature, he yielded to Hearn and was glad to be babied. The ambulance whirled under the hooded carriage entrance of the hospital, and instantly he was reduced to a zero in the nightmare succession of cork-floored halls, endless doors open an old woman sitting up in a bed, an elevator, an anesthesizing room. A young intern, contemptuous of husbands. He was permitted to kiss his wife.

He saw a thin, dark nurse fit the cone over her mouth and nose. He stiffened at a sweet and treacherous odor. Then he was driven out, and on a high stool in a laboratory, he sat dazed, longing to see her once again, to insist that he had always loved her, had never for a second loved anybody else or looked at anybody else, In the laboratory, he was conscious only of a decayed object preserved in a bottle of yellowing alcohol. It made him very sick, but he could not take his eyes from it.

He was more aware of it than of waiting. His mind floated in abeyance, coming back always to that horrible bottle. To escape it, he opened the door to the right, hoping to find a sane and business-like office. He realized that he was looking into the operating room, in one glance. He took in, Dr. Dilling, strange and white gown and bandaged head, bending over the steel table with its screws and wheels, then nurses holding basins and cotton sponges, and the swat thing, just a lifeless chin, an amount of white in the midst of which was a square of sallow flesh with a gash a little bloody on the edges, protruding from the gash, a cluster of forceps like clinging parasites.

He shut the door with haste. It may be that his frightened repentance of the night and morning had not eaten in, but this dehumanizing interment of her, who had been so pathetically human, shook him utterly. And as he crouched again on the high stool and laboratory, he swore faith to his wife, to Zenith, to business efficiency, to the Boosters Club, to every faith of the clan of good fellows. Then a nurse was soothing all over perfect success. She'll come out fine. She'll be out from under anesthetics soon and you can see her. He found her on a curious, tilted bed, her face and unwholesome yellow, but her purple lips moving slightly. Then only did he really believe

that she was alive. She was muttering. He bent and heard her sighing, hard to get real maple syrup for pancakes. He laughed inexhaustibly. He beamed on the nurse and proudly confided, Think of her, talking about maple syrup. By golly, I'm going to go and order 100 gallons of it, right from Vermont. Two.

She was out of the hospital in 17 days. He went to see her each afternoon, and in their long talks they drifted back to intimacy. once he hidden something of his relations to Tannis and the bunch, and she was inflated by the view that a wicked woman had captivated her poor George. If once he had doubted his neighbors and the supreme charm of the good fellows,

he was convinced now, you didn't, he noted, see Seneca Done coming around with any flowers or dropping into chat with the missus. But Mrs. Howard Littlefield brought to the hospital her priceless wine jelly, flavored with real wine. Orville Jones spent hours

in picking out the kind of novels Mrs. Babbit-Light, nice love stories about New York millionaires and Wyoming cowpunchers. Luetta Swanson did it a pink bedjacket. Sidney Finkelstein and his merry brown-eyed flapper of a wife selected the prettiest nightgown in all the stock of Partur and Stein. All his friends ceased whispering about him, suspecting him.

At the athletic club, they ask after her daily. Club members whose names he did not know stopped him to inquire. How's your good lady getting on? Babbit felt that he was swinging from bleak uplands down into the rich warm air of a valley, pleasant with cottages. One noon, Virgil Gunch suggested, You planning to go to the hospital about six? The wife and I thought we'd drop in.

It did drop in. Gunch was so humorous that Mrs. Babbitt said he must stop making her laugh because honestly it was hurting the her incision. As they passed down the hall, Gunch demanded amiably, George Old Scout, you were sore-headed about something here a while back. I don't know why. And it's none of my business, but you seem to be feeling all hunky-dory again and, why don't you come join us in the good citizens' league, old man? We have some quirking times together. and we need your advice.

Then did Babbitt almost cheerful with joy at being coaxed instead of bullied, at being permitted to stop fighting, at being able to desert without injuring his opinion of himself, cease utterly to be a domestic revolutionist. He patted Gunch his shoulder, and next day he became a member of the Good Citizens League. Within two weeks, no one in the league was more violent

regarding the wickedness of Seneca Dome, The crimes of labor unions, the perils of immigration, and the delights of golf, morality, and bank accounts then was George F. Babbitt. End of Chapter 33. Chapter 34 of Babette. This Labor Vox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Mike Vendetti, Mike Vendetti.com. By Sinclair Lewis, Chapter 34. 1. The Good Citizens League. League had spread through the country, but nowhere was it so effective and well-esteem as

in the cities of the type of zenith, commercial cities, of a few hundred thousand inhabitants, most of which, though not all, lay inland against a background of cornfields and mines, and of small towns which depended upon them for mortgage loans, table manners, art, social philosophy, and millinery. To the League belonged most of the prosperous citizens of Zenith. They were not all of the kind who called themselves regular guys. Besides these hardy fellows, these salesmen of prosperity, there were the aristocrats,

that is, the men who were richer or had been rich for more generations, the presidents of banks and factories, the landowners, the corporation lawyers, the fashionable doctors, and the few young old men who worked, not at all, but reluctantly remaining in Sceneth collected lustreware, and first editions as though they were back in Paris. All of them agreed that the working classes must be kept in their place, and all of them perceived that American democracy did not imply any equality of wealth,

but did demand a wholesome sameness of thought, dress, painting, morals, and vocableness. In this, they were like the ruling class of any other country, particularly of Great Britain, but they differed in being more vigorous and in actually trying to produce the accepted standards which all classes everywhere desire, but usually despair and realizing. The longest struggle of the Good Citizens League was against the open shot, which was secretly a struggle against all union labor, accompanying it was an Americanization movement with evening classes in English and history and economics

and daily articles in the newspapers so that newly arrived foreigners might learn that the true blue and 100% American way of settling labor troubles was for workmen to trust and love their employers. The League was more than generous in approving other organizations which agreed with its aims. It helped the YMCA to raise a $200,000 fund for a new building. Babbitt, Virgil Gunch, Sidney Finkelstein, and even Charles McKelvey,

told the spectators at movie theaters how great an influence for manly Christianity, the good old Y, had been in their own lives, and the horror and mighty Colonel Redford Snow, owner of the Advocate Times, was photographed clasping the hands of Sheldon Smith of the YMCA. It is true that afterwards when Smith lips, you must come to one of our prayer meetings, the ferocious colonel bellowed, What the hell would I do that for?

Got to borrow my own. But this did not appear in the public prints. The League was of value to the American Legion at a time when certain of the lesser and looser newspapers were criticizing that organization of veterans of the Great War. One evening a number of young men raided the Zenith Socialist headquarters, burned its records, beat the office staff, and agreeably dumped desks out of the window. All the newspapers, save the Advocate Times and the evening advocate,

attributed this valuable but perhaps hasty direct action to the American Legion. Then a flying squadron from the Good Citizens League called on the unfair papers and explained that no ex-soldier could possibly do such a thing. and the editors saw their light and retained their advertising. When Zenith's lone conscientious abjector came home from prison and was righteously run out of town, the newspapers referred to the perpetrators as an unidentified mob. Two.

In all the activities and triumphs of the Good Citizens League, Babit took part and completely won back to self-respect, placidity, and the affection of his friends. But he began to protest. "'Bus, I've done my share in cleaning up the city. I want to tend to business. They all just kind of slacken up on this GCL stuff now.' He had returned to the church as he had returned to the Boosters Club.

He had even endured the lavish greeting which Sheldon Smith gave him. He was worried, least during his late discontent, he had imperiled his salvation. He was not quite sure there was a half. heaven to be attained. But Dr. John Jonathan Drew said there was, and Babbitt was not going to take a chance. One evening, when he was walking past Dr. Drew's parsonage, he impulsively went in and found a pastor in his study. Just a minute getting a phone call, said Dr. Drew in business-like tones, then aggressively to the telephone. Hello? Hello? This Berkeley and heinous, Reverend Drew speaking.

"'Where the Dickens is the proof for next Sunday's calendar. "'Huh? You ought to have it here. "'Well, I can't help but they're all sick. "'I've got to have it tonight. "'Get an AT-T, boy, and shoot it up here quick.' "'He turned without slacking his briskness. "'Well, Brother Babbitt, what can I do for you?' "'I just want to ask.

"'Tell you how it is. "'Dominie, there a while ago, I guess I got kind of slack. "' Took a few drinks and so on. What I wanted to ask is, how is it if a fellow cuts that all out and comes back to his senses? Does it sort of, well, you might say, does it score against him in the long run? Reverend Drew was suddenly interested. And, uh, brother, what other things, too? Women?

No, practically, you might say, practically, not at all. Don't hesitate to tell me, brother. That's what I'm here for. Been going on joy rides, squeezing girls in cars? The Reverend's eyes glisten. Oh, no. Well, I'll tell you, I've got a deputation from the Don't Make Prohibition a Joke Association coming to see me in a quarter of an hour,

and one from the Anti-Birth Control Union at a quarter of ten. He busily grants to his watch, but I can take five minutes off and pray with you, kneel right down by your chair, brother. Don't be ashamed to seek the guidance of God. God. Babbit's scalp itched and he longed to flee, but Dr. Drew had already flopped down beside his desk chair, and his voice had changed from rasping efficiency to an uncutious familiarity

with sin and with the Almighty. Babbitt also knelt while Drew gloated. O Lord, thou seest our brother here who has been led astray by manifold temptations. O Heavenly Father, make his heart to do you. be pure, as pure as a little child's. Oh, let him know again the joy of a manly courage to abstain from evil. Sheldon Smith came flocking into the study. At the sight of the two men he smirked, forgivingly, patted Babbitt on his shoulder, and knelt beside him, his arm about him, while he authorized Dr. Drew's imprecations with moans of,

Yes, Lord, help our brother, Lord. Though he was trying to keep his eyes closed, with Babbitt squinted between his fingers and saw the pastor glance at his watch, as he concluded with a triumphant, and let him never be afraid to come to us for counsel and tender care, and let him know that the church can lead him as a little lamb. Dr. Drew sprang up, rolled his eyes in the general direction of heaven, chucked his watch into his pocket, and demanded. Has the deputation come yet, Sheldie?

Yep, right outside, Sheldie answered. with equivocal liveliness, then caressingly to Babbitt, Brother, if it would help, I'd love to go into the next room and pray with you while Dr. Drew is receiving the brothers from the Don't Make a Prohibition of Joke Association. No, thanks, I can't take the time. Yelp Babbit rushing toward the door. Thereafter, he was often seen at the Catham Road Presbyterian Church, but it is recorded that he avoided shaking hands with a pastor at the door.

3. If his moral fiber had been so weakened by rebellion that he was not quite dependable, in the more rigorous campaigns of the Good Citizens League, nor quite appreciative of the church, yet there was no doubt of the joy with which Babbitt returned to the pleasures of his home and of the athletic club, the boosters and elks. Verona and Kenneth Escott were eventually and hesitatingly married. For the wedding, Babette was dressed as carefully as was Verona. He was crammed into the morning coat he wore to tease thrice a year. And with a certain relief after Verona and Kenneth had driven away in a limousine, he returned to the house, removed the morning coat,

sat with his aching feet up on the Davenport, and reflected that his wife and he could have the living room to themselves now, and not have to listen to Verona and Kenneth worrying in a cultured collegiate manner about minimum wages and the drama league. but even this sinking into peace was less consoling than his return to being one of the best loved men in the Boosters Club. Four. President Willis Igems began the Boosters Club luncheon

by standing quiet and staring at them so unhappily that they feared he was about to announce the death of a Brother Booster. He spoke slowly then and gravely. Boys, I have something shocking to reveal to you. something terrible about one of our own members. Several boosters, including Babbitt, looked a little disconcerted. A night of the grip, a trusted friend of mine, recently made a trip upstate,

and in a certain town where a certain boosters spent his boyhood, he found out something which can no longer be concealed. In fact, he discovered the inward nature of a man whom we have accepted as a real guy in one of us. Gentlemen, I cannot trust my voice to see it, so I've written it down. He uncovered a large blackboard and on it in huge capitals was the legend. George Falunus Babbitt, O U. Folly. The boosters cheered, they laughed, they wept, they threw rolls at Babbitt, they cried,

Speech, oh, you folly! President I. Gems continued, That gentleman is the awful thing George E. Babbitt has been concealing all these years when we thought he was just plain George F. Now, I want you to tell us, talking in turn, what you've always supposed the F. stood for. Fliver, they suggested, in frog face and flathead,

and financiers and free zone and flapidoodle and foggorn, By joviality of their insults, Babbitt knew that he had been taken back to their hearts, and happily he rose. "'Boys, I've got to admit it, I've never worn a wristwatch or parted my name in the middle. But I will confess to Follensby. My only justification is that my old dad, though otherwise he was perfectly sane and packed an awful wallop when it came to trimming the city fathers at Chequers.

Name me after the family Doc. Oh, Doc Ambrose Follensby. I apologize, boys. In my next, what do you call it? I'll see to it that I get named something really practical. Something that sounds swell and yet is good and virile.

Something, in fact, like that grand old name so familiar to every household, that bold and almost overpowering name, Willis, Jimmy Jams, I-Jams. He knew by the cheer that he was secure again and popular. He knew that he would no more endanger his security and popularity

by straying from the clan of good fellows. Five. Henry Thompson dashed into the office clamming. Georgie, big news. Jake Offutt says the traction bunch are dissatisfied with the way Sanders, Tory, and Wing handle their last deal. and they're willing to dicker with us. Babbit was pleased in the realization

that the last scar of his rebellion was healed. Yet as he drove home, he was annoyed by such background's thought as had never weakened him in his days of belligerent conformity. He discovered that he actually did not consider the traction group quite honest. Well, he'd carry out one more deal for them,

but as soon as it was practicable, Maybe as soon as old Henry Thompson died, he'd break away from all association from them. He was 48, and 12 years he'd be 60. He wanted to leave a clean business to his grandchildren. Of course, there was a lot of money in negotiating for the traction people, and a fellow had to look at things in a practical way, and only he wiggled uncomfortably. He wanted to tell the traction group what he thought of them. Oh, he couldn't do it.

None now. If he offended them this second time, they would crue. crush him, but... He was conscious that his line of progress seemed confused. He wondered what he would do with his future. He was still young. Was he through with all adventuring? He felt that he had been trapped into the very net from which he had with such fury escaped

and supremest jest of all been made to rejoice in the trapping. "'Have lick me. Lick me to a finish,' he whimpered. The house was peaceful that evening and he enjoyed a game of pinnuckle with his wife. He indignantly told a tempter that he was content to do things in a good old-fashioned way. The day after, he went to see the purchasing agent of the Street Traction Company, and they made plans for the secret purchase of lots along the Everson Road. But as he drove to his office, he struggled,

I'm going to run things and figure out things to suit myself when I retire. Six. Ted had come down from the university for the weekend. Though he no longer spoke of mechanical engineering and though he was resident about his opinion of his instructors, he seemed no more reconciled to college, and his chief interest was his wireless telephone set. On Saturday evening he took Eunice Littlefield to a dance at Devon Woods.

Babette had a glimpse of her, bouncing in the seat of the car, brilliant in a scarlet cloak with over a frock of thinnest creamy silk. They, too, had not returned when the Babbitts went to bed. At half-past eleven, at a blurred indefinite time of late night, Babbitt was awakened by the ring of the telephone

and gloomily crawled downstairs. Howard Littlefield was speaking. George, Emmy isn't back yet, is Ted? No, at least his door is open. They ought to be home. Eunice said the dance would be over at midnight. What's the name of those people where they're going? Well, gosh, tell the truth, I don't know.

Howard did some classmate of Ted's out in Devon Woods. Don't see what we can do. We all skip up and ask Mary if she knows her name. Babbitt turned on the light in Ted's room. It was a brown boyish room, disordered dresser, worn books, a high school pennant, photographs of basketball teams and baseball teams. Ted was decidedly not there.

Mrs. Babbit awakened irritably, observed that she certainly did not know the name of Ted's host, that it was late that Howard Littlefield was but little better than a born fool, and that she was sleepy. But she remained awake and worrying while Babbitt, on the sleeping porch, struggled back into sleep through the incessant soft rain of her remarks. It was after dawn when he was aroused by her shaking, him and calling her, George, George, and something like horror. What is it? Come here, quick, and see, be quiet.

She led him down the hall to the door of Ted's room and pushed it gently open. On the worn brown rug, she saw a fourth of rose-colored chiffon lingerie on the sedate morse chair, a girl's silver slipper, and on the pillows were two sleepy heads, Ted's and to Eunice's. Ted woke to grin and mutter with unconvincing defiant. Good morning. Let me introduce my wife, Mrs. Theodore Roosevelt, Eunice Littlefield, Babit. Esquiris.

Good God, from Babbitt and from his wife a long-willing. I have gone in. We got married last evening. Wife, sit up and say pretty good morning to mother-in-law. But Eunice hit her shoulders and her charming wild hair under the pillow. By nine o'clock, the assembly, which was, gathered about Ted and Eunice in the living room included Mr. and Mrs. George

Abbott, Doctor and Mrs. Howard Littlefield, Mr. and Mrs. Kenneth Scott, Mr. and Mrs. Henry T. Thompson and Tinkababat, who was the only pleased member of the Inquisition. A crackling shower of phrases filled a room. At their age, ought to be a knelt. Never heard of such

a thing. Fault of both of them. Keeping out of the papers. Ought to be packed off to school. Do something about it at once, and what I say is damn good old-fashioned spanking. Worst of them all was Rona. Dad! Some way must be found to make you understand how dreadfully serious this is,

instead of standing around with that silly, fully smile on your face. He began to revolt. "'Well, like Ron, you got married yourself, didn't you? That's entirely different. You bet it is. They didn't have to work on you. you and me with a chain and tackled to get us to hold hands. Now, young man, we'll have no more flippancy, old Henry Thompson ordered.

You listen to me. You listen to grandfather, said Verona. You listen to your grandfather, said Mrs. Babbitt. Dad, you listen to Mr. Thompson, said Howard Littlefield. Oh, for the love of Mike, I am listening, Ted shouted. But you look here, all of you. I'm getting sick and tired of being the corpse and post-mortem. If you want to kill somebody, go kill a preacher that married us. Why, he stung me

five dollars, and all the money I had in the world was six dollars and two bits. I'm getting just about enough of being hollered at. A new voice, booming, authoritative, dominated the room. It was Babbitt. Yep, there's two darn many putting in the roar. Rhone, you dry up. Howard and I are still pretty strong and able to do our own cussing. Ted, come into the dining room and we'll talk this over. In the dining room, the door firmly closed. Babbitt walked to his son, put both hands on his shoulders. You're, uh, more or less right. They all talk too much. Now what do you plan to do, old man? Gosh, dad. Are you really going to be human? Well, I remember one time you called us the babbit man and said we ought to stick together. I want to. I don't pretend to think this isn't

serious the way the cards are stacked against a young fellow today. I can't say I'll prove of early marriages, but you couldn't have married a better girl than Eunice. And way I figure it, Littlefield is darn lucky to get a babbitt for a son-law. But what are you planning to do? Of course you could go right ahead with the you, and when you finished... Dad, I can't stand it anymore. Maybe it's all right for some fellows. Maybe I'll want to go back someday, but me, I want to get into mechanics. I think I'll get to be a good inventor. There's a fellow that would give me $20 a week in a factory right now.

Well, Babbitt crossed the floor slowly, ponderously, seeming a little old. I've always wanted you to have a college degree. He meditatively stomped across the floor again. But I've never, now for heaven's sake, don't repeat this to your mother or she'd remove what little hair I got left, but practically, I've never done a single thing I've wanted to in my whole life. I don't know as I've accomplished anything except just get along. Figure out I've made about a quarter of an inch out of a possible hundred rods. Well, maybe you'll carry things out further. I don't know. But I do get kind of a sneaking pleasure out of the fact that you know what

you want to do and you did it. Well, those folks in there will try to bully you and tame you down. Tell them to go to the devil. I'll back you. Take your factory job if you want to. Don't be scared of the family. No, nor all of Zenith, nor of yourself. The way I've been. Go ahead, old man. World is yours. Arms about each other's shoulders, the Babbitt men marched into the living room and faced the swooping family. End of Chapter 34. End of Babit by Sinclair Lewis.