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
away 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 the Zeeco Car 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 breathes
in every line. Listen, brother! You’ll
never know what the high art of hiking is till you
try life’s ZIPPINGEST zest—the
Zeeco!”
“Yes,” Frink 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 sighed with sympathy and admiration.
Babbitt was fond of his friends, he loved the
importance of being host and shouting, “Certainly,
you’re going to have smore chicken—the
idea!” and he appreciated the genius of T. Cholmondeley
Frink, but the vigor of the cocktails was gone, and
the more he ate the less joyful he felt. Then
the amity of the dinner was destroyed by the nagging
of the Swansons.
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 dish-washers and vacuum
cleaners, and tiled kitchen walls, their houses were
so convenient that they had little housework, and
much of their food came from bakeries and delicatessens.
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 Swansons 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 call
it a swell little dress.”
