Babbitt

"I bet I know your name!"

"Well, now, not necessarily. Of course--Oh, it isn"t so specially well known."

"Aren"t you Mr. Sondheim that travels for the Krackajack Kitchen Kutlery Ko.?"

"I am not! I"m Mr. Babbitt, the real-estate broker!"

"Oh, excuse me! Oh, of course. You mean here in Zenith."

"Yep." With the briskness of one whose feelings have been hurt.

"Oh, sure. I"ve read your ads. They"re swell."

"Um, well--You might have read about my speeches."

"Course I have! I don"t get much time to read but--I guess you think I"m an awfully silly little nit!"

"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 censorious 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 a little dinner together some evening."

"I don"t know as I ought to but--My gentleman-friend"s always wanting to take me out. But maybe I could to-night."

IV

There was no reason, he a.s.sured himself, why he shouldn"t have a quiet dinner with a poor girl who would benefit by a.s.sociation with an educated and mature person like himself. But, lest some one see them and not understand, he would take her to Biddlemeier"s 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 complaisant; her bare shoulders showed it only too clearly; but he"d be hanged if he"d make love to 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 angriest glower 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 taxicab. There was something at once wealthy and interestingly wicked about a taxicab.

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 to-night."

"Oh," she remarked, as one who had heard that tale before.

All the way out to Biddlemeier"s Inn he tried to talk as an old friend, but he could not pierce the wall of her words. With interminable indignation she narrated her retorts to "that fresh head-barber" and the drastic things she would do to him if he persisted in saying that she was "better at ga.s.sing than at hoof-paring."

At Biddlemeier"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 drive some other place, where we can get a drink and dance!" he demanded.

"Sure, some other night. But I promised Ma I"d be home early to-night."

"Rats! It"s too nice to go home."

"I"d just love to, but Ma 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 Inn, singing, "Come on, Georgie, we"ll have a nice drive and get cool."

It was a night of lovers. All along the highway into Zenith, under the low and gentle moon, motors were parked and dim figures were clasped in revery. He held out hungry hands to Ida, and when she patted them he was grateful. There was no sense of struggle and 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? Not 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 Ittle Mama scold! 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 nighty-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 the Rev. Dr. John Jennison Drew he was a wicked man, and from the standpoint of Miss Ida Putiak, an old bore who had to be endured as the penalty attached to eating a large dinner.

"Dearie, you aren"t going to go and 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? Me peevish? Why, you baby, why should I be peevish?

Now, listen, Ida; listen to Uncle George. I want to put you wise about this sc.r.a.pping 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 good-night briefly and amiably, but as the taxicab drove off he was praying "Oh, my G.o.d!"

CHAPTER XXV

I

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 ragam.u.f.fin like Ida Putiak! 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 a.s.sured himself, he was "through with this chasing after girls."

By noontime he was not so sure even of that. If in Miss McGoun, 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 hunted by the ancient thought that somewhere must exist the not impossible she who would understand him, value him, and make him happy.

II

Mrs. Babbitt returned in August.

On her previous absences he had missed her rea.s.suring buzz and of her arrival he had made a fete. 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 embarra.s.sed by the need of meeting her and looking joyful.

He loitered 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 the cement platform, peering into the chair-cars, and as he saw her in the line of pa.s.sengers 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.

Tinka 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"ll bet the kid will be the best chuffer in the family! She holds the 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.