FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   26   27   28   29   30   31   32   33   34   35   36   37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50  
51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   >>   >|  
approve of him, and Aunt Mirabelle would have to revise her estimate of him. Altogether, it was a fine arrangement, provided that his business, whatever it was, wouldn't entirely prevent him from keeping up with the procession, socially, and playing enough golf to hold his present form. He had passed 331 and 341 and 351 and his heart began to beat more rapidly. This was almost as exciting as a Christmas stocking in the Fauntleroy days. His eyes were searching among the numbers; there was a four-story office building (335) and an automobile agency (339) ... and next to that--.... Henry halted, and the laugh dried up in his throat. He had been prepared for anything but the reality. The ark of his fortunes was a shabby little motion-picture theatre. Gasping, he looked up again at the number, and when he realized that he had made no mistake, his knees turned to gelatine, and he stood staring, fascinated, numbed. His eyes wandered blankly from the crumbling ticket-booth to the unkempt lobby and back to the lurid billing--the current attraction was a seven-reel thriller entitled "What He Least Expected," but Henry missed the parallel. With trembling fingers he produced a cigarette, but in his daze he blew out two matches in succession. He crushed the cigarette in his palm, and moved a few steps towards the lobby. Great Heaven, was it possible that John Starkweather had condemned Henry the fashionable, Henry the clubable, Henry the exclusive to a year of _this_? Was _this_ his punishment for the past? Was _this_ the price of his future? This picayune sordidness, and vulgarity and decay? Evidently, it was so intended, and so ordered. His power of reason was almost atrophied. He struggled to understand his uncle's purpose; his uncle's logic. To break down his class prejudice, and teach him the dimes in a dollar, and put him on the level of a workingman? All that could have been accomplished by far less drastic methods. It could have been accomplished by a tour of duty with Bob. To be sure, Mr. Starkweather had promised him the meanest job in the directory, but Henry had put it down as a figure of speech. Now, he was faced with the literal interpretation of it, and ahead of him there was a year of trial, and then all or nothing. He succeeded in lighting a fresh cigarette, but he couldn't taste it. Previously he had paid his forfeits with the best of good-nature, but his previous forfeits hadn't obliged him to declass him
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   26   27   28   29   30   31   32   33   34   35   36   37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50  
51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

cigarette

 

forfeits

 
accomplished
 

Starkweather

 
reason
 

struggled

 
understand
 

atrophied

 

ordered

 
vulgarity

Evidently

 

arrangement

 
intended
 

Altogether

 

prejudice

 

dollar

 

purpose

 

estimate

 

sordidness

 
picayune

Heaven

 
succession
 

crushed

 

wouldn

 

condemned

 

punishment

 

future

 

provided

 

business

 

fashionable


clubable

 

exclusive

 

revise

 
succeeded
 
lighting
 

literal

 

interpretation

 

couldn

 

previous

 

obliged


declass
 

nature

 

Previously

 

approve

 

drastic

 
methods
 

Mirabelle

 

matches

 

workingman

 

directory