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Файл:Бэббитт. Книга для чтения на английском языке
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Babbitt
jump up and hug me. Hes one of these woodsmen; too
wise to go yelping and talking your arm off like a cityman.
But get him back in the mountains, out on the trail !
Thats real living!
IV
Joe reported at Babbitts cabin at nine the next morning.
Babbitt greeted him as a fellow caveman:
Well, Joe, how d you feel about hitting the trail, and
getting away from these darn soft summerites and these
women and all?
All right, Mr Babbitt.
What do you say we go over to Box Car Pond they
tell me the shack there isnt being used and camp out?
Well, all right, Mr Babbitt, but its nearer to Skowtuit
Pond, and you can get just about as good fishing there.
No, I want to get into the real wilds.
Well, all right.
Well 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 Chogue. We can go all the way by motor
boat flat-bottom boat with an Evinrude.
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 em what you want for eats. Ill be ready
soon s you are.
Most of the sports go by boat, Mr Babbitt. Its a long
walk.
Look here, Joe: are you objecting to walking?
Oh, no, I guess I can do it. But I havent tramped that
far for sixteen years. Most of the sports go by boat. But
I can do it if you say so I guess. Joe walked away in
sadness.
Babbitt 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
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Sinclair Lewis
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, the ferns, the sudden groves of white birch. He
became credulous again, and rejoiced in sweating. When
he stopped to rest he chuckled, Guess were hitting it up
pretty good for a couple o old birds, eh?
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 dont
appreciate how lucky you are to live in woods like this,
instead of a city with trolleys grinding and typewriters
clacking and people bothering the life out of you all the
time! I wish I knew the woods like you do. Say, whats the
name of that little red flower?
Rubbing his back, Joe regarded the flower resentfully
Well, some folks call it one thing and some calls it
another I always just call it Pink Flower.
Babbitt blessedly ceased thinking as tramping turned
into blind plodding. 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 a sun-scourged mile of corduroy tote-road
through a swamp where flies hovered over a hot waste of
brush, they reached the cool shore of Box Car 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-bosomed maple tree near
the guest-shack, and joyously felt sleep running through
his veins.
He awoke toward dusk, to find Joe efficiently cooking
bacon and eggs and flapjacks for supper, and his admiration
of the woodsman returned. He sat on a stump and felt
virile.
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 chewed his cud a
second, and bubbled, Ive often thought of that! If I had
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Babbitt
the money, Id go down to Tinkers 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 mosquitos. Save the snoring guide, there
was no other human being within ten miles. He was
lonelier than he had ever been in his life. Then he was in
Zenith.
He was worrying as to whether Miss McGoun wasnt
paying too much for carbon paper. He was at once
resenting and missing the persistent teasing at the
Roughnecks Table. He was wondering what Zilla Riesling
was doing now. He was wondering whether, after the
summers maturity of being a garageman, Ted would get
busy in the university. He was thinking of his wife. If
she would only if she wouldnt be so darn satisfied with
just settling down No! I wont! I wont go back! Ill be
fifty in three years. Sixty in thirteen years. Im going to
have some fun before its too late. I dont care! I will!
He thought of Ida Putiak, of Louetta Swanson, of that
nice widow what was her name? Tanis Judique? the
one for whom hed found the flat. He was enmeshed in
imaginary conversations. Then:
Gee, I cant seem to get away from thinking about
folks!
Thus it came to him merely to run away was folly,
because he could never run away from himself.
That moment he started for Zenith. In his journey there
was no appearance of flight, but he was fleeing, and four
days afterward 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 Im going to oh, Im going to start something! he
vowed, and he tried to make it valiant.
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Sinclair Lewis
Chapter XXVI
I
As he walked through the train, looking for familiar
faces, he saw only one person whom he knew, and that
was Seneca Doane, the lawyer who, after the blessings of
being in Babbitts own class at college and of becoming a
corporation-counsel, had turned crank, had headed farmerlabor 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 Pullmans he
could find no other acquaintance, and reluctantly he halted.
Seneca Doane was a slight, thin-haired man, rather like
Chum Frink except that he hadnt Frinks grin. He was
reading a book called The Way of All Flesh. It looked
religious to Babbitt, and he wondered if Doane could
possibly have been converted and turned decent and patriotic.
Why, hello, Doane, he said.
Doane looked up. His voice was curiously kind. Oh!
How do, Babbitt.
Been away, eh?
Yes, Ive been in Washington.
Washington, eh? Hows the old Government making
out?
Its Wont you sit down?
Thanks. Dont care if I do. Well, well! Been quite a
while since Ive had a good chance to talk to you, Doane.
I was, uh Sorry you didnt turn up at the last classdinner.
Oh-thanks.
Hows the unions coming? Going to run for mayor
again? Doane seemed restless. He was fingering the pages
of his book. He said I might as though it didnt mean
anything in particular, and he smiled.
Babbitt liked that smile, and hunted for conversation:
Saw a bang-up cabaret in New York: the Good-Morning
Cutie bunch at the Hotel Minton.
Yes, theyre pretty girls. I danced there one evening.
Oh. Like dancing?
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Babbitt
Naturally. I like dancing and pretty women and good
food better than anything else in the world. Most men do.
But gosh, Doane, I thought you fellows wanted to take
all the good eats and everything away from us.
No. Not at all. What Id like to see is the meetings of
the Garment Workers held at the Ritz, with a dance
afterward. Isnt that reasonable?
Yuh, might be good idea, all right. Well Shame I
havent seen more of you, recent years. Oh, say, hope you
havent held it against me, my bucking you as mayor,
going on the stump for Prout. You see, Im an organization
Republican, and I kind of felt
Theres no reason why you shouldnt fight me. I have
no doubt youre good for the Organization. I remember
in college you were an unusually liberal, sensitive chap. I
can still recall your 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. Im sure you inspired us all.
Well... Well... Ive always aimed to be liberal. Babbitt
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 Doane as he rumbled,
Trouble with a lot of these fellows, even the live wires and
some of em that think theyre forward-looking, is they
arent broad-minded and liberal. Now, I always believe in
giving the other fellow a chance, and listening to his ideas.
Thats fine.
Tell you how I figure it. A little opposition is good for
all of us, so a fellow, especially if hes a business man 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 Im pretty
visionary, but I just let em think what they want to and
go right on same as you do... By golly, this is nice to
have a chance to sit and visit and kind of, you might say,
brush up on our ideals.
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Sinclair Lewis
But of course we visionaries do rather get beaten.
Doesnt it bother you?
Not a bit! Nobody can dictate to me what I think!
Youre the man I want to help me. I want you to talk
to some of the business men and try to make them a little
more liberal in their attitude toward poor Beecher Ingram.
Ingram? But, why, hes this nut preacher that got
kicked out of the Congregationalist Church, isnt he, and
preaches free love and sedition?
This, Doane explained, was indeed the general conception
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! Ill call down any of the boys I hear getting
funny about Ingram, Babbitt said affectionately to his dear
friend Doane.
Doane 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
Piccoli. Babbitt had always supposed that Doane associated
only with the I.W.W., but now he nodded gravely, as one
who knew Lord Wycombes by the score, and he got in
two references to Sir Gerald Doak. He felt daring and
idealistic and cosmopolitan.
Suddenly, in his new spiritual grandeur, he was sorry
for Zilla Riesling, and understood her as these ordinary
fellows at the Boosters Club never could.
II
Five hours after he had arrived in Zenith and told his wife
how hot it was in New York, he went to call on Zilla. He
was buzzing with ideas and forgiveness. Hed get Paul
released; hed do things, vague but highly benevolent things,
for Zilla; hed be as generous as his friend Seneca Doane.
He had not seen Zilla since Paul had shot her, and he
still pictured her as buxom, high-colored, lively, and a
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Babbitt
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 elbow, was a woman with the features of Zilla, but
she was bloodless and aged, like a yellowed wad of old
paper crumpled into wrinkles. Where Zilla had bounced
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 Worlds Fair of 1893, fifty
times he looked at the picture of the Court of Honor.
He was startled to find Zilla in the room. She wore a
black streaky gown which she had tried to brighten 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 Zilla! By golly, its good to see you
again!
He can send his messages through a lawyer.
Why, rats, Zilla, I didnt come just because of him.
Came as an old friend.
You waited long enough!
Well, you know how it is. Figured you wouldnt want
to see a friend of his for quite some time and Sit down,
honey! Lets be sensible. Weve all of us done a bunch of
things that we hadnt ought to, but maybe we can sort of
start over again. Honest, Zilla, Id like to do something to
make you both happy. Know what I thought to-day? Mind
you, Paul doesnt know a thing about this doesnt know
I was going to come see you. I got to thinking: Zillas a
fine? big-hearted woman, and shell understand that, uh,
Pauls had his lesson now. Why wouldnt 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
youd feel if you were generous.
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Sinclair Lewis
Yes, I wish to be generous. She was sitting primly,
speaking icily. For that reason I wish to keep him in
prison, as an example to evil-doers. Ive 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 and 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
older churches are going straight to eternal damnation,
because they only do lip-service and swallow the world,
the flesh, and the devil
For fifteen 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 Zilla. She wound up with a furious:
Its 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 after 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 that he must
seem attentive, though her screeching denunciations flew
past him like carrion birds.
He sought to be calm and brotherly:
Yes, I know, Zilla. But gosh, it certainly is the essence
of religion to be charitable, isnt it? Let me tell you how I
figure it: What we need in the world is liberalism, liberality,
if were going to get anywhere. Ive always believed in
being broad-minded and liberal
You? Liberal? It was very much the old Zilla. Why,
George Babbitt, youre 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, Im as by golly liberal as you are
religious, anyway! YOU RELIGIOUS!
I am so! Our pastor says I sustain him in the faith!
Ill bet you do! With Pauls money! But just to show
you how liberal I am, Im going to send a check for ten
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Babbitt
bucks to this Beecher Ingram, because a lot of fellows are
saying the poor cuss preaches sedition and free love, and
theyre trying to run him out of town.
And theyre 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 dont know what it is
to find God, to find peace, to behold the snares that the
devil spreads out for our feet. Oh, Im so glad to see the
mysterious purposes of God in having Paul harm me and
stop my wickedness and Pauls getting his, good and
plenty, for the cruel things he did to me, and I hope he
DIES in prison!
Babbitt was up, hat in hand, growling, Well, if thats
what you call being at peace, for heavens sake just warn
me before you go to war, will you?
III
Vast is the power of cities to reclaim the wanderer.
More than mountains or the shore-devouring sea, a city
retains its character, imperturbable, cynical, holding behind
apparent changes its 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 the night before he reached
Zenith, that neither he nor the city would be the same
again, ten days after his 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 chaffing
at the Athletic Club, and once, when Vergil Gunch observed
that Seneca Doane ought to be hanged, Babbitt snorted,
Oh, rats, hes not so bad.
At home he grunted Eh? across the newspaper to his
commentatory wife, and was delighted by Tinkas new red
tam oshanter, 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
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Sinclair Lewis
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 commissionhouses 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 Mohalis only fifteen miles from Zenith,
and Ted often came down for the week-end. Babbitt was
worried. Ted was going in for everything but books. He
had tried to make the football team as a light half-back,
he was looking forward to the basket-ball season, he was
on the committee for the Freshman Hop, and (as a Zenithite,
an aristocrat among the yokels) he was being rushed by
two fraternities. But of his studies Babbitt could learn
nothing save a mumbled, Oh, gosh, these old stiffs of
teachers just give you a lot of junk about literature and
economics.
One week-end Ted proposed, Say, Dad, why cant I
transfer over from the College to the School of Engineering
and take mechanical engineering? You always holler that I
never study, but honest, I would study there.
No, the Engineering School hasnt got the standing the
College has, fretted Babbitt.
Id like to know how it hasnt! The Engineers can play
on any of the teams!
There was much explanation of the dollars-and-cents
value of being known as a college man when you go into
the law, and a truly oratorical account of the lawyers life.
Before he was through with it, Babbitt had Ted a United
States Senator.
Among the great lawyers whom he mentioned was
Secena Doane.
But, gee whiz, Ted marveled, I thought you always
said this Doane was a reglar nut!
Thats no way to speak of a great man! Doanes always
been a good friend of mine fact I helped him in college
I started him out and you might say inspired him. Just
because hes sympathetic with the aims of Labor, a lot of
chumps that lack liberality and broad-mindedness think
hes a crank, but let me tell you theres mighty few of em
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