Читать книгу Dodsworth - Sinclair Lewis - Страница 5
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ОглавлениеThey sat talking by the lake at midnight. Out on the dappled water, seen through a cloud of willow leaves, the youngsters in canoes were now singing “My Old Kentucky Home.” Zenith was still in the halcyon William Dean Howells days; not yet had it become the duty of young people to be hard and brisk, and knowing about radios, jazz, and gin.
Fran was a white shadow, in a lace shawl over her thin yellow dancing frock, as she drooped down on a newspaper which he had solemnly spread for her on the long grass. Sam trembled a little, and sounded very pompous, rather boyish:
“I suppose you went everywhere in Europe.”
“More or less. France and Spain and Austria and Switzerland and——Oh, I’ve seen the Matterhorn by moonlight, and Santa Maria della Salute at dawn. And I’ve been almost frozen to death in a mistral at Avignon!”
“I suppose you’ll be bored in Zenith.”
She laughed, in a small competent way. “I know so much about Europe—I’m no Cook’s tripper!—that I know I don’t know anything! All I can do in French is to order breakfast. Six months from now, all I’ll remember of Germany is the names of nineteen towns, and how the Potsdamer Platz looks when you’re waiting for a droschke. But you’ve done things. What are you doing now, by the way?”
“Assistant supe at the Locomotive Works. But I’m going to take a big gamble and——Ever ride in an automobile?”
“Oh yes, several times, in Paris and New York.”
“Well, I believe that in twenty years, say by 1923 or ’4, they’ll be as common as buggies are now! I’m going in on a new company here—Revelation Automobile Company. I’ll get less salary, but it’s a swell gamble. Wonderful future. I’ve been working on my mechanical drawing lately, and I’ve got the idea that they ought to get away from imitating carriages. Make a—it sounds highbrow, but I mean what you might call a new kind of beauty for autos. Kind of long straight lines. The Revelation boss thinks I’m crazy. What do you think?”
“Oh, splendid!”
“And I’ve bought me an automobile of my own.”
“Oh, really?”
“Let me drive you home tonight!”
“No, sorry; Mama is coming for me.”
“You’ve got to let me take you for a ride. Soon!”
“Perhaps next Sunday.... We must go back to the clubhouse, don’t you think?”
He sprang up, meekly. As he lifted her to her feet, as he felt her slim hands, he murmured, “Certainly like to see Europe some day. When I graduated, I thought I’d be a civil engineer and see the Brazil jungle and China and all over. Reg’lar Richard Harding Davis stuff! But——Certainly going to see Europe, anyway. Maybe I might run into you over there, and you might show me some of it.”
“I’d love to!”
Ah, if she desired Europe, he would master it, and give it to her on a platter of polished gold!
