--
"Gi' me an article you can retail at a nickel--any little thing
everybody needs--or gi' me a song with a catchy chorus--something you
can turn out on them ten-cent records.--That makes _me_. Don't want any
Wall Street stuff. That's for Rockefeller and the boobs. But just one
time le' me catch on with one little old hunch that'll go in vaudeville
or the pi'tures--get Smith and Jones diggin' for the old nickel.--That
makes _me_. Then the line can move up one. That's the thing about New
York. Say, man, len' me a cigarette.--But that's the thing about
Broadway. When you make, you make _big_. I know a guy turned out a
powder-puff looked like a lor'nette--a quarter of a dollar. You know how
the Janes'll fall for a thing like that--"
It was completely preposterous, almost uncomfortable. It made a man look
around him. On the schooner's port side spread the empty blue of the
South Pacific; the tenuous snowdrift of the reef, far out, and the
horizon. On the starboard hand, beyond the little space of the
anchorage, curved the beach, a pink-white scimitar laid flat. Then the
scattering of thatched and stilted huts, the red, corrugated-iron store,
residence and godowns of the Dutch trader, the endless Indian-file of
coco palms, the abrupt green wall of the mountain.
Pages:
497
498
499
500
501
502
503
504
505
506
507
508
509
510
511
512
513
514
515
516
517
518
519
520
521