VI
As he rode back to the hotel Babbitt reflected, "Myra would
have enjoyed all this social agony.'' For himself he cared less
for the garden party than for the motor tours which the
Monarch Chamber of Commerce had arranged. Indefatigably
he viewed water-reservoirs, suburban trolley-stations, and tanneries.
He devoured the statistics which were given to him,
and marveled to his roommate, W. A. Rogers, "Of course this
town isn't a patch on Zenith; it hasn't got our outlook and
natural resources; but did you know—I nev' did till to-day
—that they manufactured seven hundred and sixty-three million
feet of lumber last year? What d' you think of that!''
He was nervous as the time for reading his paper approached.
When he stood on the low platform before the
convention, he trembled and saw only a purple haze. But he
was in earnest, and when he had finished the formal paper
he talked to them, his hands in his pockets, his spectacled
face a flashing disk, like a plate set up on edge in the lamplight.
They shouted "That's the stuff!'' and in the discussion
afterward they referred with impressiveness to "our
friend and brother, Mr. George F. Babbitt.'' He had in fifteen
minutes changed from a minor delegate to a personage almost
as well known as that diplomat of business, Cecil Rountree.
After the meeting, delegates from all over the state said,
"Hower you, Brother Babbitt?'' Sixteen complete strangers
called him "George,'' and three men took him into corners
to confide, "Mighty glad you had the courage to stand up
and give the Profession a real boost. Now I've always maintained—''
Next morning, with tremendous casualness, Babbitt asked
the girl at the hotel news-stand for the newspapers from
Zenith. There was nothing in the Press, but in the
Advocate-Times, on the third page— He gasped. They had printed
his picture and a half-column account. The heading was
"Sensation at Annual Land-men's Convention. G. F. Babbitt,
Prominent Ziptown Realtor, Keynoter in Fine Address.''
He murmured reverently, "I guess some of the folks on
Floral Heights will sit up and take notice now, and pay a,
little attention to old Georgie!''
