Читать книгу Some Do Not... онлайн

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'You carry joking too far sometimes,' Macmaster said. 'I've warned you about it.'

'I'm as solemn as an owl!' Tietjens rejoined. 'The lower classes are becoming vocal. Why shouldn't they? They're the only people in this country who are sound in wind and limb. They'll save the country if the country's to be saved.'

'And you call yourself a Tory!' Macmaster said.

'The lower classes,' Tietjens continued equably, 'such of them as get through the secondary schools, want irregular and very transitory unions. During holidays they go together on personally conducted tours to Switzerland and such places. Wet afternoons they pass in their tiled bathrooms, slapping each other hilariously on the back and splashing white enamel paint about.'

'You say you don't read novels,' Macmaster said, 'but I recognize the quotation.'

'I don't read novels,' Tietjens answered. 'I know what's in 'em. There has been nothing worth reading written in England since the eighteenth century except by a woman...But it's natural for your enamel splashers to want to see themselves in a bright and variegated literature. Why shouldn't they? It's a healthy, human desire, and now that printing and paper are cheap they get it satisfied. It's healthy, I tell you. Infinitely healthier than...' He paused.