XII
WHERE THE CAR TURNS AT 18TH
THIS will be a homing pigeon story. Though I send it ever so far—though its destination be the office of a home-and-fireside magazine or one of the kind with a French story in the back, it will return to me. After each flight its feathers will be a little more rumpled, its wings more weary, its course more wavering, until, battered, spent, broken, it will flutter to rest in the waste basket.
And yet, though its message may never be delivered, it must be sent, because—well, because
You know where the car turns at Eighteenth? There you see a glaringly attractive billboard poster. It depicts groups of smiling, white-clad men standing on tropical shores, with waving palms overhead, and a glimpse of blue sea in the distance. The wording beneath the picture runs something like this:
"Young men wanted. An unusual oppor-
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