Page:The Genius of America (1923).pdf/123

 "Abandon hope of social success," I read in an organ of youth a few months ago, "unless you have a car and a 'line. For days I enquired in vain of my coevals the meaning of the world 'line.' But the moment I asked a young man of the new times whether he understood it, he laughed, and explained that a 'line' is a complete set of conversational openings and ready-to-wear speeches, practically committed to memory and rehearsed for use on all typical social occasions. If you have a 'line,' you are not at a loss when the door opens, or in the ten minutes' talk with the family or the chaperone, or at any of the difficult transitional moments in your Napoleonic progress from the first dance to the last goodnight.

"It is all right," said my informant, "if you don't go to the same place too often."

I mused on a number of things of which I had read or heard, including the training of a successful bookagent, before I thought of the obvious solution. Then I said: "It sounds like F. Scott Fitzgerald."

"It is like him," he replied. "They all study his stuff—get it by heart. He has the best 'line' going."

I ended my lesson with the understanding that 'line' is short for lifeline, a device by which