Page 67 - BraveNewWorld

IDPH 67

§ 3

THE journey was quite uneventful. The Blue Pacific Rocket was two and a half
minutes early at New Orleans, lost four minutes in a tornado over Texas, but
flew into a favourable air current at Longitude 95 West, and was able to land at
Santa Fé less than forty seconds behind schedule time.
“Forty seconds on a six and a half hour flight. Not so bad,” Lenina conceded.
They slept that night at Santa Fé. The hotel was excellent-incomparably bet-
ter, for example, than that horrible Aurora Bora Palace in which Lenina had
suffered so much the previous summer. Liquid air, television, vibro- vacuum
massage, radio, boiling caffeine solution, hot contraceptives, and eight different
kinds of scent were laid on in every bedroom. The synthetic music plant was
working as they entered the hall and left nothing to be desired. A notice in
the lift announced that there were sixty Escalator- Squash-Racket Courts in the
hotel, and that Obstacle and Electro-magnetic Golf could both be played in the
park.

“But it sounds simply too lovely,” cried Lenina. “I almost wish we could stay
here. Sixty Escalator-Squash Courts .”
“There won’t be any in the Reservation,” Bernard warned her. “And no scent,
no television, no hot water even. If you feel you can’t stand it, stay here till I
come back.”
Lenina was quite offended. “Of course I can stand it. I only said it was lovely
here because. well, because progress is lovely, isn’t it?”
“Five hundred repetitions once a week from thirteen to seventeen,” said Ber-
nard wearily, as though to himself.
“What did you say?”
“I said that progress was lovely. That’s why you mustn’t come to the Reserva-
tion unless you really want to.”
“But I do want to.”
“Very well, then,” said Bernard; and it was almost a threat.

Their permit required the signature of the Warden of the Reservation, at whose
office next morning they duly presented themselves. An Epsilon-Plus negro
porter took in Bernard’s card, and they were admitted almost imrnediately.
The Warden was a blond and brachycephalic Alpha-Minus, short, red, moon-
faced, and broad-shouldered, with a loud booming voice, very well adapted to
the utterance of hypnopædic wisdom. He was a mine of irrelevant information
and unasked-for good advice. Once started, he went on and on- boomingly.

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