Monday, September 16, 2013

 

The One Percent

Dashiell Hammett (1894-1961), "The Gutting of Couffignal" (1925):
The higher these roads get, the farther apart and larger are the houses they lead to. The occupants of these higher houses are the owners and rulers of the island. Most of them are well-fed old gentlemen who, the profits they took from the world with both hands in their younger days now stowed away at safe percentages, have bought into the island colony so they may spend what's left of their lives nursing their livers and improving their golf among their kind. They admit to the island only as many storekeepers, working-people, and similar riffraff as are needed to keep them comfortably served.
Hat tip: Mrs. Laudator.



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