Progress

It started in late November. The white frocked observers of the Hayes-Bickford Eating Place clientele noticed some tuxedos among the bearded loafers of the 11 o'clock crowd. Here, they thought, is something. Here is what we have been waiting for these long years. The Bick has ceased to be the symbol of the locusts' ravage, the turtles' quiet call. And swiftly they gathered back where the butterscotch puddings stand stacked in gleaming rows, where the untoasted English lies moist and soft in purple racks. We must do this slowly, they said, but inexorably.

And the next day the New Hamburger was born. It was the same as before, but it had a pickle relish and peppers and ground-up cole slaw, and it cost a nickel more. They smiled at the Bick, smiled quietly, and waited.

But they didn't wait for long. The nodding dilettantes of the 11 o'clock crowd poured in one night and the walls were painted a new and shining yellow, with a bluish trim. Gone were the spattered woodwork and the coffee stains; and there were curtains in the front. The window-sitters looked up from their game of Flarg occasionally, and chuckled unconvincingly.

Behind the counter they contemplated the incoherent group in front of them. There is one thing more, they said, only one, but we will have to wait. We will have to wait until the customers are really ready.

And then one day they were.

The move was swift, without remorse, without time for thought or even the introspection of a far away dawn. At exactly 11 o'clock a sign appeared above the counter. Minimum charge 15 cents.

Dismaying, of course; symbolic too. The move was calculated and premeditated, yet still drastic. While the clock cannot be turned back, perhaps, it need not be set ahead so suddenly. A ten-cent minimum would tax the non-coffee drinking philosophers. But 15 cents goes too far; the Bick is, after all, a place for radical talking but moderate deeds.