“Almost. But bicycling’s the craze; the factories can’t turn out enough to meet the demand. There’s a cycling club in almost every block and all the able-bodied cycle to and from work. Doing ’em good, too; a few more years and the doctors will go on short rations.”
“You got a bike?”
“Sure, a pre-vader one. Average five miles a day on it, and I eat like a horse.”
George Bailey chuckled. “I’ll have Maisie include some hay in the dinner. Well, here we are. Whoa, Bessie.”
An upstairs window went up, and Maisie looked out and down. She called out, “Hi, Pete!”
“Extra plate, Maisie,” George called. “We’ll be up soon as I put the horse away and show Pete around downstairs.”
He led Pete from the barn into the back door of the newspaper shop. “Our Linotype!” he announced proudly, pointing.
“How’s it work? Where’s your steam engine?”
George grinned. “Doesn’t work yet; we still hand set the type. I could get only one steamer and had to use that on the press. But I’ve got one on order for the Lino, and coming up in a month or so. When we get it, Pop Jenkins, my printer, is going to put himself out of a job teaching me to run it. With the Linotype going, I can handle the whole thing myself.”
“Kind of rough on Pop?”