After publishing a monumental treatise entitled “The Importance of Being Second-Rate” and opening an office “for supplying thoughts for every day,” Michael Webb’s business went uphill. The office was crowded with well-dressed clients; secretaries appointed consultation days; It happened that advice was given in absentia. The enterprise grew so large that one person could not manage it, and Michael made a gesture worthy of Napoleon and organized the Thinking Corporation of America. The business was so successful that one day Michael Webb decided to retire from business and now he spent most of his time at the Mountain Echo country boarding house with the same vacationers who were languishing from idleness: a businessman playing the role of Roosevelt; the respectable parents of the film star; the writer and his mistress, and the other public, so different, but united by one life principle: “Bread and circuses!”