senna
eee eee
Bem fskdan
Bellefonte, Pa., August 3, 1928.
EES ER
THE TONE OF VOICE.
It is not so much what you say,
As the manner in which you say it;
It is not so much the language you use,
As the tones in which you convey it.
“Come here!” I sharply said,
And the baby cowered and wept;
“Come here!” I cooed, and he looked and
smiled,
And straight to my lap he crept.
The words may be mild and fair
And the tones may pierce like a dart;
The words may be soft as a summer air,
And the tones may break the heart.
Few words but come from the mind,
And grow by study and art;
But the tomes leap forth from the inner
self :
And reveal the state of the heart.
Whether you know it or not,
Whether you mean or care,
Gentleness, kindness, love and hate,
Envy and anger are there.
Then would you quarreis avoid.
And in peace and love rejoice,
Keep anger not only out of your words,
But keep it out of your voice.
—Youth’s Companion.
ALLEY CAT.
Whether two writers should ever
marry is a question. Perhaps if
neither were sucessful it might work
out. The Jimmy §S. Jenkses went
along very well while Jimmy (Stough-
ton Jenks) was writing plays that
were produced in transformed cellars
and garges, the kind that critics call
biting, relentless, macabre and that
go in for cumulative horror, and Mrs.
Jimmy (Alexandra Dalymple) was
selling only an occasional love story
to the women’s magazines.
They had a room down on Sullivan
street, with an alcove for the bed and
a recessed washstand that would hold
a gas stove, though a curtain had to
be whisked across if the janitor
knocked, as cooking was not allowed.
The shabby place was rich in human
happiness, with Bunny Jenks develop-
ing his leg muscles in the crib and
Sanay scorching the dinner while she
recorded an idea and Jimmy hurrying
home from the office, his mind drip-
ping gore and a woolly puppy for
Bunny in his pocket. Jimmy worked
half the night amid the dark passions
of the underworld, stopping only to
warm Bunny’s last bottle if Sandy
had fallen asleep. Any praise or
money was pure job to both. They
deposited their absurd earnings with
a swelling sense that the cashier was
impressed, and conscientiously cele-
brated, one good time per check.
There was no shadow of trouble un-
til Bunny’s second Christmas tree.
His first had been merely a flowerpot
affair, Bunny being then 6 months
old; his second was a real tree, all of
three feet high, covered with every
bright beatity that the“10-cent store
could devise. This was Jimmy’s en-
terprise, and he worked over it with
as devout a seriousness as though he
were planning their future.
It was all hours before Bunny could
be torn away from it and deposited in
his bed. Sandy had just made some-
thing of a hit herself with a Christ-
mas story of a home that was drift-
ing on the rocks and was saved by a
baby, Bunny, of course, and was feel-
ing a bit cocklofty. :
“You and Bunny are about the
same age,” she told him. “He is so
good with you. Why on earth don’t
you give up the office and take care
of him?”
Jimmy could only echo:
the office!” :
“Then I could write all the morn-
ing,” Sandy explained. “I am going
ahead so fast now; I've got to have
more free time. And a good woman
would cost nearly as much as you are
earning. In this way you could get
in more writing time yourself,” she
added graciously. “I would take him
afternoons.”
Every one knows that afternoon is
a stodgy time, of no use at all to a
writer. Jimmy, who was sitting by
the crib, holding Bunny’s supper at a
considerate slant, flushed up to his
tow hair. He was the gentlest soul
that ever set a heroine to strangling
her lover and hiding his body in the
cistern, but there was a limit. After
all, it was from one of his plays, “Al-
ley Cat,” that Cylvia Deane had
sprung to fame. Another had come
in next to the winner in a play con-
test, and a one-acter had been play-
ed all over the country in the little
theatres. He had not exactly arrived,
but he was a long way from settling
down into a baby nurse.
He made no answer, but that night
he worked until morning instead of
till midnight. And the next after-
noon he dozed off in the office, a fact
that was noted with unfavorable com-
ment,
Then a household magazine offered
a prize, a vast prize of $5000, for the
best dog story, to be published as an
antivivisection document. Sandy tried
for it, and she actually used Bun-
ny for the dog—or anyway she used
some of her Bunny feeling—and so
got into it a quality that set the
whole continent to sniffing. The
prize was only the beginning of what
she won. The story was spread out
into a little book with puppy pictures
waggling down the margins and sold
by the ton, and all the magazines that
cared about sweling. hearts and wet
eyes were after Alexandra Dalrymple.
She did her best to make Jimmy
give up the office, arguing it with
more generosity than tact; she was
earning enough now to take a house
in the country with a yard for Bunny,
and it wouldn’t matter whether Jim-
my made any money or not—they
would both be working.
“If any one thinks that bringing up
Bunny isn’t work—!” Sandy urged,
to comfort his scruples.
Jimmy never argued it. He simply
wouldn’t. Nor would he move to an
apartment. Sandy struggled on with
her one room and alcove and a wo-
“Give up
tin the garage he could swab
man who came in to help but drove
her raving crazy. She was at the
bursting point when Jummy, burning
the candle at both ends and dazed
with weariness, was summarily given
up by the office.
Sandy war-danced. In a week she
had them settled in a tiny furnished
cottage with a big yard for Bunny
and a quiet room upstairs for her
study.
“It can be your study when I’m not
working,” she pointed out. “If you
keep Bunny on the other side of the
house I shan’t even hear him.
“We're not going to have a servant
until I’ve got a solid little capital put
by,” she declared. Jimmy noted that
she did not say, “Until we've got—"
but gave no sign. A woman came
one day a week, washing in the morn-
ing and cleaning in the afternoon.
Sandy got breakfast, tubbed Bunny
and made the beds, then ran joyously
to her study. By her program, Jim-
my tidied the house and cooked their
1 o'clock dinner. Bunny, 3 years old
now and wearing overalls, could be
in and out under his eye.
Sandy came down to dinner when '
he called her, cheeks blazing, eyes
dopy with work. Sometimes she re-
motely watched them, smiling &er
great joy but unaware of what they
said. The meal over,
herself back to realities with a sigh
that was like the rushing of air from
a collapsing balloon. Then she took
hold gallantly, put Bunny down for
his nap, washed the dishes, sewed |
and ironed.
“Now..you are absolutely free. No
one will go near the study,” she as-
sured him.
Jimmy went upstairs with a peev-
ish sense of being sent to his task.
He did not like the study, and he was
not going to work at any one’s or- |
ders. Usually he slept most of the
afternoon. He had been working
nights for so long that his sleep ac-
count was deeply overdrawn. When
he woke up he wandered forlornly
about the room, staring out at the
summer world with resentful eyes,
idly turned over old manuscripts,
whittled a boat for Bunny. There
was not a spark of creation left in
him, and yet he stayed up there until
nearly suppertime.
give an effect of not having entirely
slumped down on his wife. Sandy
could be trusted not to ask questions
so long as he came out with the old
aborbed, secretive air. Work was a
strictly private matter for both them
until they were ready to speak.
Jimmy's daily walk from the office
to Sullivan street had led him through
slums and low neighborhoods where |
he got flashing glimpses of the un-
derworld that so fascinated him.
Down here his walk led him through
daisies and buttercups, past little
blosséming gardens where children
played house; on every cottage porch
was a veiled baby carriage. Jimmy
came in as flatly empty as he went
out.
The afternoon sleeps dwindled to
naps, then disappeared altogether,
leaving Jimmy a hideous three or
four hours to kill. Sometimes he
strode defiantly out and went down to
wander about the village or to take
Hong, dull, créwded trolley rides, but
Sandy asked no question; she suppos-
ed he was walking a scene into shape,
as he often had done on city Sundays.
One day he picked up a girl on a
car and tried to flirt with her, but she
berea him past bearing.
Sandy chose that night to tell him
how gloriously her book was going.
Jiramy loved her truly, and was hor-
rified at the surge of hate that swept
him. Their home was drifting on the
rocks, and a baby could not save it.
He never hated Bunny, but he grew
desperate at being tied to him.
Sandy deposited her earnings in a
joint account equally open to them
both. Jimmy paid the bills and bal-
anced the bankbook, so she did not
know that he had never drawn one
cent for himself. He ate her food,
but she had forced that on him. When
he had only a little silver left he took
a teolley to a summer colony and got
part-time work washing automobiles
for a garage. It was easy to slip out
of the house while Sandy was in the
kitchen, though he had merely been
for a brief walk.
Nothing short of illness or fire
would make Sandy go to the study
door so long as it was shut. His
garage name was Thomas James, and
he gave a lurid version of his past
history to his fellow workers. There
was a touch of drama in that. For
the first time in blank weeks Jimmy’s
Imagination was showing signs of
e.
He did things well with his hands.
Washing a fancy coupe was not so
very different from washing the glass
and china in Sandy’s home, and yet
and pol-
ish without resentment, even with en-
joyment. Me was standing back,
chamois in his grimy hand, to admire
his shining headlights when a high
voice spoke at his side: “Well, Stough-
ton Jenks!”
Jimmy could hide anything; not a
flicker betrayed the shock of his dis-
may.
“Sylvia Deane!” he said, happily,
polishing up a hand to give her.
Her astonished gaze went from the
tousled hair and greasy overalls of his
make-up to the public garage set. She
was flamingly pretty, emphasized at
every point.
“But what in the world are you do-
ing 7”
“Washing cars,” Jimmy said, as
though it were the most natural thing
in the world. “Is this yours? S. D.—
of course it is. Haven't I done a
pretty good job by it?”
Sylvia was thinking, swiftly, visi-
bly; all her mental processes wers
written on her bright surface.
“I know!” She got it with a pounce
of the spirit. “You are laying one
act in a garage and you're here to
get local color!”
“Sh!” he cautioned her, glancing
over his shoulder.
She was delighted with her own
acumen.
“Make a quick change and come to
my cottage for tea,” she commanded.
“I want to hear about this new play.”
‘Oh, it isn’t quite in shape—" he
was beginning, but she cut him short.
“You can give me an idea of it.
she dragged !
He must at least |
“Fast, near tears, she pushed opén the
1!
never had a part I loved as I did Al-
ley Cat. Do me something like that
and I will get it on.” Her nod re-
minded him that she was a different
person from the unkown girl of his
semi-amateur, special-matinee begin-
ning.
In the five minutes of his change
Jimmy took a flying dive through all
the nebulous ideas that dwelt in the
back of his head, came up with a like-
ly one, knocked the man out of its
center and put in a wild and daring
female creature, lawless, high-heart-
ed, laughing, loving—Jimmy piled up
on her every stage quality that he
and Sylvia Deane adored.
In that swift hour over her tea ta-
ble he produced what would have tak-
en weeks of cold-blooded effort. She
did not remember to ask him where
the garage scene came in, but he
could have managed even that. Noth-
ing was difficult for him, nothing ob-
scure.
Sylvia was ablaze. She was about
to rehearse a tame, distinguished, in
tellectual thing that in her opinion
would not last four Broadway weeks.
“That will give you just time to
finish it,” she said. “Send me a scen-
ario for Steinway as soon as you can.
I wish you were going to be in town,
so that we could get together on it.”
“I am,” said Jimmy, rising. He
was going to be anywhere that Syl-
via Deane wanted.
“I'm going back tomorrow. I could
drive you in.”
Jimmy had gauged Slyvia’s tech-
{nique with a car in the five miputes
! that separated her cottage from the
garage.
| “No,” he said firmly. “We would
| talk, play, and you would run into the
back of an ice wagon. We can’t either
of us afford to be smashed up now.”
She lifted her voice in protesting
lament. “How can you make your
characters so gorgeously reckless
when you're such a good, careful lit-
tle man?”
| “Well, I'm husband and father—it
makes you good and careful.”
“Oh—are you?” She enacted acute
i disappointment.
| “Wasn’t I always?”
| “Husband, perhaps—certainly not
father.”
“That’s so, Bunny hadn't arrived
then.” His hand went toward his
| breast pocket, but she stopped him.
i picture. It is as an artist that you
i stir me, not as a papa.” Their eyes
j off at his table,
emotion came with
| “No. I don’t care to see his or her 'B
| laughed together over the joke of his
! stirring her, her hands curled about |
his. “Now don’t disappoint me, mon
artiste, and be quick about it.” :
| “Chain lightning,” he promised, and
‘rode a winged trolley car home, an
‘hour past suppertime. His heart ran
to Sandy. All was well between |
, them; the sulky weeks were wiped |
out. It didn’t matter who paid any- |
thing, and he loved owing his glorious |
chance to her. Splendid Sandy! Side !
by side, neither towing on behind!
{ Early that afternoon ‘Sandy had |
burned her hand, a painful burn that |
threatened to make writing impossi-
ble for days. She had tried not to
‘go to Jimmy with it, but her nerves
‘were over-wrought and she could not
bandage it properly herself, so at
\ study door.
! “I have to bother you, Jimmy,” she
faltered. ;
| No Jimmy was there. She waited
| awhile, then tied her bandage with
{ teeth and left hand and lay down to
| Ya for him. Presently a smell of
scorching took her running to the
| kitchen, where the electric iron, left
turned on, had already wrecked the
{ironing board and might have burned
| up the house. Sandy began to be an-
| gry. :
As the afternoon wore on, and Bun-
ny made demands, and her hand
throbbed, she grew angrier and an-
grier. Jimmy had no buisness to £0
off without a word! And stay all the
afternoon! She worked and slaved
and no one had any consideration for
her! When suppertime passed she
grew frightened and watched at the
window. Then the sight of him, ve-
turning cheerful and undamaged,
roused her to fury.
“Look here, Jimmy—I don’t ask
much of you,” she began in a hard,
masterful tone, “but I do think you
might be on hand when there’s trou-
ble. I got a frightful burn, and the
house nearly burned up, and there
wasn't any one to help me—”
Jimmy was dreadfully sorry and
concerned. He wanted to tell her so,
to see the burn, to get a doctor, but
she would not let him say anything.
“No. I don’t want it touched. It
will be a week before I can hold a
pencil. Get yourself some supper if
you want any. I've put Bunny to
bed—I've done everything. As usu-
(al! The flaming grievance of the
| afternoon mounted higher and high-
‘er. “I take all the responsibility, and ,
then, when you could be of some use, |
you're gone. Where were you?” |
“lI have been over in Westbridge
telling Sylvia Deane about an idea for
a play,” he said badly. “She likes it. |
She says she will get Steinway to
put it on if the new play doesn’t go.” :
Sandy was not mollified. “They al- '
i ways act enthusiastic, and then they |
; throw you down. She probably hasnt |
‘any more say with Steinway than you
{ have. Is it the play you have been |
working on this summer ?” i
Her tone made rich hopes absurd,
ideas second-rate, the chance a child- |
ish delusion. Jimmy, tumbled out of
his dream, grew angry, too, in his
quiet, hidden way.
“I haven’t been working this sum-
mer.”
“Not working this summer?” San-
1 dy rose up on one elbow to look at :
jhim. “What do you mean?” i
“Oh, I've sat up in that beastly |
room but I can’t work in the after- |
noon. You couldn’t yourself—that
was why you gave it to me.” |
“Well, but considering—!” It was
an outraged cry. i
“Yes—considering that you had
paid for everything.”
She was shocked, “1
didn’t mean that—" ;
“Well, it is that, isn’t it? Coming
here was your doing—I don’t like it,
and I can’t work. I wasn’t cut out for |
a general houseworker, anyway.” i
“I suppose I can get a cook,” Sandy
ashamed.
! corner and
HI
began in.a martyred tone, but: he‘in-:
terrupted.
“Get what you like.
back to town.”
“And leave me—with Bunny—my
book not finished—no help with my
house——
That “my house” settled it.
my rose.
“You can afford to hire 2 woman
for your house. And you won’t have
to pay any attention to her after
your work. Not that you have paid
any to me—but you do have to go
through the motions of admitting
that I'm here. I am going back
where I belong. And when we come
together again, Sandy, it’s going to
be ‘our house’—remember that. I
have had all of this ‘my-house’ busi-
ness that I'll stand.” 7
He stalked into their room, and the
banged door forbid her to follow.
Ten minutes later he came out with
a packed bag.
“Jimmy!”
imploringly,
thority.
“I can just make 2 train,” he said
curtly, and was gone.
The room on Sullivan street was
empty and the gas stove lurked be-
hind the washstang curtain.
In the dawn he fell asleep and
awoke at noon to a swelling sense of
freedom. He was back! Where he
belonged! All the afternoon he wan-
dered about the crazy streets, grimy
with soot, greasy with August heat,
steaming with the smells of alien
lives. Babies lay half naked on wide-
spread knees, children jumped in the
I'm going
Jim-
Sandy exclaimed—not
but with outraged au-
Stream from a hydrant, men dozed on
newspapers of
grass invited.
Jimmy dined at a Greek hole in a
wall and went back drunk with black
coffee. No sodden country sleep for
him! The old fires were leaping in
his breast. Dawn found him dozing
a pile of manuscriv:
wherever a square
under his hands.
The next day he sent Sandy a pos-
tal telling where he was “in case of
need.” Much she needed him! She
was like the female spider, who com-
fortably swallows her mate when he
has played his part. She would not
care whether he were there or not,
except for the bother of getting a wo-
man to come in. Bunny would miss
him—good little chap. A softening
the thought of
unny.
He introduced a child into the new
play. There were only a few States
that made trouble about child actors.
Besides, a small girl could easily play
a litle fellow of 5 or 6 on the road.
| The youngster brought in a valuable
complication.
The next day Jimmy got part-time
work with a tobacconist, and sold cig-
arettes and plug cut all the afternoon,
with the elevated roaring outside and
his soul singing the joy of freedom
and creation. A 50-cent dinner in a
back yard hung with clothesline sent
him hurrying home to his work as
once he hurried home to his love.
In the weeks that followed Jimmy
made a curious discovery. Those hai-
ed walks among the daisies and but-
tercups, the bored wanderings in the
village, the exasperating ¢are of Bun-
ny, had done something to his art. .
Something amazingly good, He felt
it take possession and let it have its
way. Steinway, who had been con-
sidering and rejecting his plays ior
years, finally worded it for him.
“You've got kinder human,” he said.
“The drama’s there, all right, but
there’s heart in it now, and it isn’t so
grubby. My boy, I think this will go.
I'm willing to take a chance on i,
anyhow.” !
Jimmy signed his contract with an
unmoved face, pocketed his $500 ad- |
vance on royalties and crushed an |
impulse to run to Sandy and Bunny,
She would probably remind him that
plays usually fail, or show him some
vast check for serial rights. She was |
evidently quite satisfied to be without
him—she had not answered his postal.
So he took Sylvia Deane to lunch
at the most exotic place in town and
sunned himself in her joy. She had
scored a personal success in her new '
play—the play itself was roasted— |
but she never grew cocklofty or open- ;
ly took the lead. After lunch they |
went back to her apartment, a lavish
little place, exotic in color, exquisite |
in its detail. Sylvia had never known |
poverty as Jimmy and Sandy knew !
it. Even in the days of “Alley Cat” |
she had lived delicately, had the es- |
sential luxuries. |
They tried out a new scene, Jim-
my taking the part of the little boy; |
and he found her maternal kiss on his |
forehead startlingly ‘agreeable. He |
stayed till it was time to take Sylvia |
to the theatre, then walked home with
a slight lift of the head to show how !
his pulses were galloping. The drift-
ing home was very near the rocks.
| Never in five years had he been so
remote from Sandy. And when he
opened his door there she sat. A pale,
worn-looking Sandy, her eyes larger
than he remembered them. |
“Oh—Sandy!” He had stopped |
short. It was almost as though he |
had drawn back. Then, of course, he
came in, closing the door. “Been here ',
long 7”
table
es.
“Yes, a good while. All the after-
noon.” She spoke absently, and her ,
eyes never left his face. “I expect- |
ed to go back tonight.”
“Too bad I was out.” Jimmy could
not manage the situation at all. This
was Sandy, and he was moved, but he |
could not seem to show anything but
a blank surface. He sat on a table
lit a cigarette. “And
how’s Bunny ?”
“Well. Splendid. He sent you his |
love.” Whatever Sandy felt it was no .
longer wrath. She gave him Bunny's |
love with an oddly subdued air. “He
misses you.”
“Well, I miss him.” Jimmy moved
to a chair, crossed his knees high. “I
suppose you got a nice woman. How
is your hand?”
She showed ijt. “All right. Not
even a scar. Is work—going ?”
The contract was stiff in his pocket,
but he did not want to tell. “Oh,
he asked, laying his hat on the |
and looking at her only in glanc- !
yes. IIl' have something—pretty
soon. By the way, you haven't dined,
have you?” : ;
“No, but Ill get something at the |
iS
. bloodless,
station,” Sandy said, in a hurried,
gentle voice. “I just wanted to see if
you were—all right.” She dragged
herself to her feet. “And I want to
apologize, Jimmy.” She was nervous
about it, fumbling with her coat and
hat. “I have only just found out that
you never drew a cent for yourself.
I must have been a beast to make
vou—ieel like that.”
“Oh, that’s all right—I was prob-
ably a fool. Men and women are dif-
ferent—about that.” His tone put
her off. Anger could not have held
out for a moment against a humble
Sandy, but the glamour of the after-
noon was a solid wall between them.
He was in terror of crashing through
into some bleak reality where they
must face truth naked and make final
decisions.
She let him edge her away, but at
the door she paused.
“You—have money? You are not
hard up?” She had to ask that. He
could see how a panic vision of him
starving had rushed over her.
“Oh, plenty,” he said, with a show
of heartiness. “I shall have good
* news very soon. I suppose your work
is booming ?”
She did not answer that at all. She
simply gave him a long, somber look,
as though she had forgotten what he
meant by her work, and closed the
door between them. He started to
follow, to escort her properly to her
train, but empty forms were impos-
sible over that last look. There was
no anger in it, no reproach, no de-
mand, no failure of courage, no com-
plaint; only an utter desolation.
accepted judgment with just that
lock.
“Oh, I'm imagining things,” Jim-
my blustered. “She's got her writings
—she doesn’t need me. I don’t count.
‘My house.’ ” He tried to whip up
the old anger and so free himself for
the new joy, but everything was spoil-
ed. Even his contract.
For three dreadful days Jimmy
sulked in his tent. Sylvia’s notes and
telegrams and Sandy’s deep silence
equally tore at him. Life was resoly-
ing itself into a plain proposition, de-
manding a plain answer: Can you
have your cake and eat it, too? But
Jimmy was in no mood to see the
stark outlines of his situation. Mists
of pain made it a dark confusion; the
vivid desire of the body fought the
aching desire of the soul;
Sylvia’s charm came reluctant
glimpses of a new splendor in Sandy;
male revolt against bondage had to
put down an upwelling of fatherhood.
Sunday afternoon Sylvia came af-
ter him. Jimmy, usually the neatest
of men, had left the bed in the alcove
unmade, and the dishes of a dreary
lunch strewed the table. He had gone
down to the janitor’s kitchen with his
little pail of garbage, leaving the door
ajar, so Sylvia walked in and stood
looking about her, as out of place as
her shining car was in the dingy
street. There was time to see every-
thing, shabby male garments on a
chair, old boots on the floor, the stain-
ed gas stove on the stained wash-
stand, and a tin pot of’ coffee boiling
over; the black ceiling and peeling
wallpaper, the spot on the rug made
by Bunny’s little grabbing hand and
the syrup jug.” Sandy had scrubbed
in vain at that spot. Then Jimmy
came in, collarless and unshaven, car-
rying his mean little pail.
Again his power of hiding came to
the rescue.
. “Hello, Sylvia,” he said cheerfull .
and put down the pail as composedly
as he had once wiped a grimy hand on
his overalls.
Sylvia’s very color seemed dimmed.
The shock of the room veiled her
eyes, made her brightly garrulous. .
“I thought you had died on us.
Where have you been all these days?”
she chattered. “You got my notes,
because they’re all over the room—"
“Like everything else,”
“Usually I'm quite tidy,
caught me on an off day.”
Her glance shuddered away from |
his surroundings, yet had to avoid his
unkempt person. Squalor on the stage
had thrilled her as the underworld
had thrilled Jimmy, but in real life
she was as aloof from it as he was
from brawny sin.
“Well, I only ran down for a mo-
ment. I wanted to be sure that you
were all right.” She was moving to-
ward the door. “Steinway says we'll
begin rehearsing next week. This is
so far from the theatre—why don’t
you live uptown ?”
Her very nostrils were scorning his
room. After all, it had been his home,
he and Sandy had been happy there.
“I'm fond of this place,” he said.
“It suits me. I’m a sort of alley cat
myself, you know.”
She wanted to be kind. “You will
get over that when the play has made
you rich and famous. You must have
a nice place and give me lovely par-
ties.” She was trying to recapture
the mood of the last time; her bright
nod promised that they would get it
back, once he had emerged from this
changeling atmosphere.
“What were you doing in that ga-
rage?” she asked.
“Washing cars,” he said placidly.
‘Earning a little extra money.”
She gave him a strained smile. '
“You wont have to do that any
more,” she consoled him, and made
her escape.
Jimmy slowly and methodically put
his room and his person in order. He
was not ashamed, not even angry; the
mists of confusion were gone, and ae
saw with a lucid clearness that lit up
every corner of his life. To Sylvia he
was outcast, malodorous; she would
never forget that revelation, never
again want him in her scenteq life.
And this revelation of her, artificial,
supercivilized, meant the
end of glamour for him. A woman
must be real, as Sandy was real. Cap-
able of going down on her knees and
scrubbing; seeing disorder and shab- |
biness as normal human states, not
shrinking away from something four. |
Sylvia had no more substance than
a painted gauze curtain. And in his
befuddled folly he had let that shadow
come between him and the flesh-and
blood reality that was Sandy. He had
repulsed Sandy, shut her out when
she came with all her big heart open
and humbled; he had turned his back
on his son.
Ab
great soul conscious of sin might have |
against
he put :n.
Sylvia. You
He drank the chilled coffee to save
it, and so could not even sleep. Half
the night he walked the streets, blind
to their drama, consumed in his own
pain. He came in bodily exhausted,
and the place that Sylvia had scorned
welcomed him like a kind old nurse.
He stood looking about, his hand still
on the light, his heart breaking in his
side for the day when this had been
home. Bunny kicking in the crib and
Sandy scorching the dinner while she
wrote down an idea!
“Was there ever a fool like me?”
he marveled.
He had produced perfect order be-
fore he went out, but there was some-
thing on the floor under the alcove
curtain, a black object no larger than
the palm of his hand. Jimmy ap-
proached it cautiously half expecting
it to run. The more he stared the
queerer it grew. He could not get
over an impression that he was look-
ing at a child’s stubby little fat shoe
with an ankle strap. “His hand went
out to touch it, to dispel the illusion
and lifted—one of Bunny’s shoes.
For a moment it seemed like some
supernatural sign, and it wrung him
with longing. Then, looking past the
Sleeve curtain, he found the explana-
ion.
Bunny lay on the bed, sound asleep
—Wwidespread, boneless, a very jelly
of sleep. Sandy’s coat was thrown
over him; Sandy herself, sitting on
the bed beside him, had sunk down on
her arm, and slept as heavily. The
dim light showed her face ali expos-
ed, young, tragic, beaten. Beside the
ed was a heavy bag.
Perhaps once in a man’s life he
knows heaven. To Jimmy, soiled, bat-
tered, homesick, ashamed, this gen-
erous impulse of loving hearts, run-
ning back to him, was just that—
heaven. He slid to his knees by the
bed and hid his face, Presently he
felt her stir, then start, but he could
‘not look up. What she had to say
came stumbling out.
“Jimmy, I had to. We can't let it
go like this. Take me into your home,
Jimmy, and let me try again. With-
out you—there’s nothing. We will go
if you don’t want us, but we had to
ask you—”
His arms were about her, his wet
cheek was against hers, Suddenly he
knew the truth: “I was coming to you
in the morning, Sandy!”—By Juliet
Wilbor Tompkins.
1
Shapeless Legs Due to Wearing High
Heels.
Recently Dr. Charles Mayo, vaca-
tioning declared that women were los-
ing their calves through the use of
high heels.
That doesn’t bother the co-eds of
the University of California at Los
Angeles.
More than 100 girl students are
wearing low-heeled shoes, which, it
is asserted, contribute to the beauty
of a woman’s calves,
These figures were revealed by a
survey of the women’s physical edu-
cation department.
“We carefully check each incoming
co-ed as to her posture and the type
of shoes she wears,” said Miss Hazel
Cubberly, of the phyical education de-
partment. on F !
“Not only are high heels detrimen-
tal to a girl’s feet, but to her general
health. Most of our girls wear sens-
ible shoes which enable them to take
firm, steady steps and maintain good
. posture.”
Corrective exercises and participa-
tion in such sports as tennis, hockey
and archery also are resorted to for
the purpose of keeping the legs of
co-eds in good shape.
Those few co-eds who cling to high
heels are warned that a dreadful fate
awaits them—the necessity of wear-
ing long skirts as a beauty measure,
some day.
Methodists Would Banish Military
Training.
In order to convince its youth that
‘war is not inevitable, and that na-
tions can arbitrate their differences,
i the United States must cease its pol-
iicy of military training in education-
fal institutions, seems to be the con-
‘census of the Methodist Episcopal
church in general conference at Kan-
‘sas City recently.
i The conference vigorously protest-
.ed further appropriations by Con-
1 gress for extending the naval cruiser
| building program past next year.
Action followed one of the most
heated debates of the conference, in
which advocates of preparedness
pointed out that the Methodist church
was opposing an established Govern-
ment policy, which requires that mil-
itary training be given at land grant
educational institutions.
“If that be so, let us recall that
the United States Government is not
the master, but the servant of the
people,” thundered Dr. Daniel L.
Marsh, president of Boston Univer-
sity and chairman of the committee on
state and the church. Dr. Marsh closed
the debate with a stirring denuncia-
tion of “militarism” in the United
States as “unchristian.”
Uniform Signs Make for Highway
Safety.
An important step to promote high-
way safety was recently taken by the
United States bureau of public roads
in co-operation with the State high-
way departments, in adopting uniform
standards for warning signs to be
used throughout the country. .
The motorist will no longer be con-
fused by a multiplicity of signs of
various designs and degrees of legi-
bility. Hazards will be indicated by
signs’ which will be uniform in ail
States and which will plainly indicate
the kind and degree of danger.
The new signs make use of a Sys-
tem of different shapes, thereby in-
creasing their value at night. The
shape indicates the degree of hazard
and if the motorist cannot read the
i legend, the shape will tell him the
degree of caution required. Twenty
. States are now actually engaged in
erecting these standard warnin
i signs, and other States have signifie
«their intention of doing the same.—
; Scienitfic American.