The Fireside Treasury of Modern Humor

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” said George. “How about another martini?” I said. “Have you noticed the martinis aren’t as strong as they used to be?” “Yes,” said George, “you said that twice before.” PO) gelsaid eoier I got to thinking about poor old George while I was shaving this morning, and I stopped for a moment and looked at my own reflection in the mirror. They don’t seem to be using the same kind of glass in mirrors any more.

The Bedchamber Mystery

“ie C. S. FORESTER Now that more than a hundred years have passed one of the scandals in my family can be told. It is very doubtful if Miss Forester (she was Eulalie, but being the eldest daughter unmarried, she of course was Miss Forester) and Miss Emily Forester and Miss Eunice Forester ever foresaw the world to which their story would

be told; in fact it is inconceivable that they could have believed that there ever would be a world in which their story could be told blatantly in public print. At that time it was the sort of thing that could only be hinted at in whispers during confidential moments in feminine drawing rooms, but it was whispered about enough to reach in the end the ears of my grandfather, who was their nephew, and my grandfather told it to me. Miss Forester and Miss Emily and Miss Eunice Forester were maiden ladies of a certain age. The old-fashioned Georgian house in which they lived kept itself modestly retired, just like its inhabitants, from what there was of bustle and excitement in the High Street of the market town. The ladies indeed led a retired life; they went to church a little, they visited those of the sick whom it was decent and proper for maiden ladies to visit, they read the more colorless of the novels in the circulating library, and sometimes they entertained other ladies at tea. And once a week they entertained a man. It might almost be said that they went from week to week looking forward to those evenings. Dr. Acheson was (not one of the old ladies would have been heartless enough to say “fortunately,” but each of them felt it) a widower, and several years older even than my great-great-aunt Eulalie. Moreover, he was a keen whist player and a brilliant one, but in no way keener or more brilliant than were Eulalie, Emily, and Eunice. For years now the three nice old ladies had looked forward to their weekly evening of whist-all, the ritual of setting out the green table, the two hours of silent cut-and-thrust play, and the final twenty minutes of conversation with Dr. Acheson as he drank a glass of old Madeira before bidding them good night.

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C. S. Forester

The late Mrs. Acheson had passed to her Maker somewhere about 1830, and it was for thirteen years they had played their weekly game of whist before the terrible thing happened. To this day we do not know whether it happened to Eulalie or Emily or Eunice, but it happened to one of them. The three of them had retired for the night, each to her separate room, and had progressed far toward the final stage of getting into bed. They were not dried-up old spinsters; on the contrary, they were women of weight and substance, with the buxom contours even married women might have been proud of. It was her weight which was the undoing of one of them, Eulalie, Emily, or Eunice.

Through the quiet house that bedtime there sounded the crash of china and a cry of pain, and two of the sisters—which two we do not know—hurried in their dressing gowns to the bedroom of the third—her identity is uncertain—to find her bleeding profusely from

severe cuts in the lower part of the back. The jagged china fragments had inflicted severe wounds, and, most unfortunately, just in those parts where the injured sister could not attend to them herself. Under the urgings of the other two she fought down her modesty sufficiently to let them attempt to deal with them, but the bleeding was profuse, and the blood of the Foresters streamed from the prone figure face downward on the bed in terrifying quantity. “We shall have to send for the doctor,” said one of the ministering sisters; it was a shocking thing to contemplate. “Oh, but we cannot!” said the other ministering sister. “We must,” said the first. “How terrible!” said the second. And with that the injured sister twisted her neck and joined in the conversation. “I will not have the doctor,” she said. “I would die of shame.” “Think of the disgrace of it!” said the second sister. “We might even have to explain to him how it happened!” “But she’s bleeding to death,” protested the first sister. “Td rather die!” said the injured one, and then, as a fresh appalling thought struck her, she twisted her neck even further. “I could never face him again. And what would happen to our whist?” That was an aspect of the case which until then had occurred to neither of the other sisters, and it was enough to make them blench.

But they were of stern stuff. Just as we do not know which was the

injured one, we do not know which one thought of a way out of the difficulty, and we shall never know. We know that it was Miss Eulalie, as befitted her rank as eldest sister, who called to Deborah,

THE

BEDCHAMBER

MYSTERY

347

the maid, to go and fetch Dr. Acheson at once, but that does not mean to say that it was not Miss Eulalie who was the injured sister

—injured or not, Miss Eulalie was quite capable of calling to Deb-

orah and telling her what to do. As she was bid, Deborah went and fetched Dr. Acheson and conducted him to Miss Eunice’s bedroom, but of course the fact that it was Miss Eunice’s bedroom is really no indication that it was Miss

Eunice who was in there. Dr. Acheson had no means of knowing; all

he saw was a recumbent form covered by a sheet. In the center of the sheet a round hole a foot in diameter had been cut, and through the hole the seat of the injury was visible. Dr. Acheson needed no explanations. He took his needles and his thread from his little black bag and he set to work and sewed up the worst of the cuts and attended to the minor ones. Finally he straightened up and eased his aching back. “T shall have to take those stitches out,” he explained to the still and silent figure which had borne the stitching stoically without a murmur. “I shall come next Wednesday and do that.” Until next Wednesday the three Misses Forester kept to their rooms. Not one of them was seen in the streets of the market town, and when on Wednesday Dr. Acheson knocked at the door Deborah conducted him once more to Miss Eunice’s bedroom. There was the recumbent form, and there was the sheet with the hole in it. Dr. Acheson took out the stitches. “It has healed very nicely,” said Dr. Acheson. “I don’t think any further attention from me will be necessary.” The figure under the sheet said nothing, nor did Dr. Acheson expect it. He gave some concluding advice and went his way. He was glad later to receive a note penned in Miss Forester’s Italian hand: Dear Dr. ACHESON, We will all be delighted if you will come to whist this week as usual.

When Dr. Acheson arrived he found that the “as usual” applied only to his coming, for there was a slight but subtle change in the furnishings of the drawing room. The stiff, high-backed chairs on which the three Misses Forester sat bore, each of them, a thick and comfortable cushion upon the seat. There was no knowing which of the sisters needed it.

The Hardship of Accounting “= ROBERT FROST Never ask of money spent Where the spender thinks it went. Nobody was ever meant To remember or invent What he did with every cent.

Sheet Music

“{ PAULINE GALE OF coursE, you don’t snore. Certainly not. However,

snoring is indulged in by mothers, fathers, children, dogs and just plain people. The reverberating sounds that arise from the trumpet nose at night are many.and varied, with equally interesting reasons for their differences. Let us examine these snore-types dispassion-

ately and with scientific detachment. Naturally you won’t find your-

self in any of these categories. But your wife—or husband? Better take a look, anyway. Now come our case histories, whose data was painstakingly gathered in the dark of the moon. I, STEADY-AS-SHE-GOES. Here is the reliable long-distance champion snorer. He goes to sleep quickly, starts his well-oiled motor and chugs through the night without a ping. UNHHH—SHOOOP! UNHHH—SHOOOP! UNHHH—SHOOOP! No change of pace save for an occasional grunt when he turns over. His wife easily becomes accustomed to his snore and can sleep comfortably, knowing he will not surprise her with a sudden difference in quality or sound. This is a man who, when he tells his wife he will work late at the office and be home at ten o’clock, comes home at ten o’clock, smelling slightly like carbon paper. He doesn’t roll in at two-thirty breathing of good Scotch and a faint flavor of Night in Paris. When such a man finds a mistake in his bank statement, he doesn’t have to

apologize. The bank does. His wife and children are lucky; they al-

ways know where their next meal is coming from. However, don’t expect him to bring home unexpected presents or suddenly tell his wife he is taking her to Europe. Slow and easy does it. He retires early—both to bed and from the business world. 2. THE ONE-SHOT. This is not a true snorer, but must be included in our careful study. He sleeps quietly enough, but at least once in the night he turns over, or twitches, and emits a thunderous SNAAKHT!! and then subsides, leaving his mate cowering under the coverlet, badly shaken. His sudden eruption resembles the sounds made when air gets into the water pipe, and is just as terrifying. This man’s timer is badly in need of adjusting. You will find his wife a

Pauline

350 nervous, thin little woman. No wonder!

Gale

He is the Executive Type.

He wants his meals on time, his office in perfect running order, and

his wife amenable to his sudden decisions to entertain twenty for dinner tomorrow or take a trip, including the children, at a moment’s notice. He fires as quickly as he hires and his political views are always available to anyone who will listen, though they are blistering. His world is difficult and beset by enemies.

3. SEWING MACHINE. Now we find the little woman

who tucks

herself in bed, turns on her motor, and stitches away all night with a

gentle but penetrating HUMM—piff/ know she snores and her husband there it is. She is a busy housewife day begins early and she picks up and dinner, mends, sews, cleans,

HUMM—pliff!

She doesn’t

is too fond of her to tell her, so and never stops for a minute. Her after the children, cooks luncheon and still finds time for The Girls

(her old club) and civic affairs. If you ask her to relax she just looks hurt. She is always Doing Something. Her husband would love to find her lying on the chaise longue reading a novel someday, but he never will. She is a Waltzing Mouse among women. But what would we do without her? 4. VARIETY sHow. The guy who never snores the same for two minutes. He starts out with a regulation SNAAA—WHOOF! SNAAA—WHOOF'! Do not be deceived. This is soon mixed with snorts, cheeps, bellows, and moans. His gas feed is intermittent and he obviously has sugar in the carburetor. His wife must needs lie awake, because who knows what will come next? Even words. Yes —he talks in his sleep as well. Never a dull moment for him. This man, when awake, is the Life of the Party. He is the one who puts the ladies’ hats on and postures. He, to believe his friends, keeps one in stitches. Far in the background one may find his wife, smiling wanly for the thousandth time at the shaggy-dog story. Need we add that he is a salesman and a good one? If you don’t like one sales talk he can quickly switch to another and get you—even if it takes a third. His children adore him but he can’t fix even a squeaky door in the house. His wife is resigned and gallant. Poor husband? Not at all. He’s so much fun you forgive the wet towels on the bathroom

floor and the extravagant fishing tackle he buys just when Junior needs to have his tonsils out.

5. MISSING CYLINDER. A steady-as-she-goes who is evidently full of carbon. Needs a tune-up this: AHHH—HOOOSHL!

job. His snores miss. They go like AHHH—HOOOSHL! GRACKLE

snfmpf! See? The poor man is trying to go up a hill, but his motor won't take it. This is a worried

man.

He worries

about his job.

SHEET

MUSIC

351

About his wife. About himself. Just as he gets set for a long haul,

his subconscious

plays a dirty trick and he remembers

to Worry

about the gas bill—hence the sufmpf! His wife is usually a calm,

serene and capable individual who soothes his troubled brow when awake and is so tired when he’s asleep that she often forgets to kick him and tell him to shut up. 6. THE KEENING soLo. Now we find a lady (it can be a man,

though) whose snore sounds like a high-powered saw going through

a log full of knots.

EEEE—HEEEESH!

EEEE—HEEEESH!

It

Sometimes amounts to a soprano wail. This sound carries through

hundred-year-old oaken doors. When young, such a snorer keens on a high note but not so loudly. After forty, however, a deeper tone

takes charge and approaches the sound of a threshing machine going

full blast. The owner of such a snore is a frustrated artist. She (or he) would have made a hit in the movies. Or as a writer. Or a

painter. They usually eat by candlelight and loathe their neighbors.

Definitely artistic. Now having categorized the main types of individual snorer, let us look into the team. Here is a duet that is difficult to imitate. The man snores deeply—his wife accompanies him with a high sing-

song that matches in mood and tempo his every change of pace. This is something to hear. He starts off with a low obbligato and she weaves her little song

around that base, rising and falling as he changes key. There are interesting breaks wherein he goes pianissimo and allows her to carry the soprano solo and then comes in with a low susurration that she matches, at once, with a gentle trill. When he snorts and changes pace—she gives a brief HUKK and they start on the second cantata. Most people who snore, when awakened, will deny it. The worst kind will admit it and say, “So what?” Nobody knows if he snores or not. It’s a mystery. You suspect it, but you aren’t sure. If you aren’t sure—you snore.

Day’s Work “ix JOHN GALSWORTHY Every morning when he awoke his first thought was: How am I? For it was extremely important that he should be well, seeing that when he was not well he could neither produce what he

knew he ought, nor contemplate that lack of production with equanimity. Having discovered that he did not ache anywhere, he would

say to his wife, “Are you all right?” and, while she was answering, he would think, ““Yes—if I make that last chapter pass subjectively through Blank’s personality, then I had better—” and so on. Not having heard whether his wife were all right, he would get out of bed and do that which he facetiously called “abdominable cult,” for it was necessary that he should digest his food and preserve his figure, and while he was doing it he would partly think, “I am doing this well,” and partly he would think, “That fellow in the Parnassus is quite wrong—he simply doesn’t see—” And pausing for a moment with nothing on, and his toes level with the top of a chest of drawers, he would say to his wife, “What I think about that Parnassus fellow is that he doesn’t grasp the fact that my books—” And he would not fail to hear her answer warmly, “Of course he doesn’t; he’s a perfect idiot.” He would then shave. This was his most creative moment, and he would soon cut himself and utter a little groan, for it would be needful now to find his special cotton wool and stop the bleeding, which was a paltry business and not favorable to the flight of genius. And if his wife, taking advantage of the incident, said

something which she had long been waiting to say, he would answer, wondering a little what it was she had said, and thinking, “There it is, Iget no time for steady thought.” Having finished shaving he would bathe, and a philosophical conclusion would almost invariably come to him just before he douched himself with cold—so that he would pause, and call out through the door: “You know, I think the supreme principle—’ And while his wife was answering, he would resume the drowning of her words, having fortunately remembered just in time that his circulation would suffer if he did not douse himself with cold while he was still

DAY'S WORK

353

warm. He would dry himself, dreamily developing that theory of the universe and imparting to his wife in sentences that seldom had an end, so that it was not necessary for her to answer them. While dressing he would stray a little, thinking, “Why can’t I concentrate myself on my work? It’s awful!” And if he had by any chance a button off, he would present himself rather unwillingly, feeling that it was a waste of his time. Watching her frown from sheer selfeffacement over her button-sewing, he would think, “She is wonder-

ful! How can she put up with doing things for me all day long?” And he would fidget a little, feeling in his bones that the postman had already come. He went down always thinking, “Oh, hang it! This infernal post taking up all my time!” And as he neared the breakfast room, he would quicken his pace; seeing a large pile of letters on the table, he would say automatically, “Curse!” and his eyes would brighten. If—as seldom happened—there were not a green-colored wrapper

enclosing mentions of him in the press, he would murmur, “Thank God!” and his face would fall. It was his custom to eat feverishly, walking a good deal and reading about himself and when his wife tried to bring him to a sense of his disorder he would tighten his lips without a word and think, “I have a good deal of self-control.” He seldom commenced work before eleven, for, though he always intended to, he found it practically impossible not to dictate to his wife things about himself, such as how he could not lecture here; or where he had been born; or how much he would take for this; and why he would not consider that; together with those letters which

began: My dear

’

Thanks tremendously for your letter about my book, and its valuable . You don’t seem criticism. Of course, I think you are quite wrong... quite do me jusever you think don’t I to have grasped. . . . In fact, TACE et pore Yours affectionately,

It was during those hours when he sat in a certain chair with a pen in his hand that he was able to rest from thought about himself, save, indeed, in those moments, not too frequent, when he could not help reflecting, ““That’s a fine page—I have seldom written anything better”; or in those moments, too frequent, when he sighed

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John Galsworthy

deeply and thought, “I am not the man I was.” About half past one, he would get up, with the pages in his hand, and seeking out his wife, would give them to her to read, remarking, “Here’s the wretched

stuff—no

good at all”; and, taking a position where

he thought

she could not see him, would do such things as did not prevent his knowing what effect the pages made on her. If the effect were good he would often feel how wonderful she was; if it were not good he had at once a chilly sensation in the pit of his stomach, and ate very little lunch. When, in the afternoons, he took his walks abroad, he passed great quantities of things and people without noticing, because he was thinking deeply on such questions as whether he were more of an observer or more of an imaginative artist; whether he were properly appreciated in Germany; and particularly whether one were not in danger of thinking too much about oneself. But every now and then he would stop and say to himself, “I really must see more of life, I

really must take in more fuel”; and he would passionately fix his eyes on a cloud, or a flower, or a man walking, and there would instantly come into his mind the thought: “I have written twenty books—ten more will make thirty—that cloud is gray”; or: “That fellow X is jealous of me! This flower is blue”; or: “This man

is walking very—very—Damn the Morning Muff, it always runs me down!” And he would have a sort of sore, beaten feeling, knowing that he had not observed those things as accurately as he would have wished to. During these excursions, too, he would often reflect impersonally upon matters of the day, large questions, of art, public policy, and the human soul; and would almost instantly find that he had always thought this or that; and at once see the necessity for putting his conclusion forward in his book or in the press, phrasing it, of course, in a way that no one else could; and there would start up before him little bits of newspaper with these words on them: ‘No one, perhaps, save Mr. , could have so ably set forth the case for Baluchistan”; or, “In the Daily Miracle there is a noble letter from that eminent

writer, M Very often on things that must get away

, pleading against the hyperspiritualism of our age.” he would say to himself, as he walked with eyes fixed he did not see, “This existence is not healthy. I really and take a complete holiday and not think at all about

my work; I am getting too self-centered.” And he would go home

and say to his wife, “Let’s go to Sicily, or Spain, or somewhere. Let’s get away from all this, and just live.” And when she answered “How jolly!” he would repeat, a little absently, “How jolly!” con-

DAY'S WORK

355. sidering what would be the best arrangement for forwarding his letters. And, if, as sometimes happened, they did go, he would spend almost a whole morning living, and thinking how jolly it was to be away from everything; but toward the afternoon he would feel a sensation as though he were a sofa that had been sat on too much, a sort of subsidence very deep within him. This would be followed in

the evening by a disinclination to live; and that feeling would grow

until on the third day he received his letters, together with a greencolored wrapper enclosing some mentions of himself, and he would

say, “Those fellows—no

getting away from them!” and feel ir-

resistibly impelled to sit down. Having done so he would take up his pen, not writing anything, indeed—because of the determination to

“live,” as yet not quite extinct—but comparatively easy in his mind.

On the following day he would say to his wife: “I believe I can work here.” And she would answer smiling, “That’s splendid”; and he would think, “She’s wonderful!” and begin to write. On other occasions, while walking the streets or about the countryside, he would suddenly be appalled at his own ignorance, and would say to himself, “I know simply nothing—I must read.” And

going home he would dictate to his wife the names of a number of books to be procured from the library. When they arrived he would

look at them a little gravely and think, “By Jove! Have I got to read those?” and the same evening he would take one up. He would not, however, get beyond the fourth page if it were a novel, before he would say, “Muck! He can’t write!” and would feel absolutely stimulated to take up his own pen and write something that was worth reading. Sometimes, on the other hand, he would put down

the novel after the third page, exclaiming: “By Jove! He can write!” And there would rise within him such a sense of dejection at his own inferiority that he would feel simply compelled to try to see whether he really was inferior. But if the book were not a novel he sometimes finished the first chapter before one of two feelings came over him: Either that what he had just read was what he had himself long thought—that, of course, would be when the book was a good one; or that what he had just read was not true, or at all events debatable. In each of these events he found it impossible to go on reading, but would remark to his wife, “This fellow says what I’ve always said”; or, “This fellow says so and so, now I say—” and he would argue the matter with her, taking both sides of the question, so as to save her all unnecessary speech. There were times when he felt that he absolutely must hear music

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John Galsworthy

and he would enter the concert hall with his wife in the pleasurable certainty that he was going to lose himself. Toward the middle of the second number, especially if it happened to be music that he liked, he would begin to nod; and presently, on waking up, would get a feeling that he really was an artist. From that moment on he was conscious of certain noises being made somewhere in his neighborhood, causing a titillation of his nerves favorable to deep and earnest thoughts, about his work. On going out his wife would ask him, “Wasn’t the Mozart lovely?” or, “How did you like the Strauss?” and he would answer, “Rather!” wondering a little which was which; or he would look at her out of the corner of his eye and

glance secretly at the program to see whether he had really heard them, and which Strauss it might be. He was extremely averse to being interviewed, or photographed, and all that sort of publicity, and only made exceptions in most cases

because his wife would say to him, “Oh! I think you ought”; or because he could not bear to refuse anybody anything; together, perhaps, with a sort of latent dislike of waste, deep down in his soul. When he saw the results he never failed to ejaculate, ““Never again! No, really—never again! The whole And he would order a few copies.

thing is wrong

and stupid!”

For he dreaded nothing so much as the thought that he might become an egoist, and knowing the dangers of his profession, fought

continually against it. Often he would complain to his wife, “I don’t think of you enough.” And she would smile and say, “Don’t you?” And he would feel better, having confessed his soul. Sometimes for an hour at a time he would make really heroic efforts not to answer her before having really grasped what she had said; and to check a tendency, that he sometimes feared was growing on him, to say “What?” whether he had heard or no. In truth, he was not (as he often said) constitutionally given to small talk. Conversation that did

not promise a chance of dialectic victory was hardly to his liking; so that he felt bound in sincerity to eschew it, which sometimes caused him to sit silent for “quite a while” as the Americans have phrased it. But once committed to an argument, he found it difficult to leave off, having a natural, if somewhat sacred, belief in his own convictions. His attitude to his creations was, perhaps, peculiar. He either did not mention them, or touched on them if absolutely obliged, with a light and somewhat disparaging tongue; this did not, indeed, come from any real distrust of them, but rather from a superstitious feeling that one must not tempt Providence in the solemn things of life. If other people touched on them in the same way, he had, not unnatu-

DAY’S WORK

TOL

rally, a feeling of real pain, such as comes to a man when he sees an instance of cruelty or injustice. And, though something always told him that it was neither wise nor dignified to notice outrages of this order, he would mutter to his wife, “Well, I suppose it is true—I can’t write”; feeling, perhaps, that—if he could not with decency notice such injuries, she might. And, indeed, she did, using warmer words than even he felt justified, which was soothing. After tea, it was his habit to sit down a second time, pen in hand; not infrequently he would spend those hours divided between

the feeling that it was his duty to write something and the feeling that it was his duty not to write anything if he had nothing to say, and he generally wrote a good deal; for deep down he was convinced that if he did not write he would gradually fade away till there would be nothing left for him to read and think about, and, though he was often tempted to believe and even to tell his wife that fame was an unworthy thing, he always deferred that pleasure, afraid perhaps of too much happiness.

In regard to the society of his fellows he liked almost anybody, though a little impatient with those, especially authors, who took themselves too seriously; and there were just one or two that he really could not stand, they were so obviously full of jealousy, a passion of which he was naturally intolerant and had, of course, no need to indulge in. And he would speak of them with extreme dryness— nothing more, disdaining to disparage. It was, perhaps, a weakness in

him that he found it difficult to accept adverse criticism as anything

but an expression of that same yellow sickness and yet there were moments when no words would adequately convey his low opinion of his own powers. At such times he would seek out his wife and confide to her his conviction that he was a poor thing, no good at all, without a thought in his head; and while she was replying, “Rubbish! You know there’s nobody to hold a candle to you,” or words to that effect, he would look at her tragically, and murmur, “Ah! you're prejudiced!” Only at such supreme moments of dejection, indeed, did he feel it a pity that he had married her, seeing how much more convincing her words would have been if he had not. He never read the papers till the evening, partly because he had not time, and partly because he so seldom found anything in them. This was not remarkable, for he turned their leaves quickly, pausing,

indeed, naturally, if there were any mention of his name; and if his wife asked him whether he had read this or that he would answer, “No,” surprised at the funny things that seemed to interest her.

Before going up to bed he would sit and smoke. And sometimes

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John Galsworthy

fancies would come to him, and sometimes none. Once in a while he would look up at the stars, and think, “What a worm I am! This wonderful infinity! I must get more of it—more of it into my work;

more of the feeling that the whole is marvelous and great, and man a little clutch of breath and dust, an atom, a straw, a nothing!” And a sort of exaltation would seize on him, so that he knew that if only he did get that into his work, as he wished to, as he felt

just then that he could, he would be the greatest writer the world had ever seen, the greatest man, almost greater than he wished to be,

almost too great to be mentioned in the press, greater than infinity itself{—for would he not be infinity’s creator? And suddenly he would check himself with the thought, “I must be careful—I must be careful. If I let my brain go at this time of night, I shan’t write a decent word tomorrow!” And he would drink some milk and go to bed.

Do Re Mi

“= WOLCOTT GIBBS I musr have been ten when it came to me that never, this side of paradise, would I be able to carry a tune, and that even identifying one would tax my tiny powers unless I could hear the words. I was a pupil then at the Horace Mann School, up on 120th Street, and our class was an early venture in experimental education, being held outdoors, on a roof. We wore little woolly suits and hoods that gave a sort of startled and bloodthirsty pleasure to the

regular students downstairs, who were without our embarrassing advantages. We looked like rabbits and when we ventured recklessly

down from our roof during recess we were hunted like rabbits. We were like rabbits, too, in that we were the soft and foolish victims of a thousand grim experiments. It was a thin week that didn’t bring us at least one delegation of educators of a refined and scientific aspect, who came with their questionnaires and went away to write admir-

ingly about us in the journals of their trade. I never had to read these articles, but nevertheless I was grateful when one of the bloodless creatures slipped on the icy roof and broke his glasses.

The delegation which found out that I was tone-deaf consisted of two ladies, who wished to test the pre-adolescent reaction to music.

We were lined up in a solemn, woolly row while one of them wrote a line of strange words on the blackboard. Her handwriting was distinguished, requiring quite a lot of preliminary skirmishing with the chalk, and I had begun to itch by the tme the other one got up and sang the words. “Do re mi fa sol la ti do,” she sang.

“I can see down into the lady’s neck,” whispered the child beside me with horror. Our visitor sang the line two or three times more, and then two or three times backward. ‘Now, children,” she said. “Let’s all sing.” We all sang. At first we were uncertain, puzzled by the unfamiliar words. “Do I hear some little mice squeaking?” said the first lady,

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Wolcott

Gibbs

cupping her hand gaily at her ear. “Oh, come, children, let’s have some really truly singing. Now louder . . .”

We sang louder, and presently, getting into the spirit of the thing, we were yelling our heads off. The ladies must have been new at

pre-adolescent research, because, having asked for. really truly singing, they seemed a little agitated when they got it. “That’s fine,” the first one said hastily. “Now we'll let each child see what he can do all by his lonesome. We'll start down at this end. What’s your name, little man?”

“Thomas,” said Thomas, “but I don’t sing.” “Why, Thomas!” said the second lady. “You don’t want to hurt Miss Edgerton’s feelings, do you? Now, ‘Do’. . .” “No,” said Thomas firmly, but the ladies were too tough for him, and in the end he executed an embarrassed scale. They moved down the line with varying results. Some of the children sang loud and clear, without self-consciousness and were disappointed

when

the ladies

moved

on.

Others

were

shy, and

their

singing was unhappy and almost inaudible. The ladies carefully noted these facts in their little notebooks. I was not at all nervous when they came to me. They had said they wanted volume, and I was confident that I could sing as loud as anybody. “And what is our name?” asked the first lady, who couldn’t possibly have had any idea what she was in for. I told her and then, as she tossed her head musically, I sang a hearty scale. Both ladies looked incredulous. ‘Perhaps we’d better try again,” said the second one, after a moment. It seemed clear that I had been a disappointment to her, although I couldn’t see why, because I was sure I had sung as loud as anybody else. I drew a deep breath and tried again. The ladies looked at one another. “No,” said the first, “I’m afraid we don’t quite understand. The little notes go up. Like this.” She sang me a sample scale, with gestures that went up. “Try to think of eight little men climbing a flight of stairs. Now. 23¢7 I sang again. The eight little men seemed to have no especial bearing on what I was doing, but I thought of them. “It’s amazing,” said the second lady, though clearly this was not praise. “The child just stays on the same note.”

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“Completely tone-deaf,” said the other one, and wrote briskly in her book.

They were reluctant to give me up, and produced many ingenious and graphic illustrations of the fact that the diatonic scale goes up as it goes along. I did my best, too, getting quite damp and breathless

in my attempts to sing the way they wanted me to. My wool pants were itching like hell at the end, but I was still singing the same note, and the ladies were licked.

Later in life being tone-deaf had its advantages, but at Horace Mann it gave me a peculiar and grisly distinction. The children were not exactly sure what was the matter with me, but whatever it was

it had been sinister enough to alarm the investigators, and my playmates were impressed, For the rest of the year my singing had a fascination for them second only to the manual-training teacher’s thumb, which had been bitten off by a turtle he’d been annoying.

Etiquette

“t= WILLIAM SCHWENK GILBERT Tue Ballyshannon foundered off the coast of Cariboo, And down in fathoms many went the captain and the crew; Down went the owners—greedy men whom hope of gain allured: Oh, dry the starting tear, for they were heavily insured. Besides the captain and the mate, the owners and the crew, The passengers were also drowned excepting only two: Young Peter Gray, who tasted teas for Baker, Croop, and Co.,

And Somers, who from Eastern shores imported indigo. These passengers, by reason of their clinging to a mast, Upon a desert island were eventually cast. They hunted for their meals, as Alexander Selkirk used, But they couldn’t chat together—they had not been introduced.

For Peter Gray, and Somers too, though certainly in trade, Were properly particular about the friends they made; And somehow thus they settled it without a word of mouth— That Gray should take the northern half, while Somers took the south. On Peter’s portion oysters grew—a delicacy rare. But oysters were a delicacy Peter couldn’t bear. On Somers’ side was turtle, on the shingle lying thick, Which Somers couldn’t eat, because it always made him sick. Gray knashed his teeth with envy as he saw a mighty store Of turtle unmolested on his fellow creature’s shore: The oysters at his feet aside impatiently he shoved, For turtle and his mother were the only things he loved. And Somers sighed in sorrow as he settled in the south, For the thought of Peter’s oysters brought the water to his mouth.

ETIQUETTE

WWN Ww

He longed to lay him down upon the shelly bed, and stuff; He had often eaten oysters, but had never had enough. How they wished an introduction to each other they had had

When on board the Ballyshannon! And it drove them nearly mad To think how very friendly with each other they might get, If it wasn’t for the arbitrary rule of etiquette!

One day, when out a-hunting for the mus ridiculus, Gray overheard his fellow man soliloquizing thus: “I wonder how the playmates of my youth are getting on, M’Connell, S. B. Walters, Paddy Byles and Robinson?” These simple words made Peter as delighted as could be, Old chummies at the Charterhouse were Robinson and he! He walked straight up to Somers, then he turned extremely red, Hesitated, hummed and hawed a bit, then cleared his throat, and said:

“T beg your pardon—pray forgive me if I seem too bold, But you have breathed a name I knew familiarly of old. You spoke aloud of Robinson—I happened to be by— You know him?” “Yes, extremely well.” “Allow me—so do I!” It was enough: they felt they could more sociably get on, For (ah, the magic of the fact!) they each knew Robinson! And Mr. Somers’ turtle was at Peter’s service quite, And Mr. Somers punished Peter’s oyster beds all night.

They soon became like brothers from community of wrongs; They wrote each other little odes and sang each other songs; They told each other anecdotes disparaging their wives; On several occasions, too, they saved each other’s lives. They felt quite melancholy when they parted for the night,

And got up in the morning soon as ever it was light; Each other’s pleasant company they reckoned so upon, And all because it happened that they both knew Robinson!

They lived for many years on that inhospitable shore, And day by day they learned to love each other more and more. At last, to their astonishment, on getting up one day, They saw a vessel anchored in the offing of the bay!

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Gilbert

To Peter an idea occurred. “Suppose we cross the main?

So good an opportunity may not occur again.” And Somers thought a minute, then ejaculated, “Done! I wonder how my business in the City’s getting on?” “But stay,” said Mr. Peter; “when in England, as you know, I earned a living tasting teas for Baker, Croop, and Co., I may be superseded—my employers think me dead!” “Then come with me,” said Somers, “and taste indigo instead.”

But all their plans were scattered in a moment when they found The vessel was a convict ship from Portland, outward bound! When a boat came off to fetch them, though they felt it very kind, To go on board they firmly but respectfully declined. As both the happy settlers roared with laughter at the joke, They recognized an unattractive fellow pulling stroke:

*T was Robinson—a convict, in an unbecoming frock! Condemned to seven years for misappropriating stock!!! They laughed no more, for Somers thought he had been rather rash In knowing one whose friend had misappropriated cash, And Peter thought a foolish tack he must have gone upon In making the acquaintance of a friend of Robinson.

At first they didn’t quarrel very openly, I’ve heard; They nodded when they met, and now and then exchanged a word: The word grew rare, and rarer still the nodding of the head, And when they meet each other now, they cut each other dead.

To allocate the island they agreed by word of mouth. And Peter takes the north again, and Somers takes the south; And Peter has the oysters, which he loathes with horror grim, And Somers has the turtle—turtle disagrees with him.

Why | Never Bawl Out a Waitress

“Y HARRY GOLDEN I wAve a rule against registering complaints in a restaurant; because I know that there are at least four billion suns in the Milky Way—which is only one galaxy. Many of these suns are thousands of times larger than our own, and vast millions of them have whole planetary systems, including literally billions of satellites, and all of this revolves at the rate of about a million miles an hour, like a huge oval pinwheel. Our own sun and its planets, which include the earth, are on the edge of this wheel. This is only our own small corner of the universe, so why do not these billions of revolving and rotating suns and planets collide? The answer is, the space is so unbelievably vast that if we reduced the suns and the planets in correct mathematical proportion with relation to the distances between them, each sun would be a speck of dust, two, three, and four thousand miles away from its nearest neighbor. And, mind you, this is only the Milky Way—our own small corner—our own galaxy. How many galaxies are there? Billions. Billions of galaxies spaced at about one million light-years apart (one light-year is about six trillion

miles). Within the range of our biggest telescopes there are at least one hundred million separate galaxies such as our own Milky Way, and that is not all, by any means. The scientists have found that the further you go out into space with the telescopes the thicker the galaxies become, and there are billions of billions as yet uncovered to the scientist’s camera and the astrophysicist’s calculations. When you think of all this, it’s silly to worry whether the waitress brought you string beans instead of limas.

Come One, Come One

“i JACK GOODMAN and ALAN GREEN ¢

Our friends have taken a place in the country this summer—our place. As a result, my wife Phyllis is fit to be tied. And unless I can arrange to have someone do a capable job of tying her before she gets

into the car and meets me when I arrive on the 6:37 at Westport, there is going to be some small unpleasantness on the eastbound platform. Phyllis says that my hospitality is going to result in her hospitalization. But it isn’t really my fault. The blame lies in that great American institution, the summer weekend. You see, [ve just finished phoning to tell her that a couple of guests will be out with me on the train tonight, Friday. When she said, “Do you think Information could give me the number of a reliable concern in the trainwrecking business?” I was offended and decided to hang up. But she beat me to it, muttering something about my not even knowing what tomorrow is. Of course I know what tomorrow is. It is the day that Bill and

Tom

and I are getting up at six so that we

can play 54 holes

of golf. I must say that Phyllis has changed. When I married her last year (I’ve forgotten the exact date, it was somewhere around this time of year, maybe next week, maybe last), she was a gay little thing who liked people, even my friends. She enjoyed out pleasant bantering evenings with them, pitched with enthusiasm into the parlor games we played, and rarely failed to win enough to pay off my small losses. But these summer weekends have changed her. I’m sure it was no one specific incident. ’m quite convinced it wasn’t that business about Sidney and the early American glassware. True, it was our glassware, but it was Sidney’s forehead. Nor could it have been that little matter of Rita and the overstuffed chair. After all, Rita studied chemistry in school, and if she

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Says it was spontaneous combustion, who are we to doubt her word?

Nevertheless, Phyllis always starts biting her nails toward the end of the week. This works out for the best, because by the time our guests leave, she is trying to claw at me with them.

By now I’m an expert on Being a Host. I’ve devoted a lot of study

to both sides of the relieved Monday-morning farewell. I’ve seen a lot of hands still shaking after they’ve unclasped. And now I’m in a position to give the world the benefits of my experience. I’ve been at it all summer and I know that the perfect Host is someone whose heart is in the right place. This place is generally his mouth. A Guest, on the other hand, is someone whose heart is on his sleeve, which is generally in my butter. In my Guest days, I believed that Hosts lay in wait treacherously for the opportunity to get up in the middle of the night and rearrange all the furniture in the path between a hapless Guest and the bathroom. Now, as a Host, I see the basic truth: Guests are low, skulking, destructive types who like nothing better than to go out of their way to bump into a costly piece of furniture. There is no problem at all to being a Guest. All you need is a toothbrush and a razor to fit your Host’s razor blades in. But being a Host requires not only the toothbrush and razor your Guest has forgotten, but also a cluster of talents in the entertainment and diplo-

matic fields which could only be found in a character combining the best features of Sally and Talley rand. For instance, no Guest need be told the proper etiquette involved

in informing his Host that his bathing trunks have just been eaten by the Host’s dog. He just tells him, quickly and forcefully. But a whole course could be given on the proper methods of informing the Guest that a large segment of the trunks he has just appeared in at the pool were recently eaten by the Host’s dog. And still another could be given on what to do about the Guest who insists on getting up early. It does no good to lock him in. I tried this a few weeks ago and it was easily parried by my guest’s

simple gambit of taking a heavy, valuable object and banging it against the wall, unhurriedly and steadily, for the next hour. People who don’t want to face and conquer these and countless other problems involved in being a Host had better spend the sweltering summer weekends in the city, having a good time in some aircooled movie. Don’t for a minute think you can duck your responsibility by airily deciding not to have Guests at all. You will have them. Any Guest who knows his business realizes that the summer is the open season on open houses. He will merely wait for your in-

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vitation until the last minute and then drop in uninvited if it doesn’t come. Now let us see How to Be a Host by watching one in actual practice—me. To understand the endless war between Hosts and Guests, to comprehend Phyllis’ reaction to my announcement that I was bringing guests out this evening, it will be necessary for us to examine a couple of actual weekends. These weekends may not be typical. One can speak of a typical weekend only in the same sense that one can refer to a typical earth-

quake. In both there are great differences of intensity, total damage, and number of human beings trapped. But just as the scientist, picking himself off the floor and painfully working his way back to his

seismograph, can discover that what has caused his violent flight through the room has been an “earthquake,” so can we glean valuable information from samples of my summer weekends.

Our first weekend in July, for instance. I'll give it in brief instead of getting the whole transcript from the court stenographer. Phyllis and [ planned this one very carefully, and whatever people say about the best-laid plans of mice and men, I feel that any self-respecting mouse would have given itself up to the nearest cat if its plans had gone that much agley. We knew it was going to be a long weekend, what with the

Fourth of July falling on a Tuesday. So we saved it for the people we like best, Graham and Mary Terwilliger. This, I felt, would be ideal, since Graham could play golf every day with me, while Mary could do whatever it is women do all day with Phyllis. Then in the evenings we could play a few rubbers of bridge and go off to bed early, tired, happy and at peace with the murmurous country night.

It might have worked out that way if Mary hadn’t slammed the train door on Graham’s foot on the way out. “You should have been

holding it open yourself,” she apologized. From that point their conversation had moved rapidly toward a silence which became total by the time their train reached Westport. Since Phyllis and I are very loyal to our friends, we promptly took sides and soon we weren’t talking to each other either. Our conversation at dinner went something like this: “Phyllis,” Mary would say, “would you kindly tell Graham to pass the catsup? Tell him not to bother taking it off his vest—there’s still enough in the bottle.” “Of course, dear,” Phyllis would answer. “I’m so sorry you have

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such a little veal chop to put it on. I must tell the maid not to serve

Jack first next time.” With a hard laugh I’d say to Graham, “You'd think my salary certainly would be bitielcke to get enough veal chops to eat, wouldn’t

you, Graham?” “Tt was,” Phyllis, explained sweetly to Mary, “until veal went up a cent and a half a pound last week.” “There are certain people,” said Graham, drumming his fingers

musingly on the table, “that I would like to see trying to run a business office.” “That’s a good one, Graham,” I said, slapping my knee apprecia-

tively with my right hand, which unifortunately held a piece of wellbuttered toast. “There are certain peaptee? said Mary to Phyllis, “that I would like to see stop trying to run a business office and run one for a

change. By the way, Graham’s still not doing very well with that gold-mine stock he bought last year from the man they arrested in Chicago last week.”

“T know,” said Phyllis. “Jack isn’t doing any better with his, even though he has twice as much of it. It’s a shame, too, when you think of how much the boys spent on that airplane trip to buy the stuff.” Somehow or other we didn’t get to bridge that night. Instead we all sat around the living room and glared at each other. At eleven, Mary went upstairs and took a hot bath, using all the water in the tank. When Graham followed later and found no water coming out, he left the faucets turned on. Sometime in the night the hot water began to flow again, overran the tub, and created a small river along the bathroom floor to the hall. From there it cascaded prettily downstairs to the living room, where it formed a deep and peaceful pool.

In the morning, while Mary was on her hands and knees mopping it up, in Phyllis’ best negligee, Graham went out to the garage and drove my car through the wall, not realizing that it is a habit of mine to leave the car in gear with the brake off. Rushing through the garage door to help him, it did not occur to me that he would be rushing through the same door to tell me what had happened. We came to an abrupt stop, both of us standing on Graham’s foot. It was the same one Mary had slammed the train door on, and from that point Graham wouldn’t talk to me, either. Golf now out of the question, I decided to let my guests shift for themselves and busy myself about the house. I took some rubbish out

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in the back to burn it, little realizing that our stationery store would

deliver our Fourth of July fireworks in such old boxes and crumpled newspaper.

For the next two days, Graham sat around with his bandaged foot on a chair while I plied myself with healing oils and’ preserved a stony silence while Phyllis told Mary that, with my eyebrows off, my forehead didn’t look quite so low. The next weekend we naturally set aside for a little peace and quiet. There were to be just the two of us—and there were—right through until Saturday midnight. It was then who were driving down from Maine, stopped off.

that

the Wialburs,

They had their garter snakes with them. Mrs. Wilbur did not know this. All she knew was that she didn’t want Milton to drive any more because the night air was definitely not sobering him up. Milton had found the garter snakes beside the road when he got out to look at a tire or something and naturally did not want to leave them so far from town. So he helped them into the tonneau among the luggage. And when we sleepily admitted him and his wife, he bedded them down in our kitchen, modestly refraining from mentioning this good deed. The first inkling we had of the snakes’ presence came in the morn-

ing when the maid tossed the butter crock through the kitchen window. This crash so startled Milton’s process of sleeping it off that he leaped from bed, tore out into the hall, and easily cleared a low rail-

ing which stood in his path. This, at the rate of 32 feet per second, brought him into our living room downstairs. He had the good fortune to land on our divan. Or, as Phyllis put it, “Why did that divan have to be right there where he would break its valuable springs instead of his own worthless neck?” Let us pass quickly over the weekend with Mr. Megglesworth and his wife. He was my biggest customer, and we simply had to have him out. They arrived Friday evening with six children and departed the following Thursday with seven. After they left, Phyllis murmured something about our weekend house being a family-waystation. She also added musingly that up to this point she thought she had seen every possible method by which an uninvited guest could drop in for the weekend. . . . Altogether, you may now be able to see why Phyllis maintains that if a man’s home is his castle, his summer one should have a good, deep moat around it. You can also see that it is easy to be a Host. All you need is an un-

limited income, a capacity for going three days without sleep or the

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Bek use of your bathroom, and an air of good-fellowship that your guests can cut with a knife and probably will.

If you haven’t all these qualities, you might solve the summer problem by taking two places. One could be a tiny affair of one

room and a bath for yourself, the other a large, drafty manor some 20 miles away for the misuse of your guests. Phyllis and I toyed with

this idea for next summer. We thought of calling the big place To-

bacco Roadhouse. The little one would be known as Cold Shoulde r Arms. But we’ve already abandoned this notion. We are undoubtedly tak-

ing this same place again next year. After all, our guests are accustomed to it. And they are such creatures of habit.

The Law of the Bungle “i= JACK GOODMAN and ALBERT RICE How, you may inquire, does one make a faux pas? Let’s see. You are, shall we say, at a party. There is a moment’s lull in the gay chatter. You make a remark to the person nearest you—a

re-

mark that rings clearly through the room. There is an immediate dead silence—more ominous than the one which had occurred before you spoke. Surprised, you look about to find a cluster of faces staring at you—in amazement—in amusement —or in high dudgeon. Hastily you check over what you have just said. To your horror, you find that it was not at all what you meant. You cannot move. You cannot speak. You look despairingly at the floor, hoping to heaven that it will open up and swallow you. But it remains grimly shut—and oh, how you wish your mouth had! You have, in short, committed a faux pas. And the only comfort you can get out of it is the knowledge that you have joined the great army of foot-swallowers—and that someone, at some time, has undoubtedly said something far worse. There are plenty of foot-swallowers. The road to hell may, as the old saw put it, be paved with good intentions, but it is a safe bet that it is likewise colored bright carmine with the blushes of those who have committed faux pas—and then violently wished that they were home having nice comfortable nightmares.

Not only are there blunderers, there are master blunderers. Just as there are great wits, with few blots on their bright verbal escutcheons, so there are great nitwits, with no bright spots on theirs.

There was a congressman many years ago, John Wesley Gaines by name, who must have ranked high among those who could turn an inappropriate phrase alluringly. His exploits, unfortunately, have not come down to us—but they are indicated in a poem written to

THE

LAW

OF

THE

BUNGLE

him by a sly, unknown

genius of a colleague—and

ails)

this poem

sufficient to immortalize John Wesley Gaines. It goes like this:

is

John Wesley Gaines! John Wesley Gaines! Thou monumental mass of brains! Come in, John Wesley— OU itmainss=. ee

The faux pas is repartee which has become accidentally entangled with hara-kiri. It is far more insidious than the most vicious type of repartee. Repartee at its very best demolishes only the person at whom it is directed, but a really juicy faux pas will pick off, not only its object, but its horrified creator as well.

A well known example of this treacherous, omnivorous quality of the faux pas is the story of the lady and the famous financier whom she had invited to tea. The lady was naturally a nervous type, and she became more than usually high-strung upon the sudden appearance of her small son during the conversation that preceded the serving of refreshments.

She was sure that the little boy was going to make some devastating comment upon the abnormally large nose possessed by her visitor. Time and again she saw her child eyeing the nose curiously. And it was large, that she was forced to admit to herself. Several times, she was convinced, she had cut short one or another frank reflection with a frantic, but judiciously timed: “Sh-h-h-h, Johnny, little boys should be seen and not heard!” Finally, to her intense relief, the nurse appeared and summarily

ushered the child to the nursery. Just then, the maid came in with the tea. With a happy sigh, the hostess turned to her guest and said: “And now, Mr. X, will you have one or two lumps with your nose?” Blunders of that sort have been known to disrupt anything from a casual friendship to a peace treaty between nations. Things that never, never should have been said have played their part in changing the course of history and the contours of maps, from Von Bethmann-Hollweg’s “scrap of paper” comment to the footswallowing efforts of rulers and statesmen back through the mists of time. There are three fundamental causes for verbal bungling. These causes overlap fraternally, so that one may play a sturdy part in assisting another. But on the whole, the types of verbal boners fall roughly into three divisions. The first general cause of foot-swallowing is ignorance—igno-

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and Albert Rice

rance either of the nitroglycerin possibilities in the words and sentences we employ, or of the fact that many situations in which we find ourselves contain all the elements needed to generate spontaneous social combustion. Boners caused by our unwitting and unwilling shortsightedness can range from the merely: laughable to the genuinely pathetic. Generally the latter are the funniest of all faux pas, yet our laughter, upon contemplating them, may be tinged with emotions which vary from “Serves him right!” to “Oh, the poor thing!” Certainly,

“Serves

him

right!”

is the universal

reaction

when

you pause to consider the disaster which overtook the young American who found himself seated next to the eminent Chinese, Wellington Koo, at a diplomatic banquet. Completely at a loss as to what to say to a Chinese, this young man, with a touch of genius such as may be detected only in real faux past-masters, said: “Likee soupee?”’ Mr. Koo smiled and nodded. Several moments later, when called

upon to say a few words, he delivered a brilliant little talk in flawless English, sat down while the applause was still resounding, turned to the young man and said: “Likee speechee?” Here the victim’s bungling was so obviously caused by stupidity that our natural reaction is that he thoroughly deserved the consequences. Nor do we feel any particular sympathy with the pronouncement made by a certain easily recognizable mayor of a great city, who,

when he was being harried by the press to make a statement regarding the current crime wave, hemmed and hawed, and finally trumpeted, to a group of delighted reporters: ‘““The police are fully able to meet and compete with all criminals!” Occasionally, however, a situation will arrive in which our sympathies are wholly with the troubled victim of his own tongue, who has said practically the same thing anyone else would have said in the same pickle, only to have it mushroom suddenly into a Frankenstein’s monster. Our sympathy is piqued quite as much as our interest by the little

slip made by Austria’s champion woman swimmer whose knowledge of English was somewhat limited. Asked by a Time reporter what her specialty was, she answered simply, “I am backside champion.” What would you have done, for instance, if you had been in the position of the socially prominent lady in the transcontinental train?

Her plight has long since become popular legend, more terrifying than any ghost story. The writers remember seeing it in The New Yorker at least four years ago.

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She knew she had somewhere

375

before seen the woman

who had

just got on the train. And she was in a complete dither when that

woman, catching her eye, came rushing over, all smiles, exclaimed, “Why, my dear, how wonderful to find you here!” and then pro-

ceeded to indulge in a stream of intimate reminiscence which patently

showed a thoroughly close previous relationship with our friend. Clawing frantically into her memory in a desperate effort to recall who under the sun her companion was, the poor woman sud-

denly heard the unknown say, “—and my brother was mentioning

you just the other day!” In her panic, she seized this scrap of information with pathetic

eagerness. She said: “Yes—yes—your brother! What—what is he do-

ing now?” The unknown appeared momentarily puzzled. Then she stiffened. “He is still,” she said icily, “President of the United States!” In most of the blunders made because of ignorance—not that par-

ticular one, incidentally—it will be found that a touch of the very

simple, easily managed ingredient of silence will work wonders.

other, and blunter words, when in doubt, shut up.

In

You certainly feel sorry for the lady on the train. But you just as certainly don’t for the small-town politician who had just been informed of a murder in one of his precincts. Fearing to step on the toes of certain prominent parishioners in the church in which the murder had taken place, he took particular care in choosing his words when asked to comment. “The recent killing of Miss Amanda Perkins in the basement of this church,” he said firmly, “has caused some criticism.” Such errors should be confined to the very young, those who are having their first adventures in the exciting jungle of words. We don’t criticize, we hail, the schoolboy quoted in Boners who, when asked to give the reason for Achilles’ invulnerability, informed his teacher that “Achilles was dipped into the River Stynx until he was intolerable.” Similarly do we admire the definition given by another promising lad when asked to outline his Opinion as to just what a surefooted animal was. “A sure-footed animal,” he said bluntly, “is an animal that when it kicks it does not miss.” But in the case of the adult who has floundered beyond his depth, our amusement is for the most part combined with gratification—as in the stock faux pas, which probably occurs at least once each day somewhere in the world, in which the young woman says, “Aren’t you the man I met at that horrible party at those impossible Wil-

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loughbys’?” and is answered with the frigid “Quite possibly—I am Mr. Willoughby.”

There is one story of this type—already a classic—which affords a different kind of chuckle. It concerns

a young man at a party who,

upon mention of the name of a certain college president, launched instantly upon a violent and abusive denunciation of that gentleman. In the course of his attack he touched acidly upon the latter’s beliefs, personal convictions and habits. When the stream of his remarks slowed down to an eddy, the attractive young woman who had re-

mained seated at his side throughout this diatribe said, “Do you happen to know who I am?” The young man expected no blow. The lady had smiled pleasantly

at his sallies. “Why, no,” he said. “I don’t believe I caught your name.” “T,” she said sweetly, “am the wife of the gentleman you have been discussing.” The young man blanched. Out of the thundering silence which ensued he heard himself murmuring, “And do you know who I am?” The lady admitted she didn’t.

“Thank God!” he said fervently, and disappeared into the night. The second major cause of foot-swallowing is plain, everyday hastiness. Those callous citizens among us who derive a good deal of fun from the contemplation of other people’s plights should be grateful to the modern speedy tempo. It has given us some of the very best blunders. It is difficult to imagine, for instance, any other civilization which could have produced the hurried politeness of the young hostess who, when seeing one of her guests to the door, remarked, “It was so nice to have met you for such a short time!” Or the irritable statement of the harassed police inspector justify-

ing himself to his superior: “How can I be expected to solve these murders,” he grated, “when the victims won’t cooperate with the authorities?”’ Hastiness gives rise to the eagerness blunder, the sort made by the young hostess. Sometimes this is eagerness to please, sometimes eagerness to impress. Eagerness to please, of course, caused the boner pulled by the mayor of a small English town when he introduced Stephen Leacock, the Canadian teacher and author, to the townsmen. “To think,” he mused impressively, “that years ago England populated Canada with felons, rogues and convicts—and now they are coming back to us!” Eagerness to impress has led to several choice morsels, among

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them the statement of the pompous doctor, about to inspect a lunatic

asylum. “Don’t forget,” he admonished his friend who was accompanying him—and who had taken no previous part in the conversation, “that an idiot is a human being like you or myself!” And the preacher hurrying through his sermon accounted for a beauty as he placed his hand upon his heart and gave a puzzled but interested congregation the following information:

“My friends, I have in my heart a half-warmed fish.” Only a few present realized that the good man was not expressing a preference for his evening meal, but had actually meant to say “‘half-formed wish.” A policy of leaping and then looking back in consternation at what one has said is responsible for unnumbered blunders of this type. All

of us are forever scrambling words, twisting sentences, mixing our metaphors—and only because our brain is turning over at a rate too rapid for our tongue to keep pace with it.

Fantastic figures of speech often result from blind haste. “My friends,”

warned

one

speaker, addressing

a young

mens’

business

club, “every man should stick to his trade. When he goes prowling about in strange pastures he spoils the broth!” The laughter which followed did not disconcert him. “Let your thoughts and your ideals soar upwards!” he continued, a moment later. “Let them speed as steadily and as truly as a bow released from its arrow!” It is charitable to assume that the same general hastiness was also responsible for the statement recently propounded by a senator, who shall be nameless. Made during an Independence Day oration, it was in newspapers throughout the nation.

“The Fourth of July is a peculiarly American institution!” was his deathless contribution to our political literature. From the business world an occasional tasty example is culled. Here are two faux pas which nicely blend eagerness to please with eagerness to impress. One is the story of the somewhat histrionic salesman of corn plaster who had reached a dramatic climax in his sales talk.

“The minute you've applied it, the pain stops like magic!” he said enthusiastically. “Now you keep the corn wet for one minute! Now it’s ready! Now just start peeling it off—foot and all.” The other concerns a young insurance agent who was proudly outlining his company’s methods to a prospect. The prospect, as is not unusual, was going down fighting. “But sir,” said the salesman earnestly, in answer to still another ob-

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jection, “it has always been the policy of our company to give the family back some money out of their insurance.” Most treacherous of all is the third major cause of faux pas, the subconscious mind. No respecter of people, the subconscious has been responsible for some amazing blunders. It has a penchant for rearing its sly head in the midst of a téte-d-téte or an important social event with a lack of discrimination and an insouciance which forever sadden the particular person whose subconscious it unfortunately happens to be. From it flower the blunders which betray the innermost secrets of our minds, the strange outpourings of queer ideas which are evolved in the tiny, uncontrollable, mischief-making segments of the brain. No one is immune to the faux pas which results from the overflow of the subconscious. The story told at the beginning of this piece, that of the lady and the financier, is typical. So is the mistake made by the guest who was debating the advisability of going home. His host looked out of the window and said, “You simply can’t go. It’s raining. You must stay for dinner.” The guest glanced through the window and said, “Oh, no, it isn’t raining that hard.” And so is that of the man who was pressing his reluctant friend to come to his house for dinner. ‘Do come up,” he urged. “My wife and I argued about it all last evening—and it’s settled!” There is, too, the famous instance of General Joe Wheeler, Confederate veteran of the Civil War. Many years later he found himself storming Las Guasimas, during the Spanish-American War. The General forgot himself completely in the excitement. Turning to his men, he shouted: “Come on, boys, we’ve got the damn Yankees on the run!” Into this category of the subconscious faux pas can be pigeonholed also all of the good old standbys about the absent-minded professor, none of which will be repeated here—although they do call to mind the little tale of the young man of our acquaintance who was never noted for his ability to concentrate. Bolting from his home one morning (he lived, let’s say, at 1467 Main Street) he bounded into a taxicab at the corner. “Quick!” he barked at the driver. “Fourteen-sixty-seven Main Street—and hurry!” He then settled back into the seat, completely absorbed in his thoughts. The driver turned wearily and said, ‘““That’s where you're at now, buddy.”

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“Never mind!” said the young man, still preoccupied. “Make it as fast as you can!” Boners of this kind are really too mild to be called faux pas. There is a certain gentle insanity to them, it is true, but a better term for

them might be faux pastels. No one ever knows when he is going to startle his hearers with one of them. Only recently an eminent man of letters, giving a lecture to a group of intellectuals, fascinated

them with the touching statement: “I have one small son—a boy.”

The faux pas is not entirely verbal. There are literary footswallowers as well as oratorical ones. Some of the very fruitiest blunders are found bound into permanence between the covers of books. And daily, the sharp-eyed are rewarded for their vigilance by the discovery of happy little errors, in newspapers and magazines, which contribute a good deal to the gaiety of nations. Consider the pleasure afforded the person who first discovered, in a book of etiquette, of all places, the dogged statement that “A

gentlemen invariably follows a lady upstairs.”

The causes of the written blunder are precisely the same as those for the spoken one. Who is to say, for instance that the reporter was not saying precisely what his subconscious dictated when he wrote, in an account of a babies’ beauty contest, that “not one of the babies on whom the judge bestowed a kiss shed a single tear.” Generally speaking, the written slip-ups which occur because the writers are not very adept at handling the language (the ignorance

type) are far funnier than those which result from typographical errors. The writers’ particular pet of this sort was penned several years

ago, but achieved a certain amount of fame through being reprinted, not only in that alert journal, The New Yorker, but in a book published by that magazine which was devoted to mistakes in the daily news. If memory serves, it was occasioned by the departure of the Graf Zeppelin from Lakehurst. The reporter’s vivid description went something like this: “Among the last to enter was Mrs. Clara A , of Erie, Pa., lone woman passenger. Slowly her huge nose was turned around into the wind. Then, like some great beast, she crawled along the grass.” Poor Mrs, A. , reading this spectacular story of her departure, must have felt a certain kinship to the executive, reading of himself in the following little note on the care and feeding of governors: “After the Governor watched the lion perform, he was taken to

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Main Street and fed twenty-five pounds of raw meat in front of the Fox Theatre.” As has been said, the simple typographical error produces smiles, rather than chuckles or absolute guffaws. However, there is an occasional rare one. There was the New Zealand paper, for example, which stated that “The departing Mr. S was a member of the defective branch of the police force,” and then, in response to the vociferous and outraged demands of the constabulary, ran the following apology the next day conspicuously boxed off:

“By an unfortunate typographical error, we were made to say yesterday, that ‘the departing Mr. S—— was a member of the defective branch of the police force.’ Our apologies. Of course this should have read: “The detective branch of the police farce.’ ” It would be very simple to invent a set of rules for the prevention

of all kinds of blunders. It would also be rank skullduggery to do so. Such a set of rules could be riddled with holes large enough to march an entire army of bunglers through—in their characteristic

step, foot in mouth. There is no cure-all for the verbal lapse. In Utopia, perhaps, a vastly superior race to our own may always say

the right thing at the right time—which is one thing that the present civilization will have over Utopia. It is fairly safe to assume, however, that as long as there are tongues, there will be slips of the tongue—and as long as rain exists,

there will be men like John Wesley Gaines disporting themselves in it. The reasoning individual must resign himself to the fact that he is going to commit faux pas. The very act of admitting the fact to himself will help him in some small, incalculable way to cut down his output of boners. He will then try, perhaps, to edit his conversation mentally before permitting it to emerge into a hostile world. That can help cure the hastiness blunder—but not the other types. And, if he is expecting to make a boner because of ignorance—or because of his subconscious—he will be more alert to counteract its effect with some tactful comment or witty squirming. It was probably an inveterate blunderer who had finally seen the light who coined the proverb “Silence is golden.” But who can

really keep silent? Certainly not the authors.

Traveler’s Curse After Misdirection “i= ROBERT GRAVES May they stumble, stage by stage On an endless pilgrimage, Dawn and dusk, mile after mile, At each and every step withal May they catch their feet and fall; At each and every fall they take

May a bone within them break; And may the bone that breaks within Not be, for variation’s sake, Now rib, now thigh, now arm, now shin, But always, without fail THE NECK.

A Moving Picture “te C. A. E. GREEN I nave always thought well of art. I even have a special stance for viewing pictures—with a soft collar I can hold it for minutes at a time, and people tiptoe round after me to see what pictures I deem worthy of notice. Only the other day I met as ardent a lover of art as you could wish. He was craning in rapt attention before a picture, peering minutely into the canvas as at a keyhole. Now, you generally find that a man who wears a stringy tie, knotted to about the size of a pea, has a very tense nature, well suited to art, and I thought it worth while spending a little time with him. [| coughed and took up my stance beside him. “Just look at them black currants,” he said, pointing with an ecstatic middle finger. “I'll show you a beauty along here.” He sidled along the wall and pointed again.

“Just look at that,” he said. “Apples!” ‘Not a school I care for,” I said, taking his arm. “Now here we have something rather better—a Pissarro.” “It’s all little blobs of paint,” he complained, thrusting his face within two inches of the canvas. “Of course it is, at that distance,” I said. “The way to look at a picture is to stand well back—about here.” “T can’t see a bloomin’ thing now!” “Don’t you find that the meaningless blobs take on a pattern now?” I asked. “Look at the picture as a whole.” “What picture?” he said, staring vaguely into space. Then I divined his trouble—he was extremely short-sighted. His eyes were round and shone with a slightly baffled melancholy, like

those of a goldfish when you flip an ant’s egg into the bowl. Yet it seemed a pity not to show him what he was missing. I suffer from the same trouble. I removed my glasses and fitted them on him. It was obviously a revelation to him. He pivoted slowly on his heels, gazing round the gallery in wonder. “Cherries!” he exclaimed.

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383

I clicked my tongue in annoyance. He was looking at one of the poorest things in the place. As far as I could see without my glasses,

it was a crude portrait of a woman in a Gainsborough hat with cherries on it—very badly done. “A very poor thing,” I said loftily, “but at least you can see it as a whole. Notice how badly that arm hangs, and the splayed feet too. The foreshortening of the face is all wrong.” “Like a horse,” he said.

“Very like.” “Her face has gone very red,” he observed. “Strange you should notice that too,” I said. “Some trick of the light perhaps. By jove, it seems to be moving now!” Horrified, I snatched back my glasses and put them on just in time. The woman with the hat was rising majestically from her seat. She was brandishing an umbrella. I side-stepped smartly, but there was no time to warn my friend. Without a word she caught him a crack on the bare part of his neck at the back. He stared vacantly around.

“Pll have to get my eyes seen to,” he remarked ruefully. “I’ve got a shocking headache coming on—a sort of shooting pain at the back of me head.” “Like a smart blow from an umbrella?” I asked, ducking again. “Yes,” he said, staring in the direction of my voice, although I was no longer there. “How did you guess?” “I’ve just got one myself—above the ear,” I said quickly. “I think we had better go at once.” “Yes,” he said, reeling slightly as the umbrella came down again.

“T think I'll go and have a lay down.” I hurried out of the gallery. Glancing back, I noticed that my friend was already lying down—at the foot of a rather fine piece of modern sculpture. It made quite a striking group, although I thought his upturned boots gave it a slightly flamboyant note. There was no time however to adjust them, as the woman was bearing down on me, but it left a very pleasing memory in my mind as | lightly descended the marble staircase four steps at a time.

Looey, Dot Epsom-Minded Dope, Nearly Buys a Huss “— MILT GROSS @

Seconp FLoor—Wot was de rizzon wot it was reenging by you a whole day de telaphun yesterday, Meesus Feitlebaum?? First FLrook—Hmm—dun’t esk!!! Sotch tings wot it heppens by oss on accont from mine Looey, dot dope, you'll wouldn’t find in de whole America. SECOND FLoor—So, wot was? First FLoorn—Was so: Mine Looey he takes all from a sodden a motion in de hempty had wot he should recite in de contry. So he puts in de noospaper a hedwertisement wot it should ridd so: “Copple wot dey now reciting in ceety would like wot dey should poichiss a one-femily houze in soboibs.” Seconp Froor—Hmmm—A “Hone you hone home” beezness it stodded opp, ha? So wot was? First FLoor—Wait yet. So dot dope wot he’s so epsom-minded wot he don’t looking wot he does, so instat he should spell howze with a hache, witt a ho, witt a yoo, witt a hess, witt a hee—so he makes a hache-ho-HARR-hess-hee—wot it spalls huss!/—Noo-noo —so dun’t esk!!! It geeves a reeng de telaphun so I geeve a yell, “Hollo, who you weesh, plizze?” So it geeves me a henswer a woice wot it saz, ““Ginsboig’s Leevery Staple spicking. We sanding opp a huss!!”” So I sad, “Who ordered here a huss, plizze??” So you should hear a cursory lengwidge witt oats wot he was swering— SECOND FLooR—Y1 yi yl yi yi— First FLoor—So you should hear wot it was calling opp a whole day all kinds from timmsters witt paddlers witt hocksters witt a weteranary sturgeon yet, wot was trattening all kinds from liable suits witt demeges— Turrp FLoor—So Isidor (SMACK) de momma’s seelk stockings you feeling dem opp witt flour already ha? (SMACK) A Hollowin beezness we nidd it yat, ha? (SMACK)—Witt chuck you got to

LOOEY,

DOT EPSOM-MINDED

DOPE, NEARLY

BUYS

A Huss

385

make mocks ulso on de front from de houze, ha? (SMACK) Wot it should stott opp witt de jenitor hoguments wot he should make me maybe a bleck heye, yat, ha (SMACK)? Tomorrow’ll be maybe

anodder holiday (SMACK) wot you'll feel opp maybe witt plester from Peris de hot wodder beg, ha (SMACK), wot you should

geeve witt it batter de bums on de had a knock (SMACK). FourtuH Froor—Oohoo, nize baby, itt opp all de Pust Tustizz, so momma’ll gonna tell you a ferry tale from Bloobidd. Wance oppon a time was leeving a nubbleman in a kestle wot it was by heem blue de wheeskers. So all de keeds from de neighborhoot dey gave heem a neeckname, “Bloobidd.” (Nize baby, take anodder spoon Pust ‘Tustizz.) POT

TWO

So he tried witt all kinds from proxit witt hanna—witt lemons, witt tee-livvs, witt hair tyes wot he should make maybe de wheeskers idder dey should be rad odder blound, odder ivvin grinn. Bot de more wot he tried de woister it bicame blue. So was a conseederable sauce from annoyance wot it gritted heem from de keeds so: “Yoohoo, hollo Bloobidd! Hollo keed!! Filling blue in de wheeskers, maybe?” und all kinds from odder tsimilar tunts. POT

TREE

So he gredually got merried. So de neighbors began to nuttice wot it deesapeared mysteerously foist one wife, den gredually anodder wife, den a toid wife till it made a tuttle from savan wifes wot dey deesapeared. So he merried gradually a hate wife. POT

FUR

So wan day he sad, “Dollink, I got to go on de road for a leedle treep on beezness. So here is mine kizz. In all de rooms you could go bot rimamber in de leedle room in de hend from de hall you shouldn’t dare to wanture. You hear me, ha? So take hidd a warning. Rimamber de mutt witt de flame!! Ulso wot cooriosity keeled wance a ket. Goodpye. I'll sand you from Etlentic Ceety some sult-wodder teffy!!” POT

FIFE

So de wife was werry henxious to know wot it was going on dere in de room so she tutt, “Hm, I’ll geeve jost wan tinny-winny pick in de room so who'll gonna nuttice de deeference?” So all in a flotter she pushed in de key in de door so she gave a look insite

Milt Gross

386

so dere it was hall de wifes wot dot doidy goot-for-notting dem—dot weeked critchure!!! So on de key it rimmained a she tried witt all kinds from supp witt wodder with scarring witt Old Dutch Clinzzer she should take it huff bot it deedn’t POT

keeled spot so podder helped.

SEEX

So it arrifed home Bloobidd. So he sad, “Noo, Fatimma, mine kizz.” So he sad, “Wat’s dees? It’s meesing a key! Hm, you gatting pale? Ha! Ha! C’mon keed—punny opp!!” So she gave him de key wot it was de mock on it yat so he sad, “Hm, 1s diss a system?? It simms wot I must chop you off de had!!” So she plidded witt

heem und cuxxed heem. So she sad, “Geeve me at list a hour I should write mine pipple!” So dot hot-hotted ting sad, “Notting doong.” So she sad, ‘So make it trickwodders from a hour.”

So he sad, “Notting doong.” So she sad, “Make it a heff from a hour.” So he sad, “Notting doong.” So she sad, “Make it feeftin minnets.” So he sad: “Hm. Go hoggue witt a woman. Ho K—feeftin minnets. So in de minntime it came along on hussbeck two soldiers wot dey roshed in queeck so dey cut a hold from Bloobidd so dey chopped him off de had witt de wheeskers togadder. (Hm, sotch a dollink baby, ate up all de Pust Tustizz.)

A Confession

“Y= GIOVANNI GUARESCHI Don Camitio had come into the world with a constitutional preference for calling a spade a spade. His parishioners

remembered the time he found out about a local scandal involving young girls of the village with some landowners well along in years. On the Sunday following his discovery, Don Camillo had begun a simple, rather mild sermon, when he spotted one of the offenders in the front pew. Taking just enough time out to throw a cloth over the crucifix at the main altar so that Christ might not hear what was going to follow, he turned on the congregation with clenched fists and finished the sermon in a voice so loud and with words so strong that the roof of the little church trembled. Naturally, when the time of the elections drew near, Don Camillo was very explicit in his allusions to the local leftists. What happened was not surprising, therefore: one fine evening as the priest was on his way home, a fellow muffled in a cloak sprang out of a hedge and, taking advantage of the fact that Don Camillo was handicapped by a bicycle with a basket of eggs on the handle bars, dealt the priest a mean blow with a heavy stick and then disappeared, as if the earth had swallowed him. Don Camillo kept his own council. He continued to the rectory and, after putting the eggs in a safe place, went into the church to talk things over with Christ, as he always did in moments of perplexity. “What should I do?” asked Don Camillo. “Anoint your back with a little oil beaten up in water and hold your tongue,” Christ answered from the main altar. “We must forgive those who offend us.” “Very true, Lord, but here we are discussing blows, not offenses.” “And what do you mean by that? Surely, Don Camillo, you don’t mean that the injuries done to the body are more painful than those to the soul?” “I see your point, Lord. But You should bear in mind that an at-

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Guareschi

tack on me, Your priest, is also an offense against You. | am really more concerned for You than for myself.” “And wasn’t I a greater minister of God than you are? And didn’t I forgive those who nailed me to the cross?” “There’s no use arguing with You!” Don Camillo exclaimed. “You are always right. May Your will be done. I will forgive, but don’t forget that if these ruffans, encouraged by my silence, crack my skull open, it will be Your responsibility. I could quote You several passages from the Old Testament . . .” ‘Don Camillo, do you propose to teach me the Old Testament? As for this business, I assume full responsibility. And just between ourselves, that little beating this evening did you some good. It may teach you to let politics alone in My house.” Don Camillo forgave in his heart, but one thing stuck in his mind and needled him—curiosity as to the identity of his assailant. Time passed. Then, late one evening as he was sitting in the confessional, Don Camillo recognized through the grille the face of Peppone, the leader of the extreme left. That Peppone should come to confession at all was a sensational event, and Don Camillo was duly gratified. “God be with you, brother; with you who, more than others, needs His holy blessing. When did you make your last confession?”

“In 1918,” replied Peppone. “In all those years you must have committed your head so crammed with crazy ideas. . . .”

a lot of sins with

“Quite a few, I’m afraid,” sighed Peppone.

“For example?” “For example, two months ago I gave you a beating.” “That is very serious,” replied Don Camillo, “since, by assaulting one of God’s priests, you have offended God himself.” “Oh, but I have repented,” Peppone exclaimed. “And anyway it was not as God’s priest that I beat you up but as my political adversary. Anyhow I did it in a moment of weakness.” “Besides this and your activities in that devilish party, have you any other sins to confess?” Peppone spilled them out, but all in all Don Camillo found nothing very serious and let him off with twenty Our Fathers and twenty Hail Marys. While Peppone was at the altar rail saying his penance, Don Camillo went and knelt before the crucifix. “Lord,” he said, “forgive me but I’m going to beat him up for You “You'll do nothing of the kind,” replied Christ. “I have forgiven

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him and you must do the same. After all, he’s not such a bad soul.”

“Lord, you can’t trust a red! They live by lies. Just look at that face—Barabbas incarnate!” “One face is the same as another. It’s your heart, Don Camillo, that is venomous!”’ “Lord, if I have been a worthy servant to You, grant me one small favor. Let me at least hit him with this candle. After all, Lord, what is a candle?”

“No,” replied Christ. “Your hands were made for blessing.” Don Camillo sighed wearily. He genuflected and left the altar. As he turned to make a final sign of the cross, he found himself exactly behind Peppone, who still knelt at the altar rail and appeared absorbed in prayer. “Lord,” groaned Don Camillo, clasping his hands and looking up at the crucifix, “my hands were made for blessing, but not my feet.”

‘““There’s something in that,” replied Christ, “but I warn you, just one.” The kick landed like a thunderbolt. Peppone didn’t After a minute he got up and sighed. “Pve been expecting that for the past ten minutes,” casually. “I feel better now.” “So do I,” exclaimed Don Camillo, whose heart was and serene as a May morning. Christ said nothing at all, but it was easy enough to too was pleased.

bat an eye. he remarked now as light

see that He

On the Vanity of Earthly Greatness

“= ARTHUR GUITERMAN The tusks that clashed in mighty brawls Of mastodons, are billiard balls.

The sword of Charlemagne the Just Is ferric oxide, known as rust. The grizzly bear whose potent hug Was feared by all, is now a rug.

Great Caesar’s bust is on the shelf, And I don’t feel so well myself!

The Ruined Maid

“t= THOMAS

HARDY

“O ’Melia, my dear, this does everything crown! Who could have supposed J should meet you in town? And whence such fair garments, such prosperi-ty?”— “O didn’t you know I’d been ruined?” said she.

—“You left us in tatters, without shoes or socks, Tired of digging potatoes, and spudding up docks; And now you’ve gay bracelets and bright feathers three.”— “Yes: that’s how we dress when we’re ruined,” said she. —“At home in the barton you said ‘thee’ and ‘thou,’ And ‘thik oon,’ and ‘theas oon,’ and ‘t’other’; but now Your talking quite fits ’ee for high company!”— “Some polish is gained with one’s ruin,” said she. —Your hands were like paws then, your face blue and bleak, But now I’m bewitched by your delicate cheek, And your little gloves fit as on any la-dy!”— “We never do work when we’re ruined,” said she. ! oe)

—*"You used to call home-life a hag-ridden dream, And you'd sigh, and you'd sock; but at present you seem To know not of megrims or melancho-ly!”— “True. There’s an advantage in ruin,” said she.

—*I And “My Isn’t

wish I had feathers, a fine sweeping gown, a delicate face, and could strut about town! ”— dear—a raw country girl, such as you be, equal to that. You ain’t ruined,” said she.

Collaboration with Kaufman “i= MOSS HART Ar FIve minutes of eleven, I rang the bell at 158 East

Sixty-third Street. The rather modest brownstone house was a little disappointing to my fancy of how a famous playwright should live, but the street was fashionable and the maid who opened the door was a reassuring sight. She was in uniform, a starched white cap perched correctly on her head. More like it, I thought, as she held the door open for me to pass her. I walked in and glanced quickly down the hall at a dining room leading out into a little garden. There was a bowl of flowers on the polished table flanked by silver candle-

sticks. Just right, I told myself satisfactorily and looked inquiringly at the stairway. “Mr. Kaufman is waiting for you,” said the maid. “The top floor,

just go right up.” I walked up the stairs and stopped briefly at the second landing to look at a drawing room and library divided by the stairwell. Both

rooms might have come straight out of the movies as far as my innocent eyes were concerned. I knew at once that my first goal the moment the money began to roll in, beyond the taking of taxicabs wherever and whenever I wanted to, would be to live like this. It was an illuminating and expensive moment. The doors on the third floor, evidently bedrooms, were all tightly closed, and as I reached the fourth-floor landing, Mr. Kaufman stood awaiting me in the doorway of what turned out to be his own bedroom and study combined. After the elegance and style of the drawing room and library, this room was a great blow. It was small, rather dark room furnished sparsely with a studio couch, a quite ugly typewriter desk and one easy chair. It was hard for me to believe that a stream of brilliant plays had come out of this monklike interior. I am not certain what I expected the atelier of Kaufman and Connelly would be like but it most certainly was the opposite of this. There was no hint of any kind that this room was in any way concerned with the theater. Not a framed photograph or program hung on its walls, and except for an excellent etching of Mark Twain, it

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might well have been, I thought regretfully, the bedroom and workroom of a certified public accountant. My initial disappointment was to deepen into an active loathing of that room, but at the

moment my eyes after the first quick look were focused on its occupant. Mr. Kaufman was in the process of greeting me with what turned out to be his daily supply of enthusiasm so far as the social amenities

were concerned; that is to say, one finger was being wearily lifted and his voice was managing a tired “Hi.” He had moved to the window after this display of cordiality and now stood with his back to the room and to me, staring out at the gardens of the houses on

Sixty-second Street. I had not been asked to sit down, but I was too uncomfortable to remain standing and after a moment of waiting I sat down in the armchair and stared at his back. His arm now reached around his neck to scratch his ear, a gesture | was to come to

recognize as a prelude to a rearrangement of a scene or the emergence of a new line; now he remained for a few moments engrossed in the movements of a large cat slowly moving along the garden fence as it contemplated a sparrow on one of the leafless trees. ‘This back-yard spectacle seemed to hold him in deep fascination until the cat leaped up into the tree and the bird flew off, whereupon he turned from the window with a large sigh. I looked at him, eager and alert, but there were still other things of moment that caught and held his attention before he addressed me directly. As he turned from the window he spied two or three pieces of lint on the floor, and these he carefully removed from the carpet with all the deftness of an expert botanist gathering specimens for the Museum of Natural History. This task completed, he turned his eyes toward a mound of sharpened pencils on the desk, found two whose points were not razor-sharp or to his liking, and ground them down in a pencil sharpener attached to the wall. In the process of do-

ing so, he discovered some more lint at the side of the desk and this, too, was carefully picked up, after which he held up and inspected a few sheets of carbon paper, found them still usable, and placed them neatly beside a pile of typewriter paper, which he neatly patted until

all its edges were perfectly aligned. His eyes darted dolefully around

the room again, seeming to be looking for something else—any thing at all, it seemed to me!—to engage his attention, but the carpet being quite free of lint, his gaze finally came to rest on the armchair in which I sat, and he addressed me at last. “Fr ...” he said, and began to pace rapidly up and down the room. This, too—the word Er used as a form of address and fol-

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lowed by a rapid pacing—I was to come to recognize as the actual start of a working session: a signal that lint-picking, cat-watching and pencil-sharpening time was over and that he wanted my attention.

During all the time we were engaged together on Once in a Lifetime, he never once addressed me by any other name but ‘“‘Er,” even in moments of stress or actual crisis. Perhaps he felt, being the innately shy and private person he was, that “Moss” was too intimate

a name to call me; and to address me as “Mr. Hart” seemed a little silly, considering the difference in our ages and positions. But somehow or other I recognized at this first meeting that “Er” meant me and not a clearing of the throat, and I waited attentively untul Mr. Kaufman stopped his pacing and stood in front of the armchair looking down at me. “The trouble begins in the third scene of the first act,” he said. “Tt’s messy and unclear and goes off in the wrong direction. Suppose we start with that.” I nodded, trying to look agreeable and knowing at the same time; but this, like my disappointment with the workshop of the master,

was my second blow of the morning. I had been looking forward with great eagerness to that first talk on play-writing by the celebrated Mr. Kaufman. I had expected to make mental notes on everything he said each day and put it all down every evening in a looseleaf folder I had bought expressly for that purpose. But this flat, unvarnished statement that something was wrong with the third scene of the first act seemed to be all I was going to get, for Mr. Kaufman was already moving past me now on his way to the bathroom. I turned in my chair and looked at him as he stood by the washbasin and slowly and meticulously washed his hands, and I was struck then and forever afterward by the fact that his hands were what one imagines the hands of a great surgeon to be like. This impression was further implemented by the odd circumstance that he invariably began the day’s work by first washing his hands —a ritual that was, of course, unconscious on his part, but which he would sometimes perform two or three times more during each working session, usually at the beginning of attacking a new scene as though the anatomy of a play were a living thing whose internal organs were to be explored surgically. | watched him dry his hands and forearms carefully—he took the trouble, I noticed, to undo the cuffs of his shirt and roll them up—and as he came back into the room, walked briskly toward the desk and selected a pencil with just the right pointed sharpness, I was again startled by the inescapable

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impression that the pencil held poised over the manuscript in those long tensile fingers was a scalpel. The pencil suddenly darted down onto the paper and moved

swiftly along the page, crossing out a line here and there, making a

large X through a solid speech, fusing two long sentences into one, indicating by an arrow or a question mark the condensation or transference of a section of dialogue so that its point was highlighted and

its emphasis sharpened; the operation was repeated with lightninglike precision on the next page and the next, until the end of the scene. Then he picked up the manuscript from the desk and brought it over to me. “Just cutting away the underbrush,” he said. “See what you think.” I took the manuscript and read with astonishment. The content of the scene remained the same, but its point was unmuddied by repetition, and the economy and clarity with which everything necessary was now Said gave the scene a new urgency. The effect of what he had done seemed to me so magical that I could hardly believe I had been so downright repetitive and verbose. I looked up from the manuscript and stared admiringly at the waiting figure by the desk. Mr. Kaufman evidently mistook my chagrined and admiring silence for pique. “I may have cut too deeply, of course,” he said apologetically. “Is there something you want to have go back? “Oh, no,” I replied hastily, “not a word. It’s just wonderful now. Just great! I don’t understand how I could have been so stupid. The scene really works now, doesn’t it?” It was Mr. Kaufman’s turn to stare at me in silence for a moment, and he looked at me quizzically over the rims of his glasses before he spoke again. “No, it doesn’t work at all,” he said gently. “I thought the cuts would show you why it wouldn’t work.” He sighed and scratched his ear. “Perhaps the trouble starts earlier than I thought.” He took the play from my lap and placed it on the desk again. “All right, Page one—Scene One. I guess we might as well face it.” He picked up a pencil and held it poised over the manuscript, and I watched fascinated and awestruck as the pencil swooped down on page after page. If it is possible for a reminiscence of this sort to have a hero, then that hero is George S. Kaufman. In the months that followed that first day’s work, however, my waking nightmare was of a glittering steel pencil suspended over my head that sometimes turned into a scalpel,

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or a baleful stare over the rims of a huge pair of disembodied tortoise-shell glasses. I do not think it far-fetched to say that such success as I have had in the theater is due in large part to George

Kaufman. I cannot pretend that I was without talent, but such gifts as I possessed were raw and undisciplined. It is one thing to have a

flair for play-writing or even a ready wit with dialogue. It is quite

another to apply these gifts in the strict and demanding terms of a

fully articulated play so that they emerge with explicitness, precision and form. All of this and a great deal more I learned from George

Kaufman. And if it is true that no more eager disciple ever sat at the feet of a teacher, it is equally true that no disciple was ever treated with more infinite patience and understanding. The debt I owe is a large one, for it could not have been easy for him to deal with some of my initial blunderings and gaucheries, particularly in those first days of our collaboration. He was not at heart

a patient man or a man who bothered to tolerate or maintain the fiction of graceful social behavior in the face of other people’s infelicities. In particular, easy admiration distressed him, and any display of emotion filled him with dismay; the aroma of a cigar physically sickened him. I was guilty of all three of these things in daily and constant succession, and since he was too shy or possibly too fearful of hurting my feelings to mention his distress to me, I continued to

compound the felony day after day; filling the room with clouds of cigar smoke, being inordinately admiring of everything he did, and in spite of myself, unable to forbear each evening before I left the making of a little speech of gratitude or thanks. His suffering at these moments was acute, but I construed his odd behavior at these times as being merely one more manifestation of the eccentricities that all celebrated people seem to have in such abundance. And the next morning, as I sat down, I would cheerfully light a cigar without pausing to wonder even briefly why Mr. Kaufman was walking as quickly and as far away from me as it was possible for him to get within the confines of that small room. It did not occur to me, I cannot think why, to be either astonished or confounded by the fact that each time I rose from the armchair and came toward him to speak, he retreated with something akin to terror to the window and stood breathing deeply of such air as was not already swirling with blue cigar smoke. Nor could I understand why, after I fulsomely admired a new line or an acid turn of phrase that he had just suggested that seemed to me downright inspired, he would scratch his ear until I thought it would drop off and stare at me malignantly over the top of his glasses, his face contorted with

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an emotion that seemed too painful to find expression. Even his passion to remove each dead cigar butt from the room almost before my hand had reached the ashtray with it, and his obsession with keeping the windows wide openon even the most frigid days, did nothing to alert me to his suffering, and I was seemingly deaf as well as dense when his diatribes against people who made speeches at each other took on added strength and fervor with each passing day.

I suppose his worst moment of the day came at my leave-taking,

when he could sense another little speech coming on. I know now that he evolved various stratagems of his own to escape these eulo-

gies, such as rushing into the bathroom and with the water taps turned full on calling out a goodbye through the closed door, or go-

ing to the telephone and with his back to me hurriedly calling a number; but with something approximating genius I nearly always managed to find the moment to have my say. He seldom escaped! Mr. Kaufman spent a good deal of his time, particularly in the late afternoons, stretched out full length on the floor, and it was usually at one of these unwary moments when he was at his lowest ebb and stretched helplessly below me that I would stand over him and deliver my captivating compendium of the day’s work. Something like a small moan, which I misinterpreted as agreement, would escape

from his lips and he would turn his head away from the sight of my face, much the way a man whose arm is about to be jabbed with a needle averts his gaze to spare himself the extra pain of seeing the needle descend. All unknowing and delighted with my eloquence, I would light a new cigar, puff a last fresh aromatic cloud of smoke down into his face, and cheerfully reminding him of the splendid ideas he had had for the scene we were going to work on tomorrow, I would take my leave. I have never allowed myself to think of some of the imprecations that must have followed my retreating figure down the stairway, but if I was torturing Mr. Kaufman all unknowingly, the score was not exactly one-sided. Quite unaware that he was doing so, he was on his part providing me with a daily Gethsemane of my own that grew more agonizing with each passing day, and though his suffering was of the spirit and mine was of the flesh, I think our pain in the end was about equal, for I was as incapable of mentioning my distress to him as he was of mentioning his to me. The cause of my agony was simple enough. Mr. Kaufman cared very little about food. His appetite was not the demanding and capricious one mine was—indeed, his lack of concern with food was quite unlike anyone else’s I have ever known. The joys and pleasures

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of the table seemed simply to have passed him by in the way that a dazzling sunset must escape the color-blind. He apparently needed very little food to sustain him and cared even less when and how it was served. He had his breakfast at ten o’clock in the morning, and work was enough to nourish him thereafter until evening. His energy, unlike my own, seemed to be attached not to his stomach but to his brain; and his capacity for work, which was enormous, seemed to flourish and grow in ratio to the rattle of a typewriter. True, every afternoon at about four o’clock, apparently as a concession to some base need he knew existed in other human beings but did not quite understand himself, tea would be brought in by the maid. Six cookies, no more and no less, and on gala occasions two slices of homemade chocolate cake would lie on a plate naked and

shimmering to my hunger-glazed eyes; and, as I could sniff the tea coming up the stairs or hear the teacups rattling on the tray outside the door, my stomach would rumble so loudly and my ravenousness would be so mouth-watering that I would get up and walk about the room, pretending to stretch my arms and legs, in order to control myself, for it was all I could do not to grab and stuff the minute the maid set the tray down. My predicament was further complicated by the fact that Mr. Kaufman was always scrupulously polite and devilishly insistent that I help myself first, and since I was only too aware that he took only a sip or two of tea and never more than one cookie, which he absentmindedly nibbled at, I could never bring myself to do more than slavishly follow his example for fear of being thought ill-mannered or unused to high life—until one day, maddened by hunger, I gobbled up every single cookie and the two slices of chocolate cake while he was in the bathroom washing his hands. Whether it was the mutely empty plate or my guilt-ridden and embarrassed face staring up at him as he approached the tea tray, I do not know; but from the day onward, little sandwiches began to appear, and tea time, to my vast relief, was moved up an hour earlier.

The Whistling Corpse “f+ BEN HECHT (AutHor’s Nore: I am indebted to the writers of myster y books for many hours of diversion. In part payment of this debt I offer them this Chapter One, gratis and unencumbered, to use as a begin-

ning for any of their subsequent works. )

Dedication

To Maybell, Gladys, ger, Ethyl, Gussykins, Gugu, Greta, My Wife understanding and jolly never have been written.

Hortense, Marianne, Mathilda, Tinee, GinHelena, Chickie, Bernice, Fifi, Dorothea, and Mom, without whose love and tender evenings at Grapes End this book would

Author’s Note

The characters in this book bear no resemblance to anyone living or dead with the exception, of course, of Colonel Sparks and the charming Eulalia. I have used their red barn as a scene for two of the murders but Marroway Hall is entirely fictional and, as everyone knows, there is no such state in the U.S.A. as Bonita.

CHAPTER

ONE

I sHALL never forget the bright summer afternoon when poor Stuffy found the green button under Grandma Marnoy’s knitting bag—on the lawn out there, a stone’s throw from Indian Creek that bisects the rolling Marpleton grounds where Toppet, Ruby and I used to play pirate and chase butterflies. I have often wondered what would have happened if Stuffy had given me the button instead of swallowing it. For one thing, Consuela Marston

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would never have met the man with the pickax and I would never,

of course, have gone to that dreadful carnival which was the beginning of everything. Had I known, of course, even after the button, what seems so obvious to us all now—I mean, about Uncle Massie’s love for that curious creature during his mining days in Texas when he founded the great Micheljohn fortune—I might have prevented some of the disasters which for a time threatened to wipe out the descendants of Nathaniel Colby. But poor Madelaine had always misunderstood Percival Massie’s reasons for selling the great coffee warehouses that

had been in the family—even before Jebby was born. Percival loved Madelaine—in his own way, of course—arrogant, thin lipped and even sneeringly. But it was love, as we all were to

discover when the green button came home to roost and poor Stuffy was no more. That afternoon of the autopsy still brings a chill into my bones. Poor Stuffy! How can I ever blot out the memory of his bewildered face when the dead rose up and whistled at him—that whistle that changed Marroway Hall into a charnel house! The events are still too fresh in my mind for me to write without

a shudder as I recall that summer afternoon when Loppy and Coppy, Grandma Marnoy’s favorite twins, arrived on the 3:18 at MaskinCott, in answer to her imperial summons.

so festive as on that moment

Marroway Hall was never

when these two ill-fated youngsters

came laughing down the baronial staircase that led from Cousin Marshall’s secret laboratory—as we were to find out—straight into the old colonial living room that had once been a fort—the fort where the British had massacred the last of the Green Mountain boys on that Sunday hundreds of years ago before Bonita had yet become a State.

As children we used to be proud of the bloodstains over the man-

telpiece which neither old Jebby nor any of the staff was allowed to efface. Little did we think that those bloodstains would someday become the clue that would put a rope around the necks of three people we all loved. But, to return to the green button and poor Stuffy’s untimely

gourmandizing. I knew, of course, on that afternoon that Jennifer and Siegfried Mersmer had left two sons at the time of their tragic death in the south of France, although Delmar had disappeared when he was twelve and Happy (as we called him) had inherited the entire Marvin fortune, including the great stables of Marvingrovia. Word of Delmar’s marriage to the ill-fated Agatha had been brought to us much later by Uncle Mooney when he returned with

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faithful Jebby after settling his affairs in the Transvaal. It was much too late for any of us to do anything, and I’m afraid we did just

that—nothing. We all knew, of course, that the young wife had died in childbirth and that the twins Loppy and Coppy belonged to a previous marriage. But none of us—with

the exception, of course,

of the dead man who whistled through those awful nights—had any

inkling of Uncle Morehead’s last will and testament. But I am getting

ahead of my story a wee bit. It all really begins with the finding of the green button. We were all sitting on the veranda, the Countess Marsley, Spike Hummer, catcher for the Giants, and Uncle Murchison’s two nephews—Milton and the irrepressible Pliny. And Grandma Marnoy was knitting

away, laughing and agile despite her 102 years. And poor ill-fated Cousin Mullineaux was poring over his famous stamp collection. We

sat sipping those adorable juleps that only old Jebby knew how to make and listening to Joel, the wittiest and yet cruelest man I have

ever known, describe his recent trip to Charlestown. I detected a curious tightening of Aunt Molby’s eyelids as Joel talked and, despite the languorous mood of that moment, I felt a

number

of undercurrents.

Jerry’s hatred of the lovely Marianne

and Uncle Milford’s twenty years of silent rage against the woman

who had left him for that impecunious art student—poor Jon Mungo whose lovely portrait of Senorita X hangs before me even now as | write—these were some of the undercurrents. There were others that I was to learn of later. But we were all gay and frightfully witty as we sat there, lis-

tening to the chatter of the twins and watching Stuffy playing pirate

on the lawn by himself. Suddenly something green flashed in the Bonita sun. I remember hearing a sharp intake of breath behind me, as if someone were stifling a gasp of terror. And then the flash of

green was gone. The green button had disappeared down Stuffy’s

throat. I turned, wondering who had gasped, and looked into the blazing eyes of Cousin Maynard—lank, easygoing Maynard with his patrician nose and the ne’er-do-well droop to his sensual mouth. A knowing chuckle came from Grandma Marnoy’s esoteric face! And then we were all chatting gayly again. All but Madelaine. Poor Loppy! Maynard’s love for her is something that still brings a glow to me as I recall him whittling that first boomerang—the one we found later at the bottom of Indian Creek, covered with her blood. It lies before me on my desk as I write, together with the green button, the cross-bow, the little torn laundry list, the pile of

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empty envelopes, and the old-fashioned fireless cooker that were all to open our eyes before that awful summer in Bonita was over.

I have always had a distaste for family reunions—and despite my interest in Grandma Marnoy’s declaration that she had decided to change her will, I felt bored. Which may explain why I was the first to leave the veranda and why it was I, of all people, who first saw the daintily shod pair of feet dangling over the baronial staircase. For a moment I was too overcome to scream! A woman, still beautiful, still voluptuous, hanging in our ancient living room! I stared in horror at the lovely dead face now contorted in agony. And I had

barely time to realize that this dangling corpse was whistling— whistling an old French-Canadian nursery song—“Arouet, Ma Jolie Arouet”—before the room turned black and I felt myself plunging

into an abyss.

Nature Study “t= THOMAS HEGGEN Tue anchoring of the Naval Auxiliary U.S.S. Reluctant was accomplished without incident. The anchor chain banged and rattled in the hawse pipes and the ship shuddered as it stampeded out. The word, “Secure the special sea detail,” was blatted over the P.A. system and five seconds later the engine room called the bridge for permission to secure the main engines. The captain made the appropriate reply, “Goddamit, they’ll secure when I get good and ready to let them secure,” but he did it without enthusiasm, and he only muttered for perhaps two minutes about those bastards down there who sit on their tails waiting to secure. It was a very hot, sweaty day, about three in the afternoon, and it seemed just another

island: so nobody’s heart beat very much faster at being anchored.

The port routine commenced, a matter of loosening the ship’s belt a notch or two. The gun watches stayed on, but the lookouts were secured and ran below to find the crap game. A boat was lowered to

go over and get the mail. Back on number four hatch the canvas screen was rigged for the night’s movie. Stuyzulski, a seaman in the third division who wouldn’t get out of his clothes under way, took a bath; and at chow everyone remarked on how much better he smelled. Ensign Pulver mixed himself what he called a Manhattan— a third of a water glass of brandy, a splash of vermouth, and a couple of ice cubes—and lay in his bunk and sipped it admiringly. The crew leaned on the rail and looked around incuriously at the little bay and the naval base ashore. Becker, a seaman received on board in the last draft, was moved to remark to Dowdy: “This ain’t a bad place, you know it?” Dowdy said something obscene without even turning his head. Becker bumbled on: “No, I mean it ain’t as bad as most of the places we been to. It’s kind of pretty.” Becker was right, though; it was kind of pretty; it was really a rather lively little bay. The water off the reef was terribly blue, a showy light-ink blue. The bay was enclosed by a chain of islands, and instead of the usual flat barren coral these were green with lush and heavy foliage, and on two sides of the anchorage they ran up to

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impressive hills that were remote and purpling in the late afternoon sun. And the channel at the end of the bay wound away into the deep shadow between the islands and reappeared flashing in the secret and smoky distance. The crew, lined along the rail, began to feel obscurely good at being here; and even Dowdy was probably aware that, aesthetically, this was quite a superior place. Its intrinsic and most spectacular virtue fell to Sam Insigna to discover. (Although if Sam hadn’t found it one of the other signalmen would have soon enough.) Sam was a little monkey of a man, not quite five feet tall, long-armed and bowlegged like a monkey, with a monkey’s grinning, wizened face, who had achieved considerable fame aboard the ship by once attacking, unprovoked and with the intention of doing physical violence, a six-foot-four marine. Sam was up on the flying bridge with the other signalmen and he was idly

scanning the beach through the ship’s telescope, a large, mounted glass of 32 power. The ship was anchored perhaps 200 yards from the beach, and just off the starboard bow, the way she was heading now, there was a base hospital. The hospital flag was flying over

three rows of Quonset huts; there was well-trimmed grass between the huts, and straight neat coral paths that looked like sidewalks. Farther off to the right was the rest of the naval base; clapboard buildings and Quonsets scattered between coconut palms, and down at the waterfront there was a long wooden two-story house, painted

yellow; long and low, with a veranda running the entire length. There was a swing on the veranda and several cane chairs, there was a fine green lawn running down to the beach, and there were two green wooden benches on the lawn under the trees. It was an old house, obviously long antedating American occupation of the island, it was a formless, bleak, and even ugly house; yet, in these surroundings, in the middle of the Pacific, it seemed to the signalmen a thing of great magnificence. “Tt must have been the governor’s house,” Schlemmer explained. Sam swung the telescope around to have a look at this. At first he trained it carelessly around the grounds, then he turned it on the house. For perhaps a full minute nothing happened, and then it did. Sam had been leaning with one elbow on the windshield; all of a sudden he jerked upright, sucked in his breath and grabbed at the glass as if he were falling. The idea flashed through the mind of Schlemmer, standing beside him, that Sam had been hit by a sniper.

“Holy Christ!” Sam said. He seemed to have difficulty in speaking. “What is it?” Schlemmer said, and he grabbed for a long-glass.

NATURE

STUDY

There was only reverence bare-assed!”

405

in Sam’s voice. “Holy Christ!

She’s

One of the many anomalies of our ponderous Navy is its ability to

move fast, to strike the swift, telling blow at the precise moment it is needed. There were accessible in the wheelhouse and charthouse

seven pairs of binoculars; on the flying bridge were two spy glasses and two long-glasses, and the ship’s telescope; and on a platform above was the range finder, an instrument of powerful magnification. Within a commendably brief time after Sam had sounded the alarm, somewhere between 15 and 20 seconds, there were manned six pairs of binoculars, two spyglasses, two long-glasses, of course the ship’s telescope, and the range finder. The glasses were all on

the target right away, but the range finder took a little longer, that instrument being a large unwieldy affair which required considerable frantic cranking and adjusting by two men in order to focus on a

target. Through a rather surprising sense of delicacy, considering

that two quartermasters and the talker were left without, one pair of binoculars remained untouched: the ones clearly labeled “Captain.” In future scrutinies, it was found necessary to press all glasses into service, exempting none. Sam’s discovery was basically simple, natural, reasonable. He had discovered that nurses lived in the long, yellow house. He had discovered two large windows in the middle of the second-story front, and that these windows had none but shade curtains, retracted. He had discovered (the telescope is a powerful glass and the room was well illumined by sunlight) that the windows belonged to the bathroom. It is, of course, redundant to say that he had also discovered a nurse in the shower stall in the far left-hand corner of the room. All of this would seem to be a model of logic, of sweet reasonableness; what could possibly be more logical than that there be a hospital at this base, that there be nurses attached to this hospital, that these nurses lived in a house, that this house have a bathroom, that this bathroom have windows, that these nurses bathe? Nothing, you would think. And yet to these signalmen and quartermasters (who had last seen a white woman, probably fat, certainly fully clothed, perhaps 14 months ago) this vision was literally that, a vision, and a miracle, and not a very small miracle, either. Like Sam, they were stricken with reverence in its presence, and like Sam, their remarks were reverent; those who could speak at all. “Holy Christ!” a few of them managed to breathe, and “Son of a bitch!” That was all. Those are the only legitimate things a man can say when suddenly confronted with the imponderable.

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The word spread fast, although how it is difficult to say: cer-

tainly no one left the bridge. The four-to-eight signal watch, Niesen

and Canappa, never known to relieve before the stroke of the hour,

appeared at three-thirty and met an equally incredible thing; a watch

that refused to be relieved. “Get the hell out of here,” Sam told the newcomers. “We're staying up here till chow.” There was some bitterness and much indignant insistence by the oncoming pair of their right to relieve the watch, but the old watch, firmly entrenched at the glasses, stayed by them until chow was piped. There was a splendid run of bathers. The shore station blinked for half an hour trying to rouse the ship, a bare two hundred yards away; and, finally succeeding, sent out a nasty message about keeping a more alert signal watch. Accordingly, the glass of the striker Mannion

was taken away from him and he was detailed to watch for signals. It seemed that Sam had just gone below for supper when he was back again, demanding and getting his telescope. He and the rest of the watch stayed on until after sunset, when lights went on in the bathroom and the curtains were pulled chastely down for the night; all the way down, leaving not the merest crack. That first day was chaotic, comparable perhaps to the establishing of a beachhead. It was ill-organized; there was duplication and wasted effort. The next day went much better. A system and a pat-

tern appeared. The curtain was raised at 0745 and was witnessed by Sam, Schlemmer, Canappa, Mannion, Morris, Niesen, three quarter-

masters, and the officer-of-the-deck. For perhaps 45 minutes there was a dazzling crowd of early-morning bathers; almost a surfeit of them, sometimes three or four at a time. Then there was a long slack period (no one in the room) that extended to ten o’clock. Sam or-

ganized for the slack period. It is fatiguing to stand squinting through an eyepiece for long periods, so Sam arranged that one man, by turns, keep the lookout during the off hours and give the word when ac-

tion developed. But he refused to let Mannion take a turn. “That son of a bitch watched one strip down yesterday and didn’t open his mouth,” he accused.

It was possible by this time to establish the routine of the house. After the big early-morning rush there was only an occasional and accidental visitor until around ten, when the night watch would begin to get up. From ten to eleven was fairly good, and eleven until noon was very good. From lunch until two was quiet, but from two

until 2:45 there was the same rich procession as in the morning. After four, things dropped off sharply and weren’t really much good again for the rest of the day. It was shrewdly observed and duly

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noted that watches at the hospital evidently changed at eight in the

morning and three in the afternoon. All glasses were manned during

those periods; pathetic little two-power opera glasses made their ap-

pearance then, and the windshield and splintershields of the flying

bridge presented a solid wall of variously magnified eyeballs. By this time, also, the watch—as it came to be known—assumed a routine of its own. The assignment and ownership of glasses came to be understood. Three pairs of binoculars belonged down below for the officer-of-the-deck and two quartermasters. The other four pairs of binoculars, the spyglasses and the long-glasses, belonged to the signalmen; to use themselves or lend to radiomen, storekeepers and cooks in return for future favors. The range finder came to be recognized as officer property and was almost continually manned by a rotating team of two officers; Lieutenant Carney and Ensign Moulton being the most constant. The big telescope, of course, was a

prize. It magnified 32 times. There was a box of Lux soap sitting on a

shelf on the far wall of the bathroom, and with the telescope Sam could make out with ease the big letters LUX and below them, in

smaller letters, the word Thrifty. He could even almost make out

the much smaller words in the lower left-hand corner of the box. The long-glass could barely make out the word Thrifty and couldn’t begin to make out the words in the corner. The spy glasses and the binoculars couldn’t even make out the word Thrifty. From the first, Sam’s right to the telescope had been strangely unchallenged, perhaps in intuitive recognition of his zeal. Turncliffe, the first-class signalman, gave him a brief argument once—more of a token argument, really, than anything else—and then retired to the

long-glass. For quite a while Sam was indisputably on the telescope; then one morning Lieutenant (jg) Billings chanced on the bridge. Lieutenant Billings was the communications officer and Sam’s boss, and he relieved Sam briefly on the telescope. That was all right

the first time; Sam was good-natured in yielding; he liked Mr. Billings. But then Mr. Billings began to chance on the bridge frequently and regularly, and every time he would relieve Sam. Not only that, he had an uncanny talent for arriving at the most propitious moment. Sam got pretty sore over the whole business. As he complained to his friend Schlemmer: “Sure, he’s an officer. All right. If we was in a chow line together, sure, he could go in ahead of me. All right. But I sure can’t see where that gives him the right to take a man’s glass away from him!” To Sam, a man’s glass was an inviolable thing. By the third day personalities began to emerge from the amorphous group that flitted past the bathroom windows. Despite the fact

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that the light was usually bad up around the face, thus eliminating facial identifications as a method, the boys were able to distinguish one nurse from another with considerable accuracy. There appeared to be nine consistent users of this particular bathroom. Canappa insisted there were only eight, but then he denied the validity of the two-blonde theory. The two-blonde theory was Sam’s and it was supported by the consensus. Canappa pointed out that the two had never been seen together; but this was rather a foolish argument, as both had been examined separately from the same angle, which happened to be a telling one. Canappa, who had not seen both from this angle, stuck to his discredited opinion. Undeniably, there were grounds for confusion. Both girls were young, both were pretty (although, as mentioned before, facial characteristics were inexact), and both wore red-and-white-striped bathrobes—or maybe even the same bathrobe. That is no doubt what threw Canappa off. Because, actually, there was conclusive evidence of their separate identity; evidence of the most distinctive sort which one of the girls carried. As Mannion put it, looking. up from his glass: “What the hell is that she’s got?” Sam didn’t look up from his glass. “You dumb bastard, that’s a birthmark.” Mannion was convinced, but he was irritated by Sam’s tone. “Birthmark!” he said scornfully. “Who the hell ever heard of a birthmark down there? That’s paint; she’s gotten into some paint. Or else it’s a burn. That’s what it is—it’s a burn!” Sam’s rebuttal was simple and unanswerable: “Who the hell ever heard of a burn down there?” It routed Mannion satisfactorily, and after a moment Sam disclosed: ““Why, Christ, I had an uncle once who had a birthmark . . .” He went on to tell where his uncle’s birthmark was situated. He described it in some detail.

The two blondes were the real stars; as the result of comparison the other girls came to be regarded as rather run-of-the-mill and were observed with condescension and even some small degree of indifference. There was one, rather old and quite fat, who absolutely disgusted Schlemmer. Whenever she put in an appearance, he would leave his glass and indignantly exhort the rest of the watch to do the same.

“Don’t look at her,” he would say. “She’s nausorating!” He

got quite angry when he was ignored. With the emergence of personalities came the recognition of personal habits. The tall skinny brunette always let the shower water run for several minutes before a bath. The stubby little brunette with the yellow bathrobe always used the bathtub; would sit in the

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tub and drink what looked like coffee, but might have been tea. The girl with high, piled-up hair would fuss for an hour extracting hairpins, and then take a shampoo in the washbasin by the window without removing her robe. “That’s a stupid goddamn way to take a shampoo,” Sam commented.

But by far the most notable idiosyncrasy belonged to the blonde

with the birthmark. It was one which endeared her to all the watchers and drove Morris to rapturously announce: “I’m going to marry that gal!” Like everything about the place it was plausible, normal, and really not at all remarkable. It occurred before every bath and con-

sisted simply of shedding the red-and-white bathrobe and standing for several minutes (discreetly withdrawn from the window), look-

ing out over the bay.. Undoubtedly,

this was a girl who loved

beauty, and certainly the view was a fine one. The bay in the afternoon was shiny blue plate glass, really perfect except where the wake of a lazily paddled native canoe flawed the illusion. The tall coconut palms along the beach were as poetically motionless as sculpture. A little way out from the bay was the thin white line of the surf at the reef, and far, far out was the scary, almost indistinguishable line of the horizon. Perhaps the girl’s thoughts, as she stood admiring all that beatitude, ran something like this: “What

peace! There is no effort anywhere. See the canoe drifting lazily across the bay. Observe the trees with not a leaf stirring, and the ship riding peacefully at anchor, her men justly resting after the arduous days at sea. What utter tranquility!” From there she could not hear the cranking of the range finder. There was one ghastly afternoon when not a soul, not a single soul, came in for a bath. The watchers were bewildered and resentful; and, finally, disgusted. Sam probably spoke for all when he said: “Christ, and they call themselves nurses! They’re nothing but a goddamn bunch of filthy pigs. A nurse would at least take a bath once

in a while. Jesus, I pity those poor sick bastards over there who have to let those filthy pigs handle them!” But that happened only once, and by and large it could not fairly be said that the nurses were disappointing. In fact, Sam himself was once moved to observe: “This is too good to last.” It was one of the most prophetic things Sam ever said. Lieutenant (jg) Langston, the gunnery officer, had been having a good bit of trouble with his eyes. He wasn’t at all satisfied with his glasses. One day he had a splitting headache and the next morning he went over to the base hospital to have his eyes refracted. They were very nice over there. The doctor was very nice, and there was a

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pleasant-faced nurse who helped, and she also was very nice. It took only about an hour and a half to find just the right lenses, and while he was waiting for his pupils to contract, Langston began talking with the nurse. In a very short time it came out that she was from a town not twenty miles from Youngstown, Ohio, where he lived. Langston felt that a certain bond was established, and on the strength of it he invited the nurse, whose name was Miss Williamson, to dinner on the ship that night. It is well known that shipboard food is several cuts above shore-based food, and this consideration was perhaps a factor in Miss Williamson’s ready acceptance. She did add one clause, though: she asked if she could bring a friend, “a terribly cute girl.”

Langston, a personable if rather courtly young man, of course said yes, and mentioned that he would assign her to a friend of his, an Ensign Pulver, whom he described as a “very handsome young man.” Everything was most friendly. When the girls came aboard that night, escorted by two officers, the entire crew was massed along the rail and on the bridges. As the white-stockinged legs tripped up the gangway, one great, composite, heartfelt whistle rose to the heavens and hung there. Ensign Pulver’s girl, Miss Girard, had turned out to be a knockout. At dinner in the wardroom he could scarcely keep his eyes off her, and no more could

the other officers, who feigned eating and made self-conscious conversation. Miss Girard had lovely soft blond hair which she wore in bangs, wide blue innocent eyes, and the pertest nose there ever was. The total effect was that of radiant innocence; innocence triumphant. Only Ensign Pulver noted that when she smiled her eyes screwed up shrewdly and her mouth curved knowingly; but then only Ensign Pulver would. For Langston, it was enough to have what he felt to be the envious admiration of his messmates; but there began to grow in the mind of Ensign Pulver, himself a young man

of deceptively guileless appearance,

visions of a greater reward.

Once in a while he would catch and hold Miss Girard’s glance, and when he did he thought he detected interest there. After dinner, when the party repaired to his room for further polite conversation, he felt more and more sure of it. There were only

two chairs in the room and so he and Miss Girard sat together on the edge of the bottom bunk. That gave a certain intimacy, he thought; a certain tie of shared experience. He was moved to break out a quart of Old Overholt, four-fifths full, which he had kept hidden for two months in the little recess under the drawer of his bunk. With Coca-Cola which Langston provided it made a nice drink. Ensign Pulver was then emboldened to tell what he privately called his “test

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story,” the decisively off-color tale of “ze black chapeau.” Miss Gi-

rard’s response was excellent; she laughed delightedly. Then, craftily

aware of the impressiveness of the unfamiliar, he proposed a tour of the ship, and both girls enthusiastically approved. The plan now be-

gan to shape itself in Pulver’s mind:

after the tour, a few more

drinks; then a little dancing in the wardroom; then a few more drinks; then get Langston to take the other one off somewhere, As they started out, Miss Girard gave him her small hand. First they toured the main deck, the offices and the galley and sick

bay. Then they dropped down into the cavernous engine room, and

Pulver, who was an engineering officer, talked casually of the massive turbines and terrifying boilers. The girls were very much im-

pressed. From the engine room they went up to the bridge, through

the wheelhouse, through the charthouse, through the radio room, and on up to the flying bridge. That was a thoughtless thing for the two officers to do, but fortunately an alert quartermaster had pre-

ceded them. The inspection party found the signalmen clustered in

an

innocent

group

under

the

canvas

awning,

and

the telescope

trained at an angle of 90 degrees from the yellow house. The signal-

men presented a curious sight. They were absolutely speechless; they seemed welded to the deck with awe. The two nurses giggled a little, no doubt over the prospect of these men so obviously dumbfounded at seeing a woman that they could only gape. Ensign Pulver later claimed that he felt something ominous in that group, but whether or not he actually did is unimportant. Langston led the party to the forward splintershield, where it could look down the sheer drop to the main deck, and the even more scary distance to the very bottom of number three hatch. The girls

were really impressed with that. When they started to walk around

behind the funnel, Ensign Pulver noticed that Sam Insigna was trailing them. He was a little annoyed, but, being a young man of poise, he made a sort of introduction. “This is Sam,” he said, “one of the signalmen.” Miss Girard smiled at Sam. “How do you do, Sam,” she said graciously. Sam was evidently too shy and flustered to speak; he just stood there and grinned foolishly. When they had gone on, Miss Girard squeezed her escort’s hand and whispered, “He’s darling.” Pulver nodded dubiously. They took a turn around the funnel, came forward again, and went over to the port wing to look at the 20millimeters. By this time the signalmen had gotten their tongues back and were having a bitter and quite vocal argument under the awning. It was obvious that they were trying to keep their voices guarded,

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but, as often happens, the restraint only intensified them. Sam’s voice in particular carried well. “Goddamit,” the party heard him say, “T’ll bet you one hundred bucks!” Lieutenant (jg) Langston nodded

his head in the direction of the signalmen, smiled superiorly, and said to the nurses: “Seems to be an argument.” Then Sam’s voice came to them again. That voice was several things: it was shrill, it was com-

bative, it was angry; but most of all it was audible. There have been few more audible voices, before or since. It traveled out from under the awning in an unfaltering parabola, fell on the ears of the inspection party, and broke into words of simple eloquence. “You stupid son of a bitch, I tell you that’s her! I got one hundred bucks that says that’s the one with the birthmark on her ass! Now put up or shut up!” Sam may have been right, at that. No one ever knew; no one on the ship ever saw that birthmark again. The curtains of the two middle upstairs windows were not raised next morning, and when the ship sailed three days later they were still down. It was three weeks before a sizable membership of the crew would speak to Sam except to curse him, and it was longer than that before Ensign Pulver would speak to him at all.

The Ransom of Red Chief “iO. HENRY (WILLIAM SYDNEY PORTER) Ir LookeEp like a good thing; but wait till I tell you. We were down South, in Alabama—Bill Driscoll and myself—when this kidnapping idea struck us. It was, as Bill afterward expressed it, “during a moment of temporary mental apparition”; but we didn’t find that out till later. There was a town down there, as flat as flannel-cake, and called Summit, of course. It contained inhabitants of as undeleterious and self-satisfied a class of peasantry as ever clustered around a Maypole. Bill and me had a joint capital of about $600, and we needed just $2000 more to pull off a fradulent town-lot scheme in Western IIli-

nois with. We talked it over on the front steps of the hotel. Philoprogenitiveness, says we, is strong in semirural communities; therefore, and for other reasons, a kidnapping project ought to do better there than in the radius of newspapers that send reporters out in plain clothes to stir up talk about such things. We knew that Summit couldn’t get after us with anything stronger than constables, and, maybe, some lackadaisical bloodhounds and a diatribe or two in the

Weekly Farmers’ Budget. So it looked good. We selected for our victim the only child of a prominent citizen named Ebenezer Dorset. The father was respectable and tight, a mortgage fancier and a stern, upright collection-plate passer and forecloser. The kid was a boy of ten, with bas-relief freckles, and hair the color of the cover of the magazine you buy at the newsstand when you want to catch a train. Bill and me figured that Ebenezer would melt down for a ransom of $2000 to a cent. But wait till I tell you. About two miles from Summit was a little mountain, covered with a dense cedar brake. On the rear elevation of this mountain was a cave. There we stored provisions. One evening after sundown we drove in a buggy past old Dorset’s

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house. The kid was in the street, throwing rocks at a kitten on the opposite fence.

“Hey, little boy!” says Bill, “would you like to have a bag of candy and a nice ride?” The boy catches Bill neatly in the eye with a piece of brick. “That will cost the old man an extra five hundred dollars,” says Bill, climbing over the wheel. That boy put up a fight like a welterweight cinnamon bear; but at last we got him down in the bottom of the buggy and drove away. We took him up to the cave, and I hitched the horse in the cedar brake. After dark I drove the buggy to the little village, three miles away, where we had hired it, and walked back to the mountain. Bill was pasting court plaster over the scratches and bruises on his features. There was a fire burning behind the big rock at the entrance of the cave, and the boy was watching a pot of boiling coffee, with two buzzard-tail feathers stuck in his red hair. He points a stick at me when I come up, and says: “Ha! Cursed paleface, do you dare to enter the camp of Red Chief, the terror of the plains?”

“He’s all right now,” says Bill, rolling up his trousers and examining some bruises on his shins. “We’re playing Indian. We’re making Buffalo Bill’s show look like magic-lantern views of Palestine in the town hall. ’m Old Hank, the Trapper, Red Chief’s captive, and I’m to be scalped at daybreak. By Geronimo! That kid can kick hard.” Yes, sir, that boy seemed to be having the time of his life. The fun of camping out in a cave had made him forget that he was a captive himself. He immediately christened me Snake-eye the Spy, and announced that, when his braves returned from the warpath, I was to be broiled at the stake at the rising of the sun. Then we had supper, and he filled his mouth full of bacon and bread and gravy, and began to talk. He made a during-dinner speech

something like this: “T like this fine. I never camped out before; but I had a pet possum once, and I was nine last birthday. I hate to go to school. Rats ate

up sixteen of Jimmy Talbot’s aunt’s speckled hen’s eggs. Are there any real Indians in these woods? I want some more gravy. Does the trees moving make the wind blow? We had five puppies. What makes your nose so red, Hank? My father has lots of money. Are the stars hot? I whipped Ed Walker twice, Saturday. I don’t like

girls. You dassent catch toads unless with a string. Do oxen make any noise? Why are oranges round?

Have you got beds to sleep on in

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this cave? Amos Murray has got six toes, A parrot can talk, but a monkey or a fish can’t. How many does it take to make twelve?” Every few minutes he would remember that he was a pesky redskin, and pick up his stick rifle and tiptoe to the mouth of the cave to rubber for the scouts of the hated paleface. Now and then he would let out a war whoop that made Old Hank the Trapper shiver. The boy had Bill terrorized from the start. “Red Chief,” says I to the kid, “would you like to go home?” “Aw, what for?” says he. “I don’t have any fun at home. I hate to

go to school. I like to camp out. You won’t take me back home again, Snake-eye, will you?”

“Not right away,” says I. “We'll stay here in the cave a while.” “AIL right!” says he. ““That’ll be fine. I never had such fun in all my life.” We went to bed about 11 o’clock. We spread down some wide blankets and quilts and put Red Chief between us. We weren’t afraid

he’d run away. He kept us awake for three hours, humping up and reaching for his rifle and screeching: “Hist! pard,” in mine and Bill’s ears, as the fancied crackle of a twig or the rustle of a leaf revealed to

his young imagination the stealthy approach of the outlaw band. At last, I fell into a troubled sleep, and dreamed that I had been kidnapped and chained to a tree by a ferocious pirate with red hair.

Just at daybreak I was awakened by a series of awful screams from Bill. They weren’t yells, or howls, or shouts, or whoops, or yawps,

such as you’d expect from a manly set of vocal organs—they were simply indecent, terrifying, humiliating screams, such as women emit when they see ghosts or caterpillars. It’s an awful thing to hear a strong, desperate, fat man scream incontinently in a cave at daybreak. I jumped up to see what the matter was. Red Chief was sitting on Bill’s chest, with one hand twined in Bill’s hair. In the other he had the sharp case knife we used for slicing bacon; and he was industriously and realistically trying to take Bill’s scalp, according to the sentence that had been pronounced upon him the evening before.

I got the knife away from the kid and made him lie down again. But from that moment Bill’s spirit was broken. He laid down on his side of the bed, but he never closed an eye again in sleep as long as that boy was with us. I dozed for a while, but along toward sunup I remembered that Red Chief had said I was to be burned at the stake at the rising of the sun. I wasn’t nervous or afraid, but I sat up and lit my pipe and leaned against a rock. “What you getting up so soon for, Sam?” asked Bill.

416 “Me?”

O. Henry says I. “Oh, I got a kind of a pain in my shoulder. I

thought sitting up would rest it.” “You're a liar!” says Bill. “You’re afraid. You was to be burned at sunrise, and you was afraid he’d do it. And he would, too, if he could find a match. Ain’t it awful, Sam? Do you think anybody will pay out money to get a little imp like that back home?” “Sure,” said I. “A rowdy kid like that is just the kind that parents dote on. Now, you and the Chief get up and cook breakfast, while I go up on the top of this mountain and reconnoiter.” I went up on the peak of the little mountain and ran my eye over the contiguous vicinity. Over toward Summit I expected to see the sturdy yeomanry of the village armed with scythes and pitchforks

beating the countryside for the dastardly kidnappers. But what I saw was a peaceful landscape dotted with one man ploughing with a dun mule. Nobody was dragging the creek; no couriers dashed hither and yon, bringing tidings of no news to the distracted parents. There was a sylvan attitude of somnolent sleepiness pervading that section of the external outward surface of Alabama that lay exposed to my view. “Perhaps,” says I to myself, “it has not yet been discovered that the wolves have borne away the tender lambkin from the fold. Heaven help the wolves!” says I, and went down the mountain to breakfast. When I got to the cave I found Bill backed up against the side of it, breathing hard, and the boy threatening to smash him with a rock half as big as a coconut. “He put a red-hot boiled potato down my back,” explained Bill, “and then mashed it with his foot; and I boxed his ears. Have you got a gun about you, Sam?” I took the rock away from the boy and kind of patched up the argument. “T’ll fix you,” says the kid to Bill. “No man ever yet struck the Red Chief but what he got paid for it. You better beware!” After breakfast the kid takes a piece of leather with strings wrapped around it out of his pocket and goes outside the cave unwinding it. “What’s he up to now?” says Bill anxiously. “You don’t think he’ll run away, do you, Sam?” “No fear of it,” says I. “He don’t seem to be much of a homebody. But we’ve got to fix up some plan about the ransom. There don’t seem to be much excitement around Summit on account of his disappearance; but maybe they think he’s spending the night with

Aunt Jane or one of the neighbors. Anyhow, he’ll be missed today.

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Tonight we must get a message to his father demanding the two thousand dollars for his return.”

Just then we heard a kind of war whoop, such as David might have

emitted when he knocked out the champion Goliath. It was a sling that Red Chief had pulled out of his pocket, and he was whirling it around his head. I dodged, and heard a heavy thud and a kind of a sigh from Bill, like a horse gives out when you take his saddle off. A rock the size

of an egg had caught Bill just behind his left ear. He loosened him-

self all over and fell in the fire across the frying pan of hot water for washing the dishes. I dragged him out and poured cold water on his head for half an hour. By and by, Bill sits up and feels behind his ear and says: “Sam, do you know who my favorite Biblical character is?” “Take it easy,” says I. “You'll come to your senses presently.” “King Herod,” says he. “You won’t go away and leave me here alone, will you, Sam?” I went out and caught that boy and shook him until his freckles rattled. “If you don’t behave,” says, I, “Ill take you straight home. Now, are you going to be good, or not?” “I was only funning,” says he sullenly. “I didn’t mean to hurt Old Hank. But what did he hit me for? I'll behave, Snake-eye, if you won't send me home, and if you'll let me play the Black Scout today.” “I don’t know the game,” says I. “That’s for you and Mr. Bill to decide. He’s your playmate for the day. I’m going away for a while, on business. Now, you come in and make friends with him and say you are sorry for hurting him, or home you go, at once.” I made him and Bill shake hands, and then I took Bill aside and told him I was going to Poplar Cove, a little village three miles from the cave, and find out what I could about how the kidnapping had been regarded in Summit. Also, I thought it best to send a peremptory letter to old man Dorset that day, demanding the ransom and dictating how it should be paid. “You know, Sam,” says Bill, “Pve stood by you without batting an eye in earthquakes, fire, and flood—in poker games, dynamite outrages, police raids, train robberies, and cyclones. I never lost my nerve yet till we kidnapped that two-legged skyrocket of a kid. He’s got me going. You won’t leave me long with him, will you, Sam?” “Pll be back sometime this afternoon,” says I. “You must keep the

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boy amused and quiet till I return. And now we'll write the letter to old Dorsey.” Bill and I got paper and pencil and worked on the letter while Red Chief, with a blanket wrapped around him, strutted up and

down, guarding the mouth of the cave. Bill begged me tearfully to

make the ransom $1500 instead of $2000. “I ain’t attempting,” says he, ‘‘to decry the celebrated moral aspect of parental affection, but we're dealing with humans, and it ain’t human for anybody to give

up two thousand dollars for that forty-pound chunk of freckled wildcat. I’m willing to take a chance at fifteen hundred dollars. You can charge the difference up to me.” So, to relieve Bill, I acceded, and we ran this way:

collaborated

a letter that

EBENEZER Dorset, Esq.: We have your boy concealed in a place far from Summit. It is useless for you or the most skilled detectives to attempt to find him. Absolutely the only terms on which you can have him restored to you are these: We demand $1500 in large bills for his return: the money to be left at midnight at the same spot and in the same box as your reply—as hereinafter

described. If you agree to these terms, send your answer in writing by a solitary messenger tonight at half-past eight o’clock. After crossing Owl Creek, on the road to Poplar Cove, there are three large trees about a hundred yards apart, close to the fence of the wheat field on the righthand side. At the bottom of the fence post opposite the third tree will be found a small pasteboard box. The messenger will place the answer in this box and return immediately to Summit. If you attempt any treachery or fail to comply with our demand as stated, you will never see your boy again. If you pay the money as demanded, he will be returned to you safe and well within three hours. These terms are final, and if you do not accede to them no further communication will be attempted. Two DEsPERATE MEN

I addressed this letter to Dorset, and put it in my pocket. As I was about to start, the kid comes up to me and says: “Aw, Snake-eye, you said I could play the Black Scout while you

was gone.” “Play it, of course,” says I. “Mr. Bill will play with you. What kind of a game is it?” “Tm the Black Scout,” says the Red Chief, “and I have to ride to

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the stockade to warn the settlers that the Indians are coming. ’m tired of playing Indian myself. I want to be the Black Scout.” “All right,” says I. “It sounds harmless to me. I guess Mr. Bill will help you foil the pesky savages.” “What am I to do?” asks Bill, looking at the kid suspiciously. “You are the hoss,” says Black Scout. “Get down on your hands and knees. How can I ride to the stockade without a hoss?” “You'd better keep him interested,” said I, “till we get the scheme going. Loosen up.”

Bill gets down on his all fours, and a look comes in his eye like a rabbit’s when you catch it in a trap. “How far is it to the stockade, kid?” he asks, in a husky manner of voice. b) “Ninety miles,’ says the Black Scout. “And you have to hump yourself to get there on time. Whoa, now!” The Black Scout jumps on Bill’s back and digs his heels in his side. “For heaven’s sake,” says Bill, “hurry back, Sam, as soon as you can. I wish we hadn’t made the ransom more than a thousand. Say, you quit kicking me or Pll get up and warm you good.” I walked over to Poplar Cove and sat around the post office and store, talking with the chawbacons that came in to trade. One whiskerando says that he hears Summit is all upset on account of Elder Ebenezer Dorset’s boy having been lost or stolen. That was all I wanted to know. I bought some smoking tobacco, referred casually to the price of black-eyed peas, posted my letter surreptitiously and came away. The postmaster said the mail carrier would come by in an hour to take the mail on to Summit. When I got back to the cave Bill and the boy were not to be found. I explored the vicinity of the cave, and risked a yodel or two, but there was no response. So I lighted my pipe and sat down on a mossy bank to await developments. In about half an hour I heard the bushes rustle, and Bill wobbled out into the little glade in front of the cave. Behind him was the kid, stepping softly like a scout, with a broad grin on his face. Bill stopped, took off his hat and wiped his face with a red handkerchief. The kid stopped about eight feet behind him. “Sam,” says Bill, “I suppose you think I’m a renegade, but I couldn’t help it. ’m a grown person with masculine proclivities and habits of self-defense, but there is a time when all systems of egotism and predominance fail. The boy is gone. I have sent him

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home. All is off. There was martyrs in old times,” goes on Bill, “that suffered death rather than give up the particular graft they enjoyed. None of ’em was subjugated to such supernatural tortures as I have been. I tried to be faithful to our articles of depredation; but there . came a limit.” ‘“What’s the trouble, Bill?” I asks him. “I was rode,” says Bill, “the ninety miles to the stockade, not barring an inch. Then, when the settlers was rescued, I was given oats. Sand ain’t a palatable substitute. And then, for an hour I had to try to explain to him why there was nothin’ in holes, how a road can run both ways and what makes the grass green. I tell you, Sam, a human can only stand so much. I takes him by the neck of his

clothes and drags him down the mountain. On the way he kicks my legs black-and-blue from the knees down; and I’ve got to have two or three bites on my thumb and hand cauterized. “But he’s gone—” continues Bill—‘‘gone home. I showed him the road to Summit and kicked him about eight feet nearer there at one kick. ’'m sorry we lose the ransom; but it was either that or Bill Driscoll to the madhouse.” Bill is puffing and blowing, but there is a look of ineffable peace and growing content on his rose-pink features. “Bill,” says I, “there isn’t any heart disease in your family, is there?” “No,” says Bill, “nothing chronic except malaria and accidents. Why?”

“Then you might turn around,” says I, “and have a look behind ou.”

; Bill turns and sees the boy, and loses his complexion and sits down plump on the ground and begins to pluck aimlessly at grass and little sticks. For an hour I was afraid of his mind. And then I told him that my scheme was to put the whole job through immediately and that we would get the ransom and be off with it by midnight if old Dorset fell in with our proposition. So Bill braced up enough to give the kid a weak sort of smile and a promise to play the Russian in a

Japanese war with him as soon as he felt a little better. I had a scheme for collecting that ransom without danger of being

caught by counterplots that ought to commend itself to professional kidnappers. The tree under which the answer was to be left—and the money later on—was close to the road fence with big, bare fields on all sides. If a gang of constables should be watching for anyone to come for the note they could see him a long way off crossing the fields or in the road. But no, siree! At half past eight I

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was up in that tree as well hidden as a tree toad, waiting for the messenger to arrive.

Exactly on time, a half-grown boy rides up the road on a bicycle, locates the pasteboard box at the foot of the fence post, slips a folded piece of paper into it and pedals away again back toward Summit. I waited an hour and then concluded the thing was square. I slid down the tree, got the note, slipped along the fence till I struck the woods, and was back at the cave in another half an hour. I opened the note, got near the lantern and read it to Bill. It was written with

a pen in a crabbed hand, and the sum and substance of it was this: Two DesPERATE MEN

GENTLEMEN: I received your letter today by post, in regard to the ransom you ask for the return of my son. I think you are a little high in your demands, and I hereby make you a counterproposition, which I am inclined to believe you will accept. You bring Johnny home and pay me $250 in cash, and I agree to take him off your hands. You had better come at night, for the neighbors believe he is lost, and I couldn’t be responsible for what they would do to anybody they saw bringing him back. Very respectfully, EBENEZER DoRSET

“Great pirates of Penzance!”

says I. “Of all the impudent—”

But I glanced at Bill, and hesitated. He had the most appealing look in his eyes I ever saw on the face of a dumb or talking brute. “Sam,” says he, “what’s two hundred

and fifty dollars, after all?

We’ve got the money. One more night of this kid will send me to bed in Bedlam. Besides being a thorough gentleman, I think Mr. Dor-

set is a spendthrift for making us such a liberal offer. You ain’t going to let the chance go, are you?” “Tell you the truth, Bill,” says I, “this little he ewe lamb has somewhat got on my nerves, too. We'll take him home, pay the ransom, and make our getaway.”

We took him home that night. We got him to go by telling him that his father had bought a silver-mounted rifle and a pair of moccasins for him, and we were going to hunt bears the next day. It was just 12 o’clock when we knocked at Ebenezer’s front door. Just at the moment when I should have been abstracting the $1500 from the box under the tree, according to the original proposition,

Bill was counting out $250 into Dorset’s hand. When the kid found out we were going to leave him at home he started up a howl like a calliope and fastened himself as tight as a

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leech to Bill’s leg. His father peeled him away gradually, like a porous plaster. “How long can you hold him?” asks Bill. “T’m not as strong as I used to be,” says old Dorset, “but I think I can promise you ten minutes.” “Enough,” says Bill. “In ten minutes I shall cross the central, southern, and middle western states, and be legging it trippingly for the Canadian border.” And, as dark as it was, and as fat as Bill was, and as good a runner as | am, he was a good mile and a half out of Summit before I could catch up with him.

The Texan

“is JOSEPH HELLER YossarIan was in the hospital with a pain in his liver that fell just short of being jaundice. The doctors were puzzled by the fact that it wasn’t quite jaundice. If it became jaundice they could treat it. If it didn’t become jaundice and went away they could discharge him. But this just being short of jaundice all the time confused them. Each morning they came around, three brisk and serious men with efficient mouths and inefficient eyes, accompanied by brisk and serious Nurse Duckett, one of the ward nurses who didn’t like Yossarian. They read the chart at the foot of the bed and asked impatiently about the pain. They seemed irritated when he told them it was exactly the same. “Still no movement?” the full colonel demanded. The doctors exchanged a look when he shook his head. “Give him another pill.” Nurse Duckett made a note to give Yossarian another pill, and the four of them moved along to the next bed. None of the nurses liked Yossarian. Actually, the pain in his liver had gone away, but Yossarian didn’t say anything and the doctors never suspected. They just

suspected that he had been moving his bowels and not telling anyone. Yossarian had everything he wanted in the hospital. The food wasn’t too bad, and his meals were brought to him in bed. There were extra rations of fresh meat, and during the hot part of the afternoon he and the others were served chilled fruit juice or chilled chocolate milk. Apart from the doctors and the nurses, no one ever disturbed him. For a little while in the morning he had to censor letters, but he was free after that to spend the rest of each day lying around idly with a clear conscience. He was comfortable in the hospital, and it was easy to stay on because he always ran a temperature of ro1. He was even more comfortable than Dunbar, who had to keep falling down on his face in order to get his meals brought to him in bed. After he made up his mind to spend the rest of the war in the

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hospital, Yossarian wrote letters to everyone he knew saying that he was in the hospital but never mentioning why. One day he had a better idea. To everyone he knew he wrote that he was going on a

very dangerous mission. “They asked for volunteers. It’s very dangerous, but someone has to do it. I'll write you the instant I get back.” And he had not written anyone since. : All the officer patients in the ward were forced to censor letters written by all the enlisted-men patients, who were kept in residence in wards of their own. It was a monotonous job, and Yossarian was

disappointed to learn that the lives of enlisted men were only slightly more interesting than the lives of officers. After the first day he had no curiosity at all. To break the monotony he invented games. Death to all modifiers, he declared one day, and out of every letter that passed through his hands went every adverb and every adjective.

The next day he made war on articles. He reached a much higher plane of creativity the following day when he blacked out everything in the letters but a, an and the. That erected more dynamic intralinear tensions, he felt, and in just about every case left a message far more universal. Soon he was proscribing parts of salutations and

signatures and leaving the text untouched. One time he blacked out all but the salutation “Dear Mary” from a letter, and at the bottom he wrote, “I yearn for you tragically, A. T. Tappman, Chaplain, US. Army.” A. T. Tappman was the group chaplain’s name. When he had exhausted all possibilities in the letters, he began at-

tacking the names and addresses on the envelopes, obliterating whole homes and streets, annihilating entire metropolises with careless flicks of his wrist as though he were God. Catch-22 required that each censored letter bear the censoring officer’s name. Most letters he didn’t read at all. On those he didn’t read at all he wrote his own name. On those he did read he wrote, “Washington Irving.” When that grew monotonous he wrote, “Irving Washington.” Censoring the envelopes had serious repercussions, produced a ripple of anxiety on some ethereal military echelon that floated a C.I.D. man back into the -ward posing as a patient. They all knew he was a C.I.D. man because he kept inquiring about an officer named Irving or Washington and because after his first day there he wouldn’t censor letters. He found them too monotonous. It was a good ward this time, one of the best he and Dunbar had ever enjoyed. With them this time was the twenty-four-year-old fighter-pilot captain with the sparse golden mustache who had been shot into the Adriatic Sea in midwinter and had not even caught cold.

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Now the summer was upon them, the captain had not been shot down, and he said he had the grippe. In the bed on Yossarian’s right, still lying amorously on his belly, was the startled captain with malaria in his blood and a mosquito bite on his ass. Across the aisle from Yossarian was Dunbar, and next to Dunbar was the artillery captain with whom Yossarian had stopped playing chess. The captain was a good chess player, and the games were always interesting. Yossarian had stopped playing chess with him because the games were so interesting they were foolish. Then there was the educated Texan from Texas who looked like someone in Technicolor and felt, patriotically, that people of means—decent folk—should be given more votes than drifters, whores, criminals, degenerates, atheists and indecent folk—people without means. Yossarian was unspringing rhythms in the letters the day they brought the Texan in. It was another quiet, hot, untroubled day. The heat pressed heavily on the roof, stifling sound. Dunbar was lying motionless on his back again with his eyes staring up at the ceiling like a doll’s. He was working hard at increasing his life span. He did it by cultivating boredom. Dunbar was working so hard at increasing his life span that Yossarian thought he was dead. They put the Texan in a bed in the middle of the ward, and it wasn’t long before he donated his views. Dunbar sat up like a shot. “That’s it,” he cried excitedly. “There

was something missing—all the time I knew there was something missing—and now I know what it is.” He banged his fist down into his palm. ““No patriotism,” he declared. “You're right,” Yossarian shouted back. “You're right, you're right, you're right. The hot dog, the Brooklyn Dodgers. Mom’s ap-

ple pie. That’s what everyone’s fighting for. But who’s fighting for the decent folk? Who’s fighting for more votes for the decent folk? There’s no patriotism, that’s what it is. And no matriotism, either.” The warrant officer on Yossarian’s left was unimpressed. ‘““Who

gives a shit?” he asked tiredly, and turned over on his side to go to sleep. The Texan turned out to be good-natured, generous and likable. In three days no one could stand him. He sent shudders of annoyance scampering up ticklish spines, and everybody fled from him. In less than ten days the Texan cleared the ward. The artillery captain broke first, and after that the exodus started. Dunbar, Yossarian and the fighter captain all bolted the same morning. Dunbar stopped having dizzy spells, and the fighter captain blew his nose. Yossarian

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told the doctors that the pain in his liver had gone away. It was as easy as that. Even the warrant officer fled. In less than ten days, the Texan drove everybody in the ward back to duty—everybody but the C.I.D. man, who had caught cold from theEES captain and come down with pneumonia.

To the Lady Behind Me at the Theater

“J SIR A. P. HERBERT Dear Madam, you have seen this play; I never saw it till today, You know the details of the plot, But, let me tell you, I do not. The author seeks to keep from me The murderer’s identity. And you are not a friend of his If you keep shouting who it is. The actors in their funny way Have several funny things to say, But they do not amuse me more If you have said them just before; The merit of the drama lies, I understand, in some surprise; But the surprise must now be small Since you have just foretold it all. The lady you have brought with you

Is, I infer, a half-wit too, But I can understand the piece Without assistance from your niece. In short, foul woman, it would suit Me just as well if you were mute,

In fact, to make my meaning plain, I trust you will not speak again. And—may [add one human touch?— Don’t breathe upon my neck so much.

Careless Talk wtw=

MARK HOLLIS Bill Was ill. In his delirium He talked about Miriam. This was an error As his wife was a terror Known

As Joan.

When Adam Day by Day...

“Ys A. E. HOUSMAN When Adam day by day Woke up in Paradise, He always used to say * “Oh, this is very nice.”

But Eve from scenes of bliss Transported him for life. The more | think of this The more | beat my wife.

Ascension and Declination of Sirius

“i= COLIN HOWARD THERE was enormous excitement when it became known that “they” were shooting a scene for a film outside a large house locally. After breakfast I decided I would stroll along for a look with Marcus, my St. Bernard dog. I have complained about Marcus in print before. He is huge, handsome and affable. He is also incredibly and supernaturally lazy. I allowed him his usual half-hour siesta after breakfast to recover from the strain of getting up, and then summoned him for his walk. He lurched to his feet with a sigh of self-pity, and stumbled somnambulistically after me. As a rule, we go only as far as the first corner, by which time we are both tired out—Marcus with the exertion, myself with the effort of keeping him going. When, after some argument, I made it clear to him we were going even farther afield this morning his reproachful eyes filled with tears. The scene was one of frantic activity. A throbbing mobile roared deafeningly in a corner of the big garden. Herds of technicians were shoving around a camera built like a self-propelled gun, unreeling tape-measures, training things like a searchlight, fooling about with yellow reflector screens, swilling mugs of tea, and bustling about apparently just for the sake of looking busy. The spectacle of so much energy had a depressing effect on Marcus, and realizing he was about to pass out on his flipperlike feet, I turned to take him home. We hadn’t got far when I heard somebody shouting and walking to catch us up. You don’t have to run to catch up a man with a St. Bernard. I straightened my tie. Just at first, I confess, I thought—but it wasn’t me; it was Marcus. “Say!” said a young man with tousled hair and horn-rimmed glasses. “That’s quite a dog!” Marcus is responsive to admiration. He simpered, and even pranced a bit in a galumphing sort of way.

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“We could use him,” said the young man. “Would you hire him for the day fora couple of guineas?” I said I would, and was instructed to bring Marcus back in a couple of hours. Two hours to get Marcus home, rest him up, and bring him back, was cutting it fine. We were nearly a quarter-mile from home. However, we set off. My wife was wildly excited by our news. She and I both went to work to groom Marcus for stardom. It is not easy to groom a dog who is lying under the kitchen table in a state of physical prostration, but, with my wife on her knees on one side, myself on the other, and our heads meeting under the table, we managed to get him done, all except the bits of himself he was lying on. Then came the terrific task of getting him back on location. We accomplished this by a little mild deceit. We pretended he had slept the clock round twice and it was now tomorrow. My wife came with us, partly because she wasn’t going to miss Marcus’s triumph, partly to push behind. “We're shooting a crowd scene—a garden party,” explained the director. He paused and tugged at his foot, on which Marcus had subsided in slumber. My wife and I deferentially prised up the appropriate portion of Marcus’s body, and the director, having withdrawn his foot and found to his surprise no bones were broken, continued: “I want him to mingle with the crowd. I suggest your wife waves to him from the other side, and you release him when I nod and let him walk across the set.” At the word “walk”? Marcus shuddered in his sleep. My wife and I worked on Marcus like a couple of seconds on a boxer who has been saved by the bell. We got him to his feet, and I managed to hold him up while my wife took up her position. When the director nodded she waved and I let go of Marcus. He fell down, bumping his nose, and went to sleep. “What’s the matter—is he ill?’’ demanded the director. “No, no—it’s just temperament,” I laughed. “Right, now! We’re going to shoot this time!” The hubbub was quadrupled. Men yelled “Okay!” at each other through a network of telephones. Buzzers sounded. Two lads without shoes shoved the camera slowly forward. The recording men dangled microphones on things like fishing rods overhead. All the extras in their smart clothes minced and smiled. The clapper boy stepped in front of the camera, exclaimed “Scene ninety-two, Take one,” snapped his board, and stepped back.

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“Shoot!” cried the director, and nodded at me. Marcus took a game of five steps forward toward my wife, faltered and slumped to the ground. The cruising camera bumped into him and bounced back. “Cut!” cried the director. By the late afternoon the clapper boy was still the only one to have made anything like an extended appearance before the camera. After the first half-dozen takes we gave up trying to get Marcus away from scratch, and let him carry on from where he’d lain down Jast time. He was still only a third of the way across the set. The clapper boy took a voice pastille, hoarsely recited, “Scene ninety-two, Take twenty-one,” and retired to get his chalk for Take 22. The director grimly muttered “Shoot.” I don’t really think he expected anything to happen. But it did. My wife, seeing fame and fortune slipping from Marcus, had been inspired. She had found a cat

and was holding it out enticingly. Cats and food are the only things that ever induce Marcus to work

like a real dog. I believe he confuses the two. He sighted the bait in my wife’s arms. When the director said “‘Shoot!” he shot. If Scene 92, Take 21, ever gets as far as the can the rushes will

show a dazzling and aristocratic garden party apparently smitten by a typhoon. One will see fair women and brave men, grave footmen and laden tea trays, bowled over left and right by some mysterious agency moving too fast for the camera. My wife popped the cat into safety behind a wall with a split second to spare. Marcus hurtled into the wall, which rocked a bit but stood up well. My wife and I, just for a change, went around picking up extras. And then the sun went in and rain spots began to fall. “Thank heaven!” said the director devoutly. “That’s all for today. Same time tomorrow, please.” “Ask him if he wants Marcus again tomorrow,” whispered my wife.

I glanced at the director, and decided not to. I took my wife’s hand, and we started to sneak away. “Please don’t forget your dog,” said the director. Marcus of course was in his usual position—flat on the ground, resting. The extras bore no malice. They realized they had Marcus to thank for another day’s work. They helped us to lift him more or less tenderly into the bus waiting to take them to the station and he was driven home in style, occupying three seats and a couple of laps, and absolutely insensible. They thought he had been stunned by the wall. They did not understand St. Bernards.

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Marcus is now slowly recovering from his tremendous day, on the front doormat where the extras dumped him. His film career, I cannot help feeling, is at an end.

Uncle Jimbo’s Marbles

“i EVAN HUNTER Lasr summer they quarantined the camp two weeks after we'd arrived. Uncle Marvin called all us counselors into the dining room one July night and announced briefly that there was a polio scare at a nearby camp. He went on to say that whereas all of our campers had of course been vaccinated, he nonetheless felt it would be in the best interests of public safety if we voluntarily agreed not to leave the camp grounds until the threat had subsided. The words “public safety” were Uncle Marvin’s own. He was the principal of a junior

high school in the Bronx, and he also happened to own Camp Marvin, which is why it was called Camp Marvin and not Camp Chippewa or Manetoga or Hiawatha. He could have called it Camp Le-

vine, I suppose, Levine being his last name, but I somehow feel his

choice was judicious. Besides, the name Marvin seemed to fit a camp whose owner was a man given to saying things like “public safety,”

especially when he became Uncle Marvin for the summer. I was Uncle Don for the summer. The kids in my bunk had never heard of Uncle Don on the radio,

so they never made any jokes about my name. To tell the truth, I'd barely heard of him myself. Besides, they were a nice bunch of kids, and we were getting along fine until the voluntary quarantine in the best interests of public safety was declared by Marvin, and then things got a little strained and eventually led to a sort of hysteria. Marvin’s wife was named Lydia, and so the girls’ camp across the lake from Camp Marvin was called Camp Lydia, and the entire complex was called Camp Lydia-Marvin, which was possibly one of the most exciting names in the annals of American camp history. I was Uncle Don last summer, and I was nineteen years old. Across the lake in Camp Lydia was a girl named Aunt Rebecca, who was also nineteen years old and whom I loved ferociously. When the quarantine began, I started writing notes to her, and I would have them smuggled across the lake, tied to the handles of the big milk cans. I love you, Aunt Rebecca, my notes would say. And I would look across the still wa-

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ters of the lake and try to imagine Becky opening my note, her dark

eyes lowered as she read the words, her quick smile flashing over her

face. I imagined she would look up hastily, she moved

hastily, her

eyes would dart, the smile would widen, she would stare into the distance at the pine trees towering over the boys’ cabins, and maybe her heart would skip a beat, and maybe she would murmur softly under her breath, J love you, too, Uncle Don. T hated Camp Marvin. I will tell you what I loved. I loved Rebecca Goldblatt, that’s all. I had loved Rebecca Goldblatt long before I met her. I had loved her, to tell the truth, from the day I was twelve years old and was allowed to join the adult

section of the public library. I had clutched my new card in my

hand that bright October day, the card unmarked, every space on it

empty, and wandered among the shelves. It was very warm inside

the library, warm and hushed, and as I walked past the big windows I could hear the wind outside, and I could see the huge tree out front with its leaves shaking loose every time there was a new gust, and

beyond that on the other side of the street some smaller trees, bare

already, bending a little in the wind. It was very cold outside, but I was warm as I walked through the aisles with a smile on my face,

holding my new library card, and wondering if everyone could tell I was an adult now, it said so on my card. I found the book on one of the open shelves. The cover was red, tooled in gold. The title was Ivanhoe. And that night I fell in love with Rebecca, not Rebecca Goldblatt, but the girl in Ivanhoe. And then when they re-released the movie, I fell in love with her all over again, not Elizabeth Taylor, but Rebecca, the girl in Ivanhoe. I can still remember one of the lines in the movie. It had nothing to do with either Ivanhoe’s Rebecca or my own Rebecca Goldblatt, but I will never forget it anyway. It was when Robert Taylor was standing horseless, without a shield, trying to fend off the mace blows of the mounted Norman knight. And the

judge or the referee, or whatever he was called in those days, looked at Robert Taylor, who had almost hit the Norman’s horse with his sword, and shouted, “Beware, Saxon, lest you strike horse!” That was a rule, you see. You weren’t allowed to strike the horse. Oh, how I loved Rebecca Goldblatt! I loved everything about her, her eyes, her nose, her mouth, her eyes. Her eyes were black. I know a lot of girls claim to have really

black eyes, but Rebecca is the only person I have ever known in my entire life whose eyes were truly black and not simply a very dark

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brown. Sometimes, when she was in a sulky, brooding mood, her eyes

got so mysterious and menacing they scared me half to death. Girls’ eyes always do that to me when they’re in that very dramatic solitary mood, as if they’re pondering all the female secrets of the world. But usually her eyes were very bright and glowing, like.a black purey. I shouldn’t talk about marbles, I suppose, since marbles started all the trouble that summer—but that was how her eyes looked, the way a black purey looks when you hold it up to the sun. I loved her eyes and I loved her smile, which was fast and open and yet somehow secretive, as if she’d been amused by something for

a very long time before allowing it to burst onto her mouth. And I

loved her figure which was very slender with sort of small breasts and very long legs that carried her in a strange sort of lope, espe-

cially when she was wearing a trench coat, don’t ask me why. I loved her name and the way she looked. I loved her walk, and I loved the way she talked, too, a sort of combination of middle-class Bronx Jewish girl with a touch of City College Speech One thrown in, which is where she went to school and which is where I met her. I think I should tell you now that I’m Italian. That’s how I happened to be at Camp Marvin in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, with a girl named Rebecca Goldblatt across the lake in Camp Lydia. I know that’s not much of a problem these days, what with new

nations clamoring for freedom, and Federal troops crawling all over the South, and discrimination of all sorts every place you look. It’s not much of a problem unless you happen to be nineteen years old and involved in it, and then it seems like a pretty big problem. I’m too

young to have seen Abie’s Irish Rose, but I honestly don’t think I will ever understand what was so funny about that situation, believe me. I didn’t think it was so funny last summer, and I still don’t

think it’s funny, but maybe what happened with Uncle Jimbo’s marbles had something to do with that. I don’t really know. I just know for certain now that you can get so involved in something you don’t really see the truth of it any more. And the simple truth of Becky and me was that we loved each other. The rest of it was all hysteria, like with the marbles. I have to tell you that I didn’t want to go to Camp Marvin in the first place. It was all Becky’s idea, and she presented it with that straightforward solemn look she always gets on her face when she discusses things like sending food to the starving people in China or disarmament or thalidomide or pesticides. She gets so deep and so involved sometimes that I feel like kissing her. Anyway, it was her

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idea, and I didn’t like it because I said it sounded to me like hiding.

Slesnot hiding,” Becky said. “Then what is it if not hiding?” I answered. “I don’t want to be a counselor this summer. I want to go to the beach and listen to records and hold your hand.” “They have a beach at Camp Marvin,” Becky said. “And I don’t like the name of the camp.” “Why not?”

“It’s unimaginative. Anybody who would name a place Camp Marvin must be a very unimaginative person.” “He’s a junior high school principal,” Becky said. “That only proves my point.” She was looking very very solemn just about then, the way she gets when we discuss the Cuban situation, so I said, “‘Give: me one good reason why we should go to Stockbridge, Massachusetts, to a camp named Marvin, of all things, would you please?” “Yes.” “Well, go ahead.” “We would be together all summer,” Becky said simply, “and we wouldn’t have to hide from my father.” “That’s the craziest thing I ever heard in myvlite,; Insaidt “You want to go away and hide from him just so we won't have to hide from him.” “That’s not what I’m saying,” Becky said. “Then what is it, if not hiding from him?”

“It’s not my fault he’s a bigoted jerk!” Becky said angrily, and I didn’t realize how much this meant to her until that minute, because tears suddenly sprang into her eyes. I never know what to do when a girl starts crying, especially someone you love. “Becky,” I said, “if we run away this summer, we’re only confirminephises * “He doesn’t even know you, Donald,” she said. “He doesn’t know how sweet you are.” “Yes, butif we hide from him . . .”

“Tf he’d only meet you, if he’d only talk to you.

. .”

“Yes, but if we run away to hide, then all we’re doing is joining

in with his lunacy, honey. Can’t you see that?” “My father is not a lunatic,” Becky said. “My father is a dentist and a prejudiced ass, but he’s not a lunatic. And anyway, you have to remember that his father can still remember pogroms in Russia.” “All right, but this isn’t Russia,” I said. “T know.”

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“And I’m not about to ride into the town and rape all the women and kill all the men.” “You don’t even know how to ride,” Becky said. “That’s right,” I said, “but even if I did know how to ride, I wouldn’t do it.” “I know, you're so sweet,” Becky said.

’

“Okay. Now if your father believes that ’'m some kind of assassin with a stiletto, that’s bis fantasy, you see, Beck? And if I sneak away

with you this summer, then I’m joining his fantasy, I’m becoming as crazy as he is. How can you ask me to do that?” “T can ask you because I love you and I want to be alone with you without having to sneak and skulk all the time. It isn’t fair.” “What isn’t fair?” “Sneaking and skulking all the time.” “That’s right.” “When I love you so much.” ? “T love you, too, Beck,” I said. “But . . . “Well, if you love me so much, it seems like a very simple thing to do to simply say you'll come with me to Camp Lydia-Marvin this summer.” I didn’t say anything. “Donald?” Becky said. “This is a mistake,” I said, shaking my head. “We'll be alone.” “We'll be surrounded by eight thousand screaming kids!” “The kids go to sleep early.” “We'll be hiding, we'll be—” “We'll be alone.” ”? “Damn it, Becky, sometimes . . . “Will you come, Donald?” “Well, what else can I do? Let you go alone?”

“T think that’s what scares my father,” Becky said, the smile coming onto her mouth, her black eyes glowing. “What are you talking about?” “That fiery Italian temper.” “Yeah, go to hell, you and your father,” I said smiling, and then I kissed her because what else can you do with a girl like that whom you love so terribly much? That’s how we came to be at Camp Lydia-Marvin last summer. The quarantine was very ironic in an O. Henry way because we

had gone to camp to be together, you see, and when Uncle Marvin had his bright quarantine idea, he really meant quarantine, the girls

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with the girls and the boys with the boys. So there was Rebecca clear the hell over on the other side of the lake, and here was I with a

bunch of counselors named Uncle Bud and Uncle Jimbo and Uncle

Dave and Uncle Ronnie and even Uncle Emil, who was a gym teacher at Benjamin Franklin High School in Manhattan. All the uncles took the quarantine in high good spirits for the first week, I guess. I must admit that even I found a sense of adventure in tying my love notes

to the handles of the milk cans. I never once questioned the validity

of a quarantine that allowed milk to be passed from one side of the Jake to the other. In fact, if it hadn’t been for the milk cans, | would have gone out of my mind immediately. As it was, I almost went out of my mind, but not until much later. And by that tume everybody was a little nutty. I think it all started with the kids. Everything usually starts with kids. I once read a Ray Bradbury story called “Invasion” or something, about these Martians, or aliens, anyway, I don’t remember which planet, who are planning an invasion of Earth, and they’re doing it through the kids. Boy, that story scared me, I can tell you, since I have a kid brother who gets a very fanatical gleam in his eye every now and then. I wouldn’t be at all surprised. The thing that started with the kids was the marbles. Now, every kid who goes to camp for the summer takes marbles with him. There’s usually what they call Free Play or Unassigned, and that’s when the kids go to ping pong or tether ball or marbles. Marbles were very big at Camp Marvin, especially after the quarantine started, though I’m still not sure whether the quarantine really had anything to do with the craze. Maybe there was just an unusual number of marbles at camp that summer, I don’t know. At the end there, it sure seemed like a lot of marbles. The most marbles I had ever seen in my life before that was when I was eight years old and still living in Manhattan, before we moved up to the Bronx. My mother and father gave me a hundred marbles for my birthday, and they also gave me a leather pouch with drawstrings to put the marbles in. I went downstairs with the hundred marbles, and I lost them all in a two-hour game. I almost lost the pouch, too, because a kid on the block wanted to trade me forty immies and a steelie for it, but I had the wisdom to refuse the offer. I'll never forget my mother’s face when I went upstairs and told her I’d been wiped out. “You lost al] the marbles?” she asked incredulously. “Yeah, all the immies,” I said. “Howe “Just playing immies,” I said.

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They didn’t play immies at Camp Marvin, they played marbles. They used to draw a circle in the dirt, and each kid would put five or six marbles in the circle and try to hit them out with his shooter. I didn’t know how to play marbles because all I played as a kid was immies, which is played by the curb, in the gutter. In fact, it was best to play immies after a rainstorm because then there would be puddles all over the street, and you never knew where the other guy’s immie was. You just shot and prayed and felt around in the dirty water with your hand spread, trying to span the immies. It used to be fun when I was a kid. A city street is something like a summer camp all year round, you see. There are always a thousand kids on the block and a hundred games to choose from: stickball, stoopball, skullies, Johnny-on-a-Pony, Kick the Can, Statues, Salugi, Ring-aLeavio, hundreds of games. I sometimes wonder why the Herald Tribune sends slum kids to the country. I think somebody ought to start sending country kids to the slums. In a way, when the marble

craze started at Camp Marvin, it was very much like a craze starting on a City street, where one day a kid will come down with his roller skates, and the next day the roller-skating season has started. It was the same thing with the marbles at Camp Marvin. A couple of kids started a game, and before any of us were really completely aware of it, there were marble games being played all over the camp. It would have been all right if the craze had restricted itself to the kids. But you have to remember that we were quarantined, which meant that we worked with the kids all day long, and then were not permitted to leave the grounds at night, on our time off. Children are very nice and all that, and someday I hope to have a dozen of my own, but that summer it was important to get away from them

every now and then. I mean, physically and geographically away from them. to have an do, in fact, of course The funny

It was important to have other interests. It was important emotional and mental respite. What it was important to was to hold Becky in my arms and kiss her, but Marvin had made that impossible with his stupid quarantine. thing was he didn’t seem to miss his wife Lydia at all.

Maybe that’s because they’d been married for 14 years. But most of the rest of us began to feel the strain of the quarantine by the end of

the second week, and I think it was then that Uncle Jimbo ventured into his first game of marbles.

Jimbo, like the rest of us, was beginning to crave a little action. He was a very tall man who taught science at a high school some-

place in Brooklyn. His real name was James McFarland, but in the

UNCLE JIMBO’S MARBLES

sel

family structure of Camp Marvin he immediately became Uncle Jim.

And then, because it is fatal to have a name like Jim at any camp, he

was naturally renamed Jimbo. He seemed like a very serious fellow, this Jimbo, about thirty-eight years old, with a wife and two kids at home. He wore eyeglasses, and he had sandy-colored hair that was al-

ways falling onto his forehead. The forehead itself bore a perpetual

frown, even when he was playing marbles, as if he were constantly try-

ing to figure out one of Einstein’s theories. He always wore sneakers and Bermuda shorts that had been made by cutting down a pair of dun-

garees. When the quarantine started, one of the kids in his bunk

painted a big PW

on Jimbo’s dungaree Bermuda shorts, the PW

standing for “prisoner of war”—a joke Jimbo didn’t think was very comical. I knew how he felt. I wasn’t married, of course, but I knew

what

it was

like to be separated

from

someone

you

loved, and

Jimbo’s wife and kids were away the hell out there in Brooklyn while we were locked up in Stockbridge.

I happened to be there the day he joined one of the games, thereby

starting the madness that followed. He had found a single marble near the tennis courts and then had gone foraging on his free time

until he’d come up with half a dozen more. It was just after dinner, and three kids were playing in front of my bunk when Jimbo strolled over and asked if he could get in the game. If there’s one

thing a kid can spot at fifty paces, it’s a sucker. They took one look at the tall science teacher from Brooklyn and fairly leaped on him in

their anxiety to get him in the game. Well, that was the last leaping any of them did for the rest of the evening. Jimbo had seven mar-

bles. He put six of them in the ring, and he kept the biggest one for his shooter. The kids, bowing graciously to their guest, allowed him

to shoot first. Standing ten feet from the circle in the dust, Jimbo

took careful aim and let his shooter go. It sprang out of his hand with the speed of sound, almost cracking a marble in the dead center of the ring and sending it flying out onto the surrounding dirt. The kids weren’t terribly impressed because they were very hip and knew all about beginner’s luck. They didn’t begin to realize

they were playing with a pro until they saw Jimbo squat down on one knee and proceed to knock every single marble out of the ring without missing a shot. Then, because there’s no sucker like a sucker

who thinks he knows one, the kids decided they could take Jimbo anyway, and they spent the rest of the evening disproving the theory by losing marble after marble to him. Jimbo told me later that he’d been raised in Plainfield, New Jersey, and had played marbles prac-

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tically every day of his childhood. But the kids didn’t know that at

the time, and by the end of that first evening Jimbo had won perhaps two hundred marbles. I wasn’t sure I liked what Jimbo had done. He was, after all, a grown man, and he was playing with kids, and one of the kids he’d beaten happened to be a kid in my bunk. I watched that kid walk

away from the game after Jimbo collected all the marbles. His name was Max, which is a funny name for a kid anyway, and he was walking with his head bent, his hands in the pockets of his shorts, his

sneakers scuffing the ground. “What’s the matter, Max?” I asked. “Nothing,” he said. “Come here, sit down,” I said. He came over and sat on the bunk steps with me. I knew better than to talk about the marbles he had lost. I talked about the baseball game that afternoon and about the

volleyball tournament, and all the while I was thinking of those hundred marbles

I had got for my

eighth birthday, and the leather

pouch, and the look on my mother’s face when I climbed to the third floor and told her I’d lost them all. It was getting on about dusk, and

I said to Max, “Something very important is going to happen in just a few minutes, Max. Do you know what it is?” “No,” Max said. “Well, can you guess?” “I don’t know. Is it the boxing matches tonight?” he asked. “No, this is before the boxing matches.” “Well, what is it?” he asked. “It happens every day at about this time,” I said, “and we hardly ever stop to look at it.” Max turned his puzzled face up to mine. “Look out there, Max,” I said. “Look out there over the lake.” Together, Max and I sat and serenely watched the sunset.

The madness started the next day.

It started when

Uncle Emil, the gym teacher from Benjamin

Franklin, decided that marbles was essentially a game of athletic skill. Being a gym teacher and also being in charge of the camp’s en-

tire sports program, he naturally decided that in order to uphold his

honor and his title, he would have to defeat Uncle Jimbo. He didn’t

declare a formal match or anything like that. He simply wandered up to Jimbo during the noon rest hour and said, “Hey, Jimbo, want to shoot some marbles?”

Jimbo looked at him with the slow steady gaze of a renowned

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JIMBO’S MARBLES

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gunslick and then said, “Sure. Why not?” Lazily he went back to his own bunk. In a few minutes he returned with a cigar box contain-

ing his winnings of the night before. They drew a circle in the dust, and each put twelve marbles in the circle. I was only sitting there writing a letter to Becky, and I guess they decided I wasn’t do-

ing anything important, so they made me referee. Jimbo was wearing a yellow short-sleeved sports shirt and his sawed-off dungarees.

Emil was wearing spotless white shorts and a spotless white T shirt, as if he were about to settle the Davis Cup at Wimbledon or some-

place. They flipped a coin to see who would shoot first. Emil won

the toss. Standing behind the line they had drawn in the dust some

ten

feet from the ring, Emil held his shooter out and sighted along the length of his arm. Jimbo stood watching him with a faintly amused look on his face. I looked up from my letter because I was supposed

to be referee, even though I’d been in the middle of telling Becky I loved her, which I always seemed to be in the middle of doing

whenever I got the chance. Emil licked his lips with his tongue, cocked his thumb against the big marble in his fist, and then triggered his shot. The marble leaped from his hand, spinning across the open air in a direct, unwavering, deadly accurate line toward the middle of the circle. It collided with one of the marbles in the ring, which richocheted off onto another marble, which struck two more marbles, which knocked out yet another marble for a total of five marbles knocked out of the circle on the first shot. I must admit I felt a slight thrill of pleasure. I can remember thinking, All right, Jimbo, this time yowre not playing with kids. But I can also

remember looking over at Jimbo and noticing that he didn’t seem at all disturbed, that he was still wearing that same faintly amused expression on his long face. Emil walked to the ring and, grinning, turned to Jimbo and said, “Want to forfeit?”

“Shoot,” Jimbo said. Emil grinned again, crouched in the dust, picked up his big marble, and shot. He knocked two more marbles out of the ring in succession and then missed the third by a hair, and that was the end of the game.

I say that was the end of the game only because Jimbo then shot and knocked out all the remaining marbles in the circle. And then, because he had won this round, it was his turn to shoot first in the next round. He shot first, and he knocked four marbles out with his opening blast, and then proceeded to clean up the ring again. And

Evan

444 then, because he’d won

Hunter

this round as well, he shot first again, and

again cleaned up the ring, and he kept doing that all through the rest

period until he’d won 75 marbles from Uncle Emil. Uncle Emil muttered something about having a little rheumatism in his fingers, throwing his game off, and Jimbo. listened sympa-

thetically while he added the 75 marbles to the collection in his bulging cigar box. That afternoon Emil came back with a hundred marbles he had scrounged from the kids, and Jimbo went to the mess hall to pick up a cardboard carton for his marble winnings. And, also that evening, he became a celebrity. I guess I was the only person, man or boy, in that camp who

didn’t want to try beating Uncle Jimbo in the hectic weeks that followed. To begin with, I am not a very competitive fellow, and besides, I only knew how to play immies, not marbles. Marbles re-

quired a strong thumb and a fast eye, Jimbo explained to me. My thumbs were pretty weak and my eyes were tired from staring across the lake trying to catch a glimpse of a distant figure I could identify as Becky. But everyone else in camp seemed to possess powerful thumbs and 20/20 vision, and they were all anxious to pit these assets against the champion. When you come to think of it, I suppose, champions exist ovly to be challenged, anyway. The chal-

lengers in this case included everybody, and all for different reasons. Uncle Ronnie was a counselor whom everyone, including the kids,

called Horizontal Ronnie because his two favorite pursuits both re-

quired a bed and a horizontal position. He wanted to beat Jimbo because the quarantine had deprived him of the satisfying company of

a girl named Laura in Camp Lydia. Jimbo won two hundred marbles from Ronnie in an hour of play. Uncle Dave taught mathematics at Evander Childs High School, and he thought he had figured out a foolproof system that he wanted

to try in practice. The system worked for 15 minutes, at the end of which time Jimbo blasted the game from its hinges and then barged on through to win 150 marbles. Uncle Marvin, too, had his own reason for wanting to beat Jimbo. Before the season had begun, when

Marvin was still hiring coun-

selors, he had offered Jimbo $1200 for the job. Jimbo had held out for $1300, which Marvin eventually and grudgingly paid him. But the extra $100 rankled, and Marvin was determined to get it back somehow. You may think it odd that he decided to get back his $100 by win-

ning marbles from Jimbo. After all, marbles are marbles, and money is money. But a very strange thing had happened in the second week

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of the madness. Marbles, which up to that time had only been round pieces of colored glass, suddenly became the hottest item of currency in the camp’s vast and complicated trading system. Before then, dimes were very hot property because the Coke machine in the counselors’ shack took only dimes. The kids weren’t allowed to enter the counselors’ shack, nor were they allowed to drink Cokes, all

of which made it absolutely necessary for them to have dimes so they could sneak into the counselors’ shack and drink Cokes. Almost every

letter home, before the marble madness began, started with the words, “Dear Mom and Dad, I am fine. Please send me some dimes.”

But suddenly, because Jimbo kept winning marbles with such frequency, there was a shortage of marbles in the camp. Marbles became a precious commodity, like gold or silver, and the basis of the camp economy. If you had marbles, you could trade them for all the dimes you needed. You could, in fact, get almost anything you

wanted, if you only had marbles. Uncle Jimbo had a lot of marbles. Uncle Jimbo had a whole damn suitcase full of them, which he kept locked and on a shelf over his bed. He was surely the richest man in camp. He became even richer the afternoon he played Uncle Marvin and won 500 marbles from him, a blow from which Marvin never recovered. By this time, beating Jimbo had become an obsession. Jimbo was the sole topic of camp discussion, overshadowing the approach-

ing Color War, eclipsing the visit of a famous football player who talked about the ways and means of forward passing while nobody listened. The counselors, the kids, even the camp doctor, were in-

terested only in the ways and means of amassing more marbles to pit against Jimbo’s growing empire. They discussed shooting techniques, and whether or not they should play with the sun facing them or behind their backs. They discussed the potency of the mass shot as against a slow deliberate one-at-a-time sort of game. They discussed different kinds of shooters, the illegality of using steelies, the current exchange rate of pureys. The kids loved every minutes of it.

They awoke each morning brimming with plans for Jimbo’s ultimate downfall. To them, beating him was important only because

it would give them an opportunity to prove that adults, especially adult counselors, were all a bunch of no-good finks. On Monday of the third week of the madness, the smart money entered the marbles business—and the gambling element began taking over. But before that, on Sunday night, I broke quarantine.

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I am usually a law-abiding fellow, and I might never have broken quarantine were it not for Horizontal Ronnie, who, I later came to learn, had very definite criminal leanings. “Look,” he said to me, “what’s to stop us from taking one of the canoes and paddling over to the other side?” “Well,” I said, “there’s a polio scare.” “Don’t you want to see What’s-her-name?” “Rebecca.” “Yeah, don’t you want to see her?” “Sure I do.” ‘Has every kid in this camp and also in Camp Lydia, by Marvin’s own admission, in his very own words, been inoculated against polio?” “Well, yes,” I said. “Then would you mind telling me how there is a polio scare?” “T don’t know,” I said.

“Fine. Pll meet you at the boat dock tonight at nine o’clock. I'll take care of getting word to the girls.”

I guess I didn’t trust him even then, because I took care of getting word to Becky myself that afternoon, by sending over one of my notes tied to an empty milk can. That night, at nine o’clock on the dot, Ronnie and I met at the boat dock and silently slipped one of the canoes into the water. We didn’t talk at all until we were in the middle of the lake, and then Ronnie said, ““We’ll come back around eleven. Is that all right with you?” “Sure,” Isaid. “Boy, that Laura,” he said, and fell silent again, apparently contemplating what was ahead. Laura, whom I had only seen once or twice before the quarantine, was a very pretty blond girl who al-

ways wore white sweaters and tight white shorts. She also wore a perfume that was very hard to avoid smelling, and the few times I had seen her was in the counselors’ shack where she kept playing the

“Malaguefia” over and over again on the piano. She was a very mysterious girl, what with her sweater and shorts and her perfume and her “Malaguefia.” She was eighteen years old. “I think I know how to beat him,” Ronnie said suddenly. “Huh?”

“Jimbo, I think I know how to beat the bastard.” “How?” J asked. “Never mind,” Ronnie said, and then he fell silent again, but it seemed to me he was paddling more furiously. I met Rebecca under the pines bordering the lake. She was wear-

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ing black slacks and a black bulky sweater, and she rushed into my

arms and didn’t say anything for the longest time, just held herself close to me, and then lifted her head and stared into my face, and then smiled that fast-breaking smile, and fleetingly kissed me on the cheek, and pulled away and looked into my face again. We skirted the edge of the pine forest, the night was still, I could feel her hand tight in my own. We sat with our backs to one of the

huge boulders overlooking the lake, and I held her in my arms and told her how miserable I'd been without her, and she kept kissing my closed eyes as I spoke, tiny little punctuating kisses that made me weak.

The night was very dark. Somewhere across the lake a dog began barking, and then the barking stopped and the night was still again. “I can barely see you, Becky,” I whispered. I held her close, I held her slender body close to mine. She was Becky, she was trembling, she was joy and sadness together, echoing inside me. If I held her a moment longer my heart would burst, I knew my heart would burst and shower trailing sparks on the night. And yet I held her, wanting to cry in my happiness, dizzy with the smell of her hair, loving everything about her in that timeless, brimming moment, still knowing my heart would burst, loving her closed

eyes and the whispery touch of her lashes, and the rough wool of her sweater, and the delicate motion of her hands on my face. I kissed

her, I died, I smiled, I listened to thunder, for oh, the kiss of Rebecca Goldblatt, the kiss, the heart-stopping kiss of my girl. The world was dark and still. “T love you,” she said. “T love you,” I said. And then she threw her arms around my neck and put her face against mine, tight, I could feel her cheekbone hard against mine, and suddenly she was crying. miley, “slisaid:W hat \,«..) honeyswhatasitey, “Oh, Donald,” she said, “‘what are we going to do? I love you so much.” “T think we ought to tell him,” I said, “when we get back.”

“How can we do that?” Becky said. “T can go to him. I can say we’re in love with each other.” “Oh yes, yes,” Becky said breathlessly. “I do love you, Donald.” “Then that’s what we’ll do.” “He .. .” She shook her head in the. darkness. I knew that her eyes were very solemn, even though I couldn’t see them. “He won't listen,” Becky said. “He'll try to break us up.”

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“Nobody will ever break us up,” I said. “Ever.” “What—what will you tell him?”

“That we love each other. That when we finish school we're go-

ing to get married.” “He won't let us.” “The hell with him.” “He doesn’t know you. He thinks Italians are terrible.” “T can’t help what he thinks,” I said. “Donald . . .” She paused. She was shaking her head again, and she began to tremble. “Donald, you can’t do it.” “Why not?” “Because he believes it, don’t you see? He really believes you are

some—some terrible sort of person.” “I know, but that doesn’t make it true. And simply because he believes it is no reason for me to behave as if J believe it.” I nodded

my head in the darkness. I felt pretty convinced by what I was saying, but at the same time I was scared to death of facing her father. “Tl tell him when we get back,” I said. Becky was quiet for a long long time. Then she said, “If only I was Italian.”

I held her very close to me, and I kissed the top of her head

very gently. Right then I knew everything was going to be all right. I knew it because Becky had said, “If only I was Italian,” when she

could just as easily have said, “If only you were Jewish.” Horizontal Ronnie swung into action the very next day. He had been inordinately silent the night before on the trip back across the lake, and I hadn’t disturbed his thoughts because I as-

sumed he was working out his system for beating Jimbo. Besides, I was working out what I would tell Becky’s father when we got back to the city. The course of action Ronnie decided upon was really the only one

that offered the slightest opportunity of defeating Jimbo and destroying his empire. He had correctly concluded that Jimbo was the best marble player in camp, if not in the entire world, and had further reasoned it would be impossible to beat him through skill alone. So, discounting skill, Ronnie had decided to try his hand at luck. At eight o’clock that Monday morning, as the kids lined up for muster, Ronnie came over with his fist clenched. He held out his hand to one of the senior boys and said, “Odds or evens?” “Huh?” the senior said. The senior boys at Camp Marvin weren’t exactly the brightest kids in the world. In fact, the junior boys had

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written a song about them which went something like “We’ve got seen-yuh boys, dumpy, lumpy seen-yuh boys, we’ve got seen-yuh

boys, the worst!” Besides, it was only eight o’clock in the morning, and when someone thrusts his fist in your face at eight o’clock in the morning and says, “Odds or evens?” what else can you reply but “Huh?” “My fist is full of marbles,” Ronnie explained. “Yeah?” the senior boy said. Mention of marbles seemed to have awakened him suddenly. His eyes gleamed. “They’re either an odd number of marbles or an even number,”

Ronnie went on. “You guess odds or evens. If you're right, I give you the marbles in my hand. If you’re wrong, you match the marbles in my hand.” “You mean if I’m wrong I give you the number of marbles you’re holding?” “That’s right.” The senior boy thought this over carefully for a moment, then nodded and said, “Odds.” Ronnie opened his fist. There were four marbles in his hand. “You pay me,” he said, and that was the beginning of the Las Vegas phase of the marble madness. If Uncle Marvin saw what was going on, he made no comment

upon it. The common opinion was that he was still smarting from his loss of 500 marbles to Jimbo and deliberately avoided contact

with everyone in the camp. It is doubtful that he could have stopped the frenzy even if he’d wanted to. The kids, presented with a new and exciting activity, took to it immediately. Here was a sport that required no skill. Here was a game that promised and delivered immediate action: the closed fist, the simple question, the guess, the payoff. Kids who were hopeless washouts on the baseball diamond suddenly discovered a sport in which they could excel. Kids who

couldn’t sing a note in a camp musical set the grounds reverberating

with their shouted “Odds or evens?” A large shipment of marbles from home to a kid named Irwin in bunk nine only increased the

feverish tempo of the gambling activity. The simple guessing game

started at reveille each morning, before a kid’s feet had barely touched the wooden floor of his bunk. It did not end until lights out, and even after that there were the whispered familiar words, and the surreptitious glow of flashlights.

Uncle Jimbo, startled by this new

development, stayed fastidi-

ously away from the gambling in the first few days. Ronnie, meanwhile, exhibiting his true gambler’s instincts, began by slowly win-

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ning a handful of marbles from every kid he could challenge, and

then became more and more reckless with his bets, clenching his fists around as many marbles as they could hold. Before too long, a bookie system became necessary, with counselors and campers writing down a number on a slip of paper and then folding the slip, so that a challenger had only to guess odds or evens on a written figure rather than on an actual fistful of marbles. That week, Ronnie successfully and infalliby called bets ranging from a low of three mar-

bles to a high of 152 marbles. It became clear almost immediately that

if Jimbo were to defend his title, he would have to enter this new phase of the sport or lose by default. I think he was beginning to like his title by then. Or perhaps he was only beginning to like his wealth. Whatever it was, he could not afford to drop out of the race. He studied the new rules, and learned them. They were really quite simple. If someone challenged you, you could either accept or decline the challenge. But once you had accepted, once the question “Odds or evens?” was asked in earnest, you either called immediately or lost the bet by default.

In the beginning, Jimbo took no chances. He deliberately sought out only those campers whose luck had been running incredibly bad. His bets were small, four marbles, seven marbles, a dozen marbles. If he won a bet, he immediately pocketed a portion of his initial investment and then began playing on his winnings alone. And then, because he thought of himself as a blood-smelling champion closing in for the kill, he began to bet more heavily, taking on all comers, swinging freely through the camp, challenging campers and coun-

selors alike. Eventually he wrote a bookie slip for 507 marbles and won the bet from a kid in bunk seven, knocking him completely

out of the competition. Jimbo’s luck was turning out to be almost as incredible as his skill had been. He lost occasionally, oh yes, but his winnings kept mounting, and marble after marble poured into the

locked suitcase on the shelf over his bed. It was becoming apparent to almost everyone in the camp—except Uncle Marvin, who still didn’t know what the hell was going on—that an elimination match

was taking place, and that the chief contenders for Jimbo’s as yet unchallenged title were Ronnie and the nouveau riche kid in bunk nine, who had parlayed his shipment from home into a sizable fortune. Irwin, the kid in bunk nine, was a tiny little kid whom everybody

called Irwin the Vermin. He wore glasses, and he always had a runny nose and a disposition to match. Ronnie, correctly figuring he would have to collar every loose marble in the camp before a showdown

with Jimbo, went over to bunk nine one afternoon and promptly

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challenged Irwin the Vermin. The number of marbles being wagered on a single bet had by this time reached fairly astronomical proportions. It was rumored that Irwin owned 1750 marbles. Ronnie, whose

number of marbles now totaled 904, sat on the edge of Irwin’s bed and wrote out a slip of paper with the number 903 on it. He folded the slip of paper and then looked Irwin directly in the eye. “Odds or evens?”’ he said. Irwin blinked behind his glasses, grinned maliciously, licked his lips with his tongue and said, “Odds.” Ronnie swallowed. ‘“‘What?” “Odds,” Irwin repeated. “Yeah,” Ronnie said. He unfolded the slip, and together they

walked back to his bunk where he made payment. “I’ve got a few marbles left,” he lied; he had only one marble to his name. “Do you want to play some more?” Irwin looked at him steadily and then, true to his nature, said, “Find yourself another sucker, jerk.” Ronnie watched Irwin as he left the bunk loaded down with his winnings. He must have seen in that tiny figure retreating across the grounds a symbol of all his frustration, the quarantine that kept him

from the mysterious Laura, the defeat of his system to beat Jimbo. It was late afternoon, and the cries of the boys at Free Play sounded from the ball diamonds and the basketball courts far off in the camp hills. Ronnie must have watched little Irwin walking away with his shattered hopes and dreams in a brown cardboard carton, and it must have been then that he made his final decision, the decision that brought the marble madness to its peak of insanity. I was coming back from the tennis courts, where I was trying to help little Max with his backhand, when I saw Ronnie striding across

the grounds toward Jimbo’s bunk. He was carrying an old battered suitcase, and there was something odd about his walk, a purposeful, angry stride which was at the same time somewhat surreptitious. I looked at him curiously and then followed him past the flagpole and watched as he entered the bunk. I stood outside for a few minutes, wondering, and then I quietly climbed the front steps.

Ronnie was in the middle of forcing the lock on Jimbo’s suitcase. He looked up when I entered the bunk and then went right back to work. ‘What are you doing?” I said. ‘What does it look like I’m doing?” he answered. “Tt looks like you’re trying to break open Jimbo’s suitcase.”

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“That’s right,” Ronnie said, and in that moment he broke the lock and opened the lid. “Give me a hand here,” he said. MINION: “Come on, don’t be a jerk.” » You're stealing his marbles,” I said. “That’s just what I’m doing. It’s a gag. Come on, “give me a hand here.” The next second was when I almost lost my own sanity because I said, I actually heard myself say, “You can go to jail for that!” as if even J had begun to believe there was a fortune in that suitcase instead of hunks of colored glass. “For stealing marbles?” Ronnie asked incredulously. “Don’t be a jackass.” His answer startled me back to reality, but at the same time it puzzled me. Because here he was, a grown man, twenty years old, and he was telling me these were only marbles, and yet he was thoroughly in-

volved in all this frantic nuttiness, so involved that he was in Jimbo’s bunk actually stealing marbles which he claimed he knew were only

marbles. He opened his own suitcase and then, seeing I was staring at him with a dumfounded expression, and knowing I wasn’t about to

help him, he lifted Jimbo’s bag himself and tilted it. The marbles spilled from one bag to the other, bright shining marbles, yellow and red and striped and black and green; glass marbles and steelies and glistening pureys, marbles of every size and hue, thousands and

thousands of marbles, spilling from Jimbo’s bag to Ronnie’s in a dazzling, glittering heap. I shook my head and said, “I think walked out of the bunk. Ronnie came carrying his own full suitcase, bending watched him as he struggled across to the camp. He put the bag down at his ing, he cupped his hands to his mouth McFarland?” There was no answer.

you’re all nuts,” and then I out after me a minute later, over with the weight of it. I the flagpole in the center of feet and then, his eyes gleamand shouted, “Where’s Jimbo

“Where’s Jimbo McFarland?” he shouted again. “Stop yelling,” I called from the steps of the bunk. “He’s up at the handball courts.’

“Jimbo McFarland!” Ronnie screamed. “Jimbo McFarland!” and the camp public address system picked up the name, shouting it across behind the bunks and down by the gully and through the na-

ture shack. “Jimbo McFarland!” and over to the lake where some

kids were taking their Red Cross tests, and then up into the hills by

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the mess hall, and across the upper-camp baseball diamond, and the

volleyball court, and finally reaching Jimbo where he was playing handball with one of the counselors.

Jimbo came striding down into the camp proper. He walked out of the hills like the gunslick he was, his back to the sun, crossing the

dusty grounds for a final showdown, stopping some twenty feet from where Ronnie stood near the flagpole. “You calling me?” he said. “You want to play marbles?” Ronnie answered.

“Have you got any marbles?” Jimbo said. “Will you match whatever I’ve got?” Jimbo hesitated a moment, weighing his luck, and then said, “Sure,” tentatively accepting the challenge. “Whatever’s in this bag?” Ronnie asked.

Again Jimbo hesitated. A crowd of kids had begun to gather, some of whom had followed Jimbo down out of the hills, the rest of whom had felt an excitement in the air, had felt that the moment of truth had finally arrived. They milled around the flagpole, waiting for

Jimbo’s decision. The gauntlet was in the dust, the challenge had been delivered, and now they waited for the undisputed champion to

decide whether or not he would defend his title. Jimbo nodded. “However much you want to bet,” he said slowly, ‘Ss all right with me.” He had irrevocably accepted the challenge. He now had to call or lose the bet by default. “Okay, then,” Ronnie said. He stooped down beside his suitcase. Slowly, nonchalantly, he unclasped the latches on either side. He

put one hand gently on the lid, and then he looked up at Jimbo,

grinned, quietly said, “Odds or evens, Jimbo?” and snapped open the lid of the bag.

From where I sat, I saw Jimbo’s face go white. I don’t know what

crossed his mind in those few terrible moments as he stared into the bag at those thousands and thousands of marbles. I don’t know whether or not he even made a mental stab at calculating the number of glistening spheres in the suitcase. I only know that he staggered back a pace and his jaw fell slack. The kids were silent now, watching him. Ronnie kept squatting beside the suitcase, his hand resting on the opened lid, the sun glowing on the marbles. “Well, Jimbo?” he said. “Odds or evens?” asbdie So

“Odds or evens, Jimbo?” Perhaps Jimbo was feverishly calculating in those breathless moments.

Perhaps he was realizing he had walked into a trap from

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which there was no return: he would either call correctly and become the marble king of the entire world; or he would call incorrectly or not at all, and lose his fortune and his fame. “Odds or evens?” Ronnie demanded. Odds or evens, but how to call? How many thousands of marbles were in that suitcase, and really what difference did it make when it all narrowed down to a single marble, the real difference between odds and evens, one solitary marble, call wrong and the empire

would come crashing down. Jimbo took a deep breath. The sweat was standing out on his face, his eyes were blinking. The kids around the flagpole stood silently awaiting his decision. Ronnie squatted by

the suitcase with his hand on the lid. “Odds or evens?” he asked again.

Jimbo shrugged. Honestly, because it was what he was really thinking, he said, “I. . .

[don’t know.”

“Did you hear him?” Ronnie said immediately. “He loses by default!” “W ait.a minute;

I...’

?

“You refused to call, you said you didn’t know! I win by default!” Ronnie said, and he snapped the lid of the bag shut, latched it and immediately lifted it from the ground.

“Now just,a second,” Jimbo protested, but Ronnie was already walking away from him. He stopped some five paces from the flagpole, turned abruptly, put the bag down, grinned, and said, “You stupid jerk! They were your own marbles!” For a moment, his announcement hung on the dust-laden air. Jimbo blinked, not understanding him at first. The kids were silent and puzzled in the circle around the flagpole. Ronnie picked up the bag of marbles again and began walking toward his bunk with it, a

triumphant grin on his face. And then the meaning of what he had said registered on Jimbo’s face, his eyes first, intelligence sparking there, his nose next, the nostrils flaring, his mouth then, the lips pull-

ing back to show his teeth, and then his voice, bursting from his mouth in a wounded roar. “‘You thief!” His words, too, hung on the silent air, and then one of the kids said, “Did he steal them from you, Uncle Jimbo?” and another kid shouted, “He’s a crook!” and then suddenly the word “Thief!” was shouted by one of the senior boys and picked up by a junior, “Thief!” and the air rang with the word, “Thief!” and then it was shouted in unison, “Thief! Thief!” and all at once there was a bloodthirsty mob. A kid who had come down from the ball diamond waved his bat in the air and began running after Ronnie. Another kid

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seized a fallen branch and rushed past the flagpole with it. The others bellowed screams of anger and rage, hysterically racing toward Ronnie, who had dropped the suitcase and turned to face them. There was a pale, sickly smile on his mouth, as though he hadn’t expected

this kind of backfire. “Look,” he said, but his voice was drowned out

in the roar of the kids as they rushed forward with Jimbo. Ronnie turned and tried to run for his bunk, but Jimbo caught his collar from behind, and pulled him backward to the ground. I saw the kid raise his baseball bat and I leaped to my feet and yelled, “Stop it! Goddamn you, stop it!” The bat hung in midair. Slowly they turned toward me. “It’s only marbles,” I said. The camp was silent. “Tt’s only marbles,” I repeated. “Don’t you see?” And then, because I had intruded upon a fantasy and threatened to shatter it, because the entire spiraling marbles structure was suddenly in danger, they turned from Ronnie, who was lying on the

ground, and they ran toward me, shouting and screaming. Jimbo, the champion, struck me on the jaw with his fist, and when I fell to the ground, the kids began kicking me and pummeling me. There was more than anger in their blows and their whispered curses. There was conviction and an overriding necessity to convince the unbeliever as well. I refused to be convinced. I felt each deliberate blow, yes, each fierce kick, but I would not be convinced because I knew, even if they didn’t, that it was only marbles. I quit Camp Marvin early the next morning. Not because of the beating. That wasn’t important. I carried my two suitcases all around the lake to Camp Lydia. It was raining, and I got soaking wet. I waited at the gate while one of the girl campers ran to get Rebecca. She came walking through the rain wearing her dirty trench coat, walking with that peculiar sideward lope, her hair wet and clinging to her face. “Come on, Beck,” I said. “We’re going home.” She looked at me for a long time, searching my face with her dark solemn eyes while the rain came down around us. I knew that word of the beating had traveled across the lake, but I didn’t know whether she was looking for cuts and bruises or for something else. “Are you all right?” she said at last. “Yes, I’m fine,” I said. “Becky, please go pack your things.” And then, as she turned to go, I said, “Becky?” She stopped in the center of the road with the rain streaming on

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her face and she looked at me curiously, her eyebrows raised, waiting. “As soon as we get back,” I said, “today, this afternoon, I’m going to talk to your father.” She stared at me a moment longer, her eyes very serious, and then she gave a small nod, and a smile began forming on her face, not the usual fast-breaking smile, but a slow steady smile that was somehow very sad and very old, even though she was only nineteen. “All right, Donald,” she said. That afternoon I went to see her father at his dental office on Fordham Road in the Bronx. It was still raining. When he heard who was calling, he told his receptionist he didn’t want to see me, so I

marched right in and stood beside his chair while he was working on a patient, and I said, “Dr. Goldblatt, you had better see me, because youre going to see a lot of me from now on.” He didn’t want to make a very big fuss because a patient was sit-

ting in the chair with her mouth open, so he walked over to his receptionist and quietly asked her to get the police, but I just kept standing by the chair very calmly. He didn’t know it, but I had been through the hysteria bit before, in spades, and this mild case didn’t faze me at all. Finally, when he realized I wasn’t going to leave, he

again left his patient sitting in the chair, and he told his receptionist to never mind where we sat on He looked at ca’s, and he said,

the police, and he led me to a private little office opposite sides of a desk. me with dark solemn eyes, almost as black as Rebec“What the hell do you want from my life?”

“Dr. Goldblatt,” I said, “I don’t want anything from your life.” “Except my daughter,” he said sourly.

“Yes, but that’s not from your life, that’s from hers.” “No,” Dr. Goldblatt said. “Dr. Goldblatt,” I said politely, “I didn’t come here to ask your permission to see her. I came here to tell you that we’re getting engaged, and as soon as we graduate we’re going to get married.”

“No,” Dr. Goldblatt said. “You’re a Gentile, she’s a Jewish girl, it would never work. Don’t you know the trouble you're asking

for? Different religions, different cultures, how will you raise the children, what will you . . . >” “Dr. Goldblatt,” I said, “that’s only marbles.”

“What?” “T said it’s only marbles.” The office went very silent, just the way the camp had when I’d shouted those words the day before. Dr. Goldblatt looked at me for

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a long time, his face expressionless. Then, all he said was “Marbles.”

“Yes,” I said, “marbles. Dr. Goldblatt, I’m going to pick up Becky

at the house tonight at eight o’clock. At the house, Dr. Goldblatt. ’m

not going to meet her in some dark alley any more.” Dr. Goldblatt said nothing. “Because she’s too nice to be meeting in dark alleys,” I said, “and I love her.” Dr. Goldblatt still said nothing. “Well,” I said, “it was nice talking to you.”

I got up and offered my hand to him, which he refused. I shrugged

and started for the door. I had my hand on the knob when I heard him say behind me, “Marbles. This is what my daughter picked. Marbles.” I didn’t let him see me smile. I walked downstairs to the street. The rain had tapered off to a fine drizzle. The gutters ran with water, and large puddles had formed in the hollows near the curb. I could remember sticking my hand into puddles just like those long ago when I was a kid, when the loss of a hundred immies had meant a great deal to me. I called Becky from a telephone booth in the corner drugstore. The nut—she cried.

Weasels in the Corn Meal

“ts JOSEPH HENRY JACKSON Wuen Marta CAME To us, complete with impeccable letters, we knew we had a treasure. Her graying hair was neat; it framed a pink, plump, confident face. Her china-blue eyes, wide like a doll’s, were clear evidence of physical health. One child in the house, she said comfortably, was nothing; she took to our cat instantly, and it took to her. There remained one small worry. My mother-in-law, who had said, “I’ll never be found with my feet under a son-in-law’s table!” and meant it lived down the block in her own bungalow. It would be part of Marta’s duty to clean for her once a week, my wife taking over in our own house on that day. And on Tuesdays and Fridays Marta was to see that good, really nourishing dinners were cooked there. The old lady liked to do for herself, she insisted, but far too often she ate out of cans. Marta was easygoing and she seemed the soul of tact. But, well, my mother-in-law had her ideas, one of them being that she didn’t like people she didn’t like. It was never wholly certain what governed her in the views she took, dim or otherwise, but there was never any doubt what those views were. For a day or two the problem did not arise. It was evident at once that Marta could cook, though she liked to go her own way. The aspect of the kitchen was immediately changed, spices and staples rearranged according to a mysterious pattern that suited her. My wife began to adjust herself to Marta’s conversation, too, and was not as startled as she might have been when Marta told her that she had found weasels in the corn meal. It was good to know they had been discovered and promptly dealt with. “I got rid of ’em,” Marta said briskly, “every single sanitary one!” Then the first Tuesday arrived, and the first dinner Marta would cook for my mother-in-law. My wife took her to the bungalow, introduced her, and left. It would work out or it wouldn’t. Next night after dinner she told me how it had gone. Marta had come back smiling. She was frank about the little shin-

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gled bungalow: it was a kind of old ramble-shack, she said. But the

old lady was sweet; she put Marta in mind of that famous painting of Hitler’s Mother. It was nice to do things for people who didn’t mind lending a hand; my mother-in-law had helped Marta wrench out the cups after the coffee, which showed she had her heart in the right end. They had talked a good deal, too, Marta reported, and it was a pleasure to discuss things with her; she never went off on a tandem the way so many ladies did. It was plain that they had much in common, for Marta had mentioned my mother-in-law’s science trouble. It was the fog, Marta explained; some people were just septic to it. They shared another idiosyncrasy, too: strawberries gave them both whelps all over their arms. One thing had bothered Marta. The old lady ought to eat more. They had talked this over, and although Marta’s chubbiness made their agreement fantastic, they had concluded that both had the

same difficulty: neither of them assumed their food properly. After that first day, Marta took to carrying special dishes over to the bungalow. The second week she slipped out for ten minutes at dinnertime on the Friday. When she came back we learned why. She had taken over to my mother-in-law the dessert in which she took the greatest pride—her Baked Elastic. She never claimed to be a bet-

ter cook than the old lady, however. The two had exchanged secrets from their store of kitchen tricks, and Marta admitted they had come out nick and tuck. As it worked out, it turned into a close friendship; but while this

was pleasant in its way, we found that we were getting less and less of Marta’s time. She was always just stepping over to see how things were; she said firmly that the old lady had told her to drop in for a snag whenever she felt like it. In the end, it all added up: we lost our treasure. It began when my mother-in-law gave Marta an old evening dress. Marta was enormously pleased with its style—black velvet, covered with Seagram’s. And the gift led directly to evening dances at Oakland’s most popular social ballroom. There, properly introduced by the lady manager, Marta met a man, and from that moment romance had the upper hand. She hadn’t known him from Adams, she told us, but he had met her once before in Southern California. They agreed that they really liked Los Angeles better, and

he was returning to his old job there. He said The Right Things, and

he wanted Marta to go with him as his wife when he left. She would have liked to stay with us, particularly with my mother-in-law. But

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anybody knew that it was silly to cut off your nose in spite of your face.

Perhaps it was just as well; for, as Marta told my wife with a selfconscious giggle, he was a man who liked to step out; he was a great one for burning the camel at both ends. It may have been this propensity of his that eventually parted them. Marta had admitted that he was the kind that carried things to the inch degree. Whatever the reason, she was her own woman again in six short months. She sent us a postcard telling us she had

gone back to work for her old employers, a family named Trott. She thought of us often, though, especially my mother-in-law, who had been a garden angel to her. We passed on the message, and it was only then that we realized how really close the two women had been. For my mother-in-law made it quite clear that we had been a pair of simpletons to let Marta go. She was the best cook we’d ever had or were likely to have, the old lady said, and for a simple reason: Marta had been taught right; she knew the principles of homey comics.

The Third Baby’s the Easiest

“SHIRLEY JACKSON EverYOongE says the third baby is the easiest one to have, and now I know why. It’s the easiest because it’s the funniest, because you’ve been there twice, and you know. You know, for instance, how you're going to look in a maternity dress about the seventh month, and you know how to release the footbrake on a baby carriage without fumbling amateurishly, and you know how to tie your shoes before and do knee-chests after, and while you're not exactly casual, you’re a little bit offhand about the whole thing. Sentimental people keep insisting that women go on to have a third baby because they love babies, and cynical people seem to maintain that a woman with two healthy, active children around the house will do

anything for ten quiet days in the hospital; my own position is somewhere between the two, but I agree that the third is the easiest. The whole event is far too recent for me to be deluded. Because it was my third I was saved a lot of unnecessary discomfort. No one sent me any dainty pink sweaters, for instance. We received only one pair of booties, and those were a pair of rosebudcovered white ones that someone had sent my first child when he was born and which I had given, still in their original pink tissue paper, to a friend when her first child was born; she had subsequently sent them to her cousin in Texas for a second baby, and the cousin sent them back east on the occasion of a mutual friend’s twins; the mutual friend gave them to me, with a card saying “Love to Baby” and the pink tissue paper hardly rufHled. I have them carefully set aside, be-

cause I know someone who is having a baby in June. I borrowed back my baby carriage from my next-door neighbor, took the crib down out of the attic, washed my way through the chest of baby shirts and woolen shawls, briefed the two incumbent children far enough ahead of time, and spent a loving and painstaking month packing my suitcase. This time I knew exactly what I was taking with me to the hospital, but assembling it took time and eventually required an emergency trip to New York from our home in Vermont. I packed it, though, finally: a yellow nightgown

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trimmed with lace, a white nightgown that tied at the throat with a blue bow, two of the fanciest bed jackets I could find—that was what I went to New York for—and then, two pounds of home-

made fudge, as many mystery stories as I could cram in, and a bag of apples. Almost at the last minute I added a box of pralines, a bottle of expensive cologne, and my toothbrush. I have heard of people who take their own satin sheets to the hospital but that has al-

ways seemed to me a waste of good suitcase space. My doctor was very pleasant and my friends were very thoughtful; for the last two weeks before I went to the hospital almost

everyone I know called me almost once a day and said, ““Haven’t you gone yet?” My mother- and father-in-law settled on a weekend visit to us when,

according to the best astronomical

figuring, I should

have had a two-weeks-old baby ready to show them; they arrived, were entertained with some restraint on my part, and left, eying me with disfavor and some suspicion. My mother sent me a telegram from California saying, “Is everything all right? Shall I come? Where is baby?” My children were sullen, my husband was embarrassed. Everything was, as I saw, perfectly normal, up to and including the frightful moment when I leaped out of bed at two in the morn-

ing as though there had been a pea under the mattress; when

I

turned on the light my husband said sleepily, “Having baby?” “T really don’t know,” I said nervously. I was looking for the clock, which I hide at night so that in the morning when the alarm rings I will have to wake up looking for it. It was hard to find it without the alarm ringing. “Shall I wake up?” my husband asked without any sign of pleased anticipation. “T can’t find the clock,” I said. “Clock?” my husband said. “Clock. Wake me five minutes apart.” I unlocked the suitcase and took out a mystery story, and sat down in the armchair with a blanket over me. After a few minutes the cat, who usually sleeps on the foot of my son’s bed, wandered in and settled down on a corner of the blanket by my feet. She slept as peacefully as my husband did most of the night, except that now and then she raised her head to regard me with a look of silent contempt. Because we live in a small country town and our hospital is five miles away I had an uneasy feeling that I ought to allow plenty of time, particularly since neither of us has ever learned to drive and consequently I must call our local taxi to take me to the hospital. At

seven-thirty I called my doctor and we chatted agreeably for a few

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463 minutes, and I said I would just give the children their breakfast and wash up the dishes and then run over to the hospit al, and he said that would be just fine and he’d plan to meet me later, then; the unspoken conviction between us was that I ought to be back in the fields before sundown. I went into the kitchen and proceeded methodically to work, hum-

ming cheerfully and stopping occasionally to grab the back of a

chair and hold my breath. My husband told me later that he found his cup and saucer (the one with Father written on it) in the oven, but I am inclined to believe that he was too upset to be a completely

reliable reporter. My own recollection is of doing everything the

way I have a thousand times before—school-morning short cuts so familiar that I am hardly aware, usually, of doing them at all. The

frying pan, for instance. My single immediate object was a cup of

coffee and I decided to heat up the coffee left from the night before, rather than take the time to make fresh; it seemed brilliantly logical to heat it in the frying pan because anyone knows that a broad shallow container will heat liquid faster than a tall narrow one, like a coffee pot. I will not try to deny, however, that it looked funny. By the time the children came down everything seemed to be moving along handsomely; my son grimly got two glasses and filled them with fruit juice for his sister and himself. He offered me one, but I had no desire to eat, or in fact to do anything which might upset my precarious balance between two and three children, or to interrupt my morning’s work for more than coffee, which I was still doggedly making in the frying pan. My husband came downstairs, sat in his usual place, said good morning to the children, accepted the glass of fruit juice my son poured for him, and asked me brightly, “How do you feel?” “Splendid,” I said, making an enormous smile for all of them. “I’m doing wonderfully well.” “Good,” he said. “How soon do you think we ought to leave?” “Around noon, probably,” I said. “Everything is fine, really.” My husband asked politely, “May I help you with breakfast?” “No indeed,” I said. I stopped to catch my breath and smiled reassuringly. “I feel so well,” I said. “Would you be offended,” he said, still very politely, “af I took this egg out of my glass?” “Certainly not,” I said. “I’m sorry, I can’t think how it got there.” “Tt’s nothing at all,” my husband said. “I was just thirsty.” They were all staring at me oddly, and I kept giving them my re-

assuring smile; I did feel splendid; my months of waiting were nearly

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over, my careful preparations had finally been brought to a purpose, tomorrow I would be wearing my yellow nightgown. “I’m so pleased,” I said. I was slightly dizzy, perhaps. And there were pains, but they were authentic ones, not the feeble imitations I had been dreaming up the

past few weeks. I patted my son on the head. “Well,” I said, in the tone I had used perhaps 500 times in the last months. “Well, do we want a little boy or a little boy?” “Won’t you sit down?” my husband said. He had the air of a man

who expects that an explanation will somehow be given him for a series of extraordinary events in which he is unwillingly involved. “I think you ought to sit down,” he added urgently. It was about then that I realized that he was right. I ought to sit down. As a matter of fact, I ought to go to the hospital right now, immediately. I dropped my reassuring smile and the fork I had been carrying around with me. “Td better hurry,” I said inadequately. My husband called the taxi and brought down my suitcase. The children were going to stay with friends, and one of the things I had planned to do was drop them off on my way to the hospital, now, however, I felt vitally that I had not the time. I began to talk fast. “You'll have to take care of the children,” I told my husband. “See that . . .” I stopped. I remember thinking with incredible clarity and speed. “See that they finish their breakfast,” I said. Pajamas on the line, I thought, school, cats, toothbrushes. Milkman. Overalls to be mended; laundry. “I ought to make a list,” I said vaguely. “Leave a note for the milkman tomorrow night. Soap, too. We need soap.” Ves, dear,” my husband kept saying. “Yes dear yes dear.” The taxi arrived and suddenly I was saying goodbye to the children. “See you later,” my son said casually. “Have a good time.” “Bring me a present,” my daughter added. “Don’t worry about a thing,” my husband said. “Now, don’t you worry,” I told him. “There’s nothing to Worry

about.” “Everything will be fine,” he said. “Don’t worry.” I waited for a good moment and then scrambled into the taxi without grace; I did not dare risk my reassuring smile on the taxi driver but I nodded to him briskly. “Pll be with you in an hour,” my husband said nervously. “And don’t worry.”

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“Everything will be fine,” I said. “Don’t worry.” “Nothing to worry about,” the taxi driver said to my husband, and we started off, my husband standing at the curb wringing his hands and the taxi tacking insanely from side to side of the road to avoid even the slightest bump. I sat very still in the back seat, trying not to breathe. I had one arm lovingly around my suitcase, which held my yellow night-

gown, and I tried to light a cigarette without using any muscles except those in my hands and my neck, and still not let go of my

suitcase. “Going to be a beautiful day,” I said to the taxi driver at last. We

had a 20-minute trip ahead of us at least—much longer, if he continued his zigzag path. “Pretty warm for the time of year.” “Pretty warm yesterday, too,” the taxi driver said. “It was warm yesterday,” I conceded, and stopped to catch my breath. The driver, who was obviously avoiding looking at me in the mirror, said a little bit hysterically, “Probably be warm tomorrow, too.” I waited for a minute, and then I was able to say, dubiously, “I don’t know as it will stay warm that long. Might cool off by tomorrow.”

“Well,” the taxi driver said, “it was sure warm yesterday.” “Yesterday,” I said. “Yes, that was a warm day.” “Going to be nice today, too,” the taxi driver said. I clutched my suitcase tighter and made some small sound—more like a yelp than anything else—and the taxi veered madly off to the left and then began to pick up speed with enthusiasm. “Very warm indeed,” the driver babbled, leaning forward against the wheel. “Warmest day I ever saw for the time of year. Usually

this time of year it’s colder. Yesterday it was terribly—” “Tt was not,” I said. “It was freezing. I can see the tower of the hospital.” “I remember thinking how warm it was,” the driver said. He

turned into the hospital drive. “It was so warm I noticed it right away. “This is a warm day,’ I thought, that’s how warm it was.” We pulled up with a magnificent flourish at the hospital entrance, and the driver skittered out of the front seat and came around and opened the door and took my arm. “My wife had five,” he said. “I'll take the suitcase, Miss. Five, and never a minute’s trouble with any of them.” He rushed me in through the door and up to the desk. “Here,” he said to the desk clerk. “Pay me later,” he said to me, and fled.

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“Name?” the desk clerk said to me politely, her pencil poised. “Name,” I said vaguely. |remembered, and told her. “Age?” she asked. “Sex? Occupation?” “Writer,” I said. “Housewife,” she said. “Writer,” I said. “[’ll just put down housewife,” she said. “Doctor? How many children?” “Two,” I said. “Up to now.” “Normal pregnancy?” she said. “Blood test? X-ray?” “Look—” I said. “HHusband’s name?” she said. ““Address? Occupation?” “Just put down housewife,” I said. “I don’t remember his name, really.” “Legitimate?” “What?” I said. “Is your husband the father of this child? Do you have a husband?” “Please,” I said plaintively, “can I go on upstairs?”

‘Well, really,” she said, and sniffed. “You're only having a baby.” She waved delicately to a nurse, who took me by the same arm everybody else had been using that morning, and in the elevator this nurse was very nice. She asked me twice how I was feeling and said “Maternity?” to me politely as we left the elevator, I was carrying my own suitcase by then. Two or more nurses joined us upstairs; we made light conversation while I got into the hospital nightgown. The nurses had all been to some occupational party the night before and one of them had been simply a riot; she was still being a riot while I undressed, because every now and then one of the two other nurses would turn around to me and say, “Isn’t she a riot, honestly?”

I made a few remarks, just to show that I too was lighthearted and not at all nervous; I commented laughingly on the hospital nightgown, and asked with amusement tinged with foreboding what was the apparatus they were wheeling in on the tray. My doctor arrived about half an hour later; he had obviously had three cups of coffee and a good cigar; he patted me on the shoulder and said, “How do we feel?” “Pretty well,” I said, with an uneasy giggle that ended in a squawk. “How long do you suppose it will be before—” “We don’t need to worry about that for a while yet,” the doctor said. He laughed pleasantly, and nodded to the nurses. They all bore

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down on me at once, One of them smoothed my pillow, one of them held my hand, and the third one stroked my forehead and said, “After

all, you’re only having a baby.”

“Call me if you want me,” the doctor said to the nurses as he left. “Tl be downstairs in the coffee shop.” “TIl call you if I need you,” I told him omino usly, and one of the nurses said in a honeyed voice, “Now, look, we don’t want our husband to get all worried.” I opened one eye; my husband was sitting, suddenly, beside the

bed. He looked as though he were trying not to screa m. “They told

me to come room.”

in here,” he said. “I was trying to find the waiting

“The other end of the hall,” I told him grimly. I pounded on the bell and the nurse came running. “Get him out of here,” I said, waving my head at my husband.

“They told me—’ my husband began, looking miserably at the

nurse. “Te’s all-]-I-I-]-] right,” the nurse said. She began to stroke my forehead again. “Hubby belongs right here.”

“Either he goes or I go,” I said. The door slammed open and the doctor came in. “Heard you were here,” he said jovially, shaking my husband’s hand. “Look a little ale.” - My husband smiled weakly. “Never lost a father yet,” the doctor said, and slapped him on the back. He turned to me. “How do we feel?” he said. “Terrible,” I said, and the doctor laughed again. “Just on my way downstairs,” he said to my husband. “Come along?” No one seemed, actually, to go or come that morning; I would open my eyes and they were there, open my eyes again and they were gone. This time, when I opened my eyes, a pleasant-faced nurse was standing beside me; she was swabbing my arm with a piece of cotton. Although I am ordinarily timid about hypodermics I welcomed this one with what was almost a genuine echo of my old reassuring smile. “Well, well,” I said to the nurse. “Sure glad to see

you.”

“Sissy,” she said distinctly, and jabbed me in the arm. “How soon will this wear off?” I asked her with deep suspicion; I am always afraid with nurses that they feel that the psychological effect of a hypodermic is enough, and that I am actually being inoculated with some useless, although probably harmless, concoction.

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“You won’t even notice,” she said enigmatically, and left. The hypodermic hit me suddenly, and I began to giggle about five minutes after she left. I was alone in the room, lying there giggling

to myself, when I opened my eyes and there was a.woman standing beside the bed. She was human, not a nurse; she was wearing a baggy

blue bathrobe. “I’m across the hall,” she said. “I been hearing you.” “T was laughing,” I said, with vast dignity. “T heard you,” she said. “Tomorrow it might be me, maybe.” “You here for a baby?” “Someday,” she said gloomily. “I was here two weeks ago, I was having pains. I come in the morning and that night they said to me, ‘Go home, wait a while longer.’ So I went home, and I come again three days later, I was having pains. And they said to me, ‘Go home,

wait a while longer.’ And so yesterday I come again, I was having pains. So far they let me stay.” ‘““That’s too bad,” I said.

“T got my mother there,” she said. “She takes care of everything and sees the meals made, but she’s beginning with false pretenses.” “That’s too bad,” I said. I began to pound “Stop that,” she said. “Somebody’ll hear The first two—nothing.” “This is my third,” I said. “I don’t care who “My kids,” she said. “Every time I come

to think I got her there the wall with my fists. you. This is my third. hears me.” home they say to me,

‘Where’s the baby?’ My mother too. My husband, he keeps driving me over and driving me back.” “They kept telling me the third was the easiest,” I said. I began to giggle again. “There you go,” she said. “Laughing your head off. I wish I had

something to laugh at.” She waved her hand at me and turned and went mournfully through the door. I opened my same weary eye and my husband was sitting comfortably in his chair. “I said,” he was saying loudly, “I said, ‘Do you mind if I read?’” He had the New York Times on his knee. “Look,” I said. “Do I have anything to read? Here I am, with nothing to do and no one to talk to and you sit there and read the New York Times right in front of me and here I am, with noth-

ing—” “How do we feel?” the doctor asked. He was suddenly much taller than before and the walls of the room were rocking distinctly.

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“Doctor,” I said, and I believe that my voice was a little louder than I intended it should be. “You better give me—” He patted me on the hand and it was my husband instead of the doctor. “Stop yelling,” he said.

‘Tm not yelling,” I said. “I don’t like this any more. I’ve changed my mind, I don’t want any baby, I want to go home and forget the

whole thing.”

“I know just how you feel,” he said. My only answer was a word which certainly I knew that I knew, although J had never honestly expected to hear it spoken in my own ladylike voice.

“Stop yelling,” my husband said urgently. “Please stop saying ; thats I had the idea that I was perfectly conscious, and I looked at him with dignity. “Who is doing this?” I asked. “You or me?” “It’s all right,” the doctor said. “We’re on our way.” The walls were moving along on either side of me and the woman in the blue bathrobe was waving from a doorway. “She loved me for the dangers I had passed,” I said to the doctor, “and I loved her that she did pity them.” “Tr’s all right, I tell you,” the doctor said. “Hold your breath.” “Did he finish his New York Times?” “Hours ago,” the doctor said. “What’s he reading now?” I asked. “The Tribune,” the doctor said. “Hold your breath.” It was so unbelievably bright that I closed my eyes. “Such a lovely time,” I said to the doctor. ‘Thank you so much for asking me, I can’t tell you how I’ve enjoyed it. Next time you must come to our—” “Tt’s a girl,” the doctor said. “Sarah,” I said politely, as though I were introducing them. I still thought I was perfectly conscious, and then I was. My husband was sitting beside the bed, smiling cheerfully. “What happened to you?” I asked him. “No Wall Street Journal?”

“Tt’s a girl,” he said. “TI know,” I said. “I was there.” I was in a pleasant, clean room. There was no doubt that it was all over; I could see my feet under the bedspread. “Tt’s a girl,” I said to my husband. The door opened and the doctor came in. “Well,” he said. “How do we feel?”

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“Fine,” T’said’ “It’s a girl.” “T know,” he said. ; The door was still open and a face peered around it. My husband, the doctor, and I, all turned happily to look. It was the woman in the blue bathrobe. “Had it yet?” I asked her. “No,” she said. “You?” “Yep,” I said. “You going home again?” “Listen,” she said. “I been thinking. Home, the kids all yelling and my mother looking sad like she’s disappointed in me. Like I did something. My husband, every time he sees me jump he reaches for the car keys. My sister, she calls me every day and if I answer the phone she hangs up. Here, I get three meals a day I don’t cook. I know all the nurses and I meet a lot of people going in and out. I figure I’d be a fool to go home. What was it, boy or girl?” “Girl,” I said. “Girl,” she said. “They say the third’s the easiest.”

The Persecution of Bob Pretty “t= W. W. JACOBS THE OLD MAN saT on his accustomed bench outsid e the Cauliflower. A generous measure of beer stood in a blue and white jug by his elbow, and little wisps of smoke curled slowly upwards from the bowl of his churchwarden pipe. The knaps acks of two young men lay where they were flung on the table, and the owners, taking a noontide rest, turned a polite, if bored, ear to the reminiscences of grateful old age. Poaching (said the old man, who had tried topics rangin g from early turnips to horseshoeing )—poaching ain’t wot it used to be in

these ’ere parts. Nothing is like it used to be, poaching nor anythi ng

else; but that there man you might ha’ noticed as went out about ten minutes ago-and called me “Old Truthfulness” as ’e passed is the

worst one I know. Bob Pretty ’is name is, and of all the sly, artful, deceiving men that ever lived in Claybury ’e is the worst—neve r did

a honest day’s work in ’is life, and never wanted the price of a glass of ale. Bob Pretty’s worst time was just after old Squire Brown died. The old squire couldn’t afford to preserve much, but by and by a gentleman with plenty of money, from London, named Rockett , took is place and things began to look up. Pheasants was ’is favorites, and ’e spent no end o’ money rearing of ’em, but anything that could be shot at suited ’im, too. He started by sneering at the little game that Squire Brown ’ad left, but all ’e could do didn’t seem to make much difference; things disappeared in most eggstrordinary way, and the keepers went pretty near crazy, while the things the squire said about Claybury and Claybury men was disgraceful. Everybody knew as it was Bob Pretty and one or two of ’is mates from other places but they couldn’t prove it. They couldn’t catch ’m nohow, and at last the squire ’ad two keepers set off to watch ’im by night and by day. Bob Pretty wouldn’t believe it; he said ’e couldn’t. And even when it was pointed out to ’im that Keeper Lewis was follering of ’im he

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said that it jus ’appened he was going the same way, that was all. And sometimes he’d get up in the middle of the night and go for a fifteen-mile walk ’cos ’e’d got the toothache, and Mr. Lewis, who

hadn’t got it, had to tag along arter ’im till he was fit to drop. O'

course, it was one keeper the less to look arter the game, and by and by the squire see that and took ’im off. All the same they kept a pretty close watch on Bob, and at last one arternoon they sprang out on ’im as he was walking past Gray’s farm, and asked him wot it was he’ad got in his pockets. “That’s my bisness, Mr. Lewis,” ses Bob Pretty. Mr. Smith, the other keeper, passed ’is hands over Bob’s coat and

felt something soft and bulgy. “You take your ’ands off of me,” ses Bob. “You don’t know ’ow partikler I am.” He jerked ’imself away, but they caught ’old of ’im agin, and Mr. Lewis put ’is hand in his inside pocket and pulled out two brace 0’ partridges. “You'll come along of us,” he ses, catching ’im by the arm. ‘We've been looking for you a long time,” ses Keeper Smith, “and it’s a pleasure for us to ’ave your company.” Bob Pretty said ’e wouldn’t go, but they forced ’im along and took ’im all the way to Cudford, four miles off, so that Policeman White could lock ’im up for the night. Mr. White was a’most as pleased as the keepers, and ’e warned Bob solemn not to speak becos alle said would be used agin “im. “Never mind about that,” ses Bob Pretty. “I’ve got a clear conscience, and talking can’t ’urt me. I’m very glad to see you, Mr. White; if these two clever, experienced keepers hadn’t brought me I should ’ave looked you up myself. They’ve been and stole my partridges.” Them as was standing round laughed, and even Policeman White couldn’t ’elp giving a little smile. “There’s nothing to laugh at,” ses Bob, ’olding his ’ead up. “It’s a fine thing when a working man—a ’ard-working man—can’t take home a little game for ’is family without being stopped and robbed.” “I s’pose they flew into your pocket,” ses Policeman White. “No, they didn’t,” ses Bob. “I’m not going to tell any lies about

it; I put ’em there. The partridges in my inside coat pocket and the bill in my waistcoat pocket.” “The bill?” ses Keeper Lewis, staring at ’im.

“Yes, the bill,” ses Bob Pretty staring back; “the bill from Mr. Keen, the poulterer, at Wickham.”

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He fetched it out of ’is pocket and showed it to Mr. White, and the keepers was like madmen a’most ’cos it was plain to see that Bob Pretty ’ad been and bought them partridges just for to play a game on ’em. “T was curious to know wot they tasted like,” he ses to the policeman. “Worst of it is, I don’t s’pose my pore wife’ll know ’ow to cook ’em.” “You get off ’ome,” ses Policeman White, staring at “im. “But ain’t I goin’ to be locked up?” ses Bob. “’Ave I been brought all this way just to ’ave a little chat with a policeman I don’t like?” “You go ’ome,” ses Policeman White, handing the partridges back to ‘im. “All right,” ses Bob, “and I may ’ave to call you to witness that these ’ere two men laid hold o’ me and tried to steal my partridges. I shall go up and see my loryer about it.” He walked off ’ome with his ’ead up as high as ’e could hold it and the airs ’e used to give ’imself arter this was terrible for to behold.

He got ’is eldest boy to write a long letter to the squire about it, saying that ’e’d overlook it this time, but ’e couldn’t promise for the future. Wot with Bob Pretty on one side and Squire Rockett on the other, them two keepers’ lives was ’ardly worth living. Then the squire got a headkeeper named Cutts, a man as was said to know more about the ways of poachers than they did themselves. He was said to ’ave cleared out all the poachers for miles round the place ’e came from, and pheasants could walk into people’s cottages and not be touched. He was a sharp-looking man, tall and thin, with screwed-up eyes and a little red beard. The second day ’e came ’e was up here at this ere Cauliflower, having a pint o’ beer and looking round at the chaps as he talked to the landlord. The odd thing was that men who’d never taken a hare or a pheasant in their lives could ’ardly meet ’is eye, while Bob Pretty stared at ’im as if ’e was a waxworks. “I ’ear you ’ad a little poaching in these parts afore I came,” ses Mr. Cutts to the landlord. “T think I ’ave ’eard something o’ the kind,” ses the landlord, staring over his ’ead with a faraway look in ’is eyes. “You won't hear of much more,” ses the keeper. “I’ve invented a

new way of catching the dirty rascals; afore I came ’ere I caught all the poachers on three estates. I clear ’em out just like a ferret clears out rats.” “Sort o’ mantrap?” ses the landlord. “Ah, that’s telling,” ses Mr. Cutts.

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“Well, I ope you'll catch ’em here,” ses Bob Pretty; “there’s far too many of ’em about for my liking. Far too many.” “T shall ’ave ’em afore long,” ses Mr. Cutts, nodding his ’ead.

“Your good ’ealth,” ses Bob Pretty, holding up ’is mug. “We’ve been wanting a man like you for a long time.” “I don’t want any of your impidence, my man,”

?

ses the keeper.

“Tve ’eard about you, and nothing good either. You be careful.” “T am careful,” ses Bob, winking at the others. “I ’ope you'll catch all them low poaching chaps; they give the place a bad

name, and I’m a’most afraid to go out arter dark for fear o’ meeting ’em:”’

Peter Gubbins and Sam Jones began to laugh, but Bob Pretty got angry with ’em, and said he didn’t see there was anything to laugh at. He said that poaching was a disgrace to their native place, and instead o’ laughing they ought to be thankful to Mr. Cutts for coming to do away with it all. “Any help I can give you shall be given cheerful,” ses he to the keeper. “When I want your help I'll ask for it,” ses Mr. Cutts. “Thankee,” ses Bob Pretty. “I on’y ’ope I sha’n’t get my face knocked about like yours ’as been, that’s all; cos my wife’s so partickler.” “Wot d’ye mean?” ses Mr. Cutts, turning on him. “My face ain’t been knocked about.” “Oh, I beg your pardin,” ses Bob; “I didn’t know it was natural.” Mr. Cutts went black in the face a’most and stared at Bob Pretty as if ’e was going to eat ’im, and Bob stared back, looking fust at the keeper’s nose and then at ’is eyes and mouth, and then at ’is nose

agin. Youll know me agin, I s’pose,” ses Mr. Cutts, at last.

“Yes,” ses Bob, smiling; “I should know you a mile off—on the darkest night.” “We shall see,” ses Mr. Cutts, taking up ’is beer and turning ’is back on him. ‘““Those of us as live the longest’ll see the most.” “I’m glad I’ve lived long enough to see im,” ses Bob to Bill Chambers. “I feel more satisfied with myself now.” Bill Chambers coughed, and Mr. Cutts, arter finishing ’is beer, took another look at Bob Pretty, and went off boiling a’most. The trouble he took to catch Bob Pretty arter that you wouldn’t believe, and all the time the game seemed to be simply melting away

and Squire Rockett was finding fault with ’im all day long. He was

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worn to a shadder a’most with watching , and Bob Pretty seemed to be more prosperous than ever. Sometimes Mr. Cutts. watched in the plant ations, and sometimes ’e hid ’imself near Bob’s house, and at last one night, when ’e was crouching behind the fence of Frederick Scott’s front garden ’e saw Bob Pretty come out of ’is house and, arter a careful look around, walk up the road. He held ’is breath as Bob passed ’im, and was just getting up to foller ’im when Bob stopped and walked slowly back

agin, sniffing.

“Wot a delicious smell 0’ roses!” he ses out loud. He stood in the middle 0’ the road nearl y Opposite where the keeper was hiding, and sniffed so that you could ha’ heard him the other end o’ the village. “It can’t be roses,” he ses, in a puzzled voice, “becos there ain’t no roses hereabouts, and besides, it’s too late for "em. It must be Mr. Cutts, the clever new keeper.” He put ’is head over the fence and bid ’im good evening, and said wot a fine night for a stroll it was, and asked ’im whether ’e was waiting for Frederick Scott’s aunt. Mr. Cutts didn’t answer ’im a word; ’e was pretty near bursting with passion. He got up and shook ’is fist in Bob Pretty’s face, and then ’e went off stamp ing down the road

as if ’e was going mad.

And for a long time Bob Pretty seemed to ’ave all the luck on is side. Keeper Lewis got rheumatic fever, which ’e put down to sit-

ting about night arter night in damp places watching for Bob, and,

while ’e was in the thick of it, with the doctor going every day, Mr. Cutts fell in getting over a fence and broke ’is leg. Then all the work fell on Keeper Smith, and to ’ear ’im talk you'd think that rheumatic fever and broken legs was better than anything else in the world. He asked the squire for ’elp, but the squire wouldn’t give it to ’im, and he kept telling ‘im wot a feather in ’is cap it would be if ’e did wot the other two couldn’t do, and caught Bob Pretty . It was all very well, but as Smith said, wot ’e wanted was feathe rs in ’is piller, instead of ’aving to snatch a bit 0’ sleep in ’is chair or sitting down with his ’ead agin a tree. When I tell you that ’e fell asleep in this public ’ouse one night while the landlord was drawing a pint o’ beer he ’ad ordered, you'll know wot’e suffered. O’ course, all this suited Bob Pretty as well as could be, and he was that good tempered ’e’d got a nice word for everyb ody, and when Bill Chambers told ’im ’e was foolhardy ’e only laughe d and

said ’e knew wot ’e was about.

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But the very next night ’e had reason to remember Bill Chambers’ words. He was walking along Farmer Hall’s field—the one next to the squire’s plantation—and, so far from being nervous, ’e was actually a-whistling. He’d got a sack over is shoulder, loaded as full as it could be, and ’e ’ad just stopped to light is pipe when three men burst out o’ the plantation and ran towards ’im as ’ard as they could run. Bob Pretty just gave one look and then ’e dropped ’is pipe and set off like a hare. It was no good dropping the sack, because Smith, the keeper, ’ad recognized him and called ’im by name, so ’e just put is teeth together and did the best he could, and there’s no doubt that if it’adn’t ha’ been for the sack ’e could ’ave got clear away. As it was, ’e ran for pretty near a mile, and they could ’ear ’im breathing like a pair o’ bellows; but at last ’e saw that the game was up. He just managed to struggle as far as Farmer

Pinnock’s

pond,

and then, waving the sack round his ’ead, ’e flung it into the middle of it, and fell down gasping for breath. “Got—you—this time—Bob Pretty,” ses one 0’ the men, as they

came up. “Wot—Mr. Cutts?” ses Bob with a start. “That’s me, my man,” says the keeper. “Why—I thought—you was— Is that Mr. Lewis? It can’t be.” “That’s me,” ses Keeper Lewis. “We both got well sudden-like, Bob Pretty, when we ’eard you was out. You ain’t so sharp as you thought you was.”

Bob Pretty sat still, getting ’is breath back and doing a bit o’ thinking at the same time. “You gave me a start,” he ses, at last, “I thought you was both in bed, and, knowing ’ow hard-worked Mr. Smith ’as been, I just came

round to ’elp ‘im keep watch like. I promised to ’elp you, Mr. Cutts, if you remember.” “Wot was that you threw in the pond just now?” ses Mr. Cutts. “A sack,” ses Bob Pretty; “a sack I found in Farmer Hall’s field. It felt to me as though it might ’ave birds in it, so I picked it up, and I was just on my way to your ’ouse with it, Mr. Cutts, when you started arter me.” “Ah!” ses the keeper. “And wot did you run for?” Bob Pretty tried to laugh. “Becos I thought it was the poachers arter me,” he ses. “It seems ridiklous, don’t it?” “Yes, it does,” ses Lewis. “T thought you’d know me a mile off,” ses Mr. Cutts. “I should ha’ thought the smell 0’ roses would ha’ told you I was near.”

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Bob Pretty scratched ’is ’ead and looked at ’im out of the corner

of ’is eye, but he ’adn’t got any answer. Then ’e sat biting his finger-

nails and thinking, while the keepers stood argyfying as to who should take ’is clothes off and go into the pond arter the pheasants. It was a very cold night and the pond was pretty deep in places, and none of ’em seemed anxious. “Make ’im go in for it,” ses Lewis, looking at Bob; “’e chucked it a “On’y becos I thought you was poachers,” ses Bob. “I’m Sorry to have caused so much trouble.” “Well, you go in and get it out,” ses Lewis, who pretty well guessed who’d have to do it if Bob didn’t. “Iv’ll look better for you, too.” “Tve got my defense all right,” ses Bob Pretty. “I ain’t set a foot on the squire’s preserves, and I found this sack a ’undered yards away from it.”

“Don’t waste more time,” ses Mr. Cutts to Lewis. “Off with your

clothes and in with you. Anybody’d think you was afraid of a little cold water.” “Whereabouts did ’e pitch it in?” ses Lewis. Bob Pretty pointed with ’is finger exactly where ’e thought it

was, but they wouldn’t listen to ’im, and then Lewis, arter twice say-

ing wot a bad cold he’d got, took ’is coat off very slow and careful.

“T wouldn’t mind going in to oblige you,” ses Bob Pretty, “but the

pond is so full of them cold, slimy efts; I don’t fancy them crawling

up agin me, and, besides that, there’s such a lot o’ deep holes in it. And wotever you do don’t put you ’ead under; you know ’ow foul the water is.” Keeper Lewis pretended not to listen to ’im. He took off ’is clothes very slowly and then ’e put one

foot in and stood shivering, al-

though Smith, who felt the water with his ’and, said it was quite warm. Then Lewis put the other foot in and began to walk about careful, arfway up to ’is knees. “T can’t find it,” he ses, with ’is teeth chattering. “You ’aven’t looked,” ses Mr. Cutts; “walk about more; you can’t expect to find it all at once. Try the middle.” Lewis tried the middle, and ’e stood there up to ‘is neck, feeling about with his foot and saying things out loud about Bob Pretty, and other things under ’is breath about Mr. Cutts. “Well, ’'m off ’ome,” ses Bob Pretty, getting up. “I’m too tender earted to stop and see a man drownded.” “You stay ’ere,” ses Mr. Cutts, catching ’old of him.

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“Wot for?” ses Bob. “You've got no right to keep me ’ere.” “Catch old of ’im, Joe,” ses Mr. Cutts, quicklike. Smith caught ’old of his other arm, and Lewis left off trying to find the sack to watch the struggle. Bob Pretty fought ’ard, and once or twice ’e nearly tumbled Mr. Cutts into the pond, but at last

he gave in and lay down panting and talking about ’is loryer. Smith ‘eld him down on the ground while Mr. Cutts kept pointing out places with ’is finger for Lewis to walk to. The last place ’e pointed to wanted a much taller man, but it wasn’t found out till too late, and the fuss Keeper Lewis made when ’e could speak agin was terrible.

“You'd better come out,” ses Mr. Cutts; “you ain’t doing no good. We know where they are and we'll watch the pond till daylight— that is, unless Smith’d like to ’ave a try.”

“Tt’s pretty near daylight now, I think,” ses Smith. Lewis came out and ran up and down to dry ’imself, and finished

off on his pocket ’andkerchief, and then with ’is teeth chattering ’e began to dress ’imself. He got ’is shirt on, and then stood turning over ‘is clothes as if ’e was looking for something. “Never mind about your stud now,” ses Mr. Cutts; “hurry up and dress.” “Stud?” ses Lewis, very snappish. “I’m looking for my trowsis.” “Your trowsis?” ses Smith, ’elping ’im look. “I put all my clothes together,” ses Lewis, a’most shouting. “Where are they? I’m ’arf perished with cold. Where are they?” “He ’ad ’em on this evening,” ses Bob Pretty,” ’cos I remember noticing em.” “They must be somewhere about,” ses Mr. Cutts; “why don’t you use your eyes?”

He walked up and down peering about, and as for Lewis he was ’opping round ’arf crazy. “I wonder,” ses Bob Pretty, in a thoughtful voice, to Smith—“I wonder whether you or Mr. Cutts kicked ’em in the pond while you was struggling with me. Come to think of it, I seem to remember earing a splash.” ““He’s done it, Mr. Cutts,” ses Smith; “never mind, it'll go all the ’arder with ’im.” “But I do mind,” ses Lewis, shouting. “T’ll be even with you for this, Bob Pretty. P’'ll make you feel it. You wait till ’'ve done with you. You'll get a month extra for this, you see if you don’t.” “Don’t you mind about me,” ses Bob; “you run off ome and cover up them legs of yours. I found that sack, so my conscience is clear.”

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Lewis put on ’is coat and waistcoat and set off, and Mr. Cutts and Smith, arter feeling about for a dry place, set theirse lves down and began to smoke.

“Look ’ere,” ses Bob Pretty, “I’m not going to sit ’ere all night to

please you; ’'m going off ’ome. If you want me you'll know where to find me.”

“You stay where you are,” ses Mr. Cutts. “We ain’t going to let

you out of our sight.” “Very well, then, you take me ’ome,” ses Bob. “I’m not going to catch my death o’ cold sitting ’ere. I’m not used to being out of a night like you are. I was brought up respectable.” “I daresay,” ses Mr. Cutts. “Take you ’ome, and then ’ave one 0’ your mates come and get the sack while we’re away.” Then Bob Pretty lost ’is temper, and the things ’e said about Mr. Cutts wasn’t fit for Smith to hear. He threw ’imself down at last full length on the ground and sulked till the day broke. Keeper Lewis was there a’most as soon as it was light, with some long hayrakes he borrowed, and I should think that pretty near ’arf the folks in Claybury ’ad turned up to see the fun. Mrs. Pretty was crying and wringing ’er ’ands; but most folk seemed to be rather pleased that Bob ’ad been caught at last.

In next to no time ’arf a dozen rakes was at work and the things they brought out 0’ that pond you wouldn’t believe. The edge of it

was all littered with rusty tin pails and saucepans and such-like, and by and by Lewis found the things he’d ’ad to go ’ome without a few hours afore, but they didn’t seem to find that sack, and Bob Pretty, wot was talking to ’is wife, began to look hopeful. But just then the squire came riding up with two friends as was staying with ’im, and he offered a reward of five shillings to the man wot found it. Three or four of ’em waded in up to their middle then and raked their ’ardest, and at last Henery Walker give a cheer and brought it to the side, all heavy with water. “That’s the sack I found, sir,” ses Bob, starting up. “It wasn’t on your land at all, but on the field next to it. I’m an honest, ’ardworking man, and I’ve never been in trouble afore. Ask anybody ere and they’ll tell you the same.” Squire Rockett took no notice of ’im. “Is that the sack?” he asks, turning to Mr. Cutts. ““That’s the one, sir,” ses Mr. Cutts. “I’d swear to it anywhere.” “You’d swear a man’s life away,” ses Bob. “’Ow can you swear to it when it was dark?” Mr. Cutts didn’t answer ’im. He went down on ’is knees and cut

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the string that tied up the mouth o’ the sack, and then ’e started back as if ’e’d been shot, and ’is eyes a’most started out of ’is ’ead. ““What’s the matter?” ses the squire. Mr. Cutts couldn’t speak; he could only stutter and point at the sack with ’is finger, and Henery Walker, as was getting curious, lifted up the other end of it and out rolled about a score of as fine cabbages as you could wish to see. I never see people so astonished afore in all my born days, and as for Bob Pretty ’e stood staring at them cabbages as if ’e couldn’t believe his eyesight. “And that’s wot I’ve been kept ’ere all night for,” he ses at last, shaking his ’ead. “That’s wot comes o’ trying to do a kindness to keepers, and ’elping of ’em in their difficult work. P’r’aps that ain’t the sack arter all, Mr. Cutts. I could ha’ sworn they was pheasants in the one I found, but I may be mistook, never ’aving ’ad one in my ‘ands afore. Or p’r’aps somebody was trying to ’ave a game with you, Mr. Cutts, and deceived me instead.” The keepers on’y stared at him. “You ought to be more careful,” ses Bob. Very likely while you was taking all that trouble over me, and Keeper Lewis was catching is death o’ cold, the poachers was up at the plantation taking all they wanted. And, besides, it ain’t right for Squire Rockett to ’ave to pay Henery Walker five shillings for finding a lot of old cabbages. I shouldn’t like it myself.” He looked out of the corner of ’is eye at the squire, as was pretending not to notice Henery Walker touching ’is cap to him, and then ’e turns to ’is wife and he ses: “Come along, old gal,” ’e ses. “I want my breakfast bad, and arter that I shall ’ave to lose a honest day’s work in bed.”

Overhauling a Bicycle ~= JEROME K. JEROME I HAVE HAD EXPERIENCE in this “overhauling.” There was a man at Folkestone; I used to meet him on the Lees. He proposed one evening we should go for a long bicycle ride together on the following day, and I agreed. I got up early, for me; I made an effort, and was pleased with myself. He came half an hour late; I was waiting for him in the garden. It was a lovely day. He said: ““That’s a good-looking machine of yours. How does it run?” “Oh, like most of them!” I answered. “Easily enough in the morn-

ing; goes a little stiffly after lunch.” He caught hold of it by the front wheel and the fork, and shook it violently. I said, “Don’t do that; you'll hurt it.”

I did not see why he should shake it; it had not done anything to him. Besides, if it wanted shaking, I was the proper person to shake it. I felt much as I should had he started whacking my dog. He said, ‘““This front wheel wobbles.” I said, “It doesn’t if you don’t wobble it.” It didn’t wobble, as a matter of fact—nothing worth calling a wobble. He said, “This is dangerous; have you got a screwdriver?” I ought to have been firm, but I thought that perhaps he really did know something about the business. I went to the toolshed to see what I could find. When I came back he was sitting on the

ground with the front wheel between his legs. He was playing with it, twiddling it round between his fingers; the remnant of the machine was lying on the gravel path beside him. He said, “Something has happened to this front wheel of yours.”

‘Tt looks like it, doesn’t it?” I answered. But he was the sort of man that never understands satire. He said, “It looks to me as if the bearings were all wrong.” I said, “Don’t you trouble about it any more; you will make yourself tired. Let us put it back and get off.” He said, “We may as well see what is the matter with it, NOW it is out.” He talked as though it had dropped out by accident.

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Jerome K. Jerome

Before I could stop him he had unscrewed something somewhere, and out rolled all over the path some dozen or so little balls. “Catch ’em!” he shouted. “Catch ’em! We mustn’t lose any of them.” He was quite excited about them. . We groveled round for half an hour, and found sixteen. He said he hoped we had got them all, because, if not, it would make a serious difference to the machine. He said there was nothing you should be more careful about in taking a bicycle to pieces than seeing you did not lose any of the balls. He explained that you ought to count them as you took them out and see that exactly the same number went back in each place. I promised if I ever took a bicycle to pieces I would remember his advice. I put the balls for safety in my hat, and I put my hat upon the doorstep. It was not a sensible thing to do, I admit. As a matter of fact, it was a silly thing to do. I am not as a rule addle-headed; his influence must have affected me. He then said that while he was about it he would see to the chain for me, and at once began taking off the gear case. I did try to persuade him from that. I told him what an experienced friend of mine once said to me solemnly, “If anything goes wrong with your gear case, sell the machine and buy a new one; it comes cheaper.”

He said, “People talk like that who understand nothing about machines. Nothing is easier than taking off a gear case.” I had to confess he was right. In less than five minutes he had the gear case in two pieces, lying on the path, and was groveling for screws. He said it was always a mystery to him the way screws disappeared. We were still looking for the screws when Ethelbertha came out. She seemed surprised to find us there; she said she thought we had started hours ago. He said, “We shan’t be long now. I’m just helping your husband to overhaul this machine of his. It’s a good machine, but they all want going over occasionally.” Ethelbertha said, “If you want to wash yourselves when you have done you might go into the back kitchen, if you don’t mind; the girls have just finished the bedrooms.” She told me that if she met Kate they would probably go for a

sail; but that in any case she would be back to lunch. I would have given a sovereign to be going with her. I was getting heartily sick of standing about watching this fool breaking up my bicycle. Common sense continued to whisper to me, “Stop him, before he does any more mischief. You have a right to protect your own prop-

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erty from the ravages of a lunatic. Take him by the scruff of the neck and kick him out of the cate!” But I am weak when it comes to hurting other people’s feelings, and I let him muddle on. He gave up looking for the rest of the screws. He said screws had a knack of turning up when you least expected them; and that now he would see to the chain. He tightened it till it would not move; next he loosened it until it was twice as loose as it was before. Then he said we had better think about getting the front wheel back into its place again. I held the forks open, and he worried with the wheel. At the end of ten minutes I suggested he should hold the forks, and that I should handle the wheel; and we changed places. At the end of his first minute, he dropped the machine and took a short walk round the croquet lawn, with his hands pressed together between his thighs. He explained as he walked that the thing to be careful about was to avoid getting your fingers pinched between the forks and the spokes of the wheel. I replied I was convinced, from my own experience, that there was much truth in what he said. He wrapped himself up in a couple of dusters, and we commenced again. At length we did get the thing into position; and the moment it was in position he burst out laughing. I said, “What’s the joke?” He said, “Well, I am an ass!” It was the first thing he had said that made me respect him. I asked him what had led him to the discovery. He said, “We’ve forgotten the balls!” I looked for my hat; it was lying topsy-turvy in the middle of the path, and Ethelbertha’s favorite hound was swallowing the balls as fast as he could pick them up. “He will kill himself,” said Ebbson—I have never met him since that day, thank the Lord; but I think his name was Ebbson—“they are solid steel.” I said, “I am not troubling about the dog. He has had a bootlace and a packet of needles already this week. Nature’s the best guide, puppies seem to require this kind of stimulant. What I am thinking about is my bicycle.” He was of a cheerful disposition. He said, ‘Well, we must put back all we can find, and trust to Providence.” We found eleven. We fixed six on one side and five on the other, and half an hour later the wheel was in its place again. It need hardly be added that it really did wobble now; a child might have noticed it.

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Ebbson said it would do for the present. He appeared to be getting a bit tired himself. If I had let him, he would, I believe, at this point have gone home. I was determined now, however, that he should stop and finish; I had abandoned all thoughts of a ride. My pride in the machine he had killed. My only interest lay now in seeing him scratch and bump and pinch himself. I revived his drooping spirits with a glass of beer and some judicious praise. I said:

“Watching you do this is of real use to me. It is not only your skill and dexterity that fascinates me, it is your cheery confidence in yourself, your inexplicable hopefulness, that does me good.” Thus encouraged, he set to work to refix the gear case. He stood the bicycle against the house, and worked from the off side. Then he stood it against a tree and worked from the near side. Then I held it for him, while he lay on the ground with his head between the wheels, and worked at it from below, and dropped oil upon himself. Then he took it away from me, and doubled himself across it like a packsaddle, till he lost his balance and slid over onto his head. Three times he said, “Thank heaven, that’s right at last!” And twice he said, “No, I’m damned if it is after all!” What he said the third time I try to forget. Then he lost his temper and tried bullying the thing. The bicycle, I was glad to see, showed spirit; and the subsequent proceedings degenerated into little else than a rough-and-tumble fight between him and the machine. One moment the bicycle would be on the gravel path, and he on top of it; the next, the position would be reversed—

he on the gravel path, the bicycle on him. Now he would be stand-

ing flushed with victory, the bicycle firmly fixed between his legs. But his triumph would be short-lived. By a sudden, quick movement it would free itself, and, turning upon him, hit him sharply over the head with one of its handles. At a quarter to one, dirty and disheveled, cut and bleeding, he said, “I think that will do,” and rose and wiped his brow. The bicycle looked as if it also had had enough of it. Which had received more punishment it would have been difficult to say. I took him into the back kitchen, where, so far as was possible without soda and proper tools, he cleaned himself, and sent him home. The bicycle I put into a cab and took round to the nearest repairing shop. The foreman of the works came up and looked at it. “What do you want me to do with that?” said he. “I want you,” I said, “so far as is possible, to restore it.” “Tt’s a bit far gone,” said he, “but I'll do my best.” He did his best, which came to two pounds ten.

The Sport “= ALVA JOHNSTON Witson Mizner, of the Klondike and Times Square, died

in Hollywood on April 3, 1933, at the age of fifty-six. His fame has grown steadily since. Although he wrote practically nothing, he is probably quoted more than any other American of this century. His chance remarks have been organized into a literature by his disciples.

Like the character in Stendhal who became a noted wit on the strength of six or seven pleasantries inherited from an uncle, scores of men have won recognition as sparkling conversationalists because they have collected small private anthologies of Mizner sayings. Shortly before he died, a publisher asked him to write the story of his life. “It would be blowing a police whistle,” replied Mizner. This was a reasonable excuse. The crime chapters would have occupied a large part of his autobiography. He was fundamentally a confidence man whom circumstances occasionally induced to go

straight. But his real reason for refusing to write an autobiography was that he hated to write; he said, “Writing is too damned lonesome.” He regarded it as an occupation for starvelings. Jim Tully once badgered him into writing a short story, which appeared in the Liberty of May 3, 1930. Mizner received a check for $1,000. He was incensed. “It took me eight hours to write it!” he exclaimed. The short story is rather poor, although it contains a few typical Mizner lines. After a description of the long, tapering fingers of a cardsharp named Bert, Mizner added that Bert “could do more with

fifty-two soda crackers than any other ocean grafter could with a new deck.” The last paragraph of the story describes a tombstone erected over the grave of the hero, showing him kneeling, with

hands clasped in prayer; the last line is: “If you pried his hands open, four dice and a pearl necklace would fall out.” Mizner was a little shamefaced over his literary effort. “I wanted to see something of mine in print except my thumbs,” he said. As a wit, Mizner belonged to two distinct schools—the scientific and the O. Henry. His scientific method consisted of bringing a calm spirit of inquiry to bear on boiling emotion. When an excited man

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rushed up to him exclaiming, “Coolidge is dead,” Mizner asked, “How do they know?” The O. Henry school was the school of fantastic exaggeration. During Mizner’s formative years, smart conversation consisted mainly of tired hyperboles. A majority of the familiar quotations from Mizner are extravagant figures of speech. He described a thin man as “a trellis for varicose veins.” He told a conceited motion-picture producer, “A demitasse cup would fit over your head like a sunbonnet.” Regarding a long-nosed Hollywood magnate, he said, “He’s the only man who can take a shower and smoke a cigar at the same time,” and “Id like to take him by the feet and plow a furrow with him.” Telling of a Klondike pal who had frozen to death in the act of tying his shoelaces, he said, “We

had to bury him in a drum.” A strutting little fellow went through bankruptcy and then strutted more than ever. “Failure has gone to his head,” said Mizner. Describing his own flight from a madman armed with a revolver, he said, “I got up enough lather to shave Kansas City.” A man with a flourishing head of hair once joined his table at the Brown Derby restaurant in Hollywood, uttered several solemn platitudes, and left. “Now I know,” said Mizner, “that hair can grow on anything.” A famous stage beauty, who had risen by five marriages to wealth and a title, attempted to bandy insults with him. “You’re nothing but a parlayed chambermaid,” he said. “You’ve compromised so many gentlemen that you think you're a lady,” he added. Talking about Tom Sharkey, the great heavyweight prizefighter, who kept a saloon with the old-fashioned swinging doors, Mizner said, “He was so dumb that he crawled under them for two years before he found out that they swing both ways.”

He disapproved of San Francisco at the time when Hiram Johnson was sending grafters to jail in large numbers. “They learn to say ‘Guilty’ here before they can say ‘Papa’ and ‘Mamma,’ ” he said. He was asked by Lew Lipton, stage and screen writer, if a certain actress wasn’t a little “mannish.”’ “Mannish!”’ he said. “Not at all. I understand it took her all winter to color a meerschaum pipe.” Many of Mizner’s lines have passed into the language. Some, like “Life’s a tough proposition, and the first hundred years are the hardest,” are passing out again after long and hard service. His rules “No opium smoking in the elevators” and “Carry out your own dead,” which he put into effect as manager of the Hotel Rand in

New York in 1907, have become standard hotel practice. Among his philosophical maxims were:

“Be nice to people on your way up be-

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cause you'll meet ’em on your way down,” and “If you steal from one author, it’s plagiarism; if you steal from many, it’s research.” H.

L. Mencken, in his New Dictionary of Quotations, attributes to Mizner, “I respect faith, but doubt is what gets you an

education” and “A good listener is not only popular everywhere, but after a while he gets to know

something.”

Mizner’s

comment

on

Hollywood, “It’s a trip through a sewer in a glass-bottomed boat,” was converted by Mayor Jimmy Walker into “A reformer is a guy who rides

through a sewer in a glass-bottomed boat ” and has since become a shopworn jewel of stump orat ory. Two of Mizner’s thirtyyear-old lines have recently had revivals in the movies. A magistrate asked him if he was trying to show cont empt of court. “No, I’m trying to conceal it,” muttered Mizner. A frien d argued that a certain Broadway producer “must have a head” to be so successful. “They put better heads on umbrellas,” said Mizner. Among his miscellaneous lines are “You sparkle with larceny,” “He’d steal a hot stove and come back for the smoke,” “Youre a mouse studying to be a rat,” “Another pot of coffee, waiter, and bring it under your arm to keep it warm,” “I’ve had better steaks than this for bad behavior,” “You look like a half-portion of cottage cheese,” and “If you [a radio chatt erer] don’t get off the air, Pll stop breathing ite Mizner usually avoided slang, although he had a few special words

of his own, such as croaker for physician, heart troub le for cowardice, and trap for a bank. He disliked puns, altho ugh a play on words

was worth about $10,000 to him on one occasi on.

It made

a jury

laugh and saved him from a verdict for damages. After the Florida

real-estate crash a man had sued him to recov er the purchase price of a barren plot, asserting that Mizner had falsel y informed him that he could grow nuts on it. “Did you tell the plaint iff that he could grow nuts on the land?” Mizner was asked. “Oh, no,” he replied. “T told him he could go nuts on it.” He perpetrate d a sort of physical pun once when playing poker with a man whose credit was not very

good. The man threw his wallet on the table and said, “I raise five

hundred dollars.” Mizner pulled off a shoe and threw it on the table. “Tf we’re betting leather, I call,” he said. The earliest recorded example of Mizner wit belong s to the sci-

entific school. He was in Nome, Alaska, in 1900. One of his pals there

was Tex Rickard. Tex had a girl named Goldie , who was famous throughout the northern-lights district. One night Tex ran out of a hotel shooting at a stranger, who escaped in the dark. Men ran up asking what the stranger had done. “He insulted Goldie !” shouted

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Tex. Others were wild with excitement; Mizner was cold, scientific, scholarly. All he wanted to know was how the thing could be done, how the ingenious and resourceful stranger had accomplished his unparalleled feat. As the others chattered, Tex shrieked again, “He insulted Goldie!” “For God’s sake, how?” inquired Mizner. Mizner had a vast firsthand criminal erudition, which he commercialized as a dramatist on Broadway and a screen writer in Hollywood. At various times during his life he had been a miner, confidence man, ballad singer, medical lecturer, man of letters, general utility man in a segregated district, cardsharp, hotel man, songwriter, dealer in imitation masterpieces of art, prize fighter, prize fight manager, Florida promoter, and roulette-wheel fixer. He was an idol of low society and a pet of high. He knew women, as his brother Addison said, from the best homes and houses. His formal underworld education began in his youth on the Barbary Coast in San Francisco, where he took up opium-smoking as an occasional pastime. After four years in mining camps in Alaska, he continued his schooling in the New York Tenderloin, and got a final polishing in London, Paris and the steamship lanes. He acquired

the gold-rush psychology in Alaska; his idea of the good life was one bonanza after another. His greatest strike was a $7,500,000 widow whom he married in 1906, but he abandoned this rich claim because he lacked the patience to exploit it. After gaining and dissipating several minor fortunes, he won paper wealth during the Florida boom. little later the a Hollywood side. “Turned

He rejected an offer of $1,250,000 for his holdings; a Florida crash left him penniless. After that he became hack, with an interest in the Brown Derby on the traitor to vagrancy at fifty,” he said.

Mizner was born in 1876 in Benicia, a town on San Francisco Bay, once the capital of California. He was only the second most distin-

guished citizen of Benicia, the first being John C. Heenan, the “Benicia Boy,” heavyweight champion of America. Heenan’s fight with Tob Sayers, at Farnborough, England, in 1860, is described by

the Encyclopaedia Britannica as “still the most celebrated prizefight of modern times.” Wilson Mizner was born in a house which had been shipped in knockdown condition around Cape Horn in the early gold-rush years. He was practically born to the purple. The Mizners were the great family of Benicia. There is nothing so toplofty as a village noble. Wilson was steeped in feelings of grandeur from childhood and always looked down on others from a towering height. He curried

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489 favor with nobody except those whom he was planni ng to fleece. Because he respected nothing and nobody, he was able to give his wit unlimited play. With all his raffishness, he had a superi ority and independence of spirit, like that other disreputable aristocrat Sir John Falstaff, who sharpened his wit on princes. A nonco mmercial

comic, Mizner never pandered to public taste. Will Rogers , a good man who liked everybody and humored the entire popula tion, wrote

hundreds of thousands of words and is remembered for little except

“All I know is what I read in the papers.” Mizner, a bad man who despised nearly everybody and wrote almost nothing, put hundreds of lines into circulation. Mizner had other advantages in additi on to contempt for the public. Humorous writers comment chiefl y on topics and events which go out of date almost immediately; Mizne r commented on human behavior, which does not become outmo ded.

Mizner specialized in exposing himself, so he had an ever-ready and

vulnerable butt for his wit. He had one further advantage; using the

oral medium, he could freely coin phrases for which rival wits, using the printed medium, would have gone to jail. A. large-headed, spindle-shanked boy during his Benicia days,

Wilson was described by his brother as wearing a No. 7 collar and a

No. 8 hat. Even at this period he had a genius for getting into trouble with schoolteachers and the village authorities, but he always emerged triumphant because of the glorified status of his family. At

the age of twelve his privileged place in the world was recognized by

international law. His father, having supported Benjamin Harrison in 1888, was appointed Minister to Guatemala. The law of nations forbade the arrest of any member of the family for anything except murder. For the rest of his life Mizner had a sort of subconscious belief that treaties had been entered into by the nations of the world authorizing him to commit anything except capital crimes. His only

conviction—for running a gambling house in Mineola in 19 19—came

as a terrific shock because of his lifelong assumption that he was a man to whom the statutes didn’t apply. Although sentence was suspended, he took the conviction to heart. He was so grateful to Al Smith for pardoning him and restoring his rights of citizenship that he named the Brown Derby in his honor. The family returned to California after two years in Guatemala. Mizner’s enjoyment of diplomatic immunity had given him too strong an I-do-as-I please spirit for school discipline. After being expelled from softer institutions, he was sent to Santa Clara College, famous for changing young hellhounds into saints. Mizner caused a panic at Santa Clara by tying a steak to the rope of a fire gong

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after curfew, the alarm being sounded when the meat attracted the attention of the large dogs which roamed the campus at night to encourage students to stay in their dormitories. He was expelled for

heating a cannon ball for several hours and then bowling it from a fire shovel along a corridor. He correctly forecast that the severest disciplinarian on the faculty would rush out and pick it up. The primary authority on the Klondike chapter of the life of Mizner is Sid Grauman, proprietor of the famous Egyptian and Chinese Theatres in Hollywood. Going to the Klondike as a boy, Grauman sold newspapers from the states for a living—a dollar-fifty apiece in Dawson City and two dollars on the creeks, where deliveries were made by dog sled. The price was always paid in gold dust poured from a tomato can into scales, and as the miners made it a point of

pride to give good measure, the newsboy made a little extra on each sale. He once took in $3,200 in three days.

Grauman lived at McQueston’s Hotel, described as an edifice of cardboard and spit. The rate was two dollars a night for a stretch of canvas; stretches were hung three deep on the walls. The newsboy’s

attitude toward Mizner was one of hero worship, inspired partly by the fact that Mizner had the only private bedroom in McQueston’s, that he had an individual pitcher and basin, and that he owned a

private

gold-monogrammed

comb

and

brush.

After

becoming

friends with his hero, Grauman won the privilege of using Mizner’s comb and brush, the only ones in the Klondike that he would trust. Miners out of luck were employed as bed-makers. They were a fastidious set. They were ready to face the animal kingdom in the form of bears or wolves, but man after man resigned rather than cope with animated nature at McQueston’s. Mizner solved the servant problem by inventing a method of making a bed with a walking stick, which enabled the bedmaker to remain at a distance. Mizner, who seldom spoke well of himself, used to be effusive in his own praise when he described this invention. Sometimes weeks passed before Grauman received a shipment of newspapers. The Spanish-American War was on and the Klondikers were crazy for news. Once, when a dog-sled shipment arrived,

Mizner offered Grauman $25 for the first paper, provided no others were sold for 45 minutes. Grauman accepted, but regretted the bargain. Mizner filled an empty store with miners at 50 cents a head and read the news aloud to them. The though he believed himself ruined. ment, however. Mizner’s reading appetite for news and Grauman

newsboy stuck to his bargain, alIt turned out to be a good investmerely whetted the community’s was soon sold out. Then Mizner

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gave him $75, half the proceeds of his show. According to Grau-

man, Wilson’s purpose in giving the reading was to be the center of attention, to have hundreds of men hanging on his every word.

Mizner acted the part of big brother to the young newsboy.

Once, when his papers were weeks overdue, Grauman was broke and hungry. Mizner invited him to a dinner of bear steaks at sevenfifty each. When they had finished, Grauman ducke d out quickly at the suggestion of his host, who, it turned out, was also broke. Mizner casually asked the proprietor to charge it. He escaped with bruises and lacerations. The arctic achievement which Mizner was fondest of recalling in later years was his $10,000 coup with a tomato can. He had gone to sleep after having had too much to drink. On awakening, he found that his revolver had been stolen. This was an ill-tim ed misfortune; a glance at his watch showed that he was already overdu e at an en-

gagement to play the part of a damaged husband in a badger game.

Cursing his irresponsibility, he picked up a tomato can, stripp ed off

the label, and hurried to the appointment. Crashing the door in with

an experienced shoulder, he raged at the culprits and threatened to

blow the entire triangle to heaven with the can, which, he gave the home-wrecking stranger to understand, was full of dynamite. The stranger, purchased his life with a belt loaded with gold dust. When the heroine asked for her share, Mizner handed her the tomato can. She asked what good that would do her. “It just got me ten thousand dollars,” said Mizner.

Mizner returned to San Francisco in 1900. Hearing, on his arrival

there, of a new gold strike on the beaches at Nome, he immediately took a boat for the new diggings. At Nome he operated a hotel, but devoted himself mainly to gambling. Addison Mizner arrived in Nome several months after his brother. He was gratified but a little puzzled at hearing Wilson casually referred to as “the bravest man in Nome.” He was told on all sides of Wilson’s reckless daring and his crazy disregard for his own safety. This reputation did not quite agree with Addison’s mental picture of his brother; he knew that Wilson would fight desperately when the reasons seemed good and sufficient, but he could not conceive of him as a man who went around thoughtlessly wasting heroism. Everybody told Addison how, as a member of a posse, Wilson, nonchalantly rolling a cigarette with one hand and holding a revolver in the other, had kicked in the door of a cabin to which three desperadoes, one of them wounded, had been traced. The other members of the posse had hung back, regarding it as foolhardy to

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walk in on trapped bandits. They all expected to see Mizner filled with bullets. But he walked into the cabin uninjured and came out beckoning to the others with a lighted cigarette. They found the place empty. Fresh bloodstains showed that a wounded man had been there. Addison found Wilson uncommunicative on this subject, but he gradually learned the truth. The three bandits—known as Mit, the Half-Kid, and Two-Tooth Mike—had been caught stealing

gold from a sluice box and chased to the cabin after a running fight. They had escaped unseen from the cabin, however, and made their

way to Mizner’s hotel, where they begged him to conceal them. He hid them in his own room behind a burlap partition. A few minutes later friends rushed in to tell him that a band of desperadoes had been cornered in the cabin; he then joined the posse and gave his

memorable exhibition of intrepidity. Three days later, after things had quieted down, he helped smuggle the robbers to safety. II

Mizner was a star witness on March 14, 1918, at a John Doe inquiry into gambling in the Court of General Sessions. According to the Sun, which treated the inquiry with some flippancy, it all

started when a German baker, who had lost $35,000 to Mizner at chemin de fer, started to pay off in doughnuts. The Sun asserted that tens of thousands of doughnuts were piled up in front of Mizner’s apartment on West Forty-third Street, near Sixth Avenue. Mizner denied on the witness stand in a Magistrates’ Court on August 28, 1918, that he lived entirely by gambling. He testified that he had a half interest in a tannery in Newark and did scenarios on the side. The charge against him was that of assaulting Herman Frank, an actor, in a Times Square restaurant. Frank had accused Mizner of stealing a Ziegfeld beauty from him. According to the testimony, Frank had sent Mizner a challenge to a duel in Van Cortlandt Park and written the challenge in blood. On crossexamination, Mizner said that he didn’t write scenarios but that he telephoned them. Referring to a screen drama of which Mizner was the author, the opposing lawyer said, “Do you mean to say that

you gave that to the motion-picture company by telephone?” “Yes,” said Mizner, “‘and they paid me by telephone.” Like most of the crim-

inal charges against Mizner, the assault charge evaporated somewhere in the judicial processes.

While Mizner was devoting much of his leisure to the denunciation of suckers and chumps, his routine evening in Hollywood consisted in coming to the Brown Derby, of which he was part owner,

THE

SPORT

493

with a thick roll of bills, and giving them away a few at a time to professional moochers. By midnight he would be reduced to getting

his paper from his newsboy on credit. He offered a feeble resistance to some of the demands on his purse. Once, when a borrower asked

for $50, he said, “Here’s twenty-five dollars. Let’s both make twenty-five dollars.” When a burglar came to him for a loan, he said, “Doesn’t it get dark any more?” For Mizner’s protection, special glass was put into the front doors

of the restaurant; a man inside could see out, but a man outside couldn’t see in. With the help of this device, Mizner occasionally escaped. Once he jumped up at the sight of a small-loan nemesis and hurried to the washroom. The knob of the washroom door was

loose. It turned round‘ and round in his hand, and prevented his get-

away. Mizner called to Robert Cobb, one of his Derby partners, “Hey, Bob! Take this knob and put it on the safe in your office.

Jimmy Valentine couldn’t crack it in three days.”

Brusque and blasphemous in his own coterie, Mizner would put on an unctuous, ingratiating, Dale Carnegie manner at the approach

of a stranger who appeared prosperous. His hope of finding new

suckers to trim never deserted him. He would even stop eating a sizzling beefsteak in order to fawn upon a possible chump. In his later years he had almost entirely lost the sensation of taste; heat gave him an illusion of flavor, and his chief pleasure of the table was a blistering-hot sirloin. His regular crowd always preserved silence until he had consumed it. One night he was half through a hot steak when a well-groomed stranger appeared and offered to bet that Mizner couldn’t remember him. Mizner sized up the stranger as a confidence man’s dream. He forgot all about the steak and began to pour on the fraudulent camaraderie in his best how-to-winfriends manner. Didn’t I meet you at Palm Beach? No. Monte Carlo? Wrong. Saratoga? Wrong again. Now I remember—Deauville? Still wrong. “Where was it?” Mizner finally demanded. “At the Hotel Ambassador last Wednesday,” the man said. “Don’t you remember? I showed you the samples of my new shirtings.” Mizner picked up his steak knife, struggled to his feet, and chased the stranger into the night. Most of Mizner’s motion-picture work was done on the Warner Brothers lot. He was a writer who never wrote. His method of collaboration was unique. At the studio he slept most of the time in a huge red plush chair, which so closely resembled an archiepiscopal throne that he was called The Archbishop. When Mizner’s literary partners needed some lines or ideas from him, they would shake him

494

Alva Johnston

gently and start him talking. After half an hour or so they would order him back to sleep while they sat and worked up the conversation into script There were large gaps in Mizner’s pose est and most callous man in the world.

down at their typewriters form. of being the hardest, coldHe used to visit narcotics

hospitals to cheer up old pals. He had a real talent for comforting a

friend in distress. One day he became greatly concerned over a change he saw in an old acquaintance, a screen writer who believed himself to be suffering from incipient insanity. The scenarist had

just tried to introduce a man he had known for 25 years to another whom he had known for ten years. He had forgotten the names of both of them and was sure that his mind was cracking up. “I’ve known you for thirty years,” said Mizner, “and that is the most hopeful sign I’ve seen in you. Now you're going to amount to something. Don’t you know that when you forget your wife’s name, your telephone number, and where you live, you’re getting somewhere? Where would you be if you knew all the Vice-Presidents by their first names? You'd be getting thirty dollars a week!” Mizner assumed that any friend of his would be in the wrong nine times out of ten. His advice to one of his young protégés was that if the man were ever in the right, he should waylay the other party in a crowded hotel lobby and carry on the discussion in ear-piercing screams. In conversation Mizner did his best to suppress the instincts of humanity. His later comic style was largely ridicule of all sentiment and feeling. Although at times he could be soft in his behavior, he aimed at being as satanic as possible in speech. He and his brother Addison both maintained a pose of being completely divorced from human emotion. Anything shocking or saddening was made to order for their wit. Death was the finest of all comedy subjects, because it provided the largest amount of emotion to be deflated. When Wilson and Addison were living together in Palm Beach, Addison came in one day with the news that another brother, Lansing, a San Francisco lawyer, had been killed in an automobile accident. “Why didn’t you tell me before I put on a red tie?” said Wilson. A young woman with whom Wilson had quarreled threw herself from the 11th floor of a Palm Beach hotel. The hotel clerk telephoned the news to Addison, who broke it to Wilson. Wilson picked up his hat and cane, “Where are you going?” asked Addison. “To Bradley’s” said Wilson. “I’m going to lay a bet on number eleven.

You can’t tell me that isn’t a hunch.” This, to some of Wilson’s admirers, was proof that his heart was broken.

THE

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495

He was working in Hollywood early in 1933 on a picture called Merry Wives of Reno when he received word that Addison was dy-

ing. He wired, “Stop dying. Am trying to write a comedy.” Singularly enough, the best-known and probably the greatest of

Mizner’s sayings is the only emotional line in his entire anthology, and it bears on the subject of death. In 1910 Mizner was the manager of Stanley

Ketchel,

the

great

middleweight

who

lasted

twelve

rounds with Jack Johnson. Ketchel was the embodiment of the fight-

ing spirit. News was telephoned to Mizner that Ketchel had been shot and killed. “Tell ’em to start counting ten over him, and he’ll get up,” said Mizner. Fatal illness was almost as happy a subject of merriment as death. One of Mizner’s closest friends was Grant Clark, the songwriter. Like most other songwriters, Clark lived chiefly on advances from publishers. Shortly before his death he tottered up to Mizner’s table in a restaurant. He wanted to borrow $20. “I'll tell you what I'll do,”

said Mizner. “I'll take you around to Campbell’s and get an advance on you.” Mizner got all possible comedy value out of his own last illness. In

March

1933, in his fifty-seventh year, he had a heart attack at the

Warner studio. When he recovered consciousness he was asked if he wanted a priest. “I want a priest, a rabbi, and a Protestant clergyman,” he said. “I want to hedge my bets.” His heart attack, President Roosevelt’s inauguration, the bank holiday, and a California earthquake came at almost the same time. Mizner criticized this piling up of climaxes. “Bad melodrama,” he said. Told that death was only a few hours away, Mizner rallied strength to send a postcard notifying a friend. “They’re going to

bury me at 9 a.M.,” wrote Mizner. “Don’t be a sucker and get up.”

When they arranged a tent over him for the administration of oxygen, he said, “It looks like the main event.” Coming out of a coma shortly before his death, he waved a priest away disdainfully. “Why should I talk to you?” he said. “I’ve just been talking to your boss.” The priest gently reproached Mizner for levity at such a time. He told the sick man that his death might come at any moment. “What?” said Mizner. “No two weeks’ notice?”

Two Doctors in One Act

“f= WILLIAM JOHNSTON” WHEN one is temporarily laid up, one begins to ponder the current state of this or that. If one is exposed to nighttime television during such a period, one’s reflections inevitably tend toward the absurd. Thus it was, during a prolonged siege of sore thumb, that

this particular one’s meditations produced the following farce. Admittedly, what takes place in the playlet may never have occurred in real life. But, considering what is happening on television these days,

it seems likely that there is more fact here than fiction.

The time is an indefinite period prior to the 1962 television season. The place is an unidentified medical institution located approximately midway between NBC and ABC.

ScENE I: Reception area of a big city hospital. The activity is routine. Two wild-eyed interns, carrying an empty stretcher between them, whip down a corridor, screaming “Emergency! Emergency!” Behind them limps the patient, pleading feebly, “Hey, the desk, the plump, motherly, wise-cracking head orderly by the throat and is explaining in a kindly and “Yes, 1 am fat and | am the head nurse, but that doesnt

fellows!” At nurse has an witty fashion, mean you can

call me ‘fathead. ” Suddenly two patients rush from their rooms. One, a chubby, pink-cheeked young man, clutches his groin and moans anguishedly, “My baby! My baby!” He then collapses. The other, a stogie-chewing politician-hoodlum, is chased into the corridor by a technician with an X-ray machine, and protests, “No pictures! No pictures!” Despite this surface calm, however, there is an undercurrent of tension in the air. Now two doctors enter the corridor. From stage left comes Dr. Kitpare. He is tall, handsome and blond. From the opposite direction comes Dr. Ben Casey, who is tall, handsome and dark. Although superficially they do look somewhat alike, their individual reactions to the plights of the patients make it instantly clear that they are as dissimilar in personality as two actors in competing television roles. Dr. Kivpare rushes to the politician-hoodlum and clasps him pro-

TWO

DOCTORS

IN ONE

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497

tectively to his bosom, meanwhile routing the technician with the sharp end of his ballpoint pen. Dr. Ben Casey, on the other hand,

stands contemptuously over the fallen young man and snarls, “Weakling! Yowd think you were the first man to ever have a baby!” And the young man crawls off ashamedly toward Obstetrics. Having dealt in their diverse ways with these two everyday crises, the doctors move on, approaching each other. Kivpare (smiling boyishly): Dr. Ben Casey, I presume. Casey (icily): Don’t try to suck up to me, Kildare. You’re not chasing the daisy chain at Vassar now—this is Medicine. All I’m interested in is performance, understand? One more insidious attempt like this to corrupt my professional standards, and [ll see to it that you never practice medicine again. Kivpare (pityingly): You need help, Doctor. You’re not happy. Going around with a grim visage like that all the time—you'd be in a pretty pickle if it froze that way. Casey (eyes narrowing): Keep your forceps out of my operation, Kildare. I know your record, you're a buttinsky. Kirpare (lyrically): Better to say that I care, Doctor. Better to say that no man is an island. Better to say that I am everyman. (He sweeps an arm in a wide, careless arc, inadvertently smacking the head nurse right square in the kisser. She scrambles after her dentures, and he proceeds with his monologue, undismayed.) These poor souls who come to us with their aches and ills, they’re more than just ninety-eight per cent water to me. They’re studies in social maladjustment. They’re my opportunity to light one little candle in the darkness. Casey (warningly): You go lighting any candles in my patients, Kildare, and I’ll see to it that you never practice medicine again. (Casey stalks off, and Kildare turns, shaking his head sadly, to the head nurse, who has retrieved her dentures.) Kirpare: What that boy needs is to get interested in a nice girl. Heap Nurse (clapping hands to ears in horror): Don’t say it! He and I have a suppressed reverse Oedipus relationship—whatever that is.

Scene II: Several minutes later, the Psychiatric Ward. Dr. K1Lpare, who has been warned repeatedly not to enter this section because of the danger of being taken for an inmate, creeps stealthily along the corridor, then slips into one of the private rooms. The room is occupied by a voluptuous, hot-eyed young woman of perhaps twenty. She is supine on the bed, fetchingly draped in a white, open-front hospital gown. Girt: Hi, sugar. You my new doctor? Kivpare (oblivious to her quite obvious

charm):

No, I'm not on this

William Johnston

498

service. I’m not on any specific service, in fact. I just poke around at random, doing good wherever I can. What’s your trouble? Girt: They say I need a rest. Kivpare (glancing at her chart): Hmmmm . . . Nymphomania, it says here. That must be Latin for nervous breakdown. (He looks up.) You asked if I were your new doctor. Where’s your old one? Girt: Well, he come in to see me regular, a couple-three times a day, for the first couple-three weeks. But now they got him on the rest kick, too. He’s down the hall in another room.

Kitpare (knowingly): Cracked up. Probably another Ben Casey, all brain and no heart. They all go eventually. (He sits down on the edge of the bed.) Never mind. We don’t need him. I’ve handled nervous breakdowns before. What seems to be at the root of your tensions? Girt: They say I’m too accommodating. I mean, I just can’t say no. Kiipare: Uh-huh. Spread yourself too thin, try to please everybody. That’s an evasion, you know. What you really want is to make one person happy. You ought to get interested in a nice boy. (He smiles proudly.) Bet you never thought of that. I picked it up from Reader’s Digest.

Girt (brightening): You figure you can smuggle a guy in? Kixpare (rising): No, but I can smuggle you out. I have just the fellow for you.

ScENE III: Another private room in another part of the hospital. Slumped in a camp chair beside the bed is a portly, balding man in his late fifties. He is wearing dark glasses and an off-white gown, across the chest of which is stenciled: HarttEy K. CkumM—PRopwcer. Dr. Ben Casey enters, sneers at Crum, then begins reading his chart. Casey (studiously): Pulse normal, temperature normal. (He looks up from the chart and glares at Crum.) Fold up your camp chair and hit the road, Crum. You're faking it, you don’t have a tumor.

Crum (belligerently): Whattaya mean? The X-rays showed it. Casey: Youre a movie producer, right? You produced The Blob That Walks the Earth and The Blob from Outer Space. Pretty well versed in special effects, aren’t you? Crum (nervously): Whattaya mean? Casey: Just this. You had those X-ray negatives touched up. Crum: Yeah? Put your proof where your mouth is. Casey (witheringly): Fess up, Crum. By pitting my noble character against your spinelessness, sooner or later I'll break you down. Crum

(breaking down):

You're right, Casey, I faked that tumor. But I

didn’t mean no harm. I just wanted to get out of the house for a few days. Casey (steely-eyed): medicine again.

Crum, I’m going to see to it that you never practice

TWO

DOCTORS

IN ONE

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499

Crum (on knees, begging): Please . . . have mercy, hear me out. There’s extenuating circumstances. Ya see, I got twelve kids at home. Twelve big, strapping boys. And they ain’t got no mother.

Casry (softening slightly): How’s that? Crum: Well, in the movie business, you meet a lot of girls, ya know? And one thing leads to another. Only they always stick me with the consequences. Casry: You mean, the offspring of these iniquitous relationships? Crum: Yeah, what you said. So I got these twelve big, strapping boys, see? Only no mother to bring’m up like gentlemen. And I’m always away on location. So what’ve I got? A even dozen no-goodniks. Casry: Crum, this is even more serious than a tumor. You have a guilt complex, resulting from your idea that the boys are wild because you’ve neglected them. But'don’t you see, Crum? Faking that tumor, getting out of the house, was only a temporary solution. You can’t completely escape your guilt until you do the right thing by those boys. Crum— face up to it, get them a mother. In other words, get married.

Crum (despondently): Who'd have me? What dame wants twelve big, strapping sons the minute she says “I do?” (The door suddenly opens and Dr. Kildare enters with the girl from the Psychiatric Ward in tow.) Kivpare (panting): Well, this is a surprise. Here’s Dr. Ben Casey. Doctor, I want you-to meet one of our most popular patients. We just happened to be passing through. She’s got a slight touch of nymphomania, caused by putting herself out too much. Clear case of a desperate search for Mister Right, as I see it. Casey (steely-eyed once more): Butting in again, eh, Kildare? And, as usual, your diagnosis is way wide of the mark. Any damn fool just out of pre-med could see that this girl is suffering from an acute mother complex. (He turns to Crum.) You need a mother for your twelve big, strapping boys, right? Well, here she is.

Crum (salaciously to girl): How about it, sister? Gir (eagerly): Twelve big, strapping boys? Casey: Twelve it is. And Crum here is off on location most of the time, so you'll have the boys all to yourself, little mother.

Girt (throwing arms around Crum): Hubby-to-be! Kipare (penitently to Casey): Dr. Ben Casey, I’ve been wrong. Terribly wrong. You've got heart. Crum: Not only that, you’ve both got contracts. No more location trips for me. I’m getting out of the movies and into TV. Got an idea for a doctor series. Casey: Count me out. I do a single. Crum: Okay, two doctor series. You can both have your own show. What say, boys? Casry and Kitpare (in unison): Hooray! We'll never have to practice medicine again!

500

William Johnston

(As the curtain falls, Casey, Kildare, Crum and the girl link arms and do a Shuffle-off-to-Buffalo toward the door, while two elderly men-inwhite, Dr. Gillespie and Dr. Zorba, drop to the floor from the light fixture, where they have been perdropaae and chase gHeh them, screeching Frere cally “Wait for us! Wait for us!)

All Right, | Heard You the First Time

“YE. J. KAHN, JR. FROM TIME TO TIME I’ve heard people say that the New York public is a dull, spiritless group, inclined to be inattentive to extraordinary occurrences, like eclipses and parachute invasions, in its midst. That’s a lie. The New York public is the most discomfortingly observant lot I have ever seen, and if I were a lady and habitually given to showing my slip, I think the public would by now have turned me into a nervous tottering wreck. I am pretty close to that as it is, because of a trying experience I had the other day. Like a good part of the public, I own a car, which carries me more or less comfortably around the local countryside. I say local because I never go very far in my car. I like to be within cruising distance of my own Lafayette Street garage, where there are a host of amiable mechanics qualified to deal with transmissions and differentials and other automotive details I don’t understand. The trying experience occurred during an excursion I rashly made to Long Island, where I visited some friends whose house is

32.8 miles from Columbus Circle. I started back toward town shortly after lunch and noticed before I had covered much ground that the dashboard knob which regulates my headlights was loose and wobbly. I pulled at it experimentally and it came right off in my hand, a state of affairs I instantly judged to be irregular, if not actually dangerous. I checked with my speedometer, which was still firmly at-

tached to its moorings, and calculated that I was 30.9 miles from my garage, where they know how to fasten light switches to dashboards. It was broad daylight, and I had no need of lights, so I tossed the detached knob into the glove compartment and drove on. I had only gone a couple of hundred yards farther when a man who had been standing at the side of the road looking off into space whirled around, pointed at me dramatically, and yelled, “Lights!” I realized then that my headlights were on and that there wasn’t anything

502

EL

Wabnsin

I could do to turn them off, short of steering into a telephone pole. On the highways you often see cars with headlights turned on in the daytime. I had always assumed that the drivers of these vehicles were charging their batteries, or discharging them, or whatever it is you do by keeping your lights on when you don’t have to. There-

fore I figured that I could enter New York inconspicuously, dis-

guised as a man who was purposely reconditioning a maladjusted battery. I did not reckon with the public. Somebody must have passed along word of my approach, for the public streamed to both sides of the Grand Central Parkway and decided unanimously to in-

dicate to me that my lights were on. By actual count, 479 people,

including children, took some

vocal cognizance

of my

passage.

Two hundred and twenty-three, belonging to the informative school, shouted “Lights on!” or the abbreviated “Lights!” Iwo hundred and eighteen, more on the admonitory side, shouted “Lights

off” or, for short, “Lights!” The other 38 people indulged in somewhat lengthy remarks, all of which began with “Hey, Bud,” or its equivalent. Early in the trip I tried to explain politely to a number of people what had happened by shouting back over my shoulder, or by nodding to signify my awareness of the situation, or by taking my hands off the wheel and extending them outward in what I hoped would be interpreted as a gesture of helplessness. By the time I had done any of these things, however, most of my informants were several hundred yards behind me and already indifferent to my problem. I couldn’t shake them all off, though. The most dogged messengers of enlightenment were those in other cars, representatives of that great fraternity of motorists who wouldn’t lift a jack handle if you really needed any assistance on the road. They honked horns, edged out of line to draw up abreast of me and tell me what was going on, or drove close behind me, flashing their own lights on and off so that the reflections would bounce off my rear-view mirror and hit me in the eyes. By the time I had crossed the Triborough Bridge my hands were trembling on the steering wheel, but the Long Island phase of my journey, it turned out, was idyllic, compared to the reception awaiting me in Manhattan. My garage is way downtown, of course, and at every traffic light north of it there seemed to be an emergency meeting of one of the various branches of my council of advisers. Truck drivers, postmen, street cleaners, children playing on the sidewalks and ladies leaning out of windows all shrieked at me, some of

ALL

RIGHT,

I HEARD

YOU

THE

FIRST

TIME

503 them almost a block away. Going crosstown through crowde d streets, I felt as if I were running a gantlet. I finally sighted my garage and swerved in happily. As I did, one of the attendants whom I had always regarded as a sympathetic friend stepped out from behind a gas pump, held up his hand, and said, “Mr. Kahn, your lights . . .” I pinned him neatly against the

pump before he could finish his sentence.

The Man Who Came to Dinner

“is GEORGE S$. KAUFMAN and

MOSS

HART

Scene: The curtain rises on the attractive living room of Mr. and Mrs. Ernest W. STantey, in a small town in Ohio. The

Stanleys are obviously people of means: the room is large, comfortable, tastefully furnished. Double doors lead into a library R. There is a glimpse through an arch U.R. of a dining room at the rear, and we see the steps of a handsome curved staircase, U.C. At the left side of the room, a bay window. Another arch, U.L., leading into the hallway. Upstage of the hallway is a swinging door leading into the pantry. The outer door to the street is off U.L. The library doors are closed. Mrs. STANLEY enters from upstairs. As she reaches the lower third step the doorbell rings. She pauses a moment, then continues on her way toward the library. A nurse (Miss PrEEN) in full uniform emerges —scurries rather—out of the room R., as the bell rings. An angry

Voice from within speeds her on her way: “Great dribbling cow!” Mrs. STANLEY (eagerly): How is he? Is he coming out? (But Miss Preen has already disappeared into the dining room up R.) (Simultaneously the doorbell rings—at the same time a young lad of twenty-one, RICHARD STANLEY, is descending the stairs C.) RicHarD (crosses to door L.): Vl go, Mother. (Joun, a white-coated servant, comes hurrying in from the library and starts up the stairs, two at a time.) Mrs. STANLEY: What’s the matter? What is it, John? Joun: They want pillows. (And he is out of sight.) (Meanwhile Miss Preen is returning to the sickroom. She enters as soon as she picks up a tray with a bowl of cornflakes, off U.R.) Mrs. STANLEY (to her): Anything I can do, Miss Preen? Miss PreEn (exit to library): No, thank you. (The Votce is heard again as she opens the doors. “Don’t call yourself a doctor in my presence! Yowre a quack if I ever saw one!”)

THE

MAN

WHO

CAME

TO

DINNER

505

(Ricuarp returns from the hall L., carrying two huge packages and a sheaf of cablegrams.) RicHarp (crosses to sofa, puts packages on floor R. of sofa, telegrams on table back of sofa): Four more cablegrams and more packages. ... Dad is going crazy upstairs, with that bell ringing all the time. (Meanwhile June, the daughter of the house, has come down the stairs C. An attractive girl of twenty.) (At the same time the telephone is ringing. JuNE crosses D.R. to phone.) Mrs. Stantey: Oh, dear! .. . June, will you go? ... What did you say, Richard?

RicHArD (examining the packages): One’s from New York and one from San Francisco. Mrs. Stanrry: There was something from Alaska early this morning. Ricuarp: Really? JUNE (at the telephone): Yes? .. . Yes, that’s right. Mrs. STANLEY: Who is it? (Before JUNE can answer, the double doors are opened again. Miss PREEN appears D.R. The Voice calls after her: “Doesn’t that bird-brain of

yours ever function?”) Miss Preen (enters D.R. Crosses L.): I—I’ll get them right away... He wants some Players’ Club cigarettes. Mrs. STANLEY: Players’ Club? (Joun enters from stairs C. with pillows. Gives pillows to Miss PREEN

D.R., exits up R.) RicHarp: They have ’em at Kitchener’s. Pll run down and get ’em. (He iOffL.)

June (still at the phone): Hello . . . Yes, I’m waiting. Mrs. Srantey: Tell me, Miss Preen, is he—are they bringing him out soonr

Miss PrEEN (wearily): We’re getting him out of bed now. He'll be out very soon. . . . Oh, thank you. (This last is to Joun, who has descended the stairs with three or four pillows. Miss PREEN starts off R.) Mrs. SranLey:

Oh, I’m so glad. He must be very happy.

(And again we hear the invalid’s Votcr as Miss PrEEN passes into the room, R. “Trapped like a rat in this hellhole! Take your fishhooks off me!”’) June (at the phone): Hello . . . Yes, he’s here, but he can’t come to the phone right now. . . . London? (She covers the transmitter with her hand.) It’s London calling Mr. Whiteside. Mrs. StanLey: My, my! June (at phone): Two o’clock? Yes, I think he could talk then. All right. (She hangs up.) Well, who do you think that was? Mr. H. G. Wells from London. Mrs. Srantey (wild-eyed): H. G. Wells? On our telephone? (The doorbell again.)

.

506

George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart

June (crosses L. to door L. Exit): Vl go. This is certainly a busy house. (Meantime Saran, the cook, has come from the dining room up R. with a pitcher of orange juice.) SaraH: I got his orange juice.

Mrs. STaNLey (as Saran knocks on double doors D.R.): Oh, that’s fine, Sarah. Is it fresh? Saran: Yes, ma’am. (She knocks on the door.) (The doors are opened; Saran hands the orange juice to the nurse. The Voice roars once more: “You have the touch of a sex-starved cobra!”’) Saran (beaming): His voice is just the same as on the radio. (She disap-

pears into the dining room as June returns from the entrance hall L., ushering in two friends of her mother’s, Mrs. Dexter and Mrs. McCurcnHeon. One is carrying a flowering plant, partially wrapped; the other is holding, with some care, what turns out to be a jar of calf’s-foot jelly.) Tue Lapies (enter L. Cross to C.): Good morning. Mrs. Stantey (to them): Girls, what do you think? He’s getting up and coming out this morning! Mrs. McCutcHeon: You don’t mean it! Mrs. Dexter: Can we stay and see him? Mrs. Stantey: Why, of course—he’d love it. (JuNE enters L. Crosses to stairs.) Girls, do you know what just happened? June (departing upstairs): Vl be upstairs, Mother, if you want me. Mrs. Stantey: What? ... Oh, yes. June, tell your father he’d better come down, will you? Mr. Whiteside is coming out. June: Yes, Mother. (She exits upstairs.) Mrs. Dexter: Is he really coming out this morning? I brought him a plant—do you think it’s all right if I give it to him? Mrs. Stantey: Why, I think that would be lovely. Mrs. McCutcueon: And some calf’s-foot jelly. Mrs. StanLey: Why, how nice! Who do you think was on the phone just now? H. G. Wells, from London. And look at those cablegrams. (The Lapirs cross L.) He’s had calls and messages from all over this country and Europe. The New York Times—and Felix Frankfurter, and Dr. Dafoe, the Mount Wilson Observatory—I just can’t tell you what’s been going on, I’m simply exhausted. (Crosses R., sits chair R.C.) Mrs. Dexter (crossing to Mrs. Srantey R.): There’s a big piece about it in this week’s Time. Did you see it? Mrs. STANLEY: No—really? Mrs. McCurcuHeon (crosses R., gives Mrs. DEXTER calf’s-foot jelly, reads from Time.): Your name’s in it too, Daisy. Listen: “Portly Sheridan Whiteside, critic, lecturer, wit, radio orator, intimate friend of the great and near great last week found his celebrated wit no weapon with which to combat an injured hip. The Falstaffian Mr. Whiteside, trekking across the country on one of his annual lecture tours, met his

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507 Waterloo in the shape of a small piece of ice on the doorstep of Mr. and Mrs. Ernest W. Stanley, of Mesalia, Ohio. Result: Canceled lectures and disappointment to. thousands of adoring clubwomen in Omaha, Denver,

and points west.

Further

result:

The

idol of the air waves

rests until further notice in home of surprised Mr. and Mrs. Stanley. Possibility: Christmas may be postponed this year.” What’s that mean? Mrs. Stantey: Why, what do you think of that? (She takes magazine, reads.) “A small piece of ice on the doorstep of Mr. and Mrs. . . .” Think of it! Mrs. McCurcueon (crosses L. to sofa D.L., sits): Of course if it were

my house, Daisy, I’d have a bronze plate put on the step, right where he fell. (Mrs. Dexter eases back of couch.) Mrs. Srantey: Well, of course, I felt terrible about it. He just never goes to dinner anywhere, and he finally agreed to come here, and then this had to happen. Poor Mr. Whiteside! But it’s going to be so wonderful having him with us, even for a little while. Just think of it! We’ll sit around in the evening, and discuss books and plays, all the great people he’s known. And he’ll talk in that wonderful way of his. He may even read Goodbye, Mr. Chips to us. (Mr. Srantey, solid, substantial—the American businessman—is descending the stairs C.)

STANLEY (coming down C.): Daisy, I can’t wait any longer. If Mr. Whiteside—ah, good morning, ladies. Lapirs: Good morning. Mrs. STaney (rises, crosses C.): Ernest, he’s coming out any minute, and H. G. Wells telephoned from London, and we’re in Time. Look. (She hands Time to StanLey.) STANLEY (as he hands the magazine back to her): 1 don’t like this kind of publicity at all, Daisy. When do you suppose he’s going to leave? Mrs. STanLey: Well, he’s only getting up this morning—after all, he’s had quite a shock, and he’s been in bed for two full weeks. He'll certainly have to rest a few days, Ernest. STANLEY: Well, I’m sure it’s a great honor his being in the house, but it is a little upsetting—phone going all the time, bells ringing, messenger boys running in and out—(Out of the sickroom comes a businesslikelooking young woman about thirty, with letters and notebook. Her name 1s MArGareT CutLER—Maccie to her friends.) Macete (closing library doors): Pardon me, Mrs. Stanley—have the cigarettes come yet? (STANLEY eases U.L.) Mrs. STanLey (crosses R.): They’re on the way, Miss Cutler. My son went for them. Macete (crosses L. to chair R.): Thank you. Mrs. Stantey: Ah—this is Miss Cutler, Mr. Whiteside’s secretary. Maccre: How do you do. May I move this chair? Mrs. Sranuey (all eagerness): You mean he’s coming out now?

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(JouN appears in doorway up R.C.) Maccie (moves chair up C. of desk. Quietly.): He is indeed. Mrs. McCurcueon (rises, crosses D.L.): He’s coming out! Mrs. Dexter (crossing to Mrs. McCutcueon D.L.): I can hardly wait! Mrs. Srantey: Ernest, call June. June! June! Mr. Whiteside is coming out!

Joun (beckoning to Saran off U.R.): Sarah! Sarah! Mr. Whiteside is coming out!

Mrs. Stantey:

I’m so excited I just don’t know what to do!

Mrs. Dexter: Me too! I know that Ill simply— (SarAH and JOHN appear in dining-room entrance, JUNE on the stairs. Mrs. STanLey and the two other ladies are keenly expectant; even STANLEY is on the qui vive. The double doors are opened once more and Dr. BrapLEY appears, bag in hand, D.R. He has taken a good deal of punishment, and speaks with a rather false heartiness.) Mrs. Stantey: Good morning, Dr. Bradley. Dr. BrapLey: Good morning, good morning. Well, here we are, merry and bright. Bring our little patient out, Miss Preen. (A moment’s pause, and then a wheelchair is rolled through the door by the nurse. It is full of pillows, blankets, and SHERIDAN WHITESIDE. SHERIDAN WHITESIDE is indeed portly and Falstaffian. He is wearing an elaborate velvet smoking jacket and a very loud tie, and he looks like every caricature ever drawn of him. There is a hush as the wheelchair rolls into the room D.R. Welcoming smiles break over every face. The chair comes to a halt; Wutreswe looks slowly around, into each and every beaming face. His fingers drum for a moment on the arm of the chair. He looks slowly around once more. Maccir comes D.R. Dr. BRaDLey crosses to the wheelchair, then Mrs. Stantey. She laughs nervously. And then he speaks.) WuitesivE (R.C., quietly to Macere): I may vomit. Mrs. STANLEY (with a nervous little laugh): Good morning, Mr. Whiteside. ’m Mrs. Ernest Stanley—remember? And this is Mr. Stanley. STANLEY (coming to D.C.): How do you do, Mr. Whiteside? I hope that you are better. Wuiresive: Thank you. I am suing you for a hundred and fifty thousand dollars. STANLEY: How’s that? What? Wuiresipe: I said I am suing you for a hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Mrs. StanLey: You mean—because you fell on our steps, Mr. Whiteside? Wuiresipe: Samuel J. Liebowitz will explain it to you in court. Who are those two harpies standing there like the kiss of death? (Mrs. McCutcueon, with a little gasp, drops the calf’s-foot jelly. It smashes

on the floor.)

Mrs. McCurcueon:

Oh, dear! My calf’s-foot jelly.

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Wuitesiwe: Made from your own foot, I have no doubt. And now, Mrs. Stanley, I have a few small matters to take up with you. Since this

corner druggist at my elbow tells me that I shall be confined to this moldy mortuary for at least another ten days, due entirely to your

stupidity and negligence, I shall have to carry on my activities as best I can. I shall require the exclusive use of this room, as well as that drafty sewer which you call the library. I want no one to come in or out while I am in this room. STANLEY: What do you mean, sir?

Mrs. StanLey

(stunned): We

have to go up the stairs to get to our

rooms, Mr. Whiteside. Wuiresipe: Isn’t there a back entrance? Mrs. STANLEY: Why—yes. Wuitesine:

Then use that. I shall also require a room

for my secretary,

Miss Cutler. Let me see. I will have a great many incoming and outgoing calls, so please do not use the telephone. I sleep until noon and must have quiet through the house until that hour. There will be five for lunch today. Where is the cook? STANLEY: Mr. Whiteside, if I may interrupt for a moment— Wuitesipe: You may not, sir. Will you take your clammy hand off my chair? (This last to Miss Preen as she arranges his pillow.) ... And now will you all leave quietly, or must I ask my secretary to pass among you with a baseball bat? (Mrs. Dexter and Mrs. McCurcueon are beating a hasty retreat, Mrs. Dexter’s gift still in her hand.) Mrs. McCutcueon: Well—goodbye, Daisy. We'll call you— Oh, no, we mustn't use the phone. Well—we’ll see you. Mrs. Dexter: Goodbye. (Both exit up L.) STANLEY (boldly): Now look here, Mr. Whiteside— Whuitesipe: There is nothing to discuss, sir. Considering the damage I have suffered at your hands, I am asking very little. Good day.

STANLEY (controlling himself, crosses L., exits L.): Vl call you from the office later, Daisy. Wulitesipe: Not on this phone, please. (STANLEY gives him a look, but goes.) Wuitesipe: Here is the menu for lunch. (He extends a slip of paper to Mrs. STANLEY.) Mrs. STANLEY: But—I’ve already ordered lunch. Wuitesipe: It will be sent up to you on a tray. I am using the dining room for my guests. . . . Where are those cigarettes?

Mrs. Staniey (eases up): Why—my son went for them. I don’t know why he—here, Sarah. Here is the menu for lunch. (She hands Saran the luncheon slip, when she has crossed to Mrs. Staniey.) T’ll—have mine upstairs on a tray. (Saran and Joun depart up R.) Wuitesie (to Junr, who has been posed on the landing during all this):

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Young lady, I cannot stand indecision. Will you either go up those stairs or come down them? (June is about to speak, decides against it and ascends the stairs with a good deal of spirit.) (Mrs. STANLEY is hovering uncertainly on the steps as RicHarD returns with the cigarettes.) RicHarp (crosses to R.C.): Oh, good morning, Mr. Whiteside. Here are the cigarettes.—I’m sorry I was so long—I had to go to three different

stores. Wuitesive: How did you travel? By oxcart? You were gone long enough to have a baby. (RicHarp is considerably taken aback. His eyes go to his mother, who motions him to come up the stairs. They disappear together, their eyes unsteadily on Wutrestve.) Is there a man in the world who suffers as I do from the gross inadequacies of the human race! (To Miss Preen, who is fussing around the chair again tucking blanket about him.) Take those canal boats away from me? (She obeys hastily.) Go in and read the life of Florence Nightingale and learn how unfitted you are for your chosen profession. (Miss Preen glares at him, but goes D.R., leaves doors open.) Brapiey (heartily—coming down to L. of chair): Well, 1 think I can safely leave you in Miss Cutler’s capable hands. Shall I look in again this afternoon? Wuiresive: If you do, I shall spit right in your eye. Braptey:

Ah! What a sense of humor you writers have! By the way, it

isn’t really worth mentioning, but—I’ve been doing a little writing myself. About my medical experiences. WhitesipE (quietly): Am I to be spared nothing? Braptey: Would it be too much to ask you to—glance over it while you're here? Wuitesive (eyes half closed, as though the pain were too exquisite to bear): Trapped.

Brabiey (delving into his bag): Well! I just happen to have a copy with me. (He brings out a tremendous manuscript, places it on WHITESIDE’s lap.) The Story of an Humble Practitioner, or Forty Years an Ohio Doctor. Wuitesve: I shall drop everything. Brapiey (crossing L.): Thank you, and I hope you like it. Well, see you on the morrow. Keep the hip quiet and don’t forget those little pills. Goodbye. (He goes up L.) Wuiteside (annoyed at BrapLey): Oh-h! (Handing the manuscript to Maccte who places it on chest D.R.) Maggie, will you take Forty Years Below the Navel or whatever it’s called? Macctir (crossing L. to C., surveying him): Well, I must say you have certainly behaved with all your accustomed grace and charm.

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See Look here, Puss—I am in no mood to discuss my behavior,

good or bad. Macate: These people have done everything in their power to make you comfortable. And they happen, God knows why, to look upon you with certain wonder and admiration. Wuitesive: If they had looked a little more carefully at their doorstep I would not be troubling them now. I did not wish to cross their cheerless threshold. I was hounded and badgered into it. I now find myself, after two weeks of racking pain, accused of behavi ng without charm. What would you have me do? Kiss them? Maccir (giving up, crosses to Wuiresipe): Very well, Sherry. After ten years I should have known better than to try to do anythi ng about your manners. But when I finally give up this job I may write a book about it all. Cavalcade of Insult or Through the Years With Prince Charming. (Tosses him letters.) Whitesipe: Listen, Repulsive, you are tied to me with an umbilical cord made of piano wire. And now if we may dismiss the subject of my charm, for which, incidentally, I receive fifteen hundred dollars per appearance (Enter Harrier L.), possibly we can go to work, . . . Oh, no, we can’t. Yes? (Macer crosses R. to DR) (This last is addressed to a wraithlike lady of uncertain years, who has more or less floated into the room. She is carrying a large spray of holly, and her whole manner suggests somethin & not quite of this world.) Harrier (crosses to him. Her voice seems to float, too): My name is Harriet Stanley. I know you are Sheridan Whiteside.

I saw this holly,

framed green against the pine trees. I remembered what you had written about Tess and Jude the Obscure. It was the nicest present I could bring you. (She places the holly in his lap, and exits upstairs C.) Wuitesive (his eyes following her): For God’s sake, what was that? Maccie (crosses L. to packages by sofa, takes them to chair up R.): That was Mr. Stanley’s sister, Harriet. I’ve talked to her a few times—she’s quite strange. Wuitesipe: Strange? She’s right out of The Hound of the Baskervilles. . . You know, I’ve seen that face before somewhere. Macair (as she puts packages on chair U.C.): Nonsense. You couldn’t have. Whuitesive (dismissing it): Oh, well! Let’s get down to work. (He hands her the armful of holly.) Here! Press this in the doctor’s book. (Maccre places holly on sofa. He picks up the first of a pile of letters.) I see no reason why I should endorse Maiden Form Brassieres. (He crumples up letter and drops it.) If young men keep asking me how to become dramatic critics— (He tears up letter and drops it on floor.)

Macerr (who has picked up the little sheaf of messages from the table back of sofa): Here are some telegrams.

George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart

pile

Wuiresive (a letter in his hand): What date is this? Maccir: December tenth. (MaccIE sits on sofa.) Wuiresiwe: Send a wire to Columbia Broadcasting: “You can schedule my Christmas Eve broadcast from the New York studio, as I shall return east instead of proceeding to Hollywood. Stop. For special New Year’s Eve broadcast will have as my guests Jascha Heifetz, Katharine Cornell, Schiaparelli, the Lunts and Dr. Alexis Carrel, with Anthony Eden on short wave from England. Whiteside.” Maccre: Are you sure you'll be all right by Christmas, Sherry? Wuiresive: Of course I will. Send a cable to Sacha Guitry: “Will be in Paris June ninth. Dinner seven-thirty. Whiteside.” . . . Wire to Harpers Magazine: “Do not worry, Stinky. Copy will arrive. Whiteside.” . . . Send a cable to the Maharajah of Jehraput, Bombay: “Dear BooBoo: Schedule changed. Can you meet me Calcutta July twelfth? Dinner eight-thirty. Whiteside.” . . . Arturo Toscanini. Where is he? Macctr: [Il find him. Wauitesie: “Counting on you January 4th Metropolitan Opera House my annual benefit Home for Paroled Convicts. As you know this is a very worthy cause and close to my heart. Tibbett, Rethberg, Martinelli and Flagstad have promised me personally to appear. Will you have quiet supper with me and Ethel Barrymore afterwards? Whiteside.” (Telephone rings. Macerr crosses back of Wuireswr to phone D.R.) If that’s for Mrs. Stanley, tell them she’s too drunk to talk.

Macaie (at phone D.R.): Hello... Wuitesipe:

what?

Macerr: Hello, Banjo! (Her face lights Wuitesipe: Banjo! Give me that phone! Macaie: Banjo, you old so-and-so! How Wuitesipe: Come on—give me that! Maccre: Shut up, Sherry! . . . Are you . . . Oh, he’s going to live. Wuitesie: Stop driveling and give me

Maceie

.. . Hollywood?

If it’s Goldwyn, hang up.

(hands him phone—stands

up.) are you, darling? coming east, Banjo? I miss you

that phone.

back of wheelchair):

In fact, he’s

screaming at me now. Here he is.

Wuitesive (taking the phone): How are you, you fawn’s behind? And what are you giving me for Christmas? (He roars with laughter at Banjo’s answer.) What news, Banjo, my boy? How’s the picture coming? . . . How are Wacko and Sloppo? ... No, no, I’m all right . . . Yes, ’m in very good hands. P’'ve got the best horse doctor in town .. . What about you? Having any fun? . . . Playing any cribbage? .. . What? (Again he laughs loudly.) . . . Well, don’t take all his money—leave a little bit for me. . . . You’re what? .. . Having your portrait painted? By whom? Milt Gross? .. . Not really? .. No, ’'m going back to New York from here. I’ll be there for twelve

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days, and then I go to Dartmouth for the Drama Festival. You wouldn’t understand. . . . Well, I can’t waste my time talking to Hollywood riff-raff. Kiss Louella Parsons for me. Goodbye. (He hangs up and

turns to Maccir. Maccie puts phone on table D.R.) He took fourteen hundred dollars from Sam Goldwyn at cribbage last night, and Sam said, “Banjo, I will never play garbage with you again.”

Macaie (crossing L to L.C.): What’s all this about his having his portrait painted? Wuiresipe: M-m, Salvador Dali. (Miss Preen enters D.R.) That’s all that face of his needs—a surrealist to paint it. . . . What do you want now, Miss Bed Pan? (This is addressed to Miss Preen, who has returned somewhat apprehensively to the room. Macaie crosses to table back of couch L.) Miss Preen: It’s—it’s’ your pills. One every forty-five minutes. drops them into his lap and hurries out of the room—Exit D.R.)

(She

(Macatr, back of couch L., opens cable.) Wuiresive (looking after her): . . . Now, where were we? Maccie (the messages in her hand, crosses to C.): Here’s a cable from that dear friend of yours, Lorraine Sheldon. WhuitesipE: Let me see it. Maccie (reading message, in a tone that gives Miss SHELDON none the better of it. Crosses to C.): “Sherry, my poor sweet lamb, have been in Scotland on a shooting party with Lord and Lady Cunard and only just heard of your poor sweet hip.” (Maccir gives a faint raspberry, then reads on.) “Am down here in Surrey with Lord Bottomley. Sailing Wednesday on the Normandie and cannot wait to see my poor sweet Sherry. Your blossom girl, Lorraine.” . . . In the words of the master, I may vomit. Whairesipe: Don’t be bitter, Puss, just because Lorraine is more beautiful than you are. Macerr: Lorraine Sheldon is a very fair example of that small but vicious circle you move in. WuiresivE: Pure sex jealousy if I ever saw it. . . . Give me the rest of those. Macerr (mumbling to herself, crossing R. and handing him cables): Lorraine Sheldon . . . Lord Bottomley .. . My Aunt Fanny. (Crossing CG:)

Wuitesive (who has opened the next message): Ah! It’s from Destiny’s Tot. Maccie (crossing to WuireEsipE, peering over his shoulder): Oh, England’s little Rover Boy? Wuiresiwe: Um-hm. (He reads.) “Treacle face, what is this I hear about a hip fractured in some bordello brawl? Does this mean our Hollywood Christmas Party is off? Finished the new play in Pago-Pago and it’s su-

George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart

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perb. Myself and a ukulele leave Honolulu tomorrow in that order. Dy the way, the Sultan of Zanzibar wants to meet

Ginger Rogers. Let’s

face it. Oscar Wilde.” Macerr (crossing L to couch, sits): He does travel, doesn’t he? You

know, it would be nice if the world went around Beverly Carlton fora change. , Wuiteswe: Hollywood next week—why couldn’t he stop over on his way to New York? Send him a cable. “Beverly Carlton, Royal Hawai-

ian Hotel, Honolulu.” (The doorbell rings. WuitEswe is properly annoyed.) If these people intend to have their friends using the front door . . . (Joun enters up L.) Maccie: What do you want them to do—use a rope ladder? (JOHN at L.C., crosses,to. exit. L-) Wauireswe: I will not have a lot of mildewed pus-bags rushing in and out of this house while I am— (He stops as the voice of Joun is heard at the front door. “Oh, good morning, Mr. Jefferson.” The answering voice of Mr. Jerrerson: “Good morning, John.”) (Roaring—Maccir rises, crosses to up L.) There’s nobody home! The Stanleys have been arrested for white slavery! Go away! (But the visitor, meanwhile, has already appeared in the archway. JEFFERSON is an interesting-looking young man in his early thirties.) JEFFERSON (crossing to her, back of couch): Good morning, Mr. Whiteside. I’m Jefferson, of the Mesalia Journal. Wuitesine (sotto voce, to Macair): Get rid of him. Maccre (brusquely): Y’'msorry—Mr. Whiteside is seeing no one. JEFFERSON: Really? Macctr: So will you please excuse us? Good day. JerFrerson (not giving up): Mr. Whiteside seems to be sitting up and taking notice. Maccte: mind?

I’m afraid he’s not taking notice of the Mesalia Journal. Do you

JEFFERSON (sizing up Maccir): You know, if I’m going to be insulted I'd like it to be by Mr. Whiteside himself. I never did like carbon copies. Wuitesive (looking around; interested): M-m, touché, if I ever heard one. And in Mesalia too, Maggie, dear.

Macate (still on the job): Will you please leave? JEFFERSON (ignoring her. Crosses to C. Macete crosses to R.C.): How about an interview, Mr. Whiteside? Wuitesibe: [never give them. Go away. Jerrerson: Mr. Whiteside, if I don’t get this interview, I lose my job. Wuirtesipe: That would be quite all right with me.

JEFFERSON:

Now, you don’t mean that, Mr. Whiteside. You used to be a

newspaper man yourself. You know what editors are like. Well, mine’s the toughest one that ever lived.

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WhuiteEsipe: You won’t get around me that way. If you don’t like him, get off the paper. JEFFERSON: Yes, but I happen to think it’s a good paper. William Allen White could have got out of Emporia, but he didn’t. Wuiresipe: You have the effrontery, in my presence, to compare yourself with William Allen White? JEFFERSON: Only in the sense that White stayed in Emporia, and I want to stay here and say what I want to say. WhuitesipeE: Such as what? JEFFERSON (crossing to below couch L.): Well, I can’t put it into words, Mr. Whiteside—it’d sound like an awful lot of hooey. But the Journal was my father’s paper. It’s kind of a sentimental point with me, the paper. I'd like to carry on where he left off. Wuiresive: Ah—ahh. So you own the paper, eh? Jerrerson: That’s right. Wulirtesipe: Then this terrifying editor, this dread journalistic Apocalypse is—you yourself?

JEFFERSON: Ina word, yes. Whuitesiwe (chuckles with appreciation): 1 see. Maccte (annoyed, starts off R.) In the future, Sherry, let me know when you don’t want to talk to people; I'll usher them right in. (She goes into the library D.R.) Wuitesipe: Young man, that journalistic trick went out with Richard Harding Davis. . . . Come here. I suppose you’ve written that novel? JEFFERSON (eases R.): No. I’ve written that play. Wuitesipe: Well, I don’t want to read it. But you can send me your paper—l’ll take a year’s subscription. Do you write the editorials, too?

JEFFERSON: Every one of them. Wuitesive: I know just what they’re like. Ah, me! I’m afraid you’re that noble young newspaper man—crusading, idealistic, dull. (He looks him

up and down.) Very good casting, too. JerreRson: You're not bad casting yourself, Mr. Whiteside. Wuiresipe: We won’t discuss it. . . . Ah, do these old eyes see a box of goodies over there? Hand them to me on your way out. JEFFERSON (crossing D.R. to small desk table): The trouble is, Mr. Whiteside, that your being in this town comes under the heading of news. Practically the biggest news since the depression. So I just got to get a story. (Crossing to L. of WuiTesivE, as he passes candy.)

WHITESIDE (examining the candy): M-m, pecan butternut fudge. (Miss PREEN, 07 her way to the kitchen with empty plate on tray, from the library R., stops short as she sees WuiItesweE with a piece of candy in his hand. She leaves doors open.) Miss PREEN (crossing D.R.): Oh, my! You mustn’t eat candy, Mr. Whiteside. It’s very bad for you.

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Wuitesive (turning): My Great-aunt Jennifer ate a whole box of candy every day of her life. She lived to be a hundred and two, and when she had been dead three days she looked better than you do now.

Passing Strange “ERIC KEOWN James chased the final crumb of cheese to the edge of his plate, emptied his tankard and called for the bill. It was this last action that weighed with me most. “If you’ve half an ‘hour to spare,” he said, “I’d be glad of your help.” “I really ought to get back,” I muttered, “and I’m just not in the mood now for haggling over snuffboxes or meeting a man who knowsamanwho.. .” “It’s nothing like that. It’s a practical experiment to do with my novel.”

“Oh, your novel. How is Lady Honoria Trimm?” “As comfortable as can be expected. She’s having a baby on page

105 and is reading about the Pre-Raphaelites with her feet up for the next three or four chapters. What I’m working on in the meantime is her brother Edward’s proposal. I believe I’ve found a brandnew location for this, on two passing escalators.” “Well?” I asked. “Tt’s vitally important to get the timing right.” “Why?” “Because whatever I put in a novel, a hundred lunatics with minds like cheap alarm clocks chip in from the steam-room at Harrogate and the forests of Assam to say it’s impossible. This time all the answers are going to be ready.” “T can't see it matters.” “T didn’t expect you would. Now, all I want from you is to jump on the up escalator when I jump on the down and impersonate a

smashing brunette called Anastasia de Grotchkin. As we pass I shall say my piece across the L.P.T.B. mahogany, and all you have to do

is reply: ‘Sir, you forget Iam a de Grotchkin. You shall hear from my brother!’ The question is, can it all be fitted in, or must I cut?” “Why must I be so idiotically haughty?”

“Tt’s a longish story,” said James, handing me a small cigar. “You see, this Edward

is an impulsive lad, not much liked. He lost two

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Eric Keown

fingers leading his college side in the stool-ball game against Girton, he lost all his money looking for pirate gold in the Pacific, in fact he’s led a thoroughly dangerous and reckless life. Anastasia he ran into playing the zither in an absinthe dive in Cannes. He followed her to a similar outfit in Budapest, he trailed her all over the Balkans, diving all the time, but whenever he had her nicely teed up for a proposal there was always some act of God and the girl got away. Floods, fires, famines, germs, gunmen. I could give you all the defalisn ee” “Skip them,” I urged. “Anastasia doesn’t really like Edward. He’s lost touch with her completely, but now suddenly he sees her coming up on the other escalator. You see what a whale of a situation it is?” “Tl buy it,” I said wearily, so we took a taxi to Leicester Square

Tube station, where escalators abound. James bought two tickets and we parted, fighting our way through a dense wall of citizens. On my way up I took a stance on the inside, and turned to find

James waving madly as he bore down towards me. “Anastasia!” he cried, sweeping his hat into the eye of the man next to him. “My darling! Where, oh where, have you been? Have

you forgotten those happy days munching apfelstrudel in the zoo at Przymsl? I love you, Anastasia! Won’t you marry me?” By this time he was rather more than broadside on, and I suppose I had still three seconds in which to play my part. But something died

inside me at that moment. I was fond of James, I had no wish to let him down, but the best I could do was to bubble and hiccup in a quite meaningless way. The whole incident seemed to leave a queer impression on the parties round, who could be heard murmuring above the rumble of the machinery. A little damped, I crossed over

to the down escalator and started off again. I noted James was coming up. [his time, however, he was out of love. “Trust you to forget your lines!” he roared in passing. “You always were a thundering oaf. You always will be!” “Sir you forget I am a de Grotchkin. You shall hear from my brother!” I replied firmly. An old gentleman standing below me

looked interested to hear this. I decided to give James one more chance, and seeing him mounting the down escalator I got on the up. As he approached he smiled forgivingly. “Anastasia!” he cried, and said his lines as passionately as before. It was just then I spotted my Aunt Emily directly behind him. She and I had not spoken since a noisy row over a dog ten years ago, but

PASSING

STRANGE

519

ten years are big enough to swallow a toy poodl e and though she was fully four-fifths gorgon I was fond of the old trout. “Aunt Emily!” I shouted, looking necessarily right throu gh James. “How are your Is it true Agatha has done it again? ” James swung round in a fury and his elbow caught Aunt Emily in

the mouth. She was by no means the woman to take this lying down,

and she hit James a powerful crack on the ear with her umbrella. The last I saw of them was a tangled mass sweeping knotti ly towards the Northern Heights. I gave up my ticket and walked quickly out into the street. For the first time I observed my original old gentleman still beside me. -Excuse me,’ he-said, “but-1 was so much interes ted to hear you're a de Grotchkin: Is the countess well?” For a moment I hesitated, but really I felt too exhaus ted to go into it all. “She is beginning to show her age,” I said weakly. “And Boris, poor fellow?” “His sciatica, alas, is mounting.” “And little Tanya?” “She is a big girl now,” I said sadly. “Then you must please dine with me tomorrow,” gentleman pleadingly. And like an ass I said I would,

cried the old

Go, Josephine, in Your Flying Machine “is JEAN KERR I rex about airplanes the way I feel about diets. It seems to me that they are wonderful things for other people to go on. When a friend of mine decides to fly to Milwaukee, I drive her out to La Guardia with marvelous calm and equanimity. I am positively lighthearted in the knowledge that ‘she will receive loving, tender care and arrive with every curl intact. Lightning may be cracking around us, but I am calm. i “Nonsense, Josephine,” I say, clasping her perspiring palm, “it’s the only way to go.” Whereupon I deliver a brisk lecture on the statistics of safety in air travel. Indeed, if my figures are correct the only possible way you could be injured in an airplane is by inadvertently strangling yourself with the seat belt. If my departing friend continues to be pessimistic about the lowering sky and the leaden clouds, I get just a wee bit impatient. “Honestly,” I say, supported by the facts and good common sense, “you are a fuddyduddy. This is the twentieth century, for heaven’s sake. You'll get there right on time.” And I’m night, of course. She always gets there, frequently before I get back home from the airport, what with the tie-up of traffic on the Whitestone Bridge. When I fly, it’s a different story altogether. In the first place, I am a rational human being and I’m not the least bit interested in statistics. | happen to know that planes do crash. You see those pictures in

the paper—the smoking ruins, the dazed survivors, the pilot (when he is able to answer questions at St. Vincent’s Hospital) reporting, “All I know is that two of the engines conked out.” And please don’t tell me a lot of irrelevant stories about the train wrecks and auto collisions. The fact remains that I have been driving in cars and riding on trains all my life and nothing has ever happened to me. And you

GO, JOSEPHINE,

IN YOUR

FLYING

MACHINE $21 can’t say as much for planes. All kinds of things have happened to me on planes. So the day before a flight I always revise my will and write short notes of maternal guidance to each of my children. (These will be found in the top bureau drawer after my demise.) My husband drives me to the airport full of random remarks about what a beautiful day it is for flying and be sure to tell my mother he enjoyed the candy. I, on the other hand, try to seize these precious

moments to make it clear to him that “after I’m gone” I expect

him to remarry, really expect him to. How could he manage—a widower with those five children? He makes a completely unsuccessful attempt to choke back his laughter and then pats me on the shoulder. “Honey, you're nuts,” he says without a trace of sympathy. “But think of Will Rogers,” I say plaintively, “and Wiley Post.

And remember the Hindenburg.” “Good heavens, that was a zep-

pelin,” he says. Yeah, and a lot of difference that made.

By the time the plane is ready to depart I have been fortified with

tranquilizers, Dramamine, and intoxicating beverages. Nevertheless I creep up the entrance ramp a craven creature, escorted usually by a copilot, who recognizes a case of nerves when he sees one. “I suppose you've checked all the engines,” I say, laughing wildly—giving

a performance like James Cagney being led to the chair in one of

those old Warner Brothers movies. The only reason I don’t change my mind and make a break for it right down the ramp is that they have by this time absconded with my luggage, which is now, I presume, locked away in the hold. I never bring reading material aboard a plane because I am convinced that if I’m not right there, alert every minute, keeping my eye on things, heaven knows what might happen to us. When it comes to selecting a seat I am torn between my wish to sit well back in the tail (surely the safest place to be when we crash) and the feeling that it is my civic duty to take a place next to the window where I can keep a constant watch over the engines. You have no idea how heedless and selfish some passengers are—reading magazines and munching sandwiches the while that I, alone, am keeping that plane aloft by tugging upward on the arms of my chair and concentrating intensely, sometimes for hours. And when it becomes absolutely clear that something is amiss, who has to ask that simple, straightforward question that will clarify things? I do. Honestly, I don’t think these people care whether they live or die. On a recent daylight flight to Washington, D.C., I was quick to

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Tean Kerr

notice that in spite of the fact that the weather was brilliantly clear our plane kept losing altitude. By which I mean it was dropping and dropping and dropping. “Stewardess,” I said, raising my voice to a whisper, “is something the matter?” She flashed me a wide Cinemascope smile and said, “Ill ask the captain, if you wish.” By this time my stomach was in such a precarious condition that I didn’t trust myself to vocalize, so I merely made a little gesture meaning “That would be very nice.” She disappeared into the cockpit, where, evidently, the intercom between pilot and passengers had been left

open. Presently we were all able to hear the stewardess reporting.

“The passengers want to know if something is the matter.” The next thing we heard was a short oath and a hoarse male voice saying, “The hell with the passengers, ’'m up to my ears in trouble.”

Well, talk about a conversation stopper. Even the jaunty junior executives who, a moment before, had been exchanging noisy jokes about an extremely cooperative girl named Mildred retreated into silence behind their copies of the Wall Street Journal, which could be seen to flap and rustle in their trembling hands. Mercifully, there were no more bulletins from the cabin and we landed uneventfully, none the worse for wear. Well, I can’t speak for the other passengers, of course. But after five days’ bed rest I felt fine. I know perfectly well that people who talk about “their flights” are on a par, conversationally, with people who talk about their operations. Consequently at social gatherings I always try to find a subject that is genuinely interesting, like, for instance, my dishwasher. (The man was here three times and still the water pours out all over the kitchen floor.) However, I barely get started when someone interrupts me to say, “Listen, do you want to hear a really hair-raising story?” And I know we are off on another saga of the perils of this age of flight. A songwriter recently told me that his plane from the Coast was barely aloft when he overheard the following exchange between a dear old lady across the aisle from him and the stewardess: Dear Op Lapy: I hate to mention this, stewardess, but I think one of the engines is on fire. STEWARDESS: No, indeed, madam, those little sparks you see are part of the normal functioning. May I ask, is this your first flight? Dear Oxp Lapy: That’s right. My children gave me this trip as a present for my eighty-sixth birthday. STEWARDEsS: I thought so. Many of our first-time passengers are a little nervous but there is nothing to worry about. Not one member of the crew has had less than two thousand hours in the air.

GO, JOSEPHINE,

Dear Otp Lavy:

IN YOUR

FLYING

MACHINE

523 Thank you, my dear. I felt I was being a little silly. But

before you go would you mind taking a look out my window here? STEWARDESS: Why, certainly. If it will make you feel a little better I'll be glad to—oh my God!

The engine, needless to say, was on fire, but I won’t wear you out

with all the details—except to say that all landed safely, including the old lady, who was heard remarking to her son-in-law, “You

pee believe this, Henry, but I had to tell them the plane was on re. In every tale of airborne trouble one hears the same recurring

phrase: “The passengers behaved so well.” They do, too. They are brave, considerate,

prompt,

reverent,

and, I sometimes

think, just

plain lacking in commion sense. A friend of mine who is a theatrical

agent told me that when her plane stopped at Gander an announcement came over the loud speaker to the effect that there would be a

six-hour delay for repairs. Twenty minutes later, to everybody’s surprise, there was a second announcement asking the passengers to reboard the plane. Several of them buttonholed the pilot on the way

up to the ramp and said, “I thought we were stopping for repairs.”

He smiled winningly and replied, “We changed our minds. We’ve decided to go on.” And would you believe it, every single one of those passengers went back onto that plane. If it had been me, I’d have hitchhiked my way home, or taken a canoe. Listen, before I’d have put one foot on that plane I would have stayed right there and begun life anew in Gander. Even in the very best weather I find it advisable to take Dramamine, if for no other reason that it helps one to cope with the smiles of the personnel. Another thing that has to be coped with is the handy leaflet of information provided so thoughtfully by every airline. A year ago my husband and I made our first overseas flight. During the endless delay in the London Airport it became clear that we had been assigned to the fifth section of what was originally intended as a three-section flight. Obviously they were out combing the hangars for something that would fly. I could imagine the arguments: “Oh, don’t be such a worry wart. You put a little Three-inOne Oil in her and she’ll go up.” I'll say this: they made no hurried, spot decisions, because it was seven hours later that we assembled on the runway to inspect the craft that was to be our home away from home on the North Atlantic. My husband took one look and

said, ‘“Good Lord, it’s The Spirit of St. Louis!” Of course he was exaggerating,

but there was

no

doubt

it was

an extremely

elderly

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Jean Kerr

plane. A little paint and paper would have done wonders, though not, I feared, enough. As we were poking our way to our seats, I heard the stewardess ask the pilot, “Did you ever see one like this, Bill?” I was spared his

answer, because there was a loud flap! caused by two upper berths

which had suddenly, and for no apparent reason, dropped down over our heads. These berths were never occupied (for what I’m

sure were good and sufficient reasons) and, since they resisted the efforts of every single member of the crew to lock them, they kept

appearing and disappearing with about the same frequency as the commercials on the “Late, Late Show.” Eventually, or in a lot more time than it takes were over the ocean. It was two o’clock in the but we were all eating scrambled eggs because, now breakfast time in Scranton, Pennsylvania. I

to tell about it, we morning, my time, I gathered, it was had become accus-

tomed to the rhythm of this particular plane: it went shlumn-blip, shlumn-blip, which seemed perfectly reasonable to me. Soon, however, I began to detect what I assumed was an alien note in this re-

frain. Now it went shlumn-blip, shlumn-blip, pickety. It got worse in a moment when the upper berths began once more to flop open, and with the addition of this new leitmotiv we had what sounded

like a full chorale: shlumn-blip, shlumn-blip, pickety, flap! Feeling that I must distract myself, I hunted through the seat pocket for something to read. Imagine my horror when I fished out a pamphlet

entitled Your Role in a Water Landing. The minutes flew by like hours as I read on and on. Clearly the world lost a great humorist when the author of this piece went to write for the airlines. In his jaunty phrase, the great North Atlantic—now looming menacingly . below us—became “the drink.” “Should we go into the drink,” he wrote, blithe as a skylark, “you should be none the worse for the

dunking.” I was already the worse, just contemplating the prospect. But let’s get back to that title: Your Role in a Water Landing. Put it that way and I’m simply not interested. I know my role in a water landing. I’m just going to splash around and sob. What I want to know, what I am really and truly curious about, is their role in a water landing. But the author kept pretty mum about that part of it. As for me, I kept entirely mum until the moment, ten hours later, when I was able to kiss the sweet soil of Idlewild. Because I seem to be giving the entirely false impression that anything that happens out of the routine, flightwise is apt to be harassing, I would like to conclude with a little tale that should serve as

GO, JOSEPHINE,

IN YOUR

FLYING

MACHINE

525

proof that it is possible to have an adventure in a plane that is merely amusing. A businessman I know who toils in New York City had to rush to Chicago to conclude an important business deal. He sped out to La Guardia and was delighted to secure a seat on a jet bound for San Francisco that had a stopover in Chicago. He was almost there,

and congratulating himself that the jet had saved him an hour in time, when word came back from the pilot that, due to fog conditions in Chicago, the plane was proceeding directly to San Francisco. Shortly afterward (these jets are swift) he found himself at the airport in San Francisco. After making a series of loud, intemperate remarks (by his own admission, he made a spectacle of himself), he struck up an acquaintance with a number of airline executives who were distressed, nay distrait, to discover his predicament. Heads rolled and red tape disappeared as though by magic as the management went into action. Within an hour they had bundled him onto the last precious seat of a jet bound for New York with a stopover in Chicago. Such are the wonders of jet speed that he found himself

approaching Chicago before you could say Jack Robinson, and also before the fog had lifted. Naturally, the plane kept right on going to New York. I asked him what he said when once more he landed at La Guardia, having flown from coast to coast and back without ever having seen Chicago. He replied, “I don’t think I said anything. I just sat there on the bench and cried.” But I don’t really believe that. This man is forty-six years old and he weighs 210 pounds. I don’t really think he would cry, out loud, in public—do you?

The Advertising World “ie ALEXANDER KING As I sir here under the old trees, contemplating the grandeur and the superb indifference of nature, it comes home to me what a bundle of petty idiosyncrasies and prejudices I have become. I believe, for instance, that most professional aviators are politically very conservative. And where do I get such an idea? Well, partially from

the life and confessions of people like Lindbergh, St. Exupéry, Rickenbacker and Ernst Udet. I’m quite aware that Udet, whom I met a few times in New York, was not an orthodox Nazi and was proba-

bly liquidated for it, but that still doesn’t make him an outstanding liberal. I think the loneliness of flying, the sense of absolute power and the constant imminence of disaster are not particularly conducive to all-embracing, democratic feelings. It tends to breed the Herrenvolk type. The aristocracy of death. I also have the feeling that most table-rappers and occultists are almost instinctively anti-Semitic. I met a lot of those cuckoos when

I was doing religion for a while, on Life magazine, and I found the majority of them to be violently anti-Jewish. I can figure that one out, too, I think. You see, the Old Testament doesn’t really talk very much about heaven or paradise with any great insistence or conviction. The stress of the Old Book seems to be on decent behavior down here below, and not too much promise of pie in the sky later on. Well, that must make the professional psychics, mystics and

pseudo metaphysicians pretty leery of Jews, who are certainly indoctrinated from infancy to keep their heads out of the fog and their feet on the ground. Of course there may be a much simpler explanation. It may be that all of those swamis that I ran up against had

once been married to some revolting Jews and had naturally developed a deep loathing for all of them. Now, another one of my cherished beliefs is that you can sell the American public anything, if it is properly publicized and sponsored. I firmly believe, for instance, that if somebody put a couple of million dollars into an advertising campaign, you could make the chewing of king-sized goat droppings into a national hobby that would

THE

ADVERTISING

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57

put Wrigley out of business. I can already see the “scientists,” in

white pajama tops, looking earnestly and scientifically at millions of

television viewers.

“The

they are saying. “The

Greeks

worshiped

the goat as a god,”

goat is the most ancient symbol of natural

virility, Let this powerful symbol carry the burden of your worries

and anxieties. Let it be your Scrape Goat. The purest natural product on the market. It reaches you directly from its original source without adulteration of any kind. The pure goat pearls are pack-

aged scientifically three seconds after they were hatched. Remem-

ber, Scrape Goat in the gold-foil wrapper. Scrape Goat for livelier liveliness!” Offhand you’d say I had a natural aptitude for the advertising business. Well, you'd be wrong, because I tried my damnedest to make a corrupt easy dollar in that line, but I never made it. Or hardly ever.

My first big chance came shortly after I had illustrated The

Magic Island, by Bill Seabrook. That’s a book about voodoo doings

in Haiti, and my illustrations show some pretty tough colored folk in various stages of somnambulism, catalepsy and catatonia. The book was a world-wide best seller and everybody reprinted my illustrations. So it came as no great surprise to me one day to receive a telegram from an advertising agency which said: COULD

YOU CALL AT OUR OFFICE

URGENT TOM

RYAN

It was from the Pedlar and Ryan Advertising Agency, on lower Park Avenue, and they certainly seemed to be in a big hurry. Of course, they could have called me on the phone, since I was listed in the book, but it wouldn’t have been good agency practice. Shake people up! Get them on their toes! Ring a fire alarm! That’s the way they operate. So an ancient Western Union lady, with a pencil haplessly snared in her hair net, had to drag her asthma up four flights of stairs just to give me a heart condition. Well, kid, I said to myself, you've finally made it. The agencies are after you, they’re already sending you wires. I didn’t know then that they also sent wires to find out the weather prognosis for the following day. At any rate, I let a decent time interval elapse, half an hour at least, before I got into a cab and dawdled up to their offices. This

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Alexander King

was quite a few years ago, but it is still as fresh with me as my first memorable contact with poison sumac. Let me tell you at once that if their reception room had been contrived to intimidate people they succeeded magnificiently with me. On the wall they had an original drawing of a cat that was the wellknown identification symbol for a toilet preparation called Liu. This cat had me completely bulldozed. I couldn’t stop gaping at it. I finally decided that it had been sprayed onto the paper with an inkfilled cooky-shooter. Well, I thought, if that’s the way it’s done, that’s the way Ill do it. ’m nobody’s El Greco. Don’t get the wrong impression. I didn’t antechamber Mr. Ryan

for more than 15 minutes. Then an underdeacon materialized beside me and, guiding me safely past a few wayside shrines, whispered me discreetly into the Presence.

I entered and bowed to a tall advertising man who was wearing a beautifully tailored pearl-gray suit. I noticed at once that this suit was more than a garment, it was the extension of a personality, and I could feel that it was oozing energy at every seam. After giving me a sincere, manly handshake, Mr. Ryan without a word proceeded to walk very briskly toward a door at the end of the longish room. But believe me, no matter how fast he walked, I was trampling

with both my feet right on his shadow; because I too was demon-

strating something. I was demonstrating youth, eagerness and love of money. I tell you, when we got to that door there weren’t two inches between us. And then an unbelievable piece of craziness happened. Mr. Ryan, without calling any warning signals, suddenly wheeled completely around and nearly knocked me down in a heap. I made a remarkable recovery and quickly skipped behind him as he dashed off in the opposite direction. This time I kept about ten inches between us, and when he wheeled about again I executed a brilliantly successful veronica, without cape or sword, of course. I tried once more. This time we walked in somewhat less close formation up to one of the filing cabinets, but when I caught him staring disapprovingly at me over his shoulder, I finally got the hang of it. He wasn’t going to go anywhere. He was just letting off some

excess vitality. He was simply churning with unspoken ideas. I might as well sit down. He didn’t need me. After he had taken a few more vigorous turns about the room, he finally stopped in front of his desk and picked up a book. It was The

Magic Island.

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529

“P’ve looked at your illustrations on the train coming down from the country,” he said, “I think you might be able to do something quite important for us.” “Something to do with Negroes?” I asked. “Oh, no! It isn’t at all settled yet, and I’m not free to discuss it in any detail, but it’s a big campaign for a hair tonic.” Something inside me gave a strange tremor, and an unaccountable whiff of wilted cauliflower came to my nose. “A hair tonic!” I said. “For white people?”

“Certainly! We’re planning a nationwide newspaper campaign. Pm

sure you'll do an excellent job. Here, for instance!”’ He of my illustrations which showed a fierce Negro wearing hat. Not a hair was visible anywhere. “You see,” he said, “this is the way I visualize the art campaign. Just in this sledge-hammer style! With all force! It’s going to bowl everybody over!”

held up one an admiral’s

work in this this ruthless

He kept staring at my illustration, so he didn’t notice that I was

passing from mere despondency to the first stages of imbecility. ve got it!” “This campaign needs power,” he said, “and you to do my best going was I me. in I was touched by his simple faith for him. “Tell me,” I said, “what sort of man do you imagine would be the hero of this hair tonic?” I could see Mr. Ryan didn’t care for my sloppy terminology.

“The art work,” he said, “should visualize the message through a

well set-up man between the ages of twenty-five and thirty-five, wearing a clean-cut athletic undershirt.”

“Just a minute,” I said. “What should this man look like? Like

me?” “Of course not!” Mr. Ryan didn’t even try to disguise his disgust.

“Well, who then? Should he look like you?”

lf, “No! No! No! No! No!” He stalked over to a rotary bookshe

took a magazine off the top of it, and purposefully started to riffle the pages, like a man who knows exactly what he is looking for. me, Well, I thought, here’s my break. Whatever the hell he shows mymake and it I’m going to copy it. Better still, ’m going to trace self a little easy money for a change. out on Finally he stopped searching and flattened the magazine his desk. “Here” he said, “look at this!”

I walked briskly up to him and took the magazine out of his hands.

imagine how I It was a double-page ad for Buick cars. You can’t the leftstared at that goddamned ad. There was a lot of text all over

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Alexander King

hand page and the open door of a car in the extreme right. The

biggest lump of illustration was a dimpled tootsie with a picture hat

who was just getting out of the car, and the layout was so cunningly

arranged that her fat, sloppy leg seemed to be stepping straight into my lap. This doll was pink all over, like a freshly spanked suckling pig. A discreet hunk of lace, from her drawers, very likely, was fluttering over the artist’s signature. I must have stared at this invention for quite a while, because Mr. Ryan finally took it out of my hand. “Well,” he said, “there you have it!” “There I have it?” I said. “I thought I was supposed to draw a man?” “Of course you are,” he said impatiently. “It’s a liquid hairdressing for men.” “Well,” I persisted, “where’s the man in the Buick ad?” “Come,” he said, ‘‘you see this woman, don’t you?” “Yeah, what about her?” “Don’t you understand?” said Mr. Ryan, and as he spoke he raised

his eyes heavenward; he grew 15 feet tall, and his voice suddenly had overtones of vast interstellar spaces and of eternally reverberating echoes, because his voice was the voice of Pure Creation. “Take a good look at that woman,” he said, “because what we want in this campaign, and what you are going to give us, is—this womans husband!” He was wrong, of course. I was completely stumped by the pink fetish in the Buick ad. I couldn’t even imagine her. And what’s more, I didn’t want ever to find out what in hell her husband could possibly look like. No. Not for all the cash in Coney Island. There is a limit to my curiosity; and even to my greed. A little while later I did get a job from an advertising agency, but luckily it didn’t require quite so much creative imagination. It was an interesting and even lucrative experience and it happened sometime

early in 1929. One morning I got a letter from an agency up in Hartford that sounded like unadulterated good news. It seems that the Linweaver Paper Company, a powerful and far-flung enterprise, was proposing to publish some notable literary tidbits once a month for a whole year; and it was further planned to have each of these morsels of good will illuminated by a well-known illustrator. Since I had al-

ready done Gulliver’s Travels, The Emperor Jones and The Magic Island, | seemed to have qualified for one of the jobs.

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531

Now, remember that you can get type-cast in the illustrating busi-

ness just as readily as on the stage or in the movies. Two out of my three books had been about Negroes, so I was slowly but inevitably getting to do all the loose Negroes that happened to be around. Not quite all of them. My dear friend Miguel Covarrubias used to split the black belt with me for a while, and a little later on a still closer friend, Al Hirschfeld, began to cut in on both of us. So, when I first

got the letter, |wondered what sort of Negroes the Linweave people would probably want me to do. At any rate, I notified my correspondent in Hartford that I was available, and a couple of days later he showed up in my studio. He turned out to: be quite a nice guy who really seemed to know something about my work. His name was Stevens, I think. Naturally,

in America you don’t go on calling a man Stevens very long; you call him Hank or Butch or Mitch, or something, ten minutes after he has crossed your fate line. From then on you are buddies until an hour afterward, when you get to loathe him for the rest of your

life. That didn’t happen with Stevens; we really grooved it from the start, and it stayed that way until the end. Now, although this new

buddy of mine came from out of town, he too had the standard agency look: tall, clean-cut, anonymous, and, of course, with the usual smile of healthful dentition. I don’t know what the hell I expected; Carl Sandburg or Bertrand Russell, I suppose. Well, anyway, he was a sweet guy, and he came straight to the point. “We're thinking of doing a fine poem or a famous piece of prose, once a month,” he said, “and we’ll print these on some of our best paper stock. We plan to send them to all our dealers, distributors and customers free of charge and alert them to the fact that these beautiful color jobs may in time become valuable collector's items.”

“Fine,” I said, “and do you have anything specific in mind for me?” “Yes,” he said. “The piece that was unanimously selected for you was ‘The Congo,’ by Vachel Lindsay.” (So, they wanted Congo Negroes.) “T know the poem,” I said, “and I'll do my best with it.” “[’m sure you will,” he said. “I’ve brought you some samples of our finest papers, and perhaps you will find yourself inspired by using some of our colored stock for your first sketches.” “Very good,” I said. “I’m glad you brought them. By the way, how much are you planning to pay each artist for his work?” “Well,” he said, “that will naturally vary with the individual artist.

iy:

Alexander King

We are prepared to go up to fifteen hundred dollars in your case, and we'll pay the same to John Held, Jr., if we use him, but we'll

try to shop around a little on the other subjects.” “Will you be in town for a while?” I asked.

“I’m planning to stay a week,” he said, “because I’m hoping you might have an idea for us by then.” “T will,” I said, “don’t worry.” I had a complete idea ten minutes after he left me, and two hours later I had completed the final drawing. But I kept my peace for the next seven days. Such, I had been told, were the well-established

ways of commerce, and I had no intention of inaugurating a new traffic system. During that time I made all my “preliminary” sketches and when the week was over I called Stevens at his hotel.

He was up at my place within half an hour, and I must say my sketches simply gassed him. Of course he had to submit them to his

sponsors first, but he was sure that these sketches surpassed their wildest expectations. And so it turned out. A couple of days after he got back to Hartford, he wired me to go ahead. I let another two weeks elapse before I wired him that I was finished. He came down on the next train, and when I handed him my drawing he was more pleased with it than I was. So everything had gone off hunky-dory. I poured him a drink and we bared our amiable fangs at each

other. “And now,” said Stevens, “I have a real problem ahead.” “What’s that?” I asked. “Our next poem,” he said, “is a translation from the Chinese.” “So, what?” I said. “That oughtn’t be too hard.” “Well,” he said, “we'd planned to have Cyrus Baldridge do us. He’s done a number of books on Chinese subjects, but it he’s off to China at the moment.” “That is a drawback,” I said. “I wonder what the hell he’s in China.” “His wife writes stories for children which have a Chinese ground,” he said. “I guess they like to keep in touch with

it for seems doing

backtheir

sources.” “Naturally!” I said. “So what are you going to do?”

“Frankly, ’'d hoped you’d be able to advise me. I thought you might know somebody who specialized in drawing Orientals, and

that you might be good enough to tip me off.” “Tm

glad you asked me,” I said. “I know a real old-timer, a

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Frenchman, who used to do such illustrations years ago. I doted on his work when I was a child. His name is Victor Helleu and he lives

out in Jersey somewhere.” Stevens was so delighted he put down his drink. “Gee,” he said,

“would you get in touch with him for me? Id stay a couple of days longer if you think it’s worth my waiting.” “You go home,” I said. “Ill find the guy in the next couple of

days, and if I do, you’d better let me handle him. He must be ninety and he’s probably a pretty crotchety party by now. I'll tackle him

with kid gloves and if he can still hold a brush he’ll come through for you.” Stevens was delighted. “Do that,” he said, “and if you have to pay the top tariff it’ll be all right. We'll manage to save on the other subjects.

“Very good,” I said. “I think the old codger lives with his daughter, out in the wilds of Jersey somewhere. I understand she’s a widow and pretty well heeled. But, don’t worry, if man can do it, it shall be done.” Well, it was done. It stands to. reason that there was no such person as Victor Helleu;

and his illustrious past, and his well-heeled

daughter, the Jersey

widow, and all the rest of it were just picturesque improvisions to give what Pooh-Bah calls “artistic verisimilitude to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative.” Do you know, it was a great deal of fun for me to get back to the Orient after all those Negroes, and, honestly, I think I did a better job over Victor Helleu’s signature than over my own. Better

still, the sponsor and the agency were absolutely delighted with the

work of the old Jersey recluse. He surpassed himself. He illustrated a poem called “The Lute Girl,” by one of my old favorites, Po Chu-i. 1 had to work very hard to disguise the real hand that had perpe-

trated the work, and in the end, I think, I succeeded quite well. Al Hirschfeld saw the illustration a few years later and, com-

pletely ignoring the signature, asked me if I had done it with my

left hand, and if so, why? But hardly anyone else ever caught wise. Certainly not the agency. They got so much credit for those first two jobs, they openly decided to engage me as a consultant on the rest of their campaign. They had six or seven more knotty problems on hand, and they rightly felt that I might prove invaluable to them. I did my best. Let me say in extenuation that my best was really not too bad.

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I don’t quite recall whether I was eight or nine of that select group of artists that did the Linweave series that year. All I remember 1s that it was quite a bit of money and that among the bunch of us we copped quite a lot of graphic prizes and honorable mentions in the trade publications. I had to open bank accounts under all those names, too, and of course I had to invent suitable biographies that were printed alongside their drawings. But finally it was all over, the money collected, new outfits for the whole family, happiness all around, and even a new trip to Eu-

rope planned for the fall. And then one morning I got a telegram from Hartford: LINWEAVE

SALESMEN

TWENTY-FIFTH

AND

PLEASE

DISTRIBUTORS INVITE

ALL

WILL ARTISTS

MEET TO

AT

HOTEL

COCKTAIL ROOSEVELT

PARTY FIVE-

THIRTY GREETINGS STEVENS

There it was, the one unexpected gambit in the whole screwy game. What was I going to do? How in hell was I going to get out of this one? It was the damnedest corner I’d ever gotten myself into; I was really rattled. I couldn’t possibly present any substitutes, because anybody I could produce was either a lush, or a professional

joker, or both. Anybody I framed it with would be sure to offer mad toasts and wild praises to every other fictitious character on my roster. That was a cast-iron certainty. No, that was out. I could easily do without Victor Helleu, he was an old crock and his daughter might reasonably object to his risking his life for a mere cocktail party. But I had one Rockwell Kentish, outdoorsy character who had lewd nudes tattooed on his biceps; what could I do about him? I might say he was off on a yacht race to Bermuda, but that still left me with quite a mob of people to account for. It was a real drag! I nearly went wild trying to find a solution, but I didn’t come up with a thing by the time that ghastly afternoon came around. Well, I finally decided to trust to some last-minute inspiration and started out for the hotel around six o’clock. I must have dawdled quite a bit on my way up there, because I didn’t get to the Roosevelt till nearly eight. Obviously the Linweave people had rented a whole floor, and when the elevator spit me out on it I could hardly find a place to stand. The joint was thick with smoke and amiability, and I sud-

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denly had a glass in my hand, without even seeing who the hell had dished it to me. A few seconds later I was part of a chain of chanters

who were going around in a circle singing “Mademoiselle from Ar-

mentieres.”’ Despite the imminent pressures of a demanding camaraderie, I kept an alert eye open for my nemesis, Stevens. At last I spied him, cut myself loose with some difficulty, and wallowed over to him. He was delighted to see me. He’d had a few, of course, but he was all the better for it. “Where are your friends?” he asked. “I want them to meet the boys.” “They’re doing great,” I said. “They’re singin’ it up in the other corner.” “Fine!” he said. “We want them all to have a good time.” While he was saying these few words to me, five or six affectionate arms were placed around him, moist-eyed comradely glances rested on his face, and glittering bifocals concentrated their gleams on him. “Tl see your friends in a little while,” he said. “I just have to take care of these boys first.” “Don’t hurry,” I said, “everybody’s doing fine.” Because I don’t drink I went down into the lobby and got myself a magazine. I stayed for an hour down there and then decided to risk another visit. Well, things were really humming now. People had taken off their coats, and barrages of fountain pens, screw pencils, collapsible rulers and every sort of office hardware had come into evidence. The gaiety and good will had become a flood tide that washed all conversation into a multiple-voiced incoherent roar. I had a drink in each hand when I spied Stevens again. He’d had a few more. In fact, so many more that I decided to take an uncalculated risk. “See my friends anywhere?” I asked.

“Friends?” he said, looking vaguely about. “Yes,” I said. “Charlie and Gus and the tall blond girl I left you with.” He tried hard to become master of his really hard-pressed faculties. “Tell you the truth,” he said finally, “I haven’t seen them in quite a while.” “Don’t worry about it,” I said. “I’m sure they’re all having a good time.” “Sure,” he said. “Everybody is having a good time. Everybody and his uncle is having a good time. Drink up!” he said. “There’s

plenty more where that came from!”

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“Right!” I said. “See you later.” I did see him, too. And because he had an agency man’s memory for names, he told me he’d waved to Charlie and to Gus but hadn’t been able to get near them. After that I thought it was safe for me to beat it.

All Yankees Are Liars

“ts ERIC KNIGHT Mr. Smiru was pleased with The Spread Eagle. He was pleased with Polingthorpe Brig. The village was off the beaten track —the truly rural sort of English village the American always wants to see. The inn was low and rambling, with great sloping roofs. Over the door swung the sign—a darksome bird in a weatherbeaten setting. Everything justified his decision to take this bicycle trip up into the north—the mullioned windows, the roaring fire, the Yorkshire accents of the men who shufHled over the sanded stone floor of the low-ceilinged room as they played darts. Mr. Smith was almost be-

ginning to understand what they were talking about. During his excellent high tea he had sorted out the four men playing darts. One was Saw Cooper, a farmer; a small old man was referred to as Sam;

a young, bright-faced lad who played darts left-handed was Gollicker Pearson; and the fourth, a huge man, was just called Ian. Mr. Smith watched them play, listening to the endless thwock of the darts in the cork board as he finished

his meal. The

barmaid,

plump, corn-haired, came toward him, her apron rustling stiffly. “W ould there be owt else?” “No. It was a very good meal.” Mr. Smith smiled. He wanted to make the girl talk some more. ““Er—what do they do for fun in this place of an evening?” “Foon?” she repeated. “Well, they sit here—or o’ Satday neights lots o’ fowk goa ovver to Wuxley to tv’ pictures.” She waited. “They

gate Boock D’Arcy i’ T’ Singing Cowboy,” she added suggestively. Mr. Smith had already become acquainted with British cinemas in small towns. Also, he was a southern Californian, and had that famil-

jarity with movies that belongs to all southern Californians. He had no inclination to go “No. I think I’ll have “Tf tha’ll sit ovver can Clean oop here.” Mr. Smith sat on

four m: es to see a last year’s Class B western. another ile and sit here,” he said. by t’ fire, Ah’ll bring it to thee theer. Than Ah the bench by the generous fire and nursed his

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ale. The dart game came to an end with Saw Cooper losing and paying for the round. The men brought their mugs to the fire. Mr. Smith shifted politely. The men, in the presence of a stranger, grew quiet. Mr. Smith decided to put them at ease. “Pretty chilly for an October evening, isn tite= The men considered the remark, as if looking at both sides of it. Finally Saw Cooper spoke. “Ay;~he said. The others nodded. There was silence, and the five regarded the fire. Then, suddenly, young Gollicker smiled. “Tha shouldn’t heed t’ cowd, being a Yankee,” he said. “Ah, but ’m not a Yankee,” Mr. Smith said. They stared at him in disbelief. “Yankees,” explained Mr. Smith, “come from New England.”

They looked from Mr. Smith to one another. The big man named Jan took a deep breath. “Yankees,” he said, “come fro’ t’ United States.” “Well, yes. New England is a part of the United States,” Mr. Smith said. “But it’s thousands of miles away from where I live. In fact, believe it or not, I should think you’re closer to the Yankees than I am. You see, the United States is a big country. In the part where the Yankees come from, it gets very cold in the winter. Where I am—in southern California—it never snows. Why, Ive never known it to snow there in all my life.” “No snow?” Gollicker breathed. Mr. Smith smiled. For, after all, he was a southern Californian— and they were discussing climate. ‘No snow,” he said. “In wintertime we have a bit of a rainy season, but after February it clears, and then it doesn’t even rain for nine months—not a drop.” “Noa rain for a nine month—noan at all?” Saw Cooper asked. “Not a drop. Day after day, the sun comes out, clear skies, never a drop of rain for nine months. Never!” “Whet do ye graw theer, lad?” Saw asked, slyly. “Lots of things. Truck, vegetables, oranges—all kinds of things.” There was a silence again. Big Ian took a breath. “Orinjis,” Ian repeated, “graw i’ Spain.”

That seemed to settle the question. They all looked in the fire in silence. Saw Cooper sniffed. “What else graws theer?” “Well, [have a ranch there; we grow alfalfa.” “Whet’s that off to be?”

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“Alfalfa? We use it for hay. It’s a desert plant originally, but it thrives in California, We get eight cuttings a year.”

“Eight cuttings 0’ hay a year?” “Eight cuttings a year.” The little man, Sam, spoke for the first time: “Mister, if it doan’t rain for a nine month, how can ye get eight cuttings o’ hay a year?” “Oh, that’s easy,” Mr. Smith said. “We irrigate the land.” He went into a short but conclusive description of irrigating. “Heh,” Saw Cooper said. ““Wheer’s this heer watter come from?” “In the San Fernando Valley we buy it from the water company.” ‘“Wheer do they get it?” “From reservoirs.” “If it doan’t rain, where’s t’ reservoys get t’ watter?” “Oh, we pipe it down from five hundred miles north. It rains a lot up there.” “And ye sprinkle t’ farming land out o’ t’ watter tap. How mony acres hesta?”’ “Te isn’t like sprinkling from the tap, of course. I used that to illustrate. The pipes are large—we have fourteen-inch valves on our pipes. We flood the land—cover it right over with water.” Saw looked in the fire. “Does corn graw theer?” “Well, generally our land is too valuable to put into corn. But it will grow corn fourteen feet high.” They made noises in their throats and shifted their feet. “Fohteen foot,” Saw breathed. “Eigh, ba gum!” “Mister,” Sam said, “once Ah were oop to see t’ Firth o’ Forth brig. Ah suppose they hev bigger brigs i’ Yankeeland?” Mr. Smith should have touched on the new Oakland bridge, but then, he was a southern Californian. “We have bridges, but they’re building tunnels under the rivers now. ”? ““Whet for?” “Well, there’s so much motor traffic.” “How mony moatorcars goa through ’em?”’ Mr. Smith lit his pipe happily. They seemed quite interested in America. “T couldn’t say. The way they turn ’em out. I should say there’s hundreds of thousands.” “How fast do they turn em out?” Gollicker asked. “T don’t know. I know they roll out finished at the rate of one every couple of minutes.” “And they goai’ tunnels, not 1’ brigs?” Sam commented.

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“Oh, we have some bridges.” “Big uns, Ah suppose.” “Well,” Mr. Smith said modestly, thinking of the Pulaski Skyway coming into New York, “we have some that go right over entire towns. You're practically on one bridge for miles.” Saw Cooper spat in the fire. “How mony fowk is there in all America?” Mr. Smith didn’t know, but he felt expansive. And after all, there was South America too. “A quarter of a billion, I should say,” he hazarded. “A quarter of a billion,” they repeated. Then they stared at Mr. Smith, and he became aware of their disbelief. “Wait a moment,” he said. “I think a billion is different in America from here. It’s a thousand million in America and a million million here, isn’t it?” “A billion,” said Ian slowly, “is a billion.” The others nodded, and then Ian stood. The others rose too. ‘“Oh—er—wait a minute. Won’t you all have a drink with me?” Mr. Smith invited. “Us is off to play darts for a round—us four,” Ian said, meaningly. The other three laughed. “Ah knew them theer brigs o’ thine’d hev to be big,” Saw Cooper said as a parting shot as he swung over the bench. “That’s so’s they’d be able to goa ovver wheat what graws fohteen foot high when ye sprinkle it fro’ t’ watter tap.” He grinned at the others in victory. “T didn’t say wheat; I said corn,” Mr. Smith protested. “Same thing,” Saw snapped. “Tt isn’t. Wheat grows in an ear. Corn grows on a cob; it has broad long leaves.” “Heh! That’s maize,” Saw said.

Big Ian stepped between Saw Cooper and Mr. Smith. “Now, lad,” he said flatly, “tha said corn, and Ah heeard thee. Thee and thy orinjis, and farming out o’ t watter tap, and brigs ovver cities, and it nivver rains, and denying th’ art a Yankee, and a billion is a billion and yet it ain’t. Tha’t tripped thysen oop a dozen times, it seems to me. Now, hesta owt to say?” Mr. Smith looked at Big Ian, standing belligerently with legs wide spread and his thumbs in the waistband of his corduroy trousers. He looked round and saw everyone in the inn waiting, silent.

Then a curious thing happened. In that minute the smell of soft-

coal smoke and pig-twist tobacco and ale was gone, and instead Mr.

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541

land and citrus

blossom and jasmine and eucalyptus trees, just as you smell it in the cool darkness coming across the San Fernando Valley. And he was homesick. Suddenly it felt unreal that he should be so far from home, sitting in an English inn with these men about him. He looked up at the faces, forbidding in their expression of disapproval. And he began to laugh. It was all so unreal that he laughed until he cried. Every time he looked up he saw the faces, now even more comical in their bewilderment than they had been in their disapproval. They stared at him, and then Big Ian began to laugh.

“Eigh, Ah’ll be jiggered!” he roared. “Drat ma buttons if Ah won't!” It was Mr. Smith’s turn to be puzzled now. Big Ian roared, and suddenly slapped Mr. Smith on the back so heartily that his chin flew up in the air and then banged back on his chest. The others looked on in amazement. “Why, whet’s oop, Ian?” Saw asked. “Why, ye gowks!” Ian roared. “He’s laughing at ye! He’s been heving us on! Sitting theer for an hour, keeping his mug straight and telling us the tale! And us swallering it, thinking he was serious!” “But,” Mr. Smith said—“but you don’t—” “Nay, now no moar on it!” Ian roared. ‘“Ye’ve codded us for fair, and done it champion! Lewk at owd Sam’s face!” The others regarded Ian and scratched their heads and grinned sheepishly, and finally looked at Mr. Smith in admiration. “But—” Mr. Smith began again. “Nay, now, ye copped us napping,” Ian said, “and here’s ma hand on it. Soa we'll hev noa moar—onless ye’d likt to tell us whet Yankeeland’s rightly like.”

Mr. Smith drew a deep breath. “Well, what would you like to hear about?” “About cowboys,” young Gollicker breathed. “Werta ivver a cowboy?” For a moment Mr. Smith stood on a brink, and then an imp pushed him over. “Of course I’ve been a cowboy—naturally,” Mr. Smith said. “What would you like to hear about it?”

“Wait a minute,” Gollicker said. They all adjusted themselves on the bench. “Now,” he went on, “tell us about a roundup—tha knaws, ‘Ah’m heading for t’ last roundup,’ like Bing Crosby sings.” Mr. Smith held his mental breath and plunged.

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“Ah,” he said. “A roundup and the life of a cowboy. Up at the crack of dawn, mates, and down to the corral. There you rope your horse—” “A mustang?” Gollicker asked. “A mustang,” Mr. Smith agreed. “A wild one off’n the prairies, happen?” “Indeed a wild one from off the prairies,” Mr. Smith agreed. “I see you know America yourself.” Gollicker grinned modestly. “Doan’t let me interrupt, measter,’ he apologized. Mr. Smith drew another breath. He saw he was up against at least

one expert, so he made it very good. He gave them in more senses

than one, a moving picture of the cowboy’s life.

When he was done, Gollicker sighed and Big Ian nodded. “Now,” Sam said, “how “Ah, the buffalo,” Mr. bison! For a while there herds were dying out. But

about them buffalo?” Smith said. “The thundering herd! The was danger, or thought to be—that the now, I am glad to say—and no doubt you

are just as glad to hear—the herds are increasing, and ere long, again the crack of a rifle will bring down a bull in full gallop.” “But how about them Indians?” Saw put in. Mr. Smith considered the Indians at the station in Santa Fe. They didn’t seem at all satisfactory. But he was inspired. He drew himself up. You will pardon me if I do not speak of that,” he said. “We have not too much love for the paleface who stole our lands. I say ‘we,’ for my mother was Yellow Blanket, a princess of the Blackfoot tribe. Therefore, let us not speak of the white man and the red man.” He stared into the fire—majestically, he hoped. “Now, see what tha’s done?” Ian said to Saw. “Happen it'll learn thee to keep thy yapper shut once in a while. . . . Tha maun excuse him, measter. Tell us about gangsters instead. Didta ivver run into

any gangsters?” “Run into them? Why, how could you help it?” Mr. Smith asked. Swiftly and graphically he painted for them an America in which here was the town where the bullets of the gangs crackled day and night. Here was the last street, and on it the last house, and beyond that was the trackless prairie where the buffalo thundered, the cowboy rode and the Indian ever lurked. As he finished, he looked up. Everyone in the inn was listening. At the bar, the maid leaned on her elbows, entranced.

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“Ah, I talk too much,” Mr. Smith said. “Nay, goa on, lad,” they said. “Goa on.” “Well, it’s dry work. How about a drink?” “Champion,” said Saw. “Owd on,” Big Ian said. “Us’ll play darts for a round.” “Now, Ian, if the lad wants to buy—” : “Ah said,” Ian repeated, “us’ll play darts—onybody that wishes to bein ont’ round. And ¢’ loser will pay.” Mr. Smith paid anyhow, for the dart game was trickier than he had thought, and they all seemed to be experts. He was getting very much better when the barmaid called: “Time, gentlemen, please.” Mr. Smith was sorry. It had been a good evening. They all said good night cheerfully. Big Ian shook him by the hand. “Well, soa long, lad. We had a champion time. But Ah just want to say, tha didn’t fool me when tha were kidding us at first. Tha sees, for one thing, us goas to t’ pictures and so us knaws whet America’s really like. And then Ah’d allus heard tell that all Yankees were liars.” “Yes,” Mr. Smith said, regarding his conscience, “I did tell some lies.” “Aye, but Ah suppose it’s a way ye Yankees have,” Ian said. “But it’s all right as long as tha told us t’ trewth finally.”

Put the Hand to the Mouth

“i= ARTHUR KOBER Pa Gross lowered his newspaper and then looked at his watch. The time must have been a cue for a yawn because he emitted one so long and loud that his daughter, Bella, seated on the sofa with Mr. Kaplan, dropped whatever she was saying to glare at him. “Father!” she exclaimed, and then quickly changed her tone to one of attempted sweetness. “Is that nice?” “Ha?” he asked, sleepily. “I said something wrong maybe?” “You just yawned,” replied his daughter. “Oh,” said Mr. Gross relieved. “Tf you’re so sleepy why don’tcha go to bed?” asked Bella. “You think maybe I’m gung to stay up a whole night like a fat polissman? What am I, a dope? Sure ’m gung to bed.” He tried to stifle another yawn but failed. “Parm me, Mr. Kaplan,” he apolo-

gized. “‘It’s—how you say?—it’s the hour and not the company.” “That’s awright,” Mr. Kaplan replied magnanimously. He then made a sweeping movement with his left arm, peeled back his cuff, and looked at his watch. “Say,” he said, “I had no idear it was so late like this. I betta be goin’.” He took Bella’s hand and squeezed it. “T gotta get to the awfice early. You know, on account the date with

Mr. Mandelbaum, the buyer fomm Rivkin Brothers and Jacoby.” “Oh, don’t go yet,” pleaded Bella. “It’s early.” “Tt’s nearly twelffa clock,” her father said. “Yeah, I betta be goin’.” Mr. Kaplan was reaching for his hat which was resting on a chair. “You know how it is,” he added. “Business before pleasure, and I gotta see Mr. Mandelbaum, the buyer fomm

Rivkin Brothers and Jacoby.” Bella cast an indignant eye at her father. He merely shrugged his shoulders and looked away. Mr. Kaplan was searching for something. “Now, where did I leave my umbrella?” he asked, looking around, “I’m sure I brought my umbrella with me.” Pa Gross, happy that the conversation had taken another turn, poked his head into the closet. “Y’ know something, Mr. Kaplan. If my Missus puts away a thing, nobody can find it. Look high, look

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low, look today, look temorreh, and nobody can find it. Sometimes she can’t even find it herself. Oh, Ma!” he suddenly shouted. Mrs. Gross came running out of the bedroom. ‘“What’sa metta? Is boining some place a fire?” she asked, pinning her kimono at the

neck. “Look the geshrei he’s making. The whole house the boss is

waking up with his noise awready. What’sa metta, Mr. Boss, is maybe the mettress making a fire by you in bed?”

“Mr. Kaplan wants his umbrella. Where you put his umbrella?” Pa Gross asked.

“Where I put his umbrella?” his wife repeated. “In my pockitbook I put his umbrella. By me in the stocking I put his umbrella. In my icebox in kitchen I put his umbrella. Where I put his umbrella!”

She gave her husband a withering look and headed for the closet.

“You ain’t got eyes, you can’t see? You maybe blind in the head, God fabbid? You can’t look in closet?” “I looked in closet awready,” Mr. Gross said. Before he could go on his wife had fished the missing umbrella out of the closet. “You looked in closet,” she said, contemptuously. “Put betta the umbrella in a piece newspaper so you can read it, and then see how quick you find it.” Mr. Kaplan, his umbrella restored, again looked at his wrist watch. “You must excuse me, folks, but I gotta run along. You see, I got a date tomorra mornin’ with Mr. Mandelbaum, the buyer fomm Rivkin Brothers and Jacoby. Well, goodbye, Mrs. Gross. Goodbye, Mr. Gross.” “Goodbye,” Pa started to say, but it was lost in an uncontrolled yawn. “Goodbye,” said Mrs. Gross. “Come up sometimes fa a bite soppur. Poison you wouldn’t get, I guarantee you.” “O.K.,” said Mr. Kaplan. “Tl take you up on that one a these days.” Bella started for the hallway. “Oh, don’t bother. I can find my way out. So long. I’ll see you at the awfice tomorra.” “A fine boy, that salesman,” said Mrs. Gross, approvingly. “He talks like he got a good head on him.” Bella waited until she heard the door slam and then turned on her father. ““That’s a nice way to disgrace me in fronta Mr. Kaplan,” she exclaimed, indignantly. “Yawning and yawning like you haven’t got the lease bitta manners. That makes a mighty good impression, I must say. That makes Mr. Kaplan think I was brought up, not in a house, but in a—a stable, excuse the expression.”

Mr. Gross clapped his hand to his forehead. “Lieber Gott, what

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I done? So I was slippy. So by me I yawned. Mr. Kaplan, he never yawned in his whole life maybe?” “I can’t have a guest in the house without somebody disgracing me

in fronta them.” Bella was now almost in tears. “No wonder I got

no boy friends. No wonder all my girl friends are engaged and they

got engagement rings, four- and six-carat stones, excepting me. Ev-

vey time I get a nice fella and bring him to the house, somebody gotta do something to give him a bad impression of my own father.”

Mrs. Gross looked at her husband with flashing eyes. “It hoits you to put your hend bime mouth and say, ‘Excuse me. Parm me?’ Is maybe not big enough the hend fa the mouth? Lookit the boss with

his big mouth. If it’s not coming out words fomm his mouth is coming out yawns. What’sa metta, Mr. Boss, it bleeds by you the hend maybe, you can’t cover up the big mouth?” “What homm I done?” Mr. Gross protested. ““The man, he never seen nobody slippy making yawns?” Bella was still basking in self-pity. “I guess if I’m an old maid and

you got me on your hands the rest of my life, I guess then you'll be satisfied, ha? I guess you'll be mighty happy then, ha?” ‘All he knows is to read and sit and to eat,” Mrs. Gross said. “It’s a lucky thing he din take off his clothes and go to slipp in Mr. Kaplan’s face.” “So what I done, fa heaven’s sakes?” Pa Gross cried. “So I yawned. Fa heaven’s sakes, how many times Mexie Fine seen me yawning? And still and all Mexie’s kipping company with you.” “He’s not keeping company with me!” Bella shouted. “Mac can

go to hell and die fa all I care. Just because you like him and he comes here evvey night to fill up his stomick with food, that don’t say I’m gonna marry him. If you like Mac so much, you can have him. He can ast me a hundritt times to marry him and still I don’t want him.” “What’sa metta, this Mr. Kaplan, he’s betta? Is betta a salesman to have than a collitch boy? Is nice a salesman who goes on the road and lives you know what kine life with drinking and gambling? That’s betta to have?” “A million times better,” she retorted. “I don’t care what kinda life he leads, see? I don’t care if he spends all his money on drinking

and gambling, see? If Mr. Kaplan woulda ast me to marry him right now this minute, I’d marry him. And hoddeya like that?” This was more than even Mrs. Gross could stand. “Shut up that

fresh little mouth, you doity slop, you! Is this a nice way to talk?

PUT

THE

HAND

TO

THE

MOUTH

Is this refined, this talk? Where

547

you get such things—fomm

the

books you all the time reading you loin such fresh talk?”

“Bring that man to the house again,” declared Mr. Gross, “and I'll kick you and him out the house together. I'll kick—” At this point he emitted a violent sneeze. “Gesundheit!” said Bella out of habit. “Thank you,” replied her father, and then resumed the irate tone he was using. “Shame on yesself, you fresh thing, you! You and Kaplan, you both in the same hear?”

cless. I'll kick you both out. You

“Who wantsta stay here anyhow?” Bella was now in tears. “I guess if I ran off with him and lived with him without even a marriage license certificate, I guess you’d feel mighty sorry then. And when the reporters came and I told them who’s to blame, I guess you'd wish you’d left me alone. But it’ll be too late then!” And with that she ran into the bedroom slamming the door behind her. “Such a mouth! Such a tongue!” Mrs. Gross shook her head and sighed. ‘““Where she loins about them things?” “Children!” Pa Gross said. “A boggain, children! It pays to have children!” “She can’t lom them things fomm you and she can’t loin them fomm me. Where she loins them things, fa heaven’s sakes?” “Next time when she talks so fresh, Pll put her on my knees and give her a strap, big as she is!” “This is all your fault,” said his wife. “Maybe this will be a lesson

to you. The lesson is, next time put the hend to the mouth when you yawn.” “No,” said Pa Gross, reaching for his newspaper. “The lesson is, next time when Mr. Kaplan wants his umbrella, Pll give him his umbrella—over his no-good, fresh head, that’s where [ll give him his umbrella!

1!”

On Speaking Russian ote ie J. M. KUCERA

ENTIRELY

TOO

MANY

Americans

and Englishmen

say,

“T just can’t figure out Russia,” and let the matter drop right there. That’s all wrong, since there’s not an American nor Englishman living who couldn’t get along famously with the inhabitants of the land behind the Iron Curtain if only he would take the trouble to learn a little bit of the Muscovite tongue. With this in mind, I submit the following simplified Russian-English conversation guide

which anyone can clip out and carry with him, in case he has to go to Russia.

English

Russian 6) 6)(01 610, 60,0 6

6) 8) 8).0)'6 Ole 10! e) 6

Sp\0 1@)16,50 05,6, 0) C16, One! of 6.0.10

eof ele

Caught you, didn’t I? I find your story difficult to be-

lieve, sir (madam). Hey mac!

..

Ce

ey

May I have a word with you, sir?

Certainly. What can I do for you? (et @) 0 (616)

obdubb6u!

3cHAM, BuB!

0: 'e, e160) -@) 16.6110) 0) 6) 6) ©

Cy

0.0: #6 (0, @: 6).

eave) 16:10) 16) ee) es 6

I find that perfectly agreeable. My, what a charming girl! I'm growing weary of your company.

The Seal That Couldn’t Swim wits ae ALEXIS LADAS Ir 1s disproportionately distressing to me to hear people confusing ordinary seals with sea lions. Sea lions balance things and blow horns at circuses. They are slapstick clowns. Seals are sadeyed creatures full of pathos and sentimentality. Clowns they may be, but of the school of Emmett Kelly. Their humor is often mixed

with tears. If they had any musical talent it would be to sing “Sonny Boy.” They don’t grin like sea lions; they smile, and that rarely. Mostly they look helpless and forlorn. At least that is how Panayoti looked most of the time. Devotion and a passionate need to be loved seemed to be the mainsprings of his character, but perhaps that was because he had lost his mother when he was still very young and I had saved him from a dreadful death at the hands of the fishermen who had found him in a cave. I say “him,” although I never found out what his sex really was; probably because when I first saw him he looked and acted like a frightened little boy who is trying his best to be brave. In those days I was abysmally ignorant about seals. I had no idea what I was letting myself in for when I ordered that the creature be

brought aboard my raiding schooner. The last thing that crossed my mind when I determined to adopt Panayoti was that I would pass the closing phases of the war in the Aegean playing nursemaid to an inexperienced seal and have to face something approaching mutiny

among my crew. All that I knew was that it was intolerable to watch a helpless little creature left to die of thirst under a pile of stones in a sun-baked courtyard. My blood boiled at the thought that SIX brawny fishermen were too superstitious to dare to kill the little animal outright, but had to immure it collectively so that the bad luck would be spread among them. Greek fishermen are poorer and more omen-ridden than most seafaring people, so it is not surprising that they both hate and fear seals.

The Mediterranean seal (Monachus albiventer, the white-bellied monk, the solitary one) is a clever animal. Long ago he discovered that it is much easier for him to gather the fish that are caught in nets

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than to go chasing after free ones. Monachus is neither very consid-

erate nor very finicky, and he has extremely sharp teeth. When he

gets into a net and starts feeding, he doesn’t trouble to disentangle

the fish. He simply swallows them, together with large pieces of the net itself. Often the net is ruined beyond repair, and nets are a fisherman’s livelihood. They are also expensive. Thus in a Greek fishing village the cry “Seal!” is a cry of despair.

The superstitious dread in which the creatures are held is just as

real as the hate, although it is more complicated to explain and more difficult to understand. Twice in his life the porter at my grandmother’s house in Athens, who had once been a schooner captain, had put back into harbor at great expense because when he set out a seal had crossed his bow. The loss.of his ship in a collision, he was

unshakably convinced, was due to his having ignored a third such warning.

It was from him that I first heard the old, old story of the Gorgon, that monstrous mermaid who frequents the blue Aegean Sea. She rises out of the water and stops ships with her hand. She looks into

the eyes of the captain and asks him whether Alexander the Great 1s alive. If he says, “Yes. He is alive and reigning,” she lets the ship go on its way. If he has not heard of the legend and says “No,” then he and his ship are dragged down to the depths. The legend is that Alexander acquired a tiny phial of water from the spring of immortality. His sister found it in a cupboard and drank it out of curiosity. When Alexander was on his deathbed, he called for the water and was told that his sister had drunk it. With his dying breath he cursed her. In desperation she tried to kill herself by jumping off a cliff into the sea. Since she had drunk the water, it did no good, and she has lived ever since with her intolerable guilt. From time to time she rises to the surface, hoping to find some seaman who will tell her that Alexander did not die. How it has happened that a seal should be identified with a mermaid, the mermaid with a snake-haired monster of antiquity, and that monster with the great Alexander’s sister, I don’t know. I don’t suppose anybody knows just how beliefs are changed and molded and transferred. But to the old schooner captain there was no in-

congruity in believing simultaneously that the little round head which showed for a moment among the waves was both an animal of no great strength and a female demon who could root his ship to the spot. And he was no exception among Greek seamen. But I myself did not learn all these things until later, and as far as seals went I lived in a fool’s paradise. First of all, I was under the

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illusion that they knew how to swim and that they lived on fish. It never occurred to me that these things did not come naturally. All I had wanted to do was to rescue Panayoti, provide him with a good meal of fish to restore his strength, and then give him his freedom. I was quickly disabused.

From the very first moment everything went wrong. To begin

with I antagonized the whole village by curtly ordering the fisher-

men to deliver the seal to me. They may have been too frightened to

kill the seal outright, but they were

damned

if a young

whipper-

snapper of a reserve lieutenant would boss them around, even if he did control the hungry island’s supply of food and had enough fire power at his command to blast the village to hell. What is more, my own crew was not at all enthusiastic. Since I could not very well open hostilities with my countrymen

over a seal, I found myself in the position of having to swallow my anger and negotiate. The villagers for their part did not wish to press matters too far. After a decent interval the fishermen offered to sell me the seal. I paid for him with food which they would have received anyway, together with some discarded clothing, and every-

body’s pride was saved. Panayoti was brought aboard, looking filthy

and miserable after his ordeal. Then and there I found out that I had made a second and more serious mistake. Panayoti simply refused to have anything to do with

the fish which I bought for his dinner. Every time I offered him one he would turn his head away and start crying. The noise he made was heartbreaking—something between the wail of a baby and the bleat of a lamb. I tried everything. I rubbed his nose with the fish, but he only cried louder. I pushed the fish into his mouth. He spat it out. Thinking that perhaps the fish was too big for him to swallow, I cut it up into small pieces and tried to force them down his throat. He spat them out too. I decided that the only thing to do was to let Panayoti go on his way without a meal, since probably he preferred to catch his own fish. I dropped Panayoti overboard, expecting to see him streak off. The next thing I knew he was drowning: his head went down and

his tail flippers came up out of the water. They beat wildly for a time, then more and more feebly. A stream of bubbles rose from his mouth. There could be no doubt that Panayoti did not know how to swim. I dove overboard and fished him out, which took some doing, since he was very slippery and I didn’t know then that the best way to pick up a seal is from under the flippers, the way one picks up a baby. Besides, I was still not at all sure he wouldn’t bite.

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I needn’t have worried. The poor creature was more dead than alive when I got him aboard again. I was afraid he might die and gave him artificial respiration as best I could. After a while he revived and started crying again weakly, moving his head from side to side in the most dejected manner. In a few minutes he seemed completely recovered and went crawling about the deck in that hopelessly inept, broken-boned way seals have out of the water. But at least he was clean now and his fur was fluffing up in the sunshine, turning from black to a soft dove gray on top and ivory underneath.

By then it had belatedly occurred to me that Panayoti was only a baby. I know it sounds stupid that I had not thought of it earlier, but I had never seen a seal before and I had no basis for comparison. A length of nearly three feet did not seem to me conclusive one way or the other. I began suspecting it when I found out, on trying to feed him more fish, that he had no teeth. So I tried milk. First I

gave him some in a saucer, but he only turned away and spilled it with his flippers. Then I made a feeding bottle out of an empty gin bottle with a nipple made from the little finger of a rubber glove which we used for handling the smoke-screen apparatus. It was a complete flop. Panayoti didn’t even want to look at it. The mere sight sent him into tantrums. He became hysterical when I tried to force the nipple into his mouth and went dragging himself round and round in circles across the deck screaming his head off. More in self-defense than from compassion I opened a can of New Zealand butter, of which we had a lot, and stuffed his mouth full of it. He spat most of it out, but a good deal stuck and for a time he was too busy choking and spitting to make much noise. He was so quiet that I almost forgot about him, and when I looked for him later I discovered to my delight that he was engaged in licking the butter off his nose. I spent the rest of the day carrying the can of butter around with me and smearing Panayoti’s nose every time I passed him. Since this method could not be used in the darkness and Panayoti was still very hungry, nobody got much sleep that night. The following day I decided that a new system had to be devised. It was, after all, unseemly for a raiding captain to spend his time buttering the nose of a seal, nor could I very well ask any of my sailors to take over the duty. Watching Panayoti crawling over the deck in his endless rounds, it occurred to me that a self-smearing technique could be devised. If a part of the deck were enclosed with cases to limit him in his movements, and pats of butter were scattered at

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random all over it, he was bound to run into some of them and butter his nose automatically. It worked like a dream. Then there was an alarm. The lookout reported an unidentified vessel on the horizon. I ordered action stations and the men streamed aft to man the machine guns. Those on the starboard side forgot

about the butter in their excitement and ended up in a cursing, tangled heap in the scuppers. The boatswain, a very irascible man, was among them. When he managed to pick himself up, dripping butter, he scowled at me and delivered himself of a dire prophecy: “Tt was an evil day when you brought that animal aboard. It will go ill with us, Captain, but with you worst of all. Mark my words,” and he stalked off. By good fortune the ship which had caused all the commotion turned out to be one of ours, and the incident fizzled out. But the obvious drawback of slippery decks gave me a brilliant idea. I drilled a hole in the deckhouse wall near the level of the deck and stuffed it full of butter, leaving a big, tempting pat on the outside. When Panayoti eventually found it and began to suck, I dashed down into my cabin and very gently inserted the nipple of the milk bottle into the hole. Finally all the butter was gone, but Panayoti kept on sucking, and, triumph of triumphs, the milk in the bottle started going, at first slowly and then, as he got a taste for it, so fast that I thought for a minute the nipple had come off. When I saw the last drops disappear I was exultant. I filled the bottle again and scrambled up on deck thinking that all I had to do now was offer Panayoti the bottle and he would feed. Not at all. The moment he saw it he set up an ungodly racket and crawled away. I tried all sorts of ruses. Nothing worked. It was mortifying and also extremely undignified. The original curiosity of the men was rapidly giving way to surreptitious snickers. So I decided to go to extreme lengths. I had the carpenter make a sort of wooden shield with a hole in the middle, which I stuffed with butter. For a couple of days I left it standing in the same place until

Panayoti got used to it. Then I let him go for 24 hours without any butter until he was good and hungry. His complaints were

heart-

rending, but I was adamant. On the following day I passed the nipple through the hole, covering the projecting end with butter and advanced upon Panayoti, hidden behind the shield. It was absurd but effective. Panayoti made a beeline for the butter and began to suck. No sooner had he taken one swallow than I pulled the bottle away and slid the shield aside. Panayoti gave a cry of anger and frustration,

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but before he could do anything else I stuck the nipple into his open mouth. For a moment he looked surprised. Then he settled down to sucking steadily, eyes closed and a beatific expression on his face. That was the first time I saw Panayoti smile. From that day on the feeding problem ceased to exist and he started gaining rapidly in size and strength. Our relationship also became much more intimate, not to say exclusive. Panayoti had at last become convinced that he had a friend in the world, and Panayoti was not a seal to do things by halves. His gratitude and affection

were embarrassing. He would not let me out of his sight. When I was standing on deck, day or night, he would come and rest his head on my bare feet. If I moved he gave forth pathetic little moans. To avoid hurting his feelings I often found myself rooted to the same spot for what seemed like hours. To stumble into him, as I

often did on dark nights, was a major calamity. It upset him terribly, and he would go on whimpering until he was picked up and comforted. As his strength and devotion grew, he would not even let me go down into my cabin unescorted. When I was below for only a few minutes, laying a course or checking a bearing, he would get so

restless and unhappy that he even overcame his dislike of heights. He would come to the open hatchway and cry. If I paid no attention he would wriggle forward over the combing until he overbalanced and slid forward down the ladder to land at my feet with a bump. I often watched him at it from between parted fingers. He obviously did not like doing it. He always looked miserable and reproachful as he prepared to take the plunge, and at the last moment just as he was about to tip forward, he always closed his eyes tight. But apparently being picked up and stroked was compensation enough. The matter of getting out of the cabin up the almost perpendicular ladder was something else again. That he never mastered. He always had to be lifted out. Sliding down into the cabin and setting up a to-do until he was taken out was nuisance enough, particularly if it happened at night when we were sailing and had to keep our ears open for the first, faint sound of enemy engines. But when he took to falling overboard every time I rowed away in the dinghy or went swimming over the side, it became really insufferable; for in spite of several unpleasant experiences, Panayoti had learned neither how to swim nor the obvious truth that he couldn’t. He had to be rescued from drowning every time.

THE

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5D.

In desperation I decided to teach him how to swim. Every morning after the schooner was moored against the rocks and camouflaged under nets, after the machine guns were emplaced and the lookouts posted, I took Panayoti in the dinghy to some secluded cove. First we began in the shallows with Panayoti barely awash. I would walk away on the beach following the edge of the sea, and Panayoti would try to wriggle after me, splashing and thrashing about in the foot-deep water. As often as not he would give up his allegedly native element and crawl out onto the sand. If he didn’t,

the lesson usually ended up with his swallowing a mouthful of water and choking. If I set him out on the sand and went and squatted in the water a few feet away, he would try to come to me. All went well until he got beyond the:depth of his flippers. Then his head went down and he had to be pulled out by the tail. It never fazed him. After I had picked him up and he had spluttered for a few seconds, he would put his head on my shoulder and nuzzle my neck contentedly. In spite of the disappointing results, I persevered with the lessons, using every method that I had ever heard of. I took him out beyond his depth and held him under the chin while swimming away backward. In the beginning this seemed promising. He began to move his flippers in a reasonable imitation of a swimming stroke, and his tail assembly, that absurd appendage which on dry land looked more like the wet hem of a skirt than anything else, became an admirably contrived instrument of propulsion. The trouble was his head. Whenever I let go of him it sank like a piece of lead and his tail beat uselessly in the air. | even strapped a Mae West on him, but he was so slippery in the water that after a few minutes it worked loose, and he slid out of it head-first to assume his usual perpendicular position. Then one night we had an unpleasant experience. We were making a long crossing to one of the more distant islands, in company with another schooner, and we were caught in the open by a German Ems Craft. Being shelled at night on the sea by a more powerful

enemy vessel against which you have no means of retaliating is very unnerving. We spent a desperate half-hour dodging right and left until the Germans lost us in the darkness. In the morning when we had made port the atmosphere on the schooner was distinctly ominous. Much as I tried to laugh it off it was clear that the crew attributed the previous night’s alarms to the presence of a seal aboard. This was a serious matter, for a discontented crew could mean

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Alexis Ladas

disaster. I was a worried man when my fellow captain hailed me and invited me to go swimming. I put Panayoti in the dinghy and rowed across. My friend and I discussed our narrow escape and my crew’s disaffection as we swam slowly round and round, with Panayoti propped

up in the dinghy’s stern, watching our every movement. We got so engrossed in our conversation we did not realize the boat was drifting further and further away, until with a splash Panayoti, unable to stand the separation any longer, slipped overboard. We dashed to rescue him, but he had disappeared. We dived and dived. There wasn’t a trace of him. Then my friend pointed with his hand and shouted, “There he is!” A hundred yards away a little black head was bobbing up and down among the waves at the mouth of the cove. I was torn between a terrible sense of loss and the joy of know-

ing that Panayoti had come into his own at last. After all, I thought, this was the best, the only way, for it to end. I waved to him, and he disappeared. My friend and I stood treading water, both of us wondering,

I

suppose, whether Panayoti was well enough equipped to face the challenge of the open sea, when, with a flurry of churning waves, his glossy head bobbled up between us. His face wore the broadest, most triumphant smile I have ever seen. He kept on looking from

one of us to the other, his whiskers twitching with excitement, his round eyes opened wide as if to say, “You see, I’ve done it.” Then, as though he needed to prove the point, he dived, nipped me playfully in the calf and was off at such speed that I had hardly time to turn around before he had served my friend in the same way. We tried to catch him but he always slipped between our fingers. He darted through our legs and brushed across our backs; he dived, he leaped out of the water, and every now and then he surfaced to look at us and make sure that we were enjoying it too. Then he’d be off again like a cockeyed torpedo. We spent a wildly exciting quarter of an hour until he got tired and came to me and put his flippers on my shoulders, wanting to be lifted back into the dinghy. From that time on the days became one long delight. We were in the water whenever we had a chance. From early morning Panayoti would start worrying me to take him swimming, and by nightfall we were both exhausted.

Fortunately the war in the Aegean was drawing to its close and all we had to do was follow the retreating Germans. Even so, fate had some further blows in store for us. A fierce gale sprang up one night and separated us from the rest of the flotilla. A man was in-

THE

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57

jured falling from the mast. Another was killed in an encounter with a German patrol vessel. And the temper of the crew grew uglier and uglier. One night while I was below they picked up Panayoti and dropped him overboard. I missed him half an hour later and much to their disgust put back and found him in the darkness by his cries. He had been desperately trying to keep up with us and was utterly exhausted. The following day they sent a deputation

to me to say the seal must go or else. I told them to be their age

and sent them packing. But I don’t know what would have happened if the war had lasted longer. Even so, I had a very hard time of it for the few remaining days.

To make things worse Panayoti was growing teeth and he began

to bite. It was all in fun, but it could be very painful. It was this new development which put an end to his career aboard one of His Hellenic Majesty’s men o’ war.

Our commanding officer was a brave and charming man, but somewhat pompous and with a passion for showing off. As we approached Athens he put his miserable little flotilla of raiding schooners through fleet maneuvers. Now that the danger of enemy aircraft was passed he made us practice blue turns and white turns and lines ahead and lines abreast until our heads were spinning. Then, on the day of liberation when we anchored off Piraeus harbor, he went ashore and returned to carry out an inspection, accompanied by several dignitaries and some pretty lady friends. We had to pipe him aboard with our men in summer whites drawn up at the rail as if we were real warships and not filthy little wooden death traps. The men were understandably angry. After so many years we were returning home as liberators, but instead of being allowed to go ashore we had to be stared at like strange animals and listen to a silly speech about the gratitude of our country. It was at this stage that Panayoti intervened. The captain was delivering his oration when Panayoti crept up behind him and bit him smartly in the calf. There was a most undignified yowl of pain and the speech came to an abrupt end. The men had a hard time of it trying to hide their grins. Afterward they came one by one, the boatswain first, and patted Panayoti on the head. The commanding officer said nothing

at the time of the incident, but a few hours later I received a curt, formal signal ordering Panayoti ashore forthwith. For one last time I tried to coax Panayoti into starting a new life on his own, but he would have none of it. So having no choice I decided to take him to Athens with me. Taxis were scarce and when we finally got one, seven of us piled into it. I sat in front

Alexis Ladas

558 with three others and with Panayoti on my lap. ous and kept sticking his head out of the window When we arrived at my aunt’s apartment the the door nearly fainted at the sight of the seal.

managed to overcome

He was very curlthe way dogs do. maid who opened My aunt too only

her revulsion for a rather grimy Panayott

because of her great pleasure at seeing me return from the wars. But she put her foot down when I suggested that Panayoti should be bathed in the bathtub. We struck a compromise eventually, and a tin hip bath was brought out to the balcony overlooking the street. Panayoti hated getting soap in his eyes and started an awful

ruckus. The strange bleatings attracted the attention of the people

sitting on their balconies in the flats above my aunt’s, and they leaned over to see what it was all about. The sight of so many people staring at something that was going on above the street intrigued the passers-by and soon a large enough crowd had formed in the street below to block the traffic. Drivers, after honking their horns futilely for a while, got out and joined the others. The people in the street started calling up to those in the balconies above, “What is it?” The people in the balconies answered, “We’re not sure. We think it’s a seal,” and presently the whole crowd started shouting in unison, “Show us the seal!” When [ had rinsed Panayoti, I picked him up from behind and he bowed to the people of Athens right and left as if he were a young prince. He was roundly applauded. Perhaps for many of those people he was a symbol as good as any for the end of the occupation. A seal being bathed on a balcony may not be what one ordinarily conceives of as a return to normalcy, but it was certainly a departure from the grim mood of the previous years. A few days later I was ordered to go on a patrol to the north, where the Germans were still fighting a rear-guard action. I took Panayoti to my mother and left him with her in our home in the country. We put him in a kennel next to the pool so he could take aswim. When I returned a few weeks later, after the last German had been driven out of Greece, my mother told me that Panayoti was dead. The weather had suddenly turned bitter, and she thought that he had died of a cold. She had him buried in the garden at the foot of a young cypress tree. I went to say goodbye and standing next to the little grave with the icy wind moaning mournfully in the branches, I couldn’t help thinking that Panayoti had died of loneliness.

Mr. and Mrs. Fixit

“{ RING LARDNER THEYRE CERTAINLY a live bunch in this town. We ain’t only been here three days and had calls already from people representin’ four different organizations—the Chamber of Commerce, Kiwanis, and I forget who else. They wanted to know if we was comfortable and did we like the town and is they anything they can do for us and what to be sure and see.

And they all asked how we happened to come here instead of goin’ _somewhere else. I guess they keep a record of everybody’s reasons for comin’ so as they can get a line on what features tourists is most attracted by. Then they play up them features in next year’s booster advertisin’. Well, I told them we was perfectly comfortable and we like the town fine and they’s nothin’ nobody can do for us right now and we'll be sure and see all the things we ought to see. But when they asked me how did we happen to come here, I said it was just a kind of a accident, because the real reason makes too long a story. My wife has been kiddin’ me about myfriends ever since we was married. She says that judgin’ by the ones [ve introduced her to, they ain’t nobody in the world got a rummier bunch of friends than me. [ll admit that the most of them ain’t, well, what you might call hot; they’re -different somehow than when I first hung around with them. They seem to be lost without a brass rail to rest their dogs on. But of course they’re old friends and I can’t give ’em the air. We have ’em to the house for dinner every little wile, they and their wives, and what my missus objects to is because they don’t none of them play bridge or mah-jongg or do crossword puzzles or sing or dance or even talk, but just set there and wait for somebody to pour ’em a fresh drink. As I say, my wife kids me about ’em and they ain’t really nothin’ I can offer in their defense. That don’t mean, though, that the shoe is all on one foot. Because w’ile the majority of her friends may not be quite as dumb as mine, just the same they’s a few she’s picked out

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who Id of had to be under the ether to allow anybody to introduce "em to me in the first place. Like the Crandalls, for instance, Mrs. Crandall come from my wife’s home town and they didn’t hardly know each other there, but they met again in a store in Chi and it went from bad to worse till finally Ada asked the dame and her husband to the house. Well, the husband turns out to be the fella that win the war, wile it seems that Mrs. Crandall was in Atlantic City once and some movin’ picture company was makin’ a picture there and they took a

scene of what was supposed to be society people walkin’ up and down the Boardwalk and Mrs. Crandall was in the picture and peo-

ple that seen it when it come out, they all said that from the way she screened, why if she wanted to go into the business, she could make Gloria Swanson look like Mrs. Gump. Now it ain’t only took me a few words to tell you these things, but when the Crandalls tells their story themselves, they don’t hardly

get started by midnight and no chance of them goin’ home till they’re through even when you drop em’ a hint that they’re springin’ it on you for the 112th time. That’s the Crandalls, and another of the wife’s friends is the Thayers. Thayer is what you might call a all-around handy man. He can mimic pretty near all the birds and beasts and fishes, he can yodel, he can play a ocarina, or he can recite Kipling or Robert H. Service, or he can do card tricks, and strike a light without no matches, and tie all the different knots. And besides that, he can make a complete radio outfit and set it up, and take pictures as good as the best professional photographers and a whole lot better. He collects autographs. And he never had a sick day in his life.

Mrs. Thayer gets a headache playin’ bridge, so it’s mah-jongg or rummy when she’s around. She used to be a teacher of elocution she still gives readin’s if you coax her, or if you don’t, and her is such a awful nuisance that she would get it cut in a minute all her friends tells her it would be criminal to spoil that head of And when she talks to her husband, she always talks baby

and hair only hair. talk,

maybe because somebody has told her that they’d be single if he wasn’t childish. And then Ada has got still another pal, a dame named Peggy Flood who is hospital mad and ain’t happy unless she is just goin’ under the knife or just been there. She’s had everything removed that the doctors knew the name of and now they’re probin’ her for new

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Well, I wouldn’t mind if they cut her up into alphabet soup if they’d only do such a good job of it that they couldn’t put her together again, but she always comes through O.K. and she spends the intermissions at our place, describin’ what all they done or what they’re plannin’ to do next. But the cat’s nightgown is Tom Stevens and his wife. There’s the team that wins the Olympics! And they’re Ada’s team, not mine.

Ada met Belle Stevens on the elevated. Ada was invited to a party out on the North Side and didn’t know exactly where to get off and Mrs. Stevens seen her talkin’ to the guard and horned in and asked her what was it she wanted to know and Ada told her, and Mrs. Stevens said she was.goin’ to get off the same station Ada wanted to get off, so they got off together. Mrs. Stevens insisted on goin’ right along to the address where

Ada was goin’ because she said Ada was bound to get lost if she wasn’t familiar with the neighborhood. Well, Ada thought it was mighty nice of her to do so much for a stranger. Mrs. Stevens said she was glad to because she didn’t know ‘what would of happened to her lots of times if strangers hadn’t been nice and helped her out. She asked Ada where she lived and Ada told her on the South Side and Mrs. Stevens said she was sure we’d like it better on the North Side if we'd leave her pick out a place for us, so Ada told her we had a year’s lease that we had just signed and couldn’t break it,

so then Mrs. Stevens said her husband had studied law and he claimed

they wasn’t no lease that you couldn’t break and some evening she would bring him out to call on us and he’d tell us how to break our lease. Well, Ada had to say sure, come on out, though we was perfectly satisfied with our apartment and didn’t no more want to break the lease than each other’s jaw. Maybe not as much. Anyway, the very next night, they showed up. Belle and Tom, and when they’d gone, I give ’em the nickname—Mr. and Mrs. Fixit. After the introductions, Stevens made some remarks about what a cozy little place we had and then he asked if I would mind tellin’ what rent we paid. So I told him a hundred and a quarter a month. So he said, of course, that was too much and no wonder we wanted to break the lease. Then I said we was satisfied and didn’t want to break it and he said I must be kiddin’ and if I would show him the lease he would see what loopholes they was in it. Well, the lease was right there in a drawer in the table, but I told him it was in my safety deposit box at the bank. I ain’t got no safety

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deposit box and no more use for one than Judge Landis has for the AS deef and dumb alphabet. it if and lease regular a just probably was lease the said Stevens meanw’ile and it, of out gettin’ was, they wouldn’t be no trouble him and his wife would see if they couldn’t find us a place in the same buildin’ with them.

And he was pretty sure they could even if the owner had to give

some other tenant the air, because he, the owner, would do anything in the world for Stevens. So I said yes, but suppose we want to stay where we are. So he said I looked like a man with better judgment than that and if I

would just leave everything to him he would fix it so’s we could move within a month. I kind of laughed and thought that would be the end of it. He wanted to see the whole apartment so I showed him around and when we come to the bathroom he noticed my safety razor on the shelf. He said, “So you use one of them things,” and I said, “Ves,” and he asked me how I liked it, and’ I said I liked it fine and he said that must be because I hadn’t never used a regular razor. He said a regular razor was the only thing to use if a man wanted to look good. So I asked him if he used a regular razor and he said he did, so I said, “Well, if you look good, I don’t want to.” é But that didn’t stop him and he said if I would meet him downtown the next day he would take me to the place where he bought all his razors and help me pick some out for myself. I told him I was goin’ to be tied up, so just to give me the name and address of the place and I would drop in there when I had time.

But, no, that wouldn’t do; he’d have to go along with me and introduce me to the proprietor because the proprietor was a great pal of his and would do anything in the world for him, and if the proprietor vouched for the razors, I could be sure I was gettin’ the best razors money could buy. I told him again that I was goin’ to. be tied up and I managed to get him on some other subject. Meanw’ile, Mrs. Stevens wanted to know where Ada had bought the dress she was wearin’ and how much had it cost and Ada told her and Mrs. Stevens said it was a crime. She would meet Ada downtown tomorrow morning and take her to the shop where she bought her clothes and would help her choose some dresses that really was dresses. So Ada told her she didn’t have no money to spend on dresses right then, and then besides, the shop Mrs. Stevens mentioned was too high priced. But it seems the dame that run the shop was just

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like a sister to Mrs. Stevens and give her and her friends a big reduction and not only that, but they wasn’t no hurry about payin’. ~ Well, Ada thanked her just the same, but didn’t need nothin’ new just at present, maybe later on she would take advantage of Mrs. Stevens’ kind offer. Yes, but right now they was some models in stock that would be just beautiful on Ada and they might be gone later on. They was nothin’ for it but Ada had to make a date with

her; she wasn’t obliged to buy nothin’, but it would be silly not to go

and look at the stuff that was in the joint and get acquainted with the dame that run it. Well, Ada kept the date and bought three dresses she didn’t want and they’s only one of them she’s had the nerve to wear. They cost her a hundred dollars a smash and I'd hate to think what the price would of been if Mrs. Stevens and the owner of the shop wasn’t so much like sisters. I was sure I hadn’t made no date with Stevens, but just the same he called me up the next night to ask why I hadn’t met him. And a

couple of days later I got three new razors in the mail along with a

bill and a note from the store sayin’ that these was three specially

fine razors that had been picked out for me by Thomas J. Stevens.

I don’t know yet why I paid for the razors and kept ’em. I ain’t used ’em and never intended to. Though I’ve been tempted a few times to test their edge on Stevens’ neck. That same week, Mrs. Stevens called up and asked us to spend Sunday with them and when we got out there, the owner of the buildin’ is there, too. And Stevens had told him that I was goin’ to give up my apartment on the South Side and wanted him to show me what he had. I thought this was a little too strong and I said Stevens must of misunderstood me, that I hadn’t no fault to find with the place I was in and wasn’t plannin’ to move, not for a year anyway. You can bet this didn’t make no hit with the guy, who was just there on Stevens’s say-so that I was a prospective tenant. Well, it was only about two months ago that this cute little couple come into our life, but I’ll bet we seen ’em twenty times at least. They was always invitin’ us to their place or invitin’ themselves to our place and Ada is one of these here kind of people that just can’t say no. Which may be why I and her is married. Anyway, it begins to seem like us and the Stevenses was livin’ together and all one family, with them at the head of it. I never in my life seen anybody as crazy to run other people’s business. Honest to heavens, it’s a wonder they let us brush our own teeth!

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Ada made the remark one night that she wished the ski jumper who was doin’ our cookin’ would get married and quit so’s she wouldn’t have to can her. Mrs. Stevens was there and asked Ada if she should try and get her a new cook, but Ada says no, the poor

gal might have trouble findin’ another job and she felt sorry for her. Just the same, the next afternoon a Jap come to the apartment and said he was ready to go to work and Mrs. Stevens had sent him. Ada had to tell him the place was already filled. Another night, Ada complained that her feet was tired. Belle said her feet used to get tired, too, till a friend of hers recommended a chiropodist and she went to him and he done her so much good that she made a regular appointment with him for once every month and paid him a flat sum and no matter how much runnin’ around she done, her dogs hadn’t fretted her once since this corn-husker started tendin’ to ’em. She wanted to call up the guy at his house right then and there and make a date for Ada and the only way Ada could stop her was by promisin’ to go and see him the next time her feet hurt. After that, whenever the two gals met, Belle’s first question was “How is your feet?” and the answer was always “Fine, thanks.” Well, ’'m quite a football fan and Ada likes to go, too, when it’s a big game and lots of excitement. So we decided we'd see the IllinoisChicago game and have a look at this “Red” Grange. I warned Ada to not say nothin’ about it to Tom and Belle as I felt like we was

entitled to a day off. But it happened that they was goin’ to be a game at Evanston that day and the Stevenses invited us to see that one with them. So we used the other game as a alibi. And when Tom asked me later on if I'd boughten my tickets yet, instead of sayin’ yes, I told him the truth and said no. So then he said: “[m glad you ain’t, because I and Belle has made up our mind that the Chicago game is the one we ought to see. And we'll all go together. And don’t you bother about tickets because I can get better ones than you can as Stagg and [is just like that.” So I left it to him to get the tickets and we might as well of set on the Adams Street bridge. I said to Stevens, I said: “If these is the seats Mr. Stagg digs up for his old pals, I suppose he leads strangers twenty or thirty miles out in the country and blindfolds ’em and ties ’em to a tree.”

Now of course it was the bunk about he and Stagg bein’ so close. He may of been introduced to him once, but he ain’t the kind of a

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guy that Stagg would go around holdin’ hands with. Just the same,

most of the people he bragged about knowin, why it turned out that

he really did know ’em; yes, and stood ace-high with ’em too.

Like, for instance, I got pinched for speedin’ one night and they

give me a ticket to show up in the Speeders’ Court and I told Steven s about it and he says, “Just forget it! I'll call up the judge and have it wiped off the book. He’s a mighty good fella and a personal friend

of mine.”

Well, I didn’t want to take no chances so I phoned Stevens the day before I was supposed to appear in court, and I asked him if he’d talked to the judge. He said he had and I asked him if he was sure. So he said, “If you, don’t believe me, call up the judge yoursel f.” And he gave me the judge’s number. Sure enough, Stevens had fixed it and when I thanked the judge for his trouble, he said it was a pleasure to do somethin’ for a friend of Tom Stevens’. Now, I know it’s silly to not appreciate favors like that and not warm up to people that’s always tryin’ to help you along, but still a person don’t relish bein’ treated like they was half-witted and

couldn’t button their shirt alone. Tom and Belle meant all right, but I and Ada got kind of tired of havin’ fault found with everything that belonged to us and everything we done or tried to do. Besides our apartment bein’ no good and our clothes terrible, we learned that my dentist didn’t know a bridge from a mustache cup, and the cigarettes I smoked didn’t have no taste to them, and the man that bobbed Ada’s hair must of been mad at her, and neither of us would ever know what it was to live till we owned a wire-haired

fox terrier. And we found out that the liquor I'd been drinkin’ and enjoyin’ was a mixture of bath salts and assorted paints, and the car we’d paid

1700 smackers for wasn’t nowheres near as much of a car as one that

Tom could of got for us for 800 on account of knowin’ a brotherin-law of a fella that used to go to school with the president of the company’s nephew, and that if Ada would take up aesthetic dancin’ under a dame Belle knew about, why she’d never have no more trouble with her tonsils. Nothin’ we had or nothin’ we talked about gettin’ or doin’ was worth a damn unless it was recommended or suggested by the Stevenses. Well, I done a pretty good business this fall and I and Ada had always planned to spend a winter in the South, so one night we figured it out that this was the year we could spare the money and the time and if we didn’t go this year we never would. So the next thing

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was where should we go, and we finally decided on Miami. And we said we wouldn’t mention nothin’ about it to Tom and Belle till the

day we was goin’. We'd pretend we was doin’ it out of a clear sky.

But a secret is just as safe with Ada as a police dog tethered with dental floss. It wasn’t more than a day or two after we'd had our talk when Tom and Belle sprang the news that they was leavin’ for

California right after New Year’s. And why didn’t we go with

them? Well, I didn’t say nothin’ and Ada said it sounded grand, but it was impossible. Then Stevens said if it was a question of money, to not let that bother us as he would loan it to me and I could pay it back whenever I felt like it. That was more than Ada could stand, so she says we wasn’t as poor as people seemed to think and the reason we couldn’t go to California was because we was goin’ to Miami. This was such a surprise that it almost struck °em dumb at first and all Tom could think of to say was that he’d been to Miami himself and it was too crowded and he’d lay off it if he was us. But the next time we seen ’em they had our trip all arranged. First, Tom asked me what road we was goin’ on and I told him the Big Four. So he asked if we had our reservations and I told him es. 4 “Well,” he said, “we'll get rid of ’em and [ll fix you up on the C.&E.I. The general passenger agent is a friend of mine and they ain’t nothin’ he won’t do for my friends. He’ll see that you’re treated right and that you get there in good shape.” So I said: “T don’t want to put you to all that trouble, and besides I don’t know nobody connected with the Big Four well enough for them to resent me travelin’ on their lines, and as for gettin’ there in good shape, even if I have a secret enemy or two on the Big Four, I don’t believe they’d endanger the lives of the other passengers just to see

that I didn’t get there in good shape.” But Stevens insisted on takin’ my tickets and sellin’ em back to the Big Four and gettin’ me fixed on the C.&E.I. The berths we'd

had on the Big Four was Lower 9 and Lower 10. The berths Tom got us on the C.&.E.I. was Lower 7 and Lower 8, which he said was better. I suppose he figured that the nearer you are to the middle of the car, the less chance there is of bein’ woke up if your car gets in another train’s way. He wanted to know too, if I’d made any reservations at a hotel. I

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showed him a wire I had from the Royal Palm in reply to a wire I’d sent ’em. “Ves2- he says, “but you don’t want to stop at the Royal Palm. You wire and tell ’em to cancel that and I’ll make arrangements for

you at the Flamingo, over at the Beach. Charley Krom, the manager

there, was born and raised in the same town I was. He'll take great care of you if he knows you're a friend of mine.” So I asked him if all the guests at the Flamingo was friends of his,

and he said of course not; what did I mean?

“Well,” I said, “I was just thinkin’ that if they ain’t, Mr. Krom probably makes life pretty miserable for ’em. What does he do, have

the phone girl ring’em up at all hours of the night, and hide their

mail, and shut off their hot water, and put cracker crumbs in their beds?” That didn’t mean nothin’ to Stevens and he went right ahead and switched me from one hotel to the other. While Tom was reorganizin’ my program and tellin’ me what to eat in Florida, and what bait to use for barracuda and carp, and what time to go bathin’ and which foot to stick in the water first, why Belle was makin’ Ada return all the stuff she had boughten to wear down there and buy other stuff that Belle picked out for her at joints where Belle was so well known that they only soaked her twice as much as a stranger. She had Ada almost crazy, but I told her to never mind; in just a few more days we’d be where they

couldn’t get at us.

I suppose you’re wonderin’ why didn’t we quarrel with ’em and break loose from ’em and tell ’em to leave us alone. You’d know why if you knew them. Nothin’ we could do would convince ’em that we didn’t want their advice and help. And nothin’ we could say was a insult. Well, the night before we was due to leave Chi, the phone rang

and I answered it. It was Tom.

.

“Tve got a surprise for you,” he says. “I and Belle has give up the California idear. We’re goin’ to Miami instead, and on account of me knowin’ the boys down at the C.&E.I., P’ve landed a drawin’ room on the same train yow’re takin’. How is that for news?” “Great!” I said, and I went back and broke it to Ada. For a minute I thought she was goin’ to faint. And all night long she moaned and groaned and had hysterics. So that’s how we happened to come to Biloxi.

Gertrude the Governess:

or Simple Seventeen “i STEPHEN LEACOCK Synopsis of Previous Chapters: There are no previous chapters.

Ir was a wild and stormy night on the West Coast of Scotland. This, however, is immaterial to the present story, as the scene is not laid in the West of Scotland. For the matter of that the weather was just as bad on the East Coast of Ireland. But the scene of this narrative is laid in the South of England and takes place in and around Knotacentinum Towers (pronounced as if written Nosham Taws), the seat of Lord Knotacent (pronounced as if written Nosh). But it is not necessary to pronounce either of these names in reading them. Nosham Taws was a typical English home. The main part of the house was an Elizabethan structure of warm red brick, while the elder portion, of which the earl was inordinately proud, still showed the outlines of a Norman keep, to which had been added a Lancastrian jail and a Plantagenet orphan asylum. From the house in all directions stretched magnificent woodland and park with oaks and elms of immemorial antiquity, while nearer the house stood raspberry bushes and geranium plants which had been set out by the Crusaders. About the grand old mansion the air was loud with the chirping of the thrushes, the cawing of partridges and the clear sweet note

of the rook, while deer, antelope and other quadrupeds strutted about the lawn so tame as to eat off the sundial. In fact, the place was a regular menagerie. From the house downwards through the park stretched a beautifully broad avenue laid out by Henry VII. Lord Nosh stood upon the hearthrug of the library. Trained diplo-

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mat and statesman as he was, his stern aristocratic face was upside down with fury. “Boy,” he said, “you shall marry this girl or I disinherit you. You are no Son of mine.” Young Lord Ronald, erect before him, flung back a glance as defiant as his own.

“I defy you,” he said. “Henceforth you are no father of mine. | will get another. I will marry none but a woman I can love. This

girl that we have never seen—” “Fool,” said the earl, “would you throw aside our estate and name of a thousand years? The girl, I am told, is beautiful; her aunt is willing; they are, French; pah! they understand such things in France.” “But your reason—” “IT give no reason,” said the earl. “Listen, Ronald, I give one month. For that time you remain here. If at the end of it you refuse me, I cut you off with a shilling.” Lord Ronald said nothing; he flung himself from the room, flung himself upon his horse and rode madly off in all directions. As the door of the library closed upon Ronald the earl sank into a chair. His face changed. It was no longer that of the haughty nobleman, but of the hunted criminal. “He must marry the girl,” he muttered. “Soon she will know all. Tutchemoff has escaped from Siberia. He knows and will tell. The whole of the mines pass to her, this property with it, and I—but enough.” He rose, walked to the sideboard, drained a dipper full of gin and bitters, and became a highbred English gentleman. It was at this moment that a high dogeart, driven by a groom in the livery of Earl Nosh, might have been seen entering the avenue of Nosham Taws. Beside him sat a young girl, scarce more than a child, in fact, not nearly so big as the groom. The apple-pie hat which she wore, surmounted with black willow plumes, concealed from view a face so facelike in its appearance as to be positively facial. It was—need we say it—Gertrude the Governess, who was this day to enter upon her duties at Nosham Taws. At the same time that the dogcart entered the avenue at one end there might have been seen riding down it from the other a tall young man, whose long, aristocratic face proclaimed his birth and who was mounted upon a horse with a face even longer than his own.

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And who is this tall young man who draws nearer to Gertrude with every revolution of the horse? Ah, who, indeed? Ah, who, who? I wonder if any of my readers could guess that this was none other than Lord Ronald. The two were destined to meet. Nearer and nearer they came. And then still nearer. Then for one brief moment they met. As they passed Gertrude raised her head and directed towards the young nobleman two eyes so eyelike in their expression as to be absolutely circular, while Lord Ronald directed towards the occupant of the dogcart a gaze so gazelike that nothing but a gazelle, or a gaspipe, could have emulated its intensity. Was this the dawn of love? Wait and see. Do not spoil the story. Let us speak of Gertrude. Gertrude De Mongmorenci McFiggin had known neither father nor mother. They had both died years before she was born. Of her mother she knew nothing, save that she was French, was extremely beautiful, and that all her ancestors and even her business acquaintances had perished in the Revolution. Yet Gertrude cherished the memory of her parents. On her breast the girl wore a locket in which was enshrined a miniature of her mother, while down her neck inside at the back hung a daguerreotype of her father. She carried a portrait of her grandmother up her sleeve and had pictures of her cousins tucked inside her boot, while beneath her—but enough, quite enough. Of her father Gertrude knew even less. That he was a high-born English gentleman who had lived as a wanderer in many lands, this was all she knew. His only legacy to Gertrude had been a Russian grammar, a Rumanian phrase book, a theodolite and a work on mining engineering. From her earliest infancy Gertrude had been brought up by her aunt. Her aunt had carefully instructed her in Christian principles. She had also taught her Mohammedanism to make sure. When Gertrude was seventeen her aunt had died of hydrophobia. The circumstances were mysterious. There had called upon her that day a strange bearded man in the costume of the Russians. After he had left, Gertrude had found her aunt in a syncope from which she passed into an apostrophe and never recovered. To avoid scandal it was called hydrophobia. Gertrude was thus thrown upon the world. What to do? That was the problem that confronted her. It was while musing one day upon her fate that Gertrude’s eye was struck with an advertisement. “Wanted a governess; must possess a knowledge of French, Italian, Russian, and Rumanian, music and mining engineering. Salary

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one pound, four shillings and fourpence halfpenny per annum. Apply

between half-past eleven and twenty-five minut es to twelve at No.

41-A Decimal Six, Belgravia Terrace. The Count ess of Nosh.”

Gertrude was a girl of great natural quick ness of apprehension, and she had not pondered over this announcement more than half an hour before she was struck with the extraordin ary coincidence between the list of items desired and the things that she herself knew. She duly presented herself at Belgravia Terrace before the count-

ess, who advanced to meet her with a charm which at once placed

the girl at her ease. “You are proficient in French?” she asked.

“Oh, oui,” said Gertrude modestly.

“And Italian?” continued the countess.

“Oh, si,” said Gertrude. “And German?”

said the countess in delight.

“Ah, ja,” said Gertrude. “And Russian?” “Yaw.” “And Rumanian?” “Sep.”

Amazed at the girl’s extraordinary proficiency in modern languages, the countess looked at her narrowly. Where had she seen those lineaments before? She passed her hand over her brow in thought, and spit upon the floor, but no, the face baffled her. “Enough,” she said. “I engage you on the spot; tomorrow you go down to Nosham Taws and begin teaching the children. I must add that in addition you will be expected to aid the earl with his Russia n correspondence. He has large mining interests at Tschminsk.” Tschminsk! Why did the simple word reverberate upon Gertrude’s ears? Why? Because it was the name written in her father’s hand on the title page of his book on mining. What mystery was here? It was on the following day that Gertrude had driven up the

avenue.

She descended from the dogcart, passed through a phalanx of liveried servants drawn up seven deep, to each of whom she gave a sovereign as she passed and entered Nosham Taws. “Welcome,” said the countess, as she aided Gertrude to carry her trunk upstairs. The girl presently descended and was ushered into the library, where she was presented to the earl. As soon as the earl’s eye fell upon the face of the new governess he started visibly. Where had he

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seen those lineaments? Where was it? At the races, or the theater— on a bus—no. Some subtler thread of memory was stirring in his mind. He strode hastily to the sideboard, drained a dipper and a half of brandy, and became again the perfect English gentleman. While Gertrude has gone to the nursery to make the acquaintance of the two golden-haired children who are to be her charges, let us say something here of the earl and his son. Lord Nosh was the perfect type of the English nobleman and statesman. The years that he had spent in the diplomatic service at Constantinople, St. Petersburg and Salt Lake City had given to him a peculiar finesse and noblesse, while his long residence at St. Helena, Pitcairn Island and Hamilton, Ontario, had rendered him impervious to external impressions. As deputy paymaster of the militia of the county he had seen something of the sterner side of military life, while his hereditary office of Groom of the Sunday Breeches had brought him into direct contact with royalty itself. His passion for outdoor sports endeared him to his tenants. A keen sportsman, he excelled in fox hunting, dog hunting, pig killing, bat catching and the pastimes of his class. In this latter respect Lord Ronald took after his father. From the start the lad had shown the greatest promise. At Eton he had made a splendid showing at battledore and shuttlecock, and at Cambridge had been first in his class at needlework. Already his name was whis-

pered in connection with the All England ping-pong championship, a triumph which would undoubtedly carry with it a seat in Parliament. Thus was Gertrude the Governess installed at Nosham Taws. The days and the weeks sped past. The simple charm of the beautiful orphan girl attracted all hearts. Her two little pupils became her slaves. “Me loves 00,” the little Rasehellfrida would say, leaning her golden head in Gertrude’s lap. Even the servants loved her. The head gardener would bring a bouquet of beautiful roses to her room before she was up, the second gardener a bunch of early cauliflowers, the third a spray of late asparagus, and even the tenth and the eleventh a sprig of mangelwurzel or an armful of hay. Her room was full of gardeners all the time, while at evening the aged butler, touched at the friendless girl’s loneliness, would tap softly at her door to bring her a rye whisky and seltzer or a box of Pittsburg stogies. Even the dumb creatures seemed to admire her in their own dumb way. The dumb rooks settled on her shoulder and every dumb dog around the place followed her.

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And Ronald! Ah, Ronald! Yes, indeed! They had met. They had spoken. “What a dull morning,” Gertrude had said. “Quel triste matin!

Was fiir ein allervendamnter Tag!” “Beastly,” Ronald had answered.

“Beastly!!” The word rang in Gertrude’s ears all day.

After that they were constantly together. They played tennis and ping-pong in the day, and in the evening, in accordance with the stiff routine of the place, they sat down with the earl and countess to 25cent poker, and later still they sat together on the veranda and watched the moon sweeping in great circles around the horizon. It was not long before Gertrude realized that Lord Ronald felt toward her a warmer feeling than that of mere ping-pong. At times in her presence he would fall, especially after dinner, into a fit of profound subtraction. Once at night, when Gertrude withdrew to her chamber and before seeking her pillow, prepared to retire as a preliminary to disrobing—in other words, before going to bed, she flung wide the casement (opened the window) and perceived (saw) the face of Lord Ronald. He was sitting on a thorn bush beneath her, and his upturned face wore an expression of agonized pallor. Meantime the days passed. Life at the Taws moved in the ordinary routine of a great English household. At seven a gong sounded for rising, at eight a horn blew for breakfast, at eight-thirty a whistle sounded for prayers, at one a flag was run up at half mast for lunch, at four a gun was fired for afternoon tea, at nine a first bell sounded for dressing, at nine-fifteen a second bell for going on dressing, while at nine-thirty a rocket was sent up to indicate that dinner was ready. At midnight dinner was over, and at 1 A.M. the tolling of a bell summoned the domestics to evening prayers. Meanwhile the month alloted by the earl to Lord Ronald was pass-

ing away. It was already July 15, then within a day or two it was July 17, and, almost immediately afterwards, July 18.

At times, the earl, in passing Ronald in the hall, would say sternly, “Remember, boy, your consent, or I disinherit you.” And what were the earl’s thoughts of Gertrude? Here was the one drop of bitterness in the girl’s cup of happiness. For some reason that she could not divine the earl showed signs of marked antipathy. Once as she passed the door of the library he threw a bootjack at her. On another occasion at lunch alone with her he struck her savagely across the face with a sausage. It was her duty to translate to the earl his Russian correspondence.

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She sought in it in vain for the mystery. One day a Russian telegram was handed to the earl. Gertrude translated it to him aloud. “Tutchemoff went to the woman. She is dead.” On hearing this the earl became livid with fury, in fact this was the day that he struck her with the sausage. Then one day while the earl was absent on a bat hunt, Gertrude, who was turning over his correspondence, with that sweet feminine instinct of interest that rose superior to ill treatment, suddenly found the key to the mystery.

Lord Nosh was not the rightful owner of the Taws. His distant cousin of the older line, the true heir, had died in a Russian prison to which the machinations of the earl, while Ambassador of Tschminsk, had consigned him. The daughter of this cousin was the true owner of Nosham Taws. The family story, save only that the documents before her withheld the name of the rightful heir, lay bare to Gertrude’s eye. Strange is the heart of woman. Did Gertrude turn from the earl with spurning? No. Her own sad fate had taught her sympathy. Yet still the mystery remained! Why did the earl start perceptibly each time that he looked into her face? Sometimes he started as much as four centimeters, so that one could distinctly see him do it. On such occasions he would hastily drain a dipper of rum and vichy water and become again the correct English gentleman.

The denouement came swiftly. Gertrude never forgot it. It was the night of the great ball at Nosham Taws. The whole neighborhood was invited. How Gertrude’s heart had beat with anticipation, and with what trepidation she had overhauled her scant wardrobe in order to appear not unworthy in Lord Ronald’s eyes. Her resources were poor indeed, yet the inborn genius for dress that she inherited from her French mother stood her in good stead. She twined a single rose in her hair and contrived herself a dress out of a few old newspapers and the inside of an umbrella that would have graced a court. Round her waist she bound a single braid of bagstring, while a piece of old lace that had been her mother’s was suspended to her ear by a thread. Gertrude was the cynosure of all eyes. Floating to the strains of the music she presented a picture of bright girlish innocence that no one could see undisenraptured. The ball was at its height. It was away up!

Ronald stood with Gertrude in the shrubbery. They looked into one another’s eyes. “Gertrude,” he said, “I love you.”

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Simple words, and yet they thrilled every fiber in the girl’s cos-

tume. “Ronald!” she said, and cast herself about his neck. At this moment the earl appeared standing beside them in the moonlight. His stern face was distorted with indignation. “So!” he said, turning to Ronald. “It appears that you have chosen!” “T have,” said Ronald with hauteur. “You prefer to marry this penniless girl rather than the heiress I have selected for you?” Gertrude looked from father to son in amazement. “Yes,” said Ronald. “Be it so,” said the earl, draining a dipper of gin which he carried, and resuming his calm. “Then I disinherit you. Leave this place, and never return to it.” “Come, Gertrude,” said Ronald tenderly, “let us flee together.” Gertrude stood before them. The rose had fallen from her head. The lace had fallen from her ear and the bag-string had come un-

done from her waist. Her newspapers were crumpled beyond recognition. But disheveled and illegible as she was, she was still mistress of herself, “Never,” she said firmly. “Ronald, you shall never make this sacrifice for me.” Then to the earl, in tones of ice, “There is a pride, sir, as great even as yours. The daughter of Metschnikoff McFiggin need crave a boon from no one.” With that she hauled from her bosom the daguerreotype of her father and pressed it to her lips. The earl started as if shot. “That name!” he cried. “That face! That photograph! Stop!” There! There is no need to finish; my readers have long since divined it. Gertrude was the heiress. The lovers fell into one another’s arms. The earl’s proud face relaxed. “God bless you,” he said. The countess and the guests came pouring out upon the lawn. The breaking day illuminated a scene of gay congratulations. Gertrude and Ronald were wed. Their happiness was complete. Need we say more? Yes, only this. The earl was killed in the hunting field a few days later. The countess was struck by lightning. The two children fell down a well. Thus the happiness of Gertrude and

Ronald was complete.

Secretary Yang and His Courtroom “Y= C. Y. LEE SometiMeEs I wonder if God regards the Shans as His favorite people and therefore provides them with a climate so mild and a land so rich that rice and fruits grow in abundance without much human care. The land is further fertilized by cattle and hogs which roam the fields at will. The grains, especially rice, are processed and polished by wooden machines operated by currents in rivulets which run through the land like the veins of a green leaf. Being so well provided for by nature, the Shans are undoubtedly the most leisurely people on the China-Burma border, and the most lawabiding; they probably regard crime as an undertaking with too much labor involved. Fang Yu-chi never had a criminal case in his state during his tenure of office. His six policemen and a chief, therefore, never had much to do except to sit under the shade of a banyan tree, picking their teeth, shining their boots and growing a stomach. One day, three months after I took my job with him, the Sawbwa sent for me. He had not come to the yamen that afternoon. His chauffeur said that he had a cold and wanted me to do a little errand for him. I thought perhaps he wanted me to go to Lashio, the Burmese town across the border, to invite a British doctor over to treat his cold. But when I arrived at his house I began to suspect that my errand might be of an entirely different nature. Six policemen, armed with swords as well as old rifles, were guarding the entrance of the white house. The servants (who ranked as ta yeh, the chief; earb yeh, the second class; and the tea servers, the third class, about two dozen in all) milled around in the garden in front of the house, talking excitedly as though something drastic had happened. I went in quickly and discovered the Sawbwa Fang was sitting on a sofa in the living room. His knees were wrapped in a blanket and his feet were soaking in a basin of hot water. He was also sniffing at an inhaler. The Police Chief, a large man with a rugged face, sitting rigidly in a chair across the spacious room from the

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Sawbwa, was questioning a group of five natives squatting on the floor. The Sawbwa motioned me to sit down. I took a seat on the davenport next to him and listened to the Chief. “You,” the Chief said, pointing a finger at an old Shan, “what is your name?” “Ah Kan,” the old man said. “How much of your rice was stolen?” “A bout three catties.” “Whom do you suspect as the thief?” Ah Kan indicated with a dried-up hand the other Shans. “Ba Mo, the same thief who has stolen their rice. We are neighbors, so it must be the same thief.” “You,” the Police Chief pointed at a younger Shan, “how do you know it is Ba Mo who stcle you rice?” The younger man cleared his throat and answered earnestly, both his hands gesticulating. “Heaven has eyes, Chief, he is the thief. He steals people’s wives, too! When one is used to stealing, one steals

everything, for one has lost his feeling of shame and no longer fears the Buddha.” The other men all nodded their heads incessantly and grunted with approval. The Chief turned to the Sawbwa and asked, “They have all accused the same man, Sawbwa. Shall I make the arTests: Sawbwa Fang sniffed at his inhaler a couple of times, then said quietly, “Go make the arrest. Put him in jail for one night. I shall give him a trial tomorrow.” “The jail has no locks, Sawbwa,” the Chief said. “He is a Shan,” the Sawbwa said. “Before he is proved guilty, I shall still treat him like an honorable man. Besides, it is good for the jail; at least he will clear out the cobwebs.” “Yes, Sawbwa,” the Chief said, getting up. He told the other men to go with him, and they all rose, bowed to the Sawbwa and left. The Sawbwa shook his head and said somewhat sadly, “The first thief in thirty years. A Shan never steals, but Ba Mo seems to have acquired this shocking habit.” “Is there any evidence against him, Sawbwa?” I asked. “Nobody has any evidence,” the Sawbwa said, sniffing at the inhaler. “But recently I received several complaints from other Shans, who said Ba Mo has slept with their wives.” “T think a wife stealer is not necessarily a rice stealer, Sawbwa,” I said. “There should be some concrete evidence against this man.” The Sawbwa thought for a moment. “I know,” he said, “but it is

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true that when a man has acquired the habit of stealing, he always

steals, no matter what. Just like a god that is used to eating dung will eat nothing but dung. This man is a bad Shan.” I thought the Sawbwa’s logic was a bit odd, but being his subordinate and still rather new in Mangshih, I didn’t want to argue with him. He blew his nose into a silk handkerchief and went on, “Well, we shall know by tomorrow. If he escapes, he is undoubtedly the thief.” “In that case,” I said, “it might be hard to catch him. The Burma Road is long.” The Sawbwa chuckled. “This may sound peculiar to you, Secretary Lee. This is how we get rid of thieves. That is why we do not have locks on the door of the jail cell. When a Shan escapes because of a crime, he will never return. He will escape to Burma and become a Burmese thief.” “What if he does not escape?” I asked, somewhat amused. “Then we shall give him a fair trial,” the Sawbwa said. “If he is found guilty, he will be fined, chained and locked up. Since he does not wish to escape, he must be punished.” He sneezed, blew his nose and sniffed at his inhaler noisily. ““That is why I have sent for you, Secretary Lee,” he went on, breathing through his mouth. “Usually the trial is conducted by the Sawbwa. If the Sawbwa is ill or out of town, it is conducted by the secretary. My father never conducted a trial; it was always Secretary Yang’s job. But Secretary Yang is so old-fashioned. If I ask him to try a criminal, he will still use the ancient method practiced during the Manchu Dynasty. Since the Burma Road was built, modern people are passing through the state every day; I don’t want them to know anything about this ancient secretary and his way of trying a thief. I want you to conduct the trial.” This assignment was quite unexpected. As I didn’t know anything about law and I had never in my life watched a criminal trial, I didn’t

know what to say. But I hated to say “no” to the Sawbwa; besides, it was a challenge and the experience might be exciting, so I accepted the assignment after some hesitation. “Good,” the Sawbwa said, “‘you can try the suspect in the courtroom in the third court. But tell the servants to clear the cobwebs there first. The room has not been used for thirty years.” “How shall I try him?” I asked. “Does he have a lawyer?” “Lawyer?” the Sawbwa asked, scowling. “What is that?” Then I realized that there was no such profession on the border. J

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“No, there is nothing complicated,” he said. “Just find out if the sus-

pect is guilty. Nothing complicated at all.”

After I left the Sawbwa’s house, I kept thinking of the trial and be-

gan to realize what I had got myself into. There was no district attorney, no defense lawyer, no jury; I, the judge, would have to function as all of them. The trial would certainly look like a complete

mockery with a green apple like me conducting it, perhaps sitting

there biting my fingernails and not knowing what to say. I couldn’t sleep that night. Tossing in my bed, I kept thinking of

what a fool I was going to make of myself. Finally I decided to get

up and pay Secretary Yang a visit. I needed his help and advice. Although old-fashioned, he had at least conducted trials before. Secretary Yang never went to bed until three or four in the morning. So when I visited him about midnight, it was his most ac-

tive hour, the hour for him to receive guests and eat evening snacks.

He lived in a large room

in the empty and somewhat

dilapidated

third court. It was said that for more than 50 years he had never

once opened his window, for fear that the fog in the Shan states might drift in and poison him. His room was crowded with uncomfortable antique furniture and cluttered up with Chinese books and stationery. His huge bed, which was like a miniature house, had an elaborate frame, carved with birds and flowers, lacquered in red and black. A large mosquito net, darkened with age, hung inside. The stale air in the room was so heavy with incense and tobacco smoke that a visitor became dizzy after a few minutes. I had always wondered why in the world Secretary Yang enjoyed such unusual longevity, an octogenarian doing practically everything in violation of modern hygiene. When I went into his room he had just finished his pork lung noodles, and a tea server was clearing the bowls away from his desk. He looked more dried up than ever and he still wore the threadbare satin gown of faded blue and a dark satin cap with a little red button at the top. He was badly stooped but his eyesight and hearing were still amazingly good, and he walked fast and briskly, although he carried a cane. He told me to sit down and then he lighted his long bamboo pipe, belching royally. I sat down in an ancestral chair across the huge teakwood desk from him and stated what I had in mind.

For a moment he seemed to be displeased. He grunted and puffed on

his pipe. “To try a criminal is a serious matter,” he said gravely. “I

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am surprised that the Sawbwa entrusted such a matter to somebody of your age. It will be a great offense to the ancestors if an innocent man is wronged and injustice is done in the yamen.” “That is exactly what I am afraid of, Secretary Yang,” I said quickly. “That is why I am here to ask for your helpand?) ..” ee “T shall try the case,” he said firmly. “The suspect shall be tried in the courtroom properly, with the correct procedure.” I had a good mind to tell him that the Sawbwa didn’t want an oldfashioned trial, but his stern look stopped me. In a way I was glad that he had grabbed the case, for at least I could tell the Sawbwa that I didn’t purposely evade it. “To try a criminal is not a simple matter,” he went on. “It should be prepared a day ahead of time, with the courtroom dusted and incense burned, and all the necessary equipment ready.” Then he turned to the door and called his tea server. A young Shan came in promptly and bowed to him. Secretary Yang

told him to tell the ta yeh, the chief servant in the yamen, to prepare for the trial. “Tell him I want it prepared before tomorrow noon,” he said. “I want six court braves in uniform. Also the court-shocking wood and the incense.”

“Court-shocking wood?” the tea server asked, looking puzzled. “The ta yeh knows it,” Secretary Yang said. “He prepared the courtroom for me thirty years ago.” After the tea server had left, the old man started asking me questions about the suspect and the crime. I told him what I knew, which was not much, but he seemed to be satisfied. ““We shall have his confession,” he said. “If he is found guilty, he shall be properly punished, so that our conscience will be clear.” Then he knocked his pipe against his chair leg and quoted some lines from Confucius that I didn’t quite understand, something on morals and justice. By this time I was getting very dizzy and about to choke. I thanked him and left the ancient gas chamber quickly, feeling both relieved and worried. I hoped that Ba Mo had already escaped. Unfortunately Ba Mo didn’t escape. The next day the courtroom was ready on time as Secretary Yang had ordered. It was a redwashed, medium-sized room, with a high ceiling and two red pillars, facing the courtyard, dusted and cleaned of all cobwebs. On the dais facing the entrance was the judge’s large red-lacquered desk, behind which was a heavy straight-backed chair. It was the only chair in the whole room. Apparently only the judge was permitted to sit down. But there were a few clumsy benches behind a yellow

curtain in the back of the room. According to the ta yeh or the chief servant, those who wanted to listen in could do so behind the

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curtain. As I was officially appointed by the Sawbwa to conduct the trial, I thought it was only proper for me to sit in front of the curtain, so I told a tea server to put another chair on the dais. Secretary Yang had set the trial for two o’clock. By one-thirty everything was ready. Six men in blue cotton uniforms bearing the

Chinese character Brave on their chests were there, standing rigidly

below the dais, three on each side, facing each other. One of the men nearest to the dais was holding a stick about six feet long and three

inches wide. I found out that he was the official torturer, or the ‘“bottom-beater.” On the judge’s desk was an incense bowl, with a

few sticks of incense burning, some stationery, and a block of black lacquered wood the size of a small brick, It was the so-called courtshocking wood, the equivalent of a gavel, I suppose; but it had more functions than just being banged for order. The judge could bang it when he was angry, or when he wanted the prisoner to be tortured, etc. It was an important item in an old-fashioned Chinese court. By two o’clock sharp the policemen brought the prisoner in; they handed him over to the court braves and withdrew from the room. Ba Mo, the prisoner, was a short, brawny Shan in his late twenties, wearing a white shirt and a pair of wrinkled khaki trousers; his hair

was long and slick and parted in the middle. He was one of those young Shans who had adopted the fashion of the Chinese truck drivers on the Burma Road. He squatted down on the ground between the braves, his small almond eyes shifting to left and right. When he spotted me on the dais he grinned at me. I wondered if he had been told that it was not I, but Secretary Yang, who was to try him. Perhaps he would not have grinned at all if he had known it. Secretary Yang entered the courtroom by two-thirty, which was proper; all important people, according to tradition, were supposed to be half an hour late, regardless of the occasion, whether it was a trial, a banquet or a funeral. As the Secretary mounted the dais and discovered me sitting in a chair beside his, he scowled slightly. But he ignored me and sat down, his face stern. He cleared his throat loudly, which, I presumed, was to boost his dignity and set the proper mood or atmosphere of the court, then he put his right hand on the courtshocking wood and scanned the whole room. F inally he set his eyes on Ba Mo, who, apparently surprised, quickly bowed his head, the suly grin vanishing from his round red face. There was a moment of silence. ‘“Prisoner,” Secretary Yang said, his voice stern, “rise your head.” Ba Mo did so, putting on the exaggeratedly sad look of a ham actor.

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“Your name?” Secretary Yang asked. “Ba Mo.” “Your age?” “Twenty-eight.” “Are you a Shan?” SY es:7

“What do you do for a living?” “T am a farmer for hire.” “You are accused of stealing your neighbors’ rice,” Secretary Yang said, his voice louder and tinged with anger. “Do you admit it?” “No, it is not true.” Ba Mo said. “I never touch anything that 1s not mine.” “You have stolen rice from five of your neighbors. They have all agreed that you are the thief; how dare you not to admit it?” “No, I am not a thief, I swear by the blue heaven above.” “All five of your neighbors have accused you of stealing. You are the thief!” “Blue heaven above has eyes, Secretary Yang,” Ba Mo said, pointing a hand at the ceiling. “If I touched anything that is not mine, may five thunderbolts strike me to ashes!” Secretary Yang banged the court-shocking wood on the desk and shouted, ‘Nonsense! You lie!” Then he turned to the court braves and ordered “Da!” which meant “Beat the prisoner.” Two men grabbed Ba Mo and pushed him down and made him lie flat on his stomach. “How many, Secretary Yang?” the torturer, or the

bottom-beater, asked. “Twenty,” Secretary Yang said. The man hit Ba Mo’s behind with the long, flat stick 20 times. The wood, apparently split to begin with, made a great deal of noise. Ba Mo twisted his head up and winced with the strokes. I wondered if he was more bothered by the noise than by the beating, which didn’t seem to hurt much. It was, I presumed, more of a gesture to shame the prisoner than real torture. When the beating was over, Ba Mo was pulled up by the two braves, and Secretary Yang shouted, “Do you confess, or don’t you?” “T have nothing to confess,” Ba Mo cried. “Blue heaven above has eyes, I have never . .” “Da!” Secretary Yang shouted. The two braves once more pushed Ba Mo down. “How many, Secretary Yang?” the torturer asked. “Thirty!” Secretary Yang cried, slamming the court-shocking wood on the desk. The bottom-beater executed the punishment, while Ba Mo twisted his head up and down, winced and grunted with

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each stroke as though it hurt very much. When it was over, the men

pulled him up to his knees again, and he started whini ng and groan-

ing. As I watched all this I felt terribly uncom fortable, not because

it looked barbarous, but because the whole thing was extremely ri-

diculous in spite of the serene atmosphere maintained by Secretary Yang and the six braves, “Do you confess, or don’t you?” Secretary Yang shouted again.

Ba Mo spat and blew his nose into a soiled handkerchief, whinin g.

“I said do you confess, or don’t you?” Secretary Yang shouted louder, hitting the desk with the court-shocking wood. Se bel have nothing to confess, Secretary Yang,” Ba Mo said, his voice no longer defiant, but faltering. “I . . . I have done nothng wrong. Blue heaven above has eyes, I have never touched anything. p44. Before he could finish, Secretary Yang yelled “Da!” and promptly the two braves pushed Ba Mo down and the whole thing was re-

peated. This time Secretary Yang ordered 50 strokes. While the torturer

was

slashing with

his long stick, his victim

cried

“Aiyoo,

aiyoo” as though in great pain. After 20 strokes, Ba Mo twisted his

head up and cried, “I confess, I confess!”

The torturer stopped beating him and they again pulled him up to his knees. He cried “Aiyoo” until Secretary Yang banged his court-shocking wood to stop him. “Confess!” Secretary Yang

shouted. “Yes, yes, I... I stole their rice,” Ba Mo whined. “Aiyoo, I stole their rice to pay a debt, all because of a bad woman. She ruined me, aiyoo. She took all my money and ran off with a truck driver. I am in debt, aiyoo. Have mercy onme, .. .” Secretary Yang banged the block of wood again and shouted, “Stealing for a bad woman is worse. I would take mercy under consideration if you had stolen because of poverty, or to help a sick relative, or to feed an old parent. As a shameless, immoral thief stealing for a bad woman, you are not to be shown any mercy. You are hereby sentenced to three months’ imprisonment, plus a fine of fifty catties of rice, which will be distributed among the neighbors whose rice you stole.” He banged his court-shocking wood. “Take the pris-

oner away. Court dismissed.” Two braves grabbed Ba Mo’s arm and pulled him up to his feet.

Sull crying “Aiyoo,” he was quickly taken out of the room. Secre-

tary Yang sat in his chair quietly for a moment,

then he turned to

me and said, “There has been no crime in Mangshih for more than

three decades. The evil influence has been brought in by the truck

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drivers, who have poisoned the minds of the Shan women, who have in turn poisoned the minds of their men. Women, therefore, are the medium of all crimes.” He sighed, quoted some lines from Confucius, then got up and left the courtroom, sighing and shaking his head sadly. The next day I learned that the Sawbwa was very unhappy about the trial. I spent the whole morning worrying about it. As I expected, he sent for me in the afternoon. His cold was apparently getting worse. Sunk deep in a sofa and wrapped up in many blankets, he was

still sniffing at his inhaler lustily and sneezing into a silk handkerchief noisily, his nose red and his eyes watery and bloodshot. His wife was fussing over him, feeding him lemon juice and dabbing his forehead with a hot towel that smelled of menthol. “Sit down, sit down,” the Sawbwa said to me as I watched him suffering. I sat in a sofa across the room from him and inquired about his cold, but he ignored my question and asked me, in an irritated voice, why I had not conducted the trial. I told him that Secretary Yang insisted on trying the suspect himself, and that being his junior, I could not but respect his will. “You should have told me before the trial,” he said, coughing into his handkerchief. “I could have stopped him.” “I am sorry, Sawbwa,” I apologized. “I did not realize that he is so old-fashioned.” “The old turtle is a piece of antique furniture,” he said. “He does things as though we were still living in the Manchu Dynasty. That is why I asked you to conduct the trial. Now the prisoner is sure to spread the news of how he was tried and it will become a great scandal on the Burma Road. The truck drivers will spread it to Kunming, perhaps to Chungking, and I shall become a laughingstock. Didn’t you realize that?” “T am sorry, Sawbwa,” I said. “I did not realize it was so serious.” “You should have,” the Sawbwa said irritatedly. “Now the harm is done.” The Sawbwa had never been cross with me before and those few harsh words really bothered me. I asked him if there was anything I could do to save the situation. He said no. There was nothing I could do. The only remedy he could think of now was to let Ba Mo es-

cape to Burma and never return; otherwise the prisoner, when released, would certainly become a walking broadcaster, propagating the ugly trial in Mangshih for the rest of his life. “I shall talk to the Police Chief about it, Sawbwa,” I said. ““We shall see to it that he escapes.”

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I went to see the Police Chief immediatel y. The Chief had his office in the second court in the yamen. He was seldom there, and was not at this moment. In order to find him, I had first to find his

policemen, who usually sat under a huge banyan tree or a cluster of bamboo, picking their teeth. They barely stirred when I did find

them. According to one of them, the Chief was having Burmese

salted tea at a butcher’s house. I went to the butcher’s place, but was told the Chief had gone to visit another frien d. Irritated, I went back

to the banyan tree and in a harsh voice told those tooth-picking policem en to get up and go find their Chief for me. The Chief came to see me an hour later at my office. I told him

what the Sawbwa had in mind. “No use,” the Chief said. “Do you

think I want a prisoner in jail? It is too much trouble looking after him. I told him to escape after the trial, but the turtle’s egg wants to

enjoy three months of laziness in jail. He has started enjoy ing it by lying there with crossed legs. He will not escape even if you kick his

bottom now, the lazybones.”’ “We shall have to get him out of Mangshih,” I said. “When visitors come to the yamen and see him, he is sure to talk and give the state abadname... .” “No use, Secretary Lee,” the Chief said, shaking his head. “He is happy to live in the yamen for a while, with two free meals a day and no rent to pay. The only way to get rid of him is to behead him and bury him in the hills.” “Doesn’t he have a home?” “No. He used to live in a barn owned by a West Villag e farmer who hires him. He is happy to have three months’ vacati on.” The Chief’s information worried me. In the afternoon I went to see the Sawbwa again and told him what I had learned. I suggested that we give Ba Mo some money and send him to Burma. The Sawbwa looked at me, his face expressionless, but his eyes full of meaning; they were actually saying to me, “Bribe a thief? Is that all you can think of? Tch tch tch!” As he stared at me in disappointme nt, I was so embarrassed that I felt a prickling sensation on my back. I racked my brain trying to find something to say to save my face, but my brain seemed to have stopped functioning altoget her. He sniffed at his inhaler a couple of times and asked me, to my considerable relief, to tell the Police Chief to bring the prisone r to him. Ba Mo, as the Chief had said, really seemed to be enjoying life in the unlocked jail, which was spacious and complete with iron bars, a wooden bed, a crude table and a bench. It was quite airy, althoug h somewhat dilapidated, with cobwebs hanging on the iron bars and

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from the low ceiling. When the Chief and I walked into the jail, he

was lying comfortably on the bed, his hands behind his head, belching and smacking his lips; apparently he had just finished his second

meal in jail and had liked it tremendously. He was very reluctant to move when the Chief told him that he was wanted in the Sawbwa’s

house. One of the policemen had to drag him out of jail. When we brought him to the Sawbwa’s house it was already late in the afternoon. He walked among the six policemen; the Chief and I followed them at an appropriate distance. As we came near the house,

Ba Mo

suddenly

walked

with

more

difficulty and started

groaning as though it hurt him very much to walk. We filed into the Sawbwa’s living room, with Ba Mo groaning and waddling in pain. The Sawbwa was still sitting on the same sofa, wrapped up in

more blankets now, and surrounded with bottles and jars and cups. He was drinking some concoction from a teacup as we came in. He scowled deeply as he swallowed the last mouthful and then quickly tossed a little green tablet into his mouth, where he rolled it around. “Sit down,” he said. The Chief and I sat on the davenport. The policemen bowed and squatted down on the floor, their knees cracking noisily. Ba Mo acted like a very sick man, shifting his legs painfully and groaning. “Down!” the Chief said to him angrily. Ba Mo stepped up with difficulty as though he had really been crippled by the beating. He first bowed to the Sawbwa with a painful grunt, then squatted down gingerly with a louder grunt as if the pain were killing him. The Sawbwa sniffed at his inhaler and scowled. “The prisoner received fifty strokes on the bottom yesterday,” the Chief reported. “Seventy-five,” Ba Mo corrected him hastily. “How is he going to pay the fine?” the Sawbwa asked. “He can not,” the Chief said. “All he has is the clothes on his back.” “A bad woman has stolen everything from me,” Ba Mo said amidst groaning. “She ran off with a truck driver. . . .” “And he is also in debt,” the Chief said without waiting for Ba Mo to finish. “He has borrowed money from three merchants in the market place. They all demand payments.” “T bought things from them for that bad woman,” Ba Mo said. “She ran off with a truck driver. . . .” “Prisoner,” the Sawbwa interrupted him quietly, “your crime is the first in thirty years in Mangshih. I have decided not to tolerate it. I am going to change the sentence to five years of hard labor. You

will build a new road between the East Village and the West Village.”

SECRETARY

YANG

AND

HIS

COURTROOM

587

Suddenly Ba Mo forgot his pain and leaped to his feet. “Sawbwa, Sawbwa,” he protested, “I have only stolen a little rice; do I deserve such severe punishment? It was only a little rice, not much

more than the amount stolen by the mice.” “Down!” the Chief shouted angrily. Ba Mo squatted down, and then he remembered his pain; he grimaced and groaned, “Heaven has eyes, Sawbwa, I did not commit a murder. I only stole a little rice, all because of a bad woman, who ran off with a truck driver. . . .” “I have made up my mind,” the Sawbwa said. “The police will see to it that the prisoner builds the new road in five years. He will build it alone, with the necessary tools supplied by the yamen; no outside help is permitted.” Then he turned to the Chief and ordered, ‘‘Put the chains on his legs tomorrow so that he will not escape.” “Yes, Sawbwa,” the Chief said. “Sawbwa, Sawbwa,” Ba Mo cried, falling on his knees and kowtowing, “have mercy, oh, have mercy! I did not commit a murder! I shall pay the fine! I shall work hard and pay back every grain of rice I have stolen. . . .” “Take the prisoner away,” the Sawbwa said. Two policemen got up and grabbed Ba Mo. They pulled him to his feet and led him away. The Chief followed, ordering the wildly protesting prisoner to quiet down. The Sawbwa coughed and sneezed into his silk handkerchief. I was sure he was suffering more than Ba Mo’s bottom. The next morning Ba Mo had, as expected, broken out of jail and escaped to Burma, probably with the help of the police. When the Sawbwa heard of it he paid the fine, which was distributed among the farmers whose rice had been stolen. I was expecting a lecture from the Sawbwa when I saw him again, but he didn’t even bring the subject up. The case was soon forgotten and everybody seemed to be satisfied, especially the Police Chief, for he had finally gotten rid of a bad Shan and probably didn’t expect to find another one for

another 30 years. He certainly loved relaxation as much as Ba Mo loved the jail.

The Scandalous Tale of Percival and Genevieve

“NEWMAN

LEVY

Percival Wilberforce Henderson Crane Was married and dwelt up in Bethlehem, Maine. He attended the church and was fond of his wife, And he lived a respectable, virtuous life. Now, Genevieve Marguerite Valois Valence Resided in Rouen, a city in France. Her husband she loved in a manner insane, For she never had heard about Percival Crane. Each morning when Percival left for the day He would kiss his wife fondly, then start on his way, And at no other woman would Percival glance, For he never had heard about Madame Valence.

New, Percival dreamed that through France he would tour With his wife and his kids; but, alas, he was poor, For his salary was small; so poor Percival Crane Was obliged to stay home up in Bethlehem, Maine. While Genevieve dreamed of a trip to the States, But, alas, all her plans were upset by the Fates, For her husband was poor, so she hadn’t a chance To travel from Rouen, a city in France. So Percival still goes his virtuous way— To church every Sunday, to business each day. And at no other woman will Percival glance, For he’s never met Genevieve Valois Valence. While Genevieve still leads a virtuous life. Her husband she loves like a dutiful wife. And no doubt she’ll continue that way to remain, For she’s never met Percival Wilberforce Crane.

Mr. Babbitt’s Morning

“SINCLAIR LEWIS Tue towers of Zenith aspired above the morning mist; austere towers of steel and cement and limestone, sturdy as cliffs and delicate as silver rods. They were neither citadels nor churches, but frankly and beautifully office buildings. The mist took pity on the fretted structures of earlier generations: the Post Office with its shingle-tortured mansard, the red_ brick minarets of hulking old houses, factories with stingy and sooted windows, wooden tenements colored like mud. The city was full of such grotesqueries, but the clean towers were thrusting them from the business center, and on the farther hills were shining new houses, homes—they seemed—for laughter and tranquility. Over a concrete bridge fled a limousine of long sleek hood and noiseless engine. These people in evening clothes were returning from an all-night rehearsal of a Little Theater play, an artistic adventure considerably illuminated by champagne. Below the bridge curved a railroad, a maze of green and crimson lights. The New York Flyer boomed past, and 20 lines of polished steel leaped into the glare. In one of the skyscrapers the wires of the Associated Press were closing down. The telegraph operators wearily raised their celluloid eye shades after a night of talking with Paris and Peking. Through the building crawled the scrubwomen, yawning, their old shoes slapping. The dawn mist spun away. Cues of men with lunchboxes clumped toward the immensity of new factories, sheets of

glass and hollow tile, glittering shops where 5000 men worked beneath one roof, pouring out the honest wares that would be sold up the Euphrates and across the veldt. The whistles rolled out in greet-

ing, a chorus cheerful as the April dawn; the song of labor in a city built—it seemed—for giants. There was nothing of the giant in the aspect of the man who was beginning to awaken on the sleeping porch of a Dutch Colonial house in that residential district of Zenith known as Floral Heights.

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His name was George F. Babbitt. He was forty-six years old now, in April 1920, and he made nothing in particular, neither butter nor shoes nor poetry, but he was nimble in the calling of selling houses for more than people could afford to pay. His large head was pink, his brown hair thin and dry. His face was babyish in slumber, despite his wrinkles and the red spectacledents on the slopes of his nose. He was not fat but he was exceed-

ingly well fed; his cheeks were pads, and the unroughened hand which lay helpless upon the khaki-colored blanket was slightly

puffy. He seemed prosperous, extremely married and unromantic; and altogether unromantic appeared this sleeping porch, which looked on one sizable elm, two respectable grass plots, a cement driveway and a corrugated iron garage. Yet Babbitt was again dreaming of the fairy child, a dream more romantic than scarlet pagodas by a silver sea. For years the fairy child had come to him. Where others saw but Georgie Babbitt, she discerned gallant youth. She waited for him, in the darkness beyond mysterious groves. When at last he could slip away from the crowded house he darted to her. His wife, his clamoring friends, sought to follow, but he escaped, the girl fleet beside him, and they crouched together on a shadowy hillside. She was so slim, so white, so eager! She cried that he was gay and valiant, that she would wait for him, that they would sail— Rumble and bang of the milk truck. Babbitt moaned, turned over, struggled back toward his dream. He could see only her face now, beyond misty waters. The furnace man slammed the basement door. A dog barked in the next yard. As Babbitt sank blissfully into a dim warm tide, the paper carrier went by whistling, and the rolled-up Advocate thumped the front door. Babbitt roused, his stomach constricted with alarm. As he relaxed, he was pierced by the familiar and irritating rattle of someone cranking a Ford: snap-ah-ah, snap-ah-ah, snap-ah-ah. Himself a pious motorist, Babbitt cranked with the unseen driver, with him waited through taut hours for the roar of the starting engine, with him agonized as the roar ceased and again began the infernal patient snap-ah-ah—a round, flat sound, a shivering cold-morning sound, a sound infuriating and inescapable. Not till the rising voice of the motor told him that the Ford was moving was he released from the panting tension. He glanced once at his favorite tree, elm twigs against the gold patina of sky, and fumbled for sleep as a drug. He who had been a boy very credulous of life was no longer greatly interested in the possible and improbable adventures of each new day.

MR.

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MORNING

591

He escaped from reality till the alarm clock rang, at seven-twenty. It was the best of nationally advertised and quantitatively produced alarm clocks, with all modern attachments, including cathedral chime, intermittent alarm, and a phosphorescent dial. Babbitt was proud of being awakened by such a rich device. Socially it was almost as creditable as buying expensive cord tires. He sulkily admitted now that there was no more escape, but he lay and detested the grind of the real-estate business, and disliked his family, and disliked himself for dishking them. The evening before, he had played poker at Vergil Gunch’s till midnight, and after such

holidays he was irritable before breakfast. It may have been the tre-

mendous home-brewed beer of the prohibition-era and the cigars to which that beer enticed him; it may have been resentment of return from his fine, bold man-world to a restricted region of wives and stenographers, and of suggestions not to smoke so much. From the bedroom beside the sleeping-porch, his wife’s detestably cheerful “Time to get up, Georgie boy,” and the itchy sound, the brisk and scratchy sound, of combing hairs out of a stiff brush. He grunted; he dragged his thick legs, in faded baby-blue pajamas, from under the khaki blanket; he sat on the edge of the cot, running his fingers through his wild hair, while his plump feet mechanically felt for his slippers. He looked regretfully at the blanket—forever a suggestion to him of freedom and heroism. He had bought if for a camping trip which had never come off. It symbolized gorgeous loafing, gorgeous cursing, virile flannel shirts. He creaked to his feet, groaning at the waves of pain which passed behind his eyeballs. Though he waited for their scorching recurrence, he looked blurrily out at the yard. It delighted him, as alWays; it was the neat yard of a successful businessman of Zenith, that is, it was perfection, and made him also perfect. He regarded the

corrugated iron garage. For the 365th time in a year he reflected, “No class to that tin shack. Have to build me a frame garage. But by golly it’s the only thing on the place that isn’t up to date!” While he stared he thought of a community garage for his acreage development, Glen Oriole. He stopped puffing and jiggling. His arms were akimbo. His petulant, sleep-swollen face was set in harder lines. He suddenly seemed capable, an official, a man to contrive, to direct, to get things done. On the vigor of his idea he was carried down the hard, clean, unused-looking hall into the bathroom. Though the house was not large it had, like all houses on Floral

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Heights, an altogether royal bathroom of porcelain and glazed tile and metal sleek as silver. The towel rack was a rod of clear glass set in nickel. The tub was long enough for a Prussian Guard, and above the set bowl was a sensational exhibit of tooth-brush holder, shavingbrush holder, soap dish, sponge dish and medicine cabinet, so glittering and so ingenious that they resembled an electrical instrument board. But the Babbitt whose god was Modern Appliances was not pleased. The air of the bathroom was thick with the smell of a heathen toothpaste. “Verona been at it again! Stead of sticking to Lilidol, like I’ve repeat-ed-ly asked her, she’s gone and gotten some confounded stinkum stuff that makes you sick!” The bath mat was wrinkled and the floor was wet. (His daughter Verona eccentrically took baths in the morning, now and then.) He slipped on the mat, and slid against the tub. He said “Damn!” Furiously he snatched up his tube of shaving cream, furiously he lathered, with a belligerent slapping of the unctuous brush, furiously he raked his plump cheeks with a safety razor. It pulled. The blade was dull. He said, ‘““Damn—oh—oh—damn it!” He hunted through the medicine cabinet for a packet of new razor blades (reflecting, as invariably, “Be cheaper to buy one of those dinguses and strop your own blades,”) and when he discovered the packet, behind the round box of bicarbonate of soda, he thought ill of his wife for putting it there and very well of himself for not saying “Damn.” But he did say it, immediately afterward, when with wet and soap-slippery fingers he tried to remove the horrible little envelope and crisp clinging oiled paper from the new blade. Then there was the problem, oft pondered, never solved, of what to do with the old blade, which might imperil the fingers of his young. As usual, he tossed it on top of the medicine cabinet, with a

mental note that some day he must remove the 50 or 60 other blades that were also, temporarily, piled up there. He finished his shaving in a growing testiness increased by his spinning headache and by the emptiness in his stomach. When he was done, his round face smooth and steamy and his eyes stinging from soapy water, he reached for a towel. The family towels were wet, wet and clammy and vile, all of them wet, he found, as he blindly snatched them—his own face towel, his wife’s, Verona’s, Ted’s, Tinka’s, and the lone bath towel with the huge welt of initial. Then George F. Babbitt did a dismaying thing. He wiped his face on the guest towel! It was a pansyembroidered trifle which always hung there to indicate that the Babbitts were in the best Floral Heights society. No one had ever used it.

MR.

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593

No guest had ever dared to. Guests secretively took a corner of the nearest regular towel. He was raging, “By golly, here they go and use up all the towels,

every doggone one of ’em, and they use ’em and get ’em all wet and

sopping, and never put out a dry one for me—of course, I’m the goat!

—and then I want one and—I’m the only person in the doggone

house that’s got the slightest doggone bit of consideration for other

people and thoughtfulness and consider there may be others that may

want to use the doggone bathroom after me and consider—” He was pitching the chill abominations into the bathtub, pleased by the vindictiveness of that desolate flapping sound; and in the midst his wife serenely trotted in, observed serenely, “Why Georgie dear, what are you doing? Are you going to wash out the towels? Why, you needn’t wash out the towels. Oh, Georgie, you didn’t go and use the guest towel, did your” It is not recorded that he was able to answer. For the first time in wecks he was sufficiently roused by his wife to look at her.

Myra Babbitt—Mrs. George F. Babbitt—was definitely mature. She had creases from the corners of her mouth to the bottom of her chin, and her plump neck bagged. But the thing that marked her as having passed the line was that she no longer had reticences before her husband, and no longer worried about not having reticences. She was in a petticoat now, and corsets which bulged, and unaware of being seen in bulgy corsets. She had become so dully habituated to married life that in her full matronliness she was as sexless as an anemic nun. She was a good woman, a kind woman, a diligent woman, but no one save perhaps Tinka, her ten-year-old, was at all interested in her or entirely aware that she was alive. After a rather thorough discussion of all the domestic and social aspects of towels she apologized to Babbitt for his having an alcoholic headache; and he recovered enough to endure the search for a B.V.D. undershirt which had, he pointed out, malevolently been concealed among his clean pajamas. He was fairly amiable in the conference on the brown suit. “What do you think, Myra?” He pawed at the clothes hunched on a chair in their bedroom, while she moved about mysteriously adjusting and patting her petticoat and, to his jaundiced eye, never seeming to get on with her dressing. “How about it? Shall I wear the brown suit another day?”

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“Well, it looks awfully nice on you.” “T know, but gosh, it needs pressing.” ‘‘That’s so. Perhaps it does.” “Tt certainly could stand being pressed, all right.” ; “Yes, perhaps it wouldn’t hurt it to be pressed.” the having in sense No pressing. need doesn’t coat “But gee, the it.” need doesn’t whole darn suit pressed, when the coat ““That’s so.” “But the pants certainly need it, all right. Look at them—look at those wrinkles—the pants certainly do need pressing.” “That’s so. Oh, Georgie, why couldn’t you wear the brown coat with the blue trousers we were wondering what we'd do with

them?” “Good Lord! Did you ever in all my life know me to wear the coat of one suit and the pants of another? What do you think I am? A busted bookkeeper?” “Well, why don’t you put on the dark gray suit today, and stop in the tailor and leave the brown trousers?”

“Well, they certainly need— Now where the devil is that gray suit? Oh, yes, here we are.” He was able to get through the other crises of dressing with comparative resoluteness and calm. His first adornment was the sleeveless dimity B.V.D. undershirt, in which he resembled a small boy humorlessly wearing a cheesecloth tabard at a civic pageant. He never put on B.V.D.’s without thanking the God of Progress that he didn’t wear tight, long, oldfashioned undergarments, like his father-in-law and partner, Henry Thompson. His second embellishment was combing and slicking back his hair. It gave him a tremendous forehead, arching up two inches beyond the former hair line. But most wonder-working of all was the donning of his spectacles. There is character in spectacles—the pretentious tortoise-shell, the meek pince-nez of the school teacher, the twisted silver-framed glasses of the old villager. Babbitt’s spectacles had huge, circular, frameless lenses of the very best glass; the earpieces were thin bars of gold. In them he was the modern business man; one who gave orders to clerks and drove a car and played occasional golf and was scholarly in regard to Salesmanship. His head suddenly appeared not babyish but weighty, and you noted his heavy, blunt nose, his straight mouth and thick, long upper lip, his chin overfleshy but strong; with respect you behold him put on the rest of his uniform as a Solid Citizen.

MR.

BABBITT’S

MORNING

595

The gray suit was well cut, well made, and completely undistinguished. It was a standard suit, White piping on the V of the vest

added a flavor of law and learning. His shoes were black laced boots,

good boots, honest boots, standard boots, extraordinarily uninte rest-

ing boots. The only frivolity was in his purple knitte d scarf. With considerable comment on the matter to Mrs. Babbit t (who, acrobatically fastening the back of her blouse to her skirt with a safety

pin, did not hear a word he said) he chose between the purple scarf and

a tapestry

effect with

stringless brown

harps among

blown

palms, and into it he thrust a snake-head pin with opal eyes. A sensational event was changing from the brown suit to the gray the contents of his pockets. He was earnest about these objects. They were of eternal importance, like baseball or the Republican Party. They included a fountain pen and a silver pencil (always lackin g a supply of new leads) which belonged in the right-hand upper vest pocket. Without them he would have felt naked. On his watch chain

were a gold penknife, silver cigar cutter, seven keys (the use of two of which he had forgotten), and incidentally a good watch. Depending from the chain was a large, yellowish elk’s tooth—proclamation of his membership in the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. Most significant of all was his looseleaf pocket notebo ok, that modern and efficient notebook which contained the addresses of people whom he had forgotten, prudent memoranda of postal money orders which had reached their destinations months ago, stamps which had lost their mucilage, clippings of verse by T. Cholmondeley Frink and of the newspaper editorials from which Babbitt got his opinions and his polysyllables, notes to be sure and do things which he did not intend to do, and one curious inscription—

D.S.S.D.M.Y.P.D.F.

But he had no cigarette case. No one had ever happened to give

him one, so he hadn’t the habit, and people who carried cigarett e cases he regarded as effeminate. Last, he stuck in his lapel the Boosters’ Club button. With the conciseness of great art the button displayed two words: “Boosters— Pep!” It made Babbitt feel loyal and important. It associated him with Good Fellows, with men who were nice and human, and important in business circles. It was his V.C., his Legion of Honor ribbon, his Phi Beta Kappa key. With the subtleties of dressing ran other complex worries. “I feel kind of punk this morning,” he said. “I think I had too much dinner last evening. You oughtn’t to serve those heavy banana fritters.” “But you asked me to have some.”

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“I know, but— I tell you, when a fellow gets past forty he has to look after his digestion. There’s a lot of fellows that don’t take proper care of themselves. I tell you at forty a man’s a fool or his doctor—I mean, his own doctor. Folks don’t give enough attention to this matter of dieting. Now I think— Course a man ought to have

a good meal after the day’s work, but it would be a good thing for

both of us if we took lighter lunches.” “But Georgie, here at home I always do have a light lunch.” “Mean to imply I make a hog of myself, eating downtown?

Yes,

sure! You’d have a swell time if you had to eat the truck that new steward hands out to us at the Athletic Club! But I certainly do feel out of sorts, this morning. Funny, got a pain down here on the left side—but no, that wouldn’t be appendicitis, would it? Last night, when I was driving over to Verg Gunch’s, I felt a pain in my stomach, too. Right here it was—kind of a sharp shooting pain. I— Where'd that dime go to? Why don’t you serve more prunes at breakfast? Of course I eat an apple every evening—an apple a day keeps the doctor away—but still, you ought to have more prunes, and not all these fancy doodads.” “The last time I had prunes you didn’t eat them.” “Well, I didn’t feel like eating ’em, I suppose. Matter of fact, I think I did eat some of em. Anyway— I tell you it’s mighty important to— I was saying to Verge Gunch, just last evening, most people don’t take sufficient care of their diges—” “Shall we have the Gunches for our dinner, next week?” “Why sure; you bet.” “Now see here, George: I want you to put on your nice dinner

jacket that evening.” “Rats! The rest of ’em won’t want to dress.” “Of course they will. You remember when you didn’t dress for the Littlefields’ supper party, and all the rest did, and how embarrassed you were.” “Embarrassed, hell! I wasn’t embarrassed. Everybody knows I can put on as expensive a tux as anybody else, and I should worry if I don’t happen to have it on sometimes. All a darn nuisance, anyway. All right for a woman, that stays around the house all the time, but when a fellow’s worked like the dickens all day, he doesn’t want to go and hustle his head off getting into the soup-and-fish for a lot of folks that he’s seen in just reg’lar ordinary clothes that same day.” “You know you enjoy being seen in one. The other evening you

admitted you were glad Id insisted on your dressing. You said you

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597

felt a lot better for it. And oh, Georgie, I do wish you wouldn ’t say ‘tux.’ It’s ‘dinner jacket.’ ” “Rats, what’s the odds?”

“Well, it’s what all the nice folks say. Suppose Lucile McKelvey

heard you calling it a ‘tux.’ ”

“Well, that’s all right now! Lucile McKelvey can’t pull anything

on me! Her folks are common as mud, even if her husband and her dad are millionaires! | suppose you're trying to rub in your exalted social position! Well, let me tell you that your revered paterna l ancestor, Henry T., doesn’t even call it a ‘tux’! He calls it a ‘bobtail jacket for a ringtail monkey,’ and you couldn’t get him into one unless you chloroformed him!” “Now don’t be horrid, George.”

“Well, I don’t want to be horrid, but Lord! you're getting as fussy

as Verona. Ever since she got out of college she’s been too rambunctious to live with—doesn’t know what she wants—well, I know what she wants!—all she wants is to marry a millionaire, and live in Europe, and hold some preacher’s hand, and simultaneously at the same

time stay right here in Zenith and be some blooming kind of a social-

ist agitator or boss charity worker or some damn thing! Lord, and Ted is just as bad! He wants to go to college, and he doesn’t want to go to college. Only one of the three that knows her own mind is Tinka. Simply can’t understand how I ever came to have a pair of

shillyshallying children like Rone and Ted. I may not be any Rocke-

feller or James J. Shakespeare, but I certainly do know my own mind, and I do keep right on plugging along in the office and— Do you know the latest? Far as I can figure out, Ted’s new bee is he’d like to be a movie actor and— And here I’ve told him a hundred

times, if he’ll go to college and law school and make good, I'll set

him up in business and—Verona just exactly as bad. Doesn’t know what she wants. Well, well, come on! Aren’t you ready yet? The girl rang the bell three minutes ago.”

Before he followed his wife, Babbitt stood at the westernmost window of their room. This residential settlement, Floral Heights, was on a rise; and though the center of the city was three miles away—Zenith had between three and four hundred thousand inhabitants now—he could see the top of the Second National Tower, an Indiana limestone building of 35 stories. Its shining walls rose against April sky to a simple cornice like a streak of white fire. Integrity was in the tower, and decision. It bore

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its strength lightly as a tall soldier. As Babbitt stared, the nervousness was soothed from his face, his slack chin lifted in reverence. All he articulated was ““That’s one lovely sight!” but he was inspired by the rhythm of the city, his love of it renewed. He beheld the tower as a temple spire of the religion of business, a faith passionate, exalted, surpassing common men; and as he clumped down to break-

fast he whistled the ballad “Oh, by gee, by gosh, by jingo” as though it were a hymn melancholy and noble.

Take a Missionary

“{* LESLIE LIEBER and CHARLIE RICE THE susPicIon that cartoonists may be living in a cockeyed dream world dawned on me in full force just the other day. Out of a clear sky my nephew asked why he had never seen anybod y at his school wearing a dunce cap. Henry’s remark caught me off guard. Like millions of other Americans, I had always laughed my head off at cartoons, no questions asked. “Better check with your teachers,” I answered testily. “If your school doesn’t have any dunce caps, why, it’s a pretty poorly equipped institution.” But the boy’s skepticism had dented my faith in all the timehonored cartoonist themes. The situation warranted a full-scale investigation. The first suspicious character to come under scrutiny was that hardy perennial, the boiled missionary. One of my informants on this ticklish topic was Dr. Elmer Fridell, distinguished foreign secretary of the American Baptist Foreign Mission Society. “I’ve traveled far and wide in the African Congo,” he told me after recovering from his initial shock at such a question, “and as far as I know, nobody has ever cooked a missionary. Furthermore, the cartoon people err when they insist on stewing us in iron kettles. Tribes on the cannibal level haven’t developed the kettle.” One century-old case of minced missionary was reported, however, by a specialist in the Pacific area, the Reverend Wynn C. Fairfield, secretary of the F oreign Missions Conference of North America. He and Kenneth S. Latourette, professor of Missions and Oriental History at Yale University, issued me a joint report revealing that two missionaries were killed—and probably eaten—by the Ba-

tak tribes of Sumatra back in 1834. To this day descendants of the

guilty tribesmen recite a special prayer asking forgiveness for their indigestible sin before entering their churches.

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Leslie Lieber and Charlie Rice

Dr. Fairfield said that God had forgiven them, and he wished the cartoonists would do likewise. The question about dunce caps caused quite a flurry at the New York City Board of Education. I found myself being switched un-

popularly from person to person as if there were a hot potato inside

the telephone receiver. Officials put their hands over the mouthpiece

as they held harried consultations. Finally, Mark A. McClosky, direc-

tor of community education, nabbed the phone. “What’s this about dunce caps?” he wanted to know. “There are no dunce caps, absolutely none. Of course, we do have plenty of dunces. But our school system makes no budgetary provision for dunce caps.” Somebody along the way had suggested that the dunce-cap habit once flourished in England. The British Delegation to the UN has somewhat flustered upon receiving our query on this subject. No-

body there admitted to ever having worn or seen one; the dunce cap was completely disowned as an adjunct to the crown. While we were still on Empire territory, we asked the press attaché about another cartoon fable: the monocle which the artists always use to identify a Britisher. “Monocles are as passé as the gout,” he said. ““Austen Chamberlain was the last great public figure who wore one. The monocle has out-

lived its day as the trade mark of the Englishman.” Next on my list for investigation was the role of the rolling pin in the American home. Cartoon tradition has touted it as the weapon

par excellence for bashing husbands’ skulls. Our question on the pantry brickbat

ambushed

Judge

Doris

Byrne, of New York’s busy Home-Term Court, in the judicial sanctity of her chambers. “The rolling pin is one of the few objects which wives in this city do not throw at their husbands,” she said. “I can cite lots of pots, pans, dishes, chairs, and, of course, half-empty bottles if that’ll help.” Lieutenant James Walsh, a detective with 18 years’ experience in a precinct riddled with family squabbles, says rolling pins lead a blameless existence in his neighborhood. “It beats me what crazy things they do pitch at each other though,” he mused. ““Woman the other night threw a dog at her husband.” The assistant warden at Sing Sing put the kibosh on another ancient myth: “Our laws of penology forbid tying prisoners to a balland-chain,” he said. “And tell the cartoonists to cut out those zebra-

striped suits. That garb hasn’t been worn since the turn of the century.”

TAKE

A MISSIONARY

601

As an acid test of the old refrain that goats dote on tin cans, |

journeyed out to a farm to place five delicacies in front of a hungry nanny personally and record the results.

The goodies consisted of an empty tin can, a copy of The New Yorker magazine, a plastic ash tray, one spool of blue typewriter ribbon, and a small portion of prepared goat chow, a prosaic fodder consisting of corn, alfalfa, meal, oats, grains and molasses. With one quick movement, the goat blasted the cartoonists’ notions to smithereens. She nose-dived straight into the goat feed and didn’t look up until the last morsel had been guzzled. Then she sniffed at The New Yorker and went to sleep. On the way back from the goat project I stopped off at the Bronx Zoo to find out whether ostriches hide their heads in the sand. “Ostriches don’t live anywhere near sand,” declared Lee S. Crandall, general curator. “For them to dig a foxhole to hide their heads, they’d need steam shovels for beaks. When an ostrich wants to con-

ceal himself, he lies down and stretches his neck out flat along the ground. All you see then is the mound formed by his body.” A little higher in the animal kingdom comes the dog. In cartoons,

dogs always wag their tails and come running when addressed as “Fido.” Charles Woodford, license clerk at the ASPCA, took a sample census for us of the 60,000 dog tags down there and found that Fido “was as dead as the dodo.” Nowadays it’s either Fala or Skippy. The faces of several Indians clouded over with a warpath look when I sauntered up and said “Ugh.” Harry Tschopik, Assistant Curator of Ethnology at the American Museum

of Natural History,

said he had combed the Red Man’s rhetoric from coast to out finding the slightest justification for the word. But Miss Rosebud Yellow-Robe, a Sioux squaw with a gree, who directs the Indian Village at Jones Beach, Long mitted sadly that many of her people had been forced to

“ughs”

in

order

to

convince

tourists

that

they’re

coast with-

college deIsland, adutter some

the

real

McThunder-Cloud. Even the cartoonist’s journalistic cousin, the newspaper reporter, wishes the pen-flourishers would mend their ways. He wishes the

boys would stop drawing him with a battered hat parked on the back of his cranium. I braved the wrath of three harried city editors one

night by calling them in the middle of Manhattan’s deadline hubbub. Result of the spot-check: Of 175 hardened newshawks surveyed in their native habitat not one was wearing a battered hat. “All the hats here are on racks,” shouted one editor over the din. Another

growled, “Try the Associated Press. Used to be two screwballs over

602

Leslie Lieber and Charlie Rice

there that never took their hats off. They saw Front Page and never got over it.” The A.P. doesn’t own up to them any more.

Indians, Heels and Tenants

“t= A. J. LIEBLING In THE Jotxiry Burtpine, which stands six stories high and covers half of a Broadway block in the high Fortie s, the term pro-

moter means

a man who mulcts another man of a dollar, or any frac-

tion or multiple thereof. The verb to promote alway s takes a personal object, and the highest praise you can accord someo ne in the

Jollity Building is to say, “He has promoted some very smart people.” The Jollity Building—it actually has a somewhat different

name, and the names of its inhabitants are not the ones which will appear below—is representative of perhaps a dozen or so buildings in the

upper stories of which the small-scale amusement industry nests like a tramp pigeon. All of them draw a major part of their incom e from the rental of their stores at street level, and most of them contai n on their lower floors a dance hall or a billiard parlor, or both. The dance hall, known as Jollity Danceland, occupies the second floor. The poolroom is in the basement. It is difficult in such a building to rent

office space to any business house that wants to be taken very seriou sly,

so the upper floors fill up with the petty nomads of Broadway—c hiefly orchestra leaders, theatrical agents, bookmakers, and miscellane ous promoters.

Fight coin-box telephone booths in the lobby of the Jollity Build-

ing serve as offices for promoters and others who cannot raise the price of desk space on an upper floor. The phones are used mostly for incoming calls. It is a matter of perpetual regret to Morty, the renting agent of the building, that he cannot collect rent from the occupants of the booths. He always refers to them as the Telephone Booth Indians, because in their lives the telephone booth furnishes sustenance as well as shelter, as the buffalo did for the Arapahoe and Sioux. A Telephone Booth Indian on the hunt often tells a prospec-

tive investor to call him at a certain hour in the afternoon, giving the victim the number of the phone in one of the booths. The Indian im-

plies, of course, that it is a private line. Then the Indian has to hang

in the booth until the fellow calls. To hang, in Indian language, means to loiter. “I used to hang in Forty-sixth Street, front of Vari-

604

A. J. Liebling

ety,” a small bookmaker may say, referring to a previous business lo-

cation. Seeing the Indians hanging in the telephone booths is painful to Morty, but there is nothing he can do about it. The regular occupants of the booths recognize one another’s rights. It may be understood among them, for instance, that a certain orchestra leader receives calls in a particular booth between three and four in the afternoon and that a competitor has the same booth from four to five. In these circumstances, ethical Indians take telephone messages

for each other. There are always fewer vacancies in the telephone

booths than in any other part of the Jollity Building.

While awaiting a call, an Indian may occasionally emerge for air, unless the lobby is so crowded that there is a chance he might lose his place to a transient who does not understand the house rules.

Usually, however, the Indian hangs in the booth with the door open, leaning against the wall and reading a scratch sheet in order to conserve time. Then, if somebody rings up and agrees to lend him two dollars, he will already have picked a horse on which to lose

that amount. When an impatient stranger shows signs of wanting to use a telephone, the man in the booth closes the door, takes the receiver off the hook, and makes motions with his lips, as if talking.

To add verisimilitude to a long performance, he occasionally hangs up, takes the receiver down again, drops a dime in the slot, whirls the dial three or four times, and hangs up again, after which the dime comes back. Eventually the stranger goes away, and the man in the booth returns to the study of his scratch sheet. At mealtimes, the Telephone Booth Indians sometimes descend

singly to the Jollity Building’s lunch counter, which is at one end of the poolroom in the basement. The busiest lunch periods are the most favorable for a stunt the boys have worked out to get free nourishment. An Indian seats himself at the counter and eats two or three pastrami sandwiches. As he is finishing his lunch, one of his comrades appears at the head of the stairs, and shouts that he is wanted on the telephone. The Indian rushes upstairs, absentmindedly omitting to pay for his meal. Barney, the lunch-counter proprietor, is too busy to go after him when he fails to return after a reasonable time. An Indian can rarely fool Barney more than once or twice. The maneuver requires nice timing and unlimited faith in one’s accomplice. Should the accomplice fail to make his entrance,

the Indian at the counter might be compelled to eat pastrami sandwiches indefinitely, acquiring frightful indigestion and piling up an appalling debt. Morty, the renting agent, is a thin, sallow man of forty whose ex-

INDIANS,

HEELS

AND

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605 pression has been compared a little unfairly to that of a dead robin. He is not, however, a man without feeling; he takes a personal in-

terest in the people who spend much of their lives in the Jollity Building. It is about the same sort of interest that Curat or Raymond

Ditmars takes in the Bronx Zoo’s vampire bats.

“I know more heels than any other man in the world,” Morty sometimes says, not without pride. “Everywhere I go around Broad-

way, I get ‘Hello, how are you?’ Heels that haven’t been with me for

years, some of them.” Morty usually reserves the appellation “heel” for the people who

rent the 48 cubicles, each furnished with a desk and two chairs, on the third floor of the Jollity Building. These cubicles are formed by

partitions of wood and frosted glass which do not quite reach the

ceiling. Sufficient air to maintain human life is supposed to circulate over the partitions. The offices rent for $10 and $12. 50 a month, pay-

able in advance. “Twelve and a half dollars with air, ten dollars without air,” Morty says facetiously. “Very often the heels who rent them take the air without telling me.” Sometimes a Telephone Booth Indian acquires enough capital to rent a cubicle. He thus rises in the social scale and becomes a heel. A cubicle has three advantages over a telephone booth. One is that you cannot get a desk into a telephone booth. Another is that you can play pinochle in a cubicle. Another is that a heel gets his name on the directory in the lobby, and the white letters have a bold, legitimate look.

The vertical social structure of the Jollity Building is subject to

continual shifts. Not only do Indians become heels, but a heel occasionally accumulates

$40 or $50 with which to pay a month’s rent

on one of the larger offices, all of them unfurnished, on the fourth, fifth, or sixth floor. He then becomes a tenant. Morty always views

such progress with suspicion, because it involves signing a lease, and

once a heel has signed ing a dispossess notice opinion, is just a heel “Any time a heel acts says, “you know he’s

a lease, you cannot put him out without servand waiting ten days. A tenant, in Morty’s who is planning to get ten days’ free rent. prosperous enough to rent an office,” Morty getting ready to take you.” A dispossessed

tenant often reappears in the Jollity Building as an Indian. It is a life cycle. Morty has people in the building who have been Telephone Booth Indians, heels, and tenants several times each. He likes them best when they are in the heel stage. “You can’t collect rent from a guy who hangs in the lobby,” he says in explanation, “and with a

606

A. J. Liebling

regular tenant of an unfurnished office, you got too many headaches.” He sometimes breaks off a conversation with a friendly heel

by saying, “Excuse me, I got to go upstairs and insult a tenant.” As if to show his predilection for the heels, Morty has his own office on the third floor. It is a large corner room with windows on

two sides. There is a flattering picture of the Jollity Building on one of the walls, and six framed plans, one of each floor, on another wall. Also in the offices are an unattractive, respectable-looking secretary and, on Morty’s desk, a rather depressing photograph of his wife. The conventionality of this décor makes Morty unhappy, and he spends as little time as possible in his office. Between nine o’clock in the morning, when he arrives and dejectedly looks through his mail for rent checks he does not expect to find, and six-thirty in the evening, when he goes home to Rockaway, he lives mostly amid the pulsating activity outside his office door.

The furnished

cubicles on the third floor yield an income

of

about $500 a month, which, as Morty says, is not hay. Until a few

years ago, the Jollity Building used to feel it should provide switchboard service for these offices. The outgoing telephone calls of the heels were supposed to be paid for at the end of every business day. This system necessitated the use of a cordon of elevator boys to prevent tenants from escaping. “Any heel who made several telephone calls toward the end of the month, you could kiss him goodbye,” Morty says. “As soon as he made up his mind to go out of business he started thinking of people to telephone. It was cheaper for him to go out of business than settle for the calls, anyhow. The only way you can tell if a heel is still in business, most of the time, anyway, is to look in his office for his hat. If his hat is gone, he is out of business.” A minor annoyance of the switchboard system was the tendency of the heels to call the operator and ask for the time. “None of them were going anywhere, but they all wanted to know the time,” Morty says resentfully. “None of them had watches. Nobody would

be in this building unless he had already hocked his watch.” There

are lady heels, too, but if they are young Morty calls them “heads.” (Morty meticulously refers to all youngish women as “heads,” which has the same meaning as broads or dolls but is newer; he does not want his conversation to sound archaic.) Heads also abused the

switchboard system. “One head that used to claim to sell stockings,”

says Morty, “called the board one day, and when the operator said, ‘Five o'clock,’ this head said, ‘My God, I didn’t eat yet!’ If there had

INDIANS,

HEELS

AND TENANTS

607

been no switchboard, she would never have known she was hungry. She would have saved a lot of money.”

As a consequence of these abuses, the switchboard was abolished,

and practically all the heels now make their telephone calls from

three open coin-box telephones against the wall in a corridor that bisects the third floor. The wall for several feet on each side of the telephones is covered with numbers the heels have jotted down. The Jollity Building pays a young man named Angelo to sit at a table in a small niche near the telephones and answer incoming calls. He screams “Who?” into the mouthpiece and then shuffles off to find

whatever heel is wanted. On days when Angelo is particularly weary,

he just says, “He ain’t in,” and hangs up. He also receives and distributes the mail for the heels. Angelo is a pallid chap who has been at various periods a chorus boy, a taxi driver, and a drummer in one

of the bands which maintain headquarters in the Jollity Building.

“Every time a heel comes in,” Angelo says, “he wants to know ‘Are you sure there isn’t a letter for me that feels like it had a Checkinuite: ven. Lhat’s funny, the fellow swore he mailed it last night.’ Then he tries to borrow a dime from me so he can telephone.” Not having a dime is a universal trait of people who rent the cubicles, and they spend a considerable portion of the business day hanging by the third-floor telephones, waiting for the arrival of somebody to borrow a dime from. While waiting, they talk to An-

gelo, who makes it a rule not to believe anything they say. There are no booths in the corridor because Morty does not want any

Telephone Booth Indians to develop on the third floor. Morty himself often goes to visit Angelo and terrifies the heels

with his bilious stare. “They all say they got something big for next

week,” he tells Angelo in a loud, carrying voice, ‘‘but the rent is ‘I'll see you tomorrow.’” Morty’s friends sometimes drop in there to visit him. He likes to sit on Angelo’s table with them and tell about the current collection of furnished-office inhabitants. “Who is that phony-looking heel who just passed, you want to know?” he may

say during such a recapitulation. “Hey, this is funny. He happens to

be a legitimate—autos to hire. The heel in the next office publishes a horse magazine. If he gets a winner, he eats. Then there’s one of them heels that hires girls to sell permanent waves

for fifty cents down,

door to door. The girl takes the fifty cents and gives the dame a ticket, but when the dame goes to look for the beauty parlor it says on the ticket, there is no such beauty parlor at that address.

608

A. J. Liebling

“We got two heels writing plays. They figure they got nothing to do, so they might as well write a play, and if it clicks, they might also eat. Then we got a lady heel who represents Brazilian music publishers and also does a bit of booking, also a head who is running a school for hat-check girls, as it seems the hat-check profession is very complicated for some of the type of minds they

got in it. Those heads who walk through the hall are going no place. They just stick their potato in every office and say, ‘Anything for me today?’ They do not even look to see if it is a theatrical office. If they expected to find anything, they would not be over here. What would anybody here have to offer? Once in a while a sap from the suburbs walks into one of the offices on this floor thinking he can get some talent cheap. ‘Sure,’ some heel says, ‘I got just the thing you want.’ They run down in the lobby looking for somebody. They ask some head they meet in the lobby, ‘Are you a performer?’ They try the other little agents that they know. The whole date is worth probably four dollars, and the forty cents’ commission they split sometimes four ways.” Heels are often, paradoxically, more affluent than the official les-

sees of larger offices. Many fellows who rent the big units take in subtenants, and if there are enough of them, each man’s share of the rent may be less than the ten dollars a month minimum rent a heel has to pay. One two-desk office on the fourth, fifth, or sixth floor may serve as headquarters for four theatrical agents, a band leader, a music arranger, a manager of prize fighters, and a dealer in pawn tickets. They agree on a schedule by which each man has the exclusive use of a desk for a few hours every day, to impress people who call by appointment, and the office is used collectively, when no outsiders are present, for games of rummy. All the fellows in the office receive their telephone calls on a single coin-box machine affixed to the wall. Subtenants often make bets among themselves, the amount of the wager corresponding to each bettor’s share of the rent. The loser is supposed to pay double rent, the winner nothing. This causes difficulties for Morty when he goes to collect the rent. The official lessee always protests that he would like to pay on the dot but the other boys haven’t paid him. Subtenants who have won bets consider themselves absolved of any responsibility, and the fellows who are supposed to pay double are invariably broke. Morty makes an average of fifteen calls to collect a month’s rent on an office, and thus acquires a much greater intimacy with the tenants than the agents of a place like Rockefeller Center or River House. Desk room in a large office has the advantage of being much

INDIANS, HEELS

AND TENANTS

609

more dignified than a cubicle on the third floor, but there is one drawback: Morty’s rule that not more than two firm names may be listed on the directory in the lobby for any one office. Callers therefore have to ask the elevator boys where to find some of the subtenants. If the elevator boys do not like the subtenant in question,

they say they never heard of him. Nor will the implacable Morty

permit more than two names to be painted on any office door. Junior subtenants get around the rule by having a signpainter put their names on strips of cardboard which they insert between the glass and

the wooden frame of the door or affix to the glass by strips of tape. “You cannot let a tenant creep on you,” Morty says in justifica-

tion of his severity. “You let them get away with eight names on the

door, and the next thing they will be asking you for eight keys to the men’s room.” Morty’s parents were named Goldberg, and he was born in the Bensonhurst region of Brooklyn. He almost finished a commercial course in high school before he got his first job, being an order

clerk for a chain of dairy-and-herring stores. In the morning he

would drive to each of these stores and find out from the store man-

agers what supplies they needed from the company’s warehouse. Since he had_ little to do in the afternoons, he began after a while to deliver packages for a bootlegger who had been a high school class-

mate and by chance had an office in the Jollity Building. The name on the door was the Music Writers Mutual Publishing Company. About a quarter of the firms in the building at that time were fronts

for bootleggers, Morty recalls. “Repeal was a terrible blow to property values in this district,” he says. ““Bootleggers were always the

best pay.” Seeing a greater future in bootlegging than in dairy goods and herring, Morty soon went to work for his old classmate on a full-time basis. The moment Morty decided that his future lay on Broadway, he translated his name from Goldberg into Ormont. ““Or is French for gold,” he sometimes explains, “and ‘mont’ is the same as ‘berg.’ But the point is it’s got more class than Goldberg.” By diligent application, Morty worked his way up to a partnership in the Music Writers Mutual Publishing Company. The part-

ners made good use of their company’s name. They advertised in pulp magazines, offering to write music for lyrics or lyrics for music, to guarantee publication, and to send back to the aspiring song writer a hundred free copies of his work, all for $100. The Music Writers Mutual agreed to pay him the customary royalties on all copies sold. There never were any royalties, because Morty and his

A. J. Liebling

610

partner had only the author’s hundred copies printed. They kept a

piano in their office and hired a professional musician for $35 a week

to set music to lyrics. Morty himself occasionally wrote lyrics to the tunes clients sent in, and had a lot of fun doing it. At times the music

business went so well that the partners were tempted to give up

bootlegging. There were so many similar publishing firms, however, that there was not a steady living in it. “But you would be surprise,” Morty says now, “how near it came to paying our over-

head.” The volume of mail made it look bona fide. They built up a prosperous semiwholesale liquor business, specializing in furnishing

whisky to firms in the garment center, which used it for presents to out-of-town buyers. “The idea on that stuff was that it should be as

reasonable as possible without killing anybody,” Morty says. “It was a good, legitimate dollar.” The depression in the garment industry ruined the Music Writers Mutual Publishing Company’s business even before repeal and left Morty broke. The Jollity Building belongs to the estate of an old New York family, and in the twenties the trustees had installed as manager one of the least promising members of the family, a middle-aged alcoholic Har-

vard man whom they wanted to keep out of harm’s way. Morty had been such a good tenant and seemed so knowing a fellow that

the Harvard man offered him a job at $25 a week as his assistant. When the manager ran off with $11,000 in rents and a head he had met in the lobby, Morty took over his job. He has held it ever since. The trustees feel, as one of them has expressed it, that “Mr. Ormont

understands the milieu.” He now gets $50 a week and 2 per cent of the total rents, which adds about two thousand a year to his income. The nostalgia Morty often feels for the opportunities of prohibition days is shared by the senior tenant in the building, the proprietor of the Quick Art Theatrical Sign Painting Company, on the sixth floor. The sign painter, a Mr. Hy Sky—a name made up of the first syllable of his first name, Hyman, and the last syllable of a surname which no one can remember—is a bulky, red-faced man who has rented space in the Jollity Building for 25 years. With his brother, a lean, sardonic man known as Si Sky, he paints signs and lobby displays

for burlesque and movie houses and does odd jobs of lettering for people in all sorts of trades. He is an extremely fast letterer and he

handles a large volume of steady business, but it lacks the exhilaration two not and

of prohibition years. Then he was o'clock in the morning redecorating be identified by a man who had just might return with cops the next day.

sometimes put to work at a clip joint, so that it could been robbed of a bank roll ‘“‘Was that fun!” Hy howls

INDIANS,

HEELS

AND

TENANTS

611

reminiscently. “And always cash in advance! If the joint had green

walls, we would make them pink. We woul d move the bar Opposite to where it was, and if there was booths in the place, we would paint

them a different color and change them around. Then the next day, when the cops came in with the sap, they woul d say, ‘Is this the

place? Try to remember the side of the door the bar was on as you

come in.’ The sap would hesitate, and the cops would say, ‘I guess he can’t identify the premises,’ and they would shove him along. It was a nice, comfortable dollar for me.”

Hy has a clinical appreciation of meretricious types which he tries

unsuccessfully to arouse in Morty. Sometimes, when Hy has a particularly preposterous liar in his place, he will teleph one the renting

agent's office and shout, “Morty, pop up and see the charac ter I got

here! He is the most phoniest character I seen in severa l years.” The person referred to seldom resents such a description. Peopl e in the Jollity Building neighborhood like to be thought of as charac ters. “He is a real character,” they say, with respect, of any fascin atingly repulsive acquaintance. Most promoters are characters. Hy Sky at-

tributes the stability of his own business to the fact that he is willin g

to “earn a hard dollar.” “The trouble with the characters,” he says, “ts they are always looking for a soft dollar. The result is they knock

theirselves out trying too hard to have it easy. So what do they get after all? Only the miss-meal cramps.” Nevertheless, it always gives

Hy a genteel pleasure to collaborate, in a strictly legitimate way,

with any of the promoters he knows. The promoter may engage

him to paint a sign saying, “A new night club will open soon on these premises. Concessionaires interested telephone So-and-So at suchand-such a number.” The name is the promoter’s own, and the tele-

phone given is, as Hy knows, in a booth in the Jollity Building. The

promoter, Hy also knows, will place this sign in front of a vacant night club with which he has absolutely no connection, in the hope

that some small hat-check concessionaire with money to invest in a

new club will read the sign before someone gets around to removing

it and take it seriously. If the concessionaire telephones, the promoter

will make an appointment to receive him in a Jollity cubicle borrowed from some other promoter for the occasion and will try to

get a couple of hundred dollars as a deposit on the concession. If

successful, he will lose the money on a horse in the sixth race at an obscure track in California. The chances of getting any money out of this promotional scheme are exceedingly slight, but the pleasure of the promoter when the device succeeds is comparable to that of a

sportsman who catches a big fish on a light line. Contemplation of

612

A. J. Liebling

the ineffectual larceny in the promoter’s heart causes Hy to laugh

constantly while lettering such a sign. A contributory cause of his

laughter is the knowledge that he will receive the only dollar that 1s

likely to change hands in the transaction—the dollar he gets for painting the sign. Musicians are not characters in Hy’s estimation, but merely a mild variety of phony. As such, they afford him a tempered amusement. When two impressive band leaders in large, fluffy overcoats call upon him for a communal cardboard door sign, toward the cost of

which each contributes 25 cents, he innocently inquires, “How many of you are there in that office?” One of the band leaders will reply

grandiosely, “Oh, we all have separate offices; the sign is for the door to quite a huge suite.” He laughs so hard he bends double to relieve the strain on his diaphragm. His brother, Si, who lives in con-

tinual fear that Hy will die of apoplexy, abandons his work and slaps

Hy’s back until the crowing abates. “A suite,” Hy repeats weakly at intervals for a half-hour afterward, “a huge suite they got, like on the subway at six o’clock you could get.” Hy also paints, at an aver-

age price of 25 cents, cardboard backs for music racks. These pieces of cardboard, whose only function is to identify the band, bear in bright letters its name, which is usually something like Everett Win-

terbottom’s Rhumba Raiders. When a Jollity Building band leader has acquired a sign for his door and a set of these lettered cardboards, he is equipped for business. If, by some unlikely chance, he gets an engagement, usually to play a weekend in a cabaret in Queens or the Bronx, he hurries out to the curb on Seventh Avenue in front of Charlie’s Bar & Grill, where there are always plenty of musicians, and picks up the number of fellows he requires, generally four. The men tapped go over to Eighth Avenue and get their instruments out of pawn. A musician who owns several instruments usually leaves them all in a pawnshop, ransoming one when he needs it to play a date and putting it back the next day. If, when he has a chance to work, he lacks the money to redeem an instrument, he borrows the

money from a Jollity Building six-for-fiver, a fellow who will lend you five dollars if you promise to pay him six dollars within 24 hours. Meanwhile, the band leader looks up a fellow who rents out orchestra arrangements guaranteed to be exact, illegal copies of those one or another of the big bandsmen has exclusive use of. The band leader puts the arrangements and his cardboards under his arm and goes down to Charlie’s to wait for the other musicians to come back from the hock shop. That night Everett Winterbottom’s Rhumba Raiders ride again. The only worry in the world the Raid-

INDIANS,

HEELS

AND

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613

ers have, at least for the moment, is that they will have to finish

their engagement before a union delegate discovers them and takes

away

their cards. Each

man

is going to receive

night, which is seven dollars below union scale.

three dollars a

Spinning the Family Circle “i= ART LINKLETTER «

“My FAmiLy, right or wrong!” This might be the motto you’d find engraved on the subconscious of most growing children. The family circle encompasses the most important areas of a child’s world, and represents in the final analysis the kind of thinking, acting and reacting he will do for the rest of his life. He knows most about this subject and has the strongest opinions about the goings-on under the family roof. This is perhaps the ‘mother lode” that an interviewer can mine indefinitely, and the sure-fire, dependable old standby when all else fails. “What kind of a family have you?” I began the questioning one day on my television show. “Seven children. All girls except one,” the six-year-old sweetiepie murmured. “Who’s that, your brother?” “My father.” “Would he like a boy in the family?” “Yes. But my mother wouldn’t.” “Why not?” “She says that Daddy is enough boy for her!” And recalling the size of that growing family, I must say I couldn’t argue with Mother’s viewpoint. Large families are the most fun, I think. My own five youngsters are a constant source of sur-

prise and delight. And the most surprising thing is that each is so completely different, he might very well have had a different set of parents. Big families, of course, must work out various compromises for adjusting differences and sharing work. I asked one young fellow who had four brothers and three sisters: “How do you decide who does chores around the house?” “We have a big council meeting, just like the government.” “Who’s president?” “My mother, of course,” he said, surprised that I wouldn’t know. “Who’s vice-president?” “All the rest of us except my dad.”

SPINNING

THE

FAMILY

CIRCLE

615

“What’s he2” “He’s in the living room watching the fights on television.”

The

subject of housework

and household

problems

finds Dad

looking out the window in many families. In fact, it is occasio nally

the subject for a round-table discussion between several of my young friends. Here are four typical answers: “My dad doesn’t even talk about housework. He Just stays in bed.” “My dad plays golf with the boss so he’ll get a raise.” “My dad won’t dust. But he cleans his own teeth.” “My dad won’t even come home weekends if there’s any work waiting there.” And here’s a peek into how the youngsters would change their parents if they had a magic wand and could say “Presto: chango! ” “Td make them both my size. I don’t like big people!” “T’d make them sweet tempered and rich.” “Td change my mother and make her skinny in the right places.” “Td change my dad into a dog and my mom into a cow” was the most startling answer I’d had ina long time. I asked: “Why?” “Because I like dogs and cows,” was the laconic answer. I didn’t press that subject any further. Here’s one that has echoed and re-echoed through many a home when the first of the month comes around: “What’s your dad’s main complaint?” “My mom’s always asking for money.” “What’s your mother’s main complaint?” “Dad never gives her any.” And this same offhand way of summing up a complete family problem is mastered by a seven-year-old who admitted: “My mother talks most at our house.” “What does your dad do when he can’t get a word in edgewise?” “He gets up and goes to bed.”

True Confessions Magazine never received such open-faced admissions of guilt as the kids pour out each day about family transgressions. Occasionally I ask, “What were you ever punished for?” “Taking money from my mother’s purse without permission,” unhesitatingly he confessed. “How much did you take?” “A nickel.”

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“What did you want it for?” “A Popsicle.” “And what did you get?” “A spanking.” It takes a lot of patience to bring up a youngster. When I asked one young fellow who had the most patience at his house, he replied: “I would rather not say. If I mention my mother, my dad’ll hit me, and if Isay my dad, my mother’l] hit me.” Driving is a multifaceted subject because every child is impatiently awaiting his chance to get back of the wheel of the family bus. And like everything else, they are apt to be just as good or bad in their habits as their parents. Do you wonder what sort of traffic conditions will be produced by the child who answered this question: “Who's the best driver in your family?” “It’s kind of hard to say. My mother always backs part way through the garage. My dad smashed into the end of a parked car yesterday. Last week my mother went up on the curb and knocked an old man down. And they both get hundreds of tickets.” Sounds just like the family that’s always driving just ahead of me on the Freeway. When I asked one young man if his daddy talked much while driving, he said, “Yes, he sure does. Are we on the air now?” “Of course. Why do you ask?” “Then Id better not say what Daddy says about the other drivers.” A red-hot topic is the romantic subject of Mother’s and Dad’s engagement or marriage. From half-remembered, half-overheard and three-quarters made-up facts, the kids concoct some fabulous stories. But they’ve “shook up” a lot of staid families, and rattled many an ancestral skeleton. One little tyke murmured the elemental facts: “How did my daddy and mommy meet? How should I know? I wasn’t even born yet.” Another one said: “My dad and mom shared a room in college. Then they graduated into marriage.” It must have been a “liberal arts” institution, to say the least. A little girl began her story: “My dad had a roommate and my mother had a roommate and they went around together, so they finally arranged a blind date for my mother and dad.” “Was it love at first sight?”

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“Tn a way.” “What way?” “My dad loved my mother’s new car.” Automobiles play quite a part in marriage apparently because the

youngsters tell me of a number of “hit and run” romances. To wit:

“My mother was wheeling her two babies down the street this man kept driving around the block whistling and flirting . finally found a parking place, and they got married in March and me in April.” “My dad was always hanging around where my mother lived

and He had be-

cause her grandma liked him and wanted my mother to marry him.

But she never liked him very much, and probably would never have married him except that he finally got a new hot-rod.” How many parents have yelped with pained surprise when they heard family jokes repeated as the gospel truth by the youngsters who tell me everything? I would have enjoyed peeking out through the TV tube into the faces of the mother and dad who were immortalized by the answer: “My dad worked at a vegetable market, and my mother used to come in and pinch the vegetables. Everytime she’d pinch a vegetable, my dad would pinch her until they couldn’t stand it any longer and got married.” Here is an odd-size one that must have gotten a lot of mileage before friends and family mercifully desisted:

“My mother fell over another man into my father’s lap at a party.

Somehow they got acquainted, and later they decided to have some babies so they got married.”

And here’s a double handful of assorted reports on how Dad met Mom and Mom got Dad: My daddy and mommy met on a cloud over Los Angeles.

Then what happened? I was born on another cloud.

How did you all get down here? I came down with a raindrop and they had a double parachute. My folks met in a night club.

What was your father doing? He was a bartender. And your mother? She was attending a Parents-Teachers Association meeting.

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My folks were cousins in Massachusetts, but when they came out to California they had to get married. There’s some sort of law out here. Well, this strange man sat down on the bus next to a strange woman, and he said: “Will you marry me?” and she said, “Yes,” and they went home and had me.

One little lad remarked that they had a brand-new daddy around their house. When I asked if he knew how his mother had met him, he told us a real whizzer: “Tt all happened one morning when the doorbell rang while Mommy was taking her bath.” He stopped to gulp. And at this point I could have inserted a ten-minute commercial for any client under the sun and we wouldn’t have lost a viewer. “My little sister went to the door,” he finally continued, “and there was a strange man standing there. He said he’d like to see my mother. So sister Jet him!” No further footnotes were needed to write finis to this bathtub

romance. The subject of remarriage is not a touchy one with the children. They come right out and wish for a new daddy or mother with no

ifs, and or buts. Recently I asked a little girl, “What kind of a man would you like to have your mother marry?” She said, “I’m not sure, but I think a millionaire.” Another frank guest said: “My mother’s busy looking everywhere for a man.” “Where is the best chance to find one?” “So far, it’s best around Santa Monica, she says. But the trouble with most of them is that they yell, or drink or something.” ““That’s too bad,” I consoled him. “Oh, she doesn’t give up easy. She had one a few weeks ago that was just about perfect except for two little things.” “What were those?” “He didn’t like her. And he was already married.”

Fqually fantastic with the stories of romance are the guesses about what Mother and Dad do to occupy their time. Here again the fertile minds of the children play with fragments of truth, putting them together in strange new patterns that must have made mince-

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meat out of the nerves of their liste ning parents. How would you like to have been this boy’s mother: “On Monday my mom cleans the whol e house from top to bottom.” “What does she do the rest of the week ?” “Oh, she just sits around, smokes cigarettes and plays canasta.”

What does your mother do?

She’s a kind of a housewife. W hat kind? The lazy kind.

When does your mother look prettiest?

When she’s going to meet people she doesn ’t know so good. And when does she look the WOrst? Around the house in her ragged old nightgow n.

How old is your mother?

She says she’s thirty, but my dad told me she’s really thirty-six.

Does your mother work for a living? No. She’s a private secretary. Well, that sounds as if she works for a hving. Isn’t that some kind of a job? All I know is that she works for a slave driver down in the Fisher Building. My mother used to sing on television. Doesn't she do it any more? Less and less every day. Why? Because every day she gets more and more pregnant.

W hat does your mother do? She used to be Laura La Plante, the movie star.

Oh, I remember her, I enthused. What’s she doing now? She’s a woman.

W hat does your mother do? She’s president of the PTA. That's a very important job. Il bet she’s proud of you, isn’t she? Pll say. And she said to be sure not to say “that damned PTA.”

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My mother stays home and keeps the dog company. What kind of a dog is it? I don’t know, but it has one thing the same as my mother.

Are you sure you want to tell us what that is? Sure—it’s the same birthday, January fifth! My folks both work. My daddy’s a bartender.

And what does your mother do? Mostly she goes to the races. Last Sunday, after church, she won two hundred dollars on the first race.

Well, that’s a nice collection following the sermon, iswt it? My mother’s in ladies underwear in the basement.

That’s a strange thing to say. What do you mean? She works for the May Company.

My mother likes to work crossword puzzles. She’s real good. How many does she do a week? None. She’s just real good at starting them. The family always has to finish. My mother keeps saying, “Boot it out and do it over again.” What does that mean? Oh, we’re remodeling the house and that’s what she says to the builders every day. My mother sculptures with no clothes on.

Doesn't she get cold? No, silly, the other people are the bare ones. And finally, here are a few random descriptions of mothers, which constitute the complete, total answer to the question: “How would I know your mother if I met her?” “My mother has black suede shoes and clean pants.” “My mother has a brown dress, brown shoes and long stockings with knots in them to hold them up above the knee.” “My mother’s sort of fat and wears a torn green dress.” “My mother wears a funny Chinese nightgown with a slit up the sides so she has to wear pants under it.”

“My mother has dark brown hair, glasses and a lot of safety pins where you can’t see them.”

One Comes Quietly

“i> RICHARD LOCKRIDGE “AND so,” said Mrs. North’s sister, “I'll take the key

and let myself in, very quietly. I'll be pretty late, I expect. But I won't disturb you—I want you to go to bed just when you would anyway, because I don’t want to be a bother.” The Norths assured her that she could never be a bother and that

they would go to bed just as though they had no guest, never worrying about her for a moment. They would not, in short, let her be

any trouble at all. ‘“She’s really a nice guest,” said Mrs. North, after she had gone. “No trouble. She doesn’t make you feel you ought to fuss over her, does she?” Mr. North agreed that she was a nice

guest and didn’t expect fuss. “And I know she’ll come in just as quietly,” said Mrs. North. “We'll never hear her.” Mr. North was sure

of it. The Norths went to a theater and came home and talked a while and went to bed. Mrs. North awakened him to say that perhaps it would be thoughtful of them to leave a light on in the hall, so her sister wouldn’t have to come into a dark apartment. “I hate to come into a completely dark apartment, don’t you?” asked Mrs. North. Mr. North said, “Yuh” sleepily and turned on the light. Then he returned to bed and within a few minutes heard Mrs. North breathing peacefully on the other side of the room. He dozed. Then he woke up. It was one-thirty by his wrist watch, which had an illuminated dial one could see if one stared at it, relentlessly, for about ten minutes. “I suppose she’s come in, quietly, and never waked us,” he thought. He decided just to have a look around. The hall light was still burning and the door of his sister-in-law’s room was open. She hadn’t come in yet, after all. Mr. North went back to bed. He dozed and awoke to another faint rustle. That would be the sister-in-law coming in quietly. He waited, but there was no further sound, except for several good loud sounds. Mr. North found that he did not mind them at all. A good loud sound was all right; it was the little

sounds that bothered him. He buried his head in the pillow, deciding

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to go to sleep. He lay for a moment and then suddenly thrashed over. “Damn it all,” said Mr. North to himself. “I wish that girl would come in and get it over. I wish she’d come in and drop a brick and have done with it.” Mr. North knew, now, that she would wake him when she came, if she rode in on a thistle. He heard someone open the door downstairs and come softly up. He sighed in relief. Then someone went on up the stairs. Mr. North swore. He knew it was no use going to sleep again, but he went to sleep, uneasily. A breeze set the shade pull rubbing softly against the windowpane. He was instantly awake. He listened a long time before he identified the sound as not a sister-in-law. The next time he was awakened by the electric refrigerator’s muffled snort as it resumed its vigil. He jumped half out of bed. “Oh, damn it!” said Mr. North. “Damn it!” He dozed off again, sleeping as a man might perilously sleep on the top rail of a rail fence. After a time he was awakened, from exasperating dreams, by a soft rustling sound outside the door to the apartment. He just avoided screaming; with a desperate effort of will he kept himself still and rigid. That was the sister-in-law now. And, God, was she being quiet! Mr. North kept himself in hand and listened. The soft rustling outside continued. He tried to identify it—was it on the carpet or was she merely wriggling inside her clothes? He waited for the sound of the key in the lock. And waited. He squirmed. “My God,” he demanded of himself, “why doesn’t she open it?” He ground his teeth. If she did not put that key in that lock by the time he counted ten he would go—he would just go, that was all. Probably straight up. One—two—three—fo— She put the key in the lock, very quietly. The key seemed at least a foot long, and he heard the gentle scraping of each tenth inch of it as it entered the keyhole. Then she began to turn the key. Mr. North found his mind running ahead of her. After a time there would be a click. Mr. North waited, grimly. He would count. One—two— click! It was so loud it made him jump. Now she would open the door gently. First there would be a tiny click and then a gentle rubbing and then— There was a tiny click. She was opening the door. She was opening the door and she was opening the door and she

was opening the door and and— Mr. North dug his fingernails into his palms. After a while she would step in, on tiptoes. Then she would shut the door. Mr. North winced at the thought.

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Mr. North heard the faint touch of her slipper on the rug inside. Now she would close the door. Rub, rub, rub, swish, squeak, rub rub— Soon there would be another click, Mr. North clutched the bedclothes in anticipation. Click! Mr. North convulsively pulled the bedclothes off his feet. Now she would come along the hall, tiptoe,

tiptoe, tiptoe. He waited, breathless. She came. Oh, so lightly! She

came quietly as any mouse. And Mr. North could have heard a snail trampling over the velvet. There was a muffled “Poup.” That was her slipper’s contact with the rug. “Poup.” She would make two more and she would be off the rug onto the bare floor. Then she would take two more steps and strike the squeaking board. One never missed it. One step, two steps. Now! Another step. Mr. North subsided, punctured. She had missed it. Squeak! She had found it. It startled her, apparently. For the first time she showed hesitation. She remained on the board and squeaked. She was afraid if she went on there would be louder squeaks. She was, Mr. North realized, go-

ing to wait where she was until they had had time to drop off again,

supposing the sound had wakened them. “If she stays there any longer I shall go out and kill her,’ Mr. North promised himself, coldly. “Kill her!” The words had a refreshing sound. She stepped off just in time. She went on, slowly, because the boards sounded so. Click. Long pause. Click. Then another—and—another. Mr. North tore his hair. “Oh damn it, damn it!” Mr. North shouted in his mind. “Why doesn’t she walk? Why doesn’t she put her foot down? Bang! Bang!” Mr. North made loud sounds in his mind with each tiny click. The sister-in-law crept on. Now she would be opposite the telephone; now she would be almost to the light switch; now— Mr. North prayed she would fall, with a loud clatter. But she did not fall. She stopped. “What the hell?” demanded Mr. North of himself. Then he realized. She would turn off the hall light before she went to bed. She was considerate. When she pushed the tumbler down it would click. She would try to keep it from clicking. She was pushing it down now, very slowly so it wouldn’t click. It would go down and down and then, all at once, it would click. No one could keep it from clicking. It would click now. Mr. North braced himself and waited. There was no click. He was furious. He kept on waiting—waiting for an elephant to crash through a stone wall; for a piledriver to hit a pile. He was waiting and waiting. Then he realized. Somehow she had turned it off without a click, or left it on. She had gone on to

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her room while he waited for the click. It was over. She had come in quietly. Now he could go to sleep. He began to float. “Thank God,” said Mr. North, dreamily, to himself. “Thank God.” Then it clicked. He woke, writhing. She had been there all that time, waiting to click! “Boo!” shouted Mr. North at the top of his voice, hysterically. “Boo! Boo!”

Subways Are for Sleeping

“{ EDMUND G. LOVE On Marcu 4, 1953 at approximately 11:30 P.M., Henry Shelby walked into the New York City hotel where he had maintained an apartment for five months. Upon asking for his key at the desk, he was informed by the clerk that he had been locked out until such time as his bill was settled. The bill amounted to about $1 Ise At the moment, Shelby had about $14, no job, and no friends upon whom he felt free to call for help. Without any argument, he turned and walked back out the door. In the time that has passed since that night, he has returned to the hotel only once, and then merely to see if he had any mail. He has not attempted to retrieve any of his belongings held by the management. With the exception of approximately three and a half

months, in the summer of 1953, he has been one of the thousands of men in various stages of vagrancy who wander the streets of New York City at all hours of the day and night. Henry Shelby today is forty-one years old, but looks at least five years younger. He is five feet, eleven and one-half inches tall, weighs 162 pounds. His hair is black but thinning, and his eyes are a deep blue. He has no disfigurements, and his bearing is good. The key to his personality lies in his eyes, which express the depth of his feeling, or a

quiet humor, depending upon his mood. When he is deep in thought, or troubled, he is apt to trace patterns on the floor, or in the dirt, with the toe of his shoe. At other times he moves briskly, and with some of the grace and sureness of an athlete. He is a graduate of the University of Michigan, with a master’s degree in economics. He also holds a life teacher’s certificate in the State of Michigan and was, at one time, a teacher in the public schools of Lansing. His master’s-degree studies were concentrated in the field of accounting procedure, and for four years after World War II he was an accountant with the Post Office Department in Washington. His associates there consider him an excellent man in this field, and at least two of them say that he could probably qualify as a certified public accountant. In addition to these qualifications, he

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is experienced and capable in the field of public relations, where his approach has been described as “fresh” and “honest.” The city of New York has long been noted for the number and variety of its vagrants. Estimates as to the number of homeless and penniless men

and women

run from a conservative

10,000 to some-

where around 500,000. Vagrants in other parts of the United States are a migratory lot, usually moving with the weather, but the New York variety stay put, occupying park benches, flophouses, gutters and doorways in all seasons. There are many who possess qualifications as rich as Henry Shelby’s. There are many who are literally human derelicts living out their days in a drunken stupor, waiting for an obscure death in the river or a ward at Bellevue. In between there are as many gradations as there are strata in normal society. Almost the only things all vagrants have in common are a hard-luck story and an air of bewilderment. Not all of them have lost hope. Henry Shelby is not a hopeless man, but he is certainly bewildered. He himself describes his present life as treading water, waiting to see how things come out. “In the meantime,” he says, “I’m getting along all right. I’m perfectly happy.” In his life as a vagrant he has become an expert at management and has learned to put first things first. In his case this means food, cleanliness and shelter, in that order. He prides himself on the fact that he has never panhandled, never visited a soup kitchen or taken a night’s lodging in one of the various hostels maintained by charitable agencies in the city. He has accepted handouts, but he can recall only one instance where anyone ever stepped up to him and gave him money: One night in the middle of winter he noticed advertisements for the premiere of a motion picture at a Broadway theater. He arrived early and took up a prominent position against the ropes under the marquee. As he stood there, watching the celebrities arrive in their limousines, a man came over to him and placed an unfolded ten-dollar bill in his hand. Shelby has never been completely penniless except for one very

brief period when he left New York. He has set 15 cents, which represents subway fare, as the absolute minimum below which he will not allow his finances to sink. He has no maximum, but rarely

possesses more than $30, which represents about one week’s salary at present minimum levels. He acquires his money in a variety of ways. He is able to pick up a day’s work here and there, carrying sandwich boards, working as a roustabout on the waterfront, washing dishes in cheap restaurants, shoveling snow for the city. When he gets money, he nurses it carefully. He can tell, one min-

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ute after he gets it, exactly how long it will last, because he knows what he’s going to eat, how many cigarettes he is going to smoke, and the amount it will cost him for lodging, or incidentals. There are no extras in his life.

Virtually all of Shelby’s cash goes for food and cigarettes. His

breakfasts, invariably, consist of a glass of fruit or vegetable juice; his lunches, of a sandwich, usually a frankfurter, and a glass of milk. His one substantial meal is supper, and into it he piles all the dietary

necessities he has missed since he last ate such a meal. His plate is apt

to be loaded with green vegetables, cooked vegetables, and meat. He will haggle back and forth with the counterman in order to get these

items, usually trading off potatoes and dessert for them. He never looks at the contents:of a meal until he looks at the prices and he always chooses the cheapest meal on the menu, unless it contains sea food, which he detests. He knows where all the best food bargains in town are to be found. A bargain means quantity, but once or twice a week he will seek out a place which serves something of which he is especially fond. Between meals, he drinks coffee, usually two cups during the

morning and three cups during the afternoon and evening. When he

is especially broke he cuts out regular meals and subsists entirely on coffee, loading all the sugar and cream he can into his cup. He explains that these are free calories, and that calories, no matter what form they take, will keep him going until he is able to eat regularly again. Shelby says that the truest statement he has ever heard is that no one will ever starve to death in the United States, and his technique for getting food when he is low on money is a simple one. He walks the streets until he finds a restaurant with a sign in the window that reads “dishwasher wanted,” or “counterman wanted.” He goes in and works long enough to pay for a meal and earn a little extra money. Usually he completes whatever constitutes a full day’s work, but if the restaurant is a pleasant place, if he is treated well and the food is good, he may stay a week, or even longer. He is a good worker, and is well liked by his bosses and fellow employees. Many of the latter are men like himself. He has learned a lot of odd jobs around kitchens and has filled in as a chef at two cafeterias, and as a short-order cook at a counter restaurant. At one place where he worked for five weeks, the manager recommended him for the managership of another unit in the chain which had fallen vacant. In this particular restaurant Shelby can always be sure of a job of some kind when he is broke; the

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manager will put him to work washing windows if there is nothing else available. The same condition holds true at five or six other places in town, but Shelby never uses them unless he is really desperate. He refers to them humorously as his social security.

Shelby usually allots no more than 15 cents a day for shelter. Occasionally he pays more than this, but only when he has gotten by for two or three days without spending anything extra. Shelter means a place to sleep to Shelby, nothing else. His great preference, month in and month out, is for the Sixth and Eighth Avenue subways. He

very rarely sleeps on the IRT or BMT. The IRT, with its ramshackle, noisy cars and its seating arrangement, is uncomfortable. The BMT has suitable accommodations, but, as Shelby describes it, “an undesirable clientele.” Shelby usually boards the Eighth Avenue Subway at Pennsylvania Station between midnight and one in the morning and takes the first express that comes along. At that hour there is usually a seat, especially in the front car, and he immediately settles down and drops off to sleep. He has developed the happy faculty of being able to drop off, or awaken, almost at will. He sleeps lightly, not because he is afraid of being robbed—he never has enough money to worry about that—but because he is very cautious about oversleeping. The vagrant who is still sleeping soundly when the train reaches the end of the line is more than likely to be picked up and lodged in jail by the transportation police. Upon reaching the end of the line, Shelby walks up the stairs from the train platform to the next level. The turnstiles are at this level, and rest rooms have been placed inside the turnstiles. He retires to one of these rest rooms, finds a booth, fastens the door, and smokes a leisurely cigarette. It is supposedly a misdemeanor to carry lighted tobacco within the turnstile area, but Shelby says he discovered quite early in his career that even the police use the privacy of the rest rooms to have a quiet cigarette. Of course he takes no chances. If there is a policeman anywhere on the turnstile level, he will forego his smoke. After his cigarette, he goes back to the train platform and boards the next train going in the opposite direction from the one he has just come. He quickly settles into a seat and goes to sleep again. He remains asleep until he reaches the other end of the line, then, as before, has his smoke and reboards a train. This time his nap is much

shorter because he debarks at the Jay Street-Borough Hall station in Brooklyn and transfers to the Sixth Avenue subway. On this he makes a full round trip, going all the way out to Queens, back to

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the Brooklyn end of the line, and then back to Jay Street. There he

reboards the Eighth Avenue which The whole trip consumes from hours, during the course of which of sleep. Over the months he has

he rides back to Penn Station. four and a half to five and a half he has probably netted four hours learned many of the habits and as-

signments of the transportation police, and he tries to keep himself

from being too familiar a figure. For this reason he does not depend

entirely upon the subway and does not dare ride it oftener than every

other night. On his off nights, in good weather, he sometimes uses the two

great parks, Central and Prospect. By varying his hours of repose,

carefully selecting secluded spots, and transferring his resting places often, he can spend one night a week in either one or the other of them. Also, in warm weather, there are fire escapes. Because he knows the city as well as he does, Shelby has been able to locate several covered, and therefore secluded, ones. Most of them are attached to theaters or warehouses and offer ideal accommodations. For some reason, the police never seem to bother vagrants who occupy these emergency exits. And on three or four occasions during the summer Shelby manages to get out to one of the beaches near the

city. He can sleep unmolested there, especially on a hot night. There are always legitimate sleepers, as he calls them, who are trying

to escape the heat. Naturally, in the fall, winter, and early spring, Shelby has to find

other places. The benches in the waiting rooms at Grand Central,

Penn Station, and the Port Authority Bus Terminal are his favorite outside of the subway. As in every other place, however, there are

strict rules of conduct which must be observed. Shelby learned early

that the station police in each of the three establishments have set habits. They make two routine checks during the course of a night. At Grand Central, for example, these checks come at one-thirty and five-thirty. Between the checks there are both policemen and plain-clothes men on duty in the waiting room throughout the night, and they wander up and down, carefully checking trouble spots.

Ordinarily, however, these roving guardians will not disturb people

who are stretched out on the benches asleep. Between

the checks,

therefore, it is possible to get almost four hours of uninterrupted sleep in a prone position. Conditions at Penn Station are about the same, and at the bus terminal the checks are farther apart, but the lights are brighter and the crowds larger, giving less room to stretch out. Shelby keeps, as part of his equipment for sleeping in one of the

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three terminals, three tickets: to Poughkeepsie, New York; Prince-

ton, New Jersey; and Elizabeth, New Jersey, one for each of the

three lines. Inspection of timetables has revealed that there are no buses or trains leaving New York for these points between one and six in the morning. In emergencies, should the station police question him too closely, Shelby flashes the appropriate ticket and claims that he missed the last train and is waiting for the first one in the morning. This has always worked, but on one occasion a station policeman escorted him to a six-thirty train and made certain he got on it. Shelby

got off at 125th Street and walked back to Grand Central. Shelby regards sleeping in hotel lobbies as an unsatisfactory experience, yet he feels bound to try it every now and then. No lobby can be occupied during the night, and daytime occupancy is limited

to about two hours at most. While house officers will not ordinarily run a respectably dressed man out into the street, they will shake him awake every hour or so. In order to get four hours of sleep, Shelby estimates that he has to visit eight hotels during a day. He al-

ways apologizes profusely for having dozed off and never visits the same hotel oftener than every third month. Shelby says that it is always advisable to carry something when sleeping in a lobby. House officers are apt to respect a man’s privacy if he has an umbrella or brief case lying in his lap. When Shelby plans to use a hotel lobby, he will wander up and down the subway trains the day before until he finds what he is looking for. Subways are full of things that are suitable for hotel lobbies. He always turns in whatever he has found to the Board of Transportation’s Lost and Found Department after he has used it, and he is always careful to check back later to find out whether there has been any reward. He collected $12.50 this way last year.

Shelby thinks that all-night theaters are the most overrated sleeping places for men like himself. He has used them, and still does occasionally, but compared to the subway, they are inordinately expensive and their seats, though much softer, are much less suited to sleeping. They tip back too much, and the head is apt to snap backward instead of forward. This always awakens Shelby. Furthermore, one cannot very well lean one’s head on one’s arm when elbow resting room has to be fought for with one’s neighbor. The pictures are noisy in unexpected places, and the sounds that are thrown out from the screen are loud and unorthodox. On top of this, Shelby has found that no matter what picture is being shown, he cannot keep from watching it to see how it comes out. Thus, instead of getting some sleep, he gets entertained.

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631

Most people do their personal grooming in the privacy of their own two than and

homes. Because Henry Shelby is homeless, he cannot. But for reasons he places more importance on his personal appearance he does on having a place to sleep. First, he is naturally a neat tidy man to whom uncleanliness is distasteful. Second, good

grooming is a safety factor in his existence. The police will always pick up an unkempt man and will generally walk right by a tidy man. A shower is not only a comfort, but a good investment. From each five-dollar bill he gets, Shelby sets aside enough money

to provide himself with a bath. If he goes six days without one, he will stop eating until he can pay for one. Most of Shelby’s baths are taken in the public rooms of Grand Central Station and cost 65 cents. Shaving is also a problem. At Shelby’s age, he cannot go for more than 24 hours without acquiring a heavy shaded face. After that his beard is apt to become a heavy stubble. Nevertheless, he tries to

stretch the time between shaves to at least 36 hours for economic reasons: it costs 25 cents to use one of the booths at Grand Central set aside

for this purpose.

Like

most

New

York

City vagrants,

Shelby always carries a safety razor in his pocket and will take any opportunity he can to get in a quick, free shave and a chance to

brush his teeth. He uses ordinary soap for shaving cream. Clothing is another important item of appearance. With the exception of his outer garments, Shelby owns two ef everything: two white shirts, two suits of underwear, two pairs of socks, and two neckties. One set is always on his back and the other is usually in storage at some laundry in the Grand Central area. Whenever he takes his bath, Shelby drops by the laundry first and picks up his clean linen. After his shower he carefully wraps the soiled clothes in a bundle and leaves them in another laundry to be washed. His outer garments are kept as neat as possible. Once or twice a week he drops in at one of the small tailor shops around town and sits in his shirt tails while his coat and trousers are being pressed. Unfortunately he has never found a place where he can sit in a booth while the clothes are being cleaned. When his garments are quite dirty, and he gets enough money ahead, he picks up his clean laundry and retires to a cheap but good hotel. There he engages a room, paying for it in advance. Once the door is closed on the bellhop, he

strips and calls valet service. For the next 24 hours, while the cleaners are at work on his coat and trousers, he spends his time in bed, or under the shower. He has slept for 22 hours on these occasions,

and taken as many as 15 showers. He never gets too much sleep or too many showers.

632

Edmund

G. Love

The whole 24-hour period in the hotel, including cleaning, costs him about seven dollars. Shelby considers this gross extravagance, since his weekly average expenditure is about eight dollars, but for

some time he never seemed to accumulate enough money to buy a second suit. Besides, he always comes out of his stay with a tremendous sense of pleasure and well-being. One of the astounding things about Shelby’s existence is that he has become a recluse, just as surely as though he lived on a desert island. For three or four days at a time he will speak to no one, nor will anyone speak to him. He is not solitary by nature, but his way of life and his desire to continue it without molestation impose this penalty upon him. While he might like to engage the policeman in the Grand Central waiting room in conversation, he realizes that if he did, he might be recognized easily the next time he visited there, and all subsequent visits would gradually peg him as a homeless person, making him liable to arrest and harassment. This solitude has brought him one great problem which he senses

but finds difficult to describe: Shelby is waiting for something. is. When it comes he will either he came, or sink out of sight in that has engulfed other vagrants.

the problem of passage of time. He himself does not know what it go back into the world from which the morass of alcoholism or despair While he is waiting, he is plagued

by a restlessness that keeps him on the move for 17 or 18 hours a day. He is likely to say that he moves about as much as he does because policemen will not stop a man who looks as though he is coming from some place or going to some place. What he does not say, because he does not realize it, is that he is working to keep his time occupied. Shelby’s search for entertainment has led him into every nook and cranny of the city and brought him knowledge which he might not otherwise have gained. One idiosyncrasy that he has discovered but cannot account for is the attitude of station policemen toward book readers. After seven-thirty in the evening, in order to read a book in Grand Central or Penn Station, a person either has to wear horn-rimmed glasses or look exceptionally prosperous. Anyone else is apt to come under surveillance. On the other hand, newspaper readers never seem to attract attention and even the seediest vagrant can sit in Grand Central all night without being molested if he continues to read a paper. Shelby therefore spends one or two hours a night going over the daily papers. He regularly reads all seven final

editions of New York journals which he picks out of trash baskets. Shelby is extraordinarily fond of museums and galleries and has be-

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come something of an art expert. Vagrants are rarely molested in New York museums and galleries. Shelby is apt to smile and say this is because the guards can never distinguish between a legitimate bum and an artistic one. They never disturb a person like him because they never know when they are trying to eject an artist who 1s holding a one-man show on the third floor. Shelby began frequenting the big marble-coated buildings many months ago in search of shelter and warmth. He followed the guides around on their tours, often three or four times a day. In order to seem part of the group making the tour he would ask questions. And by this time he knows enough to stump most of the guides. He has

developed a genuine love for the subject, knows where every show in town is being held and what it contains, and is thinking of trying

to do a little painting himself. But when he goes to the shows, he is also still on the lookout for some obscure nook or cranny where he can stretch out and sleep for an hour or two. Even a corner behind a Grecian column where a man can sleep upright without interruption is valuable. Another of Shelby’s pastimes is to take the ferry ride from the Battery to Staten Island and back. He calls this the poor man’s ocean voyage. Unfortunately, the round trip costs ten cents, which puts it in the luxury class. More often, he boards one of the numerous Cen-

tral Railroad of New Jersey ferries and makes three or four round trips to the Jersey shore. If he gets on during the rush-hour periods

he is not noticed and there 1s no expense. Pursuing this pastime Shelby has picked up a surprising amount auof information on navigation, and he is rapidly becoming an of deal great a get to thority on the New York tidal flow. He seems not do they enjoyment out of criticizing the pilots of the ferries if thing bring their vessels squarely into the slips, and almost the first three or Two news. g shippin the is he reads in the New York papers or arrival the watch to times a week he journeys to the waterfront go will he departure of one of the big liners. On other occasions

estidown to the Jersey ferry slips and board the little vessel that he

up the river mates will come closest to the big ships as they move or put out to sea. always The city offers other free sources of diversion too. Shelby if he stumbles follows a fire engine; has a nose for street fights; and, policeman has last the until upon an accident, never leaves the scene preacher he lk sidewa closed his notebook. He stops to listen to every just for the pleasure of singcomes across and likes to sing the hymns . project in town, ing something. He knows every major construction

634

Edmund

G. Love

but rarely watches such routine phases of the work as excavation or riveting. He looks the site over and then shows up at the exact moment some critical problem is about to be solved. He is a steady visitor at the various courts around town, and is what he describes as a sucker for band music. For this reason he believes he is happier in New York than he would be in any other city in the world. New York is the only place where there is a parade of some kind every day in the year. On some days there are two or three. Last Armistice Day, Shelby visited five parades and took part in one. The peculiar advantages of the microfilm room of the New York Public Library, which he came upon almost by accident, are probably Shelby’s unique discovery. He had been advised by another vagrant that the library was.a good place to keep warm on a cold day, and that it offered an opportunity for an hour or two of sleep. Several days later he made his first call there, provided with what he considered a plausible excuse for visiting the institution. He went to the main desk and asked for a copy of the New York Times for

November 10, 1936. He was referred to the microfilm room, where the attendant produced a roll of film instead of the paper. He was then escorted to one of several viewing machines which were placed helter-skelter in a sort of alcove off to one side of a large room.

Shelby put the film in the machine and looked at the image. Within half an hour as he turned the crank, he dozed off. He was not disturbed and eventually woke up about five hours later. He says now that at the time this seemed too good to be true, so a week later he went back again to see if it was an accident. He arrived about nine-fifteen in the morning and slept until almost fourthirty in the afternoon again without being disturbed. He since has become cognizant of several things. Most men in his condition who visit the Public Library go to the reading rooms. Either they have never heard of the microfilm room, or they underestimate its possibilities. Consequently the attendants there have never met a real vagrant face to face. They assume that anyone who

has heard of microfilm and wishes to use it is in search of learning. They check the film out to the applicant and never follow up. Moreover, the accommodations are very comfortable. The room is warm, and the upright film-display stands give a man an excellent place to rest his head. For some time, Shelby put the microfilm room at the top of his list as a place of shelter, then suddenly he realized that it was a far more valuable place for pure entertainment. He never goes there to

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sleep now, but he often goes in early in the morning and spends the entire day reading. He has read all the old issues of the New York Times that are ‘available on film, all his favorite comic strips from the date of their inception to the present, and every column Damon Runyon ever wrote. A by-product of his many hours in the microfilm room is a system for playing the races which he developed by virtue of having been able to study every racing chart published in New York over the past 20 years. He has put this system to a test twice. At one time he worked quite steadily for almost a month and, with $25 in his pocket,

visited Aqueduct Race Track, where he won $87.40, after expenses. Presently

he took the money

and bought himself a new

suit of

clothes, leaving the original $25 untouched. A few days later he took the $25 and went to Belmont Park, where he lost it all. He hasn’t

visited the track since, but he remains an avid racing fan and plays the horses regularly in the microfilm room. Nowadays, however, he saves all the races until cold weather sets in and plays during the winter months. He never looks at the racing results beforehand. “I might just as well be honest about it,” he says. Shelby’s favorite of all forms of recreation is walking. He usually

walks the streets of Manhattan for four to ten hours a day, covering anywhere from five to 25 miles. He has walked the full length of every up-and-down avenue in the city and crossed the island on every crosstown street. He is a walking encyclopedia on plaques and knows every traffic bottleneck and short cut in town. He loves to window-shop and knows when most of the stores change their displays. At some time every day he manages to pass the window of the Christian Science Reading Room on Park Avenue and solemnly read the Bible passage marked there. At one time he estimated that he had about exhausted the possibilities of exploration in Manhattan and decided to concentrate on Brooklyn. He crossed the Brooklyn Bridge on foot one day, and on two other occasions took the subway. At the end of the third trip he gave the project up. “Walking in Brooklyn is like walking in Lansing,

Michigan. I have the feeling I’ve seen everything before,” he says. “Manhattan isn’t like that.”

At present, Henry Shelby seems content to take things as they come. “I don’t know how long I'll live this life,” he said not long ago, as he traced a design in the dirt with his foot. “I don’t have much trouble. I’ve never gotten drunk and lain in a doorway all day. My name’s never been on a police blotter for vagrancy. I haven’t had to beg. Maybe if things were like they were twenty years ago,

636

Edmund

G. Love

when everybody was a bum, I might change. Maybe something will happen that will force me to change one way or another. Yes, I guess that’s about it, but it hasn’t happened yet, and things seem so easy and natural the way they are now, that it’s ‘just as though it was supposed to be that way. I’m just not going to look at the future. All I can tell anybody, now, is that I intend to be up at a little

delicatessen I know on Broadway. They serve a hell of a good boiled-beef dinner up there for sixty-eight cents.” He looked up at one of the big street clocks. “Which reminds me. If ’m going to get

there by six o’clock, [’'d better get going. Takes me almost an hour to walk it.” His listener asked him why he didn’t take the subway. “Subways are for sleeping,” Shelby said, smiled, and walked off.

Please Keep Imogene

“{ BETTY MacDONALD THE TRICKY

THING

to remember

about adolescents

is

that they seem so miserable doing what they are doing that you, their loving and bewildered parents, assume that they would be happier

doing something else. They wouldn’t. Adolescents are going to be miserable no matter what they are doing but they would rather be

miserable doing the things they choose. This is all so easy for me now that Anne and Joan are twenty-four and twenty-five, charming, intelligent, beautiful, companionable, adult and married. Don and I adore them and can’t see enough of them, even if Don did design a Christmas card showing him on the roof shooting at the stork. But during that long pull between fourteen and twenty (they were both married at twenty) it came over us with a flash, well, really more like a punch in the stomach accompanied by the splash of tears, that

the English are truly more civilized than we are and they know what they are doing when they send Imogene away to school—and by “away” I mean from Rangoon to England or vice versa—at age seven and bring her home reluctantly when she is thirty.

The summer Anne and Joan turned fourteen and fifteen and both bolted themselves in the bathroom for hours at a stretch and wore lip-

stick to bed, Don and I sent away for the catalogue of a fine school in Canada. It had the splendid English approach, we could tell, because the catalogue said, “No need for them to come home for any of the

holidays—we will keep them all summer.” Anne and Joan found the catalogue and cried, not because we didn’t want them home in the summer but because the school demanded that all pupils have their hair chopped off even with the ear lobes and wear black oxfords with Cuban heels. Frankly I do not know any easy answer to adolescence. About the only thing to do is to try to hang onto your sanity and pray much as you would if you were lost in a blizzard without a compass or were adrift in a leaky canoe and could hear the roar of the falls just ahead. While you are hanging on I will reach down into the black pit of

638

Betty MacDonald

my experience and give you a few things to think about, in case they aren’t already glaringly apparent: 1. Adolescents do not hate their parents. They merely feel ab-

solute contempt, occasionally coated with condescending pity for them, their tiny brains, ridiculous ideas, unfair rules and obvious senility. They all refer to their father as “oh him” and their mother as “‘she”: “She won’t let me go, naturally. She’s scared to death I

might have a little fun for a change.” “Who was that on the phone? Oh him! What did he want, his overcoat again?”

2. All adolescents are masters of the double, even triple cross. This does not mean that they will grow up to be either Communists or politicians—it is merely an indication that in adolescence, loyalty is

no long-term emotion, and best friends can turn brown quicker than gardenias. 3. All adolescents ‘“‘go steady.” Daughters with boys who appear to be oily, weak-chinned and untrustworthy. Sons with girls who

appear hard-eyed, brazen and, if not downright immoral, certainly not wholesome sister types. No parent gets anywhere combating these great romances. How can anyone as stupid as ob him evaluate a big wheel like Billy? (A big wheel who lies on the couch more than the dog and has a vocabulary of 30 words.) “Tt just so happens that Billy is left half on the football team and president of Squee-Gees, the high school fraternity.” What can she possibly know about a wonderful girl like Charlene (with her skin-tight skirts, fuchsia lipstick apparently put on with a putty knife, and scintillating conversation of “Gollee Anne,

Johnny may have the mind of a boy but he sure has the body of a man!”)? She is just jealous “because Charlene was voted sweetheart of the Squee-Gees four times” (no wonder). The thing that is so difficult for fathers to remember is that very few, if any, of the brilliant lawyers, bankers, doctors, architects or statesmen, a facsimile of which they desire for a son-in-law, ever took out girls when they were in high school. They were too shy and too busy studying to be brilliant lawyers, etc. Big wheels in high school are, always have been, and undoubtedly always will be the smooth, shifty-eyed, self-confident nonstudiers. The thing that comes as such a blow to the mothers is the fact

that little Conroy is not attracted to Ermingarde Allen, who “has

such pretty manners and will be very nice-looking when her skin clears up and after all her mother was my classmate at Bryn Mawr.” (Conroy, who is shy and unsure, refers to Ermingarde, who is shy and unsure, as “that pimply creep.”)

PLEASE

KEEP

IMOGENE

639

4. All adolescents telephone. This is part of the cohesive quality that makes them all eat in the same beanery, walk in bunches, knot up in hallways, keep in constant touch. United we stand—divided we might learn something. (You will not solve anything by having two

telephones. “Wow, two telephones!” Anne and Joan’s friends said, and kept them both busy.) 5. All adolescents intend to have the family car all of the time. To accomplish this they resort to the gentle nag or water-on-thestone method, the smooth lie, or the cold tearful silence. They will always win if you try to reason or appeal. They have the least resistance to the cheerful impersonal “no.” 6. Adolescents are not careful of their own possessions, but they are absolutely reckless with anything belonging to their parents. Don’s gray flannel slacks, Don’s shoes, my small radio, my toastcolored cashmere sweater, Don’s bathing trunks (about four pairs), my jeans, our sweatshirts, our beach towels, hit the adolescent trail and were never seen again.

7. All adolescent girls would prefer to live in a bathroom. 8. All adolescent boys would prefer to live in a car.

The Memoirs of a Bankrupt

“ie RUSSELL MALONEY I AM HAVING a fine time these days and wish the Credit Bureau of Greater New York were here, but it was not aways like this. Time was when I was accounted a very bad risk indeed, and, to

be quite fair, I suppose I was. My morning mail in those days inevitably included

a number

of collection

letters, ranging in tone

from the gaily informal (“Hello, you! Haven’t you forgotten something?”) to the grimly decisive (“If you don’t want to be

dragged through the courts, you have 48 hours in which to . . .”). My telephone (before it was disconnected) was kept busy by credit executives wishing to call my attention, to complete their records, to close their accounts, or even, in especially desperate cases, to just get some money out of me. Once my laundry was held for ransom, which obliged me to pur-

chase (from an expensive and dreamy haberdasher who hadn’t yet heard about my credit) an entire new set of shirts, socks, handkerchiefs, and underwear. The laundry then returned my bundle, probably on the advice of its attorney, leaving me with enough personal linen for three years. At one time I had the money to pay either the haberdasher or the laundry, but not both. I was unable, however, to decide who had precedence, and in the end I spent the money on a tweed jacket and some knitted ties, to set off my shirts.

That’s typical of the kind of thing that happens to a bad credit risk. His cash balance is so small he feels it would be a gratuitous insult to offer it to any single one of his creditors, so he takes to carrying it around in his pants pocket and eventually loses it in an inflationary cash purchase of something he doesn’t need. The laundry and the haberdasher both sued me, of course. Everybody sued me, but I was never dragged through a single court; the suits against me were spaced evenly enough to permit me to pay up just as judgments were about to be pronounced. This worked almost as well as if the creditors had just permitted me to pay off at my own speed. Anyway, you can see that I am something of an expert on personal credit, the way a bull is an expert on bullfighting. I am ad-

THE

MEMOIRS

OF

A BANKRUPT

641

dressing this little account of my observations and experiences to tomorrow’s bankrupts, in the hope that it will help them relax. Probably the first sign that you are becoming a fiscal leper will be the word “frankly” cropping up in your business correspondence. “Frankly” is a word that all credit managers know and like; as

they use it, 1t is pregnant with connotations. It means “One of the few rewards of this lousy little clerk’s job is being rude to people to whom I am no longer under any obligation to be polite, so here goes.” Incidentally, it is no use for the debtor to try to turn this verbal weapon against the credit manager. “Frankly, I’m broke” is not considered a valid response to any such gambit as the credit manager’s “Frankly, in regard to your overdue account, we will be

forced to take steps.” Don’t ask me why; it’s just something I found out.

Wherever it is that credit managers go to school—I always think of it as a gray, cold, dusty place like Fall River or Pittsburgh—they

are taught that there is one reason, and only one, that a man doesn’t pay his bills on or before the tenth of the month. “Slow horses and fast women,” the professor tells them. Lots of credit managers don’t absorb even this idea, and remain convinced that you’ve got the money and just won’t give it to them. When I was an apprentice bankrupt, I used to think that candor and a well-documented hard-luck story would win me an occasional reprieve. It was the renting agent of my apartment who disillusioned me. “I just haven’t got the money,” I told him, the first time he called to collect the overdue rent. He fidgeted about while I gave him the explanation—family surgery, hairbreadth scapes 1’ th’ imminent deadly breach of the abdominal cavity—and then said, “Well, frankly, we can’t wait any longer for the rent.” “What are you going to do?” I asked him. Not defiantly; I was sincerely interested in whatever might be in store for me—expulsion from my three-room Madison Avenue paradise, the forced sale of my furniture, or possibly even the confiscation of my three-year supply of shirts. This was a new experience, and I meant to live it fully and deeply, like a character ina Russian novel. “Well, frankly, all I’m interested in is collecting the rent,” he said. I told him again that I didn’t have the money, that I didn’t even know when I would have the money, though I believed I would

someday. “‘What do you do in these cases?” I inquired in a man-ofthe-world way. “Look here,” he said fretfully. “This rent is seven weeks overdue. We’d like to close our books for last month.”

642

Russell Maloney

“Td like to help you,” I said courteously. The interview continued in this inconclusive tone until the renting agent looked at his watch and realized that it was time for him to go and interview somebody else. “Remember,” he said, as he left, “I must insist on getting a check in tomorrow morning’s mail.” “You won't get it,” I called after him, but he pretended not to hear. Later I learned how to bring our interviews to a crisp and mutually satisfactory conclusion. “Oh, it’s you!” I would exclaim, opening the door at his knock. “Funny, I was just thinking about you. It’s Tuesday, isn’t it? Well, you'll have a check by—let’s see now— Friday morning, at the very latest. That O.K.>?” “Well, no later than that,” he would say, jotting a few words in his looseleaf book and giving me a keen glance. I don’t think he was ever very surprised that the check failed to show up on Friday morning, but this at least presented a problem he knew how to deal with; he’d hop right over to my place and demand immediate pay-

ment. When your credit is good, it is very, very good, and when it is bad, it is horrid. There is no such thing as a man whose credit is pretty good, or not very good, or subject to any other such twilit

qualification. One day you can walk into W. & J. Sloane’s and order a roomful of Empire furniture, and the next day the delicatessen man will be standing on your doorstep, wanting to know howsa bout. The change comes overnight, like love or toothache or spring, and when it comes all the credit managers know about it immediately. Credit managers have carried extrasensory perception to a point as yet only dreamed of by Dr. Rhine and his colleagues. This fledgling bankrupt’s greatest disillusionment will be the

shredding away of authority and prestige from the august figure of the credit manager. A manager, in the sense that he considers your case and decides what to do about it, he certainly is not. What he manages is a set of rubber stamps and form letters of graduated severity. They are predicated on the idea that all debtors are going to fight to the last ditch. If a debtor goes to a credit manager with explanations, professions of good faith, or any such sissified talk, the credit manager is as baffled and embarrassed as Clyde Beatty would be if his lions and tigers all rolled over on their backs and began to purr. Don’t do it. You might as well desert your wife, set up an apartment for that pretty little Miss Smith in the file room, and begin to take in a few night clubs and enjoy life, because that’s what the credit managers are convinced you're doing anyway. In closing, I should like to pay a compliment to the public utili-

THE

MEMOIRS

OF

A BANKRUPT

643

ties, which are, from the viewpoint of a penniless man, charmingly innocent. All you have to do, when they threaten to get out of hand, is send back their bill with any annotation that comes into your head, e.g.: “Withholding payment pending answer to my letter of August 19” or “My records apparently disagree with yours.” It is sometimes a full month before their answer comes, and then it is a worried confession that their files seem to be out of order and could you supply further details. The telephone company, just before it shuts off your telephone, calls you up and tells you that service is being discontinued. The same day that this happened to me, I received in the mail an invitation to lunch with the telephone company at the Astor. It wasn’t the same department, but it certainly was the same company; they were having some sort of promotional shindig, the letter said, and they were counting on me. I seized the telephone to call them and say that I had a previous engagement (I really did),

but the line was dead.

Warty Bliggens, the Toad

“{ DON MARQUIS imet a toad the other day by the name of warty bliggens he was sitting under a toadstool feeling contented he explained that when the cosmos was created that toadstool was especially planned for his personal shelter from sun and rain do not tell me said warty bliggens that there is not a purpose in the universe

the thought is blasphemy a little more conversation revealed that warty bliggens considers himself to be the center of the said universe the earth exists to grow toadstools for him to sit under the sun to give him light by day and the moon

and wheeling constellations to make beautiful the night for the sake of warty bliggens to what act of yours

WARTY

BLIGGENS,

THE

TOAD

645

do you impute this interest on the part of the creator of the universe iasked him why is it that you are so greatly favored ask rather said warty bliggens what the universe had done to deserve me if iwerea human being i would not laugh too complacently at poor warty bliggens for similar absurdities have only too often lodged in the crinkles of the human cerebrum archy

Book and Bookplate

“is JOHN MASEFIELD This bookplate, that thou here seest put, It was for Mr. Henderson cut; He ends it with a Latin phrase

(From Horace);

this is what it says:

“O thou sweet soother of my cares, Be helpful to my proper pray’rs.” I hoped that it was me he meant; But oh, that was not his intent. He neither read the book nor cut it, But pasted in his plate and shut it, And sold it when the price had risen,

I’m glad the book’s no longer his’n.

In a Town Garden

“J DONALD MATTAM Loveliest of trees, the cherry now Is hung with bloom along the bough As every urchin by my fence Notes for future reference.

]

A Friend in Need

“ie W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM For 30 YEARS now

I have been studying my fellow

men. I do not know very much about them. I should certainly hesitate to engage a servant on his face, and yet I suppose it is on the face that for the most part we judge the persons we meet. We draw our conclusions from the shape of the jaw, the look in the eyes, the contour of the mouth. I wonder if we are more often right than wrong. Why novels and plays are so often untrue to life is because their authors, perhaps of necessity, make their characters all of a piece. They cannot afford to make them self-contradictory, for then they become incomprehensible, and yet self-contradictory 1s what most of us are. We are a haphazard bundle of inconsistent qualities. In books on logic they will tell you that it is absurd to say that yellow is tubular or gratitude heavier than air; but in that mixture of incongruities that makes up the self yellow may very well be a horse and cart and gratitude the middle of next week. I shrug my shoulders when people tell me that their first impressions of a person are always right. I think they must have small insight or great vanity. For my own part I find that the longer I know people the

more they puzzle me; my oldest friends are just those of whom

I

can say that I don’t know the first thing about them. These reflections have occurred to me because I read in this morning’s paper that Edward Hyde Burton had died at Kobe. He was a

merchant and he had been in business in Japan for many years. I knew him very little, but he interested me because once he gave me a great surprise. Unless I had heard the story from his own lips I should never have believed that he was capable of such an action. It was more startling because both in appearance and manner he suggested a very definite type. Here if ever was a man all of a piece. He was a tiny little fellow, not much more than five feet four in height, and very slender, with white hair, a red face much wrinkled, and blue eyes. I suppose he was about sixty when I knew him. He was always neatly and quietly dressed in accordance with his age and station.

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Though his offices were in Kobe, Burton often came down to Yokohama. I happened on one occasion to be spending a few days there, waiting for a ship, and I was introduced to him at the British

Club. We played bridge together. He played a good game and a generous one. He did not talk very much, either then or later when we were having drinks, but what he said was sensible. He had a quiet, dry humor. He seemed to be popular at the club and afterwards, when he had gone, they described him as one of the best. It happened that we were both staying at the Grand Hotel and the next day he asked me to dine with him. I met his wife, fat, elderly and smiling, and his two daughters. It was evidently a united and aftec-

tionate family. I think the chief thing that struck me about Burton was his kindliness. There was something very pleasing in his mild blue eyes. His voice was gentle; you could not imagine that he could possibly raise it in anger; his smile was benign. Here was a man who attracted you because you felt in him a real love for his fellows. He had charm. But there was nothing mawkish in him: he liked his game of cards and his cocktail, he could tell with a point a good and spicy story, and in his youth he had been something of an athlete. He was a rich man and he had made every penny himself. I suppose one thing that made you like him was that he was so small and frail; he roused your instincts of protection. You felt that he could not bear to hurt a fly. One afternoon I was sitting in the lounge of the Grand Hotel. This was before the earthquake and they had leather armchairs

there. From the windows you had a spacious view of the harbor with its crowded traffic. There were great liners on their way to Vancouver and San Francisco or to Europe by way of Shanghai, Hong-

Kong and Singapore; there were tramps of al] nations, battered and

sea-worn, junks with their high sterns and great colored sails, and innumerable sampans. It was a busy, exhilarating scene, and yet, I know not why, restful to the spirit. Here was romance and it seemed that you had but to stretch out your hand to touch it. Burton came into the lounge presently and caught sight of me. He seated himself in the chair next to mine. ‘What do you say to a little drink?” He clapped his hands for a boy and ordered two gin fizzes. As the boy brought them a man passed along the street outside and, seeing

me, waved his hand. “Do you know Turner? ” said Burton as I nodded a greeting. “Pye met him at the club. I’m told he’s a remittance man.” “Yes, I believe he is. We have a good many here.”

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“He plays bridge well.”

“They generally do. There was a fellow here last year, oddly enough a namesake of mine, who was the best bridge player I ever met. I suppose you never came across him in London. Lenny Burton he called himself. I believe he’d belonged to some very good clubs.” “No, I don’t believe I remember the name.” “He was quite a remarkable player. He seemed to have an instinct about the cards. It was uncanny. I used to play with him a lot. He was in Kobe for some time.” Burton sipped his gin fizz. “It’s rather a funny story,” he said. “He wasn’t a bad chap. I liked him. He was always well dressed and smart-looking. He was handsome in a way, with curly hair and pink-and-white cheeks. Women thought a lot of him. There was no harm in him, you know, he was only wild. Of course he drank too much. Those sort of fellows always do. A bit of money used to come in for him once a quarter and he made a bit more by card playing. He won a good deal of mine, I know that.” Burton gave a kindly little chuckle. I knew from my own experience that he could lose money at bridge with a good grace. He stroked his shaven chin with his thin hand; the veins stood out on it and it was almost transparent. “T suppose that is why he came to me when he went broke, that and the fact that he was a namesake of mine. He came to see me in my office one day and asked me for a job. I was rather surprised. He told me there was no more money coming from home and he wanted to work. I asked him how old he was. “ “Thirty-five,” he said. “ “And what have you been doing hitherto?’ I asked him. “ “Well, nothing very much,’ he said. “TI couldn’t help laughing. “Pm afraid I can’t do anything for you just yet,’ I said. ‘Come back and see me in another thirty-five years, and [’ll see what I can do.’ “He didn’t move. He went rather pale. He hesitated for a moment and then told me that he had had bad luck at cards for some time. He hadn’t been willing to stick to bridge, he’d been playing poker, and he’d got trimmed. He hadn’t a penny. He’d pawned everything he had. He couldn’t pay his hotel bill and they wouldn’t give him any more credit. He was down and out. If he couldn’t get something to do he’d have to commit suicide. “IT looked at him for a bit. I could see now that he was all to

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pieces. He’d been drinking more than usual and he looked fifty. The girls wouldn’t have thought so much of him if they’d seen him then. ““Well, isn’t there anything you can do except play cards?’ | asked him. “ “T can swim,’ he said. *¢ ‘Swim!’ “T could hardly believe my ears; it seemed such an inane answer to give. “ “IT swam for my university.’ “T got some glimmering of what he was driving at. I’ve known too many men who were little tin gods at their university to be impressed by it. ““T was a pretty good swimmer myself when I was a young man,’ I said. “Suddenly I had an idea.” Pausing in his story, Burton turned to me. “Do you know Kobe?” he asked. “No,” I said. “I passed through it once, but I only spent a night there.” “Then you don’t know the Shioya Club. When I was a young man I swam from there round the beacon and landed at the creek of Tarumi. It’s over three miles and it’s rather difficult on account of the currents round the beacon. Well, I told my young namesake about it and I said to him that if he’d do it I'd give him a job. “T could see he was rather taken aback. “You say you're a swimmer,’I said. “Pm not in very good condition,’ he answered. “T didn’t say anything. I shrugged my shoulders. He looked at me for a moment and then he nodded. “ AJ] right,’ he said: ‘When do you want me to do it?’ “T looked at my watch. It was just after ten. “The swim shouldn’t take you much over an hour and a quarter. I'll drive round to the creek at half-past twelve and meet you. Pil take you back to the club to dress and then we’ll have lunch together.’ “* Tyone,’ he said. “We shook hands. I wished him good luck and he left me. I had a lot of work to do that morning and I only just managed to get to

the creek at Tarumi at half-past twelve. But I needn’t have hurried;

he never turned up.” ‘Did he funk it at the last moment?” I asked. “No, he didn’t funk it. He started all right. But of course he’d

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ruined his constitution by drink and dissipation. The currents round the beacon were more than he could manage. We didn’t get the body for about three days.” I didn’t say anything for a moment or two. I was a trifle shocked. Then I asked Burton a question. “When you made him that offer of a job, did you know he’d be drowned?” He gave me a little mild chuckle and he looked at me with those kind and candid blue eyes of his. He rubbed his chin with his hand. “Well, [hadn’t got a vacancy in my office at the moment.”

The Birth of a Great Artist

“= ANDRE MAUROIS Pierre Douce, the painter, was just finishing a still life —flowers in a chemist’s jar, eggplant on a plate—when Paul-Emile Glaise, the novelist, entered the studio. For some minutes Glaise contemplated his friend at work, then he said emphatically: “No.” The painter interrupted the polishing of an eggplant and looked up in surprise. “No,” Glaise repeated with rising emphasis. “No, you will never

get there. You have skill, you have talent, and you are in earnest. But your painting is flat, old man. It has no flash, it does not cry out. In a salon of five thousand canvases, what is there to halt the sleepy procession in front of your work? . . . No, Douce, you will never get there, I am sorry to say.”

“Why?” sighed honest Douce. “I paint whatI see; I have never hoped for more than that.” “That is just the point. You have a wife, old man, a wife and three

children. Milk costs eighteen sous a liter and eggs are one franc each. There are more pictures than there are buyers, and the blockheads outnumber the connoisseurs. How under the circumstances is it possible, Douce, to emerge from this vast horde of the unknown?” “Work?” “Be serious. The only way, Douce, of arousing the imbeciles is to do something outlandish. Announce that you are going to paint a picture at the North Pole. Go about dressed like an Egyptian king. Found a new school. Mix up some learned words like exteriorization

and dynamism in a hat and compose manifestos. Deny movement, or repose; white or black; the circle or the square. Invent Neo-Homeric

painting which recognizes nothing but red and yellow, or cylindrical painting, or octohedral painting, or fourth-dimensional painting.” At this point a waft of strange sweet perfume announced the entrance of Madame Kosnevska. She was a Polish beauty whom Pierre Douce admired for her great charm. A subscriber to expensive reviews which reproduced at considerable cost the masterpieces of three-year-olds, she never noted the name of our honest Douce in

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them and she disapproved of his painting accordingly. Stretching

herself out on a divan, she inspected the canvas on which he was working, shook her blond hair, and smiled not without malice. “Yesterday,” she said, with her suave and purring accent, “T went to see an exhibit of Negro art. Ah! The sensibility, the plasticity, and the power there!” Turned to the wall was a portrait which the painter had liked. He showed her this. “Very nice,” she said dutifully; and suave, purring, and perfumed, she disappeared. Pierre Douce tossed his palette into a corner and dropped on the divan. “I am going to get a job,” he said, “‘as an insurance inspector, or a bank clerk, or a policeman. Painting is the lowest of trades. To be successful you have to appeal to a lot of idlers, and resort to all kinds of antics. Instead of respecting the masters, the critics encourage the barbarians. I have had enough of it, and I’m through.” Paul-Fmile listened to him, then lit a cigarette and for some time pondered in silence. Finally he spoke. “Would you like to give the snobs and the pseudo-artists the rough treatment they deserve? Do you feel as though you could, with an air of mystery and high seriousness, announce to Kosnevska and a few other aesthetes that for the last ten years you have been preparing to carry your manner of painting another step forward?” “TI?” said honest Douce in astonishment. “Listen. . . . I am going to tell the world, in two articles judiciously placed, that you are founding the ideo-analytic school. Previous to you, all portraitists have in their ignorance emphasized the importance of the human physiognomy. Nonsense! For on the contrary, what really makes a man is the ideas which he evokes in us. Thus the portrait of a colonel would be five enormous stripes against a background of blue and gold, with a horse in one corner and crosses in another. The portrait of a manufacturer would be a factory chimney and a clenched fist on a table. Do you understand, Douce, what you are bringing into the world, and can you paint me in one month twenty ideo-analytic portraits?” “In one hour,” he said, “and the sad part of it is, Glaise, that it might succeed.” Let's try it.} “T couldn’t put up the front.” “Then, old man, when anyone asks you for an explanation, simply take your time, launch a whiff of your pipe smoke in the face of your

THE

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interlocutor, and say these simple words: “ ‘Have you ever studied ariver:’ ” “And what does that mean?” “Nothing,” said Glaise, “and as a consequence they will consider it wonderful.”

Two months later, the private showing that precedes the public opening (the vernissage of the Exhibit Douce), was closing in tri-

umph. Suave, purring and perfumed, the beautiful Madame

Kos-

nevska was inseparable from her latest great man.

“Ah!” she repeated, “the sensibility, the plasticity, and the power there! What intelligence! What revelation! And just how, dear, did you arrive at these astounding syntheses?” The painter paused for some time, then exhaled a cloud of smoke from his pipe and said, “Have you ever, dear madame, studied a river?” In a rabbit-fur overcoat the young and brilliant Levy-Coeur was haranguing a group. “Very strong!” he was saying. “Very strong! As for me, I have been repeating for a long time that it is the height of absurdity to paint from a model. But tell me, Douce: the revelation. Where did you get the idea? From my articles?” Pierre Douce took his time, blew a triumphant cloud of smoke in his face and said, “Have you, monsieur, ever studied a river?” ‘“‘Admirable!” the other man exclaimed approvingly. “Admirable 1? At that moment, a celebrated art dealer who had just finished the rounds of the pictures plucked the painter by the sleeve and dragged him into a corner. “Douce, my friend,” he said, “you are a clever fellow. We could make this the beginning of a career. Give me exclusive rights to your whole output. Don’t change your manner until I tell you, and I will take fifty pictures a year. Agreed?” Enigmatically, Douce smoked and said nothing. Gradually the studio was emptied. Paul-Emile Glaise went and closed the door behind the last visitor. From the stairs came a retreating murmur of admiration. Left alone now with the painter, the novelist gaily thrust his hands in his pockets and broke into formidable laughter. The painter frowned, and as the other kept laughing, he said brusquely, “Imbecile!” “Imbecile?” the novelist exclaimed angrily. “When I have just succeeded in the greatest hoax since the one perpetrated by the notorious Monsieur Bixiou.”

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The painter cast a proud glance at the twenty analytic portraits and said, ‘Yes, Glaise, you are an imbecile. There is something in these paintings.” The novelist contemplated his friend with extreme astonishment. “That is too much!” he shouted. “Douce, remember. Who suggested this new style of painting to you?” Then Pierre Douce took his time and exhaled an enormous cloud of smoke. “Have you ever,” he said, “studied a river?”

The Girl from Sewickley, Pa.

“{— MILTON MAYER Like (I suppose) most people, I don’t get to Pittsburgh much. As a matter of fact, I never get there, except for a lecture every second year or so, and then—the way one does on a lecture tour, in a town where he isn’t closely acquainted—I bounce in and

out. I was there a while back, en route from Columbus to Erie, and on the way in from the Pittsburgh airport I saw a sign which read: SEWICKLEY

2

Sewickley, Sewickley. Come, now—where and when and how had I had to do with Sewickley? I couldn’t think, and I let it go. I had an hour to wait for the train to Erie and I killed it looking in the windows of the secondhand stores across the bridge from the P.& L.E. station. I got a copy of the Post-Gazette and got on the train

and got something to eat in the diner. When I came back to my seat it was was to And Town

dark and the lighting was bad, so I watched what little there watch out the window. then I remembered. I remembered Aix-les-Bains and Dorking and Sewickley.

I remembered a day in the summer of 1927, well over a quartercentury ago. I was nineteen. We were traveling, my mother and father

and my older brother and I, from Rome on the petit grand tour Americain, and they got on the train at Aix, twenty American college girls jabbering English. Of course they saw me from the platform. I was sitting at the window, my chin on my folded hands (and my folded hands on the pearl handle of my Malacca stick), staring emptily out, above and beyond the jabbering crowd

on the platform, into

the empty distance. Of course they saw me: a man still young in years but worn with unutterable sophistication. Of course they saw me, because they came rollicking through the train to their seats in the car behind us and rollicking back, a little later, to the dining car ahead. I was still staring emptily out, in my pearl-gray spats, and my pearl-gray suit, and my pearl-gray hat, and my stick; Frenchman, likely, but one of those Frenchmen who be-

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long to no country and to whom every country has, to its edification, belonged.

I was aroused by my father, who said, “Get a move on, boy. This is our sitting for lunch. Have you washed your hands?” My hands were encased in pearl-gray gloves. “He hasn’t washed brother.

them

since

he got those

gloves,”

said my

“Wash your hands,” said my mother, “and come on. Well be in the diner. But for pity’s sake—hurry.” Beneath the double-breasted jacket of my pearl-gray suit was a pair of red suspenders, purchased in Rome the day before; the whim of a man whom red suspenders and red suspenders alone would move from an ennui begotten of absolutely every other experience. My father, when I bought them, said, “You're crazy, boy.” My mother said, “He’ll grow up,” and my brother said, “When?” They were my first suspenders, and my brother said, “Don’t forget to pull them up after you've been to the bathroom.” I washed my hands and went into the dining car. On my right arm I carried my pearl-gray hat, in my left hand my pearl-gray gloves and my stick, on which I leaned, walking with a loose limp that would hardly deceive anyone who had watched the performance of

the dying roué in The Fool, which had been on the road a season or two before. The American girls filled almost the whole of the diner, and our table was at the far end. As I entered the car, a falling hush reached my half-consciousness. My face was a pallid mask, my eyes fixed on nothingness—for which the Cinzano advertisement on the farther door of the dining car sufficed. But the hush was broken by a giggle arising from girl to girl and from table to table after I passed. And the incidence of the giggle, proceeding, even as I proceeded, from the back to the front of the car, was not to be mistaken. The pallid mask of my face turned red. As I turned around and sat down, my brother whispered to me, “You forgot to pull up your suspenders.” A week later we reached the Hotel Cecil in London, to spend three days before we sailed on the Mauretania. With my stick I managed to get up the broad stone steps, and my brother said to the doorman, “You'd better take his arm. He’s in the last stages.” In the lobby were two of the American girls who had been on the train from Aix. Coming down in the elevator for dinner were two more. They were all staying at the Cecil.

THE

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The first day I didn’t go out at all. I explained my behavior to my

parents as a general lassitude arising, I thought, from a number of worries, “the worst of which,” said my brother, “is that pack of girls

who laughed at him in the diner.” The second day I had breakfast in

the room and went downstairs at eleven, when the girls were sure to be out on tour. One of them was alone with me in the elevator. She said, “Hello,” and 1 bowed from the neck. “How long are you staying?” she said. I stared at her. How long did a man like me, in my condition, know he was staying, and where? She was the first of the lot I had really looked at, or through. She was not the prettiest. She was very tall (like me), spare, knuckly, small-featured. And nice. Really nice. And pretty enough. “Until Thursday,” I said. “So are we,” she said. “Are you going back on the ie?” “No, on the Mauretania.” “Oh,” she said, “that’s too bad,” and then she pulled herself up, the way you do when you might blush, and said, “I mean it’s so good to have someone to talk English—American—to,” and she laughed a nice laugh compounded of embarrassment and friendliness. I held my stick behind me, and when we got out of the elevator I left it there alongside the car. We talked some more and she said that the other girls were out on

a rubberneck tour but she hadn’t felt so well and, besides, she liked to go places alone once in a while, you never had a chance to when you were in a tour. I understood that, and I said so, and we went for a walk, and when we came back she said, ““Thanks for com-

ing with me. I don’t really like to go alone, and I get kind of scared, even when they speak English. But this is the end of the tour and we've all been together seven weeks.” I asked her what she’d be doing tomorrow, and she said it was their last day and she guessed there would be something scheduled and they’d have to pack and all—and I said, “You can pack tomorrow night. So can I. Why don’t you say you're not feeling well at breakfast and I'll meet you in the lobby at ten and we'll go somewhere.” “Where?” she said.

“Really,” I said, and my pearl-gray limp came back, “there are dozens of places out of London—it’s your first time over, isn’t it?” She said it was, and didn’t ask me if it was mine. “Well, then,” I said, “I'll arrange something, and we'll be back at five.”

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I hot-footed it to the American Express Company, and one of the clerks, when I asked him where a fellow and his girl ought to go on their last day in England, said, “Why, Dorking.” So we went to Dorking Town. I don’t know, now, what it was like or how we got there. (By train, I suppose.) I remember a buggy, and village lanes, and a teashop, and that’s all. And I may as well say that all of the details of

this story (except the pearl-gray outfit; there’s a snapshot of me in it) are only what the lawyers, when the witness shakes his head, call “your best recollection, if you please.” It was well over a quartercentury ago, and, as bad money drives out good on the market, so bad history, of which we have had a lot this quarter century, drives out good in the memory. I remember, as I say, that she was tall and spare. She was dark—at least she wasn’t a yellow blonde. I remember that her fingers were long, so I must have held her hand that day—but it may have been only in getting on or off the train. I don’t remember what we talked about, except that we didn’t talk about the dining car from Aix. She never once said she’d seen me before—she was that nice—and that, I suppose, is why I fell in love with her in the elevator in the Cecil. I remember that we got back to London later than we intended to, and we said goodbye. I must have promised to call her in New York, or to write her, and we must have exchanged addresses. Well—I had a girl back home and she may have had a boy. I know that we never wrote or saw each other again. I don’t remember where she was going to school: I don’t remember her name. I remember that she lived in a town I had never heard of—Sewickley, Pa. And what if I went to Sewickley and found her? I’m happily married, and I hope she is, too. Besides, this is not 1927, and, while we lean people wear pretty well, I’m not the blade I was—or pretended to be. And women wear worse than men. Or at least they act as if they do, and like as not she is no longer lean but gaunt. Sewickley isn’t Chicago, either. It’s suburban rich (I’ve learned) and always has been, and I suppose she’s solid, maybe shallow, or even country-club, in all her views (there’s no reason that I can think of why she shouldn’t be: neither of us had any views at all, in Dorking), and I’m a rheumy old radical. I can get myself shined up for occasions, but what in the world would we talk about? If a real love affair is best ended when it ends, how much more so a day that began and ended in Dorking? And how would I find her if I wanted to? Go from house to house in Sewickley? And is the impossibility (as I suppose) of finding her

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the reason that I’m afraid that the next time I’m in Pittsburgh Pll try to? I might advertise in the Post-Gazette personals, but how would the ad read?—

DORKING TOWN.—Will yng lady (1927) spent happy day yng man write Box 297? Pd do better to put my ad in the lost-and-found column:

Lost.—My 19th yr. Sntmntl. value to loser. Lib. rwrd. of any 10 yrs. since for return of same.

Fugitive from Chess

“= DAVID McCORD People always say to me, “Do you play chess?” I don’t know why they do it, for the answer isn’t “Yes.” I know what chess boys look like: they have long white beards and gout. But still, that doesn’t tell me why they corner me and shout: “Do you play chess?” (Expecting I'll say “Yes.”’) No, sir, I don’t. I can’t. I haven’t, and I shan’t. I think I know a pawn— Or maybe it’s a prawn, I know a knight (Red, black, or white): I know a castle, I know a queen; But lots of others in between I don’t know, though I might. No, sir, I don’t play chess— Can’t you look at me and guess?

But thank you for the compliment. Good night. “Thank you for the compliment”—that’s something else amiss. Why must I make apologies and carry on like this? I might have learned to play The Game. I might speak Russian, too.

I might have split the atom, but I left those things for you. Do I play chess? What misery to confess! My buoyant spirit dies, I speak with lowered eyes And shiver in the shame Of “Sorry, not my game.” It isn’t that I mind

This side of me that’s blind; It’s being thought I’m one who ought

FUGITIVE

FROM

663

CHESS

To play that galls me so. Why can’t I say, “Old man, go ’way!: Play chess? Of course not. No!” Traveling once to Halifax, I rose before the dawn. I washed and shaved and thought about my breakfast later on.

One other man had risen too, and as the murky day Disclosed the lonely Maritimes, that’s what I heard him say:

“Do you play chess?” And then the old distress. . I’ve seen a man turn round, Cross over with abound— Excitement in his eye And in his mind a “Why, By God, I nearly missed This obvious strategist Who, like as not, can play Twelve men at once all day.” And why should it be so? It is. You want to bet? (Here comes one now. All set?) “Do you play chess? Yes?” “No!”

Guinea Pig “i= RUTH McKENNEY I WAs NEARLY DROWNED, in my youth, by a Red Cross Lifesaving Examiner, and I once suffered, in the noble cause of saving human life from a watery grave, a black eye which was a perfect daisy and embarrassed me for days. Looking back on my agonies, I feel that none of my sacrifices, especially the black eye, were in the least worth while. Indeed, to be brutally frank about it, I feel that the whole modern school of scientific lifesaving is a lot of hogwash. Of course, I’ve had rather bad luck with lifesavers, right from the beginning. Long before I ever had any dealing with professional lifesavers my sister nearly drowned me, quite by mistake. My father once took us to a northern Michigan fishing camp, where we found the life very dull. He used to go trolling for bass on our little lake all day long, and at night come home to our lodge, dead-beat and minus any bass. In the meantime Eileen and I, who were nine and ten at the time, used to take an old rowboat out to a shallow section of the lake and, sitting in the hot sun, feed worms to an unexciting variety of small, undernourished fish called gillies. We hated the whole business. Father, however, loved to fish, even if he didn’t catch a single fish in three weeks, which on this trip he didn’t. One night, however, he carried his enthusiasm beyond a decent pitch. He decided to go bass fishing after dark, and rather than leave us alone in the lodge and up to God knows what, he ordered us to take our boat and row along after him. Fileen and I were very bored rowing around in the dark, and finally, in desperation, we began to stand up and rock the boat, which resulted, at last, in my falling into the lake with a mighty splash. When I came up, choking and mad as anything, Eileen saw me struggling, and, as she always says with a catch in her voice, she only meant to help me. Good intentions, however, are of little importance in a situation like that. For she grabbed an oar out of the lock, and with an uncertain gesture hit me square on the chin.

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I went down with a howl much in the darkness, was now vived me after the blow. and I weakened but still able to swim

of pain. Eileen, who could not see really frightened. The cold water recame up to the surface, considerably over to the boat. Whereupon Eileen, in a noble attempt to give me the oar to grab, raised it once again, this time without a murmur, and my last thought was a vague wonder that my own sister should want to murder me with a rowboat

oar. As for Eileen, she heard the dull impact of the oar on my head and saw the shadowy figure of her sister disappear. So she jumped in the lake, screeching furiously, and begain to flail around in the water, howling for help and looking for me. At this point I came to the surface and swam over to the boat, with the intention of killing Eileen. Father, rowing hard, arrived just in time to pull us both out of the water and prevent me from attacking Eileen with the rowboat

anchor. The worst part about the whole thing, as far as I was concerned, was that Eileen was considered

a heroine and Father told

everybody in the lake community that she had saved my life. The postmaster put her name in for a medal. After what I suffered from amateur

lifesaving,

I should

have

known enough to avoid even the merest contact with the professional variety of water mercy. I learned too late that being socked with an oar is as nothing compared to what the Red Cross can think up. From the very beginning of that awful lifesaving course I took the last season I went to a girls’ camp, I was a marked woman.

The rest

of the embryo lifesavers were little, slender maidens, but I am a peasant type, and I was monstrously big for my fourteen years. I approximated, in poundage anyway, the theoretical adult we energetic young lifesavers were scheduled to rescue, and so I was, for the teacher’s purpose, the perfect guinea pig. The first few days of the course were unpleasant for me, but not terribly dangerous. The elementary lifesaving hold, in case you haven’t seen some hapless victim being rescued by our brave beach guardians, is a snakelike arrangement for supporting the drowning citizen with one hand while you paddle him in to shore with the other. You are supposed to wrap your arm around his neck and shoulders, and keep his head well above water by resting it on your collarbone. This is all very well in theory, of course, but the trick that none of Miss Folgil’s little pupils could master was keeping the victim’s

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nose and mouth above the waterline. Time and again I was held in a viselike grip by one of the earnest students with my whole face an inch or two under the billowing waves. “No, no, Betsy,” Miss Folgil would scream through her megaphone, as I felt the water rush into my lungs. “No, no, you must keep the head a little higher.” At this point I would begin to kick

and struggle, and generally the pupil would have to let go while I

came up for air. Miss Folgil was always very stern with me. “Ruth,” she would shriek from her boat, “I insist! You must allow

Betsy to tow you all the way in. We come to Struggling in Lesson Sian This was but the mere beginning, however. A few lessons later we came to the section of the course where we learned how to undress under water in 40 seconds. Perhaps I should say we came to the point where the rest of the pupils learned how to get rid of shoes and such while holding their breaths. I never did. There was quite a little ceremony connected with this part of the course. Miss Folgil, and some lucky creature named as timekeeper and armed with a stop watch, rowed the prospective victim out to deep water. The pupil, dressed in high, laced tennis shoes, long stocking, heavy bloomers, and a middy blouse, then stood poised at the end of the boat. When the timekeeper yelled “Go!” the future boon to mankind dived into the water and, while holding her breath under

the surface, unlaced her shoes and stripped down to her bathing suit. Miss Folgil never explained what connection, if any, this curious rite had with saving human lives. I had no middy of my own, so I borrowed one of my sister’s. My sister was a slender little thing and I was, as I said, robust, which puts it politely. Eileen had some trouble wedging me into that middy, and once in it I looked like a stuffed sausage. It never occurred to me how hard it was going to be to get that middy off, especially when it was wet and slippery. As we rowed out for my ordeal by undressing, Miss Folgil was snappish and bored. “Hurry up,” she said, looking irritated. “Let’s get this over with quick. I don’t think you’re ready to pass the test, anyway.” I was good and mad when I jumped off the boat, and determined to Make Good and show that old Miss Folgil, whom I was beginning to dislike thoroughly. As soon as I was under water, I got my shoes off, and I had no trouble with the bloomers or stockings. I was just beginning to run out of breath when I held up my arms and started to pull off the middy.

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PIG

667

Now, the middy, in the event you don’t understand the principle of this girl-child garment, is made with a small head opening, long sleeves, and no front opening. You pull it on and off over your head.

You do if you are lucky, that is. I got the middy just past my

neck so that my face was covered with heavy linen cloth, when it stuck.

I pulled frantically and my lungs started to burst. Finally I thought the hell with the test, the hell with saving other people’s lives, anyway. I came to the surface, a curious sight, my head enfolded in a

water-soaked middy blouse. I made a brief sound, a desperate glub-

glub, a call for help. My arms were stuck in the middy and I couldn’t swim. I went down. I breathed in large quantities of water and linen cloth. I came up again, making final frantic appeals. Four feet away sat a

professional lifesaver, paying absolutely no attention to somebody drowning right under her nose. I went down again, struggling with last panic-stricken feverishness, fighting water and a middy blouse for my life. At this point the timekeeper pointed out to Miss Folgil that I had been under water for eighty-five seconds, which was quite a time for anybody. Miss Folgil was very annoyed, as she hated to get her bathing suit wet, but, a thoughtful teacher, she picked up her

megaphone, shouted to the rest of the class on the beach to watch, and dived in after me. If I say so myself, I gave her quite a time rescuing me. I presented a new and different problem, and probably am written up in textbooks now under the heading ‘“‘What to Do When the Victim Is Entangled in a Tight Middy Blouse.” Miss Folgil finally towed my stillbreathing body over to the boat, reached for her bowie knife, which she carried on a ring with her whistle, and cut Eileen’s middy straight up the front. Then she towed me with Hold No. 2 right in to the shore and delivered me up to the class for artificial respiration. I will never forgive the Red Cross for that terrible trip through the

water, when I might have been hoisted into the boat and rowed in except for Miss Folgil’s overdeveloped sense of drama and pedagogy. I tried to quit the lifesaving class after that, but the head councilor

at the camp said I must keep on, to show that I was the kind of girl who always finished what she planned to do. Otherwise, she assured

me, I would be a weak character and never amount to anything when I grew up. So I stayed for Lesson 6: “Struggling.” After that I didn’t care if I never amounted to anything when I grew up. In fact, I hoped I wouldn’t. It would serve everybody right, especially Miss Folgil. I

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came a little late to the class session that day and missed the discussion of theory, always held on the beach before the actual practice in the lake. That was just my hard luck. I was always a child of misfortune. I wonder that I survived my youth at all. “We were waiting for you, Ruth,” Miss Folgil chirped cheerily to me as I arrived, sullen and downcast, at the little group of earnest students sitting on the sand. “What for?” I said warily. | was determined not to be a guinea pig any more. The last wave had washed over my helpless face. “You swim out,” Miss Folgil went on, ignoring my bad temper, “antil you are in deep water—about twelve feet will do. Then you

begin to flail around and shout for help. One of the students will swim out to you.” All of this sounded familiar and terrible. I had been doing that for days, and getting water in my nose for my pains.

“But when the student arrives,” Miss Folgil went on, “you must not allow her to simply tow you away. You must struggle, just as hard as you can. You must try to clutch her by the head, you must

try to twine your legs about her, and otherwise hamper her in trying to save you.” Now, this sounded something like. I was foolishly fired by the at-

tractive thought of getting back at some of the fiends who had been ducking me in the name of science for the past two weeks. Unfortu-

nately, I hadn’t studied Chapter 9, entitled “How to Break Holds the Drowning Swimmer Uses.” Worse, I hadn’t heard Miss Folgil’s lecture on “Be Firm with the Panic-Stricken Swimmer—Better a Few Bruises Than a Watery Grave.” This last was Miss Folgil’s own opinion, of course. So [swam out to my doom, happy as a lark. Maybelle Anne Pettijohn, a tall, lean girl who ordinarily wore horn-rimmed spectacles, was Miss Folgil’s choice to rescue Exhibit A, the panic-stricken swimmer. I laughed when I saw her coming. I thought I could clean up Maybelle Anne easily enough, but alas, I hadn’t counted on Maybelle

Anne’s methodical approach to life. She had read Chapter 9 in our textbook, and she had listened carefully to Miss Folgil’s inspiring words. Besides, Maybelle Anne was just naturally the kind of girl who ran around doing people dirty for their own good. “This may hurt your feelings,” she used to say mournfully, “but I feel I have to tell: you 1 aie When Maybelle Anne got near me, I enthusiastically lunged for her neck and hung on with both hands while getting her around her

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waist with my legs. Maybelle Anne thereupon dug her fingernails into my hands with ferocious force, and I let go and swam away, hurt and surprised. This was distinctly not playing fair. ‘““What’s the idea?” I called out. “It says to do that in the book,” Maybelle Anne replied, treading water. “Well, you lay off of that stuff,” I said, angered, book or no book. Maybelle Anne was a Girl Scout, too, and I was shocked to think she’d go around using her fingernails in a fair fight. “Come on, struggle,” Maybelle Anne said, getting winded from treading water. I swam over, pretty reluctant and much more wary. Believe it or not, this time Maybelle Anne, who was two medals

from being a Beaver or whatever it is Girl Scouts with a lot of medals get to be, bit me. In addition to biting me, Maybelle Anne swung her arm around my neck, with the intention of towing me in to the shore. But I still

had plenty of fight left and I had never been so mad in my life. I got Maybelle Anne under water two or three times, and I almost thought I had her when suddenly, to my earnest surprise, she hauled off and hit me as hard as she could, right in the eye. Then she towed me in,

triumphant as anything. Maybelle Anne afterward claimed it was all in the book, and she

wouldn’t even apologize for my black eye. Eileen and I fixed her, though. We put a little garter snake in her bed and scared the daylights out of her. Maybelle Anne was easy to scare anyway, and really a very disagreeable girl. I used to hope that she would come to a bad end, which, from my point of view, at least, she did. Maybelle Anne grew up to be a Regional Red Cross Lifesaving examiner. Pll bet she just loves her work.

Two Bums Here Would Spend Freely Except for Poverty

“= JOHN McNULTY Nosopy KNows how the boss of this saloon on Third Avenue reaches such quick decisions about people who come in, but he does. Like in the case of the two bums who came in Sunday afternoon off the avenue. It was that time on Sunday afternoon that the inhabitants of this place call the Angelus. That’s about four o’clock when late hangovers from Saturday night come in one by one. They stay that way, too, one by one. Each man makes himself into an island, standing in front of the bar, and everyone keeps a space on each side of him the way water is on the sides of islands. These hangovers feel too terrible to talk to each other for a couple of hours yet, anyway. Each of them keeps staring into the mirror in back of the bar and saying to himself, “Look at you, you'll never amount to anything. You went to school and grew up and everything and now look at you, you'll never amount to anything.” Old veteran Third Avenue bartenders

call this fighting the mirror, and they all think it is very bad for a man. The place is sad and quiet when a batch of hangovers are doing this and so someone nicknamed this time of Sunday afternoon the Angelus. The boss was tending bar himself. He was on the pledge again this Sunday afternoon, so he was standing behind the bar and not saying hardly anything. He is a sour man when not drinking, because he is a man who doesn’t take very well to not drinking. The two bums came in walking as if they had the bottoms of rocking chairs for feet. They had that heel-and-toe walk that punchdrunk fighters have, that roll from heels to toes like a rocking chair

rocks from back to front. They were never fighters, though, these two bums, too frail-built and no cauliflower ears on them. They were scratch bums. In this neighborhood they call them scratch bums when they’ve got as far low as they could get, and

TWO

BUMS

WOULD

SPEND

FREELY

EXCEPT

FOR

POVERTY

671

don’t even try any more to keep themselves without bugs on them. Therefore, scratch bums. One bum had a version of a straw hat on him he rescued, most likely, out of an ash can in a fashionable neighborhood. It had one time been one of those peanut straws they call them that look like a panama that’s got sunburned, only cheaper price. That hat had a hell of a swaggering big brim on it, and looked funny over the scratch bum’s crummy clothes. The other bum carried a closed cigar box under one arm, for God knows what and nobody ever did find out. The two bums were arm in arm and they came in without making hardly a sound. The boss took a drag on his cigarette and laid it down, the way he

does when he’s ready to tell bums to turn right around and get out

of there, but the bums reached the bar before he did that. They come rolling up to the bar on the rocking-chair feet and one bum, the most sad-faced one, dredged up two nickels out of his pocket and slithered them onto the bar. “How much is a glass of wine?” the bum asked, and even the hangovers heard him and looked surprised. Nobody ever asks for a glass of wine hardly in that neighborhood. Except maybe on Christmas Eve some nondrinker might unloosen himself up that much on account of Christmas. They keep wine only for show-off, so when the bum asked for wine a couple of the hangovers looked at him and so did the boss. He didn’t seem to believe his ears, but he answered the bum. “Aw, wine is twenty-five cents,” the boss said. He shoved back the puny pair of nickels at the bum.

“Oh!” the bum said. Just plain “Oh.” He picked up his two nickels and him and his pal turned to go out. They took a couple steps toward the door when all of a sudden the boss yelled, “Hey, just a minute!” and wiggled a finger on one hand for them to come back to the bar.

Well, the two bums stood there, wondering what was going to happen. The boss walked down to the other end of the bar and he reached back and got two of the best wineglasses and wiped the dust off of them. He walked back with a hell of a flourish and set the glasses on the bar in front of the two bums. In this place they keep the imported stuff that’s hard to get in a little locker under the back end of the bar. The boss stalked back to this locker and out he hauls a bottle of imported Spanish sherry. Not the junk, a bottle of the McCoy, the real stuff, best in the house. He went to the bums and poured out two glasses full. Then he said, “Drink up, fellers, and welcome!”

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John McNulty

You'd think the bums might be surprised, but they didn’t look it.

They seemed to take it in their stride like everything else. They lifted the glasses and drank the wine slow. “Thank you, sir,” the one with the big-brim hat said. “We won’t be botherin’ you any longer.” And the two of them give their mouths a slow swipe with the backs of their hands and swiveled

around from the bar and walked out. The bums looked dignified. “Now, why in the hell did you do that?” one of the hangovers asked the boss.

“Never mind why I done it,” the boss said, grumpy. “Those fellers would spend thousands of dollars if it wasn’t for they haven’t

got even a quarter. Only two nickels. Never mind why I done it.” The boss kept smoking his cigarette a while and paying no attention to the hangover customers. After a couple minutes, damn if he didn’t go down again to the far end of the bar and get his hat. He kept trying it on this way and that in front of the mirror. “I wish to God,” he said, “I could get my hat to set on my head the way that hat set on the bum. Now, didn’t it have a hell of a jaunty look to it?”

How to Stop Being a Junior Executive

“{ SHEPHERD MEAD A JUNIOR EXECUTIVE is any male in an office who sits

down. At first you will make considerably less money than the men who run the elevators, wash the windows, and shine the shoes. But remember—you are being paid not in money but in experience. You are learning! Some men spend their whole lives doing this, and when they finish they may have little in the bank, but they are rich indeed. However, you are headed for the Top, so don’t overdo this. Learn the business, yes, but you have other far more important things to learn, too. Your

Muisston

As a junior executive you are the very pillar on which modern business rests. It is you who must shoulder the load while Top Management thinks. Yes, this is what they are doing, thinking. They may not look it, but they are. It will be your job, as a junior executive, to take over as many of their worries as you can. This will leave them as little as possible to think about. Your

APPEARANCE

The keynote now is one of maturity, and of cheerful suffering. Clothes. You need buy few clothes, since the junior executive does not dress as elegantly as the mail room boy. Simply have your brighter, more dashing items dyed mouse color or Oxford gray, and sprinkle lightly with dandruff. Look Older. But don’t be too obvious about it! Do not wear highbutton shoes, green eyeshades or sleeve protectors.

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Shepherd Mead

Never exaggerate the importance of a few gray hairs, especially

in the temples. This will mark you as a man of judgment. There are a number of good commercial preparations which are inexpensive and easy to apply. Mustache. A mustache, well cultivated and closely cropped, will add years and a look of sly cunning. This latter, though undesirable in job applicants, is a real plus in the junior executive.

The Look of Suffering. The junior executive is expected to suffer, and if you cannot manage it, you must at least appear to. An ulcer is excellent. Grow one if you can, but if you cannot, a bottle of milk placed conspicuously on the desk will do nicely, if accompanied by a slightly pained smile. Your

Orrice

Is ImMporTANT

The caste of a junior executive is determined by the size and magnificence of his office. In fact, when your office is indistinguishable from that of the senior executives you will be a senior executive.

Your first step will be to get any office. Few will listen to a man who sits at a hall desk. When you see an opportunity, go quickly to the office manager: “T see that Mr. Grabble is leaving, sir.” “That’s right.” “Do you mind if I move my things in there until the new man

comes?” (Note: Never say “have the office?” It is always “move my things in.”’) “Ts there anew man?” (There isn’t.) “Hadn’t you heard? Should be in any day now.’ You will be allowed to ‘‘move your things iin’ Be ots After a few months everyone will forget it isn’t your office and it will be. The Head-Cold Approach is equally successful: “Frideful code in the head,” you say to the office manager, sneezing violently. “Oh, too bad, Finch.” “Wonder if I could sid in the ebty office for a few days. Draft out here is derrible!”’ “Well, for a few days I think it’ll be all right.” Such a cold can hang on for weeks. By this time it is wise to ad-

minister the coup de grace: “I don’t like to cobplain, but my office is fridefully drafty.” (Note “my office.”) =

(6) eae

“The one in the corner seebs to get the sun. This code, you know.

HOW

TO STOP

BEING

A JUNIOR

EXECUTIVE

675

Maybe you could swidge O’Brien in here. Strong as an oggs, O’Brien.” “We'll see what we can do, Mr. Finch.”

After the transfer, the office will be yours until it no longer suits

you. Continue the process until you have at least four windows. A four-window man is one to be reckoned with! The Furnishings! It is a careless man who neglects these! You will have to decide first what mood you want to create. Some prefer the severe and monastic, with straight chair and table instead of swivel chair and desk; others favor soft lights, Oriental rugs, and incense; others, rococo; and still others, the tooled leather and old gold nothing-is-too-good-for-me approach. Decide for yourself. Fit your personality. Your office is a frame

for you!

In most cases you will want a generous supply of sofas, easy chairs, portable bars, credenzas and bric-a-brac. The company will supply these. But remember that a caste system governs all office furnishings as well as offices. Furnishings are handed down until—by the time they reach the junior executive—they are a sorry sight indeed. It is simple to beat this unfair system, if you remember the Magic Time. There is a Magic Time to pick up really suitable furnishings. First, prepare a list of the different items you would like, in various offices. Then, as their occupants leave the company or are transferred, simply summon the porter: “Oh, John, sometime today will you pick up that breakfront in Crabtree’s old office?”

“I thought the new man was coming in Thursday, Mr. Finch.” “He is. Crabtree wanted me to have the breakfront, though. He mentioned it specially. When you bring it in, move it against this wall, please, next to the bar. You can take this old thing here and move it in for the new man. He may like it, you know.” Soon you will have a real show place. But always remember—you are not doing this for yourself. “Tt’s quiet,” you will say, “that’s the important thing. These six windows are a distraction, but I don’t really mind. Just give me a desk, a pencil, and a piece of paper. I can work anywhere.” Desk

MANAGEMENT

You will soon have to decide whether to adopt the very-full- or very-empty-desk approach. There is no middle ground. A few pa-

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pers on a desk look messy and inefficient. The keen young man keeps either a polished expanse of bright wood, or a great overflowing mass of work. The one indicates cleanliness and efficiency, the other herculean effort and overwork. Both are good. Decide now which course you will follow. CALENDAR

MANAGEMENT

The same reasoning applies to the notations on your desk calendar, which is on top of your desk, for all to see. Confine yourself to one or two simple notations, such as:

“J.B.—AIl Day. Lunch— otork. B.o.”

The “Lunch, Stork”—‘Lunch, Colony”—or “Lunch, ‘21’ ” is advisable in all cases, even if you plan to duck out for franks and beans at a lunch counter. Or, you may prefer the cluttered-calendar approach, with dozens of appointments, scores of notations, appointments scratched out and replaced with others. This is especially effective if combined with the absolutely clean desk. It creates an impression of feverish but antiseptic activity—and will win you admiration everywhere.

The Girl from Red Lion, P. A. “=H. L. MENCKEN SOMEWHERE in his lush, magenta prose Oscar Wilde speaks of the tendency of nature to imitate art—a phenomenon often observed by persons who keep their eyes open. I first became aware of it, not through the pages of Wilde, but at the hands of an old-time hack-driver named Peebles, who flourished in Baltimore in the days of this history. Peebles was a Scotsman of a generally unfriendly and

retiring character, but nevertheless he was something of a public figure in the town. Perhaps that was partly due to the fact that he had served twelve years in the Maryland Penitentiary for killing his wife, but I think he owed much more of his eminence to his adamantine rectitude in money matters, so rare in his profession. The very cops, indeed, regarded him as an honest man, and said so freely. They knew about his blanket refusal to take more than three or four times the legal fare from drunks, they knew how many lost watches, wal-

lets, stickpins and walking sticks he turned in every year, and they admired as Christians, though deploring as cops, his absolute refusal to work for them in the capacity of stool pigeon. Moreover, he was industrious as well as honest, and it was the common belief that he had money in five banks. He appeared on the hack stand in front of the old Eutaw House every evening at nine o'clock, and put in the next five or six hours shuttling merrymakers and sociologists to and from the red light districts. When this trade

began to languish he drove to Union Station, and there kept watch until his two old horses fell asleep. Most of the strangers who got off the early morning trains wanted to go to the nearest hotel, which was only two blocks away, so there was not a great deal of money in their patronage, but unlike the other hackers Peebles never resorted

to the device of driving them swiftly in the wrong direction and then working back by a circuitous route.

A little after dawn one morning in the early autumn

of 1903,

just as his off horse began to snore gently, a milk train got in from lower Pennsylvania, and out of it issued a rosy-cheeked young woman carrying a pasteboard suitcase and a pink parasol. Squired up

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H. L. Mencken

from the train level by a car greaser with an eye for country beauty, she emerged into the sunlight.shyly and ran her eye down the line of hacks. The other drivers seemed to scare her, and no wonder, for they were all grasping men whose evil propensities glowed from them like heat from a stove. But when she saw Peebles her feminine intuition must have told her that he could be trusted, for she shook

off the car greaser without further ado, and came up to the Peebles

hack with a pretty show of confidence. “Say, mister,” she said, “how much will you charge to take me to a house of ill fame?”

In telling of it afterward Peebles probably exaggerated his astonishment a bit, but certainly he must have suffered something rationally describable as a shock. He laid great stress upon her air of

blooming innocence, almost like that of a cavorting lamb. He said her two cheeks glowed like apples, and that she smelled like a load of hay. But by his own account he stared at her for a full minute without answering her question, with a wild stream of confused surmises

racing through his mind. What imaginable business could a creature so obviously guileless have in the sort of establishment she had men-

tioned? Could it be that her tongue had slipped—that she actually meant an employment office, the Y.W.C.A., or what not? Peebles, as he later elaborated the story, insisted that he had cross-examined her at length and that she had not only reiterated her question in precise terms, but explained that she was fully determined to abandon herself to sin and looked forward confidently to dying in the gutter, but in his first version he reported simply that he had stared at her dumbly until his amazement began to wear off, and then motioned to her to climb into his hack. After all, he was a common carrier, and

obliged by law to haul all comers, regardless of their private projects and intentions. If he yielded anything to his Caledonian moral sense it took the form of choosing her destination with some prudence. He

might have dumped her into one of the third-rate bagnios that crowded a street not three blocks from Union Station, and then gone on about his business. Instead, he drove halfway across town to the high-toned studio of Miss Nellie d’Alembert, at that time one of the

leaders of her profession in Baltimore, and a woman who, though she lacked the polish of Vassar, had sound sense, progressive ideas.

a pawky humor and

I had become, only a little while before, city editor of the Herald, and in that capacity received frequent confidential communications from her. She was, in fact, the source of a great many useful news tips. She knew everything about everyone that no one was supposed

THE GIRL FROM

RED LION, P. A.

679

to know, and had accurate advance information, in particular, about page-one divorces, for nearly all the big law firms of the town used her facilities for the manufacture of evidence. There was no Walter Winchell in that era, and the city editors of the land had to depend on volunteers for inside stuff. Such volunteers were moved (a) by a sense of public duty gracefully performed, and (4) by an en-

lightened desire to keep on the good side of newspapers. Not infrequently they cashed in on this last. I well remember the night when

two visiting congressmen from Washington got into a debate in Miss Nellie’s music room, and one of them dented with a spittoon. At my suggestion the other more joined me in straining journalistic ethics the accident to Mt. Vernon Place, the most

the skull of the other city editors of Baltifar enough to remove respectable neighbor-

hood in town, and to lay the fracture to a fall on the ice.

My chance leadership in this public work made Miss Nellie my partisan, and now and then she gave me a nice tip and forgot to include the other city editors. Thus I was alert when she called up during the early afternoon of Peebles’ strange adventure, and told me that something swell was on ice. She explained that it was not really what you could call important news, but simply a sort of human-interest story, so I asked Percy Heath to go to see her, for though he was now my successor as Sunday editor, he still did an occasional news story, and I knew what kind he enjoyed especially. He called up in half an hour, and asked me to join him. “If you don’t hear it yourself,” he said, “you will say Iam pulling a fake.” When I got to Miss Nellie’s house I found her sitting with Percy in a basement room that she used as a sort of office, and at once she plunged into the story.

“Tl tell you first,” she began, “before you see the poor thing herself. When Peebles yanked the bell this morning I was sound asleep, and so was all the girls, and Sadie the maid had gone home. I stuck my head out of the window, and there was Peebles on the front steps. I said: ‘Get the hell away from here! What do you mean by bringing in a drunk at this time of the morning? Don’t you know us poor working people gotta get some rest?’ But he hollered back that he didn’t have no drunk in his hack, but something he didn’t know what to make of, ard needed my help on, so [ slipped on my kimono and went down to the door, and by that time he had the girl out of the hack, and befere I could say ‘scat’ he had shoved her in the parlor, and she was urioading what she had to say. “Well, to make a long story short, she said she come from somewheres near a burg they call Red Lion, P.A., and lived on a farm.

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She said her father was one of them old rubes with whiskers they

call Dunkards, and very strict. She said she had a beau in York, P.A., of the name of Elmer, and whenever he could get away he would come out to the farm and set in the parlor with her, and they would do a little hugging and kissing. She said Elmer was educated and a

great reader, and he would bring her books that he got from his

brother, who was a train butcher on the Northern Central, and him and her would read them. She said the books was all about love, and that most of them was sad. Her and Elmer would talk about them while they set in the parlor, and the more they talked about them the sadder they would get, and sometimes she would have to cry. “Well, to make a long story short, this went on once a week or so, and night before last Elmer come down from York with some more books, and they set in the parlor, and talked about love. Her old man usually stuck his nose in the door now and then, to see that there wasn’t no foolishness, but night before last he had a bilious attack and went to bed early, so her and Elmer had it all to theirself in the parlor. So they quit talking about the books, and Elmer began to love her up, and in a little while they was hugging and kissing to beat the band. Well, to make a long story short, Elmer went too far, and when she come to herself and kicked him out she realized she had lost her honest name. “She laid awake all night thinking about it, and the more she thought about it the more scared she got. In every one of the books her and Elmer read there was something on the subject, and all of the books said the same thing. When a girl lost her honest name there was nothing for her to do excepting to run away from home and lead a life of shame. No girl that she ever read about ever done anything else. They all rushed off to the nearest city, started this life of shame, and then took to booze and dope and died in the gutter. Their family never knew what had become of them. Maybe they landed finally in a medical college, or maybe the Salvation Army buried them, but their people never heard no more of them, and their

name was rubbed out of the family Bible. Sometimes their beau tried to find them, but he never could do it, and in the end he usually

married the Judge’s homely daughter, and moved into the big house when the judge died. “Well, to make a long story short, this poor girl lay awake all

night thinking of such sad things, and when she got up at 4:30 A.M. and went out to milk the cows her eyes was so full of tears that she could hardly find their spigots. Her father, who was still bilious, give

THE

GIRL

FROM

RED

LION, P. A.

681

her hell, and told her she was getting her just punishment for setting up until ten and eleven o’clock at night, when all decent people ought to be in bed. So she began to suspect that he may have snuck down during the evening, and caught her, and was getting ready to turn her out of the house and wash his hands of her, and maybe even curse her. So she decided to have it over and done with as soon as possible, and last night, the minute he hit the hay again, she hoofed in to York, P.A., and caught the milk train for Baltimore, and that is how Peebles found her at Union Station and brought her here. When I asked her what in hell she wanted all she had to say was, ‘Ain’t this a house of ill fame?’, and it took me an hour or two to pump her story out of her. So now I have got her upstairs under lock and key, and as soon as I can get word to Peebles I'll tell him to take her back to Union Station, and start her back for Red Lion, P.A. Can you beat it?”

Percy and I, of course, demanded to see the girl, and presently Miss Nellie fetched her in. She was by no means the bucolic Lillian Russell that Peebles’ tall tales afterward made her out, but she was certainly far from unappetizing. Despite her loss of sleep, the

dreadful gnawings of her conscience and the menace of an appalling retribution, her cheeks were still rosy, and there remained a considerable sparkle in her troubled blue eyes. I never heard her name but it was plain that she was

of foursquare Pennsylvania

Dutch

stock,

and as sturdy as the cows she serviced. She had on her Sunday clothes, and appeared to be somewhat uncomfortable in them, but

Miss Nellie set her at ease, and soon she was retelling her story to two strange and, in her sight, probably highly dubious men. We listened without interrupting her, and when she finished Percy was the first to speak.

“My dear young lady,” he said, “you have been grossly misinformed. I don’t know what these works of fiction are that you and Elmer read, but they are as far out of date as Joe Miller’s Jest-Book. The stuff that seems to be in them would make even a newspaper editorial writer cough and scratch himself. It may be true that, in

the remote era when they appear to have been written, the penalty of a slight and venial slip was as drastic as you say, but I assure you that it is no longer the case. The world is much more humane than it used to be, and much more rational. Just as it no longer burns men for heresy or women for witchcraft, so it has ceased to condemn girls to lives of shame and death in the gutter for the trivial dereliction you acknowledge. If there were time I’d get you some of the

682

H. L. Mencken

more recent books, and point out passages showing how moral principles have changed. The only thing that is frowned on now seems to be getting caught. Otherwise, justice is virtually silent on the sub-

ect.

. “Inasmuch as your story indicates that no one knows of your crime save your beau who, if he has learned of your disappearance, is probably scared half to death, I advise you to go home, make some plausible excuse to your pa for lighting out, and resume your care of his cows. At the proper opportunity take your beau to the pastor,

and join him in indissoluble love. It is the safe, respectable and hygienic course. Everyone agrees that it is moral, even moralists. Meanwhile, don’t forget to thank Miss Nellie. She might have helped you down the primrose way; instead, she has restored you to virtue and happiness, no worse for an interesting experience.” The girl, of course, took in only a small part of this, for Percy’s

voluptuous style and vocabulary were beyond the grasp of a simple milkmaid. But Miss Nellie, who understood English much better than she spoke it, translated freely, and in a little while the troubled look departed from those blue eyes, and large tears of joy welled from them. Miss Nellie shed a couple herself, and so did all the ladies of the resident faculty, for they had drifted downstairs during the

interview, sleepy but curious. The practical Miss Nellie inevitably thought of money, and it turned out that the trip down by milk train and Peebles’ lawful freight of one dollar had about exhausted the poor girl’s savings and she had only some odd change left. Percy threw in a dollar and I threw in a dollar, and Miss Nellie not only threw in a third, but ordered one of the ladies to go to the kitchen and prepare a box lunch for the return to Red Lion. Sadie the maid had not yet come to work, but Peebles presently bobbed up without being sent for, and toward the end of the afternoon he started off for the Union Station with his most amazing passenger, now as full of innocent jubilation as a martyr saved at the stake. As I have said, he embellished the story considerably during the days following, especially in the direction of touching up the girl’s pulchritude. The cops, because of their general confidence in him, swallowed his exaggerations, and I heard more than one of them lament that they had missed the chance to handle the case professionally. Percy, in his later years, made two or three attempts to put it into a movie scenario, but the Hays office always vetoed it.

How the girl managed to account to her father for her mysterious flight and quick return I don’t know, for she was never heard from

THE

GIRL FROM

RED LION, P. A.

683

afterward. She promised to send Miss Nellie a picture postcard of Red Lion, showing the new hall of the Knights of Pythias, but if it was ever actually mailed it must have been misaddressed, for it never arrived.

The Dilemma of Lance O’Neill “= SCOTT MEREDITH Tuis Is a true story which has become one of the publishing industry’s favorite anecdotes.

Magazines today won't purchase and print each installment of a serial as the author completes it: they’ve seen so many good stories fall apart at the end that it is now the rule to see and okay the full yarn before they begin to publish any part of it. Some years ago, however, many magazines made it a regular practice to rush into print each installment of a serial as the author pulled it out of his typewriter, and the editors of one of these publications found themselves rather worried one day. They’d just published the next to last installment of a serial and the author had left the lead character, whom we shall call Lance O’Neill, in quite a fix. After a long series of narrow escapes from death at the villain’s hands, the crisis had arrived—and it looked as though Lance were really cooked this time. He had fallen into a deep pit set up by the villain, a pit with sides so smooth it was obvious he wouldn’t possibly be able to scramble up again. Sharp spikes were beginning to come out of the sides of the pit to impale him, and, to make things worse, molten lead was beginning to pour out of a pipe in the pit and fill it up. The more the editors thought about it, the more it worried them. What if the author couldn’t think of a solution—some way to rescue O’Neill? What if he found he just couldn’t go on, and they had to publish the next issue without the final installment? The thought was terrible—thousands of readers might cancel their subscriptions in protest. Frantically, they phoned the author at his home, but he wasn’t there. They were running down the list, and phoning places at which he might be found, when he walked in. “What’s all the excitement about?” he asked. “The Lance O’Neill serial,” the editor-in-chief said nervously. “The predicament he’s in—did it throw you? Were you able to get him out of it?”

THE

DILEMMA

OF LANCE

O’NEILL

685

Casually, the author took the manuscript of the final installment

out of an envelope, and pointed to the opening line. This is what it said: ' With a mighty leap, Lance O'Neill sprang out of the pit.

The Lodging-House Letters 7

us J. B. MORTON A Fout

THERE

HAVE

LATELY

INNUENDO

BEEN

complaints

in the newspa-

pers, from civil servants, that lodging-house keepers show favoritism to their regular clientele. The accusation seaside landlady, Mrs. McGurgle.

roused

that well-known

Dear Sir,

I treat civil servants just like my other lodgers. No better and no worse. It is rapid eating and not social status that gets a second helping. If I see an empty plate I fill it, be its owner a big panjandrum in government circles or only a humble traveler in biscuits. Snobbery, I am thankful to say, has never cast its foul shadow across the threshold of Marine House. For though the late Mr. McGurgle, by whom I had the honor to be led to the altar at St. Philip’s in this very resort, held an important position in a warehouse, he never to his dying day set up to be better than his fellows. An early decease, due to tainted cocoa partaken of at a French watering place during a well-earned holiday, robbed me of my guide, philosopher and friend, but I flatter myself that Marine House is run today as it was in his lifetime, without fear or favor. All are welcome, from dukes to dustmen.

Yours faithfully, FLORENCE McGurcLe Tue

Boarpinc-Houszt

Row

Dear Sir,

As one who has had a long experience of lodging houses by the sea, may I hasten to support Mrs. McGurgle’s contention servants are human beings, and must be treated as such? are bad mixers. It takes the old habitué to come into the private sitting room with a bit of a swagger, and maybe

that civil But they landlady’s to pinch

THE

LODGING-HOUSE

LETTERS

687

her ear in sheer camaraderie. Landladies don’t like being treated as stand-off ogres, and are as susceptible to a spot of flattery as the rest of us. What some of these establishments where there are civil servants need is a bit of rough and tumble to break the ice—blind-man’s buff or something of that sort. That is the rule we have adopted at

Beach View, and already it is no uncommon sight to see a gentleman

from the Board of Works on all fours in the passage, begging a piece

of kipper from one of the young ladies touring in Atta Girl! Yours truly,

Herpert CLert

‘Mrs. McGurete

AGAIN

Dear Sir, I can well imagine what the late Mr. McGurgle—him that I have said fell a victim to tainted Continental cocoa and should have known better than to tempt fate by ordering it so far from home— would have had to say of a proprietress who graded her helpings according to the birth and education of the clientele. Why, I remember once it was our privilege to receive as a paying guest at Marine House a very high official of the gas company. It is true we gave him a big room, him having so much luggage, but when it came to mealtimes, I can hear my late husband saying, as though it was yesterday, “Flo, put the gentleman between the insurance clerk and the piano tuner. He is only one of us while he enjoys the shelter of the McGurgle roof.” And I flatter myself that when I stood up to help the gravy, gas company or no gas company, his portion did not outweigh that of his neighbors’, nor was the smile I directed to the least of our patrons, Miss Ansper, the orphan of a night watchman whom diphtheria and complications carried to a premature burial in the north corner of St. Oswith’s cemetery, any less friendly than that reserved for the official who, be it added, for all his luggage and fine airs, knew no better than to stove his morning egg in at a blow with his thumb. Yours truly, FLORENCE McGurGLe McGurcte’s

SENSITIVENESS

Dear Sir,

Barbed tongues, vicious as the serpent’s tooth, are saying that my communications

to you are only a vulgar attempt to advertise Ma-

J. B. Morton

688 rine House. Let me say tested even well-merited second prize in a South a gigantic turnip which

at once that the late Mr. McGurgle so defame that on the occasion of his winning of England vegetable show, his entry being he did my sister, Mrs. Cage, the honor of

presenting to her afterwards, when the local newspaper sent a young

man to interview him he refused to allow his photograph to be published, since he said he was not going to compete with film stars for

the public applause. Would such a man’s widow be likely to go in for vulgar advertisement?

On another occasion the late Mr. Mc-

Gurgle, a horticulturist if there ever was one, called a peony which he exhibited at Bognor the Mrs. McGurgle, in compliment to me. But at the last moment he told me he could not bring himself to expose even so much as my married name to the sensation-mongers

of today. So he changed the peony’s name to Robinson, after a longdead granduncle of his mother’s. Perhaps I have said enough to defend myself from foul innuendo. Yours truly, FLorENCE McGurGLe SUNDAY

SuPPER

AT MarINE

House

Dear Sir, It is difficult for a mere member of the public to fathom what is behind your extraordinary attempt to deify the late Mr. McGurgle. I knew him quite well, when we were both with Clipper and Red-

lett. He was a very ordinary man, and had an annoying habit of cracking his fingers while he talked. Mrs. McGurgle, for whose feelings as a bereaved widow I have every respect, is, I think, idealizing her late consort. I only once met her, being bidden to Sunday supper at Marine House. It was a gloomy meal, relieved only by the senseless giggling of a young lady, who appeared to be a filing clerk in the office of a hop factory. The food was terrible and scanty. I was allowed one glass of stout, and the whole time I was drinking it Mrs. McGurgle kept on saying that, though she had never succumbed to the demon drink, she had no objection to others wrecking their insides and their morals by wallowing in alcohol. We broke up early, because the very silent sister of a commissionaire suddenly went into screaming hysterics. Yours truly, Oscar SUGGRIDGE

THE

LODGING-HOUSE

LETTERS

689

Sue Is Hurt

Dear Sir,

Mr. Suggridge’s letter is merely vulgar. When he complains that Sunday suppers were gloomy at Marine House, I will ask him to remember that this establishment is not a cabray. Almost my mother’s last words to me, as she lay a-dying in Hampshire, were, “Flo, never let the French Sunday get a grip on your establishment.” As to the

clicking of the late Mr. McGurgle’s fingers which so irritated this so-called Mr. Suggridge, may I hasten to assert that my late consort

only clicked them when he desired to emphasize a point? The giggling lady he refers to was my niece, who has been nervous ever since she was jilted by a man who sold scissors and knives at a booth at Hexham. I hope I have said more than enough to demonstrate that Mr. Suggridge, whom I scarcely have the honor to recollect, is hardly what respectable people would call comeelfo. If one glass of stout on a Sunday night is not enough, his spiritual home is the bodeega, Yours truly, FLORENCE McGurcLeE

Tue Late

McGurcLe

Dear Sir,

If the Mrs. McGurgle who writes to you is the Mrs. McGurgle

whose husband tried to get my brother Alfred to join the Lamplight League of Sunday Silence, she must have married a tartar. McGurgle

used to come to our house gassing about the beauty of contempla-

tion, and he always left leaflets urging us all to link our thoughts in

a chain of pure gold to the Infinite. I never heard a man talk so much about silence, and I often wondered how the lodgers at Marine House took his jabbering. He gave my brother a snapshot of his wife when she was Miss Palmer. He said she was the ray of sunshine which filled the boarding house with singing birds. | told him to save me a chaffinch, and he left off bothering us. Yours truly, E. N. SPILLMAN

690

J. B. Morton A Nosie

DEFENSE

Dear Sir,

There appears to be a conspiracy to malign the late Mr. McGurgle, even by those who, baser than the serpent’s tooth, mark their ingratitude by attempting to bite the hand of the deceased man who fed and boarded them in the early days of Marine House. If stout did not flow like water at our table, is that not to the credit of the establishment? There are doubtless boarding houses which cater for such as cannot pass a public house without darting in to the detri-

ment of their characters. Mr. McGurgle used to say that his home was his public house, and water his tipple, and that he required no bar in his front parlor. But I venture to reassert that he was no less

gay and sporty than they whose veins run with distilled poison, whose eyes are bloodshot and restless, and whose limbs tremble at breakfast like the proverbial aspen. He is not likely to turn in his

grave at the mud-slinging of mean natures. Yours truly, FLorENcCE McGurcLe ANOTHER

SUPPORTER

Dear Sir,

As sister to the late Mr. McGurgle, I protest against this bandying

of his name, as though he were a Casanova always diving into public houses frequented by what my sainted mother used to designate harpies of the underworld. Mr. McGurgle always abhorred strong

drink, as exemplified on the 4:52 from Waterloo to Epsom one day,

when a stranger changed hats with him unasked. My brother gave

him a stare that would have turned a basilica to stone. The sot got out at Raynes Park, still reeking of the demon alcohol. My brother merely wiped his hat on his knee and began to hum nonchalantly. A fine example of manners and self-control. Yours truly, FreDA RUMTEIGH More

GuHosts FROM

THE PAst

Dear Sir,

Florrie Palmer that was has certainly sobered up a bit, no offense.

My word!

There were

evenings at the Magpie which would

have

THE

LODGING-HOUSE

LETTERS

691

made her future lord’s hair stand on end. Florrie used to sing, “Tap, tap, tap! It’s not the postman!” and then she and Fred Townham would do a Russian dance, splits and all, with two kitchen

knives between their teeth. Ah, well! It’s a far call from the Magpie

to Marine House, which sounds to yours truly about as gay and giddy

as a morgue. I wonder if Flo recalls the evening when Capper put a bloater down her back? Yours truly, Syp TELGROVE

Tue

ExceLttent

Coc

Dear Sir, Your correspondent who claims to have known me in my court-

ing days seems to be surprised that I have not remained a giddy young girl whose god was pleasure. It is one thing to stand on the threshold of life’s doorway and raise the bubbling cup of youth to inexperienced. lips. It is another thing to be the chosen consort of a serious-minded warehouse overseer and to have an old-established boarding house to manage. Of course, I take my work seriously,

and proud of it. Success in the boarding-house world is the guerdon of hard work and nothing la-di-da about it. We landladies are but small cogs in the vast machine of the lodgers’ world, but as one of the least of those cogs permit me to say that without cogs where would you get to? Yours truly, FLoRENCE McGurcLe

A Toucuinc

TRIBUTE

Dear Sir, I hasten to corroborate all that my old and esteemed friend and landlady says of her deceased consort, the late lamented Stephen McGurgle. I had many occasions, while on tour, to use Marine House as my peadertair, and I can say, with my hand on my heart, that the excellence of the grub and the downy softness of the beds were only exceeded to by the human warmth and benignity of the welcome voochsaved to all by the charming host and hostess. Only a very brave woman could have kept the flag flying after the untimely removal of such a skipper as Stephen McGurgle. May I add

692

J. B. Morton

that by a happy dispensation of his will and testament,

when

his

anniversary comes round there is not a dry mouth in the King’s Arms!

Yours truly, EpMUND PILLINGER SHE REMEMBERS

Mr. PILLINGER

Dear Si,

Mr. Pillinger’s tribute to the late Mr. McGurgle is very handsome. I wonder whether he is the Mr. Pillinger who boarded at Marine House while playing the miser in The Aftermath. If so, I well remember him helping the late Mr. McGurgle to add a few twirls to the “Welcome” which was such a prominent feature of our doormat. I fear we used to make a good deal of fun of him, as he was very much attracted to one of our patrons, a Miss Gowle, who afterwards married into a Steam Carpet-Beating Business, and only once returned to our humble Marine House, in a solid silver motorcar with the flags of all the nations tacked onto the bonnet. I understand that her stepson was a bit of a racer and covered even the furniture with plaques and medals. I wonder if Mr. Pillinger ever married. He would have made a fine, steady mate for some decent girl who could appreciate art and culture, and though I was never a matchmaker, I tried to encourage a friendship between him and a girl who

typed dramas. Nothing came of it as both became involved in a row about a loose board on the landing and she left in a huff. Yours truly, FLORENCE McGurGLE

Wild Life “i OGDEN NASH Tue

Turt_e

The turtle lives ’twixt plated decks Which practically conceal its sex. I think it clever of the turtle In such a fix to be so fertile. Tue

Fisu

The fish, when he’s exposed to air, Can show no trace of savoir faire, But in the sea regains his balance And exploits all his manly talents. The chastest of the vertebrates, He never even sees his mates, But when they’ve finished, he appears And O.K.’s all their bright ideas. Tue

Rassits

Here’s a verse about rabbits That doesn’t mention their habits.

Tue

Cow

The cow is of the bovine ilk; One end is moo, the other, milk. Tue

Pickton

There is nothing in any religion Which compels us to love the pigeon.

THe

SHREW

Strange as it seems, the smallest mammal Is the shrew, and not the camel. And that is all I ever knew, Or wish to know, about the shrew.

Ogden Nash

694 Tue

RHINOCEROS

The rhino is a homely beast, For human eyes he’s not a feast. Farewell, farewell, you old rhinoceros, I'll stare at something less prepoceros. THe

GERM

A mighty creature is the germ, Though smaller than the pachyderm. His customary dwelling place Is deep within the human race. His childish pride he often pleases By giving people strange diseases. Do you, my poppet, feel infirm? You probably contain a germ. Tue

Srork

From long descriptions I have heard I guess this creature is a bird.

I’ve nothing else of him to say, Except I wish he’d go away.

Newsbreaks from The New Yorker

WHEN

A MAGAZINE

ARTICLE

falls short and does not

quite reach the end of the column, there is a space of two or three inches that has to be filled somehow. This is an irksome problem and is almost reason enough to give up publishing the magazine. However, it is a problem that can be, and is, solved in various

Ways in various magazines.

Some

magazines simply call up the

writer of the article and ask him to write fifty more words so that his piece will extend down to the bottom of the column. The

Saturday

Evening

Post, more

resourceful

than

that, solved the

problem years ago by publishing a photograph of Lake Louise in the

space, and now every time a story or article in The Saturday Evening Post falls short you will find a picture of Lake Louise.

The New Yorker, having no picture of Lake Louise in the office, and unable to get harder course and from newspapers posed to be funny

in touch with its writers by telephone, took the began filling out its columns with little excerpts and other publications—excerpts that were supor instructive because they contained some error

of typography or judgment. To these was appended some slight comment calculated to make people laugh if and when the excerpt itself failed. The work of finding these little newsbreaks, as they are sometimes called, was difficult during the first three weeks of pub-

lishing The New

Yorker; after that the problem was one of dis-

posal, not acquisition—people began supplying them in such quantities as to make necessary a change in the arrangement of the floor space of the editorial offices. About 1000 clippings a week are now received and some ten square feet of floor have been allotted to

throw them away on. The magazine made, and still makes, the mistake of paying contributors for accepted newsbreaks; and this reprehensible practice has so aroused and stimulated people who have a natural tendency to cut things out of the newspapers that sometimes

a single typographical error in the Times will net the United States government five dollars in stamps used by persons who cut out the error and mail it in.

from The New

696

Yorker

There is a secret joy in discovering a blunder in the public prints. Almost every person has a little of the proofreader in him; and just as a certain kind of person walks through a field with his eye peeled

for four-leaf clovers, a similar kind of person goes. through a newspaper looking for errors. The commonest typographical mistakes (they occur with great regularity) are these: immorality for immortality, widow for window, bride for bridge, and martial for marital.

There are, of course, a lot of other common

ones. Thus, when a

person, in looking through the classified-advertising section of a pa-

per, discovers an ad for a ‘“widow dresser,” he makes a mistake in

clipping it out and sending it in—he and fourteen others. In addition to the common typos, there are stock jokes that either

happen to occur frequently in the papers or are made to occur by printers or writers who are trying to be funny, on the sly—things that are worded to have a double meaning, like: “Ladies’ Bloomers,

1/2 off.” Such jokes are no longer a laughing matter to anybody whose duty is to read them in all their multiplicity. Another newsbreak, and a common one, is the scrambled line, etaoin shrdlu, which is the merry glissando of all compositors. Etaoin and shrdlu are sequences of letters that occur on a linotype machine,

just as qwerty occurs on a typewriter. A slug containing them sometimes fails to get pulled out of a galley of type, which results in a

sentence something like this: Her name was given to the police as Mari etaoin shrdlushrdlushrdlushrdlu

There are people who, after all these years of linotype machines,

can’t read such a line without shrieking with laughter and who, when their immediate excitement has died down, get out the scissors and send the clipping to The New Yorker. People who send in clippings not only send them in in great quantities, but in strange shapes: they have a perverse habit of doing them up in curious knots or “twists,” or tying them up with a bit of thread or horsehair, or sticking them together with spruce gum, or wrapping them in an old lace handkerchief. A favorite physical type is the accordion-pleated newsbreak, which arrives in the office in a large envelope and, on being opened, unrolls like a booklet of the Thousand Islands. Finding the nugget of meaning in the depths of these odd bundles is no mean chore in itself, let alone having the strength of character to throw them away without even looking. Of course, there are professional newsbreak contributors who sub-

NEWSBREAKS

697

mit newsbreaks in apple-pie order, all pasted neatly on slips of paper. These are presumably people who allowed the glamour of the scis-

sors to get into their blood, and who are unable to go back to their

regular vocation, whatever it used to be. The following newsbreaks are a selection from those that have

appeared in The New Yorker in past years. Many of them, I have no

doubt, will be snipped from these very pages by scissors-owners far

and wide and sent back to The New Yorker, with the scribbled note: “Here’s a funny one from a book I was reading the other day. Can you use it?” E. B. Wuite *

A son was born to Mr. and Mrs. William Kleintop, Lehigh Avenue, during the past week. Congratulations, Pete!—Palmerton (Pa.) Press

Where credit is due. *

ERRATUM. We regret to state that we did not have the information about John Ehrlich ’28 correct. He is not an instructor, but just a fellow. Dr. Wolf is not head of the botany department. There is no botany department, it’s in biology. It’s not Durham University, but

Duke University at Durham, North Carolina—The Cornell Countryman

Maybe yowre not correcting the right article? *

There was something about that title, Old Incestors’ Trading Corporation, that inspired confidence—The American We don’t know what it was. *

Here is an evening prayer for the little ones, and to me it is very sweet and solemn: Saviour, tender Shepherd hear me, Bless thy little lamb tonight; In the darkness by Thou near me, Keep me safe till morning light. To remove rust from window glass, dip cloth in coal oil and rub hard. —The Kansas City Star

It is sort of sweet and solemn.

from The New

698

Yorker

This cablegram reached us as the Bremen flew: “Sanka Coffee on board the Bremen. If we reach New York with the aid of God, we greet Sanka. (Signed, Huenefeld.)”—Advertisement in the Times We ate beef tea, sandwiches, bananas, and coffee. I thoroughly enjoyed that meal—until after drinking the coffee, which didn’t taste

very nice.—Major Fitzmaurice in the Times

Greetings, Sanka! *

FATHER OF FORTY IS HAILED AS THE CHAMPION DADDy—Long Island Daily Press, January 15 BIRTH CONTROL CLINICS ALLOwED—Long Island Daily Press, January 15

Too late. *

We have the same eggs for sale that we had last winter. Come and see us.—Pyote (Okla.) Clarion

If we do, it will be just a friendly visit. *

MANIAC STABS 4 IN SUBWAY CRUSH—The Herald Tribune

MANIAC SLASHES 5 IN TIMES SQUARE sUBWAY—The Times STABS 8 MANIAC MANIAC SEVERAL

IN TIMES HACKS 2 SLASHES SLASHED

SQUARE SUBWAY—The Daily News IN suBwAY—The Daily Mirror 4 AT TIMES SQUARE—The World BY MANIAC—The American

It was a despicable thing for him to do, anyway. *

Mr. and Mrs, Frank Di Pietro, of Miles Avenue, are receiving congratulations on the birth of a daughter. Both mother and baby

are doing nicely under the car of Dr. Robert Sievers.—Bordentown (N.J.) Register

That animal instinct to go where it’s quiet and dark. *

THE

LYRICAL

PRESS

There is still no news of the party of Jews who left Portobello on Sunday.—Manchester Guardian But we choose to think that they did not sink, and will turn up for work on Monday. *

Marjorie Evans, a cashier at the bank, was slightly bruised Monday afternoon when the car driven by George Baker struck her in front

NEWSBREAKS

699

of the bank. Mr. Baker is to be commended for the consideration he

showed for Miss Evans. He stopped the car immediately, picking her

up and feeling her all over to make sure that no bones were broken, after which he insisted on taking her home where he could make a closer examination. We are glad to hear that outside of a

bruised hip she escaped injury.—Norwood (Ohio) Enterprise We're not alittle relieved, too! *

We Do Not Tear Your Clothes with Machinery. We Do It Carefully by Hand.—Sign in a laundry window W hich is so much nicer. é

*

I tell those aspiring writers who write me for advice to read, read, read. Everything. From the classic writers to the modern. Write, write, write tirelessly, all the time. Then, above all, one must have

lived.—Louis Bromfield, interviewed in The Writer

Have lived, have lived, have lived! *

Joe Stenosklaip, of Streator, has just received a letter from his wife

in Italy telling of the birth of a son. Joe immediately set the boys up to drinks, and stated that he had not seen his wife for five years.— Washburn (Ill.) Leader

But the brave little woman is carrying on. *

Happy New Year Everyone. Mr. Chas. Lewis is confined to his bed with the grippe. Howard Tebo has been confined to his bed with pleurisy. Charles Batson is ill at his home on Lindon Ave. with the grippe.

—Stanhope-Netcong News in the New Jersey Herald And avery Happy New Year to you! *

Large artistically furnished sleeping room, bay window corner; fireplace; 6 blocks from Market; marine view if you stick your head

far enough out the window.

25 Joice St., nr. Powell.—Advertise-

ment in San Francisco Examiner

And hang on tight enough. *

Mrs. S.T.: You may develop a scrawny neck by exercising. Stand with feet about eighteen inches apart, body erect, chin in; without

700

from The New

Yorker

moving the body turn head sharply to the right three times, then to

the left.—From “Beauty Queries” in the Chicago Tribune And presto! You have a scrawny neck. *

Dorothy Andrus, grand-daughter of John E. Andrus, wealthy capitalist of Yonkers, N.Y., could have a million today, her twentyfirst birthday, if she went home to sign the papers. But she has been in a tennis tournament here. “Let the money wait,” she explained.

“T can git it any time.” —A.P. dispatch in an Omaha paper

Yeah, but can youse appreciate it? *

In Los Angeles, District Attorney Buron Fitts announced that Hefner’s first-person story, obtained exclusively by the United Press, did much to round out information which his own detectives have unearthed in connection with the Long-Dormant case since it was recently reopened.—The Herald Tribune

Somehow it reminds us of the famous Hotly-Contested case. *

Lost—Male fox hound, brown head, yellow legs, blue body with large black spots on left side, male. Also female, white with red head

and spot on hip.—Fayette (Mo.) Democrat-Leader Those aren't dogs, those are nasturtiums. *

A stray dog with the name of E. G. Caldwell has been about the village for a few days.—Carroll County (N.H.) Independent Not old Eddy Caldwell? *

Walter Anuzic, 26 years old, 2011 Cullerton Street, was arraigned in the Court of Domestic Relations yesterday on the complaints of four young women, each of whom alleged that he was

the father of her child. The cases were continued to Jan. 13. Anuzic is an employee of a baby carriage factory.—Chicago Tribune And trying desperately, like all of us, to hold his job. *

Six sergeants, each with a patrolman and all in civilian clothes, went through more than a dozen rooms in the Hotel Avery on

Avery Street shortly after 3 o’clock this morning and after a lengthy questioning of guests and hotel attaches brought six couples to the

NEWSBREAKS

701

Lagrange Street Station where charges.—Boston Herald

they were

booked

on statutory

Special Summer Rates Avery Hore Single Rooms $2.50 and up Double Rooms $3.00 and up Every Room with Bath and Shower —A dvertisement in the Boston Herald, two columns away

Every room with Bath and Shower and sergeant. *

Plaintiff alleges that this defendant represented to her that this

range would not become heated on the upper surface of the oven. That plaintiff, relying wholly on this defendant’s representations,

placed her bath tub in the kitchen near the range. That upon emerging from the tub, plaintiff’s foot accidentally came into contact with the soap on the floor and she was thus compelled to sit upon the range. That, although she arose therefrom in all diligence, she

discovered she had been branded ““H-47.”—From a petition in a damage suit

Well, it’s as good anumber as any. *

She is a brown-eyed brunette, 23 years old, and an accomplished danger.—Wilkes Barre (Pa.) Times-Leader We prefer an inexperienced little peril, ourself. *

If a man sees that a girl is losing her petticoat or some other alien part of the wardrobe, should he tell her about it, or would she think it impertinent of him? E.L. This depends largely on whether he does or does not know the girl. To have a perfect stranger walk up to you and say, “You have a smudge on your nose,” would be disconcerting; the problem of draggling underthings is much the same. The thing to do if you know the girl is to go up to her quietly and without embarrassment and say, “I think you’re losing something.” She will undoubtedly be

glad to know about it—Etiquette column in the World-Telegram Particularly if her arms are full of bundles. *

from The New

702

Yorker

LEAVES SHIP LEANING ON DAUGHTER —Headline in a San Francisco newspaper That’s a dirty trick, heaven knows. *

About four years ago, he produced “Hamlet” for Miss O’Neil at

the Hearst Greek theatre at the University of California. He appeared

as “Polonius” while Miss O’Neil took the title role—Los Angeles Herald The melancholy dame. *

Laconic, witty remarks punctured Sir Ronald’s conversation. He sometimes indulges in a bit of American slang. When a guest commented on an imported screen depicting the Spanish armada Sir Ronald remarked with a twinkle: “They are shown getting what you call ‘in the neck.’ ”__Baltimore Sun

Which is that, the laconic or the witty? *

BOOKKEEPER AND TYPIST, THOROUGHLY EXPERIENCED, PREFER ONE WITH SILK UNDERWEAR: EXPERIENCED. TRI-KNIT, 31 East 32nd.— Advertisement in the Times As who doesw’t? *

“Carroll had drank too deeply of the cup of life,” said Miss Kim,

a graduate of the University of Southern California.—Indianapohs Times Better just make it “said Miss Kim.” *

This is to notify that W. W. Boob has adopted the trade name of

Equipment-Exchange.—Public notice in the Los Angeles Times We still think it’s a funny name. *

DEAR SISTERS: I have read the column for years with a great deal of interest and have been particularly interested in those sisters who have a most unusual craving for various articles of food, etc., but I have yet failed to find anyone with the most peculiar appetite that I

have, and it is for chewing the lead out of lead pencils. For the past three months I have averaged a good-sized pencil lead a day, and so far it has not had any apparent ill effects, but now I find myself craving more than this amount and I am beginning to get worried. Can

NEWSBREAKS

703

any of the sisters help me in my most unfortunate condition? LEAD

PENCIL.—Household column in the Boston Globe

Yes. Try eating the little red erasers on the end. *

BROOKLYN: I’m desperate. I married a girl three years ago. Everything was o.k. for a few weeks. Then she stuck a fork in my head one day. I forgave her for that. But one thing has led to another, until now she will do no housework, while I have to clean and cook, and wash my own laundry on Saturday afternoon. I have a $2,000 accident policy, and so when we go to the beach, she frequently tries to pull me under by both feet. Hell’s no word for the

life I live. Hersert F.—Letter in the Daily

News

Beaches are no place for a man who ought to be home doing his washing. *

Of all her husbands, Eugenia loved Hoyt best—and he did the most to prove that he loved her. After their second divorce he tried to leap from an upper floor of the Ritz-Carlton. Later he did jump off a liner in New York Harbor, and was rescued just in time to save his life. His final gesture of love, which finally won Eugenia into a third

marriage with him, was eating a whiskbroom.—The Daily Mirror That breaks’em down. *

NEATEST JUXTAPOSITION OF THE WEEK

(From the World)

Other Reports of College Commencements Will Be Found on Page 12 of the Want Ad Section. Prosecuting a divorce suit yesterday in Middlesex probate court, Saul Lafestein, Framingham and Marlboro merchant, claimed that

his wife Esther tore his straw hat into 55 pieces, his tie into 40 pieces, and his shirt into 25 pieces, and that she hit him with a broom, locked him out, hurled a kettle of hot water at him, threatened to kill him, threw a crank at him, slashed upholstery in his automobile, and interfered with his business.—Boston Herald

And business none too good to begin with. *

from The New

704

Q. What apparatus can be used to stop the A. Nothing is entirely efficacious. A good rooster’s roost so high that when he stretches strike his head gently on the roof. This will

Yorker

crowing of roosters? plan is to place the up to crow he will stop his crowing.—

Frederic Haskin, in the Nebraska State Journal

He’ll never feel quite the same toward you, though. *

GENERAL MANAGER for expanding storage and moving business, executive type and business builder; must estimate on storage, furniture moving anywhere in the United States and Canada; do crating, packing, in warehouse; drive van; hoist and carry pianos. Detail your ex-

perience, references, education.

X2604.—A dvertisement in the Times

All right, general manager, tip your end up a little! *

RIDING BREECHES,

new pair of, in vicinity of 73rd St. Return to

Arthur M. Rosenberg, 16 East 52nd St.—Lost-and-found advertisement in the

New York Times

Pockets, anything in the? *

Announcement of his resignation as minister of the Church of Christ in this city and plans for removal to Gallatin, Tenn., where in addition to preaching he will also be affiliated with the Interstate Life & Accident Insurance Company was made today by the Rev. W.N. Ridge. For his morning subject Sunday Mr. Ridge will discuss ““The Hard-

ening of Pharaoh’s Heart.”—Clarksville (Tenn.) Leaf Chronicle

And how heart-hardening might have been covered by one of the new I.L.&A. policies. *

“Even with wouldn’t have I was a boy Maine. When middle. When

my God-given sense of rhythm and flair for phrasing I amounted to anything if I hadn’t worked hard. When I washed the windows in my father’s drug store in the clerks washed the windows they only washed the I washed them I cleaned up all the soap powder in the

corner. Those clerks are still in Maine.”—Rudy W orld-Telegram

Vallee quoted in the

Sleeping under blankets. *

“T still thought it was some kind of a prank and told him he was

NEWSBREAKS

705

crazy. Then he hit me over the head with the pistol and take things seriously. I started to get out of the right side The other man leaped on my back but slipped and fell. He hit his head on the running board of the car because he

I began to of the car. must have fell to the

ground, and when I jumped down from the car I stepped right in his

face.’ —Texas newspaper Then he began to take things seriously. *

Stanley Godamski, 19, a farmer of Peconic, was driving along the main highway Saturday night when he lost control of his car and crashed into a telephone pole. Godamski was unconscious when found by Traffic Officer Douglass Clark, who gave first aid until a physician arrived. The car was a complete wreck. Godamski was taken to his home.—East Hampton (N.Y.) Star

Where he gladly gave his name. *

An Interview with the Man with the Hoe

“Ie G. H. M. NICHOLS “T.00K AT Mg,” said the Man with the Hoe. “Look at me. Sixty-three, come next lambing, if I’m spared, and don’t look a day over fifty. Bowed wi’ centuries, indeed! And look ’ere,” he went on, with rising indignation, “bowed! ‘Lean forrard,’’e says—”

“Who said?” we asked. “This ’ere French artist chap. Milly, ’is name were—same as a lass. ‘Stand ’ere,’ ’e says. “You’re oppressed, downtrodden, that’s wot you are, ’e says. ‘Bend over that ’oe and look miserable.’ So I does. But ’tweren’t that as I minded—it were this American chap—poet, ’e were. I never said aught to ’im, but up ’e comes an’ calls me all man-

ner o’ names. ‘Brother to the ox, you are,’ ’e says. Me, what’s lived respectable in this parish nigh on fifty year! And then ’e starts askin’ all manner o’ questions. “*°’Oo loosened an’ let down this brutal jaw?’ ’e wants to know. *’Oos was the ’and wot slanted back this ere brow?’ “ “Why, that Mister Milly,’ I tell ’im. ‘E done it—that’s ’oo,’ I says. “Now, I don’t reckon to set up for a film star or one o’ them chaps, but folks always did allow I were middlin’ handsome like, an’ I tell you I were fair riled agin ’im. ‘You talk to Mister Milly,’ I says. ‘Don’t you come a-blamin’ me for wot ’e done!’ But d’you think ’e’d let me alone? Nay! Kept on at it, ’e did. “No shape more terrible than you, ’e says. ““‘Tt’s the way I be standin’, I tells ’im, but ’e wouldn’t listen. ‘When I were in Yeomanry,’ I says, ‘you wouldn’t ha’ found a straighter-backed chap in the ’ole county.’ But it weren’t no use talkin’. Proper abusive, ’e were. ‘Monstrous thing,’ ’e called me, an’ ‘dread shape.’ Ay.” The Man with the Hoe paused, and regarded his instrument of toil with disfavor.

“Right poor tool is yon,” he said. “Mister Milly brought it special

AN

INTERVIEW

WITH

THE

MAN

WITH

THE

HOE

707

with ‘im. I reckon it must be a French ’oe. ‘Wot’s this2’ I Says to “im. ‘That?’ ’e says. “Why, that’s a ’oe. Wot do you think it is—a shovel?’ ‘It might be an’ all,’ says I. But it were cruel short in the ’andle for leanin’ on.” We asked; “And what became of the American gentleman—the poet?” “Well, arter standin’ an’ starin’ at I as though I were a show at a tide-fair, ’e says, shakin’ ’is ’ead, ‘’Ow will you ever straighten up

this shape?’ ‘Oil o’ wintergreen "ll do it,’ I says. ‘That'll fix ’un proper.

“Tis only a touch o’ the lumbago,’ I says; ‘it’ll soon straighten out.’ But I could see as ow ’e weren’t satisfied.” “On the whole,” we said, “you preferred the Frenchman to the American?” The man smiled a sly smile. “Mister Milly? Well, ’e were only man as ever knowingly paid I for just leanin’ on a ’oe.”

Pets in the Press

“ie ERIC NICOL

WueEn I MEET pos, cats, canaries, turtles and other pets in real life I’m never sure what they’re going to do next. But when I meet them in the newspaper I know right away what they’re up to. In fact they’re beginning to get on my nerves.

Just once, I'd like to read a news story that goes something like this:

Zwicky, B.C., April 30 (VP)—Two weeks ago Harold Lagersnifter piled his bulldog, Winston, into the car and drove 4oo miles to a friend’s cottage at the seaside. The next day Winston disappeared and after a long search Lagersnifter sadly resigned himself to the loss of his pet. Two weeks later, his vacation over, Lagersnifter drove the 400 miles back home, and what do you suppose was waiting for him on his porch? You

guessed it: 14 quarts of milk.

Another pet story that makes burning newspapers such a pleasure is the one about the pet that saves umpteen people from certain death in a fiery inferno by turning in the alarm. Usually the hero is a small mongrel dog, but cats occasionally make the grade. None of them, to my knowledge, has ever run to the closest fire-alarm box and broken the glass, or dialed the right number on the telephone. Instead, trapped in a burning building, they bark, meow, or splash about (goldfish) until somebody wakes up, opens a door and trips over them in the rush to the street. For this they get photographed,

interviewed, and fussed over. Lord knows what else they might have been expected to do in the middle of a fire. Toast marshmallows, maybe. Or could we hope for an account like this: Zparaz, Man., July 2 (MP)—First to detect the smoke and flame filling the corridors

of the Moose

Hotel last night was

a two-year-old

Irish

PETS

IN THE

PRESS

709

dachshund, O’Shultz, who quickly jumped out of the icebox, trotted silently down the back stairs, let himself out through a broken cellar window and ran to the nearest hydrant. Fifty-six people burned to death.

It also does nothing for my morale to read about pets inheriting from wealthy eccentrics more money than I'll ever see. I don’t think

this kind of story is good for pets in general. (The papers and magazines admit that more and more animals are learning to read and understand the news as well as people can—and that I believe.) Once pets get the idea that devotion may pay off in Tel & Tel

and villas on the Riviera, we’re done for. A certain type of spaniel is barely tolerable as it is without giving him ulterior motives for lollygagging around. And some of the larger pets may be tempted to accelerate the departure of the benefactor, normal life spans being what they are. (Evn a lovebird could get pretty good results by fluttering just out of reach on the window ledge of a tenth-story apartment.) I therefore plump for more stories like this: Zepuyr, Texas, Aug. 15 (DP)—The will of Mrs. Stuyvesant S. Slud, widow of multimillionaire Slud, was probated today before an excited

gathering of family lawyers. Mrs. Slud, who for the past 50 years has resolutely shut out the world from her huge house, preferring to live alone with only her parrot, Eustace, to keep her company, made Eustace her only heir by leaving him two crackers and a note saying, “Talk your way out of that, you little b——!” The rest of the Slud fortune went to

pay taxes.

Equally refreshing, for me at least, would be the mercy killing of the story of eternal devotion, which could be replaced with something like this: ZiLWAuKEE, Mich., Nov. 11 (HP)—For two long months now fisherman Ole Swenson’s small, spotted dog (name of Mutt) has been sitting on the end of the local wharf, staring out to sea. Observers who feed Mutt regularly say he never leaves his vigil, though his appetite remains excellent. Questioned at his shack a few feet from the wharf, where he has been during the entire period of Mutt’s watch, Swenson said: “Don’t ask me. He lives his life and I live mine.”

To the men in the rotogravure department I recommend the following for oblivion: monkeys wearing funny hats, the zoo’s annual springtime proof of the fertility of the hippopotamus in spite of everything (including The Bomb), the strange phenomenon of cats

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Eric Nicol

nursing little rats (or rats nursing little cats), and people covered with bees for some silly reason or other.

I’m sorry if my attitude sounds negative. Out of print I like pets fine, you understand, even when they don’t care for me. But I’m only human, and I resent having somebody’s pooch thrown up in my face as braver, wittier and more loyal than I am. If he’s so smart, let him pay the subscription for my daily paper while I run down and bite the city editor in the leg. We'll settle this thing, once and for all.

But of Course It Sells More Copies if It's Banned in Boston

“te JOHN O'REILLY Ir sEEMS TO ME that a subject too many modern-day novelists use to bring in those publishers’ checks Is Sex. And while women in real life spend their time running to masseurs

and people who own gymnasiums and to other professional reducers,, Women in these books spend their time running to, or from, seducers. And while men in real life spend their time thinking about salting away a lot of dough so that in their old age they'll have plenty of butter and eggs, Men in these books spend their time panting and thinking about legs. Now, [ think there’s nothing like sex or sexual contemplation, But if people in real life acted the way people in these books act, where would we house all the added population?

Mrs. Murphy on Honesty “= BARRY PAIN Ir you GoEs our to work at houses, same as I does, and you happens to have a basket, you burn it. Leastwise, leave it at home. For if you takes it to the place where you're working you're making trouble for yourself. A charwoman what carries a basket ain’t popular, and only attracts attention. I remember what happened when I were a deal younger nor what I am now. I was but fifty-four then, and sent for sudden to a job at The Sycamores, where I’d never been afore. I takes my basket and off I goes. I does my work, and were just starting back when up sails her ladyship with her chin stuck out. She were titled, though not born to it, nor looking it neither. “I wish to see what you've got in your basket,” says she. So I took and showed her what I’d got. It were my apron, and the key of my door, and my teeth, what I only wears for meals, waste not being a fault of mine. “Which of these is yours?” says I. ‘Don’t address me in that way,” says her majesty. “I merely wished to know. I have had things taken out of my house before by dishonest charwomen.” “And I hope you may again,” I says. “Goodbye, ducky. Take care of yourself.” And with that I leaves her. No, I hadn’t got nothing of hers in my basket. And all I’d got in the pocket under my skirt was a bit of bacon as were too cornerwise for the dining-room rashers, a few potatoes, half a bar of soap, and a box of matches. And most of that had been give me by the cook. I never took no basket with me after that, not when I were going out to work. It puts ideas into the lady’s head, and leads to unpleas-

antness. I’ve had to take the rough with the smooth all my life; but suspiciousness is just one of them things as I can’t stick. Never could. No honest woman could. Besides, if the pocket under your skirt’s

large enough, you don’t need no basket. Yes, I’m honest according to my views. And if the lady ain’t got

MRS.

MURPHY

ON

HONESTY

TAS

a same views, then that’s her misfortune. Just look into it for yourself. Suppose I was to find a diamond tarara when I were doing out the scullery—I ain’t never found none yet, but you never knows your luck—what should I do? I should up and take that tarara to her

ladyship at once. Shouldn’t even stop to wipe my hands and adjust my toilette. There you are. Property worth hundreds, and give back

instantaneous

by a poor woman

out

for two-and-a-kick

and

her

dinner. Pve thought that out, and it’s right every way. It puts your character right for all time, and the meanest lady as ever stepped couldn’t shed less than a sovereign for a tarara come back. And what else are

you to do? A nice‘old sight I should look, round at my uncle’s, and asking for fifty on a diamond tarara. Six months with usual bonus is about what I should get. Not for me, thank you. I comes of a family what has kept theirselves respectable. But when the cook gives you a trifle, that’s a different thing al-

together. It’s my duty to do what the cook says, and act respectful. If she says: “Hand me this here, Mrs. Murphy,” then I hands it. If she says: “Reach me that there,” then I reaches. And if she trims a chop off of the end of the loin afore she puts it in, and says I can fry that for my supper, then I borrows a bit of paper to wrap it in. And I’m right again, and I knows it. It’s the lady herself as has given me that chop, acting through the cook, which is her agent. She mayn’t know it, and maybe she wouldn’t like it if she did, but there it is just the same. That’s the law of this land, and I ain’t making no mistake about it, for I got it from a solicitor’s clerk what

lodged with us in brighter days. And a fine upstanding gentleman he was—doing time now, poor chap. There’s a motto as should be chalked up in letters of gold over the bed of every charwoman. And the words of it is, “Keep in with the cook.” If she speaks of her rich relatives with the motor car, keep your temper and listen for all the world as if you believed it. When she tells you what they said about her looks when she were a girl, tell her they might say the same today, and not be so far out. When she starts on the men what she might have married, but wouldn't, don’t let yourself go. And if she shows you her new hat, break out into a cold sweat over the marvel of it at the price. Kind words is a good investment, as the hymn says. And so you'll think next morning when you warms up them cold sausages for your breakfast. I’m not saying as it was the cook as give me that bit of soap and box of matches. There’s many a woman as will leave soap in the wa-

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Barry Pain

ter to waste. That’s a thing I never did in my life. And what I saves

I has a right to half a bar of now and again. As for the matches, matches are cheap enough. It would be a measly sort of lady as

would make a song over a box of matches. I acts on principle, and [I has what matches I requires, and I ain’t bought a box for the last eighteen years, and I ain’t going to begin now. If no lady never comes across no worse sort nor what I am, then she’s lucky.

But I do remember one time when I were suspected wrongful, and never spoke back, nor nothing. And why? Because I’m one as can make allowances where reasonable. For one thing, the party in question were a young couple, hardly old enough to blow their own noses, and had just started housekeeping. And then again, I'd been recommended to them by the parson’s wife, and we all knows what that is. Mostly the parson’s wife recommends them as has been brought to see the error of it, and is wishful to make a fresh start. All right as far as it goes. She’s got to back her husband up in his business, same as any other woman. Still, anybody taking anybody on what I calls a rectory character, so to speak, naturally counts the spoons and tries the cupboard where the decanters is kept to see if it’s really locked. You've got to look after yourself in this world. And though nothing of the kind in my case, how was that young couple to know? The first time they sent for me was when the housemaid were upset internal, which was put down to the new paint. That is a thing as

may happen, a niece of my own being one as the smell of new paint is death to, as she’s proved more than once. However, cook asked me to take a cup of tea up to that suffering housemaid, so I see the girl myself, and what was the matter with her were not paint. Oh, no! And it didn’t take me two minutes to find out what her trouble really was. I were night, too. A week later she was sent out on the quick jump, with her box to follow per C.P., and they found the actual whisky bottles. But that were nothing to do with me at the time. I were there to do her work, and start in on the breakfast room, which I did. Soon as I come to the mantel shelf I see a silver shilling lying there. Now them as is used to doing out rooms knows when a thing has been put there, and when it’s been left there accidental. Ask me the difference, and there I confess you has me, for I couldn’t put it in words. All the same, I won’t never make a mistake about it. That shilling had been put deliberate, as I’d have swore to before a magistrate. So I ups with

MRS.

MURPHY

ON

HONESTY

715

it and turns it over, and it were no surprise to me to find a small cross scratched left-hand on the lion. To think of it—them two poor young Canterbury lambs trying to lay the marked-money trap for me as would be sixty-seven next

quarter day! Simply look at it. Their cook ordered what she liked

from the tradesmen, and no weights was never checked. Their housemaid was making life one long beano. Smoking fags in the shed were the gardener’s principal work. They was done all round, them turtledoves was. They could never have caught nobody at nothing. And there they was playing at being the C.I.D. along of me. Well, you couldn’t be angry with them—it were too heartbreaking. Made me smile, I can tell you. So to carry the fun on, I put that shilling under a bronze figure of Venus, or Gladstone, or some such person. Then I finishes off there, and hops down to the kitchen for my elevenses. I don’t want to drink better beer nor what they kept in that house. Presently orders was brought me to go up to the breakfast room, which was what I had expected. There they both was, a nice-looking

couple, though nervous. She were pretending to read the paper, and not looking a bit like it. He’d been put up to do the talking, and were standing back to the fire and heartily ashamed of himself, which was to his credit. So I opens the ball by dropping my curtsy, which is old-fashioned but earns money. “I say, Mrs. Murphy,” says he. “TI left a shilling on the mantelpiece here this morning, and it seems to have gone. Do you know anything about it?” “Yes, sir,” I says. “It’s still there. I slipped it under that little small bronze statue by your elbow, sir, out of sight, sir, and was meaning to have mentioned it. For it didn’t hardly look safe with the painter’s men coming and going. Of course, they may all be as respectable as the day, but sudden temptation is what finds out the sore point in the armor. And I’m sure I hope I haven’t done wrong, sir.” Then she up and spoke, and very pleased with me she were. She said I were a most honest, intelligent and careful woman. He said he only wished everybody who worked for him had got my common sense. Then they gave me the shilling, and said I deserved it. Later in the day she brings out a pair of very handsome, shadowy vases. They’d been given them as a wedding present, but seemingly was not to their taste, and she asked me if I could do with them. So I thanked her warmly, and said they’d make my little home look very bright and gay. And so I dare say they would, if I hadn’t sold them

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Barry Pain

that night for half a crown and a pie dish, and believe now I ought to have got more.

And that were not all. Just as I were leaving they were turning out a nice bit of linoleum, as they’d bought, and then not fancied, and I could have it if I liked. So I did. What with them things, and a

few trifles as cook had said I could take, I could hardly carry the stuff home. I still works for that couple, but it ain’t the little gold mine here below what it used to be. It’s cocoa at eleven now, and all the extra I’ve had this last twice has been a pair of his old pajamas. It’s a wonderful thing how much a girl picks up in a few months after she’s become a married woman. Now, don’t what I’ve told you go to show that the old proverb is right which says honesty is the best policy? Use it with discretion, same as I have done, and don’t make too much of a hobby of it, and you won’t go far wrong.

Re-enter Margot Asquith

“t= DOROTHY PARKER “Dappy, what’s an optimist?” said Pat to Mike while they were walking down the street together one day. “One who thought that Margot Asquith wasn’t going to write any more,” replied the absent-minded professor, as he wound up the cat and put the clock out. That gifted entertainer, the Countess of Oxford and Asquith, au-

thor of The Autobiography

of Margot Asquith

(four volumes,

neatly boxed, suitable for throwing purposes), reverts to tripe in a

new book deftly entitled Lay Sermons. It is a little dandy if I have ever seen one, and I certainly have. I think it must be pleasanter to be Margot Asquith than to be any other living human being; and this is no matter of snap judgment on my part, for I have given long and envious thought to the desirabil-

ity of being Charles A. Levine. But the lady seems to have even more self-assurance than has the argumentative birdman. Her perfect confidence in herself is a thing to which monuments should be erected; hers is a poise that ought to be on display in the British Museum. The affair between Margot Asquith and Margot Asquith will live on as one of the prettiest love stories in all literature. In this book of essays, which has all the depth and glitter of a worn dime, the countess walks right up to such subjects as Health, Human Nature, Fame, Character, Marriage, Politics, and Opportunities. A rather large order, you might say, but it leaves the lady with unturned hair. Successively, she knocks down and drags out each

topic. And there is something vastly stirring in the way in which, no matter where she takes off from, she brings the discourse back to Margot Asquith. Such singleness of purpose is met but infrequently. When she does get around to less personal matters, it turns out that her conclusions are soothingly far from startling. A compilation of her sentiments, suitably engraved upon a nice, big calendar, would make an ideal Christmas gift for your pastor, your dentist, or

Junior’s music teacher. Here, for instance, are a few ingots lifted from her golden treasury: “The artistic temperament has been known to land people in every kind of dilemma.” . . . “Pleasure

Dorothy Parker

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will always make a stronger appeal than Wisdom.” . . . “It is only

the fine natures that profit by Experience.” . . . “Tt is better to be a pioneer than a passenger, and best of all to try and create.” . . “Tt

is not only what you See but what you Feel that kindles appreciation

and gives life to Beauty.” . . . “Quite apart from the question of sex, some of the greatest rascals have been loved.” 4 Sr