Evening Star Newspaper, May 21, 1922, Page 63

‘Cousin Ethelind Elizalbefh. V;teran of Many Cults, Possessor of Oriental Ward- . robe and Bizarre Adornments, Leads Way in Tour of Almosf Forgotten Byways ‘and Alleys—Giving Password at the Wicket—Lost Aura Puts Bohemian Feast on Commercial Plane—Dreamy-Eyed One Discourses on the Pu_rple Inner Self. Enthusiasts Gasp for Breath While Speaker Rakes Modern Civilization. doctor. He was baffled in his diag-|ern \cousin while she was in our nosis until we had recited the tale of midst. Coward that we-are, we did the morning’s happening, when he, | not go to the office, nor did we return cruel wretch that he is, calloused by | to the Ivy-clad place we call home. baving cut up many people, stated|Instead, we went down to Halns that it would be a wonderful thing|Point and spent the day wondering for us to tote the high priestess why the fishes were so silly as to around Washington'in search of Bo- |grab the hooks that the fishermen ‘hemia. cast into the river. It's an odd thing how some doctors e = 2 can be so cruel and prescribe such VW/E @enerally dine at 6:30; but it drastic_treatment, but here it was. S islnoar 72 0%lock Betore we Friend “wite, modest; retiring and | ,;; yeq ¢ the place upon which we home loving, would not know Bohe-| .o "o v e “anare was & look in mia if she met it coming down 14th |y oy oves that indicated E. E. had] Strsst st FAs MD 0 be nmie Do | peen broadcasting. ever since her ar- D‘;momr b ‘:'hnd Tk ‘:":: rival in the morning. The furniture had been rearranged so as to give the proper vibrations, according to E E., and she had likewise proposed 2 new color scheme s0 a8 to facilitate the etheric convolutions. Just what these ‘e T don't know, and E. E. has been explaining patiently to me for the past week. Dinner, which was formerly a de- light, became a series of oddities. With each course 2 new thought was taken' in order that there might be no soul resistance, because if re ance occurred it interfered with the spiritual development. Somehow we managed to finish the meal, and from then. until bedtime E. E. discoursed upon the manner in which mankind— and by that she meant womankind primarily—was to occupy a higher and purer plane. Not once during the evening did we hold our favored pipe between our teeth, for nicotine, according to B. E., compelled tortuous complexeseand de- stroyed the bleaching of the Inner rays. You never will know how cruel a loving wife and helpmate can be un- til you have crossed her, and 1 never before imagined that sweet, gentle little Mary could ever be Nerolike Just simply because I had told her we couldn’t afford to get that new plati- num wrist watch she wanted last month. With a gleam in her eye, she | suggested just before we retired that it would be perfectly splendid for me t Coustn Ethelind Elizabeth ‘Washington’s Bohemia. Ye gods and little Sshes! That night my dreams were worse than 'those of the man who combines crabs, ice | introduction to several members of wates Tollowed the same lines. She proceeded to give me the list of ad- dresses, and at the same time con- fided to Mary that I would be a far different man after I had associated with real Bohemid. g The addresses she gave me were, in the main, of places and streets, by- ‘ways and alleys totally unknown, but that morning I journeyed to the city engineer's office and with the kind assistarice of one of the attaches managed to locate all but one of the places. Throughout the day I sat in my office steeling myself for the or- BY JAMES A BUCHANAN. OUSIN Ethelind .. Elisabeth , . hails from ‘Capetown Cross- " roads, a thriving metropolls in the.middle west. It is a burg where_there are more cuits and higher-plane organisations te the square vard thap in any. other place in the world: a municipality that is chack full jof indiyiduals. who are continually seeking after. the new and unusual; & town .that has’ given bifth to more societies, .clubs, soclations, étc.. than all the national headquarters of the different .orders ©f the world. stz 'Tis a place .where the originatoer of some new-fangled “idea or . thought can, without the ~slightest trouble. secure a charter list of 'a hundred or more members. ' He needs but some new and queer, idea in order tq secure a two-foot hold in this bustling little weommunity. Neighbors .of adjbining towns have long since. dubbed . this village “Nut-town.” . % * Ok E ¥ 3 THE prime mover of all these 'mod- ern-thought ~and . up-to-thé-min- ute societies is- Cousin Ethell Elizabeth, who has suffered _ev thing, from ingrowing complexes ,to meurotic reflexes. Shé 'has Deen identified with so many differént cults that her -wardrgbe resembles that of a high priestess of the Drulds or one :of the innérmost témple worshipers in findia. In” fact, Hef brother John has computed that'if her flowing white gowns and, offier bizarre adornments were patched together they . would make & tent} larger than that emplg¥ed by the big circus that comes 6 tgwn ann@lly, and were her amulels. sn Irnh bands and other .pictufesque {f not beautiful perdonal ornamentations]. grouped togethér, it would look like the complete demolifion. of“a.popular though inexpensive btand- of auto- “mobile: While many of.these trinkets were orffinally purchased s having come from the tofmnb of the Pharaohs and other similzr places,-a’ micros copic examination would, no. doubt. disclose that théy wepe” e in. Passalc, N. J., or fabricatéd by some of the cunning aftisans who can turn out an old master- at twenty-four Jours’ notice! + The sandals that Cousin Ethelind Elizabeth owrs would equip an .army preparing to march across the desert of Sahara, ghile the funny folderols that she places atop her hennaed treéses occupy several rooms.in the family mansion. ' o . So much, in part, for a descriptiqn of the fair ome who wired s & week ago that she was coming on to Wash- ington in order that alie might he an rapport with the wmocida-heart throb, which, according to the latest viston, had moved to .thé capfial of: the nation. JEARLY Tuesday mornisi-we crank- / ed up the family flivver and in spits of bewildering traffic regula- tions managed tor reaéh ‘the Union station without demagp—that is. phys- fcal damage—the mentsl damage be- ing caused by the .afore-mentioned trafic regulations, which are as in- gelligible to the averdge motorist as Banskrit is to Babe Ruth.. Parking our; féverish steed, fever- sh because we had neglected to put water.in the leaking radiator, we dis- embarked three-blocks from our gdes- tination and set forth for the station. We proceeded with fear and trepir @ation, because we had not seen Cou- ain Ethelind Elizp¥eth for about eight years. In otWer words, we bad not cast our loyfng eyes upon her smiling tountenance since she first became ad- dlicted to the cult Niabit. We were not sfraid, however, that we would miss before ‘our blood relative came like Lochinvar from out of the west. Shie was: attiréd in a hat that re- minded ore of Robin Hood in his. palmy days. Her Titlan (by bottle) hair was the latest bob. Perched upon® Nef dainty noe—her brother calls it pug—was a pair of rubbe: tiréd bifocals, almost hiding the éye- brows that once had been plucked. but were now examples of the black.stick art.. A greenish purple”tinge covered her cheeks. - A <cupid’s Bow made’ by a “lip “stick smiled .to "us.a welcome. between ‘& hooch- dream and an ori- ental creation, and the length of her sRirt Indicated one of two things— elther that meterial was scarce when #hé “purchased the gown or she de- sired extreme freedom of movement. It would be folly to attempt to de- ibe her-footwear, It was a cross ness, but as we neared the stately edifice Where we have our office We were seized. with a panic, cold per- spiration broke out on our manly brow, a swamp-like chill racked our slender frame, and instead of going to the office we visited the family goose and cerise crocodiles form but a gentle collection of nightmare mix- tures compared with the thoughts that flashed through my brain cells from the hour of midnight until dawn, for I realized full well that I would have to carry cousin around from pillar to post. * k¥ % B OHEMIA, where was it? I knew not. - I dared not ask my friends lest they gccuse me' of trying to kid them. The problem of locating this {Husive something was partly solved by E. M, who announced at break- fast that she had brought letters of deal that was to come, and no duelist who is to meet his adversary on the field of honor at sunrise the next morning could have gone through a greater mental strafe than I did. Night came. Acting under Ethe- myself in a loose costume, donning this form of attire because it per- mitted free movement of the body, which, according to her, was essen- tial in the full enjoyment of things of & higher naturs, her theory being tight clothing acted upon the nerve centers as dépressants. We were headed for a place that E. E. called the Yellow Frog Studio. It was the rendezvous of a number of alleged artists and writers, Wwho gathered there mightly in order to exchange ideas and thoughts that in- timately concerned their respective fields of endeavor. It was located down a dark alley in a rather fash- fonable section of the city. * ¥ ¥ % I response to Ethelind's rap on the door, a little wicket was opened. Ethelind Elizabeth uttered, meaning- less to me, phrases that were evi- dently the password, and the door swung open. The structure had ap- parently at one time been used as a stable and carriage house. As we stood just inside the éoor E..E. an- nounced herself, giving emphasis to the title that she possessed by reason of having belonged to numerous or- ganizations of which she was a fully accredited member. With an apologetic, it seemed to me, manner she presented me to the assembled throng, but before de- L a8 o e “SHARING THE LAST CRUSY between £-Lotis XIV and an Indian OR GIVING THE LAST CENTIME” mocecasin. 2% It was’ Imposiible: to -locate her aura. ' She had one, because she had upon numerdus oécasions. written us about it in, detail, and, not desiring to appear ignorant .we cast no| searching glances. - * ¥ k¥ HE Queen of Sheba, with all her| ~retinue, would not have attracted sny more attention than we did when Was & most interesting talker and &) the St. Lawrence river, her favorite woman of wide infermation. There |fishing ground. was nothing of the plunger about| With all her business shrewdne: her at all. It is true that she bought|and the manvsideness of her fn- when the outlook looked blackest for | terests, Mrs. Wyckoff-Bent seems to the securities she purchased and she|{have been sufficiently feminine to profited immensely by the ultimate|be inconsistent. Until about a year recoveries. She bought only sound|before she died she réfused to re- securities and she was fortunate in|linquish her predudice against au- having ample funds with which t0|tomobiles. She preferred her horse finance her purchasges, and buggy, and in the Bronx, where Albert Wyckoft died in 1898, & feW | she lived for forty-five years, she years after he had inherited the en-|was s familiar figure in an old- tire Wyckoft estate, which he willed | fgshioned outfit, while her less pros- to his widow. Two years later Mrs.| perous neighbors were shooting Wyckoft married Thomas C.” Bent,|ground in motor cars. Then, when known as one of the leading cornet|she finally got a car, she bought the players of the country. It was the|best she ‘could find. second marriage for both of them. In ‘What most surprised her business 1894 Mr. Bent had eloped with Isabel { acquaintances was to learn that this Nixon, the beautiful daughter of the [ multi-millionairess had neglected “to Rev. George Nixon, pastor of Tre-|make a will later than one that was| mont Presbyterian Church. Their|executed in 1873, In which she left|- son, Sidney Bent, now twenty-siX,|most of her estats to her then hu served with the 115th Regiment in|band, Albert Wyckof. Preparations the war. The first Mrs. Bent died in|are being made to distribute the 1900, and Mr. Bent was living ®ith|property according to law. In this his father-in-law, the Rev. Dr. Nixon, | connection interest attaches to an old whose home was directly across the | document, dated 1873, in which the street from Mrs. Wychoff's home, onf | then Mrs. Wyckoff signed a formsal ‘Washington avenue. ed of adoption of a young half- Mrs. Wyckoft w: then fifty-six lfll!r, now Mrs. Josephine Pease of and Mr, Bent was thirty-three. Again | Wilmette, IiL. her friends advised her not to take Her real estate holdings include the contemplated plunge. They|the property from No. 199 to 207 6th threshed over. the old question|avenue, No. 210 to 220 6th avenue, whether a couple should marry wRen | No. 112 West 14th street, from No. the woman is many years the senior. | 1769 to 1776 Washington avenue, the Meanwhile the two were seen very|Bronx, and from No. 4054 to 4 often--together at the opera, the|Park svenue, inclusive. She also theater and the races. Horses had|owned her summer home at City for yéars been among Mrs. Wyckofr's | sland. pet hobbies and she frequently bet on the races. Mr. Nixon, the father- In-law, approved of the marriage, and it was he who married the coup in the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel and saw them off on a wedding trip fo Europ that thex. might come in'bhandy some|,;q tnis started her on & ten-share @ay, smile contentedly and chanse |y, | She bought her stocks outright the. subject. . Perhaps she would insfgng kept them until théy showed a vite them to gather up some. lunch | e0ria) proat, ana thokle and go fshing. Her greatest Wall strest successes PR were. in two ventures, one in United ; States Steel, the other in Amalgamat- Mn& Bent, who Was seventy-seven, | ¢d Copper. On each of these specuja. lived with so little, splurge that | tions she is credited with having made few-people had any ‘suspicion of her | half a million dollars. She bought great wealth. She-was regarded by |these stocks in 1907, the year of the her acquaintances as & very active old | reat Northern Pacific panic. United lady-who got & Iot out of life and was | States Steel common had dropped to devoted, to a_small circle of friends, | 8%; Amalgamated Copper had shrunk whereas if she had wished she might | from 135 to 38. Nobody needed to tell have set.herself up & very excep- | Mrs. Wyckoff that the prices in ‘Wall tiongl woman who played a hazardous | street reflected the state of the mar- game and won, ket rather than the intrinsic value of She had none of the frumpy appear- | the securities. She knew that when ance of the.old-time feminine finan-|money Is plentiful stocks soar, when cier. . Har clothes were .good and |money is scarce they decline, and that stylish, and because in recent years|when there was almost no .money she believed in reaping-her harvest |they practically lost their market by getting & good time out of value. - money she found-herself equally at She had advisers—many of them. home i sOBT® quiet hotel in Paris or|They advised her not to buy these London or Rome. On.one of her latest | stocks, predicting that the bottom trips_to. Europe this unostentatious | was about to fall out of everything. woman creafed quite o sensation in a | Buying Amalgamated Copper, she was showy gathering when she made a|told, was financial suicide. With ready grand slam at the roulette wheel in|cash in her pocket and a woman's love Monte Carlo. of a bargain in her brain, she disre- " Tha history of ‘her life starts with | garded the precepts of her friendsand 1 'story, and: those who knew | bought whatever Ilooked attractive. ‘% % ¥ % LTHOUGH her life was Alied with \_the sort of romance that Kept the days and years active with vivid interest for this enterprising daugh- ter of a conmservative New England community, ‘a commentary on Ler personality may be found In the fact that, notwithstanding few outside of & small circle knew anything about her, she took great pride in the fact that there wers thousands through- out the colintry who knew Mr. Bent. During the Bt Louis exposition he e .2 reputation - as soloist with Gllmore's Band, and he was the lead- scribing these individuals, a pen plcture of the place is essentiah The partitions, which had once been used to divide the resting place for ! the equine inhabitants had been torn away, leaving one large room. Long tables had been placed around the walls, while the center was covered with white sand. The Uluminstion was secured by means of tallow dips placed in _the necks of bottles or Jeast powder cans partly filled with earth. At the far end of. the room * * X % TBROUGEOUT the years of her life _with Mr. Bent the woman flnan- cier was a rather constant traveler. They would spend their summers in the west or in Europe, and the win- ters were usually spent at one of the’ Florida resorts. Besides their home in tlr i mer home'at City' ‘Wyokoft-Bent very fond of so- 2 the Old Guard Band in Ni v;l;;. wolblst with 1unes Band wnd| was a translucent replica of a frog of clety, they frequently had house parties there. Their dinners wers in_vaudevilie from coast to comst. yellow hue. Just ‘why this group of R0 tamous on’ account of the excellent | that i any one fn.the family should | and unnatural creature was a myste- cream and cherry ple. Purple pachy- | the Bohémian set, people whose souls Mrs. Wyckoff-Bent Also Bet on the Races—Married Famous Y oung Corne:ist. EHIND - recent mews ftem|Actérised her business judgment, the B e e & story’ of unusuai|f her career. She and her husband cerns the Ilife of Mrs. Sarah A.|While mortsages and interest were 000,000. Mrs: Bent's bargain counter * % % % bargains for the most part that had|ga,q of living and with the surplus she and whenever her friends tried to tell| wir her means. She never believed range vision on the future, remdrk | po ooyl spare went to Wall street, T treet purchasers derms, magenta monkeys, mauve mon- | were attuned, mortals whose thought that emapated from the sur.|YOURE Mra. Wyckoff could not see lny‘ | romance and achievement foinded on}lived for five years in two rooma,l Wyckofr-Bent of the Brofx, who' disd | Pa1d: The property was freed of in- was Wall_streét. There she bought MRS . Wyckoft put some of her been discarded by others. She re-|pegan to dgbble in the stock market. | her she was wasting her momey On iy mortgaging property to get mon!yl “If Rockefeller can afford to biy to Borrow money had been put 2 5 : Made. Million Her Own Stock Ti ade . vilions on rier vuwn oC 1ps. \ ~ BY SARAH MACDOUGALL. the telescopic yision that later char- rogate's court in New York|Pense in putting on style at that stage & wrdman’s 1oV of ins. It con-|Practicing the most rigid economy last October, leaving an estate of $3,- | UmPrance. remnants ‘that looked' good ¢o her, spare money Into a better stand- lied entigely on her own judgment,|p.. ventures were small, consistent uselses purchases she would fix 2 1008 | 45 gpeculate with., Only money that Amalgamated. Copper I guess I can,” to pay for W{ x appesr- and dowh.-the loHg-platform. The woman finaricier was satisfied | Individuals had adopted this strange quality of the wine for, the Moselle | be in the limelight that.person should | ry' that I, & mere outsider, was nol and the Rhine, the plains of the Mid! I be her husband, ‘ took patns | permitted to know. n alopes of thi poured reguard In response to & rather corpulent, e 5 ::'“' in fact, I might say obese; woman 7Jth_ skimpy hair, we took our seats at one of the tables and waited for the ceremionies of the evening to-be- The first number on the program was & talk on the decadence of “GATHERED THERE NIGHTLY IN ORDER T0 EXCHANGE IDEAS.” lind Elizabeth's orders, I had attired | that cramped muscles - caused by | who afterward turned out to be a New York litéPary hack, gave those assembled to understand that there was only ome school of literature that really amounted to anything, end that was the school he had origi- nated. If an ounce of egotism could be sold for a dollar, this man would have to pay an income tax on a cool million each time he opened his mouth. _Claire de Forde, “a dancer with the soul of Egypt,” according to the fat person who announced the events of the evening, cameforth to the cen- RN ter of the sanded floor, and, in all | justice to Pavlowa, Gertrude Hoff- | man, Mile. Genee, Maud Allen and | the rest of the real dancers, it is per- | fectly honest and fair to say that | the yousg woman danced.in a man- ner far different from those before mentioned. : The next offering was the recitation of a poem in the original by a young Russian, whose matted hair had left its greasy stain upon a ten-sevénty- five serge suit. He, in turn, was | followed by a violinist whose name sounded like the ifgredients of a goulash. He played an original com- position, which brought tears to my eyes; onions do the same thing. * ¥ % ¥ ¥ order to. glve the assembled ~throng time thoroughiy to digest the treats that had been accorded them, an intermission was announced, and it was here that the deadly ser- pent sneaked forth in the shape of waitresses who bore platters upon which were piled sandwiches made of rye bread, chopped raw ham and chopped onions, while others deposit- ed bottles of near-beer by the side of the formidable food products, at the same time presenting a check for a right smart sum. Our impression had always been that Bohemian feasts were largely a community affair, but this one had evidently slipped a cog and entered the commercial plane. It evidently had lost its aura or. the plane had become tilted. In the corner meareft the door sat a trio. The center one was a tall. angular member of the female “AT LAST THE TRAIN ARRIVED AND DOWN THE LONG PLATFORM SWEPT ETHELIND ELIZABETH.” species, bobbed hair, extremely low- cut smoex, shoulder sleeves. Her thin fingers were loaded down with one-half of .1 per cent of jewelry, while the scarab in one of her brace- lets was the cheapest kind of & green stone imitation. Her cigarette holder was at least a foot long, and the decorations thereon gave it the ap- . pearance of a miniature totem pole. Her escorts were just o‘lnlry look- ing he-persons, meither intelligent nor dumb. Each, however, hung hun- grily upon her words, which we afterward learned concerned the higher frailty ‘of man in a_ great crisis. Across from them sat a couple who drank in eagerly the words of a dreamy-eyed foreigner explaining =t great length the advantdges of hav- ing a purple innerself. She was a rather matronly-leoking individual, who was tryink, Oh, #0 hard, to know what it “was all about, while he nervously gulpec at his Adam's apple or polished his pince-nez, muttering. ~ (Coutinued on Eighth Page.)