Evening Star Newspaper, August 17, 1930, Page 91

THE SUN_D_AY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, AUGUST 17, 1930. 19 AND SO THEY SAW HER ANKLE! She Was a Lovely, Modest Girl, but Her Skirt Slipped Up Above Her Ankle! Tragedy! Today Noflzing Like That Could Occur, for the Skirt Has Been on the Up and Up, With Minor Variations, for So Long That This Man Is Worried About - What Might Happen Next. By Homer Croy, REMEMBER as if it were yesterday the first time I ever saw a girl’s ankle. It was a lovely, peaceful Sunday aft- ernocon, such as come in the Middle ‘West during the glorious month of June. It was the hour of the meeting of the Young People’s Society at the church. By ome and twos the young people were arriving to attend the meeting. I arrived early and was standing on the stone steps which led up to the side door of the church, which, on these occn~ sions, was used instead of the front or main door of the church. At this moment a surrey drove up, with a nice straight whip in the whip-socket and little tassels hanging down from the canopy top. A charming vision descended from the surrey— Edna Jones herself—a lovely, modest girl. As she came up the stone steps of the church she spoke to us young men who were waiting there a few moments before going into the meeting, and we lifted our hats gallantly. It was while she was speaking to us that the unfortunate accident occurred. Her attention was engaged as she spoke to us and inadvertently she lifted her skirt a trifie higher than was needed for her foot to attain the next step, and we saw her ankle. ‘There it was in plain view, a second, or pos- sibly two seconds, before it disappeared. No one spoke, not a word was uttered. THE tragedy of it was that the girl suspected nothing of what had taken place. My heart bled for hef. If she had beén a hussy and had wanted to show her ankle it would have been a different matter. But instead of that she was a pure, sweet, innocent girl. Later, after the young people’s meeting was over, we saw her coming out, and again she spoke to us sweetly and innocently, never sus- pecting what we men had seen. ‘That, I say, was the first time I ever saw & lady’s ankle. Years went by before anything like this hap- pened again, and then suddenly out of a blue sky something worse took place. Even now, after all these years, a shudder passes over me when I think of it. It was also of an afternoon, but fortunately it was not Sunday. It was the custom of the women of Junction City to come downtown of an afternoon, do their shopping and then go to the confectionery and have a dish of ice cream. On the afternoon I speak of I chanced to pause in front of our Bon Ton Ice Cream Parlor and was chatting with two friends when an automobile drove up and, after considerable effort, stopped. Spit-spit! it said, and then paused, and the woman who was driving it started to get out. But just as her foot was reaching for the ground the car suddenly gave Orawn for The Star's Sunday Magazine F. Btro'-hmalln.’ e - \‘ There it was in plain view, a second, or po ssibly two seconds, before ut disappeared! was perfectly innocent in every done—we had seen all the calf! it was evident that nothing th the car she put her foot the rest of the way to the ground and stood on it. In the excitement she had not noticed what had happened and went into the Bon Ton suspecting nothing of what we men had seen. Usually men are hard and merciless where a pretty woman is concerned, but this was too much. We hardly spoke to each other and Slunk off down the street ashamed of ourselves that we had not had the decency to avert our eyes. But I must say in our favor that never once Harbor Police Safeguard Lives. Continued from Seventh Page it happen time and again. But that's one - worry we don’t have any more. Somehow they don’t bring the jug along nowadays when they go fishing—it costs too much today and the stuff they get just don’t mix with boating.” Bootlegging is no problem at all to what the old bar room days used to be in Georgetown, hell tell you. On Saturday nights a rough- neck element used to come in from Virginia and South Washington and gangs used to congregate on the river front, causing all man- ner of trouble. “There isn’t any more whole- sale drinking like that,” he says. Birkight i& now 63, yet he still covers his beat daily, chugging up the river in his power boat under Chain Bridge and some times almost up to Little Falls when the water's high, watch- ing both banks along his familiar course with & trained and vigilant eye, as active and eager as he ever was. Some times he walks the banks of the canal for miles. Rain or shine, you'll find him on duty somewhere along the Upper Potomac. Almost every spot of the way holds some memory for him, and he’]l relate the ex- perience with keen interest. He doesn't talk of retiring. Like his pal, Will Reynolds, he finds the lure of the river too strong. More than a half century ago, when he and Will played pirates on the banks, the Potomac cast a spell over them and they can't shake. it off. IN Birkight you find the real spirit of the harbor police. Faithful to duty, year in and year ous; vigilant, always on deck; ready for whatever comes. ‘Theirs is a big job. The order and safety of the city’s harbor and of the Potomac, which adds to the pleasure and beauty of Washington in so many ways, is in their keeping. Yet they do their work so smoothly and so well that they are easily overlooked by those who work or seek recreation on the river. But let some emergency arise, let trouble break out somewhere along the waterfront, let an accident occur, and it is then that the debt Washington owes its harbor police becomes apparent. Met Drastic Treatment. EVERAL pink boll worms which made their way all the distance from India to th2 United Sgates met a quick and drastic death almost upon their arrival. 'This may not seem like such an important announcement, but it was only a few of the Japanese green beetles which made their way into the United States in a shipment of iris root which brought about one of the most difficult insect problems the agricultural experts of the country have had to deal with, The pink boll worms, destructive enemy of cotton, were sent by an agricultural expert to another in this country accidentally, when they made their way into a shipment of Indian cot- ton seed. The container in which the seed was shipped became crushed en route, and upon its arrival and the discovery of the worms the seed went into the fire at once. later did we refer to i among ourselves by look, word or deed. So far as we were con- cerned the little tragedy had never occurred— for, after all, we were not base IT would not have been so been & married woman, or instead of that she was a young lady of, 22 or 23, and was from one of most respected families in our had seen her calf, and when she us at a party or danced with us that thought would always be uppermost in our minds. It could never be blotted. out—and she would never know anything about it. That was the thing, I think, that was the most poignant of all—the fact that she did not know, so that she could not drop her eyes before us. She continues to live on in our little town, never once suspecting the silent tragedy that had taken place that afternoon in front of our leading ice cream store, and unless this chances to fall beneath her eyes she will never know. I remember as if it were yesterday the first time I saw a knee. It was in a club smoking car on a train. I had come from the dining car into the club car, which was about half filled with men smoking and reading and chatting. In the car was a rather pretty woman, reading. Evie dently she was so occupied with her reading that she did not suspect what had happened. In some way that I cannot explain her dress had become drawn up slightly and her knee was there to be seen by those hardened men. My heart bled for her, but X did not feel that I could tap her on the shoulder or signal her in any way, and so I crept out like a coward and left her to her shame. That was several years ago and now a mere knee attracts no more attention than a fly lazily buzzing in the sunshine. The skirt which I have been watching for s0 many years has been steadily creeping up- ward, inch by inch—I take no account of minor sctbacks such as the present ane, for they never amount to much—as relentless as the ice creeping down from the North during the glacial age. Where the skirt is going to stop in its creep- ing upward I don’t know—I can only shut my eyes and pray. And it's getting 80 I can’t keep my eyes shut very long either. bad if a