Evening Star Newspaper, June 9, 1931, Page 10

THE Lucky LAWRENCES By KATHLEEN NORRIS Commn 193, by Mo Amernn Newsoper Al b SYNOPSIS OF PRECEDING INSTALL- She wanted — in fact, all of them M wanted—leisur2 and beauty and luxury in life. Ariel seemed to want it more than the others, somehow, or in some | indefinably different way. She seemed | made for beautiful gardens, beautiful | porches, spacious luxurious rooms. She pined in the atmosphere of poverty, | griminess and dullness. Even as a_child Arlel had not been happy, exactly. She had always been a whimsical, moody child, at one moment deliciously amusing and fantastic, at | another snappy, gloomy and incompre- The luck which had brought the Bos- ton Lawrences to California just at the begmning of the gold rush seemed to have deserted the present generation. From a 4.000-acre ranch their holdings had shrunk fo a small farm nd the old family home in Clippersville, where they were now living. Their father's death in Washington while doing war work had forced the three elder chil- am and little their education. d gone direct from high works. e girls had managed to capitalize their voracious iaterest in literature, Gall, the 23-year- mothe: immediately, walking | hensible. And ‘all these things had department of et her, so that now the rest of . 17-) -old Ariel b 1 hore a_ problem o her sis: | her sometimes. She would be out- oya ey Wwere discussing her interest | rageous, insulting. intolerant, and then T | she would suddenly change and begin INSTALLMENT 1II. | gazs was lifted; Edith's serious look met Gail's consclously. “Secretive.” she offered. “Well! Well, yes,” Gail an-| “Ariel will get married before either | cne of us, because we happen to be| a little 'more particular!” Edith pro- | nounced with her little air of old-| things like that it vaguely irritated Goll. But almost down the Spring street, the younger | “Gall, dear, you don't know what I'd do for your birthday if I could.” “I don't kncw what more you could | do than you do, do, Ede.” | Frocks, B e the family hardly knew how to manage HE ‘younger sister’s quick keen swered on a nervous laugh. maidish _snobbery. When Edith said | sister was sweet again. “Oh, everything, darling! and a car, and the country club—" “If Sam finds that check and Ariel | behaves herself and graduates, and | 't in love with Mrs. Cass,” Gail | I shan't have a worry in the " Edith pleaded, wor- ried herself. | “Oh, I won't!" But Gail sounded anxious, sounded older than her 23 vears as she left Edith at Montalvo boulevard, and turned up the calle to the plaza, where the library stood. | “Heavenly day!” Gail said to Francis ‘Wilcox, the librarian. | “Fine what about those slips?” Mr. | Wilcox answered without punctuation. | “They're here.” | ‘The day had begun. Gail pinned | paper cuffs over her sleeves. The dim big rooms saw various noiseless activi- | ties afoot. | Outside the high cool windows the Spring day was burgeoning over Clip- lle. Motor horns scunded in the haded street, the faces of early patrons were damp with heat. Presently Gall was perched high at the desk, putting slips into paper en- velopes, tossing books into wire crates behind her. Sometimes she looked sharply at a date, compared it to some cther entry. Opposite her on the high white wall hung portraits of Lincoln, Carnegie and Patterson Lawrence. ~ Gail's father had been Clippersville's one|to laugh and cry together helplossly, literary light so far and Clippersville | and perhaps would be sick and have to honored him. Patterson, only son of | be put to bed. And when loving, re- lucky Philip Lawrence. | proachful Edith and loving, unre- Every day some woman said admir- | proachful Gail were sponging off her ingly to Gail, “Do you Lawrences read | pitifully pale little face and pushing every book that's printed?” the wet strings of golden hair from And every day it gave Gail pleasure her hot, moist forehead, she would be to answer with her own joyous laugh, | penitent and affectionate—their dar- “Well, not quite! But with Edith in|ling baby Ariel once more. Mullei’s, you know, bringing home all | Thinking of all this, Gail abstractedly the new books, and with me in here, |stamped and scribbled and tossed the bringing home all the old, we really do | books about. When the whistles droned get a look at most of them!” | noon and a sudden responsive pang of Sometimes the interrogator added, | hunger stabbed her she put on her hat Turning away from-the window, With her own peculiar graci-usness she THE EVENING STAR, WASHINGTON, idolized and idealized each other and were proud of their friendship. All the passion of the younger sister's rather cold nature was in the look; this was |one of her awaited moments every | day, when her flushed, adored, tousled Gail came in and they went to lunch together. They linked hands, walking along the familiar_blocks of the calle under the trees. They went in at the side door to the home kitchen, and let up the | shade and began their preparations for | lunch. The Kkettle was boiling over a | bead of gas, for Ariel always came in promptly at 12 and had her lunch and was gone before the elder girls arrived. It was understood that the elder sis- | ters must find a hot kettle. | " Edith put soft fresh rolls on a plate | and Gail made tea. | said Gail at the safe. “These beans | and the stewed onions and an egg, sort | of squizzled together.” | _“I'm going to have bread and honey,” | Edith_declared. “And a boiled egg, Ede?” Put it in the kettle.” “Maybe. she walked straight into the miracle. extended both her brown square hands, and her round face lighted, and her blue eyes. | “Were you counting on these beans for dinner, Ede?” “No. I haven't an idea for dinner!" Edith sat wearily, luxuriously, over her rclls, honey and tea, her eyes ab- sent. her hand idly stirring the cup. “Ede, do you suppose things’ll ever be any easier for us? Do you suppose we'll have clothes and a car some day | w1l belong to a country club?” Fidith pondered it. reaily don't—know,” she said at last- hesitatingly, as if she might with more time have given a definite an- swer. | “I know what I'm going to have,” | &€ “Your little sister—the bionde one— |and walked up the street to Muller's = “I me does she go on writing poetry?” | to meet Edith, who would be waiting | wistfully, But of late years this had given Gail | for her. no particular pleasure. As a matter| The book department was on the of fact she read too much good poetry | main floor behind the jewelry counters, to trink Ariel's good any more. It |tucked away in the stairway angle. It was pretty and it Wwas an amusement | was not very large, but a steady current Yor Ariel to write it, but it was not | of new books ran through it and a little poetry. She kept hoping that some |side current diverged through Edith’s | day Ariel would suddenly begin to write | hands into the Lawrence house. All| better verse. Darling little Ariel— | the Lawrences were accustomed to She had wanted to give Gail some- | reading books in their paper jackets, thing handsomer than the spoon, the | with every regard for spotting or mark- | darling! Gail felt her heart contract [ine A general fear of injuring Mul- | with love and pain as she remembered | lers books and having to pay for them the scene at the birthday breakfast | prevailed among the whole family. table. Ariel had no money except what | Tdlith, still neat. cool and clean, lift- Phil or Gail sometimes gave her, poor | ed an ccstatic look to Gal as she de- kid! She had probably charged the |corously finished the =sale of seven spoon to Phil's account at Muller’s. | novels to a passing motorist. The girls an—" Gall fumbled along “poor people—people Who astounding! 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GOTT, President have a hard start—do.” “Edith, I could stand anything for But it worries me, about Phil “I don’t think Phil minds being poor s0 much, not since he's been going with Lily Cass,” Edith offered. “Well, I think I want him to mind! I don't think Phil is ambitious,” Galil countered with an anxious little laugh. “Maybe we're fcoling ourselves, Edith said, suddenly gloomy. “Maybe our luck’s changed.” “Fooling ourselves?” “Yes. Do you think we are?” “I don't think I quite understand you,” Gail said uncomfortably, biting into a cracker so loaded with home- made blackberry jam that it dripped yich red sweetness between her fin- TS, “Oh, yes you do!” Edith answered ith a laugh. i “You me{n, Gall "}‘lfl soberly, “that e aren't getting anywhere?” ""wzu, l're we?” Edith was clearing away the plates and spoons of their meal; she turned from the sink, where ¢he breakfast dizhes were still soaking, to regard her sister steadily. A “We are stuck in Clippersville, A.he summarized it. “Nobody knows were alive. We're not in debt because the doctors and dentists won't send us bills Zbut wo ought to be. We haven't any clothes, any social standing— “Oh, we have that, Ede!” “Well, it we have, if we are the lucky Lawrences, if we were one of the most important families in California once, | what are we now? Who's going to marry us—who is there here for us to marry anyway? What's to prevent our living on and on here, old maids, scrap- ing along as bes. we can—Phil mar- rying that horrible Mrs. Cass, Sam | getting & job somewhere and going way, and Ariel—committing suicide, I suppose—' “Oh, Edith, Edith!” Gail protested | horrified. “Don’t talk like that! You're blue. You're just tired today. Why, | upon themselves to melt away darling, nobody knows where changes are coming from, or when. We're hav- ing our hard times now instead of later, that's all! Well have dresses and country clubs and trips and—and fun, theaters, I mean, and everything, one of these days!” Edith's grave intellectual face was doubtful. “You're 23" suggested Edith signifi- t]; “And I could be married and have nice fat baby by the time I was 2 Gail insisted hardily over a little in- terior pang. “I don't think I mind for myself; I' mind for you,” HERE are as many kinds of tobacco as there are soils and cli- mate in which the plant is grown. Every smoker knows that no single tobaceo makes a pleasant smoke. You may prefer Burley with a touch of Turkish or a mixture which includes Perique. Whatever the preference, every good smoke is blended. The popularity of your favorite brand rests entirely on the adeptness of the D. C., TUESDAY walked back to work down the tree- shaded calle. “You ought to be hav- ing good times, you ought to be danc- ing and going to little restaurants, and —and everything.’ “And so ought you!” Gail answered cheerfully, although she felt a knife in 'Oh, I—! Edith dismissed her- self lightly and immediately fell into that silly strain for which Gail could find no better word than ‘“old-maidy.” “I have a feeling,” Edith went on complacently, “that I will meet my hus- band, and be married to him, all in a very short time. tune teller that was Mabel's—" “I wish she wouldn't talk that way!” Gail thought suddenly hot, irritable and discouraged. But she had another moment of af- fection for Edith when they parted, and when her little, shabby, conscientious sister said reassuringly, “I'll think up a grand dinner and buy everything we need, so don't have it on your mind, Gail! Unless—" Edith, who was not iral-born cook, as Gail was, add- ed, “unless I meed you on a gravy or something!” ‘They alternated getting dinners and tonight was Edith’s turn. # Galil felt weary and discouraged as she went on her way. The long after- noon in the library dragged. She felt bored. A sense of injustice oppressed her. Twenty-three—and she might Just as well have been 53. She walked home in languid twilight: all Clipperville was relaxed and jaded after the fierce, unexpected heat of the Spring day. Windows were opened everywhere, under the motionless new green of the tree branches: sprinklers whirled on the lawns. Her long shadow stretched before Gall as she walked along toward a painted gauze back- drop of mountains, mountains rl?lng nto the soft afternoon sky. Gail looked at a dress in Muller's window, a blue organdie with thin orange ribbons hanging in a bunch from shoulder and waist. Nearby it lay a broad-brimmed white hat with an orange rose and a blue rose on it. ‘Turning away from the window she , walked straight into the miracle. “I beg your pardon!” she said laugh- ing. Forshe had really crashed into this man inexcusably. ail Lawrence!” he said. For & second she was bewildered, taken aback. Then with her own pe- cullar graciousness she extended both brown square hands, and her round face lighted, and her blue eyes. The vy Lawrence brows went up into two Edith sald as theypeaks. blender. There are various types of gasoline. No one of them contains all the prop- erties you want in a motor fuel. The proper ones in proper balance do con- tain them. That’s why CONOCO You know that for-, JUNE 9 “Van Murchison!® “Well, hel-lo!” he sa!d delightedly. “Van Murchison! 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