Evening Star Newspaper, July 12, 1931, Page 75

RGN, D, €, JULY 12 1931, Larys Neck Co/alzy—BY BOOTH TARKINGTON “We rolled and tossed in that channel for two of the worst hours this world's ever seen.” have a good chance at dinner to notice her, because she's going to bring him back with her, and of course sh2’ll ask him to stay. Mrs. Massey wouldn't say another thing right then, largely because I said her hint was pre- posterous and just laughed at it. Enid was an intelligent girl, not crazy, I told her, but when dinner time fulfilled her prediction that the Turpie boy would be there I began to feel a little disturbed. I felt more so the more I noticed Enid and listened to her. It was plain as could be that she wasn't behaving . very naturally. When we sat down at the table she began talking excitedly about nothing at all and dropped her r's, something I'd never known her to do before, because she'd always been a girl that fairly abominated any kind of showing off or pretentiousness. She kept interrupting her own chatter by laughing in an affected way that sounded too musical, as if she'd practiced it, and she rcferred to me seve:al times as “fulfhy little papa,” not meaning little in size, of course, but seeming to imply that conse- quential people ought to take me more or less as sort of a joke. The consequential pcople involved appeared to be herself and Mallow- field Turpie, not including her mother or Clarissa, because pretty soon she went so far as to speak of her mother as “funny little mamma” and of Clarissa as “funny old Clarissa.” THEN, spang in the middle of something she was saying, she stopped. All her excitement and laughter and talk wilted right down like the water of a garden hose somebody turns off unexpectedly at the hydrant. Nobody else had said anything; there wasn't any visible cause— she just suddenly quit doing everything except sit and look across the table at that Turpie boy, with her mouth partly open. She did this all through the meal. She'd chatter and laugh & while, not giving anybody else a chance to say a word. Then, right when she seemed most wound up to continue per- manently, she’d have another seizu e of looking at him, usually with her mouth partly open. He seemed used to it and kept right on eating, though looking back at her approvingly quite a little and getting kind of more dampish on his face, I thought. I didn't make a very good meal of it myself on account of getting dis- turbed enough not to feel so well inside, and £nid’s not seeming herself got her mother and Clarissa and me to feeling so constrained that it was quite a relief at first when Eddie Bull- finch came stumbling in while we were eating dessert. He had sort of a hard look on his face and didn't apologize for coming right out to the * dining room, but sat down in a chair against the wall. ‘“No, thank you,” he said, when Mrs. Massey asked him if he wouldn't sit at the table and have some dessert with us. “I'll wait here.. I guess it won't do any harm my just waiting, in spite of the fact that it's customary when any girl invites somebody that's visiting to dinner to also invite whoever they're visiting instead of sending word that their host can come around after dinner and sit in the rumble to go to the movies with them. Not that it makes any great difference to me, be- cause I'm just as able to take food at home as csome place else where I'm practically requested not to.” Enid looked furious and gave a contemptuous sort of ‘sniff, but Mallowfield Turpie didn’t show any symptoms of being interested at all— just went on finishing up his second plate of floating islands—and the rest of us felt pretty embarrassed. Mrs. Massey murmvred some- thing about being sorry Eddie hadn't come to dinner with his guest, to which he responded by saying, “Yes'm, it wasn't your manners I was alluding to, ha, ha!” in such a harsh, crackling voice that I was glad to zee Mrs. Massey get up to go into the living room for coffee. He came in there with us, of course, but sat off in a corner staring at the ceiling, while Clarissa went to_the piano and tried to be tactful by playing fomething to relieve the constraint. “That was pretty,” he said when she finished a piece. “ ‘Tea for Two,’ wasn't it? Somebody ought to make up some old song about tea for three or movies for three or sundaes and sodas for three, and the third person being allowed to come along in order to have somebody to pay for it. Otherwise there wouldn't be any, prob’ly!” Then he said “ha, ha!” again, not laughing, but just saying it harshly, and went on, turning in his cheair toward Mallowfield, “Well, Mush, old Sloppy Weather, if you wouldn't mind letting me have one of my own cigarettes I might as well smoke awhile until you and the lady. get ready for me to go down to the movies with you and buy the tickets.” Mallowfield Turpie didn't 1espond to Eddie’s suggestion about the cigarette. “I'm smoking my own, thank you,” he said. “I bought ‘em this afternoon, and don't spring that old stuff again about its being the first time!” And he added with a kind of spiteful little laugh in his treble voice, “Try and think up some- thing brighter, old Gooseberry!™” Eddie looked dangerous over being called & gooseberry—real trouble seemed to be imminent right there—but Enid jumped up, p-etty red, and said it was already late for the movie they were going to. So they went out, with that Turpie boy holding to Enid's elbow even before they got to the door, and she let him. All I could do for a minute was to sit staring from Mrs. Massey to Clarissa and back again, while both of them nodded their heads and then shook 'em solemnly as if answering me. “Why this is the worst thing I ever heard of in my life!” I said. “That is, it is if it's what it looks like.” “It's what it looks like,” Clarissa told me. “Only it's worse. Haven't I always said that if Enid ever did get this way we'd have a per- fectly fearful time with her?” “Why, my goodness!” I said. “It's got to be dealt with! I can't understand how such a thing was ever permitted to geot started!” Clarissa gave a hoot. *“Started! Papa, don't vou know yet that when it happens at first sight it's already too late to do anything about it by the time anybody notices it? Don’t you s'pose mamma and I have tried everything we could? Don’'t you s'pose we pointed out all his defects to her? That was easy because he hasn't got anything else, but all the effect it had on Enid was to make her rave at us for letting Eddie Bullfinch poison our minds. Then we t:ied making fun of Mushmelon and telling her what all the other boys said about him, but I had to stop because it began to make her think I was jealous!” LARISSA jumped up, there, because an automobile horn was rasping for her out- side, with half a dozen boys and girls whistling and calling her name. She put her head back in the door after she'd gene out, though: “You say it's got to be dealt with, do you, papa? Gracious! I do hope I get the chance to see you dealing with it!” Well I got up and began to walk the floor. *It's got to be stopped!” I said. “How much time is Enid in the habit of putting in with this Turpie?” “Only her mornings and afternoons and evenings every day!"” “Why, good heavens!” I said. “What on earth do they find to talk about?” “That's a complete mystery,” Mrs. Massey told me. “You can see for yourself he's another of those boys that never say anything at all when we older people are around, but just look as though we were impediments that ought to be very temporary. I asked Enid if he ever sald anything worth listening to, but she in- “Usually they'd have to get towed in by a fisherman, or somebody, because Eddic’'d taken out the sails.” stantly got excited and wanted to know if I could guote anything George Washington ever said. I told her certainly that he said ‘I can- not tell a lie’ She asked me if I thought that was worth listening to, and then told me it wasn't so anyhow, because no serious historian believed he ever said it.” “Good heavens,” I said. “Comparing this Turpie boy to George Washington! People’ll get the idea Enid isn't in her senses. It's be- yond all reason for a girl that's always held aloof from sentiment and has had as many fairly attractive, normal boys interested in her without giving one of 'em a glance—for an intellectual, capable, artistic girl like that to pick out the very last one you'd ever think, the dumbest, spongiest lJummox that ever—= - Mrs. Massey shook her head, looking pretty despondent. “MNo, Enid didn't pick him out; you don’'t understand. It just happened to her. It does with young people sometimes—it just happens without anybody on earth's being able to explain it. I've done everything I could, but, as Clarissa said, it only makes Enid furious. For instance, when I mentioned that so far as I could discover he hadn't ever read a single book in his whole life and might be rather dull company for such a reading giil as Enid, she asked me pretty tartly how long it was since I'd seen you reading anything except news- papers.” “Why, that's terrible!” I said. ‘“Comparing that lJummox even to her own father—and when I was away on a trip, too!” “Oh, my, yes!” Mrs. Massey told me. “There've been a great many such compari- sons, none in your favor. She said that if I thought I had a :1ight to attack him to her she certainly had a right to attack you to me.” “What!” I said. “What!"” “Oh, my, yes! I thought there was one thing might rouse her pride, and that was about his closeness. His mother gives him a large allowance, it seems, but he never spends a penny of it if he can possibly help it. Enid’s always despised the slightest sign of stinginess in anybody, but when I tried to point this out to her she said you had declined to give any- thing to the Indigent Improvement Fund last yvear, and when I told her that was because I knew the fund was a fraud and I wouldn't let you, and that you were ordinarily much too lavish in your contiibutions, she said that proved ycu didn't know how to save in a proper way. She said Mallowfield had the most gen- erous nature she'd ever known. He'd told her himself about large expenses he'd been put to by other pcople, but he certainly didn't intend to be imposed on, especially not by Eddie Buil- finch, particularly when it was Eddie's place as host to bz doing the entertaining and not screeching every time it cost him anything. You see, the slightest hint—no matter how gentle and reasonable—that he isn't absolute perfection only makes her surer that he is and sets her wild with every one else.” “Yes,” I said, “if it isn't done properly.” HEN, when Mrs. Massey wanted to know what I mcant by this we had a long dis- . cussion and after I'd pacified her she contended that Enid was in such a state of mind that nothing at all I could do would have any weight with hcr. But something had to be done, I said, and done right away, and I de- clined to believe that my daughter’'s mental condition was already such that I couldn't rousec her to the perception of what a grisly mistake her untrained sentiments were leading her into. M.s. Masscy said gloomily all right I could try if I wanted to; so, being alone with Enid after lunch the next day, I did. I began by asking her cheerfully and casually what she'd been up to while I was away, and then when she didn’L hear me because she was looking out of the window too engrossingly 1 said I thought she might pay a little attention to me after my absence. I spoke affectionately. “Don’t you ever have a thought in your head any more for your poor old man, Enid?” I asked her. “What?” she said dreamily, not hearing a word. Then she jumped and started for the door. “G'by,” she said, and through the window I saw Mushmelon Turpie coming along the board sidewalk in the distance. “You wait a minute!” I told her, kind of loudly. “I want a few reasonable words with you, Enid, about that young man. I just want to say——" “What!" she interrupted, and turned on me likke a flash,” pale right on the instant and breathing fast. “What!” “Now don't get excited,” I said. “I haven't spoken a word against him and I'm not going to.” “Oh, indeed!” she said. “Oh, aren't you?” “Certainly not,” I told her. “I merely wanted to mention that I couldn't help noticing you look kind of peakid and not your usual self. Now when that happens to a daughter of mine I can't help feeling disturbed, especially when I could hardly fail to see the causc of it. All I want to say is that it can’t help making me feel a little uneasy, Enid.” “Why?” she asked me. “What makes you uneasy?” “Why that young man does,” I told her, ’ . and I can't deny I got a liitle confused about what I intended to say, her manner was so inter.ce and sharp. “In the first place,” I told her, “I admit I donu’'t know anything about his character except what I've Leard, and I haven's seen anything of hira much myself except at dinner last night, when he certainly didn't say anything very noticcaile. I was only thinking, Enid, that if you'd take a better look at him yourself you'd see he isn't exactly--that is to cay, his appearance isn't exactly——" But she cut me off rigni theie. “So you don’t think he's handsome!” she said, getting paler and brcathing harder “That's your charge against him, is it? Even mamma and Clarissa haven't dared to say that! You admit you den't know anythning whatever about him, but you object to him because in your exper§ eyes he isn't handsome!” “Look here!” I said, naturally a little proe voked. “I don't care whether he's hiandsome b not. It's what he locks like that I object to!”™ At that she got even fercer with me. *“X kw.w you'd join in this persocutl ' she told mf. “Do!” Then she lifled both her arms up kind of violently. “Oh!” the said, pretty nearly shouting. “It's unbelicvable how small the natures of people can b2 when they find themse selves compared to one of the finest, braves§§ souls this world has ever sezn!” Then she said “oh!” again, banged the door b-hind her and ran out to the board walk. ;] Well, sir, the way ch='d fiswn off the handle, almost completely taking leare of her proper senses, as you might say, 12ft me in a pretty astonished condition. What's more, practically thce same thing happened every time I tried te reason with her upon that subiect. I couldn’f penctrate to her intcllicence at all. I tried logic. I tried pleading. I tried sarcasm. ¥ even tried overpraising him. But after abou§ three weeks I acknowvledged that her mother was right about my not accomplishing any« thing. One day I asked Eddie Bullfinch with a good deal of feeling how long his visitof intended to keep on visiiing. Eddie was wearing that hard look on hi¢ face pretty much all th2 time now, and what I said seemed to intensily it. He stared at me as if I'd brought an accusation against him that he couldn't bear. “Well, I don't know,” he said. looking thoughtful, and I could see he was unwilling to answer directly. “The Shoo'ing Star's bt out o' commission ever sincte he’s been here, on account of engine trou but it's all right now and I'm going to take Enid and Mush auite a long trip in her tomorrow afternoon. Mush hasn’'t ever bcen in any boat right out on the ocean, and if today's wind holds out it might get a little rough.” Eddie looked at me, then. with a plaintive kind of hopefulness and as if he thought there might be something of a bond between us created by mutual trouble. “Would you lke to go along, sir, maybe?” he asked me. Well, I thought I saw a gleam in what seemed to be his idca, =0 I said I'd go, and ¥ did. The breeze freshened up overnight and when the four of us sputtered cut of the harbor in the Shooting Star right after lunch, it was pretty exhilarating for a while; that is, it was until Enid and Musktmelon began singing “Boy of My Dreams, I Want You.” He had one of those high-school tin treble voices of the sort I'd often heard Enid mimirking and making fun of, but now it just put her in a soft glow, painful to look at. Eddie tried to join in the singing and ruin it, kind of howling, but they didn't appear to know he was thera. W=e went about four miles, not moving very rapidly—Eddie explained to me that only one of his engines was working—then he steered the Shooting Star into a channel about half a mile wide behind a low, rocky island, where there seemed to be cross-currents and the water was unusually choppy. He said he hoped we wouldn't break down anywhere in thess because the island would likely keep other boats from sighting us and coming to tow us, He was tinkering with his one working engine as he spoke, and right that very minute # made & flopping sound inside and stopped. Enid and Mushmelon. up in the bow, didn’t seem to notice this right away, but went on talking. and, with the ergine quiet, we ecould hear what they said. - Mushmelon was speaking. “I like the ocean,¥ he said. “On a railroad train you have tor keep on the tracks, but on the ocean you don't.* } ELL, it's hard to believe, but Enid looke§ at him as if he'd said something Q intelligent it was startling. “That's & wonderful thought,” she said. “I sce what youw mean—the freedom anything vast and tracke less gives you—the freedom to be a gypsy of the sea! Mallowfield, your mind never stopd working for one instant, does it?” . He frowned and puckered up his little mouth, “Well, I can't say it does,” he said : “You're wonderful!” she said. “Wuvnderful!™® And “she gave him a worshiping loo® that I wished she hadn’t, because it was the sort of look that would tend to sicken any father who saw his daughter doing it; it's a fact that I felt an actual qualm inside of me, one that stayed there. I turned to Eddie Bullfinch, “Let’s get out ef here,” T aid. “Start that engine and let's get back aome.” 2 From where he was tinkering with a mon¥t$ wrench he Tooked up at me kind of brightly, “Well,” he said, “we will as soon as wec ge§ going again. The way it seems to me, some= thing appears to be jammed.” “Hurry!” I told him. “Hurry!” I did wish I hadn’t listened to Enid and Mushmelon or seen her give him that look, because I couldn'$ get it out of my mind and it seemed to be increasing my qualm. The Shooting Star had begun to roll and pitch uncomfortably, toa, as soon as it lost feadway, and as we couldn’t feel the breeze pny more, the sun felt too and the enghfs had an unplec-ang f Continues” om Fourtcent| Page