The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, March 18, 1906, Page 11

NO! 5000, FOR,HE DY e r‘v— NOTE a little foot—two j tlefeet, in fact— | ty lttle feet in prett ttle shoes, come [ tapping across the te: sélfated floor of ab the difference een $1,000000 and ix eas com k g s M. Schwab, who is so good a P eve e week s w ef that I find Mrs. Bob e a jo ttle wom. full ' full common se and k ss, with a brain as big t as big as all out bterfuges natural, friendly of you because mery’s fresh, vigorous rsonality contrasts with us artificiality that does She Is & nd she is £ a is the nest pla and San Fran- sco the finest California, »f se—having been born here. She knows jttle girls in school know she belie: its fu at she is putting a good acquired $5,000,000 into happy woman nely happy en I ha er seen, with all the ing up instead of yond a doubt that t and despond- e to do any bbles up and flows g shower upon great she gives many a y a shiver up rigid spines of peonle who given lives ac- egulations of sort for the people on er sort of all for those o their the and . ps o greater—kind- r Margaret, the ws her " any top-n Iboy who ridor for o serve her is “Johnny B finds fa when there is fault m peevish ill-tem- v best service in that big ause of the size of the h, goodness knows, 1—but because of the ich she gives them. cs—thou She ¢ independent in lier dréss as she is in her manners. The black silk skirt that conveniently escapes the is as modish as any one could wish, the embrofdered white blouse s the latest' thing in blouses, the pretty hat with brim full of roses is as be- coming a hat can be, and you'd rather like to know the milliner who made it; but it is morning and there monds, two pretty gems in her ears and several splendid ones on her fingers, and she knows as well as you or 1, or'the silliest slave to form, that fashion stickles for diamonds after dark. She doesn't care a rap about that—she wears the gems for senti- are ment, because somebody—I think it was Bob” himself—gave them to her, and for that reason she always wears them. And to tell the, truth, they look very well in the shapely ears and on the plump white hands. There's another pint or two of them in the safe that she cares to put on only when “Bob” is with her and she wants to look her best to please him and his friends. “Otherwise,” she says, *“I don’t care anything about them.” She ‘s a comfortably plump little woman a trim waist and a matronly pret- tiness and the energy, enthusiasm ande interest in life that will always keep from growing old. I mention the plumpness because with a laughing pretense of indignation she tells me: Of all the nonsense that bas been printed about me in the East on ac- count of this deal with Mr. Schwab the one thing that burt was this: A reporter said I weighed 240 pounds Think of it!” the benefit of that repo: s too generous o1 fully ety pounds and that he'd ter take to cover, for a libeled lit- le woman and forty frenzied financiers have their knives sharpened for him “How about that 3,000,000 and Mr. Schwab?” T ask. “How about the big mining deal and your share in 1t? Did Oh, it's true enough. The deal has been de, and it’s a big one, and it's with Mr. Sehwab—and others; but I_can't give the figures and I can't give the de- ails. That wouldn't be right to.the par- ties concerned; it wouldn't be fair and it wouldn’t be discreet.” And did you really—7' “Did I really w and doe: tion Oh, she knows all right. " she asks teasing- t need to wait for elucida- She shuts her smiling Iips and shakes@) her head, and there is'a gleam of sat- isfaction in her eyes, and with it a soupcon of mischief. It is a very enjoy- able knowledge she holds and will not® impaft to me. I'm not going to tell you anything about it—mot a_thin, It wouldn't be fafr, and it's nobody’s business anyhow; put—" she hesitates smilingly, long enough to relent a little; and besides is a very -enjoyable knowledge she Lolds—of a very big triumph for a little o man. “I'll tell you this much; you may say this hat Mrs. Montgomery is perfectly satisficd with the deal that Mr. Montgom- ery has made with Mr. Schwab— “That Mrs. Montgomery has had her own way, and is perfectly satisfied! “Perfec satisfied! ““There now! What do you want more than that?’ A dozen things that I can think of in one breath, and I begin with “How——"_ She shakes her head and shuts her lips still more tightly. She’s not going to let out another :\'ord, Oh, welll I give it up. Still I should like to know that— “1t wasn't by nagging? “Jt sn't by ceaxing? “It wasn't by bullying? *Hen-pecking? “Crying 2™ 1 feel that T'm getting positively offen- sive; I'm almost ashamed of myself when— “Well! I should say not! There’s noth- ing like that necessary between my hus- band and me. He's the best fellow in the world. Ocr interests are the same—we always talk them over together. When- 'MRS.80B MQ? 000 USBAND N DARE, ~ HEN the Crodstraw divorce case came up before Judge Star- rett, in a down-East city last month, the Judge frankly owned that he would rather doff the judicial er- mine (whatever that is—the Judge didn’t know) than attempt to rénder a decision. Mrs. Crodstraw wanted to get a decree absolute from Jake because of !‘cruel and unusual occupations pursued by the said libelee to the great bodily suffering and extreme mental anguish of said libel- ant.” according to the language of the petition. It appeared from the evidence “that when Mrs. Crodstraw (nee Cobb) married her husband he was foreman of a tide mill, which would not seem a cruel, though possibly a sumeth unusual, condition. Since a tide mill can only work during the ebb of the tide, of course it must be- gin operations just after tne turn, which comes about forty minutes later every day. Consequently Jake's hours were con- stantly altering by that amount of time. ““There wasn't nothin’ reg’lar 'n’ abldin® about him.” sald Mrs. Crodstraw, tear- fully giving her testimony. “He'd get up at sunset 'n’ go to bed at sunup 'n’ eat breakfus in the mid- dle o’ the arternoon, 'n’ hev his dinner at midnight—'n" wouldn’t even stick to that, but jes’ go on a-varyin’ 'n’ a-vacillatin’ all ‘'round the clock with no more stabil- ity to him than thar is to a fresh caught eel. 'N’ ‘twant no use to remonstrate. ‘It's the tide,” he'd say; ‘I mus’ foller the tide,” 'n" up he'd git and to the mill he'd go at 1 o'clock In the mornin’, which is agin all the laws o' nature 'n’ orter be . contrary to them o' man. T couldn’t git no sleep 'n’ I couldn’t git no meals at any Christlan hour, 'n’ 1 wuz a'ways a-p'roos- in’ of the tide almanac 'n’ gettin' beat by BGERN0S it. The tide! They never had no ‘tides where I come from up in Varmount, 'n’ there won't be no 4ides (not wet ones) w'ere Jake'll go to if he ain't more mind- ful of his marrlage vows." “But he left the tide mill, I under- stand,” said the Judge. P i “Yes, he did. Sometimes T wisht he hadn’t. For what does he do? Gits a Jjob as a machine tender in a glant powder fact'ry.” “Well, his hours were regular then, weren't they?” “Bakes allve! Yes, his hours was reg’lar, but his turn to git blowed pp wan't reg'lar, anyway, Jedge. I never knowed when that aggravatin' man'd drop in on me—wan't no countin’ on him nohow. Sometimes#I'd hear a bang over at the works, 'n’ rush ‘round after arnica 'n’ splints 'n’ bandages 'n’ coolin’ applica- tions, wonderin’ all the time whether I'd better have my blue dress dyed black, 'n’ then they wouldn't bring him, 'n’ I'd find it was either some other fellow or else nobody hadn't been h'isted at al and p'r'aps very next day, when I wasn't thinkin’ o’ nuthin’ or might hev relations visitin’ me, in ke be brung, a-gaspin' out: ‘Ninety-six feet high this time, Cla inda!" Jes' s'f he was some kind o’ self- registerin’ cycloneometer. No, he wuz jes’ as irreg’lar 'y’ cruel 'n’ unusual as before, Jedge. ® “Fin’lly he lef’ there—'hed a blow-up with the boss,’ he said—n’ wat do you s'pose he goes into then? As sure's my name used to be Clarinda Cleopatra Cobb and will be ag’in If you give me the jes- tice you're pald a big sellery for passin’ out, that provokin’, pesterin’ person starts in runnin’ a night lunch wagon.” “Well, what was the trouble with that?" asked the Judge, wearlly. “Trouble? Why, it was all trouble. had to live on what he couldn't sell. it was frankfurterss and cheese for all three meals, then "twould be picklgs and pie for a solid week, and lambs’ week, 'n’ so on. Besides, the hoss used to run away fre- goin’ or comin’, 'n’ either he'd the subbubs some- whers all amongst tétal smash; or he'd all our stock in Jake atop of it, right ker-thump into his own box stall at Jake wan't Some days for another fetch up out no business man 'n’ Plerpont Morgan himself (he were some kind of a raider when I wuz a girl) couldn’t have made his books bal- trusted every- ¥ 'n’ nobody trusted him. had enough cold pigs’ feet alone scored up ag'in our most prominent citizens bought a sguab those prominent- have remembered when they were sober; 'n’ if he failed to tot up cvery doughnut he'd sold jes' exactly right, the baker'd hev a dep- perty sheriff sitting on the roof of our cart in less than ten minutes. manity et at our expense 'n’ we et at foundry if citizens could ever anything about . suggested the Judge, looking at the clock and rubbing his deafened ears. “But now?" Crodstraw, Now. he's an under- taker and seems to do al! his work for who- die busted and they go and decease jus’ whenever like it—morniu’, night—'n’ no one of ‘em quits' their mortal clay at any convenient hour for housekeepin’, 'n’ they all wants their obsequies celebrated jes' at my meal ~_-hours. Td ruther be back at the tide see Jake .blowed up Firstly, business wasn't good 'n’ . we twict as often as he used to bel" turning viclous. ‘mill. Jedge, ever he's going to do anything he always tells me about it, and we talk it over of course, and I have my ideas about it. Why shouldn’t I have? THere's just Bob and me!” ¢ 1 wouldn’t swear that she didn’t say “Me 'nd Bob." “And that's the way it was in this +deal. We talked it over together, of course, and 1 wouldn't agree to the offer that was made. A million dollars sounds lke a whole lot; but—if you have something that's worth, say $5,000,000—remember now, I'm not giv- ing you figures—why should you take less for it? I don’t know gold ore from a cobble in the street, but, maybe, I know something about business; and that's the way I felt about. I knew Mr. Schwab, I've known him for a long time. I like him. We've always been good friends—and we are yet, just the best of friends, but—" “Even bétween the best friends busi- ness is bustess?” “Certainly! And so you can say Mrs. Montgomery has had her own way and is perfectly satisfied.” And now what will Mr. and Mrs. Robert Montgomery—"Just Bob and me!”—do with their millions, I want to know. Diplomatically and indirectly Mrs. Montgomery lets me know .that the world need not expect to see them In- dulging in any spectacular extra gances, that the luxuries and ecle- gancies of life are not unsampled by them, that they are not lkely to ‘hyeak loose” accovding to ancient miining camp tradition. “Mr. Montgomery has never been a really poor man,” she explains to me; “he has always bad money of his own. or money from his friends who backed his ventures. He has never been the flannel-shirt, grubstake sort of a pros- pector witi nothing but an outfit and e burro. He has had his.ups and downd, like all mining men, but we've always had money —sometimes than at other times. Mrs. Bob Montgomery wears some of the handsomest gowns that are seen in that showplace of handsome gowns, the St. Francis, but she doesn’t wor- ry her head much about dress and dressmakers. “I woulén’'t bother about my clothes and give my time to studying the fashions and talking about them for NOROONNOONNI0 NN Danythink in the world. I like pretty things, but pretty things are not worth “T am interested’in politics, railroads, | PHASES OF DOMESTIC PROBLEM. }nhi i vs ®real estate, bullding—the progress of the world. I want to know what is going on in the world and what is be- ing done for the betterment of the people around me. I'm interested in the development of my State; it's the greatest State in the Union. T'm in- terested in San Francisco. I'm inter- ested in the development of the gold fields that have given us so mucit.” Mrs. Montgomery is interested thera in a thorougily practieal way, for she has built & scheolhouse for the children in the camp where lies the Shoshone mine—the mine that made the mil- Mons—and she has buflt a hotel. the best equipped hotel on tie desert, at Beattie. It has twenty rooms with hot and celd water, five rooms with baths, and built it as she mentions easu- ally, “Because we need it ourselves when we go up there. 5 Mrs. Bob Montgomery, you see, is not a woman concerned with trifles, .! “I like to go to the races.” she goes on. “because I like to see the horses Tun. I love horses. 1 put my little bet down on the ponies with the rest of the party when Im there, 'but it's not the betting I care for, it's the horses themselves. I love to see them an. . “I iike to entertain my husband's friends and my own.” 7 Her husband’s friends she entertains as only a man’s woman—which she is in the very best sense—can do; “and I'd rather entertain ten of them than one,” she says. “It's easier.” Her own friends are bevies of girls that she does all sorts of generous, de- lightful things for, without one pang “for,” she laughs, “I'm not Bgb doesn’t think about any- body but me.” and she on her side doesn’t think about anybody but “Bob.” With all these interests and diver- sions, that Mrs. Montgomery has no time left to worry about dress is appar- ent, but she bas that problem settled to her satisfaction and comfort. “I bave adressmakerin Los Angeles who has looked after my clothes for twenty years. She knows just what I like and what I don’t like. She has one of those Paris forms for me that are an exact duplication of your figure. She goes to Europe a couple of times a year, and she always brings back for me the things she thinks I'll need— everything I may réquire, the newest things that are out, but not the ex treme rasnions and novelties, and she sends’ them to me fitted exactly. I never have to bother with them, and so well do they At I have mnot had to hffve a change of any sort made in the past two years. “It's a great relief—a heavy burden off my shoulders. select clothes for me: I wea and M Montgomery pays for without showing me the b t con- venierit arrange “About society “Society I wouldn't bot that any more than I we ou dress. I like to meet my frie t I don’t ‘care for large functions where you go only to dee and be seen. Life is too short for at “Nobody need t going to be a el er. because [ don't have teo; second, because I don't want to Mrs. Montgomery woman in the hou says “I've lived in Iy. Tve nev grown u keep house if So 1t is n immediate future to put any part of the the buil either here or on Fifth avenue. After a Mrs. Montge conditions by with divided sk come back to the St. Francis until May, for M real es deals to close, some flats to build for sister-in-law o attend to an and then comes ng of a house f About the charitie: suite by a cident and thr a circum- stance that hers, Mrs. Mor leas of charity are as evendent and oviginal and character 1s leas along other lines. “Pah!” she says with d sntempt, “It is an easy thing to a check for\a $1000 or $5000 and give it to the Assoclated Charities or imstitu tion, or someth like that, and it off your mind. I dox all that ehar- ity! I don’t ¢all THAT doing anything for your fellow beings! “Real charity is giving of yourself as well as of your mone t i3 opening your heart to them ax wel your pocket-book. This revelation of the heart under the ered blouse ¢ prefty embro result of a happy interruption to our talk; another vi or is waiting. This visitor comes to tell about the progress of a little deaf and dumb department of the pub- lic sehool, who was paralyzed—a little protege of Mrs. Montgomery that she put under the care of her dector. who with heg characteristic enthusiasm is the best doctor in the world. e par- alysis is not evercome. but the little boy is improvi and “that's some- thing, anPhow,” says Mrs. Montgom- ery. This other visitor has alse to do with the deaf and dumb department of the Harrison Primary School out on Grove street. Perhaps you don't know that there is a deaf and dumb department at the Harrison Brimary School: that, if your little boy or your little girl is deaf, you do not need to send the child from home to an institution to be educated; that you can keep your dear little one at home in your loving care and send him to publlc school to be taught as well as though he had no deficiency. Even if you do know that perhaps you don't know, any more than I did, that this department. in the public sciools for children who are so af- flicted was established through the ef- forts of Mrs. Bob Montgomery. Mrs. Bob Montgomery has no children of her own. There are in her immedi- ate family as she confides to me “just mes as eaf boy from the Bob and me!” But that doesn’t make her blind to the needs of little chil- dren. For some r«agon or other that touched her heart, and which she carefully keeps to herselt—for Mrs. Bob Montgomery doesn’t tell everything she knows—she became deeply interested in the estab- lishing of a department in the publie schools for deaf and dumb children. She didn't like to think of them having te leave home and go into the Joneliness and’ strangeness of an institution. So she interested herself in getting a bill introduced Into the Legislature provid- ing for such a department in the pub- Ne school here; and then she busied he‘r- self In gettiag it chrough. On the night it was to come up and be voted on she was at the Capitol at Sacramento nearly all night, until 2 o'clock in the morning. prodding the memory of the members and Senators who had oromised to vote for it and never resting a moment or shutting an eye until it was voted upon and safely made a law. Then she was as triumphantly happy as she was the other day when’ she won her own way over astute Mr. Schwab and his brother financiers and could declare herself “perfectly satis. fled.” I don’t know for certain If every husband who could be lucky enough to have a wife like Mrs. Bob Mont- gomery would be $5.000,000 richer im consequence, but it does seem that for every woman like her the world is a little pleasanter, and surely mese ln~ teresting. i