The Seattle Star Newspaper, November 11, 1921, Page 15

on IN STR EET The Story of Carol Kennicott BY SINCLAIR LEWIS Copyright, 1920, Harcourt, Brace & Howe, Ina eeeccccccees NE As far as we have o have been omitted What maybe at the point of its beginning in starts on the editorial po page. It may, tingly begun re ® Page. Attention is thus o take will not be repeated, (Continued From Yest » CHAPTER woe Ir They were driving down the lake the cottages that moonlit Jan. ¥ night, twenty of them in the] ied. They sang “Toy Land” “Seeing Nelly Home”; they Meped from the low back of the @ed to race over the slippery snow Fut and when they were tired | they climbed on the runners for a Be. The moon-tipped flakes kicked | up by the horses settled over the! Pevelers and dripped down their! Becks, but they laughed, yelped,| pS Beat their leather mittens against! their chests. The harness rattled,| p the sleigh-bdelis wore frantic, Jack| p Elder's setter sprang beside the} Dorses, barking, For a time Carol raced with them. The cold alr gave fictive wer. She felt that she could run all night, leap twenty feet at a to or two Star readers have callea our attention to they thought were gans in the Story be . bor tween installments, hecked back, no sections of the nevol Bx vorced has happened was thie: That these readers (and ers) have fatled to start reading every day's installment the paper. Sometimes the story And is “continued over to the comic in thowe instances, be that readers have unwit- ading at the latter place and h tected the omission of the part they ave naturally de failed to see on thp former allied to the matter so that such a mis- ing, “Well, we made pretty good time coming up,” from one—any ona, “Yump, we hit it up after we struck the good going on the like.” “Seems kind of slow tho, after ing an auto.” “Yump, it does, at how'd you make out Sphinx tire you got? “Seems to hold out fine Still I don't know’s I like ft any better than the Roadeater Cord.” “Yump., nothing better Roadeater. cord’s lots better than the fabric.” “Yump, you sald something deater’s a good tire." how'd you come out with Pete Garsheim on his payments?” “He's paying up pretty good That's a nice piece of land he's got.” “Yump, that's a dandy farm.” “Yump, Pete's got a good place ar that. Say, with that than a R ‘ide, But the excess of energy}.there.” a her, and she was glad to snug under the comforters which cov. d the hay jn the sled-box. Im the midst of the babel she ind enchanted quietude. Along the road the shadows from ebranches were. inked on the Uke bars of music. Then the! came \out on the surface of| Minniemashie. Across the fee was a veritable road, a -eut for farmers. On the glar expanse of the lake—levels of crust, flashes of green ice clear, chains of drifts ribbet the sea-beach—the moonlight Was overwhelming. It stormed on ‘ snow, it turned the woods into crystals of fire The ht was tropical and voluptuous, that drugged magic there was difference between heavy heat insinuating cold Carol was dream-strayed. The bulent yolees, even Guy Pollock connotative: beside her, were She repeated: on the conyent-roof the snows sparkling to the moon. ‘The words and the light blurred One .vast indefinite happiness, she believed that some great ‘was coming to her. She’ with- from the clamor into a wor of incomprehensible gods, The expanded, she was conscious the universe, and all mysteries 4 down to her, Was jarred out of her ecstasy he bobsled bumped up the steep to the, bluff where stood the ) | dismounted at Jack Pider’s The interior walls of un- nied boards, which had been in August, were forbidding the chill. In fur coats and. muf- tied over caps they were a company, bears and wal- talking. Jack Elder lighted shavings waiting in the belly of Castiron stove which was like an d bean-pot. They piled their high on a rocker, and cheered rocker as it solemnly tipped Elder an@ Mra Sam Clark gingerbread; Mrs. Dare dogs” —trank- . Terry Gould. ies and gents, to be shocked; shock line on the right.” produced a of bourbon whisky. others danced, muttering ~ as thelr frosted feet struck }pine planks, Carol had lost her Harry Haydock lifted her Waist and ewung her. She The gravity of the people tho stood apart and talked made ‘the more impatient for frolic. b 0 Sam Clark, Jackson young Dr. McGanum, and Madison Howland, teetering} pthetr toes near the stove, con- with the sedate pomposity| commercialist. In details the) were unlike, yet they said the) things in the same hearty} is voices, You had to look) [them to see which was speak-| ” They glided from these serious topics into the jocose inaults which are the wit of Main Street. Sam Clark was particularly apt at them. “What's this, wild-eyed sale of sum- mer caps you think you're trying to pull off?" he clamored at Harry Haydock. “Did you steal ‘em, or are you just overcharging us, as usual? ‘ Oh say, speaking about caps, @'I ever tell you the good one I've got on Will? The doe thinks he's a pretty good driver, fact, he thinks he’s almost got human Intelligence, but one time he had his machine out in the rain, and the poor fish, he hadn't put on chains, and thinks I—”" Carol had heard the story rather often. She fled back to the dancers, and at Dave Dyer’s masterstroke of dropping an icicle down Mra. Mo- Ganum's back she applauded hys. terically, They sat on the floor, devouring the food. The men giggied amiably as they passed the whisky bottle, and laughed, “There's a real sport!” when Juanita Haydock took a sip. Carol tried to follow; she believed that she desired to be drunk and riotous; but the whisky choked her and as she saw Kennicott ‘frown she handed the bottle on repentantly. Somewhat too late she remembered that she had given up domesticity and repentance, “Let's play charades™ ald Ray- mie Wutherspoon, “Oh yes, do let us.” Stowboxty. “That's the caper,” Harry Haydock. ‘They interpreted the word “mak- ing” as May and King. The crown was a red flannel mitten cocked on Sam Clark's broad pink bald head. They forgot they were re spectable. They made-believe, Carol was stimulated to cry: “Let's form a dramatic club and give a play! Shalk we? It's been so much fun tonight?” They looked affable. “Sure,” observed Sam Clark loy: “Oh, do let ust T think tt would wald Ella sanctioned “Be a whale of a lot of fun,” Terry Gould granted. “But if we did,” Carol cautioned, “It would be awfully silly to have amateur theatrical. We ought to paint our own .scenery and every- thing, and really do something fine. There'd be a lot of hard work. Would you—would we all be punc- tual at rehearsals, do you suppose?” “You bet" “Sure.” “That's the idea." “Fellow ought to be prompt at rehearsals,” they all agreed. “Then let's meet next week and form the Gopher Prairie Dramatic Association!” Carol sang. She drove home loving these friends who raced thru moonlit snow, had Bohemian parties, and were about to create beauty in the theatre. Everything was solved, She would be an authentic part of the town, yet escape the coma of the Village Virus. She would be free of Kennicott again, without hurting him, without his knowing. es OF THE TWIN lick,” said Cap'n Pennywinkle, | the Twins had returned from | important errand, “something ed last night and I don't where it was.” po Yes, sir,” answered the little boy | y. | p"It happened in the ocean, but the eran 16 4 big place, wo that do n't | mean much. Aiso it made a terrific | It woke me up and it woke | up, but it wasn’t thunder. It louder than thunder. Moreover, | morning I found some of’ the Wiggletin people dead. A loud sound the water kills fis because it | ks the floaters th arry inside them to balance with.” "It might have been a torpedo- out practicing,” said thoughtful | bbe,” agreed the Cap'n. it might have been a bombing "the little boy suggested. All very gam" waid Cap'n Penny- “but I don’t think so, It was too dark. What I'm afraid of ts that it’s a new island and that it might not stick up far enough| “You see,” went on thé fatryman, “every once in a while'we get a new island, and do you know, we have an awful time findmg it. Worse ‘n’ |finding @ needle in @ ten-ton hay stack.” “And do they make a noise?” asked Nick. “Do they? Yes, indeed. You see, there are voleanoes under the sea as well as on land, and when they ex- plode and a lot of rocks ‘n’*things come bursting out, they pile up on b other clear to the top of the water and that’s an island. If it doesn't get up to the top, but stays just under the water, it is dangerous. So, Nickie, we must find that island and jearn if it's a safe one. If it isn’t, we'll have to build a light- house or put a bell buoy on it.” (To, Be Continued) (Copyright, 1921, by Seattle Star) Especially the cord, The} THE SEATTLE STAR > DOINGS OF THE NUFFS A Little Uncertain PANSY ‘You MUST HAVE BEAT THE SUN UP “THIS MORNING ! PANSY, ‘You ARE CERTAINLY ALL POLLED uP THIS MORNING! YAS SUH 15 STILL A UTTLE FUSSY "BOUT MY APPEARANCE! WELL, ILL SAY YOUR HUSBAND PANSY, NEBER WAITS FO’ DE SUN, MISTAH HERE TO Do THE WASHING -GO DOWN AND LET NER IN! THAT IS RINGING OUR DOORBELL AT THIS TIME IN THE MORNING P | | — ONE FELLOW SEIZED A BIG CLUB AND SWUNG [TT SAW WE WAS E0ING To KNOCK, ) } TWO MEN GoT IN | } A FIGUT IN FRONT OF THE DOST OFFICE AND T TELL You ff LoKeED PRETTY BAD FoR “TUS CTHER FELLOWS BRAINS OUT, So T JUMPED IN BETWEEN HEM—THAT WAS ALL. ee She had triumphed. The moon was small and high) now, and unheeding. u Tho they had all been certain that they longed for the privilege of attending committees meetings and rehearsals, the dramatic asso ciation as definitely formed con sisted only of Kennicott, Carol, Guy | Pollock, Vida Sherwin, Ella Stow body, the Harry Haydocks, the Dave Dyers, Raymie Wutherspoon, Dr, Terry Gould, and four new can didates: Mirtatious Rita Simona, Dr and Mrs. Harvey Dillon and Myrtle Cass, an uncomely but intense girl of nineteen. Of these fifteen only seven came to the first meeting The reat telephoned their unparal leled regrets and engagements and ilnesses, and announced that they would be present at all other meet ings thru eternity Carol was made president and 4! rector. She had added the Dillons, De spite Kennicott's apprehension the dentist and his wife had not been taken up by the Westiakes but had remained as definitely outside really smart society as Willis Woodford, who was teller, bookkeeper, and Janitor in Stowbedy’s bank. Carol had noted Mra Dillon dragging past the house’ during @ bridge of the Jolly Seventeen, looking in with pathetic lips at the splendor of the accepted. She ulsively Invited the Dillons to the dramatic asso ciation meeting, and when Kennicott was brusque to them she was un usually cordial, and felt virtuous. That selfapproval balanced her disappointment at the smallness of the meeting, and her embarrassment during Raymie Wutherspoon's repe- titions of “The stage needs uplift ing,” and “I believe that there are great lessons in some plays.” Ella Stowbody, who was a pro- fessional, having studied elocution in Milwaukee, disapproved of Carol's enthusiasm for recent plays. Miss Stowbody expressed the fundamental principle of the American dram: the only way to be artistic is to Present Shakespeare, As no one listened to her she sat back and looked like Lady Macbeth. m1 JUST COOKS AsHeS Aw over MY DAVENPORT! AnD A HOLS RNGD IN -—— HOLD ON, MRE, TR — You MEAN " I GOT OF PACKING A LiL SLEEP WITH You BABOONS, DISTURBING ME JES WHEN I SMART D DozE?= IM ALL Wl, SO LEMME ALONE WOW OR T'LL CROWD UP A HOSPITAL WITH TH’ WHOLE CREW OF You !! CUR. DAVEN by ry r ‘The Little Theatres, which were (Copyright, 1931, Beattie Star) to give piquancy to American drama | three or four years later, were only| in embryo. But of this fast coming revolt Carol had premonitions. She/ knew from some lost magazine arti- cle that in Dublin were innovators called The Irish Players, She knew) confusedly that a man named Gor-| don Craig had painted sconery—or had he written piags? She felt that) in the turbulence of the drama she) was discovering @ history more im-| portant than the commonplace! chronicles which dealt with sena-| tors and their pompous puerilities.| She had a sensation: of familiarity; | a dream of sitting in a Brussels! cafe and going afterward to a tiny} way theatre under a cathedral wall.| The advertisement in the Minne) apolis paper leaped from the page| to her eyes: The Cosmos School of Muse, Oratory, and Dramatic Art an- nounces a program of four one act plays by Schnitzler, Shaw, Yeatd, and Lord Dunsany. She had to be there! She beaged Kennicott to “run down to the cities” with her. “Well, I don't know. Be fun to! tax ath J don't know. | Be fun tol] g0od, brave woman with the ugly 6 in a show, but why the deuce de you want to eee those darn for-|| 0°? Could go outside the covers of * * eT jout while Motherdear renewed the [tepid bandages upon my eyeballs. Nandy's notion about the poverty of romance in my past was all wrong. Any girl of 16 has had one dream-romance at least. I had had mine—and Dick Barnes’ voice over the phone brought it back to me with painful vividness, The previous summer I had vis- ited the Vermont home of my Revo- lutionary ancestors for the first |time. And there I had met Jimmy Alcott. ‘With the money I had saved from jmy first year’s work as a star, I ‘had purchased the farm my fore | bears had surveyed 150 years ago, The town of Barnesville touched the boundary of my farm. Jimmy, that summer, never learn- ed that I was a mofie actress. It | was part of my vacation plan that hobody should have a chance to talk | shop. to me, which carried his marble to the main Page 518 line, SAVED BY A FOOL “That ugly woman was a good | a regular mountain trafl along the sport all right, wasn't she?” David | edge of a precipice. mid, when the-littlelady-with- “Below us the river rushed white-curis got to that part of her) madly over great rocks, and it story. “Did the Indians leave! looked deep and wider than we them?” had expected, and was full of “No,” she told him, “but they| whirlpools and eddies, * Little dropped back a little and followed | wooded islands dotted it and from one of these, larger than the rest, smoke rose from the camp fires of another band of Indians. “All the time the leaders of our party were talking and planning and wondering what they could do if the Indians should attack us in the narrow gorge, the poor half wit had been watching the In- dians, putting together bit by bit the things he could understand of what they said, and working his I cut back several times to a cer- [tain scene: Jimmy—moonlight—a jyellow Persian cat—and I! There was a most exciting “chase” after my feline. Motherdear, tired of the pursuit and sure that the cat would come back, retreated to a restful corner of the veranda. Jimmy and I pursued his majesty, Smilodon, but couldn't catch him. Instead, Jimmy caught me as we emerizxed from opposite sides of the |shrubbery and reached for the cat between us. Smilodon evaded us and made a beautiful lazy leap to a low bough, poised there waving his tail grace- fully and eyeing us indulgently. Jimmy reached for him, clutched him and was badly scratched. We handed the reprobate over to Motherdear and then I washed Jim- my's wounds at the old fountain un- as they had before, “We had some beautiful iris, young ladies I mean, in our party, and for two days not one} of them dared show her face for fear the savages would see and capture her; we all remained hid- den in the wagons and only the YAS, HE AM \F HE DON'T MUST BE A PRETTY] cet cauaur AT rr! ANY BRAINS OUT OF You, COULD HE, Pop ? Confessions of a Movie Star — talked in the moonlight—un Motherdear called me! I could swim and row and with the boys. TI had gone to hig school with them and to school—and they were all alike me. Just boys! But. Jimmy was different. Perhaps it was because Jimmy. older—10 years older than I, Jimmy had been as much a of that summer as the view or alr or the trees. He came to see daily, When he failed to appear ¢ evening, Motherdear was a little turbed. bd I might as well know the : she said. Jimmy’s father was on ing some business troubles, Dee the general financial slump, ss ably. Jimmy would explain. mustn't be fussy. a & ’ we CHAPTER VIII—THE SCANDAL OF BARNESVILLE or & Cissy Sheldon slipped out of my| Now, Jimmy’s father was the der the trees, and there we sat | vudouh st & mpenportiee te «ee [ewesd de Gastron” We enon aie 01 jumme! o a own ee By abel C icland_ 4 | ogland town faded tn end faded |tank and even. the railroad spur Rie, plain. I never saw him again, Inside of a week, a dreadful dal rocked the little town of ville. (To Be Continued) stupid brain for all it was worth. “Now, I don't know whether you children know it or not, but Indifins are most awfully afraid of anything unnatural, And from the first they showed a sort of fear of that boy, and somehow or other he knew it." “Nearer and nearer came the dangerous, narrow trail along the of the precipice, and nearer nearer crept the savages, rid- ing now close up to the side of each slow-moving wagon. Inside the wagons we cowered and wait- ed, outside the crazy boy rode back and forth, watching. (To Be Continued) the elevator, When he snorted “Go ahead!” she was mortified. He thought she was a hayseed, she worried, The moment she was in their room, with the belfboy safely out of the way, she looked critically at Kennicott. For the first time in months she really saw him. His clothes were too heavy and provincial. His decent gray suit, made by Nat Hicks of Gopher Prai- rie, might have been of sheet iron; it had no distinction of cut, no easy grace like the diplomat's Burberry. His black shoes were blunt and not well polished. His scarf was a stupid brown. He needed a shave, But she forgot her doubt as she realized the ingenuities of the room She ran about, turning on the taps of the bath-tub, which gushed in- stead of dribbling like the taps at home, snatching the new wash-rag out of its envelope of oiled paper, trying the rose-shaded light between the twin beds, pulling out. the Araav- ers of the kidney-shaped walnut desk to examine the engraved sta- tionery, planning to write on it wo every one she knew, admiring ‘the claret-colored velvet arm-chair and the blue rug, testing the ice-water chill elegance; she was faintly an- «ry at him for the vulgar way in which, after signing the register “Dr, W. P. Kennicott and wife,” he | bellowed at the clerk, “Got a nice room with bath for us, old man?" She gazed about haughtily, but as |she discovered that no one was in | terested in her she felt foolish, and) | ashamed of her irritation. She asserted, “This silly lobby ts too florid,” and simultaneously she admired it: the onyx columns with gilt capitals, the crown-embroidered velvet curtains at the restaurant door, the silk-roped alcove where | pretty girls perpetually waited for mysterious men, the | two-pound boxes of candy and the variety of magazines at the news stand, The hidden orchestra was lively. She saw a man who looked like a Huro- pean diplomat, in a loose top-coat and a Homburg hat, A woman with a broadtail coat, a heavy lace veil pearl earrings, and a close black hat entered the restaurant. “Heavens! ‘That's the first really smart woman I've seen in a year!” Carol exulted. She felt metropolitan, But as she followed Kennicott to the elevator the coat-check girl, & confident young woman, with cheeks powdered like lime, and a blouse eign plays, given by @ lot of ama-| the wagons. teurs? Why don’t you wait for a| Wiese wus’ alas th ths Gaete 6 ga | st ham gy bal poor half.witted fellow, to whom ‘Lottie of TwoGun Ranche my father had been kind, ‘Cops, and Grooks'—real Bre stuff, with ‘the New York casta.| What's this junk you want to ‘How He Lied ‘to Her Hust Hm. That doesn’t listen so Sounds racy. go to the motor show, I suppose. | I'd like to see this new Hup road ster. Well—" | She never knew which attraction made him decide. She had four days of delightful worry—over the hole in her one good silk petticoat, the loss of a string of beads from her chiffon and brown velvet frock, the catsu stain on her best georgette crep blouse. She wailed, “I hayen't a single solitary thing that’s fit to be seen in,” and enjoyed herself very much indeed. Kennicutt went about casually let: ting people know that he was “go- ing to run down to the cities and see some shows.” ‘Ag the train plodded thru the gray prairie, on a windless day with the smoke from the engine clinging to the fields in giant cotton-rolls, “People urged father not to let him join the emigrant train, but father felt sorry for him and woulln’t'sénd him back.” “ ‘He'll surely make trouble for | the .fallow’s. a fool, half y,) the men said, But father went right on being good to him, “Well, we were more and more uneasy, of course, as we neared m and found that it was you; wen, traffic. When a clerk in an over. coat too closely fitted at the waist stared at her, she moved nearer to Kennicott'’s. arm. The clerk was flippant and urban. He was a su perlor person, used to this tumult. Was he laughing at her? For & moment she wanted the secure quiet of Gopher Prairie, In the hotellobby she was self. conscious, She was not used to hotels; she remembered with jeal- ousy how often Juanita Haydock talked of the famous hotels in Chi cago. She could not face the travel- ming. She was the young poet attacking fame and Paris, In the Minneapolis station the crowd of lumberjacks, farmers, and Swedish families with innumerous children and grandparents and pa per parcels, thelr foggy crowding and their clamor confused her. She felt rustic in this once familiar elt after a year and a half of Goph Prairie. She was certain that Ken nicott was taking the wrong trolley- car, By dusk, the liquor ware houses, Hebraic clothing shops, and in a low and writhing wall which shut off the snowy fields, she Aid| lodging houses on lower Hennepin hot look out of the window. Whe|ave. were smoky, hideous, ill-tem-|leather chairs. She wanted people] percilious glance Carol closed her eyes and hummed, and|pered. Sho was battered by the|/to believe that her husband and|again, She unconsciously did not know that she was hum- noise and shuttling of the rush-hour'she were accustomed to luxury andjfor the bellboy to precede her into ing salesmen, baronial in large tap, and squealing happily. when the! low and thin and furiously erimson,| water really did come out cold, She inspected her, and under that su-/ftung her arms about Kennicott, was shy| kissed him, waited} “Like it, old ladyt” “It's adorable, It's so amusing. I $$$ love you for bringing me. You really are a dear!” se He looked blankly indulgent, and yawned, and condescended, “That's a pretty slick arrangement on the radiator, so you can adjust it at any temperature you want. Must take a big furnace to run this Gosh, I hope Bea remembers to , off the drafts tonigh Under the glass cover of the dress ing-table was a menu with the most enchanting dishes: breast of guinea hen De Vitresse, pommes de terre a la Russe,’ meringue gateaux Bruxelles. “Oh, let's-- I'm going to have ® hot bath, and put on my new — hat with the wool flowers, and let's go down and eat for hours, and We'll have a cocktail!” she chanted. While Kennicott labored over om dering it was annoying to see him permit the waiter to be tmpertinent, but as the cocktail elevated her to — @ bridge among colored stars, ag the | oysters came in—not canned oysters in the Gopher Prairie fashion, but” on the half-shell—she cried, “If you only, knew how wonderful it is not to have had to plan this and order it at the butcher's : fuss and think about it, and watch Bea cook it! I feel so free, — And to have new kinds of food, different patterns of dishes 4 linen, and not worry about. the pudding ts being spoiled! Chantilly, 4 st