The Seattle Star Newspaper, December 7, 1921, Page 11

‘MAI N STREET. The Story of Carol Kennicott RY SINCLAIR LEWIS Copyright, 1920, Harcourt, Brace & Howe, Ine. on Page Six) ghe could do any more HR aimply breaks my heart and fea me to think what she may gone already, even if some of oat understand and know about Pymoaupt Who are you talking about Fern Mul ot pleasantly talking Eennicott was incredulous certainty am" flourished Mre ’ “and good and thankful yeu that I found her out in time, she could get you into some. Carol, cause even if you are ina Will's wife and ~ let me tell you right Carol Kennicott, that you ain't vgeag respectful to—you ain't as You don’t stick by the good ways like they Was laid down for be God in the Bible, and while there ain't a bit of harm & geod laugh, and I know ain't any real wickedness in thesame you don't fear nate the transgressors of commandments like you ought gand you may be thankful I found at this serpent I nou 0 oh yes! oh yes indeed! lady must have two exes every for breakfast, and ees six ts a dozen, and wa'n't satisfied ‘oné, like most folks—what did i care how much they cost of if : couldn't Make hardly noth- ‘on het board atid room, in fact took her in out of charity and have known from the kind @ stockings and clothes that she into my house in her they got her story she had » minutes of obscene wal- ‘The gutter comedy turned tragedy, with Nemesis in kid gloves. The actual story depressing, and unim- As to details Mrs. Bogart indefinite, and angry that she de questioned. | Fern Mullin and Cy had, the even. ing before, driven alone to a bam- in the country. (Caro! brought the admission that Fern had tried ‘to get dchaperon.) At the dance Cy bad Fern—she confessed that. obtained a pint of whisky iu he didn't remember a » he had got it; Mrs. Bogart that Fern had given it to Fern herself insisted that he olen it from a farmer's over. Mrs. Bogart raged, was alie, He had become sog Fern had driven him . gave ft confessed that all of the Fern, because the own teacher—had dared Bogart, the impudence Purpose Wanting the filthy pup to ’ People’s motals—you're worse op) papederggead I says. I let * good. I wa'n't going to from my bounden duty and Ht ber think that decent folk» had Jamil her vile talk. ‘Purpose?’ ‘Mays, ‘Purpose? I'll tell you what a you had! Ain't I seen you Raking up to everything in pants it'd waste time and pay attention oF Ciwe ee es iZiK\ “After their leader. 4 When Nick asked where Crooka ‘bone lived he was told “across the — from the chimneysweep, and it door to the toymaker.” And iwhen he asked where the toymaker fe was told “across the street ‘om the chimneysweep and next © Crookabon: he axked how big Crooka- S cellar was he was told to ly the length by the width, Pee ceiling was as far above the is the floor was below the ceil- tried once more. “Where's pm he asked, just as Nancy had » “Above his shoes!’ came the at once, who said it thought that he telling the truth. But some ing happened. The cat's eye over wate that had been glaring down them with a baleful green light, ly turned pink and then red. Jumped to hin feet. “That's vot the truth, Jigabump,” be ished in my | |.| “then I go and bring into my own ADVENTURES INS natantly all the ugly gnomes were struggling and scusfung ‘jover, that means that he is hunting And of course the | }to your iMpert'nence? Ain't 1 seen | you showing off your legs with them short skirts of yours, trying to make out lke you was so girlish and la | deda, running along the street?” | Carol was very sick at this ‘sion }ot Fern's eager youth, but she was sicker as Mra. Bogart hinted that) jno one could tell what had happened between Fern and Cy before the drive }home, Without exactly describing the scone, by her power of lustful imagination the woman suggested |dark country places apart from the lanterns and rude fiddling and bang jing dancesteps in the barn, then madness and harsh hateful conquest | Carol was too sick to interrupt. It | was Kennicott who cried, “Oh, for God's sake quit it! You haven't any idea what happened. You haven't| | given us a single proof yet that Fern i anything but a rattie-brained | youngster.” | “L haven't, eh? Well, what do yout Seay to this? I come straight out and 'T says to her, ‘Did you or did you! | not taste the whisky Cy had? and/ |she says, ‘I think I did take one sip | | —Cy made me,’ she aaid. She owned | up to that much, so you oan im | agine—" “Doon that prove her a prost! tute?” asked Carol. “Carrie! Don't you never tse a word like that again! walled the out | aged Puritan, | “Well, does it prove her to be a | bed woman, that she took a t | jof whisky? I've doné it myseit™ } “That's different. Not that I ap | prove your doing it. What do the Scriptures tell us? ‘Strong drink {| }& mocker’! But that’s entirely dif-| | ferent from a teacher drinking with [one of her own puptis.” } “Yea, it does sound bad. Fern was | silly, ufdoubtedly. But as a matter of fact she's only a year or two older than Cy, and probably a good many years younger in experience ot vice.” “That’s—not—true! She ts plenty old enough to corrupt him “The job of corrupting Cy was done by your sinless town, five years ago!” Mra. Bogart did not rage tn return. Suddenly she was hopelees. Her) head dropped. She patted her biack kid gloves, picked at a thread of her | faded brown skirt, and sightd, “He's @ good boy, and awful affectionate | if you treat him right. Some thinks , he's terrible wild, but that’s because hv young. And he's so brave and truthful——-why, he was one of the | Girst tn town that wanted to enlist | for the war, and I had to spenk real | Sharp to him to keep him from run. ning. I didn’t want him to get into no bad influences round these camps —and then,” Mrs. Bogart rose from her pitifulm recovered her pace, house a woman that’s worse, when alle said and done, than any bad! woman he could have met. You say this Mullins woman is too young and inexperienced to corrupt Cy. Well then, she’s too young and inex. (perienced to teach him, too, one or Vother, you can't have your cake and ¢at it! So don’t make no differ ence which son they fire her for. and that’s practically almost what I said to the sctiool-board.” “Have you been telling this story to the members of the school board?” “I certainly have! Every one of ‘om! And their wives. I says to them, ‘"Tain'’t my affair to decide what you should or should fot do with your teachers,’ 1 sys, ‘and I ain't presuming to dictate In any | way. shape, manner or form. I just | want to know,” I says, ‘whether | you're going to #6 on record ad keep. ing here in our schools, among a lot Of innocent boys and girls, 2 woman that Gritike, smokes, curses, uses bad language, und d6é¢s auch dreadful things as I wouldn't lay tongue to | but you know what i mean,’ I says, ‘and if vo, IT! jast see to tt that the town learns about it.’ And that's what I told Professor Mott, too, bet superintendent—and he’s a Pimhteous man, not going autoing on the Bab. bath like the school-board membera. And the professor as much as ad mitted he was suspicious of the Mul j ling woman himself.” mW Kennicott was leas shocked and much less frightened than Carol, and more articulate in his description of | Mrs, Bogart, when she had gone. Maud Dyer telephoned to Carol and, after a rather improbable ques tion about cooking lima beans with | i wy, ay @: |aaid, so you'll have to give Nick a |forfeit. That cat's eye says wo. If Kip isn’t above his shoes, something j has happened, Kither he is hurt or }he is bending over. If.he ia hurt, we | must help him, and if he is bending |for the key to the Enchanted Cup- |board hiddeh under the coal in my |cellar. And he mustn't find it. Come joM, gnomes, come one, come all,” and Crookabone blew @ shrill blast on his whistle. | Instantly all the ugly gnomes were struggling and seuffling after their |leader, leaving Nancy and Nick alone in the middle of Gnome Village. The at's eye had turned green again and gave the only light visible in this | underground place, “Let's follow!” whispered Nick | “No, don’t,” said a new voice atl | their elbow, — ™ (T* Be Continued) (Copyright, 1921, by Beattle Star) | for what they had been afraid to do | were giggling (this second—ahe could | | ate you mickering at? | Fern? JUST THINK CHRISTMAS 1S ALMOST HERE OLIVIA TO WoRK THE RECEIVE AGREAT MANY CHRISTMAS PRESENTS THIS YGBAR MISS OLIVIA 1S TRYING THAT LAD Tom COME AWAY FROM RECKLES AND HIS FRIENDS — - bacon, demanded, “Have you heard the scandal about this Miss Mullins and Cy Bogart? “I'm sure it's a Ile" “Oh, probably is.” Maud's man-| ner indicated that the falsity of the mory was 4n insignificant flaw in} its general delightfulness. Carol crept (6 hér room, sat with hands curled tight together as she listened to @ plague of volees. She could hear the town yelping with it, avery soul of them, gteeful at new details, panting to win importance by having détails of their own to add. How well they would make up by imagining it in another! They who had not been entirely afraid (but merely careful and sneaky), all the barber shop roves and millinery parlor mondaines, how archly they hear then at it); with what self-com-| Mendation they were cackling their | suavest wit: “You can’t tell me she ain't a gay bird: I'm wise! And not one man in town to arry out their pioneer tradition of superb and contemptuous cursing, not one to verify the myth that their “rough chivalry” and “rugged virtues” were more generous than the pétty sean- dalpicking of older lands, not one dfamatic frontiersman to thunder, with fantastic and fictional ¢aths, “What are you hinting at? What What fact have you? What are these unheant./| of sins you condemn so much—dnd| |] like so well?” No one to say ft. Not Kernieott nor Guy Pollock nor Champ Perry. Erik? Possibly. He would sputter) uneasy protest She suddenly wondered what sub. terranean connection her interest in Erik had with this affair, Wasn't it because they had been prevented by her caste from bounding on her own trail that they were howling at mt Before supper she found, by half a dozen teléphone calls, that Fern had fled to the Minniemashie House. She hastened there, trying not to be seif- conscious about the people who looked at her on the street, The lerk said indifferently that he ‘guessed” Miss Milling was up in Room 37, and left Carol to find the way. She hunted along the stale- smelling corridors with their wall- paper of cerise daisies and poison. | green rosettes, streake@ in white! spots from «pitied water, their frayed red and yellow matting, and rows) of pine doors painted a sickly blue. She could not find the fiumber. If the darkness at the end of a corridor she had to feel the aluminum figures on thé door-panels. She was startied ofice by a man's voice: “Yep?! Whadyth Want?” and fied. When) she reached the right door she stood listening. She made out a long sob- bing. There was no answer till her third knock; then an alartied “Who is it? Go away!” Her hatred of the town turned rea olute as she pushed open the door. Yesterday she had seen Fern Mul lins in boots and. tweed skirt and candry-yellow sweater, fleet and self- posseased. Now she lay across the bed, in erumpled lavender cotton and shabby pumps, very feminine, utterly cowed, She lifted her head in stupid | terror, Her hair was in tousied strings and her face was sallow, creased. Her eyes were a blur from weeping. “{ didn’t! 1 didn’t?’ was all she would say at first, and she repeated it while Carol kissed her cheek, stfoked her hair, bathed her fore- head. Shé rested then, while Carol looked about the roorm—the welcome to strangers, thé sanctuary of hos pltablé Main Street, the lucrative property of Kennicott's friend, Jack: son Elder, It amelied of old linen and decaying carpet and ancient to- baceo amokée, The bed was rickety, with 4 thin knotty mattress; the | sandcoloréd walls were scratched | and gouged; in every corner, under everything, were fluffy dust and ¢i- war ashes: of tho tilted wash-stand Was 4 nicked and squatty pitcher;| the only chair was a grim straight object of spotty varnish; but there was an altogether eplendid gilt and rose cuspidor, She did not try to draw out Pern's story: Fern insisted on telling it. She had gone to thé party, not quite liking Cy but willing; to endure him ffor the sake of dancing, of e# caping from Mrs, Bogart's flow of moral comments, of relvxing after the first strained weeks of teaching. Cr “promised to be good.” He was, on the way out. There were a few workmen from Gopher Prairie at the dance, with many young farm-people, Half @ dozen squatters from a dé generate colony in a brush-hidden hollow, planteys of potatoes, sus- ected thieves, came in noisily drunk. hey all poundéd the floor of the barn in old-fashioned square dances, swinging théir partners, skipping, ldughing, undér thé incantations of Del Snafflin, the barber, who fiddled OU=IT'S SOMETHING AWFUL, AWFUL DRETTY, PoP, EVERETT TRUE SEATTLE STAR It Wea Getlina } | HOPE SO* CHRISTMAS PRESENTS ARE A HOBBY OF MINE~ 12 IGINE UP TAG o WHAT ARE You GOING To GIVE Grattle _ » * ar. + * bel Cleland _« age 540 FIRST TURKEYS IN OREGON Persy’s eyes were dancing, her dimplés were coming and going and she was about as happy as & little pioneer-hunter could be when Mrs, Washburn finished the story of the wood chopper. “Did pioneers eat roosters on Thanksgiving ‘stéad of turkeys?” whe questioned. “Pioneers ate chickens for quite a While in the Oregon country,” Mrs. Washburn told her, “before any turkeys were brought here. It was hard to get things started; you know it ts in & new country. “It was hard to get the first homes built, bitter hard to get the first roads thru, hard to put in the first gardens, hard to clear ground enough for fields and get enough’ grain planted to make a real crop, “But as you know, Oregon plo- neers were not afraid of hard things; if a thing neéded doing they did it whether it was hard or not. “Went, after a few years’ work my’ uncle Fendel Sutherlin had enough land cleared to plant @ wheat crop. Lthcthal and called the figu' 'y had two drinks from pocket-flasks, Fern saw him fumbling among the overcoats piled on the feed-box at the far end of the barn; soon after she heard a farmer declaring that somé one had stolen his bottle, She taxed Cy with the theft> he chuckled, “Oh, it's just a joké; I'm going to givé it back.” He demanded thas she take a drink. w,' he said to his wife, ‘the worst is over for us, it is begin: ning that is so hard. When we get this first crop in it will be smooth galling for us.’ “But Uncle Fendel didn’t know what 4 strangé thing waa hap- pening way hack in the state of Kansas or that that same strange thing could in any way affect the first wheat erop he had planted way out on the West Coast. “If there had been more malis and more newspapers, of course he would have read all about how the grasshoppers in armies, millions of grasshoppers, and had eaten every gréen thing as they came to it. He would have read that the vast grass hopper colony was moving west Ike a cloud, “But one morning—not having Deen forewarned at all—he woke to find the rails of his fence so covered with grasshoppers that you couldn't see the fence at all. It was covered with that swarm of insects. “How had they come? How could little bugs trayel those thousands of miles and what could he do now that they were here to save his crop?” (To had come Unless she did, the bottle. “{ just brushed my lips with it, and gave it back to him,” moaned Fern, She sat up, glared at Carol. “Did you éver take a drink?” “T have, A few. I'd love to have one right now! This contact with righteousness has about done me up he wouldn't return a Trifle Warm | WONDER IF I MAY HAVE A GLASS OF WATER, ce PLEASE P ALL AROUND TH!’ ‘TOP AN’ TRE LADIES AID SOCIETY, CORNERED “STINGY"Wi YES INDEED! EXCUSE ME NO YOu li ANEN'T I JUST DROPPED ‘TON TH IGGINS IN MARTHA ; ‘ WHICH RAFFLES OFF A QUILT TobAY, SNOOKS BRIER PAT CHS! MANAGED To EVADE THE TCKET-SELLERS FouR DAYS, Confessions of a Movie Star The whistle of a meadow lark in @ city fog at midnight must have startied more than one passerby, must havé made; somé of them smile. ‘The quick beat of running feet as- | |wured me that my strange “S. O. 8." |had been heard. And béecause the |unexpected often becomes the ex- | Barnes! | Sheldon! ‘They are athletes, Cissy, tall, thin and powerful; Dick, short, square and more powerful. Naturally my ductors were into their auto, and off, and lost in the fog before Dick had pieked me up from the pavement where I had been violently thrown, Motherdear had kept one of the mauraders occupied, When the danger was over, shé shook like a| fever victim, Perhaps her shaken | nerves, perhaps the darkness of the night, prevented her from recogniz- ing Jimmy. After the resene, he left us with Cissy while he hunted up a taxi for lus. Then he departed as if he wish- led to avoid our gratitude. Cissy ¢s- corted us home. And at his heels came Cissy | dear, lfrom her, but the secret was Dick's, | not mine, | why bother her? | pected, out of the mist came Dick | carry ‘me off? ab- | (Copyright, 1981, Seattle Star) Dick did not wish to meet Mother. I couldn’t bear to have a secret Moreover, I felt sure Motherdear would be as confused as I was about Jimmy's cénduct So— Who was back of the attempt to Mothérdear had me watohed for weeks by plainclothes men—to my) disgust. The passionate love let: ters in the disguised writing ceased | to come. But that proved nothing | to me. MeMasters came to the studios next morning and commended me with an odd smile, Dick Barnes did hot come near me except to ask if I of my mother had suffered from the shock, But Cissy came whenever he per- ceived an opening and stayed when- ever he came. Once more he announced that he wasn't fit to marry me, but neither was any other'man, and since I cer- tainly needed a strong man in the family, hé would like to be it! | May?" CHAPTER XXX—TWO HEROES COME TO MY RESCUE And once more I told him frankly that I didn’t see any sense in get- ting married, altho it might be awfully handy to have an athlete t0 depend upon in emergencies, 5 “Why are you such a little eynig, “Because I've learned that passes. Ask any of the older you know!” “I don’t need to! T've found for myself, I—I've been fooled I've pretended—as other men do. me tell you—I deceived myself, If was serious, something always hap: pened to break up the affair. At 1 blamed the girl always. I fair. I've done some thinking 1 met you, little girl. You—you's so true. I couldn't bear to deceli you, ever. J know a line that fité you, dear. Poetry sticks in my mind, you know. I know one little liné describes you exactly. It's like motif from an opera, Whenever See you T recall it: “| will be true—for there aré those who trust me.’ “That's you, little girl.” (To Be Continued) Fern could laugh then. “So would I! 1 don't suppose I've had five drinks in my life, but if 1 meet Just one more Bogart and son— Well, I didn’t really touch that bottle—hor- fible raw whisky—tho I'd have loved | some wine. I felt so folly. The barn Was almost like a stage seene—the | high rafters, and the dark stalls, and tin lanterns swinging, and a silage-| cutter up at the end like some mys- terious kind of machine, And I'd) been having lots of fun dancing with the nicest young farmer, so strong And nice, and awfully intelligent. But I got uneasy when I saw how Cy was. So I doubt if T touched two drops of the beastly stuff. Do you suppose God is punishing me for even want ing wine?” “My dear, Mrs. Bogart's god may Bbe—Main Street's god. But all the courageous intelligent people are fighting him tho he slay us,” Fern danced again with the young farmer; she forgot Cy while she was talking with a girl who had taken the University agricultural course. Cy could not have returned the bot- tle; he came staggering toward her— taking time to make himself offen- aive to every girl on the way and to dance a fig. She insisted on their returning. Cy went with her, chuck: ling and jigging. He kissed her, out: side the door, . “And to think 63 hl 8 ing to have men kiss you at @ dance!” . She ignored the kiss, | in the need of getting him home) before he started a fight. A farmer helped her harness the buggy, while Cy snored if the seat. He awoke before they set out; all the way home he alternately slept and tried to make love to her. “['m almost as strong as he is, I managed to kegp him away while I drove—-such a rickety bugey. I didn't feel like a girl; T felt like a scrub. woman—no, I guess T was too scared to have any feelings at all. It was terribly dark. I got home, somehow, But it was hard, the time T had to} get out, and it was quite muddy, to read a sign-post-I lit matches that} I took from Cy's coat pocket, and he} followed me—he fell off the bugey step into the mud, and got up and tried to make love to me, and— T was scared, But I hit him, Quite hard, And got in, and so he ran after the buggy, crying like a baby, and I let him in again, and right away again he was trying— But no matter, I got Wim home, Up-on the porch, Mrs, Bogart was waiting up, “You know, it was funny; all the time she wae—oh, talking to me~-and | Cy was being terribly sick—I just} kept thinking, ‘I've still got to drive} the buggy down to the livéry stable, I wonder if the livery man will be awake” But 1 got thru somehow. [1 used to think it was interest. and got to my room. I locked my door, but Mrs. Bogart kept sayi things, outside the door, Stood out there sayings things about me, dread> ful things, and rattling the knob. And all the while I could hear Cy in thé back yard—being sick, I don’ think I'll ever marry any man, then today— “She drove me right out of the house, She wouldn't listen to mé, all morning, Just to Cy, 1 supy he's over his headache now, fat breakfast he thought the wholé thing was a grand joke, T supposé right this minute he's going around town boasting about his ‘conquest. You understand—oh, don't you Um derstand? T did keep him away! But I don’t see how I can face my school, ‘They say country towns are fine for bringing up boys in, but—~ 1 be believe this is me, lying here saying this, I don't believe what happened last night. “Oh, ‘This was curious; When I took off my dress last night—it a darling dress, I loved it 60, of course the mud had spoiled T cried over it and— No matter, thy white silk stockings were torn, and the strange thing is, don't know whether I caught my in the briers when T got out to at the sign-post, or whether seratched me when I was fight him off.” 1 took the buggy down to the stable, (Continued Tomorrow)