Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 January 1913 — Their Narrow Escapes [ARTICLE]

Their Narrow Escapes

‘lt was like, this,” explained the man after the others had told him that he was looking pale. "I was to meet my wife’s cousin downtown to buy a present for my wife, and, of course, she was late. I got tired standing in the store entrance, where we were to find each other, so I started down the street tomeet her. In the crowd I saw her coming and she was at her old tricks—carrying her handbag tucked carelessly under one arm, ready to tumble out or be grabbed. “Keeping my eye on the bag, I resolved to give Emma the Jolt of her life and scare her Into a fit of common sense. Just as I got in front of her I reached out and took the handbag. Then I looked at her triumphantly, condescendingly, accusingly. At least, I started out with the intention of crushing her with that sort of a gaze, but I never completed it, because —well, you see, it wasn’t Emma! “It was, however, a perfectly good imitation of her and she was both scared to death, hopping mad and ready for hysterics. There was one awful second when she opened her lips to scream and at that instant the crossing policeman looked ten feet high to me and fierce in proportion. In the last panic of desperation I grabbed her arm so hard that It hurt her so she couldn’t yell and pleaded for my life. I gasped out that it was a mistake and she Indignantly assured me It certainly was, the biggest mistake of my life, but that that was what they all said when they got caught.

“I assured her that I thought she was my Cousin Emma and she looked at me scornfully. She was beginning to get back her breath and her courage. She said no doubt Cousin Emma was a most estimable person, but she didn’t thank me for taking her for the cousin of a pickpocket and opened her mouth again to scream. I think I shook her then—at any rate, her scream was lost. I never before talked so fast In my life or so much. It was like having three seconds before the drop was sprung to say all I wanted to say. I told her all about my great-grandfather who was In the Revolutionary war an{d the new house I was building and how respectable the club were to which I belonged and how I had credit at all the stores. "Either I led her to think I was insane and dangerous or else my piteous gaze roused a spark of humanity in her, because by the time the crowd had drawn the policeman to us she quite snapped at him and told ~fiim nothing was the trouble and to go back to waving his hand at automobiles and let her manage her own affairs. Anyhow, she let me slink away without raising any row. I’m still shaking!” "I expect she didn’t mind so much, because she’d spent all her money for Christmas, and there wasn’t anything in the pocket book,” said one of the other men. “I’m not precisely breathless over your very narrow escape, because' I had one that was so much worse a short time ago. Say, couldn't a blind man with his head In a sack tell from one brief glance at me that I am a respectable, straitlaced family man? Could any one ever mistake me for a gay and roistering blade, or do«B any one exist who would dream of accusing me of flirting? "Well, the other night I was taking my wife and Jones’ wife downtown to dinner. Jonea was to join us at the case. I stopped to buy a paper and the women walked on ahead. It was terribly crowded on the streets that time of the evening, and my wife 1» so used to being looked after that I was afraid she would walk under an automobile or alt down and rest on the car tracks or something, so I tore after them. I caught up just as my wife stepped off the sidewalk to the crossing. Slipping my hand under her elbow, I leaned over close and said distinctly—oh, most distinctly—’Be camful, dearie, about crossing the street!’"

"Wasn't It yoor wife?" "Of course not!” shouted the man who was telling the story. "It’s never your wife in a situation like that! "Say, the things that woman said to me then and there! The memory of them wakes me up In the night and they make frescoes all over any wall I look at! What did $ do? What can a man do when a woman possessing a fine and fluent command of English and plenty of time starts In to relate her opinion of him to his face? I gasped like a goldfish on land and turned pea green and maybe I got down on my knees to her and prayed —l’m not sore. "My wife and Mrs. Jones were a block ahead and I was glad they were, because my wife 1» -er excitable. I didn’t want to have to explain to her, too.

"Nothing on this earth would have saved me from being handed over to the policeman by that woman if a passing truck horse hadn’t chewed her hat under the Impression that the green leaves on It were real. In she excitement I took to my heels. I ran as though I had robbed the bank and had five minutes too few to catch the train.

“Then my wife made tie take a bib ter tonio three times e day for e week because I had ao appetite for dinner that night!"