Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 125, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 May 1916 — LEADING-STRINGS [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

LEADING-STRINGS

By H. M. EGBERT.

"I guess we’ll let the boy see what poverty’s like,” said close-fisted old Simon Granger to his wife. . Maria Granger agreed. She was a typical product of Newburgh, a manufacturing town of two hundred thousand souls, some of them bodies without souls, as one might say. < The Grangers, by virtue of Simon’s four million dollars, acquired in the packing business, stood at the head of the aristocracy, although the BarrySmlthsran them close, old Jim Smith, or Jim Barry-Smith, as his wife came to be known, owning some three millions acquired in the paper game. When Tom Granger announced his decision to become an author there was consternation. In the end his father gave him the choice between entering the packing business and earning his own living. “He’ll soon come to his senses, ma,” he told his wife. There was consternation also In the Barry-Smith household. Maud BarrySmith was considered as good as engaged to Tom. The union would establish the two families at the top of the Newburgh social register. Maud, a heartless, shallow society girl, upbraided Tom sternly. “Don’t be a fool, Tom!” she said. "Are you going to throw away all those millions? If you must write, do it at home, in your spare time.” Tom felt cut to the quick at the girl’s defection. He, too, had grown up in the idea that some day he was to do what had been drilled into him ever since he could remember —marry

Maud. However, he could not give up the plan, the great plan for the great novel. So he left the parental household ■with about twenty dollars in his pocket, ostensibly bound for New York. However, he knew that he could live unknown in a less secluded part of Newburgh, and he had no Intention of seeking his fortune in the metropolis. He went to a cheap boarding house not two miles from his home, and disappeared from the ken of his old associates. "When you’re ready to enter the packing business my home’s open to you,” his father had said. The first three weeks Tom spent •writing ceaselessly. Then he awakened to the fact that his money was gone. His landlady, a kind-hearted woman named Elkins, took him to task. "Writing may earn money,” she said doubtfully. "But a young man wants to get a job. A steady Job. Now why don’t you speak to Mr. Rogers on the fourth floor. He was saying only yesterday that there’s going to be a vacancy in his insurance office for a .couple of men.” Tom obeyed, because he had obeyed most of his life, and the upshot was that he found himself engaged at nine dollars a week on the clerical staff. And there his life began. To come home on Saturday nights, ■with nine dollars of actual earnings, with four over when his board was paid gave him a sense of strange and delightful independence. He had a good stock of clothes; he had ncFworries. And night after night he worked steadily at his book. He was depicting Newburgh, because it was all he had known, except for his years at college, which had left only a hazy impression. And because it was so simple the book ■was really great. Tom’s eyes were opened to the meaning of American life. He lived and worked tn an old-fashioned part of the city, not far from the roaring arteries of traffic, yet secluded as if it were a century ago. And the people whom he met, honest young working fellows and quiet families, were as different as possible from those of the old life, which seemed so far away. And if ever he had felt a tenderness for Maud Barry-Smith it was forgotten as soon as he set eyes on his landlady’s daughter, Elsa. Elsa was a girl of twenty, and studying stenography to help support her mother. Tom was amazed at the limitations of her knowledge. After a whtieitdawned on him that her limitations were precisely in those things of which he had never taken any account. The young'man was drifting Into a •very serious love affair when an amazing thing'happened. He had finished the book and sent It to a publisher, who bad accepted it. much to

his surprise, though he knew nothing of the difficulties of first books. But, two months later, he found himself famous. , All the papers were full of the young author who had been satisfied to stay at home and write of the local town. His photograph was in every Sunday issue. He was Interviewed. More satisfactory, he received a check, in first payment, for seven thousand dollars. Very soon his mother descended in triumph upon him and haled him forth with kisses and reproaches. Tom, who lived in a vague world (as always), in which the central figure was Elsa, had a misty vision of a tear-stained face, and a memory of his promises to return. “He’ll never return,” said practical Mrs. Elkins. “He’s the best ever, but —what’s the use? I know human nature, Elsa: So dry your eyes and don’t be a little goose!” At home Tom’s father condescended to Invite him to resume his life with the family. The neighbors, who thought a good deal of a man who could make good In the writing business. resolved to forget the scandal of his departure. Maud Barry-Smith released a tentative millionaire from her clutches. “I knew you’d make good, Tommy,” she said, and looked meaningly at him. Tom was too much absorbed in the plans for his second novel to read that light in her eyes. But everybody took the engagement for granted. They began to discuss the date of the wedding. Tom had a constant vision of Elsa’s tear-stained face. But, unpractical as ever, he only meant to return as soon as he had done his duty toward his family. Meanwhile his book absorbed him. Then one day the storm burst. "When are you going to ask Maud to be your wife?” his mother asked fondly. "You see, we don’t want to hurry you, Tom, but people are beginning to talk, and—” Tom felt a devil of craft enter his heart. All at once he saw the baited trap that awaited him. “Oh, yes, mother,” he answered vaguely. When she had gone he stole downstairs. Like a thief he left the house, gained the street, and took a street car. Half an hour later he stood, with desperate intent, before the overjoyed Mrs. Elkins. And Elsa, entering, saw them there. Tom heard her step, he turned and grasped her Ln his arms. "Tom!” she protested. “I came to ask you to marry me at once!” cried Tom. "At once, Elsa, dear.”' “But you two aren’t engaged!” exclaimed Mrs. Elkins, scandalized. “Now see here!” Tom burst out. “I guess we all got on together pretty well when I lived here, didn’t we? Well—l want Elsa. And I’m determined to have her. And those people the other side of Newburgh have got a plan for me to marry somebody else. I didn’t see it, because I never see things. But it seems that it’s all fixed, cut and dried, and —and it’s up to you two to help me out.” "Mr. Granger, you’re perfectly absurd!” exclaimed the mother. Tom turned to Elsa, who, oddly enough, was still half in and half out of his embrace. “I know I’m a fool. I can’t understand life. I can only write about it,” said Tom. "I wish I knew how to ask you properly, but —Elsa, dear, won’t you overlook my stupidity and tell me that you;n marry me? Yes, and take care of me. I want to marry you before they find I’m here and yank me away.” "Tom, do you love me?” the girl demanded, looking him very straight in the face. “I never loved anyone if I don’t,” said Tom. “Then —yes, dear,” said Elsa. “Because I love you with all my heart.” "Then I’ll take charge,” said Mrs. Elkins. "I believe you two young people were just made for each other, and you want somebody to look after you, Tom, you dear, foolish boy, because—” And she burst into tears at the thought of the happiness in store for the young people, and their love, which was to carry them through the uncharted seas of marriage. When, three hours later, Tom and Elsa found themselves husband and wife, and emerged into the late summer sunshine from the little church, an immense crowd surrounded them. Photographers came hurrying up with cameras. Their path was blocked — that magic path to the station and the honeymoon land. “Look!” gasped Mrs. Elkins, staring at a newspaper which somebody held before her. Under the caption "Author’s Runaway Marriage" she saw the photographs of the bride and groom. Then, through the crowd, scattering it, came an automobile, and Tom’s parents hurled themselves to the ground. “Stop the marriage if it isn’t too late!" exclaimed the father. - “It is too late,” said Mrs. Elkins, planting herself squarely in front of him. "Hurrah!” yelled a street urchin, capering before them. “You hear that, Simon?" asked Tom’s mother, with cold rage. "Our son has disgraced our name again, and Irreparably. I wash my hands of him forever more.” “Madam,” asked Mrs. Elkins, “pray maylask;haveyou “ever -dene- anything else?” But neither the anger nor the silence reached Tom’s ears. For already, with Elsa, he was traveling the flowery meads of honeymoon land, which reaches, if one can find the way, to the slopes of paradise. (Copyright, by W. G. Chapman.) Jfef *2

“Don't Be a Fool, Tom.”