Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 113, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 May 1918 — SAW[?] [ARTICLE]

SAW[?]

Movie SpeiM ® j to Ttt’KN Ono Among the moit Be Called a One Had to Pay for Headgear. My seat was directly behind those occupied by the-trio who figured in a serio-comic accident that • convulsed nearby spectators in a Broadway moving picture theater the other afternoon. I therefore am able to tell just what happened and giye details that must have puzzled persons sitting a little farther away. The two wonmn were loaded down with parcels and small packages when, right In the middle of a thrilling drama they slowly and cautiously fitted themselves into two orchestra chairs near the middle aisle. It was a tight fit, for neither of the ladies could be described as sylphlike in form, and the armfuls of purchased bundles contributed in no way to facilitate adjustment of the generous cargo nature previously entrusted to each. Parcels of various sizes slid from their knees into recesses under the seats In front and slopped into the aisle from the lap of one who sat nearest to it. The theater was in semidarkness, and it was only by the groping of many hands, in response to whispered appeals, that the troubles of diligent hours spent in shopping were returned to them. They then apparently for the first time discovered that the adjoining seat—third from the side—was unoccupied, and into it they dumped their bundles and their hats. Quiet in the immediate vicinity had scarcely been restored when a stout, middle-aged man arrived with coupon calling for the seat they had just converted Into a sort of family catch-all. Regardless of their exclamations of despair he inched his way in. while they with frantic haste struggled to clear off the place upon which he was to sit. < Peace finally descended again upon the neighborhood, and we had given ourselves up to undisturbed wonder concerning the fate of the film heroine should the villain penetrate her disguise as a French artillery officer, when one of the package-laden women said to the other: “Mercy! I promised to be home hy five o’clock. Lucy is going out and I forgot all abaut it.” While the speaker, who sat nearest the aisle, arranged her hat and pierced it with a couple of pins, her companion struggled to convert the fruits of their shopping into two portable pyramids. Suddenly she uttered a little scream, and then . w’hispered to her friend in awe-stricken tones, “I can’t find my hat. I believe that man is sitting on it.” “Gracious goodness,” said the other. “Ask him.” “I can’t do it,” said her friend. “You ask him.” Thus appealed to, the bolder.of the two turned to the man, who appeared to have heard nothing of their conversation. and said: “I think you are sitting on this lady’s hat.” “I am not doing anything of the sort • why should I?” was the amazing reply she received. “Sit down,” cried several voices to the hatted and hatless ones, from whose arms bundles again began to leak. “I am not sitting on your hat, ma’am,” said the suspected male, “but it it will do you any good, I’ll prove Then he arose, and from under his ponderous body the hatless woman removed what had once been a towering millinery creation, with twin pinnacles soaring aloft, but which was now only a pancake of cloth and feathers. A wave of mingled applause and protestation swept that part of the theater, as the shoppers departed, pausing every few feet to recapture some meandering parcel. —Madge Arthur, in Buffalo Courier.