Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 249, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 October 1918 — Cheating Catherine [ARTICLE]

Cheating Catherine

By IMES MACDONALD

(Copyright, MIS, toy tha McClura Newspaper Syndicate.) The last of her line was Catherine Van Wye, who lived with two maiden aunts In the old colonial mansion that had been the home of the Van Wyes for a hundred and forty years. Stiff and prim had been her upbringing, and not for a single instant had she been permitted to forget that she was a Van Wye—something rarer, something fairer, something so much closer to heaven than any one of the “common people.” After a fashion Catherine was pretty, but a little too slim, a little too wan. Her blood may have been blue, but also it was thin. She was delicate, but Catherine had wealth, was cultured in the ignorance of life as her grandmother had been —this "showed in her shy, rather wondering eyes—but she did have one redeeming trait which might save her from a bai+en life of oldmaid gentility—and that trait was curiosity. • The only man Catherine knew who was anywhere near her own age was John, the chauffeur. She used to sit primly behind John in the car and study the |mck of his well-set head and sturdy shoulders, and wonder about men in general as represented by John. If it had ever occurred to him, John might ha VP encouraged Catherine to think about him in particular. He might have even done this so successfully that she would have eloped with him, for John was a good-looking boy, but he had never once given Catherine a thought. A certain* little maid in the stone front over in the next block completely filled John’s head and heart Poor Catherine could never have competed with Adele, the little maid, for Adele- had blood-red lips and daring eyes—she was all curves and dash and vitality—and John was mad about her. However, John's presence always set Catherine’s curious mind to wondering about men in general. It wasn’t nice, of course, for to wonder about men was quite vulgar, she knew that her aunts had said so. They had impressed upon Catherine that she was a Van Wye and a sacred thing, and she believed it The idea of a man’s even so much hs touching her gave her shivers of horror—especially an ordinary * man of the People—for the People were terribly common, and Catherine was patrician, very patrician, indeed. Then one afternoon it so happened that Adele had occupied so much of John’s time and thought that he had neglected his job and the car, so much so that that neglected piece of mechanism stalled right on a busy crossing on the avenue. It certainly was embarrassing, for the traffic policeman was as sore as a wounded rhinoceros. He called John a “mutt,” and would probably have said worse things than that if it hadn’t been for Catherine’s patrician presence. But the engine would not start and the traffic was piling up behind them while the traffic regulator became more and more angry. “Here!” he roared. “Swing her down the middle of the block next the curb!” And as he heaved his massive weight against the back corner of the heavy car one Jim Brand detached himself from the passing throng and joined In pushing the heavy car out of the way. “You oughta be on the force, with them shoulders.” The policeman grinned his thanks to Jim Brand as they rolled the big car up to the curb. But Jim only laughed and waved his hand in a half salute as the other went back to his job. “Thank you very much indeed,” said Catherine primly as Jim Brand turned to her with his hat In his hand, and her eyes as she sat in the car were almost on a level with his own. His first thought was that she would have been pretty If she had a little more life to her.

“Shell have to go to the garage, miss," offered John, meekly. “I’ll get yon a taxi,” smiled John Brand. He did so, and handed her Into It most naturally by taking firm hold of her arm. And no young man had ever before taken hold of Catherine’s arm. From the taxi she leaned out and thanked him again, smiling just a little excitedly, for this was an adventure. Then, summoning all her courage, she said: “Were you going downtown? Perhaps I could drop you somewhere.” So Jim Brand got in beside her and they rolled down the avenue, at length stopping in front of Catherine’s home. “I—l was really on my way uptown,” confessed Jim Brand, humorously, “but I —wanted Jo ride with you.” - Catherine didn’t know what to say to that, so she Just looked —and then looked away, wondering If either of her aunts was observing the tableau as she and the strange young man stood there on the walk. “You’re not offended, are you?” he asked. “I—l should be” —she entered the gate and turned to him for a fleeting instant—’’but I'm not!” And with a little laugh she ran up the steps. The very next Sunday morning quite early Catherine crossed the street to the park opposite the houses The aristocracy of the square only use the park during the early hours, before the rabble of the city fills the beiiehes, so she sat herself down in the early morning sunlight and wondered about Jim J ' • ■:■■■' -i-. -v 3

Brand, who at that very moment came strolling toward her. “I hoped Td find you—-aren’t you go* ing to ask me to sit down*” Then he sat down anyway. It was qnite startling and very exciting. He questioned her and teased her, treated her just as if rite weren’t a Van Wye and sacred—just as if she were a girl whom he liked. ‘"Let's walk,” he finally said, rising and catching her by the hands to draw her to her feet. He was "like that—just sudden and abruptly.insistent —It took Catherine’s breath completely away. And the color came into her cheeks and lips, and animation to her eyes. She fairly sparkled in response to his vital presence, and she completely forgot herself and her aunts and tradition. So it went She met him many times. Apparently by accident, but really by arrangement, although Catherine herself never fully realized this. And suddenly her aunts noticed a change in her. She grew rounder, color became pronounced, her lips were red always and her eyes danced on the slightest pretext. The aunts were perplexed until one evening Catherine was late to dinner. She had been out all afternoon In the car. Jim Brand had riven John $5, and they had left John to his own devices while Jim took the wheel, with Catherine in the seat beside him. Together all afternoon they had breezed along through the country recklessly happy. Hence Catherine’s lateness to dinner. At the Van Wye table that night there was less conversation than usual.** The aunts were uneasy. Catherine’s father had been a "little wild in his youth, and the aunts wondered vaguely until Catherine arose from the table with a little smile. “Aunt Belinda, were you ever grabbed suddenly by a nice young man and hugged close up to his heart and kissed ever so many times right on the mouth before you realized what was happening?” "Whatever put such notions into your head, Catherine Van Wye? Certainly not IV said Aunt Belinda, severely. “Then I reel very sorry for you, Aunt Belinda,”, said Catherine, demurely, “for you have missed something.” “Catherine!” chorused the horrified aunts in despair, but their terrible niece had danced toward the telephone. And an hour later Jim Brand was playing ragtime on Catherine’s piano while that young woman stood behind him and patted the syncopated time on his broad shoulders, occasionally leaning down to rub her smooth cheek against his, while In the room above those maiden ladies, her aunts, communed in solemn conference. “And he’s just a common country boy who happens to go to college!” said Aunt Melvina. “I don’t see what we can do about it,” said Aunt Belinda helplessly; "she’s twenty-one and has the Van Wye willfulness!’’ And every now and then Catherine Van Wye unexpectedly launches her agile young body like a catapult upon her surprised husband and hugs his head savagely to her breast, murmuring: “And they would h»ve me out of this! Cheated me out of life, and love, and you—you common person!” But Jim Brand only grins and gives his ardent wife a proper kissing, which vulgar practice, I regret to say, seems to agree with the last of the patrician Van Wyes.