Picard's game seems effortless. He's a long driver - in a tight spot, a heady strategist. 11 A cigarette, too, has to be sized up from a lot of angles, 11 he says.
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GEORGE SCHEER Editor-in-Chief; J. H. KELLOGG, Richmond College Editor; LAVINIA
WINSTON Westha'mpton College Editor; STUART GRAHAM, PAU_L SAUNI~R, JR ., ROYALL
BRANDIS 'MARTHA ELus, MARIE KEYSER, EUGENIA JoEL, Amstant Edtt?rs; R C. :t >H 'J B · M • JOHN S HARRIS MILDRED HARRELL, Assrstant Busrness
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By NATALYE T. BABCOCK
In this) a rather thin record of my !if e) I have used scents as my medium. Throughout my !if e) there seems to have been an odor which will connect up with each section. I have made n o endeavor to go deeply into this subjec t ) but I h a v e just written as I remember things just as they have been recalled to my mind. N. T. B.
II DON'T RECALL much of my life before my sixth year. I know of my life before that time only through stories told by others, and from pictures. I was a war baby born twenty years ago, in Astoria, Long Island City, New York. The apartment house was a five-story affair, with facilities which would hardly be considered modern today. Our five-room apartment had no heat other than that which was supplied by the coal range in the kitchen. It was this range which offers me one of the very first distin ct odors connected with my earliest years. Coal gas of ten filled the small dark kitchen, and many a time I sat in front of the open door of the stove warming myself after hours of play in the courtyard of the building.
My first connection with books came as a pre-school child. My mother was my first and best teacher. Before I entered the public school of that district, I could read, write, and was very adept in arithmetic. When the time came for me to be enrolled in the school, I went with my mother to the doctor's office for the neces-
sary vaccination. There was the second important factor ... the doctor's office. Disinfectant, and the smell of sharp steel implements, together with the clean odor of gauze ... my first recollection of our family doctor. It wasn't my first experience with Dr. Schoenfeld, however, for when I was about one year old, I had been the tiny victim of measles and scarletina. That was long before my sense of smell had begun to work in connection with my memory, though.
At six, I entered Public School No. 6. I stayed in the first grade only two weeks, and then I was promoted into the second grade I remember not liking to leave my first grade teacher, who was named Miss Rose Allen, ?l.nd I gave some excuse to leave the room, and from the second grade classroom, I returned to the first grade classroom, from which I was led, very forcefully, back to the second grade.
I remember that the basement of the school building, which was used for a playroom, was damp and musty. I used to think that dungeons, such as I had read about ( and I had read a good deal for a little girl) , would smell as that basement did.
My second grade teacher must not have impressed me very favorably, because I don ' t recall her name or her appearance. In fact, the whole of the second grade is vague in my mind. My third grade, however, brought with it new material dress material petticoat flannel. It brought my first attempt at
sewing. My teacher was a Mrs. Rose Macaulay, who had bright red hair, and whom I always connect with the odor of dress material. In this class I manufactured a most magnificent apron ( which I never wore) , and a flannel petticoat (ditto) . . . but they were masterpieces.
It was in the first half of this third grade that I was "skipped" to the second half. I was now seven years old, and two years younger than many children in my class.
The first half of my fourth grade goes quickly through my memory without any startling revelations. It was at this time that I developed a great interest in reading, and I can remember mother constantly telling me to put down my book and go play with the rest of the children. One of the strongest recollections of this time is the smell of fresh, hot bread. Mother would send me to the bakery two blocks from the house, every night just before supper. I would get a loaf of bread, and before I had reached home, there would be a hole in the end of the loaf where a small fist had dug out a tasty morsel. And I would swear that there must be a mouse in the bakery. It happened every time. This is the only time I can ever recall even tending toward falsehood in my whole life.
It was about this time that Mother began to take a fancy to curling my hair on Sunday mornings for Sunday school. I wore my hair cut in a Dutch bob, and Mother would curl those sorrowfully straight pieces on the side just above my ears, and every Sunday she would burn either my hair, or my ear ... Sunday morning and burned hair.
Another feature of Sunday morning was pancakes. My father always cooked Sunday morning breakfast, and he always cooked pancakes. For me, there were always little minute pancakes in a little dish and none I have
ever had since then have tasted as good as did those my Daddy made for me.
In the second half of my fourth grade came the most outstanding change of my life. Even now, twelve years later, the odor of carnations nearly drives me crazy. Why? I'll tell you briefly, because it is a rather painful subject. My Mother died-and the only recollection of the house full of flowers is that of the smell of carnations. I had loved carnations until that time. Now I can't smell carnations without bringing it all back . . . the coffin, the silence -the tears my not-understanding-it-all not quite. Daddy told me that God had taken Mother away-but I didn't know what he meant. I remember Mother, cold and still, in the living room, with the blinds drawn. I had been told not to go near the coffin; but once, in the middle of the night, I awakened and went into the living room, walked straight to the coffin with the strangest desire to touch Mother. I did touch her. And I cried myself to sleep afterwards. She was so cold-so marble-like.
•It's strange to me that out of so many flowers that were sent to her by her very many friends -out of so many kinds-that I should remember the carnation so vividly. I used to like it, but after that I never could smell a carnation without remembering. Even now, on Mother's Day, I wear a rose.
IIIt was after Mother's death that I really began to know my father. We became greater friends, which was natural, since I was the only child. I was a terrible tomboy, and Daddy and I went everywhere together. We used to go for walks after supper to the business section of town, and my favorite pastime was to stand in front of a certain store and sniff to my heart's content, while Daddy would look at
[4]
the hardware in the window of the store next door. It was my favorite smell, and still is. You'd never guess what it is-it's linoleum! Did you ever hear of anyone's favoring the odor of linoleum? I did, and do even now.
I'm afraid that I forgot something something that was connected with my life before my mother's death. I forgot the chocolate cake. Chocolate cake was my father's favorite, and Mother seldom made any other kind. If she did, I don't remember it. But I can remember opening the china-closet door and exclaiming, "Oh, choc'late cake!" Mother would say, "Don't tell Daddy." But Daddy always knew. I guess I couldn't keep secrets very well.
My Grandmother's house always smelled musty, as most grandmother's houses do, I imagine. Grandma lived on a farm in New Jersey, and besides the mustiness, there is the odor of fried foods, the strawberry patch where I always ate more than I picked, the cattle in the barn, and kerosene lamps.
Grandma died when I was ten years old, and I remember that I couldn't even cry at the funeral. I do remember how queer Popsey looked in store clothes, and how his shoes squeaked.
I passed into an extremely boyish age. I would ignore my girl friends and dolls for a bike or a tree to climb at any time. I was a worse tomboy than I had ever been. This time it was the smell of corduroy and sheepskin.
I had my tonsils and adenoids removed during my tenth year. I remember asking the nurse how old she thought I was, and I was so proud when she said that I looked about fourteen. I was quite tall, but skinny. A very awkward and spoiled child. Of course, the connection is ether.
In October, 1928, we moved out to Babylon,
Long Island. This time we lived with some distant relatives of Daddy's. We still live with them, and my cousins are like sisters to me, and my far-removed aunt has been my mother for the past ten years.
It was just a short while before this that I had become a sufferer from hay-fever. One of the most irritating of all things is that infernal plant, ragweed. It practically throws me into fits. Any flower will do me damage, but ragweed is my chief offender.
My next two years passed by rather unexcitedly. Nothing particularly outstandingno unusual happenings. I was more of a tomboy than ever; I would not play with the girls; I wore boys' clothes; I had my hair cut like a boy's; I despised dolls; I reveled with my bike and electric trains, which I still cherish.
At the close of my grammar school days, there were three turning points in my life. They are those marked by the scent of my first perfume, gardenia, starched dotted swiss, and nail polish. The beginning of a metamorphosis. I became a girl-no longer a tomboy. The dotted swiss was my graduation dress, and I remember how I stood on the platform in the school auditorium and delivered the salutatorian speech of welcome. Twelve years old and scared to death.
III
High school brought with it a complete change. I became feminine and pensive. I again became interested in reading which I had discarded for climbing trees and throwing rocks.
I remember the smell of liniment when I was on the track team in high school. I was a broad jumper, and I was constantly getting charley-horses in my legs. I had a lot of muscle and it was always getting knotted up.
I played basketball and baseball, too. I never
[ 5 J.
proved myself an outstanding athlete, but I enjoyed competition. I think that I can say that I was a good loser, for I never won anything-and I don't remember ever being hurt about it. Perhaps I was hurt for a short while, but I had always been told "Never complain" -and I didn't.
I took piano lessons. Most all girls do. My piano teacher always smelled so nice-as if she had just finished scrubbing herself. She was oh, so patient. She had to be. I hated to practice, and I knew millions of excuses to get out of it. And I used them all the time.
It was about this time that we acquired a pony. It belonged to my younger cousin, but I was the oldest, and I had to take more care of it than the smaller girls. I would ride him for exercise, and harness him to the carts for rides; I remember the smell of his stall and the sweat on his back when he was tired from exercise. You know how horses smell.
It was during my third year at high school that I was called upon to keep house. My aunt was taken ill very suddenly and had to be taken away from home. I was fifteen at the time. I did all the cooking, and managed the house for about two weeks, all by myself. Needless to say, the primary recollection is that of the kitchen and its connections. I was usually exhausted, trying to get supper ready on time, and cooking, and washing dishes, and performing the other duties of a housekeeper. I was very gallant and proud of it all, though.
My senior year at high school-what a time! I was what they called a "big shot"-secretary of the senior class, manager of girls' basketball, secretary-treasurer of the Press Club, sports editor of the school paper, president of the French Club, Le Cercle Franfais, if I remember correctly. I worked in the principal's office as his secretary and also was secretary to
my English teacher. I was efficient to the point that I could even sign the initials of the principal and the teacher, so that even they could not tell the difference.
When I was manager of basketball, the smell of the sweaty locker room was nasty. But I liked it, because it carried with it a sense of responsibility. The coach used to leave early and have me lock up, and see that practice was carried off right. I had a key-ring that jangled. It held a key for the gymnasium, a key to the coach's office, a key to the principal's office, a key to my English teacher's room, and three locker keys. And I lost them on an average of twice a month. But I always found them.
It was during this senior year at high school that I developed my first real "crush" on a boy. It was a lasting crush, too, because even now I look forward to his weekly letters with a lot more eagerness than anyone suspects. He was a year behind me in school, and a fourletter athlete-but he was a woman hater. I suffered in silence. . . .
In the spring of this same year, our class took a trip to Washington, D. C. Predominating in this trip was the stench of gasoline and hot bus tires. It was a memorable trip, with four hours sleep for me in the three nights we were there. We visited the White House, the Capitol, the Congressional Library, the Washington Monument, the Lincoln Memorial, Mount Vernon, as well as the mint, Smithsonian Institute-oh me, what a time!
Graduation from high school brought with it the scent of talisman roses, our class flower. Our motto was rrNon confectus, sed initum," "Not the end, but the beginning."
IV
After high school, I attended Columbia University in New York City for a year. I didn't like it. I can't pick out one singular recall
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for this period, as it seems a conglomeration. The subway, crowded trains, crowded elevators, many races of people. The most vivid odor is that of books. I'll never forget my amazement at the five-story library, where I used to sit and simply watch the people come and go-when I was supposed to be studying.
And then I came to Virginia. I began again as a Freshman at the University of Richmond. I like Virginia, and I like Westhampton College. My best friends are here.
One of the outstanding memories of my Freshman year is that of onion grass. On my first date, the boy and I were sitting on the grass on the hockey field, talking. He was from New York, too. I have the very bad habit of chewing on grass when I'm talking, and this time, I happened to pick up a blade of grass and chew on it. I realized that something was wrong. It was onion grass! I would have been more embarrassed, if it hadn't been for the fact that he had done the same thing.
With my Freshman year, I will always connect the smell of T oujours Mai perfume and those red-headed twins who roomed next door to me. They are from Philadelphia, and they still room next door to me-and they still use Toujours Mai. I used a very pungent perfume called Ben Hur. I'm afraid that I care for slightly more subtle scents now.
My summer vacation brought with it a trip to Niagara Falls with my aunt and uncle and two cousins. All I can remember of this trip is hay. It was haying time, and I was miserable the whole trip, except for those few minutes when we were down underneath the spray of the falls; my hay-fever was at its worst, or should I say best?
My Sophomore year at college brought me my change of life ambition. I had wanted to teach mathematics. But now I began to take a liking to English, and now I am completely up
to my neck in English, and I am planning to teach it. It changed all my college courses when I changed my ambitions, but I'm perfectly content. ... No regrets.
Most important in my Sophomore year was the Daisy Chain. I couldn't help gather the daisies, or take part in the making of it, because of my hay-fever. But I did carry it in the ceremony-and suffered for an hour afterwards for a few minutes of ceremony. The chain was based on honeysuckle, which caused a great furor with my nose and eyes. (Will I never get rid of that darn hay-fever?)
I forgot to mention as a part of my Freshman year that another smell was that of liniment again. I was playing hockey when I ripped the cartilege in my knee-cap. I remember liniment for quite a while after that, and I kept myself out of any further athletic contest. And I had been elected class hockey captain, too.
My Sophomore year, I was elected class treasurer, and served as a reporter on the Richmond Collegian. I became thoroughly interested in journalism until now I am, in my Junior year, just recently appointed editor for next year.
My Junior year brings with it the most important smell of my whole life. That of the print shop, where we print our college paper. It is the grandest smell I can think of, besides that of linoleum. The grime of the ink . . . the pungency of fresh news print . . . just everything about it satisfies me. That is the perfume I use during the day. I change my mood at night, and use Shanghai. It is crisp; it peps me up when I feel tired.
Last summer, when I stayed down here for summer school, my perfume was one called Heatherfield. The boy I was going with at the time was very fond of it, and I used it constantly. Ironically enough, when I stopped go-
[7]
ing with him, several months ago, the store which sold the perfume went out of business, and no other store sells it, insofar as I know. So, the perfume and the boy have both gone. But they are both nice to look back upon.
My most treasured memory is that of a night at the seaside, at Jones' Beach. I was with my first "crush," whom I have spoken of; but it was only two years ago. We were walking along the shore. It was dark and hot. But the sand was damp and cool, and I had taken off my shoes, and was enjoying myself to the utmost, walking and talking with him. We sat and watched the ocean waves boom into
the shore and smelled the fresh salt air and saw the phosphorus in the waves. Have you ever been to the shore at night? If you have you'll know what I mean; there is about it an indescribable odor that is heavenly and unforgettable, especially when you are with the right person. V
As for my future life, all I ask is a classroom in which to teach-with the smell of chalk and books, pen and ink. Added to this, may there be freshly printed paper, whether it be a newspaper, or a book out of my own mind-and a home of my own. We all have dreams.
1ancied
Fancied dreams! My thoughts are now Dead as leaves on chestnut bough That seem so old of ages past, Yet strive to struggle till the last Breath of life has left this brow.
Fancied dreams? My thoughts have known The careless scent of lilies blown Upon the willowy wind of spring, And sensed fresh songs dew stars sing Amid the many bladed grasses fl.own.
Fancied dreams. Ah, yes, but only those Who have touched a lily's grandiose, Or searched the mind for hidden lair And drunk of dew-stars fare, Have pierced life's fragile comatose
DONALD
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E. TRUMP.
By PHILIP COOKE
"FoR ALL OF YOURtheories and arguments about this case," said Junior Inspector Robert Milton's sister, "I still don't think that any person could be so cold-blooded as deliberate1y to cause the death of an innocent man to kill a guilty man, no matter what the motives are."
But Inspector Milton was not so sure about that.
For a few days the front pages of the London newspapers screamed at the public eye the facts that a Mr. Conant had been found one dismal morning on the outskirts of that city with the sum total of three bullet holes in the back of his skull. The coroner pronounced him dead at the hands of a person or persons unknown, and Scotland Yard immediately set to work on the case.
Five things were found out when the dead man's effects were gone over: one, he was from Australia; two, he had a son; three, he was well-off financially; four, he was about to make an accusation that one of his partners had mismanaged the funds of his firm to an alarming degree; fifth, on him at the time of his death he had important papers, dealing with that unknown person, which the police were unable to locate when they arrived.
Scotland Yard sent a wire to the son informing him of his father's death. They questioned the two remaining partners. After a while, when the papers had shifted their attention to something more interesting than an unsolved crime, they turned the case over to Junior Inspector Milton.
Conant's body was sent to Australia at the wired request of his son. At the Yard, all ex-
[9}
cept Milton and a few of the higher-ups soon forgot the case.
* * *
The front door bell rang just as Milton sat in his favorite chair preparing for a quiet evening with a book and pipe. He opened the door on a man dressed in formal attire. Not over twenty years old by the looks·of his cleanshaven face. About five-eight he would list on the records, with clean cut features and brown hair. Milton opened the door a bit wider.
"Inspector Milton?"
"Yes."
"My name's Conant. Peter Conant."
"Yes, Mr. Conant. Come in, please."
"Thank you."
·"Have a seat. You'll have to excuse the appearance of the fl.at,my sister, who keeps house for me, is away in the country for the weekend. Take this chair here, by the fire."
"Thank you."
"Will you have a drink?"
'TU be delighted, Inspector."
"Cigarette?"
"Thanks. I suppose you know why I wanted to meet you?" ·
"Yes. I had an inkling when I received your letter by post earlier this afternoon informing me of your arrival in London."
"I want to thank you for all you've done."
"A sad duty I had to perform."
"Could you tell me all the details of the case? I am rather interested in the facts that surround my father's-er-death."
"There really isn't much that I can tell you, Mr. Conant."
"Peter, please."
· "Thank you. We found your father with three wounds in the back of his head. His pockets showed signs of having been searched, but we found his wallet with over twenty pounds in it. From it we found the name of his hotel and his address in Australia. We searched his luggage at the hotel for some clues and found a diary in which he had written that he suspected one of his two business partners of embezzlement."
"His partners? Mr. Phelps and Mr. Walk;,"er.
"Yes. We checked on the stories of both and found that both were alone most of the night. Of course, it is impossible to arrest the two of them for the murder when we haven't the slightest proof that either of them committed the crime."
"What were their stories?"
" Walker dined at home, worked in his library until late, then went to bed."
"His servants?"
" Slept in the back of the house out of earshot of anyone entering or leaving by the front door."
'And Phelps?"
"He had much the same story. He dined about eight, went to his library and worked until twelve, then went to bed."
"And his servants?"
" One of them, the butler, heard him typing in his library about ten forty-five. He tried the door to see if Phelps might want anything, but found the door locked. Not wishing to disturb his master, he finished his inspection of the downstairs, then went to bed."
"Then the more likely of the two to have committed the crime is Walker?"
"That is our opinion, but we haven't a leg to stand on if we took it to court. There isn ' t enough evidence to support supposition. "
"Then he would be acquitted?"
"Without a doubt. "
"Tell me, why were my father's pockets searched and yet his wallet left behind which contained over twenty pounds?"
"We believe that your father had on him at the time evidence of the one who was embezzling his company's funds, and that the murder was committed to get that evidence. "
"What induced him to leave his hotel?"
"He received a phone call shortly after eleven. He left soon after."
" Who called?"
"We don ' t know. The call was made from a phone box near Piccadilly. We have no way of finding out who called other than where the call was placed."
"So you suspect one of my father ' s partners?"
"Definitely. One of those two had the only reason for killing him that we have been able to find out. Which of the two it was I have no idea."
"You are having them shadowed? "
"No We found that that did no good. We have warned them about leaving the country, however, until the case is closed."
"Do you have my father ' s diary?"
"Yes. I have it at the office with his other effects. Shall I send them to you?"
"No thanks. If you don't mind, I'd like to drop by your office in the morning and pick them up there."
"Certainly. If you care to I'll have you taken through our famous Crime Museum and let you get some idea of the crimes we have had to solve."
"I look forward to it with a great deal of pleasure, Inspector. Oh, if anything suddenly develops, I'm at the Carlton, Room 218 . I've really got to run now, I have an engagement with a young lady for this evening. Thank you
[ 10}
very much for all the information. I'll see you tomorrow morning.''
"Thank you for dropping by, Peter. Good night."
"Good night, Inspector."
Milton closed the door, turned and stared thoughtfully at the two empty highball glasses.
"A queer one," he thought. "I did not like the look in his eyes. There's something going on behind them that I do not like." He shrugged, lit a cigarette, then went into the kitchen with the empty glasses.
"Inspector Milton, please."
"What name?"
"Peter Conant."
"Have a seat, please."
"Thank you."
The constable left Peter seated and entered an office. The door did not close completely.
"Well?"
"A Mr. Conant, sir, to see you, sir."
"Thanks. Just a minute. Before you show Mr. Conant in, look up the past record of Willie Coffee, forger, residence 1828 Plum Lane, Hythe, and bring it to me."
"Yes, sir. Mr. Conant, if you'll step this way, please."
"Thank you. Good morning, Inspector."
"Good morning, Peter. Well, here are all of your father's effects. Diary, a few letters from his partners, money, jewelry, and clothes. I'll have to ask you to sign this receipt for them."
"Surely."
"Do you wish to read his diary here, or wait until you return to your hotel?"
'Tll wait, thank you, Inspector. Now, if you do not mind, I'd like to see your famous Crime Museum."
"Rig ht you are. Donnavan!"
"Yes, sir?"
"Show Mr. Conant through our Crime Museum."
"Yes, sir."
"Peter."
"Yes?"
"Never mind about the clothes and jewelry. I'll have them sent to the hotel for you."
"Righto. See you later, Inspector."
Peter walked along the Embankment gazing thoughtfully at the muddy Thames. He took a coin out of his pocket, shifted his gaze to it and stopped. For a moment he mused, then the coin ascended flashingly into the air to fall with a smack in the palm of Peter's hand. He looked at it for a moment, nodded to himself, put the coin back into his pocket, and hailed a cab.
"1828 Plum Lane, Hythe, please."
He settled back in his seat and lit a cigarette.
"A Mr. Phelps called, Mr. Conant. He left his card."
"Thank you."
Peter looked at the card, then left his hotel.
"Mr. Phelps, please."
"Who shall I say is calling?"
"Mr. Peter Conant."
"Step this way, sir. If you will wait here in the library I will see if he is in."
"Thank you."
Peter went over to Phelp's desk and sat down. Absently he opened one of the drawers. Handkerchiefs and cigarettes. Peter took one of the cigarettes, noted from the box that they were blended specially for Phelps by Dunhill. He lit one and closed the drawer.
'Tm sorry sir, but Mr. Phelps is having his afternoon nap. Unless it is very important, sir, I do not think it wise to disturb him."
"Quite all right, old man. Tell him I called, will you?"
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"Certainly, sir."
When Peter left there rested in his pocket a few of Phelps' cigarettes wrapped in one of his initialed handkerchiefs. Peter was satisfied with the outcome of his call.
I am fully aware of your connection with the death of our late partner Conant. I have lately been over the books of the firm with an accountant, and it is now only a short matter of days before I will have strong enough evidence to turn over to the police.
I am sending you this to notify you of my intentions and to give you sufficient time to leave the country.
JONATHAN WALKER.
Phelps read the handwritten note over several times. He took a cigarette lighter out of his pocket, flipped the wheel and held the note until the flame grew too hot for his fingers. He dropped the blazing remains into a nearby ash tray. Going to his desk he took out his gun and began to examine it thoroughly and thoughtfully.
* * *
Walker was writing in his library. Behind him a door silently and slowly opened to admit Phelps. He was walking on tip-toe. His hat was pulled low over his eyes, and enveloped in a great overcoat damp from the pea-soup fog that had covered London since earlier that afternoon. In one of his gloved hands he carried a pistol.
Cat-like Phelps approached the unsuspecting Walker and stood directly behind him. Walker must have felt the presence of another beside himself, for he started to look up. Quickly Phelps placed the gun against Walker's temple and fired! There was a muffled explosion, the smell of cordite and singed flesh
and hair. Walker slumped over his desk, over his writings, dead.
Phelps placed the pistol in Walker's hand, cast a quick look about, stood transfixed for an instant, listening, then left the way he had entered; quietly and swiftly.
Blood from ,the wound in Walker's head dripping on the papers on his desk was the only sound for several minutes. Slowly a window opened. Whisps of fog entered the room to disappear ghost-like. A man climbed through the open window, shutting it after him. For a moment he stood looking about the room. He approached the body and removed the gun from the corpse's hand substituting a clean, rectangular, white piece of cardboard in its place. The man lit a cigarette, puffed for a few moments, then stumped it out in an ash tray. He took a handkerchief out of his pocket, regarded the fine initialed linen, then dropped it on the floor. Silently he went about the room upsetting the furniture, pulling books from the shelves, opening drawers and emptying the contents. He went to the desk and pushed Walker's body out of its chair. He took the blood-stained papers off of the desk, placed ,them in the fireplace, set a match to them, and watched them go up in smoke. He then ground the ashes underfoot. Finished, he gazed about the now disheveled room with a satisfied air. He went to the phone, picked up the receiver and dialed "O."
"Scotland Yard, please."
* * *
Phelps entered his office as Big Ben was striking the morning hour of ten.
"Mr. Phelps?"
"Yes?"
"In the name of his majesty, the King, I arrest you for the murder of Jonathan Walker. Anything you now say will be used for or against you as the case may be."
[ 12}
"Never mind that. I-I am guilty."
There was a slight sound of a ratchet followed closely by another of similar quality as the handcuffs were snapped about his wrists.
Two weeks after pleading guilty and throwing himself on the mercy of the court, Samuel Phelps was hanged at Dartmoor. Mr. Elliott did a thorough job.
"What I do not understand," said Milton, speaking of the case to his sister later, "is how the confession of Phelps differed from what we found at the scene of the murder."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that when Phelps was arrested he confessed that he had killed Walker. He took a plea of guilty, and, as you know, was hanged. However, just before his death he wrote me and asked how we happened to catch him, as he thought he had made it to look like suicide."
"Well?"
"The thing of i,t was, Betty, that when we received a phone call from the house that there had been a murder committed there, we dashed over, found the body and the place in a mess. There were several definite clues leading to Phelps. One was a handkerchief with his laundry mark on it; another was a cigarette butt of one of Phelps' personal cigarettes, and third, one of Phelps' calling cards in Walker's hand. It looked as if there had been a hellevah fight there. Yet Phelps said that he had made
it to look like suicide. How could that be? There was no gun. Good Lord!"
"What?"
"None of the servants sent the phone call, they were all asleep when we arrived. Somebody must have moved ,things around after Phelps left!''
"But who could have done such a thing?"
"I wonder. Peter Conant knew that one of the two had killed his father. He knew no more than we do at the Yard. Could it be possible that he engineered this thing to hit at one of the two, even if an innocent man had to die?"
"Rubbish, Bob. Who could be so coldblooded as to intentionally kill an innocent man? I do not think that Peter Conant could have done such a thing."
"I wonder. However, the case is closed Conant's murder is an unsolved case, never will be solved with his killer dead, though it seems funny to know his murderer is dead and yet not know who he is. Walker is dead and Phelps hanged for the crime That closes both cases. Well, here's to Peter Conant. I hope for his conscience's sake he did not engineer the W alker-Phelps affair; and for the peace of his father's soul, I hope he did."
"Bob?"
''Hummmmm?''
"I wonder what Peter Conant is doing toht 1 " mg * * * * *
Peter Conant was getting gloriously and happily drunk aboard the S.S. Sidney1 bound for Australia
[ 13]
A{o,
By OTTO WHITTAKER
Yo u DRIVE DOWN highways lying white beneath shimmering heat waves, breathe in the oily heat of the pine, smell briefly of the tobacco-dust, as you pick your way through the cities farther west, thunder up to the edge of the Land of the Sky, veer to the south and go down slender strips of asphalt humped along the middle, cross scores of ribbons of damp mud they call rivers, until the highway becomes red clay stamped with hoof-prints and manure instead of the concrete and oiland tire-stain of miles back - and then you ' re in the Big Heller, where the cotton and corn and tobacco rise but little from the earth, and where men button blue shirts of cotton about their necks and turn up the bottoms of their overalls, and where women bend their bones and shed their teeth from too-frequent childbirth.
When the North Carolina sun came up in the springtime, Mo drove the mule to the plough and went out into the field. All day long he followed in the earthen wake of the blade, stumbling in his heavy hob-nailed brogans over the damp red clods. Sometimes he stopped to wipe sweat, or to pull deep at the water-jug left swathed in wet leaves in the shade of the maple . Sometimes he paused to tear off a chew of the bitter home-cure, or to talk crops with a passing neighbor. But mostly he ploughed-furrow-on-furrow, acre-afteracre, determined again to beat life out of the failing soil.
Nellie was Mo's wife, and she worked hard too . With face like the Johnson-Winter apple , red here, pale there, and wrinkled though still young; with rough, muscular hands and arms; with shapeless breasts swung low on
sagging chest, with bloated belly and broad hips-old in her youth-she had thrice borne babies for Mo. The first were sickly girls and died at birth . Each time she had lain on the pine bed, and •tugged at a sheet tied to the footboard, and grunted and groaned and strained to give birth to her baby, while the midwife pressed her belly here and there and stood ready with towel and hot water. Then, soon on her feet and at work. That's the way in the Big Heller, where the men sow their seed like crops, and reap, and rest, and then sow again.
_Nellie tended the baby, Virgil, and kept things clean, and did the cooking. From the rise of the early sun until late evening, she swept about the house, barefoot, with strings of hair curtaining her eyes, hastening to suckle the baby, turning to stir the dinner, scurrying mouselike out to milk the cow and churn up great hunks of white watery butter for the cornbread.
In the evening, when her work was almost done, she'd take the baby to her meager breast and sit in the doorway listening to Mo shout " Gee" and "Haw" out in the field, and when she saw his stooping figure come between her and the falling sun, she got up and put the supper on the table.
In the summer and early fall, when the earth had nurtured and returned Mo's seed, he and Nellie went together into the field. Sometimes they took along the baby to leave him under the maple, cooing and sucking at his thumb, while they silently gathered their reward into great hampers of wood and wire.
At night, after the heavy, simple suppers, Nellie cooked the vegetables and put them into canning jars, while Mo, seated heavily on a cane-bottom chair, put a wick into a lamp, or patched shoes, or jounced the laughing baby on his huge knee. And Nellie listened to Mo [ 14}
tell how next year be' d let the bottom acres lie fallow, and sow the corner field in oatsand they planned the future and believed in it, and were happy. Gamble and weep for ever and on and aye.
Sometimes at night when Nellie sat and rocked and sewed on clothes, Mo would come up silently behind her, and put his hand on her shoulder, and say, "I thought I'd go down to the store for a while." And Nellie would turn and smile at him, and squeeze his big hand between her cheek and shoulder, and say, "You go ahead. I'll be all right." And Mo would go out and walk a mile down the road to the little store, where the farmers sat on counters and boxes and laughed and talked about crops and liquor and women.
"Women are all right," Mo would say. "A man's got a good wife is a lucky man. They both get old together. You turn in your bed sometimes and look at her and think about when she was young and soft as a com-shoot, and when you wanted her more than anything else in the world. And sometimes when you' re lovin' her you pretend she's some other woman, young and pretty, like in pictures. But you love her just the same, because she's your wife and had your kids and she's a part of you."
When the first snow fell Nellie got sick. It took her three months to die. Mo watched her turn grey, like water that was clear before you washed your hands in it, then saw her turn yellow. He watched the red go from her cheek, and watched the flesh melt away from her frame. Throughout the evenings, throughout the winter, he sat sentinel beside the bed and held her yellow hand in his brown one. Sometimes he talked softly with her: "I killed th' pig. 'Twas fat's a blood-leech. Meat mighty pink and good." When she looked tired he held her hand without speaking, and often his tears were so silent that they escaped her notice. And when her dull eyes were closed by merci-
ful sleep, he'd tuck the pitiful arms under the heavy patchwork covers and sleep on the floor, afraid of awakening her if he got into bed.
It was still dark the morning Mo turned and found her dead beside him. He went to the window and stood staring while a cold rain blazed its way down the pane in little, unceasing rivulets. He dressed and took the baby and went back to his seat beside the bed.
They buried her under the maple. Not many were at the burial: a few neighbors, the preacher, and Mo, Mo tall and red at his helpless eyes and clad in shiny blue serge barely reaching to his wrists and the tops of the same brogans he worked in. The rain had stopped, but the maple dropped little bulbs of rain into the open grave and onto the coffin. Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God} in his wise providence} to take out of this world the soul of our deceased sister. The gathering milled slightly, turned up its coat collar, maneuvered to escape the dripping maple we therefore commit her body to the ground . . . the preacher cast the wet earth into the grave . . . earth to earth} ashes to ashes} dust to dust. And when the first spadeful of earth fell hollowly on the wooden coffin, Mo sank to his knees, the baby at his chest, and dammed back the tears and looked up to God:
"God," he said, "you took her. You got a check on us all, and nobody can live too long. When the time comes we got to go. But she hadn't lived up her share when you took her. She's gone, but I still need her." And not until the last spade had thumped its back on the packed mound of earth did he leave. He walked slowly to the house, the baby close to him under his coat. That night it stormed again, and the thunder and lightning were fiercer than ever before, and Mo turned in the death-bed and looked through the window to the angry sky, and thrust his head back into the big pillow and laughed and laughed.
[ 15}
By MARTHA WARE
Remembered Patterns
Music notes moving through the years-at first, round empty whole notes, ponderously pounded; then the more cheerful half-notes, proudly carrying their flags; then the pert black quarter-notes, plunking firmly alongfollowed by eager, stumbling eighths, now madcap sixteenths, insane thirty-seconds punctuated by audible pauses . . . more notes .. silence. .,. .,. .,.
Circles of marbles on the convenient patterns of the hall rug. . . . .,. .,. .,.
The blinking glow of lightning bugs imprisoned in mayonnaise jars .,. .,. .,.
Thumb-smudges on the pages of Alice in Wonderland. .,. .,. .,.
Raveled bandages on an eight-year-old, pony-bitten finger. .,. .,. .,.
Changing designs on the old blue card table in the play room ... old maid cards, checker men, dominoes, mah jongh pieces, bridge cards, jiz-saw puzzles, a carom board, chess men, red white, and blue poker chips. Lexicon cards ....
Random Thoughts
There just must be an artistic streak in me somewhere. I can tell by the patterns I make when I cut the grass. . . .
To my mind, a cat has always embodied the essence of feminity-the quiet, s.tay-by-thefire, prissy type of female, while a puppy has always signified the eternal masculine-the energetic, bouncing, playful type that never knows when to stop playing. I'll never become reconciled to the fact that my cat is a he and my puppy a she. I just can't understand it. .,. .,. .,.
My puppy's mind is an eternal revelation to me. Who but Dingo would have conceived the idea of taking Daddy's socks, garters, and all, and placing them proudly and neatly in the middle of the living-room floor-just before company arrived?
Confessions
I am a head-scratcher. I have always been a head-scratcher. A tousled mop of hair is a sure sign I have just enjoyed a book or done some extraordinary concentration. .,.
I'm a jitter bug . To be more specific, I snap my fingers, sway from side to side, beat my heels, slap my knees, and add a little peckin' and posin' for good measure. That's what Benny Goodman does to me. Yet Beethoven's Fifth or Rachmaninoff's Prelude in C Sharp Minor can send me soaring-but to a different level. Soul' s yearnings find their supreme expression in all their fantasy and madness, to dissolve in philosophic finality Thought: Jazz works you up, but a classic never lets you down.
While I'm confessing, I may as well admit what all my friends know already: I'm not at all common-sensible. Why, when I was about four years old, a peppermint life-saver burnt my tongue-so I put it in the ice-box to cool! . .,. .,. .,.
And, of course, I'm absent-minded. There ' s the time I was helping clear the table after a [ 16 J
rather large dinner. About a half-hour was spent in trips from the table to the ice-box, from the ice-box to the table. So, when Mother asked me to put the cat out, I picked him up and automatically headed for the ice-box. I think it was the cat's eagerness to comply that brought me to. Oh, yes, and there's the time I called Daddy on the telephone and said, "Hello, Marshie, this is Daddy." I'll never hear the last of that.
1' 1' 1'
An open fire has a powerful fascination for Katze ( my alley tom-cat) and me. Katze goes up close to the grate and sniffs until his whiskers scorch, then yawns and stretches, and curls up on the hearth boredly to watch his tail wiggle. I turn on the radio and curl up in the easy chair with the Readers Digest.
1' 1' 1'
Wonder if I'm growing old? Ait dances
where I formerly was accustomed to shag with zest, I feel myself detachedly amused by the couples-some smoothly gliding, eyebrows raised on their sophisticated poker-faces; others happily hopping about, grinning smugly. They know we can't do the Little Apple! I resent it. I feel as though I were being slowly pushed back into a corner from which I must be content only to watch . . Well, I'll always have my knitting! . . .
1' 1' 1'
I'd like to write a thesis on ''The Influence of Goethe's Die Leiden des f ungen Werther upon Ferdinand the Bull."
1' 1' 1'
I fritter. I fritter time in day-dreaming. I fritter money on peanut blocks and peppermints. I despair of becoming anything else1'm just a confirmed fritterer
1oe.q.
I bring you flaming gifts within my handsy our eyes holds pools of melancholy laughter; There I find joys that I've sought after: Exotic, strange, unconquerable lands.
You more than pay me for my soul's bright fire; You give me courage, unfulfilled desire.
KIRANICHOLSKY.
[ 17 J
Hai-idsomeDatt, The Shootingest Man inWildcat Gulch. ..
"YIPPEE-E-E-E-E-E---."The shrill yell of a mounted cowboy sounded out over the sunbaked width of Sunshine Valley.
"Yippee-e-e-e-e-e---." The echo came back across the purple sage to the ears of the horseman.
"Yippee-e-e-e-e-e---," he yelled in retaliation, spurring his painted sorrel after the dogie which dodged among the bushes and finally headed toward the squat ranch-house of the X-Bar-X ranch which nestled under the shadow of Bare-face Mountain, a treacherous pile of rock if ever there was one.
The calf cleared a fence on the run and bucked around the corner of the house just as a man stepped down from the porch and headed for the corral where his best pal and friend whinnied for him. The charging yearling gave him a shoulder buck and body block that sailed him up against the log walls of the mess house. He bounced back and rolled in the dust just in time to have his face stepped on by the pursuing horse. As the chase disappeared around the edge of the barn, the man sat up in the swirling dust and gazed after them.
"Wal, tan my hide," swore our hero migh-fly, for it was truly Handsome Dan Darling, the shootingist man in Wildcat Gulch, as he wiped the dust from his brand new patentleather riding boots with a perfumed silk handkerchief.
"Heah, you, you ornery critter, feed them thar hogs," and the cook flung two buckets of vile slop to Katherine, a fair maid of the land. She caught them deftly without spilling a
B~Rohetl ?nMtill
drop. "A-listen, a-here, a-you, just a-cause my a-father is a-lost in the a-Dead Man's a-Caves while a-hunting a-gold for our a-fortune, and a-I had to a-take this a-meanly job to a-keep my a-fair body from a-wasting away-" and Kitty began sobbing and wringing her poor starved hands over the slop.
"Gwan, now, feed them pigs before you poison thar feed with your slobbering," and he flung a meat cleaver at her. She ducked, picked it up and flung it back. It split his head open and mixed his brains and blood with the dough. Then our heroine, Katherine Pearl, went and fed the pigs.
Butch Smutch staggered through the swinging doors of the Soak-'Em-Up Saloon and bellowed a greeting to Dice Dick, the one-eyed bartender. After him followed his cronies, three dark-complexioned men with thin, oily mustaches just like the villian's, Butch. They seated themselves in the corner about a table and ordered straight whiskey with a loud
voice. When their order was served and each had downed his without a sneeze, the three put their heads together and plotted vile doings. "Blankety-blank - X-Bar-X - blanketyblank - Pearl dame - blank - ten o'clock tonight -meet at lower end of Sunshine Valley by creek-(whisper) ."
Butch ordered another round of drinks. He was feeling dark and low-tempered after the second dose and was looking around for trouble. The order wasn't fast in coming. "Hey, you blankety-blank-blank sunuva blank-blank. Bring that stuff over here purty blank quick." The order was still slow, so whipping out his notched six-shooter, he let Dice Dick have it between the eyes. Dice seemed surprised, and without uttering a sound, slumped behind the counter.
"Aw, shucks, Butch, now you'll have to get your liquor yourself," said Peter Lung, one of his side-kicks.
"Like blankety blank blank I will. You'll get it, or else-," and Butch pointed the newly notched weapon at Pete.
Butch was drunk.
Four dark figures crept noiselessly toward the mess-house. Then one advanced before the other three and tried the door. It was unlocked. After posting one of them as a lqokout, Butch went into the house followed by Pete Lung and another bad man. They paused in the darkness and listened. A low razzing sound which changed its tempo and volume with each breath came from the right. Butch strode in that direction confidentially and stumbled over an empty slop bucket that was left in the middle of the floor· by Kitty, the heroine. He listened from the floor. The snoring continued. After opening the door quietly, he crossed the dark bedroom to the side of the bunk occupied by the dream girl. She
heard his step and opened her eyes dreamily.
"Oh, a-Handsome Dan, my a-man, I a-knew you' ld a-come. Kiss a-me."
"Can dat stuff, wench, and come wit' me," growled the base-hearted ruffian as he grabbed her arm.
"Oh, you a-beast! Stop! You're a-hurting my a-arm! a-Who are a-you?"
"Ha! Ha! Ha! Some people call me SureShot Smutch, but you can call me Butch, honey. Ha! Ha! Ha!"
Kitty sat straight up in bed at these words, fully awake. Then, after drawing in a deep breath accompanied by rattlings in her throat, she let out a scream that startled the cows sleeping in the lower end of the pasture.
Down in the bunk-house Handsome Dan mumbled in his sleep something about the 10: 40 blowing for Mine Run Crossing and turned over in bed, hugging his patent-leather riding boots tighter against him.
Back in Kitty's boudoir Butch made a grab at her to shut her up. She scratched his right eye out, so he knocked her pearly incisors down her throat and slung her over his shoulders. She spit out two teeth.
Meanwhile Handsome Dan , the minuteman, woke up, and feeling hungry, decided to go up to the mess house and see if he couldn't snitch something. Kitty Pearl usually left the door open for him for such occasions. So slipping on the warm shining patent-leather riding boots, he left the bunk-house and sauntered toward the mess house. The sentinel spied him.
"Pst, boss, here comes Handsome Dan. Let's scram!"
Butch Smutch dropped Kitty with a thud in surprise "Come on, men, out the back way. We can't let Handsome Dan catch us," and with a shudder, he picked up the unconscious girl. "Out the window you must go," and
[ 19]
Kitty, that delicate jewel, sailed out of the window, carrying the sash about her neck. The four men clambered through after her, and loading her like a sack of flour across one of the horses, the four blackguards galloped off into the slumbering night.
Dan Darling advanced slowly towards the hash joint and reached for the door. It was open. "Ah, ha," thought our hero, "she's waiting for me," and he straightened his tie. Once in the house he stumbled over the same slop bucket that overthrew Butch, and pitched headlong into Kitty's fragrant bedroom. Kitty was gone. The bed held evidence of struggle. Then, and only then, did our hero notice the missing window. He was through it in one bound and was searching the ground when his horse, Dabbled Dancer, nudged him and whinnied.
Quick as a flash, Dan knew what had happened. "Ah, that scum of the earth, Butch Smutch, and his delinquent colleague, One Lung Pete - uh - Under Slung Pete - uh - Pete Lung, the rat - they, they have purloined that rare blossom of the desert, that precious diadem of the Golden West. She, the fairest in all the land, my Kitty. Come, Dabbled Dancer, we will fly to her rescue. You and I will preserve the virtue of the bright-eyed personification of the womanhood of our land. I see my mission, D. D., and will call on you to aid me in fulfilling it. Ours-" and he straightened up- "ours is a noble cause. So let us away. By the way, run down to my bunk and get my shooting iron. It's under the pillow in the holster." While D. Dancer pranced down to secure the pistol, Handsome Dan Darling searched the ground for possible clues. When the horse returned, our hero mounted and galloped off into the slumbering night, too.
The trail of the maruaders led down the Valley, across the creek, and up through the
canyon that opened into Wildcat Gulch, the hangout of a band of rustlers and killers. Handsome Dan didn't hesitate, though, in riding daringly after Butch Smutch. As Dappled Dancer bounded along the narrow trail, dodging boulders in the dim path, Dan schemed a plan of attack. Suddenly a mosquito whined dangerously close to the hero's ear. Dan slapped at it as a faint "crack" smote his ear-drum. Another whine made him drop low on the back of the horse. But our hero, oblivious to all danger in his maddened desire to rescue Katherine Pearl, spurred his horse faster along the rocky trail. Faster and faster the horse went,whipping the wind into a frenzy. Suddenly Dan saw a white shape fluttering in the distance. Then it disappeared, and Dan muttered, "That was Kathy's nightgown a.fluttering in the breeze created by the rush of that dastard's horse. After him, my sweet little one," and he pinched the cheek of his charging steed. Under the loving touch of his master, the horse let out another burst of speed, rapid1y closing the distance between the villian and the hero.
Suddenly the horses turned into a straight stretch. Dan drew his gun and fired. No thought of any danger of his hitting the girl crossed his mind. Handsome Dan was a straight shooter, and he knew it. Butch's horse lurched, but kept running, though slower. Dan fired again and shattered the wrist of Smutch' s shooting hand. Holstering his trusty weapon, Darling rode fast beside Butch, dropped him with a straight right from the shoulder, and pulled Katherine across the streaming mane of his steed just as Butch's horse skidded in a half-circle and crashed into a boulder.
Dappled Dancer drew up beside a large rock. Dan laid the still unconscious girl gently upon it and gazed in the starlight at her.
[ 20}
Half aloud he thought, "Aw, gosh, don't she look purty in that thar night gown!" and he blushed furiously at the thought.
A sudden jolit spun him around sideways and toppled him off the boulder on his head. Quickly sizing up the situation, he drew his gun with his good right arm and began stalking Butch among the rocks. Finally he found him propped up against a rock, nursing his wounded hand. Quicker on the trigger, Dan blasted Butch's left eye out along with some other cranial :fillings and left him to grovel in the thoughts of his sins.
Back on the boulder Kitty awoke suddenly at the sound of the shot that removed forever from this fair earth that cur and black-hearted crook, Butch Smutch. She sat up in bewilderment at the surroundings, far different from her soft bed in the cook house at X-Bar-X ranch.
She gave a smothered scream as Handsome Dan stuck his head above the rock she was sitting on. "Oh, you startled me, Handsome." She had lost the hesitating manner of her speech along with her front teeth.
"Hello, Miss Pearl, -uh-how are you feeling?" Handsome Dan Darling, a terror to outlaws, was very bashful in the presence of pretty women.
"Oh, you're hurt," cried Kitty, tears welling into her lovely green and blue eyes as she noticed the bloody shirt on her fearless rescuer.
"Aw, 'taint nothing."
"Here, let me bind it for you," and she tore a long bandage from her flimsy wrappings. Dan Darling swallowed his tongue and nearly choked to death.
After Dan ' s wound was :fixed, the two sat on the rock and talked, having no thought of returning to the ranch.
"Dan, call me Kitty."
"Yes, m'am."
"Do you know who I am, Dan? "
"Yes, m'am. You're the cook's help."
"Look at me, Daniel." Daniel looked and saw a snaggled-toothed girl of about twentyone . And because she had torn her gown to wrap his shoulder, he noticed that she was knocked-kneed, also. But he couldn't bear to look too long at the lower pinions of the girl. He turned away, hot and sweating
"Daniel, my hero, could you learn to love me for myself?"
"M'am?"
"Could you-?"
"I reckon we'd better be getting along now, m'am."
Kitty started crying, sobbing convulsively. At each sob, her breath whistled through the gap left by her missing teeth.
Even our hero, Handsome Dan ·Darling, shootingest man in Wildcat Gulch, couldn't resist the tears of this girl in distress. After a few moments of valiantly striving to avoid the inevitable, Dan confessed his love for her. She was radiant
"Now that I know you love me, I'll tell you something. My father is not missing, but lives in California. He found his gold mine and is :filthily rich. I took the job at the X-Bar-X ranch to see if anyone could love me for me alone, and not for my money. I'm so happy."
Handsome Dan, the minute-man, rose to the occasion. "Kitty," spitting over the edge of the boulder, "Kitty, evah since I :firstsaw you, I loved you." And he dreamed idly of a life of ease and luxury.
Kitty nestled close up against him to protect herself from a cold breeze and wondered if she could have the ceremony performed before he learned the truth.
[ 21}
With the end of the year and the coming of summer, may we suggest a few not-too-heavy books for those lazy afternoons when a lawn chair under a shady tree, a book, and a long, tall one seem to fit? There is adventure and its philosophies here and the beauty and surge of the sea and-Ferdinand.
TOMBS, TRAVEL AND TROUBLE. By Lawrence Griswold. Illustrated. Hillman-Curl, Inc. New York. 337 pp. $3.00.
Back in 1924 blonde, big Lawrence Griswold, fresh from Harvard, where it seems he cut most of his classes and read everything available on American archaeology, struck out into the dense, matted jungles of Guatemala to learn what he might of the fabulous lost empire of the Mayas. This he would do by digging into the ruins of their cities. And thus, in a modest manner, without the usual capital and equipped expedition, began a crowded career of research and scientific exploration that stretched from the unpenetrated wastes of Central and South America to primitive Komodo Island in the Dutch East Indies.
With skill and vitality Lawrence Griswold tells the story of his years of travel and trouble, a story so filled with strange incidents and narrow escapes that it almost taxes one's credulity; its swift pace sets the blood racing to that indescribable tempo that the lure of exotic places and exciting adventure brings.
Adventure, the author writes, is "a piece of extremely bad luck which barely misses a fatal ending." Many times, then, Griswold has had bad luck.
There was the revolt of three native porters who attacked him in a forest glade one morning. He clubbed one with an axe handle. Another he shot three times before the giant, murderous mutineer dropped, and the third, Alphonse disposed of by piercing with a steel-spiked umbrella standard. Alphonse was the Negro camp foreman, whose head was later neatly lopped off and tossed into camp by one who bore a grievance against him.
At another time Griswold was adrift for five days in the Sulu Sea. \XTithfive companions he had to hold off twenty-four thirst-crazed Chinese, none of whom survived the ordeal.
Some of the episodes the author relates will remain long in readers' minds. One is the story of the United States Marine officer, lost to his country and civilization for forty years, and found in a village of the ·wild Carib country-a tale rivalling the description of the discovery of Livingstone by Henry Morton Stanley in central Africa.
And then he tells of carrying a malaria-ridden friend for miles on his back, trying to get him to a doctor. Night falls. Griswold's strength wanes. His arms become numb and the man slips from his grip more and more frequently. Griswold's eyes smart; his stomach is torn raw by his sweat-soaked belt. His feet slide in mud. His heart beats loudly in his ears. Suddenly the music of Chopin's Nocturne in G breaks into his consciousiness, and he knows he is as delirious as his suffering friend. But windows appear ahead. And he stumbles to the door of Karl Hansen, political fugitive from Germany, who had set up his home in the wilderness and brought his pipe organ, so that Chopin could not be denied him.
It would be folly to attempt to capture the scope and spirit of this solidly packed, fascinating book. Almost half of it is devoted to Komodo Island, weird reminder of the dark age before man. This alone might have made a separate volume. The multitude of bits, the bulk of interesting material compressed into Tombs, Travel and Trouble is amazing. It is, I think, the best travel-autobiographical book of recent months. - G. S.
PIPE ALL HANDS. By H. M. Tomlinson. Harper and Brothers. New York. 326 pp. $2.50.
When her master died in a native hut at Salawan, and a lean, taciturn man who had the appearance of a cleric took command, Jerry Barton, second officer of the Hestia, began to give credibility to the rumors he had heard about her temperament. The Hestia had a name for trouble, though from the looks of her she was a hard-working tramp freighter of aging, but sturdy, build. On a voyage from Celebes to Java to London, from London to Tripoli and Sicily and toward Boston, she exhausted her bag of tricks, from taking on unlucky passengers like Dr. Tennant, famed archaeologist, and his pretty daughter to running full into a North Atlantic hurricane.
Mr. Tomlinson tells the story in a cool, unhurried style with the same feeling that made Gallions Reach "an achievement in the history of the English novel" and the same art that made all his
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WHENITHIN L.ONOFELLOW'S L '~ND THE Fl AT THEIR EASE, THERESATA GR OF FRIENDS E I CAN PICTURE THERE EN.JOVI )OJI OLDi:t. THEINN~ST, BY51>.MLELHOWE, IN Tl-IE FAMILY _;.:-...:..YEARS~:.__J SION ED---RE
P.A. MONEY-BACKOFFER. Smoke 20 fragrant pipefuls of Prince Albert. If you don't find it the mellowest, tastiest pipe tobacco you ever smoked, return the pocket tin with the rest of the tobacco in it to us at any time within a month from this date, and we will refund full purchase price, plus postage. (Signed) R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, Winston-Salem,N.C. l'VE READ 11W WHEN
sea stories as real as Winslow Homer paintings. His artistry has never failed him , but it is regrettaable that "love interest" had to be dragged into Pipe All Hands; it doesn't belong. Yet even this flaw is obscured by the smoothness and enviable skill of his writing.
f f f THE STORY OF FERDINAND By
Munro Leaf
Ilustrated by Robert Lawson. The Viking Press. New York. $1.00.
English Romanticism has given us Byron; French Romanticism gave us Chateaubriand's Rene; Goethe's Werther was the masterpiece of German Romanticism. Now American literature gives us Ferdinand, whose mother was a cow.
As a young bull Ferdinand grew, along with the flowers, 'mid the pastures of Spain. His life was one of deep communion with nature in general ( the flowers under the cork tree in particular), until a bumble bee changed its course. Ferdinand jumped from the sting of the bee and landed in an arena in Madrid, the famed object of national curi-
1CANS.ILL BUVA LOT RAND, TASTY SMOKI HERES THE VERY RXlM WHERE
osity, for he was now termed " el toro ferocio." What a problem for peace-loving Ferdinand! What to do? Ferdinand's solution of his problem is typically romantic.
Let us compare Ferdinand with the most romantic of romantic heroes, Werther. They have many common qualities. For instance, there is the love of nature. Consider this passage in The Story of Ferdinand: " He had a favorite spot out in the pasture under a cork tree. There he liked to sit just quietly and smell the flowers," and these lines from Die Leiden des Jungen Werther: "Die kleine Mauer, die oben umber die Einfassung macht, die hohen Baume, die den Platz rings umber bedecken, die Kiihle des Orts, das hat alles so was Anziigliches, was Schauerliches. Es vergebt kein Tag, class ich nicht eine Stunde da sitze."
And then there is their egotism- although I admit that there are certain differences between the egotism of a bull and that of a man. And Ferdinand's ego cer tainly is different. It is the result of an underestimation of his own importance. For in-
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stance, he didn't run around snorting for the bullfighters, because he thought they wouldn't pick him to fight in Madrid anyway. This inferiority complex led him to withdraw from worldly things to within himself, and he neglected to think of others, thus becoming egotistical. Then when the great moment came in the arena, he felt no sense of duty toward his audience. So he indulged his own desires-and sat down to smell the flowers in the ladies' hair. That was certainly a most egotistical thing to do.
On the other hand, Werther's ego is the result of an overestimation of his own importance. I cite this sentence, "Die geringen Leute des Ortes kennen mich schon, und lieben mich, besonders die Kinder."
Another trait almost universal among the romantics is their love of solitude. Here also our two heroes agree. Werther says: "Ich bin allein, und freue mich meines Lebens in dieser Gegend, die fiir solche Seelen geschaffen ist, wie die meine." And at another time: "So vertraulich, so heimlich hab' ich nicht leicht ein Platzchen gefunden, und dahin lass' ich mein Tischchen aus dem Wirthshause bringen und meinen Stuhl, trinke meinen Kaffee da und lese meiner Homer."
While Leaf tells us that Ferdinand would sit in the shade all day and smell the flowers. The only difference is that while Werther drinks coffee and reads Homer under a Linden tree, Ferdinand smells flowers under a cork tree. Of the two I wonder which is the more romantic?
Originality is another flavor common to both our heroes. In The Story of Ferdinand it is exemplified in the phrase, "but not Ferdinand." All the other bulls play in the pasture, "but not Ferdinand;" all the other bulls are dying to be picked to fight in Madrid, "but not Ferdinand." That's originality for you!
There is still another element present in the make-up of a romantic hero; it is almost undefinable. The French call it "la sensibilite." It is an underlying cause for the love of nature, the desire for solitude, the yearning for originality-it is what made Ferdinand, when he got to the middle of the bull ring and saw the flowers in all the lovely ladies' hair, sit down just quietly and smell. Don't you like Ferdinand? Then, you really must become better acquainted. He will touch the heart of every romantic-and aren't we all? You simply must read The Story of Ferdinand. You may be forgiven if you miss Ethel Barrymore, or Shirley Temple, or even Snow White, perhaps-but not Ferdinand!
MARTHAWARE.
It is midnight. Tomorrow we will take the first of a set of examinations. But tonight the "by-line" must be written. We are beginning to feel that inaugurating the column was grabbing the proverbial bull by the tail, for we can't let go; we've got to write 460 words and that is final! . . . In two or three days we will read proof and go to press, and then our job will be through. It seems customary among college editors to write "farewell" editorials, or otherwise bring out the fact that they have tried and tried to make their journal everything a good magazine should be and that the job will always live in their memories as one which, despite its trials, gave them many happy hours; the last locking of the door of the editorial sanctum wrings tears from many of our weaker breathren. Not so with us. \V/e look forward to a vacation from column writing at midnight with such anticipatory glee that no tears could possibly come. . . . So we hastily jot down a word or two about our contributors and sing out, "So long," over our shoulders .... NATALYE BABCOCK'S autobiography has an ingenuousness about it that we found appealing. "Carnations and Printer's Ink" is a simple, unvarnished, human document, and the idea of playing up the sense of smell is grounded in good psychology. E. Alexander Powell said, "Of all the senses, that of smell is most closely associated with remembrance." ... MARTHA WARE, senior, appears in THE MESSENGER for the first time on the eve of her graduation day. We deem it scarcely necessary to say anymore about her than she herself reveals in "Prelude." . . . Freshman PHILIP COOKE is the author of our "whodunit" story, which, he says, follows rather closely the lines of Edgar Wallace .... The "science boy" who was responsible for "Lynch" in a recent number turns now to satire in his two-fisted, red-blooded tale of the \V/est, "Handsome Dan, The Shootingest Man in \Wildcat Gulch." The story of Mo's existence in his acres is sordid as the life he represents is sordid, and "Mo" is not a story for those who recoil from the realism of today. But to us there is power and simplicity and deep pathos in the writing of OTTO WHITT AKER, winner of the PDEMESSENGER short story contest. Mo and his wife, Nellie, are people who live and laugh-occasionally-and suffer and live and die And now-"So long." .
