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About The Omaha morning bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 1922-1927 | View Entire Issue (Aug. 26, 1924)
JO ELLEN 1 By ALEXANDER BLACK• copyright, 1&24. -- (Continued From Yr*terdajr.) But you ought to have done it. Too late now to do it right. What you have to think of is what you've done to her and—what'e left to be done on her account. I’m going to tell her the etory to get it over with. If she'd never heard a word, you—or I either—might have been weak enough to keep quiet. Now that she's had the word there’s nothing else for it. No matter how it hurts her, it’s bet ter than leaving her to do a lot of imagining—making it worse than it was, maybe?’ ” "Could it be worse?" This came so faintly that Bogert might have doubted whether the ques tion was more than a movement of the lips. * "Yes—yes, Jo Ellen, I think it could be worse—If you started filling things in that’re not so. When your mother said you had heard something, I want ed to stop the danger of that—of your piling up a bunch of horrors and put ting Marty in the middle, like he was a monster—the chief monster. I tell you, Jo Ellen, this boy you married could have been the worst sex sneak ever, and if nothing noisy had hap pened he might be the candy hus band and grow up to pass the plate in church. Then again, not being bad at all, he might make one mis take—one mistake—and, if circum stances ran agninst him. down comes his whole world in a mess. If you want to know what I think, that wasn't like Marty. That’s a great point to think of—whether a thing’s like a person. When it comes to punishments, we ought to get more for wrongness that’s like us than for wrongness that isn't like us. Of course, circumstances don't consider that at all. You only have to lean too far over the edge of the roof once, and gravitation does the trick. Pun ishments we put on ought to be dif ferent. Here’s a hoy sails away with his regiment—” "Are you going to say it was the war?” Jo Ellen demanded. “The war?" Bogert gave apprehen sive consideration to this, then went on with a heightened vehemence, holding his voice to his best imita tion of a whisper: "No! That’s just what I don’t do. He might have gone to Schnectady to sell gas fixtures and had the same thing happen to him. Why—” his tones quivered in a fresh visualization. “—it might have hap pened at Inwood, and the maniac might have been old Tice! We know it wouldn’t have happened at Inwood for a hundred per cent good reason right there was Jo Ellen!” "I see. When she isn't right there—” , . , , Jo Ellen saw the little beads of —- x Nav York --Day by Day _j - By o. o. McIntyre. New York, Aug. 26.—In one of the muffled midnight haunts of Jazz the other night pleasure seekers were Just a bit shocked to see a correctly * groomed man apply a hypodermic needle to his arm and send the plunger home. He made no effect at evasion. He wanted a “shot" and took It. It was a striking example of the way secrecy Is being shattered among drug ad dicta. Formerly the addict was skil fully adroit In hiding his vice from the world. Now he doesn't seem to care. At lunch the other day I overheard two men openly discussing their slavery . before a group of five. One I rec ognized as a playwright who has had two fairly successful plays and quite a number of vaudeville skits. Of course, they may have been Jest ing. Two famous song writers make no secret of the fact that for many years they were in the clutches of drugs—one an opium smoker and the other a user of morphine. They claim now to have cast off the shackles. Chours girls who use co caine Jest about "snow parties." Narcotic squad scouts claim that one out of every four Broadway ha bitue uses drugs In some form. Heroin, the most deadly of all, Is the most popular among them. These scouts can spot the addict on sight. The peculiar sparkle of the eye and the pallor gives them away. Few drink. There are a hundred dope run ners In the Times Square district. They supply what Is not supplied by illicit druggists and doctors attached to the staffs of shady hotels, the Broadway drug addicts run In a pack. Where there la one there are usually several cronies. It Is said there are more drug ad dicts living on 46th, 46th and 47th | streets, between Broadway and Sixth avenue than any other given area of the town. There Is also a dope belt on 125th street In Harlem. The Bowery hasn’t as many drug addicts as It has rum sots. Gotham has the “bromide" phobia. A casual remark that smacks of the commonplace Is a bromide. It Is a term Gelett Burgess coined many years ago and has not lost caste In the Shantytown. To pull a "bromide" brands one as a yokel. One must not discuss the weather and kindred everyday topics. One must achieve the brilliant epl gram or wise-crack. The hackneyed phrase brands you as a conversational dud. As a result few talk about the subject that Interest them most. That Is why I long for the comfortable chair on the country hptel porch. Here we discussed the dog fight, the roan mare that broke out of the pas ture and the meaale epldemlo in Shmentytown. Do eats reason? There la a woman In Greenwich Village who, one night a week, makes It a custom to provide meals for stray cats In her tiny little beck yard. Bhe has been doing this for four years. About 50 cats come there regularly on that particular night. Other nights they do not ap pear, She does not place the food out In the yard until the cRts arrive and thus proves that the cate are not at tracted by the odor of the food. And, by the way, Klolse, a little kitten with a maahad paw that I picked up In front of a village cafe a year ago and transported to the home of a friend In Park avenue la now a mother of aix kittens. Elolae ^ cams from the gutter and now aleepa on a silk cushion—a true Cinderella. The tea hounds with waspish waists and Ritzy look* are to be .dramatized In a play shortly to open (Copyright, im,) ' perspiration on Bogert's lips. He was throwing himself into a great effort. He was pleading mightily. A kind of cruelty appeared in letting him do It —In forcing him to do It. If tie was right, only an utterly miserable selfish ness could let him go on. Yet he could be wrong. Affection was often wrong; not, perhaps, In asking char lty, but In marking out ways. Bogert was sending her back to Marty—and to Marty’s mother. This was what It meant. v Back to the roof. No one knew whether she Intended to go back to the roof. They werer playing safe. Probably this was what affection al ways did—urged you to return to the suffering, and be noble. It wasn’t merely an Issue between two people. There were a lot of others to consider —others who had made a pretty dia gram for you and hated to see It mussed. A separated wife Imposed enormous inconveniences. Keeping people in a nice procession, two by two, preserved the peace of social traffic. The people of two people . . . “And there's this," said Bogert fer vently. "It isn’t fair to size up this boy the way he is now. You know how he was. I always liked him. You liked him. Suppose he had had a fever, or something. Or say T. B. You'd stick to him. You'd fight it out. You wouldn't quit. You wouldn't ask whether it was his fault. What I say is, that tum ble when he was with you was part of the calamity. See? His fault was nil back of that. But the smash —take the whole of it together—isn’t it right that his partner—even if he let himself forget her for a mo ment—should remember that the vic tim is a partner and up against it hard? He's down. No shell got him —he was hit by life! You know, life can pound us. God Almighty—!" Bogert glanced about him as if in desperation. There was something he wished to say that needed another setting. After talking in so feverish a defiance of surroundings, save for the painful effort to limit the dimen sion of his tones, he suddenly winced at the glare in which they 3at." “Don't argue any more,” protested Jo Kllen. “I’m only—" "Let me think It out.” He glared at her anxiously. "See here—we didn’t order any dessert. What do you think of that?” "I don’t want dessert, thank you. You're awfully kind to me, and I know I seem like a troublesome affair." "You'll he troublesome if you don’t eat. And I've spoiled your appetite. Look at your plate.” Jo Ellen smiled upon him wearily. Bogert himself had eaten little. He had no certainty of having moved her, no certainty that there was any pro found need to move her. He knew only that she had turned to Inwood, that she had announced her inten tion of going there for a second night. This represented a situation of tower ing importance. If anything could he done, now was the time. And he felt defeated. "What do you say?” he cried. "Let's gc to a show!” She didn't care for a show. They had better go home. Mother and Grandmother would be wondering. "Don't you care how anybody won dera.” He put out the bills for the waiter. "Don’t you waste any time thinking nbout anybody but yourself —and that boy. That's the game— you and Marty. Give everybody else the air. Mrs. Simms, too. Let her gloom around as much as she wants to." "I wonder wh&t you’d do with her." Jo Ellen said dully. He was glad she didn’t flare. The omission seemed promising. "Want to chloroform her, prob ably. For her own good. It's a blamed shame we can’t chloroform some people. And yet . . . Well, she a his mother. You couldn't chloroform a mother. God, no!” This was no ending to all that Bo gert had wanted to say. No use keep ing it up. Perhaps he had done some thing. Tha story was out—all that was rightly to be told—and that was something. When he saw her stand ing there, ready to go forth with him, ready to rattle toward Inwood where the others would get at her, he knew that anything might happen—any thing. All the strong arms on earth couldn’t forcibly lift her over the chasm of her difficulty She must make her own leaps. She must do her own living. Once he Vould pick her up—how she used to wriggle!) and carry her anywhere. She hnd strad died his neck and driven him with two clutches In his wiry hair, wrench ing a howl out of him with those clever little fingers. An altogether amazing girl child she was. . . And now . . . now that fine free stride of her must follow her own path You could walk beside her. and feel an proud as you liked, or worry until you sweated. You could gab along and be Intoxicated by her listening look. But you couldn't gather het up, or tote her any place you wanted to. She wouldn't etraddle your neck and pull your hair and let you do Second Honeymoon* ^ Briggs; MORTimrR ARtj You AlV. RBAOY To <3o ? I HA'/R 1 Thh. hamper ALL/ packed * /we fle doir-ic; with j / fH« MOU.ICMS I l Their ca« - ' Just ■ V<N(OVO va/S LL HAve J (a lo^RI-Y time J we HAVEN'T OW | I A dOOP OLD FASHIWJSD \ I PlChJlCl »>MCB \ JX5M T I _J v<MOW 'WMS-M - - I 7HINK / 1 ~y TneVRCiJuST P»IECK$ J op FUN • * I----* WHSKJ V*J£ UuSRC* FIRST MARRIED You uue«e crazy To Co PICKn\ckinJ(, Just To Be out o*-~ .Odors with iv'ie ahO The Bi6 OPeti & Paces I You) SAiD* AajT) ( A/OWT _ rome/vmd necf I Me CARRY Thi! { Basket *** __ I \ ‘ ABIE THE AGENT Drawn for The Omaha Bee by Hershneld Hf'i No Fool. ■ stunt* and yell Joyously. She was a woman. IV. The mother and grandmother were quite assured of Ben Bogert’s inten tlons; not because he had mentioned them, but because It was inevitable that he should have them, and the telephone message established the circumstance of the meeting. It is probable that each made an estimate of the value to be placed on the in tercesslon. Each had a way of loving Hen, and each had her own habit of discipline. They would have agreed that whatever he did would require Isolation. His mental gestures need ed space. He was easily frustrated in a group. They could fancy him as saying, "If I had her alone—" He had her alone, and who could say what would he going on in rer head while he talked? Roth of the women felt a piercing curiosity as to Jo El len, a curiosity which each after her own method bad sought to muffle or to justify. Again and again one and the other put herself In Jo Ellen's place, escaped, and went back. Neith er had had any Individual experience that seemed to fit them for an al together conscientious estimate, and when their thoughts wandered to some tale or circumstance that threat ened to present a parallel, they al ways ended by deciding that Jo KI len’s situation was not to be mens ured by any other. Of these thoughts the two women said very little to each other. For :,ne thing, there was Billy at the liv ing room table wrestling w-ith his ilgebra. Even absent piinded boys iften had absurdly acute ears. When Hilly knew that his sister was ex pected, after having spent one night it the house, he looked up to ask, (To Be Continued Tomorrow.) THE NEBBS \\_i AND THAT AIN’T ALL Directed for I he Umaha l>ee by 001 ness 1 So HOO'CE GOikIG DOwkJTo\ I WOPTHVMLV.E- I WOULpM T \ HAVE PUT ALL THE STMLE AMO 1 . CLASS IKI THESE DRESSES \r r~ ID kkiOwni — 'T will (j o>nnr BE WASTED OKI THOSE J X^NORTHWILLE PEOPLE yS !1 r| ill I /TMERE'S NO SOCIAL LIFE THERE — I \ DON'T. KNOW VaJMW SOUR UUSB&N0\ ‘tSTHiNKiNG <\£>OUT TOTMCE.VOU \ i THERE UNLESS VTS “TO SAME MONES l DON'T W&NT TO'DvSCOURftOE / A‘ SOU - MOO-MvGWT l\ke it ir SOU / \UWENJ"T TRAVELED MUCH^/ A/ChD hot • AMO MOSQUITOS ! ] YOU'LL UAYE PLENTY Or THEM CUEING YOU UP - they PAY ALL THEIR ATTENTION TO , STRANGERS -THE INHABITANTS ARE 50 OR\ED UP THEYOON'T 1 WASTE TIME UGHTING ON THEM 1 UNLESS IT S TO REST A \NHlLtV f v\RS SPECKLES ( SHE'S RIGHT - SHE \ I . VI SITED NORTHVflLLE ALWAYS WA^ RiGMT_\ once - She thats whv shc SAN'S ITS A COULDN’T GET ALONG "TERRIBLE with HER HUSBAND I \ puTcr - She wouldn-t / 'V BE HAPPN IN HEAVEN ] planing drop the j BANDKERCHlEryf Barney Google and Spark Plug SUNSHINE A NEW LIGHT IN SPORTING WORLD Dra™ for The °™ah* B*e by Bllly PeBecH I Formerly owned by Garon SCARE FA OFF IS NOW Tut LEGAL. PROPERTY OF SUN SHINE , M*. 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