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About Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922 | View Entire Issue (April 30, 1922)
9-B SISTER ANNE By Henry Kitchell Webster TJIE BEE: OMAHA. SUNDAY, APRIL 30. 1922. i The Girl Who Pleases Only Her self Collides With the Girl Who Prefers to Please Others. ilere' a tip for the rising generation: LJu ruiiun la a dangeroue thing. In ancient, fur aotten time br It siood fur It, and what iliey mnt we Ilcadin', 'latin and 'lUthmeue. Th thr l-tter which would aymbolti It new ar TNT, a uaeful aubetenc. but with disconcerting poMlbltttlra If It happen to back fire. The young Know a lot mora than th old ie,-, Ihia a cheerfully concede but let thatn b waro now tncjr educate ua. There an occa sional, harmless Victorian to b found bar and ther. born away back In tha Uat decad i if tha last rantury brfora tha grand old lady uini, ng i myivm, unucr puuicwni puntui. Con. of (akin a leaf out Of tha new book. (Iiarlott lllunt. who had baan Charlotta Fulton until aha married Wilfred Charlotta. at tha ri old at of ! proved to b on of thoat too apt pupil. I'ntll her alater. Anna, ased II. cam boma frt'in aohool to apend tha Easter holldaya with her and Wilfred, It had nover occurred to Char lotl to think of hcr If a a victim. It alona . Mv or a groveling worm. If asked, aha'd ha autl.l. In th benighted, unreallatlo way which t'huracterlied har coeval, that aha waa an nnueually lucky prnton and fully a happy hi It waa good for any on to be. CI.'.! .mi., fin In u rnmntf. hftffl.v. atihiirhan V.kboiiae. llor parent wera nice, regular people, Xr well enough off, and aerlously enough dlapoaed, I to Inaur that everything they provided for their children enouia nnv me aternng mam of conventional approval atamped upon It. Since aha waa pretty and amiable, and amuetng fiom tha time aha waa a baby, they mad eome thing of a domestic pet of her. especially her father. Her mother took her a little more eerl oualy; concerned heraelf mora conatantly than Charlotte thought necessary with auch detail a rubber, draft a, tooth brushes, alang, Sunday 4 school lessons, hair curling, and eo on but then, that waa tho way of mother, wasn't ltt These minor drawbacka wer magnificently ' ' compenaated for, anyhow, when on Charlotte' eighth birthday, her mother presented her, miraculously, with a live dolt, a baby alater whom they named Anna. It never occurred to Charlott to serutlnlz any of then peoplo very closely, wtth th ey ut disinterested analysis; to ask heraelf how admlrabl they really were, nor to defln her own feeling about them. What waa there to think about them? They wera hera, and ah loved them. Of course, you loved your own father and mother and slater. Didn't every body? I don't mean to aay that there never wer any free acids of the spiritual aort in Char lotte' thoughts or emotions. She suffered dis appointments and. occasionally, humiliations; j the had to be told now and then not to sulk; I she sometime lay awake for quite a while, after V she'd been sent to bed, feeling exquisitely sorry for herself; once In a blue moon she got so angry that she cried. But no appalling ter minology had, as yot, been applied to these phe nomena, and no one took them any more seri ously than Charlotte herself. This la old stuff, you see nineteenth century. She went on growing up in the regular way. She discovered how nice it was to be pretty .... i . W ill,, gh. l.orn.il to V dance the Hesitation and the Castle Walk. She xVSsf-! to"' ihe Blra fiettn of asking for things sne Nwasn't at aiVsure'she was going to get, during the first ten minutas of her father's after-dinner M -i.... hnr o vlnH.henrte1 vnnnc thlnff. she spared her mother occasional bits of knowl edge which that estimable lady might have found distressing. They didn't send her away to the smart fin ishing school which some of her friends at tended, but to a nice private day school a few miles up the shore instead. This was In order not to interfere with her piano lessons. Back In those day, of course, piano playing was . still considered seriously as a femlnln accom plishment, but It was a little more than that to Charlotte. She had a certain amount of real musical capacity. She practiced at the piano con amore, and by 18 it was the old part of her education that she herself regarded seri ously. She was entertaining a project, as yet coldly received at home, of going to Berlin to study with Mm. Carreno, and then bursting upon the world 88 a first magnitude concert pianist, when tha outbreak of the war, In 1914. knocked all that In the head. Her mother needed a lot of her time, what with all the benefits and drives and relief movements that were springing up on every hand; and her father got to seeming a lot more affectionate and dependent upon her than he'd ever been before. And then she met Wilfred Blunt and liked him awfully, and pretty soon got to liking him a lot mora than that, and they tell Into on of those typically suburban, undefinable, perfectly understood relationships which nice young American boys and girls seem to have invented for themselves. He was only two year older than she, and, having nothing to live on beyond wnat ne couia earn, ne waa, cvuni iw I urban Ideas of tho period, no more mania ge I able during the two years which followed his I graduation from a school of architecture, than, They didn't call themselves engaged even 1 when he went up to the Sheridan training camp, in the Summer of '17. She kept her week ends swept perfectly clean for him, and their ca resses, though they didn't go much farther than they had gone before, abandoned an air, scru pulously maintained up to then, of fortuity; but he didn't ask her to be a war bride, and she, having been born in the last century, hadn't ' proposed to him just waited for him like the nice little Victorian thing she waa Indeed, the status quo ante bellum might have continued for quite a while after Wilfred . emerged from his captain's uniform quite In tact the had been useful to hia country, but not especially glorious) if It hadn't been for Char lotte's father. He remarked, one Sunday, after a sermon he hadn't liked and a rather too carnal . Sunday dinner, that young Blunt was all right, of course, and, for anything he knew to the con trary, talented in his line; and a boy and girl , affair was all right, of course, for boys and girls; but, after all, the war was over. "Wilfred and I are going to be married right after Easter," Charlotte said, bright pink and a little breathless, "I Just thought I'd tell you." She was waiting In the hall with her things on for the aforesaid Wilfred when he came for his r regular Sunday afternoon call, took him out for . ft a walk, and told him not what her father had said, but simply what Was going to happen. Which was news to Wilfred. She'd never realized how rapturously in love with him she was until she saw how he took it, the panic of happiness It threw him into. There was something shy about him, and mysterious, underneath his imperturbable surface and his thoroughly nice, conventional manners, and she got a fairer glimpse of it during that intoxicating V 3 afternoon than she d ever had before. Her father offered no active opposition to the ft match. He welcomed his prospective son-in-law with a Jocular ferociousness that might pass for real affection. He told Charlotte one day this as the nearest he came to overt dissuasion that he wasn't a rich man; he had an excellent law practice, but in these days of terrible prices he wasn't able to put much of anything by, and if he should die tomorrow Charlotte's immediate hare of the estate wouldn't run to more than sv .areatk.. Ha waa coin t make a sortou attempt to Increase It, but (hat would mean, of court, cutting down on cur rtat xpaea Thta waa Just and raonbl. and It wa kind of Mm, no doubt, to 111 hr, but It left Mr chilled a little. Indeed, ah as a war. In thinking back, that th roy aura which had enveloped all thalr relation sine ah was 17 bad changed to a colder color, ah wis nut aura, though, that inla wasn't a much bar own fault a har father". 0h was looking at U th family ept har mother at her fthr, two or thre youngish uncle, and Ann In a manner a littl mor critically detached alno ah had begun using Wilfred a atand ard of comparison. It occurred to har that they war a littl hrdboi!d. and ah was awar that th quality about him which they wer Inclined to regard, conttmptuouily, au .4' Cv r - V clusiveness which made him shy of trampled path and platitudes and resonant enthusl and pep, was Just what she specially adored him for. This waa all fine spinning, of course. Really, to the eye of common sense, everything was as Jolly and nice as possible. She and Wilfred found a heavenly little six room cottage that was within the compass of what Wilfred's wage as a designer in an archi tect office would run to, provided he didn't lose his Job. They furnished it sketchily, but with a good general effect Her mother show ed a lovely liberality in the matter of dresses, and household linen; her father gav her a massive silver service, complete from platters to aaltapoons. (She was conscious of an un gracious wish that his gift had been a piano.) She was duly showered and feted by friends, and they wer married upon the date she had snatched at random to stun her father with that Sunday afternoon in February. Precisely 52 week from that same mo mentous February Sunday she bore a son and named him James Fulton, after his maternal grandfather. He was a big baby, and she had rather desperate time with him. It had want ed all the skill of the eminent accoucheur who attended her to avert a catastrophe, but every thing turned out a well as possible. The child thrived mightily under the most enlightened of modern conditions. She nursed him herself until he waa 10 months old. and she as stringy and thin a a bantamweight boxer. She'd hoped to do all her housework, too (they were hard up, of course, with the building business shot to piece the way it was), but this was beyond her. The least she could do with was a part-time girl who came at 4 and stayed till 8 or later In the evening tor 60 cents extra, when she and Wilfred wanted to go out any where. Well, there you have the life history of Charlotte Blunt as ah would have recounted it up to the time two year after her marriage, when her father'a and mother'a trip to Hawaii made it aeem th pleasant and natural thing for her little sister, Anne, aged 18, to spend her Easter holidays from school visiting her and Wilfred. Anne, you may have noticed, does not figure very largely in Charlotte's btography, for all her miraculous and ecstatio entrance upon the scene. For th two or three year that real babyhood lasts, Anne had meant a lot to Char lotte; a source of pride and responsibility, a developer of maternal instincts. But long be fore eh waa 5 year old (I tell you they're born that way, these young ones), Anne discov ered that her big sister's authority had no punitive and little remunatory sanction behind it. And by the time she waa 6 she was defi nitely leading her own life, so far as Char lott waa concerned. Charlotte might have fought it out with her, but fighting, unless you absolutely cornered her. wasn't Charlotte's way. This visit, she told heraelf, was going to be a good thing. It was dreadful that two sisters should be so little sisterly; and now that Anne waa on the threshold, as they say, of woman hood, her was a chance to welcome her in, win her confidence, make a companion of her. If. only she and Wilfred weren't so desperately hard up it would be easier. It wasn't until she saw Anne on her own threshold that her mind misgave her. The problem Was going to be not to win Anne's confidences, but to protect her own. The only serious change in Anne's appearance since Christmas was her bobbed hair, and this sho explained as she took off her hat. She'd resisted the hair-bobbing epidemic at school until th morning when Miss Hood, th prin cipal, promulgated the rule that no more of the pupil would be permitted to bob their hair without express parental sanction. Inatantly, thereupon, Anne had bobbed her own and tele graphed her father, explaining the fait accompli and demanding, by wire, th requisite authori sation. She then informed the principal of both these acts and argued, successfully, for a stay in execution until her father's telegram should have had time to arrive. Anne didn't regard this at all as an exploit; it had been rather a 1 bore, really. But you couldn't let people get , away with thing like that. Also, she was ' rather sorry for Miss Hood, who waa a poor, fiuttery old thing tha girls spared her when they could. Charlotte, during that first half hour as she laughed and chatted, exhibited the baby and busied herself with the score of pleasant un caanUal arvi which make up JLAlituai of IRpbca) V- welcoming a guest, felt her original misgivings grow bigger all tho while. Was she, too, going to be described in due time as a poor, fiuttery old thing? Anne was getting her goat, but as yet Charlotte didn't see how she did it. That night in bed, in the nearest thing to whispers she could reduce him to, Wilfred supplied her with a clew. Whispers were neces sary, first, because they'd moved the baby in with them, and, second, because Charlotte didn't want Anne, in the next room, to hear even that they were talking, let alone about her. "She's completely unornamented," Wilfred said. "That's the new thing, I suppose. I don't mean Just the way she dresses, nor that she isn't made up. It's mostly her manners. She never smiles unless Bhe's t amused. If you're used to having people smile Just to be polite and encouraging, she leaves you flat. She doesn't urge you not to do things for her that she knows you're going to do anyway." She heard him give a sleepy little laugh, which was one of the things she adored about him. "She puckers up your mouth," he explained, "like a bite out of a nice, hard, young apple." Charlotte was up on one elbow, about to lean down and kiss him good night, but instead of doing that she said: "You like her though?" "Sure, I like her. All she needs is a littl warming up. We'll have to try to show her a good time." "We can't spend any money on her, Bill," Charlott remonstrated. "We simply haven't got it, not for theater tickets or parties thing like that." ' He admitted, ruefully, that they couldn't do much. , His disclaimer didn't satisfy Charlotte, and It was on her tongue to tell him the thing she had been holding back namely, that the collector had made his second call that day about the piano. The next Installment would bo due next week and they hadn't paid the last. But she fotebore. After all, the collector had agreed to wait, and she had one more string to her bow. one ship that might be coming in any day now. Of course she was glad Wilfred liked Anne. Let her reflect how miserable she would feel if he didn't; if he regarded the visit as an impo sition. She pumped away valiantly at that re flection for 15 minutes before she went to sleep. Anne didn't seem, next morning, quite the little monster that Charlotte's imaginings during an uneasy night had painted her. She turned out for their early breakfast full dressed, and she helped, good-humoredly, with the dishes and tho baby afterward. During the morning, while he was having his nap, she told Charlotte a lot about her school It was thoroughly contempti ble, so far as Its official activities and curri culum weVe concerned, but a few of the best ; girls had got together to correct Its more fla grant shortcomings for themselves. They didn't call themselves a club, let alone go in for any thing childish, like secrets or symbols or pass words. They had no organization at all. Some times they took concerted action, and, since they were the flower of the school,; usually won the point they had felt it necessary to make. But for the most part they merely talked things over made up their minds about things individu ally. - They talked each other and themselves over, too. No girl, no matter bow prominent or charming or Intelligent she might be, could be one of them unless she showed she could endure without flinching the most penetrating comment upon her defects of character, manners or per son. After yoVd been analyzed a few times in open meeting you learned to do the trick upon yourself. The ability to give a brilliantly ruth less performance of this sort was highly re garded. , , Charlotte, expressing approval of this scheme, betrayed a benighted misapprehension of its pur pose. It was not, Anne patiently explained, self Improvement. They weren't trying to make their lives sublime, like that silly Psalm of Life which Miss Hood quoted every year at graduation lime. The Idea was to find out what you were really like, what your motives and weaknesses were, and what you wanted; when you knew all that you could act accordingly. Tou wouldn't start anything you couldn't finish. Tou could back yourself not to turn soft and sappy at the critical moment and not to welch. Tou wouldn't whimper over the results you got. Wilfred was right; there was a charm about it. You were immensely set up when you won one of her rare smiles. You felt an impulse, every now and then, to turn upon her and crumple her up and kiss her. In some respects a, wan amazingly uaUJm jJu Waa al flannrr. But AntM cMftim? f- tit among hf nsin. made familiar by bright stories in th maga zines, which Charlotte had dreaded lest she might, during the past year, have degenerated into. There was nothing outrageous about her dress; she managed what skirts she had rather decently. She didn't paint. Charlotte, who had learned to smoke since her marriage, but didn't enjoy it much, had been a littl disconcerted .when Anne after dinner on the night of her arrival had declined Wilfred's proffered clgareta Her speech was no slangier than Charlotte' own. and she was distinctly more fastidious about It But when Charlotte ventured a tactful compli ment upon these points, citing her authorities for having dreaded something different, she drew forth a startling explanation. "Of course, I haven't any modesty ,"i Anne said. (She spoke of it precisely as If It wer a dis ease.) ''But I don't have to scream It to the world from morning to night, any mor than you had to go around telling everybody, In youi day, that you were I wonder what you'd have said, a nice girl or an honest woman? There are some things that can be taken for granted. The trouble with those girls in What's-His-Name's stories I suppose they really wer like that once was that they had to show people, or they wouldn't know, that they had legs and so on; and that they could swear and smoke and were good sports and knew about sex and psycho-analysis. But that' pretty old stuff now. Of course," she added, reflectively, "if ever I want to dress to excite a man, I will. I den't care about exciting Wilfred I don't think I do so what's the use?" Charlotte, her blood beginning to run cold, asked whether all the girls In her sister' set felt th same way. ' They didn't think exactly alike, of course, Anne told her, but they agreed pretty well on fundamentals. And did the teachers know, Charlotte inquired, about the existence of the club and th aort of Ideaa It encouraged? "It isn't a club at all," Ann explained. "They don't allow clubs In the school. But they can't keep girls who find each other interesting from talking to each other Instead of with people they find dull. They can't make u talk the same way' with people we don't take seri ously and with people we do. There's one Eng lish teacher who's a peach. We writ real themes for her; put down what we think. The others we fluff along with; not because we're afraid of them I think most of them are afraid of us. ' "Of course, you can't be afraid of people who are afraid of themselves; you treat them like children: All old people are like that, I guess practically all. Don't dare look 'emselves In the eye, afraid something will pop out at them. Pre tending to be kind and self-sacrificing when they're Just simply afraid to see something through; pretending everything's lovely when they know something's rotten; saying 'Hush!' and looking the other way. Of course, if you're pretending, too, and believe all they tell you, they can bully you as much as they like all for your own good, of course. But, if you don't have to pretend, and they know you don't, they'll let you alone, all right Unless you go and shout It in their ear, they won't. let on they heard you at all." "Am I an old person?" Charlotte asked, and Jumped at the sound of her own voice. She had been thinking the question ever since Ann had begun talking about them, but sh hadn't meant to apeak; it had alipped out, somehow. Anne smiled, faintly. . "You're an old dear," she aaid, coming over to Charlotte and kissing her. (Wa this "fluff," Charlotte wondered, or real affection?) "Most people hate their sisters, of course, aud I thought you were going to be. awful. But somehow you aren't I don't won der father used to be spoony about you." Almost in the same breath, and with a man ner so casual that It Instantly caught Char lotte's attention, she went on to ask whether, by the way, a letter had come for her from dad. She'd written him, to San Francisco, and the answer, it there was one, would be Just about due. "O, I'm so glad you wrote to him," Charlotte , said, and added, as she flinched way, without as yet realising why, from her terrible little sister's look, "I wrote him a steamer letter, too." At that Anne's brows contracted. "What did you write to him for?" she asked. "What for?" Charlotte echoed blankly. But she felt her face getting hot, still without quite Vnnn.pg Mbxi lb auDuoscd iUa'U nothing but annoyanc at something commiserating and ! together nuffirbl which ah road In hr uter'a amll. ' 1 gu you'd bttr tall m Jut a hat you r'n. ah 4id. Ann amll broadened Into on of unequiv ocal raliah. "Wall," h remarked, It' a chanr to find out whether you r old or not. If you'r gam to take It without frill". X don't mind." Charlott laul)i, "Co ah4d.' h command ad, liar vole loyally responding wtth Just th shad of carl amusement ah wanted. tt' whether I could get into th t or not." liut thla touch of Irony didn't dlwompoa Ann a bit Sh spuko, a hen n got ready, re flectively: "You got a Jolt when you found I'd written to father, too. You pretended to b pUaMd, tcau you pretend you lov lum ao much that you have to let on to b glad over anything that would puts him. aurh a getting a sweet littl good by not from me. Iteally, you war Just about aa glad to hear that I'd written to him a you would b to find a not from torn wil In on of Wilfred' pocket It cornea to mor or la tha aam thing, of cour." Charlott managed on mor laugh, "Really, Anne." ah said, "you'r being Just funny a when you used to dr up In mother' clothe and pretend to go calling," "O. yea," observed th Imperturbable child, tliafe th way people alwaya try to get out of It when they've had enough. But I don't mind being funny." "Is there any nioio?" Charlott asked. "Tou'v settled It that I don't far for father. What' th next thing? That he doesn't car for me?" "We ran take that next. If you like," said Ann. "II had an awful crush on you for a while. Golly, don't I remember! Perfectly ellly about you. You could get anything you wanted out of him. Of course, he tot aor when you jilted him for Wilfred. Ilea been sore ever since, hasn't he? How many presents has he given you real presents, I mean, not Junk? IJow much has ho done for you?" "W don't went anything don for ua." Char lotte said, quietly. "Wilfred wouldn't let m If I did. Father told me before w wer married that h waa going to try to reduce expense In order to lay up mor for all of u when he died." Sh added, with a pounce of anger, "I'd Ilk to get Into your mind with a broom I" "Any time you like," said Ann. "Only It'a your mind we're talking about now; your and father'a Why, look here, I can remember I suppose. I must have been 6 or 7 before you got pretty, when you wer scrawny and disagree able and affected. I know I used to think you must have something terrible th matter with you. Weil, did father ever make a fuss bout you then hold you In his lap and pet you, and bring you presents? And wouldn't it have done you more good right then than any thing else? It wasn't until you were some tody nice to snuggle up to that he began. I was Just beginning to get scrawny and unpleas ant then myself, so I was In th side llnea Eut when you Jilted him, I took htm over." "I guess that's enough," said Charlotte, get ting to her feet "I don't suppose you're old enough to realize what perfectly nasty things you've been saying." "O, they're nasty enough," Anne agreed, good humoredly, "only the nastlneas isn't in saying them. But I haven't got around yet to why you wrote that letter to father." Charlotte turned upon her with a gasp of protest, but the girl didn't look up. She had clasped one knee in her hands and was staring at it meditatively. "It wasn't because you're getting sick of Wilfred. You're still crazy about him I could see that last night That's one of the real things about you. So you must have written to dad because you wanted some money out of him. Well, I guess there's no reason why you shouldn't. That's what I did. I asked him for $300 besides my regular allowance, of course. I told him I knew it was an awful lot of money, but I'd simply be heartbroken If I couldn't have it" Charlotte echoed the amount mechanically, then Inquired what the child wanted it for. "Dancing1 lessons,'.' she said. And in response to another echo went on to explain: "Not ordi nary dancing lessons, nor the regular boarding school gymnastics dancing, either. The school provided that, and it was second rate, like all the rest of their instruction good enough .for flu f fa But their bunch was going to get Baum, who waa the greatest ballet master In New York, as well as one of the greatest of living dancers. He wouldn't do any of the routine teaching, of course, but he'd give them a good man and would look them over himself now and then. There were 10 of them meant to go into it The school authorities had been bullied Into giving the scheme a sort of passive sanction; they'd furnish chaperons and arrange houra and so on, provided the girls could get parental authorization, but they wouldn't recommend it nor have anything to do with the collecting of money. Which meant, of course, that it had to be cash In advance. What I wrote to father was that all the nicest girls in the school were going into it every one of my best friends and that I'd be terribly left out unless he'd see me through. And that they'd prob ably give a show commencement time. Sob stuff like that, you know; It ought to fetch him, I guess." "Isn't that the reason," Charlotte asked, "why you're so keen to go into it?" . Anne stared. "How old do you think I am 9? No, but if I'd told dad the real reason he'd hove com down on me like a feather bed. There are aeveral of my best friends who aren't going into it at all because they couldn't ever be real dancers. This is going to be a serious thing. If I turn out to be as good as I think I am, why I'll know what to do next I'm pretty old, of course; that's the main trouble." "You mean you -want to be a professional ballet dancer?" Charlotte asked. "You'd ask Baum for a Job?" , , "At the end of a 10 weeks' course of lessons? ft isn't quite as quick as that. ( No, but I could find out in that time whether I'm a hopeless lemon or not; If I am, it's no use going to the mat with father about It I'll have to go to the mat with him about something, of course, only I want to choose a good hold. I'd like to have scmething to go on before I come back from this silly old school. I know , I'm not coming . back to be a domestic pet Got to act like one, that'a all, till it's time to strike out But not for a steady thing, unless I lose my mind. It's too darned uncertain. Look at you!" "It's silly to be rude like that. Just wan tonly," Charlotte remarked. "That wasn't wanton," Anne, retorted. "1 meant it You let dad kid you out of going to Europe for a serious shot at the piano he'd have let you go a dozen times for fun. He didn't want you to do any real work on it, even at home. He wanted you Jolly and fresh; nice to play with. Remember the- way he blew up one night when you'd practiced seven hours aud were too tired to go to a show with him? I do. I wasn't quite old enough for him to ask me to go with him Instead. "Well, you fell for it. Natural enough, 1 suppose, back in your day. But look what It got you. You decided to be Wilfred's pet in stead of father's, and now you're just his slave his and the baby's. He's a peach of a baby, of course. I'd like to have one myself, for the experience, anyhow, but not till I'm good and ready. Not till it doesn't mean being tired out and hard up all the time, the way you are." Charlotte felt the tears starting and furiously fought them back, but the effort wouldn't have availed if the baby hadn't called Just then and given her an excuse to dart upstairs. When she came down with him a few minutes later she looked as serene as ever. As soon as she had got him out of her arms, on the floor among his, toys, Anne came over and bussed hec "Tou'r a pretty good sport, aa well aa an eld dar," h appalling child oNwrved. toelt that pretty well for the first try, Usually ihey I Into fit, even when Ihry'r bow her near a old ae you." Hut right her as a her young Ann, Ilk IVer lUbblt In Ma celebrated experience with th tar baby, bruk hr tnolars jug, th drew a totally unwarranted aiiinptltn front th fact thttt pour old Charlott didn't visibly bv fita Ann had a few Ihlna yet to learn, and on of thane, in point now, waa tha spiritual application yt the law If Inertia. Kb didn't at all realu Iiow much momentum Charlott had acquired In th past two of her J yeara by tha accumulation of a h unhand and a baby to lak careof. a lioua lo keep going, an appearance of solvency to preeent to th world: a heavy train of care. In fact, behind her on th rails, whUh needed a good deal of energy to pull, to b ure, but which, on occasion, had an almost h resist Ihl power to puah. Young Anne, run ning light and making excellent speed toward whatever h wanted, getting on very tla faclorlly eo long as ther wa nothing much In th way, had almply no conception of what a h'ad-on collision with Charlott would mean. It'a only fair to ay that Charlott hadn't eithr. nor did she, until a Ultln after 6 o'clock that afternoon, forese on. Fifteen .minutes after Anne had finished her exposition of her sister's character and motives, aud her own In tendons, tho two wer discussing what they'd hav for lunch, and romping with th baby aa domentlcally aa If nothing had disturbed their traditionally sisterly relation. The only time they skirted th morning battlefield waa when Charlott mad a humorous reft-rcne to It. This wa after lunch, when Anna wna setting out for a matinee. "I suppose. If I wer to say I waa glad Dicky Boyd had Invited you and that you wer going to see such a good. show, you'd tell m that I aid It because I'm glad to be rid of you for a while; ao I won't Hut do have a good time, and don't analyse Dicky, because It will be nice to hav him ask you again." Ther waa a littl mor edg to that than you'd hav expected from poor old Charlotte. Looking back upon It. Anne decided that thla waa the firat Intimation of her alster new note. The new not waa unmistakable, when Ann got -horn from th matinee. Sh found Char lott busy at her desk, fending oft th baby, with on hand while she wrote with the other, "I'm glad you'r back, anyhow." Charlotte aid, without rising, "Have a good time? Comi and take Jamesle off me, will you? He'a Just ruined the signature on a perfectly good check. O. I don't care what you do with him. Tak him along upstairs with you, If you're going He'll have a grand time with your trunk unit you get your things hung up." "Sure," said Anne, "I'd love to." And thea actually caught herself on the edge of an apoK ogy for having left her room like that Half way up the stairs she waa sufficiently recovered to stop and say: "That's one to you. I thought perhapa if I left 'em you'd think it was your Christian duty to put them away for me." "You're going to know me a whole lot battel before you go back to school," Charlotte called after her. If what Charlotte meant by this prediction that Anne was going to accumulate a lot of new and unsuspected data about her, it was verified. As an entelechy, on the other hand, Charlotte day by day became to Anne's bright, hard, young mind more mysterious. The theory and technique of the Jump was subject in which Anne was professedly expert Among her friends in school she gave lessoni in it by precept and example. Any situation, ne matter how difficult intrinsically, In which you could manage to get the Jump on your rival, oi opponent, was far from hopeless. You kepi the Jump by knowing what you were going to do next while the other party to the affair wat still contemplating the thing you had done last, and then, by doing that next thing decisively. Just aa he came up for air. ' The principal ol Anne'a school could hav borne eloquent and pathetio testimony to the child's talents in thil branch of applied psychology; the halr-bobblnf, episode waa but one of a brilliant galaxy. Well, the thing that Anne's expertness en abled her clearly to perceive at the end of th first 24 hours of her visit to Charlotte was that her elder sister had got the Jump on her. How she had got it remained a mystery. Boi tho first evening and the first morning of the visit the Jump had been with Anne, but some how or other during her absence at the matine the shoe had, so to speak, changed feet If you want an example, Charlotte's manner of dealing with her father' letter will serve. When Anne came downstairs with the baby (she'd had a revealing experience with him up there in her room, while she tried to do some thing entirely at cross purposes with hia She'd . never had the care of a small, irresponsible ruffian like this before except under circum stances In which she could give him hef whole attention, and she could adumbrate now what it said tor Charlotte' force of character that she wasn't in a sanatorium for nervous wrecks), when she came lugging him, now, downstairs, Charlotte got up from her desk, took him away from her, chucked him casually onto the daven port, and said: "I got a letter from father this afternoon, from the ship Just before they sailed. He sent his love to you. I'd show you the letter, but Jamesle got It and chewed it up. They're going to have a grand time, he and mother. She sent her love, too, to both of us." , She had nothing more, it appeared, to vol unteer about the contents of the letter, and the crime Imputed to Jamesle was certainly plaus ible enough. , An even Imperfectly masticated Iotter wasn't a thing you could ask to have ex hibited as a document. "Did he say anthlng," Anne asked, after turn ing the thing over in her mind for a minute. "about having written to me?" ."Not a word," said Charlotte. And she added, with a slightly reflective smile, "of course, there's o reason why he should mention a thing like that to me." "Meaning he wouldn't want to make you Jealous," Anne commented, in the hope of starting something. . But all she got from Charlotte was, "O, well, that's your Idea" "I suppose he may have sent my letter to the ' school," Anne reflected. "Of course," said Charlotte. She was kneel ing on the davenport, holding the baby by the feet, and letting him down over the back of It, a proceeding which roused him to such ecstasies of delight that it wasn't easy to hear Just what she said. "Of course, people never realize how long it takes a letter to come clear across from San Francisco." Anne was conscious of a wish that it were practicable to put young Jamesie on the wit ness stand and learn whether he really had chewed up a letter that afternoon or not. An other thing which she found herself surprisingly concerned to know was whether or not her father had sent any money to Charlotte, but this was a thing which her code wouldn't per mit her to ask. People's motives, their hidden impulses and unformulated desires, were fair game in the sort of inquisitions she and her friends were in the habit of conducting; but at practical, material facts one drew the line; firm ly, too, or their simulating analyses would de generate into precisely tho prying sort of gossip which they held themselves so superior to. But did Charlotte understand her immunity? Did she know enough to bank upon it? You could hardly think at all with the baby carrying on like that "I hope those poor simps at the school will know enough to forward It to me here," Anna said. "It would be Just like them to hold It tor me. If I don't get my allowance. n . f . HT to rage TncJvci V