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About The frontier. (O'Neill City, Holt County, Neb.) 1880-1965 | View Entire Issue (April 22, 1937)
SYNOPSIS Victoria Herrendeen, a vivacious little girl, had been too young to feel the shock that came when her father, Keith Herrendeen, lost his fortune. A gentle, unobtrusive soul, he is now employed •s an obscure chemist in San Fran cisco, at a meager salary. His wife, Magda, cannot adjust herself to the change. She is a beautiful woman, fond of pleasure and a magnet for men's attention. Magda and Victoria have been down at a summer resort and Keith joins them for the week-end. Magda leaves for a bridge party, excusing her self for being such a "runaway.” Later that night Victoria is grief-stricken when she hears her parents quarreling. The Herrendeens return to their small San Francisco apartment. Keith does not approve of Magda's mad social life and they quarrel frequently. Magda receives flowers and a diamond from Ferdy Man % ners, a wealthy man from Argentina whom she had met less than a week before. Manners arrives a few hours later. Magda takes Victoria to Nevada to visit a woman friend who has a daughter named Catherine. There she tells her she is going to get a divorce. Victoria soon is in boarding school with her friend Catherine. Magda marries Manners and they spend two years in Argentina. Victoria has studied in Eu rope and at eighteen she visits her mother when Ferdy rents a beautiful home. Magda is unhappy over Ferdy's drinking and attentions to other women. Vic dislikes him. but for her mother's sake is nice to him. When her mother and stepfather return to South America. Victoria refuses to go with them because of Ferdy's unwelcome attentions to her. Magda returns. CHAPTER III—Continued Maid, dog, p&rrot, bags, they got Into a large waiting car at the Em barcadero, Mrs. Manners talking, as is the custom of returned trav elers, of the amusing steward on the boat, the races at Havana, of everything unimportant and incon sequential. They were driven rap idly up the steep hills to the big hotel; everything going with the smoothness of custom; Victoria’s mother had been arriving and de parting in just this manner ever since her second marriage five years earlier. Soon Victoria and her mother set tled at luncheon beside the fire. “Well, this is fun!” said Magda then. “And now we can talk. You look so well, Vic, and you’re really handsome. Really you are! What have you been doing with yourself, tell me everything, you got my wires?” “You’re the one with the news,” she said smilingly. “Nothing has happened here. Miss Butler put me on night duty last night—only the second time, and I’m dead! I had breakfast at the hospital at seven, and had to clean up three bath rooms, and stopped on my way downtown to leave my bag here.” “The hospital!” Magda echoed ’ aghast, not hearing the rest. “You’ve been ill!” Victoria’s smile was reassuring. Her color was beginning to come back now, as she fell with vigor upon a three-inch steak, and there was revived light in her eyes. “I’m in with Catherine,” she ex plained. “Student nurses.” Mrs. Manners sat back and re i garded her with puzzled eyes. “Mummy, you’re such fun—it’s such fun to be talking to you again, and it’s the best food I ever tasted! But darling,” Victoria pleaded, “I had to do something. I couldn’t just take a room somewhere and wait for you. You were with Ferdy ’way down in South America, and I was absolutely on the loose.” “But you were with Anna and Catherine.” “Aunt Anna got a most flattering offer from a school in Cleveland. We couldn't go with her, and Kittsy was going to be a nurse. So I went along to the hospital with her.” “You are handsome,” Madga said, under her breath, not listen ing. “Don’t they let you use make up at all?” “Not on duty, and you sort of get out of the habit. What are you look ing at?’ Victoria asked, with an embarrassed laugh, as her mother continued her placid scrutiny. “Well, you’re simply adorable, Vicky,” she said at length, “and you get enthusiastic just the way you used to. But—although it’s a little soon to talk about it, I had rather a different plan in mind for you. I was thinking of Europe, after your debut.” “Europe!” Vicky echoed, her own eyes suddenly blazing. She remem > bered her student year there under the gentle unremitting chaperonage of the Dominican nuns. Again she heard the fountains of Rome splash ing; saw the lights of the Place de la Concorde setting white statues and dark tree tops in bold relief against a blue night sky, caught a whiff of wet spring greenness from the grass beside the London Mall. "Oh, Mummy!' she said. “Would you like it?” “Oh, well, Mother—you and I?” Victoria’s voice shook with excite ment. “We two.” “Ferdy wouldn’t mind?” t Instead of answering, Mrs. Man ners looked away through the ex quisite silky shadows of half-low ered lashes. Victoria’s heart sank; she knew that gentle patience, she knew that long, resigned sigh. All was not going well between her mother and Ferdy. The luncheon was cleared away; the two women resumed their chairs by the wood fire. ‘‘There are a thousand persons to whom I ought to telephone,” Madga said lazily. “I won’t. I love this sitting here with you. You haven't told me anything about yourself. Vicky, have you seen or heard any thing of your father?” The question cami suddenly, and with it the color rose to Magda’s face. “Yes, I saw Dad about two weeks ago,” she said aloud. Magda added no further ques tions, but her eyes were expectant. “He’s married again, you know. Mummy. I wrote you that. And they’re going to have a baby. They were married last February, and they expect the baby at Christmas. He simply adores Olivette, and he's all excited about the baby.” “Ha!” Magda said and fell thoughtful. “Still up in Seattle?” “He says he loves it." Magda twisted the Herrendeen pearls in beautiful restless fingers. But for some reason or other she felt a little chill in the air, felt that her mother wasn’t wholly pleased with the news that Dad was happy and that a new baby was on the way. “Ferdy,” said Madga, out of thought—“Ferdy is a strange crea ture, Vicky. I may as well tell you now as at any time that every thing’s wrong—it’s all wrong.” Victoria was silent, puzzled, and after a pause Magda went on light ly: “And so—Mr. Fernando Ainsa y Castello Manners and I have de cide^ to separate. No, no, no, not a divorce,” she interrupted herself to say quickly, as Vicky’s stricken face was turned from the fire in involuntary protest. "He doesn’t want a divorce. If he got a di vorce Maud Campbell would have him married before he could turn around, so he doesn’t want a di vorce, and neither do I. If you get a divorce they can do all sorts of funny things about alimony, go to court and have it adjusted and less ened—I don’t know what they can’t do. But a separation means that you and I can live where we like, and do as we please. And so it’s to be Europe—off we go! I’ll get you some things—or we can get them there—” “The only thing,” Victoria began somewhat hesitantly, “Ought Ferdy pay for me, too? I mean, it’s all right for a visit—it’s all right for a few months. But after all—after all he doesn’t owe me—” “It’s my money, and you’re with me,” Magda explained simply, with a touch of impatience. "I was thinking of Ferdy, Vic,” Magda said, out of a silence, “and thinking—” she stopped for a long sigh—“thinking of the tremendous difference there is in men,” she said. “I mean, Vic,” she began again, as Victoria could find nothing to say—“I mean that—well, I suppose I was thinking of Lucius Farmer.” “Who’s he?” A familiar tighten ing, a familiar sinking sensation was at Victoria’s heart- Oh, dear. Oh, dear. This was commencing again was it? "You must know his name, dar ling. He’s about the most success ful painter of murals in America. He made the trip with us from Buenos Aires, but he lives down here in Carmel with a perfectly impossible wife and daughters.” “And what did the impossible wife and daughters think of you, Mum my?” “Oh, they weren’t along—perish the thought! No, he was alone.” Magda’s voice fell to a dreamy note. “One of the finest men—” she said, under her breath ‘I mean one of the simplest and—and big gest—and gentlest— “This life would be heaven for women, Vic, if many men were like him!” And again Victoria could find nothing to say. Lucius Farmer came tc see them the next morning. Magda was restless; Victoria had gone into her own room to try on a gown her mother had brought her. It was of sheer batiste, embroidered delicately with tiny garlands of roses, all in white. It was the sort of gown that makes any girl’s eyes dance, and Victoria, coming back with its frail folds blowing about her, wore the radiant expression that only a new gown gives to twenty years. She halted at the sight of a strange tall man standing at the foggy window, talking with her mother. They both turned. Vic toria’s hand was taken in a big hard hand. She liked the man at once, one must like him; there was something about Lucius that dis armed criticism, that won all hearts. Something simple and friendly, and a little uncertain and timid, and at the same time some thing definite and vital; there was a world of mirth, a child’s secret and delicious merriment in his gray eyes. He was not smiling this morning; he seemed serious and burdened, immediately the pleasantries of greeting had died away. Victoria, presently going back to her room, could hear through the open door way the gravity of his tone as he and her mother talked at the win dow, their heads together. ‘‘I can’t, Magda,” he said more than once. “I’m so sorry—I can’t.” But when Victoria came out again to find her mother alone, there was a: air of disappointment or defeat in Mrs. Manners' attitude. She was glowing with inner fires; she was shaken, laughing, ecstatic. She put her arms about Vicky; held the girl away from her to laugh into her eyes. “My darling, do you like him?” Victoria regarded her with a smile that had small heart in it. “Isn’t the question—do you?” "Vic, on the steamer, the day we left Buenos Aires, we found each other!” Magda said. “He came up to me and said, 'Aren’t you the Valdes' friend, Senora Manners?’ I don’t know how he ever nerved himself to do it, for he’s not like that as a rule. But he said he had seen me at the country club. We hardly spoke to anyone else on the voyage; we had our meals on deck, we talked and talked as if we never could talk enough! “For the first time in my life, Vic, I have met a man who stirs i" me— something—something that I might have been, might have had?” Mag da continued. “He loves me, I know that, although he’s never told me so. But it isn’t that. It’s the companionship, the exquisite delight “I Love This Sitting Here With You.” of being understood—understood!” Magda broke off to say in amused scorn. "He knows more than I of everything—books, music, people. And his attitude toward life is so beautiful, so simple and eager and fine.” There was a silence. Magda smiled and wiped suddenly wet eyes, and Victoria smiled, too, a mother’s patient smile for a child. “So what?” the girl asked good naturedly. “So nothing, my darling, that’s the tragedy!" Magda answered lightly, and there was another si lence. “No,” she went on presently, end ing it. “Ferdy gets here next week, and Lucius goes down to his wife and the little girls in Carmel, and that’s the end.” The day moved on. That night, when they went down stairs to join the Kendalls, and be carried off for a dinner, Victoria saw Lucius and a woman and two gawky dark shy girls, all sitting in the great red chairs of the hotel foyer, evidently waiting for some one. Was it for Mother? Whether it was or not they all came over to Vic and Magda, and there were introductions. Mrs. Farmer was a plain stout whole some - looking little woman in glasses, with ropes of oily gray brown hair wound about her head. The girls were like her, although both gave promise of some beauty. Ann. Constance. Victoria. “Vicky,” said her mother, in the course of the next few days, “when you fall in love, make it with a man to whom you can be an inspiration. It’s a sacred thing—it’s worth all the pain and the ache, to inspire a truly great man!” At first Victoria felt most pity for the man. He was clever, keen, af fectionate, simple, and he was suf fering cruelly. After a few weeks she perceived that her mother was in misery as great as his. Magda carried it better, but it was there. Ferdy was back now, restless, ir ritable, unreasonable. He went to races, fights, polo games with men; he went off on hunting and fishing trips. Sometimes Victoria thought him entirely oblivious of what was going on; sometimes she thought he knew. Magda was burning up with it; she could not have wholly con cealed it even if she would. She glowed and trembled, laughed and cried; she was strangely, awk wardly like a girl again—a girl upon whom the inexorable forties had set their tragic seal. Some how it hurt Victoria to the deeps of her soul to see her mother's agony in this grip of young love. Lucius was fighting it; grimly, honestly, uselessly. He and Magda met; sat long over hotel tea tables telling each other that this must be the end. that there was no honor, no happiness for them except in renunciation. Magda, in her dark violet velvet, with the broad brim of her dark velvet hat shadowing her splendid eyes, and the rich gold brown of sables setting off her ex quisite skin, was perhaps as beau tiful at such moments as she had ever been in her life. Just to be with Lucius brought the transpar ent color to her face and the strange liquid pulsing to her eyes. But when they had parted it Was only to begin the agony again. Ferdy was settled in a suite of rooms connecting with Magda's own. It was Ferdy who brought to Vic toria and Magda a handful of steam ship companies’ folders. They opened the shining, brightly colored little booklets eagerly, studied floor plans, discussed “Deck B“ and "Deck C.” It was Ferdy’s idea that Magda and Victoria take one of the canal steamers to New York, stopping at South America and is land ports, using up the coldest of the winter weeks on the leisurely trip. "It’s just possible that Lucius will be on the Elcantic with us,” Magda said one day innocently. "Mother, don’t let him!” Vic pleaded. Magda looked at her, and the color rushed into her own face. "But, what am I to do, Vic? I can’t stand this!” Magda suddenly muttered defensively. CHAPTER IV Victoria looked sympathy, dis tress. “We’ll be gone in a week, Mum my. Then won’t It be better?” Magda looked at her daughter somberly. “I’m forty-two, Vicky, and I’ve never—liked—anyone before,” Mag da faltered, with a little difficulty. “It isn’t only myself—truly, Vic, it isn’t. But it’s to hurt him so hor ribly—to ruin his life, now when he’s just beginning to succeed— that’s what kills me,” Magda whis pered. “But you’re separating, Mother. We’ll be gone in a few days. That’ll help,” Victoria said, forcing her self to gentleness and sympathy. “That’s just it, Vic. It’ll kill him.” Magda shut her eyes, and tears squeezed themselves under the lowered lashes. “But he’ll have his work, and his wife and children—” Victoria be gan and stopped. “His wife means absolutely noth ing to him, Vic. They’ve been noth ing to each other for five years. He told me so.” “But Mother,” she presently of fered doubtfully, “doesn’t a man belong to his wife?” To this Magda superbly made no answer. With an expression of pa tient endurance she rose and swept into her room. When the bright soft morning came, Magda was exhausted. Her face was bleached and blotched with tears, her eyes swollen, and the hair that had so often been pushed off her forehead during the fevers of the night hung in careless locks and showed darkness at its roots. Victoria was dressed in silk pa jamas, having her own breakfast, when her mother awakened; she set Magda’s tray on the tumbled bed before her. But her mother could not eat. She drank a little coffee, set the tray aside. “Vic,” she breathed, “what shall I do?” “Mother, you mustn’t cry so. Ferd’s coming up this morning; he’ll be here for lunch!” “Ferd knows," her mother whis pered, not opening her eyes. “Ferd knows!” Victoria was star tled. “I told him.” Magda shrugged in differently. “Well, what does he think? Is he— What does he say?” “Nothing. It amused him, I think,” Magda said, with more bit terness than Victoria had ever seen in her before. “You wouldn’t like to divorce Fer dy?” Victoria asked doubtfully. “If Lucius got a divorce?” “He won’t hear of it.” “Ferdy won’t!” It was an excla mation. “No. He’s frightened to death of that Campbell woman. She’s going to be on the Loughborough yacht; he knows that the minute I’m out she’ll be in. He's tiring of her al ready, or if he’s not he’s beginning to feel that he will some day. As long as he’s married to me he’s safe.” (TO liK CONTINUED) Shilling, Anyway The expression “cut off with a shilling” is believed to have its ori gin in the ancient Roman law which provided that a will,*to be legal, had to make some provision for true heirs, no matter how small. Thus, it became customary in Eng land to insure the validity of a will (though the Roman law had never been adopted) by providing for a true heir with at least a shilling, no matter in what disfavor he may have stood. UNCOMMON AMERICANS •-•-• By Elmo © Western j C .. rr/ .. Newspaper OCOtt n atson Union - ! Founder of the Chautauqua THERE, was a time when the Chautauqua was “next only to the public school system in bringing to the masses of people some share of their inheritance in the world’s great creations in art and litera ture.” It was literally the "uni versity of the people” and it was the creation of a man who did not him self have a college education. He was John Heyl Vincent, born in Alabama in 1832 of a line of Penn sylvanians who moved back to that state soon after John was born. Educated at Wesleyan institute in Newark, N. J., he began to preach at the age of eighteen and later was ordained into the Methodist min istry. Transferred to the Rock Riv er, 111., conference in 1857 he be came the pastor of a church at Ga lena, 111., where one of his parish ioners was a quiet little ex-captain of the army named Ulysses S. Grant. After a trip to the old world Vin cent was elected general agent of the Methodist Episcopal Sunday School Union in 1866 and two years later corresponding secretary of the Sunday School Union and Tract So ciety in New York. In these offices he did more than any other man to shape the International Uniform Sunday School Lesson system. In 1874 Vincent and Lewis Miller founded a summer assembly on Chautauqua Lake, N. Y., for the training of Sunday school teachers and in 1878 the Chautauqua Lit erary and Scientific Circle was in stituted, providing a system of pop ular education through home read ing and study. The next year the first of the summer schools was or ganized and these developed rapid ly ki speaking of his work at Chau tauqua Bishop Vincent said, “I do not expect to make a second Har vard or Yale out of Chautauqua, but I do want to give the people of this generation such a taste of what it is to be intelligent that they will see to it that their children have the best education the country can give.” How well he succeeded in doing that is shown by the extension of the idea—to the summer schools of colleges and universities, the sum mer assemblies, conferences and training schools of the various re ligious and secular organizations and the summer courses of lectures and entertainments which made the word “Chautauqua” a common noun. It is also shown by the dec laration of Theodore Roosevelt that “Chautauqua is the most American thing in America.” Camera Man WITH telephoto lens to aid them in getting long distance "shots” and high-speed film to re cord the scene even when the light is poor, it’s not so difficult for the camera man of today to "cover” a modern war. But it was very dif erent when the first camera man who ever "covered” a war went into the field to do his job. His name was Mathew Brady, the son of Irish immigrants to New York state, who was engaged in the trade of making jewel and in strument cases when he became in terested in the art of daguerreo typy soon after it was introduced into this country in 1839. The man j who brought it here was S. F. B Morse, a painter, later famous as the inventor of the telegraph. Brady learned his first lessons from Morse and Jearned them so well that by 1853 he was this na tion’s outstanding photographer. When the War Between the States opened he was both famous and wealthy and he could have lived a life of ease on his income. In stead he chose a career of priva tion and danger on the battlefields. Brady fitted up a canvas-covered wagon to carry his equipment and to serve as his dark room in the field. In it he had to make his own emulsion to coat the large glass plates that were his negatives, for the convenient film roll had not yet been thought of. His wagon became a familiar sight to all the armies. It plowed through muddy roads, it was fer ried over rivers in constant dan ger of being dumped overboard and all his precious equipment lost. But fortunately for posterity Brady came safely through all these dangers and the United States gov ernment now owns a collection of his negatives, which are priceless records of one of the greatest trag edies in our history. It is also the symbol of a tragic career. After the war was over Brady found him self in financial difficulties. His negatives were sold to pay a stor age bill and in 1874 the govern ment acquired them by paying the charges of $2,840. Brady did not benefit by the deal but later—much later—the government did give him $25,000 for the collection which was then valued at $150,000. In his later years Brady lost his pre-eminence as a photographer and he died in comparative poverty and obscurity in 1896. Murmurings of Spring “IF YOU’D take a few steps, * Sis, I believe I’d be inspired to answer that question, ‘Did you ever see a dream walking?’ You are nothing less than devastating —truly a menace!” ‘‘You meow so sweetly, Connie. I’m a bit suspicious that this little peplum frock of mine has got you catty. Your eyes really aren’t green by rights, you know.” Connie Sews Her Own. “How could you? I think my dress looks as nice on me as yours does on you. Why practical ly all of the girls at the Laf-a-Lot last night wanted to know where I found such a lovely frock. Not one of them guessed that I made it myself. And did I feel elegant when I played Mendelssohn’s Spring Song on Diane’s new baby grand! The girls said I fit into the picture perfectly. I thought if only Dwight could see me now.” “I still say my two-piecer with its piped peplum, cute little but tons and stream-lines is the No. 1 spring outfit in this woman’s town.” Mother Happens Along. “Girls, girls, if your talk were only half as pretty as your frocks you’d be better off. Sometimes I wonder if you wouldn’t be more appropriately titled The Cheek Twins, rather than The Chic Twins.” “Okay, Mother, you win. Let’s change the subject by changing clothes. We’ll put on our cullottes and join you in a round of golf, how’s that? Gee, Mother, you nev er look sweeter than when you’re wearing a casual young two-piece shirt dress. The plaid pique is just the thing for you, too. In fact, Mom, you’re just about tops from any angle.” The Patterns. Pattern 1257 is for sizes 12 to 20 (30 to 40 bust). Size 14 re quires 4% yards of 39-inch ma terial plus 11 yards of ribbon or bias binding. Pattern 1231 is avail able in sizes 14 to 20 (32 to 42 bust). Size 16 requires 4Vi yards of 39-inch material. Pattern 1236 comes in sizes 14 to 20 (32 to 42 bust). Size 16 re quires 4Vi yards of 39-inch ma terial. New Pattern Book. Send for the Barbara Bell Spring and Summer Pattern Book. Make yourself attractive, practical and becoming clothes, selecting designs from the Bar bara Bell well-planned easy-to make patterns. Interesting and exclusive fashions for little chil dren and the difficult junior age; slenderizing, well-cut patterns for the mature figure; afternoon dresses for the most particular young women and matrons and other patterns for special occa sions are all to be found in the Barbara Bell Pattern Book. Send 15 cents (in coins) today for your copy. Send your order to The Sewing Circle Pattern Dept., Room 1020, 211 W. Wacker Dr., Chicago, 111. Patterns 15 cents (in coins) each. © Bell Syndicate.—WNU Service. Use of Raillery Raillery is a poison which if un diluted kills friendship and excites hatred, but which qualified by a mixture of wit and flattery of praise, produces friendship and preserves it.—La Rochefoucauld. 40. 1 I KILLS INSECTS I ON FLOWERS • FRUITS I VEGETABLES l SHRUBS 1 Demand original seated 1 bottles, from your dealer 3cyy wmm—mmm—mmm Ignorance and Knowledge Distance sometimes endears friendship and absence sweeteneth it.—Howell. NERVOUS WOMEN Mrs. Albert Still of 5712 Morrill Ave., Lincoln, Nebr., said: "I used Dr. Pierce’s Favorite Prescrip tion as a tonic at a time when I felt weakened and was ‘all nerves,' due to functional disturbancesand it helped to stimulate my appetite and the greater Intake of food strengthened me and made me feel just fine." Buy of your druggist New size, tabs. 50c. Liquid $1.00 & $1-15. Consult Dr. Pierce’s Clinic. Buffalo, N. T. LIFE’S LIKE THAT By Fred Neher ZEKE I (Copyright 1937. by Fred Neher) ‘Til be goin’ to town with ya jest as soon as Paw falis outa my boots!”
