The Sunday Bee
MAGAZINE SECTION
VOL. 52 NO. 3. OMAHA, SUNDAY MORNING, JULY 2, 1922. FIVE CENTS i
Probability and Error By Sophie Kerr
i
Laura Wished, More Than Anything
Else in the World to Make Heaps of
Money, but She Didn't Know How
to Go About It; Then Came
Kendall with a 'Recipe. .
THE phrase belongs, strictly and technically, to the ar.
tillcry, but it is vividly capable of translation into al
most any affair of humanity, intellectual, financial, or
emotional. It is, in fact, a military transmutation ci
the old proverb of the slip betwixt cup and lip, for it repre
sents the little, incalculable margin left to explain why. after
range has been mathematically found, humidity, wind, and
such atmospheric vagaries allowed for,
and the hundred and one other condi
tions which go to the firing of big guns
toward any definite mark have been
taken into consideration even then,
"when all this has been done, with utter
most exactness, a hit isnot invariably
scored. Therefore, the miss is accounted
for and blamed on "probability and er
ror." A good, euphonious phrase. The
civilian sometimes finds it as useful as
the soldier.
"I want to pay all these bills, Miss
Woodford. But first, please write each
committee chairman to come to the
meeting on Wednesday, and bring a full
report of what 'heir committee has
done." Mrs. Utiles gave this direction in
her usual tone of calm majesty. Then
she announced, with a violence .that
spread a hot, purplish flush beneath her
well-applied rouge and strained at the
strings of her oversnug corset:
"Never, never again will I manage
another bazar! It's the most thankless
job in the world. Jealousy! Irresponsi
bility! 'I'm leaving for Palm Beach,
dear Mrs. Hilles, but I know you can
easily get some one to fill my place.'
. . '.' She paused to glower in righteous
indignation. "O, well, this gets us no
where. You can take your typewriter to
the library. Miss Woodford. I'll sign
the letters before I go out. I'm going
to begin my morning siege with the
telephone now."
Laura Woodford's almost childlike
blue eyes darkened with real sympathy.
In the three years that she had been
secretary to Mrs. John Ganzcvoort
Hilles she had seen that capable lady
manage many bazars, and all with the
same friction, the same appalling waste
of time and effort and money, the same
minimum of financial return. She had
come to regard bazars as one of the
subtle ways in which the possessors of
great wealth are chastened.
She had come to know the whole lay
out the pretty debutantes who sell
flowers and cigarets; the plain debutantes
who are relegated to be waitresses in the
badly run tearoom; the young matrons
who dote on doing dances in fancy dress
provided they can get bachelors or other
women's husbands for partners; the
costumes of southern Europe and pre
side inefficiently over the sale of things
no one wants; the photographer from
me Minciy magazine; mc uatngiuuuu
of weary governesses, secretaries, and
maids who do all the hard work, whose
helpless hate and fatigue peep now and
then from eyes usually subservient. O,
yes, Laura Woodford knew it all, per
fectly. She picked up her little typewriter
and a box of stationery and prepared to.
leave the apricot and gray-green Louis
Seize boudoir where Mrs. Hilles parked
her 190 pounds each morning and pro
vided the motive power of her complex
household and her even more complex
social existence.
"Just one moment, Miss Woodford. Mr. Hilles is send
ing a man from his office who will take charge of all the
financial details. He will, of course, co-operate with you,
but his presence will relieve you of any responsibility about
the accounts, which and L quite understand it you do not
care to assunie."
Laura Woodford heard this announcement with real
gratitude. At the last bazar there had been omc scatter
brained committee chairman whose report showed a wide
discrepancy between money received and money turned in,
and when Laura, as Mrs. Hilles' representative, ventured to
call the erring one's attention to the matter, there had been
an unpleasant scene. Scatterbrain had turned nasty, and
suggested that the deficit had not occurred until after the
funds were in Laura's hands. Laura had retorted with heat
that, in such a case, she'd be a fool to have made the loss
public. And there were more words. Scatter-brain proved
herself to have a large supply of them. . Laura herself was
not deficient in vocabulary. In the end Mrs. Hilles pro
claimed peace, made up the deficit herself, and pacified her
indignant secretary by showing her how futile aid silly it
is to row with a scatter-brain, and also by assuring her that
she would never be forced to endure another such contre
temps. The coming man from Mr. Hilles' office made good
her promise.
" The library was a fine, richly-colored room, and usually
Laura loved to work there. Today there was so much to
do she set up her machine and fell to without giving herself
the pleasure of even the shortest glance about her. Blank
sheets of Mrs. Hilles' gray paper went in. and quickly
came out again, bearing perfectly typed summons to com
mittee chairmen.
At about the sixth or seventh letter the curtain f dusky
red velvet were puttied aside and a young man entered.
"Hello, he said, with a rather forced blilhenest.
Laura did not look up. "Good morning, Mr. Hilles,"
she answered, as shortly as the click ci her machine.
It was the son of the house. His nickname was Tiddy,
and he was said to be good at billiards which completes
his description. He lounged on the corner of the carved oak
table.
"I hear there's a beauty shop downtown that sells eye
lashes by the yard you cut oft what you need and gum
'em on. Great improvement over mascara, I'd say, he
remarked. "But that wouldn't interest you. You don't
need'em."
Laura went on with her letters, deaf to this small news
item. Tiddy continued: "Can't understand why a girl as
pretty as you keeps on beating a typewriter and taking or
ders from the Empress" an allusion to his mother ?" when
Ziegfcld's simply weeping for another perfect blonde."
- i a i i 1 1 u mmt- i i 1 1 i ii I
: - JCK
p su & k& y ill
"I want to make money more than anything else in the world heaps of it" cried Laura,
Now Laura looked up and gazed on him as she might
have gazed at a large, juicy, white cutworm. "Get out of
here," she remarked, in an even, dispassionate tone.
Tiddy laughed uneasily, but slid off the table. "You
don't mean that," he parried, weakly.
"I mean it; but that wasn't all. I should have said get
out and stay out." Whereupon she returned to her typing.
Tiddy watched her a few moments, tried another remark,
which was rendered inaudible by the noise of her machine,
and finally slid away, the velvet curtains falling noiselessly
behind him. Laura glanced around to see that he was gone,
and relaxed the austerity of her youthful countenance by
sticking out her tongue slightly at the place where he had
been. Tiddy was such a scream. The offspring of the very
rich, Laura meditated, were too often another form of
chastening to their parents.
"I'll wark home," she told herself. "I need the air.
That house! The dogs! Tiddy! Ugh!"
Now, from the east side to the west is a matter of half
to three quarters of a mile, and a winter's walk of that
length can work off much superfluous energy and tranquilize
the most irritated nerves. But it did not do this tonight for
Laura. Instead her "mad" increased with each rapid step,
until she had the sensation of rolling before her a powerful
ball of wrath. A block from the little apartment which she
shared with her friend, Callie Rhodes, she stopped at a
butcher's, bought four lamb chops, then at a grocery, and
after a wistful look at some ruddy hothouse tomatoes shook
her head and took romaine instead. A bakery, 10 steps
(arthcr on, supplied two coffee eclairs. It was her turn to
get the dinner. !
She fairly ran up the three flights of stairs, turned the
key with a jerk, and flung the door open, "Hoo-oo," came
cheerful greeting from the Hishted sittimr room, nrovin
that Callie was already at home.
"Lo," she returned shortly. She dumped her package
cxi the kitchen table and stopped to light the oven of the
gas love. Then she went into the bedroom, Aung off her
hat and coat, retrieved an apron by the simple process of
reaching one hand into the cloct she could stand in the
middle of the floor and touch everything In the room and
went back to the kitchen.
She worked with a swift, ferocious efficiency. Callie,
10 years older than Laura, an incredibly homely girl of an
imperturbable good nature, glanced up from the pile of pa
pers which eternally occupied her hours, even as all
school teachers.
"Want any help?" she asked.
Laura shook her head. They sat down without further
words and ate the grapefruit. Then Laura brought in the
rest of the dinner. Callie raised her eyebrows at the corn
pudding. "Aren't we rather going it?"
she asked. "Salad and vegetable?
"An II cent can of corn and one egg.
O, I wish I didn't know how much it
cost," broke forth from Laura fiercely.
"Ah, I fee our little friend has an
economy complex, or a wealth complex,
or something. What's the matter, honey
child?" "Callie, I hate these little cramped ti
rooms, with the furniture we found in
second hand shops and repainted, the
curtains we made ourselves, all our little
shabby-genteel box of tricks. I want
huge rooms, with great, high ceilings,
and wonderful old Georgian furniture,
and Italian mirrors, and fireplaces, and
velvet hangings, and people to wait on
me! I want lovely frocks and pink silk
undies, and soft, luxurious furs, and
strings of pearls O, everything!"
"You might marry Tiddy."
Laura dropped her voice as one mak
ing a shameful confession. "Ves I've
considered that. Now you know how
desperate I am. O, it takes so long to
save, so endlessly long, and at-the end
what have you got? I've saved for tw
years you know that first year 1 had
to pay back Aunt Lizzie's loan saved
and scrimped and pinched, and I've got
exactly $600, not enough for one real
pood bust. In another vear I'll have
$900, and in another $1,200, and by the
time I'm an old woman I'll maybe have
$5,000, just enough to give me a starva
tion income, provided I keep out of an
old ladies' home."
"You're too silly for words. Babe.
You'll never end in an old ladies' home.
And though I suggested that you marry
Tiddy you will note that I carefully
refrained from saying anything about
Dick. Dick's a rising young man, as the
success books would say. Some day
he'll be able to give you a bipr hou.se
and giddy gowns galore if that's what
you want, which I doubt."
"I don't want to marry Dick Long.
T don't want to marry anybody. I want
a lot of money all my own, so I can fly
around and see the world all on my own,
without any husband to fuss about
trunks and hate looking at the things
I want to look at."
"You sound as if you'd 'traveled with
husbands for years."
"There are women who arc smart
enough to get big salaries and do big
things. That's what makes me so sore
that I haven't got it in me. I'm a
hopeless mediocrity I know it. You
know it. So marriage is my only graft.
You practical! admit that when you
suggest Tiddy and Dick."
Callie stared across the table at the
lovely flushed, unhappy creature before
her. "It's no good, Laura. You might
as well accept things as they arc. Look
at me. Every time I get in .front of the
looking glass I loathe myself. Nor am
I any more in love with teaching than
I am with my face. But you can't live
when you're using up your energy in
' rebellion, lake things as they are, and
well take things as they are."
It Was the first time Callie had ever alluded to her physi
cal appearance, and Laura was touched and a little awed,
as we always are after a peep into a friend's deeper feelings.
"O, Callie, don't. You know I don't grouse so very
much. Onlysonce in a while. . . Well, we may as wcil
eat the eclairs."
She jumped up, cleared the table, and brought on the
simple dessert. "I love these yellow plates," she said, and
Callie knew that the remark was intended to convey that
the storm was over. "You doing themes again tonight?"
"Yes, about a million. On the highly original subject
of 'What I Like Best in Winter.' Not one of the poor little
guttersnipes has ever had a sleigh ride or gone coasting.
Is Dick coming?"
"Yes, but don't you ctear out of here. We'll probably
go to pictures or do. something equally inexpensive and un
entertaining. Don't look so horrified, Callie. I know Dick
can't afford to spend a lot of money, and I don't want him
to. But, O golly, how Lwish I had a suitor who could
and would!"
With that she rose and began to pile the dishes on a big
tray. Presently she was scraping them and sloshing the
soap in the dish water with drawn-back, distasteful fingers.
Laura hated not dish water, but even so, she would not
slight the dishes. She rinsed her tcacloth and hung it up
to dry, snapped out the kitchen light, and went back to
her own little sleeping room to prink a bit before Dick Long
appeared Dick, who'd take her to the movies or somewhere
else cheap. Dick with his struggling printing business that
he'd financed on a shoestring, and in which he had such a
profound and magnificent confidence. Laura had had that
confidence, too. But tonight she hadn't a grain of it. An4
