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About The Omaha morning bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 1922-1927 | View Entire Issue (Sept. 1, 1924)
I (Continued From Saturday.) "1 didn’t have a chance.” This was with a relaxed bitterness, a mere whine. "You know I didn't Cards stacked against me." "Chance?" She wanted to hold his mind, perhaps to drag It free, to make him look squarely at all that might he salvaged. It was like ask ing him to walk again. "You could do a lot with your life. . . He list ened with his soiled brown tie In his hand, while she pleaded. What she said might have seemed to offer fea tures of curious and rather remote Interest. He was disposed to let her go on. She was wonderful. But he couldn't think of the right answer. No use making her flare up. Presently he resumed his going to bed ritual. Jo Kllen loosened her hair. The room suddenly seemed horribly small. . . . lake a cell. But in a cell you were alone. . . . No, there were cell mates sometimes. Two in a cell. They would get to know each other fright fully. Locked In together. For bet ter or for worse. They could plan an escape if they wanted to. When they got out they couid run in opposite directions, for safety, and so that each would have his freedom alone. To be free.' That would he the ulti mate thrill. . . . But they would have to plan together. They must both have a strong, conquering hunger for freedom. If only one of them had this hunger it would be very hard to do anything. Suppose that each night the room got to seem smaller nnd smaller, ns in the gruesome story. The cellmate might not notice this at all. It would be a thing you might not tell him. To admit it. even to yourself, would make you sure that something was happen ing In your brain. If the thing kept up. you would be compelled . . . O yes! If you could get out you would run away at last. She heard a ship's whistle, deep, as from the chest of a sea giant, boom ing through the treble yelpings of the little boats like a voice that knew it did not have to lie raised. This would be a great liner. It did not shout or ask. It elmply said, "I come!” On such a ship you could travel to a farthest freedom. If you ran to In wood, and to an office and hack again to ... to a cell, scurry ing stupidly, like an ant who had wandered into a tight place, and you came to the screaming point, the point where you eaw white and red, nnd the pain of not saying and not doing cut Into the marrow of you— what then? t New York --Day by Day j — Ity O. O. McINTYRE. On the Atlantic, Sept. 1.—Prepar ing to cross the ocean is in toxlcat ingly joyful up to a certain point. When the cry "All Visitors Ashore” is sounded there la a sudden hush. Laughter comes to a full stop. Faces become grave. Only the seasoned voyageur watch es the gang planks being pulled away without longing to be at the other end _at least for a moment or so. The ocean seems fearfully wide. And there's something eerie about the life, boats with their two casks of water. Sill if I am lost at sea it upsets the predictions of a lot of elderly ladles back home. They predicted the end would be by hanging. The Olympic slipped out of her berth as New York was in the first t h roes of sleep. The valiant little tugs like so many tumblebugs nosed her out into the North river and then putt-putted away slrening their glee. They are the clowns of the ocean. At the pier and deck rails a 1,000 handkerchiefs fluttered. Megaphones boomed final goodbyes. We were off. A slight crescent of a moon lighted a tiny trail to deeper waters. And passengers drifted to their staterooms—just a few all ready with slightly pea green expressions Indicative of faint nausea. Our steward Is named Light and the stewardess White. Light and White sounds like a vaudeville t«am. Mr. Light is one of those superior trained British servants of whom I always stand in awe. People who call a bath "bawth" and half "hawf" stir my inferiority complex. And when they drawl "Really. How extraw-di nary" I want to join the boys In the steerage. My wife was born during a raging flood on the Ohio and evidently left Its Impress. She is a good sailor. I am up to a certain point, then, "Whoops, my dea r!” On my pillow was a placcard read ing: "The attention of the manage™ has been called to the fact that certain pernons, bellved to be profes sional gamble™, are In the habit of traveling to and fro in Atlantic steam ships." I couldn't help but wonder If they had me under suspicion. It looks rather personal. For an hour I sat looking out the port hole gloomily theorizing as to what would happen If the glass broke. It seems thin stuff to combat a mountainous wave. There Isn't much fun in the prospect of being • slapped in the face by an ocean In the dead of night. Back on the promenade deck a quartette. slightly Inebriated, at tempted "Many brave hearts are asleep in the deep!" with a mock solemnity. New York and Its wilting heat was supplanted by the Invigor ating brackish l.-^ng of the sea. Four turns around the deck Is a mile. I did two miles to gain my sea legs but my gain was a loss I'll not mention. This ocean seems to have a perma nent wave. • The stateroom of a modern llner has myriad Interesting pushbuttons, gadgets and mechanical doodads. 1 tried them sll to relieve the tedium of Insomnia. Once as the boat lurched I got my hand caught In a projecting whatnot or other and awakened my wife. "What In the world are you do Ing?" she Inquired. "Why don't you relax at.d enjoy yourself?" "That's Just It," I replied, attempt ing as Is my wont to be always merry and bright, “I have to relax too much red If I gfd what Is left from a per fectly good head out of this thing unibob 1'ni going to be off the ma chinery fur the rest of this trip." Bn as dawn was brushing the shy I fell to reading Preiser's "Twelve Men," but I don't remember » word or it. ICnpyrlsht, 1024.) Marty, with dangling legs, found his freedom in a bottle. At this moment he was staring, his lips loose. . . . Staring at what? If he noticed that deep voice of the ship, what did it make him think of? He had been away nnd had come back. His dreams would carry him again through the Narrows, over the so.uirming water, straight to the place where everything was sharpened into the one thing that crashed . . . you could not dream your way out of that very well. You would keep on making the same journey. That would be a terror. To be carried again to the one unspeakable place. . . "I was thinking," he said, "we might get Arnold to buy us one of those little roulette outfits." And he resumed his stare, this time at the utterly incomprehensible stoniness of her face. VIII. Morning at the office. Aaron com ing in very^ate. Mrs. l'inney, angry, trying the transfixing power of the human eye. He was an irritating boy. "I wonder what you were doing last night.” Aaron turned to the fight page of the morning paper. "Only a little petting party,” "You snipe!” hissed Mrs. Pinney. Aaron refused to be withered. As it turned out, this became one of his busy days. There were a great many callers. Mrs. Pinney had a well-secreted admiration for Aaron's efficiency in such crises. Cannerton was among the many who did not reach Eberly. J to found an opportunity to say to Jo Ellen: "Your friend, Cora Vance, is a shade anxious about you.” “Sorry,” said Jo Ellen. She wished to see Cora Vance. It was not a comfortable wish. The feeling trans lated by Cannerton as an anxiety was likely to be complicated Cora Vance might be anxious, but she was certain to be something else also. Something else had sounded in her voice when she said Stan was a fast worker. Something else looked out of her eyes, too. How would you feel to see a man who had been your husband going away with another? You might have stopped loving him, and might have decided that you no longer cared st all what he did, whom he knew, or what he was to them. And yet . . . Above everything, it would make a difference if you liked another girl, had a strong feeling (she really had shown a strong feel ing) of friendliness for her, and then saw the man who had been your husband standing close, and the two slipping away late at night 1 ntil she told Cora Vance something more than she had told her, Jo Ellen knew that she would herself feel unfair. . The notion of not telling that you were married was rather foolish. No body cared a whoop whether you were married or not. Yet telling f ora that she was the pitiable creature of that story—the wife who didn't know —that would be pretty rough. Any body might know quite easily—Emma Traub or any other. The awkward, thing wag that Cora’s blunder—If you wanted to call it that—made tell ing her now something quite unlike any other way of telling. They would both feel the lastingness of that thing that happened when the cocktail tray was coming. Of course, Cora might get the connecting link at any mo ment Suppose Cora had any words with Stan. That might settle the thing. But it would look silly that Jo Ellen had sat there without sense enough to do anything more than swallow cocktails. There was a rea son for not crying out, “I’m the wife ' You had to hold on to yourself. If you'd begun admitting you'd have gone to pieces, right there at the l>arty. Being impulsive was all light for people who didn't have terrii.c impulses. ... "Why. you almost look anxious yourself," said Cannerton, "and I hope it may not be considered lmper tinent to remark that anxiety does not fit you. If I saw you really look ing anxious I'd say, right off the bat < —miscast. No, you're for something with a devilish dash In it. superb ■ vonng, but nothing flapperish—noth ing like a flapper. You wouldn t do for a flapper. Maybe a kind of heroic inKenue_I could do it—I could write a part that would fit you like a ten dollar silk stocking, a part that—■" The buzzer terminated the intru sion. „ It occurred to Jo Ellen, while Eber ly was droning, that the loot: < an nertnn pretended to see might really be there. Probably there were, peo^ pie who could examine your fare and read everything. Could such peopb see that you had stared into the dark of a cell?—that you went out. except on awful Sundays, to take exercise in the Place of the White Bights, and then dragged yourself back again into the cell to dream furiously Could they read what it was that made you stick? Was It cowardly to slick, or would the cowardly thing bo the thing you put off, that rain into your head when you had one of those staring dreams—In the dark or In some uproar? Were you to be dogged Indefinitely by thoughts like these, wherever you went, whatever you were doing? Was your type ma chine to keep on stabbing you with the sound of such thoughts? 'Was Kherly to keep on looking as If he knew, and as if he withheld his rage with an effort that whitened his gills and gave his voice the refined attri tion of a file? Was Shaffer to keep on seeming sarcastic when he talked about the wonder of his wife? Peo ple who were absolutely contented should have the decency to be quiet about ft. Nothing objectionable In their being contented, but why con fide the condition. Especially people like Shaffer. Was it a sign that you were W’rong that Shaffer should be so Irritating? What would a person like Shaffer say if he knew every thing? For that matter, what would Eberly say? Eberly—that would be stupendous, listening to Eberly. And then you knew that all of these thoughts came tearing back to yourself. They never really got' out side of yourself. You were alone, i’ou didn’t tell anybody. You couldn't. It wouldn't do any good. If they had an opinion it wouldn't do any good. You had heard opinions already. These changed nothing. You might have told Cora Vance, for heaven knows what reason, but Cora Vance had gone to Chicago with a company. This information was dropped by Miss Parr.and whom Jo Ellen saw some day* later at a rehearsal. The r< hearsnl waa In an unrented loft wit dirty (tray walla in which the volet echoed fantastically. The line* of t) play—or of one *cene In one act of . play, hammered over and over—wet like some insane make believe. . . j (To Be Continued Tomorrow.)_| THE NEBBS MEOW-MEOW-SPT-S-SPT! Directed for The Omaha Bee by Sol Hea» • >»«* _ irH. 1.. . 1 . CN\ not SuRPR.1'j'iO \ / urn O Wi \/ >r' ) ( ~ NOO HW[ wrtRO iTTriTk \ OT Mr.iMTur' (. I VOST Mi^T ON \ SOOCTS IL&DI-R 'Nl ' vou-1EPT uroM^s 1 Twic, to'wm - VN VtQ'f /] JaJE&WNOUO 4 lXC"P'Vr IN A.LL C'JR /) ^u- PlR»T H ’ sb&i z^r,s /(!i rS??SrSSrA/SUPERIORS fST KNOWVOOR^'Y WWAT OOVOu\\ PLA.ce _ DON'T \ rV^Vr^o^V '.nfl\CT nouR // 'T 3 GOSS\P\nG PRESENCE ON I/Oft SCANDAL PEDOLINJG NOUR SUPE«\ORS / _NES - RUT NO 7 wlTMi^T-ANJ / \ OTHER W&N y ^inv.tKtiOn _^ 'yes in education^ you dont -tell*\* and R£rik)CMEMT PER ALL YOU KNiOwJ}) too Just mho SEroRE you leayc j. ARC YOU AMD */ n-J4 BECAUSE TOU TOP60Tj YOUR PEOPLE?, / SOMETHING 1 TELL PER f I LL SPARE YOU U ABOUT YOUR BROTHER / THE PA\M BY JOSEPH who TOO* UP* i MOT YELL'mGt/JthE CpuRCh CONTRIBUTION t KRS.'NLBB //— YHEY D'Dnt EVEN uETij V^'^V ThE BOH BACH ,mv| -:—YT TOLHS ARE HONEST UARO \ woiywg People -•»- • > \, auEY may Build jailSII o-YV But they DOut uvc^ •* —-^(Copynjht. 1W4. by Tht Bell Syndicate. Inc) Barney Google and Spark Plug Barney Certainly Makes It Hot for Sparky. Drawn for The Omaha Bee by Billy DeBeck BARNSW dCJOdlE.FAMOUS TO REMAIN, OWNER CP SPARK t>tU<J- AND E* 3ocw*1 Sunshine,owner, <> • TROTSKI ;iRf; CELEBRaTSD Tto SEAR do. ARRNE N MEMPHIS (UHOIE ToluN IN UPROAR A* DAV Of Tut ROPE APPROACHES Wise brannisans dowu ~13' the dumb weenies "Throughout tUe country ARE OFFERING eic ODDS That "The oocGte enTst ujiu. w<n the*y.ooc" MEMPHIS OlASSIC c NtXT SATURDAY. Station W-M C Will BROAD PAST’ Further detahs i» TT*S announcer isnt Toe 8USV VtfHATS ROBBING \IM UP IN TuF A'R , you i t«i* is yooR\PcjE - x gotta first uisit T© Slant at sparry (ui6mpa'S in a long/as we rolled out Time ano yoo ./of Tne baggage. noiiT want /Car tl»is A m. and Ti BRCCJ* (M6 LOOK’ CNERWP'GhT Out a*J0 SEE / ITs Got We 'l The sights ) Luooriro - if c \ rage Next saturoaN Vs^ I ll 6F Run out op _\ 1?>lNN • X WON T Be Tin. x kNOul .fll 1^14 It Kiftf Tf»twr*« IfK H<M.F OF YOUR Body AT A Tir^E . . AMM \75 POOMOS - - JUST RlfeWT -• WOUJ TtIPFJ jWO AMO UA <-«■ 'SWE •l AT VOVoR OTUSR f.re*t right* rtmrr*mi. '/ WHA f UL I £*> ABOOT 4.PARK-Y » J-IE'S tr Pcumos excess'! VS^ - YES - f&PVl f(pT WA-rtR - MUSWJC SALT — ves-vet- , RRlNfUNH I IP FATHFR „ R*«'*‘"«« SEE J,GGS AND MAGGIE in full Drawn for The Omaha Bee by McManu* DIxll NVJIINvJ \J I r 1 ilLilX U. S. Patent OfHca PACE OF COLORS IN THE SUNDAY BEE (Copyright 1924) . ... . - - - ■ ■ - - - ■ ■ — ■ . ■ — - " "" 1 1 £rk 'Tt> A WAME The way Tne^E A ry» r | women walk around im men^ LOTVLE s> - I UNDERSTAND THAT # say so-the police THE IDEA OF ME HAVIN' TmO^jE. PRETT'f W\KIH ?>U\T*b ARGJEEjTEO i rv\ foR^Them_ s | MAvOCiie: I HELLO -i^ThiTs THE. MAXO« WELL ARREST I ALL WOMEN IIM HIKIN' AM ^>eino a k>ol*ce. mah j NEAR MX HQO^E - JM V) wri. ^ © *924 bf fnt*l Fcatu«€ Srwvice. fwe CrcAt 'Britain nth** inerv'd JERRY ON THE JOB deny this, if you can Dr*«rn for TI,e..°mah* B" b? H<=b»n It Happens in the Best Regulated Families By Briggs Oh here 13 *-AV OFF, / h« is so <tooO CHftRMiNG Thb. Prince i LOOKirsto • | Thinik Picture op THe l ll Be Glad , ) Me Hp,a eyas PRINCE - IAAICH HE GOBS' \ like VOORS 0B3R > , riw 6ick n TircD V HEARING You I V_"_/ V_ ABOUT him. — f IT GOE.S To vShouu That j ) MOBILITY I* AOmcTminC, I Else Besicei aosr Royal gLOoO AnC ACCIDCnT of Birth •• You haus ALL THB QUALIFICATIONS^ But-. will I IweuiPNTTaA&g ) . You for THe / ' PRINCE — ( HOu1 ABOUT A LlTT(.f jTHfTAIRra AruD A / SUPPER. DAiucer. vSdivue ( k/icht This wctk \ little GIRL.-HEV? / \You_liTTLe PHILOSOPHER*,/^ WzK) ABIE THE AGENT Drawn for The Omaha Bee by Hershfield n* i\nnir» nfwaiwrwn MrsiPiy, / THIS CUTLET \ | ERSouttr. j \ 'TOO TERRIBLE I \ T^eat*:’. J SWM.L1 \ ',ES'lre' ! rt» a A | Bl-'T '"r PlECE OF WM**** Row beer i \ 1 mE SAMg X^JSiEJkO ’ / \ Rrller ~.i