“THE GOLDEN BED”
By WALLACE IRWIN.
Produced as a Paramount Picture by Cecil* B. DeMUle From a Screen
Adaptation by Jennie Maepherson,
(Copyrlsht. 1I2«>
V»'. -s___
(Continued From Saturday.)
“It's sho’ ’nuft time you was askln
tliat question,” drawled Mrs. Stek,
"You’ve made right smart o' trouble
fer yo’ Ma. and that's a fact. But let
it be a jedgernent on her. She had
little enough charity fer me an’ mine
in time o’ trouble an’ distress. And
now when her own boys has turned
agin >r—”
"Where's Ma?” he repeated sullen
ly, tempted to fall upon the woman
and rend her.
"In the County Hospital where she
should o’ been long ago. Bast week
we found her with lung fever, wan
derin’ on the Fort. Said she was look
in’ fer yer Pa. No* that I hold much
agin’ 'cr. She's had her burdens.
With such a pair—”
"Where's Jo?” ha asked, too
•stunned to catch the full import of
that awful story.
“Jo? Oh, he's long gone. It. was
him that busied her, I reckon. When
she learned that he'd backslid his
religion and ran away to marry that
gaj—”
He found himself covering his ears,
rushing away from the woman's hor
rid clatter. He ran clumsily like a
wounded man, hastened by the silty
id/iiii that running would do some
good. It would take him to the Coun
isr Hospital in time to help, to
straighten things out, to be some use.
lie had killed his mother. Killed
her, that was it. With his own un
feeling hands. . . . But he could fix
everything if he got there in time. . ..
But running did no good.
"She’s been asking for you,” said
the nurse in her stereotyped tone as
she led him through the ward. They
had drawn a screen In front of the
woman's bed so that her dying might
be a little private. Embarrassed oy
all this official cleanliness, Admah
stood in his rough clothes and gazed
down at the skeleton face on the pil
low. Scanty gray hair was combed
straight back, showing skin stretched
tight over a narrow skull. There was
dignity In the thin hooked nose and
sharply closed lips. The knotty hands
on the white coverlid twisted in and
out. in and out, unable to stit. the
motions of work.
Admah gazed in wonder, bathed in
silence. It was a noisy public ward;
two aisles beyond a thin-voiced wom
an was laughing shrilly at one of
her 6wn jokes; an old man sitting
Up in bed. was coughing like a sick
horse. Nurses and Internes moved
casually about, their cheerful gossip
unrestrained. Yet to Admah all toe
world seemed still. It was like a
great church in which Bhe lay, carved
in alabaster. ... It couldn't be nts
---- ■>
New York
••Day by Day—
By O. O. M’IXTTRE.
New York, Dec. 28.—A page from
the diary of a modern Samuel Pepys:
Up after a night of no sleep but my
head full of what I thought fine
thoughts which I set down on pa
per. but Lord! to read them In cold
daylight was a blow.
Through the town with Braley, the
poet, and we discussed shaving soap,
patent garters, and whatnot. And a
fire wagon came dashing by and I
off to follow it, nor could he under
stand such oafish whims.
Home where came Ben Bemle the
bondman, and told some gay stories
about the glum Willie Hammersteln
when he ran the old Victoria variety
house.
Jr the evening to a dinner to Jack
isiit and Percy Hammond and all
roasted them to a crisp brown but
in. good fun and among those speak
ing were Wilton Laekaye, W. A.
Brady, Joe Laurie, Lowell Sherman
and others. So home late and to bed.
Tho servant problem in New York
is the most difficult perhaps In the
world. It is not unsual for home
owners to have two and three sets
of servants a month. That is the
why of the sudden growth of apart
mont hotels—there being now more
than 130 in courso of construction.
Out of the flood of high yaller
shows on the Rialto a year ago only
a few remain. Slssle and Blake In
their chocolate revue are still with us
Here are two colored musicians who
are said to have made a fortune of
more than $100,000 each. They have
written seven song hits and have
furnished skits for a half dozen re
vues besides writing their own play.
They are still good natured fellows'
who have not taken their success too
seriously. Slssle is building an all col
ored apartment house In the Harlem
Black Belt with his savings. Bert
Williams at his death was reputed to
be one of the richest colored fellows I
In New York. Now the palm falls
to Slssle and Blake.
A New York detective has re
turned from a trip that took him
almost around the world with a con
fessed murderer. His captive was a
desperate criminal who it was pre
dicted would not be returned alive.
VOr more than five weeks there was
not a moment the prisoner was not
handcuffed to his captor. They ate,
slept and walked shackled. The de
tective turned Ills prisoner over to the
jailers, walked out of the prison to
the sidewalk and slumpted to the
ground in a faint. The strain had
be«i too much.
There Is r cafe In New York that
charges $2 for a single order of alli
gator pear salad.* It consists of a
half pear with a dressing. Because It
is expensive New Yorkers order It.
yet the alligator pear is the food of
Costa Rican billygoats .
What does .an ordlnnry evening’s
entertainment cost In New York for
two persona? A man almut town has
figured It all out. Dinner at any
first class cafe Is about $10 with the
tip. Good seats to a reigning theatrical
h't are at speculator’s prices—and
they have good seats—$10.50. A night
c|uh couvert charge is $2 each. A
bottle of table water $1 and a mild
repast Is about $4. Figure taxi fare
about $2 and you have a total of
$31<50. This Is not considered a.
splurge, for if one orders a bottle of
surreptitious wine the bill Is around
$50 for the evening.
The senrcbcry for addresses in the
New York post office are men of keen
reasoning. Thousands of letters pour
Into ths city dally Improperly sd
dressed. It |s their Job to send them
as quickly as possible to the right
address. Of all these letters not more
than two per cent fall to find the
proper destination.
(Copyright. 1114.)
mother. He couldn’t fancy her rn
helpless, doing nothing for herself,
actually giving trouble to other people.
"Ma:” He whispered It, leaning
close to the motionless head.
Eyelids so thin that the eyes them
stives seemed to be showing through,
fluttered slightly, then slowly thev
opened.
"So, you done came home?” she
asked in a voice so natural that he
could not believe but that she was in
her old health, merely shamming
sickness.
"Ma, I camp fast as I could.” He
spoke rapidly to steady his tone. "1
couldn't let you know where I was.
But I came fast as I could.”
"I know you did.” Something In
her throat seemed to thicken, and
her words grew indistinct. “I beet:
powerful hard to git alongwith some
times, I reckon. I ain’t always been
the sort of mother—”
“You have, Ma! Oh, you have:”
Losing his shame in the presence of
the stark white nurse he fell on nl.«
knees and drew one of the gnarled
hands to his breast. Never in all hia
clumsy, incoherent life had he shown
her so much tenderness. "Ma, dear:
I ain’t never done anythin’ I should.”
Even In her dying breath she said
a dry thing: "You’re powerful like
yo’ Pa, Ad.” And then she softened
it with, “I reckon I was mighty fond
of him.”
He mumbled incoherently, asking
her to forgive him; poor Admah nev
er had the words with which to un
burden his troubled heart.
“That’s all over,” she told him with
one of her queer smiles. "But now
that I got to go, son, I want you to
promise me this—I want you—” A
deep, terrible cough seemed to tear
her from head to feet, but after the
nurse had laid a spoon to her lips
she went on, ”1 want you to promise
—you wasn't born to be pore trash.
Admah. You got somethin’ better. I
never give you no book-lamin', AO.
But I always wanted you—”
“I'll be a man, Ma,” he whispered.
”1 won’t go this way any longer.
I’ll make you proud of me, Ma.”
”1 reckon so.” It came like a sigh
“You believe me, don’t you, Ma?
Honest to God—”
But the nurse had brushed him
aside, and leaning over the white
bed had slowly raised one of the sick
woman’s fallen lids.
“You’d better go out for a while,”
she said coolly, and beckoned to rt
passing interne. "Dr. Holmes, would
you mind—”
Almost the first thing Admah rec
ognized when he went down the front
steps, feeling his way like a sleep
walker, was a young man in a pttu
r.lu colored waistcoat Who sprang to
ward him an<l held him tight across
the shoulders.
"You need a bracer, hoy,” he said.
"Just shuffle along to the corner and
I’ll throw a slug o' rye under your
belt.”
It was the Spring of 1913 when
the noble marquis, Carlos Domingo
de San Pilar, squandered a few
months of his abundant time In order
to follow Miss Flora Lee Peake from
Paris to America; he was kind to all
the reporters and was complimentary,
If not exactly accurate, m his obser
vations of the lady’s native town. To
representatives of the Star-Eagle, the
Lnlon-Democrat and the Evening
Democrat he expressed the opinion
that ho had at last met the thing
for which he had pined since early
yguth—the Ideal American city; so
what-you-call hustling with men who
must be very powerful and coura
geous to make those soul-stirring
sounds of Iron *verywh*r»; and such
striking, primltiVf frt on gU'the bill
boards to remind the etrsnger of
America’s Indian origin. And the la
dles’ So beautiful—ah’ They make
the loveliest ladles of Spain look very
pale by comparison.
When Jimmy Wilder, the celebrat
ed city editor of the Evening Demo
ci at, heard this observation about
“rale by comparison” he made a long,
accurate shot at the office spittoon
aud remarked:
”1 reckon he’s referrln’ to the col
ored population.”
The coming of San Pilar provoked
much argument pro and con. Among
those pleasantly affected by ’he news
the second Mrs. Garnett Peeke stood
at the fore. Garnett had married her
in 1906 when he. had found her, a
pretty divorcee living somewhere on
tho outer edge of Satsutna Slightly
Interior, according to the Peake stand
arcs, she had never taken complete
command of the big house In Inness
Street. By 1913 she had grown quite
fat and Garnett’s constant nagging
had reduced her to a Jelly-like stale
of pacifism. She was all a flutter at
the though of entertaining so noble
a lord, and the night before his arrl
val she had the temerity to suggest —
In the presence of Garnett and the
withering Judge—that Flora Lee’s al
liance with a noble, house would, In
a Way, have Its social advantages.
“There are five of us already In the
Almanac de Gotha," quoth Garnett,
standing stiffly before a cold fireplace
In his father's library.
"Six," creaked the Judge, looking
sourly up from the chessmen which
he was arranging for his evening
game. "Six. That is. if you count
Cousin l^iura who married that Ital
ian scoundrel and starved to death
at Ntcp.”
Which closed the argument ns to
Flora Lee's designs on a foreign cor
onet. The old gentleman had been
showing signs of irritability ever
since the Taft inauguration, and of
late he had wreaked his ill temper
upon the modern young lady. So
purist himself, he was unable to see
her smoke or hear her swear without
shaking his wattles like an ancient
turkey gobbler. And cocktails. More
than once he hail seen Ids own grand
child standing in an open drawing
room, a elgaret in one hand, a glass
in the other. Her voice was becom
ing harsh. These motor ears were
playing tlm very devil with young
women. And the way they danced.
Hnch (lances and such music ns he
would not have permitted out In the
negro quarter. . . . With Margaret
now, it was different. He wasn't
sure he liked her way any better.
Klora l.ee port been engaged a dozen
times and broken it off and been all
the livelier for it. Hut that Carter
was given the state chamber which,
during her lifetime, hail belonged to
Grandmother I'eilke. Zeno Washing*
ton, a nimble young mullatto with y
something of th* worldly air which |
we associate with Pullman portent,
appeared to "wait un” the affable
young Marquis.
(To Be Continued Tomorrow.)
-— ■ ■ ■
The Days of Real Sport • ]$y ]>i i^s
". ITMiM— --——i
THE NEBBS ERNIE’S COME TO STAY. Directed for The Omaha Bee by S°l Hew
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BRINGING UP FATHER u sRp«unt*OHic. M?tJnlccs,AND MACG,E in full Drawn for The Omaha Bee by McManus
w 0,,1« PAGE OF COLORS IN THE SUNDAY BEE (Cormeht 1924 )
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___ _ frn^vriht 19241
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