The Omaha Sunday Bee Magazine Pag
Copyright, lilt, by American-Examiner. Great Britain Rights Reserved.
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"It was just like that, perhaps, for Gnderella of oldSmash went the enchanted coach! .Away scurried the enchanted servants!.
A - - V went the enchanted Prince after another enchantress!"
All the Gaudy Footmen Turned Back into Rats, the Crystal
Slipper Broken, and Prince Charming o
Dancer The End of a Beautiful Kentucky Belle's Romance
ARB all fairy tales true to life? Could
Jack climb the beanstalk to-day?
Could a wolf really gobble up some
Little Red Riding Hood? Could Cinderella
go to the ball In her pumpkin coach, lose her
glass slipper and marry the prince? And, If
ehe married him, could she live happily ever
after, as the fairy tale says that'she did?
Of all modern Cinderellas the most interest
ing is Mrs. Edward R. Thomas, who was
( PK 1
1 li&i
"Teddy" Gerard, the Dancer
Who Upset Cinderella's
Pumpkin Ccach.
beautiful Linda Lee, of Kentucky. . The old
Cinderella had three sisters. Our modern
Cinderella has one sister, Jouett, as pretty
and fascinating as Linda herself. There are
five chapters in this harrowing tale; all hu
man passions play their part. Cinderella
gets her Jewels, her luxuries, her pumpkin
coaches, her white rat horses, her Prince
Charming, and then loses them all! Every
thing goeB to smash. Prince Charming
breaks his legs in a motor accident. Breaks
his heart and breaks up his home, all because
of a pretty actress, and then smash goes the
marriage certificate. The scene of this
first chapter is laid in Louisville twelve
years ago.
Sister Jouett
Marries the Poor Prince
On a modest side street of the Kentucky
city live the two Lee girls, Linda and Jouett.
Their home is a quaint old gabled house,
hidden behind flowering shrubs. Their
father, William Lee, holds a position In the
gas company of the town. By birth, the sis
ters are entitled to go with the proudest In
the land. But, alas! they are long on lineage
but short on money. Mr, Lee's salary of
$1,500 a year does not provide many luxuries
for his daughters. Jouett is more contented
than her sister Linda. She sings happily
while making up her simple muslin frocks.
But Linda frowns and adds to her daily pray
ers the ever increasing one, "Oh, Lord, give
us riches." Every year the Autumn season
brings men and women of great wealth to
Louisville. Linda looks on their diamonds,
their horses, their servants, and says to
Jouett: "I shall marry a rich man, no mat
ter how old or ugly he may be."
While Linda is yearning for riches, Jouett
has fallen in love with a girlhood chum,
Worth Otto. He has no fortune. He earns
$80 a month. Louisville says that it is a
very good match for one of the Lee girls.
Jouett is very happy, and scoffs at Linda's
prayer for riches. "We cannot meet these
millionaires," sagely says Jouett. "They are
here to-day and gone to-morrow. I shall
take the goods the gods provide and marry
Worth." They marry, and begin to live very
happily. In fairy stories life apparently ends
when the lovers marry. In reality, life only
begins at marriage. Life did not fiegin for
Jouett until she married Worth.
Sister Linda
Weds the Rich Prince
Just after Jouett's marriage Linda per
suades her father to send her to Florida for
a month. It is the height of the season.
At Palm Beach she meets Edward R. Thoma3,
a millionaire racing man, banker and yachts
man. Mr. Thomas Is the great catch of the
Palm Beach season. He looks Into Miss Lee's
blue eyes, and his freedom slips away. He
is bound by those eyes and the most exquisite
complexion he has ever seen. Mr. Thomas
fulfills every desire of the Kentucky belle's
heart. He is a millionaire, he has horses,
yachts, houses and lands to give her, and he
is young, tall and hand3ome. A true fairy
prince. She returns to Louisville, engaged
to marry General Samuel Thomas's heir.
What a change now comes in the lives cf
the sisters! Linda marries Mr. Thomas and
whirls away in her private car. She has
maids at her beck and call, diamonds, pearls,
rubies in her jewel chest, practically unlim
ited wealth at her command. Jouett, Just as
pretty, just a3 fascinating, remains in Louis
ville to keep house on $80 a month. Thus
endeth the second chapter.
Princess Cinderella
Won't Let Sister Get Divorced
A year later Mrs. Edward R. Thomas drops
down on Louisville. She arrives in her pri
vate car. She goes to see Jouett. Jouett
is doing her own work, her hands are rough
ened. She looks tired. Linda is wearing a
gown that cost $600, a hat that cost $80,
"One month's salary," mutters Jouett Otto,
when Linda chatters on about her clothes
and jewels.
"Ned is going to buy me the most valuable
race horse In the world," said Linda. (Later
Ned bought Hermis, paid $60,000 for him,
and gave him to Linda.)
"We go to Newport for the Summer," rat
tled on Linda. "I've taken a lease on Stone
acre, and if I like it Ned says he will buy the
place for me."
Jouett looks about her little six-room home.
It does not look much like Newport to her!
When Worth came home to supper that night
he found his pretty wife in tears. Things
happened quickly. Before Linda's first sea
son at Newport was over Jouett was suing
Worth for divoTce. She could no longer
stand Linda's opulence. In the midst of her
social triumphs at Newport Mrs. Thomas
hears of the divorce and hurries to Louis
ville. "There can be no divorce in my fam
ily," says Linda. "I'm tired of being poor,"
wails Jouett. "I want to be free."
But Linda is firm. She patches up the
trouble, sends her sister and her husband to
Europe for a second honeymoon and returns
to Newport.
Does Mrs. Thomas, the Newport belle, ever
think of her girlhood In Louisville? Not
often! Her life is too full. In the Winter
she has her opera box, her $10,000 suite at
the St. Regis, her motors, all that money can
buy. Her Summers are Just as replete with
pleasures. She gives dances and dinner par
ties that cost fifty thousand yea, even sixty
thousand dollars. She rides on the crest of
the wave. Can anything mar her happiness,
her worldly success? Let us read chapter IV.
But Sister Does,
and Weds a Richer Prince
Jouett Otto and her husband return to
Louisville after a leisurely and luxurious
European trip. Alas for Jouett! The little
house Is no bigger, the $80 a month goes no
further. The result is inevitable! She sues
a second time tor divorce and sister Linda
cannot help matters any. The decree Is
granted. Jouett is free again. And before
very long she takes a leaf from Sister Linda's
book of life and marries a multi-millionaire,
William Wallace, a Western mine owner,
Jouett now has diamonds, pearls, motor cars,
yachts, footmen and maids! And does Linda
rejoice in her sister's happiness? Does our
modern Cinderella approve of her sister's
second marriage? Does she believe In her
heart that It is money and not love that
makes the world go round? Riches can take
wings and fly away, motor cars can be
smashed, yachts sunk. Does love pass at
the same time?
Before we can fully understand the denoue
ment of this very modern tale we must catch
i
C
up a few loos threads.
Mrs. Thomas married
the wealtn to gratify
her racial ambitions.
Throughout chapters
'I. and III. we find her
moving 6wlftly from
one pinnacle to another.
She achieves; Newport
with great rapidity.
Mr. Thomas all this
time is moving just as
rapidly in other ways. He
exceeds the speed limit
in his financial career
and comes a cropper.
He loses some of hi
millions. He has to retrench. And this
happens at about the time that he smashes
his legs In a motor accident. It is a smash
up all around, for his domestic career also
ends at about this time. Cinderella finds
her world made of sawdust and ashes, her
pumpkn coach disappears, her white-rat
horses scamper away, her prince follows
strange goddesses. And she finds herself
almost at the place she was when she mar
ried her Prince Charming. Chapter IV. is
indeed full of tragedy, but what of chapter V.?
Divorce for Cinderella;
Diamonds for Sister
Here in the Summer of Nineteen-Twelve
we find Jouett, the one-time poor sister, liv
ing In the lap of luxury. Her every wish is
gratified. She offered to rent Sister Linda's
Newport house for the Summer, but Sister
Linda refused. That would have been turn
ing the knife in the wound. And so Sister
Jouett goes West in her private car, but prom
ises to return next Winter and display her
pearls and diamonds at the opera. "I shall
have my own box next season," says the once
poor sister. "I am having a wonderful tiara
designed. It will be far handsomer than
anything ever seen In the Diamond Horse
Shoe."
And Sister Linda sighs and thinks of her
too few years of glorious, intoxicating pleni
tude. Sister Linda no longer possesses yachts,
tiaras, motors galore, but she has something
she never thought of In those spendthrift days.
She has a brand new divorce decree. She is
no longer the wife of the one-time multi
millionaire. He is free, and so is she. Sucn
a sad ending for even a modern Cinderella!
But does it not seem that most of our mod
ern fairy tales wind up with a divorce decree?
"They married and lived happily ever after."
No! They marry and live unhappily until
such time as the law will permit them to
part.
But what of fickle Mr. Thomas and the
sprightly lady who threw Cinderella's Coach
ofT it's track? The sprightly lady Is Thee
dora Gerard, better known as "Teddy," of
Paris and New York, She Is named In Cin
derella's bill of complaint and Is very famous
because she originated one form of the
curious "vampire dance," which was known,
too, back in fairy times.
Alas for Prince Charming! He follows her
to Monte Carlo and there she won't have any
thing more to do with him. Mr. Thomas,
say the dispatches, is hiding his mortifica
tion and identity behnd an Immense, newly,
acquired red moustache!
Perhaps it was juBt like that back in the
times when the first Cinderella lived.
The .
Beautiful ' ;X
Mrs. v&fc'V
E. R. Thomas
Who Has --v,'1 ,
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Divorced ' f Vv'
Her Prince S :V'
Charming. ;
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