Main Street

opher Prairie home, Carol began to make the house her own. She dismissed the parlor furniture-the golden oak table with brass knobs, the moldy brocade chairs, the picture of "The Doctor." She went

y of gold thread on stiff ultramarine tissue, which she hung as a panel against the maize wall; a couch with pillows of sapphire velvet and gold bands; chairs which, in Gopher Pr

eplace. "We'll have a new house

est, Kennicott hinted, she'd bette

it seemed to be in motion; it welcomed her bac

so comfortable, but I must say this divan, or whatever you call it, is a lot better than

he lawn to peer through the windows and exclaim, "Fine! Looks swell!" Dave Dyer at the drug store, Harry Haydock and Raym

Mrs.

She had so painfully reared three sons to be Christian gentlemen that one of them had become an Omaha bartender, one a professor

, depressingly hopeful kind. There are in every large chicken-yard a number of old and indignant hens who resemble Mrs. Boga

nnicotts and Mrs. Bogart did not move in the same sets-which meant precisely the same in

y at the revelation of ankles as Carol crossed her legs, sighed, inspec

neighbors, but I thought I'd wait till you got settled, yo

-seven d

was raised up a Baptist, and I do hope he won't drift away from the fold, of course we all know there isn't anything, not cleverness or gifts of gold or anything, that can make up for humility and the inward grace and they can say w

nal, as a girl in Mankato, bu

at the Baptist Church and--As I was saying, of course I agree with Reverend Zitterel in thinking that the great trouble with this nation today is lack of spiritual faith-so few going to church, and people automobiling on Sunday

es

on a lot of these gadding young folks like the Haydocks and the Dyers-and heaven only knows how much money Juanita Haydock blows in in a year-why then you may be glad to know that slow old Aunty Bogart is always right there, and heaven knows--" A portentous sigh. "-I HOPE you and your husband won

front door. Carol ran back into the living-room and jerked open the

r herself of blame by going about whimpering, "I know I'm t

was married, she was going to have an allowance and be business-like and modern. But it was too much trouble to explain to Kennicott's kindly stubbornness that she was a p

es. She became self-conscious; occasionally she was indignant that she should always have to petition him for the money with which to buy his food. She caught herself criticizing his belief that, since his joke about trying to keep

ings," she reflected. He liked

ills sent to him. She had found that staple groceries, sugar, flour, could be mos

ter open a charg

iness except for c

"Do you kn

it. But that's yoost a rule I made. I

undignified desire to slap him, but her reason agreed with h

y. She ran up the stairs to Kennicott's office. On the door was a sign advertising a headache cure and stating, "The doctor is out

s. Dyer demanding, "Dave, I

as there, and two other men,

How much do you want

ot to get some underc

fill the closet so I couldn't find my

all in rags. You got to

rly Dave, regarded it as an excellent jest. She waited-she knew what would come-it did. Dave yelped, "

up to Kennicott and commanded

thing the

es

s, into his barren office. Before

he refused. Just now I've heard Mrs. Dyer going through the same humiliation. And I-I'm in the same position! I have to be

t? By God, I'

oney with which to buy meals for you to eat. And hereafter to remember it. The next time

overcoat, "How can you shame me so?" and he was blubbering, "Dog-gone it, I me

nd after that he remembered to give

unt-be business-like. System. I must do something a

I

She spoke judiciously to Bea about left-overs. She read the cookbook again and, like a child with a picture-

ent orders to Minneapolis "fancy grocers." She pinned patterns and sewed. She was irritated when Kennicott was jocular about "these frightful big doings that are going on." Sh

the afternoon before the housewarming he found himself a slave, an intruder, a blunderer. Carol wailed, "Fix the furnace so you won't have to touch it after supper. And for heaven's sake take that horrible old door-mat off the

in a silver sheath, the calyx of a lily, her piled hair like black glass; she had the fragility and costliness of a Viennese goblet; and her eyes were intense. He was stirred to ri

tt cried from the bay-window in the living-room, "Here comes somebody!" and Mr. and Mrs. Luke Dawson faltered in, at a quarter to eight. Then in a shy avalanche arrived the en

ulius Flickerbaugh, the attorney, gasp, "Well, I'll be switched," as he viewed the vermilion print hanging against the Japanese obi. She was amused. But her high spirits slackened as

igs of iron? I don't know that I can mak

noisy and undignified! This is the christening of my house, and I want you to help me have a bad influence on it, so

er of the floor, loose-jointed, lean, small, rusty headed, pointed of

r forty-five, Carol got them into a waltz and a Virginia Reel. But when she left them to disenjoy themselves in their own way Harry Haydock put a one-step record on the phonograph, the younger p

e. Ezra Stowbody hunted for something to say, hid a yawn, and offered to Lyman Cass,

convinced that in their debauches of respectability they had lost the power of play as well as the power of impersonal thought. Even the dancers were gradually crushed by the invisib

. Nat Hicks, Ella Stowbody, and Dave Dyer were abstracted, fingers and lips slightly moving. She knew with a cold certainty that Dave was rehearsing his "stunt" abo

e the word 'stunt' in my house,

you: why not have Ray

he's the most sentime

is tail. But the poor dear--Longing for what he calls 'self-expression' and no training in anything except selling shoes

the planners of "stunts," "We all want you to sing, Mr. Wutherspoon. You

as clearing his throat, pulling his clean handkerchief farther out of his

her desire to "discover artistic talent," C

" and "When the Little Swallow Leaves Its Tiny

should do at all. She wanted to laugh at the gratified importance in Raymie's half-shut eyes; she wanted to weep over the meek ambitiousness which clouded like an aura his pale face, flap

inspired vision and breathed to Carol, "My! That was sweet! Of course Raymond hasn't

y, but without originality: "Oh yes

ast hope of being amused. She cried, "Now we're going to play an idiotic game which I learned in Chicago. You wi

yebrows indicating a verdict that Doc K

The shepherds scatter the sheep through this room, then turn off all the lights, and the wolves crawl in from the hall and in the darkness they try to get the shoes away fr

y one else and waited fo

k shoes. Ezra Stowbody cackled, "Well, you're a terror to old folks. You're like the gals I used to go horseback-riding with, back in the sixties. Ai

giggled a

nothingness toward a waiting foe, a mysterious foe which expanded and grew more menacing. The wolves peered to make out landmarks, they touched gliding arms which did not seem to be attached to a

priety was shaken out of her, and she delightedly continued to ejaculate "Nev' in my LIFE" as she saw the living-room door opened by invisible hands and shoes hurlin

heir eyes; and the owlish Mr. Julius Flickerbaugh was retreating from Juanita Haydock, and gulping with unaccustomed laughter. Guy Pollock's discreet brown scarf hung down his back. Young Rita Simons's net blouse had lost two buttons, and betrayed more of her delicious plump shoulder than was regarde

n that she was a

needle and thread ready. She permitted the

designs of lotos blossoms, dragons, apes, in cobalt and crimson and gray, and p

n Minneapolis. You are to put them on over your clothes, and please forget that you are Minnesotans,

after she gazed down from the stairs upon grotesquely ruddy Yankee heads abov

hair pierced with jade pins; a languid peacock fan in an out-stretched hand; eyes uplifted to a vision of pagoda towers. When she dropped her pose and smiled down she discovered Kenni

real Chinese concert. Messrs. Pollock, Kennicott, and, well,

e orchestra, with a ruler and a totally inaccurate sense of rhythm. The music was a reminiscence of tom-toms heard at circus fortune-

in a dancing procession to the dining-room, to blue bowls o

agreeable doubt they ventured through the bamboo shoots into the golden fried noodles of the chow mein;

She wondered whether they could for five minutes be coaxed to talk about something besides the winter top of Knute Stamquist's Ford, and what Al Tingley had said about his mother-in-law. She sighed, "Oh, let 'em alone. I've done enough." She crossed her trousered legs, and snuggled luxuriously above her sau

y--Don't cross your legs in that co

subject as, on lonely evenings in his office, he had read at least one book on every subject in the world. Guy's thin maturity was changing in her vision to flushed youth and they were roaming an

hands, and cried many suitable things regarding children, and being sure to wrap up warmly, and Raymie's singing and Juanita Haydo

king folks up. Now you've showed 'em how, they won't go on having the same old kind of parties an

shoulder, and her irritation at his

Weekly

plar Street, and is now extremely nifty in modern color scheme. The doctor and his bride were at home to their numerous friends and a number of novelties in diversions were held, including

circle of mourners kept its place all evening, and Da