Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page. It is also available as plain text as well as XML.

i y :ember 24, 1931 WCORMICK MESSENGER, McCORMICK, SOUTH CAROLINA PAGE NUMBER THR] KATtlARINf FIRST INSTALMENT When Jocelyn, forgetting what her music master had taught her, played music, her own mother, Marcella, was alarmed. It was like the voice of a stranger in the house. She rose from the prie-dieu in an alcove of the long Spanish-looking room, difficult to recognize as the living-room of a New York apart ment, and came forward past in tervening massive furniture to look at the player. There she sat, the daughter Mar cella had put into a foreign con vent twelve years before, a smooth sleek golden girl, eighteen years old, full-bosomed, narrow-waisted and round-hipped. She used, when her eyes met her mother’s, a .slow smile.. She did nothing, quickly. But when she played this music of her own there was a change. Mar cella was quick to recognize it. Jocelyn had thrust down her chin and there was in her eyes, when the slow smile left them, the dif ference between June sky and thunder sky. Then Marcella thought of the contents of that little crypt above her prie-dieu and of Julian . . . and of all the things that this daughter must never know. “I want her to be safe,” she mur mured to a nun when twelve years before she had left the little girl trembling in the dim waxy-smell ing parlor of the convent. And greeting her only two days ago on the wharf of her native city with all the wharf tall towers stretching up behind them Marcella had said again to the same nun, twelve years older, more waxen and more frail. “Oh, dear Sister Delice, how shall I keep her—safe?” Jocelyn Harlowe’s first ball-gown —it was for a costume ball—was white, as all first ball-gowns prob ably should be. Standing sheathed in all this purity of color Jocelyn herself had a look of sleek brilli ance which did not express her age, her simplicity or her profound lack of all worldly experience. It was not the convent child’s fault that she looked so unconven tual. She was really ignorant, a veritable mdvice in living, but there was in her blood and in her brain a swift rebellious maturity to which her body had subtly shaped itself. A husband in her mind. It must be managed quickly before Jocelyn was fully awakened to reality. She must be made to long for it ignor antly as a release. If marriage, if this man, could be presented to her as an escape, as the opening rather than the closing of life’s doors . . . Before Jocelyn’s- return from France Marcella had been busy warming chilled social contacts, melting the edges from metallic connections of one sort or another. She had once a great position in the city and it was not too difficult, in spite of what had once shatter ed her life, to make herself remem bered. So when she brought Joce lyn into the ballroom she was able to obtain for her, aided by her own exotic charm, a sufficiency of fan tastic partners—to Jbcelyn they all seemed Romeos and the ballroom an iridescent bubble of delight— and at last even to attract for her the supper-partner Marcella had desired. This was Felix Kent, dress ed as the Jack of Diamonds, and with his regular Saxon face and large eyes curiously resembling that conventionalized gentleman of fortune: “But you don’t look it,” he said, seating himself beside flushed Juliet at the small palmy rosy table they had taken for themselves. “You don’t look it and you don’t act it and you don’t—yes, you do speak it. You have a delicious little French accent. And, well, something about the way you move your lips and use your eyes is dif ferent, conventual. Perhaps I’m not going to be disappointed after aU.” This was the address altogether different from any Jocelyn had yet received. An older man, evidently. He condescended to her. WeU, that was of course to be expected. “Mr. Kent,” she said, “you have really no right to any - disappoint ment, have you? Because you can’t have had an interest in me (there was shadowy delicate drum-roll on the r) ever before tonight.” “You’re wrong, I’ve had an inter est in you for—let me see—twelve years.” “But you are just seel-y,” scoff ed Jocelyn at her sweetest. “And I have not any French accent at all.” “Twelve years ago I saw you in a bank in Paris. And I said to your mother. ‘Give me a first option when she comes out, won’t you, Marcella?’ ” “But, Mr. Kent, you are not so old as that.” “I am nineteen years older than you are, Miss Jocelyn.” “And my mother did give you a first—option?” questioned Jocelyn with her eyes down. Kent stared and laughed delight edly and drew in about her as though he had become for her a warm curtain, sheltering darken ing. “She did, really. She said to me that day in Paris, ‘There isn’t a man in the World I’d be so glad to trust her to, Felix.” Kent laughed. But he was giddy and filled with instant fear. There had never in the world been a love ly child like this one, so frankly hungry, so ignorantly passionate, and so untaught; with not a jot of the deep cold wisdom of experience. He could hardly bear to surrender her to her next partner. Kent sought out Jocelyn’s mother and bending his fair lean height above her he talked and talked and their extraordinary incandescence. “Stop playing ... just a minute, Jocelyn, please.” She obeyed, let her hands fall and gave him her meek child’s look and her, slow unchildish smile. “Your mother has left us togeth er. You know I love you.” “Yes,” said Jocelyn, trembling and looking down. “Do you think you can love me?” “I don’t know monsieur.” He laughed in soft delight and drew closer. “I may put my arm around you, loveliest?” She made no movement nor sound but he, interpreting her sil ence, did draw her to him and she came softly suddenly so that all of her young body seemed to be his own. Then he kissed her mouth. At that she was up and at the far side of the room. Never had he seen a living creature move so swiftly. Both her hands were press ed against her lips. Her bosom panted. Her eyes were distended and wet. “Oh, no,” she whispered. “Oh . . . no . . . no . . . no. I can’t. Kent came toward her, not close, for her arms were stretched out to keep him at a distance. She even went back against the window which held an amazing picture of lighted towers and silver smoke and of a sky colored like the petals of dark pansies. “Darling, I’m sorry, I beg your pardon. I know I frightened you. fF7I r» fTtl • tp........ * , „^o - — — R v A Thort TT Who Can Pass Ihis Examination f Mjy flUnZil A • MXfMA Questions AWSWB YES OS.HO Have youtriedto beaded boy? Arc you impudent. ? Do you eat vvhatyouare to/d to? Do you pick up your play thing;? o you tease the dog? 'Q you wash, your hands and face DO youtratk Kuxd intotte house Oo you cuways say’VesmW anoL *oo sir " 7 ' s^4rTo<-*STM.M. Dp you, always say "thank yog' Are you nice, to your little pUy mates ? bed when. 7ouareto(d > \k i ‘ r oPE N UP Y£R MOUF I 7BLL YA BUD, WHAT ARE You DOING? Jimmies kip brother wants some- OUR CARAMELS ^ Felix drew her to him, and she came softly, suddenly. talked. ( Marcella was wise. She declined innumerable invita tions. An occasional theater-party she accepted. Several of these were given in Jocelyn’s honor by Felix Kent. But Marcella brought her charge home after the play, for bidding any extension of gayety for Jocelyn. She was not to be whirled off to the cafe or restaur ants of after midnight joy. Jocelyn was meek, had suffered a long dis cipline in meekness. But her nerves began to quiver. “The other girls,” she said with a sort of fierce timidity, “the other girls go on, Mother.” “You are not like the other girls,” said Marcella, “and I will not let you become like them.” Jocelyn murmured, “They’re very nice.” Marcella’s hand fell upon hers and tightened sternly. “I am the judge of niceness.” And Jocelyn sat still under that touch. Often Felix Kent came into see them. During his visits in the liv ing-room Marcella was a constant chaperon. Jocelyn would play her Please do forgive me.” He felt as though he had been sent back in a dream to play the part of a Vic torian lover. Phrases came to him from half-forgotten old romantic novels: “I won’t do it again. You may take your own time. I want you so: I want you to marry me.” After a considerable silence Joce lyn composed herself. But she stayed against her window, drawn up there as though for an instant spring backward into the great dark city of refuge beyond the win dow-panes. “You won’t do that again?” “Not until you wish it. Please, Jocelyn, give me just the tip of your silly little convent fingers.” She let him take her hand and kiss it. She brushed the other hand across her eyes and smiled. “Then it’s all right?’ he asked her. “I think so. Yes: If my mother “Your mother gave me her con sent at that same costume ball when I was the Jack of Diamonds.” “Do you mean that I will marry you . . . you are asking?” “Yes.” He had kept her hand, was hold- PUT HE CANT Y" s^£M CAUSE HES OAJLV >T ONE TooTIl AN' I WAS TRYING- To PIT ME GRAN’AIAS Bridge work in his ^ ^ S ^ 10U ^ piano or sit with her eyes down | ing it close to him in both of his listening to her mother’s hard own. manufactured conversation with an older man. She had never before studied a man at such close quarters. Felix Kent was a man shapely and hard and different in every fiber from her thrilled self. The convent child felt this difference in all her nerves and pulses. There came an evening when Marcella left them alone. Jocelyn was at her piano -dutiful ly executing a commanded melody. It was intricate and held all her attention. She did not know that she had been left unchaperoned in the room with Felix Kent. He came and stood close to her leaning on the piano. In the slim severity of evening dress he looked “May I have a piano?” whisper ed Jocelyn. The question sounded so like mere childishness that Felix laughed out, and again, but very carefully, put his arm about her. She came to him but not so softly, so completely, as before. “You shall have everything,” promised the Jack of Diamonds. The engagement of Miss Jocelyn Harlowe of New York City to Mr. Felix Kent of Chicago with all pos sible other details of information was presently in due form an nounced. And Jocelyn wore upon her third finger a diamond as splendid as a star. “You shall be married in the spring after a four months’ en- sleek and attractive, like a panth- ’ gagement,” Marcella promised, er. His eyes were now filled with Later there were evenings, how ever, when Felix’ new role of re straint was difficult to maintain. On one such evening be left Joce lyn abruptly with a manufactured excuse. She went back into the room and sat down by her piano, brooding. The door from the passage which led back toward the bedrooms op ened softly. Jocelyn whirled about, surprised. She could see no one. But the door had moved. She was startled. Then she saw him, coming round a great throne of a chair which had interposed between them. The cripple. The little bent man, side long, with bright eager eyes. Jocelyn would have screamed but he arrested her with speech. “Don’t be frightened, Jocelyn.” he said gently in a voice full of pleas antness, “I wouldn’t scare ... I wouldn’t hurt you for the world. You see, you poor little child, I am your father.” And Jocelyn recognized him. For years Jocelyn had had a photograph in her possession, se cretly. All other pictures of Nick Sandal had been destroyed, clipped into splinters of cardboard and burned to black feathers, by his wife. When the bent man came round the corner of the chair and spoke to her, Jocelyn was therefore able to identify him. “I’m not afraid of you,” she said —a queer first speech from child to parent. “I’m glad my daughter is not afraid of me. I thought by this time you’d be made ... of fear—I used to call you ‘Lynda.’ ” He lifted her hand to his lips. "I came to ask you . . . are you happy?” ’ “Yes. And thr-rilled.” (CONTINUED NEXT WEEK) When you choose a kitchen cab inet see that it is well-made, and mouse-proof; that the material of which it is made is easy to clean; and that the drawers and com partments are suitable in size and shape for the articles you will want to store in them. -X- A dry cow needs plenty of min erals. Well-cured legume hay with wheat bran, cottonseed meal, or linseed meal will supply these. Galvanized wire cloth placed around the trunks of fruit trees will protect them during the winter against rabbits which often gnaw off the bark. Put the wire cloth, about 3 inches in the ground and 18 inches to 2 feet up the trunks, or more if used in a region where deep snows enable the rabbits to reach higher than would otherwise be the case. This offers some pro tection from mice also. m Our cordial greetings go out to you in the hope that you may enjoy an abundance % of the good things of life during this happy yuletide. 0 We hope you will have a bigger and brighter New Year, happy in good health, good cheer and prosperity. STROMS’ DRUG STORE MAIN STREET McCORMICK, S. C. —aQo——— ‘Send The Messenger your next order for job printing. Experience Service Facilities Those are the important things in measuring the worth of a funeral director, and should be borne in mind when you have occasion to choose one DISTANCE IS NO HINDRANCE TO OUR SERVICE and there is no additional charge for service out of town J. S. STROM Main Street McCormick, S. C.