The Aberdeen Democrat. (Aberdeen, South Dakota) 1???-1909, 1905-03-03
The Man ana
the Hour
Nv KEITH GORDON
convr,sb,, 1904, by Frances "'soa

.or the first time III he
h' ,,aa the future ~sQuarely IN Ine
owe Hitherto she had been col.'ls
s;Hh,o Of life. munching away con'en,
na,,, enough, satisfied with the JOY ..
.,o,on+ And she might have soNe
m 60 for an indefinite time hao II Nv
hpon for the occurrence Of the o. :"
June. only
heconse then, by common cohSen'
time moves up 4 number. This paFuo,
,,,or 1rne 2 made an indelio!e lmp!eS.
sion an Elinor's mind because Oh '""'
dav she began to be thirty-t"o-oee".
At the very beginning, OF course O"'
| still she began. .,,,
a shall say I'm thirty-one all tnIs
rear anyway" she announced oel"nt
~ 70 that other self that receives gu,
| dearest condolences. It's such p"u
form to say you're thirty-one years anu
tvo months old, or whatever II INA.
hennen to be. And if | have to write u
ri make it %thirty-one in rouhd NUN.
hors-not ever 1hirty-one plus" All or
which. as the reader can see, was 't!
INSCRIPTIONS.
However. as she found, BY lar lhe
worst thing about beginning to be 1h'F-
tv-tvo was the fact that you couldh |
forget it. The harder you tried the be''
ter YOU remembered it.
well, what if | am:
This was the remark that our heroine
slung into space when, after a week OF
torment. she sat down with her chin
resting on her hands to have the thing
out. What if | am? So are plenty OF
other gir-women, | mean. Alice IS
thirty, Mary %tbirty-one, Mabel twenty
eight
She paused in her enumeration, struck
by the thought that all these friends
were married. Matrimony was q sub
iect to which she had given the mini
mum of thought. She supposed shed
come to 1t some time, but she was in
no hurry to enter that narrow pasture
SO long as there was pleasant browsing
to be had outside.
When she had thought Of it at all 1t
had seemed to mean chiefly a tiresome
round Of housekeeping that resulted in
three perpendicular lines just over the
nose, q memorandum Of worry that she
secretly determined to avoid as long as
possible. But now that she was be
ginning to be %thirty-two the thing was
different.
Could it be, she asked herself. that
she had made q mistake after al! and
that those three incisive lines We're as
much Of an honor al an officers bars,
Could 1t be that there was a poinI
when one began to be thirty-two-fo,
instance, when becomingness demand
ed that II should lay aside Miss
just as it required that one should
stop wearing pink:
She faced her plight with a stiff I'D
per lip. realizing that she had no one
but herself to blame. There had beer
a number Of men-the mischievous dim
pie at the corner Of her mouth danced
into sight for a second at the though
OF how many-who had done their hes,
to stop her in what she now recognized
Tor the first time her mad career. Sh,
mad declined their offers kindly, bu
with a certain royal carelessness tina
rocked not of possible dark hours I,
come. When did any woman born I,
the belief in the divine right Of queen,
ever foresee dethronement?
She had inadvertently lived over
as she had once heard it Quaint,
phrased. There was no doubt about II
she was an old maid. She repeated
aloud In all its brutal truth. scorDin,
such euphemisms as "spinster' an,
bachelor woman"
You're al old maid-iust q plain NJ,
maid" she said audihly. But it sound
gu Ike a Joke-like one Of those THING
too bad to be true. She would nroho
Oily wake up after q bit to find thai 81
mad been married since her eichteen,,
year and had 4 son ready to enter 90,
iege and a daughter about to mako no
debut.
No such happy awakening cam.
however, and with desperate phiIos(
phy she decided that since she u,o
an old maid she would enter in,o ~
role for all it was worth A. lao.
she would avoid the error Of hsin
kittenish. 0eH
Little by little her plainest gor-,,
were brought into reQuisitjon. Cer,oI
nttle graces and frivolities OF tho ,o,,,
were II by II abandoned. She wv.
y asked Alice, her closest friena d,
teach the children to call her "snnro
a thing which she had hitherto To.s,,
den under the penalty Of . s .Uta W.
oeath to the cherub that sbo,ld sN
be guilty Of it. o'u Ut
what Is the matter with von., w
ed Alice. with a stare Of saSl