The Somerset reporter., 1905-02-16
The Man and
the Hour
By KEITH GORDON


GNNNNNNNNNNNNNN,NNNNNNNNNN/a
Elinor for the first time in her life
WAS looking the future squarely in the
eye. Hitherto she had been content to
nibble at life, munching away content
edly enough, satisfied with the Joy Of
the moment And she might have gone
on so for an indefinite time had it not
been for the occurrence of the 81 of
June.
New Years day is significant only
because then. by common consent
time moves up Il number. This partc.
ular June ) made an indelible impress
sion on Elinor's mind because on that
day she began to be thirty-two-begag
at the very beginning, of course. but
still she began
II shall say I'm thi1'ty-one all this
year anyway she announced defiant
ly to that other self that receives our
dearest condolences. Its such bad
form to say you're thirty=onc years and
Two months old, or whatever il may
happen TO be. And if have to write il
I'll make it thirty-Onc in round mum
hers-not even thirty plus All of
which. as the reader can see. was very
INSCRIPTIONS
However, as she found by far the
worst thing about beginning to hp thir-
tY-two WAS the fact that you couldn't
forget it. The harder you tried The bet
ter YOU remembered it,
We'll. what if l am ?"
This was the remark that our heroine
sung into space when. after week OF
torment. she sat down with her chin
resting on her hands to have the thing
out What If ann So are plenty of
other gii-women. | mean. Alice r.
thirty, Mary thirty-one. Mabel twenty
eight"
She paused in her enumeration struck
by the thought that all these friends
were married Matrimony was sub
ject to which she had given the mini
mum of thought. She supposed she'd
come 10 it some time. but she WAS i'm
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 it
had seemed TO mean chiefly tiresome
round Of housekeeping that resulted in
three perpendicular lines just over the
nose. n memorandum of worry that she
secretly determined TO avoid ms long M
possible. But now that she WAS he
ginning to be thirty-two the thing was
different
Could it be- she asked herself, that
she had made mistake after all and
that those three incisive lines were as
much of an honor as an officers barsi
Could ii be that there was point
when one began to be thirty two-foI
instance. when beconinene~S demand.
ed that one should lay aside Miss
just as II required thai one should
stop wearing pink:
She faced her plight with stn up.
per lip. realizing that She had no one
but herself to blame. There had been
a number of men-the mischieyous dim
pie at the corner of her mouth danced
into sight for n second at the thought
OF how many-who had done their best
to stop her in what she now recognized
for the first time her mad career. She
had declined their offers kindly. hut
with a certain royal carelessness that
rocked not of possible dark hours to
come. When did any woman born to
the belief in the divine right Of queens
ever foresee dethrOnement?
She had inadvertently lived over"
as she had once heard ii quantity
phrased There was no doubt about it,
she was an old maid, She repeated it
aloud in all it's brutal truth, scornin9
such euphemlsms as "spinster' and
bachelor woman"
You're an old maid-just plain old
maidr she said audibly. But it sound
ed like a joke-like one of those things
too bad to be true. She would proha.
bly, wake up after bit to find that she
had been married since her eighteenth
year and had son ready TO enter col
lege and daughter about to make her
debut.
No such happy awakening came