The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1908-08-25
THE EVENING STORY
Fresh Air Funds.
(By Lulu Johnson.)

- NOkRCkJ Skys lld0 lOnk since ceased
to shine down upon the narrow street
and hung lazily upon the line of the
western sky as though reluctant to
leave battlefield where he had been a
mighty victor. The pavements, and
even the buildings. gave out their
screening heat like a bake oven from
which the fires have been newly drawn
Here and there some one watered the
street with hose or turned the stream
upon the tiny grass plots in front OF
the houses, but the heat qickly dried
up the flood and the humidity served
only to add to the general discomfort.
1t was a long street of oId-fashioned.
hfgh-stoop houses. once the home of
fashion. Latterly society had been
driven out by the resistless march OF
the ctty's progress. and the district
was given over to the clearinghouse
mistresses until such time as the needs
OF the growing city should require the
space for factories
Still retaining somewhat of its old
fashioned dignity, the street was be-
coming shabby-genteel. Here and there
a brownstone front had been replaced
by brick tenement. masquerading as
a fiathouse, and here and there the
squalor of the poor became apparent.
Already the street marked the extreme
edge of the residential district as the
boarding-house mistress loved to term
1t, and its chief recommendation was
their places of employment by walking.
and SO save the tedious cars and the
sixty cents car fare that represented
an important item in their weekly ex-
penditure.
The boarders thronged the high
stoops, gasping in the hot air, not dar-
ing to seek their rooms until the heat
should abate a little At Mrs. Marcy's,
Dudley Thearle shared the top step
with Maude Ryerson. Ever since he
had come to Marcy's, two weeks be-
fore, he had sought a place beside
Maude, until the other boarders had
come to regard the top step as the
joint property of the two.
Presently they would make jests on
the oddly assorted pair, and Theatres
love affair would share, with the weak
ness of the coffee and the strength of
the butter, the humorous attention of
the other boarders. The coffee was not
weak, and the butter rather better than
the average, but tradition is mighty,
and has decreed that these jokes shall
endure while boarding houses exist.
/ Generally, too, there is some misma ted
pair, lost in their own happiness, to
offer a third butt of ridicule.
AND surely never was there such an
oddly assorted pair. Thearle still wore
the sunburn and rudy coloring which
proclaimed him product Of field and
farm. The fortnight which had passed
since he had taken a position offered
him by one OF last summers boarders
at the farm had not faded the flush
Of health, nor had the city's burdens
bent the strong shoulders.
MISS Ryerson was commercial nun,
welded to the work which took her
youth and beauty, and gave naught in
return save the pittance which permit
ted mere existence, with none of the
pleasures that are the heritage of
youth. She was only Fl, but she look
ar Sfv va Il irft do
she had been working. Part of that
time she had been the support of a
younger sister, and the story of priva
tons endured for her sisters sake was
written large on the colorless skin and
in the weary eyes and bent carriage.
Yet to Thearle she seemed beautiful.
for she represented knowledge; knowl-
edge Of ways and manners that were
strange and new to him, and he wor-
SHIPPED dumbly, If not from afar.
Her greatest charm he found in the
fact that she did not laugh at his blum
ders, as the others did. She seemed to
him some Lady Gracious, a woman
vastly different from all others, a wo
man most greatly to be desired.
AS they sat there in silence, unwill
ing to make even the exertion that con-
versation demanded. there came the
shouts of children. the complaining
grind OF heavy motor cars, and pres
emily there rolled past line of deliv-
cargo.
ITS the city fresh air fund.-" ex-
planned the girl in answer to Thearle's
inquiring glance. THE real fund sends
the children to the country. This is an
idea of the Evening Spark. The parks
are too far for the little feet to walk,
and carfare is not for the children of
the tenements. The merchants loan
their trucks In the evenings and the
children are taken out to the park to
x1A Nd ~
fresh air. 1t is wonderful charity"
81 wish some one would start a
fresh air fund for people like me-"
unused Thearle. 81 don't mean just
that sort, of course. but I sit here on
the steps because there seems to be
nothing else to do"
you could go to the park" sug-
geste dthe girl. "That car on the cor
ner goes straight out past the park
into the country. It's lovely ride.
but it costs another nickel once you
are past the park"
But what good is that to me?" de-
manded Thearle. II don't know my
way around yet. Why can't an ac-
commodating guide come and get us?"
you are supposed to be able to
make acquaintances and arrange pic
MICS" reminded the girl. you have
the people at the store and at your
boarding house."
Twill you conner" demanded
Thearle, reused to interest. Il didn't
suppose that you'd care"
"GIadly," was the smiling response,
while the tired eyes lighted with
pleasure. 'T'n go for my hat
In ten minutes they were speeding
toward the suburbs, exchanging the
narrow, ill-smelling streets for the
broader avenues, past the park with
its soft greens, into the open country.
with now and then a suburban tract
that in time would be absorbed into
the city proper.
And SO they came at last to the real
feIds free from the advertising
boards of real estate firms and patent
medicines. Cornstalks cut the velvet
dusk with faint green swords of light, |
- ;, -. ---,1r1 - cIover and huckWheat |