The Detroit times., 1913-07-26

| conscious of his intolerance. added ::
'Oh. well-thats all right. Har-
| Ian II drop all that Bostonese accent
when he gets back to practice here
year or two And he'll be with Ms
on the band wagon when we get this
county organized TO dump the old
gang. He'll forget he's Judge Van
( Harris son, and nephew OF Senator
| Fairchild and IA Geek
Again they smiled at Arne's heat.
He and Harlan had played on tho
same football team In high school,
and the lean farm boy had been the
sensation OF the state athletic asso-
citation. But though one may rip up
the invading lines and score the
championship touchdowns and be
borne from the field smothering in
ribbons and have to face. tongue-tied.
the clapping OF all the pretty hands in
school al the annual association ban
quet. yet when all's said and done,
to be Geek" and call on all those
girls who hutter summer evenings in
and out of the Van Hart gate is a
much greater thing. Which is reason
able and proper and according TO the
light Of the best people In many places
east and west other than Rome,
Iowa.
"Oh, Harlan's all right" repeated
Arne, and so are these other people
along High street. SO is that cop
per Indian over on the sqiare-hes
marking the spot where something
once happened. In Earlville they're
laughing at our row over Sin Creek
Every time a freshet comes. what
happens? Some OF our prominent
citizens wake up In the morning and
find their lawns strewn with drowned
socks and busted stoyepipes and brass
collar buttons that Sin Creek has
swept down on us from the garbage
heaps OF EarlvilIe. Chen they roar
and talk creek diversion but nothing
was ever done until they made II a
county steal with Old Thad Tanner
getting the rake-of Then. being reg
ular, the best families agreed 70 II.
Sinsinawa had been a scandal i'm
memorially. everybody knew But
then everybody loved Sinsinawa. and
Rome without the wanton singing
down a dozen channels from the bluff
would not have been Rome. One
could put up with a vulgar collar but
ton washed down now and then from
the alleys OF Earlville.
Wiley Curran sighed as he watched
the copper Indian across the square,
Chief Winnesaqua, who ruled the land
when squirrels gamboled oYer-fhe
site o. Rome They were still gam
boiling over the old town, while Earl
Vile had built its Hotel Metropole
with English steeplechase scenes
around the diningroom wainscot.
Rome had had Miss Amelia Parsons
of the Parsons House, and her one
o'clock Sunday dinner. with chicken,
since 1856. Earlville had its ElKs
club done with a brownstone 'front.'.
Rome had it's Shakespeare club which
met Thursdays at the ladies homes.
Earlville had it's syndicate theater In
cream brick: Rome had its opera
house sheathed in tin imitation OF
sandstone-and peeling off Earlville
-bu, why rehearse? There Ia the Car
negie library. the Young men I'M rs
tan association. the Federal ouliulhs'
the paid fire department. the inter
urban, the home Of Congressman hau'
which like all the homes or greN
men in the west, was spiked with the
militant decoration OF German cake
the east addition. and the factory
district
Rome had none of these. In lieu
of town plats it had an imperial isola-
ton. When the Earlville boosters
in train. went up the valley. 10 ser
enade other communities and paraue
in silk hats and white flannel trous'
err Rome was usually entertaining
district delegates TO the Baptist
Young Peoples association; and when
a girl show" struck Earlville direct
from two hundred nights in Chicago,
Romes tin opera-house was invari-
ably given over to Flint. the Hypnot
ist. the Swiss Bell Ringers, or the
Chautauqua Quartette.
Mr.. Curan accepted tickets 10 these
on advertising. and sat gloomily all
through. After ALL Mr.. Curran was a
LOYAL citizen. Even though he ala
print the story OF the drummer VINO
related that Miss Amelia Parsons or
the Parsons House insisted on his
sleeping with brown papers under MS
ears lest the pillows become soiled
too soon after the Saturday change.
OF course he lost advertising. hut
Mr.. Curran had an unhappy mania
for printing things that lost advertis-
ing. Even now, Miss Vance. looking
with patient eyes at the three-Har-
Ian, skinned, resolute, serious, his
large boned frame carrying, at twen(-'
ty-one, mans dignity; her brother
Arne, soil-burned. Indian-cheeked.
nervous, lean. a Lincolnian awkward
ness about his clothes; and then WI
ley with his young-old eyes. the close
brown beard lending him, in Rome.
an unacceptable foreign air-felt MI
Curran's perennial failure.
At eighteen, when she taught her
first school, she supposed that Wiley
would ask her 10 marry him. but he
had gone of on footless wanderings.
Twelve years later he came back,
trifie stouter. a bit sac. still mischiev-
Gus, the manysided friend, but not
the lover She had gone on TO a sue
cessful and widening career; she had
developed a personality, made a
place: but Wiley--well. Wiley had
become "Curran OF the News" Even
now Harlan Van Hart. many years
the younger, was fitting himself for
his fathers honored footsteps: Arne
was enthusiastically putting in his
great schemes for soil-sweetening. lee
,uripo, IN farmara' inafiflItca md doh.