The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1913-07-24
THE EVENING STORY
Mrs Bett-Jones,s Button-Box.

dressing a veritable ocean of enve-
| lopes which were piled up before her.
There is no use teasing, Roger"
| she said, shaking her pen at the
young man who sat at her side
| sponging stamps on the envelopes.
Il am doing it for your good as well
as for my own. 1t would spoil ev-
erything to get married now. To do
! that we would have to use your little
bank account to buy the furniture,
and a young lawyer just beginning in
a city like this needs something to
| fall back on, no matter how well he
| is doing. I have saved enough for
| the household linen and my clothes,
and in year more can save enough
! for the furniture. L am saving $50
of my $50 month, and in a year
But if 1 want to spend my own
| money to feather our nest with I
don't, candidly, see that it Is any of
your business" said Roger. You
don't know how stupid it seems to
me, as long as we are perfectly sure,
| to have to go on living in boarding
houses when We might just as well
have our own little flat
| "Of course, it would be better" ad-
mitted Terry, but we can't live with
! out furniture and 1 won't let you buy
| it. Perhaps if 1 pinch a little I can
| save the money faster-how would
| that be?''
"All right, you little spendthrift,
| don't buy me any more birthday
presents and then maybe we can af-
ford to be married.
Terry glanced at the clock on the
wall. You must go now" she said.
| Thank you for helping me with
| these stamps. Mrs. Bett-Jones said
she would be here at and she
try to make you promise to walk in
the mans brigade at the next suf-
| frage parade"
Roger hurried out of the door of
the suffrage headquarters, where his
fiancee worked as active secretary
In the hall he passed Mrs. Bett-
Jones, followed by her maid, getting
out of the elevator. He went back to
his law offices with feeling of hurt
disappointment. He had planned to
tell Terry that he had definitely de-
i cfded to use his own money for the
| furniture of their little apartment, so
that they could be married at once.
| Meantime Mrs. Bett-Jones had
found Terry stacking the envelopes
| into piles.
THE notices will be out today.
won't they?" asked Mrs. Bett-Jones.
DO be sure not to omit single name.
TT is so important. I am really quite
thrilled about it. See, Miss Flagg,
| Sophie has brought down basket
| load today and every time we pass
| here in the motor we shall have an
other load brought in. The attic is
just filled with things like this and
| it is really q relief to get rid of them:
There was to be a rummage sale
for the benefit of the suffrage cause
| in the headquarters during the next
week and Terry had been sending out
| notices to the five or six hundred
members of the society to notify them
! of the fact. In the meantime com
mittee of which Mrs. Bett-Jones was
the head, had been securing their
attics for undesired objects suitable
for a rummage sale.
ct is awfully good of you, Miss
/ ill inc m
of this sale. I do hope none of the
committee will bring any really
dreadful things.
The maid had placed her basket
on a large table and now with Nrs.
Bett-Jones she was unpacking the
various articles of rummage. Terry
cast an amused glance at the array
| of objects which Mrs. Bett-Jones,
with all her millions had brought
down for the purpose OF selling.
There was a pair of old brass shoe
buckles-worth probably ten cents
when new; there were two or three
shabby prayer books. an old pack OF
cards, discarded ostrich plume
shorn of ali but it's backbone, ere
| tonne-covered tea caddy, broken
fire screen, an old parasol, two or
three nicked tea-cups and box full
INV idea said Mrs Bett-Jones. rs
to sell everything for ten. fifteen or
twenty-five cents. You can arrange the
things as you think they are worth.
Have nothing over quarter though I
suppose some of the things VIII De
worth much more"
Terry let, her eyes wander over the
pile Of rubbish.
'I have literally carloads Of funk
like this said Mrs. Bett-Jones, land
if we could sell five hundred articles
at an average of twenty cents an ar
ticle-that would be a hundred dollars
and that would pay the rent of this Of
flee for two months. Really 1T is most
inspiring
Terry had taken a close view of the
objects and as Mrs. Beett-Jones was
leaving she detained her How would
you price these-these buttonsT' she
asked Mrs. Bett-Jones ran her long
fingers through the box full of old but
tons as If she could feel their value
They are just old odds and ends,
! she said Some of them may be quite
worthless and some of them may be
quite nice Suppose you arrange them
| in patches of half dozen each and let
each batch go for quarter. But be sure
nothing is over that price. They are
worth nothing to me and I don't want
to have to cart anything back after the
| sale"
AS soon as the door was closed on
Mrs. Bett-Jones's back Terry burst in
to laugh which would have been con-
/ tagiouS IL there had been any one to
| hear it. Mrs. Bett-Jones's scheme for
raising money by selling rubbish
struck her as being absurd. But she
wasted no time and began arranging
the contents of the button box In
| patches of six each. There were soma
| rather pretty pieces of colored crystal
| in the bottom of the box and these
| Terry placed by themselves and, re-
membering Rogers fondness for miner
alogy, she wanted to pay the quarter
needed to buy them for him. But she
/ remembered her promise to save
money.
The rummage sale proved a success