The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1914-12-04
Underneath the High Cut Vest
A Business Adventure of Emma McChesney

BIZ EDNA FERBER
Author of "Do,on O,7ara. ''Butiered Side Dopn %

ma McChesney, her eyes glowing will
something other than fever 'Tvs
something to say It's just this. l
Pm going to be sick I'd prefer to bt
sick right here, unless it's something
catching. No hospital. Don't ask me
why. l don't know. We people OF
the road are all alike. Wire T. A
| Buck, Jr., of the Featherloom Petticoa
company, New York. You'll find plenty
of clean nightgowns in the left-hant
tray of my trunk, covered with white
tissue paper Get nurse that doesnt
| sniffie, or talk about the palace she
nursed in last, where they treated hel
like a queen and waited on her hanG
and foot. For goodness sake, put my
switch where nothing will happen tt
it, and if l die and they run my pic
ture in the Dry Goods Review under
the caption, Veteran Travelling Sales
woman Succumbs at Glen Rock III
haunt the editor" She paused a mo
ment.
Everything will be all right said
lAiO uouoChCCpCl, IOu
think you're right at home, it'll be sc
comfortable. Was there anything else
J now"
YES" said Emma McChesney
"The most important of all. My son
Jock McChesney, is fishing up in the
Canadian woods. A telegram may not
reach him for three weeks. They're
shifting about from camp to camp. Try
| to get him, but don't scare him toe
much. You'll find the address under
j. in my address book in my handbag
Poor kid. Perhaps it's just as well he
doesn't know"
| Perhaps it was. At any rate it was
| true that had the tribe of McChesney
been as the leaves of the trees, and
had it held family reunion in Emma
McChesney's little hotel bedroom, il
would have mattered not at all to her
For she was doctor-three-times
| OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES bottles-by-the-bed
| side sick, her head, with its bright hair
rumpled and dry with the fever, toss
ing from side to side on the lumpy
hotel pillow, or lying terribly silent
and inert against the gray-white of the
bed linen. She never quite knew how
narrowly she escaped that picture in
the Dry Goods Review
Then one day the fever began to re
cede, slowly, whence fevers come, and
the indefinable air of suspense and re
preston that fingers about a sick
room at such a crisis began to lift i'm
perceptibly. There came time when
Emma McChesney asked in a weak
but sane voice:
did Jock come? Did they cut of
my hair?"
mot yet, DEAR" the nurse had an
swered to the first, but we'll hear in
a day or so, I'm sure" And, Your
lovely hair! Well, not if l know it,
to the second.
The spirit of small-town kindness
took Emma McChesney in it's arms
The dingy little hotel room glowed
with flowers. The story of the sicl
woman fighting there alone in the ter
rors of delirium had gone up and dowr
about the town. Housewives with &
| fine contempt for hotel soup sem
broths of chicken and beef. The loca
members of the U. C. T. sent rose.
enough to tax every vase and wash
pitcher that the hotel could muster
and asked their wives to call at thu
hotel and see what they could do. The
wives came, obediently, but with sus
picion and distrust in their eyes, ant
remained to pat Emma McChesney
arm, ask to read aloud to her, and tt
indulge generally in that process
known as cheering her up" Ever.
travelling man who stopped at the lit
tie hotel on his way to Minneapolis
added to the heaped-up offerings a
Emma McChesney's shrine. Book
and magazines assumed the proper
tons of library. One could see tn,
hand of T. A. Buck, Jr., in the case
of mineral water, quarts of wine, Gun
Ling cordials and tiny bottles o
liqueur that stood in convivial rows OF
the closet shelf and floor. There cam,
letters, too, and kilograms with sucl
phrases as 'let nothing be left undone
and spare no expense under T.
Buck, Jr's., signature.
So Emma IIcChesney climbed tn,
long, weary hill of illness and pain
reached the top, painting and almos
spent, rested there, and began tn,
easy descent on the other side tina
| cd RI CT d.,
something was lacking. That sum,
optimism that had been Emma Nc
Chesney's most valuable asset was alb
sent. The blue eyes had lost thei
brave laughter. A respondent droo]
fingered on the corners of the moutl
that had been such a rare mixture o
firmness and tenderness. Even tn,
advent of Fat Ed Meyers, her keen
est competitor, and representative o
the Strauss Sanssilk company, failei
to awaken in her the proper spirit o
antagonism. Fat Ed Meyers sent
bunch of violets that devastated tn
violet beds at the local greenhouse
Emma McChesney regarded them list
lessly when the nurse lifted them GU
of their tissue wrappings. But tn
name on the card brough tiny smil
to her lips.
"He says he'd like to see you, if yo1
feel abley said Miss Haney, the nurse
when she came up from dinner.
| Emma McChesney thought minute
Better tell him it's catching" sh
said.
UIIo Hpnu-c II iSp'f' rofr,t.pod Mic