The Press., 1920-10-14
co. 1920. by Mcclure Newsp

enough of a social calendar to fill 8 Sunday social column.
 Last year-well, last year his ambi tion had been greater. He had fallen in love with and wanted to marry on the spot a girl in the next town. a young slip of a thing with brown eyes and golden hair and dimple in hef chin who answered to the name o1 Elsie Darlington.
 Somehow or other between them, his mother and sister had managed to niI this absurdly youthful romance, as ii seemed to them, in the bud, and Tom had returned to college sadder wiser, but unmarried man. Sadder, be- cause of temporarily thwarted plans wiser, because just wiser, we'll say.
 What form would his activities take this year?
 q hope the 'vamp' doesn't try for him." said Julia, bitterly, thereby voic. ing the very fear in her mothers mind And both of them knew that If Tom Branford did not succumb to Alice Haynes vampishness 1t would be be- cause he had more strength of character than the rest of the Whit. neville youth or else because he was irrevocably attached to another.
 Alice Haynes was not exactly a new. conner to Whitneyville. She was an old-timer who had gone away to study art and had come back in new char. O TNhof ic "a rot1Jrno6 Q rt iSt-of sorts. She dressed like one, in stenciled smocks, talked the lingo and lived in studio.
 Yes, she had taken over old man Woodbridge's barn, replaced the horse stall partitions with beaver board, hung the walls with rep instead of har- ness, and imported by truck from New York a collection of rugs, samovars, easels and ash trays which would have done credit to locality where such things were better appreciated.
 Once settled, she began to enter. tain-sister artists over week-ends a musical comedy star, Russian vio- so many people that Whitneyville soon lost all track of their numerous com ings and gOings.
 Gradually, however, the young men of the town managed an introduction to her, then dropped in to call, and finally got the habit of going often. One day some facetious town wit spoke of her as the vamp, and from that moment her stock dropped below par with the women folk. The epithet may or may not have been true. What was indubitably true, however, was the fact that former popular young women were now forced to sit of a Sunday afternoon on their lonely yer. andas twirling their thumbs and won- dering who invented vamps, anyway
 Into this disturbed social atmos- phere dropped Tom Branford, now a graduate and his own master, with a promising job at his disposal the first of September. And he had not been in Whitneyville week before, in spite of the efforts of his mother and Julia he had not only discovered the vamI but had become one of the most regu. lar frequenters of the studio.
 He's lost his appetite!" lamented Mrs. Branford one morning, viewing the array of cup custards proposed to tempt 1t back again.
 More likely he's fed up with Rus sfa tea and Dutch cheeses and-and glace fruits," said Julia shortly. "What he can see in that woman"
 'I wish we had not put our foot down so strongly about Miss Caring ton," ventured her mother. "I didn't really object to her. It was just that Tom was so young" To Mrs. Bran ford the visions of last year, which at the time seemed so observation-disclosures of Tom marrying young slip of a thing and setting up an establishment of his own-now appeared altogether heavenly beside pictures of Tom loung- and drinking tea poured by the hands of short-haired women.
 "I have an idea," began Julia slow ly, Eff 1t isn't too late. Let's tell Tom that we have changed our minds about thinking he was to young to be- mar ried, and suggest that he invite Miss Darlington here for a visit. She wouldn't come unless they were en- gagged, and if he still cares he might persuade her to be engaged-and there's an end to Alice the Vamp!"
 Mrs. Branford looked hopeful Then an expression of doubt clouded h"r face. Would Tom haunt the home ,l, L. other? If only it isn't too late!" sl,e breathCd.
 That night when Tom sneaked in some time nearer l2 than II, he found to his surprise both his mother and his sister awaiting his return. Usu ally the task of "sitting up for Tom was assumed by them alternately. Ii was form of attention, moreover which greatly annoyed Tom. who had no desire to be sat up for like young high school girl.
 But tonight his face wore an eS pression of such radiant happiness that nothing could have chilled 1t "Mother-Julia" |" he cried. "Congratu late me! She has said 'Yes'!
 The hearts of the two women con- gealed within them. Too late! Toe late!
 Pm sure I hope you'll be very happy" Julia rose to the occasion with proper, if mild, politeness.
 1T do, too, dear." faltered his moth. CT. Although I had hoped-Else Burlington, you know" ~.... s~
 Well, of - all - things !" Tom brought out the words with staccato