The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1922-01-14
EucningStory
The Call of Already.
BY LILLIACE MITCHELL.
r-.1. oI-a--- Ii.-na l.. I'D

LllLlACE
Esther had always lived in institu-
tionS-and she was deathly tired of
them. She sometimes thought that if
ever again she heard gong sound
she would curl up on the floor'and die.
But she didn't. Instead, the moment
that the first jangle sounded she was
on her feet hurrying to breakfast in
the morning or putting out the lights
at 1880 at night. Just the same, she
always hoped stolidly that something
some day would happen to take her
away from institution life. Yet she
really did not anticipate it greatly.
Then. one day, going home from
work, on the street car she found a
volume of success articles. Esther
liked stories, but past that she seldom
read anything unless it was a news
paper This book, however, had
red cover and the name of it was
stamped on it in startling golden let
tiers. She glanced inside and became
interested. She found that she had
sunk into rut-altho had it not been
for the book she never would have
thought of it. She read on, for it
seemed to give some idea that if one
chose she could climb out of the rut
no matter how deep and rough a rut
it might be.
And that night, when the 1880 bell
the lights out" bell--sounded, she
put her lights out with the rest of
| them, listened to her roommate's reg
ular breathing, and then made gay
plans for herself
After all, life was only a pattern,
and it need not necessarily be a stencil
pattern-just the same old thing day
after day. True, she had been left an
orphan in an orphan asylum, and at
fourteen, when she was considered too
old to be any longer an orphan to be
| supported by the authorities" she
was permitted to go to the home of
| vi oh "a -ul
helper in-the kitchen.
There was nothing very inspiring
about the kitchen work of the largest
| cafeteria in the world. 1t was always
a case of just getting a thing done.
| For instance, peeling enough potatoes
| of odd sizes that would not go thru
the machine and then finding that the
bin was again filled with odd sizes.
! She often wondered as she did these
odd Jobs what Johnny Johns had done
when he became fourteen and was au-
| tomatically released from the orphan
I asylum. She and Johnny had used to
play together. and she always looked
with rare admiration upon his shock
of red hair that stood upright.
To the other orphans that hair had
been a source of amusement and
Johnny had been called Red by the
others. She could recall three sep
arate occasions when people of the city
who had automobiles had lent them to
the orphan asylum for the day and
they had all piled in and had gone to
| the zoo. Those days to Esther and
Johnny Johns had been red-letter days
days of Already life.
And they used to plan to go every
day to the zoo just the minute they
were old enough to get out of the
| asylum. And with dismayed eyes that
stared into the darkness of the girls
boarding club that was her present in
| stitutional home Esther realized that,
altho it had been almost six years
since she had left Johnny and the
other children, she had never once
gone to Already, as they had called the
zoo.
Tomorrow" she said aloud, I'm
going"
''What?" asked her roommate, sit
ting straight up in her narrow bed of
white iron that was so durable in the
dormitory.
'Tm going to Already said Esther
firmly.
Her roommate lay down again:
you must a eaten plum pudding for
your dinner tonight she said sulkily.
And Esther giggled as she thought
of plum pudding in an institution.
The next day she stopped to tell the
commissary that she probably would
not be back for tea-it was Sunday
and if the girls notified the commits
sary in time they were allowed twenty
five cents on their weekly bill
Going out to the zoo?" said that
plump lady behind the desk. well,
wait a bit and we'll go together.
always take my little boy out Sunday
afternoons, and we always meet my
nephew there. I always kid him and
tell him he must be going to meet a
girl there-he goes so regular-like.
But he takes the teasing well-ah,
she stretched her arms out ahead of
her as a gong sounded, NOW I'm thru
and can co.
Esther felt a little shock to think
that Mrs. Spears was glad to be free
for the afternoon. Somehow she had
always thought that people who ran
institutions did so because they loved
the authority. But there was little
time to con over this thought, for they