Plentywood herald. [volume] (Plentywood, Mont.) 1908-current, 1927-04-15

sica's shoulder, and she felt the tremble OF
1t through her body.
They came to Chicago before Billy could
walk. JesSica was twelve, and knew some
things about infant welfare and the prob
lens Of marketing that were news to her
domestic science teacher when she entered
high school a couple years later. Also, she
knew that what one was to expect at home
was the unexpected. Feast and famine"
was her fathers favorite phrase for 1t, and
the phrase was rather near the fact. Jes-
sica never knew, quite, what 1t was her
father did, but there we're sometimes
months when the Hills were very prosper
GUS. 1t was during one of these periods
that Mr.. Hill made the surprising invest
ment of nominating Jessica In a neighbor-
hood newspaper contest, the eligibles high
school students, the prize a trip to Niagara
Falls. 1t was a dramatic gesture-almost
theatric, considering-and he bought a good
many subscriptions. So many, in fact. that
Jessica actually came out of the campaign
with a second prize. She made the trip
across the lake to Michigan; but IL you
meet Miss Jessica Hill today at her desk
In the Travel Tour offices, please check
your little jest about the Falls. 1t Is funny,
or course, that a woman who presides at
the Information desk In a travel bureau
should want to see Niagara Falls. Or
would be IL the woman we're not Jessica
Hill, and If Jessica hadn't, ultimately, made
her discovery.
Meanwhile. she was busy enough with
Jack, and Billy, and her father, not to
spend much time In thinking about herself.
1t wouldn't have been normal, anyway
and Jessicu was so normal that she was
rather matter Of fact. 1t was well that she
was. When she was a senior In high school
Jack was a rough and tumble kid of twelve
and Billy was a seraphic individual Of five
or six. and matter of factness was good
for both. Anything less might have hard
ened the one and s~oftened the other. There
were times when she could have thrashed
LACK for his dnVi1frU and grant pilu m
her arms for his angelicness. She did
neither. She ran the house, and her father
with 1t. She managed that gentleman so
well, in fact, that when her graduation
and one or his periods OF prosperity coin
cided and the prosperity seemed prolonged
out of all balance with history, and he
wanted to send her to the state university,
she patted him almost patronizingly on
the Misunderstanding herself to tip-toe to
do it-and vetoed the proposition in favor
OF a downtown business college. Which
was one of the wisest things Jessica Hill
ever did. She was sure of that. She was
certain when, her first year out, a slippery
pavement and Il street car made a finish to
the feast-and- famine career of Jeremy Hill.
She hadn't known what a vast affection
she had for that tall, incalculabIe figure
until they brought him home. But she
knew then. The world seemed to totter for
n while-for weeks-and then settled into
the steady, even thoroughfare that it was.
NO valleys hintful of w~ild6owers, no cliffs
.JaS&tu Will iothN-UD lpHStS. no 1HJllnGS.I
Just good, reliable pavement. Macadam-
lied.
Jessica knew Just where she was, and
why, and that she belonged there, q pedes-
TRAN. 1t was one of the things she learned
at business college. Not that 1t was in the
curriculum. 1t came by way of an imported
speaker, speaking his "inspirational'
speech. Jessica sat In the front row. He
was one OF those big listed, broad faced
gentlemen who cannily veer dow from
nigh 0rQfnvU m fango nnnAIA~4
And ! wish to tell you" he proclaimed
at the height, that there's room at the
top. Room for every one. Room for every
one who's a go-getter. For every first
But for the second rater !" The in
spirer dropped his big voice to its effect
i've. conversation pitch 1.-THE sec
ond-rater, my friends, is the fellow who
zon. He's lost IN a fog Of details. He
hasn't a vision. He's the fellow that gets
the second prize, the honorable mention.
He's on the fringe. You all know him."
matte stiffness that would pnnctuate his
hiatus. Only, he sensed wrongly. For
That's mel said a quiet voice before
him, matter of factly.
He glanced down at the front row,
startled. And
Il see" equivocated Jessica, flushing.
We all do" he picked up his discourse.
but we-you and I-are never going to
be satisfied a single rung from the top.
He said, more, of course. Much
more. But Jessica wasn't hearing. She
had made her discovery. She was think
Ing OF the sociable where she was among
those presents; Of the Tree In the school
play of the trip to Niagara Falls that was
really a boat ride across Lake Michigan.
A second-rater . that's what she was.
That's what she had known without having
q name for 1t. A second rater. And poor
Jack, already, too. drifting around the
fringe. But Billy? Bilyi Jessica had
walked home that night. head up, shoulders
back, eyes straight before her.
rms Is, l know, a long way to begin a
story. But haven't you often thought that
the important parts of a story are what
come before 1t and after It? 1t seems that
way TO me: and ! know that the Incidents
that happened this single night In spring
would be only incidents II Jessica and her
discovery were not before ~them-ahead Of
them-to tell what it's all about.
1t was nve o'clock. A stir OF papers pre-
coded the shutting OF roII-top desks. En-
pfoyes moved alertly about the room, began