Maryland independent. [volume] (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1874-current, 1930-05-02
CHAPTER l
Call Me In

Her life began to have meaning and
Importance the day that Ernestine met
Will again on Michigan boulevard.
She had not seen him since they were
both children, and the attachment she
had formed for him then was a pale
plant beside that which sprang up in
her now. She was so beguiled with
VIII, so in love with his long nervous
person, his burning black eyes, and his
bright EXPLANATORY ways, that nothing
mattered to her except that he love
her. Lillian always contended that
Ernestine could have stopped the
whole affair in its beginnings, but it
is more than likely that she was
wrong.
At that time Ernestine was surfeited
with safety. She felt in herself the
beginnings of spiritual indigestions at
the security and complacency of the
Bricelands. At school she had dis
covered that there were worlds beyond
worlds outside of her mothers. Her
family's outspoken conviction that So
ciety began and ended in their own
particular group was conviction en-
tireIy unjustified by facts. The oasis,
Sheridan Park, had become lost long
since in the great activity of Chicago,
and what the Bricelands considered
"old family" was unknown among the
really rich and powerful of the city,
as well as among the newly rich and
arrogant gold coasters of the North
side.
Her schooling was finished when
Ernestine was twenty. Lillian had
been out of school year and had
already taken up the threads of the
life outlined for them by mammals
connections. The sisters were con-
genial and fond Of each other. At
first Ernestine had been more than
satisfied-she had been actively happy
just to be with her mother and Lii
liam again, with Grandmother Brice-
land and old friends in the big lovely
house on Sheridan road There was
an endless parade of parties and
dances and weddings.
But after a few months Ernestine
decided that to be reared in an "oId
family" group on the North side of
Chicago was almost as bad as being
brought up in a little town. She
knew everything that every one hoped
or did Some of the younger people
were becoming definitely ambitious,
and aligning themselves with the gold
coasters, or making entry, through
school connections, into the older and
richer society of other cities. The
Bricelands were inaccessible to the
horde of apartment house dwellers
who were moving into Buena and
Sheridan Parks, and crowding the
North Shore with glass enclosed tene-
ments. Mamma disregarded the in
vaders superbly and refused to Join
the northward movement out Of Chi
cago or the southwark movement
downtown. She would stay where she
was, and Lillian complained that her
attitude not only protected her from
climbers, but also prevented the fam
fly from doing any climbing of its own.
But Ernestine sympathlzed with her
mothers loyalty to old associations.
Ernestine herself was without social
ambitions. She was established among
intimate friends. She had only to be
natural, casual, mocking, and it was
enough. Ernestine knew strange
nostalgia. She wakened at night,
filled with the need to use her gifts
more actively.
And then, she met Will.
1t had been twelve years since she
had last seen him, but she knew him
at once when she encountered him on
Michigan boulevard one November
afternoon after the Armistice. 1t was
late afternoon, and the sky was thick
ening with dusk. viii stood with his
shoulders against the great granite
blocks of the library, looking out over
the heads Of other people, into the
mysterious beauty of the clouds.
She stopped and looked at him, and
her heart missed beat lest this be
come stranger who might respond too
boldly to her stare But she was sure
It was VIII. He did not see her at all,