The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1931-09-25
CHAPTER XIII-Continued

InlFQ uHSer OF ner leIL manu- the pidlu
broad gold band of long-past day.
Synchronous with the permanent wave
and the reducing diet the oil-rich
Usage matrons Of Sabra's age cast
sentiment aside for fashion, quietly
placed the clumsy band in bureau
drawer and appeared with slim plati-
mum circlet bearing, perhaps, the en-
graved anachronism, IN. OK. L.
1884" Certainly it was much more at
ease among its square-cut emerald and
oblong-diamond neighbors. These
ladies explained (if at alU that the
gold band had grown too tight for
the finger, or too loose. Sabra looked
down at theEbroad. old-fashioned we'd
ding ring on her own gemless finger.
She had not once taken 1t off In over
forty years. 1t was as much a part
of her as the finger itself.
All the Oklahoma millionaire
houses had libraries. Yards and yards
of fine leather libraries, with gold
tooling. Ike Hawkes. library had five
sets of Dickens alone, handsomely
bound in red, green, blue, brown. and
black, and Ike all unaware of any of
them.
Moving picture palaces, with white
gloved ushers, had all the big Broad
way super-flms. Gas filling stations
on every corner. Hot dog, chilli con
carne, and hamburger stands on the
most remote country roads. The Ar
verne Grand Opera company at the
Mckee theater for a whole week every
year, and the best of everything
Traviata, Boheme, Carmen, Louise,
The Barber OF Seville. The display
of jewels during that week made the
diamond horseshoe at the Metropoli-
tan look like the Black Hole of Cal
cutta.
The sunbonnets had triumphed.
STILL oil was oil, and Indians were
Indians. There was no way in which
either of these native forces could
quite be nodded to fit the New York
pattern.
The Osages still whirled up and
down the Oklahoma roads, and those
roads, for hundreds of miles, were still
unpaved red prairie dust. They
crashed into bitches and draws and
culverts as of old, walked back to
town and, entering the automobile
salesroom in which they had bought
the original car, pointed with one
dusky finger at new and glittering
model.
Mother" they said, succinctly. And
drove out with it.
1t was common news that Charley
Vest had smashed eight cars in year.
but then Charley had mysterious
source through which he procured fire
water.
Sabra Cravat had introduced a bill
for the further protection of the
Osages, and rather took away the
breath Of the house assembled by ad-
vocating abolition Of the Indian reser-
walton system. Her speech, radical
though 1t was, and sensational. was
greeted with favor by some of the
more liberal Of the congressman. They
even conceded that this idea of hers,
to the effect that the Indian would
never develop or express himself until
he was as free as the negro, might
some day become a reality. These
were the reformers-the long-hairs--
fanatics.
Oklahoma was very proud of Sabra
Cravat, editor, congresswoman, pio-
neer. Usage said she embodied the
finest spirit of the state and of the
Southwest. When ten of Osage's most
unctuous millionaires contributed fifty
thousand dollars each for a five-hun-
Observation-Disclosures statue that should
embody the Oklahoma pioneer no one
was surprised to hear that the sculp-
tor, Masja Krbecek, wanted to inter-
view Sabra Cravat.
Usage was not familiar with the
sculpture of Krbecek, but it was i'm
pressed with the price of it. Half a
million dollars for statue!
Certainly" said the committee,
calmly. He's the best there is. Half
a million is nothing for his stuff. He
wouldn't kick pebble for less than
q quarter of million"
do you suppose he'll do her as a
pioneer woman in sunbonnet? Hold
ing little CHM by the hand, huh? Or
maybe in covered wagon"
Sabra received Krbecek in a simple
{draped) dress. He turned out to be
a quiet, rather snuffy little Pole in
eyeglasses, who looked more like a
tailor-a 'little" tailor-than a sculp-
tor. His eye roamed about the living
room Of the house on Kihekik. The
old wooden house had been covered
with plaster in deep warm shade
much the color of the native clay the
gimcrack porch and the cupolas had
been torn away and a great square
yeranda and a terrace built at the
side. away from the street and
screened by thick hedge and an iron
grille. 1t was now, in fact, much the
house that Yancey had planned when
Sabra first built It years ago. The
old pieces of mahogany, and glass and
silver were back, triumphant again
over the plush and brocade with which
Sabra had furnished the house when
new. The old, despised since pioneer