Montgomery County sentinel. [volume] (Rockville, Md.) 1855-1974, 1932-05-06

w ONE ONE, he e composed p,s. na,' dream
sE ts caught ON, and for a consld-
cradle while the entire land was dane
ing to it and humming. iaN
Incidentally, 1t made quite a pile of
money for Leonard, enabling him to
plan q trip to Greece there to satisfy
some sort Of congenital hunger in his
middle west soul, to say nothing of
the fact that, for at least a six-inonth,
he was quite a celebrity. His home
town honored him; even New York
bowed to him upon his arrival there
to talse ship, and for one brief sec
ond in his scheme of things, the gods
took notice Of a lean gangling fellow
with shock of blond hair, who hailed
from town called Granite City, and
through whose commonplace looking
Uranium had waited the haunting mel
0dy of a dream.
Everywhere he went for those few
months, the melody went with him,
following him like wisp Of lovely
smoke. In restaurants, when he en-
tered, the orchestra played him his
dream waltz; on dance floors, youth,
with drugged looking eyes, moved
rhythmically to 1t, Even on street
corners barrel organs sent his dream
waltz tumbling into the street din.
They were short, excited melodius
months, dominated by the subtle aura
of success.
1t was in New York, while waiting
to take the ship for the Aegean is
lands, that he met slip of a girl from
Brooklyn endowed with the absurdly
homogeneous and beautiful name of
Hesper. She was a flat-yolced, satin
skinned, colloquial, quick-mlnded, city
minded, city-turned little piece, one of
hordes who milled through the daily
scene, but to Leonard, from the mo-
ment he clapped eyes on her seated
on a high stool beside him at an ice
cream counter, a nymph who must
have slipped out of the surf of the
ocean surrounding Manhattan.
Their courtship was quick, citified
and ended in marriage. The trip to
the Aegean, of course, was shelved,
first because Hesper preferred to pur-
chase furniture with the money and
secondly, because any spot she chose
to be, became the Aegean isles to
Leonard.
They were married on Monday,
had fitted up pert little filing cabi-
net Of fiat by the following Monday,
and in another week were neatly adj
justed into well-oiled routine of the
butcher, the baker, the refrigerator de-
froster; the dumb waiter, the subway,
the vermin eXtermlnatOr.
Nor was the transition of hopes and
plans difficult for Leonard Hesper
was more delectable, II possible, in
lrurriage than she had been In court
ship. Built like doll, her quick pink
tongue, her darting adorably hayward
eye, her flashing little temper, her ir-
resistable remorse were ms elusive, as
maddening, as appetizing to him, as
had been the elusive strains of his
waltz before he captured them all.
For twelve month they lived, these
two children, captured into the cave
Of their Manhattan fiat, the deliciously
irresponsible, uninhibited lives Of play
boy and playgirl.
Then the funds gave out, the vogue
of the dream waltz began to go the
way Of all vogues, and life began to
become the serious business it can
manage to be upon occasion.
What subsequently happened, came
much more gradually than It seems in
the telling The first dlmming of the
ulster of the vivaciousness that was
IIesper's did not come until those first
strangely solemn days when 1t became
necessary for the little household,
bullded on the dream waltz, to sit
solemnly down and take note Of its
budget And then, almost before they
could catch their breath over the mar
row margin Of their resources, Hes
per's twin girls were born and ten
months thereafter, boy, and ten
months after that, another.
Thereupon, this story takes its all
too usual course. The gradual conflict
Of wear and tear, worry and financial
strain upon beauty, youth and hope.
For almost year, battling with the
haunting desires for melody that still
lay tormented in the hlnterlands of his
mind, Leonard, borrowing, devIslng,
scheming to meet his budget, strove
to recapture some OF the quality that
had nol,red info tbe dream waltz.
Az tho end of fourteen montbs no
wac clort,ino IN a hohorioshary A.
a., and 90 O. ,.o,,.s he ,,,as oIo,,, inc