Evening star., 1936-04-16
|f;3;N3Mzst19S%Sj}S' ~
&myGWp%KATHLEEN NORRIS ~

/ of borrowing the bill without ac-
| knowledgement. Somehow 1t made
her feel little sick.
The larder was low. There was a
weeks salary due Tam, but she could
not collect it today. She telephoned
to the delicatessen store for bread and
beans and coffee. One could not go
on into such staples as chocolate and
vanilla extract and canned chicken
with only S216 in the house!
Even if Mayne comes out" Ia
supper-there's absolutely nothing
here. And the shows closed-the
shows cloSedl"
Mayne did not telephone. The
hours went by; the light shone garish-
ly at l, at 2, at o'clock, and still
there was no Mayne, and no message
from Mayne. Tamara had telephoned
the hotel at II to be told that Mr..
Mallory had asked not to be disturbed.
Again telephoning-even though every
fiber of her being protested against
the weakness of it-at 2, she had an
other message. Mr. Mallory had gone
down to the country with friends.
The words fell like a blow on Ia
mara's heart. He had gone down to
Pete's at Los Altos, of course; they
were all down there, housebound in
/ the streaming rain. laughing about a
fire, while good odors of wood smoke
and cigarette smoke mingled with the
| n1lc frnV,o Iria Ii1NNor =
rations in the kitchen. Oh, why
should they leave her out-why should
they be cruel to her-how could life
be at once so deadly dull and so
sharply painful?
Coral lay on her bed and sobbed,
snhhed, sobbed again. Now and then
she blew her nose, lay brooding, with
O knitted brow, and burst into bitter
denunciation Of her recent admirer.
He and his Ada, I'd Ada her!" Coral
muttered.
Don't clean that room" Willette
said, Of the parlor, coming to the door
way with her pudgy hand pressed
! against her bandaged cheek. "Liss Il
be here tomorrow and she'll do it.;
you don't have to clean up after Lance.
believe" she added in an undertone,
I'll take another aspirin
Il can't stand this room this way,
Liss or no Liss!" Tam said in angry
protest. She wiped the floor. rinsed
rags, opened the stiff window and let
the cold, dreary, wet air stream in.
All the time her heart was in bitter
rebellion. She hated her brother, her
sister, her mother, herself and her
/ life.
I'm going to write his sweet little
! cousin Ada letter she won't care so
much about" Coral said, in the
kitchen doorway. Suddenly the sound
of loud droning voice came up the
kitchen airshaft; the three women
listened with blanching faces.
A woman's voice was saying, LET
me alone, can't you? Let me alone!"
and an official Irish voice was break
I ing across the accompaniment of con-
fused, agitated voices and cries. Shes
fixed herself this time, all right Bet
ter call the ambulance, Joel" the
voices murmured. Then the great
weary. dragging voice came again:
"Oh, let me alone!"
The crying got louder and louder
and developed into screams. and there
was scuffing and dragging. The
| Crennetts' fat. Margalo Crennett
| had tried to kill herself! That was it.
Coral and Willette and Tam had
worked it all out correctly before Mrs.
Wincey came running upstairs to con-
firm it. Poor girl, she had not had
job for two years. and she had
asthma; you couldn't really blame her.
Mrs. Wincey had some stuff that
positively knocked out toothache. She
obligingly went downstairs again to