The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1936-05-05
-Toddy's Short Story

that way he had.
He dictated standing, and looked,
Jean thought, like a cavalryman.
AS she wrote the letter in neat,
swift shorthand that she had
learned in a hurry-up course so
that she could help out, she
thought that Tobey had swagger
written all over him; that he al
most strutted q little; that If you
didn't like him you might almost
think him big-Ikey; that he was
cocky from his big, scuffed up,
carefully polished shoes to his big,
pulled around -which-way cav
alrymans hat that would have
said: "Tobey Grantland" to any,
body in town.
But Jean thought also that he
was cute, and the most masculine
man she knew.
So that perhaps 1t was just as
well that she was safely and cozily
married to him and not just his
secretary.
Writing down his words, he was,
she reflected, very much the boss
there in the office, having been a
little cramped in his natural, high
ide-and-handsome style out of it
by the fact that all the eligible
young men about had wanted to
marry Jean Winant, in almost every
case, good deal more to offer both
socially and financially than he had.
For the truth was that Tobey Grant
land could not be called eligible at
all. 1t was perfectly plain that,
though he had started from scratch,
he was going somewhere, but it was
certainly without benefit of ances-
tors. Tobey's parents had left him
nothing but debts and background
of social obscurity.
VXTHEREAS the remoteSt Winant
w was easily identifiable, prac-
tically always distinguished and
safely embalmed in some book or
other. Which meant nothing to
Tobey and not a whit more to Jean,
but nevertheless had cramped his
style of counting and lent gusto to
1t now debating to the American
equivalent of the daughter of a
hundred earls a letter to Mrs. Lack
land Marston about renting her
house. It was a kind of high-fa-
luting letter, meant to impress Jean,
and it did.
THE lamb!" she thought. "He
thinks it's lovely He's showing me
how it ought to be done. I wonder
if / could correct that one gram
NAUTICAL error? No. Not now. Next
year, maybe"
Get that one off right away, will
you? And then call up Cartwright
and tell him-better write it down
so you'll get it straight. And
then drop around and pay the
taxes on And sometime today
let Bill Moreland know I'm not 60
ing to buy that car he showed me
because And figure out those
rates for me on the Alexander and
West policies. And 80"
For Tobey was going away. Meek
ly Jean wrote down as much as she
could of what he told her-he was
quite big-business and very rapid
fire today-and tried to pack the
rest into her head
But it wasn't that kind of head.
After he was gone she got the
notebook part as straight as string,
but the head part she jumbled up
quite bit She telephoned, and
trotted around town, and inter-
viewed, and came back to the Office
and figured, and she was as busy
as an extremely chic little bee until
she got it all attended to, and then
she sighed the sigh Of the thor
oughly uninterested and lay back,
not in her stenographer's chair, but
in Tobeys boss chair, and day.
dreamed about her and Tobey.
A ND THEN-then she did the
n next best thing: She pulled
toward her there at the boss desk
a pad of fresh paper and began
sketching dresses she would like to
have made up by the best shop on
earth and wear now and then in
the smartest places. That was a
pursuit she could drop into at any
moment as a diver into the depths
of the sea.
You had to tell her what time
it was when she was doing that,
and since there was no one around
to do it that day, she was late for
dinner and didn't go to the Pal
ace Restaurant, where everything
would be cooked to pieces and as
cold as ice (and where she and
Tobey usually dined frugally for SO
cents EACH, but reverted character
istically and foolishly to old splen-
doris and blew herself to the tune
of 50 at the Poinsettia, which had
been taboo now for many day.
The head waiter, who knew her
we'll. gave her the best small table
in the dining room, with a well
come-to-our- city air, and she sank
back into the old comforting at
mosphere with a sigh - and, too
into her sketches. For she had
brought them along with her, and
was simply gaga by this time about
a black and-white get-up that
would have made her with her
camellia skin and blackbird hair
and her coal-black eyes-the last
word in what the well dressed young
matron should wear. Between
courses she gazes at her sketch and
pondered it and mentally improved
It and tried hard to pull up her
sinking heart with the thought that
a measly little two dollars-no, two
and quarter. with the tip-couldnt
make or break even a poor man like
Tobey.
TINE two occupations so absorbed
l. her that she didn't notice Ray
mond Porter until he had sunk into
the chair opposite.
"You don't mind, do you7 Quite
like old times, isn't itp"
why, Raymond Mind? How
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