Montana oil and mining journal. [volume] (Great Falls, Mont.) 1931-1953, 1939-09-16
BY FANNIE HURST

! CENT SCHOOLGIRL.
Considering my widely assorted
memories of Mrs. Leland's board
ing house, / wonder why / choos.
to lead off with Miss HasweII
Perhaps because the acid impress.
sion of this memory-etching BIZ
deeply into my adolescence. Il
would seem more properly sequen-
tial to first introduce Mrs. Leland
herself. / shall, but not at this
time, in detail.
My outstanding recollection Of hei
Is her stomach. 1t was very large and
| her nl-made corset accumulated ar
angle not true to anatomy. It gave the
front of Mrs. Leland the look of q
chicken breast
I know now. that what actually gave
her front its undue proportion was an
enormous benign stomach tumor
pounds Of it, which through years OF
relentless routine she carried valiantly
up and down three flights of boarding
house stairs.
I say the outstanding characteristic
which sticks in my memory Is this sill
shared by another impression equally
sharp
recall, more suppose with a hurt
in my heart than with actual memory.
the unassailable brightness of the
spirit Of Mrs. Leland I was part of
the relentless boarding house universe
which demanded of Mrs. Leland, car
rying her enormous fibroid growth, so
many chores I should have done my
self
Mrs. Leland, come up and feel.
There's no hot air coming out of the
furnace in our room"
Mrs. Leland, mamma wants you =
Mrs. Leland, come see! I found a
big black bug IN the hall"
I recall, I recall, the patience, the
impregnable good nature, the tireless-
ness with which she met the exigencies
OF conducting this boarding house,
which never showed anything but an
nual deficit. or for one moment re-
leased her from the chronic terrors of
foreclosure or eviction.
Mamma, who rode Mrs. Leland with
a high hand, demanding that both the
top. and lower bedsheetS be changed
each week, condiments on our own
special table in the dining room, three
eggs for papa's breakfast, bread and
butter and apple butter for me after
school, was at the same time her good
Samaritan
I can see our landlady now, seated
in our second story front room, her
large kind face speckled with liver
spots, her pOinty stomach and her ar
tficial teeth protruding, crying softly
to mamma.
Usually on these occasions mamma
told Mrs. Leland she ought to make
Mr.. Leland help with the housework
and stop reading novels all day down
In their basement bedroom, that she
should force VIII Hardness, the hus-
band of her deceased daughter, to help
with the support of the child, Harry, |
who lived with his grandparents, and |
that she must compel families like the |
TownSendS and the HOltons to pay |
SIS a month more during the winter !
now that coal was so high. /
Invariably, Mrs. Leland, drying her |
eyes, promised to do all of these, none !
OF which she ever found the courage
to accomplish.
Leland, as she called her husband, /
was just what he was, a shiftleSs book
worm. Harry'S father had not been |
heard from in years, the Townsends |
and Holtons might not stand for the |
raise.
In the end, it was mamma, who
could be counted on to have a Wad |
OF banknotes in her stocking, who paid |
Mrs Leland a months board in adj |
vance. We were usually paid up ahead |
in this fashion.
Seventy-five dollars a month for the |
second story front for mamma and |
papa, with alcove for me.
1t was this chronic Indebtedness of
Mrs. Leland to mamma, that earned
we, Tor instance. had no napkin rings |
at our table but were allotted fresh
napery each evening. When the sec
md floor Darkroom lost its tenant,
Mrs. Berwanger, mamma pre-empted
,he use of the hall closet, which by
tights belonged to it, necessitating
1uiltin shelves and a curtained en-
closure for the rooms next occupant,
which was to be Miss HaSwell.
Pretty nearly everybody adored, and
after a certain manner feared, mann
ma, except me. Her sharp tongue
,omettmes hurt, but never left a scar.
Even though 1 was off the piece OF
ny fathers nature Of measured re-
itratnt, understood the volatile quail
ty Of mammals too well to fear it,
From the day was old enough to
lppraise her with what / guess was
nothing more than my intuition, her
maternity, blind as bat and
warm as heaven, embodied me like
'ome sort Of a celestial eiderdown,
ecuTe ana without weight. u
During the period of my childhood,
forms aplenty aSSailed our little fam
" of three. Business collapse, the re-
Iult of panic years, which drove my
ather from the canning industry into
he button business, and which had
lecesSitated our removal from our own
private home on pretty Westminster
Place to Mrs. IelandS boarding house,
lad hit us broadside.
But through 1t all, the even keel OF
ny existence had never shown tremor.
remained the most overdresSed small
'irl in school. continued to have a
ancy purse full of pocket money.
Lttended Mr. Mahler's dancing school.
The immensely Of mamma was then,
md continued to be, sea wall between
ne and storm. To the end Of her life,
ye two, IN one another's eyes, could !
10 no wrong.
In Mrs. Lelands boarding house ON |
Vest Pine street, fairly broad tree (
'ordered avenue of bygone grandeurs
whose erstwhile mansions were now
tven over to z. M. G. AS, boarding
Iouses, piano saleSrooms, undertaking |
'arlors and funeral room dwellings,
Tere several youngsters also approach {
1g Is. CLARK Holton, Bess and Tress