Browning chief. [volume] (Browning, Mont.) 1941-1953, 1942-05-29
A Girl Helps an Embit.
tered Boy Change
His Point of View
Toward His Mother
IN TWO PARTS-PART ONE


orchids or gardenias when you took
her out. she felt that love was waning
and he was too tired today to con-
vince her that it wasn't.
He almost never forgot the small
attentions like this. his theory being
the not very original one, that If you
kept a woman pacified in minor mat
tiers. you could do as you pleased in
the ways that counted. But last night
he had had to take a client out and
the client had been the type which
goes in for colored streamers, explod-
ing balloons with his cigarets and
singing along with the orchestra.
After two hours sleep, the skin felt
tight at the cheek bones and temples of
Alan's severe ugly-good looking face
and his temper was vicious.
Haven't you anything but these?"
he asked, sharply, surveying with dis
taste the slightly stale blossom the
fat, dark little proprietress was Gag
erly showing him. She beamed.
How about a nize potted plant?"
she asked. Its for the momma. eh?"
The :" Alan glared at her. Lis
ten he spoke very distinctly. 81 want
corsage for young lady. Here, these
violets they'll last a couple of
hours, I guess, and these two gar
denias :" He brusquely selected the
freshest of the heavy waXen blooms
Hide them in the middle of the vio-
lets; they'll have to do"
He walked reStlessly about while the
little woman arranged the flowers and
put them in their square box She took
his money and beamed again.
Your momma alive or dead?" she
asked
Alan shrugged slightly. The woman
was undoubtedly demented.
Dead" he said, with crisp finality.
She wasn't, but she might as we'll
have been. 1t would have been better
if she had died when he was born, or
better still if she'd died beforehand
and that Notwithstanding event had new
er taken place. He had said so once
to her and she had laughed.
you and me both, my pet" she had
answered lightly. you don't think I
wanted you, do you?"
He had hated her from that moment
That was after he was grown up, on
his 2lst birthday, to be exact, Just II
years after she'd walked out leaving
him to the tender mercies of his faith
er who, presumably heart broken, had
grown bitter, Incorporate and resent
full of the son left on his hands.
Alan Sr. had died, few years before
and his son had not unduly mourned
him. And the last time Alan had seen
his mother she had been in some cock
tail dump or other surrounded by her
usual crowd of Riviera scourings and
she had wanted him to call her Fran
@tya - I, 1,aI l,1 tty,aof 49,,
at frequent intervals and had enjoyed
seeing her wrtthe. That was the first
and last time within his memory that
he had ever used the word
The uglineSS of his thoughts was
interrupted by hands pulling at his
coat lapel. And he looked down in dis
gIsted establishment to see the little
proprietress fastening of all things!
:. a large, cabbagey white carnation
in the impecable gray coat
kindly. white for your poor momma,
she's dead"
Horror for a Second robbed Alan of
sneech and his hand moved inward tn
tear out the flower Then he realized
that the woman was after all making
him a Gift and his social sense re-
turned tn him
"Whv thanks very much" he said
THAT'S very kind Of Won"
She Matted his arm with her hard
brown small hand
.ssaates notbingn sbe said ct knov
bou, o how he meoses the momma I'm,
q n,ornns n,yse1f"
"ReaIivom Alan said vap,elv "splen-
did Verv nice for voI, y
To r,.da bic escona with d;sn,+cb
.rd coIIed q taxi in which bn sat y
tr;e1a noori,, star;na straie,t ahead
SaneroI nass;ne gir1s hestowed annrov-
~ Ioot,s p mo-, him hnt he did not M
tina tba ir,torest ha aronsed He was
Wv tho n,onent entireIv nreoccuniad
u,;t,, tra raoI;zatio,, that 10 oct rerv
''C L. ou ha y, uan of an srner-so,esuon
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