THE PARTY

Dominion, Volume 22, Issue 72, 18 December 1928, Page 19 (Supplement)

THE PARTY

•By

Winifred Peck.

This is not only the story of a tragedy, but a protest. It is an appeal for the unrecognised, speechless victims who view the festive season with dismay. To the bountiful, beaming majority who stand in shining rooms, welcome in their eyes, jokes on their lips, crackers in one hand and gifts in the other, this tale of the miserable and ungrateful minority of party-haters is dedicated, imploring their pity and understanding. Dickie knew perfectly well what would happen from the moment that the little pink invitation arrived for himself and Helen. He watched the posting of the acceptance with resignation, because the 27th was incredibly far away and there were measles in his form. Not till Helen began to croon “It’s Jimmy’s Party to-morrow I" did he realise that the germs had played him false and he would have to go. “You won’t mind this year, you know,” said his mother, with anxious brightness, on the morning of the Black Friday. “Now you’re at school you're accustomed to playing with lots Of other children!” “It’s different,” said Dickie. It was no use, of course. He couldn’t Explain the distinction, so vaguely realised by himself, between being a unit at work, in an orderly machine and a Little Boy at a Party, a dressed-up person who might at any moment be dragged into prominence by a grownup joke, the exigencies of a round game, or the shouts of his companions, dazzled by lights and crowds. “You wouldn’t like to stay at home *nd disappoint Helen?” Much Helen cared! He did not |tnow whether he disliked more the parties where she deserted him at once pr those when, suddenly maternal, she would hold his hand, explaining loudly that he was shy. Helen, he realised Vaguely, was the child who always gets the fourth cracker when there are three apiece. Helen miss him! But of all these things Dickie said nothing, and the fatal Friday found him in the nursery being dressed, the usual sick feeling under his kilt, while Helen danced delightedly in her frilly frock round the room. There was the cab with its scent of stale tobacco, dead flowers, petrol, and damp; the : hateful Party House lit up and shin-

ing. As usual, he watched the happj cabman drive away, free as air, intc the empty world; he followed a smiling maid to take his coat off with the help of another smiling attendant. Nurse combed his hair and went away. ' The party had begun. The Party was playing at “Steps” 1 as Helen pranced before him into the drawing-room, and just for a little a mad hope assailed Dickie that he wasn’t going to mind this one after all. The room was fairly empty still, it was easy to avoid being caught and noticed; one could hide from view behind a curtain or a sofa. It was not till a loud gong sounded and a resolute, bright-eyed girl of twelve seized upon him as her partner for tea and dragged him off in a procession that his old terrors returned.

; It was no use to struggle. Here was ’ the dining-room and his doom was sealed. Now as always it was a night--1 mare of proximity, a horror of crowd- , ed people and things. Cakes, cups, and crackers crowded the room. Elbows touched elbows, eyes, staring eyes, met across the table. The air was thick with the smell of tea and scents and the noise of plates and voices and laughter which made up that awful entity of the Party. Not into these words did Dickie put his vague feelings. He stared at his plate for two minutes, struggling to keep out the world by main force. Then someone touched his elbow, a spongecake was thrust under his nose, and Dickie collapsed. At first slowly and silently, then rapidly and noisily, he began to cry. “I understand 1 Oh, I do so understand 1” Dickie woke from the stunning, blinding shame of being led out of the room to the worse shame of finding himself in the warm, scented arms of his hostess. “Now tell me is the pain just here?” She was rubbing Dickie suggestively and smiling more sweetly than ever. “Now, isn’t that better? Come, and have some tea.” Dickie shook his head and wept. “No? You’d rather just stay here quietly with me?” Dickie wept and struggled, but the soft, lacy arms were surprisingly strong. “He’d better' go home,” said Helen, with told detachment. She had strolled in to observe the scene. “Oh, no, no! Come back and have some crackers!” But Helen had at least served to

give Dickie a lead. “I want to go home!” he wept, so loudly and insistently that at last the door opened and a man looked in. “Wants to go home? I’ll run him back, Alice. You go and get your tea. Now, old fellow, stop those waterworks and cut and get your coat.” Dickie cut, but he was still crying when he got into the car. “Look out! Don’t water the petrol,” said the man as the - car started. Dickie laughed, as the fugitives from fire or earthquake laugh after they escape. The man, the car, the joke were all divine. “If you don’t want to be kissed an-

other time,” suggested the man later, “say you’ve spots coming out; that frightens ’em.” Another divine joke rapturously received. “Do you hate parties?” he ventured at last. “Yes,” agreed his friend. “But now I spend most of my time in East Africa, a hundred miles from the nearest white man, so I don’t have to dodge them. Stick ’em out till you can join me.” Dickie went to bed in disgrace quite happily, so rapturous a prospect stretched before him in the future. There were places in the world innocent. of parties, and some day he would find one and be at peace. His mother came to look at him with a worried frown, but the shades of all hermits, pioneers, and solitaries looked down at him. one may feel assured, with smiles of sympathy. They understand. —“Manchester Guardian.”