A MAN’S SIZE.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 2 June 1928, Page 7

A MAN’S SIZE.

There had been a long period of frenzied speculation, levered worship of the great god—Chance. Bubbles had burst, and been succeeded by other bubbles, equally alluring, equally evanescent. Except for a few sickening wobbles the cotton boom held Arm. Andrew Graeme was in it up to his neck. It was his one and only plunge, and it stood to win him a fortune or leave him beggared. All the savings of all his thrifty years were sunk in cotton.

A shrewd and cautious Scot, to whom his country was merely his spiritual home, Andrew loved London so well that lie never left it alter his transplanting thither. He married an English girl, and when she died his affections' and ambitions centred in their daughter Ethel. She became engaged to James Percivale, and Andrew was both proud and sore. Proud, because the Percivales, though poor, were aristocrats, and he had the Scots ie\erence for ancient lineage; sore, because Ethel loved her Janies first and l est, and old Graeme wasn’t quite sure that Percivale loved her in the same steadfast way. If you had asked him his unuttered opinion of an Englishman —and he thought you wouldn’t repeat it—he would have told you grumpily that they lacked staying power —were chiefly froth. Ethel didn’t share his opinion. Ethel • preferred the English to any Scots she had met. for was not the mother she resembled Loudon’s own, and she' her counterpart in mind and body-' Lissom, bright-eyed, with the traditional ruses and cream complexions of maids south of the Border, Ethel was sweet iuul fresh as a May morning. .Before he met her Janies had had a love affair with his cousin Lina, but that exotic and avaricious young person threw him over for* a wealthy peer in his dotage, and James eventually thanked the Fates whose interference had saved him up to he the husband ui a better than Lina. Secretary to n Cabinet Minister, he resided in the Piccadilly flat of his bachelor uncle, Colonel Percivale, a crotchety imli- \ idual, nicknamed “Redpepper” Perciv ale. Prior to the cotton plunge the

colonel was decidedly peppery and unpleasant to his nephew, counting the Giaemes suburban nobodies, their money wholly inadequate as a means o ■ launching James on the independent p jlitical career he coveted. Subsequent to the venture, lie said that if Andrew came out of it triumphantly the girl wouicl suit well enough, but lie 1 eared the cotton-mad were riding for a fall. I'resuming on the position of prospective son-in-law, James told Andrew of the colonel’s fears, and advised him tie careful. Andrew curled his lips around his pipe stem, and dryly Hoped lie (otild manage his business matters unaided. '1 he look accompanying the answer made James uncomfortable, as il ho were being accused of taking too greedy an interest in the Graeme assets.

V. wing never again to refer to cotton, lie switched the conversation on to the controversial question of whether the lnunan race was of ape origin or a special creation. Andrew had written to the papers about it, had sharply rapped the knuckles of the ape theorists Now he shrugged his shoulders, and muttered that it was difl'icult to dogmatise, in view o: the fact that ape and man possessed one failing in common— an insatiable acquisitiveness. .Janies might have instanced an example near at hand, but he refrained and assumed a properly chastened expression. Ethel thought he was vexed, and consoled him with extra kisses. She was very happy, very much in Jove, and had but one grievance. She could have wished him more demonstrative, more like Claude Potter, of the neighbouring semi-detached. She had witnessed Claude’s love-making, and it was the .style of the film hero’s when the hero is so strenuously in earnest that you get a close-up of him writhing in tiie throes. That would be thrilling. She wanted thrills. Perhaps it made a difference being an aristocrat. a Percivale instead of a Potter. All the same, a dash of the colonel’s cayenne wouldn’t do James any harm. Sally and Bertha, Claude’s sisters, prolessed to sneer at his lackadaisical air, and tailed him “a stick of a feller.” The Potters were products of a wardeal in condemned' fodder, but a nice cheerful family, and Claude, at any rate, had the advantages of education. Kthel voted them a jolly lot, wistfully wondering why the cast of Yere de Vere didn’t let itself rip sometimes. It was a pity she had only seen the Colonel on the state occasion of a ceremonial introduction.

Nothing short of a year’s engagement would satisfy Andrew, and while the year was in its third quarter Lina blossomed into a rich widow after a brief speli of matrimony that troubled her as little as a. speck of dust in her e.. e. for the poor peer had spent the bulk of it propped on pillows, nursing bis scanty breath. Then war broke out, anew in the Piccadilly flat. The Colonel insisted on a break with Ethel, and a return to Lina, who was. fonder of James than ever. Night- and day the old gentleman nagged Ids nephew, using military language of such a nerve-racking, soul-destroying nature that shocked dwellers through the wall acquired an aspect of strained listening, and marvelled at the endurance of the nagged. Net a whimper of this did James imparl. to Ethel, but tales of Lina’s aspirations travelled to her by devious routes, and she laughed, pot thinking them worth mentioning to her lover. Sh ■ had large ideas of her powers to hold, and the Potter woman played up to those ideas, telling her she was the said of girl to drive men crazy, and ( lande was frantic about her, and they trembled lest he should attempt his life in the bitterness of liis jealous disappointment. Incidentally, we may remark, cotton was soaring .to the clouds, anil the entire suburb envied the Graemes their colossal luck.

Kthel forgot the many love idylls of C laude, and was sorry for him. She bad another cause for sorrow. When skies were golden James absented himself from her pretty often, pleading hard work, a plea she disbelieved,

unaware of tho Cabinet Minister’s fiendish zest for the strenuous life, particularly with a Government crisis pending. She complained to her father.- and mentioned the tittle-tattle of certain society journals concerning Lina and I’erjivale. Whatever Andrew thought, he said no word, but Ethel said suffi-

• cient for two, and she did the unpardonable thing, carried lier complaint to the Potters. They saw through the excuses., of course. Lina, her ladvship. had James hack in the toils, anc’ given a favourable opportunity, i: would be off with the new love and on with the old. Shaking her head, Mrs. Potter said; “Them swells are cold ■ hlo.ded. They ’aren’t our warm ’earts.’’ Ethel, however, rallied from her di: belief and flatly contradicted his d* tractors. Confidence in her superior charms revived her drooping spirit . and when James came one evening wearing a tired face from burning the \ midnight oil, and arranged to take her ' to a fashionable Cabaret dance, she was ashamed of her nasty suspicions, and atoned for them by showering tendenies* on him. Who could gaze into 1 his melting brown eyes and harbour a wicked suspicion? Not Ethel, who adored him. She bought a pink frock embroidered with diamante to wear to the dance, and diamante glittered on her pink satin shoes, in the heart of the gauze i lower fastened to her shoulder-strap. Andrew's sober glance lingered on her as she piroueted in front of him to show her finery, upstairs in his bedroom where he was seated beside the lire, nursing a -slight chill. The lines round Andrew’s mouth were tense. Luring the past week, even to people who skimmed the gay surface of pampered existence, the nerves of the city had seemed to be strung taut. They waited instinctively to catch the sound of a snapping string. M at, li Ethel in the flush of radiant anticipation, Andrew conjured up other visions of her, visions of the uiight-h.-.v «:-becn if—if —— That lE, big and black, stared him n the swimming eyes, and set him wincing, crumpling the evening paper he. held in his hand. “I won’t go down to see James,” he said, settling into his armchair. “I’ll be having a read c the paper, quiet and comfortable csea \ou enjoy yourself, my lassie.” Sally and Bertha Potter had come in to admire her frock, and the telep/ioiie bell was raising a racket. Sally rushed to answer it. “Your flame is speaking.” she tittered, giving Ethel Ine meiver. “I’m ready Isn’t it time you were here?” said the girl merrily. To her surprise Percivale repiide in a worried, rather metallic i olee “Eiliel. I’m not going to the c abaret. I can’t. The reason is an imperative one. You ar,e not to go either. You must stay at home tonight, and if you need me—but, please goodness, you won’t, at least I trust von won’t ” James stopped in apparent agitation, and resumed: • J'lJ be with you later, Ethel. Remember. you are to stay at liime. On u'j account are you to attend the Cabaret.” interrupted evidently in his taik, ne seemed to turn his head away and address somebody near him, and hoarsely imploring his voice was wafted to Ethel to Sally at her elbow, ears pricked. “Darling, for heaven’s sake, have patience, and I’ll lie with you in a miiui te.” “Joidv!” exclaimed Sally, “wan darling in a minute, and vou later. .Niie for you, 1 don’t think.” “Excuse me, Ethel,” came the full tones again. “I’m in a fix, but I’d ii. e to impress on you that you are not to— —” Angrily the astounded girl flung the receiver from her. A further insistent call, and she disconnected the telephone, scarlet under the Potters’ amus.r(l 'scrutiny. “Well, if he ain’t the

. rami Turk!” giggled Bertha. “]’u sfc it was his cousin he spoke to aside ••did he’.s fetching her to tile Cabaret •nid doesn’t want you to be there. I’c ) to spite him and her. Claude ha l , i ti ket and will take you. I’ll run to get him a tayi.” Bertha ran, and Sally fed the fires o indignation and wounded pride. ‘‘Trying to provoke a. quarrel, so that ho can jilt you and marry her ladyship. She has as much money as you’ll have, and she's his class. Ethel; It’s a shabby trick to get rid of you.” Bertha and her brother joined them, .dusking sympathy, urging retaliation. The taxi arrived, and Ethel allowed them to hustle her into it, her head whirling. her teeth sunk in her nether lip to stem the tide of rising tears she was too proud to shed. In Ins upper room Andrew remained, ignorant of changed pi a ns. The housekeeper. Mrs. Affleck, was myopic, and from her basement windows in a haze of dusk she failed to notice that her mistress had the wong escort, A i la«hv extravagance and a winning tongue were Potter’s valuable allies in a high-speed wooing, the si wees of which depended on seizing the psychological moment and hanging on to it for all one was worth. Long ere they reached the cifry his arm clasped Etliel, and his How of impassioned language hurled itself on her. vShe consented to jilt Percivale before he had time to jilt, her, and she promised to become engaged to Olaude. Apprehensively ho said, “1 suppose you’ll be able to manage your old man?’’ And she intimated that her old man would be the loser if an argument arose. As a reward, Potter treated her to lus latest and hitherto untried adaption of tli© Sheik .kiss, but it left her cold, gave her chill shrinkings instead ■of thrills, and what she called ‘‘a bad taste in her soul.” Claude, admitted to intimacies, disgusted her. She was glad when the ride ended, horribly afraid when lie whispered, ‘‘Tomorrow', little peaehiest of peaches, we’ll interview your father together.’’

The Cabaret was a scent of enchantment. yet she felt like a Peri mourning outside the' gates of lost paradise. Lina and James were not amongst the crowd and she knew none of the company. Claude monopolised and paraded her until she was weary to death of his florid attentions, and towards midnight. having sent him for an ice, she fled and hid from him in an alcove . c invert ient to the swing doors of an exit. J.caning aching temples on her palms, acutely miserable, she ponderc 1 her lover’s strange behaviour, and the more she pondered the uglier seemed his treachery. Men had been standing about in groups, taking scant part in the riotous fun. grace-faced men, talking seriously, heedless of the distraction they had sought as an antidot to worry. Three of them approached the swing doors and halted beside the alcove. They were speaking of panic on the Stock Exchange, the bottom falling out of something and involving people in ruin. Ethel held her breath, hearing a reference to her father. I

[ ‘‘Andrew Graeme risked his last pound on cotton, and the sudden smash has done for him. Shouldn’t wonder it' he blew his brains to smithereens. It’s a mistake to put all one's eggs in one basket. There’ll be crop of tragedies. Though things have been looking ominous, cottons bad such amazing luck that most speculators sat tight, expecting matters to right themselves. Yesterday’s rumours and the Exchange panic opened their eyes too late. Cotton shares wouldn’t letch a farthing apiece. 1 can tell yon there was pandemonium in linancial circles.” The three passed on. White as chalk, Ethel sprang up, clutching her pounding heart. This east light on the iix James was in; he had known yesterday oi' the imminent crash, and he was linished with her; he had ordered "her to stay at home to prevent . her father from blowing his brains to e .smithereens, because if her lather were gone James might be doubly censured tor deserting her. She searched wildly for t laude. It was odd that she had litiLulty in finding him. Odder still •fas his distantly polite manner. Did you hear of the failure!-'” she panted, A couple of minutes ago. .Rotten, isn’t it Miss Graemef” ‘ Get me a taxi—quick!” Claude tucked her into the vehicle, puttv-coloured and obviously nervous. Sticking Ills head, in, he cleared his throat and said at parting, ‘Tunny o; it to happen just after that joke of ours about—er —you and me, you know. Jt does seem as if it was unlucky of us to indulge in jokes.” Ethel's contemptous expression had no sting. It braced him with the assurance {hat she understood. As the taxi skimmed the street newsboys invaded them, shouting late specials containing full acounts of the disaster. A lump rose in her throat, and almost choked her, thinking ol her father, not of the money, thinking 0/ dreadful things she might not reach heme in time to avert. She let herself in with her Yale key. The house was dark. Mrs. Affleck slept like a log in a basement bedroom, and Ethel didn’t wait to awaken her. She flew upstairs, a prayer on her lips. A singleshaded electric blub lit Andrew’s room, and he reclined in his armchair, face turned to the wall, tiic paper he had been reading lying on the carpet where it had fallen from his slack fingers. Numbed with terror, siie bent over him and touched his cheek

The flesh was warm to her touch. Andrew breathed softly and regularly; he was asleep; he couldn’t know lie was ruined. Maybe the news was only in the .late specials, and yesterday he hadn’t been in town. The reaction from utter despair to glad relief prostrated Ethel. She tottered to the landing and sat on the stairs to enjoy a real good cry. She had neglected to shut the hall door in her haste, and James, finding in wide open, walked in while she was blubbering her best. At the stairfcot he paused to listen, and with a swing cf his shoulders he marched up, stared at her gala dress, lifted her, and—would you believe it ?—actually shook her. The Vere de Vere repose was shattered, the melting brown eyes were blazing down upon her. James shook Ethel! “Ohf my gracious!” she gasped. James did it again, slid liis wrathful gaze back t-o pink georgette and glitterdiamente. “You went,’’ he accused her, as though going were a crime. “What are you. crying for now P What’ your poor broken father done? Killed himself while you danced over his grave. You unfeeling ” “Dad s asleep in there,” a nod muLating the door. The sound of a faint but recognisable snore drifted to them, and Janies blinked and dropped his jaws a bit. “You see he doesn’t know yet,” she quavered. “1 heard at the Cabaret. Claude Potter told me.” “I wish I’d caught him doing it, the puppy!” James yelped so fiercely that Ethel clung to him and burrowed her head into his waistcoat, realising that thrills were coming her way at last; her man was a he-man, a big strong, wonderful fellow, with a gem of a temper, and a pair of hands which made one leel line a tomtit in the grip of an eagle. “lie a mind to —to kiss the Jittle face <lf you,” he went on. “You cut me short on the telephone, wouldn’t wait .or me to explain, wouldn’t answer my calls. 1 I’d no notion you and that bounder were on the loose, and there was I in the mischief’s own stew, unde throwing tits, and Darling as uesless as a tame cat.” Ethel started and struggled to free herself, recollecting his baseness. “You let go of me,’! she said, frantically. “We”could hear you, Sally Potter and I, saying darling to her.” “To whom?” “Your cousin Lina in the flat.” “Lina be hanged! I was speaking to Timothy Darling, our servant, uncle’s former arniy servant, a one-eyed old wreck, with a. singularly inappropriate iront name. You be quiet, miss, and you’ll learn not to jump to rash conclusion. 1 couldn’t leave uncle. We’d had a row over the cotton smash, and u lien I refused to obey his commands he had a seizure; he had several, was having a beauty when I rang you up, and Darling interrupted me. Between '.ears for him and for your father I got pretty well rattled, and my tone wasn’t honeyed. If I irritated you, dearest, I’ll humbly apologise.” “Oil, not humbly,” she protested. ‘Woit'd spoil everything. James looked puzzled, then surprised as if he had added to his store of wisdom by a discovery Smiling, lie stroked the silky fair head nestled to his breast. “I’d have been round sooner, but the doctor detained me .till his patient was out of danger. Ethel, we’ll soften the blow to your father, telling him we are to !>e married immediately, and ive don’t care a hoot about the money., and we’ll have him to live with us. My salary isn’t a fat lot, but it’ll teach us to practise economy. I’m just as eager as a boy to prove to him that I’m no fortune-hunter. I fancy lie doubted me.”. “chiles I was dubious,” muttered Andrew, standing in his bedroom doorway, an unnoticed watcher and auditor. They turned to scan him solicitously. •‘‘Whiles. I confess, I \wasna sure of you. Jamie,” the diminutive roiling < onclly off his slow-moving tongue, “washa sure whether you were a mail’s size or a monkey’s. It is man’s size you are, in very truth.” Bustling his papier, hip continued calmly—“No need to he alarmed for me, J got wind of the cotton slump in this when Ethel was titivating herself to go to- the Cabaret, and it made me sad to think —-—” “You iqusn’t think, sir, or fret.” “Jamie,, you’vq an awfu’ habit of cutting in on folks. As I was observing, it made me sad to think I’d be in the same boat as the rest of the witless deils if 1 hadna had the gumption to unload before share quotations rcse to higli-water mark. . There’s a frightful amount of food for sober reflection in a large-sized IF, my bairns. Aye, is there.” —Madge Barlow in the “Australian ”