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THE OSHAWA DAILY TIMES, WEDNESDAY, APRIL 3, 1929 PAGE FIVE The Make-Believe Wife By Kathleen Norris -. About A Young Girl Who Married Her Employer, CHAPTER 20 Hugh's room! It nad been Alice's, and then Hugh alone for a while, and now it was Beatrice's room, Alleen 'remembered visiting here two or three times, after Alice's death, in her own husband's life~ time, She remembered one spec ial visit, a week-end when Arthur bad not been with her and when Hugh had had young Bert and Min nie and two interesting Hungarian musicians, brothers, for his guests. A memorably time, & time of dignified talk among the three of them who had been old friends, of affectionate references to poor dear Alice, and dutiful occasional men- tion of Arthur, of beautiful music, wonderful walks and a moon that had quite frankly affected Aileen, pacing slowly up and down the ter- race under the pine trees, .on her host's arm. "Like you too much, Hugh!" she had whispered in the hallway, a-lit- tle later, when they were saying goodnight in a perfectly silent house. And, smiling with his mouth, but with a sort of wistful sadness still in his eyes, he had quite simply kissed her good night "You know how I loved Alice!" she breathed senselesly, "1 know you did!" he had ans- wered, a little incoherently, "This, she remembered now In hot scorn, and the solemn happiness she had felt tuat night--the tri- umph in winning even so much of a demonstration from the man she had always eo deeply admired and respected--this had taken place in the actual hall where his son and Alice's succesor were now exchang- ing adolescent pleasantries! It had seemed a distinction to her to have Houston Challoner's mere friendship. But evidently this girl had jumped cheerfully over all that, jumped right into the position of his wife, with no preliminaries and no misgivings. During the meal she noted, with sll the misery of the jealous, that Hugh's young wife poured his tea, and Bert's tea, without any ques- tion; she was very much at home at the head of the Challoner table, After dinner they bent over the plans for the memorial college; Ail- een knew what questions to ask, ad- dressing herseif directly to Hugh. "They have to be mailed by mid- August," he said, catching up the delicate scrools that curled in his fingers. "There's just one I'm working on now--some details of windows, 'and of course the big gate, which will carry an inscrip- tion." "It's incredibly interesting!" All- een conceded. "Oh, isn't it?" Beatrice asked de- lightedly., "When you've watched it begin from nothing," she said, "and gradually altered this and changed that--well, it's wonder- full" "you'll insure them, Dad?" Bert asked, "They'll take care of all that at the office, I imagine. At the bottom of the thin sheet of oiled paper, carefully lettered, were the names, 'Beatrice and Houston Challoner, Architects, Challoner Building, North Under- hill, Aileen was studying the scrool. She felt a sensation almost of phy- sical sickness. "I didn't know your wife was an architect, too, Hugh?" she asked, tasting salt in her mouth. "Oh, Bee's been the moving spirit of the whole thing!" Hugh boasted, laughing. "It was her idea, to be- gin with, and she's worked on it al- most as much as I have, ever since." "Not really that!" Beatrice dis- claimed eagerly, "I see that I must follow the fashion and fall in love with Bea- trice," Aileen said, with as cold a look for her holtess as one woman ever smiled at another. Beatrice, turning her own quick smile, was chilled, and all but drew back physically, as well as in spirit, from Aileen's neighborhood. Bert drove Aileen home at eleven o'clock, She would have preferr- ed Hugh's escort, but having this opportunity for a word alone with Bert she did not disdain it, "You know your darling mother and I were school chums, Bert." "I know you were, Aileen." "Yuo used to call me 'Aunt Yeen' years ago," she reminded him fond- ly. "I remember. But you were younger than Mother," Bert said politely. ; "Three years. She was twénty when she was married--and I had on my first long dress at her wed- ding. Dresses were long then," Mrs, Kavanaugh said. And then, wistfully, "I wish I could be your mother to-night, Bert, for just five minutes." "If you mean because you want to kiss me good night," Bert sug- gested, wita his usual winning im- pudence, "I mean to do it, anyway." "No, it's not nat, you bad boy!" Aileen said. And with a touch of emotion, of softness, in her voice, she went on, rather low, "If I were your mother tonight, Bert, I think I'd say to you--" she paused. "Don't go too far!" ghe said, "with Beatrice, 1 mean." There was a moment's silence, as the motor car ran smoothly along the dark, piny roadway, and then Bert sald, with a little edge to his voice: "Am 1 going too far?" Aileen knew that she had blund- ered--hurt him, She had meant to cut deep. But she mustn't anger him. She was smart enough to retreat with honors, "It's not you; it's for her that I'm speaking. Don't hurt her," she she elucidated quickly, "How could I hure her?" Bert led gruffly, unsvmpache!lcally. "{ know you wouldn't: Aileen id loyally, in a satisfied voice, as if the subject were dismissed, But Bert was not quite done, "She has no use for me!" he sald. forlornly and suddenly. The wo- man pecreived instantly that he really was suffering--she had only suspected it before, "Ah, ert, don't count on that!" she said. "I'm a woman--I can see what you can't gee, She's riding for a fall--Beatrice." "I think you're wrong," he said coldly. \ "In fact," Bert added, stopping the car, descending, and coming about to open the door on her side--"in fact, I know you're wrong!" "I'm not wrong, and you're going to remember what I've just said, whether you want to or mot!" Ail- een prophesied triumphantly, amaz- ed that she had brought blood eo soon. But Bert made np answer, for these words were spoken only in Aileen's mind, as she nodded good night to him, without the promised kiss after all. A few days later Aileen saw Hugh and had an unexpected opportunity for a few words alone with him. Her anger, her resentful sense of having been cheated, had not cool- ed, and in the height of the lake season she had had plenty of oppor- tunity to discuss with old friends of his and of Alice's the weak spot in poor Hugh Challoner"s armor, the obvious fact that that pretty wife of his--a mere unformed girl, atfer all--and young Bert, were evidently head-over-heels-- Today Hugh was playing golf, in smoky, hot, ominous afternoon sun- shine, There were thunderclouds in the south; the air was sticky and heavy. And for once young Mrs. Challoner affectionately christened by Hugh his "pilot fish," was not hopping along beside him on the bright greens , "What's that stunning Bert of ours going to do, Hugh?" Aileen said, "I don't know, Aileen," he admit- ted doubtfully. "He was with us for awhile-- everyone likes him, But he's very restless--I don't know what's the matter with him!" It was her opening, "Don't you really, Hugh?" she asked surprisedly, with an artless side glance. ~He looked up, scowled in puzzle- ment. \ : "I? No, I don't," he said brief- y. Aileen was silent, They walked along. "Why, what's your idea, Aileen?" Hugh presently demanded, made uneasy by her manner, "Well, it isn't mipe, Hugh," she explained simply. It's just--I'm like a stranger here, now; I hear people talk, and perhaps I get a viewpoint that you---wouldn't!"" "On, Bert?" Hugh asked, sharply suspicious. ? "Nothing serious, nothing that he won't get over like measles!" Aileen assured him, laughing. "I confess I'm in the dark," Hugh said coldly. 2 "Bert's .a heartbreaker," the wo- man stated thoughtfully, "Bert--"" his father repeated, on a thoughtful note. And she's pretty, and not partie- ularly wise," Aileen pursued, still in a half-playful tone, "She?" He stopped short and faced her. "Well, my dear," Aileen said, with an eloquent shrug, "it's the most natural thing in the world, of course, and 1 daresay that neither one of them is aware of it. But, after all, he's extraordinaryily handsome, Hugh, and the girl is a girl--twenty-two, it is? He's sim- ply head over heels in love with Beatrice!" "Bert?" Hugh eaid quietly, al- most absently, with no eurprise in his tone. "I--I suppose so." "Not that there's any harm in it." Aileen began, with an indulgent half-laugh. "No," Hugh walked on. "Why should there be?" he said. "Exactly!" Aileen agreed. CHAPTER 21 "She's devoted to him, wonder fully sweet and kind with him, al- ways," the man resumed, as if he were merely thinking aloud. "Nat- ural that the boy should--most natural thing in the world!" z "If only it doesn't make them un- happy," Aileen suggested delicately, with faint anxiety n her tone. Hugh glanced at Jer sharply, "No, no, no!" he said decisively. "It's merely--She herself, Bee, has- n't the faintest notion of i!" he di- verged to say hastily. "Hugh, dear, that's where I think you're mistaken," she said firmly, but gently and regretfully, "Why, what did you think you noticed, Aileen?" he asked, pati- ently, kindly. She saw that she had not reached him. "Ah, I wasn't spying! How could I possibly answer that?" she pro- tested. "There's no question that he has a boy's fancy for her,'"' Hugh admit- ted, walking on, speaking unalarm- edly. "I've seen that; I'm not sur- prised. I suppose the" sensible thing would be to pack him back to Europe--he wants to go." "He did want to go," Aileen said, nettled at the course the conver- sation was taking. "He doesn't want to go now." "You think not?" Hugh asked, with a shrewd, disconcerted glance. "He tald me so. ' No, he doesn't even want you to win that Califor- nia college contest; the woman ad- ded, losing her head a little. "He doesn't want you and Beatrice to go away! I'm sorry, Hugh," she broke off to say with a litle emo- tion, "I'm eo sorry! Perhaps I shouldn't have mentioned it at all --I don't know why I did. Except --1I loved Alice---" Aileen added, a little incoherently, "No, no. I'm very grateful. It's just possible that we'll be off in California this winter," Hugh said presently, '""And that will end the thing for a while." "I'm as much taken aback as you are at the thing, Hugh!" Aileen hastened to say. "And I only felt--" She paused. Hugh nodded to- the fleld behind her. "I'm over there--in the stubble. You're right there," he said briefly, The woman felt snubbed. "Hugh, you'll forgive me if I= out of my devotion to all you Chal- loners--" she began impulsively, "Oh, my dear girl, of course I undefstand!" he said, coldly and wearlly. They separated, and when they met again, Aileen was careful to odo a totally different subject of cdnversation, "How many firms are competing for this prize, Hugh?" "Oh, a great many. Two or thred hundred probably--that's a lot, in a contest like this. But I have a notion--had a notion--" He stopped speaking, and brushed his forehead fretfully, as a man might do who was pestered by gnats. "WHat does it matter?" he mutter~ ed, under his breath, not looking at his companion or seeming aware of her presence. 'I had an idea that I might win it," he resumed. 'My chances are especially good because the men Kreutzmann appointed as judges mostly live in California, as it happens--one is a retired archi- tect who lives in a Spanish hacienda in Santa Barbara, and the others-- well, I know most of them; they all favor that type of thing, One very good friend of mine, Philo Apple- white, is a flendish enthusiast for Spanish architecture; all of them are big men in the profession--and I know most of them intimately." He sighed impatiently, looked up, as if for air, He had the manner of a man suffocating, "Whew, what a day!" he said. "Beatrice is not at all anxious to go. Why?" Aileen asked simply, "Beatrice not anxious to go?" he asked, stopping again, "Well, she said it wouldn't make the slightest difference to her, either way," Alleen corrected her- self. They did not speak again for some time, They had reached an- other green now, and Aileen had decided to leave *him here; in any case, even before she saw Beatrice and Bert cutting across from the clubhouse to join Hugh---Beatric and Bert, not nurrying, not appar- ntly in the least self-conscious, as hey came along, [Evidently they were deep in talk, talk so absorbing that they stopped now and then to speak to each other face to face. Against the eastern sky hot clouds were massing slowly together; there was no wind. Beatrice was in blue, broad stripes and angles of blue and dark- er blue and white, and wore a brimmed blue hat under which her hair smoldered like flames. The smooth. cream of her cheeks was without color on this oppressive dey. Her blue eyes were blazing with some unexplained excitement. She greeted Hugh with a glance and en upflung hand, but did not approach him; she paused beside Aileen instead. "I didn't know that you played, Mrs; Kavanaugh?" "I play very badly," Aileen assur- ed her. "Where have you been, dear?" Hugh asked, feelingly euddenly cold and tired and clumsy, Her eyes danced. She looked at Bert, and bubbled with mysterious laughter, "We've been selecting your birth- day present, Hugh!" ghe burst out, electrically. "You're in time," he said, in his dry, quiet way. "My. birthday's September 20th!" "I went shopping, and stopped at Bert's office," Beatrice said, "and he took me to have an ice, at the Underhill, and drove me out here. Do you realize that it's nearly six?" "Two more and I'm done," Hugh explained. "I played the second nine first, because there were a bunch of women on this one and I've about finished." "We'll walk with you," she offer- ed, nodding pleasantly at Aileen as she eauntered away at Hugh's side. "Stay and gossip with me, Bert, until Frances Lennox comes up," Aileen said, boiling within, but outwardly waving a smiling fare- well to Beatrice. Bert's fatuous gaze was upon the younger woman, now walking lightly, elastically, at his father's side, and turning her brimmed blue hat now and then, to glance into Hugh's attentive, ser- ious face. Beatrice's brown wrist, emerging from the striped blue cuff--her doubled fist, pushed into the pocket of the blue gown--her silky red hair, curling like feathers about her shapely ears--the rise of her firm breasts under the frail fabric of her dress--these things affected Bert like a potent wine, The fumes of her were in his nostrils, dizzying him and making him hard- ly conscious of what Aileen was saying. Beatrice came running back. Her eyes were very blue, in the shadow of her hat. 3 "Bert, you have my house key!" she reminded him, He could hardly answer; he laughed conmusedly. "Bufparen't you going to drive me back?" he asked blankly, "No I'm going with Hugh!' she answered, surprised. Her £ru, warm fingers touched as #9 took the key; she ran off again, with a nodded goodbye over hee shoulder, Aileen watched Bert,-as a ecien- tist might watch an insect impaled on a pin. Se saw him look after the girl's figure dazedly, and heard him give an abrupt, mirthful laugh. Then suddenly he turned away and began to walk toward the clubhouse slowly, without so much as a back- ward look for her. "Fireworks there, sooner or lat ler," Aileen reected, sitting on the little bench beside the sand box, and alternately glancing at the receding figures of father and son, the gap widening between them, and Bea- trice's slim figure fluttering faith- fully along beside the older man. "I wonder just how long it wil! take him to get her?" she mused -aloud, : . The late sunshine {lluminated Bert's magnicflent figure as he strode along; it glinted on his bar- ed head" A few women, loitering across the greens, stopped him and spoke to him; Afleen saw one of the younger ones look atfer him as he went on his way. "Now, if he'd married Beatrice," she thought, "how much more suit- able! Mrs, Houston Challoner. Mrs. Houston Challoner! Poor Hugh, what else can he possibly suppose she married him for, if it wasn't just to be that--Mrs., Challoner She's not awake yet. - But she'll wake up, Hugh. They don't s leep forever, in this day and genera- tion!" Soret "You and Bert have a nice time?" Hugh asked, with a little effort, as they walked along, "Oh, wonderful! Beatrice sald, and laughed. "He really is a dar- ling, Bert," she said absently, A moment later, happening to glance at Hugh, she exclaimed concernedly '"Hugh, you look queer! Is your head--your head is aching again!" "No, not a bit. Yes, it's split- ting!" he said incoherently, "Oh, Hugh, dear! Mr, Challon- er won't play any more," Beatrice said hurriedly to the caddie, "Take all the clubs, we'll cut right to the car, Hugh, darling," Beatrice plead- ed, her young hand firm under his elbow, as she guided him across the rising ground, "why didn't you tell me? How long has this been go- ing on?" Reaching the car, she sprang in, took the wheel; his door had bare- ly slammed before they were off for home. Not a word was said while she helped him upstairs, establish- ed him on the couch, smoothed pil- lows under his tired head, and stop- ped to touch his closed eyes with her fresh fragrant kiss, "Tell me the first instant you feel better, dearest!" (To be continued.) (Copyright, 1928, by Kathleen Norris) > 4 SOVIET CONDUCTING "HOUSE CLEANING" Tens of Thousands Being Swept Out of Em- ployment. Moscow, April 3.--The Soviet Union is engaged in a dramatic, of- ten tragic, "house-cleaning," which is sweeping tens of thousands out of employment. The proletarian dictatorship is poking its broom ruthlessly jito every corner and cranny where "formers," as they are called here --former Czarist officials, land- lords, aristocrats, businessmen-- may have fébund a temporary hid- ing place, intent upon driving them out and giving their jobs, occasion- ally their homes also, to workers and peasants. Members of the pre-revolution- ary upper classes who have proved themselves 100 per cent loyal to the Soviet regime, are spared, es- pecially if they are specialists in any line the Government needs. Those who, despite every working class origin, have showed them- selves tainted with bourgeois ideas or methods, are swept out as if they were mere grand dukes. Every section of the Soviet struc- ture is agitated by this relentless campaign against 'socially alien" elements, including the Communist Party itself, the complicated gov- ernmental apparatus, the co-opera- tives, trade unions, schools and universities, even literary and an- istic organizations. Reason for Panic. There is ample reason for panic among those who may be affected by the process. To be "cleaned out" is no slight matter here. It means that one becomes an outlaw, deprived of all social privileges and subjected to merciless economic pressure. It means expulsion from the trade union, and therefore nei- ther work nor the unemployment pittance while out of work. It means enormously higher prices for food, clothes, rent, exclusion of one's children from the schools and universities. No one here blinks at the fact that great numbers are being driv- en into misery, despair and worse. It is regarded as a harsh but nec- essary manoeuvre in the class struggle--part of the merciless civ- il war which in the twelfth year of the revolution, is far from end- ed. It is, in fact, a part of the process of exterminating the rem- nants of the former upper classes which would not--or could not-- adjust themselves to the new soci- ety. There is, of course, a fringe of private enterprise where some Of those affected may find a tenuous shelter. They may 'become street peddlers, kustars (handicraft workers), private teachers and the like. If they have the acumen and the capital they may even go into business on a small scale. But already unemploymént is so large and competition so keen among the "de-classed" persons that such hope is not substantial. May Lose Franchise The Soviet elections, by forcing every community, even every sin- gle house, to sift out those who are not entitled to vote, have become an important part of the job of 'house-cleaying." In Moscow alone COMPLEXION IMPROVED R eo « QUICKLY Look Fit! BeAllve! Get rid of that pasty, s allo w, blemished complexion! Instead of spending many dollars on fancy creams and skin lotions, buy a 25¢ pkg. of Carter's Little Liver Pills and remove the constipation poi- sons. Your skin should be bene- fited, likewise your health improved. All Druggists 25¢ and 75¢ red pkgs. CARTERS IEZi PILLS APRIL J Big Days Your sale bill is in the Mail, kindly advise us ifyou do not get it LOOK FOR IT! ~ READ IT! - It Will Save You Many Dollars on Things You Need Sale Bill THURSDAY FRIDAY SATURDAY See Window for Extra Specials in I Addition to Those on the f I | | | i i i some 80,000 have been disfranchis- ed. The Government has recognized the likelihood of errors in weeding out those not entitled to vote and Las already restored thousands to tlieir rights. Moreover, everyone has a right to appeal his or her case. But those who at the end of a year--the limit for appeals-- are still on the blacklists of non- voters, become outlaws whose lives at best will be difficult, at least un- hearable. The necessity of eliminating these remainders of the past order is accepted as a natural and inevit- able fact, quite beyond dispute. The vacated jobs and vacated homes will go to workers who need them, Extra places in the over- crowded schools will be taken by proletarian and peasant children. The petty tyrants in a hundred thousand offices throughout the union who may lose their posts for "bureaucratic" conduct certainly will find no sympathy among the masses. The party cleansing mow under way aims to expel members who harbor political heresies, left or right, and those who conduct ir their social work or private life is considered unworthy of Commu- nists. At the same time an effort is being made to draw workers and peasants, new proletarian blood, into the ranks of the ruling party. 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