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Show - THE BULLETIN. BINGHAM CANYON, UTAH rer ButmoUa Powell Shootina slER SANCTUM MYSTERY V N 3AB ND AMDY BLAKE f6ATURts H I was quite Arab arrived. been a certain it, like living but until win actions, positively her at was my desk oables from they didn't IBAPTEKhall the sure to ask; all High his tell a his questions j and complained, brushing and what not eight girls to when I at "Arab!" least to "Sure," I said, "I'm glad to see you. The way a guy's glad to see his right arm when he wakes up in the morning. The way he's glad there's enough air to breathe. The way . . . look, I can't say these things properly." "You could try. You could start courting me all over again. You only spent about two weeks at it last spring, Andy, and I always felt a little bit cheated." "Cheated?" I said. "How about me on our honeymoon? You got us in a shooting scrape so fast we al-most used the wedding flowers for a joint funeral." "You needed to be stirred up, Andy. You were turning into a vege-tabl- You were in a rut." "Vegetables are in furrows." "And I'm afraid," she said, look-ing at me seriously, "you're in one now. You've been here two months. You're still a first lieutenant. No citations. No ribbons. Not even a badge for pistol marksmanship." I growled, "The way I handle guns I'll get a pistol badge and a military funeral at the same time." "You're getting fat, Andy. I bet your joints are starting to creak." which she had checked at Union Sta-Ho-and she hadn't made an at-tempt to wire ahead for a room. Probably it wouldn't have mattered; you have to be entered for a Wash-ington hotel room almost at birth, like getting into Groton or St. Paul's. I was rooming with a family out near Kalis Church, in Virginia; they might put Arab up for the night in an emergency, but it would be better to get her a place of her own. We cheeked the newspapers and made a few phone calls and located a couple of possibilities way out in Chevy Chase. That made us feel very gay and carefree, and we boarded an L-- 5 bus for the Circle and I had no suspicion that it was the last carefree moment I'd have for a long time. Riding Washington bus in any of the rush hours is like holding a wrestling match in a revolving door. You don't even dare let out your breath all the way because then they'll get somebody else in the bus and you have to give up inhaling until somebody gets off. The bus had traveled only a few blocks when Arab gripped my hand and whispered, "Did you hear what colonel cleared like a warming up nbered an errand down r niy one fourth of a sec-- i Into the files, and my ! picked up their tele-taile- d each other. I held i body closely and for a pim mass of The Penta-- j to spin and dip like a und. ied me back to arm'i By, and laughed chokily "Oh, Andy, it's been so you'd been overseas I managed but I couldn't ist t hundred and forty und- -" have dragged you down (hair two months ago," it you were being patri-layin- g useless people nove to Washington and you are going to stay, ' Aren't you?" want me?" up my rubber heels," I TO take ray sugar. They can it (or scrap. I won't de-to-my Income tax. I'll any oth hut " t're still patriotic, dar- - How?" going to be useless. i the identification tag taring. It was the type nut to new employees for their photograph badges Does that mean you're B here?" I'm going to take a Job "Oh, Andy, It's been so lone" "Tn nthpr words, meet Lieutenant that man said? The one behind me?" "No. What?" "Something about shipping loco-motives to England. I think he men-tioned twenty." "That's not so good," I muttered. "People talk too muchV" We listened a moment, and a girl's voice cut across the babble, saying, ". . . and he always used to write three times a week so when Jane told me that, I said, Jane, if you haven't had a letter in two weeks those parachute boys have moved out and his next letter will have an APO number on . . ." Arab whispered, "Are they crazy? Don't they even know how to read?" She pointed up. Right In front of the man talking about locomotives was a car ad reading: NEVER DIS-CUSS MILITARY OR NAVAL IN-FORMATION IN A PUBLIC VEHICLE. Arab went on, "Is there much of this kind of loose talk?" "Yeah, I suppose io," I said. "Something ought to be done about It." "It ought to ... and it's going to be, right now!" "Now listen, Arab," I said uneas-ily, "you've got to take things eas-ier. A lot of people are working on this business of loose talk, and" "And maybe I can help them! I'm going through this bus and listen to what people are saying and make notes. And I'm going to write let-ters to newspapers and do a report for everybody high up I can think of and make speeches and every-thing." I tried to calm her, without suc-cess. She dug out a pocket note-hnn- lr and a stubbv pencil and W the pause for romance. Aisper "Here comes the if "Greer Carson's in the Wi cause less general dis-- if you say "Here's a 'I 'or a job as a secre-on- e fourth of a secretary from her flies as if she fa first words of a new p Proclamation. My Wed their phones and M wolflshly. My colonel the room and up to us ando heading for an ob- - feiyou sign up?" I asked it was this way. Pened to" lid you sign up!" With Ordnance." v I said. "Shotguns !nugh around the house. bazookas." sorry," Arab said, fy tuition to work for rs 8st hit the desk like an bomb. "It's an out- - Slid "I won't stand for they expect us to oper- - ' they got me another m for a transfer. Four one secretary, and we P work out. I'd trade a good typist. P m too- ' Ordnance! a deep breath, then a Place to live?" It. " e thinking of, letting "Washington before he Pwyou? You'd better Good-by- , Mrs. Blake. 81ake- Help her get set- - F. 1 was going to stay ""'sh up the report for "ny theater." P" can do it. His 'ike Andy away from the Protested ' the colonel said, to live in Washing- - tough as winning y he added gloomily, c aa ion-- ,. ; S('rvice cap and we , the office, while be-- 1 iMrkpr was starting he personally would et man wno snowed ry he couldn't have. Blake of the Chair-Born- e Infantry. No hero. Just a guy doing a Job that calls for a uniform. I know all that. What am I supposed to do about It?" "I don't know yet, darling. But I'm going to find out. Ummm, how Is the war getting on?" "All right, I guess." ' She said softly, "This is October, 1942. The Japs may take back Guadalcanal. The Germans have half of Stalingrad. The war's get-ting on all right, he guesses." I gulped. "He's glad to see me the way a man's glad to see his right arm in the morning. In other words, he takes it for granted as long as it s there." "Look" "Andy Blake, you're not going to take me for granted. And you're not going to guess the war s get ting You're going to start along all right. worrying about things. I don t know how I'm going to do it, but I'm go-ing to uproot you if I have to use dynamite." I shivered. Arab really means "It's getting near things like that. "Can we have ' I mumbled. dinner first? I understand the troops often get a final hot meal before the jUsmhPeCsqueezed my arm. "I do love Andy. So much that it ache. you, a d we'll get a nice apartment hAave fun even if I do have to itir apartment," I said glumly. better rent a fox-hole." I got a feeling we We walked silently through the a half mile to South Park-- bus termi-nal' where the temporary still located. It had been rating Hghtly all afternoon a prepared for it with Arab had come umbrella and white raincoat. We customs f the serv contrary to the began worrying aooui me catchfng cold and I began feeling better. O'Donnell's for dinner went to It tmA Norfolk and that uTeven more. Then me ZP rP 0fShenhadg cAombe dolaCwii0 . scrawled a few lines of symbols. It was my introduction to the Ara-bella Blake Shorthand System: a method which combined the worst features of Pitman, Gregg, and the way Arab marks checkbook stubs. "You stay here," she said. "I'm going to work my way up to the front of the bus." She wriggled two feet up the aisle and paused. She swayed there, look-ing like a dreamy schoolgirl. If I hadn't been watching for it, I'd nev-er have seen her make a few quick notes. You wouldn't have thought she was interested in anything more important than the relative mer-its of chocolate nut sundaes and malteds with floats. In a few minutes she had edged her way up the aisle out of my sight. Gradually I began to realize that something was wrong. I couldn't fig-ure what. The big Capital Transit bus was still rocketing up Connecti-cut Avenue through its bright tunnel of raindrops. Voices still chattered but there was a difference. The passengers didn't seem the same. It was almost as if I had been transferred, while I drowsed, to a bus filled with utter strangers. The impression was so strong that I looked carefully at nearby faces. They hadn't changed. Here in the middle of Washington, in a brightly lit bus filled with middle- -aged civil-servic- e workers and government girls and housewives and businessmen, a witch hunt was assembling. Sixty normal people were being slowly fused into a mob A mob with one idea. Shreds of talk whipped by my ears like leaves in a gale. "It was a girl . . while I was talking about Jane she ..." . . . standing right by me and list.e.ni.n.g ..." a girl in a white raincoat . ' "... . . listening to every word I "t was telling you about that Brit-ish carrier and she had a notebook a""I peeked down and she was writ-ing of code." in some kind a girl in a white . . . "She's up in the front of the bus now ..." . . . listening to every word I sald ' ' .'to bk cnNTTNinHM Pretty Vestcos for Classroom Wear 5 4 Here's why NO ENGINE is Complete without an OIL FILTER more than ever, no engine is complete TODAY, an oil filter . . . because a properly-designe- d oil filter saves costly repairs, gives top operating econ-omy, lengthens the life of your car, truck, tractor or stationary engine. Fram Oil & Motor Cleaners filter out dirt, grit, carbon, sludge, abrasives and other harmful contaminants . . . keep motor oil visually clean. Thus Fram saves motors and money . . . helps keep your equipment on the job. 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'S&mKL XZIT has been used by industry for more than twenty years. XZIT SOOT ERADICATOR -- 2 J-- - ' S8O0 South Mooyer Street U Angek, 44, California "Jffij jo xzitto. m A LEADING expert on brain and muscular action has announced that man's mental and physical prime or peak Is around 33 years that most of his good work is done before he is 40 and little of it after 50. The expert admits that there are certain exceptions, but he is taking the general aver-age. He fixes the f jHpM physical peak ti;H around 33 years In tit jH the matter of age. W J The mental peak Mf '5 8 around 40. He may jr ;.. T J1m be entirely correct jgyp JL In sizing up the Jml mental side of the ; '.. JT argument. So many fjjHEf golden autumns have slipped by """-'- since we were 33 Bill Tilden that most of the de-tails are a bit hazy. But the expert uses up too many years In calling the athletic peak. Here are just a few leading ex-amples 1. Jack Pempsey was just 24 the day he manicured Jess Willard and in this Massacre of Maumee Bay, Dempsey was at his peak. He was better that hot July afternoon than he ever was later on. He earned a one-roun- d knockout In that Toledo assault, boll or no bell. 2. Ty Cobb was 25 when he turned In his greatest season. This was in 1911, when Ty delivered 248 base hits, 147 runs, 83 stolen bases and a batting average of .420. He was almost as good a year later with a 410 average, but not quite up to his 1911 collection. The two ages of 25 and 2G found the Georgia Peach at the top of a great career. 3. Babe Ruth was 33 years old when he blasted his 60 home runs. This was In 1927. But the Babe fired 55 four base blows In 1921 when he was only 27. But it should be re-called that the Babe was a pitcher until he reached the age of 25. He was around 24 when he came to his pitching prime. Jones a Champ at 21 4. Bobby Jones found his best year In 1930 when he ran into his Grand Slam. He was then 28 years old. A "Boy Wonder" at the age of 14, he was 21 before he won his first championship in 1923. While Jones was only 28 when he retired from active competition, he still had known 15 seasons of hard, tourna-ment golf. 5. Big Bill Tilden was 26 before he won his first major crown. His top years ran from 26 to 31, although he remained a star through another decade. But you could name his peak at 28 or 29 and not miss the mark by many weeks. 6. Jim Thorpe, greatest athlete, came to his best year in 1912 when he was in the general neigh-borhood of 25 years. That was the year Old Jim won the Olympic championship while also playing his best football and base-ball. You'll find this cross section gives you man's athletic prime around 26 or 27. I mean the top ones. I could name other examples. Walter Ha(f-e-n was 21 when he bagged his first V. S. open crown in 1914 and he was 26 when he won his last one at Brae Burn in 1919. But after that his British campaign was Just as brilliant. The war cut into any Joe Louis rating but you could name his 27th year and not be far wrong. And there's the case of Mel Hein, the Giant center now facing his 19th or 20th football season, adding in his college years at Washington State. Hein's peak was in the vicin-ity of his 27th and 28th year. Value of Experience The eminent expert in sizing up the mental and physical side over-looked one important detail it is the physical side that collapses or takes the first dip. Many veterans still hang on, vet-erans with fading legs and fading arms, through greater experience and the smartness that only the years can bring. These men have to offer their brains against younger legs and younger arms. Jack Quinn was a winning pitcher well beyond 40, after 26 years of pitching. When some one asked Jack how he could hang around so long his answer was quite simple "A wife and six children." But the golden age of sport is still youth those years that run from 23 to 27. At the ages of 26 and 27 we have the winning combination of physical youth and experience. Pos-sibly the ages 22 or 23 would be the big years physically, but they lack the experience which later years bring. Knute Rockne never liked sopho-mores and John McGraw never cared for rookies. After all, there is no substitute for experience, eight times out of ten. In this diagnosis we must stick with the general average not with the exceptions. In sport the best physical years would be around 23 the top mental years around 28. "As a matter of fact," several well known trainers tell me, "the ideal physical age, minus experience, is around 21 or 22. It is experience and the know-ho- that make 26 or 17 the better vears." Robot Has Repertoire of 3,000 Tunes for Zither Probably the most incredible ro-bot ever made in this country is a life-size- d figure of the Egyptian goddess Isis, a recent invention of Dr. Cecil Nixon of San Francis-co, says Collier's. Isis reclines on a couch containing her mecha-nism which is comprised of 370 electromagnets, 1,187 wheels, 2,233 sections of wire and a score of other secret gadgets. With a pick on one finger of each hand, for plucking the strings of the zither on her lap, the lady plays any one of 3,000 tunes re-quested of her by any person with-in 12 feet, her machinery being set in motion by the vibrations of the human voice. |