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Show . , . , . , . . I, 'IwgFICnON CORNER 1 j I WILL OF THE WIND I WJ) By WILLIAM BRANDON They were gone six days. Each daj Sylvia had them up and driving a daylight and she kept on the job circuiting the sights at the next stop until late at night. She called upor Chip to stop often at roadside standi where she purchased carved ornaments orna-ments and bumpy pottery. She plied him with hot dogs, soft drinks and bad coffee. She was sur prised and delighted at the glazed look that appeared in his eyes 01 the third day. Mrs. Hackett came over the daj after they returned. She said, "Well!" and paused expectantly, holding the cup of sugar in both hands. "He went back to work today," Sylvia said. There was a listlesi note in her voice. "He hasn't said anything about going to Canton for days." "Mm! And what did he say when he got home?" She pursed her lips. "That he never thought it would look so good to him?" Sylvia nodded. She sat down on kitchen chair and swung one foot and watched It pensively. "Just exactly," ex-actly," she said. "You won't even be able to get him to stir out of the house to a pic- l 1 . MRS. HACKETT found her in the bedroom crying. She stood in the doorway and said grimly: "I came in to borrow some sugar, Sylvia. The door was open so I just walked in. Now what on earth's wrong with you?" Sylvia sat up and dried her eyes. Her starched gingham skirt was wrinkled and her black hair was' tangled and disordered. A curling Etrand of it hung down beside her nose like an ink stain. A pin had come out of her imitation lace collar and It had fallen down to catch in the red buckle at her waist. She said shakily, "Hello, Mrs. Hackett. N-othing." Mrs. Hackett drew down the cor-ners cor-ners of her mouth. "Nothing, my foot. It's because of Chip wanting to pull up stakes and go to Canton. Isn't it? Of course It Is." "Why?" Sylvia wailed. "What did you do?" "Well," Mrs. Hackett said, "you can take it for what it's worth, Sylvia. It worked with Mr. Hackett, I know that." "But what was it?" "Whenever he worked himself up to a pitch about cutting loose and chasing away some place after something he thought was better, I simply gave him his way." Sylvia looked disappointed and puzzled. "Oh." "But," Mrs. Hackett said profoundly, pro-foundly, "he didn't know it. I took him on a trip. Just a week or so. And I kept him on the jump every minute of it. I always liked little trips around, anyway. Well, by the time that man would get home again he'd be so tired of Jumping around that he wouldn't have left III ill l! Sylvia slapped the lock of hair out of her eyes. "I won't be a boomer's wife!" she flared. "I won't!" "Mm," Mrs. Hackett said sourly. 'A boy's will is the wind's will.' That's a poem. It's the truest thing In the world. Don't do no good to fight against It. Remember that and you'll have It easier." "I won't be a boomer's b-boom er's wife! I won't drag around to one mill after another all my life, and never have anything, no home, and no no nothing! I won't!" "Well. It's his Job, If he wants to throw it away." "It Isn't! It's just as much mine as It is his! I don't believe in that old idea that a woman's Just a a slave, to follow a man around at whatever he happens to want to do!" "Oh, you don't," Mrs. Hackett said. "And just what can you do - about it?" -Sylvia bowed her head and scrubbed unhappily . at her cheeks with her handkerchief. "I don't know," she sobbed. "Of course you don't. You're noth- They went up into Michigan, west to Wisconsin, down through Minnesota and Iowa and St. Louts to Memphis. ture show for a month. I told you. Wind's will, that's the poem. They're all alike." She put the cup of sugar on the kitchen cabinet and looked at Sylvia and frowned. "But I wouldn't say you look so happy about it, Sylvie. But you're tired." Sylvia stopped swinging her foot and rested her chin on her hands. She sighed and said, "Only of this town, I guess. I was just thinking, when we came back yesterday, and it looked so ... so old and so shabby and dull and tiresome . . . and I thought that we'll spend all our lives here." Mrs. Hackett drew back and regarded re-garded her and then said again defensively, de-fensively, "You're Just tired, Sylvie." Sylvia looked up and her eyes were sparkling. "But I'm not," she said. "I had a wonderful time." sniffed. "You'd be twenty years finding out what to do and by that tiwie It's too late to do you any good. Unless there's somebody around to tell you to begin with. Somebody who knows." Sylvia was not Impressed. "What could you tell me, Mrs. Hackett? What could anyone do? I've argued with him until I'm almost crazy but he he doesn't even listen any more. He's got his mind set on moving on, to something different that won't be any different at all, and then he'll want to go again, and" '"A boy's will is the wind's will,' " said Mrs. Hackett. "That's what the poem says. It's Just as true of a man or an old man, for that matter. The older they get the truer It gets, I reckon. Only they kind of give up trying to do any thing about it after so long a time." She pushed up her lower lip and looked down her nose at Sylvia. Xlke Mr. Hackett." Sylvia looked up, startled. "You mean Mr. Hackett used to want to-" "He was the hardest man to hold down In this town. He got tired of everything, that was his trouble. It's a sort of laziness, that's all It Is. But be stuck here. He stuck, all right" for a pension. That," Mrs. Hackett said, "is something you find out about men, Sylvia. They like to start but they like getting back a whole lot more." Sylvia said doubtfully, "It doesn't sound like Chip would" "Maybe he wouldn't. I'm the last person in the world to try to give folks advice, Sylvia. Nobody wants it and I guess everyone has to sew his own seam anyway. But Mr. Hackett says they're shutting down for a week for the millwright's gang, and if Chip was to spend that week In a car bouncing along from one place to another, without even aschance to catch his breath , . . Well, a boy's will is the wind's will,' and the wind can change In a minute." min-ute." "But what If he wouldn't want to go?" "Mm. You tell him you want a little vacation before you move to Canton. If he thinks you've given in about that he'll take you. You try It and see." They went up into Michigan, west to Wisconsin, down through Minnesota Minne-sota and Iowa and St. Louis to Memphis, Mem-phis, east to Knoxville and up through Louisville to come home. |