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Show THE PRIZE BOOB I By Ona F. Larhrop Bill Baylis wai the prize boob of U tlte neighbors in "The Cuurt." If anybody as much as started a paint job on one ot the little white houkea that dotted the street like itring of china beads, Bill would come sauntering . across, paintbrush paint-brush in hand, with that look in his eye. "Hi there, ella. See you Rot your-ntll your-ntll a nice pie,.i of work cut out. Want a little help?" And he'd not to and paint as lung as the job held out. If there was a lawn to grade or a fence to build. Bill would turn up with the proper tools, grinning in lus good-natured way, and help until un-til the job was done. When Janet West wanted to en-tertaiii en-tertaiii her bridge club in her newly new-ly pme-pancllcd living-room last spring before their sidewalks were ill and their front yard a rnudhole, here came Bill trundling a wheel- opened our eyes. Polly and the children had been gone weeks caring for her sick mother when Bill went home dog-tired from helping help-ing Jim Curtis with his porch, and fell asleep with a cigarette In his hand. The next thing The Cuurt knew, the fire department was tearing down the street trying to save the little white house that wasn't finished yet. Bill didn't even let Polly know, and the next day he started all over again. But this time he wasn't alone. Every one of us had a debt to pay BUI Bayliss In one way or another and we were there too. That house got repaired in nothinf flat, and we all turned in and painted paint-ed it inside and out. The girls washed up the curtains and fixed the inside. We put up the shelves for the canned fruit and painted the kids' room In circus colors. W graded up the lawn that Bill had barrow of his own stepping stones that he'd taken up and brought over for Janet's 'girls' to walk In on. You couldn't hate a guy like that, and yet he made the rest of US feel like pikers! Polly, his wife, complained a little. They had built their own house, moving in before the partition parti-tion were In to save rent and they were still 'finishing' only there didn't seem to be any hurry about it for Bill. "If only Bill took as much interest in-terest in our own place as he does In th rest of yours," Polly would wall. "I've been trying to get him to put up shelves for my canned fruit for two years, and the children's chil-dren's room still isn't painted but he lays that makes it nice they can mark on the walls all they want to and then we'll Jo it over when they know better!" The other wives sympathized with Polly, but they all welcomed his help and plied him with coffee and cokes, and you always heard them bragging what a wonderful fellow Bill was, and how possessive Polly was. But when calamity struck, we never got around to doing, and each ' of us contributed some planting or perennials where the firemen had trampled theirs out. Bob West even took up the stepping stones aud came trundling them back to set In place the night before Polly came home. When Polly walked In and saw things shining and heard what had happened, she broke down and wept on Bill's shoulder. We all stood around grinning proudly as if we'd originated the 'help one another' an-other' theory, until Polly said, "I know I don't rate all this, but I realize you did it for Bill, and he certainly deserves It. If ever a man was a big-hearted boob, It's Bill, and I'll never complain again when he goes off to help the rest of you." We murmured silly things sheepishly sheep-ishly about neighbors always stand iug ready to help, and that's what friends were for. But the look on Bill's face was enough to repay us a hundred times over for the little we had done. Now there's a guy that The Court is proud to have living in it, even if he is one prize boob! |