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Show The Irleno srable Ursele LanGy By ETHEL HUESTON O Bobbi-MrrllI Co. WNU Swylct CHAPTER XVI Continued 17 Aunt Olympia was back in bed first, whiling away the time with a little work on her under-chin, but the Senator was not long behind her. "I'm not even going to shave," he said cheerfully. "Thank God it's over." "To tell the truth, it's a great relief re-lief to me, Del," she said bravely. "Your business is your own and if you wanted to be senator, why, it was your say-so. But personally I've had enough and I'm glad to be out of it so we can live our own life for a while." "We'd better have some coffee," said the Senator. Hilda answered the ring with suspicious sus-picious alacrity. On the tray, with a big pot of coffee, was fresh fruit and a small covered plate of hot muffins. "You may need sustainment," she said grimly. She gave the Senator a severe look. "Mr. Allen came about two o'clock with a dozen more hungry politicians for me to feed and with blobs of blood around his nose and a very black eye for which I offered mi i "I'm not even going to shave." him a beefsteak and he asked me to fry it, please, and took another of the same." "A bloody nose?" gasped the Senator. Sen-ator. "A black eye!" ejaculated Aunt Olympia. "It seems he hit the leg of a bench as he went down but giving the Senator the credit," said Hilda reprovingly. "Anyhow they ate all the steaks and are now working on the ham and eggs." Beneath her arm, in direct defiance defi-ance of orders, Hilda bore a huge stack of morning papers. Olympia frowned at sight of them. "I said coffee and nothing but coffee cof-fee and by all means none of those filthy sheets that are a profanation to the holy Sabbath." Hilda laid the papers on the foot of Olympia's bed and arranged the tray on a small table between them. Her expression disturbed Aunt Olympia. In anybody else, it would have been definitely pleasurable; in Hilda, it was merely sardonic. "I thought you might like a look at the pictures anyhow," she said. "And besides, I had to get them out of my way downstairs, cluttering things up, with politicians all over the place." "How are the girls?" asked Uncle Un-cle Lancy diplomatically. "They are all right what I seen of them," she added, with dour significance. sig-nificance. "You should have been at the rally," ral-ly," said Aunt Olympia, with a twinge that would have done jus-j jus-j tice to a toothache. "You'd have seen plenty of them." I Hilda moved toward the door. "I , got to go now," she said. "I been ' giving coffee and doughnuts and boiled eggs to rcportersand camera men for four hours. Mr. Cooper I and Mr. Dodd and the boys worked all night and the telephone's been ringin' steady since six o'clock and they sent to town. for more stenogra-' stenogra-' phers to take the messages." Aunt Olympia swallowed hard. ! She looked at the Senator. He was gazing at his coffee. Obliged to say something, she said faintly, "Oh, yes. From the constituents." "From everybody I ever heard of so far and some I ain't. We ain't opened the telegrams yet No time. We put them in the potato basket. I'm boiling the potatoes to make salad for everybody that'll be coming com-ing before the day's over. I'm boiling boil-ing another ham, too." ' Aunt Olympia groaned and closed I her eyes. She waved feebly for I Hilda to go away. I Hilda paused once more. 'Seems as if to me the girls did all right for theirsclves," she re- marked cryptically and closed the 3oor behind her. 1 Aunt Olympia did not open her yes until she could hear Hilda :reaking downstairs. "After election, I'm going to fire ' that idiot," she said bitterly. "I I ion't mind her not being able to speak English, but she might at least make a little sense in some language!" "Try one of these muffins, my dear," said the Senator. "Piping hotl Hilda's muffins make sense in any language." Aunt Olympia, feeling dulled and bruised, mechanically set her teeth into a muffin. It was all right. Her eyes wandered to the pile of papers on the foot of thy bed. Purposefully, Purpose-fully, she forced them away and looked at the Senator. He was looking look-ing at the papers, too, rather sheepishly, sheep-ishly, over the rim of his cup. "Whoever gave a patent to the fool that invented kodaks should be strung up for treason! Freedom of the press, huh? It's freedom of the press makes cowardly slaves and craven knaves of otherwise good citizens. cit-izens. You ought to get up a bill about it. The press' freedom is taxpayers' poison." She could have smiled at that. She wished the girls had been there to hear it Purely extemporaneous it was, too. But her eyes would not be kept away from the pile of papers. She set her cup down with an impatient impa-tient little crash. "Oh, well, we may as well have a look at the pictures, I suppose," she snapped. "They're not bow-legged, that's one thingl" She reached for the papers and passed two or three from the top of the pile across to the Senator, who was reaching for them. They settled back on the pillows. Suddenly Sudden-ly Olympia gasped. "Tch, tch, ten," clucked the Senator, and kept on clucking. Olympia gazed across at him, wide-eyed, speechless. He gazed at her. "Well, God bless my soull Think of that nowl" he said reverently. Then they fell desperately on the papers and silence hung between them, except for the crinkle of paper, pa-per, occasional hissing sighs from Olympia and an almost continuous stream of clucks from the Senator. The election was as good as won. The girls, and the Senator along with them, had got a terrific press. Newspaper News-paper men all over the state had worked on the case all night. They had covered the Dastardly Outrage in large caps from every possible possi-ble angle. Public sentiment was aroused to the highest pitch; public indignation was an inferno. Never had the widely publicized American standard of moral decency been so flagrantly betrayed. The New York Herald-Tribune came out with an editorial denunciation denunci-ation of tactical devices so contrary to pure Republican principle and ideal. "I'd like to see Len Hardesty's face now," said Aunt Olympia happily. hap-pily. Len Hardesty publicly absolved the Governor of all complicity and shouldered the blame for the debacle; deba-cle; Governor Wilkie pleaded complete com-plete ignorance of the entire matter and deplored the incident. But the newsmen did not let it rest there. They admitted that while the Governor Gov-ernor hadn't been smart enough to think it up, he had certainly been immoral enough to try to reap the advantage of it; they cited his prepared pre-pared speech, the use of his chauffeur, chauf-feur, the arrangement of floodlights. Limpy's speech was quoted verbatim, ver-batim, with Helen's anguished "Don't say brats" in parenthesis. Uncle Limpy's glasses fogged up so over Limpy's speech that Aunt Olympia had to read it aloud to him. "Now, you see, Ollie," he said reproachfully, "Hilda made good sense indeed. Very good sense. 'Seems as if they have did all right for theirselves,' just as she said." In the meantime, Hilda, with all she had on hand that hectic day, did not neglect to keep the secluded girls informed. "They've rung for their coffee now," she said. "It'll take 'em a good thirty minutes to get recom-posed." recom-posed." At the end of an hour, she appeared ap-peared again. "Mr. Hardesty 'phoned have you any bad effects afterward and he feels the same and they ought to be composed by now, if ever." The girls got up at once, a little frightened, but determined. "Shall we dress?" asked Adcle. . "Um, no, I think not," said Lim-py Lim-py sagely. "We'd better go as we are. Don't brush your hair, Adele. Don't be too slick. We look more votes-appealy in our bathrobes and a little tousled. But not too tousled. tou-sled. Not tousled enough to be tough." In bathrobes and slippers, effectively effec-tively tousled but not tough, they slipped down the hall to that suddenly sud-denly dread door keeping sharp lookout for cameras as they went. Limpy knocked bravely but her heart was heavy. "Anybody but reporters can come in and welcome!" boomed Aunt Olympia joyously. Limpy opened the door. Aunt Olympia and Uncle Lancy were sitting sit-ting bolt upright in beds strewn with pages of the morning papers. Both were redly flushed with excitement, beaming broadly. Aunt Olympia held out her arms to them. Uncle Lancy wiped his glasses. "Oh hello," said Limpy, taken back by the surprising cheerfulness of the scene. "Good morning," said Adele faint- ly. "Come In, you dear precious darlings," dar-lings," cooed Aunt Olympia. "Ring for coffee, my dear!" said the Senator. "They look pale. Sit down, girls. Nice legs you've got, my dears." The girls stopped short and looked at each other. "Would you think maybe the campaign cam-paign has gone to their cerebellums?" cerebel-lums?" asked Limpy. "How adorable and rested you do look!" said Aunt Olympia. "You must have had a good night's sleep." ."Did we sleep, Adele?" "I don't remember." "We must be on guard though," said Limpy. "These seemingly simple sim-ple cases often turn violent at a moment's notice." . "We must be armed to protect ourselves," said Adele. "We can use chairs if we have to. Keep close to a chair, Limpy." "Oh, by the way, I forgot to tell you," said Limpy. "We have bad news for you." "Bad news!" "Oh, did you catch cold?" wailed Aunt Olympia, in an immediate panic. pan-ic. "No. Be calm. We didn't catch anything." Limpy's small face puckered puck-ered with a sudden sadness. "We lost something. We lost" "Tish, tish," said the Senator kindly. kind-ly. "Don't give it a minute's thought. I'll buy you another. Where's my checkbook?" "You can't buy this," said Limpy, feeling suddenly sad and forlorn and homesick. "It is something not for sale! Never for sale! It's Helen." The smile faded from the Senator's Sena-tor's face. He glanced almost accusingly ac-cusingly at the shocked Olympia. "You've lost Helen!" she stammered. stam-mered. "My dear," said the Senator, reproachfully, re-proachfully, "didn't you make sure we had them all with us in the car last night? Do you mean," he went on, becoming excited, "that one of our children is still running around at large among Republicans in in a wet bathing suit?" Limpy laughed tearfully. "Oh, we brought her home all right! but well you know, this sacred franchise." fran-chise." "Franchise!" ejaculated Aunt Olympia. "She's feverish! She wants to buy a bus line." "Not that kind of a franchise. I mean the vote. Helen got up this morning and took a plane out to Iowa to vote." "When is she going?" demanded Aunt Olympia. "She's gone. She went at six o'clock." Aunt Olympia turned briskly to the Senator. "Del, make a note of that. Call Dave. Tell him to get it in all the Monday papers. That's the kind of citizens we are! After a night like last night, we send one of our children by plane out to Iowa just to cast her sacred vote." "Did she take time to dress?" asked the Senator. "Oh, yes. She dressed. We helped her. She looked lovely." "She took the wind-up costume along to vote in," said Adele helpfully. help-fully. "Maybe she can get us our groceries gro-ceries at wholesale from this on," said Aunt Olympia philosophically. "Will she be back after the election?" elec-tion?" asked Uncle Lancy. The faint, familiar flicker flashed between the girls. "Um well I rather doubt it," said Adele. "Not for a while, at least," said Limpy. "She's not going to send for you girls to come out there, is she?" quavered Aunt Olympia. "Um well I rather doubt it," said Adele. "Not for a while, anyhow," said Limpy. "I'll have her mail stopped," declared de-clared Aunt Olympia. "I'll hire a detective. I said she could go when she liked and she can go if she likes. But if she tries to get you away, I'll sue her." "She won't try to get us," said Adele soothingly. "She'll have her hands full without us. And she may be back, you know." "For a while, at least," added Limpy. "My dear," said the Senator suddenly, sud-denly, "ring for Hilda. Tell her to call the highest official of that line and tell him to report to me every hour how the plane goes through. This is a murky day for flying." Tears came to Limpy's eyes. She went over and sat down beside him on the bed and kissed the rosy bald spot on top of his head. "Uncle Lancy." she said humbly, "I'm really just sick about disgracing disgrac-ing you the way I did. I lost my temper and couldn't help it. But there's one thing you've got to say about my speech. I told the truth, and not many campaigners can say as much. I said you were a swell guy and you are a swell guy!" "You didn't disgrace him," said Aunt Olympia jealously. "Sit down, Adele. Sit here by me. Even Hilda realizes you seem 'to have did all right for yourselves.' Haven't you seen the papers?" The girls covered their eyes with their hands. They groaned. "No! No, pleaje!" , "No papers! Anything but papers!" pa-pers!" "Oh, have a heart. Auntie! Don't rub it in!" "Why, you silly little dunces I mean darlings," roared Aunt Olympia Olym-pia fondly. "Everything's lovely! Everything's jake! In fact, hunky-dory! hunky-dory! They liked it" "They liked what?" asked Adele timidly. "You," said the Senator. "All of you." "They're outraged! They're furious! furi-ous! It's an insult to the nation! Their national sense of decency is cut to the core!" "I don't blame them," faltered Limpy. j "No, no, not you! The Opposition! , . . . After all, the public's seen plenty of legs. Legs are nothing . . . Though a God's blessing they're good legs, I must say . . . It's Brother Wilkie they're cursing. Even the White House called up." "Is is it in the papers?" asked Limpy feebly. "Certainly it is in the papers! The papers are full of it!" "Oh . . . They are . . . Are they? . . . Did anybody mention my ' speech?" "They say it was the best speech' made in any campaign this year. They print it in full even to Helen's reminding you about the brats. It' was a great speech, Limpy. I wish I'd made it ... I Just wish I could see Len Hardesty's face now!" Limpy, blushing faintly, reached for a paper. "Oh, Adele," she cried. "How sweet how proud you look!" "Look at this one of you, Limpy. Look, where you come out of the truck. See what it says. AMERICA'S AMERI-CA'S LITTLEST STATE S WOMAN TAKES A BOW. Isn't that sweet!", "Look at this one of Brother Wilkie Wil-kie standing on the platform with his mouth open," said the Senator. "Look at this one of Len Hardesty Hardes-ty standing there like a snake-in-the-grass beside the truck as you pass by!" "Did did anybody hear what he said?" asked Adele, nervously. "No. It just says he was muttering mutter-ing angrily. What did he say, Adele.?" "Oh, he just said oh, he didn't say anything he just muttered," said Adele. "Look at this one" of the Senator wrapping Limpy in his coat! Isn't that the noblest picture you ever t . . "They liked what?" asked Adele timidly. saw of the Senator? Doesn't he look like a real Napoleon standing there with his arms full?" "We'd better save these pictures and send them to Helen," said Limpy. Lim-py. "She was so embarrassed. She'll feel better when she sees they aren't so bad. We don't show half as much leg as girdle and stocking ads." "She'll see them," said Aunt Olympia. "Everybody'll see them." She mopped tears of joy from her eyes. "These pictures have swept the country. They've swept the world. I'll bet the King of England is looking at these pictures this morning . . . Look at this one of me, Adele. It's not very flattering, but it just shows how upset and motherly I am. It'll pull the woman-vote." Hilda appeared once more. "There's an awful lot of people on their way here about one thing and another and there's plenty downstairs now in my opinion eating us out of house and home and Mr. Allen says bygones is bygones " The Senator coughed deprecating-ly. deprecating-ly. "Hilda," he reproved her gently. gen-tly. "The young ladies are present pres-ent We can dispense with the gory details." "And the camera men are waiting wait-ing to get a picture of you and him and his bloody nose with your arms around each other and Mr. Farley says you call him as soon as you wake up and whatever you need you can have and that Ambassador to England says you can have your pick of his nine to get them in training for future and someone whose name we didn't rightly get 'phoned from Iowa and says will Miss Limpy he said Limpy be his campaign manager in '40 and would you like more coffee? And Mr. Hardesty Har-desty 'phones have you any symptoms symp-toms and he feels the same " "My dear," said the Senator. "I think I'd better shave." (TO BE COXTIMED) 1. Francis Hopkinson, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, Independ-ence, designed the Stars and Stripes. 2. In old-time wars, messages ! were written on paper and tied to arrows to b shot to the enemy. 3. Washington received no salary sal-ary during his terms as President. 4. Zero. 5. Large liners require more than a million gallons of fresh water, wa-ter, for one trip across. 6. Head (it's a wig). 7. It was formerly used as a sign of serfdom among slaves in Ancient Rome. 8. Harvard, founded in 1636. |