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The Old Order
Changeth
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By DeLYSLE FERREE CASS
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(Copyright)
FIFTEEN minutes of twelve!
A brief quarter of an hour later
and all the town bells would be
madly ringing; the factory whis
tles would be tooting; horns would
shrill raucously; the restless crowds
surging aimlessly through the streets
would raise voices in the hysterical
pandemonium that customarily wakes
the dying year into extinction.
“Then,” said Myrtle the telephone
girl to herself, “then my busy time
commences. Every lunatic in town
will begin trying to get his or her
friends on the wire to yell ‘Happy
New Year!’—everybody will be want
ing their numbers at once and all sore
because the telephone company hasn’t
put in 5,000 extra wires for their es
pecial convenience tonight.”
The metal loop with the receiver at
her ear had grown irksome and heavy
on Myrtle’s head. Her hand raised to
adjust it more comfortably just as
one of the little white lights flashed on
before her.
“Number please” (plugging the hole)
,. . Grand 4354 . . . What did you
say . . Yes, I know I ‘have a sweet
voice,’ but my name don’t happen to be
‘Kiddo’ . . . There you are.”
Just then another light flashed in
Myrtle’s section.
“Number please . . . Riverview 4197
, . . Thank you . . . What? . . . Oh, I
beg your pardon . . . 4111.”
“Why don’t you listen as you’re paid
to do?” growled back a man’s voice
over the wire. His articulation was
thick, hoarse. Evidently he was labor
ing under some tremendous strain.
However it is not for the mere tele
phone operator to resent, whatever her
provocation.
“4111, thank you,” said Myrtle in
the same pleasantly modulated tone as
before and made the proper connec
tion. But not even then being certain
r
n
I
The U9'y Revolver in His Hand.
man’cSl« ha<i correctly understood the
the lin,liCk. directions, she cut in on
forestan f U.lten for a moment and so
With +5urther complaints from him.
her PnV , receiver clamped tight to
buz7inrr Ve could hear the ’phone bell
S—taintl^ across the city—in a
house, Myrtle judged, because the Riv
erview exchange lay in the aristocratic
residential section. Buzz—Buzz-zz—z!
Then came a woman’s voice—soft,
sweet and low.
“Hello ... Oh, is that you, Jim? I
had gotten quite anxious about you. I
expected you home to dinner tonight.
You promised, you know. . . . And
Snookums’ was so disappointed when
I had to tuc^c him in bed without kiss
ing his papa good night. He was so
excited by all the noise on the streets
and kept asking me if his bad daddy
wouldn’t come home early to him on
New Year’s eve. I really think you
might have, Jim, because—’’
“Oh, I know! I know !” interrupted
the man’s voice impatiently, although
he evidently was making a strong ef
fort to conceal his distraught condition
from her. “Business detained me at
the office later than I anticipated, Ed
na, and afterwards . . . afterwards
Harry Forbes dropped in and we went
out for a bite to eat together.”
“But you’ll be home right away now,
won’t you, dear?” pleaded the woman’s
voice coaxingly. “Please don’t stay
any later. I’ve promised ‘Snookums’
that you’ll be home to wish him a Hap
py New Year while the whistles are
still blowing.”
“I can’t possibly make it now . . .
there’s a big deal we’re talking over.”
“Jim”—reproachfully — “I thought
you assured me you never would dab
ble in the market again after that last
time when you risked all we had in the
world simply on the chance of making
a few dollars without really earning
“Edna, I—I—”
“Jim, your very voice sounds queer
ly. Nothing has gone wrong at the of
fice there today, has there, dear?”
“No . . . No, nothing,” came the
man’s voice wearily, soothingly. “Don’t
worry now . . . -To use any more. Ex
cuse me if I spoke sharply, little girl.
I’m tired out—that’s all . . . Yes, yes
. . . Good-by, dearest one.”
The receiver clicked sharply and the
listening Myrtle experienced a sense of
physical relief, the exact reason for
which she would have been at a loss
to explain. How strangely the man
had intoned his good-bye—almost as
if he never expected to be able to say
it again to the wife he loved. It was
as if—
"xes, number please . . . un—
It was the voifce of the same man
speaking crossly over the wire.
“Get me Grant 6212—quick!” he
growled. “I’m in a hurry.”
She plugged the proper hole con
necting him and listened for a mo
ment.
“Hello! Grant 6212? the Morgue?
Well, this is James P. Thornton talk
ing. Yes, J-A-M-E-S Thornton of J.
P. Thornton, Inc. I’m about to com
mit suicide in my office at 1478 Stock
Exchange building. If you’ll send your
men over here within 15 minutes
they’ll find my body here . . . Door’s
unlocked, ready for you. Statement
for the newspapers will be found on
desk. I’ve just completed it. . . . Was
smashed in collapse of market on the
board floor this afternoon ... No,
that’s—and then, ironically — all . • #
Happy New Year!”
His receiver clicked down on the
hook, severing the connection in the
midst of horrified abjurations from the
other end of the wire. Simultaneously
Myrtle, the telephone girl, jerked the
metal loop from her head and sprang
down the aisle, disregarding the sur
prised exclamations of her fellows and
the imperative call of the supervisor.
She grabbed her hat and shabby little
jacket from their peg on the locker
room wall as she fled.
A suicide? ... he was about to die
by his own hand ... . And with that
sweet-voiced wife waiting for him
there at home with the dear little kid
die tucked up in bed and crying for his
daddy’s good-night kiss! It was wrong
—all wrong! ... To stop him! Ah,
if only she could get there in time!
There was a chance—a slim chance,
for ij happened that the Stock Ex
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change was directly next door to the
big gray telephone building.
Fortunately the night elevator man
had his car waiting there on the main
floor, w'hile he leaned against the side
of the cage gossiping with one of the
scrub women. Myrtle bounded in, star
tling both nearly out of their wits.
| “Quick!” she panted, seizing his arm
with tense fingers, “The fourteenth
floor . . . Not an instant to spare!”
1 “But it’s against rules to let you go
up there at this unholy time of night
unless you’ve got a permit,” expostu
lated the bewildered elevator man.
j “You can’t—”
Myrtle drove the motive lever home
herself and the iron cage shot swiftly
upwards before the man could stop
her. It was a sickening breathless rise
• . . Ah! the fourteenth floor at last!
Precious moments wasted fumbling
with the mechanism of the elevator
door . . . Then through it and out . . .
| the staccato clatter of little high heels
racing down the long dim, empty cor
ridor to where a blotch of light showed
through the transom of Suite 1478.
j For a brief second Myrtle’s heart
suspended its pulsation and she hesi
tated with her trembling hand out
I stretched to turn the knob. What if
she should find—should 'find him al
I ready the victim of his own mad act—
lying there on the richly-carpeted floor
| of the sumptuously furnished offices
j with a pool of blood slowly coagulating
around the bullet hole in his temple.
1 If—
But Myrtle, the telephone girl, walt
zed to conjecture no longer. She threw
her weight against the unlocked door.
It gave suddenly and precipitated her
| inwards coincidently with her frenzied
! cry of:
“STOP!”
The naan sitting at the long mahog
any desk with the ugly revolver al
ready in his hand half started to his
feet, his face ashen; stared at this
most unexpected intruder, bulge-eyed.
He seemed unable to collect his
thoughts; only passed his hand over
his mouth two or three times, mutter
ing in a half-witted way: “Who . . .
who . . . what . .
Then he toppled suddenly and fell
flat on his face to the floor.
“Dead!” groaned Myrtle, horror
stricken, dropping to her knees beside
the inaminate form.
nuw ; gruuieu uie eievator man,
who just then joined her. “He’s fainted
—that’s all, kid. Better go git me a
wet rag to sop his face with. That’ll
bring him ’round in a jiffy.”
But Myrtle was already seated at
the adjacent telephone, calling the
number she so well remembered:
“Yes, yes, operator . . . That’s it,
Riverview 4111. . . . Hello! . . . hel
lo ! Is this Mrs. Thornton talking? . . .
No, you don’t know me, but that
doesn’t matter. You hurry and wake
up ‘Snookums;’ put on all his things
and hurry down here to Mr. Thorn
ton’s office. He needs you . . . Asked
me to call you up. . . . Says he wants
to begin a Happy New Year with you
and the baby right dowTn here. . . .
You’ll come right away . . . All right,
thank you ... Yes, I’ll wait here too—”
And just then a deafening racket of
horns, whistles and bells burst forth,
while hundreds of little white lights
began to flash here and there along
their great switchboard in the nearby
telephone exchange, and the girls’
hands flew to the connections. And, as
James Thornton slowly revived under
the tender, solicitous ministrations of
the ’phone girl and the grimy elevator
man, a white light illumined his soul
also.
“Where’s ‘Snookums?’ ” he queried
weakly.
But Some Can Do It.
How does an old bachelor make
love, anyway? Surely after one has
! been encrusted with the dust and
j toughness of three-score years or more
! he can’t reel off that baby talk that is
1 so foolish and sweet in the ruddy morn
I ing of life.
PROFESSIONAL CARDS
J. H. WEST
PHYSICIAN AND SURGEON.
Calls answered promptly
day or night.
Grays, Arkansas
DR. R. L. FRASER,
IS READY TO ANSWER
CALLS, DAY OR NIGHT.
Phone Number 2,
McCrory, .'. Arkansas
L. B. WINFREE, J. P.
CONVEYANCES
G. W. BARBER
NOTARY PUBLIC
AND INSURANCE
Mr. and Mrs. G. L. Carson left
Sunday for Hot Springs where
the former hopes to regain his
health.
Died: Friday, Jan. 5, 1917,
Mrs. John Pierce, age 36 years,
on the T. A. Jeffries’ farm north
of Fakes station.
Mr. Paul Taylor left Thursday
for Chillieothe, Mo., to enter a
business college. He will take a
full course and we are sure will
finish with first honors.
LO WtSTt FARES
NOW IN EFFECT
TO THE
SOUTHEAST
AND
SOUTHWEST
For full information write to
or call on
TICKET AGENT, ROCK ISLAND LINES
or
CHAS. B. SLOAT
AuL Goal Pass. Ait. Littlo Rock. Aik
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