Ma Pettengill

by Harry Leon Wilson

The awestruck group split up outside. Nothing like this had ever entered our dull lives, and it was too soon to talk about it. Cousin Egbert walked downtown with me and even he said only a few little things. He still called the lady a glass blower, and said if she must paint at all why not paint family pictures that could be hung in the home. He said, what with every barroom in the state closed, there couldn't be much demand for them Grinitch paintings. He also said, after another block, that if he owned this lady and wanted to get her in shape to sell he'd put her out on short sand grass, short almost to the roots, where she'd wear her teeth down. And a block later he said she hadn't ought to be calling everyone comrade that way—it sounded too much like a German. Still and all, he said, there was something about her. He didn't say what.

So now the Latin Quarter had begun, and in no time at all it was going strong. It seemed like everybody had long been wanting to get away from it all but hadn't known how. They gathered daily in Metta's studio, the women setting round in smocks, they all took to wearing smocks, of course, while hungry-eyed Vernabelle got the men to tell her all about themselves, and said wasn't it precious that a few choice spirits could thus meet in the little half-lighted hour, away from it all, and be by way of forgetting that outer world where human souls are bartered in the market place.

Of course the elderberry wine was by way of giving plumb out after the second half-lighted hour, but others come forward with cherished offerings. Mrs. Dr. Percy Hailey Martingale brought round some currant wine that had been laid down in her cellar over a year ago, and Beryl Mae Macomber pilfered a quart of homemade cherry brandy that her aunt had been saving against sickness, and even Mrs. Judge Ballard kicked in with some blackberry cordial made from her own berries, though originally meant for medicine.

Lon Price was a feverish Bohemian from the start, dropping in almost every day to tell Vernabelle all about himself and get out of convention's shell into the raw throb of life, as it was now being called. Lon always was kind of light-minded, even after the state went dry. He told Vernabelle he had a treasured keepsake hid away which he would sacrifice to Bohemia at the last moment, consisting of one quart bottle of prime old rye. And he was going to make over to her a choice building lot in Price's Addition, right near the proposed site of the Carnegie library, if Vernabelle would put up something snappy on it in the way of a Latin Quarter bungalow.

Lon also added Jeff Tuttle to the Bohemians the day that old horned toad got down from his ranch. After going once Jeff said darned if he hadn't been a Bohemian all his life and never knew what was the matter with him. Vernabelle had him telling her all about himself instantly. She said he was such a colourful bit, so virile and red-blooded, and she just knew that when he was in his untamed wilderness he put vine leaves in his hair and went beautifully barefoot. She said it wasn't so much him as the inevitability of him. She'd said this about Cousin Egbert, too, but she was now saying of this old silly that he had a nameless pathos that cut to her artist's heart. It seems Cousin Egbert had gone round a couple times more looking for glass blowing and getting disappointed.

And there was new Bohemians every day. Otto Gashwiler, that keeps books for the canning factory, and Hugo Jennings, night clerk of the Occidental Hotel, was now prominent lights of the good old Latin Quarter passing their spare moments there where they could get away from it all, instead of shaking dice at the Owl cigar store, like they used to. And Oswald Cummings of the Elite Bootery, was another. Oswald is a big fair-haired lummox that sings tenor in the Presbyterian choir and has the young men's Bible class in the Sabbath School. Vernabelle lost no time in telling him that he was oh, so frankly a pagan creature, born for splendid sins; and Otto seemed to believe it for a couple of weeks, going round absent like as if trying to think up some sins that would be splendid, though if any one but a Bohemian had told him this he'd have blushed himself to death. It shows you what a hold Vernabelle was by way of getting on Red Gap.

It was sure one season of triumph for Metta Bigler, who lurked proudly in the background as manager. Metta's mother wasn't near so thrilled as Metta, though. She confided to me that Bohemians was a messy lot to clean up after, raining cigarette ashes over everything; and also it was pretty hard to have raised a child to Metta's age only to see her become a cigarette fiend overnight, and having these mad revels with currant wine and other intoxicants—and Metta was even using a lip stick!

And Metta's mother wasn't the only one in town looking sidewise at these Bohemian doings. There was them that held aloof from the beginning and would give their bitter reasons at every opportunity. These was the ultra-conservative element of the North Side set, and what they said about the new Latin Quarter was a plenty. They said it was mostly an excuse for drunken orgies in which all sense of decency was cast aside, to say nothing of cigarettes being brazenly smoked by so-called ladies. They said this here talk about getting away from it all meant the ruin of the home upon which all durable civilization must be built; and as for wives and mothers going round without their stockings look at what befell proud Rome! And it was time something was done to stem this tide of corruption.

Mrs. Cora Wales and Mrs. Tracy Bangs, president and vice-president of our anti-tobacco league, was the leaders of this movement and sent in a long complaint to the chamber of commerce urging instant action or a foul blot would be splashed on the fair name of our city, to say nothing of homes being broken up. They was ably backed up in this move by a committee from the civic purity league.

And of course this added to the attractions of the Latin Quarter, giving each Bohemian a new thrill. Vernabelle said it was by way of being ancient history; that from time immemorial these little groups of choice spirits who did things had been scorned and persecuted, but that every true Bohemian would give a light laugh and pursue his carefree way, regardless of the Philistine And so it went, venomous on both sides, but with Vernabelle holding the bridge. She'd brought new stuff to town and had a good working majority in favour of it.