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than I. Neither of the girls were much to look at although Beth was somewhat on the voluptuous side, big, busty, but also with weak eyes and thick glasses. However, Beth was a self-starting speed-ball who was ready for anything, promoted get-togethers and parties, liked to dance, talk, kid, and hold her own with any of them. One of her services was forging excuses for kids who'd skipped school.

Across the street from us, lived a Mrs. Persse, a widow, and her only child, Burton Glover Persse, my age. Mrs. Persse had been widowed a few years before but had been left with insufficient funds to avoid working to keep herself and her son. She had a job in one of the big department stores downtown, I think clerking. The Persses were good people, Roman Catholics, and I believe that Mr. Persse had been in the oil business somehow. Jack, Burton Glover's nickname, and I became fast friends, and I picked up this close friendship with him as I rapidly relinquished a similar relationship with Jimmie Halsted. The Persses lived in a lower flat of considerable antiquity and their place was jammed full of old furniture, drab and gloomy, and I think it depressed me to go over there, as I preferred our bright, modern apartment. Jack was a good-looking boy with curly, reddish hair, good-sized, and quite a sprinter although he never indulged in baseball and football at school. He was one of the ring leaders in the gang that hung out at the Montgomerys. He enjoyed reading and was quite original in writing various imaginative things such as a short story which I published in my paper -- in fact, Jack and I were co-editors of the paper at first but he dropped out after a few weeks. I am still in touch with Jack at Christmas time, Jack having married an old flame of mine, Louise Neale, who died about five years ago. More of this later. 

Next to the Montgomerys on Graves Street lived the Traubs. Mr. Traub was a letter carrier, I believe, or working in the post office. The Traubs had two sons, David and Paul, Dave being my age and Paul a couple of years younger. Dave was one of the gang. The Traub home, which they owned, was a small, square, clapboard house but it was neat inside and out and immaculate, yard and all. The boys had been well trained by Mrs. Traub to be polite and well-behaved and Dave, in particular, was quite a boy, winding up at West Point and, I think, making the Army his career. I became well acquainted with the Train boys and liked them.

Next to Persses lived a Protestant minister named Beebe and his wife and two sons, the Rev. Beebe being the pastor of the church on the corner of Douglas and Graves across from the Montgomerys. I never got very well acquainted with the Beebe boys and I don't remember that they figured in the high jinks going on at the Montgomerys; perhaps the Reverend disapproved of this and wouldn't let them participate. Also they moved away shortly.