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January 31, 1925 THE HEEBIE JEEBIES 3. THE GUN WOMAN A Girls Adventure to Death By Roger Didier SYNOPSIS The time is that of those forgotten days in the late autumn of 1911. The place is Chicago. The characters in the story are Mrs. Sally Johnson, a stewardess in Monther Bethel; Mrs. Lottie Walker, one of the lady pillars down at old Quinn chapel; Mrs. Betty Green, a wide-awake and suspected worker on Mother Bethel's board of stewardesses; and Mr. and Mrs. George Hill. Mr. Hill is a little man with a very high yellow complexion. He is much older than Mrs. Hill who is noticeably large and noticeably dark. They have just come from Alabama where Mrs. Hill left her rightful husband, Tom Colloway. She introduces herself as Mrs. Calloway-Hill. Mr. Hill has proceeded to get him a high-toned job, passing for white as an elevator operator. Mrs. Hill is nursing social ambitions and has made her first real contact through a party given by Mrs. Betty Green for the newcomers. It would appear that Mrs. Green is scheduled to show Mrs. Calloway-Hill the way. They are to be found now at the old Pekin cafe. With them is Mrs. Green's husband. Mattie's old man has stayed at home. He was too tire to come out. PART VI MATTIE HITS HER STRIDE "Look," she told Betty. "At what? What do you mean?" questioned Betty softly as she leaned over. "Do you see that white man lookin' at me?" Mattie asked as she indicated with her eye the general direction of the man she had caught staring at her. Mrs. Green looked. He was still staring. He turned his gaze for a moment from Mattie to Betty, then back again to Mattie. "I wonder what's the matter with him," Mattie inquired of her friend again. "Oh I don't know, just trying to flirt, I reckon," Betty murmured, adding "Don't pay him no mind." A short while later, the waiter brought Mattie the man's card and the torn half of a ten-dollar bill. She did not understand. She had not yet reached the point in her experiences where she would "take on" anything without thought. The proffer of the money from the white man was entirely new to her. More in confusion than in disdain, she refused to look at the card or accept the money. She was somewhat afraid that Mr. Green would see what was happening. They remained at the cabaret until nearly three in the morning. Mattie got her enjoyment out of watching what the regular habitues of the place did. She tried not to miss anything. She could sense that there was in all this the essence of that freedom for which she yearned. Here was what was going to be her proper milieu. And as they rode home, she did not forget that that white man had stared at her and sent to her half of a ten dollar bill. She made a strong effort to determine just what that might mean. That night Mattie had taken her first taste of the wide-open life To her it was the first drink of coco cola. It was the first bit of "snow." She did not know, nor did Mrs. Green, that she had started, just six months after her arrival in Chicago, upon the career that was going to lead up and down, in and out, of all the fanciful, the glamorous, the dangerous and tragic that a big city holds. She did not understand that the comfortable feeling she experienced was the mere air cushion of a dread fate. Rather -------------- NOW OPEN 35th ST. BAZAAR WEARING APPAREL OF ALL KINDS AT THE VERY LOWEST PRICE Come In, We Will Show You Some Real Bargains MRS. LUCILLE THOMPSON 119 E. 35th St. Chicago --------------- than choosing, it was to appear later that she had been chosen by some invisible hand, power, or call it what you will, to open and close one of those strange, vivid lives that are the part of the wanderer and adventurer in a big city. Mattie had been chosen. She found her freedom. She had reached Chicago and George Hill, her husband, had fallen into the background. She had stepped out. She was going to live. She had found Mrs. Betty Green who also wanted to get a chance at the new freedom for women. But Mrs. Green was left behind, too. George worked on. One year, two years, three years, on and on and on, Mattie played, dared, adventured. For twelve years she lived an audacious symphony. When she had learned her ways well, the war came on. The town opened wide. She was ready for it. She was prepared to assume leadership of the growing group of women who sought to get out from their cramped lives and take in things. White men and their cards didn't scare her any more. She ran through one white man after another. She toyed with the men of her race. She dominated every circumstance. She grew prosperous. She lived on good terms with gentry of varying occupation. While others, timorous and ignorant, gazed in disquieting awe at the denizens of the underworld, Mattie slapped them on the back and was embraced in turn. They never stopped to ask her of her husband. Her husband soon came to know that it would be useless to ask her where she went. They simply lived as man and wife. At one time or another, they roomed at one place or another. Mattie had her things; George had his. She did not care much about what he had; she gave him to understand that he was not to meddle in her affairs. Within the room where they slept, she kept what she called her "chest." It was always locked. Her husband never saw it. When they had come to Chicago, she had been nineteen. He was thirty-eight. He grew older and weaker. She grew older and stronger. She was an amazon. She was proud of it. She crushed people who got in her way. When they were living on Ellis, a man living next door, talked in on the line as she was telephoning. They quarreled and called each other names. Mattie dared him to come out in the hall. When he did appear, she shot him twice, was arrested and released. Once, when her husband sought to remonstrate her, she pulled an arm off a rocking chair and beat him over the head with it. At other times, she would go out on mysterious forays with other men, call her husband up and tell him to keep quiet about it, and command him to go to work. And he didn't complain because as he grew older, he grew weaker; she grew stronger. (Continued next week) ----------------- The Sionilli Adelphia girls met with Miss Lydia Weis Sunday. Final plans were laid for the formal installation dance, February 26. Miss Gale Barnett was a visitor at the club meeting. The next meeting will be held with Miss Amanda Miller, 6010 Wabash ave. The following Sionilli Adelphia mothers are ill: Mrs. Pitts, mother of Kate; Mrs. Hoggs, mother of Luphibia. The misses Alice Huff and Gladys Brumell are still indisposed.
