1937-03-11 — Page 11

Strictly On The Level

of

-

couldn't-

"What's Class B-Class A being the self ID you ever hear the one about back, driving the horses half crazy Smith. Mr. Smith says:

the old lady who starved to and getting nowhere fast. By night- your name, little girl?" and the lit- cocking, full-floating type like

only halfway to tle girl, feeling contrary, answers: old Arab and Mr. Smith. death? Stop me whether you have fall they were

A rich Englishman went away to or not, because it's terrible. The Medina, the horses were dead beat "My name is the same as my moth- only thing to be said against the --and they were still neck and neck er's" "Ah," says Mr. Smith, "then Cannes, say, leaving his butler with enigma-story is that some member They agreed to put up overnight at your name's Margaret?" "Yes," orders to forward him some impor of the party is always-dragging in a convenient caravanserai, get some says the little girl. Now just how tant papers that were due in the the old lady who starved to death. sleep and start fresh in the morn did Mr. Smith know that the name mail the morning after he left, giv-

was Margaret?

ing instructions as to identifying Otherwise the enigma is one of the ing.

Inside more satisfactory ways of catering

the caravanserai they The victim may ask questions if the envelope. He waited in Cannes to human beings' longings to be

found a wise old Arab to whom they he likes, but there's no point in do- a week and no papers came, so he The facts are to be wired the butler asking what was made to feel like fools. It has lit-

told their troubles. He said their ing so here.

The butler wired back that tle or nothing in common with post problem was extremely simple taken as given and

no more are wrong.

there he could office, anagrams, ghosts, or any

whispered something in one bro- necessary. Somewhere is the ans- the papers were those all too numerous parlor-games ther's ear, whispered the same thing wer, as obvious as the lyric of a see the envelope through the slot in which call for paper and enough in the other brother's ear and went love-song. Unless you see it right the mail-box-bat master had gone pencils to go around. Unlike amat out. The brothers slapped their away, you're sunk. The more in- off with the key and he

(You have to assume a eur magic it has the virtue of sim- knees in delight and went to bed genious you are, the straighter you open it.

dumb plicity and, in the best examples, in the morning they got up at the think, the worse off you are.

Not butler too

to waylay the the beauties of intellectual honesty crack of dawn, saddled the horses one in two hundred lands it. Only mailman or get a locksmith.) Mas-

Oriental peoples are extremely

and rode for Medina hell-bent for a sheer genius or a bright child ter wired back that he was sending But fond of the yarn with a stinger in election, as fast as the fresh horses stands a chance. It has the Indian the key and rush the papers.

to Cannes. its tail. Some of the current crop could set hoof to the ground under sign on crack mathematicians and the papers never got may sound like samples from those whip and spur all the way. It was hack-drivers alike. I have seen one Why not?

You'll get questions like these: books of compressed detective-mys- a swell race. One horse won-one of the most eminent lawyers in the teries which challenge you to do a horse lost-and the requirements of country, a man with a brain like a Yes, master was still waiting at Sherlock Holmes in two minutes. the will were met.” But what did steel-trap, pore over a typewritten Cannes. No, the butler didn't die But the connoisseur of enigmas the wise old Arab say to make them copy of that story for a week and in the meantime. Yes the key scorns the red herrings and fluky act that way? motivations of detective tales in

a fairly canny person in your audi- general "His choicest specimens

ence, you'll eventually get the right:

the answer that master mailed are simple as Mother Goose, shrewd as Mark Hanna and baffling as 2

key to the butler and it also was locked inside the box. knot in a shoe-lace. They may oc-

You can, if you like, tantalise the casionally contain the element

Just a couple of cautionary re- Tell him he marks. Watch crime-detection, but the main point tale probably goes back to the time victim with hints

your step when is never who killed Cock Robin or of Hammurabi and was very famil- has made a false assumption and telling about Mr. Smith and his old what was the flaw in his alibi. iar to your great-aunt Sophie, as let him try and find it. If he's a friend. Unless you're as wary as An example, of first quality but she will probably tell you if you try linguist; point out to him that he a professional witness, you'll slip in easier than most, should be the it on her. Whatever its age, you're couldn't tell that story in any well a "he" or a "she" instead of stick- European language but ing to "friend" and then you've best explanation of what this is all rather better than average smart if known

spoiled it. about. That means the one about you can hang the ring on it. It's English without giving it away

As for the other cautionary re- the old Arab, which has a certain a good example because there's no which is true, but it won't do him flavour to boot. He was a testy clutter, no spare props, nothing but any good. The dismaying answer, mark - never let anybody tell you only which makes the enigma no enigma about the old lady who starved to old gentleman whose two sons were a bare situation which calis crazy about horse-racing and each for cooniness in the solution, like at all, is that Mr. Smith's old friend death. It'll spoil your intellectual owned a fast horse. Their inces the fox, the goose and the bag of was a woman-and it was by no palate the way an onion would spoil sant arguments as to which horse corn. Among reasonably bright means unnatural that he should coffee. In fact, just to make sure But, you'll never let anybody tell it to was faster got sadly in the old people, one in three or four gets have known her first name.

you are at you, I'll tell it to you myself. gentleman's hair, so much so that, it. He will grin presently and say no matter how smart

A mildly wealthy old couple had when he died, he left a will be that the wise old Arab told the cards, crossword puzzles or the croc- queathing all his property to that boys to change horses. To which kery business, you always assume a country-house where they lived son whose horse should lose in a the chorus will respond: "Why, I that Mr. Smith's old friend was a the year round, nursing, the old gen-

man and then you're gone. Maybe tleman's heart-trouble.

The place race from Mecca to Medina. That never thought of that."

give up in disgust.

by J. C. FURNAS

of In one or another version that

arrived. And so forth. If there's

was his way of expressing what he If you got the old Arab's number that's the Anglo-Saxon mind for was quite isolated and, when the thought of horsey people in general and are rashly inclined to think you, as well as the English langu- old lady fired the whole staff of ser- and his two boys in particular that this is simple business, here is age, in which the gender of "friend" vants one day and sent them pack-

This problem of how to lose a the toughest of the lot to chew on. is not clearly indicated.

ing, there was nobody round but That is the cream of the collec- herself and her husband.

She race when the other fellow also It has the additional recommenda-

it contains nothing wrote an employment agency in a wanted to lose had the boys com- tion of being the simplest. A man tion because pletely baffled. But they had to try named Smith-Jones, if you like whatever but the bare essentials of nearby city for a new staff of ser- it because, unless the race was held, goes walking and meets an old a hair-trigger trap which gets its vants, but told them not to be in a hurry take their time and pick all the property went to Mecca friend whom he hasn't seen or heard man every time.

Lodge No. 3 of the Odd Fellows. So of for twenty years. The old friend The butler and the mail-box have some good ones, she said, and in off they started for Medina, each says: "Tve been married since we points. Here we get into the kind the meantime she could. telephone as set on getting there second as last met. We have a little daugh- of enigmas which make it worth the village for provisions and keep a crooked jockey riding the favour- ter-here she is." The little daugh- the victim's while to ask ite, reining in all the time, turning ter appears and is presented to Mr. questions. That,

FATHER OWEN DUDLEY ON

LUST

OR

LOVE?

of

courfew the place going herself. When the

is new servants arrived a couple of weeks later, they found the old gentleman dead in bed upstairs the autopsy proved his heart had finally killed him and the old lady starved to death.

The kitchen was full of all kinds. of food, the telephone was working,

HERE is a kind of slapstick passion which ends and ends school regard sex-love as essential and yet the doctor said she had cer- Tlove making presented on the pametimes na the Divorce Court, yormal, to the ruling out of in- tainly starved. The old gentleman screen, which lays emphasis on True love is based on something tellectual sympathy, friendship had been dead almost two weeks, physical attractions t to the exclu- deeper than the flesh. It is also personal attachment and devotion the old lady only a few days. Ob--- sion of all else. It is a presenta based on something deeper than And yet those factors constitute viously the question is how had tion of love which conveys false emotion.

the permanent element of all en- she managed to starve a house notions to millions of young men. What exactly is love?

during love between men and wo full of food?

She hadn't broken her leg. She and, women. The average roman Is it merely a sloppy feeling that men.

and foot tic film takes it for granted that makes young men go groggy at the There must be that moral union wasn't bound hand love and passion are the same knees? An ecstasy induced by which consists in oneness of will, thieves. When they start asking thing, only a few exceptional films moonlight? Or producing lyrics and that oneness of will can only you where she was found, you can draw a distinction.

about her eyes like the stars at be achieved and aintained when truthfully say she wasn't in the liv

ight?

a bed-room or the cel- the two are at one their spirit- ing-room

far or the attic or on the stairs or, ual and inte

fion of for that matter in any room. But she was inside house, Don't mion of let people suffer too long over that

of the It's not worth

he was in the the first few tomatic ele

there on zc-

to

other's

That squelchy vacuum-cleaner kiss, with the two gummed gether like limpets, pawing mauling and biting each necke, is scarcely calculated raise the ideals of love..

Love that is

is not

lominated

the love that h

Some people experience similar feelings when they are tight. Those feelings may be

fects of love in emotional natures; they are not love in itself. Love something far stronger than passing emotion.

Endless novV

the

amera

the old gentleman's heart and stalled be-