U.S.A_ - John Dos Passos [118]
"Wel , I declare," said Ada when they were safely on the train for New York. "I think you've lost your mind."
"You'd have done the same thing, Ada darlin', if you'd seen what I saw . . . when I tel Dad and the boys about it they'l see red. It's the most outrageous thing I ever heard of." Then she burst out crying.
When they got back to Ada's apartment they found a
telegram from Dad saying Coming at once. Make no state- ment until I arrive. Late that night another telegram came; it read: Dad seriously ill come on home at once have Ada retain best lawyer obtainable. In the morning Daughter scared and trembling was on the first train south. At St. Louis she got a telegram saying Don't worry condition fair double pneumonia. Upset as she was it cer-tainly did her good to see the wide Texas country, the spring crops beginning, a few bluebonnets in bloom. Buster was there to meet her at the depot, "Wel , Daughter," he said after he had taken her bag, "you've almost kil ed Dad."
-278-Buster was sixteen and captain of the highschool bal team. Driving her up to the house in the new Stutz he told her how things were. Bud had been tearing things up at the University and was on the edge of getting fired and had gotten bal ed up with a girl in Galveston who was trying to blackmail him. Dad had been very much worried because he'd gotten in too deep in the oil game and seeing Daughter spread al over the front page for knocking down a cop had about finished him; old Emma was getting too old to run the house for them anymore and it was up to Daughter to give up her crazy ideas and stay home and keep house for them. "See this car? A dandy ain't it. . . . I bought it myself.
. . . Did a little tradin' in options up near Amaril o on my own, jus' for the hel of it, and I made five thousand bucks." "Why, you smart kid. I tel you, Bud, it's good to be home. But about that policeman you'd have done the same yourself or you're not my brother. I'l tel you al about it sometime. Believe me it does me good to see Texas faces after those mean weasel-faced Easterners." Dr. Winslow was in the hal when they came in. He shook hands warmly and told her how wel she was looking and not to worry because he'd pul her Dad through if it was the last thing he did on earth. The sickroom and Dad's restless flushed face made her feel awful, and she didn't like finding a trained nurse running the house.
After Dad began to get around a little they both went down to Port Arthur for a couple of weeks for a change to stay with an old friend of Dad's. Dad said he'd give her a car if she'd stay on, and that he'd get her out of this sil y mess she'd gotten into up north. She began to play a lot of tennis and golf again and to go out a good deal social y. Joe Washburn had married and was living in Oklahoma getting rich on oil. She felt easier in Dal as when he wasn't there; seeing him upset her so. The next fal Daughter went down to Austin to
-279-finish her journalism course, mostly because she thought her being there would keep Bud in the straight and nar-row. Friday afternoons they drove back home together in her Buick sedan for the weekend. Dad had bought a new Tudor style house way out and al her spare time was taken up picking out furniture and hanging curtains and arranging the rooms. She had a great many beaux always coming around to take her out and had to start keeping an engagement book. Especial y after the declaration of war social life became very hectic. She was going every minute and never got any sleep. Everybody was getting commis-sions or leaving for officers training camps. Daughter went in for Red Cross work and organized a canteen, but