Milford High School - Oak Lily and Ivy Yearbook (Milford, MA)

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THE OAK, LILY AND IVY. 29 He gazed hollow-eyed into the night. He was flying by dead reckoning. Not a thing was visible in the intense darkness. The wind howled, the rain swished, and still that dismal blackness. “I must do it, I must.” Then again that clutching fear. He shivered, drew his helmet more firmly over his ears, and again peered into the night. Was that a light below? Was it? The ship gave a sudden lurch, and he almost lost control in the screaming wind. It tore at the rudder, it seemed to lift the wings off the plane, and when he righted the plane, the light was nowhere to be seen. “I might have known it,” he muttered. “At least another hour of this agony. Heavens, I can’t stand it,” he sobbed. “Why did I ever do it? Why? Why?” The wind screamed anew. The rain beat in a sheet of ice over the plane. The plane lurched, it trembled, it shook. He was losing control. “Jove, a tailspin, a tailspin!” The plane spun around; it was being carried off like a kite. He clutched desperately at his controls, he tugged at them in despair, and suddenly the plane righted itself as if by magic. It was a dying gasp of the storm. He sighed and breathed easier. Perhaps he could reach it after all. The wind was dying down, and the rain had abated. “I surely can reach it,” he thought. “How good it will be to reach home, to see mother, the doctor and Billy. How fine it will be.” He regained his composure as he went on. Only a half hour now, and then —blissful thoughts. He sailed steadily on, humming a tune to the accompani¬ ment of the motor with a dreamy gaze in his eyes. Wouldn’t it be wonderful? He had fulfilled his quest. Yes, he would pop the question tonight and she would accept—he knew that. Suddenly he saw the searchlight below off Dover Field. Well, here he was, safe and sound. That tailspin stuff was the bunk. Why had he ever worried about that stuff? He pointed the nose of the plane down and descended swiftly and surely. But as he dropped, he clutched his breast, his eyes protruded, he uttered a shriek, and the nerveless hand let go of the control. The plane which had been so swiftly descending, turned on its side and fell, fluttering like a dead leaf. As it fell, the wind lifted it, and then dropped it to the ground with a sickening crash. Raymond Lynch, ’28. FINE FEATHERS. The girl looked out of her clear blue eyes into the stern brown orbs of her companion. At length she spoke. “My answer is no, Jimmy. I can’t do it. I like you very much, but I’m sick and tired of skimping and saving and going without those things which I love—beautiful clothes, expensive cars, beautiful houses. Oh, but that’s the life! No, Jimmy, I can’t do it,” she ended emphatically. “Then this is good-bye, Betty?” “Yes, good-bye.” With that the young man, known as the ambitious Jimmy Walker, picked up his soft gray hat, slammed the door behind him, and strode angrily down the walk muttering about the selfishness of women.

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28 THE OAK, LILY AND IVY. Dazed, his lordship, tried to pierce the inky blackness. The foul deed was done. The treasure was his, all his! Midway down the long treacherous steps he perceived the band of light. Strange, he thought, that the bulb had not been shattered to fragments. Slowly and carefully he descended the stairs. Just one more step and the light would be his and then for the—Suddenly and without warning he stumbled over the unseen crow-bar, and was pitched into space. A blood-curdling scream rent the air—a sickening thud—silence. Samuel Ianzito, ’ 28 . FEAR. The wind whistled through the struts of the plane with a high shrill scream. The ship plunged and staggered on its way, but kept its nose into the wind. The pilot peered into the darkness of the storm with his haggard tired eyes. “Jove” he whispered, “if I go into a tailspin. Oh, those tailspins!” He shook his head as if trying to clear his mind of the horrible thought. A strong blast at this moment almost ripped the plane apart. The roar of the wind drowned the sound of the motor. He struggled with the control stick, glanced at his instruments, and shook his head. “I can never make it,” he murmured. “I can never make it.” As he battled with the wind and rain, he pictured his dear old mother safe and warm by the fire. Dear mother, she didn’t want him to take up aviation, but it was in his blood. He could picture her as she was when he had broken the news of his first flight, tearful, but yet with a proud light shining in her eyes. He saw also the family doctor, their most faithful friend, who had warned him that same fateful day. He could remember vividly his words, “My boy, some day your heart will get you yet. High altitudes are not for you.” But overpowering these thoughts was his great inherent fear. “If I go into a tailspin,” he murmured, “if I go into a tailspin!” He resolutely chased the subject from his mind, and bent his will to the task of bringing the plane safely down. The violence of the wind increased. I he rain drove like hailstones against the plane and froze on the wings. It was a terrible night for flying, enough to make the strongest bend under the load. The boy, however, flew resolutely onward. “For Billy,” he said. “I’ll do it for Billy.” He thought of the blue-eyed, dusky haired maiden for whom he had risked his life. He saw her stretching out her arm toward him, welcoming him, when he arrived at her house. Tomorrow was her twenty-first birthday, and she dearly loved diamonds. I here was no jewelry stores in Dover that had jewels fit for his girl. Say, but wouldn’t it be worth the struggle to watch her eyes shine, and to see her lovely dimples when she saw that diamond? He clasped his hand over the bulge in his coat, and grinned from sheer delight. But then the terrible thought again crept into his mind. A tailspin,” he muttered. “If I ever go into a tailspin.” He clenched his teeth and bowed his head as the wind howled over the cock¬ pit. He forgot his mother, he forgot the doctor, and even forgot Billy as he trembled violently from fear, and prayed with all his strength.

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30 THE OAK, LILY AND IVY. Betty Randolph gazed out the window a bit wistfully at the poorly though neatly dressed young man, and then at her drab room and her plain dress. With a defiant look in her eyes, she turned squarely around, as if to forget the whole incident, and began picking up ' her room when she heard the telephone. “Hello. Yes, this is Betty. Oh, hello, Bert. What am I doing? Nothing much just now. Sure, I’d love to. Will you be up soon? All right. Bye-Bye.” Bert was going to take her to the Ritz Carlton for another wonderful evening. But she would have to wear that old pink dress which she had worn every night for two weeks. Well, anyway, it was better than going to a cheap movie with Jimmy. She didn’t exactly like Bert, but he brought her around and spelled her idea of luxury. So why in the world should she be fool enough to marry Jimmy and try to live on twenty-five per and love? She quickly changed her clothes and was a dream in the becoming though old pink gown with her sparkling blue eyes and natural wavy blond hair, when the dashing young millionaire, Bert Van Ulster, appeared in his La Salle road¬ ster. She bundled up in her cheap fur coat and hopped in beside a pair of strong shoulders which supported a head covered with thick jet black hair. “Hello, Betty dear! Gee, but you’re looking wonderful to-night,” the young man greeted her as they started along the road. “Oh Bert, thank you, but how can I look nice with this rag of a coat?” asked Betty. “Well, cheer up, old dear. You will soon have half a dozen of them.” “Bert, do you really mean that? Have you mentioned it at home?” “No, not yet, but let’s forget it. Here w r e are at the Ritz.” But Betty could not forget it, and after she got home that night— more correctly, morning—she wondered when Bert would mention her to the folks, and ask her to marry him. Surely it would be soon. She also thought of Jimmy, but only for a second. That was over. She saw Bert every night for two months and she now had a stunning squirrel coat and other beautiful things for, of course, it was perfectly all right for her to accept these gifts when Bert was at last going to tell his parents. He would have the news when he came as usual at eight. But Bert did not come that evening or the next, or the next. Betty had lost her job a month before this and had on Bert’s suggestion not bothered to secure another, for she would not have to work when they were married. She waited for a week. Seven long tiresome days spent wholly at the side of the telephone, not daring to leave her room for fear of missing a call. Still no word from Bert. Suddenly she thought of his club, called up, but no one had ever heard of Bert Van Ulster. Her money was gone at last, and for the last three days she had eaten practically nothing. She had to eat, and pay her rent, so one by one her fine feathers had to go to the pawn shop, and still no word from Bert. Forced to leave her room, she went out into the cold world. She was jostled among the hurrying crowd and went along blindly neither knowing nor caring where she went. Out of the chatter of the shopping throng came the grinding of breaks, screams, and all was black and still. hen Betty woke up, she was in a white room and someone all in white was holding her hand. Where could she be? Oh, her head! How her feet ached! At last she came to enough to ask where she was. “ a tj 011 16 dear. Don’t move,” replied the kind voice of the nurse, and I 11 tell you what has happened. You were struck by an auto and one leg is broken but you won’t mind a little thing like that when I tell you who was driving the car. The noted woman-hater, James Walker, author of that wonder-