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3 5 C H a P t e r 1 The Noses Have It According to all accounts, which I have no reason to disbelieve, I was a disgustingly fat baby. I was an out-sized Hoosier with no perceptible neck and such thick rolls of fat dispersed about my person that I had to be probed clean. Other than that, I was blonde, curly haired, and hazeleyed like my mother, and the nose budding between my fatuous cheeks began immediately to turn up towards my forehead. Of the facts I have set down above, only the last is of great consequence . Although time has worked upon the others, the nose has remained . If I were even slightly whimsical, I would insist that the course of my life has been determined by Mabelle Parmelee’s nose. I am Mabelle Parmelee’s son, and within the normal limits of genes and chromosomes her nose is my nose. It is not something to be worn lightly. Once upon a time, for example, I was smuggled into a wicked Parisian party. It was the annual Bal des Quat’z Arts, and I was smuggled because nobody but French artists and models was supposed to be there. the Bal des Quat’z arts, the art students’ ball, took place in the spring. the theme was changed every year: Incas, aztecs, phoenicians, egyptians, Gauls, and Babylonians. the costumes were almost always non-existent and there wasn’t much historical authenticity. everyone, male and female, was covered with vivid colored paint: red, bronze, gold, and silver. even great painters like henri Matisse attended this roman Saturnalia, where every license was permitted. Having been told that the evening’s motif was Babylonian, I attired myself in a ratty toga and a great deal of brown makeup, which an old t H e n o s e s H av e i t 4 dressing-room crone lathered on me with a sponge. At that, I turned out to be overdressed. Some of the artists wore nothing but blue paint and a small tin cup, while there was one model costumed exclusively in a bunch of cherries hung at the most obvious spot. Along about midnight she astonished everybody by launching into a routine of bumps and grinds, extremely professionally executed, as a man in a long black beard pranced about on all fours, snapping at her costume with his teeth. Without warning, some hour and bottles of champagne later, she climbed a ladder to the box where I was sitting. Before I could move she was in my lap. “Tiens! Quell nez extraordinaire!” she exclaimed, and, seizing my nose between her thumb and forefinger, she gave it a dreadful wrench. The only point of the incident is that at the height of a bacchanal, surrounded by a horde of pickled Babylonians, the first thing that lady noticed was my nose. As far as design goes, Mabelle’s nose is not a headliner. Cyrano de Bergerac would have ignored it completely. It is merely a nice, functional feature, constructed for blowing, sniffing, and the occasional dramatic snort. There is nothing flamboyant about our nose. The essential factor is its tilt. Although I have never applied a protractor, I am certain that the angle described by the tip of Mabelle’s nose and her brief upper lip is considerably greater than 135 degrees. Since one’s birth is a purely involuntary part of one’s life, and since the root of everything that happens in this world is imbedded in the past, I must digress for a while to the period when I was merely a coming event. Mabelle was sixteen and thoroughly saturated with Southern charm when her parents moved from Lexington, Kentucky, to Indianapolis in 1885. The indirect result was their daughter’s romance and my advent. the 1880 census shows Mabelle and her family living in Indianapolis. In 1870 they were living in Coles County, Illinois. Mabelle had two brothers; Marvin was six years younger and edwin was older. Webb never mentions them. the family moved to Indianapolis when Mabelle was about eleven years old. the Indianapolis Evening News noted Mabelle’s early theatrical career with articles on her performances (april 18, 1882, and May 30, 1882) at the St. Nichol’s hotel in Indianapolis. She gave readings of “painter of Seville,” “Mrs. Candle’s Lecture,” and “Order for a picture.” a reporter stated, “all the recitations were well delivered but those of Miss Mabel parmelee...

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