Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 4 November 1936 — Page 20

SALUTE TO

NOW GO ON WITH THE STORY

- CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE Saturday came Caroline

got out baking materials and them over the kitchen table

vy two days Jeff Howard's name not been spoken between them and Kate had ceased to talk of Brown Boy. Yet the grim expression of Kate's tense young face did not suggest forgiveness or neighborly love. Walking into the kitchen when Caroline was sifting flour, she Jooked at her accusingly, “That's not for Jeff Howard, is it?” “Why, yes,” Caroline answered. “I thought I'd make him a butterscotch pie and coconut cake, for a change of flavors. You needn't help me. Althy’s going to mix the butter and sugar.” Kate said, “We'll make nothing more in this house for Jeff Howard.” “Don’t be a fool,” Caroline implored. “We clear $3 a week from our sales to that man, He's our only regular customer.” “I don't care what we clear. We're through with him, Caroline! We should never have had any dealings with him. It should've been lesson enough to us when he took our home.” » » F 4 “gH, for heaven's sake, Kate! That was a legitimate business deal. He held the mortgage and we couldn't pay. What could _ you expect Mr. Howard to do? Eat

the papers?”

“He needn't have crowed over

us,” Kate replied. “He needn’t have boasted and sneered and rubbed his own back. He's hated me from the first, Caroline, and he knows I return it. He got hold of poor old Brown Boy just to tread me a little into the dust!” “Youre being melodramatic, Kate,” Caroline said wearily. “But, granting what you say is true, why toss up his order when we need the money we get out of it?” “Because 1 won't be indebted to the creature, Caroline. I don’t believe he really wants the stuff. He takes it because it tickles his vanity to have the Meeds cooking for him. Caroline, let me tell you something! Zeke asked me yesterday why Mr. Howard buys beaten biscuits to feed to the chickens! He said he’s seen broken biscuits scattered to the chickens every time he’s been over there.” “Our biscuits?” asked Caroline in blank surprise. © “Whose else? Does that look as if he’s buying our baked goods to eat it? No, I tell you! It's another of his mockeriés. He's put us on his charity list, and then sits back “and gloats over it. I'll not be indebted to him, Careline!- I'll never ask another favor of him as long as I live!” = = 2 AROLINE saw that Kate was in earnest. She shrugged and began to put away flour and baking powder and cake pans. “All right,” she said, “I'll send him word we're going out of business. But I think it's something like the poor aan who said he intended to hang himself and somebody asked him what he'd do for a rope. He said he'd make it out of pride, because pride’s stronger than hemp.” Kate might have been benefited by this fable if something had not occurred to drive it from her mind. On the living room table was an open newspaper which her grandfather had just laid down. Glanc- ~ ing through it before starting to dust the room, she came on the announcement of Eve Elwell's engaget to Morgan Prentiss. The wedwould be in October. Kate had expected this to happen, yet it was shocking to come upon it in cold black print. The news was already a day old. That evening at supper she was conscious of tender solicitude on the part of Caroline and Major Meed. She said, “For goodness sake, stop watching me with soft-boiled eyes! I'm bearing up very nicely, : you. I was expecting it. Only I thought they'd elope and not bother with a formal engagement.”

“YX VE would have to have a big wedding,” Caroline said with a shade of bitterness. Her heart was heavy with resentment, for Kate's sake. Granted that Kate had ceased to love Morgan, as she claimed she had, had he not caused her love to die through his neglect? And there was the way the affair would look to others. Caroline writhed at the thought of it. Kate in the role of the jilted girl! Major Meed poured skimmed

Yet when, that night, Johnnie came driving out to Rickety House, bringing Cynthia Chenault and two young men and melons enough for a party, Kate felt no elation. “Here I am.” Johnnie's eyes told her,

While the others arranged themselves on pillows on the porch steps, Kate and Johnnie walked down the star-lit road. ‘I've always had a weakness for country roads in the dark,” he said. “What smells so sweet?” = » F J

“ UGUST lilies,” Kate told him. “There's a clump in bloom just over by the fence. Don’t pay any attention to them. They'd make a rock sentimental.” Johnnie lit a cigaret and said huskily, “I could get that way if you'd let me——" “Some other time, Johnnie,” Kate said quickly. “Not tonight. Let's just be crazy tonight. Let's make limericks, the way we used to.” “Limericks!” Johnnie protested. “Why did I ever get myself a reputation for those things?” A horse neighed in the pasture. “Is that Brown Boy?” Johnnie wanted to know. “No,” Kate replied shortly. “Go on, Johnnie. Make a limerick. Make one about—about—King Carol of Rumania.” Johnnie looked up at the stars, inhaled and presently chanted, slowly and obediently: “See Carol in gold lace and saber Reviewing his army. What labor! He never fatigues us, In fact, he intrigues us. And 50 does his red-headed neighr.” Kate applauded. “That's the gem of your career, Johnnie! I'll write it down in my book tonight, along with your others. I did a pretty good one myself last week. Listen to this—"

» » =

HE old game was on, and Kate kept the star-lit walk down the dark road free from sentiment. It was not until they were entering the yard that Johnnie said

JoUe [inane]

—~T'd like to take Morgan's place if you'll let me. If you feel the need of somebody, I mean, to fetch and carry Kate at the Johnnie their

squirrel, Kate!” It was an old local expression, conveying

Prentiss stood tried and condemned in the court of their reason. Johnnie Baird, in the week that followed, did not conceal the fact that he was renewing his courtship of Kate Meed. Every one seemed. glad, so Kate tried to feel glad, too. ” » =

“g NAN I bear to marry him?” she asked herself. By way of experiment she let herself be kissed by him, hoping to find the answer there. But, while the process was not repellent, neither was it thrilling. Because it was not thrilling she was impatient with both herself and Johnnie. Johnnie found the kiss stimulating enough. He repeated it with increasing - ardor. “I'm crazy about you, Kate,” he said. “I don’t know when I wasn’t. Will you marry me? Please, Kate! We could beat Morgan and Eve to it. Let’s, Kate!” “Good old Johnnie,” she thought gratefully, “Wanting to save my pride almost as much as he wants to marry me. Good old Johnnie. Why can’t 1?” Yet something reason made her lift her hands-to his chest and push him away. “I can’t, Johnnie, I simply can’t. The bad luck’s mine, but I can’t get the right reaction.” She spoke with the filippancy of modern youth, but she was deadly in earnest Johnnie said impatiently, “Somebody’s standing in my light, blotting me out. Still Morgan! How long before he fades out, Kate?” Kate let him think the shadow between them was Morgan. She let herself think it. She was afraid to face the truth.

quickly, “I meant to tell you, Kate’

(To Be Continued)

ARJORIE drew the curtains close against the January twilight, and the candle-flames stood tall and still in the silent room. Tiny flames shone back from the squat brass andirons and the brass god on the bookcase, and in the clear old mirror Marjorie saw herself reflected against the shadows, a tall dark girl, palely aristocratic, her face an ivory oval above the black velvet of the dress Aunt Marjorie had brought her. “You belong in a castle, my darling,” Philip had murmured yesterday. “With acres of lawn and a keep and a hundred retainers.” Philip was always saying things like that. It was one of the reasons she loved him . . . Marjorie’s mouth was dry and her fingers icy. So much waited on Philip. . . . Her hand shook as she turned the fire low under the steaming tea-urn, and the small French clock chimed once for halfpast five. Tom was so different from Philip. He would have teased her about her apartment, as he did her painting.

» 8 =

“YF you must paint, can't you paint and be comfortable at the same time, honey?” Tom had said. But Philip had taken it all very very seriously. Perhaps because he was an artist, too. The clock ticked on—5:40. Philip had never been so late before. If, today of all days, he would only hurry. It was awful, this being in love for the first time, at 20. Too lovely. Bewildering. And Philip was 35, lean, tall and flawless as a magazine cover. Almost too perfect. It was incredible, this being loved by somebody like Philip. The clock chimed the quarterhour. Philip was very late. Marjorie wanted to pace the room, to fling the curtains wide, to shout. There was something she and Philip had to prove, to people like Tom and Aun Marjorie. . . . But she sat, outwardly very calm, very still, waiting. s n ”

CROSS the hall, in the apartment like her own, Philip would be standing at his easel. His green smock would be open at his throat, the great sunlight lamp he used wou’! be glaring nakedly in his bare room. “To paint, I want to be as free of things as possible,” he had explained once about his apartment. “Uncluttered—" Yet her frail silver and the brass god and her Chinese ivory had caught Philip's eye before she had, Marjorie was certain. Well, you couldn't expect logic of an artist such as Philip. Tom was always so logical. Perhaps that was one of the things that was wrong with

And Philip had a way of forgetting everything when he was painting. It hurt, that he should forget her, today. He must be working

swing would hear his feet in the his knock and the departing model’s laugh as she ran down the stairs.

Iseult in the Moonlight

By Mary Chadbourne Daily Short Story

now, she shivered and held her chin up proudly. The clock chimed 6:15. Philip would come soon. PHilip must come! He couldn’t fail her. She Aunt Marjorie’s parting speech this morning—the speech which, she was sure, Aunt Marjorie had meant Philip to overhear. ” ” # “y WISH you'd come with me,” Aunt Marjorie had said. “We'd have a grand time in England. Tom's still at Oxford, you know... of course Marjorie, darling, I'm glad to let you do anything you like, even to playing at art-in GreenwichVillage. But tell your young man, will you, that once you're married, you can expect no support from me?’ As Marjorie had watched, Philip’s door swung ever so little on its hinges. He must have overheard. Well, it ‘was better so. She needn't tell him, needn’t imply that money mattered between them. She had kissed her aunt’s firm

cheek, and clearly: “Of course¥gunt Marjorie. We want it so. tell Philip this afternoon. And I'm sorry that you won't be here for the wedding.” The January cold seeped about Marjarie’s shoulders as the candles guttered lower. A tug tooted on the river. But there was no sound from Philip. Marjorie rested her head in her cold hands and stared at the flame below the tea-urn. » % ” “y SAIL at midnight,” Aunt Marjorie had finished. “I put your passport in my bag, just in case.

Come along if you change your}

mind; otherwise, I won't see you until I come back.” The clock chimed half-past six. Panic caught at Marjorie. Life, love and the struggle for fame had seemed so wonderful last night, when she and Philip dreamed about them together. He must come to her now. Something must be wrong. She sped across the hall to Philip's door. . The door swung loosely open at her touch. . A bitter wind rattled the windowpanes, snd the arc-light in the curve of Gay-st, outside, glared coldly in on the bare boards, empty bookshelves and black hearth. Even the dark corners were empty. Bag, baggage, easel and canvasses, Philip had vanished. Iseult in a patch of moonlight . « « Marjorie began to giggle, hysterically. Back in her own,apartment, she rummaged in the closet for the tweed suit Aunt Marjorie had bought her. It would be just the thing for a January ocean

voyage. : ; THE END [* Copyright, 1936, by United Feature ¢ ng Syndicate, Inc.) The characters in this story are fictitious.

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