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Show THE RICH COUNTY REAPER, RANDOLPH, UTAH Gas on Stomach OmL 9L So? Julia (Dooley) McFarlanes husband, Richard, disappeared in World War I, leaving her with two children. She and her father-in-laJohn I. McFarlane, have tried in vain to find some trace of Richard, either dead or alive. Twenty-fiv- e years later Ric Is 27 and serving In the army of World War n while Jill, 26, professes an Interest in Spang Gordon, a young lieutenant. Julia still clings to the belief that Richard may yet be alive and refuses to have him declared legally dead. Her greatest worry is that her daughter might marry Spang, thus becoming an army wife, subject to the same grief she has endured for a quarter of a century without word of Richard. CHAPTER n Julia twisted her hands together. John I., she began abruptly, Ric didnt have a furlough when he came home. He traded for some other mans pass. Jill told me. The old mans mustache twitched. I suppose if they put him in the guard-hous- e youd send him a fruitcake with a file in it! If they put him in the guardhouse his chances for a commission are gone. Might be a good thing. Being ,a buck private might be good for him. Dooley, you spoiled that boy! I know, Julia said heavily, but he was all I had! He needed me. Jill didnt. She was always like you. Shes a McFarlane. The stand on their own feet. But that young Richard hes another Dont say it, John I., Julia Weve begged, pain in her eyes. let that Dont bitterness put away. it come alive again. But it is coming alive again, whether you want it or not. Ive seen it for years. I warned you that that boy was growing up like his father. I was his mother, Julia reminded him. he said grimly, no Dooley, matter what you say, Im going to court next term and file that paper. Ive listened to you long enough. Youve got a right to a life of your own, and Im going to see that you have it. Julias face drained swiftly, and out of the whiteness her eyes were embers. No. No, John I., I wont let self-sufficie- nt, Mc-Farlan- es you do it. He twisted his mouth. You cant stop me if I want to do it. Julias voice came, hoarse and thin. I think I can stop you. Hes been gone twenty-fiv- e years. If he were legally dead, everything would be cleared up. Youre a fool a weak, sentimental fool! she sighed, Im a All right, fool. Leave it like that, John I. She walked away, setting her boots down firmly. John I. watched her go, frowning. IH do it anyway! he said aloud. Then he leaned back and thumbed tobacco into his pipe. Dave Patterson rode his horse slowly across the great dam. On his right the power lake slept, silvery and flat under the stars, a skittish young bass flinging himself as an offering to the frail platinum moon and falling back to mint great coins 'of shadowy quicksilver. than he liked to reckon, Dave Pat- proud, proprietary air. Good terson knew that he had been in night, sir. Glad to have seen you. love with het. You look very decorative, you Not that he had let her know. two, Dave approved. The miliTo Dooley he was good old Dave, tary is at its best with something whose farm and handsome old brick fluffy alongside. house had been swallowed up by More pleasing to the eye, no the encroaching power project, who doubt, Spang amended, but not was a bit bewildered now, uproot- quite so effective as an oxygen ed from the land that Pattersons mask and parachute. I hope you had farmed for generations, trying know where this dance, is. Rememto find himself again by running a ber Im a country boy from down bank and not being very happy. the Delta. I could get lost mighty He crossed the porch and opened easy in these hills. a french door without knocking, and Jill knows every hill, Dave told instantly a young man in the tan him. breeches and olive-dra- b blouse of I should! Ive hunted chinquathe Air Corps, with a silver bar pins on them and got chiggers on on his shoulder, jumped to his feet. practically all of them. Have fun, kids. Dave went Dave said, I thought Hello, you were Ric at first. I thought he through the hall to the foot of the stnirs. There he intoned in a firm, must have got his shoulder-hardwar- e carrying voice, I could just sit mighty quick. How do you do, sir? The sol- here and talk to myself. Or I could Oh, hello, Dooley. I dier showed very white teeth' in a go home. thought maybe youd gone to bed. Julia leaned over the banister. At nine oclock? I dont do that any more. I wake up at two a. m. and think too much. Ill be down in a minute. She came presently, trailing a Her flowered chintz housegown. hair was roughened, her eyes looked a little shadowed. This is my sixth change of costume for today, she sighed as she dropped into a chair. When are you going to ease off this strenuous business? And what you need is a drink. Not tonight, Dave. It stimulates me too much. I cant sleep. But fix one for yourself and you can make one for John I., too. Hell be in presently. No ice for him he hates having it bump against his mustache. As for this strenuous life, it wont be over soon, I fear. They put Fosters boy into One A today. I argued that he was essential, that we had to raise food for our army, but old Mr. Corbett he is and you know how always stiff with the letter of the law asked me if I wanted to keep this farm for my children or let the Nazis have it. Dave went to the kitchen, came back presently with two tall glasses. So you revised your decision about letting Jill run around with the army? he said. I could get lost mighty easy in What can I do, Dave? Shes a these hills. grown woman. I cant put her in a convent. She has to have fun. Im Spencer Gordon. Shes twenty-si- x years old. Sounds quick mile. I used to be a friend of Rics be- incredible, doesnt it? The span fore the war. between two wars. Richards last Dave leave before he went over, and I Before you got those? and grinned and indicated the silver was so young and so heart-tobars. Now, no friendship with men so terribly in love and so unhappy in the ranks, eh? Old military pro- with it. I cant believe that that tocol. Im Dave Patterson. Lived agonized, nineteen-year-ol- d thing on the next place till the TVA was I! Two babies, and no home, drowned me out. So youre in the no husband, nothing till you air, are you? came and found me, and John I. brought me back here. I dont want When Old Friends anything like that for Jill. I dont want that loneliness for her, sitting Get Together at home, watching the mail, waitNot now. They grounded me for ing, freezing with dread every time a while to teach aerodynamics in a messenger comes down the street. T.S. thats technical school, sir. And I dont want her to have what But I have my wings, and I hope Ive had for twenty-fiv- e years sito be back in the air before long. lence! Not even to know, not to I assume youre here to see be certain whether it was quite Jill? right either to grieve or to be reYes. Young Gordon flushed. signed. But what can I do? Met Jills mother yet? We Nothing, 'Dave agreed. Yes, sir, shes upstairs helping cant live other peoples lives for Jill dress. I met the grandfather, them. No matter how much we too. Hes out somewhere now tend- love them. Id like to live your life ing a sick pig. differently, if I could. A sick pig is a catastrophe on But I like my life. Whats wrong this place. The McFarlanes raise with it? the finest hogs in Tennessee. Its empty. Oh, I know what My people were farmers, too. youre going to say. Youve crowdMississippi. Cotton mostly. But my ed it full of work and responsibility. father and mother died when I was Youve raised Ric and Jill, and takvery young. en care of John I. and a few hunWhats Ric doing now? Dave dred pigs. Youve made this farm Is he going to try for the a success, but what does it get you, asked. cadet corps? Dooley you, personally? He washed out, I think some It gets me just that, Dave. Sucminor point or other. Now hes try- cess. What else is there what else ing for officers school, so I hear. beside accomplishment? Work that I dont see him often. Thats a big is of value, to me and to the post down there, and you rarely world. What else is there? hear much about a man unless hes in your own squadron. Young Gor- Dave Has His don stopped abruptly as heels Little Secret clicked on the polished stairs. In the big mirror in the hall Dave Dave could have said, Theres could see the reflection of Jill com- love, Dooley. But he knew he ing down. would not say it. Sometimes he She paused at the door, and Dave was certain, wearily, that he would saw the young lieutenants throat never .say it. twitch and his eyes glow as he He had loved Dooley for so long sprang to his feet. Jill was the but even now, after a span of 25 prettiest thing alive, Dave decided uncertain years he had never menbut not beautiful as Julia was. tioned it to her because he knew inJill said, Hello, Dave. I didnt stinctively she would have drawn hear you come in. I thought Spang herself into a shell, and their friendwas down here alone hating me for ship, which had come to mean so being so slow. much to both of them, would have Are you Spang? Dave asked. become strained, possibly even endIm Spang. They hung that on ed. me at college. Youll excuse us, sir, Sometimes I think He said, if we take off? wonderful a woman, Dooley. Jill said, We have to drive the youre And then there are times when Im station-wagoIt, has plenty of convinced that youre a sentimenB gas in it, but D6oley says to retal idiot. Twenty-fiv- e years' and not member that the tires have to last a word, and still you wont give all winter. up. ) Spang took her elbow with a (TO BE CONTINUED) At the lower end of the lane young pigs got up and skittered away hys- terically when the horse snorted at them. Every fence post glistened white, and beyond the wire the dew shone on rectangular roofs of rows of low houses. The homely farm smell was definite now, the mixture of pigs and hay and froggy cattle-pon- d that gave Dave a feeling of A naked bulb burned nostalgia. above a gate, shadowed by dark old trees, and Dave got down and tied his horse,- opened the gate and passing through closed it carefully, walking across the shorn, quiet grass to the house. Behind high windows soft lights glowed, and the house itself loomed starkly white under the aged trees. Dave remembered the way it had looked not so long ago. Old and faded, the mortar melting sadly from between the tired bricks, a little shelf of a porch with spindly railings sagging. Now it , was pillared and restored and proud, with a sweep of drive between ivied stone posts and the fanlight above the door gleaming. Julia McFarlane had done all that. Born a McFarlane and mar-lie- d to a distant cousin of the same Dame, she had dragged the old place back from desuetude alone, txcept for the fumbling, peppery encouragement of old John I. McFarlane. Julia was slender and calm and merry, but Indomitable with it, and for a long time, longer - COUNTLESS people will not live to encounter the troubles they fear. Weighty opinions are never derived from featherheads. Figures will not lie nearly as much as some fellows who use them. It is usually when your hand are doing nothing that time hangs heavy on them. 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