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Show CHATTER IX Continued 11 "Oh, yes, pl.-iys backgammon very well,' Spencer answered, with his characteristic little bitter smile twisting his mouth. "But she gets no particular thrill from playing with me." The drawing room was almost dark when they reached it, but Serena Se-rena immediately snapped up the lights. Only one lamp had been burning, and In Its light and that ol the fire Quentin and she had been sitting in big chairs, at the hearth. Had they been there all these long two hours, Vic wondered? Serena detained Quentin for a moment mo-ment at the door. "Are you working tonight? Sometimes Some-times I see your light quite late? Last night you were late." "Last night I was playing bridge with three men," Quentin told her. "She watches his light," Victoria thought, disappearing into the outer blackness with a farewell nod over her shoulder. "If you're working tonight," Serena Se-rena said to Quentin then, without the slightest expression in her voice or her face, "come over when you finish and I will give you a cup of chocolate." "Good-night!" Quentin said. He followed Vicky down the porch steps. When they reached their room he said that he thought he would do a little work: fifteen minutes, min-utes, maybe. The next morning at breakfast Vic said to him casually: "You didn't go back to the Morrisons' Mor-risons' last night, did you?" "Well, yes, I did," Quentin answered, an-swered, looking off his paper. "I'd meant to take her a book and left it on my dresser. I ran over with it, and she was making chocolate. She says she often has a little supper, after he's gone upstairs. We sat In the kitchen awhile." Well, what was a wife to say to that? After that night there was another an-other change. And this one, to her sinking heart, seemed to Victoria much more ominous than the first Quentin was always good-natured and gentle now; absent-minded; uninterested un-interested in what went on at home. He no longer defended Mrs. Morrison, Mor-rison, or seemed especially to want to exchange family courtesies, dinners, din-ners, and evening meetings, with the house next door. Whatever his relationship with Serena had become, be-come, he was content never to mention men-tion it; it was their own affair now, his and Serena's, and needed no apologies, no justification. From Vic's confused thoughts there emerged surprisingly one concrete con-crete fact: she loathed Serena; she would have been glad to hear of Serena's violent and sudden death. And this made it increasingly hard to endure Quentin's simple revelations revela-tions concerning her neighbor. "She's always been just a little girl," Quentin would say. "She says she still likes to get a kitten and a plate of apples and a good book on a rainy afternoon and curl up in the attic and read. "Just try to Imagine it, Vic, this woman who has been adored and spoiled by some of the most famous persons in the world! Rothesay Rothe-say Middleton, for example you know that every woman ir Hollywood Holly-wood is trying to get him? She tells me that when she married Morrison she told him that she had to spend one week every year with Middle-ton, Middle-ton, and no questions asked! She said Spencer almost lost his mind trying to reconcile himself to the Idea, but in the end he gave in." "Not much to his credit," Vic might submit dryly- But, fortunately fortunate-ly for her, Quentin was usually too much absorbed in his subject to see anything amiss. "Well, he couldn't have gotten her otherwise! And when I think what that fellow has put her through " "Spencer! How d'you mean 'put her through'?" "Why, my God, Vic, he was climbing right to the top in diplomacy diplo-macy when he got hurt! They were to go to Spain; that's one of the fat places! There's lots of money; nothing noth-ing could have stopped him! She was packing her trunks when he was hurt." "Well, I don't suppose he especially espe-cially enjoyed it." "She told me," Quentin said in a tender undertone, not hearing one word of what Vicky had said "she told me that just before the smash she had been planning to buy a certain cer-tain white shawl at the Sea Captain's Cap-tain's Shop in Shanghai. She says it was the most gorgeous thing she ever saw and that when their plans all changed, and before she knew whether Morrison's eye was going to be saved or not, she used to go every day and take a look at the nawl. So when it was all over and t- he'd resigned from the diplomatic stall, she wont up there one Inst time and kissed the white shawl good-by! "Somehow," Quentin said, lost In his own thoughts "somehow the thought of her going in there and laying her face against that shawl well, it gets you! I mean she's nothing but a little girl." "And you're nothing but a little raw blind baby!" Vicky might think hotly. But she never said it aloud. No, he was in the grip of a fever now, and there was no saving him until it went down. He could neither nei-ther hear nor understand until then. One day Vic met In the street a woman who stopped her with a 6mile. A pretty woman, but wearing wear-ing too much rouge and powder, lipstick and mascara, a woman suggesting sug-gesting a gallant retreat from youth and beauty. "Marian Pool!" Vicky said. Marian Mar-ian was animated; the beautiful eyes worked with their old fire; she had an "adorable cattle king" In tow. "My dear, he owns half of Brazil!" she said in an aside, introducing in-troducing a copper-colored s'out old person who spoke only a stilted English and used that almost entirely entire-ly for labored compliments to Marian. Mar-ian. Marian was still beautiful, Vicky thought; she was not much more than forty, but ten years ago she would not have wasted any time on Senor de Raa. Now she was working over him industriously, laughing at his lame jokes, allowing the fat paw to squeeze her own pretty hands. "Watch me get a present out of him. He shipped his wife and daughters on the last steamer, and he's going wild," said Marian, drawing Vicky with them into Marsh's beautiful shop. She called the attention of the cattle king to the cabinets of jade Jewelry. Vicky, who had left Gwen with a dentist for half an hour's straightening of teeth, looked interestedly at one of the world's finest collections of oriental jewelry and porcelain, brocade and teak and ivory, brass and enamel. A middle-aged saleswoman sales-woman presently drew her aside. "Excuse me, madam, but did your friend speak of you as 'Mrs. Hardisty'?" "I'm Mrs. Hardisty," Vic said. "And your husband is Dr. Hardisty? Har-disty? I thought so. There was something I wanted to ask you. This is very unprofessional," the woman broke off in a tone of smiling smil-ing and eager apology. Vic could only continue to look expectation and surprise. "You see," the saleswoman sales-woman pursued, "Christmas is very close, and someone was looking at a present for you in here yesterday, and I thought . . ." She had led Victoria Into a small adjoining salesroom where there were a teak table and some chairs. "Do sit down," she said, "and I'll explain. Your husband was in here yesterday looking at some of our lovely things, and he picked one out for your Christmas present. Now, often when a gentleman does that," Mrs. Mooreweather went on confidentially, "I like to give the lady just a little hint, when I can, because sometimes, as we all know, tastes do differ, and when a present is very handsome and this is handsome hand-some it's so easy to give a gentleman gentle-man just a little hint, and say, "I think your wife would surely prefer that,' and then she gets what she wants, and we please a customer." While the amiable endless patter had been streaming on, Victoria had been smiling vaguely, hardly listening. listen-ing. "Now, this must be a secret. Where is that? I thought oh, yes, I know where it is!" Mrs. Mooreweather Moore-weather was saying, as she drew in and out of their frames great deep black drawers filled with silken beauty. "This must be a little secret se-cret between you- and me," she ran on. Victoria did not hear her. Her head was spinning, and her mouth filled with salt water. Her brown hands were lying on the royal folds of a white Chinese shawl. After a while she was out in the street again, walking in a businesslike business-like way toward the White House. The familiar shops and corners went by her; flashing in winter sunlight sun-light and cold shadows, moving with forms and sounding with the horns of cars and the chip of feet. Victoria felt dazed and weak; she felt that her knees would give way. "Oh, my God, my God, my God!" Victoria said, half aloud. She couldn't stand here like an idiot; passers-by would notice her. She walked irresolutely toward Geary street, turned back. She had had something to do something to do at three o'clock oh, yes, Quentin Quen-tin had asked her what she wanted for Christmas, and she had said that he would meet her some after noon to pick it out, and slit' had told the children that Ki'own-up.s didn't like surprises as much ns they liked getting Just what they wanted. And then only yesterday Quentin had suggested that she pick It out herself. her-self. She had said she would go In at three and pick out the electric refrigerator. re-frigerator. Her Christmas gift was to be an electric refrlgerntor. Another oriental art shop. Victoria Vic-toria went In. "You have a beautiful shawl In the window the red and yellow one. What price Is a shawl like thnt?" "That one, madam? Shall we take It out of the window? That one is $323." "It's beautiful. But not today, thank you. It isn't as handsome as the white one," Vicky thought, wandering wan-dering aimlessly out Into the sunshine sun-shine again. "It Isn't anything like as handsome. What will he write on the card? But no, I won't bear It I won't bear it!" She felt sick, sore, as if every bone of her, mental, moral, and spiritual, had been Jarred and hurt. She couldn't even select the refrigerator. refrig-erator. Feverishly, In a sudden need to be home and with her children, Victoria picked up Gwen, very chatty chat-ty and gay, went to the garage, got into her car, and threaded her way through the south-bound traffic toward to-ward the Peninsula. The trees were bare, and the roads looked cold. Smoke went straight up from all the little houses; Christmas wreaths showed In their windows. Victoria shuddered; shud-dered; it would be good to get home. But when she was in a cotton dress, and fairly smothered by the enthusiastic reception from the nursery, even then the sense of sickness and shock did not heal; even then she sat blankly, Maddy in her lap, the other children circling cir-cling about her In the glow of the nursery fire, with her eyes staring Into space. Quentin loved another woman. Quentin loved another woman ... A more beautiful woman wom-an than she could ever hope to be. A strange, mysterious, fascinating woman . . . "The doctor will not be home for dinner, Mrs. Hardisty. Miss Cone Just telephoned. He has an operation opera-tion at nine." Thank you. Anna." And the Jealous agony, lulled for a moment, 3 iiiilihiiiii'ii' R W ,:m She Lay Thinking, Her Throat Thick, Her Head Confused. began again, fierce and tearing and irresistible. After a while Victoria was In her own room and idly handling han-dling the telephone. Suddenly, shamed color In her pale face, she called the hospital. Was Dr. Hardisty there? Was he to be there? No operation that evening? eve-ning? "You can get him at his home, Atherton eight eight eight," a pleasant pleas-ant girl's voice presently said. Vicky waited awhile, and the cold-bound winter world and the wind whining over the oaks and the blighted gardens seemed to wait, too. Presently she telephoned to Serena. "What are you two doing tonight?" to-night?" "My dear,' said Serena, "I've Just ordered an early dinner for Spencer why don't you be a darling dar-ling and come over and play backgammon back-gammon with him? I've been called to town. A dear old friend, Mary Catherwood, is at the Fairmont, and she wants me to come in and dine late with her. I'm disgusted such a frightful night, but what can you do?" There was more of it. It was very convincing, but not quite convincing con-vincing enough. When the conversation conver-sation was ended, there was nothing noth-ing for Victoria but vigil. Restless, feverish, sleepless, the hours of the night began to go by. It was a still night, the eve of Christmas eve, with the world tightened under a frost, and every outdoor sound echoing like a pistol shot. Ten. Eleven. Midnight, and no Quentin. At half-past twelve Victoria, Vic-toria, drowsing with her reading lamp shining full in her eyes, started start-ed up with a frightened sense that everything was all wrong. Fire accident ac-cident calamity . . . Then she heard what had waked her; his car on the drive. She knew the sound of the engine and the scrunch of the gravel; her heart, heavy and sad as it was, felt something some-thing of reassurance and calm. She snapped off her light, composed herself her-self us If asleep. He mustn't feel himself watched. She heard him come upstairs; he wasn't going to put his car away? Poor Quentin, purhaps it had really been an operation then, at the City and County hospital, or the emergency; emer-gency; perhaps he was completely blameless, tonight at least . . . CHAPTER X Other sounds, Victoria sat up In bed with her heart pumping. Everything Ev-erything was all wrong, cold, terrifying, terri-fying, shaken again. For Quentin, cautiously coming upstairs, had only put out his porch light, had snapped out the drive light. Now the car lights were up again, and the car itself was slowly wheeling on the drive. Victoria, not knowing what she did, was on her own upper porch, trembling with cold and fear and despair In her thin wrapper, with her feet bare and her eyes straining after the departing car. She saw the car turn, saw It leave the gates again, saw it turn toward the Morrisons' house. It stopped at the side door, and presently pres-ently a house light went up, and then the car lights were put out Shrubs shut the doorway partially from the window porch where Victoria Vic-toria stood with all her world going to pieces about her, but she could discern two figures silhouetted for an instant against the open door. Then It closed, and presently the downstairs light went out too, and, the cold Christmas countryside and her life and her love and her faith were all plunged Into cold darkness. dark-ness. An iron winter sky was low over the world when morning came without with-out sunrise; Vicky, waking at seven, sev-en, shivered wearily down again into her warm blankets. It would be good to stay In bed on such a morning, morn-ing, she thought still caught in dreams what morning was this, anyway? Good heavens, this was Christmas eve with everything to do . . . Then she remembered, and the gray dark morning seemed darker, and her bones, her head, her whole being seemed to ache with the bitter necessity of coming back to consciousness. con-sciousness. Ah, if she could only stay asleep, and go on from sleep to death, beautiful, warm, friendly death ... She lay thinking, her throat thick, her head confused, her heart and mind in confusion. Quentin. Quentin Quen-tin and Serena Morrison. Victoria suddenly felt that she was suffocating, strangling. She flung off the blankets, reached for her heavy wrapper even while she was groping with her feet for her fur-lined slippers. "B-r-r-rl" she muttered, going to the opened window, shutting it with one swift gesture. The garden below be-low the window lay bleak and bare under a fine frosting of white; a delicate powdering of frost covered cov-ered the bricks of the walks and lay like lace on the soaked bronze red of the leaf pile under the oaks. She splashed her face with cold water, brushed her hair, looked at the ghostly vision in the mirror. After a while she went downstairs, down-stairs, to sit holding her coffee cup' at the level of her mouth, an elbow resting on the table, her eyes far away. She could eat nothing, but she managed a few swallows of coffee; cof-fee; managed a question to the maid: "Did the doctor have his breakfast break-fast Anna?" "No, ma'am. He had a cup of coffee standing, in the kitchen, he wouldn't sit down. He had an eight o'clock at the Dante." "Did he say anything about dinner?" din-ner?" "He said he'd have Miss Cone telephone." All the Keatses would be coming down tomorrow to have Christmas dinner with all the Hardistys. There would be presents for all the little Keatses upon the little Hardistys' tree. This was Christmas eve. Hateful, Hate-ful, unendurable, empty, Christmas eve and Christmas day must somehow some-how be endured. She mounted the two flights of stairs to her mother's room. Magda always stayed in bed In the mornings; morn-ings; this morning she had a fire, and was cozily ensconced in her pillows, with her light burning, and her breakfast tray on her knees. "You look tired," Magda said, with a glance. "I started trimming the Christmas Christ-mas tree night before last" Victoria Vic-toria said. "I had to get some more things for it in town yesterday." She stopped, remembering Marsh's and the white shawl. The sick reluctance to believe it all took possession of her again. "Quentin gone?" "He went early I didn't see bun." (TO BE CO.TlUED) |