Show 0 ai ARRY PUGH CLURE installment NINE the story so far laura maguire Magu lre wife ot of mike maguire happy go lucky editor and mayor ot of the town Is mother to tour four children tom whose real estate job Is 13 profitless during the depression and who Is 13 married to mary etta secretary to a big shot alee alec unable to get a job CHAPTER XII continued tom knew she wanted him to pay for his supper by hunting up his host and being very appreciative of the spectacle to which he had been invited solely for his cifes sake but tom had had all he could stomach at one sitting so he stood stiffly by until mary etta was free to leave and said nothing complimentary to anybody did you ever see anything like the way harvey manages that three ring circus murmured mary etta on the way to the car tom grunted sulking again she inquired crisply turning the key in the ignition with a snap if you must know said tom im fed up to the gills with harvey leigh and everything about him do you realize we have him for breakfast dinner and a bedtime story you just cant bear success in somebody else can you she glanced at him curiously you have even hated me lately you tom went white do you realize weve scarcely spoken a civil word to each other in six months yes said mary etta in her cool unemotional way 1 I realize all that where are we drifting mary etta asked tom in a stifled voice 1 I know her flippancy flecked him on the raw he stared unseeingly straight before him and thought of their brief tempestuous courtship they known each other very well tom was barely twenty one mary etta a few months younger he intended to think of marriage for years but somehow after he met mary etta he could think of nothing else he had not been sure she liked him at all being mary etta she had been more antagonistic than encouraging cou raging the day tom asked her out of a sudden mad impulse to elope with him over the weekend week end he had half expected her to bounce an ink bottle off his head not until they came out of the county courthouse the license firmly clutched in his perspiring hand band had he believed in her surrender but then mary etta never had exactly surrendered on their brief honeymoon before each of them returned to their respective spec tive desks she had never even in his arms quite let herself go she did love or rather she had he was convinced of that or she would never have married him mary etta had played fair she did not believe in maudlin sentiment but she asked no more than she was willing to give she proved a curiously exciting wife tom admitted that there had been moments when he could have wrung her neck interspersed with the delirium of loving her so wildly it frightened him but he was never indifferent to her 1 I had another letter from old colonel shoup today he said later while mary etta was cold creaming her face he dies hard he she observed 1 I should think hed tire of wasting postage listen mary etta said tom thickly 1 I know you hate small towns but we cant go on like this I 1 grant you colonel shoups proposition sounds like piffle on the surface fifty dollars a month and commissions if any but hes got the best real estate business in covington and hes offering to let me buy into a partnership on the installment plan its exactly what ive always wanted and his voice quivered a couple can live on fifty dollars a month in covington I 1 know a four room house not far from mothers that can be rented for twenty and whole families nowadays eat on a dollar a day you mean if the wife does all the cooking and the washing and the ironing said mary etta scornfully are you seriously proposing that I 1 give up my hundred and sev enty five a month and move to a town towal I 1 hate where ill have to work like a slave just so have the pleasure of saying you pay all our expenses yes said tom his mouth a hard ugly gash tp to save your face went on mary etta im to let go of everything ive won from life and turn into the kind of female drudge my mother was bending Be riding over a hot cook stove squeezing pennies saving on haircuts wearing house aprons cutting up sundays roast for thursdays hash boiling cabbage till I 1 want to scream we even keep a car no said tom we but we might afford a baby some day mary etta went very white just because your mother thinks a wife should sacrifice herself to her man and go on and on ori sacrificing well leave my mother out of this its tunny funny you married me when zu ahe a your ideal who takes up with a flashy divorcee much older than he shirley engaged to jaird who also Is out of 0 a job since his father gave up his manufacturing fac turing plant to stop losses and whose marriage Is delayed kathleen whom a stranger ritchie graham also a news you laugh that off snapped tom it seem funny to me he reached up to the shelf over the bed alcove and dragged down a battered suitcase what are you going to do demanded mary etta what do you think he retorted opening that drawer in the dresser which was dedicated to his use mary etta stood very still for a minute calling it a day and quits she asked at last tom was stuffing shirts into the suitcase im a failure As a provider and as a husband but im not going to be kept by a woman even my wife mary etta caught her breath 1 I warned you when I 1 married you that id not let any man swallow my personality 1 I know and probably youre right but I 1 happen to have a personality sona lity too As well as a little pride of my own you might possibly pay my bills and retain some shreds of respect for me but I 1 let you and feel like anything except my cifes lap dog these past six months have proved that dont you think between us weve killed our love all it needs now is a decent burial and I 1 fancy UV akl 7 1 I er V 0 what are you going to doa do 1 I demanded mary alary etta you wont be long about that after im gone goodby good by mary etta she turned quickly away without speaking tom stared at her for a moment and then very gently he opened and closed the door behind him it was exactly as if he had slammed the lid of a coffin on a fragment of his heart CHAPTER XIII kathleen maguire was late getting down to the office the following morning of course it did not make a lot of difference when kathleen reached her desk officially she was the clarions clarious Cla rions society editor but she suspected that mike would not blink an eye if she tailed failed to show up at all for years he had been everything from janitor to political economist on the paper if the emergency arose and he was still capable of writing every word in any edition without missing a stride nevertheless kathleen took her job as seri seriously as lie he allowed her to in many ways the staff due to mike s penchant for broken down humanity was as decrepit as the purely mechanical end of the business mike had an unique manner of selecting employees he was always hiring some derelict because bebau se he was down on his luck at present there were old miller an excellent typesetter when he was sober roger whyte who could write like an angel if he having nervous shakes and tommy south office boy an orphan mike had plucked off by the scruff of his neck out of the court for juvenile delinquents the moment she entered the big cluttered room which was the clari ons main office kathleen knew there was tension in the air roger waytes frail hands trembled on his typewriter keys tommy mouths freckles stood out more prominently on a pale and perspiring countenance old ducky miller had dropped a tray of type and just stood staring at the jumbled pi the door to mikes private office was closed an unusual occurrence kathleen recognized the symptoms even before her sharp ears identified the roar on the other side of the flimsy partition grimly she paper man Is interested in ma wants jaird to marry connie mays tho the bankers daughter on a bet alec alco takes out lou knight the town drunks arunka daughter tom and mary etta had just been guests at a tavern party of 0 mary ettas employer harvey cobb leigh hung her white linen hat on its accustomed cus tomed nail and marched over to the littered table consecrated to her use the last issue of the clarion lay there neatly arranged by tommy for her consideration kathleen did not need to turn to the editorial page to know what was afoot nevertheless erth eless her brown eyes smoldering she read every word mike had done it again the very paper crackled with the remarks he had to make about unscrupulous financiers in general and banker eugene mays of Coving tons leading bank in particular kathleen had to admit that her father when he decided to set off fireworks did a thoroughly good job no wonder eugene mays had paid the clar ions editor an early morning call kathleen shivered a little the banker was a very imposing figure in local concerns naturally he resented d having sarcasm of the most virulent nature directed at his policies in the private office somebody guf cawed it was mike of course laughing in his callers infuriated face A faint grin traveled over the harassed faces of the group outside it was so exactly like mike to treat mr eugene mays important anger to a cold douche of derision but kathleen did not grin it might be very audacious and gallant of her father to tweak the lions tail and then snigger about it his daughter however was thinking of the number of people in covington who owed eugene mays money and who jumped through hoops at his signal the door of the inner office came open with a sharp crack and everybody in the main office became suddenly tremendously occupied with his own tasks mr mays however did not condescend a glance to his audience he stood on the threshold facing the other way and brandished brandishes bran dished a fleshy fist in the general direction of michael maguires ue grin rin keep on printing these in infamous f amous attacks on me and my institution maguire he said and by god ill break you mike grinned ive been broke before mays by better men than you but ive never yet been scared out of telling the truth if it needed to be told kathleen was aware that ritchie graham had come in by the street et door and was listening to the encounter with every manifestation of pleasure of course it gave him a thrill to see mike risk financial annihilation lation for a principle but kathleen thought of laura who was already stretching dollars till they groaned and kathleen did not feel thrilled as she would have a year ago at her fathers debonair disregard of consequences she felt a little sick if its war you want said eugene mays in a suddenly colder and more ominous voice say so but you had better take into consideration the tact fact that I 1 have influence in this town I 1 can cut your advertising accounts to a quarter of what they are likewise your circulation maybe you dont realize that your ultimatum now suppose you listen to mine mike said with a thrust like the glitter of a rapier you have ten thousand depositors in your bank and a couple of hundred stockholders who leave everything to you you are the bank and its a hell bell of a responsibility because this whole community would be sunk if you got go your tail in a crack now as bankers go youre not so rank but you could be sweeter that western deal you are dickering with smells to heaven so do one or two other juicy pies youve tried to stick your finger into recently the people ought to know that sort of thing is dangerous to their interests and going to know every time you try to pull a fast one my advice to you mays is to pull in your horns and leave high financing to the rest of the pirates but if you dont then have to put up with whatever I 1 care to say about you and your wildcat business ventures and believe me ill say plenty unfortunately the peroration of mikes philippic was somewhat spoiled by the failure of banker mays to remain for its grandiloquent conclusion hitchins Hit Rit chies gray eyes sparkled in his sunburned face im pretty good at the sling shot if you need any help he said he interrupted kathleen with tartness mike never missed a bullseye bulls eye in his life it if he had something to shoot at that was practically certain to explode and gum up the works mike cocked a quizzical eyebrow at his daughter yes she said in a voice sharper than she realized it if eugene mays wants to he can move us all into the poorhouse and she gave her father a hostile glance think it was a circus and laugh but then ive begun to wonder it if ever be quite adult or maybe ive got growing pains anyway the prospect amuse me TO BE CONTINUED |