Show INSTALLMENT FIFTEEN The Story So Far I u wife or lucky editor and mayor of whom banker Mays Is seeking to ruin for criticism of his banking She Is the mother of four whose real estate Job in a bigger city peters out In the and who separates from his Mary secretary to a big shen she re-fuses to give up her Job and go with CHAPTER Continued It was just ten when she heard Alec's He was whistling as he came down the Laura's heart caught Alec hadn't arrived home with a whistle for how's tricks and Where's was his have you been all Laura Interrupted drop he went I've got a What a He but Laura noticed that his black eyes she In he announced with a Kenne-day's hired I'm the grocer boy now at ten dollars a delivering lettuce and cabbage and what not at the back doors of all the best houses In If you don't believe me order a flock of goods tomorrow and watch me do my Laura laughed Alec of all people clerking In a cheap grocery Alec who had dreamed of doing tremendous things In a huge she gasped between excuse it But this is so He ought to see mc in a white apron slicing Laura And then suddenly she realized that Alec was not laughing any His young face was set and a little been an awful he said because I couldn't tackle Pitying myself and running you I Going to the devil because the world refused to let me set it But I'm through with all Going to be a man If I can and I think I Laura's heart paying Lou's don't need to do but I want God knows but she thinks I'm the best cut So I've sort of got to try to haven't Laura swallowed I drew five dollars of my salary in Get her some decent Next week maybe I can manage enough for a Laura's breath think I can fix up some of Kathleen's for will Alec's face was radiant Laura sat very But a pulse throbbed In her throat And inside she breathed a little grateful prayer to the God who watches over the sons of CHAPTER Alec stood In the went up to her room and I've an Idea she's crying her eyes said you might see for Alec went almost shyly up the he His voice held a note Laura had never heard came to say you've been said Lou's wan little face needn't stay away all day she because you can't bear to have mc I don't want to run you out of your own I'll right got me said don't feel like that about I like Better than any girl I ever He heard her catch her not just that because you're sorry for Somehow he had her small trembling at Her eyes lifted to so he whispered and stooped and kissed Lou's little face flooded with burning said I'll be some of the things you think But In the meanwhile in go on believing I couldn't not believe in she you're And then she closed the door and Alec went off to his own room ta crawl Into bed beside But Alec did not go to sleep at everybody will he told I'll beat the face off the first ape who sneers at Kathleen was dancing with Gene Mays and pretending to be breathlessly absorbed by his determined to flatter her off her feet Actually she was not absorbed at all either in him or his to the smaller who can't get a Job and runs around with a but lately has become Interested In Lou the town drunk's daughter whom he has tak-en to his mother's home when her ther died rescuing a crippled boy In a whose marriage to New-sum at length takes place when they Ritchie Graham was the fishbone In Kathleen's throat Ruth had him in They had come to Marigold Gardens with three other couples and were apparently having a splendid Kathleen thought she had never seen anything so disgustingly blah as But Ritchie appeared to have a sweet Every time he smiled at Kathleen felt like And she couldn't even flatter herself that he was doing it deliberately to annoy He didn't seem to know Kathleen was on Once when Gene Mays danced her quite Kathleen sang out something impudent about what a small world It Is after alL But Ritchie only looked at her as if he had a vague recollection of having seen her somewhere before and turned back to Ruth with ev-ery evidence of It was then Kathleen ground her never dreamed I could be this way about a said Gene Mays in a strange hoarse Kathleen's pulses After he was Eugene The town The guy girls had tried and tried to Only to get the old ax for their it's any news to he said got me standing on my Kathleen look awfully cunning on an a he may be fun for but it's hell on dancing this with The way you throw me for a fall every time I open my she queried know damned well you She I'm bad dope for she you'd better leave me he said make you take me seriously If I have to break a tooth or Kathleen a dancing this with said a voice at Kathleen's zat growled Gene Ritchie did not even look at you taking a lot for she asked don't think murmured Ritchie and held out bis She had the perverse desire to hurt him the way he was always hurting her without even She wondered why he mattered so It had no rhyme or But he Throat Kathleen slipped into Ritchie's arms while Hot Shot Mays Glared after them with a didn't suppose you could tear yourself away from the syrup she Ritchie looked down at her with sardonic gray eyes and Kathleen's heart ran up and down a wild chromatic don't want but you hate to think someone else he She colored I'm a dog In the along with a bad-tempered brat nd a mercenary little she summarized with agreed Ritchie and She could have slapped To her horror Kathleen found her eyes threatened with She looked hastily But Ritchie roust have for his arms sud denly tightened about her and a thrill heart In he said In a low should be a moon if there Isn't and I've something to say to scrape up enough money to buy a ham- burger Ma want ed him to marry Connie the bank j er's j who despite Is be- coming Interested In Ritchie a also a Kathleen docs not approve her father and Ritchie's fighting with She's a very unhappy CHAPTER Gene Mays would be In a killing So would But somehow Kathleen could not work up any lather over that She followed Ritchie without a word down the graveled drive and across the There was a Fantastically huge and golden above the brooding cotton Honeysuckle tangled in the fence Achingly sweet The orchestra pursued them from a distance with the plaintive love Ritchie sang the words In a soft caressing voice that was treachery to her throbbing Is the sweetest What else on earth could ever bring Such happiness to everything as love's old Kathleen simply could not bear It that Ritchie should sing like that along with everything she cried Ritchie turned and looked down at And the hand that held his cigarette was not quite suppose that uncouth Mays cub represents all the things you think you want from he said Her lips Ritchie made a sudden violent are not in love with Ritchie stared at her and there was a flame back of his gray he said and again his voice made a poem of her Little ripples of emotion surged through strange impulses that swayed her like a slender palm in the clutch of a tropical are you going to do about he don't know what you He leaned toward her and she began to tremble Everything in her reached out to can't give you anything but sang Ritchie under his The song was trite and silly but it didn't sound that way when Ritchie sang Kathleen's hands my wife won't really she said manage to keep a roof of sorts over her And if she's extremely clever about using up every scrap of stale bread for pudding and stoking the furnace on rejection slips and sponging last year's Panama so that it'll do for another she'll probably live happy ever Ritchie looked down at her and his face was white and very values are They're determined not to have a rush of glamour to the brain and spend the rest of my life regretting could make you forget false He took a quick step toward her and her heart cried out If he caught her In his she was lost She knew it She wanted so terribly to be crushed against Ritchie's breast she Only deep within she did not really crave mercy of cried Ritchie in a inflexible want It's queer that I never wanted any woman this way I don't know why you tear me to pieces or how it happens that in all the world 1 you're the one my heart cannot re- But I don't want even you at the cost of my self-respect and I could take if I here and I could set you afire with Hold you till you begged me never to let you isn't I don't want you that I'm a quixotic I take advantage of I love I think you love me too in spite of But you'll probably break both our hearts with your half-baked misconceptions of what life's all Would you rather I let you strictly he She Ritchie stared at her with caustic gray He was proud as he had He did not force his love on any she said do something to You have from the first Maybe it's Maybe it's I don't know but I hate Probably you could sweep me off my balance if you And for a while It might be heaven in your But it wouldn't last Love doesn't Some day I'd wake up and know I'd cheated myself for the kind of thrill that soon burns I'd never forgive either of He walked away without a BE |