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Show ..IV fcV r Mc Clum. W.N.U.Serice " VZ aw INSTALLMENT ELEVEN The Story So Far Laura Magulre. wife of Mme Magulre, happy-go-lucky editor and mayor of Covington, Cov-ington, is mother to four children, not too well treated by the depression: Tom, whose real estate Job In the big city became be-came profitless and who proposed moving mov-ing to Covington rather than depend on the earnings of Mary Etta, his wife, secretary to a big shot; Alec, who, unable un-able to get a job, runs around with a flashy divorcee older than he and on a bet dates up Lou Knight, the town drunk's daughter; Shirley, engaged to Jalrd Newsum, also out of work since his father closed up the factory to stop losses and whose marriage is thus delayed; de-layed; Kathleen, In whom a stranger, Ritchie Graham, also a newspaperman. Is Interested. Ma Newsum wants Jaird to marry Connie Mays, the banker's daughter. Tom and Mary Etta separate when she refused to give up her Job. Banker Mays threatens to break Magulre Ma-gulre for criticizing his banking methods. meth-ods. Magulre and Ritchie Joyously laugh at him. Kathleen is critical of their recklessness. "Hot Shot" Mays, the banker's son. Invites her to a swimming swim-ming party. Ritchie grins when she accepts. "Anyway," as Ruth . brightly explained ex-plained while Ritchie was helping her unload hampers and thermos jugs, "it's so primitive to eat out under the trees, don't you think?" "Absolutely," he agreed. Kathleen darted him a glance. Ruthie was going strong in her own sweet way. But Ritchie appeared to like his flattery rank. . If he was even aware that she was hanging around the outskirts, he concealed it. Shirley was. helping Ruth collect the various eatables in a sheltered spot. But Connie Mays never put herself to such inconveniences. "I'll bet you a kiss, Jaird, that I beat you into the water," she challenged. chal-lenged. "Say," growled Hot Shot Mays, "did we come out here to swim or what? I'm hot as two firecrackers." "Come on, Hot Shot," cried Kathleen Kath-leen crossly, slinging her bathing CHAPTER XV Continued Nevertheless Kathleen had felt In a way revenged. And then Ruth had spoiled everything. She was one of those saccharine persons whose mission mis-sion in life is to shed sweetness. She cooed like a mourning dove at every opportunity and was quite pretty in a soft, fluttery, ash-blonde way. Her elders said she had a beautiful nature. But she was apt to cloy if taken in steady idoses. For that reason Ruth was always avidly interested in the appearance of a new man in town. And somewhere she heard about Ritchie Graham. She promptly telephoned Kathleen and insisted that he be added to L the party. All things considered Kathleen arrived ar-rived home practically ready to throw things. Laura was lying down with a touch of headache or so she had given out. But when Kathleen heard about Tom she surmised that her mother had gone to bed of a heavy heart. Privately Kathleen thought her brother was well rid of an unpleasant incubus. To Kathleen's surprise Shirley was ' also going to the swimming party. They didn't usually run in the same crowd except at very large affairs to which the whole town was invited. But Shirley gave the show away when Kathleen in all innocence asked if they couldn't all four go together. Away from Ritchie, Kathleen Kath-leen was not at all anxious to be alone with Gene M-ays. "Sorry," said Shirley evenly, "but Connie Mays asked us to ride over with her and Lance Ferguson." "I see," said Kathleen, staring fixedly fix-edly at the red leather belt she was fastening about her. She did see a lot. Of course Connie Con-nie had engineered the whole thing. She had probably refused to go at all unless Jaird was invited. And Ruth was one of Connie's yes-men. But to get Jaird, Shirley had to be included. Only Connie, with her usual brazen disregard for other people's rights, had arranged that too to her own taste. Ostensibly Lance, a weak little baa-baa sheep, was Connie's date.' Actually he was being taken along for the ride, as Kathleen knew. And of course so did Shirley, even if she did not breathe out fire and brimstone as Kathleen would have done. In the end they went off with their respective swains, Shirley first. Both Kathleen and Laura noticed that Connie had waited till the last to collect the second girl. And when her smart car disappeared, she was driving as she usually did with one hand, while she faced the back seat and carried on an animated and ges-ticulative ges-ticulative conversation with a rather rath-er silent Jaird and a totally silent Shirley. Hot Shot Mays drove up almost before his sister's dust had settled. He was in a terrific hurry to be on his way. He did not bother to exercise ex-ercise his famous charm on Laura. It was not necessary with most mothers. As a rule they were overwhelmingly over-whelmingly on his side. Laura knew he would always be like that Unnecessarily Un-necessarily brusque unless forced to be otherwise. But Kathleen for once missed the little telltale pucker between be-tween Laura's eyes. Kathleen had worries of her own. Gene Mays was a bit overpowering. overpower-ing. There was no getting around that. He had a smooth way about him when he strove to please. And he had every intention of pleasing Kathleen. She baffled him a little. Other girls struggled to impress him in a big way. Kathleen reversed the process. It was a new experience experi-ence for Hot Shot Mays to sit in the uncertain seat. Kathleen even laughed when he ladled out what he called "heavy sugar." "Maybe I'm boring you," he said at the end of twenty miles, when he seemed to have got no farther fast with his campaign. "Maybe," agreed Kathleen and smiled. By the time they reached their destination Gene Mays felt a little like a dirigible in a high wind, and Kathleen's equanimity was somewhat some-what restored. She might not have made any dent on Ritchie Graham's O consciousness, but she had Hot Shot Mays doing acrobatics against his will. He was a big bluff as a menace men-ace to female hearts, or so it seemed to Kathleen. She had him pawing the air and she could grin at his best efforts. She felt perfectly the mistress of the situation and decidedly decid-edly cocky and pleased with herself. CHAPTER XVI The new Porterville Swimming Pool was ideally situated on the edge of town in a ravine between two fern-clad hills. There were sixty acres of wooded grounds, a huge outdoor out-door lake fed by springs, a number of rustic dressing huts and the usual diving boards, floats and soft drink stands. But the big dining room, like the dancing pavilion, was more impressive than effective. The food tasted as the mechanical orchestration orchestra-tion sounded, a bit tinny. led up to the diving platform. Only he was there first, daring her to set I foot on a rung. She was beginning to wish that he'd go off somewhere ! and die for a week or two. Her I pointed face took on a slightly haggard hag-gard look. She did not beg for quar- ter. Somehow one didn't with Gene , Mays. But there was still that catch , in her side, only more of it. i A little grimly Kathleen made for i the big buoy at the upper end of the lake. It was quite a distance, but ordinarily no swim for her. Nevertheless, strangely it seemed to come no nearer however many strokes she took, and her limbs felt weighted. Lethargy attacked her arms. She glanced over her shoulder. shoul-der. She was quite far away from everybody. Even Gene had paused to filch a pair of water wings from a small girl who was doing her utmost ut-most to hang onto them. Kathleen measured the distance between going go-ing back and struggling on, and decided de-cided the buoy was nearer. Even then it did not occur to her she might not make it Again she risked a glance over her shoulder. Hope clanged a brazen bra-zen bell in her heart. Gene had draped the water wings about his neck and was again swimming after her. Kathleen sobbed once. She knew by the exquisiteness of her relief re-lief how nearly she had lost her nerve. She had only to stay afloat till Gene reached her. She turned over on her back. But the cramp in her side doubled her up. She went under, gasped and almost lacked the energy to come up. "You would run off and make me wear myself out chasing you!" shouted Gene. He was only a few feet away, flailing flail-ing water like a porpoise, and laughing laugh-ing uproariously. If he ducked her again Kathleen was suddenly frantic. fran-tic. She tried to call out, to tell him she was exhausted. But the muscles in her throat locked with panic and fatigue. "All that goes down is bound to come up!" bawled Gene and made a dive for her feet. He meant to drag her under. With a terrible bitterness Kathleen realized real-ized that he would probably repeat the process with appropriate brays of laughter until finally she did not come up at all. And then he would feel dreadful of course. But she wouldn't be there to witness his remorse. re-morse. She tried again to call out failed, and saw Gene gathering his huge muscles for the lunge. "You damned fool, can't you see she's in trouble?" cried a sharp voice. But Gene didn't see. He leaped. Only a fist caught him on the jaw and dropped him back in his tracks. "Put your hand on my shoulder," Ritchie Graham commanded Kathleen. Kath-leen. But she was past doing even that White as death, she slid down into the water. Down. Down. Down. She thought listlessly that it was perilously per-ilously easy to die. Only Ritchie's hand closed on her shoulder. He had dived after her. They rose to the surface. Keeping one arm about her waist he towed her to the buoy, picked her up in his long strong arms and laid out her full length on her face like a wet paper doll. After a while Kathleen's shuddering shudder-ing breaths subsided to something approaching normal. She sat up dizzily. diz-zily. "Thanks," she said in an unsteady un-steady voice. "Don't mention it." He did not look at her. Apparently Appar-ently he was a little bored at having dragged her from a watery grave. Or did he realize that it had been as bad as that? She flushed, and sudden tears burned her eyes. "Maybe you'd better bet-ter throw me back in if that's the way you feel about it" she said bitterly. He turned with one of those quick movements that always surprised her. He was very white. And his gray eyes blazed at her. "I don't trifle, Kathleen," he said in a rough uneven voice. "I told you once before be-fore I'm no ladies' man. I wouldn't flirt with you or anyone else." "I don't know what you mean." "You know exactly what I mean. Ever since the first time I saw you, your eyes have dared me to do this and this and this." His arms were about her. GripV ping her in a fierce embrace that hurt. His lips hurt too. Because his kisses were more antagonistic than tender. And they pushed Kathleen Kath-leen across the border of everything she had ever known into a region of strange pain and a heartbreaking ecstasy. "I hate you!" she blazed. "Do you?" "Yes!" He made her a little mocking bow. "Probably we were meant to hate each other like hell or else " his voice shook "to love each other that way." "I don't love you," she cried. But Ritchie had slid oil the float and was swimming to shore. (TO BE COXTIM ED) "You sort of make a feller pin his ears back in that outfit," said Hot Shot Mays. suit over her shoulder, ,"how's for getting dressed? And don't be all day about it, Tarzan." When she emerged in her brief One-piece white suit, a scarlet bandana ban-dana about her bead, Hot Shot was waiting for her at the diving platform, plat-form, but Jaird and Connie were already al-ready in the water. "You sort of make a feller pin his ears back in that outfit," said Hot Shot Mays as his hard blue eyes traveled over Kathleen's lithe young body. "Listen, Baby, if I was staging beauty contests you could be Miss Universe." "But you aren't" Kathleen made a beautiful flip-flop in the air for a perfect landing. He dived after her, hitting the water a split second later. But he failed to overtake her before she crawled up on the raft between Jaird and Connie. The latter looked distinctly dis-tinctly annoyed at the intrusion, which did not afflict Kathleen. She even enjoyed it and thought she might stay where she was till Shirley Shir-ley joined them. But Gene Mays had other ideas. He dragged Kathleen Kath-leen off her perch although she fought him like a tigress and sent her to the bottom, clawing and scratching. He howled with mirth when she came up choked and breathless. He managed to pinch her thigh, for which she boxed his ears. But there was no peace from him except to keep swimming just out of his reach. And that was a little lit-tle wearying. "The big stiff," she thought angrily, angri-ly, aware of a catch in her side as she dodged one of his sideswipes. Jaird swam in to shore to meet Shirley while Connie glowered. It looked as if Ruth was going to get into the water at last. Ritchie was already in his suit and lounging on the end of the pier waiting for her, a cigarette in his mouth. Kathleen paused long enough in her hectic flight from Gene Mays' caveman tactics to observe that Ritchie looked provokingly handsome in his black jersey. She felt she could bear him better if just once he showed to a disadvantage. Hot Shot Mays seized upon her momentary preoccupation with another man to push her head under water until her lungs caught fire. The catch in her side was more pronounced when she again took to flight She began to feel a little like a heavy bellows. She tried to edge up to the raft, but Gene yanked her off. She made for the ladder which |