by Peggy Gaddis
“Jamie?” she repeated faintly.
“You met her. Lieutenant Ruth Jamison, the navy nurse.”
“Oh, that ill-bred creature who brought an uninvited guest to dinner without permission?”
“Look, Mother,” Tip was unexpectedly gentle, his eyes on his mother almost pitying. “I don’t suppose I can expect you, living in your nice, warm, safe little world out of which you’ve never stepped in all your life, to understand — ”
“I understand that you are planning to disgrace the family name with a divorce,” she flashed at him unsteadily. “There’s never been a divorce in our family.”
Mrs. Parker was in tears now, and Tip put his arm about her, gentle though almost without affection.
“Come along, Mother, and take it easy for a spell,” he said gently. “You’ll get used to it, and you’ll be crazy about Jamie once you get to know her. She’s a very real, lovable person.”
“I’ve known from the very first that Gerry was not the girl for you.” Mrs. Parker’s eyes flashed malevolence at Geraldine. “But how can I know this — this Jamie person is?”
“Afraid you’ll have to take my word for it, Mother,” said Tip, and gently steered his mother towards the door. There he paused a moment to look back at Geraldine, and to lift his thumb and forefinger together in a little circle meaning “OK.”
Geraldine beamed at him, misty-eyed; Tip and his mother went out and the door closed behind them.
Almost the moment they were out of the room, Geraldine flung back the covers and slid out of bed. She locked the door to protect herself from further interruptions and stood tense and still, savoring to the full this exquisite moment.
After long months of strain and worry and the effort to keep Tip convinced of her love for him, she was free. She and Tip had a clear understanding. She thought of the long, long weeks, and her heart was torn with pity for Tip. Trying so desperately hard to tear the image of the little nurse from his mind and his heart just as Geraldine had tried without success to forget Phil.
Phil! The thought of him. She must look her loveliest; the beautiful moment of going to Phil, with all the barriers down between them, was so cherished that only the most becoming costume she owned was worthy of it.
Her selection fell finally on a dress of amber linen. This was no morning for the cheerfully casual shorts or slacks or sweater and skirt. The amber linen was simple, almost severe, but the color was vastly becoming to her warm sun tan and the burnished waves of her shining hair. She smiled at herself happily and went down the stairs.
Breakfast was over, of course. The house guests were scattered.
“Good morning, my dear,” Ted said pleasantly, on the terrace. “You look fresh as a daisy.”
“Thanks,” Geraldine glowed radiantly. “Where is everybody? The place looks deserted.”
“Around and about,” answered Ted evasively.
But when Gerry raised her eyebrows, he cleared his throat, and said flatly, “Phil and Sally went off an hour or so ago, headed for the county seat, so Sally told me.”
There was a moment’s stunned silence.
The county seat! Where one bought a marriage license and had a wedding performed. In this state one could buy a license and be married the same day!
Geraldine tried to scoff at the idea, but it clung like a burr to the fringes of her mind. It couldn’t possibly be like that! After the way she had behaved last night, Phil must know that her marriage to Tip was off. That they would get a divorce, that she would soon be free — yet he and Sally had departed for the county seat, and he hadn’t even waited to see her, nor had he sent her a message.
“I feel sure they’ll be back for lunch,” said Ted gently. But Geraldine had turned and hurried back into the house.
Chapter Thirteen
Phil’s convertible was performing nobly, and he and Sally looked like the most carefree vacationers in the world as they bowled along the paved mountain road towards the county seat.
Sally looked sideways at Phil, and said resentfully, “You might just toss me a word now and then as one tosses a bone to a hungry hound dog.”
Phil looked at her swiftly and said, “Sorry, Sally. I’m not very good company this morning.”
“You can say that again,” she agreed almost viciously.
With sudden decision he pulled the car off the side of the road, into a small clearing beneath the giant trees, and parked. He looked for a moment at his brown, strong hands clinched so hard about the steering wheel that the knuckles were small white mounds.
“Look here, Sally, I’m beginning to wonder. After all, this seems to me a pretty childish thing we are doing,” he said flatly.
Sally smothered a little impatient exclamation.
“Pretty silly for us to rush off like this and get married, darling?” She made her voice sweet and warm.
“Just to keep Tip and Gerry from smashing up.”
“But if you had been there, darling, and seen the way she behaved — ” Sally could not keep the edge from her voice.
Phil leaned forward over the wheel, his bitter eyes on the far-flung scene below them.
“I can’t imagine Gerry breaking like that.”
“And accusing her husband of murder?”
“Gerry couldn’t possibly have thought — ”
“Oh, no?”
“No,” stated Phil flatly and looked at Sally oddly. “What could possibly have put such a crazy idea in her head, in the first place?”
“How should I know?” snapped Sally shortly.
Phil turned once more to look with unseeing eyes at the vista of mountains that lay, fold on fold, the near ones green, the farther ones a deepening blue until they seemed to melt into the deep blue of the sky.
“I thought she and Tip were making a go of things,” he said wearily after a moment.
“They are, but Gerry can’t bear the thought that there is an unattached man at hand who doesn’t bow down and worship her.” Sally’s voice was vicious.
Phil’s laugh was like a small, hard slap in her face.
“That’s not Gerry you’re talking about. It must be a couple of other people,” he said grimly.
Sally had made a mistake and she knew it. But she was angry, determined that she must pull this off. She had worked on Phil ever since he had come back late last night, laughing a little at his misadventure, anxious to know that Tip had suffered no serious effects from the accident. And he had sensed instantly the changed manner of the other guests; puzzled, until Sally had slipped her hand through his arm and borne him off to where a belated supper was waiting for him. And over that supper, she had told him quickly, shading the details deliberately, what had happened when Tip had come unsteadily up the drive and Geraldine had flown at him with her frantic accusations.
She drew a deep breath, and her hands were clenched tightly, out of sight in the crisp folds of her smart cotton frock. She had to play her cards carefully. Whatever she hoped to do, she must accomplish it before Phil and Geraldine could meet.
“I’m sorry, darling,” she said sweetly, at last. “I’d rather not be the one to tell you. But it is something you simply must know, and — well, I can’t bear to see you go on making a fool of yourself over Gerry.”
She paused, prettily reluctant, but watching him covertly beneath her lashes. She could not read his taut, brown face, and he would not look at her.
“Go on.” he said expressionlessly.
She made a pretty little gesture of abasement.
“Well, it all began a long time ago, when we were just kids,” Sally’s dulcet voice went on with every indication of reluctance. “For some reason, Gerry always hated me.”
“And of course you were terribly fond of Gerry.” Phil’s voice was derisive, cutting.
Anger flashed in Sally’s eyes and for a moment she forgot her pretty pose.
“I was never terribly fond of any woman. I hate women,” she spat furiously; she made a terrific effort at self-contro
l and went on more gently, trying hard to sound pathetic. “It’s just that — well, women were spiteful and catty and incapable of the sort of friendship that is possible between two men.” She shrugged and waited, all but breathlessly, for his reaction.
But once more his expression was unreadable.
“Go on — I’m listening,” he said after a moment.
She set her teeth hard for a moment before she could obey him.
“Well, in the beginning, when we were high school kids, Tip — was mine,” she said with that air of gentle pathos. “He liked me, and of course that was something Gerry couldn’t stand. So she went to work to take him away from me. She was lovely as a dream even then, and I was not. My hair was carroty, and I had freckles and there were braces on my teeth. I never had pretty clothes, and — well, she didn’t have to work very hard to get Tip. After the engagement was announced she threw it in my teeth that she had taken him away from me.” Perfectly dry-eyed, Sally touched a wisp of a handkerchief to her eyes, subconsciously careful of the mascara, and stole another covert look at Phil.
His expression still told her nothing. She could have shaken him; she wanted to scream at him, to beat at him with her clenched fists.
After a little, he said politely, “So then what happened?”
Sally was still for a moment until she felt reasonably sure that she could trust her voice; and then she went on, gently but bravely pathetic, “Well, then she and Tip were married and Tip went to Vietnam and I went to work.”
“And also married,” Phil supplied neatly.
The color fanned out in her face for a moment, but she answered him quietly. “Yes, and I also married. But it was a mistake, of course. I should have been wise enough to know that after loving Tip, I couldn’t be happy with anyone else. The marriage ended in a divorce. And then you came to the mills.”
She turned her head away as though in confusion. But in reality it was because she dared not let him see her eyes, lest they give the lie to her brave, gentle pathos.
“I see,” said Phil at last. Was there just the faintest possible hint of softening in his voice? Hopefully, she risked a glance but he was not looking at her.
“I liked you from the first,” Sally went on gently. “And of course, Gerry knew it. She seemed always to know when I liked someone and couldn’t rest until she’d broken it up.”
“Once again, Sally my girl, that’s not Gerry you’re describing,” Phil cut in and there was once more a sting in his voice.
Sally’s hands were clenched hard and her teeth were set in her lower lip.
“Oh, of course I couldn’t expect a mere man to understand Gerry — or any woman, for that matter!” she flashed at him uncontrollably. “But you were the first man she so much as looked at after the word came that Tip’s ship had gone down; and you were the first man I had been interested in.”
Phil frowned and rubbed a hand over his forehead as though in the slight hope that he might rub away the complex emotions and problems that centered there.
Sally was still for a moment, knowing that now was the moment to play her trump card. But she must proceed with the utmost caution. She knew that her whole plan, her last hope, depended on the way she played it, that everything rested on the turn of that card.
She laid her hand gently on his arm and her voice was cooingly sweet.
“Darling,” she said very softly, “we’re talking all around the real problem, and we both know it. My happiness, even your happiness, is not nearly so important as Tip’s! After what he has been through, all the suffering and hardship and pain, surely you can’t feel it is right to rob him of the one thing in life that he needs — his wife! Phil, dearest, you could never be happy with her, no matter how much you loved her, knowing that Tip’s ghost was always between you! Every time you — k-k-kissed her, or took her in your arms — Phil, dearest, don’t you know the thought of Tip would blast every hope of happiness you could ever dream of knowing?”
Phil’s face twisted with pain and he bent a little forward over the wheel, as though trying to avoid her eyes.
“Do you suppose I’ve thought of anything else since we knew he was alive?” he asked harshly.
The silence lasted, and finally he straightened and looked down at her, his expression once more under control. There was even a taut smile on his lips, though it did nothing to soften the bleak look in his eyes.
“And even knowing all this — the way I feel about Gerry — you are willing to marry me?” he asked, and there was something faintly like derision in his tone.
Sally winced and turned her face away, lest he see something in her eyes that she must not let him guess.
“I knew all along, my darling,” she said at last, her voice husky. “But I can’t seem to do anything about it. I suppose if I had any pride — but then, a woman in love can’t afford such a luxury, can she?”
She turned to him then, the tears misty in her eyes, her voice shaken.
“I want you any way I can get you, dearest,” she told him and made a little expressive gesture with her hands. ‘“There! There’s my pride, all done up in an untidy little bundle and offered to you.”
Phil’s face was white.
“You deserve a better break.”
“But if I don’t want a better break? If I’m quite satisfied?”
He nodded then as though he had reached a difficult decision and started the car.
“Then I’m very much afraid, Sally my girl, you’ve got yourself a husband, heaven have pity on you,” he said and tried hard to smile at her.
Sally dared not trust herself to speak, lest her exultation be too strong for revelation to him at this moment. She had put it over! She was going to be married to the man Gerry loved, and some small bit of the ancient score she had chalked up against Gerry all the years since they had been children together, was going to be settled.
As the car slid back into the highway, she put her band for a fleeting moment on Phil’s and said huskily, “Darling, I won’t let you be sorry!”
Phil answered wryly, “That’s hardly the question. Are you so sure you’re not going to be sorry?”
“Never, Phil — never!” she assured him radiantly. “I’m going to be such a good wife, and some day, maybe you’ll care for me — just a little! That’s why I can start out like this, Phil, knowing that you don’t love me now, but feeling so very sure, my darling, that some day you will!”
Phil hesitated and his jaw set hard. But he kept back the words, and Sally said softly, “Some day, Phil. I can wait for what I want — so terribly.”
Phil took his hand from the wheel for a moment and held hers close and hard. But the bitterness and the pain had not quite faded from his eyes, despite the little ghost of pity that stood there for a moment.
Chapter Fourteen
Geraldine went back upstairs to her own room. She did not quite know how the time passed; she sat at the window looking out at the sun-drenched morning.
Yesterday she let herself be flung off her mental balance by Sally’s poisoned insinuations; she knew now that without those little barbs of Sally’s, she would never have made a fool of herself when Tip came alone up the drive at dusk. And her sober common sense tried desperately to tell her that she was letting her thoughts run away with her now.
Suppose Phil and Sally had driven away to the county seat? That didn’t necessarily mean that they were going to be married; she was being a fool to think of such a thing. She hadn’t seen Phil; maybe he hadn’t wanted to see her. The exhibition she had made of herself last night had been embarrassing; it would make things extremely awkward for Phil. It was perfectly natural that he would want to get away from the house for a while, away from the others who had witnessed that scene. And what more natural than that he should ask Sally to go with him?
Dimly she heard the ringing of the telephone, but she paid no attention to it. She was still sitting there, looking with wide, sick eyes out into the sunny morning, when Tip knocked at
her door and came in.
She knew, by her first look at him, that something had happened. She got unsteadily to her feet, paling.
“Tip — what — ” Her voice stuck in her throat.
“Pull yourself together, Gerry. It’s going to be a hard knock,” Tip said evenly, pity in his eyes.
“Tell me — ”
“Sally just telephoned,” said Tip quietly. “She and Phil are on their way to the county seat to be married.”
Mercifully he let her have it with brevity.
For a moment she stood quite still, drawn to her full height, staring at him with wide, shocked eyes.
“Poor little Gerry,” said Tip huskily.
She shook her head then, her eyes blurred with tears.
“It’s my own fault,” she said steadily. “I should have been honest with you at the start. I wanted to be, only I wasn’t brave enough. I had no right to play games. It’s only what I deserved.”
Tip put his arm about her, gently, as though he were her brother, and she leaned against him, grateful for the support of his arms.
For a little they were still, and then she made herself laugh. A little ragged laugh that was half a sob.
“Tip, you’ve got to hurry and find Jamie before it’s too late,” she said then.
“I’ve been on the long distance telephone for the last hour,” he said quietly. “I know where she is — a hospital in New York State. I’ve sent her a wire, and I’m going to call her tonight.”
“I’m so terribly glad for you, Tip, and for Jamie,” she told him with simple sincerity.
“Look, Gerry, I’m going back to town right away,” he said quickly. “Want to go with me?”
“Oh, Tip — yes!”
He nodded.
“I thought you’d want to.” He smiled hearteningly. “Throw a few duds into a suitcase, and I’ll take you to Beth. We can see my attorneys in the morning, and you can leave for Reno or wherever you want to go tomorrow afternoon! You’ll want to get away — fast!”
“You’re sweet, Tip.” She tried to thank him but her voice shook, and she set her teeth hard in her lower lip.