Romance Classics

by Peggy Gaddis

  Sandra watched her with a curious intentness, and Cherry all but held her breath, so fearful was she that Sandra would say something that would upset Loyce.

  They were halfway through lunch before there was the sound of a car in the drive and Cherry saw Loyce sit up alertly, breaking off in the middle of a sentence as she listened to the sound of footsteps crossing the graveled drive and climbing the steps and then coming on across the verandah.

  When Jonathan came into the dining area, Loyce’s eyes lit up and a soft surge of color touched her face. Cherry was watching Sandra and saw Sandra watching Loyce; and there was an ugly glint in Sandra’s eyes. Cherry held her breath, prepared for an explosion as Loyce’s eyes asked a question of Jonathan, who smiled and shook his head slightly.

  The whole brief scene had lasted no more than moments; and yet Jonathan had brought into the room with him a super-charged atmosphere that tensed Cherry’s nerves.

  “You’re just in time for lunch, my boy,” said the Judge, and Jonathan smiled his thanks and took the place beside, Loyce, which brought him directly across the table from Sandra, who was eying him grimly.

  “You still here?” Jonathan asked curtly.

  Sandra rested her elbows on the table on either side of her plate and put her chin in her palms, eying him with a look that held hatred and viciousness.

  “Oh, I’ll be here for quite a while,” she drawled. “That is, of course, unless you want to send me packing. And you know the only way you can do that, don’t you?”

  Jonathan’s mouth was a thin, grim line and his eyes were bitter with loathing.

  “I’ll attend to it directly after lunch,” he told her savagely.

  Cherry cried out hotly, “Jonny, you’re going to pay her to go away? Gran’sir, isn’t that blackmail, and punishable by prison?”

  Sandra said sharply, “Oh, dry up! What do you know about it?”

  “Jonny, if you give this creature five cents you are a yellow-livered coward and a dope,” cried Cherry.

  Loyce asked tremulously, “What is this all about?”

  Sandra said coolly, “It’s about some money Jonny owes me that I’ve come to collect and don’t intend to leave without.”

  Loyce turned swiftly to Jonathan. “Do you owe her money, Jonny?”

  “She thinks so,” answered Jonathan wearily. “I told you about it last night, remember? And now it’s come to a showdown. She wins, of course. It will be worth it to be quite sure I never set eyes on her again. Go get packed, Sandra, and be ready to leave within an hour.”

  Highly gratified by the turn of events, Sandra stood up.

  “I’ll be ready in half an hour,” she cooed sweetly. “I’m already packed. In fact, I haven’t unpacked.”

  “That’s good,” said Cherry, scarlet-cheeked. “Because you’re going to be leaving, but you’re not taking Jonny’s check. Because he’s not going to give you one.”

  Sandra whirled on her like a virago.

  “You keep out of this,” she flashed. “It’s none of your business.”

  “I never like to see a man get a dirty deal,” Cherry said firmly. “And if Jonny bribes you to stay away from him, then he’s more of a fool than I take him for.”

  “Now, Cherry, wait a minute,” Jonathan protested.

  “No, you wait a minute,” Cherry flashed. “You wait a lot of minutes, or you’ll have this harpy on your neck for the rest of your life. You don’t think for a minute that she’ll stay away from you? And what kind of a man are you, anyway, to have to bribe women to stay away from you? Don’t you have any pride, any self-respect at all?”

  “Now, Cherry — ” protested the Judge sternly.

  “Well, all right, Gran’sir, maybe I’ve got no right to speak,” Cherry burst out.

  “Now there you’re quite right,” Sandra flashed furiously. “This has nothing to do with you, you backwoods fool! This is strictly between Jonny and me. And if he feels it’s worth fifty grand to him to know he will never set eyes on me again — ”

  “Oh, I’m certain he’d feel the money was well-invested if he could be sure of that!” Cherry cut in. “But how can he be sure? He tried to hide from you, and you hired private detectives to find him. How can he be sure you won’t do it again and be always under foot, telling lies about him and harassing him?”

  Before Sandra could manage an answer, Cherry turned to Jonathan and went racing on, “And as for you, Jonathan Gayle, I’d have a lot more respect for you if you simply grabbed her by the nape of the neck, slammed her into the car and told her to get going! What kind of man are you, anyway, that you have to pay blackmail to keep from being pursued by a shameless creature like her?”

  Loyce was looking from one irate, screaming girl to the other and then at Jonathan; the lovely color had faded from her face, and her eyes were wide with alarm and concern.

  Jonathan met Cherry’s eyes, and suddenly the tautness went out of his face and he grinned at her. Sandra, seeing the swift exchange of meaningful glances, cried out furiously, “You’d better give me my check, Jonny, or you’ll wish you’d never been born.”

  Jonathan turned to the Judge, as though Sandra had not spoken.

  “What would you advise, sir, in a case like this?” he asked.

  The Judge eyed Sandra without warmth.

  “Why, I’d simply tell her to get out and stay out, and if she went on with her attempts to harass me, I’d get an injunction against her that would make her ‘cease and desist,’ “ he drawled. “And then I’d explain her to my wife, if I had one, and laugh in her face whenever she tried to pursue me again. She’s running a most colossal bluff, my boy. My advice is that you call it, here and now in the presence of witnesses.”

  Sandra cried out in fury, “Why, you old goat!”

  Cherry was on her feet immediately, eyes blazing.

  “Don’t you swear at my Gran’sir,” she said hotly, and laid a hand on Sandra’s arm. “Come on, you! You’re leaving.”

  Sandra flung Cherry’s hand away from her and glared at Jonathan.

  “Are you going to listen to that old fool of a Judge?” she blazed.

  “Since he is a very wise and astute Judge and my legal adviser, that’s exactly what I’m going to do,” Jonathan told her. “I’m thoroughly ashamed that I ever let you bluff me in the first place. But that’s all over now. I think you’d better do what Cherry says and get going.”

  “Like fun I will! Not until you give me my check!” Sandra’s tone was still belligerent, but there was a touch of uneasiness in her eyes as she looked about the table from one forbidding face to another.

  “Your check!” Cherry sniffed. “I’d laugh if I wasn’t so disgusted.”

  “Oh, you!” Sandra swung on her with a burst of profanity that startled them all and that brought a wave of dark angry color to Jonathan’s face.

  He stood up, caught Sandra’s arms and marched her toward the stairs and up them out of sight.

  “When I see a woman like that,” he said quietly, “I am reconciled to the fact that my two girls are mountain-raised.”

  “Gran’sir, I couldn’t believe last night when Jonny told me about her that she was really like this,” Loyce confessed, wide-eyed and shaken.

  “She’s unbelievable, isn’t she?” Cherry marveled. “I mean you just can’t believe a woman who looks like that on the outside could be so sickeningly shameless on the inside! Golly!”

  “Poor Jonny!” said Loyce softly.

  “Poor Jonny my eye!” snapped Cherry. “How any man could ever have been taken in by her! Hiding from her, for Pete’s sake! Letting her chase him out of his profession! Planning to buy her off with a big fat settlement as if she had really been his wife instead of just trying like blazes to be! Jonny’s almost as incredible as she is. I’m not sure I like him any better than I like her. And I purely despise her.”

  “Oh, now, Cherry you mustn’t be hard on the boy,” the Judge protested. “I’m sure she made things very unpleasant for him.”


  “Well, what was to stop him from smacking her down?” raged Cherry. “Any real man would have told her to go peddle her hoop and get out of his way. But no, he has to be all soft and let her chase him all over the country. No, I’m quite sure I don’t like him any better than I like her. Gran’sir, let’s notify him that we’ll be needing his room immediately. I’ve got reservations for the week-end that will fill the place.”

  “No!” said Loyce so sharply that they both looked at her in swift surprise. Loyce’s color deepened and her eyes would not quite meet theirs. “I mean — well, it’s not fair to penalize Jonny just because of her behavior. He’s happy here and he’s not making any trouble. I think we ought to let him stay until he’s ready to go.”

  Cherry stared at her and then at the Judge. For a moment neither spoke, and then Cherry said awkwardly, “Well, of course, honey, if you want him to stay-”

  “It’s not that I want him to stay,” Loyce answered uncomfortably. “It’s just that I think it would be unfair to make him go just because of Sandra. After all, he wasn’t to blame for her coming here. She just hired detectives to trace him and then came. It wasn’t really his fault.”

  “It was, too!” Cherry could not keep back the words. “If he had told her to go chase herself and not encouraged her to think he was in love with her, this would never have happened.”

  “He didn’t encourage her to think he was in love with her,” Loyce protested so warmly that once more the Judge and Cherry exchanged startled, uneasy glances. “She’s beautiful, and he dated her, and if she read more into his intentions than was really there — well, after all, a man can’t be blamed if a girl convinces herself of something that her common sense tells her isn’t true, but that she want’s to be true so much that she finally makes herself believe it.”

  The Judge and Cherry were staring at Loyce as though they had never set eyes on her before.

  “I suppose I’m not making much sense,” she managed painfully at last, and there was a pleading in the look she gave them and in the tone of her voice.

  “Well, I wouldn’t say that,” Cherry admitted reluctantly, though it was exactly what she would have said had the speaker been anybody but Loyce. “What doesn’t make sense to me is why you’re taking up for Jonny. I didn’t think you even liked him.”

  The Judge was watching Loyce with a sharp intentness that he was at some pains to mask, but Loyce was too absorbed trying to answer Cherry to be really aware of him.

  “Well, I do like him,” Loyce said awkwardly. “He’s kind and he’s gentle and he’s nice.”

  She glanced at both of them as though to apologize for the inadequate word.

  Upstairs, a door banged sharply open and Sandra’s strident voice hurled an unprintable epithet. And then she came marching down the stairs, her head held high, her cheeks blazing beneath her deft make-up. She did not glance at the group still about the table in the dining area but marched straight out of the big front door.

  Jonathan, his face set and white with anger, came behind her, carrying two large suitcases; and following Jonathan was Eben with two more cases. Elsie brought up the rear. As the men followed Sandra outside Elsie stopped at the foot of the stairs and watched as the big front door closed behind Eben.

  “My sakes alive!” she murmured, and then came to the table. “That was better than a movie. For a minute there I thought she was going to try to kill him. Man, was she ever mad! She called him things I never heard a man say, let alone a woman that’s supposed to be a lady.”

  She looked at the three around the table and saw the forbidding gleam in the Judge’s eyes and said hastily to Cherry, “He gave her a check.”

  Cherry cried out angrily, “He what?”

  Elsie nodded. “He sure did. But I don’t reckon it was as big as she was hoping for. She sure screamed some nasty things at him. But she kept the check. He said it was to tide her over until she could get back to work.”

  “That will do, Elsie!” said the Judge sternly.

  “Sure, Your Honor,” said Elsie mildly. But as she began clearing the table she winked at Cherry, who was seething with anger at Jonathan’s supine surrender to Sandra’s outrageous demands.

  They had moved into the living room area and Elsie was busy clearing the dining area in preparation for the lunch hour when Jonathan came back. The sound of Sandra’s car was dying away down the drive, and Jonathan paused at the foot of the stairs and faced them, his face taut and drawn.

  “There are no apologies I could offer for the outrageous episode that just ended,” he said quietly. “I can’t begin to tell you how sorry I am or how much I regret it. I’ll be packed and away from here as fast as I can make it.”

  The Judge forestalled Loyce’s protest by saying quietly, “You’re fed up with the Lodge, Jonathan?”

  Jonathan looked startled. “You know better than that, sir. It’s just that I felt sure you’d want me to leave, after this outrageous affair.”

  “Oh, Jonny, don’t go,” stammered Loyce, her voice shaking. “Please don’t go!”

  Jonathan looked uncertainly at the Judge.

  “I don’t want to go, Loyce, unless I’m no longer welcome here,” Jonathan told her. “And that’s for you to say, Judge. Am I?”

  The Judge’s eyes twinkled beneath his bushy brows, but he answered without a smile, “Loyce is a full partner in the Lodge, my boy. She has as much to say about who’s to stay as Cherry or I. If she wants you to stay, then you are quite welcome.”

  Jonathan turned to Cherry, who met his gaze with her chin tilted at a defiant angle and her eyes frosty.

  “Cherry?” he asked uncertainly.

  “It’s up to Loyce,” said Cherry coldly. “Personally, I couldn’t care less one way or another. And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got work to do.”

  The door of her small library-office closed behind her, and Jonathan looked gratefully at Loyce and the Judge.

  “You’re all very kind and I’m really very grateful,” he said simply.

  “You don’t think she’ll be back, Jonathan?” asked the Judge.

  Jonathan’s face grew taut. “I’m quite sure she won’t sir!”

  “Then we may as well forget about her, don’t you think?” suggested the Judge.

  “That’s good of you, sir. I hope we can.”

  Chapter Eleven

  In the late afternoon, as Loyce came up from the bottom fields, she discovered Jonathan at the spot where the path to the fishing spot joined that to the fields.

  She paused for an instant, and color flooded her sun-tanned face as her eyes met his shyly. Then she came on to meet him, eager-eyed and breathless.

  “What did you find out, Jonny?” she asked him eagerly.

  “It’s too soon to have found out anything, Loyce honey,” Jonathan answered her quickly. “I started some inquiries, but it will be several days before we can hope for news. I waited here because I wanted to thank you for taking my part in that ugly mess with Sandra.”

  “I didn’t want you to leave,” Loyce told him awkwardly, “until we had found out about Weldon.”

  Jonathan looked as though she had slapped him. He took a step backward, and his expression hardened.

  “Oh, yes, of course. It was your concern for news of Hammett, not any interest in me, that caused you to want me to stay. I was a fool to have thought anything else,” His voice was harsh, his eyes bitter.

  Loyce put out a hand to touch him, drew it back and locked it tight in her other hand. Her eyes were warm and anxious and her voice was not quite steady when she answered:

  “It wasn’t altogether that, Jonny. Please believe me. I didn’t want you to have to go just because she’d made things so unpleasant for all of us. I didn’t feel it was your fault that she followed you around. You seemed happy here, and I didn’t see why you couldn’t stay on if you wanted to.”

  Jonathan studied her for a long time, tense moment as though not quite sure that he dared believe her. But th
e earnestness in her eyes, the warm sincerity in her voice dispelled his doubts, and suddenly he smiled warmly at her.

  “That’s good to know, Loyce. I suppose it was my fault, as Cherry pointed out, because I didn’t smack her down when the pursuit first started,” he admitted ruefully. “But a man feels an utter fool to imagine a beauteous damsel like Sandra has dishonorable intentions toward him.”

  He was trying hard for a light note, but it didn’t come off quite as he had hoped. Loyce merely nodded solemnly.

  “I can imagine that it would,” she agreed. “Do you think she will come back, Jonny?”

  “Not here,” Jonathan assured her grimly.

  “I know. But if she is shameless enough to hire private detectives to trail you, mightn’t she do it again when you are somewhere else; when she’s spent the money you gave her?”

  Jonathan’s brows drew together in a small frown.

  “You know about that?” he asked.

  Loyce’s color deepened but she managed a faint smile.

  “Elsie is a terrific tattletale,” she reminded him. “And she said the whole thing was better than a movie. Naturally she knew that you gave Sandra a check, and naturally she told us. I’m sorry, Jonny, but there are very few secrets at the Lodge.”

  “You think I gave her the fifty thousand she demanded?” asked Jonathan, his tone cool and expressionless.

  “Elsie said Sandra wasn’t satisfied with the amount, and you told her it was to tide her over until she got back to work. So I don’t imagine it was the whole amount she wanted.”

  “It wasn’t,” Jonathan said curtly. “It wasn’t even a tenth of what she wanted. She said she was broke; I gave her enough to take her back to New York and to keep her going until she could get back to modeling. Was that wrong, Loyce?”

  “Of course not, Jonny,” Loyce answered swiftly. “It was kind of you, and I’m awfully glad you did it.”

  Jonathan’s brow cleared.

  “Well, thanks,” he told her. “That’s something I hated to have you or Cherry know. Cherry surely made no bones of what she thinks of me for letting myself in for such a messy affair.”