Romance Classics

by Peggy Gaddis

  Mrs. Kendall’s eyes flashed, but whatever she had meant to say was interrupted by the appearance of the maid, bearing with the exaggerated care that told she was unfamiliar with it, a handsome silver tea service which she placed on a low table beside Mrs. Kendall.

  When the maid had gone, Mrs. Kendall poured tea and passed tiny thin sandwiches and when the amenities had been dispensed with, she said lightly:

  “Bill seems to think a good deal of you, Miss Layne.”

  Cathy put down her teacup and looked straight at Mrs. Kendall.

  “Bill doesn’t just ‘think a good deal of me,’ Mrs. Kendall. Bill loves me—and I love him.”

  For a moment there was silence in the room. Outside, Cathy could hear the hum of a power lawn mower; from the kitchen, as a door opened, there was a murmur of voices that was stilled when the door swung shut.

  But neither Cathy nor Mrs. Kendall was aware of the sounds. They were staring straight at each other, the naked sword of enmity drawn between them, two women suddenly hating each other because of the man they both loved.

  Mrs. Kendall laughed thinly and poured fresh tea into her cup, but her hand shook ever so slightly.

  “My dear Miss Layne,” her tone was insolently derisive, “are you trying to tell me you have any fantastic idea that Bill has been in love with you all the time you’ve been gone?”

  “And for a long time before I left, Mrs. Kendall,” said Cathy steadily.

  Mrs. Kendall’s mouth thinned.

  “And I suppose you hope to inveigle him into marrying you?”

  “I don’t think it will be necessary to ‘inveigle’ him—since he wants to marry me. I’ve told you that we love each other,” Cathy reminded her.

  “Bill will never marry you while I live,” said Mrs. Kendall sharply.

  “Oh, come now, Mrs. Kendall, let’s not get melodramatic and absurd. After all, Bill is twenty-eight. Surely you don’t expect to control his whole life—”

  “I control something that means a great deal to Bill,” said Mrs. Kendall thinly. “I control the Kendall estate—an estate that is close to a million dollars—and Bill wants very much to inherit it. Which, of course, he will—under certain circumstances.”

  “One of which is that he remain unmarried and devote his entire life to the whims of a selfish, domineering woman!” Cathy flashed recklessly.

  “Oh, no, I have no objection to Bill’s marrying—when he finds a suitable wife!” said Mrs. Kendall, and her tone was an insult.

  “Which, of course, means that you do not consider me suitable,” Cathy finished for her.

  “Naturally not. You are a girl from nowhere—with no background, no social standing. A girl who has been off mixing herself in all sorts of unpleasantnesses. No doubt there was much lowering of—er—moral standards where you were.”

  “I was in a war, Mrs. Kendall. Life was not very dainty, I’m afraid,” said Cathy hotly. “But my morals are quite as good as they ever were.”

  “Which isn’t saying too much, is it?”

  “There’s really no point in my sitting here and allowing you to insult me, Mrs. Kendall,” said Cathy when she could trust her voice. “We are the two women who mean most to Bill. He is genuinely fond of you and deeply grateful to you; for that reason, I would honestly like to be fond of you too. But that’s something you don’t want.”

  “Why should I want your liking? You are less than nothing to me,” flashed Mrs. Kendall spitefully.

  “And you are the same to me—except that I love Bill and I know it would please him if we could be friends. And I’d do anything I could to please Bill,” said Cathy evenly. “But since that’s impossible, in this instance, I see no reason why this unpleasant scene should be prolonged.”

  She walked toward the door, and Mrs. Kendall did not speak. Cathy opened the door and let herself out. For a moment she stood on the steps, her shoulders back, breathing deep of the scented spring air. She felt as though she had come out of some noisome jungle; the big, handsome, chill drawing room had been so impregnated with Mrs. Kendall’s hostility that Cathy felt as though she had been defiled by it.

  She went down the walk to the waiting Betsy-Bug, her heart heavy with the thought that Bill must decide between the two women who meant most to him. He couldn’t have both, and knowing his love for her, Cathy had no doubt of his decision. He would choose her, and his aunt and her precious money could do whatever they liked. But the decision would be painful for him, and she was bitterly sorry that it had to be made.

  Chapter Four

  Cathy was in the porch swing that evening when Bill’s sports car stopped at the curb and he came up the walk. She and Maggie had had supper and Maggie had gone next door to take half a freshly baked apple pie to a neighbor who was convalescing from the birth of a fifth child.

  Cathy braced herself a little as Bill came up the steps and bent to scoop her into his arms and hold her close.

  “Lord, if you knew what it meant to me to have you in my arms like this,” he said huskily, his cheek hard against her own.

  There was a sort of suppressed excitement in his voice, and Cathy waited tensely,

  “It’s a great night,” said Bill. “Let’s go for a ride. I fain would have words with thee, beloved—many words, some of them serious.”

  Cathy said wryly, half under her breath, “I was afraid of that!”

  Bill, drawing her down the steps with him, holding her hand, grinned at her warmly.

  “Oh, you’ve nothing to be afraid of—I hope!” he assured her, and laughed.

  Cathy’s heart sang. Then he wasn’t upset. He wasn’t angry. She scolded herself sternly that she should have for a moment believed that he could be angry with her! Mrs. Kendall had brought about the unpleasant scene this afternoon, and of course Bill would realize that.

  He tucked her into the car and slid beneath the wheel. He looked down at her as the car began to move, and said lightly, “Of course you haven’t the faintest idea where I’m taking you?”

  “Sand Bar Ferry Road?” she guessed, and her heart leaped a little.

  “Where else but? It being the town’s favorite Lovers’ Lane—and me being very much in love with you and having great news to divulge—where else?” he argued reasonably, and in the soft moonlight she saw that his face was happy and eager.

  Bill turned the sports car away from the road to park beneath a big tree. There were several other parked cars but the meadow was vast, and the curve of its bank above the river offered privacy.

  Bill turned to Cathy and said eagerly, “Now that I have you alone, my proud beauty—”

  Cathy laid a swift hand on his arm.

  “I’m—sorry, Bill, truly I am. I tried, but she—she just wasn’t having any.”

  Bill was puzzled.

  “What the heck are you talking about?”

  “You mean Mrs. Kendall didn’t tell you about inviting me to tea this afternoon?”

  Bill was amazed.

  “You went to tea with Aunt Edith?”

  “She didn’t tell you?”

  “Not a word. What was the idea, I wonder?”

  “Chiefly, I gathered, to convince me that I am not a suitable wife for you, Bill,” said Cathy steadily. She informed me that she had no objection to your getting married—”

  “That’s big of her!”

  “Provided she was convinced that your prospective bride was suitable. And she added quite frankly that I wasn’t.”

  “Sounds like her,” commented Bill bitterly.

  “So I told her that I loved you and that you loved me, and that we would neither of us ask her consent.”

  “Look, Cathy, will you marry me?”

  Her heart sang with delight and her voice was unsteady as she answered instantly, “Of course, darling.”

  “Immediately?” he insisted, and added quietly, “And secretly?”

  For a moment Cathy sat quite still, convinced that she had not heard him correctly. She stared at him through the
dark shadows of the old tree, wondering what his expression could be, and wishing that some of the silver-white moonlight that spilled so prodigally beyond the branches could penetrate the shadows.

  “Secretly, Bill?” she repeated after a dazed moment.

  “Secretly, Cathy—for a little while,” said Bill, and there was a note almost of sternness in his voice. “You see, Cathy, we have to be realistic about things. Aunt Edith would throw a fit—”

  “Is that important?”

  “As long as she has complete control of the money, I’m afraid it is, Cathy,” said Bill grimly.

  “But—but, Bill, I don’t care about the money!”

  “I do,” said Bill flatly. “I care a hell of a lot about the money, Cathy. It’s mine by rights. It was never Aunt Edith’s, except by marrying Uncle Will. Half of it should have been my mother’s. Cathy, I watched my mother work herself to death. Do you know what the death certificate said? ‘Malnutrition and physical exhaustion.’ Starvation, Cathy—my mother starved to death while Aunt Edith and Uncle Will were the richest people in town—and half of their money, by every moral right on earth, belonged to my mother.”

  Cathy sat very still. She ached with pity for him, and yet she was so bewildered and shaken that she could not speak.

  “You see, Cathy, I want the money for you as much as for myself,” he went on after a moment, as though searching through his mind and his heart for the words that would make her understand what was so clear to him. As Cathy made a little movement, he went on swiftly.

  “Oh, I know, darling, what you’re going to say: that when two people love each other as much as we do, money’s not important. But from my own bitter experience, Cathy, I know that’s a wicked lie. Loving you as I do, if I saw you want for something—if I saw you ill and starving as my mother was, and I had nothing to provide for you with—Cathy, I’d cut my throat before I’d ever let that happen.”

  “But—oh, Bill, you’re so wrong,” she protested shakily.

  “Am I? You’re going to have one devil of a time convincing me of it, Cathy,” he said, and now his voice was harsh. “I’ve known you since you were ten, Cathy. I know you’ve always lived modestly; you’ve never had anything except what was given to you by people as poor as yourself, until you were old enough to work for yourself. I know what you went through during your training as a nurse. I know that never in your life have you had beauty or comfort or luxury—and, Cathy, that’s going to be my gift to you, a proof of my love.”

  “I think I’d rather have you willing to—to work to earn a living for me.”

  “At what? I’ve been in the plant since I was eighteen, learning the business. It’s the only business I know, Cathy, and if I walked out on Aunt Edith now, or married against her wishes, I’d have to start all over again somewhere else at a piddling little salary that might just possibly afford us a couple of rooms somewhere. That’s not good enough for you, Cathy—it’s not good enough for me.”

  Cathy drew a long shaken breath and knew that her hands were clenched so hard in her lap that they were aching from the strain.

  “Then I guess that’s that,” she said painfully. “There isn’t anything more to say.”

  “There’s a devil of a lot, Cathy, and if you love me as much as I love you, you’ll listen to me—with an open mind, darling,” said Bill swiftly. “I’ve got it all figured out, and—well, all it needs is for you to love me a whole lot and trust me just a little.”

  “I’ll listen, Bill,” she said faintly, and waited.

  “Aunt Edith wants me to go to New York for a month,” he said. “She sprang the idea on me tonight at dinner. I know now that the reason behind her sudden idea was to get me away while you were here!”

  Cathy said softly, “So?”

  “So I’ll go to New York, just as she has planned,” answered Bill. “But you will go with me, as my wife. We’ll have a thirty-day honeymoon—”

  “A secret honeymoon!” said Cathy, her mouth twisting with distaste.

  “What’s wrong with that?” argued Bill. “After all, a honeymoon concerns the two people involved, and it’s nobody else’s business.”

  “And afterwards?”

  “Afterwards, we’ll come back here. And after you’ve received your discharge, we’ll face Aunt Edith with the fact that we’re married, and spike her guns. Oh, I’ve got it all figured out. If we try to get married publicly, she’ll cut up and raise the roof and disinherit me. But if, after we are married, I go to her and tell her—once I’ve got her softened up and the surrounding circumstances are just right—she’ll give in. You can safely leave all that to me.”

  Cathy said huskily after a long moment, “I don’t like it, Bill.”

  “Not even if it is the only way, Cathy?”

  “But it isn’t, Bill. I don’t care about the money.”

  “I do, Cathy,” Bill said doggedly. “In a way, I—well, maybe it sounds cockeyed, but I feel I owe it to my mother. She had such a devil of a life, and all because she loved my father so much that the money didn’t matter. It hurt her terribly, when I was growing up and we were so desperately poor, that she had—she called it ‘cheated’ me out of what should have been mine. She always believed that Grandfather would have relented, except that William and Edith stood guard over the old man and kept him riled up about the way she had eloped.”

  “But, Bill,” Cathy said unsteadily, “a secret marriage! It—oh, it seems somehow cheap and—and almost sordid.”

  Bill straightened as though she had struck him. A bar of moonlight touched his face and she saw that it was stern and set.

  “Then if that’s the way it seems to you, Cathy, we’ll drop the subject,” he said grimly. “I’d hoped I could persuade you to see it my way—to trust me.”

  “I do trust you, Bill. I love you. I’ve always dreamed of marrying you—but not this way.” Cathy was on the verge of tears.

  “Oh, I know, darling. I’d like it to be that way, too—you in a white satin gown and armfuls of lilies, and a veil a mile long, and sixteen bridesmaids, and a choir—and me white to the gills and scared stiff I’ll fall flat on my face before you reach the end of that mile-long aisle. It’s a pretty picture, and one I’d love to star you in. But knowing what it would cost—”

  “Your father and mother didn’t think it cost too much,” she pointed out faintly.

  “No, but Mother finally realized, with heartbreak and agony, that it did. And before Dad died, he knew, too. No, Cathy, I’ve been through it; I’ve watched it. I couldn’t see it happen to you. Cathy, I’d rather never set eyes on you again, I’d rather say good-bye to you here and now, and know that we’d never see each other again, than to marry you and have Aunt Edith disinherit me.”

  The very thought of saying good-bye to him, to all the precious dreams that had filled her heart for years; the thought that she might never see him again tore at her heart with steel claws and she cried out in pain.

  Bill caught her close and hard in his arms and kissed her.

  “Cathy, my dearest—oh, Cathy, please believe that I know what I’m doing,” he pleaded, his voice little more than a husky murmur. “Maybe watching Mother die, knowing that the money was rightfully hers, that she should have had its comfort and its care—maybe that did something to me—warped me—made me hard—I wouldn’t know. All I know is that I’ve got to have the money, Cathy, for you and for our children. Because we want children, Cathy, and we want them to grow up decently. To have a happy childhood and a future. Cathy, Cathy—believe me, dearest—trust me.”

  She turned her tear-wet cheek against his, and said shakily, “Whatever you say, Bill, my darling. Whatever you say—always.”

  Chapter Five

  Maggie had asked no questions about her “trip.” Funny, Cathy thought wryly to herself, not being able to tell those nearest to you of your approaching marriage. She had always been a bit smug about secret weddings. She had been sure in her heart that there was something not quite right
about secret marriages. She had felt certain that she would never be tempted into one. Yet here she was on her way, secretly, to meet the man she loved and whom she planned to marry, in secret.

  She thought of Bill and all the things he had said. She was not afraid of poverty; she had almost always known it. But now, she realized, in the light of Bill’s arguments, of his impassioned bitterness, what she had known had been more a thrifty frugality, rather than the abject, heartbreaking tragedy of Bill’s youth. He had grown through a bitterness that had left a scar on his mind that might never heal. He would never be able to look lightly on money; its power to provide for those he loved, not only the small luxuries and comforts, but the actual necessities of life, had been made so brutally plain to him. Maybe Bill was wrong—but he was hers!

  By the time the train had pulled into Atlanta five hours later, she had managed to convince herself that Bill was right. She had cast her lot with him, and whatever came, she and Bill would belong to each other. And after all, wasn’t that the one thing in life she wanted?

  Bill was waiting for her as her taxi halted at the hotel entrance, and the light in his eyes as he hurried forward and helped her out of the taxi sent a warm flood of delight through her.

  “Hello, you!” said Bill huskily, his eyes adoring her.

  He paid the taxi, took her suitcase, and turned with her to the hotel’s parking lot where the familiar blue sports car stood waiting. He put her into the car, stowed her bag in the trunk with his own, and came swiftly around to get in beside her.

  He brought out a square cellophane florist’s box, through which there was the gleam of white orchids, crisp and very pleased with their own beauty.

  “I always like my brides to wear orchids,” he told her, beaming at her while, with a mist of happy tears in her eyes, she pinned the orchids to the shoulder of her smart new green suit.

  Bill sighed happily and said, “Ready, sweet? All set?”

  “All set,” she told him, with a reckless feeling of throwing all doubt and fear behind her.