Part 45 (1/2)

”Well--what do I get out of it?” he asked, in the old teasing voice of the boy who had liked to play ”Post-office” and ”Clap-in-and-clap-out”

years ago.

But they were not children now, and there was reproach in the glance Martie gave him as she ran up the steps.

Rose, in blue satin, fluttered to meet her and she was conveyed upstairs on a sort of cloud of laughter and affection. Everywhere were lights and pretty rooms; wraps were flung darkly across the Madeira embroidery and filet-work of Rose's bed.

”Other people, Rose?”

”Just the Ellises, Martie, and the Youngers--you don't know them. And a city man to balance Florence, and Cliff.” Rose, hovering over the dressing-table exclaimed ecstatically over Martie's hair. ”You look lovely--you want your scarf? No, you won't need it--but it's so pretty--”

She laid an arm about Martie's waist as they went downstairs.

”You've heard that we've had trouble with the girls?” Rose said, in a confidential whisper. ”Yes. Ida and May--after all Rodney had done for them, too! He did EVERYTHING. It was over a piece of property that their grandfather had left their father--I don't know just what the trouble was! But you won't mention them to Rod--?”

Everything was perfection, of course. There were c.o.c.ktails, served in the big drawing room, with its one big rug, and its Potocka and le Brun looking down from the tinted walls. Martie sat between Rodney and the strange man, who was unresponsive.

Rodney, warmed by a delicious dinner, became emotional.

”That was a precious friends.h.i.+p of ours, to me, Martie,” he said. ”Just our boy-and-girl days, but they were happy days! I remember waking up in the mornings and saying to myself, 'I'll see Martie to-day!' Yes,”

said Rodney, putting down his gla.s.s, his eyes watering, ”that's a precious memory to me--very.”

”Is Rodney making love to you, Martie?” Rose called gaily, ”he does that to every one--he's perfectly terrible!”

”How many children has Sally now?” Florence Frost, sickly, emaciated, asked with a sort of cluck.

”Four,” Martie answered, smiling.

”Gracious!” Florence said, drawing her shawl about her.

”Poor Sally!” Rose said, with the merry laugh that accompanied everything she said.

Cliff did not talk to Martie at all, nor to any of the other women. He and the other men talked politics after dinner, in real country fas.h.i.+on. The women played a few rubbers of bridge, and Rose had not forgotten a prize, in tissue-paper and pink ribbon. The room grew hot, and the men's cigars scented the close air thickly.

Rose said that she supposed she should be able to offer Martie a cigarette.

”It would be my first,” Martie said, smiling, and Rose, giving her shoulders a quick little impulsive squeeze, said brightly: ”Good for you! New York hasn't spoiled YOU!”.

When at eleven o'clock Martie went upstairs for her wraps, Rose came, too, and they had a word in private, in the pretty bedroom.

”Martie--did Cliff say that you and he were going on a--on a sort of picnic on Sunday?”

”Why, yes,” Martie admitted, surprised, ”Sally is going down to the city to see Joe, and I'll have the children. I happened to mention it to Cliff, and he suggested that he take us all up to Deegan's Point, and that we take a lunch.”

Innocently commenced, the sentence ended with sudden self-consciousness. Martie, putting a scarf over her bronze hair saw her own scarlet cheeks in the mirror.

”Yes, I know!” Rose c.o.c.ked her head on one side, like a pretty bird.

”Well, now, I have a plan!” she said gaily, ”I suggest that Cliff take his car, and we take ours, and the Ellises theirs, and we all go--children and all! Just a real old-fas.h.i.+oned family picnic.”

”I think that would be fun,” Martie said, with a slow smile.