“Oh, Jonny, you’re all dressed up and you look beautiful and the date’s off,” she mourned, flinging the whole thing into a single sentence.
She blinked rapidly against the mist of tears in her eyes.
“Well, come on; tell me,” Jonathan urged.
“Loyce sent word a little while ago that she wouldn’t be able to get home tonight,” Cherry told him. “Queen Lulu is sick.”
“Oh, and who is Queen Lulu?” asked Jonathan.
“Our prize cow,” Cherry answered indignantly. She added hastily, “Oh, I know Lulu’s very valuable and very important. She took all the prizes in her class at the state fair last year, and people have been making all sorts of fantastic offers for her. But I don’t see why Loyce has to sit up with her. There are the dairy men, and one of them is a graduate veterinarian from the State University. So Loyce doesn’t
have
to stay!”
“I guess, then, we have to figure that she thinks sitting up with a sick cow would be more fun than going to dinner with a guy like me,” said Jonathan.
“Then she’s a fool,” Cherry burst out. “Oh, you look just beautiful, Jonny. You don’t mind if I call you Jonny, do you?”
Jonathan laughed. “Of course not; it’s what all my friends call me.”
He was scowling thoughtfully, and Cherry studied him for an intense moment before she offered hesitantly, “I could go with you, Jonny. I’d love to. That is, if you wouldn’t mind taking me in Loyce’s place.”
Jonathan looked down at her flushed, pretty face and smiled warmly.
“Mind? It would be an honor,” he assured her handsomely, “if you are sure Job wouldn’t object.”
Cherry sniffed. “What business is it of his? I’ll fall into my ‘Sunday go t’meetin’ dress’ and be right with you, Jonny.”
She rushed up the stairs, and he heard the door of her room shut behind her.
He stood for a moment at the foot of the stairs, and then he walked into the big living room where the Judge sat reading.
“Come in, my boy, come in,” the Judge greeted him, and added, “I’m terribly sorry about Loyce breaking her date with you.”
“Oh, well, I suppose she thinks the cow is more important, and I’m sure she’s quite right.” Jonathan smiled. “And Cherry has kindly offered to fill in for her.”
“I knew she was going to,” the Judge confessed. “I’m sorry about Loyce. I admit I had hoped that she might be forgetting her grief about Weldon. She’s too fine a girl, too capable, to waste her life grieving for a man she can’t have. I liked Weldon, but I can’t help feeling that Loyce could be happy with someone else if she would only let herself.”
“Of course it’s difficult for her here at the Lodge,” the Judge mused as though scarcely aware of Jonathan’s words. “Very few of our guests are eligible young men. For the most part they are middle-aged and married. Oh, of course some of the local young men like Job and Hutch and their friends are around. But I suppose the fact that she has known them all her life would prevent her from considering them as substitutes for Weldon.”
Jonathan wisely made no attempt to answer. He knew that the Judge was merely speaking his troubled thoughts aloud and that no answer was required or expected.
Cherry came down shortly, looking fresh and lovely in a printed cotton frock of jade-green with a beige cashmere sweater swung over her shoulders.
“I do hope you didn’t expect me to come swishing down all gussied up in a floor-length formal all frothing with lace ruffles and with an orchid in my hair,” she said cheerfully. “We’d be flung out of the Hilltop Motel’s dining room if I got myself up like that. They’d be sure we were ‘snooting’ them.”
“You look very pretty, doesn’t she, Judge?” said Jonathan.
“Very pretty indeed,” agreed the Judge. “Have fun, you two, and don’t stay out too late.”
“It’s a promise, Gran’sir darling,” Cherry assured him, and dropped a light kiss on his cheek.
Outside in the cool spring night, she looked up at Jonathan with a touch of anxiety.
“You’re sure you don’t mind taking me instead of Loyce?” she asked.
Jonathan looked down at her in the moonlight.
“I’ve known a lot of pretty girls in my time, man and boy,” he observed dryly, “but I’ve never known two with inferiority complexes that could match yours and Loyce’s. For Pete’s sake, will you please tell me why you should think any man wouldn’t be overjoyed to walk into a restaurant wearing you on his arm? Or any other place, for that matter?”
Cherry beamed at him.
“Oh, well, you’re a ‘big city slicker,’ “ she reminded him gaily. “And I bet you
have
known a lot of pretty girls; all sleek and sophisticated and glamorous. So when you take time out for a backwoods gal like me — ”
“In you go before I spank you!” Jonathan ordered her. “A backwoods gal my eye!”
Cherry laughed and slid into the car and motioned him behind the wheel.
“You drive,” she said gaily. “Anyway, that’s why Loyce got cold feet about keeping her date with you tonight. She knew that no matter how much she ‘gussied’ herself up in her best bib-and-tucker, she couldn’t compete with your girl friends back home. She and I both know they must be very special.”
“You,” Jonathan told her as he let the car roll down the steep drive to the county road, “are talking like an idiot. Anybody would think, to hear you, that I was a matinee idol with gals swooning at his feet.”
Cherry turned bright eyes on him.
“You mean they don’t?” she marveled.
“They don’t,” Jonathan answered, somewhat nettled at her raillery. “And will you accept it as the solemn truth that there isn’t one of the girls I know back home who could hold a candle to you or to Loyce?”
Cherry considered that thoughtfully.
“Well, no, I don’t believe you, but you’re a sweetie-pie to say it,” she assured him.
He eyed her for a moment before he once more gave his attention to the road and Cherry began chattering gaily about people and places and things that made up her interests in the mountains.
The Hilltop Motel was at the junction of the county road with a main north-south highway. It had an oblong of swimming pool in the center, with a cluster of neat-looking white cabins drawn up about it, and the main building a little to one side. Cars were parked in front of all the cabins and the neon “No Vacancy” sign flashed above the main building that was ablaze with lights. The sound of a juke-box wafted out to Jonathan and Cherry as he parked the car and they crossed the graveled space to the entrance.
The place was well-filled. A somewhat harried hostess greeted Cherry by name and welcomed them, even as she cast her eyes about trying to locate an unoccupied table.
From a corner a voice called out, “Hi, Cherry, over here. Couple of extra places, if you don’t mind being crowded.”
“It’s Mabel and Jerry and some of the others,” Cherry said happily over her shoulder to Jonathan. The hostess looked relieved as Cherry threaded her way between the tables, crossed the small dance floor and reached the table where a group of six waited.
Jonathan was introduced and made welcome. A waitress produced two more chairs, and everybody moved obligingly to create room enough for two more guests.
“Hi, lookit, Cherry,” Jonathan heard the buxom blonde girl murmur to Cherry, “what’s with you, palling around with a guest from the Lodge? How’s Job going to take this?”
Jonathan smothered a grin as Cherry elevated her pretty nose a trifle and answered coolly, “Well, since it’s none of his business, why should I give that a thought?”
“Don’t tell me you and Job have
phfft?
” asked the blonde.
“Of course not. Job and I are friends. But that doesn’t give either of us any right to dictate to the other,” Cherry answered.
“Good. Then you won’t be upset to learn Job escorted the Widow Marshall to the church box supper Friday night,” said the blonde.
Jonathan saw Cherry’s eyes flash momentarily, and then she chuckled.
“Well, hooray for Job. Betsy’s a darned cute girl, and I hope they had fun,” she said.
“Oh, they did.” The blonde grinned. “They were the life of the party. Too bad you weren’t there.”
“Well, I always say if you’ve been to one box supper social you’ve been to all of them,” Cherry answered.
“Is that what you always say?” mocked the blonde. “What I always say: if you’ve got your claws on a good, steady, dependable boy friend, you are nuts to relax your grip.”
“I’m a stranger here,” Jonathan murmured in Cherry’s ear, “but is it customary to dance while the juke-box blares? If so, would you care to have a whirl?”
“Thanks, I would,” Cherry answered, and he thought he detected a note of relief in her voice as she rose and moved with him to the dance floor.
“Who is this Widow Marshall your friend mentioned?” Jonathan asked.
“A very pretty girl who ran away to get married to a man who was killed a few months later in a car crash,” Cherry answered. “She came back here to live with her parents. It’s absurd to call her the Widow Marshall, for she can’t be a day over twenty.”
“Any danger that she may undermine you with Job?” asked Jonathan, and added hastily as she flung up her head to stare at him, “Oh, not that it’s any of my business, of course. It’s just that I didn’t want to make any trouble for you by bringing you here.”
“I asked you to bring me, remember? And what trouble could it cause? And — oh, hello, Hutch,” Cherry broke off as the dance ended and they turned to face a short, stocky young man who showed every evidence of being delighted to see them.
“Hello, Cherry, where’s Job?” the man asked, and looked up at Jonathan curiously.
“I wouldn’t know about Job,” Cherry answered, and her tone said that she was faintly nettled at the mention of his name. “Hutch, this is Mr. Gayle, a guest at the Lodge. Jonathan, this is Mr. Mayfield.”
The two men shook hands.
“Is Loyce with you?” asked Hutch when the amenities had been disposed of.
“You know better than that, Hutch! When was Loyce ever along on a party?” Cherry said dryly. “She’s sitting up with a sick friend.”
“Oh? Who’s sick? I hadn’t heard,” Hutch asked with neighborly interest.
“Queen Lulu,” answered Cherry.
“Oh,” Hutch showed quick concern, “I do hope it’s nothing really serious. I know how valuable an animal she is and how attached Loyce is to her.”
“I wouldn’t know how serious it is,” Cherry answered dryly. “Loyce felt she had to sit up with her, although there’s a vet and a couple of expert dairy men also in attendance.”
“Well, Loyce knows her job, and I suppose she feels she has to be there.” Hutch seemed to resent Cherry’s off-hand manner.
“I suppose,” Cherry answered, and added, “And what are
you
doing out here? I thought you were busily burning the midnight oil, getting ready for the trial of the year.”
“I’m seeing someone connected with the case, and yonder he is,” Hutch answered briskly. “Glad to have met you, Mr. Gayle. Staying long?”
“A month or so.”
“Then I’ll probably see you again,” Hutch said. And to Cherry, “Tell Loyce hello for me, won’t you?”
“Of course,” Cherry answered.
“So that’s Hutch Mayfield, Loyce’s boy friend,” Jonathan commented as they made their way back to their table.
“The same,” Cherry answered, and added, “Don’t underestimate him. He may not be a Rock Hudson in looks, or a Prince Philip in charm, but Hutch is a nice guy and a brain. He’s going places.”
“Hooray for him,” said Jonathan, and laughed. “Put down that gun, gal. I had no intention of disparaging the guy.”
“I’m sorry,” Cherry apologized lightly. “My tongue seems to have been whittled to a sharp edge all of a sudden; I can’t think why. Maybe we’d better dance again. That way I can’t talk.”
It was several days before Jonathan and Loyce met by chance on the path below the Lodge. Loyce had appeared at dinner each evening; but she had not looked at Jonathan, she had taken no part in the table talk, and Jonathan’s mouth had grown thin with anger. After all, he raged to himself, what insult had he offered the girl? An invitation to dinner! And now she was avoiding him, skittering out of his way as though she expected him to do or say something unforgivable.
After lunch one afternoon he was going down the path with his fishing gear, intent on an afternoon of loafing and fishing. She was coming hurriedly up the path from the lower field, her head lowered so that she did not see him until she was within a few feet of him. Then she threw up her head and stood rigid, wide-eyed.
Jonathan made no move to allow her to pass. The trail was narrow there and they could not pass unless one stepped aside. And neither did.
Jonathan gave her a slight, mocking bow and said in a tone that was touched with frost, “Ah, the elusive Miss Bramblett, I believe. I do hope Her Majesty is enjoying the best of health.”
“Will you please let me pass?” Loyce’s tone was faintly husky.
“In just a moment,” Jonathan answered. “First there are a few things I’d like to get off my chest. You haven’t given me a chance lately, and I have to take this opportunity to tell you that you are being pretty silly to go to so much trouble to avoid me. It really isn’t necessary.”
“Don’t be silly. I’m not avoiding you. It’s just that it’s spring and there’s an awful lot of work and I’ve been busy.” Loyce hated herself because her voice was not as steady as she wished it to be.
“I’m sure,” Jonathan drawled, and added quietly, “What I really wanted to say was that if I grievously offended you by asking you for a date, I’m truly sorry. And if you find my presence here so distasteful, you have only to say so and I’ll be off the premises in thirty minutes.”
“I wasn’t insulted by your asking for a date; that’s a silly thing to say. I just couldn’t make it, with the Queen ill.” She was stammering. “And as for your presence here being distasteful to me, I only work here, remember? Gran’sir is the boss, and if he likes having you here then Cherry and I have nothing to say.”
“Now that,” Jonathan stated flatly, “is a big, fat, colossal lie.”
Loyce gasped and her eyes flew wide.
“How dare you call me a liar?” she snapped.
“Because you stand there looking as if butter wouldn’t melt in your mouth and tell a whopper,” he accused her. “You know as well as I do that all you have to do is drop a hint to that grand old gentleman, your grandfather, that you would like me removed, and it would be done instanter. So don’t go trying to tell me that you and Cherry don’t have as much to do with the Lodge as the Judge. More, in fact, because of his physical condition. So make up your mind, my girl. Do I stay? Or do I get a sudden urgent message that necessitates my return to Chicago?”