“You should criticize!”
“Well, I’m older,” Millicent said. “I’ve had my day.”
“You talk like a great-grandmother, not a mother!” Judith protested.
“Well, it’s true,” her mother said with a sigh. And then, coyly, “Is Alan coming to take you?”
“As a matter of fact, he is,” Judith said. “But don’t go getting any ideas. He’s engaged to Pauline, and she’s the one giving the party. And he isn’t taking her because she’s already there getting things ready for later.”
“I’m not getting any ideas,” Millicent said angrily. “Surely a mother has a right to take an interest in her own little girl.”
“I know the signs,” Judith said calmly. “And it’s been some time since I was a little girl.”
“You will always be that to me,” her mother said.
“Oh, Mother!” Judith groaned as she went on sewing.
“It isn’t easy trying to be both a mother and father to you,” Millicent said tartly. “I’ve done my best, but you seem to delight in going against me and making it harder.”
“I’m sorry,” Judith said, humoring her and privately thinking that she was the one who had to assume the responsibility in the household her mother should have taken.
Millicent had a happy thought. “Even though Alan Fraser is engaged, he could still change his mind. He may decide this other young woman is not right for him.”
“That’s true, Mother,” Judith said, concentrating on her sewing, “Don’t ever give up hope.”
“You shouldn’t make fun of such things!”
“I mean it.”
Her mother sighed and started for the door. “Well, I hope you have a nice time. It’s a relief just to know you’re going somewhere there will be our kind of people. Be sure and change in time to answer the door. I don’t want to have Alan see me in this shabby old dressing gown.”
“Then why don’t you change into something else?” Judith asked.
Millicent protested, “You know I’m not well!” And she hurried out.
Judith was only half finished with the task of hemming the dress and was glad to be left alone. Time was passing quickly, and she did want to be ready when Alan came for her.
He picked her up shortly before nine and gave her an admiring appraisal as he helped her into his car. “You look great!” was his comment.
She smiled. “I’m not sure I’m in a party mood.”
“I never am until I get there,” he said, turning on the ignition. “But Pauline always has interesting parties.”
“I’m sure of it,” Judith agreed, reaching to be sure she’d not upset her uplift hair-do when she’d gotten in the car. An examination showed it to be in place.
“We’ll have the chance to meet a lot of people and get a cross-section of the town’s opinions on the bridge crisis,” he said, heading the car into a main street that would eventually lead them to the gallery.
“I’ve been hearing Mother’s views for the past hour, and I’ve had my fill,” Judith told him.
He laughed. “Were they that bad?”
“She’s hopelessly mixed up about it, and there was no point wearing myself out trying to make it clear to her,” Judith said. She smiled at him. “I wonder if Pauline will really be glad to see me at the party?”
“She invited you.”
“She’s a very generous person. That’s why I feel a little awkward about us.”
“Pauline told me to pick you up,” he said. “She knew I wouldn’t be calling for her. It gave me something to do.”
Judith smiled at him. “I hope you’ll be able to apply this same guile when it comes to dealing with Senator Lafferty.”
“Which reminds me,” Alan said, “you may see the Senator tonight. He often attends the gallery parties. He and his wife fancy themselves as art patrons.”
“He should be able to buy a few paintings with all the graft he’s collected,” she said indignantly. “I don’t know what I’ll say if I meet him there!”
Alan laughed. “You won’t have to say anything. He’ll come straight over to you and bow from the waist and say, ‘I’ve never seen you looking prettier, Miss Barnes.’ It’s his standard speech!”
“I’ve never seen you looking prettier, Miss Barnes,” the Senator said with a bow, as he came across to join Judith in the crowded room. He glanced around with a smile on his bloated baby face, “I seem to have lost my wife, but who needs her with all you pretty girls around!”
Judith tried to hide her exasperation. The big gallery was noisy with the chattering of the various groups crowded into it. Scant attention was being paid to the display of paintings on the walls as the guests moved about with glasses in hand, greeting each other with shrill gaiety.
She forced a smile for the Senator and said, “I hardly expected you to be here. You’re so busy presenting petitions these days.”
“Public service, my dear,” the pot-bellied man said pompously. “But I never let it interfere with my private amusements. Never!”
“Do you really think that extra spur should be added to the bridge?” she inquired with suitable innocence.
“It’s a must, Miss Barnes,” the Senator assured her. “And I have every reason to believe the Governor will agree.”
She lifted her eyebrows. “Oh! You’ve already discussed it with him?”
Senator Lafferty looked disturbed. “Not at all! But we think along the same lines in such matters.” He shifted his glance across the room. “I believe I see my wife. If you’ll excuse me!” He offered another of his ridiculous bows and trotted off.
Judith watched him go, convinced that he hadn’t rushed off to join his long-suffering wife but to get away from her. She had touched on a delicate subject, and he wasn’t about to commit himself for her benefit.
She was left standing alone for a moment until Alan came pushing through the cluster of people to reach her. He looked exceedingly handsome in his dark suit, and he was wearing a confident smile.
“Everyone seems to be having a good time,” he said.
“The Senator has just been entertaining me,” she told him with an amused glance.
“Then you’ve been royally entertained,” Alan said. “Did you get any dirt from him?”
“I started to dig, and he turned coward and ran off,” she complained.
“That’s our Senator!” Alan said. “Better luck another time.”
“I’ll be satisfied if he doesn’t bother me for the rest of the evening,” Judith said.
A slender, pale young man with very light yellow hair came strolling by and seeing Alan, offered him a languid smile. “Hi, Alan!” Next, glancing at Judith, he showed mild surprise and said, “And Judith!” It was none other than Charles North, the son of the famous S.C.
Alan said, “I guess everybody is here.”
“I’d say so,” Charles North agreed. “Pauline always has the best parties. Been a long time since I’ve seen you, Judith.”
“Yes.” She wasn’t able to smile. Her feelings where Charles North was concerned had been too bitter since the incident involving Miles Estey. She couldn’t stand him.
Now, with an insolence she hadn’t believed possible, he asked casually, “Where’s your old boy friend, Miles?”
Her eyes met his. “Don’t you know?”
Charles North smiled nastily. “We’ve sort of lost track of him since he left the city in such a hurry.”
Judith said, “Were you surprised that he went away?”
Charles North showed no uneasiness. “In a way,” he said. “But then I guess he knew what was best for him.”
“I thought it must have pleased you.”
“Why should it?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. I just had that impression.”
There was a hard expression in the young man’s blue eyes. He said, “I don’t expect he’ll be back.”
Judith said, “I imagine you’d be surprised if he did decide to return.”
“It would be a very unwise move for him to make,” Charles North said, a flush of anger mounting his pale cheeks.
Judith raised her eyebrows. “I wonder!”
Charles North turned his attention to Alan, saying, “Looks as if you’re about to get a badly needed vacation, Alan. They’re going to shut your bridge down.”
“It hasn’t happened yet,” Alan told him.
“According to the papers, it’s only a matter of a week or so,” young North said with a mocking smile. “Harvey Wheaton won’t have to worry any more about those overdue steel deliveries.”
“It’ll give us a chance to build a stockpile,” Alan suggested.
“But then you mightn’t need one, might you?” North asked with another of his smiles. Nodding to Judith, he said, “See you both later!” And he moved on.
“Now I know I shouldn’t have come,” Judith said with a despairing look at Alan.
“I don’t agree,” he told her. “We got him mad enough to tip his hand about the steel. There’s no doubt that’s what is bothering his father.”
“You heard the way he sneered at poor Miles Estey!” Judith said.
“If what you think is true, it’s exactly the way you’d expect him to talk,” Alan reminded her. “We’ve got quite a cross-section of town to study tonight. Make the best of it.”
Judith was beginning to weary of the crowd and the noisy conversation. Also, the room was becoming uncomfortably warm. As she and Alan stood chatting, they were interrupted by an art teacher friend of Pauline’s. He was a hunched little man with a freaky black mustache and beard. He beamed at them from behind his horn-rimmed glasses and in a very British accent inquired if they’d seen the work of the featured artist.
“I’m afraid not,” Judith said with a wan smile. “There’s such a crush.”
The bearded man nodded his head. “Don’t I know it!” he said. And then, leaning forward confidentially, he said, “Don’t worry about missing the display. It’s very ordinary work! I’ve done much better myself.”
“Well, at least you’re modest,” Alan teased him.
The art teacher shrugged. “One needn’t be any more.
It’s very much the mod thing to be outspokenly frank. If one has talent, one should push oneself!” And suddenly seeing a crony in the distance, he raised a bony hand and, uttering a weird cry of recognition, hurried on.
“One is very hard to take,” Judith told Alan wryly.
“A recent import from London,” Alan informed her. “Considers himself a priceless addition to our local school system.”
“It would be good to meet just one nice, friendly, ordinary human being here,” Judith wailed.
Alan laughed. “Here comes one,” he said. “Our hostess.”
Pauline was wearing a gold spangled dress with the usual above the knee skirt. She came forward to join them with a pleasnt smile on her attractive face. “At last!” she said with some sincerity. “Two of my favorite people, and together.”
“The place is really rocking,” Alan told her. “It’s the party of the year!”
“But will it sell any paintings?” Pauline asked with a grimace. “I’m beginning to wonder.”
“They’re bound to buy something just to make sure they get invited to your next binge,” Alan assured her.
Pauline turned a laughing face to Judith. “I’m so glad you made up your mind to come.”
“It’s been fun,” she said. “But isn’t it getting warm?”
“I’m dying!” the girl in the gold dress said. “Alan, be a good fellow and see if you can get some air in this place.” As he walked off, she turned to Judith and added, “I’ve been working to get ready for this since noon! I’m dead tired! Let’s sneak off to my office for a few minutes of quiet. I need some rest before I face the leavetakings!” And she took Judith by the hand and led her through the crowded room to a door far at the back.
They went inside and down a short hallway to another door which led to a pleasantly furnished office with a desk, filing cabinet and several comfortable-looking chairs. It was brightly lit, with colorful blue drapes along one wall.
“Sit down,” Pauline said, sinking into a chair. “I must be out of my mind to try and entertain a mob like that.”
Judith smiled. “If it helps business.”
The other girl gave her a sharp look. “Speaking of business, what’s going on about the bridge? I’ve hardly had a chance to look at the papers, but they seem to be criticizing my Alan roundly!”
“Alan is not in the wrong,” Judith said firmly.
Pauline considered this as she lit herself a cigarette. Then she said, “I guess you should know.” She held out the pack and lighter. “I should have offered you one first.”
“Thanks; I don’t smoke.”
Pauline raised her carefully painted eyebrows. “No vices?”
“Smoking isn’t one of them.”
The other girl laughed as she leaned back in her chair and exhaled two spirals of smoke. “I’ve been dying for this. So you don’t think Alan is in any trouble?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Oh?”
Judith wasn’t sure she liked Pauline’s attitude. She seemed just a bit too casual. “I’m sure Alan will be anxious to explain all about it himself,” Judith said, “just as soon as he has a chance.”
Pauline flung her hand out in a gesture. “You know how introverted he is. I’ll be lucky if I can drag anything out of him. That’s why I’m asking you now.”
“It’s mostly politics and a power play,” Judith said. “To put it very simply, the Senator is trying to prove that Alan had the bridge plans changed to elminate the North End spur without telling the public. That simply isn’t true. Now the Senator is stirring up trouble to have the work on the bridge halted, Alan dismissed as chairman of the bridge authority or pressure exerted to force him to resign, and the steel contracts that are being filled by an out-of-state company turned over to the S.C. North mills, even though they’re asking a ridiculous price.” She paused briefly. “That’s what it’s really about. North wants the steel contracts.”
Pauline had been listening with growing interest. “You make it sound as if they’re out to get Alan.”
“It seems they are.”
“Do you think they will?”
Judith sighed. “It’s too soon to know.”
The girl in gold took a deep puff on her cigarette and then exhaled. “I think he ought to resign right away. He should never have gotten mixed up in that bridge thing.”
“But it’s given him responsibility and a lot of experience,” Judith hastened to tell her. “He’s gained a lot of it.”
Pauline gave her a wry look. “So it seems.”
“I mean until now,” Judith faltered.
“The papers aren’t treating him very kindly, from what I read.”
“That’s just been lately,” she said. “It happens to almost everyone who is in the public eye. All the comments can’t be favorable.”