Part 11 (1/2)
The road-house of his choice, when they reached it, proved to have deteriorated sadly since his last visit. The cool interior that he remembered had been inopportunely opened to the hottest blast of the day's heat, and hermetically sealed again, or at least so it seemed to d.i.c.k; and the furniture was all red and thickly, almost suffocatingly, upholstered. Nancy had no comment on the torrid air of the dining-room,--she rarely complained about anything. Even the presence of a fly in her bouillon jelly scarcely disturbed her equanimity, but d.i.c.k knew that she was secretly sustained by the conviction that such an accident was impossible under her system of supervision at Outside Inn, and resented her tranquillity accordingly.
Caroline, behaving not so well, seemed to him a much more human and sympathetic figure, though her nose took on a high s.h.i.+ne unknown to Nancy's demurer and more discreetly served features; but Billy evidently preferred Nancy's deportment, which was on the surface calm and rea.s.suring.
”Nancy's a sport,” he pointed out to Caroline enthusiastically, ”no fly in the ointment gets her goat. She enjoys herself even when she's perfectly miserable.”
”She doesn't feel the heat the way I do,” Caroline snapped.
”I feel the heat,” Nancy said, ”but I--”
”She's got a system,” d.i.c.k cut in savagely: ”she stands it just as long as she can, and then she takes it out of me in some diabolical fas.h.i.+on.”
Nancy's gray-blue eyes took on the far-away look that those who loved her had learned to a.s.sociate with her most baffling moments.
”Just by being especially nice to d.i.c.k,” she said thoughtfully, ”I can make him more furious with me than in any other way.”
Nancy and Caroline finished their sloppy ices at the table together while d.i.c.k and Billy sought the solace of a pipe in the garage outside.
”I don't understand coming into Connecticut to-day,” Nancy said as soon as they were alone; ”it seems like such a stupid excursion for d.i.c.k to make. He's usually pretty good at picking out places to go. In fact, he has a kind of genius for it.”
”He slipped up this time,” Caroline said, ”I'm so hot.”
”So am I,” said Nancy, slumping limply into the depths of her red velour chair. ”I want to get back to New York. Oh! what was it you told me the other day that you had been saving up to tell me?”
Caroline brightened.
”Oh, yes! Why, it was something Collier Pratt said about you. You know Betty has sc.r.a.ped up quite an acquaintance with him. She goes and sits down at his table sometimes.”
”She's going to be stopped doing _that_,” Nancy said.
”Well, you remember the night when you went home early with a headache, and pa.s.sed by his table going out?”
”Yes, but I didn't know he saw me.”
”He sees everything, Betty says.”
”He didn't suspect me?”
”He didn't know you came out of the interior. He said to Betty, 'It's curious that Miss Martin never stays here to dine in the evening, though she so often drops in.' Betty is pretty quick, you know. She said, 'I think Miss Martin is a friend of the proprietor.'”
”So I am,” said Nancy, ”the best friend she's got. Go on, dear.”
”Then he said slowly and thoughtfully, 'It's a crime for a woman like that not to be the mother of children. If ever I saw a maternal type, Miss Ann Martin is the apotheosis of it. Why some man hasn't made her understand that long ago I can not see.'”
Nancy's cheeks burned crimson and then white again.
”How dare Betty?” she said.
”Wait till you hear. You know Betty doesn't care what she says. Her reply to that was peculiarly Bettyish. She sighed and cast down her eyes,--the little imp! 'The course of true love never does run smooth,' she said; 'perhaps Ann has discovered the truth of that old saying in some new connection.' She didn't mean to be a cat, she was only trying to create a romantic interest in your affairs, doing as she would be done by. The effect was more than she bargained for though. Collier Pratt's eyes quite lit up. 'I can imagine no greater crime than frustrating the instincts of a woman like that,' he said.