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  “So are you, Gerry,” said Tip gently. “It’s a shame it couldn’t have worked out — but neither of us is to blame. We can always be friends, Gerry, can’t we?”

  “Of course, Tip — always.”

  He touched his lips to the top of her head, grinned at her hearteningly, and said briskly, “I’m ready to shove off any time you are, Gerry I”

  “Give me fifteen minutes,” she promised rashly.

  He nodded and the door closed behind him.

  Swiftly, with shaking fingers, she got out of her dress and changed into a sheer dark dress more suitable for traveling. She was just adjusting her hat when there was a tap at the door, and Betsy thrust her head in, her eyes widening as she took in the dark dress and hat.

  “Hi, what gives?” she demanded, coming in and closing the door behind her, making no effort to hide her curiosity.

  “Tip’s driving me back to town,” answered Geraldine.

  “I see,” said Betsy, and obviously didn’t “Then you and Tip are — all right?”

  “Of course,” answered Geraldine, and selected gloves and a bag with meticulous care. “We are seeing his attorneys in the morning, and I’m leaving for the West immediately.”

  Betsy’s eyes widened.

  “For — the usual reason?” she gasped incredulously.

  “For a divorce,” answered Geraldine.

  “Oh, for Pete’s sake, I didn’t think Tip would be such a dope. Good gosh, Gerry, can’t he understand that you just sort of lost your head for a couple of minutes?”

  Geraldine turned to her quietly.

  “Betsy, you’re my best friend and I want you to know the truth, so that you can put an end to a lot of scandalous rumors and gossip,” she said swiftly. “Tip is not in love with me. He hasn’t been for a long time. He wants to be free quite as much as I do. And last night, he realized that he and I had both been making a pretense, nothing else. And so, like a couple of reasonably sensible people, we are ending a situation that has made three people very unhappy.”

  Betsy blinked, and after a moment she repeated, “Three people? What about Phil?”

  Geraldine turned away, concealing her face.

  “Phil and Sally are being married this morning at the county seat.” She made herself say it quietly and steadily.

  Betsy gave a little gasp and cried out, ‘What? You mean she pulled it off after what happened last night? Why, the rotten little — ”

  “Don’t, Betsy!” Geraldine cut in and in spite of herself, her voice was ragged with pain. “After all, Sally couldn’t very well force Phil to marry her at the point of a gun.”

  “She’s quite capable of it. I wouldn’t put it past her.”

  “We’re both being ridiculous. Phil’s marrying Sally because he wants to, and that’s that,” stated Geraldine crisply. “And now I’m going to cut and run for it. I know I ought to be modern and sophisticated and all that. Maybe announce our impending divorce at the luncheon table as one announces an engagement, but I can’t quite make it I guess I’m just — just a country girl at heart.”

  “Take it on the lam, pal,” said Betsy almost gruffly. “I’ll make whatever announcement is necessary. Anyway, Ted is your friend and Tip’s. He’ll understand.”

  Geraldine smiled at her.

  “Thanks, chum. You’re aces,” she said as she gave Betsy a little hug.

  “Send me a picture postcard from Reno. I may be trekking out that way some day myself,” said Betsy darkly.

  Geraldine hurried down the stairs and out through the side door to where Tip waited in the car.

  “I didn’t say good-bye to your mother.” She hesitated, reluctant to face the ordeal.

  Tip said wryly, “Think nothing of it, Gerry, my pet. She’s lying down in a darkened room, plentifully supplied with eau de cologne and cold cloths for her head!”

  Geraldine got into the car beside him, and as they rolled down the drive, she unconsciously gave a deep sigh and straightened her shoulders and tilted her head back to breathe deeply.

  Tip looked at her oddly.

  “A little like being released from prison, isn’t it, Gerry?” he asked quietly. “I’m sorry.”

  Color burned in her face and she said awkwardly, “It’s just that — well, I’m mixed up, Tip.”

  Tip nodded. “I know, but you’ve never been really happy with me, have you, Gerry?”

  “That’s not true, Tip. I was! I was!” she protested unsteadily. “It’s just that — well, I seemed to have grown up while you were gone.”

  “I know. I did, too,” Tip answered her.

  Geraldine nodded. “Oh, Tip, darling, I do hope that it will be all right with you and Jamie.”

  Tip said evenly, “It will be, I’m sure of it. I was a little worried about Bob Drake, but he’s been discharged and has married his hometown sweetheart and Jamie is still free.”

  “I’m glad,” said Geraldine simply.

  He hesitated a moment and then he said awkwardly, “I’m sorry as the dickens about Phil, Gerry.”

  She quivered a little but her hands were clenched tightly in her lap. “Thanks, Tip, but you don’t have to be. If he wanted to marry Sally, he was quite free to do so. After all, he and I said good-bye, firmly and definitely, before you ever came back. That was the way it had to be.”

  “I know, Gerry, but it’s such a rotten break for you.”

  She made herself smile at him, her mouth firm.

  “You needn’t be. I’ll get over it,” she told him quietly. “What’s that old line — ’Men have died, and worms have eaten them — but not for love’?”

  “Now there’s a nice cheerful thought for a bright summer morning. You’re not going morbid on me, by any chance?”

  Geraldine’s laugh was slightly more convincing.

  “Of course not. I can’t imagine where that quotation came from, and I assure you I have no intention of going into a decline or grieving my heart out. After all, I’m still young and the world is full of interesting and exciting things for a career girl.

  Tip, unexpectedly grave, stopped her.

  “We haven’t had a chance to discuss financial arrangements, or anything like that, Gerry,” he told her swiftly. “But you know, of course, that you will be amply provided for.”

  “I don’t want — ”

  “It makes no difference what you want, it’s what you’re going to get,” Tip told her flatly. “There will be a substantial settlement that will give you an income sufficient to live comfortably and even indulge in a mild extravagance here and there.”

  “But, Tip — ” she protested.

  “It’s either that, Gerry, or I’ll contest the divorce,” he threatened, and, startled, she saw that he meant it. “You’re giving me Jamie and, through me, you’ve lost Phil. For the love of Mike, don’t you want me to have any happiness at all?”

  “Of course, Tip — You know — ”

  “And you know that I’d never draw a peaceful breath if I had to think of you, out earning a living, growing old and haggard and tired with the battle. Oh, no, my pet! You’re going to be a good girl and let me salve my conscience by making as handsome a settlement on you as I can — and that’s that!”

  “But, Tip, I like to work.”

  “Then develop a hobby and make money out of it if you can — but you’re going to have a decent income, from a settlement, or I’m going to contest the divorce and keep you tied to me for the rest of your life! And don’t think I don’t mean that, either. I’m not the one to make idle threats, pet!” His tone, as much as his words, warned her that he was in deadly earnest.

  “We’ll talk it over with Beth and Tom,” she temporized.

  “Oh, no, we won’t. We’ll settle it here and now and that’s that!” he cut in and now there was an edge to his voice. “One half of my stock in the mills is going to be transferred to you.”

  “But, Tip, there’s Jamie. You’ll want children — you won’t want to support two wives,” she protested. />
  He grinned at her.

  “Oh, there’ll be plenty for Jamie and a family, and neither of us could enjoy our happiness unless we knew that at least your financial wants were taken care of.”

  And because she saw that he was determined and there was no argument that could sway him, she finally yielded, but with reluctance. A reluctance Tip could not fail to see and read.

  “Sorry you dislike me so much.”

  “Oh, now you’re being silly.”

  He grinned at her and patted her hand.

  “That sounds like the Gerry I know,” he said contentedly. “So that’s settled. And we don’t have to argue about it any more.”

  • • •

  They reached Marthasville late in the evening. Beth was still at St. Simons, but Tom was at home, and her first sight of him, through the lighted window, brought a little lump into Geraldine’s throat. He looked so lonely, and somehow, older.

  She ran to him and threw her arms about him, hiding her face against his shoulder. Startled, Tom’s arms went about her and held her close, and above her head, he looked with sharp suspicion at Tip.

  “What have you been doing to her?” he demanded.

  Tip said quietly, “We have some news for you, Tom. I hope you won’t be — too shocked.”

  Tom’s eyes sharpened. “Oh, I don’t imagine I will. You and Gerry have found that your marriage isn’t working out, haven’t you?”

  Geraldine stared at him, tears drying on her cheeks.

  “Why, Dad,” she gasped, “how did you guess?”

  Tom all but snorted.

  “Guess, my eye! I’ve suspected it from the day Tip came home. I knew you two kids were breaking your hearts trying to make a brave show of being happy, but I hope I have sense enough to scent a pretense when I see one. I think it’s high time you were behaving like grown-ups.”

  Tip said eagerly, “Then you aren’t shocked that Gerry and I are deciding on a friendly divorce?”

  Tom’s eyebrows went up a little.

  “Are people still shocked by a divorce? I hadn’t heard that. I thought the world had grown up enough to realize that a divorce is the only sane solution to a marriage that doesn’t work out. Regrettable of course, but after two people have tried, and failed, then what else is there?”

  “Right,” said Tip, and grinned his relief. “I appreciate your taking that view. Gerry tried with all her heart — so did I; I’d like you to believe that.”

  “Of course, of course,” said Tom as though that did not need to be said.

  He looked down at Geraldine for a moment, and then he smiled warmly at her and patted her shoulder.

  “You trot upstairs to your own room and tuck yourself into bed and get a good night’s sleep. You look as if you could use one. And in the morning, I’ll turn over the store to Jenkins and we’ll run down and see Beth! She’s been lonesome for you,” he said, and Geraldine kissed him with tears in her eyes.

  Chapter Fifteen

  She had not expected to like Nevada, but once the necessary preliminaries were over and she was free to depart for the dude ranch out of town where she had elected to spend her six weeks’ waiting period, she found a strange sort of peace.

  The ranch was as comfortable, as luxurious as the most modern hotel. The guests were a rather conglomerate crew: several young, pretty women who wore levis and shirts and boots with an air no cow-country girl would ever have thought of attempting; one or two plump, middle-aged women who risked unwisely the wearing of slacks or the inevitable dungarees, but who dressed lavishly for dinner.

  At first there were a few attempts at confidences, getting acquainted; but when Geraldine did not show a willingness to confide, the would-be confidantes shrugged and left her alone.

  The chambermaid who looked after the two-roomed cabin, luxuriously appointed, for all its self-conscious “atmosphere” eyed Geraldine covertly when she was making the bed that first morning, and said with Western frankness, “Guess you’re new around here. Your first visit?”

  “Yes,” answered Geraldine.

  The chambermaid nodded.

  “I can always tell a firstie,” she said dryly.

  “A firstie?” Geraldine repeated.

  The chambermaid grinned.

  “A first divorce. Kinda want to keep yourself to yourself, and ain’t runnin’ around tellin’ the rest of ‘em your troubles, and singing’ songs o’ hate agin all men,” said the chambermaid cheerfully, banging away at the pillow she was inserting into a crisply immaculate slip. “Kinda tough, the first time, ‘specially if you kinda like the guy you’re sheddin’ — or mebbe you got another feller waitin’, like the others?”

  Geraldine flushed, but there was something friendly and kindly about the maid, for all her frank curiosity.

  “No — that is, my husband fell in lote with another girl while he was in Vietnam.” She stammered and was ashamed of the little involuntary attempt at confidence.

  The maid nodded with understanding.

  “Yep, that’s the way it happens, lotsa times,” she said briskly, attacking the shining floor with an oiled mop. “ ‘Course, you had a chance, too, didn’t you, to pick yourself another feller?”

  Her friendly curiosity was as inoffensive as the tail of a clamorous pup.

  “Well, in a way; only someone else came along,” she admitted reluctantly.

  The maid straightened her tall, gaunt body and rested her work-reddened hands on almost non-existent hips.

  “Say, now, that’s a real shame,” she said, warmly sympathetic, eyeing Geraldine from the top of her burnished brown hair to the tips of her sturdy brown brogues. “But you ain’t got no cause to worry. I always say they’s just as good fish in the sea as ever been caught, and you’re the right kind o’ bait. Betcha ten minutes after you throw your ring in the river, some feller’ll come along.”

  Geraldine repeated, puzzled, “Throw my ring in the river?”

  The maid chuckled.

  “You ain’t up on the customs of the country, are you?” she asked cheerfully. “Sure, the minute you walk down the courthouse steps with the papers in your hand you’re supposed to walk out on the bridge over the Truckee, take off your wedding ring, and say ‘Here goes nothing’ and chuck it into the river.”

  Geraldine looked down at the narrow band of platinum and diamonds that was guarded by the square-cut solitaire Tip had so proudly placed there.

  “Oh, but I couldn’t do that!” she protested.

  “You better. It’s bad luck if you don’t.”

  She shouldered her armful of fresh linen and her cleaning implements, and with a cheerful “So long” went her way, leaving Geraldine a little breathless at the breeziness and frankness of her confession.

  She looked down at the diamond and platinum band on her slim third finger, and with sudden decision she slipped them both off, and that afternoon she rode into town and mailed the package, registered, to Tip. He would not want to use them again, perhaps; but she could not bear to throw them away. The idea was absurd. And what if it did bring her bad luck, refusing to follow the custom! She had lost Phil, and beside that blow, any other bad luck would seem slight.

  She had been at the dude ranch a week, when she came out of the dining room after breakfast and found a little heap of mail waiting for her. She skimmed through it hastily; a thick letter from Beth, several from friends back home, and one from Betsy Hammond that had been sent air mail.

  She retired to her cabin to read them quietly and peacefully. When she had finished Beth’s determinedly cheerful letter, she picked up Betsy’s, looked at it curiously, and slit the envelope. Reading it, Geraldine felt as though she could see Betsy and hear her soft, eager voice.

  Gerry, my lamb, get yourself settled in a nice quiet place and bend your ears back, honey, because I’ve got some news for you that’s going to set you back on your heels, but good! All set? Then here it is: Phil and little Sal did NOT get married, after all! There! Take a deep breath, sni
ff the smelling salts and relax while I unfold the tale!

  After you left that afternoon, we were sitting around wondering how we could manage to get ourselves called back to town on urgent business; Mrs. Parker was still “prostrated,” bless her, and we were feeling about as unnecessary as a fifth wheel or a third arm, and wishing that we were anywhere but there — when a car turned in at the drive, and out of it stepped Phil and Sal. We braced ourselves, all set to stick a smile on our silly looking faces and yelp “Congratulations and we hope you’ll all be very happy,” when Sal, with a face like a thundercloud, stalked past us and into the house and the screen door banged behind her with a thud that could have been heard in the next county.

  Phil just stood there for a minute, looking like a man hag-ridden — and of course, thinking he had married our Sal, we couldn’t be surprised at that — when, like the bright-eyed little goop I am, I said as warmly as I could under the circumstances, “Well, Phil, me lad, congratulations and stuff.” He looked at me as though somebody had kicked him, but good! and said grimly, “I don’t know what you mean.” And being me, I said blithely, “Oh, Sally telephoned that you were on your way to the county seat to be married.” He looked as if he’d been kicked again, only harder. “Oh, she did, did she?” was his brilliant rejoinder, which sort of held up proceedings for a bit.

  Well, anyway, he finally said pretty sharply, “We did have some idea, but when we got to the county seat and found that all the offices and stores were closed, because it’s a half-holiday, and when we couldn’t find anybody to do the job — well, we sort of came to our senses and realized we’d been a bit hasty.”

  And with that he stalked into the house, and there was another bang of the screen door audible at least a quarter of a mile away. I didn’t write you then. I wanted to go to the telephone and call you, only Ted made me shush, on account of he knows Sal pretty well, and reminded me that she was “a bit devious.” I can think of a better word to describe her, but if I did, it would have to be written on asbestos notepaper and I’m fresh out of same — and that if she’d made up her mind to marry Phil, which we all knew she had, Phil was practically a dead duck, and the only hope he had was of submitting graciously.