New Britain herald., 1926-06-19

door, holding the brandy bottle rn- i der her arm. But who could the woman have been?
 ! She found out, the next morning from Mother Phelps own firm lips Miss Gould. my dressmaker, lives just block or two from the Wilks house on Tower street" she explain cd And sine almost jumped out of her skin when she saw you and Peter go into his house that night. She never dreamed that you were taking that bottle Of brandy to poor Fanny! She came straight here the next morning and told me that you and Peter had been out drinking together?"
 She rustled to her feet. "Il call her right up and tell her to come over here 10 get the rights of the story" she said importantly. I'm only sorry l didn't come straight 10 you with the tale when I first heard it, Sylvia. I might have known there wasn't any truth in it! By now, goodness knows who hasn't heard it,'
 "Oh. horse-collar!" Lolly said in her slsngy way when her mother had gone. She knows that nobody has heard the story except Fanny. She told Miss Gould at the time that if she ever mentioned IL 10 a living soul, she'd jump down her throat! She knows that Miss Gould has never opened her mouth about it. She just wants 10 stir up some fresh excitement, that's all.' Lolly saw through all her moth CTS harmless little shams, with the clear eyes Of the unsentimental napper.
 Speaking of operations, want to ask you and Ranny 10 q party" Lollv went on, dropping her toy dog or the floor, and taking a rouge box from her handbag. Tt starts at my house with cocktails, and winds up at Sally Kings with 2 dance"
 The idea wos this: Two could give 8. party much more cheaply than one, so Lolly and Sally King. who had been Sally March, decided 10 give one together. Lolly was 10 pay for the sandwiches and the cocktails. and Sally vas 10 provide tho jazz orchestra.
 For both Thomas Boyle and Woody" King were paying for their little bungalows in Evergreen Court and their wives had received orders 10 "count the pennies"
 When Sylvia told Ranny about the party, he said grudgingly that he would go. Unless Peter Willis been invited" he added, scowling.
 He no longer believed Miss Gould's highly colored story Of Syl- via and Peter and the brandy bot tie. but nevertheless. it had served to make him dislike Peter more than ever. To mention Peters name to him was like waving a red flag at q mad bull, these days!
 After long thought and much counting of her own pennies, Sylvia made up her mind 10 buy a new dress for the party. Long afterward. she decided that 1t must have been her guardian angel that told her to buy the dress,
 For she was very beautiful In it's cloth Of silver, splendor - and she needed all her beauty and her lure that night, as she seldom had need ed them before.
 Ten minutes after she walked in- to LoIly's adorable little house, with it's chintz covers and hook rugs, and crisp muslin curtains, q girl came in, with a nondescript young man whom Woody" King hailed as Bellows old sport,' They slapped each other on the shoulders Woody and Bellows-with the cir Of old friends, while the girl stood smiling from them to Sylvia.
 But Sylvia did not smile back at her. She was looking at the girls hat-a tiny red thing, as bright as a. scarlet tanager. On one side of l. flashed huge rhinestone buckle.
 She had seen that hat before, and the girl. too, She was the girl who had been in the car with Ranny that October night, when Peter had tried to keep Sylvia from seeing them!
 CHAPTER XL.
 Svivia's face was a soft smiling mask that hid the misery In her heart. az she looked at the girl with the red hat. She was not a pretty girl. but she was wonderfully at ,ractive with her wide smile, her big brown eyes and curly black hair.
 Sylvia saw st once that she was lust the kind of girl that Ranny lik- ed-reckless daring and full of "the old Nick" as Aunt Agony would say.
 Her dark eyes were rather blank when Sally March brought her up 10 Sylvia. and introduced her as "my cousin, Elsie Leopold" But they shone again, like Mazda lamps, as she turned to greet Eddie Car ter.
 IL was plain that she was 3. mans woman" just as Fay Car ter was a mans woman, the type of woman who is half asleep until a man appears on the horizon.
 "I want you to see lots of Elsie" " Sally King said to Sylvia a few min utes later. when she brought her a cocktail. she's just come here from Maine 10 open 8 gift shop. She's so clever. You'n just adore her"
 Sylvia refused the cocktail,
 She was wondering what Sally would say if she knew that her cousin Elsie was the kind of girl who would go joy-riding with q strange man. And she was wondering what Fanny would have 10 say when he saw his pick up here as a guest in Sally Kings house.
 At that very instant Ranny walk
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