Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-09-01

FOR she na0 cuV1eO tneln, CteL. JUST 10 see
her tall. fair, broad-shouldered brother with
his laughing, gray-eyed wife had made Celia
horribly lonely, she remembered. For reasons
she could not quite define she had felt shut
out and rather forlorn after her evenings with
them. And it wasn't that they weren't dear
to her, for they were.
Indeed, during that first year they were al
ways insisting that she share their Sunday
night suppers or 60 to movie with them or
join them in drive. But being with them
tended to increase rather than to lessen her
reStiveness, she found, and she would come
away moody and disquieted.
Get married. Cecy It's the only life"
Scotty said to her enc Sunday evening when
he was taking her back to the sprawly, ginger
brown boarding house where stI lived.
DUT Cecy hadn't found the man, then. It
- had taken five years to bring Phil Free
man to her and with him came the haunting
fear that life would bring to them the bleak
disenchantment she had seen it bring to
Madge and Scotty.
For, somehow, in those years the magic, the
teasing tenderness which had once sparkled
like bubbles between them seemed to have dis
appeared. The gay chafing dish Suppers in
the sprightly three-room fiat were no more.
Scotty was home owner nova thousand
down and sixty dollars month"-and Madge
was too busy counting vitamins and proteins
for the fat, tow-headed twins to have time to
concoct Newburgs seasoned with cheese.
Yes, there was no use trying to deny 1t,
Madge and Scotty had changed. With the
advent Of bungalow and babies the whimsical
nonsense, the tender banter Of their honey
moon year had vanished like heecy Summer
clouds before bitter wind. Now when Celia
was with them the ache she felt was not for
herself, but for them-so burdened, so fraz-
zled and on edge did both of them seem. On
Ecotty's once smooth brow a frown. groove
of worried absorption had stamped itself.
pills and bills-that's marriage" he said to
Cecy one day, and even though he laughed as
he said it she noticed that there was q deep
ening Of his frown and grim tightening OF
the lines about his mouth.
And Madge-wel, the dancing merriment Of
her eyes had been usurped by sober, count
g-the-pennies look now that she was @ sub
urban mother and housewife trying to coax
one stubborn, reluctant dollar to do the work
Of two.
DARK thoughts, these, for a hssome girl
- with honey colored hair and q vivid mouth
that quirked up at the corners! Yet Cecy had
them. The drab. commonplace, pots-and-pans
story Of what life does to love kept sweeping
through her mind as she walked from the law
Offices where she worked to the Red Parrot tea
room where she and Phil, who was real
estate salesman, usually met for lunch.
A half block away she saw him standing
IN the entrance, waiting for her, and the
sight of him, tall, lean, sunburned, with dark,
steady eyes and an alert fne-cut face, caused
q quickening Of her step and pulses. If only she
weren't so afraid! Little coward" Phil had
once called her, not understanding that her fear
was born Of her love.
II say, Cecy." he began few minutes later
when they were at the small corner table which
romantic young waitress always reserved for
them, Il saw peach Of a cottage this morning.
ITS not far from Scotty's. Has slate roof and
. green tiled kitchen and bath and all those
built-in things you like so much-ironing
board and bookcases and drawers for clothes
And linen"
He leaned to her. his keen brown face with
its dark, purposeful eyes all a-glow. YOU'D be
dotty about it. Cecy. And it's cheap, too Six
hundred down and terms"
A CROSS the glass-topped table she looked at
"A him. It was hard hard to resist him
Especially when he leaned to her like this with
that imploring, small-boy look in his eyes.
Yearning to him with sudden, overwhelm-
ing tenderness:
do you want that little house so much?"
She asked.
In a swift. fugitive caress his hand, which
was lean and sunburned like his face, closed
over hers.
eff can have you in it."
At his touch, his look, his words, her heart
duivered within her. For a second, lust a
breath, reckleSsneSs seized her. He was hers
And dear to her. Life would be sweet for them
N that little house together!
"Ah, yes, for the first year, perhaps" the