The Key West citizen. [volume] (Key West, Fla.) 1879-current, 1937-11-03
Two > Company
BY MARGARET CuION HERzOC Y u


turned into rain.
"Wait second" he told her,
''I'll get cab"
They paused under a street
lamp, but though several passed,
they were all occupied.
After a minute, two cars shot
out of the side street on green
light. The sedan turned south, tut
the empty taxi hesued north,
across the way. Richard, whistled,
stepped off the curb waving his
stick just as he did so, tn
driver of the second car changed
his mind and wheeled about
drunkenly.
Richard, with his back turned,
stood directly in the cars path.
The sedan, overloaded with
young people, ;areened .nadly-
evidently quite out of control.
Nina called out something, franti-
cally, and Richard jumped to one
side in time. The fender missed him
by bare two inches.
He was safe, but Nina stood
there trembling.
In the fraction of :. second that
she had watched him in danger of
his life, revealing. flash had come
to her and she was frightened
still. Terribl.
nina
He hurried over to he saw that
the tears were trimming over on
to her white cheeks, and put his
arm around her.
"I'm all right, my ear :"
But it wasn't that.
When she had seer him standing
there, right in the path of the on
coming car, she hadn't called a
warning or his name g
had cried out: "Ddrlins"
Nina knew now that she loved
him.
Just A Silly Girl
ION Thanksgiving evenin j., Nina
~ left the FenwickS' dinner
party az early as she decently
could. Honey was a confirmed
stay -out-late-e~ and Nina wanted
to be in bed when they got home.
She chose to play backgammon,
rather than bridge, because it was
easier to break up one persons
game, than three. nd ste chose
to play with Tom Halliday, Betty's
brother, because he was so easy to
handle.
Tom was nice, ugly, boyish
person, whose every remark you
could predict. If SAID il was a
grand party, he would say, yes, {
had been grand ever .ince you
came. In other words, you knew
where you stood with him. He
could be counted on, hich was
something.
He was one of the people who
had asked Nina where she had
been all his life, the first time he
met her. He was pretty crs fo1
her, poor Tom.
After four garh~S, she stoppe,.
without conjunction. Tom was so
delighted to have h. / her choose
him, in the first place, that his
evening was made any way.
Nina babe him good night on her
shivery 74th street stoop, and
couldn't get up to her room asst
enough.
She made ready for the nigh,
refusing to think. She concern
trated on creams anG lotions, and
only let herself go when the lights
were out, and she was in bed.
Nina was in the first stages of a
series of emotional reactions to
Richard.
In this present stage, she sought
to convince herself that she was. t
really in love with him, at all.
Physically attracted. yes. But not
in love.
Nina had a good mind, and a
pretty fair smattering of psychol-
ogy. In a fiuttery, excited state !.
quite out of keeping with he. de-
liberate calculations she bega |
to count up on her fingers, all her
past loves.
There! You see? BY this method,
she told herself, she had explained
everything. That 18-year-old st.
Paul senior: those two Yale boys
Tony and Frank; that cookbook
ing golfer, who won Che cup at
Midi Ocean, in Bermuda; that
crazy Vanderpool kid. last winter
!. all young, immature creatures,
beside whom Richard Challoner
was the very embodiment of
sophistication. The fact that her
stepfather would have made many
Of the current men-about-town
seem decidedly bucolic. only add
ed weight 10 her argument.
It was decided then. She was
not in love with him, merely be-
glamored. So there wa nothing to
bite her fingernails about, or heave
over. She was Just silly girl.
She was just about to curl up in
ball, like a kitten, and 60 to
sleep, with great load off her
mind, when she thought of some
thing.
Lord Had Richard leard her
when she called out Darling" -
frantically? Had he suspected her
childish infatuation?
More cogitating.
Then-no. She thought not,
Everybody was darling" in this
indiScri inat- age, and besid s,
he had acted quite naturally on the
ride home.
Everything having been settled
too conveniently, Nina curled -
in ball, for the second time. AMI
this time she went to sleep.
fcopEriaAt 1857. Marearst RerseaI
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