Free Ozark Nurse by Fern Shepard Page A

bathroom and turned on the shower. If things go the way I hope, she thought, shivering as the cold spray hit her shoulders and back, I'll talk to him again about getting married right away.
    When she was finally dressed she looked lovely. She was wearing a gray flannel suit with Paul's favorite pale pink cashmere sweater, and a pink wool stole was laid out on the bed to go with it. She had indulged in high heels, earrings, dabs of her precious perfume—all the touches of glamour which she rarely had the time or reason to bother about.
    The phone rang, the extension on her bedside table.
    "Nora?" It was Paul.
    Her heart lifted at the sound of his voice.
    Then it plummeted, down, down, down.
    "I'm afraid I can't make it tonight after all."
    "Oh, Paul, is your shoulder worse?"
    "No. Bothers me a bit, naturally, But—no, it isn't that."
    She waited, tense.
    He muttered something or other which she couldn't make out, hemmed and hawed as a man does when he has something unpleasant to say but can't make up his mind how to say it. Finally: "The fact is, Nora, I'm at Rita Lansing's house."
    "You're
where
!" That was when her heart did a nosedive. "I must have misunderstood.
Where
did you say you were?"
    He explained Rita had been in her dad's newspaper office when the story came in about the trouble in the hospital. Worried, Rita had driven right over to make sure he was all right.
    Being a very thoughtful and considerate girl, Rita had insisted upon driving him to her house for dinner.
    "I felt that it would be imposing," he said, "and I didn't want to come. But Rita—" his laugh sounded a bit hollow—"wouldn't take no for an answer. So here I am. And I can't very well rush off as soon as I've finished eating. You do understand that, don't you, Nora?"
    There were dozens of furious, contemptuous things she wanted to blurt out, to cut him down to size. But what would it accomplish? She would simply sound like a jealous, humiliated girl who couldn't stand being pushed aside for a wealthy, more glamorous woman. Which was exactly what she was.
    He would feel sorry for her, and she did not want his pity.
    All she really wanted at the moment was to throw herself over the bed and sob her heart out and give herself a few stiff kicks for having been such a dreaming fool.
    "I hope you have a very pleasant evening," she said in a tone dripping icicles. "Have fun, and when the wedding arrangements are all set up, do let me know."
    "Oh, Nora, don't be like that. Please try to understand my position."
    She was angry, and saw no reason to pretend she wasn't. "Listen," she said. "If you ask me once more to try to understand—" She broke off, her threat unspoken.
    Then, in a quiet, controlled tone: "I understand all right; perhaps a lot more than you do. But some day you'll catch on."
    He was still talking when she put down the receiver.
    How she could go downstairs and pretend to eat she did not know. But if she did not go, there would be a thousand questions.
    "Aren't you feeling well, dear?" from Caroline.
    "Catch the B.F. stepping out with another gal?" That would be Jerry. "Well, don't let it bother you, kid. Us guys have to go roaming now and again into the hither and yon. But we always come back. It's a law of nature."
    Then, as likely as not, Bobby would start howling: "Are you gonna run away again, Daddy?"
    The table was set in the kitchen, where they always ate unless there was company.
    Carol had arrived, and when Nora went down she was well along in her report on her latest clash with Howie, who absolutely refused to go to that convention in Atlantic City. "Howie says we can't afford it, as usual. And as I said to Howie, we'll never be able to afford anything, if he won't even try to get out of that pokey law office and out of this horrible little town. And as I also said to Howie, how long he expects me to put up with—"
    Interrupting herself, she glanced up to say, "Oh, hello there," to Nora, then went right on with her list of