Free Romance Classics by Peggy Gaddis Page B

thought, a faint edge of malice in Betsy’s voice, though Betsy’s eyes were wide and blue and innocent.
    “How very nice for Phil,” said Geraldine lightly, and prayed that neither her eyes nor her voice betrayed her inner emotion.
    “How very nice for Sal, you mean,” said Betsy.
    “Sally’s very attractive and good company.”
    “I don’t like her either,” Betsy interrupted cheerfully. “Few people do — that is, few women. Which, of course, worries our Sal so much that she barely sleeps at night So long as men come and sit up and beg when she whistles, Sal should give two hoots in Hades about women liking her.”
    “Aren’t you a little hard on her?” Geraldine made herself say lightly.
    “I’d like to be really hard on her — something with boiling oil in it.” Betsy was suddenly neither so young nor so innocent. “Women like that should be burned at the stake.”
    Geraldine studied her in sudden sharpness.
    “See here, Betsy — ” she began.
    Betsy drew a deep breath and said tautly, “Oh, I got him back, of course. He wasn’t a big enough fish for Sal’s net She just snagged him in an idle moment, to keep her hand in. When somebody with more money came along, she threw Ted back to
me
— slightly damaged and never to be quite the same again — but I can have him if I want him.”
    Geraldine said softly, “Betsy, I’m so terribly sorry.”
    Betsy managed a wry grin. “Thanks.”
    Tip, who had been talking to a group of men a few feet away, came back to Geraldine and said, “Want to finish this, honey?” Then he grinned at Betsy and added, “Hi, Bets! Or am I interrupting something?”
    Betsy tossed her head saucily.
    “Well, but of course you are. Don’t you men always? Only it’ll keep. Be seein’ you around, people,” she answered and turned away.
    “Gosh,” said Tip as he put his arms about Geraldine and drew her out on the floor, “it’s indecent the way these kids grow up on you the minute your back’s turned! Bets had pigtails and freckles when I went away, and now here she is a married woman.”
    “Girls grow up fast these days,” Geraldine answered lightly. “Men, too, for that matter.”
    Tip nodded and his gaiety slipped for a moment and the old bleak, tired look was back. The next moment he smiled at her and warned, “How right you are! Careful not to trip over my long white beard, angel face.”
    The encore finished with Tip and Geraldine, Sally and Phil within a few feet of each other. They greeted each other pleasantly, found a table together, and Sally smiled at Geraldine. The smile, Geraldine told herself grimly, of a cat that has just made a meal of the family’s morning cream.
    “You’re looking a bit fagged, darling,” said Sally in an almost cooing voice. “Afraid you’re working too hard — all those committees and things.”
    “I feel splendid,” said Geraldine coolly.
    “You mustn’t let her work herself to death, Tip — or go off in her looks,” drawled Sally sweetly.
    Tip stared at her coldly. “My good woman,” he said sternly, “Geraldine will be a dazzling beauty when she’s eighty! Brown-haired, gray-eyed women like Gerry only improve with age.”
    Sally bristled a little. “Meaning that it’s red-heads who fade?”
    Tip grinned.
    “You said it, I didn’t,” he reminded her gently.
    Sally shrugged.
    “Oh, well, I never claimed to be a celebrated beauty, thank heaven,” she drawled carelessly. “My only hope for distinction is in wearing outrageous clothes.”
    She put a suddenly possessive hand on Phil’s and gave him her most enchanting smile. “But there’s them as likes redheads, eh, pardner?” she drawled.
    Phil patted her hand warmly and answered her smile, and Geraldine felt a little tightening about her heart. And knew, in the split second that she felt Sally’s eyes upon her, that Sally had been entirely aware of that tightening. There was a triumphant gleam in the other girl’s green eyes.
    A little