trembling underlip, fighting back the tears that filled her eyes, fighting down the anger, the remorse, the dismay that threatened to overwhelm her. Then she began to walk up and down the small room like a young lion in a cage.
Suddenly her mood changed. She grew calmer. She took a book and a warm coat, went out on the deck, found an out-of-the-way nook where Carter would have to hunt to find her, and sat down, pretending to read, but really thinking out the way before her step by step. If she had to go back twenty-four hours, would she have been willing to marry Carter? She refused to answer that question. It was too late. She must go forward!
She stayed in her hiding place until long past the lunch hour, subsisting on the cup of broth that was brought around on deck in the midmorning. Still Carter had not found her, or perhaps had not chosen to seek her. Then soon after lunchtime a young man came breezily by her chair, paused, hesitated, and then cried out, “Great Caesar’s ghost! If this isn’t Arla Prentiss! Say now, what do you know about that? I’m in luck, aren’t I?”
Arla looked up, dismay in her soul, for there before her stood the soda clerk from her hometown drugstore, crude and breezy and familiar as ever. He had known her all her life, had bestowed various boxes of candy upon her, had attempted to pay her attention sometimes, though she had always been able to laugh him off. Still, he was genuine, and somehow the real hearty admiration in his eyes now warmed her heart, even while she was wondering what Cater would say when he found that Hurley Kirkwood was on board.
But there was no dismay in Hurley Kirkwood’s heart. He was joyously glad to see her. He had been somewhat like a stray cat till he sighted her, having no acquaintances on board, and being adrift in the world for the first time in his life.
“Say now, this is great!” said Hurley, quickly drawing up a camp stool and settling down to enjoy himself. “Say now, Arla, are you alone? Taking a trip to Europe alone? Say now, if I can be of any service!”
Arla gave a little shiver.
“No, I’m not alone,” she smiled. “My husband is around here somewhere! I’m on my wedding trip, Hurley!”
“Boom! Just like that!” said Hurley, slapping his hands together noisily. “Hopes busted at the first word! Well, I congratulate you, Arla. But say now, when did it happen? You kept it mighty still, didn’t you? Didn’t any of the home folks come to the wedding? Your aunt Tilly wouldn’t have missed it, I’m sure, if she’d known.”
Arla suddenly realized that there was another part of her world yet to be dealt with.
“Yes, it was rather sudden,” said Arla. “You see, Carter found he had to go abroad, and of course it made a splendid wedding trip. I had practically no warning whatever. We just got married and rushed off to catch the boat.”
“Well, you certainly put one over on the hometown,” said Hurley. “Sorry I didn’t know about it. You might have called. There’s about a dozen I know would have come on to see you off. And me, why, I could have made it easy. I been in New York three days just bumming!”
Arla tried not to shudder again at the thought. It seemed to her that nothing could have been more perfectly the last straw at that terrible wedding of hers than to have had Hurley Kirkwood appear on the scene. She registered a distinct thanksgiving that she had been saved so much at least.
And yet, as he talked on, giving her homely items of domestic interest about her aunt Tilly’s rheumatism, old Mrs. Pike’s having lost all her money when the bank closed and going to the poorhouse, Lila Ginn’s latest escapade of running away with a drummer, and the party the high school kids had at a roadhouse that made all the school board sit up and take notice, somehow Arla felt the tension in her taut nerves relax. After all, it was comforting just to hear of home folks and hometown and things that happened in the years before Carter had loved and tried to marry another woman. It was good to forget if only for a few minutes the problems and perplexities of her own present situation.
Hurley Kirkwood made a good soda clerk. He knew how to kid