To love and to honor Read Online Free PDF Page B

her.
    "We're about the only persons left on the beach except d'Arcy and the girl in the red one-piece snuggling up to the man in the loud suit," he observed.
    "I snapped a picture of them, they seem so out of character on this beach. Later they were quarreling as I

    passed. They seem to have made it up now. I have the most curious feeling I've seen him, the tilt of liis hat, before."
    He laughed.
    "Sure you have. In the movies. That is bad boy Humphrey Bogart's tilt to the fraction of an inch." He drew a package of cigarettes and a lighter from a pocket in the beach robe and offered them.
    "Have one?"
    "No, thanks." She waited until he had blown a smoke ring or two. "Did your Sally like the bracelet?" she inquired.
    "Sally was improvised at the moment to give the hatchet-faced Ella the impression that you and I were old friends. I bought it to send to a homesick woman overseas."
    "You didn't fool Ella Crane for a minute. She fancies she's psychic. She has been owner and head bottle-washer of that shop for years. It is not only a listening post, it is a major clearing station with broadcasting facilities for town gossip. That woman has seen me grow up and never lets me forget the fact."
    "Then you are grown-up?"
    She liked the way his eyes which could be piercingly keen collaborated with his mouth when he smiled.
    "Certainly I'm grown-up. I have been handling business affairs for three years and not a child prodigy, either. I am a certified accountant."
    "Fancy that. What's happened to your hair since yesterday? Your head is covered with short curls."
    "I had it cut this morning. Fortunately it has a natural wave." She ran the fingers of her right hand through the wet hair. "It will look more presentable when it dries."
    "Even wet it has a golden glint. I thought the chatty Ella called you Cinderella. Right?"
    "Right. It is my name, worse luck. Now don't quip, *Has the Prince found your slipper?' It was amusing the first time I heard it, but it has lost its rapier edge."
    He threw back his head and laughed a spontaneous

    go TO LOVE AND TO HONOR
    laugh of genuine amusement which made one think, "What a bright girl am I."
    "Good line. Sorry I didn't think of it first."
    Stretched out at length, resting on one elbow, he began to scoop, mold and pat the sand till it assumed outlines. Fascinated she watched his long, supple brown fingers add a tiny turret to the structure.
    "As there is no Prince in the offing, another castle for Cinderella," he explained.
    "It's a masterpiece. Even to the little windows. Pity the tide will wash it away."
    "The castle for my Cinderella can't be washed away. It will be built on a rock."
    "Are you—" she remembered the jagged scar—"were you an architect before you went into the service?"
    "As an avocation only. I have helped my friends when they made over old houses. Sometimes I help them in other ways, also—I was off to a good start as a consulting engineer when Uncle Sam called me."
    A quizzical light in the eyes that challenged hers when he said "Sometimes I help them in other ways, also" clanged a warning. She sprang to her feet.
    "You are Bill Damon," she accused. "Why didn't you tell me?"
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    FIVE
    He swept the little castle flat and rose.
    "Why should I? You refused to speak to him when he phoned. I couldn't very well stop and introduce him when that boat was shooting for us, could I?"
    "I still don't want to talk with you."
    "That's just too bad. Because I am in this town to stay and we are likely to meet. Remember I told you that when I started a job I hung on till it was finished?"
    "Are you referring to the job for Kenniston Stewart?"
    "That is one of them."
    "Why doesn't he come home and settle the matter himself?"
    "Why are you so bitter against Ken? Is it a defense mechanism? Not in love with him, are you?"
    "In love with him. That's the funniest thing I ever heard. I've never even seen a picture of him—and you may be sure he never has seen one of me. I refused to send it, not