"I am not forgetting," said Linda. "For Eileen's sake I am Isorry to say that her ship is on the shoals. She is not going to have clear sailing with little sister Linda any longer. This is the year of woman's rights, you know, Katy, and I am beginning to realize that my rights have been badly infringed upon for lo these many years. If Eileen chooses to make a scene before guests, that is strictly up to Eileen. Now what is it you want me to do?"Katy directed and Linda worked swiftly. Soon they heard a motor stop, and laughing voices told them that the guests had arrived.
"Now I wonder," said Linda, "whether Marian is here yet."At that minute Marian appeared at the kitchen door.
"Linda," she said breathlessly, "I am feeling queer about this.
Eileen hasn't been over."
"Oh, that's all right," said Linda casually. "The folks have come, and she was only waiting to make them a bit at home before she ran after you."Marian hesitated.
"She was not allowing me much time to dress.""That's 'cause she knew you did not need it," retorted Linda.
"The more you fuss up, the less handsome you are, and you never owned anything in your life so becoming as that old red blouse.
So farewell, Katy, we're due to burst into high society tonight.
We're going to help Eileen vamp a lawyer, and an author, and an architect, one apiece. Which do you prefer, Marian?""I'll take the architect," said Marian. "We should have something in common since I am going to be a great architect myself one of these days.""Why, that is too bad," said Linda. "I'll have to rearrange the table if you insist, because I took him, and left you the author, and it was for love of you I did it. I truly wanted him myself, all the time."They stopped in the dining room and Marian praised Linda's work in laying the table; and then, together they entered the living room.
At the moment of their entrance, Eileen was talking animatedly about the beauties of the valley as a location for a happy home.
When she saw the two girls she paused, the color swiftly faded from her face, and Linda, who was watching to see what would happen, noticed the effort she made at self-control, but she was very sure that their guests did not.
It never occurred to Linda that anyone would consider good looks in connection with her overgrown, rawboned frame and lean face, but she was accustomed to seeing people admire Marian, for Marian was a perfectly modeled woman with peach bloom cheeks, deep, dark eyes, her face framed in a waving mass of hair whose whiteness dated from the day that the brakes of her car failed and she plunged down the mountain with her father beside her, and her mother and Doctor and Mrs. Strong in the back seat. Ten days afterward Marian's head of beautiful dark hair was muslin white.
Now it framed a face of youth and beauty with peculiar pathos.
"Striking" was perhaps the one adjective which would best describe her.
John Gilman came hastily to greet them. Linda, after a swift glance at Eileen, turned astonished eyes on their guests. For one second she looked at the elder of them, then at the younger.
There was no recognition in her eyes, and there was a decided negative in a swift movement of her head. Both men understood that she did not wish them to mention that they ever had seen her previously. For an instant there was a strained situation.
