LITMIR.BIZ

      CHAPTER II

       Table of Contents

      Mrs. Marshall's car had been gone only a short time when a handsome naval officer came slowly down the street with a package in his arms, looking carefully at the numbers of each house.

      Corliss emerged from her hiding in the kitchen just in time to see him in the near distance. She remained within sight to watch him. Such a personable young man in uniform she had not seen since she came East to attend this awful funeral of a grandmother she had seldom seen and had not been taught to love.

      Corliss went nearer to the open window to see him better and wondered if it would be too obvious if she were to go back to the chair in which she had eaten her only half-finished dinner.

      But the young officer was stepping more quickly now and was actually turning in at the gate. He was coming here! What was he? A florist? Surely not, as he was in uniform! Of course not.

      Corliss gave a quick pat to her golden curls, adjusted a smile of come-hitherness on her fierce young features, and got ready to go to the door when he should knock. She had no intention of letting an opportunity like this pass her by.

      But Corliss was reckoning without her hostess, for Dale had lingered on the porch to straighten out the evidence of the recent meal served there before more people should arrive, and she went forward with a quiet little smile as the officer came up the steps saluting her.

      "Is this where Miss Huntley lives, Miss Dale Huntley?" he asked with a grin of recognition. "I thought I'd find you. You wouldn't remember me, would you?" And there was a wistfulness in his voice that it was most fortunate that Corliss was not outside to hear. "I'm just the guy that helped you wipe dishes about a month ago at the Social Center. I had another short furlough, and I thought I'd stop by and see if you were still on the job."

      "Oh yes, I remember you," said Dale with a sudden lighting of her eyes. "You are David Kenyon. Isn't that so?"

      "That's right. You've got a wonderful memory. All the fellows you must meet at that center."

      "Oh, but that night you were there was the last night I've been to the Center. You see, we've had sickness here, and death——"

      "Yes, I know," said the young man with a sudden gentle sobering of his expression. "They told me. They said your grandmother was gone. And I remembered how you spoke of her. You've lived with her for a long time, and it seemed as if you must love her a lot. I thought perhaps you wouldn't mind if I brought a few flowers, just to show my sympathy."

      He held out the florist's box he carried, almost shyly.

      "Oh, how very kind of you," said Dale, quick appreciative tears springing to her eyes at such thoughtfulness in a young stranger. "Do you know, I told Grandmother about you when I got home that night. She had been a little worried about my staying out so late, and she was so grateful that you had walked home with me. Of course she wanted to know what kind of a man you were, and I told her how you came out in the kitchen and helped me wash up the last dishes after the other helpers had gone. She enjoyed hearing what we talked about, and she said, ‘If you ever meet that young fellow again, you tell him I thank him for being helpful to you and for bringing you home. And tell him I like his name, David!'"

      "Say! I appreciate that," said the young man. "You described her so pleasantly I was quite disappointed when I heard she was gone. I had hoped I might be able to find you and perhaps have the pleasure of meeting her. You know, my own grandmother died while I was overseas the first time, and she was the last of my family, so I have missed her greatly this homecoming."

      "Oh, I'm sorry you couldn't have met my grandmother, then. She would have loved it, I know. She was so sharp and sort of young for her years. She could enter right into conversation with anyone and seem to understand them. Would you—care to—see her now? She looks so sweet, lying there, just as if she is glad to be seeing heaven."

      "Yes, I'd like to see her," he said gently. "That is, if you don't feel I would be intruding."

      "Intruding? Why, of course not! I'd love to have you see her. We'll take your flowers up and give them to her. Come!"

      She brushed bright tears away and led him in the front door and up the stairs. Right past the curious Corliss, who had quickly and arrogantly arranged herself where they would have to brush by her and could not, she was sure, fail to see her in her recently repaired makeup.

      But David Kenyon did not cast an eye in her direction, although he passed so near he almost had to push by her, following Dale up the stairs. Dale had not even noticed that she was there until she had started up the stairs, and then she could only pray in her heart that her young cousin would not be moved to scream or otherwise mar the quiet atmosphere of the home from which the moving spirit had fled.

      Corliss stared up after them until they vanished toward the room where the grandmother lay, and then she flounced out onto the porch and met her brother, who had just come whistling up the walk from the street.

      "Hi, Cor; didn't I see a navy man coming in here? What's become of him, and how come you're not flirting with him with those big, wistful eyes of yours?"

      "Oh, get out! You're a pest if there ever was one! That navy man is a flat tire. He's gone upstairs with Dale, acts as if Gram was his relative. It makes me tired, all this carrying on about a dead person. When you're dead you're dead, and that's the end of it, isn't it? Then why all the shilly-shally? Where've you been? Isn't there a movie theater around here where we could go see a picture or something? I'm simply fed up with all this funeral business. And where is that hotel Dale talked about? I think it's time we found it and moved on. Go find Mother and tell her to come out here. I can't see going into that house again. It makes me sick to smell those flowers. I'd like to pull them all down and scatter them on the sidewalk. I wonder what Dale would do if I did, now that her precious Mrs. Marshall has been here and seen them. I believe I will."

      "You better go easy, Cor; that's the undertaker coming now. He'll give you ballyhoo if you touch 'em, and he looks as if he could

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