Texas rich (4 page)

If the lieutenant was still around through summer, what would that do to Billie's chances with Neal Fox? Neal Fox, whose father owned the bank. Neal Fox, who was more than acceptable with his studious habits, family money, and 4F classification. Martha Fox, a member of Agnes's garden club, had eagerly arranged a date for the two youngsters. Comparing the Fox boy with someone like Lieutenant Coleman... Agnes shuddered and almost cut her thumb as she peeled the potatoes. She hoped—no, prayed—that the lieutenant wouldn't come for dinner. He had thanked them for the invitation but never actually accepted. No manners. Ignorant cowhand. Agnes supposed this was the way cowboys did things. Neal was the kind of boy who would arrive exactly fifteen minutes early for dinner, carrying a bouquet of flowers for her and a box of candy for Billie. That was the way it should be done. The lieutenant would arrive, maybe, with his hat in his hand, eat three helpings of everything, hold the chicken in his fingers and lick them afterward. She'd been to the movies; she knew cowboys cooked over open fires and ate out of cans. But was the handsome young lieutenant actually one of those? There'd been something about him when he'd met her penetrating gaze. It was as though he'd been trying to figure her out. A Texan!

Today would be a good time to talk to Billie about Neal. After their guest left and they were doing the dishes. A nice mother-to-daughter talk. Billie seemed to like that Sunday bit of intimacy. Agnes personally found it especially boring. Her own life was uneventful and Billie's was so placid and pre-

{21}

dictable that it didn't leave much room for conversation. Usually they ended up discussing a book or the progress of the garden, or exchanging pieces of gossip.

Agnes glanced at the clock. It was one-forty-five. Fifteen minutes till their guest arrived. Billie stopped playing. She closed the piano. She was going into her room. Agnes knew her daughter was perched on the window seat, book in hand, staring out at the road. Waiting for a white uniform.

The telephone rang at three minutes of two. Bilhe almost broke her neck running out to the hall to pick up the receiver. "Hello," she breathed.

"Billie?"

"Yes." It was him. "Yes, yes, it's me. Moss?"

A low chuckle came over the wire. "I'm sorry, Billie, but I won't be able to come to dinner. The admiral wants to play golf this afternoon and can't find a partner. I'm the best he can come up with. Perhaps you'll invite me another time?"

Billie sucked in her breath. He wasn't coming. Somehow, she'd known he wouldn't. She wanted so badly to see him walk up to her front door. She couldn't remember ever wanting something so badly, unless it was the Christmas she'd wanted a two-wheeled bike. She hadn't gotten that, either. "Anytime," she said brightly, hiding her disappointment. "Our Sundays are open. You don't need an invitation." There. Short of begging, what else could she say?

"That's very kind of you. Please thank your mother. Listen, Billie, if you're ever at the Front Street USO on a Saturday night, I hope you'll save me a dance."

USO. Dance. Save him a dance. "I'll do that, Lieutenant. Thank you for calling," Billie said pleasantly. When she hung up the phone, she forced a smile to her lips. She knew Agnes was standing in the doorway and had probably heard every word. She had to turn and face her mother. Do it. Do it now before your face cracks with the strain.

"Oh, Mother—there you are. That was Lieutenant Coleman. He won't be able to make dinner. He has to play golf with the admiral. I told him he had an open invitation. Was that all right. Mother?"

Relief coursed through Agnes. Neal was still in the running. "Of course, dear. We must do our part, small as it may seem. I'm certain that one day, when he has nothing better to do, he'll drop by for a home-cooked meal."

{22}

Billie wanted to run to her room and cry. Cry when things got too bad. But it wouldn't be the same now. Now she was sleeping in the study because her room, a room that had been hers and hers alone, was to be rented! How she had loved it, the small windows under the eaves, the shelves holding all her books. Her music scores in neat stacks, the pictures she'd painted, and her bulging portfolio of designs that leaned against the wall. Now it was all a jumble in the study. A study wasn't a bedroom. She was sick with disappointment.

"Well, since there are just the two of us, we might as well eat now." Agnes turned and went back into the kitchen. "We'll eat in here; no sense going to all the trouble of messing up the dining room, is there?"

Billie followed after her mother, knowing how difficult it was going to be to swallow even one bite. She adjusted her features into a pleasant mask of indifference. It was going to be just another Sunday.

As Moss replaced the phone, his eyes went to the golf bag in the comer of Admiral McCarter's office. The admiral was entertaining a visiting three-star at the Officers Club. Moss's conscience pricked slightly as he made his way down the long battleship-gray hallway. He joined three of his friends who waited impatiently at the curb in the parking lot.

"New York City, here we come!" one of the j.g.'s shouted hoarsely. Moss grinned and climbed into the backseat of the Ford.

He didn't think about Billie Ames again until the next Sunday morning, when he awoke feeling achy and out of sorts. He brushed his teeth and swallowed three aspirin. When was he going to learn that Saturday-night hangovers hung on like leeches and were the ruination of a good Sunday? As long as he was going to be miserable, he might as well salve his conscience and go to dinner at Billie's house.

For a long moment he looked at the pay phone on the wall outside his quarters. Who was he kidding? Last night at the USO, he'd hung about the doorway watching for her. It was only after eleven o'clock, when nice girls like Billie would already be home, that he'd gone out to the local bar to tie one on. Now, he quickly dropped his nickel into the slot before he could talk sense to himself.

Billie picked up the phone on the first ring. She tilted her

{23}

hat slightly tD the side so she could comfortably place the receiver against her ear. She expected to hear her girlfriend's voice.

"Billie?"

When she heard his low, husky drawl, she felt her knees buckle. Her knuckles whitened on the prayer book in her hand. He'd called. Her eyes lifted upward, acknowledging the power of prayer.

Cool and calm. "Lieutenant, how are you? Did you have a nice golf game last Sunday with the admiral?" she asked for want of anything better and needing a moment to compose herself. Lordy, why couldn't she be more sophisticated?

"Golf? Oh, that golf game. Par." His conscience pricked again and he quickly squelched it. His head was kiUing him and he shouldn't be doing this; he didn't even know why he was doing it. She was a nice girl, a nice young girl, and there was nothing there for him. He remembered how he'd looked for her the night before. "How are you, Billie? Am I calling too early?" He massaged his temples, wondering what time it was.

The low, throaty laugh felt good in his ear. "No, of course not. I've been up for hours. As a matter of fact I was just on my way to church. Another five minutes and you'd have missed me." She waited expectantly.

"Church?" Where people go to pray. Did she pray for him as she'd promised? "Are you Catholic?"

"Yes, I am."

"I'm Catholic also. So's my mother. There aren't very many of us in Texas. Not a very good one, I'm afraid. I don't attend mass regularly." Hell, what was he, really? More agnostic than anything else, he supposed. The day his mother had told him he was old enough to attend services on his own he'd stopped going. Instead of attending the ten o'clock service as his sister Amelia did, he'd hung around the airfield. Seth never went to church.

Billie was unsure of what comment she could make to another of his confessions. Out of the comer of her eye she could see Agnes standing by the front door, waiting impatiently. Did Agnes know who was on the other end of the phone?

Moss saved her from making a reply. "I'd like to come to dinner today, if the invitation is still open."

Moss heard the slight gasp over the wire. "Of course. Dinner is at two. I'll look forward to seeing you again. Lieutenant."

{24}

"Do you think you could call me Moss, instead of lieutenant?"

"Of course... Moss. I'll see you this afternoon."

"Don't forget you promised to pray for me," he joked.

"I won't."

She dropped the receiver and turned to face Agnes. "Mother, do you know who that was? Lieutenant Coleman is coming to dinner. Isn't that nice?" She adjusted her hat in the front hall mirror, afraid to face her mother's scowl.

"We'll have to hurry dinner through if you're going to visit your girlfriend this afternoon." Agnes made a supreme effort to keep her tone light and conversational. Inside, she was having difficulty resigning herself to the threat of the handsome heutenant. She'd thought that matter closed.

Billie turned. "There. How do I look?"

Agnes detected a change in her daughter. In the passing of an instant she seemed to have bloomed. She was so pretty, this daughter of hers. In a few years she'd be a raving beauty. Billie had her bones, her carriage. Good, clear skin with soft melting eyes that changed from green to brown to gray. Hazel eyes. Much too good for a Texas cowpoke. Another week or so and Neal Fox would be home from college.

As they walked the four blocks to St. Elias they were regaled with the chiming of the carillon. Agnes was worried. Perhaps a prayer would help. It seemed like such a long time since she'd believed in prayer. She only attended church because it was expected of her; it was the right thing to do and most of the right people were there. Agnes was a convert to Catholicism. That jackass she'd married to spite her parents had insisted she convert and raise the children in his religion. She'd done her duty, but as far as she was concerned religion was just a lot of hokus-pokus. She never held with going to confession and abstaining from meat on Fridays, but, good mother that she was, she'd seen to it that Billie had made her first conmiunion and been confirmed when she was eleven. Once a month she sent her off to confession. How bored that priest must have been listening to Billie's little sins! Communion on every Sunday was a must. For Billie. Billie was a good girl and would stay a good girl. And it wasn't the power of prayer that would do it. That was Agnes's job!

Billie dreamed her way through mass and her mother had to nudge her gently when it was time to go to the altar rail for communion. Her prom was just weeks away. Was it possible

{25}

to invite someone like Moss Coleman to be her escort? Would he think a senior dance silly and young? She was counting on too much, looking too far ahead. Coming to dinner was one thing; what she wanted and hoped for was another. She had to be patient. She would pray for that, for patience. Still, she'd be the envy of every girl there if she showed up with a tall handsome navy man. A lieutenant, a fly-boy. The girls would drop dead.

In just a few hours she'd see him again. Prickly fingers of excitement ran up and down her arms. She bowed her head and prayed Moss Coleman would get what he wanted, everything he wanted.

Billie sat on the window seat pretending to read, watching for Moss. She'd brushed her teeth twice and kept glancing in the mirror to be sure the breeze hadn't disturbed her hair. It was smooth and sleek, a shining cap of ash blond, curved under in a pageboy. She wished it would fall over one eye like Veronica Lake's, but its own natural tendency to curl forced her to tame it back with a barrette. When the car slid to a stop at the curb, Billie felt positively light-headed. She forced herself to take two or three deep breaths as she did before playing in a piano recital. She allowed the bell to ring before she opened the door and found herself held in the gaze of those smiling summer-blue eyes. She smiled the dazzling smile Moss remembered and his head felt better already.

Agnes walked into the front room and was stunned to see Moss extending a huge bouquet of flowers toward her. "For your table, Mrs. Ames. Billie, the chocolates are for you." This was all wrong. It was Neal Fox who was supposed to bring the candy and flowers. For a moment, Agnes was unnerved. But only for a moment. She smiled her smile that never reached her eyes.

He grinned. He knew she didn't want him here and it didn't make any difference to him. He turned to Billie. "If dinner isn't ready, why don't you show me your garden? I could see from the front that your property goes pretty far back."

"I'd like that. Mother, you don't need me in the kitchen, do you?"

Moss's eyes went to Agnes again. He waited, almost daring her.

"No, you two young people go along. I can manage. I'll serve in twenty minutes." Agnes hadn't failed to notice the

{26}

time. Moss had arrived fifteen minutes early. Neal Fox was the one who was supposed to have such impeccable manners. She felt confused and irritable as she went back to the kitchen. Stooping to reach under the sink, she runmiaged for a suitable vase. The flowers stopped just short of being ostentatious. They must have cost him a fortune. The candy, too. The most expensive there was. And it wasn't a measly little one-pound box. No, it was a full five pounds and tied with a big red bow. How much did junior lieutenants make a month? Not enough to pay for such costly gifts, she was certain. Agnes sniffed. She thought she smelled money. Was it possible that this drawling, brash young man with the perceptive eyes could be something other than a cowhand? She'd quiz him during dinner. Agnes was good at quizzing. Most of the time people weren't aware of just how much they were telling her. She'd somehow underestimated this handsome flyer and she wouldn't make that mistake again.

As she stirred the gravy she watched Billie and Moss through the kitchen window. They did make a handsome couple. What were they talking about? The weather? Hardly. Him? More than likely. Billie was a good listener.

She grimaced. The gravy was lumpy; now she was going to have to strain it.

Dinner was a puzzling affair to Billie. Conversation was rapid and nonstop between her mother and Moss. She'd been worried that Agnes would be frigidly aloof and make the strain of conversation unbearable. Instead, her mother appeared animated and interested. Moss answered Agnes's questions with an exaggerated drawl, all the while wearing a most disconcertingly amused expression. He never spoke that way, Billie thought, when he was talking to her.