The SNAP! inside her brain was like a Fourth of July firecracker. The sparklers that danced in front of her eyes were much in the same category. Her eyelids felt heavy, opening and closing slowly like the metal covers on those new 1980 sport-car head-lights. Why did she think of a car? Had there been an accident?
No pain, not yet.
But such an odd numbness in her brain. There was light, yes, some light, and it was growing a bit stronger.
CRACK! again inside her head. Still no pain, just noise.
She was thinking of nothing, absolutely nothing, and it seemed that every last ounce of strength was seeping out of the pores of her skin. A bead of water, perhaps perspiration, rolled down past her ear, causing her to turn her head on the pillow.
The movement brought a sharp pain, and at the same time brought into her line of vision a large mirror. Reflected in it was a bed with a darkly polished headboard and an expanse of rose satin. A girl lay in the bed, her slight body lost beneath the comforter, her face almost as pale as the white band around her fore-head.
She stared at the picture, and the girl in the bed stared steadily back. Me? was her startled thought. The strangeness that swept over her was soul-shaking. It was as if the pleasant room had been picked up and whirled madly.
She was looking into a mirror--yet there was nothing in it that she could remember seeing before, not even the girl who was her-self !
She searched the corners of her mind frantically for something to tie to, some peg to hang remembrance on. There was this pleasant room; beyond it, all was blank and impenetrable. There was nothing. Not even a name.
Name! New panic woke in her. She gasped, "Who am I?"
There was no answer in the quiet room. But from somewhere beyond it, she heard voices raised in argument. One woman's voice, imperative, no longer young, soared above the others.
"You're keeping something from me!"
The murmured protests apparently did not satisfy her. "Is Carol in this house or not?"
Carol. The girl in the bed turned the name over in her mind. It held no familiarity. She repeated it, her panic growing. Carol.
She raised her head, and dizziness flooded through her. Flinging out her arm, she struck a glass on the bedside table. It crashed to the floor.
In the sudden quiet outside the room, she heard a broken-voiced cry: "What has happened to my granddaughter?"
A moment later, a man entered the bed-room, closing the door behind him. "You're awake!" he exclaimed, relief in his deep voice. She turned her head further on the pillow to look at him, and experienced another wrench of dizzying pain. She searched his face, anxiously awaiting recognition.
He was a young man, tall, with heavy, crisp-looking hair and a strong, sensitive face. There was kindness and concern in his eyes, and something more--perhaps a dark awareness of sorrow. It was a face she instinctively liked, but she could find no familiarity in it.
In panic, she cried again, "Who am I? Am I--Carol?"
"You had a nasty bump--" They had spoken at the same time. He stopped, and in an altered tone, asked, "What did you say?"
"Should I--know you?"
He gave her a strange look.
"I can't remember anything," she confessed. "You--this room--not even my name."
His lips parted, but he closed them without speaking. "Don't worry--about anything," he said finally. "You had an accident. You've been unconscious for some time, but the X-rays show no serious damage."
There was a curious constraint in his voice. "The doctor will want to see you now--and I promised to call the sheriff when you woke up."
"The sheriff?" she repeated, bewildered.
"He will ask you about the accident. But, of course,, if you don't remember--" His voice trailed off, making a question of it. "It's all--blank."
"Well, then," he said, shrugging, "that's all you can-tell him, isn't it?" He smiled at her, and she felt both relieved and warmed.
But as he left the room it occurred to her that she might have hurt-him. Was he someone close to her? Was that why he looked so constrained? She realized he had not answered her question about her name. Oh, why couldn't she remember?
She discovered it was futile to try to force her memory. Her head throbbed with pain, as if it were expanding and contracting with her heartbeats. The buzzing drone of the bees outside the window no longer seemed peaceful, but was angry and hurtful to her ears.
After a while, she heard heavy steps approaching her room. As the door opened, she heard: "Naturally she's upset. Extremely dangerous in her condition--under sedation--"
The elderly man speaking broke off as he met her eyes. "Well, young lady, how do you feel?" he asked cheerfully, coming for-ward to probe with gentle professional fingers around what she realized was a largish lump on her head.
The man to whom he had been speaking held a wide-brimmed hat in his hands and wore a sheriff's star on his khaki shirt. Behind them, the young man who had talked with her earlier closed the door.
She winced. "It hurts."
"Of course it does. You came a bad cropper."
Came a cropper. The unfamiliar phrase had a horsey flavor. Did that mean she had been riding? The thought was a strange one. "What--happened?"
"You don't remember anything about it?" His hands were busy changing her bandage. "That is not at all unusual. I'll leave it to Elliot to tell you all about it."
She glanced at the tall young man and thought, So his name is Elliot. It suited him. But she felt no more familiar with it than she did with him.
The sheriff began asking her questions, simple, kindly questions but ones, she knew, that were designed to probe into the locked chambers of her memory.
"I don't know. I don't--know," she could only repeat in a low voice over and over. With each question and each invariable response, the dark wall of strangeness seemed to rise higher and higher around her.
At last they left her alone, but she heard the murmur of their voices going on and on in the hall outside her room. She caught one surprising remark: "The newspapers want a picture--"
She must have sleet. for the room was dimmer when she opened her eyes. A middle-aged nurse came in to give her some medicine and plump up her pillows.
"What did the doctor say?" she asked the nurse.
"Why--that you'll be fit as a fiddle as soon as you get over that nasty bump on your head. Of course, you may be forgetting things for a little while. It often happens, after accidents such as you had--and you aren't to worry about it. Let's pretty you up a bit now, shall we?"
She wanted to ask the nurse what her name was, but the question seemed so ridiculous that she felt suddenly shy. Elliot would tell her. Or perhaps she would remember herself.
The nurse washed her face and combed her hair, then patted her nose with a little powder, touched her lips with lipstick and sprayed perfume on her hair.
"Morale?" the girl murmured.
The nurse's laugh was amused. "It's important, isn't it?"
Her headache dwindled. Probably the medicine, she thought, feeling drowsy again. The nurse left her, but returned almost at once, followed by Elliot and the doctor. Between them, supported on Elliot's. arm, was an erect little old woman with the whitest hair and skin she had ever seen. She looked very frail. She carried a cane and tapped it gently across the floor.
"Carol, my dear!" she said.
So I am Carol, thought the girl.
"Carol, speak to me!" the old lady said, anxiety sharpening her voice. "It's your grandmother, child." She reached out a hand toward the girl's face. Her fingers touched the bandage and she hastily with-drew them.
"I warned you, Granny." It was Elliot speaking. "She can remember nothing. Dr. Babson says it is only temporary."
"It may last only a day or two," the doctor added. "There is nothing for you to worry about, Mrs. Lane."
The girl in the bed scarcely heard them. She was staring at the old woman who had called herself her grandmother, realizing with a shock that those deepset eyes were sightless. How could she have forgotten that her grandmother was blind?
She was shaken and upset, but the old lady's next words upset her even more.
"It's all right, Elliot," she was saying with a testiness that one could guess covered pain. "How could I expect her to know her grandmother when she didn't remember her husband?"
The girl in the. bed lay still and unbelieving. Her husband! Then she knew this man well, had lain in the circle of his arms, had touched his lips with her own. She was trembling with confused emotions, the foremost of which was fright. Had she felt like this on her wedding day?
Suddenly she felt a sense of irreparable loss. There had been a day when she and the man at the foot of the bed had stood at the altar together and exchanged the most sacred of vows. Her wedding day--and she could not remember it! She began to cry.
"You must all go now," the doctor said. "And don't try to talk with her again until after I have examined her tomorrow. She has suffered a bad shock. I think perhaps another sedative, Miss Swift, to calm her nerves. Soft foods, but don't try to feed her while she's upset. I'd keep her in bed for a day or two."
The nurse remained after the room emptied to lay her hand on the girl's forehead and soothe her with murmured reassurances until the sedative helped her slip back into the dreamless sleep that was the only beginning she knew to her life. But she slept fitfully. Each time she awakened, she hoped the strangeness would be gone, that somehow she would have effortlessly fitted into her surroundings, and each time she was disappointed.
She felt better after she had eaten. She looked at the objects in the room, wondering if she had selected them. She inspected her dinner tray with interest, thinking: This is my silver, my china. Did I choose it? A sense of humor was coming to her rescue. It seems you have good taste, Carol.
When Nurse Swift came to take the tray, she chatted pleasantly. "Two patients are more than I bargained for when I came here, but I'd do anything for Mrs. Lane, and that's the truth. Anyone in Mayville would. She's such a dear. "
She smoothed the coverlet and fluffed up the pillows. "Mr. Hallett will be bringing her again to say good night to you."
The girl in the bed pounced hungrily on the name. Then she was Carol Hallett. Mrs. Elliot Hallett. It was something to tie to.
They came a little later, her grandmother leaning on Elliot's arm. The old woman's distress was obvious. Elliot's manner was friendly but quite formal.
She wondered what it would be like to have your wife suddenly tell you that you were a complete stranger to her. It must, she thought, be something of a blow. She tried to be very nice to him, to hide the strangeness she felt when she realized that she was married to him.
"Tell me the things I've forgotten," she begged them.
"There isn't much to tell," Elliot began.
"Elliot is a ship's medical officer," her grandmother said.
"U.S. Navy, she means."
"Attached to a destroyer that's in port
"--most of the time," Elliot finished, with an easy smile.
Carol watched that smile transform his face with the delight of discovery. "It's rather exciting, you know," she confessed, "getting to know you again." She added, in sobering curiosity, "It isn't much fun for you, is it?"
"I'd hardly call it fun for you, either," he returned politely.
"Oh, but in a way--" She broke off, laughing a little. "When I think of all the people I could have wakened to be! I could have been a chambermaid. Or a typist, who washes out her undies and dries them over the radiator at night, and goes without lunches to buy pretty nighties. Instead, I open my eyes in a lovely home surrounded by lovely things, and find that I 'came a cropper'--Does that mean my horse threw me?"
Her grandmother gave a muffled exclamation, but Elliot hurried on, ignoring her question: "You could have been a matron of fifty--"
All right. She would play the game.
"Instead, I'm young and not at all bad-looking?"
Elliot and her grandmother both laughed. "Well, it could have been much worse," Carol protested.
"Oh, definitely!" Elliot said, still laughing.
"I could have awakened in a hospital," she continued, "without friends or family. Instead, I find I have an exciting-looking husband--"
He flushed and she broke off, hearing a totally unexpected sound. It was a child's voice, crying, "Daddy! Daddy!"
Her eyes met Elliot's in shock as her grandmother went on for her, "And a small son."
She paled. "A son? You mean that I--that we--have a child?"
"Here he is," Elliot said, turning his face away as a young girl Carol had not yet seen opened the door.
"I'm sorry, Mr. Hallett," the girl said, smiling, as the fair-haired chubby boy ran past her into the room.
He was not yet two, Carol guessed, and thought, appalled, But I should know!
The child ran to Elliot. Then he saw the girl in the bed and stopped, suddenly shy. His round, wondering eyes went over the tray still lying across her knees and all the medical paraphernalia on the smaller tray on her bedside table.
She looked at him, her throat paralyzed. My child, she thought, and I can't even remember--
Elliot spoke with a gentleness that touched her. "Little Elliot is awed by the machinery of illness. Aren't you, Elliot?"
The child rubbed his cheek against his father's hand. Nurse Swift appeared in the door and said, "We mustn't get overtired now.-Shall I help you to bed, Mrs. Lane?"
"In a moment, Swift," the old woman said. "Elliot, come give Granny a good-night kiss."
The little boy ran to her and put his hands on her cheeks while she kissed his forehead. Then he returned to his father, and Nurse Swift helped the old woman to her feet.
She turned her face toward the bed and said uncertainly, "Good night, my dear. Good night, Elliot."
When they were alone, Carol looked at the two Elliots. They had the same dark eyes and the same well-shaped mouth, she, observed, but the man's hair was dark, crisp, and the child's soft and golden.
"He looks like you, doesn't he?" she said, feeling a painful shyness. "Not a bit like me."
Elliot looked embarrassed. She thought of all the memories he must have that she had strangely lost. A line of poetry came to her mind. What unremembered delights--
Distressed, she put out a hand to him. "Please forgive me. I know how I must be hurting you." Because she was innately kind, she said, "At least I can tell you before you go that I feel something toward you, "that I feel there is something between us. It's--it's as if I were falling in love with you all over again."
Elliot's face flushed darkly. He stood up. "We'd better go, son," he told the child.
Carol gazed after him as he strode across the room with little Elliot tugging at his hand and looking back over his shoulder as he trotted to keep up.
At the door, Elliot turned. "If there is anything you want--anything," he repeated, "just tell Mrs. Hagen, the housekeeper. She will take care of every-thing."
Carol sat looking at the closed door and facing a peculiar and unpleasant thought. Could it be possible that she and her very attractive husband had not been happy together? That they were not in love? Was that why she had the feeling that he was on guard with her?
"I don't see how I could have helped loving him," she told herself. But was that any reason for assuming that he was still in love with her? If he ever was?
We must have loved each other once, she thought. We married--had a child--. Oh, it was maddening to know so little, to have forgotten so much!
CHAPTER TWO
Who was she remembering?
Carol had no idea, but as she drowsily surfaced from the hazy depths of slumber, she knew very clearly what she was remembering.
Odd, that although she could not recall her name, or her husband, she could recall. very vividly making love with... some-body.
Sometime....
Her nipples had: risen into engorged little towers, and when his hand roamed on downward, the quietly rising and falling hillocks were alive and almost achingly ready for the touch of his fingers.
He lingered on the creamy mounds of her warm breasts for several minutes, cupping them, gently squeezing them, tracing with the tips of his fingers the contours of her rubbery-textured nipples and the delicate surrounding areolas.
She began to feel a sweet warm softness inside her belly as though she were melting into a loving surrender.
At last his hand strayed away from her breasts and moved in a leisurely trail over the slight mound of tier belly.
His fingertips spanned her abdomen, and his thumb rested teasingly for a moment at the top of her pubic triangle, then stroked the bushy curls downward, brushing the outer lips of her pussy with a maddeningly light caress.
She gave a little moan of excitement as his delicate manipulations sent a pulsing throb of sexual heat radiating through her loins, and the slick honey of her juices began to flow, saturating the tight entrance of her cunt.
"Ooooh, that feels so goddamn sensational! I never... ohhhhhh... never..."
The tip of his index finger moved further downward, parting the swollen outer lips and spreading the luscious moisture from her inner channel lavishly over the slick membranes.
"Wow! Oh, that's... fantastic!"
Her body jerked uncontrollably as his fingers brushed the magical nubbin of her engorged clitoris.
She reached for his cock, wrapping her fingers lovingly around the pulsating diameter of his hard, silken, hot-fleshed massiveness.
The thin, slightly sticky precoital fluid leaking from its inflamed tip trickled over her fingers, and she worked her grip up and down the shaft a little, spreading the lubrication lavishly as she did so.
"Mmmmm... ohhhh...
With a moan of voluptuous pleasure, he buried his face in the white valley between her breasts, nuzzling against the warm cushions of flesh, inhaling the scent of her skin.
He licked his way up to one nipple peak, circling the tiny cylinder with his avid tongue. He teased it to a point of aching desire, then cruelly abandoned it, the wet heat of his tongue following the trail his knowing fingers had already blazed, licking a path of fire down her quivering belly.
His tantalizing tongue tip dipped for a moment into her navel, then brushed on down to the thick pubic nest, and homed in on the fiery, raging ember of her aching clitoris.
Almost unconsciously reacting to the renewed jolt of pleasure, the embrace of her fingers around his prick tightened, and he groaned his ecstasy against the moist flesh of her cunt, sending a vibration of intense delight resounding throughout her entire trembling body.
"Yeah, that's incredible!"
Then he was maneuvering his body into position atop hers, and she spread her thighs eagerly. The tip of his huge, straining cock nuzzled at the dew-soaked entrance of her pussy.
"Yes! Yes! Fuck me! Oh, fuck me!" she urged, writhing up against him with insatiable eagerness.
The rigid shaft cleaved in.
She thrust her hips towards him again, engulfing the welcome intruder, sucking him into the liquid-seeming depths of her passionate heat.
Her velvety inner walls contracted to enfold him in their snug embrace and he penetrated until every inch of his throbbing sex shaft lay nestled in the warm canal.
Her legs rose and she clasped them firmly about his hips, and began a slow gyrating, circling motion with her pelvis to complement the slow,-steady, in-and-out thrusting of his potent, rock-hard piston of masculine flesh.
"OOOOHHHH!" she panted in pleasure, and the sound of her enjoyment spurred him on.
The friction of their ardent fucking was generating waves of electrical excitement, and sparks of pleasure seemed to crackle between them. The accelerating movement of his slippery, sliding cock inside her was rapidly carrying her, a willing captive, to the heights of ecstasy.
Faster and faster he pumped, and tighter and tighter her arms and legs embraced him, as her first orgasm overwhelmed her.
The clutching contractions of her cunt seemed to be trying to drag the sperm by sheer force from his congested balls.
He hung on almost desperately, his. fingers clenching on the sheets, and when the first wave of her climax had passed over, he still remained hard inside her like an indomitable breakwater.
She lay gasping beneath him, and he ceased all movement, looking down at her fondly.
He bent his head and kissed her hard on the mouth.
Then, to her delight, his hips began their thrusting once again; and after a few moments she recommenced the circling pat-tern of her pelvis, sweating now, her cunt incredibly wet with the copious outpouring of lubricating juices. But its embrace around his iron cock lost none of its snugness.
Then the come was boiling up in his balls, and with a kind of desperate frenzy he speeded up the relentless driving and pounding of his hips, determined not to climax until he had forced her to surrender to ecstasy once again.
Faster and faster his body flailed, slamming his phallic thickness deep into the molten core of her being. At last, just when she thought he would never make it for those last few vital seconds, the volcano inside her blew once again, and she convulsed with a helpless shriek, and he poured out his pent-up semen into the living furnace of her belly....
Carol jerked back to full consciousness to find that Nurse Swift had come to help her prepare for the day.
"I think it would be nice if you paid a little visit to your grandmother," the nurse said. "She always needs a bit of cheering up when Mr. Hallett goes on a cruise."
"He's gone, then?"
"This morning. He telephoned late last night."
"Oh," Carol said faintly.
Later that morning, Carol left her bed-room for the first time she could remember. She leaned on Nurse Swift's arm and went with eager, if unsteady, steps through the door, thrilling with the excitement of discovering if the sight of her home would open the door to her lost memory....
The hall was wide and graceful, its white walls broken by dark paneled doors. On one door, ajar, she saw a reflection of leaping firelight.
It was through this door that Nurse Swift led her, into a dark-paneled sitting room with a small fireplace.
In a chintz-covered chair before the fire sat her grandmother, Mrs. Lane, tinier than she had looked beside Carol's bed, her sightless eyes turned toward the doorway, her snowy head tilted alertly.
"Come in, my dear," she said. "It's good to have you up again."
Nurse Swift spoke in Carol's ear. "Kiss her. And call her Granny. She loves it."
Carol flashed a grateful smile at the nurse before she bent over the fragrant, wrinkled cheek.
"Thanks, Granny," she said. "My knees need a bit of stiffening yet."
Her grandmother drew back a little. "You smell of medicines and things."
"She is exhausted already," Nurse Swift put in, rather loudly, helping Carol into the companion chair across the hearth.
"We're so worried about you, Elliot and I. Are you beginning to remember anything at all?
"Nothing," Carol confessed, and was surprised to find a choking sensation in her throat.
"Are you hoarse, my dear? Your voice sounds strange."
"It sounds strange to me," Carol said, and told her grandmother about the ringing in her ears.
"Eh?" said her grandmother doubtfully. "She doesn't hear very well, you know," Nurse Swift whispered.
"I heard you perfectly, Swift!" The words came like the crack of a whip.
The nurse laughed. "Don't whisper secrets near her. She hears a whisper every time."
Amused, Carol looked at the old lady. Nurse Swift had spoken in her usual tone of voice this time, but there was nothing in her grandmother's face to indicate that she had heard. She was still looking very pleased with herself at hearing the nurse's whisper.
With a surge of affection, Carol thought, You darling!
As if she felt the warmth of Carol's thought, the old woman spoke in a gentler voice. "I brought you up, you know." She paused, then said, "It seems odd to be telling you that."
Carol waited. When the old lady said no more, the girl asked, "My mother--? "
"--died when you were born."
"There is so much you must tell me," Carol said. "I have forgotten so much."
Her grandmother sighed. "When you are stronger, my dear."
The fire crackled noisily. Carol shifted in her chair. Already her back ached and she was beginning to feel weak with weariness. Yet her mind would not let her rest.
There were so many questions she wanted to ask, so many things she wanted to know. But her grandmother, was nodding now, apparently overtaken by sudden drowsiness.
Nurse Swift rose and moved forward. "Time's up. Back to bed you go!"
In her efficient way, she had Carol back in her room, relaxing gratefully under the covers, before the girl had time to discover if it was her own or her grandmother's strength the nurse was more interested in conserving.
But her most important question was still unanswered. She had not dared to say, "What about Elliot and me, Granny? Why should he flush and look so embarrassed when I speak of love?"
After lunch, she explored further in the old house, which was large and full of surprises--a charming little room opening off a large one, or an unexpected terrace looking on a corner of the garden.
Little Elliot was at play in the sunshine, with his young nurse sitting nearby knitting something of soft blue wool. Carol joined her, stretching out on a garden chair.
She discovered that she would not be expected to concern herself with any house-keeping details as she grew stronger. The housekeeper, a tall, middle-aged, rather hard-faced woman named Stella Hagen, had made that clear as soon as she came down-stairs. Mrs. Hagen came outside now to announce that the sheriff had arrived with a photographer.
The sheriff followed her through the garden doors, carrying his wide hat in his hand. "Good afternoon, ma'am," he greeted Carol in his soft voice. "This man wants to take your picture for his city news-paper. I came along to inquire if you are feeling up to it now."
"I'm fine, thank you."
"Do you remember anything about your accident?" the photographer asked, sighting through his camera.
"I'm asking the questions," the sheriff reminded him softly. "How is Mrs. Lane?"
"She's not at all well!" Mrs. Hagen spoke up, her voice sharp and vaguely accusatory, as though she held them all responsible.
The sheriff sighed. "Please give her my regards, Mrs. Hagen."
"I'll do that, sheriff." The housekeeper turned back into the house.
"Look at me, please," the photographer said to Carol, and snapped his picture. "Let's try another pose. Look at the sheriff," he suggested, and snapped again as Carol turned her head. "That's all."
He was still saying "Thank you," when, with a brusque, "This way," the sheriff hurried him off toward the garden gate.
Nurse Peters looked after them with faint amusement.
"Why did they want my picture?" Carol asked her.
The girl shrugged. "They wanted to take it while you were still in bed, but Dr. Babson wouldn't let them."
Little Elliot ran to Carol's knee. He took her hand and tugged it, urging, "Horsie!" She looked questioningly at his nurse, who said, "He wants to take you to the stables."
"Is it all right?"
"If you feel like walking. It isn't far."
She stood up and took Elliot's hand, letting him lead her. They passed an old unused greenhouse and walked along a shaded lane toward a white-washed barn. The wide door was open and the sun through the trees shone on the flank of a russet mare.
Little Elliot's eyes were as enchanted as she felt. It occurred to her that she came closer to sharing the child's life than anyone else in his small world, for she, too, was seeing everything through unjaded eyes. It was like being born again.
"Good morning, ma'am," said a voice from the darkness beyond the doorway. "Pretty little mare, ain't she?"
As a small man with a sharp nose and kindly, piercing eyes came into the sunlight, the child broke into voluble noise, pointing excitedly at the mare.
"I think he's trying to tell us something," Carol said, laughing.
"Yes'm," said the man, looking fondly down at the boy. "He has quite a vocabulary, but it's all his own. I haven't caught on to it yet. But he loves horses, just like his father. Mr. Hallett brings him down here often."
He pointed to the black horse in the next stall. "That's Mr. Hallett's mount. He's a fine animal. Mr. Hallett's very fond of him."
She sensed that the pride in his eyes was for Elliot as well as for Elliot's horses.
"You're Arthur, aren't you?" she said. She had heard his name in the house and knew he was both gardener and groom.
"Yes'm. Henry Arthur's my name." The quick, pierceing eyes looked up at her, and she thought she detected curiosity in them. She turned away, embarrassed.
Her eyes fell on the greenhouse, and she said uncertainly, "That isn't used any more, is it?"
"Oh, not for some years, ma'am. It was built when Mrs. Lane was the young mistress. There were half a dozen gardeners in those days, I'm told."
He broke off as a white-clad figure moved into the range of the doorway. It was little Elliot's nurse.
"Oh, there you are!" she said, smiling. "It's nap-time." And despite the boy's protests, she took him back to the house.
Carol lingered, wanting Arthur to tell her more, yet hesitating to ask questions. His last words stuck in her mind. "--when Mrs. Lane was the young mistress--"
So I didn't come here as a bride, she thought. If it is--Granny's house and she brought me up, I should know every corner of it.
It was like a jigsaw puzzle. You fitted pieces together and bit by bit the picture grew. Was the house still Granny's, or did it belong to Elliot now?
"Care to ride her, ma'am?" Arthur said. He was brushing the mare.
Carol hesitated, aware of an involuntary shrinking, as she told herself that last time she rode she had been thrown.
"No," she said. "Not today."
"Lots of nice bridle paths in the hills back here."
"Another time, perhaps." She hesitated. "Arthur?"
"Yes'm?"
"Which horse--threw me?"
His eyes shifted quickly. After a slight hesitation, he indicated the russet mare. "She might've done it," he said cryptically.
Carol's eyes widened. It was on the tip of her tongue to cry, "But don't you know?" Then she saw that he was distressed and kept silent. He must blame himself in some way for the accident, she thought, feeling sorry for him. She must ask Elliot when he came back.
Out in the lane again, she looked toward the hills that rolled in soft gray-green waves back of the-buildings. Her newly regained strength was pulsing and eager within her, and the smudge of color that must be wild-flowers on the hillsides drew her like a magnet.
She turned her back on the house, skirting the stables.
After Carol had gone, Arthur stepped out next to the west side of the stables and made a strange hand signal toward the house. A few moments later, little Elliot's nurse joined Arthur on a stack of hay bales inside the big wooden building.
"I've been waiting all day for this," Arthur said, leaning over and kissing the pretty nurse full on the lips. Their tongues duelled erotically for a few moments, and then the young woman pushed him away.
"I've been thinking about you, too, Arthur," she said, "but I've been worrying more about that woman. I don't know how much longer we can keep up this charade."
"Oh, don't bother yourself with that. Elliot pays us well, so we have no room to argue. And besides, where else would they let you make love during working hours?"
Arthur laughed lewdly and then kissed the nurse once again. She wrapped her arms around him and ran her fingers through his hair. With her arms up high, Arthur had no trouble reaching in and massaging the girl's tits. She responded by sighing deeply, moving closer against him, pressing her breasts into his hands, forcing him to squeeze them harder.
Spurred on by her sexy movements, Arthur began unbuttoning her blouse. He sucked in a gasp of breath when her cleavage was revealed. Sticking out his tongue, he bent down and began licking her tit flesh, tugging gently on her white bra with his teeth.
The nurse got the message and helped Arthur remove her bra, unhooking it from behind. When her tits were revealed in their entirety, Arthur whistled softly.
"You've got the prettiest pair I've ever seen," he said, licking his lips.
The girl just giggled, and then she began groaning when Arthur started chewing on her rosy red nipples.
"Oh, that feels so good," she murmured, pushing her tit hard into his face. "Do it... harder, honey. Harder!"
Arthur needed no second invitation. He savagely attacked her tits with his tongue and lips and teeth. In a short while, he had the pretty nurse writhing beneath him, gasping out her pleasure while she ground her hips against his crotch.
Her frantic movements served to ignite the fire in his loins. His cock was now hard and throbbing and it was painful to keep so much thick cock meat stuffed in his pants.
"Here, baby," he growled, turning over on his side. "Why don't you get it out for me?"
The aroused man laughed while his lover fumbled with his fly. She struggled to unbutton his jeans, licking her lips as she thought about all that good cock twitching just out of reach. Finally, she managed to yank his pants open, freeing his huge penis.
"Oh, it's beautiful," she sighed. "I love it!"
"Well, it's all yours, baby," he said. "Now, just give it a little suck. Yeah, just like that. Ohhhhh!"
Opening her mouth wide, the pretty young girl-took in the first few inches of Arthur's prick. Then she locked her full lips around his shaft and ' began sucking intensely.
"Ohhh, baby, Yeah!" he cried. "That's the way. Oh, yeah, that's the... way! Now, reach down there... yeah... and grab holda my... balls. Ohhhh, not too hard... there... just like that... yeahhh. Damn, baby, that feels... great!"
The excited nurse worked in his crotch eagerly, doing everything that Arthur asked. And she worked all the harder when she sensed that Arthur was about to have his climax. His hips were pumping furiously and he was gurgling deep in his throat like some sort of wild beast.
But she didn't want him to come in her mouth. She really didn't care for the taste of sperm. She would rather have him fucking into her pussy with all that good cock. So she withdrew her mouth and flopped down onto her back. After tearing her clothes off, she spread her legs wide, revealing the glistening pinkness of her vagina.
"Now I get the idea," Arthur said, staring down at her with bulging eyes--not to mention a bulging penis.
Gritting his teeth, Arthur entered the young girl easily. Her pussy was good and wet, and he thrust in balls-deep in the first try. Within seconds, they were fucking steadily, their hips bucking wildly and their bellies slapping together.
"Yahhhh! I'm coming!" Arthur howled. "Oh, baby, gonna shoot it. Ohhhhh!"
The young girl clung to him tighter, thoroughly enjoying the feel of his thick penis sliding in and out of her cunt. And when she felt the first sizzling spurt of his jism blast into the back of her pussy, she felt wonderful. It was much more satisfying to feel that hot semen spurting into her cunt than it was to feel it sliding down her throat. It was so satisfying, that her. own orgasm began to overtake her just before Arthur finished coming.
CHAPTER THREE
She followed the lane until it ended at a wooden gate and, finding that difficult to open, stooped under the wire fence and struck out across the hilly pasture. The sun warmed her shoulders and the ground was springy beneath her feet. There was a low, drowsy hum of bees working among the wildflowers.
She breathed deeply of the warm, earth-fragrant air, climbing slowly, pausing now and again to look down on the shrinking buildings below her.
The house seemed to dwindle and the stables and garages moved toward it until they all seemed to be under one roof, only partly visible through the foliage of the surrounding trees. From here she could see their neighbors' houses as well, seemingly close at this distance yet separated in privacy by hedges and gardens and trees. Here and there, she caught the glimmer of a swimming pool, and occasionally a gay blob of color that could be only a huge umbrella. It was a peaceful, idyllic scene.
"And it's mine," she told herself, in comfortable possession.
She climbed still higher and found a natural seat in the misshappen branches of a stunted oak. From here, the whole town was visible, and her house had shrunk to a mere dot on the outermost street of the little community. She picked out the main business street and resolved to explore it as soon as possible.
My town, she thought comfortably. Then she whispered, "Mrs. Elliot Hallett." And because she was alone and quite safe from listening ears, she said it again, aloud.
Closing her eyes, she could almost see Elliot standing before her, his head dark against the bright sky, his eyes a warm brown beneath his straight brows. The wind would be tumbling his hair and he would stand with his hands in his pockets smiling down at her... her husband.
"When he comes back--" she murmured, and opened her eyes quickly to reality as she felt a flush stealing over her face.
From somewhere behind the crest of the hill, she could hear the barking of dogs. As she sat dreaming, the sound came nearer until, with a start, she looked around to see three large black and white creatures leaping down the hill toward her, white teeth showing in red gaping mouths.
Panic engulfed her. She scrambled to her feet on the almost horizontal branch and tried to reach for a higher limb, her feet slip-ping on the smooth bark.
"Go away!" she cried shakily. "Go away!"
A man shouted from the top of the hill, but the dogs did not stop their ear-splitting noise. When the man saw her, he ran down the slope. He was laughing.
"Good lord, you're not really scared, are you? It's only a game. Down! Polka! Flash! Down, all of you!"
He held up his arms. "Here," he said. "Put your arms on my shoulders and jump." He chuckled. "First time they've treed anything half so pretty!"
With a glance at the dogs, crowding around with wagging tails, she put her hands on the man's shoulders. As she jumped, he caught her and lowered her to the ground and almost into his arms.
"I'm terribly sorry they frightened you," he said, still holding her. "I'm sure they thought you were playing a game with them. They're friendly as puppies."
He was a year or two older than Elliot and attractive in a fair, good-humored way. There was a hint of mockery in his smile.
"I should know them, shouldn't I?" she said. "I should know you, too, no doubt. I'm Carol Hallett."
He looked so amazed that she added hastily, "I see that you haven't heard. I had an accident. My horse threw me and I--well, I seem to have lost my memory.
And then it was her turn to be amazed, for he looked at her a long moment and his eyes began to dance while laughter struggled on his lips. He gave in to his amusement, throwing back his head and shouting with laughter.
"Darling; that's wonderful!" he said, and kissed her.
Flushing scarlet, she stepped back out of his reach, steadying herself against the tree that had been her precarious perch a few moments before. It had been a quick and quite harmless kiss, but she felt keenly her disadvantage. like everyone else she had met so far, this man knew more about her than she knew herself.
What he knew was still furnishing him with amusement. Anger swept over her in a hot wave. She said unsteadily, "I don't know why you think you have the right--"
"Oh, don't be stuffy," he said easily. "I didn't mean anything. Have a cigarette?"
"No, thanks."
"You're still angry, aren't you? I'm sorry." He shook a cigarette half out of the pack and held it toward her.
After a moment, she took it.
"Turn your back to the wind," he said, and when she obeyed, he struck a match between his cupped hands. The dogs had stretched out at their feet, panting, watching with intent eyes.
"Do you want me to tell you some of the things you have forgotten?" he asked. "We could start with my name. Or do you remember it?" His tone was lightly mocking.
She began to take his mockery less personally, wondering if it wasn't just his way. She felt less annoyed with him and more inclined to talk. It would be a relief to talk to someone about her strange situation.
"No," she confessed. "I remember nothing."
"I'm Guy Eastland," he told her. "Guy to you. And my Dalmatians--Polka, Flash, and Storm. We're your next-door neighbors--or practically next door. Storm, get up and shake hands with our neighbor." His voice was suddenly imperative. "Shake hands, Storm!"
The largest of the three dogs yawned, got slowly to his feet, came nearer and lifted his right paw.
Carol took it gently in her hand, delighted. "How do you do?" she said, laughing.
"You see, you are friends. He's the only one who observes the social amenities, how-ever. Polka and Flash are bored by such conventionalities."
"That's all right," Carol teased. "You'll have them trained, too, someday."
He grinned. "She sees through us, fellows. Now, what else are you wondering? Oh, yes! Why am I not slaving away in an office this fine spring day? The answer, my dear, is that I am working. Even now, I am filing away in my head that pretty luster to your hair and the highlights the sun brings out in it."
"I don't understand--"
"I'm a commercial artist," he explained. "Posters, advertising--that sort of thing."
He gave her a quick glance. "Where's Elliot?" he asked. "Out on the high seas?"
"Yes," she said, troubled by something in his look that she did not understand, something speculative. Suddenly she didn't like his admiration or his amusement. She didn't like him at all, she decided.
Especially when he said, with his mocking smile, "Not by choice, I'm sure." And added, "I've always said, Elliot could pick 'em."
She put out her cigarette. "Nice to have seen you," she said, and turned away from him.
He did not try to keep her, but he said, "I'll see you again," and his eyes were once more dancing with amusement.
It must be a joke! she thought hotly. Too bad I can't laugh too!
As she went down the slope, she heard him whistle up his dogs and talk to them in a low voice. Once she looked back. He was standing just beyond the tree where she had left him, looking down at her.
He waved. She was still annoyed, but she didn't want to appear rude. She waved back.
The next day, feeling more and more restless as her strength increased, Carol decided to walk down to the town and get some personal things she needed.
She told no one she was going, but simply strolled through the front gate, bareheaded and bare-armed in her tailored cotton dress, and turned down the shaded path.
From the hill behind the house she picked out the town's main street, and she walked in that general direction, finding a childish pleasure in exploring the pleas-ant streets. She felt a little nervous about finding her way back and picked out land-marks at each corner. When she saw a house that she admired particularly, she tried to imagine its rooms, hoping to stir some latent memory of visiting it.
Each passerby she scrutinized, hoping to be recognized by some friend or acquaintance and fearful that she might cut someone she ought to know. Several times she nodded shyly because. someone looked curiously at her.
By the time she reached the shopping center, she felt exhausted, not so much from the walk as from the mental strain of it. She entered a drug store and sat down at a long fountain, thinking that she would order a cold drink. But she was facing a mirror, and it seemed to her that all the reflected pairs of eyes were turned to her. Were they waiting for her to speak or make some sign of recognition? For no one spoke to her.
Had word gone around town about her unusual malady? Were her friends holding off, waiting for her to make the first sign? Was that why no one had called at the house or telephoned? Or were Swift and Mrs. Hagen keeping such things from her, perhaps on doctor's orders?
Suddenly nervous, she left the fountain without ordering. Out on the street again, she found the one department store without any trouble and quickly selected the few things she needed. She had with her only some small change she had found in her desk, but she had reasoned that she must have accounts in town, since Elliot had given her no money.
As the salesgirl made out her sales slip, she said, "Charge them, please. Mrs. Elliot Hallett."
The girl lifted her head. "I beg your pardon?"
Carol repeated, "Charge the things to my account. The name is Mrs. Elliot Hallett."
The girl hesitated, looking curiously at her. "Just a moment, please," she said, then hurried away.
Embarrassment seized Carol. She might not have an account here, after all. What if they wanted to question her? They might ask questions she couldn't answer. She didn't even know the name of his ship.
She watched the girl, who was obviously consulting a superior. The two looked in her direction, and she looked nervously away. Her hands felt icy, but her palms were moist. She longed to be home in the garden with little Elliot, safe behind the hedges that shut out the outside world. What if she couldn't find her way home?
The salesgirl returned, handed her her parcel, and said, "Thank you."
Relief flooded through Carol. Apparently, whether she had an account or not, Elliot's credit was good. But there was curiosity in the girl's eyes.
She turned blindly out of the store and almost ran into a woman just entering.
"Sorry!" she said contritely. The woman gave her a long look and Carol thought, I probably should have called her by name. Utterly miserable, wanting only to get home, she hurried down the sidewalk.
Realizing that she was very tired, she hailed a taxi and asked to be taken home. She resolved to ask many more questions before she ventured out alone again.
She was white with fatigue when she reached the house. She found the front door locked, and she rang the bell. Mrs. Hagen opened the door, her eyes angry and worried. Swift appeared behind her in the entry, hall, looking relieved.
"You've given us all a turn!" the housekeeper said sourly. "You're not sup-posed to go out alone."
The woman's manner was like a spark to Carol's frayed nerves.. "I give the orders here, Mrs. Hagen," she said coldly.
"I take my orders from Mr. Hallett," the housekeeper snapped, "and he told me not to let you go out."
Carol flushed. "Please see that someone pays for my cab," she said, and turned to go up to her room.
Nurse Swift came up almost immediately.
"Don't pay any attention to that old battleaxe," she said. "She couldn't say sweet words without making them sound sour. You know it's only because Mr. Hallett is so worried about your memory."
Carol looked up from the chaise lounge on which she had flung herself. "He could have spoken to me. He needn't have asked Mrs. Hagen to interfere--"
"Now, you mustn't take it that way. He asked us all to take care of you."
The girl said slowly, "It makes me feel almost as if I were in prison."
The nurse hesitated a moment before she said, practically, "Well, it is a little like being in prison, not having a memory, isn't it? But it isn't anybody's fault." She put her hand in her pocket and brought out a radio-gram. "See what came while you were away?"
Carol took the sheet of paper with a stir-ring in her heart. Elliot's message was very brief:
Dear Granny. Well and working hard. Take good care of yourself. My love to Carol. Elliot.
She read it through three times, asking herself a question. Why hadn't Elliot sent his message to her? She was his wife.
"You do look tired," the nurse said. "I'll bring you a cup of tea. Then maybe you will feel like having dinner with your grand-mother tonight. She has especially asked that you do."
The girl did not open her eyes. She was thinking.
Give my love to Carol. It was so conventional a message that it had no meaning. She had wondered before if there had been some quarrel with Elliot, some estrangement. Now she felt certain of it.
Why would they have quarrelled?
I'll ask Granny, she thought. Granny was bound to know. And she loved them both. She would want things to be right between them again.
But it was as though Nurse Swift had divined Carol's resolve, for when the girl went to Mrs. Lane's room that evening the nurse met her at the door.
"I'd like to ask a favor of you, my dear," she said. "Please don't worry your grand-mother with questions about the past. If you do, you will upset her. She frets about you as it is, without being reminded of your accident."
The girl's eyes opened wide. "Who else can help me?" she said, exasperated. "Can't you see I'm nearly frantic with the things I don't know? I must--"
"Mrs. Lane is very frail," the nurse interrupted her firmly. "Her health should come first with you."
Carol closed her lips on the words boiling up inside her. Nurse Swift's meaning seemed clear enough. If Elliot and his wife were estranged, Granny was not supposed to know it.
CHAPTER FOUR
Carol had been looking through a collection of bills and correspondence in one of the drawers, and came across a small folded note. She opened it and read:
Carol mine.
I am distracted, undone, infuriated, I adore you!
Same time, same place. Or else!
G
She sat looking at it, puzzled. Who had written it? It couldn't have been Elliot. Had she been a faithless wife? "I can't believe it," she whispered to the, picture smiling at
her from the desk. "Elliot, I love you so terribly. How could I have done anything to hurt you?"
The initial "G"--Guy Eastland? Her mind went back to the meeting with the artist, and, strangely, a sexual scenario began to unroll in her mind. Fantasy? Memory? She couldn't tell, and neither could she say whether the face of the man belonged to Guy Eastland.
She was unwilling to let the mental performance proceed at first, until she realized that it might afford her some clue, if it were indeed a memory...
It was a beautiful afternoon. And the fact that it was afternoon was really the only thing that made Carol at all uneasy. Out here in his (whose?) car in the daylight--sure, it was a secluded spot, but suppose somebody came along and saw them?
A moment later, with a jolt of guilt, she realized that the idea was only increasing her excitement.
Her head started to whirl and tingles of sensation crept sweetly through her pussy.
She could feel a trickle of lubricating honey oozing languidly out of the puffy little slit.
His fingers grazed over the front of her sweater and her nipples perked up, eager for attention. And they got plenty. His fingers worked their way beneath her sweater and brushed thrillingly over the bare skin of her midriff on the way to her bra--and beneath it!
Her nipples were like rough pebbles beneath his touch, and she heard her own breath panting, the blood pounding in her ears. The oozing juice of her pussy was soaking the crotch of her flimsy panties. Little sparks of sensation seemed to be zipping out of her clit and traveling along her feverishly inflamed cunt lips.
She dropped one hand to the rapidly swelling bulge that was trying to fight its way through the zipped front of his tightly clinging pants.
He started to pant a little, and his hips jerked when she gave a particularly telling squeeze.
Carol unglued her mouth from his and hissed in his ear: "Play with my tits some more!"
He shoved his free hand beneath her sweater and into the other bra cup. There was a sudden straining of elastic and nylon, then the hooks on the back gave way, and Carol's tits were bouncing free under the cashmere as the remains of her bra slithered down to her lap.'
"That's better," she sighed, and he began to rub his palms on her nipples, working them around in little circles. Carol found it absolutely delightful.
Her fingers closed convulsively over that throbbing mound at the man's crotch, and she groped for the tab of his zipper. The denim of his Levi's was so strained by the activity beneath that she thought she would never get the zipper started. But she persevered, and one of her jerks of pleasure as the man gently tweaked her nipples between his fingers did the trick, and with a satisfying smoothness the zipper slid down its track and her hands were filled with a pulsating mass of velvet-covered, steelhard cock.
"It's just beautiful," she whispered, her eyes riveted to the twitching shaft.
"Why don't you give it a kiss hello?"
Happily Carol ducked her head down and planted a long, passionate kiss right on the oozing tip. She slid her lips down over the plum-shaped crown and swirled her tongue around the silky-textured flesh. His fingers tightened on her breasts, and he started to grunt and pant in harsh response.
Carol came up for air, and his cock tried to follow. She looked up into his face, and after a few moments his eyes came back into focus, and he gulped.
"My poor pussy is getting awfully lone-some," she said demurely.
The man gawked at her--then released one of her tits and slid the hand over her knee, then warily up her thigh, as though not sure that she really meant it.
Carol spread her legs wider to prove that she did, and moaned encouragingly as his fingers crept up her thigh and brushed against the flimsy wisp of her panties.
Just that light touch sent about a thousand volts straight up to her womb!
"Jesus!" he croaked, "your panties are soaking wet! You really want it, huh?"
He squirmed a finger in under one of the leg bands and hooked it over a pussy lip, separating it from its partner with a slightly sticky sound.
It was Carol's turn to grunt and gasp with pleasure now, as his finger slid over the wet inner surface, skidded up and collided with her marble-hard clitoris, then caromed back down to the fever-swollen lips of her virginal but very ready vulva.
"Wow! You're wetter and hotter than a... aw, grab holda my rod, babe, willya!"
Carol reached for the nine-inch pole between his thighs and caressed it lovingly, slumping down in the seat to get her legs wider still.
The man had got his finger in all the way to the last knuckle, and she sighed blissfully.
"Ooooh, that feels so good, so fucking gooooood. I never... ohhhhhh!"
Juice from his prick started to trickle down over her knuckles as she worked the ring of her fingers up and down the steel-hard length of meat.
"Okay, babe," he growled, "you get them panties off and I'll give you something better than a finger up that juicy little quim."
Carol grinned up at him impudently. "Why don't you take them off yourself?"
He grabbed at the waistband and she lifted her hips enough to let him strip the soaked wisp of nylon down her thighs and off over her feet.
She could smell the fresh muskiness of her own excitement mixing with his, and the pungent aroma of his sweat.
The cool air felt good on her overheated box, and she lifted her feet up and rested them against the dash, tilting her head enough to see the erotic reflection in the mirror.
He gripped her hips and tugged her close.
With a grunt of pleasure, he buried his face in the moist, hot slit of her cunt. He swept his tongue over her juicy pussy lips, making her gasp and shudder with excitement.
He dug his fingers into her smooth-skinned thighs almost painfully as he eagerly licked and sucked and nuzzled in the hot depths of her, overwhelmed by sexual hunger.
"Really like that, don't you, baby? It really makes you feel like heaven, hmmmm?"
"Ooooh... yesssss... YESSS! Don't stop! For heaven's sake don't stop...
She seized his head between her hands and dragged him even closer, the passion-soaked membranes of her cleft pussy pressing almost chokingly against his slobbering mouth and nose until he had to fight free of her, struggling for air.
"Fuck!" he gasped. "We gotta fuck, baby--now!"
Carol looked down at his cockhead, slippery with preparatory juice.
"Sounds good to me," she said.
They scrambled over the seats and arranged themselves in the back--it was cramped, but there would be room enough for what they had to do!
"Hey," the man grunted, "let me lie down an' you get on top."
"Oh, feeling kinky, are we?" Carol grinned down at him teasingly.
"Never mind kinky," the man growled with arrogant assurance. "You just get that hot little box of yours down on my cock if you want any more action today."
Carol leaned over and planted a lingering kiss of appreciation on the tip of the soaring purple shaft.
"Anything you say boss," she agreed with an ironical meekness.
"Fuckin' aye," he agreed. "Get it up you, babe, or you'll find it up your ass-hole instead."
"That might be kind of fun," she cooed. "Only maybe not just now."
She straddled him, and cautiously began to lower herself toward the blood-gorged, plum-sized head. She poised her cunt lips just above it and moved from side to side, gradually working herself down until the lips of her pussy were strained about the hot, slippery knob.
"Yeah, that's sensational!"
The man steadied her hips with his hands, urging her downward, though not forcefully. Carol let herself slide gradually, then suddenly the whole wet length of him was embedded in her wet, juicy cave.
"That really turns you on, sweetheart, doesn't it!"
He slid his hands up her sides and pulled her forward so that he could reach the hard berries of her nipples with his hungry lips and tongue. Renewed volts of sexual electricity sparked through her body. He stroked her back tenderly, then his hands glided down and cupped her ass, kneading the buttock globes.
"Mmmmm... ohhhh.. . "
Carol straightened her body again, and he brought one hand around to stroke her pubic hair, then started flicking at her clitoris while she began to lever herself up and down the long, thick pole impaling her. "Yeah, that's sensational!"
The sloppy, slushing, slurping sounds from her working cunt were erotic music to their ears.
"Fuck, oh fuck me!" she begged.
"Ahhhh... mmmmm..."
He started to buck his hips, matching her up-and-down motions, her buttocks meeting his belly with audible slaps of flesh. He hung on to her hips to steady her, staring avidly at her bouncing tits.
"Sweet, sweet cunt," he murmured.
But Carol's only reply was a wail of ecstasy as the violent explosion ripped through the tender membranes of her passion pit, milking his cock into frenzied surrender as his boiling sperm rocketed up from his balls to saturate her inner depths....
Shaken, she snapped out of her fantasy (memory?) and looked at herself in the mirror, wondering who she was, what she had become.
She thought, involuntarily, that at least she hadn't lost her figure when she'd had the child.
And then, like a flash of lightning, the realization hit her that she never had. Little Elliot was not her son. She had never borne a child!
CHAPTER FIVE
She walked across the room in a daze, realizing that the suspicion had lain in the back of her mind all along, like a bitterness flavoring her thoughts. Now that she had acknowledged it, the world she had built up in the last few days was snatched rudely away from her. She was right back where she had started.
She slid between the covers and turned out the light beside her bed. If she was not little Elliot's mother, how could she be sure she was Elliot's wife? And if she was not Carol Hallett, who was she?
No--she must cling to her identity!
She thought, The child is Elliot's, but not mine. He must have been married before--Her emotional response to that thought was surprising.
She tried to remember what had been said that night she first saw little Elliot. If Elliot had not spoken of him as her son, he certainly had not denied the relationship. Did he really think she was the mother of his child? Or was he pretending?
It doesn't make sense, she thought. None of it makes sense. With shaking fingers, she reached out and snapped the light on again.
How could she discover the truth? A doctor could tell her whether or not she had ever given birth to a child, couldn't he? Not Dr. Babson, who preferred to keep her in ignorance! She imagined herself going to a strange doctor and asking him, "Doctor, am I a mother?"
No, it was not necessary. She knew she was not. Another woman had borne Elliot's child. And for some reason, they were keeping this knowledge from her.
The hours of the night dragged by, and still she lay awake, trying to guess the answers she did not know. Toward morning, she remembered the newspaperman who had come to take her picture, and recalled that she had not once been offered a newspaper.
Of course! Why hadn't she thought of it before? They were keeping the newspapers from her. If she could search the newspaper files--But where? In the city? She had no money. Mayville was a small country village. There would be no local newspaper, but there should be a library where she could find files of the city papers. At last she was able to relax enough to sleep.
She wakened very late, with a headache so painful that she took one of Dr. Babson's pills and slept again. When she awakened the second time, it was to the sound of a commotion in the nursery. She heard a deep laugh. Elliot? Her headache was gone.
She looked at the clock on her dressing table. She had slept the day away! She remembered her fears of the night and her resolve at dawn to find a library where she could search the old newspaper files. But with Elliot home, everything took on a different complexion. It was illogical and feminine and perhaps naive--but she wanted to give Elliot one more chance to tell her the truth.
She dressed in a breathless hurry, and a few moments later stood in the doorway of the nursery.
He was standing with his back to her, little Elliot in his arms. The child was making so much noise that neither of them heard her approach. Elliot's son was gurgling and laughing and beating his hands against his father's chest.
"Whoa, there!" Elliot was chuckling. "Have a heart, son!"
He tossed the small body in the air and little Elliot squealed with delight. Above Elliot's head, he saw Carol in the doorway. "Daddy!" he shouted at her. "Daddy, Daddy!"
He has never called me, "Mommy," she thought, and it was a revealing thought.
But when Elliot, sensing her presence, lowered the child to the floor and turned to meet her eyes, an indescribable rush of emotion pushed everything else from her mind.
"You're home," she said, and moved blindly forward to touch him.
He hesitated, then took her in his arms. Her arms slipped round his neck and she lifted her face. Was it their first kiss? She could not know. To her, it was the first; yet such sweet, blinding flame must have grown from some smaller kindling.
She had a feeling of coming home, and she thought, exultingly, I have been in his arms before. He is my man and I am his woman. It cannot be any other way.
Then Elliot put her away from him with a restraint that chilled her. "You're looking fit," he said, stepping back and pulling out his cigarettes. She noticed that his hands were trembling.
He feels it, too, but he's fighting it, she thought. Why--if be is my husband?
If she did not tell him what she suspected, it could be a weapon in her hands. If Elliot knew that she was not his wife, she could make him give himself away. If he was pre-tending to her, for reasons of his own, she must know what his reasons were.
It hurt her to look at Elliot as an adversary; but Carol remembered how she had regretted her frank naivet� after her first gained consciousness and how much at a disadvantage she had felt. This time, she would keep her own counsel, keep her eyes and ears open until she had the answer.
She smiled up at him. "Fit?" she repeated. "I'm feeling wonderful, darling. Well enough for a real homecoming celebration!"
"A champagne dinner?" It was as if he were making a conscious effort to enter into her mood.
"Champagne!" She clapped her hands in delight. "Shall I tell Mrs. Hagen?"
Elliot grinned. "It won't be necessary. She was outdoing herself when I looked into the kitchen."
Little Elliot had been ignored too long. "Play ball!" he demanded, tugging at his father's trouser leg. "Play ball!"
"We're going into the garden," Elliot told Carol. "Care to challenge us to a game of catch?"
Laughing, she agreed. Elliot threw his son up on his shoulder and they went down the stairs together.
"We didn't expect you back so soon," Carol told him. "We only received your message yesterday. A ship must be as unpredictable as a woman is supposed to be!"
"My ship's still out. I flew back on business."
"It must have been important," she exclaimed involuntarily.
"It was." His face closed, leaving her facing a look that said plainly, No trespassing.
They did not speak again until they reached the garden, but little Elliot soon melted the constraint between them with his "play," and before long they were running across the lawn in a laughing abandon almost as young as his own.
For a delightful half-hour they frolicked with him, then his nurse came to say his supper was ready. While Elliot was having one last romp with his son, Carol went up to her room for a brief rest before dressing for dinner.
When she came out of her shower and stood before the mirror in her long pencil-slim robe, unpinning the hair she had piled high on her head, she was struck by the glow that enveloped her. It was not only in her eyes, but in her skin and in the deep red of her lips. Happiness stood out around her like an aura.
She thought, I love him! Heaven help me if he isn't my husband!
In her closet she found a dress of pale blue tulle with bands of satin ribbon around the full skirt. It was gala, very gala, but when she saw what the color did for her eyes, she decided to wear it.
She was combing her hair for the fifth time when there was a knock at the door. Her heart leaped. Elliot?
But it was Nurse Swift. "How lovely you look!" she said crisply. She was not her usual cheerful self, and Carol sensed it immediately.
"It is a lovely dress, isn't it?" she said. "Much too lovely for anything but a celebration."
"Well, remember that you are still my patient," the nurse said. "Very little celebration for you!" She turned to go out, but added, "Mrs. Lane is expecting you to look in before dinner."
"Of course," Carol said, a little hurt. There was disapproval in Swift's manner.
A little later, Carol left her room. She could hear the rumble of Elliot's deep voice from her grandmother's room. She went down the hall and paused in the doorway, smiling a little, fully aware that she was lovely and desirable.
Elliot looked up, notfinishing his sentence, but staring at her as if he were seeing a ghost.
She spoke softly, happily. "Hello, Granny. Isn't it wonderful to have him home?"
The old woman was nodding. "Your dress seemed to whisper," she murmured. "What are you wearing?"
"Blue tulle," Carol answered, marveling at the way her grandmother seemed to hear so sharply at-times and not at all at others.
"Blue tulle," the old woman repeated. "Blue tulle--"
"It's a new dress, Granny," Elliot said loudly.
"Ah--new--"
He was lying, Carol knew. The dress was a special one, and it must have brought back memories he did not want to recall.
A chiming bell from downstairs told them dinner was ready, and Nurse Swift made a signal. Carol bent over Granny's cheek. Surprisingly the old fingers caught her arm and she heard a whisper like the rustle of dry leaves.
"Be sweet to him, child."
"I will," she promised, and her heart sang, Oh, I will!
Elliot bent over and Granny whispered something in his ear, too. Whatever it was made his handsome face flush.
As they went down the stairs together, Carol touched his arm. "Are you a lieu-tenant, darling?"
"Senior grade."
"And what does that mean?"
"Very little." Smiling, he briefed her on Navy rank.
She listened happily, thinking. It isn't what he is saying--it's his voice and the way he says it. There couldn't be anyone else like him--never anyone else for me--
Elliot made a small ceremony of opening the champagne, chilling in its bucket of ice on the sideboard. The table was set with flowers and candles and a heavy array of silver. He seated Carol before he filled their glasses.'
"This is better than the wardroom," he said, sitting across the table from her.
"Wardroom?" she repeated.
"The officers' mess aboard ship."
"Did I ever know that?" she wondered aloud, frowning. But he didn't answer her.
"To you," he said, lifting his glass.
"To us," Carol returned, and saw the flush appear again on Elliot's cheeks.
Mrs. Hagen brought in the soup, all blushes and smiles. Carol stared at her. It was plain the housekeeper adored Elliot.
When she had gone, Carol murmured, "I'm jealous, darling."
Elliot looked surprised. "Why?"
"Mrs. Hagen has never been anything but a sourpuss to me. I see now that she has been hoarding all her sweetness for you. She would have to hoard it to produce a smile like that."
Elliot laughed. Then he sobered and asked "Has she been unpleasant?"
Carol shrugged. "Oh, just a petty tyrant. About my going out alone--"
Elliot stiffened. "You went out alone? Where did you go?"
"Downtown." She looked at him mischievously. "I found your credit was good."
Elliot looked very grave. She thought he wanted to say something, but he evidently thought better of it. "That's good," he said finally.
After coffee in the living room, Elliot turned on the radio. Dance music came softly, provocatively, between them. Carol stood up, her feet tingling. She did a tentative whirl across the carpeted floor, her dress fanning out around her.
"Isn't it wonderful, Elliot?" she cried. "My feet remember, if I don't! Dance with me?"
He smiled down at her for a moment, appreciation and something almost tender in his eyes. Then he held out his arms. For a few moments they moved in silence across the carpeted floor, so rhythmically, with such closeness, it was as if they were one.
"Oh, Elliot, how could I have forgotten this?" she said huskily.
His arms tightened about her. She rested her head against his shoulder. Then he deliberately put her away from him.
"Oh, by the way, I met a neighbor of ours while you were away. His name is Guy East-land."
"You saw Guy Eastland?" His voice frightened her. She stopped dancing and they stood facing each other. "What did he say?"
"Why, the--the usual things, I guess. He had his dogs and he introduced them. I introduced myself."
Elliot's hands were clenched at his sides.
"You introduced yourself," he repeated. "Yes? Yes?"
"I don't know what you mean."
She watched Elliot relax and knew he was deliberately forcing himself to be casual.
"You told him of your accident, of course."
"Of course." She was on her guard now.
"What did he say?"
She hesitated. Then she said deliberately, "He said, 'Darling, that's wonderful!' Then he kissed me."
She saw Elliot flinch.
She moved closer to him. "You don't mind, do you, Elliot?" she whispered. "You needn't be jealous because it didn't mean a thing. It was as if I were his sister. And I'm your wife, Elliot." He looked down at her, his whole body tense.
"Your wife, Elliot," she repeated.
She could almost hear the words trembling on his lips. But he did not speak them. He didn't say yes or no. He took her in his arms and his lips were hard on hers. She closed her eyes, thinking, I didn't dream it, then. Oh, Elliot, Elliot!
He let her go. She came down to reality--to see that he was remote again and quite controlled.
"Sorry, darling," he said. "You're almost too much for me tonight."
Still, she didn't know. Was she his wife, or wasn't she? "Kiss me again," she whispered. "I loved it."
He put her away from him with a light laugh. "And answer for it to your doctor? You run along to bed, like a good girl. This has been quite enough celebration for you."
"Oh, bother the doctor!" she cried.
But Elliot took her upstairs. At the door of her room, he dropped a kiss on her fore-head. "Sweet dreams," he said, and went firmly along to his own room.
Carol went inside and sank down on the chaise lounge, burying her hot cheeks in her hands. She had flung herself at him, without shame, without reserve. And in doing so had learned the truth--she was not Elliot's wife.
She was sure of it now.
CHAPTER SIX
Her windows were wide open to the summer night. From below and a little to the rear, she could hear clearly the rattle of crockery through the open kitchen windows.
Gradually the tumult Elliot's arms and kisses had aroused in her quieted and a weariness took its place. But she was not sleepy.
She lay back on the chaise lounge, her tulle skirts spilling in a blue froth to the floor, and closed her eyes. Someone went by her door. It sounded like Elliot's firm tread--Elliot who was not her husband but had told her that he was.
A little later she heard his voice, so clearly that he could only be in the kitchen. The rattle of crockery stopped in time for her to hear him finish: "--Very important, Mrs. Hagen."
The housekeeper's voice was harsh and carrying: "--Did my best, sir, but--so much to do--couldn't watch her every minute
Carol sat up, electrified. But all she caught of Elliot's next words were: "--in the future--" The dishwashing, noisily resumed, cut out the rest.
She got to her feet, her weariness for-gotten. Should she go to Elliot now and tell him what she knew and demand an explanation?
She heard him coming up the front stair and went to her door. But she paused with her hand on the knob, some instinct of caution holding her back.
She heard him go by and her hand fell. Tomorrow, she thought confusedly. Tomorrow. But she didn't know if she could wait that long. So many things had been happening lately, so many strange things, and she felt as if something was building up inside her, something that needed to be released. She couldn't put her finger on this feeling, but she was compelled to leave her room thinking that a cold glass of milk might help settle her nerves.
But what she heard next did nothing but agitate her nerves. As she walked down the hall she heard a strange muffled groaning sound coming from downstairs. Perking up her ears, she determined the sounds were coming from the housekeeper's room just off the kitchen. '
What was going on? If things weren't crazy enough already, now this!
She knew it was wrong, but upon reaching the door to Mrs. Hagen's room Carol dropped to her knees and peered in through the keyhole. Maybe what she was about to see would help in clearing up her amnesia, she hoped. For too long she had felt so alienated, as if everyone else were playing a game with her, keeping secrets from her, trying to keep her in the dark on purpose.
Carol peeked into the small room, and what she saw did more for her pentup feelings of frustration than it did for her memory. As soon as she saw Arthur on the bed with his face buried in Mrs. Hagen's cunt, Carol moved her hand down to her pussy mound and began rubbing slowly but forcefully. Carol's ears perked up when she heard the older woman begin to howl.
"Oh, damn, Art. Suck on it harder!" Mrs. Hagen gasped. "And your tongue. Put it in deeper. Deeper!"
Straining for a better focus, Carol saw that Arthur had his tongue all the way up inside Mrs. Hagen's cunt. With his small-fingers, he was stroking her clitoris. And a flood of lubricant was smeared all over Arthur's face.
Even though the older woman's hips were bucking wildly up off the little bed, Arthur managed to keep his face firmly locked onto her vagina. Carol swooned, thinking how good it must feel to have such an experienced man nibbling on her pussy. As she continued to stroke her own cunt, she tried to remember the last time she had been in bed with a man. And she couldn't. Some-thing inside her told her that sex was not new to her, but for the life of her she couldn't recall if a man had ever eaten' her pussy, or fucked his cock into her, or sucked on her tits.
But the more she watched the couple sucking and writhing on the bed, the more she craved sexual satisfaction. She thought about going to Elliot's room and seducing him, but that thought struck her as ultimately foolish. No, she would just have to stay where she was and finger her pussy. She did know that if done properly masturbation could be just as pleasurable as real fucking. And when she had such a delightful sight to occupy her lusty mind, that of Mrs. Hagen and her frantic lover Arthur wallowing around lewdly, she knew that she could draw some satisfaction from this situation.
"Oh, Art!" Mrs. Hagen wailed. "Now give me your cock. Oh, I want you inside me so bad."
As Carol watched the aroused stable hand pull down his pants, she thought about how much more she could use that prick than Mrs. Hagen. That old housekeeper probably got more cock than she could use around this place, Carol thought. For a moment she was distressed, thinking that not only was her memory faulty, but she had not been able to satisfy her primal sexual needs for too long. Oh, if only that cock were meant for her, she silently lamented. If only...
In the heat of her passion, Carol had slipped her hand up under her nightgown. She caressed her hairy cunt for a moment with her palm, and then she drove her middle finger into her pussy hole. She was wet enough to take in the entire digit. And when she had it buried to the last knuckle, she squirmed her finger around slowly, trying to imitate the motion of a small fucking penis.
"Ohhhh," she hissed quietly. "That's good. Ohhhhh."
It had been so long since she had been able to express herself sexually. And she was glad that she had discovered Mrs. Hagen and Arthur fucking, because it gave her an excuse to release some of her pentup urges. She might not have any more clues as to her past, but at least, for the time being, she wouldn't have to contend with that strange mounting pressure that was building up inside her. Fingering her pussy was proving to be the perfect cure for her recent discomfort and frustration.
Keeping her finger working inside her wet vagina, Carol pressed her face closer to the keyhole. By this time, Arthur had managed to jam his cock into the old housekeeper's cunt, and he was fucking her intensely. Back and forth he thrust his hips, driving his penis deep inside Mrs. Hagen's juicy twat.
"More!" the housekeeper moaned. "Give me more!"
"Yesss," Carol gasped just under her breath. "Ohhh, give her more. And come inside her, ohhhhh, yessssss!"
Carol steadily stroked her clitoris, working herself toward a satisfying orgasm, dreaming about the hot load of sperm that Arthur was getting ready to blast into Mrs. Hagen's snatch.
Oh, if only Arthur were about to fill her with jism. Carol could barely contain her-self, thinking about how sweet it would feel to have her cunt brimming with a sizzling load of semen. More than anything she wanted a man to come inside her. But for the time being she would have to settle for her finger.
Then she watched avidly as Arthur's body tensed up and he prepared to unleash his cum. Mrs. Hagen worked her hips frantically, and then she cried out, "Come on my stomach! Can't get pregnant! Ohhhh!"
Arthur did as she pleaded, squirting his sticky white jism onto her quivering belly. At the sight of his sperm, Carol's orgasm overtook her and she struggled to keep from crying out. Then she pulled her nightie back down and ran upstairs to bed.
* * *
Tomorrow, when it arrived, was fair and balmy, and fragrant with promise.
When Carol went downstairs, little Elliot was sitting in a high chair pulled up to the table, his nurse hovering over him.
Elliot smiled at Carol, mischief in his dark eyes. "Good morning! You're just in time to settle an argument. Nurse Peters insists I am spoiling Elliot by inviting him to have breakfast with us this morning."
Carol laughed. "And what do you say?"
"It's my day," he said, "and all rules are off. How about a picnic? Just you and Elliot and me?"
"I'd love that." She dropped a kiss on little Elliot's cheek and the nurse darted for-ward just in time to keep him from smearing her frock with his cereal spoon.
Elliot looked at Carol curiously. "You mean that, don't you?"
"Why wouldn't I? It sounds wonderful." The brightening look in his eyes made her feel a little heady. "We can walk up the hill behind the house."
"You don't want'to ride?"
She hadn't even thought of the horses. After a moment's hesitation, she shook her head.
"All right," he said. "We'll walk. I'll tell Mrs. Hagen we won't be here for lunch and have her pack something. I can carry Elliot when he's tired. He'll love it."
As they walked up the grassy hillside, Carol found it easy to imagine they were a family of three. Little Elliot rode on Elliot's shoulder, volubly happy. Carol had changed to slim-fitting slacks and a sweater of sage-green, and Elliot's eyes when they rested on her were warm with admiration.
A family of three... I wish it were true! she thought.
As they walked, she wondered if Elliot knew who she really was and whether or not he would tell her. Perhaps he had suggested this picnic for that very reason. She dreaded the things he might reveal. She wanted to say, "Elliot, don't tell me. Let it always be this way--please."
For she knew she would rather be Elliot's wife than anyone else in the world.
They ate their lunch beneath the oak tree where Carol had met and talked with Guy Eastland. When they had cleaned up the last cookie crumb, drowsy with satisfaction and the warmth of the sun, Carol sat with her back against the tree and Elliot stretched out in the grass at her feet, while little Elliot ran after butterflies.
Elliot looked up at her and smiled. "Happy?"
She realized that her lips had been curved in a smile. "Terribly," she admitted.
The wind was stirring her hair. It moved caressingly against her cheek. Below them the valley lay in a blue-gray haze that softened its contours and enhanced its drowsy beauty.
She tried to put her feelings into words.
"Right now, the past that I can't remember doesn't matter at all, not any more than the future. It's enough that this moment is so perfect. Do you understand?"
Elliot nodded. His dark eyes were very grave. "Do you remember anything at all?" he asked. "Isn't any of it beginning to come back to you?"
Her heart quickened. She thought, Now he will tell me! "No," she said breathlessly. "Nothing, Elliot." When he didn't speak at once, she said, "I did remember how to dance, of course. My feet seemed to know what to do."
He nodded. "You could still type, if you had ever learned, or play the piano. Any-thing like that."
"But I couldn't remember ever dancing with you before, Elliot."
His eyes shifted their gaze. He looked over the hills, his gaze brooding, worried. Silently she willed him to speak.
But instead, he jumped to his feet and pulled her to hers. "Come on," he said. "We'd better get the boy back for his nap."
He scooped little Elliot up and started down the hill. Carol glanced back over her shoulder--and froze in sudden comprehension. On the rim of the hill she could see a black-and-white dog standing at attention, his nose lifted to catch their scent.
It was one of Guy Eastland's Dalmatians, she was sure. So that was why Elliot had decided so suddenly that they must take little Elliot back for his nap! Feeling oppressed, she followed him down the hill.
Little Elliot had gathered wildflowers for Granny, and although he was fast asleep when Elliot carried him upstairs, he still clutched them. They paused at Mrs. Lane's open door and Carol gently detached the flowers from the little hand and took them in to her.
"Little Elliot brought these flowers back to you," she said. "They're wilted, but they smell very sweet."
The old woman took them and spoke softly. Carol bent to hear her whispered words. "You're making him happy, child. You've changed--"
Carol caught her breath. So Granny didn't know she wasn't Elliot's wife... or Elliot's mother: Granny really believed she was Carol.
Alone in her room, she closed the door and went to her small desk. Sitting down, she selected a sheet of paper and picked up a pencil. On one side of the sheet she wrote, "Granny." On the other side she wrote, "Elliot."
She hesitated, then beneath Elliot's name she wrote, "Mrs. Hagen," and put a question mark after it. Then, quickly, "Guy Eastland."
Suddenly she put the sheet away from her, in the shallow desk drawer. She had seen another meaning in Granny's words. "You're making him happy. You've changed--"
She stood up in agitation, putting her hands to her hot cheeks. "Oh, God forgive me," she whispered, "but I am glad he was not happy--before..."
* * *
Elliot went out on business and did not return for dinner. Carol spent a restless evening pacing the floor of her room, and at last, when the rest of the house had quieted down, slipped into a white-and-gold house-coat and went downstairs with a book to wait for him.
It was not much after eleven when he came in. Seeing the glow from her lamp, he paused in the sitting-room door. "Hello! Still up?"
His face was white with weariness and strain, and she ached to put her arms around him and say, "Tell me what is wrong!"
"Must be an engorssing book." He came into the room and slumped wearily in the big chair opposite hers, closing his eyes. She studied his face--the strong sweep of his jaw, his eyebrows that were so straight and dark, the blue shadows under his eyes.
"Elliot wants to go on another picnic," she said softly.
Without opening his eyes, he said, "I've got business again tomorrow. When that's finished--back to the ship."
She stood up, and her forgotten book slipped from the folds of her housecoat, to fall with a thud. "Elliot," she said, in despair, "speak to me!"
He looked up at her with eyes glazed with weariness. "I wish I could--" Putting his hands on the arms of the chair, he pushed himself to his feet. There was such unhappiness in his face that she could not bear it.
She threw herself into his arms, burying her face against his shoulders. He held her closely, and the pounding of his heart was loud in her ears.
"Darling," she whispered.
As though the words were wrung out of him, he said, "Oh, darling, you're so sweet--"
For a few wonderful seconds she felt as cherished and loved as though she really belonged to him. Then she knew that it was not true--and that he was not going to tell her what she longed to know. He was stiffening in a deliberate withdrawal. "Bed-time, isn't it?" he said. "I'm all in."
The grasp of his hand on her arm as he turned her upstairs was firm. He left her at her door and, shivering, she went to bed.
His step in the hall was familiar to her now. She heard it again when he left the house very early the next morning. She did not know where he was going. He apparently had not felt it necessary to tell her.
But why should he? She was not his wife. What was their relationship then? Where did she fit into this household?
Today I will find out, she promised her-self. She could no longer let her feeling for Elliot blind her to reality.
When Nurse Swift brought in her break-fast tray, she asked for a newspaper.
She got a startled look in reply. "A news-paper? Why, my dear, I don't think there's a newspaper delivered to the house." She added, stumbling a little over the words, "You see, Mr. Hallett's away so much and Mrs. Lane gets her news from the radio--"
"And nobody else in the house can read?" Carol asked tartly.
"I know I don't have time for the papers!" Swift retorted, and left the room. But the crack in the nurse's composure had been revealing.
Thoughtfully Carol finished her break-fast. Later she dressed and went downstairs to a small sitting room where she had seen a telephone and a directory. She was thumbing through the directory when Swift walked by the door.
"What are you doing?
"I am looking up the public library," Carol said deliberately. "There is a library in Mayville, isn't there?"
"I think there is a small branch. But there are lots of books in the house, if you are looking for something to read."
"I thought I would enjoy the walk."
"My dear, it's five miles! Arthur could pick up something for you when he goes for groceries."
"In other words, I'm still not supposed to leave the house?"
The nurse's face was tense and annoyed. "It's Dr. Babson's orders, you know. Didn't he say not to force things? And I wish you wouldn't give me any trouble right now. I'm so concerned about Mrs. Lane."
"I'm sorry," Carol said, feeling contrite. "Is she worse?"
"She's fretting about something, and it's making her heart do crazy things. Do you mind if I use the telephone? I want to talk to Dr. Babson."
Carol left the room. Slowly she climbed the stairs, passing Granny's closed door on the way to her bedroom. She closed her own door and sat at her desk. Taking out the sheet she had been listing names on a few days before, she studied it thoughtfully.
After a moment she erased the question mark after Mrs. Hagen's name. She should have realized before that Mrs. Hagen knew she was not Carol Hallett. All along, the housekeeper's impertinent, almost hostile manner had seemed to say, "You are not my mistress!"
How many of the others knew? She went down the list, starting with Swift. The nurse had given herself away this morning, but her vigilance in keeping Carol from spending too much time with Granny should have been proof enough before now. She would have to put Swift down under Mrs. Hagen.
Next was Arthur, so oddly evasive about her accident. Guy Eastland she already had down. She understood his knowing amusement now. Even Dr. Babson, the last time he had come, nervously biting his lips, hurrying away from her questions. And the sheriff... but she put a question mark after his name. He had not called her "Mrs. Hallett" but "ma'am." She wondered if he knew that she had been led to believe she was Carol Hallett.
When she had finished she found that Mrs. Lane's name stood alone on one side of the sheet. All the other names were under Elliot's. With an exclamation, she stood up and crumpled the sheet of paper. She was about to throw it into the wastebasket, when she thought better of it and stuffed it in her pocket.
The house was Granny's. She had been its "young mistress," according to Arthur, and it must still be hers--a naval officer's pay could not support it.
She began to tremble violently. The hoax was for Granny. Granny was the only one who didn't know the truth. And it was Granny's money they all lived on!
She remembered the sharp cry she had heard that first day, shortly after she had opened her eyes to consciousness, the voice that could only have been Mrs. Lane's, crying, "You are keeping something from me!"
She remembered that Swift had sprayed her with perfume before they brought Granny in--to confuse a woman who could not see?
Where was the real Carol Hallett?
Sick with apprehension, she thought, Oh, Elliot, Elliot--darling--what are you hiding?
She longed to throw herself into his arms and beg him to deny the ugly suspicions in her mind. She tried to deny them herself. Why should she imagine there should be any advantage to Elliot in pretending to Mrs. Lane that her granddaughter were still alive?
Because Carol Hallett was the old woman's heir, of course.
And if Carol were dead--little Elliot? A trust fund no one but his mother could draw on? Some important papers unsigned?-Some reason why, if Mrs. Lane, who was old and frail, should die still thinking her grand-daughter was alive--?
She made a choked sound of protest. Oh, Elliot! she thought. What am I accusing you of?
Whatever he was hiding, Elliot was no criminal. Her common sense leaped to champion her faith in him. The very fact that so many people knew Elliot's secret proved that it could be no crime he was concealing. As much as the servants liked him, their loyalty would not go that far.
She remembered Arthur's pride in him and the way even dour Mrs. Hagen smiled when he praised her cooking.
And yet--people did strange things for money. And there must be quite a lot of money involved.
I've got to know, she thought. I don't believe it of you, Elliot, but--I've got to know.
One of the things she had to know was whether or not Elliot had access to Mrs. Lane's money.
The house was quiet, the afternoon warm and still. It was little Elliot's naptime. Granny, too, usually took a rest about this-time, and the two nurses seized the opportunity for an hour of privacy in their own rooms.
Acting on an impulse, Carol left her room and went along the hall to Elliot's. She felt ashamed of what she was doing, but her desperate need drove her. She slipped inside and quietly closed the door behind her.
It was the first time she had seen Elliot's room. The furnishings were plain and rough-textured, and though the windows were open, a faint aroma of his pipe clung to them. She closed her eyes, feeling his presence almost as if he were beside her, for it was the same scent that was associated with those few moments when she had been in his arms.
She crossed to his desk and glanced over the papers lying there. There were a few letters, and she laid them aside. Some bills, small and quite ordinary. Then she came upon a checkbook. She opened it and examined the stubs.
She found that he had written several large checks to someone named "A. Bergman." She frowned when she found the first one for five hundred dollars. But when she saw another for fifteen hundred, she stared at it, appalled.
"Fifteen hundred dollars?" she whispered. "Oh, Elliot, what for?" And a sickening doubt crept through her.
Who was A. Bergman, and why had Elliot given him two thousand dollars?
At least she had answered one question, she thought miserably. Elliot must have access to the money.
It wasn't the answer she had wanted. She began putting the papers back as she had found them... and then she saw the photo-graph. It was just a snapshot, but it was obviously a family group. Elliot had little Elliot in his arms, an infant in a shawl, and standing beside him was the girl who must be the child's mother.
She was very fair and attractive. Her eyes and brows were shapely, her mouth full and pouting. It was a clear picture, and it was easy to see there was no resemblance what-ever between the girl in the photograph and the girl who looked at it with stunned eyes.
This was clear proof that nobody believed her to be Carol Hallett but poor old Mrs. Lane, who was blind. Mrs. Hagen... Nurse Swift... Nurse Peters... Arthur... Guy Eastland--they all knew she was an imposter, but out of loyalty to Elliot they treated her as though she were his wife.
But why? What had happened to Elliot's wife?
She looked at the girl in the picture and thought, So you are "Carol-mine"! There was a stirring in the next room and through the wall she could hear Mrs. Lane calling, "Swift! Swift!"
Had Granny heard her in Elliot's bed-room? She heard the nurse go by and enter the older woman's room. When she could hear the murmur of their voices, she carefully put away the photograph and tiptoed to the door. The hall was clear, and she went quietly to her own room.
The memory of Guy Eastland's laughing, mocking eyes nagged her. She thought, Of course! Of all the persons on her list, he was the only one who might answer her questions truthfully. Or he might help her to get to the library. It should be easy to find him. She could slip away on the pretext of visiting the stables.
She was wearing slacks, very well-cut ones of sage-green gabardine, and a sweater of the same color. It occurred to her that they would blend with the hill colors very nicely. Camouflage.
Casually, she went down the back stair and out through the kitchen. When Mrs. Hagen gave her a sharp look, she asked, "Is Arthur at the stables?"
"Probably," the housekeeper answered shortly.
Carol went outside and sauntered slowly toward the stables. She heard Arthur's tuneless whistle and the sound of brushing from inside, but she did not stop to chat with him. When the stables were between her and the house, she struck out purposefully. She climbed for a while, bearing toward the right,-and when she was sure she could no longer be seen, she started down toward what she had picked out as the young artist's house.
In a few moments she found herself in a dip from which the valley was hidden from her. There was shrubbery and she suddenly remembered a warning of Elliot's about poison oak. She picked her way gingerly, skirting the brush as much as possible.
Across the small ravine she climbed a gentle rise and found to her dismay that the village was still hidden from her. She was confused, uncertain of her directions. Fighting a panicky feeling, she continued in the direction she thought she had been following.
Far to her left, she heard the barking of dogs. She struck out toward the sound. It seemed to veer, now to the left, now to the right. She was utterly lost, and she called, hopefully.
To her relief, the barking came nearer. In a few moments one of the graceful, black-and-white Dalmatians came bounding through the grass toward her.
"Hello!" she cried happily. She did not know which one he was, and she repeated all the names softly: "Storm? Polka? Flash?" He jumped up on her and she felt his moist tongue in greeting.
When she began walking again, the dog trotted ahead of her, and she followed him. After a few minutes she topped a hill and started down a slope where the wild grasses were almost knee-deep. Far down, she could see a figure.
Presently she noticed the other dogs coming up to meet her, only their noses and their high-held tails visible above the grass.
Guy Eastland was seated before an easel, absorbed in his painting. When he finally looked up, he exclaimed, "Stop where you are!" And startled, she obeyed.
He worked furiously for a while, talking as he worked. "You're a godsend! Gad, how you fit in! Color--everything! Don't move. Who sent you? Must have been my guardian angel. Can you hold it a little longer?"
She was impatient, but she reminded her-self that she wanted something from him. When at last he put down his brushes and said, "Okay, darling," she ached all over.
She moved forward, curious to see what he had done. It was the scene before him, simplified and brightened, with the dogs moving through the silver-green grasses and herself a not-too-recognizable figure in the background--green slacks, a blob of gold-brown hair, red, laughing lips.
She looked at him with respect. "You must be pretty good."
"Thanks," he said, putting away his paints and brushes. He threw her a mocking glance and added, "--Mrs. Hallett."
"I know I'm not Mrs. Hallett," she said, flushing.
His crooked eyebrow went up. "Oh, you do! Who are you, then?"
"I don't know."
He folded his camp stool. "Well, Miss Mystery," he said, "you won't object to advertising beer, will you.? "
"Beer?" she said, startled
He gestured toward the canvas. "Strictly commercial. It's supposed to sell more beer. That's all for today." He picked up his folded gear, in the other hand carrying the wet canvas. "Are you going to walk home with me?"
As she hesitated, he added, "You'll be properly chaperoned. My housekeeper has had loads of experience."
"No doubt," she said.
He whistled to the dogs and they streaked ahead as they went down the hill.
He took her into what was obviously his studio. It was surprisingly neat. The floor was tile and the north wall was all glass. Canvases were stacked against one wall, a few were hung and a few stood on easels. There were low tables, some chairs, and several hassocks.
A cold drink tasted good after their hot walk down the hill. She sipped it appreciatively as she looked around. "I don't know how you do it.
"What?"
"Everything-is so neat. I expected it to be a clutter."
He laughed. "Oh, this is for show. I really work upstairs."
She liked his frankness. Abruptly she spoke what was on her mind. "Do you know why Elliot is pretending that I am his wife?"
He grinned. "I know why I'd do it."
She found herself disliking him. "Did 'Carol mine' pose for you, too?" she asked him.
The mockery left his eyes and they were suddenly hard. "Hullo," he said softly. He pulled a hassock up close to her chair, sat on it facing her, and said, "Now, then, Miss Know-it-all, what did you mean by that?"
His tone accused her of snooping. She disliked him more than ever. "Can I help it if she left her love letters lying around?" she demanded. "I thought it was my mail I was reading."
"And after you had read her love letters, I suppose you destroyed them?"
"I did not," she told him.
"No, of course not," he said, in that nasty-soft tone. "What did you do with them?"
"Put them back where I found them."
He made an angry sound. "You came here for a reason, didn't you? What do you want?"
"Not very much," she said truthfully. "Just a few questions answered. What happened to her?"
"What happened to her?" he repeated, with a curious inflection. "You mean--you want to know where she is now?"
He smiled sardonically at her astounded expression.
"You mean," she said, her voice thick, you mean that she's--"
"Very much alive," he said coolly.
She stared at him, stunned. "Then why--where?"
"Where is she? She's in prison."
"In prison? Elliot's wife?" After a pause, she asked faintly, "Why?"
"Hit-and-run manslaughter."
"She killed someone?"
"An old man. I'm afraid Carol was drunk when her car hit him. Of course, Elliot is moving heaven and earth to get her free--I say!" he exclaimed, suddenly contrite. "You look pale. Perhaps I shouldn't have told you. Is it on the level about your not having any memory?"
She nodded. "Thanks for--telling me," she said.
He crossed the room and came back with a small glass. "You need a pick-me-up," he said. "Drink this brandy."
She shook her head and walked away from him, toward the French windows open to the garden. When she had almost reached them, his voice came after her, cool and amused once more.
"That letter didn't mean a thing, you know. Carol and I are old friends."
She went out blindly. Elliot's wife was alive!
Subconsciously, ever since she had discovered she was not the real Carol Hallett, she had been assuming that the other girl was dead. She had thought of Elliot as free. And her love for him had grown and deepened. She had not tried to restrain it.
As she walked, she recalled with misery and understanding how she had thrown her-self into Elliot's arms, only to be repulsed. The restraint had all been on his part.
She climbed the hill, unwilling to go directly back to the house. When it came into view, red-roofed, nestling in its screening trees, comfortable and inviting, she realized that all her feeling for home was centered in it. It was the only home she knew... and she was an alien, an interloper.
It was painful to come down around the stables and hear Arthur still whistling his tuneless whistle and realize that what she had just discovered he had known all along. As had Hagen and Swift and all the others in the house--except Mrs. Lane.
She entered the kitchen yard, observing that the housekeeper's sharp eyes had spied her from the kitchen door. She did not want to see Mrs. Hagen just now. The woman would guess she had been farther than the stables. She walked around the house, entering the enclosed side garden where little Elliot played.
He was running across the lawn now, as fast as his fat little legs would carry him, running toward his nurse. He looked scrubbed and healthy and utterly adorable. Watching them, both laughingly absorbed in their game, she felt sharply excluded.
Then the nurse looked up and waved to her. Little Elliot turned and saw her and came running, arms outstretched. She caught him up and hugged him to her with pain in her heart.
He clapped his hands against her cheeks in affection. "Picnic?" he said hopefully. Suddenly unable to bear it, she put him down again and went inside.
By the time she reached her room, the pain was intolerable. She looked around her, telling herself, "This is not your room. These are not your things. They belong to Carol Hallett, who is in prison."
Even here, she was an interloper. I can't bear it, she thought. She would have to leave this house. She must go--but where?
Her eyes were suddenly blinded by tears. Where could she turn? What could she do? I'm so alone, she thought.
Involuntarily she thought of Guy East-land, perhaps because he had made her feel useful when she posed for him. But she shrank from returning to him.
She paced the floor of the room until it began to oppress her. Nurse Swift looked in the door, and she complained to her that she had a headache and didn't want any dinner. But the nurse insisted on bringing a tray.
When Swift returned with the tray she reported that Sheriff Brown was downstairs. "He wants to see you."
"Me?" Her heart gave a frightened leap. He knows something, she thought. She was too disturbed to eat. Leaving the tray untouched, she hurried down the stairs.
The big, soft-voiced man was standing in the sitting room, holding his hat. He greeted her pleasantly, and asked, "Are you recalling anything that happened before the accident, ma'am?"
"Nothing at all."
"Well, I'd like to try a little experiment, if you don't mind."
"What kind of experiment?"
"I'll tell you about it on, the way back to my office."
She caught her breath. "I'll get a wrap," she said, and went back upstairs. Nurse Swift had followed her into her room and was standing in front of the door when she turned from the closet with a loose coat over her arm.
"Where are you going?"
"Sheriff Brown is taking me to his office."
"Why?" Swift demanded.
"I have no idea." Unconsciously, they were both keeping their voices low.
There was definite anxiety in the nurse's eyes. "You'll be back soon? Your grand-mother may ask for you--"
"I don't know," she said, and went down the stairs and out of the house with the officer.
Sheriff Brown helped her into a station wagon in the driveway. As he closed the door she felt an inexplicable dread. He got behind the wheel and started the engine, and she fought the unreasoning panic that rose within her.
Was it because her blanked-out past was catching up with her, and she feared what it might reveal? Or was it something more than that?
"Don't keep me in suspense," she begged the man beside her.
"Now, don't give too much importance to this," the sheriff said, with a reassuring smile. "There's a young man in my office who thinks you might remember him. I'm going to give you an opportunity to look at him before he sees you. If what he tells me is true, it might stir up some memories. That's all."
He drove easily, in a relaxed manner, yet she found herself sitting tensely erect, clinging to the arm rest.
A young man. Who was he and what part would he play in her life?
The turns-of the shaded country road unwound with maddening slowness. They passed through the business section where she had shopped and pulled up beside a tile-roofed building.
"I'm taking you in the back way," the sheriff said. She followed him along a corridor and into a small office. There was a glass-paned door into a larger room, and he gestured toward it. "It's a one-way glass," he said. "Ever see that fellow before?"
Her heart was suddenly pounding. The young man was on his feet, moving impatiently about the room. She studied him--the way his dark hair stood up from his forehead, the set of his head on his shoulders, the aggressive way he walked.
"Well?"
She shook her head. "Not that I can remember."
He opened the door and gestured to her to enter. The young man turned a pleasant, snubnosed face toward her and started . violently. "Prue!"
Prue. She absorbed the shock of that with an effort.
"Prue, darling!" he said again. He came toward her. The next thing she knew he was holding her in his arms as if he would never let her go. She pushed him away, stumbling back from him--but his hands still clung to her.
"I don't understand this," he was saying. "Why did you leave the city without a word? Why didn't you let somebody know you were taking a vacation?"
"You called me Prue," she said. "Is--that my name?"
The young man dropped his hands and stepped back, his face a study. "You're joking! Look--you must remember me? Bill? Your--your boy friend."
She was on the verge of tears. "I've never seen you before."
"Oh, yes, you have!"
"Take it easy," the sheriff said. "Bill, how about that snapshot you showed me?"
A flush crept up the young man's cheeks. He took out his wallet and offered her a small picture. She looked down at alikeness of him standing with an arm around a girl who was leaning against him in a relaxed pose, laughing happily--and the girl was unmistakably herself.
"It was taken about two months ago," he said. "The date's on the back."
She sank weakly down on a straight-backed chair, still staring at her pictured self. "I'm sorry--Bill. I--I had an accident--"
"What kind of an accident?"
She began, "My horse threw me--" then stopped. It wasn't her horse--it was Carol's horse. She wondered now if the story of a fall from a horse was true. She remembered how Arthur had averted his eyes that day in the stables and said, "It might have been her that threw you." His love for the little mare would not let him come right out with a lie.
Bill was looking at her strangely. She had a feeling that he knew as well as she that the explanation she had offered was false.
The sheriff was called to the telephone. "Talk to Bill," he told her. "He can answer some of your questions. I'll run you back to the Halletts' when you're ready. Or maybe Bill--"
"I'll take her wherever she wants to go, Sheriff."
"All right." He waved them off with one hand and went across the room to his desk.
"We can't talk here," Bill said, taking her arms. "I've got my car."
She let him lead her outside. At the curb was a small coupe. "Get in, darling," he said, as though he had said the words many times before.
It must be all right, or the sheriff would not have suggested that she go. She got into the car, feeling the same sick dread that had. oppressed her in the station wagon.
"Don't go far," she said faintly.
Now that her past had caught up with her, she wanted to push it back again, to stop her ears to what this man could tell her.
He gave her a strange look, but did as she asked. Around the corner he pulled to the curb again and stopped. "Now tell me how this all started," he said. "How did you get to the Halletts'? "
"I don't know. I just--woke up there."
"And who did you think you were?"
Sudden heat rose to her face as a warning pounded through her, a warning that said, "Elliot--" Until she knew more, she must be careful.
"Will you let me ask the questions?" she said. "Prue--what is the rest of my name?"
Shaking his head as though he still could not quite believe, he told her, "Prudence Merrill."
"You're sure?"
"Absolutely."
"And my family?"
"I don't think you have any, darling." He paused, then added; "Except me." She looked at him questioningly.
"Bill Gorman. Just a guy who--hopes to marry you."
"Oh, no!"
"Does it sound as bad as that?" Bill Gorman's voice was strained.
"What?" she asked blankly.
"Marry me."
"I don't mean to hurt you, but I've told you I've lost all--Have I a home?"
"There's your apartment."
After a moment, she asked, "How did I pay the rent?"
He stared at her. Then, for the first time, he laughed. "Why, there was your job. Don't tell me you've forgotten your fine boss?"
"What did I do?" she asked patiently.
"You were a secretary." The words were. jerked from him. "Darling, I can't believe it! You can't be in such a fog as that! All the wonderful times we've had together--" He had his arm along the back of the seat. He dropped it now and began drawing her closer.
Suddenly she felt she could stand no more. She cried hysterically, "Will you take your hands off me? I can't tolerate--"
"Prue!" he said, stricken.
She was crying. "Can't you realize that you are a total stranger to me?"
"Forgive me," he said contritely. "I'm awkward and impatient and uncouth and anything else you want to call me! But I've been so worried about you. I've called your apartment every day. I finally called your office and was told you had taken a few weeks off. I just couldn't figure it.
"I was worrying aloud about it at the shop today and one of the fellows pulled out a three-day-old paper and asked if I'd seen the picture of the girl who was suffering from amnesia. When I saw it, I burned off my tires getting out to Mayville to the sheriff's office. You'll let me take you home now, won't you, Prue?"
She closed her eyes. It was the answer to her prayer of only an hour earlier. Some-where to go. But it was hard to know that she would never see Elliot again. No less hard because it was the only thing she could do.
"Yes," she said finally. "But I must go back to the Halletts' first. I must get some things."
"What things? You'll have-everything you need at the apartment."
"They have been very kind to me. I can't just run off--"
He gave in, but she could see that he was reluctant to take her back there.
When he had turned the car around, she said, speaking her thoughts aloud, "It wasn't a fall from a horse, after all. They told me that, but--perhaps even they don't know. Do you know anything about it--the accident, I mean?" she asked in surprise, struck by the expression on his face.
"I have a couple of ideas," he said grimly.
A few minutes later he stopped the car in the Halletts' drive. "Sure you don't want me to come in with you?"
She shook her head. "Wait for me here."
He looked after her with a worried expression, his forehead narrowing in puckers beneath the dark ridge of wiry hair.
The front door was open, and she let her-self in and went up the stairs without encountering anyone. Mrs. Lane's door was closed. She went past it and into her own room, across the hall.
There was only one thing she really wanted to take with her--the picture of Elliot that stood on the desk.
"'Carol mine' won't miss it," she told herself.
She concealed the picture beneath her coat and went out into the hall. For a moment, she hesitated, listening. All was quiet.
She made her way to little Elliot's nursery. The door was slightly ajar and the blue night light was burning. Little Elliot was asleep in his crib, his fair curls making a halo for his rosy face.
She stood above him, her heart wrenched with the knowledge that she might never see him again. It was partly because he was Elliot's that he was so dear to her, and partly that little Elliot himself had curled his fat fingers right around her heart. She bent over the crib.
A sound at the door startled her. She straightened and turned. Elliot stood there.
"Hello," he said. "Going out again?"
Her knees felt weak. If only she could have gone away without seeing him again! She drew a deep breath. "I'm leaving, Elliot."
"So you know," he said, and it seemed to her that there was relief in his voice.
"I've known for some time that I am not your wife. I know now who I am. Elliot, you have been kind to me, but I don't under-stand why you have let me live a lie--" Her voice broke. She stopped, unable to go on.
There were two deeply etched lines beside his mouth. "Lowe you an explanation. Shall we go down to my study?"
She went silently past him and down the stairs. He followed her into his study and snapped on a light before he closed the door.
"Sit down. I'm afraid it's going to be a long story."
She obeyed. Her heart was beating thickly with anticipation. He saw how pale she was and poured a glass of wine from the decanter which stood on the mantel.
"Drink this," he said.
She sipped it, her eyes on him. He picked up a pipe and began filling it, but he did not light it.
"Did Sheriff Brown tell you where Carol is now?"
"Guy Eastland told me."
"Eastland! Did he tell you the whole story?"
"Only that she had gone to prison for hit-and-run manslaughter."
The lines deepened around his mouth. "That's the technical term for it. What happened was that Carol, driving home from the golf club where she had had several drinks, struck something in the road. She vows she felt nothing but a slight bump and saw no one. She drove on. Later, someone came along and found an injured man lying in the road and remembered having passed Carol in her car. When the man died, they arrested her. She is in prison now awaiting trial."
His voice flattened. "Carol's been fined for drunken driving before. The judge refused bail."
His knuckles whitened around his for-gotten pipe. "We kept the whole thing from Granny, on her doctor's orders. But she knew Carol was gone. And she sensed the strained atmosphere in the house. She knew we were keeping something unpleasant from her. She worked herself into a nervous state that was extremely dangerous to her health. And then Fate gave us you."
Prue leaned forward. "How, Elliot?"
He looked at her and her heart seemed to turn over as she saw the way his eyes softened. "You were lying as though you had been thrown there, in a clump of bushes along the roadside between here and Dr. Babson's office. I found you and notified the sheriff. There was no identification on you, no pocket book, nothing. The sheriff searched the bushes very thoroughly.
"We carried you into the clinic, where X-rays were taken, and Dr. Babson was notified here, where he was making his daily call on Granny. Carol's absence had never been satisfactorily explained to her. We had made up a story about a riding accident.... You had no money, no identity--it was the county hospital " for you, some twenty-five miles away. I offered to take you in here while the sheriff checked out the missing, persons reports."
He looked to her for understanding, but Prue kept silent.
"So the hoax began," Elliot said. "And I swear to you that I had no idea of continuing it beyond a few days at most. We were at our wits' end with Granny at about the time you regained consciousness and we found that you had lost your memory."
He rubbed his hand over his face. "At first, we were very hopeful that Carol would be fined and paroled. But she was bound over to the grand jury and denied bail. They indicted her." He looked up at her. "You do understand, don't you? We all thought Carol would be home in a few days and that meantime the sheriff would discover who you really were. Or that you would remember."
"But I didn't," Prue said.
"No, you didn't. Then, as you know, I had to go on that test cruise unexpectedly, and in my absence the servants simply carried on."
She cried, "Oh, Elliot, Elliot, if you knew the awful things I've thought! I felt like a prisoner. Mrs. Hagen was-likea jailer. And when I overheard you scolding her for letting me go out--"
"I was worried about you," he said simply. "Amnesia plays strange tricks some-times."
"But why didn't you tell me the truth? Why did you let me go on thinking--"
Elliot flushed. "I wanted to tell you so badly it hurt. But by that time the doctor had said we shouldn't tell you until you began remembering for yourself. He said it would be a terrific shock to you, after we had let you build up a personality, to throw you right back where you had started."
She closed her eyes. Her realization that she could not be little Elliot's mother had done that.
"But you do remember now? Elliot asked.
She shook her head, feeling a growing resentment at the injustice they had unthinkingly done her. "A friend saw my picture in the newspaper and came to Sheriff Brown. He says that I am Prudence Merrill, a secretary, and that I have an apartment in the city. An apartment I can't even remember! It sounds terrifying to me."
Suddenly her voice shook. "You never thought of me at all, did you?" she cried. "Of what it would do to my life to let me think I was your wife, that this was my home, my servants, that little Elliot was our child? It was cruel of you! I would have believed anything you told me. And you let me think that you--that I--"
In her agitation, she stood up. Something dropped to the floor between them. Warm color flooded Prue's face as she saw what it was--Elliot's photograph that she had been taking away with her.
Elliot looked down at it, then his eyes searched her face. Her flush and her trembling lips betrayed her. She saw under-standing and emotion darken his face.
"You say I didn't think of you in all this. It isn't true. I have thought and thought endlessly of you. If only I had known that you suspected, but I told myself I was helping you as well as Granny. At least I was giving you a home, peace of mind,even if it was only temporary."
The peal of the doorbell sounded from the front of the house.
"Bill!" Prue exclaimed. She had for-gotten him.
"Bill?"
"He has been waiting outside to take me to my apartment.
They heard Mrs. Hagen's heavy tread and Elliot opened the study door. "I'll go, Mrs. Hagen," he told her.
"Yes, sir," said the housekeeper, and retreated.
Elliot turned back to Prue. "Will you stay here?"
She stared at him, color rising in her face. "Elliot, how can you ask--"
"It's not for myself," he said quickly. "I wouldn't ask it of you if I weren't going away again. But there is nothing more I can do for Carol now and I have used up all my emergency leave. It's a job I'm offering you, at any salary you name--"
"Elliot!" she protested.
He finished as though he hadn't heard her interruption. "--and I hope you will accept it, for Granny's sake."
The doorbell pealed again, three sharp rings.
"I honestly am afraid to let her know the truth now. If you would only stay as long as she is satisfied that you are Carol! It may not be long. In spite of the local feeling about the case, the evidence against Carol is all circumstantial. Mr. Bergman expects to get her acquitted."
Bill began banging on the door and Elliot went down the hall. Prue suddenly remembered where she had heard Mr. Bergman's name before. Those checks of Elliot's made to "A. Bergman." Of course, she thought. He would be Elliot's lawyer. That money had gone to win Carol's freedom.
How could she do as he asked? How could she stay in his wife's house, pre-tending to take her place? It was impossible.
She heard Elliot open the door, heard Bill's voice demanding, "Where is she?"
"Here," Prue said quietly from the study door.
Bill stopped, obviously relieved to see her. "Are you ready?. "
She looked at Elliot. He said nothing more, but there was entreaty in his eyes. She knew she should go with Bill. She should get out of Elliot's house quickly. But she heard herself saying, "I'm staying a little longer, Bill."
By the flush creeping up his cheeks she knew that Bill Gorman's anger was rising. "You're coming with me," he contradicted her. "You're coming out of here with me, Prue. Now!"
"And why should she go with you?" Elliot asked quietly.
"Because I don't like the setup, that's why!" Bill said. "I know she's been posing as your wife."
Prue gasped. The words, true as they were, had an ugly sound coming from a third person.
Elliot moved toward Bill. "Take that back!"
"I'm not insinuating anything," Bill said bitterly. "I know Prue too well for that. But there's bound to be gossip. It isn't fair to her."
"Mr. Hallett has asked me to help him a little longer," Prue told him. "I know it's--unusual, but it may mean an old woman's life, Bill."
Baffled, Bill asked, "You would do this for a man you've known a little over a week?"
"You forget that's my whole life."
"For your own good, Prue, I'm asking you to let me take you home!"
"I'm sorry to refuse you, Bill, but I'm staying."
"Quite sure?"
He reached in his pocket and drew out a card. Walking past Elliot, he gave it to her.
"If you change your mind," he said, "Phone me at this number."
She felt the genuineness of his feeling for her and was oddly touched. He really did care for her.
As soon as the door had closed, Elliot's dark eyes sought hers, and the look in them set her heart to trembling. "Prue," he said, softly. "The name suits you, you know. Prudence."
"Prudence Merrill," she said, thinking unsteadily that it was good he was going away.
"And this--Bill. Where does he fit in? No, wait--I have no right to ask that." He turned sharply away from her. "I'd better let you go and change or you'll be late for dinner."
She went upstairs, her eyes blurred with tears.
She was in her room when Nurse Swift knocked and put her elaborately coiffured head in at the door. "Everything all right?"
"Swift," Prue said, "is there any dress she hasn't worn? Mrs. Hallett, I mead?"
The nurse looked curiously at-her, then came in and closed the door behind her. "You know, don't you?"
Prue nodded.
Nurse Swift sank into a chair. "I'm glad," she said, with a big sigh of relief. "I'm right glad." She added, "Dr. Babson will be relieved, too. It has been on his conscience." Alarm crossed her face. "You're not leaving?"
"No. I promised to stay as long as Mrs. Lane needs me."
"That's good of you, my dear." There was a look in the nurse's eyes that told Prue she had guessed her secret--guessed that she was in love with Elliot.
The girl's eyes went bleak. "Tonight is his last night," she said. "I just thought--if there was some dress that wasn't hers..."
The older woman's face held pity, but she said briskly, "Well, now, let's see." She went to the closet and began looking through the dresses.
The dress Swift chose was a lovely thing of gold jersey, supple and exquisitely made.
"Mrs. Hallett never wore this. It just didn't do the right things for her complexion. But your skin has a glow to it. Try it, my dear."
Prue took it gratefully. Even if the nurse. were saying Carol had never worn it thinking only to please her, she would still feel better in the dress. The color was all right. It brought out golden lights in her hair and little hazel flecks she hadn't know were in her eyes, giving her a golden aura. Her hair had grown quite long, and she brushed it until it shone.
When she went downstairs Elliot had lighted the fire in the grate and on a low table a bottle stood in a bucket of ice near two slender-stemmed glasses.
She understood that he was trying to express his gratitude because she was staying, and was touched. He uncorked the bottle and filled the glasses. She took the one he offered and held it up, watching the bubbles rise in its hollow stem.
"To Prudence Merrill," he said, lifting his glass.
She hesitated, then drank to the girl who was unaccountably herself.
Elliot looked troubled. "I hope I am doing the right thing, asking you to stay."
"If you're worrying about what Bill Gorman said, please don't, Elliot."
"I'm afraid we were all too concerned about Granny to think about the gossip angles. I don't want you talked about, Prue."
Her heart trembled at the way he spoke the unfamiliar name. "Who is there to talk?" she asked.
He was silent for a moment. Then he said, "I don't care who knows you are here as long as they know why you are here. Granny has many friends, and they will understand."
Mrs. Hagen announced dinner then. It was for the most part a silent meal. Elliot told her he was going back to the naval base after dinner. In the morning a helicopter would return him to his ship. She wanted to reach out and drag each minute to a stop.
There seemed so little to say, even after the meal was over and they were alone again in the living room.
"You'll take care of little Elliot for me, won't you?" he asked.
"Yes, Elliot."
"I'll feel better about him with you here. His nurse is very good but--" He broke off and said, irrelevantly, "He adores you.
"I adore him," Prue said unsteadily, her eyes shining.
That put an effective stop to their conversation. Elliot got out his pipe and turned his back on her while he shook it out into the fireplace.
After a while he began to talk of his boy-hood and his father, who was a country doctor. He. talked about his school days, and the long years when he was finishing his medical training. The fire burned low and Prue listened, engraving each word on her heart.
"I wish I could remember," she said, when he paused. "It leaves such a blank--no childhood, no background--"
"I know the important things about you," he said at last. "I know that you like picnics and that babies adore you. That you will meet a man halfway. That you are as lovely inside as you are out--"
"Elliot, don't--" she begged.
He stood up abruptly. "You're right. It's time for me to go."
"Good sailing, Elliot."
She started by him but, suddenly overwhelmed by the imminence of parting, turned blindly into his arms.
For a precious moment he held her close. And when he kissed her, she understood that that moment was going to last for a long, long time. She drifted easily into-his arms, and met his warm lips with hers. Their tongues entwined while Elliot's arms wrapped around her even tighter.
It felt so good that Prue could hardly believe it. It felt so right to be with Elliot, alone with him, in his arms, with his crotch rubbing insistently against hers. And it didn't seem fair that he would be leaving, for how long she didn't know. But that seemed to be the price she had to pay. Nothing came easy, not even love. So she decided to-make this moment as special as possible, drawing from it as much pleasure as she could--and providing Elliot with boundless pleasure in return.
"Please, darling," Elliot said softly, tearing his lips from hers. "Let's go... up to my room. We'll be more... comfortable there."
"Of course," she replied, sighing deeply.
For good measure, and to let Elliot know just how she felt about him, Prue gave his crotch a soft caress. He smiled agreeably, and then pulled her to her feet.
He whisked her up the stairs, and it seemed like mere seconds before they were side by side in his bed, naked, their clothes lying in heaps around his room.
"I've wanted to be with you like this for so long," Elliot sighed, rubbing his hand across her nipples. "Oh, and your body. It's just as wonderful as I dreamed it was. Your breasts are so big and soft, and your sweet pussy is so tender and wet and..."
"Oh, Elliot, would you... please... would you kiss it? Please?"
Ever since Prue had seen Arthur with his face buried in Mrs. Hagen's crotch, she had had an overwhelming desire to have her own pussy licked. And as Elliot dragged his tongue down across her belly before licking her curly pubic hairs, she hoped that he could suck cunt as well as Arthur could.
"There," she groaned. "Ohhhh, yes, right there!"
Peeling her cunt flaps aside, Elliot revealed the gleaming pinkness of Prue's pussy hole. Licking his lips and then swallowing some pubic hairs that had become stuck in his teeth, he lowered his face until he was up to his ears in wet cunt. He jammed his tongue up her hole and worked it back and forth like a little cock. And at the same time he tried to stroke her clitoris with his nose and upper lip.
Flashes of lust streaked through Prue's loins as Elliot fucked her vagina with his tongue. She gripped the sides of his head and struggled to hold him in place so she could achieve her climax. Back and forth she thrashed her hips, pretending a big cock was reaming out her cunt. And all the while she valiantly held on to Elliot's head, forcing him to remain locked fast to her wet vagina.
Finally, the young man had to come up for air. With Prue still writhing beneath him, he wiped off his mouth with the back of his hand.
"Can't... hold out... much... longer," he gasped. "Gotta fuck... gotta fuck..."
"Okay!" Prue cried. "Fuck me! Fuck me!"
By this time she didn't care if he ate her out or not. She just wanted something in her cunt, be it his tongue or his cock. She just wanted to come. She was so far gone that any sort of stimulation would trigger her orgasm, and knowing that Elliot wanted to fuck her and that he would be receiving pleasure also made it that much more thrilling for Prue.
Gripping the backs of her thighs, Elliot hoisted her legs up and back until her knees were jammed into her big tits. In this position, her pussy was wide open and ready for him. By fucking down and around, he would be able to excite her clit with his cock shaft as well as plunge into the depths of her vagina.
Prue moaned from the added pressure on her nipples. She liked to have her tits pinched or stroked during sex, especially when she had a cock filling up her cunt. And having her knees crushing into her breasts seemed just as good a way to receive pleasure as any. Then she moaned again as Elliot scooted up just behind her ass-cheeks, kneeling while he aimed his cock at her hole. Her moans turned to groans and little yelps when Elliot finally slid his cock into her.
"Ohhhhhh!" she squealed. "Elliot, do it, do it to me. Take me now, darling. Now! Deeper! Yaaaaaaa!"
Elliot loved to see a woman in such need of a good fucking. While watching the impassioned grimace on Prue's face, he steadily pounded his penis into her. And after each stroke it seemed as if he was carrying her closer and closer to her final release.
Leaning forward on the upstroke, Elliot managed to drag his cock shaft across her clitoris. This turned Prue into a wild woman, and she howled out her delight each time he pulled back his prick.
They were sweating profusely from their frantic efforts, and soon their bellies were smacking together loudly. Prue quivered all over from the force of Elliot's fucking, and she cried out for more, more, until the first unmistakable spasms of ecstasy began sweeping through her loins.
Her orgasm was on her in seconds, causing Prue's body to buck almost out of control. Elliot strained to keep his penis inside her, and when her pussy began clenching around his shaft he let fly his load of sperm.
Exhausted from their intense efforts, they collapsed into one another's arms. And just before she drifted off to sleep, Prue thought about how unfair it was that Elliot should be leaving. And she had no idea when he would return.
CHAPTER SEVEN
In the morning, Prue's eyes opened reluctantly. She would rather sleep, was her first conscious thought, than wake to reality. For reality was that Elliot was gone... that she was Prudence Merrill, who was Bill Gorman's sweetheart.
Bill's face was very clear in her mind this morning. In all fairness, she had to admit that he was an attractive man--young and clean-looking, with a hard drive that she had felt even in their brief meeting.
But not as strong as Elliot, she thought, remembering that moment when he had backed down before the steel that Elliot's quiet manner concealed.
Nevertheless, she knew Bill Gorman cared for her. And it troubled her. What had she felt for him, before the accident that had divided her life as sharply as a curtain divides the stage from the audience? Had she been in love with him?
With her lips still trembling whenever she remembered kissing Elliot, with the feel of his arms around her fresh in her memory, she could not now understand how she could have felt anything; for any other man.
No--Bill Gorman was only a ghost out of her unremembered past. She would far rather live in the present--even if the present were a lie!
She heard Swift go briskly by with Granny's early-morning tea. From some-where in the yard came the grating sound that told her Arthur was mowing the lawn. The familiar noises were sharply painful to her.
She thought, I can't bear knowing the truth. I wish I didn't know.
But the day had begun, and she must get out of bed and go about the business of living.
* * *
Nurse Swift did not keep her away from Granny in the days that followed. Prue spent most of her time sitting with the old woman or playing with little Elliot.
But there was a specter she could not banish from her thoughts. Try as she might to ignore the existence of Carol Hallett, she found the little things she had learned about the other girl returning to haunt her.
Gradually, she was building a portrait in her mind of Elliot's wife, adding details from day to day as she went over what she had learned. She found herself remembering little significant remarks and saying to her-self, "So she's that kind of person."
She knew that the other girl was very fair and that her figure was much like her own, for she had easily worn her clothes. She knew that she belonged to the local golf club and the Gymkhana Club and rode a great deal. By her grandmother's admission, she was badly spoiled as a child--perhaps was still, Prue thought.
She was flirtatious, Prue decided, remembering Guy Eastland's note. Guy had said it hadn't meant a thing... and it was possible that Carol and Guy had known each other from childhood, that he had worded his note so extravagantly only in fun.
Wondering about it, she went to the desk to look at the note again. Startled when she did not find it, she went carefully through the contents of the desk drawer again.
It was gone!
She sat back, stunned. Who had taken it?. Had Elliot gone through his wife's desk, as she had gone through his?
Suddenly she remembered that she had told Guy Eastland exactly where the note was. Could he have bribed someone to get it for him?
It was evident that someone did not consider the note as innocent as Guy had claimed it was.
No newspapers came to the house and no one ever mentioned Carol in Prue's hearing, so she had no idea of what was happening about Carol's trial. Then one evening as she was going upstairs, she heard a key turning in the lock, and as the door swung back someone entered.
She turned and faced a girl smartly dressed in a leopard-trimmed coat and hat. Prue looked at the lovely long legs and the sleek blonde hair and they pouting red, Ups--and knew that she was looking at Carol Hallett.
She could feel the color leaving her face. This was Elliot's wife! She had known this moment would come, but it had been impossible to prepare herself for it. Her eyes, in an agony of curiosity, were taking in every detail of the other girl's appearance.
"Hello," she said, her voice sounding as if it were not her own. "You're Mrs. Hallett, aren't you? I'm Prudence Merrill."
The other girl looked her up and down.
"You're wearing my clothes," she said coldly.
The color washed back into Prue's face in an angry, embarrassed wave. It was true. Everything she had on belonged to the other girl, as far as she knew. At first, she had naturally assumed everything in the closets belonged to her. The frock she had on now was a soft print with a plain bodice and a very full skirt.
Carol Hallett looked at the brooch she had pinned at the neckline. "You've even taken my mother's brooch!" she accused.
"I'm sorry," Prue stammered, feeling that she, too, would be angry if she were in the other girl's place. "I haven't liked doing it, but I had no choice--"
But Carol Hallett was in no mood to listen to explanations. Her eyes blazed at Prue.
"I've heard stories, all sorts of stories, while I've been waiting for my case to come up, but I couldn't believe them. If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, I wouldn't have believed Elliot would dare do this to me! I'll show him up for what he is! I'll--"
"His story? Do you think I can't see through it? What does he think I am? Every-body's laughing at me."
Guy Eastland, Prue thought involuntarily. The other girl's voice had risen, and Prue was afraid Mrs. Lane might sense trouble in spite of her deafness.
"Let's go into the study, where we can't be heard. I can tell you everything," Prue said.
"I'll shout this from the housetops! While I've been away, you've been living in my rooms, wearing my clothing, even my jewellery!"
Prue had heard a door open. "Hush!" she said, in an agonized whisper. "Your grandmother will hear!"
"And what will I hear?" demanded a crackling old voice.
Prue's heart sank. Mrs. Lane stood just at the head of the stair. Too late, the girl remembered the old woman's ability to hear even a whisper.
Carol lifted her arrogant young voice angrily. "You'll hear what your precious Elliot has been up to! He's had another girl here posing as me, right under your nose!"
Prue's eyes blazed at her. "You idiot!" she cried, as she ran up, the stairs to the old woman.
"Granny!" she said. "I mean--Mrs. Lane! Whatever Elliot did, it was for your sake. He did it to save you pain."
The old woman rapped her stick sharply on the floor. "What is this all about?" she said. "Will someone please tell me? Well, Carol?"
The first flicker of alarm crossed Carol Hallett's face. When neither she nor Prue spoke, old Mrs. Lane screamed, "Will you please tell me what this means?"
Prue was trembling with anxiety. "Please don't get upset," she begged.
Swift came racing down the hall from the direction of the back stairs. Her eyes opened wide when she saw Carol Hallett coming up the front stairs toward her grandmother.
"Heaven help us!" she muttered.
She took Mrs. Lane's arm. "You know you shouldn't get yourself all worked up over nothing," she scolded her gently. "Remember what the doctor--"
"Nothing?" screamed the old woman, pounding the floor with her stick. "There are two of them, Swift! Who is this other woman? Tell me the truth!"
"Of course we'll tell you the truth!" said the nurse, with a black look for Carol and Prue. "Come back to your room, and I'll tell you all about it. You'll laugh when you hear how your Elliot tricked you. And all for your own good. He'd be terribly upset to see you carrying on like this when you know it's so bad for you."
Mrs. Lane raised her stick threateningly. "Don't try your bedtime stories on me, Swift!"
Prue could scarcely believe her eyes. She would never have imagined that Granny of the silvery hair and the fragrant cheek could work herself up into such a rage. Nurse Swift was calm and steady, but Prue knew her well enough to read the sharp concern beneath her professional exterior, as she helped the trembling old woman through her door.
Carol followed, but when Prue started after them, she turned on her sharply.
"We don't need your help!" she said, and shut the door in Prue's face.
Prue stood staring at it for a moment, her heart tight with concern. The door opened almost immediately and Nurse Swift stepped outside.
Her eyes had an abstracted look. "Call Dr. Babson, will you, dear?"
"Is she--? " Prue began.
"She's all right now, but I'm afraid this might bring on an attack. Tell him to come as soon as he can." She went in and closed the door again.
Prue went to the telephone. Dr. Babson wasn't in, but she left a message for him. She could hear the low murmur of voices when she went by the closed door. They were quiet and unexcited. Somewhat reassured, she went on to her own room.
How could Carol Hallett have done what she just had--when everyone had been trying so hard to keep from her grand-mother the trouble she was in?
Yet Prue's conscience was hurting her, too. She felt that Carol had a right to be angry, a better right than she knew. Elliot's picture faced her across the room, his eyes lighted by the smile that curved the corners of his mouth.
Prue looked at it miserably."I didn't mean to fall in love with another girl's husband, Elliot," she murmured.
But she had. And because she had, she was aware of an uneasy feeling that if Carol's disclosures brought on one of her grandmother's heart attacks, she would blame herself as much as Elliot's wife.
She did not think of her own position until Nurse Swift came in, her mouth grim, her eyes unhappy. But her voice was as crisp as ever.
"We will have to move you, you know. Mrs. Hallett will want this room," she said in a matter-of-fact tone.
"Oh!" Prue faltered. "Of course."
She looked around. There was nothing really hers, nothing she had added to the room except a few faded wildflowersin a vase on the desk, a book she had brought up from Elliot's study, a picture she had clipped from a magazine that lay on the table beside her bed.
She picked it up. Then she remembered the card Bill Gorman had given her, and got it from the desk drawer. The maid who had followed Nurse Swift in was busily taking the bedding from the bed.
"We'll put 'you in the guest room at the end of the hall," the nurse told Prue. "Everything you need is there, even to a nightie."
"Have you the clothes I was wearing when I was brought here?" Prue asked.
"Yes," the nurse said cheerfully, "but they are not wearable." She looked at Prue with understanding and sympathy. "Shall I borrow a dress from Nurse Peters for you? It would be a bit large."
Prue's eyes glowed. "Would she mind?"
"Of course not."
Prue picked up her few treasures. Regretfully she looked back at Elliot's portrait, wishing she could take it with her.
As she left the room, Carol Hallett came out of her grandmother's room. Ignoring her, Elliot's wife crossed to the room Prue was leaving. In a clear voice she told the maid, "Send everything in the closets to the cleaners."
"Yes, Mrs. Hallett," said the maid.
Prue turned back. In a choked voice she said to the maid, "You can send the dress I have on, too."
"Keep it," Carol said coldly. "I'll never wear it again."
Prue flushed. "Neither will I," she said, and turned blindly after Nurse Swift.
The nurse led her to a smaller but very comfortable room. She opened a window and began turning down the bed.
Prue spoke almost sharply. "Don't, Swift'! I'm not staying here tonight."
The nurse turned to look at her. "Why? Where are you going?"
"I'm going to phone a friend in the city to come for me." Her lips were trembling.
"It's pretty late," the nurse replied. "I'll get everything ready for you in case your friend can't come tonight."
Prue set her mouth firmly, but after the operator had rung the number Bill had left her for nearly five minutes, she gave up.
"Don't fret," Nurse Swift said. "Tomorrow will do just as well. Good night, dear."
"I don't know what I would have done without you," Prue said impulsively.
"That's sweet of you. But you helped us a great deal, too." The nurse sighed. "I hope it hasn't been all for nothing."
"How is Mrs. Lane?"
"She seems to be taking it pretty well. I think she will be all right. I'll sleep on a settee tonight in her sitting room, as I always do when she's poorly."
They said good night again, and Prue made herself ready for bed. But she was in no mood to sleep. She lay awake, staring into the darkness, still smarting under Carol's contempt, wondering unhappily what the future held for her.
The house was intolerable to her now that Carol was back. After a while, she decided to get up and try once more to phone Bill Gorman. Perhaps if she talked to him and knew that he was coming for. her in the morning, she could relax enough to sleep.
Snapping on her bedside light, she slipped into the dressing gown Nurse Swift had found for her and went out into the hall. There was a small light burning there, but the house was still, apparently asleep.
Suddenly there were hurried footsteps. Mrs. Lane's door burst open and Nurse Swift stood there with her hair hanging in silvered auburn braids. It was the first time Prue had seen the nurse out of her uniform, or without the elaborate swirling hairdo that was so much a part of her personality. She looked smaller and she looked alarmed.
She was obviously relieved to see Prue. "Get Dr. Babson at once," she said. "Tell him it's Mrs. Lane--I'm afraid--" Without finishing, she turned and hurried back into the room.
Prue ran to the telephone.
It seemed an interminable time before she got the doctor's number on the line. While she waited, a maid came running up the back stairs in answer to Nurse Swift's bell. Carol came out of her room in a frothy negligee and followed the maid into Mrs. Lane's room.
A woman's voice answered Prue at last, her voice sounding far away. But she grasped Prue's message at once. "Just a moment," she said. And when she came back on, she said, "I gave the doctor your message. He's on his way now."
Prue thanked her. As she put down the telephone, she heard Carol burst into hysterical sobs. The maid came out of the old woman's room, her pretty face dead white.
Prue walked the floor. At last the door-bell pealed and Prue could hear the housekeeper letting the doctor in. She hardly knew it was herself running to the top of the stairs, crying, "Oh, Dr. Babson, hurry, hurry!"
He ran up, but as he gained the top step Nurse Swift came out into the hall, looking oddly old.
"I'm afraid it's too late, Doctor," she said.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Exhausted with grief and reaction, Prue finally fell asleep, only to plunge into a wild dream of watching Carol with Guy East-land.
She seemed to be in the same room with them, yet unseen, watching everything that passed. She even seemed to share Carol's. erotic sensations as she sat there in one of the deep armchairs, enticing her lover into action.
Deliberately, she began to take extra-deep breaths, partly, indeed, because of the tingles of excitement this very attractive male was sending through her, but mostly because she knew only too well that those chesty inhalations displayed her breasts to the best possible advantage.
Her nipples started to perk up, and a downward glance assured her that their state of arousal was very plain to the eye; they thrust at the front of her blouse like two little towers.
When she looked back at his face, his eyes seemed slightly glazed, their focus hardly wavering from the display of tits in gentle motion.
The intensity of his concentrated stare had almost the effect of a physical caress, and her nipples eagerly responded, their hardness increasing yet further, until they were almost painful in their taut and thrusting pressure against the restraining cloth.
She let her own eyes flick down to the junction of his thighs and smiled at the unmistakable bulge that was visible beneath his pants.
His eyes suddenly left her tits and met her gaze, and a jolt of electricity sparked between them.
He shifted uncomfortably in his chair, in the process giving her an even clearer glimpse of his cock, rapidly reaching a state of full tumescence.
She took a yet deeper breath, and squirmed a little, sending her tits into gentle undulation.
Then she passed her tongue-tip lightly over her lower lip, in unmistakable erotic invitation.
She glided over to where he was sitting and planted herself on his lap. She leaned forward, gazing deeply into his eyes, stop-ping with her lips hardly an inch away from his. She could feel the warmth of his breath.
He was suddenly galvanized into action.
His arms encircled her and crushed her tightly against him, and his lips grabbed for hers, their moist, hard heat kindling new fires in her body.
Her achingly hard nipples pressed against his muscular chest as he leaned back, and-his hands kneaded her back.
Panting for breath, he broke the kiss, but a moment later he had buried his lips against her neck, nibbling and sucking; then he ducked his head to the opening at the neck of her blouse. His fingers groped clumsily with the little buttons and spread them wide until her breasts came bobbing free of their confinement.
"Oh, Jesus," he croaked, and captured one swaying nipple between knowing lips and sucked it for long, blissful seconds.
"Ooooh, that feels so goddamn sensational! I never... ohhhhhh... never..."
She swung her legs up onto the couch, and the side of her thigh pressed snugly against the rigid length of his still-confined prick.
She cocked the other knee and tilted it outward a little, and the friction of her panties over her now heated pussy made her catch her breath.
He dropped one hand down to her throbbing crotch and massaged gently.
"Mmmmm... ohhhh..."
Could he feel how hot and wet she was getting? she wondered.
"Why," she gasped, "don't we get a bit more comfortable?"
And she led Guy upstairs to her bedroom.
Slowly she unbuttoned her blouse the rest of the way and pulled it off, enjoying his enraptured gaze as he got the full effect of her bouncing boobs.
She dropped her blouse and stood with her hands planted on her hips.
"Now you," she commanded.
He stripped off his shirt, and she smiled appreciatively at his well-built, suntanned chest with its mat of fair, curling hair, through which his tiny brown nipples peeked.
"Gorgeous tits," he said softly.
Pleased with his homage, she moved her hands to the waistband of her skirt and popped a button out of its hole, then slowly drew down the zipper. She pushed the garment down over the smooth curve of her hips, down the length of her legs, and off. She stood there, proudly displaying her body, naked now except for the wispy barrier of her flimsy white cotton panties.
"like it?" she asked.
His response was a low, long drawn-out whistle.
And just in case she needed any further assurance, the bulge at his crotch swelled to even more gigantic proportions than before.
She stripped off the filmy scrap of her juice-soaked panties and stood there, fluffing up the curls of her pubic hair, letting him get a good eyeful.
He licked his lips lecherously, then undid his pants and stripped them and his shorts off, and stood proudly facing her, quite naked.
Her eyes focused eagerly on the massive shaft that seemed to be homing right in on her fiery cunt, which gave a little convulsion at the sight.
He held out a hand to her, and she walked over to him. He gathered her into his arms and crushed his lips to hers, the warm, moist probe of his tongue coaxing her lips apart and thrusting determinedly inward.
His hard chest scraped its mat of hair excitingly across her thrusting nipples, crushing the yielding mounds of her tits against his muscular torso. The pulsating mass of his eager cock rubbed demandingly against her belly, and she reached a hand boldly down between them and guided it between her legs to slide into the juicy groove of her pussy lips, and rub deliciously against the inflamed knob of her super-heated little clitoris.
His hands kneaded and squeezed the flesh of her ass cheeks, then he pulled her hips even-closer to his own, so that their pubic hair ground together and their thighs seemed to be welded to each other in sticky heat.
They clung together in that long, deep, moist kiss, their bodies filled with the white-hot fluids of desire, then he laughed softly and pushed her down onto the bed.
She lay sprawled there, gazing up at him, with hunger that showed in her eyes, looking from his handsome face to the broad swell of his arm and shoulder muscles; his powerful chest with its swirls of hair; his trim waist and flat belly and deep-set navel; his narrow hips and sturdy thighs and well-shaped legs--and the focal point of it all as far as her present craving was concerned: the thick, throbbing spear of inflamed, engorged meat that jutted out like the barrel of a cannon from the tangle of pubic hair that decorated his masculine loins.
She stretched out a hand to him and drew him down beside her.
She threw one thigh across his hip, so that his cock mashed excitingly against her pubic triangle, then slipped between the moist outer lips of her pussy, the upper surface of the straining shaft sliding sensuously over the pink, juice-slick membranes.
His cock slid sweetly back and forth for a couple of minutes, and he heard her breathing grow harsh and sharp as the friction against her clitoris and cunt lips sent her excitement soaring.
He ducked his head to nuzzle at the firm, high breasts, whose engorged nipples seemed almost the size of thimbles. The sweetly scented wealth of her hair fell upon him as she writhed and heaved in passion, and she twisted herself around on the mat-tress, the wetness of her cunt trailing up along the front of his body, until the open pink-cleft of her sex was presented to his willing lips and her warm breath sent little currents of excitement eddying over his steel-hard, straining prick.
His hunger for her was suddenly overwhelming, drowning out all other thoughts.
He seized her thighs and pulled them further apart, and buried his face in the lush, damp cavern of delight. His tongue swept over her delicate pussy lips, and made her gasp and shudder .with profound pleasure. His fingers dug into her velvet-skinned thighs almost painfully as he eagerly licked and sucked and rooted in the hot depths of her, overwhelmed by sexual hunger.
"Ooooh, that feels so good...."
She caught his head between her hands and pressed him even closer, the honey-soaked tissues pressing suffocatingly against his mouth and nose until he had to pull free of her, fighting for breath.
"Wow! Oh, that's... fantastic!"
Panting, he sat back on his heels and surveyed her body with ravenous eyes.
A moment later he was attacking her white-skinned breasts, sucking the hard pink nipples into the wet furnace of his voracious mouth, and biting, not savagely, but ferociously enough to bring her to that very edge of pain which yet remains at the peak of bliss.
"Mmmmm.. . ohhhh..."
He stayed at her tits for long minutes, until her pussy was running freely with the hot, slippery, musky-smelling juices of feminine desire.
"Yeah, that's incredible!"
She was so hot, she had slipped one hand down to her crotch to afford herself a little temporary relief, and when he raised his head from her tits in momentary exhaustion, he became aware of what she was doing and drew back a little, staring with eyes full of avid interest.
She spread her thighs and worked her fingers more visibly, thrusting one, then two, then three into her moist depths and with-drawing them sticky and gleaming. She held them to his mouth, and he licked eagerly at the intimate flavor.
With a little howl of passion he flung him-self upon her, once again nuzzling into her cunt to lap up the sweet juices. Again she maneuvered her body around until they were lying in the classic sixty-nine position, and she cupped his heavy wrinkled balls in one hand, and circled the thick throbbing flesh of his straining cock in the other. She ducked her head and licked around the edge of the corona.
His moan of pleasure was muffled against her pussy, but the vibration quivered through her. She slipped her lips around the head of his cock and held it in the warm, wet sanctuary of her incredibly knowing mouth.
His violent shuddering and his renewed attack upon her burning, hair-lined flesh assured her of his complete and delighted response.
She clutched his buttocks in her slim-fingered hands and pulled him closer, engulfing his raging shaft within the dark constriction of her throat. His tongue was thrusting deeply into her now, as if trying to reach all the way to her womb with its very tip.
.Orgasm was approaching, irresistibly, inevitably.
He could feel the violent, spasmodic quivering of her belly, and then she was bucking
I and convulsing helplessly beneath him, his suddenly released cock slapping against her face and neck as she thrashed her head wildly from side to side and jerked her pelvis against his mouth.
He twisted around on the mattress and flung himself on top of her flailing body.
While she was still shuddering with the violence of her climax, his pulsating cock was forcing its way between her cunt lips and thrusting into her, sliding effortlessly into the well-lubricated passage, and she moaned with new satisfaction.
"Ohhhh..." she whimpered ecstatically.
She was filled, and he was tightly mbraced by the tight clutch of her flutering pussy.
like two machines in perfect harmony, they began to fuck. He was pumping back !and forth, back and forth, like a well-oiled piston. She was bucking up to meet every stroke, her hips swiveling and turning, grinding and winding as she pressed her whole moist outer cunt against him, wide-spread. to stimulate every nerve-ending that it was humanly possible to reach.
Then she flung her legs around his waist, her arms aroundhis back. His searching tongue plunged like a drill into her receptive mouth and plumbed its farthest recesses with insatiable eagerness.
His mind seemed to give way. He, was no longer a thinking creature, but a focus of pure uninhibited sexual energy enfolded in flesh.
She worked and gasped and moaned and spasmed against him, striving for her second orgasm... if indeed her first climax could really be said to have ended. It was more like a nonstop flood, he thought, as she twisted and groaned and sobbed beneath him.
"Yes, yes, YES!" she shrieked ecstatically as the blissful sensations filled her.
He increased the tempo suddenly, and she began to flail her arms and an unearthly scream burst from her throat as her body convulsed so violently that it was all he could do to remain in position.
But the stimulus of her orgasm was too intense to be resisted, and with a helpless groan, he felt the boiling sperm come frothing out of his balls and fountain out of his spasming cock, tossing him helplessly on billows of ecstasy almost into unconsciousness....
Prue awoke abruptly, and she knew that she must leave this place as soon as she possibly could.
A couple of hours later, she was driving toward the city with Bill Gorman.
"The old woman's death cut you up a bit, didn't it?" he asked sympathetically.
"She was family to me," Prue said. "All the family I knew."
He looked at her oddly, and she guessed he wanted to ask about Elliot, but he didn't.
"Don't worry, I'll change all that." He patted her knee.
She moved away from him a little, but he didn't seem to notice. She studied him. He was lean and hard and his brown jaw had an aggressive thrust. Yet his blue eyes could be surprisingly tender.
She admitted that it was possible she had liked him a lot.
They were entering the city now and the tension within her mounted. It was more than anticipation and strain. It was an instinctive fear that she could not explain.
When Bill finally stopped before a three-story apartment house, she climbed out of the car with relief that the trip was over. She looked at the entrance to the building curiously, with no sense of recognition.
"I have no keys," she said.
"We'll get you some," Bill said. He rang the manager's bell and presently a buzzer sounded. Bill pushed the door open and they entered the hall. A gray-haired woman looked down on them from the landing above.
"Oh, it's you, Miss Merrill," she said.
Her words gave Prue a queer sense of finality. So I really am Prudence Merrill, she thought. Climbing the stairs, she said apologetically, "I don't have my keys."
"You mean you've lost them?" asked the woman.
"I'm afraid I have."
The woman disappeared into a doorway and came back with a ring of keys. She detached two from the ring and gave them to Prue.
"There will be an extra charge for these," she said. "I'll have to have some more made. I'll put it on your bill."
"Of course," Prue said, a little intimidated by her.
The woman turned and went into her own apartment. She had not been unfriendly, but neither had she been cordial. At least, Prue thought, relieved, she hadn't asked questions.
Bill took-her arm and they went up another flight of stairs. Another rather dark hallway confronted them.
Prue said under her breath, "How annoying not to know which is my door!"
"It's incredible," Bill said.
He guided her to the end of the hall and, taking the keys from her, unlocked the door. She stepped into a large. hall. Sun streamed through large windows and was reflected in mellow colored glassware. There were healthy green plants, obviously not neglected during her absence.
At one end of the room was a fireplace and there were loveseats covered in a linerf-like fabric patterned with flowers in soft colors.
Bill indicated two doors at the other end of the room. "The kitchen is behind one, the bathroom the other." He opened a door, revealing a gas platewith shelves above and below it.
"Kitchen-in-a-closet," he said. "And very efficient, too."
"You seem acquainted with it.
His look reproached her. "I've cooked a steak or two on.it."
Prue asked, "Isn't there a bedroom?"
"That couch opens up."
"I like it," she decided. "But I shudder to think what my bill must be after all this time. It was good of her not to put me out."
Bill came across the room to her. "Have you any money, darling?"
She shook her head. "Not a penny. Do you think I can get a job right away?"
He-put his hands on her shoulders. His voice was suddenly husky. "Prue, you know there's one job that you can have right away."
He saw the refusal that leaped to her eyes and said quickly, "I wasn't going to rush you, Prue. I understand how it must be with you. But I can't see you without money or a job or any of those things. Please, let me take care of you!"
"Don't say any more now, Bill."
She turned away from him. But he followed her and took her in his arms. Her protests were muffled beneath his kiss. She could feel the hard pounding of his heart above her own, and his lips were sure and warmly sweet.
She tried to push him away but could not.
He raised his head. "You love me, Prue." His voice was low and sure.
"I don't know, darling," she faltered. "I know, darling."
But when-he kissed her again, Prue gave in to the feeling. It was a good feeling, not un-like what she felt when she was with Elliot. And while Bill's tongue explored her mouth, she thought about Elliot and the fact that she would not see him for a long time. Then she thought about the wonderful night they had spent together making love in his bed. Knowing that she would not see Elliot for some time convinced her that it might be wise to give in to Bill. Where else could she receive the sexual satisfaction she had been craving more and more lately than in Bill's arms? She couldn't just go out into the bars and enter into a series of one night stands. And she knew she could trust Bill, no matter what happened.
So she gave in to his advances, turning to the side to offer him her tit, trying to tell him with her body that she was his, that he could do to her whatever he wished. Bill accepted her offer greedily, grabbing hold of her breast and squeezing until it almost hurt.
"Oh, baby," he sighed, starting to blow in her ear while kissing up and down the soft creamy flesh of her neck. "You know, I love you, baby. What's holding you back? Don't you want to marry me?"
Tilting her head back to allow him freer access to her neck and shoulders, she said, "Just love me now, Bill. Right now. Let's not worry about anything else."
Grabbing her around the waist, Bill led Prue over to the couch. He placed her on her back and then began frantically taking off her clothes. Prue helped him as best she could, even though Bill's frantic clumsy gestures were more of a hindrance than any-thing. Finally she just gave in and waited impatiently while he undressed her. For a brief moment, she remembered how much easier it had been with Elliot. But she had gone this far, and she couldn't stop now.
"Baby, you're so beautiful," Bill sighed as he yanked her panties off. "Such a soft pussy. Ohhhh, baby, I love you so much. So much..."
Tearing off his clothes quickly, Bill then nuzzled his face between Prue's legs. He licked at her pussy tentatively, and Prue silently lamented the fact that Bill was hardly as experienced as Elliot, or even Arthur the stable hand. He seemed to be eating her out as if it were an obligation, something he had read about in a monthly men's magazine.
Why am I going through with this? Prue asked herself. Am I so incapable of control-ling my emotions that I just give in to any man who rushes at me? Why do these things have to be happening to me? What did I ever do to deserve this fate? I have no memory of my past and the man I truly love is gone for months and months...
It was as if some primal need to be punished was unleashed inside her. Much to Bill's surprise, she rolled over onto her belly. Reaching back around her sides, she grabbed her ass-cheeks and pulled them apart.
"Please," she hissed, "fuck me in the ass. Oh, Bill, please do it to me that way. Now! Ohhhhhhhh!"
Sitting up on the end of the couch, Bill stared down at the wrinkled grommet of Prue's ass-hole. He couldn't believe what she was asking him to do. Of course, he had often thought about fucking a woman this way, but he had never had the guts to bring it up. Now that the opportunity was his, he wasn't quite sure what to do next.
"What are you waiting for?" she cried out. "Fuck me now. Now!"
Bill hesitated for just a second, and then the situation became, as far as he was concerned, a test of his manhood. He forcefully squirmed up between Prue's spread legs and aimed his cock tip at her ass-hole. Having forgotten to take the time to lubricate his cock, wedging the tip into her ass took a bit of effort. Prue cried out in pain when the first few inches of his cock meat were forced inside, but Bill refused to listen to her. She had demanded he fuck her in the ass, and that's just what she was going to get.
Pushing down even harder, Bill managed to wedge most of his cock into her anus. His balls drooped down and flopped against her wet pussy. And then after one final thrust, he managed to push his prick all the way inside.
"You're killing me!" she cried. "You're splitting me apart! Stop, oh, stop!"
But Bill only grinned and began picking up the pace of his fucking motions. Faster and faster he drove his penis into her ass while Prue frantically clutched the couch, digging her fingernails into the soft fabric.
As they continued ass-fucking, it became more and more pleasurable for both of them. When Bill finally emptied his load of cum, filling her insides with hot sticky jism, Prue found herself enjoying every second of it. She enjoyed it so much that she even experienced an orgasm by reaching down between her legs and whipping her fingers against her clit.
But after it was all over and the wonderful afterglow began fading away, Prue began thinking about Elliot again.
Will I ever be able to get him out of my mind? she thought.
CHAPTER NINE
For all her apparent confusion, when, a few weeks later, Prue read in the newspaper that Carol had been convicted of
I manslaughter, she didn't waste a moment. She was in a cab en route to Elliot Hallett's home almost without thinking about it.
"Oh, Elliot, I'm so glad to see you!" she cried, rushing into his arms. "You don't-know how long I've been dreaming about this moment!"
Looking into Prue's moist, gleaming eyes, Elliot kissed her, holding her close and letting her know just how much he cared for her. Then they undressed.
Lovingly, he drew her into his embrace.
He could feel her ample, cushiony breasts mashing against his chest, and the sweet-smelling tresses ofher hair brushed his lips excitingly.
He slipped his fingers under her chin and tilted her face upward, then kissed her. Her lips were warm and soft and sweet, and her hot tongue darted out to meet his own in ardent, heartfelt response.
He was aroused and delighted to feel her nipples hardening, stabbing sweetly against his chest.
One of his hands glided down the voluptuous curve of her back and cupped a generous bottom cheek. Her skin was silky, and the flesh filling his palm was firm and bouncy.
"Mmmmm," she murmured.
He pulled her even closer, and her triangle of springy pubic hair scrubbed against him.
His joystick twitched in happy anticipation.
One of her hands started to trace a sensuous path down between the fronts of their bodies, slipping between his thighs to investigate what was going on there.
"Ohhh, so hard, so strong," she whispered as her skilled fingers explored and teased.
The sensuous caress of her fingers threatened to drive him insane.
But she had only just started!
She wriggled down in the bed., drawing herself out of his embrace. He felt her kneeling beside him, and a breeze of warmth touched his masculine weapon.
"Ohh, sweetheart," he whimpered ecstatically.
Then the moist furnace of her tongue was taunting his throbbing organ, bathing the aching knob of his cockhead in hot wetness.
He gasped and squirmed uncontrollably.
"Feel nice?" she teased.
His only reply was a strangled gulp.
Another hot tongue-swipe sent a stab of excitement crashing through his balls.
"Oh, it's getting so hard," she crooned, her lips still resting against his joystick, so that the vibration of her voice sent another quiver of ecstasy through his helpless body.
Then she stopped licking, and she maneuvered the swollen head into the warm, wet cave between her soft, gorgeous lips. Her teeth scraped over it, but very gently, just enough to provide a shock of sensation that dragged yet another gasp of pleasure from his throat.
Affectionately, he reached down his hand and fondled her softly curling hair.
Then one of her hands slipped around to his bottom, and a fingertip stroked excitingly along the tight, dark split. He tensed with anticipation.
Her finger went down to the swollen ridge between his ass-hole and the base of his dick. She rubbed along it for a moment, then cupped his balls, just firmly enough to add to his growing pleasure.
She moved her head so that his throbbing dick slid sweetly into the humid velvet of her mouth, and then on, incredibly on, until her tender lips were pressing against the very base of his masculinity.
Then, cruelly, the blissful sensation was removed as her head tilted back, leaving his spit-soaked shaft stabbing futilely in the cool air of the room.
A moment later, she was crawling back up beside him, snuggling into his arms, her lips and tongue once again meeting and devouring his own.
After a few seconds, a little breathless, he broke the kiss and nuzzled at the fragrant hollow of her throat, then started to blaze a fiery trail with his tongue down to one of her voluptuous tits.
He scooped his tongue around the thrusting, rubbery-textured nipple and tasted the crinkled flesh surrounding it.
She whimpered softly with pleasure, which greatly added to his raging excitement, and her hips made a thrusting movement against his loins.
He switched his attention to her other luscious mammary, gave it a few minutes' concentrated attention, then continued his exploration down the front of her body, flicking the tip of his tongue into her navel for a moment, then continuing still lower, until his tongue met the crispness of her pubic ringlets.
With gentle fingers, he pulled apart the outer labia and blew a current of air onto the exposed flesh beneath.
She squirmed and wriggled with delight.
He ducked his head until his lips were touching those other intimate lips that protected her inner sex.
She trembled.
His nostrils were filled with the sweet, musky perfume and he breathed deeply, his dick twitching with the desire to plunge into her hot tunnel.
Instead, his tongue began to lave the juicy membranes, lapping up the sexual nectar.
"Oh, ooooh," she whimpered ecstatically.
When the tip of his tongue finally homed in on the morsel of her clitoris, hard as a marble inside its tiny protective hood, she writhed in sensual agony.
Her harsh whisper floated to his ears: "Fuck me! Oh, fuck me now! Now!"
But he stayed there a little while longer, batting the little marble back and forth with his tongue, enjoying her moans of delicious sweet agony.
"Fuck me, oh fuck me!" she was pleading.
He sucked at the little knob of flesh.
"Mmmmmm... nnnnnoooo... yes... ooohhhhhh you're driving me crazy..."
The crazier the better. The hotter she was, the better his ride would be.
"OOOOOHHHHHH!"
She was very close now, and he didn't want to send her over the edge until he had his love-prod tucked safely up inside the snug, velvety cave of her hot, sweet, receptive, tight little cunt.
He squirmed upward, the front of his body rubbing along hers, his chest hair rasping against her stomach and then her breasts as he settled, himself in position on top of her.
Her thighs, quivering with excitement, parted widely, and her tender fingers gave his dick a loving squeeze before guiding its blunted arrowhead into position against her passion-soaked pussy.
He thrust forward, and her, pelvis rose to meet him, and his rod of flesh cleaved joyfully inward.
The walls of her inner cunt contracted lovingly around his invading shaft.
For almost a minute they just lay there without moving, relishing their closeness, hearing only each other's aroused breathing. He kissed her again and again.
Then he moved his hips a fraction, so that his rigid weapon slid a little way out of her, then thrust back home.
The inner walls of her pussy seemed to quiver and clutch, embracing the unyielding bulk of the welcome invader in a loving grasp.
Now the end of his rod was pressing against her cervix. He lay and enjoyed the depth of penetration for a few moments more, then grunted with pleasure as her inner muscles squeezed his meat in a sort of milking action.
Then he began to work in and out of her, at first only a little way, until she started to match his rhythm with that of her own pelvis and hips.
He increased the length of his hot stroke, a fraction more with each outward pull, until it reached the point where the super-sensitive ridge of his corona was feeling the outer air each time.
And every inward thrust was like plunging into a bath of boiling oil--how could it feel so terrific?
"Ooooh, that feels so good, so fucking gooooood.... Ohhhhhh!"
He could feel the sweat starting to trickle down his face and shoulders and chest.
"Really like that, don't you, baby? It really makes you feel like heaven, hmmmm?"
"Ooooh... yesssss... YESSS! Don't stop! For heaven's sake don't stop..."
He suddenly pulled out of her, leaving her gasping, and hooked his arms beneath her thighs, lifting them to rest on his shoulders. Then he plunged back into the plush furnace of her widespread cunt.
"Mmmmm... ohhhh.. . "
He plowed her to her very fullest depth and his own entire length.
"Yeah, that's sensational!"
The moist sounds of their fucking filled his ears, blending with her harsh gasps and tiny moans as' he plunged in and out of her most intimate recesses: He could hear his own harsh breathing too, and realized he was perilously close to what promised to be a volcanic eruption.
"That really turns you on, sweetheart, doesn't it!"
"Ooooh... that's... so GOOD! Don't stop now! I'll kill you if you stop..."
"Ahhhh... mmmmm..."
He increased the tempo suddenly, and she began to flail her arms and an unearthly. scream burst from her throat as her body convulsed so violently that it was all he could do to remain in position.
But the stimulus of her orgasm was too intense to be resisted, and with a helpless groan, he felt the sperm come churning out of his balls and fountaining out of his spasming cock, hurling him helplessly on waves of ecstasy almost into oblivion.
* * *
Later, as they lay in each other's arms, Elliot said:
"It's been terrible for me, Prudence. I--I didn't think I was going to make it. If it hadn't been for my son, I think I might have..."
"Stop talking like that, Elliot," she commanded. "I'm here now and that's all that matters."
"How would you like to be a Navy wife?"
"But, Elliot, you're still married. We can't just..."
"Hush, dear. Just answer the question. I've talked with my lawyer and he said there would be no problem getting a divorce. Carol's going to be put away for a long time, you know."
Prudence was at a loss for words. And as she nodded her .head up and down, smiling, she understood that it didn't matter that she couldn't remember her past. No, because now she was about to start a wonderful new future, and her past was better left behind.
And she decided that she couldn't make a better start on the future than the one that popped into her head at that moment.
She slid her hand down to Elliot's loins.
"Ready to go again?"
The spasmodic twitch of his cock in response was all the answer she needed!