house when they got back there. They had been making calls and both were nicely plastered.
Lillian noticed at once that Anna and Louise were uncommonly chummy tonight. She attributed this strange manifestation to the Yuletide season at first.
But later in the evening Louise asked of Anna, "Did you hear from Claire Rubens today?"
Anna shook her head and frowned slightly.
"I wonder how she got home?" Louise went on.
"Home from where?" Cliff cut in with an elaborate stage delivery. "Was she somewhere unusual?"
"Why. You know, she—" Louise broke off suddenly and there was a moment's silence during which Louise and Anna flushed and Cliff and Billy whistled carelessly and searched their pockets for cigarettes.
Lillian kept her eyes fastened to the little bare spot near the door where the builders had evidently run short of wainscoting. She wished she were anywhere but in this room. She was far more embarrassed than any of the four who sat so uncomfortably grouped about her. She had no business here. They wanted to talk over the party at Anna's mother's house which clearly the Fishers had attended. Oh, why did people have to weave senselessly intricate nets of lies? Why couldn't they be square and say, "Look here, so and so's the case." Damn them for trying to spare a person's feelings and then plunging them into a position like this.
Lillian said to herself, "The hell with them." She said it many times, but it didn't seem to help.
