Firefly by Linda Hilton Page B

shook her head.  Wilhelm complained when she wasn't there, but he never complimented her when she was.
    What would happen when she told him Morgan had asked her to work for him?  If she accepted, it would mean changes in the Hollstrom household.  Just the matter of turning the cooking over to Katharine was enough to assure Julie of her father's refusal.
    She had known from the start that the venture was doomed, but she hadn't wanted to accept it.  Even now she fought against it.
    "Mama, I don't mean to sound ungrateful," she began, "but I think it's time--.  Who can that be?"
    The light tapping on the front door was almost inaudible. Settling her spectacles back on the bridge of her nose where they belonged, she walked to the foyer and pulled the door open.
    "Good morning, Miss Hollstrom."
    "Dr. Morgan?"
    She tried to hold back the title he had forbidden, but he looked so deserving of it, standing there still smelling faintly of shaving soap, shampoo, and bay rum.  He slid the brim of a new, low-crowned hat through his fingers nervously.  Julie knew he probably could barely see her, for the hallway was dark and he'd just come out of the sunlight.
    "I came to see if you and Master Willy were free for that ice cream I promised."
    "Oh, I'm sorry, really I am.  Willy's with Clancy McCrory right now, and in a few minutes my father will be home for lunch." She felt like a fool, sending him away like this.  He had gone to a great deal of effort and expense to change from yesterday's derelict to the well-dressed, clean-shaven gentleman at her door this morning.
    Despite her words, he seemed undeterred.
    "Perhaps this afternoon?" he asked.  "I have some business of my own at McCrory's.  We could meet there at, say, two o'clock?"
    He could see her better now that his eyes adjusted to the shade on the porch.  When she briefly smiled, he thought perhaps she was about to agree to meet him, but then anger puckered her brow.
    He mumbled, "It's all right, Miss Hollstrom.  I understand."  He felt like a complete ass.  He had just turned to leave when the reason for her scowl clumped up the stairs behind him.
    "Off my porch, Morgan," Wilhelm growled, pointing a finger towards the street.  "I will deal with you later."
    "Papa, please."
    "You go in and leave this to me." Now he shook the finger at his daughter.  "I don't want you--"
    "Well, hello, Dr. Morgan!" Katharine sang behind Julie.  She hardly sounded like a woman with a throbbing head and a churning stomach.
    "Good morning, Mrs. Hollstrom."
    "It isn't morning any more, Dr. Morgan.  It's five minutes after twelve.  Have you had lunch?"
    "Katharine, this is not the time--"
    "Oh, nonsense.  We have plenty for one more, don't we, Julie?"
    Julie felt trapped between her insistent mother and her obstinate father.  Wilhelm shoved his way past Morgan and stood on the threshold, neither in nor out of the house.  And Julie couldn't move out of his way.
    Julie could see Morgan clearly now, and he seemed to hide a sympathetic smile when he said, "I don't want to put you to any trouble, Mrs. Hollstrom."
    "No trouble at all, Dr. Morgan." Katharine reached past Julie to take her husband's arm.  "Come on in, Wilhelm, and don't block the doorway."
    Without bothering to plead her useless arm as an excuse not to offer some assistance in the kitchen, Katharine led the gentlemen into the parlor while Julie gathered lunch.  She found a platter of leftover chicken and discovered it wasn't burnt as badly as Katharine had let on.  Julie took a pint jar of corn from the pantry and dumped the contents into a pan with a lump of butter to heat while she sliced bread.
    Though she worked frantically, Julie couldn't keep her mind off that image of Del Morgan as he walked through her front door.  He looked so different that she had trouble recalling the man who had brought her home last night.  Instead of faded denims he wore a pair of black trousers, plain but of good quality.  The tattered