The Joys of Love

The Joys of Love Read Free Page A

Book: The Joys of Love Read Free
Author: Madeleine L'Engle
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lights and lock up when you’re through.”
    â€œOkay, Mr. Price.”
    â€œAnd be in the box office at nine tomorrow morning, will you, Elizabeth?”
    â€œI’ll miss my classes—” Elizabeth started, then stopped. “Okay, Mr. Price.”
    â€œGood night, darling,” Mr. Price said with automatic affection, and left.
    Elizabeth picked up the telephone and asked for operator twenty-three.
    â€œYou have a call from Jordan, Virginia, Miss Jerrold,” the operator told her, and Elizabeth’s heart began to beat with apprehension. If the call was from Jordan, it meant that it must be from her aunt with whom she had lived since her father’s death, and Aunt Harriet Jerrold would not call except for bad news. Elizabeth heard the telephone ringing and she could imagine it ringing in the dark, narrow hall of the house in Jordan. It’s after midnight, she thought. Why on earth would Aunt Harriet be calling me at this time of night?
    The phone kept ringing, and after a while the operator said, “There doesn’t seem to be any answer, Miss Jerrold. I’ve
been trying to get you since eight o’clock this evening and either the line was busy or you couldn’t be reached. Do you think I should try again in twenty minutes?”
    â€œNo,” Elizabeth said, “it’s too late now. I’d better call in the morning. Shall I ask for you?”
    â€œI won’t be on in the morning, but ask for operator nineteen and she’ll take care of you.”
    â€œAll right. Thanks.” Elizabeth hung up and a sick feeling of apprehension settled in the pit of her stomach. She looked around the small office, starkly painted white. On the wall was a calendar, opened to the month of August, 1946, showing the schedule for the rest of the summer. Most summer-stock theatres did a play a week, and this theatre was no exception. There are four more plays to learn from, Elizabeth thought wistfully. Next to the calendar was the box office window.
    Elizabeth reached up to the neat cubbyholes to touch one of the stacks of pink and blue and green tickets which she would be selling the next morning. Under the green money box was a large mimeographed seating plan of the theatre, and on this she would mark off all the tickets she sold. She rather enjoyed sitting on the high stool by the ticket window and chatting with the people who would be seeing the play that night or later on in the week; she had come to know several who returned each week, and tried to always give them the choicest seats. I love everything about this place, she thought. Ben can say anything he likes about it, but I’ve loved every minute of this summer so far.
    â€œLiz!” a voice called. “Are you there?”
    â€œI’m here,” Elizabeth called back.

    After a moment Jane Gardiner’s slight figure appeared in the doorway. Ben had been in the theatre since he was a child, only taking a break for college at his father’s insistence, but it was Jane, fresh out of drama school, who seemed to have the wisdom the rest of them lacked. Elizabeth always felt tall and clumsy beside her, though Jane said that Elizabeth was a Viking, and she herself the product of a decadent civilization.
    â€œBen told me you had a long distance call,” Jane said, “so I thought I’d come over and make sure it wasn’t bad news.”
    Elizabeth shook her head. “The operator said she had a call from Jordan for me and that she’d been trying to get me all evening. But when she rang just now, there wasn’t any answer. It must have been Aunt Harriet. And Aunt Harriet never answers the phone after ten o’clock. If anybody called to tell her the house was on fire, it could just burn down if it depended on her answering the phone. I do hope she isn’t ill or something.”
    â€œProbably just wants to talk to you,” Jane said.
    â€œNot Aunt Harriet. It’s

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