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Old 06-10-2006, 11:17 AM   #49
Celuien
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Join Date: May 2005
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Primrose turned her attention to the biscuits, silent and thoughtful, her ears still aflame. Cela didn't think her new found interest in Will was silly. Primrose only wished she could feel the same way. True, she could have cast her attention in a worse direction than the congenial, hard-working Will. But she wasn't sure that she had any business casting her attention in any direction, especially towards someone who was clearly trying his best to avoid any attention of the kind. Had he wanted such attentions, he wouldn't have needed to invent names to send his relatives.

She tried to sort through her confused emotions. Silly. She was silly to permit herself to be so flustered by a joke. And she was silly to allow the embarrassment to continue with Cela's plan, which was really just a bit of fun. But even more importantly, if she told herself that she was silly, Primrose couldn't be disappointed that Will was, in fact, only joking. And so she decided to cling to the word for the time, despite Cela's words to the contrary. If it happened that she didn't need to remind herself of having a foolish fancy, she could drop that defense later.

But the little game would present a problem. If she played along, Primrose would be in constant danger of betraying herself to Will. Yet maybe it wasn't such a bad idea to have the excuse of the game after all. It was possible that she would unintentionally let something slip. A slip during the impersonation was forgivable and even expected as a ploy for her part in the deception. Her main difficulty would lie in not becoming frustrated that it was all a game and not permitting the play acting to work her emotions into something more than they were. She wasn't sure what those feelings were, having arisen so unexpectedly, and did not want them to become more confused than they already were.

Cela was hurrying the bacon to a plate. Primrose began cutting her dough into biscuit shape and preparing another batch for the oven. As she slid the pan into the heat, she turned to Cela again and sighed.

"Maybe you're right. Maybe it's not silly. I don't know anything. But enough of this for the present. Someone will hear, and I'm not wanting Will to take notice of anything just now."

As if in justification of Primrose's fear of eavesdroppers, Dick reappeared at the door to call for tea. She started the tea and, drawing close to Cela's ear, whispered, "Do you think he knows? He heard some of what we were saying before."
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