Spring fancy

wear in a church to practice walking on a white linen runner on the arm of a best man?

Back in the vestibule, Winnie felt his eyes following her as she slipped between Sandy 's mother and father to greet them warmly, looping a hand through each of their arms.

'Why, Winnie, I didn't see you come in. Did the dress arrive?' Ann Schaeffer inquired.

'All hemmed properly and ready to go. And how about at your house? Any last-minute complications?'

'None. Everything's ready for tomorrow.'

'But I'll bet you're both exhausted.'

'I confess, we've-'

A shrill whistle cut through the vestibule and echoed in the cavernous nave beyond the open double doors: Mick calling attention to Father Waldron, who began filling everyone in on the opening part of the service. As he talked, he entered the main part of the church, and the wedding party followed.

Winnie moved toward the door, conscious that Joseph Duggan awaited there to escort her inside. She avoided his eyes until the last minute, then lifted her gaze to find him with a scintillating sparkle still in his eyes and the flirtatious expression on his lips. For the first time she realized why his buddies called him Jo-Jo. That name fit. While commandeering the coat from her arm, he gave her hair the once- over.

'I liked it better messy, Winnifred Gardner, and there was something a little offbeat and amusing about a girl wearing gasoline for perfume. But anyway, may I?' He presented his right elbow in courtly fashion, still grinning devilishly as they moved inside.

'Thank you, and no thank you, Mr. Duggan. I'm not certain if I've just been insulted, laughed at or both. But I can walk perfectly well without your elbow while I'm deciding.'

His grin became dazzling, and without a glance aside he dropped her coat in the last pew, then took a rather deliberate grip on her elbow as they moved toward the front pews.

For the next five minutes Father Waldron outlined the procedures and rituals of the wedding service, explaining that both bride and groom had elected to walk up the aisle with their respective parents and have the attendants do so as pairs. Winnie had known this, of course, but had scarcely given it a second thought until now, seated on a hard wooden pew with Jo-Jo Duggan's knees sprawled wide, one of them only a scant inch from her own. He straightened, turned more fully in Father Waldron's direction and hung his wrist on the pew behind her.

Not only a flirt, but an accomplished flirt!

The door at the rear of the church slammed, and scampering footsteps clicked up the aisle, causing every head to turn.

There stood a birdlike woman, pulling black gloves from her fingers, clutching a portfolio against her coat front. 'I'm sorry, Father. I would have been here sooner, but somebody fed my cat beer and got it drunk and…'

The rest was drowned out by laughter, and the twittery woman became more flustered. Father Waldron's voice echoed in the empty church. 'Lent just being over, the cat probably needed it, Mrs. Collingswood.'

Beside Winnie, Jo-Jo Duggan's chest shook with laughter, and his eyes glinted as if he himself might very well have pulled such pranks once or twice in his day and sympathized not with the cat, but with the prankster.

'We're ready for the music whenever you are, Mrs. Collingswood,' Father advised benevolently.

'Oh… oh, certainly, Father.' Her footsteps carried through the church again, then became a series of muffled thuds on the stairway at the rear. There followed a silence, the rustle of sheet music and a few testing notes.

Within minutes Winnie found herself walking beside Joseph Duggan toward the rear of the church. Father Waldron directed the proceedings like an elementary teacher at a school play, while everyone awaited instructions and cues.

Standing in the shadowed vestibule, Winnie covertly studied the best man more carefully. He was dressed casually, as were most of the men present. His Levi's were dark and new and creased. They fit snugly across lean hips and partially concealed clean new tennis shoes with a neat blue wave curling along their sides. Beneath a lightweight spring jacket he wore a button-down shirt of pale yellow. While listening to the priest, Duggan stood with feet widespread, firmly planted, both his hands slipped into his rear pockets. The stance pulled his open jacket aside, revealing a sturdy chest and hollow belly. Through the thin cotton of his right shirtfront she saw the dim image of a nipple. His other was hidden behind a breast pocket pressed flat against his chest. Father Waldron gestured, and Joseph Duggan's head swerved to follow the pointing finger. His profile was startlingly attractive, and she wondered why, for he had the kind of face that would still look seventeen when he was fifty, a vernal combination of features contrasting oddly with his physically fit five-feet-ten frame and the dense whiskers that must-she was sure-require two shaves a day if he had evening appointments. His nose was slightly upturned, rather short, and his forehead unmarked by frown line or blemish. The amber lights gilded the top of his girlish locks, which fluffed out just enough to obscure his hairline and touch the perimeter of his shiny forehead. For a moment Winnie wondered if she'd ever touched the hair of a man who possessed such curls. Not that she could recall. Paul's hair was feather cut to ultimate perfection, never out of place, always blow combed away from his face and held lightly in place with hair spray. She was accustomed to Paul's fastidious ways and found the breezy natural look of Joseph Duggan's unfettered curls arresting. She'd always thought curly-haired men rather effeminate looking. But there wasn't a square inch of Jo-Jo Duggan that was effeminate. Shorter by a good two inches than most men she'd dated, shorter than Paul by at least six, he had a sturdiness that compensated for the difference in height.

Perhaps it was the stance that caused her eyes to sweep his length and linger longer than was prudent: shoulders back, chest out, athletic, self-assured and perhaps a slight bit cocky.

Or maybe she gave him the twice-over simply because he was so different. Different from Paul.

He turned, caught her studying him and flashed a smile that transformed his face into a tableau of charm. He did it so effortlessly she wondered how many hearts he'd broken with no conscious intent. He smiled more with the right side of his mouth than the left, but with every volt of candlepower his eyes possessed. He had the most beautifully matched set of eyebrows she'd ever encountered, and when the lids beneath them lowered and crinkled at the corners, his smile was devastating. Bedroom eyes, some women called such as these, with their dark spiky lashes and that killing little flicker of teasing that would probably be present were he kissing the ring of the Pope of the Holy Catholic Church!

It glittered out of the nearly closed lids now as he turned and moved closer. 'Looks as if you and I come fourth.'

'Fourth?' She jerked awake, realizing she'd been preoccupied and had missed what Father Waldron was saying.

'In the wedding procession.'

'Oh!'

'We head out when Jeanne and Larry get halfway up the aisle in front of us.'

'Yes, I know.' But she hadn't known. She'd been too busy assessing Jo-Jo Duggan to pay attention. 'We'd better get behind them, then.'

The vestibule was crowded, everyone conversing softly, when the talk was brought to a halt by the resounding chords of Lohengrin's Wedding March. The traditional song was a surprise in today's upbeat world where everything from the Beatles to John Denver was used as wedding music. The staunch fortissimo chords had a legend of power and tradition that vibrated not only through the ceiling over Winnifred Gardner's head, but right through her body.

Her head snapped up, and her eyes met those of Joseph Duggan.

'I think that's our song,' he said, offering his elbow. The grin had softened but was still on his face, disarming. 'This time you have no choice.'

Her eyes dropped down to the cream-colored sleeve of his jacket, and a queer premonition joined the body vibrations already scintillating along her nerves in time to the music. Touch him, and you're a goner. The flower girl and ring bearer were being coaxed up the aisle, then the first pair of attendants had reached the halfway spot. Winnifred looped her hand on the crook of Joseph Duggan's arm and let him lead her to the double doors.

It was disconcerting, being so drawn to a total stranger. The sleeve of his jacket was cool, but as her hand rested upon it, the warmth of his skin seeped up and made her aware of how solid his flesh was within. He stood with feet firmly planted, watching the couple ahead, waiting. Winnie was on his left, thus it was her right ringless hand resting on his elbow. She experienced a discomfiting jolt of guilt at the thought that she was glad she didn't