Front Page Affair by Radha Vatsal Page A

bad,” he murmured, glancing over her notes. “I can do something with this.” He looked up. “You’ll speak to a third party tomorrow?”
    â€œYes, Mr. Flanagan. First thing.” Kitty planned to telephone Mrs. Clements to set up an appointment.
    â€œAll right then. You’re free to report to Miss Busby.”
    But the Ladies’ Page editor still seemed miffed by Kitty’s disloyalty, and when Kitty went in, she said that all she needed was the result of this week’s home cookery contest.
    â€œDid Mr. Flanagan like your work?” Jeannie asked when Kitty returned to her desk.
    â€œI think so.” Kitty sifted through the entries and picked a recipe for breaded mutton cutlets with onion sauce. It didn’t sound too appetizing, but she was in a rush. She dropped it off on Miss Busby’s desk.
    â€œI’ll see you tomorrow, Jeannie.” Kitty left the hen coop without looking back, so she didn’t notice the typist staring after her.

Chapter Seven
    Kitty hurried home and changed into her leather boots, a split skirt, and a linen shirt. Then she telephoned Mrs. Clements before calling for her Stutz Bearcat, the sporty yellow roadster that her father had given her for her birthday. Like riding a horse, Kitty drove for pleasure. She went downstairs, hopped into her car, and covered the distance to Durland’s Academy on the west side of Central Park at top speed, only to find Amanda Vanderwell already mounted on Lucky Number 7, waiting for her.
    â€œSorry I’m late.” Kitty parked the car. A lad brought Damsel forward, and she hoisted herself into the saddle. Kitty and Amanda had met the previous summer and struck up a conversation over the rose garden plantings at the Botanical Gardens. Kitty had been dazzled by Amanda’s beauty and effortless confidence; what Amanda admired in her had been less obvious—perhaps it was Kitty’s freedom to move about the city, which was so foreign to Amanda’s rarified and tightly controlled experience of New York, although the Vanderwells and their set had been on the island for generations.
    â€œI hope you have a good excuse.” Amanda flicked Lucky with her crop, and the horse trotted along with Amanda poised elegantly sidesaddle.
    â€œWork,” Kitty said, following a few paces behind, acutely aware, as always, how awkward she appeared in comparison astride on Damsel. But Mr. Weeks insisted. It was safer to ride in the mannish style, he said, for both horse and equestrienne.
    â€œI don’t know why you carry on with that nonsense.” Amanda turned and raised an eyebrow behind her veil, but her lips parted in a smile. Coppery hair glinted from below her hat.
    â€œHow was your weekend?” Kitty asked as they headed toward the bridle paths that crisscrossed the park.
    â€œLovely.” Amanda shrugged. “As was to be expected. Did you know that this was the first big party the Astors have held since Colonel Astor drowned on the Titanic ? And then we found out about what happened to Mr. Morgan, and I can tell you, it gave everyone quite a scare. But”—a roaring sound from one of the automobile mowers trimming the lawns in the distance distracted her—“I did have a fascinating time at Saturday’s dinner.”
    â€œDid you meet someone?” Kitty grinned at her friend. Amanda had no shortage of beaus, all of whom she found some reason to reject sooner or later.
    â€œNot in the way you’re thinking, naughty girl.” Amanda laughed. “I was seated next to the most intriguing little man though, one of those newfangled psychoanalyst fellows. He regaled us with one story after another, the best of which was that the kaiser started the war in order to win his mother’s approval.”
    â€œReally?”
    â€œOh yes. Of course, the kaiser, King George, and Tsar Nicholas of Russia are all cousins, related through their grandmama, Queen