finally the widow showed some sense. She crawdaddied out of his arms. A couple of satisfied humphs came from her as she patted herself back into place. Then she said, “Oh, goodness.”
“Yes,” he said, and his tone was exactly that of a faro dealer who knows the game ain’t straight. “Goodness is what it is.”
“Aw, for crying out loud!” I said. I pointed at hunkered Holt, then myself. “We’re sitting right here! Show us some mercy.”
My comments had a stunning effect. All the mushy stuff went up the chimney. I didn’t glance to see it, but I could feel Jack Bull staring hard at me. No one knew him better, or even as well.
“He is quite right,” Sue Lee said. “I must leave. I have to get. I better get to the house.”
“Cover your tracks in the snow, too,” I said. “You’ll be leading curious Federals right onto us.”
“Now, don’t be rude,” Jack Bull said. “You have no reason to be rude.”
I faced him after that.
“Is that so?” I asked. I could display some pesky qualities myself when forced to it. “There is a war going on everywhere but between your ears, you dumb ox.”
I guess I was more than pesky.
He kicked me square in the chest. I felt my innards bobble. The next few breaths I drew rattled and wheezed.
“Dumb ox, am I?”
Oh, he had that look for a moment there. It was not the look I most liked to see. But it passed as fast as it came.
“I’m sorry, Jake,” he said. I think he meant it. “My leg just did that on its own. There was no thought behind it.”
I rubbed and rubbed at the place where his boot had visited all on its own. It was a dull throbbing spot.
“I hear you,” I said. “I hear you. These things happen. But Holt and me ain’t dying just so you can be kissed.”
“Leave me out of this,” Holt bleated. “I ain’t even here, or nowhere near here.”
Jack Bull laughed. His eyes had a lantern glow.
“I don’t believe anyone is about to die from my kiss. In fact, she seems to be doing tolerably well.”
The widow excused herself swiftly. She got right out of there. I reckon widows feel okay about acts that some maidens might drown themselves over. Anyhow that’s the way I figured it.
When she was gone Jack Bull said, “Hey, looky here, boys.”
“Where?” I asked.
“Right here.”
There was a big lump in his britches square between where his pistols hung.
“My God,” I said. “Where’s your shame, Chiles?”
“Gone to Texas,” he said, and just uproared with lewd joy.
I couldn’t chime in.
Nothing was the same.
The chimney fire broke light across the dugout. It was a jagged illumination. The flames writhed and bounced and a deathly howl of wind blew down the chimney. It felt homey to me.
George Clyde was back. He was ruining Juanita Willard’s reputation. Often he stayed with her all night. Her family seemed to think nothing of it. If ever we won the war, it would take years to renovate our honor. Honor had come to be a frivolous virtue in practice, but it was also the one that urged us to battle.
Confusing.
“So, now,” Clyde said to Jack Bull. “You have become quite the young swain, I hear.”
“I can’t deny it.”
“You have been loose with your kisses, I hear.”
“Not as loose as I hope to be.”
“Hah, hah! I know that feeling.” Clyde, by dint of his regular berth at the Willards, seemed practically married. “What is she like?”
“Oh, she is fine. Just fine and dandy. A robust widow.”
“Those are by far the best kind,” Clyde said. “And there are getting to be plenty of them.”
This conversation seemed two-sided, so I threw in my own oar.
“She is coltish of attitude,” I said. “With an ungainly gallop of spirit.”
“Ho, ho,” went Clyde. “You are making me jealous!”
Jack Bull beamed. He chewed at a twig, his strong cheeks bulging around a smile. His skin seemed flushed to about the same degree as six chugs of popskull whiskey would do.
“Yes,” he said. “This gal is some proposition.”
“She is lowly born,” I said.
“Oh, she is. She is lowly born,” Jack Bull said happily, “but highly fascinating.”
Clyde went to giggling and said, “Leave off with it—you boys are making me so jealous.”
“I say again,” Jack Bull mused. “She is lowly born but highly fascinating.”
I felt wounded and left by the roadside.
Change was required of me.
I didn’t know if I was up to it.
Things got worse. George Clyde had Juanita Willard beg