JOHNTOWN, TENN.
413
her confusion, she was aware of as incongruous to
his
size. "Dh,"
she cried out, "oh, I'm so sorry!"
Then she saw that, despite blue serge and white shirt, and
no bear-skin, the man was the man of the pick-up truck, and he was
looking right at her.
"Dh, I'm sorry," she repeated, more flustered.
"Well, lady," he said, and his bright blue glance was flickering
on her, "you just be sorry to your little heart's content. But- " and
the bright glance was flickering all over her, plucking, "- I'm not.
And don't aim to be."
She wasn't wearing any low-neck dress, even if spring had just
begun to come on, but his eyes, she knew, were looking right there
just as though she did have on one. And then, as she recognized that
fact, it was as shameful as though right there in broad daylight he
had snapped off a button and run his hand in. He was grinning at
her, just like he had, and didn't intend to take it out quick. But
that wasn't the shameful thing. The shameful thing was that, even
that second in the midst of being ashamed, she was happy there was
something there worth his trouble to be putting his hand on. She
felt full-and in a funny way, almost sleepy.
It
was that feeling that made her have to say "What-I beg
your pardon?" when he said something she hadn't heard a word of.
"I said," he said, "you look like you're going to church. All
dressed up."
She nodded.
"Well," he said, "would it discombobulate or embarrass you if
I walked you as far as the door?"
If
he had been a young man, near her own age, looking down
at her like that, where he had looked, and then asking her to walk
to church, she might very well have refused him curtly, as fresh.
But this man was, she knew, as old as her father, and she was say–
ing that deep down in herself,
why, he's old as my father,
and mixed
with that, too, was a sudden, quickly blacked-out vision of her
father's waxy hand reaching for the bottle of cough medicine, or some
other God-damned thing.
Some other God-damned thing-yes,
those words had actually
been in her, as part of the vision, and it was the awareness of their
