“When evening came we cut the cake and had a last dance and then sneaked away. To the hotel. Not this hotel, mind, but the old Southern Arms. Can you believe that name? Corny. But at the time we thought it was a fine, defiant reminder to the Yankees who came through and had to stay there. At the time it was the only hotel in Addington, and that is where we took the honeymoon suite. Of course it hadn’t been called the honeymoon suite until we booked it, but that’s what they named it then. It was on the top floor, which was only the second floor but even so it was as tall a building as we had in town barring the public buildings like the courthouse and City Hall. So anyway, we slipped away to the hotel, and our suite was all decorated and beautiful and there were flowers and bowls of fruit and some bubbly champagne that Buddy never had before, and truth to tell I never had champagne, before that night either, though I’ve drunk enough since to take a bath in.” She looked away, the movement casual in appearance although Longarm had the impression that what Jane Sproul was telling him was of considerable importance to her, never mind the seemingly easy flow of words. There was pain lying deep beneath the otherwise light tone of voice. “Buddy and me really did think I was in love with him, and I know he really did think he was in love with me. And we had the wedding of the goddamn century, didn’t we?”
“Yeah,” Longarm said. “Yeah, Janie, it for sure was the wedding of the century, wasn’t it?”
She kept her face turned away, but from the side he could see one small, bright tear rolling down across the wrinkles and the powder that marred her puffy cheeks. She pretended that she hadn’t shed it, and he pretended that he hadn’t seen it.
“Go on,” he prompted after some moments of awkward silence.
“Yeah. Right.” She sniffed. “Damn right, honey.”
Chapter 17
“It was the liquor, of course. They were drunk. For that matter so was Buddy. And I was too, at least a little bit.” Maybe She shrugged. “Nobody will ever know that, will they?”
“No,” Longarm agreed, fairly sure he was on safe ground regardless of what it was she was talking about because actions once taken can never be called back and no one will ever know what might have been but was not.
“We had a cold supper that the hotel laid out for us. Potato salad and fried squab and some cheese and hard sausages. And of course the champagne. It was nice. And Buddy wanted to do things right. Me, I wanted to rip his pants down around his ankles and get to tasting the thing that interested me most, but Buddy wanted to do everything all dignified and proper. And he kept saying that we had all the rest of our lives for that. Hell What a laugh that turned out to be, sweetie.”
“What hap …?”
“You know what a shivaree is, honey?”
“Of course. A bunch of lunatics making noise and raising a ruckus so a pair of newlyweds can’t ignore them and jump into bed. O’ course as I understand it the original idea was for the party-goers t’ wait a while an’ then demand t’ see the bed sheets so they could look for the red stain that’d prove first that the groom was man enough to bust his bride’s cherry an’ second that the girl was a virgin an’ still had her cherry there t’ break.”
“Is that so? Damned if I ever knew that part of it, sweetie. Around here a shivaree is all like the first thing you said. Hell-‘ raising and meanness and a way to bother the new married couple.”
“That’s what it’s mostly turned into. Wasn’t that way t’ begin with.”
“I wish it’d been that way here. No, I don’t … hell, I don’t know what I wish. I only know the way it turned out. Maybe it would have worked. Maybe not. We’ll never know that, will we?”
“No, you won’t,” he assured her.
“Anyway, honey, around here a shivaree is the mean and stupid kind. And those boys were pretty much drunk, like I said. Upstairs in the hotel Buddy and me had our supper and were about to crawl in the sack. Finally. I mean, I was hot and ready. I was running juice down below my knees from thinking about getting that big ol’ thing inside me. And I know Buddy was so worked up he was about to bust. Hell, I was afraid he was going to spend it all in his drawers and not have any left over for me if he didn’t hurry up and get his clothes off.
“I hurried through the meal as fast as he’d let me and went into the bedroom to put on something pretty that he could turn around and take right back off me. You know?”
“I know,” Longarm said as obviously she wanted him to contribute something to the conversation.
“I got my gown off and my fluffy night dress on, cut real low so it showed my tits. I opened the door to call Buddy in and tell him it was time he should screw my ass off. Or anyplace else he wanted to stick it. And about that time the stupid shivaree crowd showed up.”
“They got into the room?”
“Oh, hell no. They were outside. But they were loud and calling out all sorts of comments. You know. Saying things they were drunk enough to think were funny. And Buddy was drunk enough to feel insulted. Maybe if it hadn’t been for the liquor and the champagne …” She sighed once more, and now the tears were flowing freely.
Longarm kept his mouth shut. He didn’t think this was any time for him to be intruding on her memories.
“They were our friends. That is the worst thing about it, don’t you see. They were all our friends. But they were drunk and they were loud and they were insulting. Not that they meant to be insulting. But they were. And Buddy was so … sensitive. So protective of me. He thought I was a real lady, don’t you see. He thought I was a virgin and shouldn’t be hearing the coarse, awful things they were saying in the shivaree. Sex talk. You know.”
He nodded, but she did not see. She was still looking away although she no longer tried to keep her tears a secret. There was no way she could have done that in any case. She was crying very hard now and very openly.
“Buddy got mad. He opened the window out onto the balcony and cussed them. Of course that only got them worked up all the more. And then someone … I don’t know who it was … got the idea that they should all climb up onto the balcony so they could peek into the bedroom windows. Buddy was furious about that. But some of the drunks started climbing up the porch-roof supports and over the railing onto the balcony while others down below were beating on pots and clanging cowbells and ringing angle irons and the like. I remember hearing a voice call out that Buddy should share, that there was enough to go around and they should all have a piece of what he had. I … I think I recognized the voice. I think it was one of the boys I’d been with before. But I couldn’t swear to that. Not that it makes any difference, I suppose. But,” she shuddered, “I think it was Wil Meyers.” She paused a moment.
“Wil was the … third, was it? Third or maybe fourth boy I screwed. Randy was the first, then …” She shook her head. “I think the voice was Wil’s.”
“Uh-huh.”
“And some of the others laughed and thought that was funny. Buddy didn’t think so. Not at all. And by then some of the boys were climbing onto the balcony. Buddy jumped out the window and grabbed hold of someone … Jeremy Baker, I think that was … and threw him off the balcony onto the crowd below. Everybody thought that was the funniest thing ever. Then Buddy threw someone else off. I don’t recall who that would have been. And that’s when it all started to go really bad.”
Longarm said nothing, waiting.
“Buddy ran to where Wallace Tatlinger was trying to get over the rail. He punched him in the face. Buddy punched Wallace, that is. And Wallace lost his grip on the rail and fell backward off the balcony. He hit a hitching rail on the street below. Hit right in the small of his back. It was just terrible luck, that’s all. He broke his back. Wallace never walked again, not a step. He died, oh, three or four years ago, I think it was. And in all that time he never walked another step nor felt a thing from his waist on down.