"Now, my goodness," I said. "My goodness gracious! You don't need to talk that way. I wouldn't stand by an' watch Rose get hurt."
"Well, you'd better not! That's all I've got to say! You'd just better not!"
I started eating, with Myra shooting me a suspicious look now and then. After a while, I looked up and said I'd just thought of something else about Rose. Suppose Tom came home, after! left and wouldn't be around to protect her.
"He's bound to be pretty bad off," I said. "Stayin' away so long, he'll probably be twice as drunk and mean as he usually is. Makes me plumb shiver to think what he might do to Rose."
"Well…" Myra hesitated, studying over what I'd said and not finding anything to fault me for. "Well, I don't suppose it would look right for you to stay all night at the house. But-"
"Naw, I couldn't do that! I sure couldn't do that," I said. "Anyways, we don't know for sure when Tom's comin' home. Might be gone, two, three days. All we know is he's gonna be plenty hard to get along with when he does get back."
Myra fumed and frowned, and said I should have done something about Tom long ago, and Rose wouldn't be in this position now. I said she was probably right, and it was just too bad we couldn't think of some way to give Rose some protection.
"Let's see," I said. "I wonder maybe if we could get her a watchdog, or-"
"You fool! Tom would kill it in a minute! He's killed every dog they ever had!"
"Mmm-hmm," I said. "God-dang if I didn't forget about that. Well, let's see, now. I'd know of just the thing if Rose was a different kind of person. More nervy, you know, instead of so meek and mild. But that's the way she is, so it just wouldn't do no good."
"What wouldn't do no good! What are you talking about now?"
"Why, a gun," I said. "You know, one of them things you shoot with. But it sure wouldn't do no good with Rose, her bein' scared of her own shadder, so-"
"That's it!" Myra cut in. "We'll get her a gun! She ought to have one anyway, a woman alone as much as she is."
"But what good will it do?" I said. "Rose wouldn't shoot no one to save her life."
"I'm not so sure about that-not if her life was at stake. At any rate, she could point it. Make that big brute of a husband keep away from her."
"Well, now, I just don't know about that," I said. "If you ask me-"
"I'm not asking you! I'm taking Rose out to get a gun this very day, so just finish your dinner and shut up!"
I finished eating, and went back down to my office. I rested and dozed some more, but not as good as I had in the morning. I was kind of puzzled with myself, you know, wondering why I'd wanted Rose Hauck to have a gun. Because, of course, I did want her to have one.
I tried to tell myself that it was just for her own protection, just in case someone tried to bother her. But I knew that wasn't my real reason. My real reason, I guessed, was something I hadn't quite figured out yet. It was part of something else, some plan-wishes I had for Myra and Lennie-and I hadn't quite figured out what they were either.
Maybe it don't seem to make sense for a fella to be doing things for a reason that he don't know about. But I reckon I've been doing it most of my life. The reason I went to see Ken Lacey, for example, wasn't the one I let on that it was. I'd done it because I had a plan for him-and you've seen what that plan was. But I didn't know it at the time I'd called on him.
I'd had kind of a goal, and I'd figured that a fella like Ken could be a lot of help in bringing it about. But just how I was going to use him I wasn't even halfway sure.
And it was the same situation now, with Rose and the gun. All I knew was that they probably fitted into a plan for Myra and Lennie. But I didn't have no real idea of what the plan was; I purely didn't.
Except that it was probably pretty unpleasant…
Rose got to the courthouse around four o'clock that afternoon. I was on the lookout for her, and I got her in the office for a minute before she could goon upstairs.
She was looking prettier than I'd ever seen her, which was really saying something. She said she'd slept like a goddam baby all night long, and she'd woke up laughing, thinking about that son-of-a-bitch of a Tom being dead out in the mud somewheres.
"Did I do all right when I called up this morning, honey?" she whispered. "It sounded like I was really concerned about the dirty bastard?"
"You did just fine," I said. "And looky, baby…"
I told her about the gun, how it would look like she was worried about Tom beating her up when became back-which, you see, would prove she didn't know he was dead. And she kind of hesitated for a second, giving me a quick frowny look, but she didn't argue about it.
"Whatever you say, Nick, honey. If you think it's a good idea."
"Well, it was actually Myra's," I said. "I just about had to go along with it, or it would have looked like I knew Tom wasn't coming back."
Rose nodded and said. "What the hell?", dismissing the subject. "Maybe I can take a shot at you some time, if you're not real nice to me."
"That time ain't never gonna come," I said. And I gave her a quick hug and a squeeze, and she went on up the stairs.
She and Myra went out a little later to get the gun, and stayed out until after five.
A few minutes before six, Myra called me, and I closed the office and went upstairs to supper.
Myra did most of the talking, like she always did; shutting me up whenever I said anything. About all Rose did was agree with her, putting in a word now and then about how wonderful and smart Myra was. And that was the same as usual, too. We finished eating. Myra and Rose started clearing up the dishes. Lennie looked at me to see if I was watching him- which I was, only he didn't know it-and then he made a sneak toward the door.
I cleared my throat to get Myra's attention, and jerked my head at Lennie. "How about that, honey?" I said. "You know what we agreed on."
"What?" she said. "What are you talking about now, for pity's sake?"
"About him goin' out at night," I said. "You know what he'll do, an' it just ain't a good idea with the election coming up."
Myra said, "Oh, pshaw. The boy's got to get a little air some time, doesn't he? You can't begrudge him that!"
"But we agreed that-"
"I did not! You just got me so mixed up I wasn't thinking what I was saying! Anyway Sam Gaddis is bound to be beat and you know it!"
"Well, I just don't see no use in taking chances," I said. "I-"
"Oh, shut up! Did you ever see such a man in your life, Rose? Is it any wonder that I'm half out of my mind from living with him?" Myra scowled at me, then turned to give Lennie a smile. "You go right ahead, honey. Have a good time, but don't stay out too late."
He went out, after a blubbery spiteful grin at me. Myra said I'd better go to my bedroom and stay if I couldn't make sense, which she was sure I couldn't, so that's what I did.
I stretched out on the bed, with the spread turned back so that my boots wouldn't soil it. The window was open, and I could hear the crickets singing, like they always do after a rain. Now and then a bullfrog would sound off with a loud kerrumph, like a bass drummer keeping time. Way off across town, someone was pumping water, p-plump, whish, p-plump, whish, and you could hear some mother calling her kid, "Henry Clay, oooh, Hen-ry Clay Houston! You come home now! " And the smell of fresh-washed soil was in the air, just about the nicest smell there is. And… and everything was fine.