throat. Please, oh please, Jonathan, she wished silently. The simple wish encompassed countless hopes. If only he would know them.
Aaron, too, had taken pains with his preparations. He'd worked to smooth his curly hair until it lay thick and clean around his smooth-shaven face. He wore his worsted Sunday suit and a white shirt with a crisp, starched collar buttoned tightly onto the neckband. A black bow tie was giving him trouble now as he stood in the kitchen by the wall mirror above the sink. But he managed it finally and hoped the effort wouldn't prove fruitless, that his appearance would speak for itself, telling Pris that he'd made a special effort for her.
He was splashing bay rum on his face when a golden re- flection in the mirror stopped his hands in midair. Mary had rounded the corner from the steps and was coming into the kitchen. Her path held her in his mirror until she swerved toward the washtub on his right. She had come up near and behind him and bent down to squeeze the cloth from Jonathan's bathwater. He turned and looked down at her bending figure and saw the honey-colored curls that fell on each side of her neck. The top three buttons of her dress were unbuttoned, and he saw the white cotton of a garment on her back beneath it. She seemed to be bending down a long time over the tub, and he continued staring at the back of her neck.
She straightened then and turned to face him, and the bay rum and lavender all mixed in the air between them, and it was heady as warm spring wine. She saw his tanned skin redden slightly above the white collar. His russet hair glistened, and as she looked up at it, one unruly curl sprang loose onto his forehead. His brow shone. His blue eyes took in the details of her high, pink cheekbones and shiny lips. Her hair did not have the usual part down the center, but was skimmed back tightly, clearing her face before it and giving it an open look. Behind the yellow lace that ran across the top of her dress he saw without glancing down that her breathing was quick.
They had each prepared themselves for someone else. Yet, as they stood facing each other in perfection, a confusion of feelings made them glad they pleased each other. 'I couldn't reach the last buttons,' she said. Her eyes dropped as she turned her back to him. He buttoned them for her without touching her skin, but the fluttering touch of the dress on her back raised goosebumps on her arms.
They heard Jonathan whistling his way up the walk then, and Aaron turned quickly to put away the bottle of bay rum underneath the sink. Mary went to the front room closet to find her coat in the small space there. She heard the screen door slam as Jonathan came in, but she stayed where she was, in the darkening room, because the light in the kitchen might reveal her agitated state. She heard the clink of the washtub handles as the two men lifted it to carry it outside.
Jonathan said, 'What's the matter with your hand, Aaron?' and Mary glimpsed them taking the tub out the doorway, a wincing expression on Aaron's face. 'Just a bit tender, that's all. Seems I got softer than a patty- cake over the winter.' 'Why don't you have Mary rub a little of that ointment on them that she gets from the Raleigh man? That'll fix 'em up in no time.' 'Aw, no, they'll be fine. Just gotta toughen 'em up a little, that's all.'
But Jonathan was coming back inside as he said, 'Mary, get that ointment you keep for-' And there his words died. She had come out of the dimness of the front room into the kitchen light. Her coat was folded over one arm, and she stood very still as Jonathan stared hard at her. Behind him, Aaron stared, too.
Jonathan broke the silence. 'Why, Mary, I didn't know you'd want me to dress up. You should've told me.' He always wore his blue cambrics to the hall, but tonight he wished he'd dressed better because she sure looked fine.
He hadn't said she looked good, or in any way noted the effort she'd made for him tonight. Her obvious failure to elicit his admiration made her feel suddenly quite foolish and Aaron saw the reaction parade across her face. He bit his lip to keep from paying the compliment her husband should have voiced. 'That's okay, Jonathan. You look just fine.' 'Could you rub some of that ointment on Aaron's hand, Mary? I got the wagon hitched up again, but I'll go get the mare on the buggy while you two get his hands fixed up.' He went around Aaron, slamming the screen door behind him.
Mary jerked into action as it banged, and crossed over to lay her coat on the back of a kitchen chair. She found the ointment in a tin under the sink and took the cover off and set it on the table. Aaron still stood just inside the door. She scooped some of the ointment into her cupped fingers and stood waiting. He came over in front of her and extended one hand toward her. He could have taken the ointment and rubbed it on by himself, but instead he gave the hand to her and they both looked down at it self-consciously before she reached out and took it, laying it palm-up on hers. He relaxed his fingers, and she saw tender flesh where blisters had newly broken. She had a sudden, compulsive urge to lower her lips to the spot and, in doing so, heal it. But instead, she touched it with the ointment, then rubbed her flat palm across his, working it in. He kept his hand lax, fingers gently curled upward. He watched small fingers play over his aching flesh as she massaged the hand, curling her own fingers around his thumb, then around the butt of his hand.
When she'd finished his left hand, she reached to the jar to bring up more ointment from it, and the process was re- peated with his right. They both kept their eyes on the hand being worked between them, and maybe it took a little longer than it needed to, for the ointment had disappeared before Mary's fingers slid back toward his wrist, then to his finger- tips one last time. He realized they would be gone in an in- stant, and he gently and firmly closed his hand around hers, stopping it in its final pass. It stung, but he welcomed the pain of it. They just stood there with the surging realization of what this handclasp revealed, and there was no way their eyes could meet. He opened his hand, but hers lingered where it was, resting lightly atop his. He could feel the warmth of her flesh burning the tender skin of his own where the sore was.
And suddenly she didn't feel foolish anymore.
This is Mary, Aaron thought, and she's more than my friend. Just then, she moved away from him, turning to re- trieve the cover of the tin and screw it back on. When she had put it away again under the sink and washed the salve from her hands, she turned to find Aaron holding her coat for her. She slipped her arms in, then reached to lift the curls off her neck to free them of the coat collar. Her action stirred the scent of lavender and bared the back of her neck once again to the man who stood behind her. The ointment on his hands kept him from caressing her shoulders where he had lowered her coat, and he held it gingerly to keep the ointment from soiling it.
She was, in that instant, a thing that he must never soil.
Abruptly he turned, leaving the kitchen. She leaned over to lower the wick and blow out the kerosene lamp on the table. When she straightened, he had gone out the door, and she followed him after quickly pressing her hands to her cheeks, scolding herself for their heat. When she came into the yard, Aaron had already left in the buggy, and Jonathan was waiting on the buckboard.
6
Aaron tried to concentrate on Pris as he drove the short distance west. But the trot to her place was too short to give him time to dispel the image of a yellow-clad girl that filled his mind. Had it really been Mary? Mary, who had been there in his house for seven years? Mary, with her child-wo- man's body, her expression of openness glowing up at him from a face that seemed brand new, hair swept up from that face, fastened in a knot of flowing curls like a schoolgirl's, cheeks flushed pink, lips shining, and tiny hands massaging not only his skin but the blood that flowed within him, sending it coursing to his head and heart like a spring catar- act?
Sweet Jesus, had it been Mary?
Aaron reached the Volence driveway in a state of agitation. With an effort he forced himself to a semblance of calm be- fore he reached the house. The door was closed, but the light was bright inside. There'd still be time for Pris to change clothes if she needed to, and they'd get to the hall in good time.
He could hear from inside that someone was playing the organ again in the living room. That must be why nobody'd heard his rig pull into the yard. When he knocked, the organ music stopped and Cora opened the door to him.
Cora had a smile that was as close to smug as any he'd ever seen. 'Evening, Cora. Is Pris here?' he asked. 'She sure ain't. She's gone off to the Bohemian Hall with Willy Michalek. Figgered you woulda seen 'em ride by your place about twenty minutes ago.'
But twenty minutes ago he'd been standing in the kitchen with his hand inside of Mary's, and he hadn't noticed any- thing else. Why hadn't Jonathan seen the rig and said something? He must have been in the lean-to
