Jist Hold On

"Yes, it's me," Danny said. His voice sounded subdued and a little hurt. "You've known I was back. I've come to the house nearly every day for the past week. They always say you aren't there. The last time I came, your pap met me at the door with his shotgun."

"You know—" Marylou started to say. She put the water bucket down and shrank back into the lean-to. The trough ran most of the way across the open end of the lean-to and three cows were nuzzling into it from the outside. A couple of bales of hay were sitting more or less in the center of the open space inside the lean-to. Marylou retreated until she felt stalks of hay pricking the backs of her calves.

"I got home in time to take you to the Valentine Dance, but I heard that Hugh—"

"I thought you weren't coming home at all, Danny. I thought you'd found someone—"

"Yes, I know what you thought," Danny answered. It was cold enough that Marylou could see the puffs of smoke escaping his lips and hear the heaving of his breath. She also wasn't unaware of the bunching of Danny's fists. His knuckles were bruised and bloody.

"Danny—"

"I know it all. I beat it out of Hugh. It's not your fault."

"Danny," Marylou whimpered. Her eyes were downcast. She couldn't look at him. But it had to be finished, here and now. Nothing could be left unsaid. She was trembling, and it wasn't from the cold. "Hugh can't have told you everything, Danny. Hugh don't know everything."

Danny said nothing. He just stood there. Waiting.

Marylou didn't say anything for the longest time, either. It took her a while to say it.

"Hugh don't know. I haven't told him. I'm carrying Hugh's baby."

Silence. And when Marylou looked up, Danny was gone. Just like that. She had expected fireworks or a beating. The Carson County men were good at beating their wives. This surely was the best of excuses for a beating.

Marylou sighed and picked up the water bucket. Life would go on in Carson County. With luck Hugh would marry her. But she could never count on lifting her head in the county again. And she'd let the best man she'd ever had slip out of her life. But for now, the cattle needed three more buckets of water for the trough. Life in Carson County wasn't going to skip a beat for her convenience.

She started to move out of the lean-to, but there he was again, standing in her path.

He'd come back to beat her. Well, she deserved it.

But what was that? Danny was just standing there, his arm extended, and in his hand, a blue box. A fuzzy dark blue box. Was that velvet? She'd never actually seen velvet before.

Danny pushed the box open, and the last rays of the sun glinted on the gemstone inside.

"What—?" Further words escaped Marylou.

"This is why I went away, Marylou. But I had to stay twice as long, because Uncle Joe's threshing machine broke and I had to work until I could help make up the loss of that. I told you all of that in a letter. But, of course, Hugh never read what I really said in the letter to you."

"It's a ring," Marylou said, dumbly pointing out the obvious. "A . . . a diamond?"

"Yep, I wasn't going to give it to you until the dance. I had Valentines Day all picked out. But I had it in the wagon and decided I'd best go git it now." A tone of pride had invaded Danny's voice. "A real diamond. It's real small. But it's real. I wanted you to have something real, something of value. Something that sparkled for you as bright as you sparkle for me. And I wanted it to say that I wanted you for me."

"Oh, I'm so sorry. And now I've—" Marylou was about to break down, the full blow of what she'd done—and lost—hammering away at her. This was far worse than a beating.

"Don't be sorry none," Danny said. "I want you, and I'll take you however I can git you, if you'll take me. I figured your family would come along with the deal—although I don't know about takin' your pap; we'll have to jaw about that a while—and I don't think one mouth more or less will matter."

"I don't know what to say," Marylou said. And of course she didn't.

"Don't say nothin', Marylou. Jist hold on. Wrap your arms around me and hold on if yr' willin."

And she did just that. She dropped the bucket and opened her arms to her man and spread her legs for him as he eased her back onto the hay and united with her in a deep thrust of mutual giving and taking.