Page:The Geranium.pdf/129

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59

he'd better not roll over with the dog after all. The women would be more or less pretty--yellow hair, fat ankles, muddy-colored eyes.

She would get supper for him in the cabin and he'd sit there eating the lumpy grits she hadn't bothered to put salt in and thinking about something big something way off--another cow, a painted house, a clean well, a farm of his own even. The woman would yowl at him for not cutting enough wood for her stove and would whine about the pain in her back. She'd sit and stare at him eating the sour grits and say he didn't have nerve enough to steal food. "You're just a damn beggar!” she'd sneer. Then he'd tell her to keep quiet. "Shut your mouth!" he'd shout, "I've taken all I'm gonna." She'd roll her eyes mocking him and laugh--"I ain't afraid er nothin' that looks like you." Then he'd push his chair behind him and head toward her. She'd snatch a knife off the table--Miss Willerton wondered what kind of a fool the woman was--and back away holding it in front of her. He'd lunge forward but she'd dart from him like a wild horse. Then they'd face each other again--their eyes brimming with hate--and sway back and forth. Miss Willerton could hear the seconds dropping on the tin roof outside. He'd dart at her again but she'd have the knife ready and would plunge it into him in an instant--Miss Willerton could stand it no longer. She