“Oh, the rodeo grounds, I guess. I didn’t have nothing definite in mind. I just thought we ought to get Mrs. Carpenter away from her books for a while.”
Patsy felt she disliked him more than any person she had ever known. He was arrogant and irritating when he was being pleasant, but when he was being unpleasant, even slightly, he was terrifying. She felt she had rather eat a fair amount of crow than risk making him angry again.
“Arizona ain’t got many crooks,” he said. “Nothin’ much’ll get stolen.”
He seemed to derive a great deal of amusement from the way she huddled over her knees clutching her bathrobe. He drew his foot back and rubbed his other shin with it.
“Hurt my toe, kicking that book,” he said.
“I’m glad. This strange farce is all your doing and I’m glad you aren’t going to come out of it completely unscathed.”
“Ain’t the kind of scar I was hoping for,” he said. They passed his motel, the colored waters still spurting high behind the ornamental palms. Soon they were approaching the darkened rodeo grounds.
“Everybody here’s probably asleep,” Sonny said. “Let’s go out in the arena.”
“I find this exceedingly bizarre,” Patsy said.
The young man named Coon got out and opened a gate and got back in and drove them through the entranceway to the arena. He seemed to find it bizarre too, and a little nerve-racking. He cut off his lights and kept glancing at the bleachers. They proceeded slowly out into the arena, lit only by the desert moonlight. The bleachers were dark bulks. Patsy was feeling scared again; her legs were trembling and she hugged her knees to keep them still Sonny was fumbling in the pile of junk, clothes, and equipment that littered one side of the hearse. When they reached the middle of the arena Coon stopped the hearse.
“Turn on the goddamn lights,” Sonny said. “The inside lights. We ain’t botherin’ nobody but Patsy, and we got her too buffaloed to yell.”
“You better be polite,” she said. “I’m not too friendly with you just now and I may yell any second.”
“When you start yelling, that’s when we’ll be leaving,” Sonny said. “Knew I had a piggin’ string here somewhere. This hearse is like Fibber McGee’s closet. Let’s get out and stretch our legs.”
He opened the doors and got out, an old towel and a short piece of rope in his hand. “I don’t want to get out,” Patsy said, still hugging her knees. “This is not my idea of a good place to be this time of night.”
“Aw, come on,” he said. “I don’t want to drag you out. It would just embarrass you and Coon both.”
Patsy changed her mind. He sounded good-tempered, but it was clear he meant for her to get out, and he had handled her twice already, as easily as an experienced mother handles a child that doesn’t want to be diapered. Her best bet was to keep him in a good humor, she decided.
“Okay,” she said. “If you insist, Mr. Shanks.”
She kept the bathrobe tucked about her, and he helped her down. “Just stay in the car, Coon,” he said and walked a few steps away from the hearse and squatted down. “If you’ll just have a seat this won’t take a minute,” he said.
“You’re really out of your mind,” Patsy said. “Have a seat where?”
“Right here on god’s earth,” Sonny said.
Patsy sighed and squatted down a little distance from him, but she was nervous and lost her balance and sat down. When she did Sonny grabbed her ankles, scaring her out of her wits again. She would have screamed if she hadn’t remembered what he had said about breaking her jaw. But Sonny was talking soothingly, as he might to a frightened animal.
“Just take it easy now,” he said. “Not what you think at all.” He crossed her ankles and began to wrap the old towel around them. Patsy was shaking, but she didn’t say anything. She felt quite speechless. When he had wrapped the towel around her ankles he wrapped the short rope around them too, over the towel, pulled it tight, and tied it.
“I brought the towel so you wouldn’t get no rope burn,” he explained.
“Thanks,” Patsy said. She was becoming not quite so scared as it dawned on her that what he had in mind was not ravishment but something in the nature of a crude practical joke. Sitting in the sandy arena made her feel very undignified, but better indignity than a broken jaw.
“Now,” Sonny said, squatting in front of her. “You know what this demonstrates, honey?”
“I’m afraid I don’t,” she said in a shaky voice.
“Quit shaking,” he said. “I told you not to be scared. Ain’t nothing more gonna happen. I’m just gonna drive off and leave you here. Probably be the last we’ll see of one another for a while.”
“I must say I hope so,” Patsy said.
Sonny chuckled good-naturedly. “Yeah, I bet you do hope so,” he said. “What it demonstrates is that you can’t never tell what might happen. I bet when you was primping for the party you never thought you’d finish off the evenin’ hogtied in the rodeo pens.”
“No,” Patsy said. “The possibility never occurred to me.” Sonny leaned down and pulled at the knot again and she smelled bourbon on his breath.
“Never occurred to me, neither,” he said. “I was really kinda countin’ on making up to you, if you want to know the truth. We might have had a fling, if we’d gone about things right. But one of us screwed up, don’t matter which one, and now we ain’t never gonna have a fling, I don’t guess.”
“Pity,” she said, tense, wishing he would just go.
“Sure is a pity,” he said. “I could get killed any old year now and that’ll be one beautiful memory won’t neither of us ever have. I’m kinda sweet to girls, when I want to be. And I always figure the more you have, the more you have, you know.”
“I thought you were going,” Patsy said.
Sonny laughed a quick deep laugh. “I am,” he said, and as he stepped past, ruffled her hair playfully.
“If you can’t get that knot untied, just yell,” he said. “Lots of folks sleeping around here. Somebody’ll untie you and see you get home.”
In a moment she heard the hearse’s doors shut and a warm puff of exhaust blew over her, followed by a small cloud of dust as Coon shot the hearse forward too quickly in the loose dirt. It became very quiet, no sound but that of the departing car. Then she heard the clank of the aluminum gate as Coon shut it, and then the sound of the hearse accelerating as it left the grounds. Then no sound at all. If there were animals around they were apparently asleep. Patsy bent forward and discovered to her chagrin that she simply could not untie the rope from around her ankles. She couldn’t see it, to begin with, and Shanks had pulled the knot so hard that the rope felt as hard and tight as iron. She tried to wiggle her feet out, but it didn’t work and just got her gritty. There was nothing to do but yell—only what to yell? It was going to be humiliating to be found like she was. The arena was huge and dark, though the sky overhead was bright with moon. The thought of a sudden noise was frightening, even though she was going to be the one to make it. There might be bulls sleeping nearby, for all she knew. It was both vexing and scary.
“Help,” she said, so hesitantly and quietly that she could barely hear it herself. No answer. “Oh, shit!” she said, feeling like crying. Then, struck with inspiration, she yelled—not “Oh, shit!” but “Oh, hell!” as loudly as she could bring herself to. It was not very loud, but it was adequate. Almost immediately a flashlight began to bob around near the entrance to the arena.
“It’s me,” she yelled, encouraged. “Over here.”
Soon the flashlight began a cautious approach. “Here, here,” she said, to give its owner confidence. It approached to within several yards, flickered nervously over her, and quickly withdrew, to shine incongruously into the dirt several yards away.
“Who-all’s there?” a man’s voice asked.
“Just me,” Patsy said. “Please don’t be scared. I’m a very harmless maiden in distress. A sort of maniac brought me here and tied me up. It would
be very Christian of you to untie me.”
The flashlight zeroed in on her again and then came nearer, followed by the man who held it, a young bulldogger from Idaho. His name was Clint Brink and he was accompanied by his properly pajamaed sweetheart, also from Idaho. They had been spending the night in a sleeping bag in one of the bucking chutes.
“I know I’m a surprising sight,” Patsy said, “but don’t worry. I’m not a trap or anything.”
“Goddamn,” the boy said. “How come you to be out here?”
“I doubt I could make it very clear to you. Could you just untie me? Sonny Shanks tied me up more or less on a whim. I believe he’s a well-known cowboy.”
“Oh,” the young man said, as if that made the phenomenon quite comprehensible.
“Hon, I’m scared,” the girl friend said, peeking hostilely at Patsy from over his shoulder.
Clint Brink squatted down at her ankles, very conscious that Patsy’s legs were bare and that his girl was with him. He pointed the flashlight irrelevantly out into the arena and peered through the darkness at the rope.
“Couldn’t you just cut it?” Patsy asked, but as she asked he jerked expertly a time or two and the knot came loose.
“No use ruining a good piggin’ string,” he said, happy to be able to be practical in such a situation.
Patsy got up and straightened her gown and robe, brushing off as much sand as possible. It occurred to her that Pete and Boots must be somewhere around, and when she asked Clint Brink he seemed relieved that she knew them and said they would show her the way to the trailer. His girl hung on to his arm as they walked out of the arena. Patsy kept well back, walking on tiptoe most of the way, worried that she might step on broken glass.
At the chutes the young man courteously pointed her to the trailer and handed her the flashlight. “I’ll get it from Pete,” he said.
She thanked him profusely and he and his girl went back to their sleeping bag, speculating in whispers about it all.
When she got to the trailer it was quite dark and she tapped gently on the door. “Pete,” she said. She had to rap very loudly before he answered.
“Yeah?”
“I’m afraid it’s me. Patsy Carpenter.”
In a minute the inside door opened and Pete appeared behind the screen, holding a sheet bunched in front of him.
“My lord,” he said.
“I’m so sorry. I hate to wake people. I got into a strange predicament and thought maybe you could help me get home.”
“Minute,” he said. “I’ll get dressed.”
“Please don’t wake Boots, if I haven’t already. I’m very embarrassed to be such a bother.”
“Boots ain’t very wakable,” he said and shut the door.
She sat down on the narrow aluminum steps, feeling very foolish and out of place. In a moment the door pressed against her back—it was Pete coming out. He stepped down and stretched, his shirt on but not buttoned.
“I know this is incredible,” she said. “I really don’t fit in the rodeo world.”
“If I was to guess,” he said, “I’d guess all this come about because you went to Sonny’s party.”
“Right. If you understand it or him I’d appreciate an explanation. I went to the party and he followed me home and sort of made a pass. I suppose that’s reasonably clear, but then when I got mad at him he simply carried me off. He didn’t really hurt me, but he tied my feet with some kind of rope and left me out there in the middle of the arena. A young man named Brink untied me. Does that make sense to you?”
“Well, it sounds like Sonny. Hop in the Thunderbird. I’ll run you home.”
She was glad to be in the car, hidden from people. There was an empty beer can on the floorboard under her feet, and she nervously rolled it back and forth with one foot. The inside of the car smelled of beer and leather and dried horse sweat, from the bridles and halters Boots kept in the back. Pete had difficulty fitting himself under the wheel.
“It’s like driving a sardine can,” he said.
“I would get a taxi, if there were a place where I could call one.”
“No, I’ll run you home. Sonny might still be lurking around. Where’s Jim?”
“I left him at the party. I guess that was my mistake.
“Eleanor Guthrie was there,” she added. “That’s why Jim was so eager to stay. What in god’s name does she see in that man?”
Pete shrugged. He was driving slowly, his face still a little puffy from sleep. “Don’t know the lady,” he said. “I guess women see something in him.”
There was a note of flat undisguised sadness in the way he said the last sentence, a sadness so noticeable that it made Patsy look at him more closely than she had. He wore a long-sleeved shirt and had not got one of the sleeves buttoned, so that the cuff hung awkwardly off his wrist. She wished he would button it and had an impulse to reach over and do it for him, but she didn’t.
He glanced at her sharply, as if he had realized he had said too much. Patsy was huddled in the seat in her bathrobe, like a child that was up past her bedtime. Her look was so open that he relaxed a little.
“My first wife seen somethin’ in him,” he said. “That’s the story of me and Sonny, but don’t go spreadin’ it around. She wasn’t no more the type to take to him than you’d think Eleanor Guthrie would be. Even less. Women are hard to tell about.”
He stopped talking, as though to close off a morass of memories that he had floundered in too many times. Patsy was disappointed but didn’t show it. She had begun to feel secure and comfortable and a little lightheaded and would have liked to chatter about Sonny and probe his psychology, but it was clearly not the sort of thing that Pete would enjoy.
“I’m sandy,” she said. “Another thing he did that infuriated me was that he drove off and left the door to our motel room open. I was afraid to blast him for it. He acted as if he might hit me.
“Do you think he would have?” she asked. “I don’t know anything about such men.”
“Sonny? Sure.”
There was no hearse at the motel, and the door to their room was still open. “Please come in a minute, until I see if anything’s gone,” she said.
Pete got out and followed her into the room, but he was nervous. The sight of her made him nervous—the flash of her calves as she went through the door, and the way she tossed her hair back from her face. He didn’t like being susceptible to anyone but Boots and knew that Patsy was someone he would do just as well to avoid.
“The bastard,” she said, going over to pick up the Gibbon. “Now my book’s all crumpled.”
Pete stood awkwardly, just inside the door, watching her as she moved rapidly around the room. She peered vaguely at things, as if to try and remember what should be where.
“It was kind of black humor, you know,” she said, looking with relief at Jim’s pile of cameras. But then she looked at Pete and realized he didn’t know. It was on her tongue to mention novelists’ names, but he wouldn’t know them either and her remark suddenly made her feel shallow and inconsiderate. He had got out of bed to bring her home, and what right had she to go talking over his head?
“I guess I’m still nervous,” she said, peeping in the closet. “This sort of thing doesn’t happen to me every night. In fact, nothing remotely like this has ever happened to me. You don’t suppose he’ll come back, do you?”
“No, he probably went on back to the party,” Pete said. “Might have been someone else there he was interested in.”
“No, just me,” Patsy said and blushed immediately when she realized how vain it sounded.
Pete sighed and moved restlessly in the doorway, neither coming in nor going out. “I guess I could go by and beat hell out of him,” he said.
“What?” Patsy said, very surprised. “What do you mean? There’s no need to do that. He didn’t really hurt me.”
“No, but he’s got it coming,” Pete said. He was clearly on the horns of a dilemma, and his restlessness was be
ginning to make Patsy uncomfortable.
“Please don’t,” she said. “I don’t like things like that. Fighting. There’s no point in beating him up just because he’s slightly crazy. It’s like those people hitting Jim. Besides, it’s nothing to do with you—”
She stopped, confused. She had been going to remind him that it was not his place, that Jim was the one who would be obliged to defend her honor, if it came to that. But Jim fighting Sonny was inconceivable. Not that he lacked courage—it was just inconceivable. Pete fighting him was conceivable. It was frightening to think of, but it was conceivable. What she knew for certain was that she didn’t want to be involved in it in any way.
“No point tonight, I guess,” he said. “I’m too sleepy and he’s probably pilled up a mile high. I better get home.”
She followed him out and thanked him again, and he turned and rested his elbows on the open door of the Thunderbird for a minute, rubbing his eyes with one hand.
“Poor man,” she said. “You seem to be my guardian angel lately. I’m afraid I’m a very inconvenient person to guard.”
Pete looked up at her. She was standing on the sidewalk, her hands in the pockets of the white bathrobe, with a foot of green nightgown showing underneath it. She looked a little moody, but she did not look like an inconvenient or difficult person to guard. She looked lovely. He told her to be careful, eased back under the wheel, and missed her a little as he drove home.
Patsy showered the grit off herself, feeling very keyed up and wide awake. She had begun to worry a little about Jim and contemplated calling the party, but that would merely announce that she was back again, easy prey. It was not really likely that Jim would come to harm, so she didn’t call. She made sure the door was really locked and turned off the light and pulled the bedsheet up under her chin. It had been an incredible evening. Grown men had looked at her, and that was very unusual. She was used to being ogled at student parties, but grown men were different. Mr. Percy, in his friendly way, had clearly admired her—so had Sonny, although it was strictly a disadvantage to be admired as he admired. And Pete Tatum had looked at her very strangely, particularly as he was about to leave, when he was leaning on the car door. She had no experience at reading looks, but his had made her uncertain. The evening had made her uncertain. She wanted to go away and be by herself. It was all she could do to cope with being wanted by Jim, her own husband. She looked out the window at the pale light on the street, wishing she were in Houston.
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