Linda Lou blinked. And then she started clucking again. "You are a truly noble soul, I must say. After everything he's done, to refuse to disparage him—"
"Oh, come on, Linda Lou," Delilah objected, and paused to blow her nose again. "Listen to yourself. What you're saying makes no sense at all. Have I ever refused to disparage Sam Fletcher before?"
Linda Lou thought about that. "Well, no. I can't say as you have."
"Of course I haven't. In fact, I've always been the one most willing to explain in detail what a low-down, mean, rotten rat he is."
"Well, yes," Linda Lou allowed, "I suppose, now you point it out, that that is true."
"You'd better believe it's true."
"And you were right," Linda Lou announced staunchly.
"No. I was wrong."
Linda Lou blinked again. "Wrong?" The word was disbelief personified.
Delilah nodded. "Yes, wrong."
Linda Lou did not take this information well. Her browless eyes were all scrunched up, her mouth pursed tight. But then her long face softened, and she looked pitying again. She started patting Delilah's hand once more. "Now, now, dear. It's going to be all right. You just need a little rest, that's all. You can take some time off from school and have a long talk with Pastor Johnson…"
Delilah batted the soothing hand away. "Stop it, Linda Lou."
Linda Lou remained undaunted. "You've been under a lot of strain, dear. Just try to—"
"There is nothing wrong with me."
"—relax. The hysterics will pass, and you'll feel much better very soon."
"I am not having hysterics."
Linda Lou shook her head. "Fine, fine, dear. Whatever you say."
The patronizing tone was too much. Delilah stood up. "Look at me, Linda Lou. Look at me real well. Do I look crazy to you?"
A terribly pained expression crossed Linda Lou's face. "Now, dear…"
"I do? I look crazy, is that what you're thinking?"
Linda Lou blinked again and looked away.
This was too much. Delilah shouted. "Nellie!"
"Yes, honey?"
"Nellie, get in here!"
"But the tea—"
"Forget the tea. In here. Now!"
Nellie flitted in. "What in the world is the matter?"
"Sit down," Delilah commanded. "There. Next to Linda Lou."
Nellie looked at Linda Lou. "Is she all right?"
Linda Lou went on looking pained, but wisely refrained from answering.
"Nellie." Delilah's tone gave clear warning. "Sit."
"All right, I'm sitting." She dropped down next to Linda Lou.
"Now," Delilah said. Two pairs of eyes watched her, wide and wary. "You two are my very dear friends, and it is my hope that you will both remain that way. But it has recently come to my attention, through personal and intimate experience—" Delilah paused, irritated no end as she watched her friends share a shudder and a significant look "—that I have been cruel and nasty and completely off-base about a certain man we all know. And you both know who I mean. I mean Sam Fletcher."
"Oh, no, you haven't been," Linda Lou protested.
"Not for a minute," Nellie declared.
"Yes." Delilah held firm. "It's true. I've misjudged him for years. But not anymore. And I've made other gross errors in behavior as well. I've been … dishonest, with myself and with everyone I care about. I've pretended for years to be less than my whole self. Because really, deep down, I'm a lot like Sam is. I've got wildness in me, just like he does, a wildness I've denied for years."
"No," Nellie breathed, as Linda Lou murmured simultaneously, "It's not so."
"It is so." Delilah looked right at Nellie. "Nellie, he asked me out the night you called two weeks ago."
Nellie gasped. "I knew it. I knew something was going on even then—"
"You were right. And I wanted to go out with him then—"
"No!"
"Yes. But I was too foolish and full of myself to admit it. He was forced to resort to desperate means to get my attention."
"The wager," Linda Lou breathed.
"Exactly. And now he has my attention."
Nellie rose up and then sat down again. "Delilah, what are you saying?"
"He asked me to marry him."
"He didn't." Linda Lou spoke with awe.
"He did. I said yes."
Nellie sputtered, "You never—"
"I did."
"Oh, my heavens!" Linda Lou put a hand to her heaving breast.
"But then, I didn't really believe in him, not deep down, and I've hurt him very deeply, I'm afraid. I'm afraid, to be honest, that he's never going to forgive me, no matter what I do…"
Nellie longed for the details. "But what happened?"
"It's too involved to explain right now."
Both women sighed in mutual disappointment.
"But the point is," Delilah went on. "I love him."
Nellie and Linda Lou gasped in unison at that.
"It's true. I love Sam Fletcher. And you can call me crazy, you can shake your heads in pity and say I should visit Pastor Johnson. You can do and say whatever you please. It doesn't matter. Because Sam Fletcher is the man for me. He's always been the man for me, whether he ever lets me near him again or not. And anyone who says anything against him will not be someone with whom I choose to associate on a regular basis. Is that understood?"
Both Nellie and Linda Lou stared at her with their mouths hanging open.
"Is that understood?" she repeated once more.
"But, honey—" Nellie began.
"But, dear—" said Linda Lou.
And then both of them fell silent at the sound of heavy, hurried footsteps on the porch. They stared past Delilah. Delilah turned just as her baby brother appeared in the open front door.
"Brendan," Delilah muttered. "What now?"
"Sis…" Brendan gulped in air. His hair was windblown, and his face was flushed. He looked like he'd just run a hard mile. "I have to talk to you!"
"Come in," she told him. "Don't just stand there. And for heaven's sake, close that door."
Brendan stepped over the threshold and shut the door as he'd been told. He nodded at the wide-eyed pair on the couch. "Ladies…"
"Good evening."
"Hello, Brendan."
"All right," Delilah cut through the pleasantries. "What's happened now?"
"It's Jared…" He eyed the women on the couch. "Sis, could we talk alone?"
"What for? Whatever it is, they'll find out soon enough anyway. This is North Magdalene. We have to face facts." Delilah approached her brother and looked at him closely. "What's this?"
"What's it look like? A black eye." He winced. "Hey. Hands off."
"You and Jared got into it?"
Brendan nodded. "He got on me for my part in you going off with Sam. And sis, he's—"
Delilah shook her head. "Jared's always been trouble looking for somewhere to happen."
"That's what I'm trying to tell you—"
"So tell me. I'm listening."
"That's what you say, and then you interrupt."
"Brendan, get to the point."
"Okay, okay. It's like this… Jared's been looking all over for Sam, swearing he's going to beat the bejesus out of him, for taking you off against your will, even though Dad has been trying to get him to see that Sam really only wants to put a ring on your finger—"
"So?"
"So Jared finally found him. Just now. Over at The Hole in the Wall. And Sam, instead of being reasonable, is acting crazy as Jared, like he was even looking for a fight himself, you know what I mean?"
Delilah's heart sank. She knew exactly why Sam was in such a troublemaking mood. "They're beating each other up," she said grimly.
"Are they ever!" Brendan, replied. "And since you went off with Sam for my sake, when I saw the trouble happening, I thought just in case you did care for Sam, I should tell you—"
But Delilah was already moving. She flew into
the kitchen and grabbed her keys from the peg there, then rushed back to the living room, shot around her dumbstruck brother and flung open the door.
As she went by, Brendan asked, "But what are you gonna do, sis?"
"I'll figure that out when the time comes." She rushed out into the twilight and slid behind the wheel of her car.
She no sooner had the door shut than Brendan was dropping into the passenger seat and Nellie and Linda Lou were piling in the back.
"What are you two doing?" Delilah demanded over her shoulder, as she pumped the pedal and turned the key.
"Well, if you love him, dear—" Linda Lou said.
Nellie finished. "We are your friends, after all."
"Things could get pretty rough," Delilah warned.
"We can take it," Nellie vowed. Her eyes were shining—just like Linda Lou's. It occurred to Delilah that this was probably more excitement than either of them normally saw in a month of Sundays.
And then there was no more time to think of Nellie and Linda Lou. The engine sputtered to life. Delilah switched on the lights and shoved it into gear. The tires squealed as she swung around. She peeled rubber down the street and almost ran into Roger McCleb who was crossing the street at the intersection of Pine and Main. Luckily, she missed Roger and made it onto Main.
She found a free space across the street from the bar, and slammed into it, missing the car in the space in front by mere inches. She was out of the car and striding across the street for the bar within seconds.
She paid no attention to whether her brother and two friends were following. Her concentration was on the double doors, on the sounds of cursing and crashing from beyond them. She thought for a moment that maybe she ought to call Sheriff Pangborn, but then she realized the odds were ten to one someone already had. He'd be there eventually—when the fighting got loud enough.
Her toe touched the sidewalk in front of the doors—and the doors burst open. From inside, unmuffled now, came the sound of a splintering table, the crashing of a chair. A loud splat followed by a man's groan.
Two locked bodies rolled out, tussled briefly at her feet, and then struggled upright and forged back in again. The doors swung shut.
"Sis," Brendan warned as he came up behind her. "This is entirely out of hand. It's no place for a woman."
"Shut up," Delilah told him. "And come on."
She put her shoulder against the door, and encountered some resistance as someone fell against it on the other side. She shoved again, harder. The door swung in. She went through.
She faced pure chaos. Swiftly, she tried to assess the situation—no mean feat, as she kept having to duck flung beer mugs and flying furniture. Still, she managed to scan the room—and spotted Jared and Sam going at it like a couple of pit bulls in the center of the fray. Both of them, at this point, looked bloody, dogged and determined, the way men get when they're evenly matched and neither of them has the good sense to give it up.
She saw her father, then, beyond them, trapped across the room from the bar where he'd probably been when the trouble broke out, trying to convince them the fight wasn't necessary, and then, when that didn't work, ordering them to take it outside.
That's what he was still shouting now. "You hooligans! You get your butts out the door! You're wreckin' my place! Get it out, get it outside now!" He kept yelling orders, with only an occasional pause to punch any fool who got close enough to make him nervous. Then he'd start in shouting again.
The situation assessed, Delilah wasted no time. She dropped to her knees and scurried to the bar. She ducked behind it just as a pool cue soared tip-first into the big mirror on the wall over the register. The mirror cracked, the way ice does on a frozen pond, in sharp splintering fingers. But miraculously, it stayed stuck to the wall while the pool cue clattered to the register counter, knocking over bottles, which shattered and spilled their contents all over the counter and down to the floor.
Delilah crept along behind the bar, trying to avoid the puddles of peppermint schnapps and orange liqueur, looking up at the underside of the bar and the counters, watching for what her father had always kept somewhere back here, since she was a child.
She found it, at last, right next to the seltzer fountain. Her father's .38 special, strapped under the bar in a tacked-up beltless holster, where he could easily yank it out whenever things got out of hand—as long as he had sense enough to stay behind the bar.
Still crouched where no flying objects could reach her, she drew the gun. She broke it open. The gun was fully loaded, just as she'd expected.
Over her head, a chair came sailing, hitting the mirror squarely and sending the splintered pieces flying.
Now, she thought resolutely, was as good a time as any.
So she rose up, quick as a cat, and leapt onto the bar. Below and all around her, the fighting continued unabated. Over by the door, she spotted Linda Lou, sticking out her foot to trip a brawler who dared to get too close. When he got up and came at her, Nellie brained him with a beer bottle. Across the room, Owen Beardsly spotted his wife. "Linda Lou!" he shouted, "My God, Linda Lou!"
"Oh, settle down, Owen!" Linda Lou advised and gave another man a shove who came flying out of the fray and got too close to her for comfort.
In the center of the floor, Sam, swaying on his feet, aimed a punch at Jared. It connected, Jared went down, and doggedly rose up once more.
"Gentlemen!" Delilah shouted, "Gentlemen! Please!"
She might as well have tried to stop a stampede with a feather duster. No one even paused to look her way.
Resigned, she aimed the gun at the big light fixture that hung over the center of the room. She fired off four shots, until each of the bulbs in the fixture was no more than splinters and dust.
Somewhere around the destruction of the third light bulb, the battling patrons ceased trading blows and dived for cover—all except for Jared and Sam, who simply stopped fighting and stared at her, their mouths hanging open.
When all four light bulbs were no more, she announced, "That's enough, gentlemen!" She was gratified to discover she had everyone's attention. "Wrap it up. This fight has reached its conclusion."
"Delilah!" said her father, scratching his head. "Delilah, you shot out the lights!"
She gave him an infinitely patient glance. "Someone had to do something."
"Well, I know that gal. But I swear I never thought I'd see the day…"
"Don't worry, I'll replace them." Slowly, around the battered barroom, the men were picking themselves up and checking themselves for damages. Delilah, too terrified that Sam might reject her to look at him, aimed a glare at her oldest brother. "And just what in the world do you think you're doing, Jared Jones?"
Jared, never known for his sweet disposition, swiped the blood out of his eyes and glared right back at her. "Sticking up for you, sis. What the hell do you think?"
A murmur of agreement went up from the crowd.
"Yeah, right on, Jared…"
"A man's gotta do what a man's gotta do—"
"Stick up for your sister, whatever it takes!"
Linda Lou cut them short. "Hush up, you roughnecks! Let Delilah talk."
The man she'd tripped turned on her. "Hey, you're the old bitch who hit me with that beer bottle—"
Near the curtain to the back room, Owen Beardsly spoke up. "You watch how you talk to my wife, mister!"
"Yes, you watch it, young man," Nellie piped up. "And she didn't hit you with that bottle anyway, that was me. Want to make something of it?"
The man muttered another insult and took a step toward Nellie.
Owen was already elbowing his way across the room. "You leave her alone. You want to fight with someone, you fight with me!"
"Don't trouble yourself, Owen!" Nellie called. "We can handle this moron!"
"Moron!" The man was furious now. "Who you callin' a moron, you old—"
It was obvious to Delilah that another brawl was in the offing. So she aimed the gun at the ce
iling and fired it again. Plaster flew and rained down. All fell silent once more.
"I have one more shot, Gentlemen," Delilah announced. "Don't make me use it."
A sea of subdued male faces stared up at her expectantly. But Delilah was aware of only one pair of eyes. She could feel those eyes watching her; she just didn't have the nerve to look into them yet.
She focused on her brother once more. "I appreciate your efforts on my behalf, Jared, but next time see me first."
Jared totally ignored her real point and took issue with the sincerity of her thankfulness for all he'd done. "Yeah, well, you don't seem too damn grateful. In fact, you don't seem grateful at all."
Oggie cut in. "And why should she be grateful, you idiot? You're beating up her fiancé!"
Jared glowered at his father. "He never said so. I asked him straight out, 'You gonna marry my sister?' and he never said yes. You heard it. You were here. He said what he and sis were gonna do was nobody's business but theirs. And when a man won't answer if he's gonna do the right thing by a woman straight out, then as far as I'm concerned, it's a done deal. He's got what he wanted, and he's out the door."
Oggie turned to Sam. "Tell him, Sam. Tell him right now. Tell him you and my little girl are walking down the aisle side by side. Shut this blockhead up, and make me the happiest old man on earth."
The time had come, Delilah knew it. She had to face Sam now. She forced herself to look at him, at his bloody face and his ice blue eyes. He was looking right at her, as she'd known he would be, staring right through her, right down into her heart.
She said to her father, to Jared, to everyone in the bar, to the town, to the whole wide world, and most of all to Sam, "Yes, we're getting married. We love each other more than anyone else can know. We've had our … difficulties, but we'll come through them, side by side." She kept looking at Sam, willing him to know, to understand, to give her one more chance to show him she was a woman he could trust forevermore. He looked back but said nothing. Her heart sank. She asked, "Aren't we, Sam?" And a pleading note crept in.
"Answer her," Oggie hissed.
"Shut up, Oggie," Sam said softly. And he started moving forward. The crowd melted out of his way, leaving a clear path to Delilah where she stood up on the bar. Sam came on, closer and closer.
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