Читать книгу Impatient Virgin - Donald Henderson Clarke - Страница 7

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Ruth was leaving for the Sarah Langley School early next day, and Myron was making his last call. They were sitting on a sofa in the front parlor. Electricity had been installed in Southington, but Ben still burned kerosene. The lamp on the curly-legged mahogany table was turned low.

“How is your Uncle?” Myron asked.

“He’s still in bed upstairs, groaning something awful. Aunt Katherine is ironing his back with a hot iron. He says it’s the only thing that does lumbago any good.”

“He’ll be all right, huh?”

“All right? He’s all right now. But all you men are babies—you like to be sick, and be looked after.”

“As if your uncle didn’t look after you!”

“Oh, he takes care of me, Uncle Ben does. And he can stand pain, like when he chopped off his toe with an ax two years ago when I was with him in our west wood lot. He joked all the way home. But just being sick, and being looked after, is different. Give Uncle Ben a little cold, and he’ll howl for Aunt Katherine and me, I’ll tell you. He’s a big baby in some ways.”

“I’m a big baby when I think about you going away to school, Ruth.”

Myron leaned over and kissed her. He slid his arm around her neck, and kissed her again. She wrapped both arms around his neck and kissed him back, long and hard. They both breathed audibly, and shivered. Suddenly, Ruth reached down and took hold of Myron’s right hand.

“Don’t,” she said.

“You’ve got such pretty legs,” he pleaded.

“They’re just like anybody’s legs,” she said, still holding his hand.

“They are not. They are the prettiest legs in the world.”

“You’d say that to any girl, I guess.”

“I wouldn’t kiss any girl but you, ever. If you never would kiss me again, I never would get kissed again. I’m just crazy about you, Ruth.”

They kissed again. After a minute or two, Ruth reached down and took hold of Myron’s right hand.

“You are awful tonight, Myron,” she said. “If you don’t stop that, I’ll have to go upstairs.”

“You’re so beautiful.”

“You’d say that to any girl.”

“I never said it to any one but you, because you are the only girl in the world.”

They kissed again. Ruth pulled Myron’s hand first from her knee and then from her blouse without missing a fraction of physical contact of lips.

“Don’t, Myron,” she whispered.

They kissed for a long time. Ruth sighed, catching her breath a little.

“Myron.”

“Yes.”

“Why do you want to see my body?”

Myron was silent.

“Would you like to?”

Myron’s voice trembled, and his voice was husky.

“I’d like to more than anything in the world.”

“Will you promise to be still, if I let you just once?”

“I promise.”

“Cross your heart?”

“Cross my heart.”

Ruth slipped aside a bit of linen.

There was the sound of the tick tock of the grandfather’s clock in the front hall. Myron just looked.

“There,” Ruth said, and restored her blouse to its original condition. Then she said brightly in a voice that sounded like a thunderclap after their previous whispers:

“Oh, won’t you have some fudge, Myron? I made it this afternoon.”

Myron jumped to his feet, too, and took a piece of fudge from a plate on the table. They looked at each other as they ate the fudge. After licking her fingers, Ruth suddenly stepped to Myron, and standing face to face with him, she pressed her lips and her body to his. A long silence followed. It was broken by Katherine’s voice from upstairs:

“Ruth! Ruth!”

Ruth heard the first call, and shoved Myron away from her. He looked dazed. Ruth ran her fingers through her hair, and smoothed down her clothing, and took a deep breath.

“Yes, Aunt,” she called in her pleasant contralto.

“I’m sorry,” Katherine called, “but it’s time for you to come upstairs. You have some packing to do, and your Uncle Benjamin wants to see you for a few minutes. You know you have to catch an early train.”

Myron caught Ruth in his arms, and kissed her hard.

“I’ll love you till I die,” he promised. “Will you love me?”

“I love you now, anyway, Myron,” Ruth said.

“But promise me you’ll never love any one else.”

“How can I promise that? All I can say is that I never loved any other boy except you, Myron.”

“Please promise me, so I won’t be miserable.”

“I love you, Myron.”

“Will you promise never to kiss any other fellow?”

“I never did kiss any other boy; you know that.”

“You’d better not. We’ll get married in about ten years—after I finish college and medical school.”

“I’ve got to go now, Myron.”

“Will you promise?”

“Promise what?” Ruth asked.

“Don’t do that, Ruth,” Myron begged. “You know what I want you to promise—to never love anybody but me.”

“The way I feel now, I won’t,” Ruth said, kissing Myron, and looking at herself in the mirror over the mantel at the same time.

“I hate to leave you,” Myron said. “I love you to death.”

“I love you too, Myron; here’s your coat.”

Ruth held the coat for Myron, and handed him his hat. She gave him a hurried kiss.

“I’ll write every day, and you write me every day,” Myron said.

“All right,” Ruth assented. “Good-by, Myron.”

Ruth closed the door, and went into the parlor to put out the lamp. Down the street a little way, Myron stopped suddenly and looked back at the house. Then he looked up at the sky. Then he made a despairing gesture with balled fists, and began to walk briskly.

Ben was gazing out his bedroom window when Ruth entered. He had a good view of the moonlit street.

“Hello, Ruthy.”

Ruth went to the bed and kissed his cheek.

“Is your lumbago better, Uncle Ben?”

Ben laughed.

“Have a good time saying good-by to your fiancé?”

Ruth looked serious.

“I don’t know whether I want to marry Myron or not,” she said.

“Ain’t women marvelous?” Ben exclaimed delightedly, “from cradle to the grave.”

“I think we are a bit young to be talking about marriage,” Ruth explained. “After all, I’m only fourteen and Myron is only seventeen. He won’t be a doctor for ten years yet. And that’s a long time.”

Ben eyed his niece, with one thick eyebrow cocked quizzically.

“You chased Myron, didn’t you, Ruthy?”

Ruth blushed.

“Come on now, tell your Uncle Ben the truth. You kissed him first, didn’t you?”

“I guess I did, Uncle Ben,” Ruth said.

“And then he wanted more kisses and things than you wanted to give him, didn’t he?”

“How did you know?” Ruth demanded.

“Boys are like that,” Ben observed.

Ben reached out and grabbed Ruth, and, pulling her suddenly to him, spanked her once, hard. Ruth’s eyes filled with tears, and she looked wonderingly at Ben.

“What did you do that for?” she asked. “You hurt me.”

Ben chuckled.

“Never spanked you before, did I?”

“No.”

“Never was cross with you—hardly—was I?”

“No.”

“This is the only time I ever hit you in my life, isn’t it?”

Ruth nodded.

“And it hurt, didn’t it, so that you’ll remember it?”

“Yes, I’ll remember it, Uncle Ben,” Ruth said. “It hurts.”

“Well, Ruthy, I did it because I want you to remember something. You’re a well-developed girl, almost a young woman, despite what the calendar says. And I want you to remember that there’s a big difference between a young boy living at home and a grown man.”

“What difference is there, Uncle Ben?”

“If the boys had the brains and experience of the men there wouldn’t be any virgins hardly, Ruthy. A boy like Myron asks if he may do something; a man doesn’t ask: he just goes ahead.”

Ruth didn’t say anything, but her eyes turned towards the window overlooking the street.

“I guess unconsciously you were blaming Myron for not doing what you won’t admit to yourself you wanted him to do, Ruthy. It may sound complicated, but I guess you understand.”

Ruth blushed again, and looked at her shoes.

“But now I’ve explained it this way, I guess you find you care just as much as ever for Myron.”

“How much was that, Uncle Ben? You seem to know everything.”

“That was as much as any full-blooded youngster feels for a full-blooded youngster of the opposite sex.”

“I thought I wanted to marry him,” Ruth said.

“I know,” Ben agreed. “I know. As I’ve told you, there’ll be a lot of young fellers that’ll set your nerves tingling before you’re done. But you keep your weather eye peeled, Ruthy, and don’t let any of the older ones get you on a parlor sofa when you’re feeling romantic and loving. It’s a tough spot for a girl who wants to keep herself right for the babies to come.”

“I guess I understand now, Uncle Ben,” Ruth said.

“Now run along to your Aunt Susie,” Ben said. “I’ll be ready to take you to the station in the morning.”

A half-hour later, Katherine came into the room.

“What did you do to Ruth, Benjamin?” she demanded. “There’s the mark of your hand on her bottom. It’s blistered.”

“It was put there to make her a little cautious,” Ben said.

“Well, I think it was brutal and uncalled for, and it’s a great relief to me that she finally is going away from this house.”

Katherine started to stalk from the room. At the door she turned and exclaimed tearfully:

“And don’t call me Kitty.”

“By gosh! I didn’t,” Ben said.

But he said it to an empty room: his sister was gone, leaving nothing except a draft caused by her hasty departure.