“You want me to drink gasoline or have my stomach cut open?”
“Why the hell did you let it happen?”
“It’s here and you’re stuck with it, so think about getting a marriage license,” she said.
“How do I know it’s mine?”
“It would take you to say something like that.”
“Seth says you and Doc Elgin got something going on.”
“You and me are going to stand up before a justice of the peace. You don’t have any way out of it.”
“There ain’t no shotgun laws in this state. You can’t force me into it. All I got to do is support the child.”
“But wait till your Baptist-Methodist audience finds out about it.”
“Are you going to put signboards on the highway?”
“I’ll have a blood test made and take it into court. Then all the hicks can read about it in the paper. Lathrop and Hunnicut will give you bus fare back to your tenant farm.”
“I got half a mind to take that bus ride.”
“How are you going to pay for your habit?”
“I can still kick it. It ain’t too late,” he said.
“You’re a fool.”
“I ain’t stuck it in my arm.”
“You will.”
“Everyone don’t have to end in the junkie ward.”
“I don’t feel like hearing about your cures this morning.”
“You and that bastard Elgin got me on it,” he said.
“Go cry to somebody else about it.”
“Don’t it bother you none fixing up Elgin with customers?”
“A girl looks out for herself.”
“You let yourself get knocked up on purpose.”
“I don’t want a child. I never liked children,” she said.
“Why in the hell weren’t you careful?”
“The courthouse closes at five o’clock. We’ll apply for the license this afternoon and three days from now we’ll be married. Isn’t that nice?”
“I got to think it over.”
“I’ll meet you in the lobby at one.”
“I can’t do it today. Elgin is coming by with a delivery.”
“There’s some in the drawer. Get it and take it with you.”
“I got to pay Elgin anyway.”
“He’ll be back tomorrow.”
“Look, we can put it off a while. It don’t hurt to wait.”
“Stop being an ass.”
“We wouldn’t be no good married together.”
“I’m not getting caught with your brat and no husband.”
Two hours later he was downstairs in the lobby waiting for her. He had coffee in the café and went outside to the cigar stand for a shoeshine. The stand was under the brick colonnade of the hotel. A large oak tree grew through an opening in the sidewalk. The day was not hot yet, and there was a slight breeze that carried the watermelon smell of summer from the country and the odor of old brick. J.P. gave the porter a half dollar and went inside to the bar for a drink. He left word at the desk for April.
He sat on one of the tall bar stools and drank a draught beer. April came in and sat next to him. She wore a dark blue skirt and a white blouse and black high heels.
“You want a beer?” he said.
“No. Let’s go to the courthouse.”
“Bring me another draught,” he said to the bartender.
“We have to go,” she said.
“I feel like drinking some beer.”
“You can drink later.”
The bartender drew the beer from the tap and put the filled mug on the bar. J.P. paid him and drank half of it without putting the mug down. He wiped the foam off the corners of his mouth.
“You ought to have a drink,” he said.
“I don’t feel like it.”
“Are you still shaky from last night?”
“Finish your beer and let’s go,” she said.
“I ain’t in no hurry.”
He swallowed down the rest of the beer and motioned to the bartender for another.
“Can’t you do anything without getting high first?” she said.
“I feel like getting blind.”
“After we come back you can pass out in the lobby if you want to.”
“You’ll be a sweet wife.”
The beer came. He watched her over the top of the mug as he drank.
“Pay for it and let’s go,” she said.
“Did you ever have a boilermaker? This seems like a good day to have one.” He called the bartender over and had him put a double shot of whiskey in the glass. He drank it down in two long swallows and put a dollar on the bar.
They took a taxi to the courthouse. They went into the clerk of court’s office to fill out the applications. He paid the license fee to the clerk and left April in the office. He walked down the marble corridor towards the front entrance. He heard her high heels clacking on the floor behind him.
“Where are you going?” she said.
“There ain’t nothing else, is there?”
“Why did you walk off and leave me alone in there?”
“I’m going somewhere, and I don’t reckon you want to come along,” he said.
He walked out the front door and down the wide concrete walk to the street. The sun was very hot now, and the glare from the cement hurt his eyes. He heard the high heels clacking behind him again. He didn’t look back. He signaled a taxi and got in and slammed the door before she reached the street. He saw her face go by the window as the taxi pulled away from the curb.
“What are you laughing at, mister?” the driver said, looking at him in the rear-view mirror.
“It’s so goddamn funny you wouldn’t believe it.”
“Are you all right?”
“I’d tell you about it, but you wouldn’t believe it.”
“Where did you say you wanted to go?”
“Jerry’s Bar, back of the depot.”
The driver looked at him once more in the mirror and drove down a side street through the old part of town and across the railroad tracks. They slowed down behind the station and stopped in front of a bar across from the freight yards. The bar was a two-story board building with dirty front windows and a shorted-out neon sign that buzzed loudly and lighted up only half of its letters.
J.P. went inside. It smelled of flat beer and the sawdust that was spread on the floor. The mirror behind the bar was yellowed, and the rough-grained floor was stained with tobacco spittle. Some of the chairs were turned over on the tables, and two railroad workers were drinking at the other end of the bar. A middle-aged man in a dirty apron was drying glasses behind the bar. His hair was combed over the bald spot in the middle of his head.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Winfield,” he said.
“Give me a whiskey and water, Jerry,” J.P. said.
“Yes, sir.”
He mopped the area in front of J.P. with a rag and set down the drink.
“We ain’t seen you in a while. You must be busy in politics.”
“When are you going to stop cutting your whiskey?” J.P. said.
“We don’t do that here, Mr. Winfield. I can give you another shot if it’s too weak.” He filled the jigger and poured it in J.P.’s glass.
“I want a room upstairs for the afternoon.”
“It’s a little early. I don’t know if any of the girls are in.”
J.P. took out his billfold and put five ten-dollar bills on the bar.
“Let me ask my wife,” the bartender said. “Emma, come over here a minute.”
The woman who had been sweeping propped her broom against a table and came behind the bar. She was stout and had big arms like a man. There was a large wart on her chin. She didn’t look at J.P.
“Mr. Winfield wants to go upstairs. I told him it was a little early for the girls,” the bartender said.
She took the money off the bar and rang the cash register and put it in the drawer.
“Come with me,” she said.
J.P. followed her off into a narrow hallway at the back. She opened the door to a stairway and climbed the steps with J.P. behind her. The upstairs was divided by a hallway with a series of doors on each side. The floor was covered with a tattered maroon carpet. The hall ended in a single large room that served as the kitchen. There was a curtain pulled across the doorway. The woman left J.P. standing at the top of the staircase and went down the hall opening doors and looking into rooms. She came back and went past him to the kitchen, not looking at him.