She leaned across the table. “You know what we could really do is so simple it will make you laugh.”

“What?”

“We could run your father’s ranch. My father says it’s beautiful land.”

“No,” Aron said quickly.

“Why not?”

“I’m not going to be a farmer and you’re not going to be a farmer’s wife.”

“I’m going to be Aron’s wife, no matter what he is.”

“I’m not going to give up college,” he said.

“I’ll help you,” Abra said again.

“Where would you get the money?”

“Steal it,” she said.

“I want to get out of this town,” he said. “Everybody’s sneering at me. I can’t stand it here.”

“They’ll forget it pretty soon.”

“No, they won’t either. I don’t want to stay two years more to finish high school.”

“Do you want to go away from me, Aron?”

“No. Oh, damn it, why did he have to mess with things he doesn’t know about?”

Abra reproved him. “Don’t you blame your father. If it had worked everybody’d been bowing to him.”

“Well, it didn’t work. He sure fixed me. I can’t hold up my head. By God! I hate him.”

Abra said sternly, “Aron! You stop talking like that!”

“How do I know he didn’t lie about my mother?”

Abra’s face reddened with anger. “You ought to be spanked,” she said. “If it wasn’t in front of everybody I’d spank you myself.” She looked at his beautiful face, twisted now with rage and frustration, and suddenly she changed her tactics. “Why don’t you ask about your mother? Just come right out and ask him.”

“I can’t, I promised you.”

“You only promised not to say what I told you.”

“Well, if I asked him he’d want to know where I heard.”

“All right,” she cried, “you’re a spoiled baby! I let you out of your promise. Go ahead and ask him.”

“I don’t know if I will or not.”

“Sometimes I want to kill you,” she said. “But Aron—I do love you so. I do love you so.” There was giggling from the stools in front of the soda fountain. Their voices had risen and they were overheard by their peers. Aron blushed and tears of anger started in his eyes. He ran out of the store and plunged away up the street.

Abra calmly picked up her purse and straightened her skirt and brushed it with her hand. She walked calmly over to Mr. Bell and paid for the celery tonics. On her way to the door she stopped by the giggling group. “You let him alone,” she said coldly. She walked on, and a falsetto followed her—“Oh, Aron, I do love you so.”

In the street she broke into a run to try to catch up with Aron, but she couldn’t find him. She called on the telephone. Lee said that Aron had not come home. But Aron was in his bedroom, lapped in resentments—Lee had seen him creep in and close his door behind him.