“Nick!”—she was beginning to sound cross again— “you’re not going to sleep again, are you?”

“Me?” I said. “Me go to sleep around a pretty thing like you? Now, what do you think?”

She let me out the door, so drowsy herself she could barely keep her eyes open. I sneaked back across town, and believe me, sneakin’ is the word, because I was plumb wrung dry an’ there wasn’t enough juice left in me to wet a whistle.

I got to the courthouse, and slipped off my boots at the foot of the stairs. I sneaked up the stairs and got to my room, and got out of my clothes. Then, I slid into bed, careful as I could to keep the springs from squeaking. And I sighed and thought Oh, Lord, how long, god.dang it? One cross is bad enough, but I hadn’t ought to carry a whole god-dang lumberyard around with me!

Rose grabbed me. She swarmed all over me, and it was like her body was on fire.

“Goddam! What the hell took you so long, Nick?”

I tried to keep from groaning. I said, “Look, Rose we can’t do this, honey. It’s already Sunday morning.”

“Crap on Sunday morning!” she said. “Who gives a damn what day it is?”

“But—but this ain’t nice,” I said. “It just ain’t nice to fornicate on Sunday morning. Now, you just think about it, an’ you’ll see I’m right.”

Rose said she didn’t want to think about it, she just wanted to do it. “Come on, dammit!” she panted. “Come on! I’ll show you whether it’s nice or not!”

Well, I just couldn’t, you know. At least, I thought I couldn’t. And I guess the only way I managed to was because the good Lord gave me strength. He seen I was in a heck of a spot, like He naturally would, because if He’d noticed something like a sparrow fallin’, He’d just about have to see the predicament I was in.

So He gave me strength, I reckon. Which—an’ I don’t mean to sound ungrateful—was about the ‘least’ He could do.

19

Rose went to church with Myra and me, Lennie staying at home because he didn’t always behave too well in crowds. After the services, Rose and Myra went on home to get dinner ready, and I hung around to do a little handshakin’ and baby-pattin’ and backslappin’.

Sam Gaddis was doing the same thing, a grayhaired middle-aged fella with a dignified look about him. The minister had given him a kind of indirect boost in his sermon, which was about casting stones and judge not lest ye be judged, and now he seemed to be getting a better reception than I was. People would turn their heads to look at him, while they were shaking hands with me. I’d slap ‘em on the back and they’d sort of take it as a shove toward Sam. And there was one woman that yanked her baby away just as I was about to kiss it, so that I danged near kissed my own belt buckle.