by Peggy Webb
His eyes met Martie’s over the heads of their unexpected guests. If looks could have started a fire, the parsonage would have gone up in flames. For tonight, at least, it seemed the wall between them would come tumbling down, and both were having the same vision.
o0o
It was well past midnight when the band was finally tucked away. Paul and Martie faced each other across the double bed in the master bedroom and tried to act naturally.
“You take the bed. I’ll sleep in the chair,” Paul said.
“I wouldn’t dream of such a thing,” Martie protested. “It’s your bed and those are my friends. I’ll curl up with a blanket on the floor.”
“Absolutely not. And that’s my final word on the subject.” Paul spun around and tried to cover his turmoil by taking his pajamas from the bureau drawer. He felt a smothering sensation, as if his heart were expanding right out of his chest. With unaccustomed haste he marched into the bathroom and emerged a few minutes later wearing his pajamas, tops and bottoms. He hoped he didn’t suffocate in the things.
Martie was still standing beside the bed when he returned. “Paul, we have a small problem,” she said, her mouth so dry she could hardly speak. If fainting had been fashionable, she would have keeled over on the carpet. “I don’t own any pajamas. I always sleep in the nude.”
Paul already knew that, but hearing her say it made his blood pressure skyrocket. His knuckles turned white as he gripped the back of the chair.
“You can use my pajama tops,” he offered. With trembling hands he removed the garment and handed it to her.
Their hands touched briefly, and the contact burned through her, singeing her heart. If she hadn’t been so certain that she would be the ruination of his career, she would have pulled him down onto the bed and seduced him. She was fed up with martyrdom, and living under the same roof with the man she loved and not being able to have him was making her crazy.
Taking the pajama tops, she hurried to the bathroom before she did something they would both regret. When she returned, the lights were off and Paul was huddled uncomfortably under the blanket in the chair.
Silently she crawled between the sheets and held herself rigid, trying not to give herself away by restless movements. She lay in the dark, listening to the sound of his breathing, trying to decide if he was asleep or awake. She listened to the tick of the hall clock, the one they had moved from her house, and to the scratching of the oleander bush outside the bedroom window as it was buffeted by the November wind. Sounds that were usually comforting to her grated across her nerves like sandpaper, and she thought she might explode from frustration.
At last she could stand the widening pit of loneliness no longer.
“Paul?” she whispered. “Are you asleep?”
“No.”
“You know that kiss you gave me? The one that was supposed to last a lifetime?”
“How could I forget?”
“Well, it wore off.”
With a strangled cry, Paul shoved his blanket aside and came to the bed. Kneeling on the floor beside her, he gently pushed her hair back from her face.
“I’m sorry, angel. I’m so sorry it had to be like this.” He gathered her in his arms and pulled her fiercely against his chest.
She clung to him, moving her face against the glorious nakedness of his chest. Neither of them knew when the kiss began; they only knew that the burning thirst welling up inside them had to be quenched.
It was a hungry kiss, full of passion too long denied and dynamite set to explode. It was a time bomb ticking between them, a dangerous weapon that could only be defused by superhuman effort.
When their mouths were love slick and swollen, when the enchantment had provided small relief, when the giant named Desire had taken his tidbit and returned unwillingly to his chains, Paul made that effort. He got onto the bed and lay on top of the covers beside her. Taking her in his arms, he cradled her head against his shoulder.
“I’ll keep the loneliness away, angel.”
“Thank you, Paul.” She fell asleep listening to the steady, reassuring beat of his heart.
But for Paul, sleep didn’t come. Listening to Martie’s quiet breathing and the scratching of the oleander bush, he wrestled the giant all night long.
CHAPTER NINE
Martie held the book up to her face and pretended she didn’t hear the conversation on the other side of the stacks. It was impossible not to hear, however, because the voices were crystal clear and she was the topic of conversation.
“Where did Reverend Donovan and his new wife go on a honeymoon?”
“They didn’t take one.”
“You don’t mean to say it! How come?”
“Maybe the poor man just couldn’t afford it, what with having to buy her all that fancy jewelry and stuff. Lord, do you notice the way she dresses? Like a peacock.”
Martie couldn’t stand to hear any more. She shoved the book back onto the stacks and left the library without checking out a single thing. Pulling her sweater around herself against the November chill, she fumed all the way home. How dare they speculate about her honeymoon! Her marriage was torture enough. She just didn’t think she could survive a honeymoon with her sanity intact.
Her steps slowed as she neared the parsonage and saw three cars parked in the yard. She hadn’t been aware of any meetings scheduled for this afternoon; Paul would have told her if there were. Suddenly a terrible possibility occurred to her. Something had happened to Paul!
She raced over the sidewalk, pounded through the parsonage yard, and burst into the kitchen, breathless.
Paul looked up from a chair beside the table. “You’re just in time, Martie,” he said, smiling.
She sank weakly into a chair. “Just in time for what?” She really didn’t care what she was in time for as long as Paul was all right.
Bob Taylor grinned at her.
“Some of us got together and decided that the preacher is working too hard. He’s so dedicated that he didn’t even take time for a honeymoon.”
Was there something in the air? she wondered. Was everybody in town afflicted with the preacher’s honeymoon bug? A hundred different emotions rushed over her—joy, excitement, fear, longing, desire, despair. She felt Paul watching her and tried to keep her face from mirroring her feelings.
“He certainly is dedicated,” she agreed. “He’s the most dedicated minister I’ve ever seen. I’m very proud of him.”
“You haven’t heard the best part,” said Skeeter’s dad, who’d been a fan of the preacher’s new wife ever since the night of the Halloween festival. Anybody who could get Skeeter as fired up about coming to church as she could was top-notch in his book. He didn’t care what anybody else said. “We’ve contacted a lay speaker to fill the pulpit this Sunday so that you and Reverend Donovan can take a honeymoon trip. We even got together a little donation so you can go in style.”
Martie couldn’t look at Paul. She felt as if she were on a roller coaster headed toward some unknown fate. She didn’t know which awaited her at the end of the ride, wonder or despair. She could only be sure of one thing: with Paul at her side, the journey would be worth it.
“That’s great,” she managed to say in what she hoped was a properly enthusiastic tone.
“Didn’t I tell you she’d be tickled pink!” the postman said, beaming. “Just like the Reverend was. Nothing’s too good for our Reverend Donovan, I tell you! We want him to be happy.”
“I guess we’ll be going, so you two lovebirds can decide where to spend your belated honeymoon.” Bob Taylor clapped his felt cap on his head and started for the door. “Jolene likes The Peabody in Memphis.” He winked at Paul. “See you when you get back.”
“Have fun,” said Skeeter’s dad.
“Don’t take any wooden nickels,” the postman added.
Silence descended on the kitchen after the door had closed behind the well-meaning committee. Martie inspected the ceiling, the walls, and the floor, looking ev
erywhere except at Paul.
“Well, what do you think?” he finally asked.
“I don’t know. I never have known the meaning of that phrase.”
“What phrase?”
“Don’t take any wooden nickels. What does it mean, Paul?”
“Don’t settle for less than the real thing.”
“Is that what we did?” she asked quietly.
“There’s only one way to find out.” He stood up, solemn-faced, and came around the table. “Pinch you and see if you’re real.”
“Paul!” Playfully she ducked out of his way.
He lightly pinched her cheek. “Yep. You’re real all right.”
“And you’re crazy.”
Suddenly their eyes locked and the air around them sizzled. Their honeymoon loomed in front of them, unavoidable and awesome.
“What will we do?” she whispered.
“We have to go.”
“I know.”
“Get separate rooms I suppose,” he said, watching her.
Her heart sank. “I suppose.” She didn’t know what she’d expected. Certainly not a real honeymoon. Theirs was not even a real marriage. And they’d already tried one room—that was too much temptation for anybody to bear.
“With a connecting door,” he added.
She didn’t know why, but if he hadn’t said that, she would have hit him.
o0o
The Peabody was a grand old hotel, recently restored, that had seen its heyday during the late thirties when cotton was king in the South. Martie and Paul deposited their luggage in separate bedrooms and began their enforced honeymoon.
There was a knock at the connecting door, and Martie unlocked it to let her husband in. The restraint that had possessed them on their wedding day had returned, making them stilted and almost shy. Behind them the curtained bed took on a mystic quality as it pervaded their minds, spawning rainbow fantasies and impossible dreams.
“I think we’re in time to see the parade of ducks in the lobby,” Paul said, carefully avoiding looking at the bed.
“I’ve never seen a parade of ducks.”
Martie was suddenly filled with an urge to pull all their tail feathers out. She had developed this violent streak, she decided, about the time she’d been forced into a celibate marriage with Paul. Sometimes life just wasn’t fair, but she would feel better about it if she could pull out a few tail feathers, Miss Beulah’s included.
“Do they toot horns and play drums?” she asked.
“They make do with a record, a John Philip Sousa march, I think.”
“I wonder if they would prefer honky-tonk music?”
“Why don’t we ask the ducks?”
He took her elbow and together they went down to the lobby. Away from the influence of the curtained bed, they became themselves again, Martie and Paul, two people who lived each day to the hilt.
As the elevator opened and the ducks paraded to the fountain on a red carpet, Martie pointed to the last one, a large drake.
“I think I saw that duck down in Mexico once,” she commented.
“What was he doing?”
“Drinking champagne out of a silver slipper.”
Paul laughed. “That must have been some party.”
After the parade of ducks they decided to visit Libertyland. The theme park was still open because the weather, a notorious prankster in the South, was balmy and beautiful, November pretending to be summer.
“I want to ride the roller coaster until I’m dizzy and eat funnel cakes until I’m stuffed,” Martie told Paul.
“Roller coasters are on par with go-carts, but for you, I’ll make the supreme sacrifice.”
She boldly assessed him from head to toe.
“You don’t look like a sacrifice to me. You look like a big, strapping man who should enjoy the finer things of life.”
He scrunched his long legs into the small roller coaster car. “You call this the finer things of life?” he asked doubtfully.
“Certainly. Anything that’s fun falls into that category.”
“I married a woman who is easy to please.”
If the roller coaster hadn’t whizzed off on its clackety tracks, the subject of marriage might have gotten a proper hearing. But it fell by the wayside as Paul and Martie clung to their seats and laughed in the sudden breeze that whipped the scarlet ribbon from her hair.
True to her word, Martie ate funnel cakes until Paul observed that she might turn into one herself and become a permanent part of the theme park. They watched the dolphins, listened to a good country band, applauded a sensational honky-tonk pianist, and rode the roller coaster again.
Except for the specter of the curtained bed, which kept creeping into their thoughts, they had a wonderful time. Paul was enchanted all over again with the high-spirited child that was so much a part of Martie, and she became more and more obsessed with the generous-hearted man who was forbidden to her.
o0o
Hoping to wear themselves out so that they could fall asleep quickly in their separate beds, they returned to The Peabody and dressed to go dancing. Martie soaked in her summer-scented bubble bath, dreaming of the “if onlys,” and Paul stood under a cold shower thinking of the “what ifs.”
She was still pinning the blue sequined butterfly in her topknot of silver curls when Paul knocked at the adjoining door. She almost dropped the butterfly when she saw him in his tuxedo.
“I didn’t know you were so gorgeous,” she said with a straightforwardness that didn’t surprise him at all. “I think you should preach in your tuxedo. Everybody in Pontotoc would come just to look.”
“That’s an innovative idea. I’ll keep it in mind.” His eyes roamed over her blue chiffon dress. “You are lovely, Martie. But then, I always knew that.”
As they looked at each other, the air sizzled around them and the bed played its siren song. “Paul,” she said softly, “if we don’t go dancing now, I’m afraid we never will.”
He cleared the huskiness from his throat.
“I think you’re right.” His hand trembled on her waist as he led her from the room, and he was careful not to hold her too tight lest he be tempted to never let go.
o0o
The tiny mirrors on the ceiling of the Continental Ballroom sparkled like a million stars.
“Do you like to dance, Paul?” Martie asked as he led her onto the polished dance floor.
“I’d rather watch you.” He pulled her into his arms and put his cheek against her soft hair as mood music drifted around them. “But I enjoy doing everything as long as you’re a part of it.”
The words sang through her, and she wished that she were free to tell him how very much he was loved. She wished that she were suitable and that he were anything but a minister and that all the Miss Beulahs everywhere would drop off the edge of the earth.
They danced without stopping through five consecutive songs; neither of them wanted to let go. Paul welcomed the scorching, searing feeling where her body touched his, and he was thankful that the band preferred dreamy mood music. But even if they had burst into rock and roll, he wouldn’t have noticed. He would still have held her precious body close to his, dancing to the slow love song that throbbed in his heart.
He buried his lips in the fragrant hair just above her ear. “I would like to hold you this way forever, angel,” he whispered.
“There are no forevers for us, Paul. We both know that.”
She didn’t know how she had the courage to be sensible at a time like this, a time of racing pulse and thundering heart and runaway passion. With the music filling her soul and stars winking from the ceiling, she felt like shouting her love at the top of her lungs. She wanted to drag Paul upstairs to that curtained bed arid forget everything except her own needs.
“I’m not so sure of that, Martie. This feels like forever to me.” His arms tightened around her, and in that moment he knew he could never let her go. There had to be a way through her barriers. And he was deter
mined to find it.
“I don’t want to think about forever, Paul.”
“Why?” he asked softly.
“Because it makes me sad.”
“Sadness can be abolished.”
“Not the sadness of a forever without you.” She hadn’t meant to say it; it just popped out. She’d had no intention of keeping him trapped in this marriage out of guilt or pity. She sighed against his shoulder. Where was her flamboyance when she needed it?
Paul’s feet missed a step at her impulsive revelation. He could almost feel the fence between them come tumbling down. He could almost leap through the barrier and make this marriage real. But not quite. He could still feel her uncertainty, and he would never take advantage of her vulnerability.
“It doesn’t have to be that way,” he replied carefully.
“Tell me why it doesn’t have to be that way.”
“In cases of the heart, nothing matters except the feelings of the two people involved.”
“That’s the way it should be, Paul, but is it? Does it work that way in real life or only in fantasy?” She lifted her face to his, and he could see the ceiling stars mirrored in her eyes. “Don’t answer that. I want to forget everything and just dance. I want the music to last forever.”
“Then I won’t let it stop.”
He could feel the smooth silk of her skin through the filmy chiffon. Her vibrance communicated itself through his fingertips, and unconsciously his hands moved in erotic circles on her back. With the polished glitter of the ballroom around him and the girl of his dreams in his arms, he had a moment of epiphany. This marriage had never been one of appearances: it had always been one of the heart. They had simply been too blind to see.
They danced on, even after the music stopped, prolonging the magic until the lights were dimmed and the band took their instruments and stole away.
“I think they’re trying to tell us something, angel.”
“You promised not to let the music stop, Paul.”
“It hasn’t. You’re just not listening.”
With their arms around each other, they left the darkened ballroom and took the elevator to their rooms. Martie fitted her key to the lock, then turned to him.
