Thalia

by Larry McMurtry

  “Let’s go fishing,” I said.

  “Guess what?” she said, grinning and looking happy. “I got a postcard from Johnny last week. Want to see it?”

  “No, I don’t want to see it,” I said. “I want to go fishing with you. Now do you want to go or don’t you?”

  “Yes,” she said, “let’s go right now. I just thought you might like to read Johnny’s card. He mentioned you in it too.”

  I did want to read it, but I wasn’t going to admit that to Molly. No telling what an idiot like Johnny would write on a postcard.

  “Your dad don’t look in too good a humor,” I said.

  “Get the poles out of the smokehouse and I’ll wrap up some bait,” she said. “Dad won’t bother us. He likes catfish for supper.”

  I got the poles and propped them against the fence and went down and saddled Molly’s horse. The old man was still drinking and sharpening his knife; he never even looked up. In a minute Molly came out with a lunch sack and a bait sack. She went up to the old man and hugged him a little with one arm and whispered to him and kissed him on one cheek and then come on out to me. She really liked that old bugger—it always surprised me to see it. He looked up at the lunch sack, but he didn’t say anything.

  “Want to go to a tank or to the River?” I said.

  “Let’s go to the big tank,” she said. “South of the hill, in you-’all’s place.”

  It was my favorite tank too, but it was better for courting than for fishing. I never caught nothing there. There was a lot of Bermuda grass around it, though, and shade trees and nice places to sit.

  Molly was riding a little gray horse her old man had cheated a feller out of two years before. I was riding old Denver; we named him that because his momma come from Colorado. We loped nearly all the way to our fence before we pulled up. I let Molly go in front of me. Her hair was flying all over the place, and her shirttail come out. She rode good though. There wasn’t no cattle around the tank when we got there, and not a ripple on the water, except once in a while when some dragonfly would light on the tank for a minute. We used liver for bait, and I put enough on the hooks to last awhile and stuck the poles in the mud. Molly sat down on the Bermuda grass, in the shade, and I sat down by her and held her hand. We were all set to fish.

  It was about a perfect day. The sky was clear, and the sun felt warm like summer while the air felt cool like fall. We lolled around on the Bermuda grass and courted and ate lunch and fished all day. We caught three fish too, two croppies and one nice little cat; I guess we could have caught more if we had tried. We got a lot of nibbles, but Molly was so good to be with that day that I quit paying attention to them. I held her down and told her it was just turtles gnawing at the bait. She knew how inconvenient it was to catch turtles.

  Sometime in the early afternoon, when we were over under the big shade trees and not even pretending to fish, I finally asked Molly to marry me for the first time. There wasn’t much grass under the trees, and we were laying on the slicker. We had been kissing a good deal and she seemed to like me so much that I didn’t see why not to ask her. I was crazy about her.

  “Molly,” I said, “say, Molly. We’re sweethearts anyway, why don’t we go on and get married? Wouldn’t that be the best thing to do? I sure would like to marry you.”

  She kinda grinned to herself and wouldn’t look at me.

  “Don’t you want to at all?” I said. “You’re the one for me, I know that for sure.”

  “You’re my favorite,” she said, and sat up and kissed me. “Gid-ington. But what in the world would we do married?”

  “Why, what everybody else does, I guess. We ain’t so different.”

  “Maybe you ain’t,” she said, “but I am. I don’t want to get into all that stuff yet. It ain’t near as much fun as things like we’re doing today.”

  “How do you know?” I said. “You ain’t been married. It might be more fun.”

  She got kinda mad. “Don’t tell me that,” she said. “I don’t want to marry you or nobody else. Girls who get married just to do a lot of things with boys ain’t very nice. I don’t like it. I’d just as soon do all those things and not be married, and I mean it. I ain’t gonna marry till I have to because of having a baby, and I mean that too. And I wish I didn’t even have to then.”

  Well, that shocked me as much as anything I ever heard, Molly saying that. It was just like her though. She never cared what people thought about her. I guess she never thought she was very respectable anyway, growing up with the daddy she had. I knew a lot of people around Thalia who didn’t think she was nice, either, but they didn’t mean anything to me.

  “Honey, don’t talk that way,” I said. “I’m crazy about you and I just want you for a wife, that’s all.”

  She looked sorry then, but she looked kinda wild, too, and we lay there and hugged one another for a long time before she would talk agin at all.

  “I’m crazy about you too, Gid,” she said, hugging my neck. “You’re the best to me of anybody. But I ain’t going to marry, I mean it. I’ll do anything you want me to but that. I’ll do everything else if you want me to right now,” and when I kissed her she was trembling like a leaf. But we never managed it, somehow: it was my fault. I guess I was too surprised at Molly, and I couldn’t quit thinking about it. She practically took her shirt off and that was something, but I couldn’t quit thinking about it, and I knew it wasn’t right, so I made her quit.

  “Now we got to quit,” I said. “You know it, Molly. Why can’t we get married?”

  Then she got real cool and mad at me, but I was pretty mad too, and I didn’t back down.

  “Let’s go swimming, Gid,” she said. “It’s so hot. Then we can talk about it some more.” She was cool as ice when she said that.

  “You hush,” I said. “There ain’t no use in you teasing me, and you know it. I ain’t no damn kid. We got nothing to go swimming in, so how can we go?”

  “We got skin,” she said. “I didn’t know you was such a scardy-cat. Why do you want to get married if you’re scared of girls?”

  “Now listen, Molly,” I said. “I told you to quit teasing me and you better do it before I shake the hell out of you. I’m sorry. But I ain’t scared of you. I just know what’s right and what ain’t, and you ain’t gonna talk me out of it just because you’re mad. And if you don’t like it, you can just stay mad.”

  “Don’t ask me to marry you any more,” she said, only she wasn’t mad then, she was kind of quiet. “Get off my shirt, honey. You’re too sober, I never could get along with you. You didn’t know I was like this, did you?”

  I grabbed her and made her let me hold her, even if she didn’t want me to.

  “I may be too sober,” I said. “I guess I am. But I’m not going to get stampeded into doing something crazy even if we do both want to. You got to be a little careful about some things.”

  “Okay,” she said. “You done said that. Shut up about it. Let’s fish or ride or do something. I’m tired of sitting here being so careful. I guess you’re so careful you won’t even want to hold hands with me no more, will you?”

  But after a while she got in a good humor again and we walked around the dam and rode horses some and finally went home about five o’clock, just when the shadows were beginning to stretch out. The old man was gone when we got there and I cleaned the fish for her. She cooked them and made biscuits and gravy and we each ate one of the croppie, bones or no bones. We left the catfish for the old man.

  After supper we went out on the porch and swung in her porch swing and she was real warm and sweet agin and we kissed all we wanted to. I don’t guess things could have been any nicer, except that I had already begin to feel mad at myself for not taking better advantage of the afternoon. But she acted like she’d forgot about it. She teased me a little about Johnny.

  “I know why you don’t come see me as much any more,” she said. “It’s because Johnny’s gone. You don’t really care much about me, do you? You jus
t like to spite Johnny.”

  She was wrong about that and we both knew it, but it was true that I got a little extra kick out of being with Molly when Johnny was around to notice it. It would have probably been the same with him if he’d been in my place.

  I made up with her for the afternoon, only she wouldn’t hear a word about marrying. I had to drop that for a while, but I didn’t care. She gave me a big kiss just before I got on my horse and held on to my hand until I had to turn loose and ride away. And she stood on the hill and watched me go.

  Later I got awful mad at myself for being such a sissy down at the tank. I must have been either scared to death or crazy, I couldn’t figure which. At least we could have gone swimming, that wouldn’t have been no great crime. The more I thought about it the worse it got, and it was all I could do to keep from riding back over that night. But I figured the old man would be back, so I never.

  I guess I always did think things over too much, at least where Molly was concerned. She was a special girl. Johnny, he would have done it and then thought it over later, but I always did the thinking first. The next time I got the chance I decided I would try his way.

  But things never worked out too good. Dad rode in the next morning with about a month’s work lined up to do, and I had to stay mad at myself all the time I was doing it. By the time things loosened up enough that I could get back over to see Molly, why it was the middle of October and Johnny was home agin, so I had him to worry about. If there was one thing I learned that day, it was not to miss no opportunities. I just wish learning it had done me a little more good.

  Four

  I GUESS IT WAS BEING SO MAD AT MYSELF OVER MOLLY THAT caused me to run off one night and court Mabel Peters. I knew at the time I didn’t have no business doing it. In the first place it was on a Friday night, and I never got off work till after dark, and I knew I would have to start agin before sunup. And it was nearly six miles over to Mabel’s house; I could have gone over and seen Molly with a lot less trouble. But I was still kind of ashamed of the way I acted around Molly; I didn’t want to see her that night. Mabel wasn’t the kind of a girl I could get excited about in no permanent way, but every once in a while she was the kind I could get real excited about in a temporary way. Her folks were so poor and they lived so far off from everybody that none of the boys courted Mabel much. She was right pretty in a neat, timid kind of way, but she never had no real boy friends, and I knew she was so anxious for a sweetheart she would do most anything. So I wasn’t very proud of the reasons I went to see her, but I went, anyway.

  Mabel’s ma and pa were pretty old and usually went to bed early; except for one or two of the younger kids, Mabel was nearly always up by herself. I rode up to the yard gate in the dark and sat on my horse till the dogs kind of quieted down. One thing I hated about visiting the Peterses was them barking dogs. There must have been six or eight; I never knew Old Man Peters to keep no less. In a minute Mabel came out and stood in the door.

  “Who’s that out there?” she said.

  “It’s just me, Mabel,” I said. “I’d get down but I’m afraid these dogs would eat me.”

  “Gid?” she said. “Hush up, Pete, hush that.” I guess Pete was the boss dog, because he went running over to her, and in a minute they all quieted down. Then I got off my horse and tied him to their mailbox.

  “Have you been to supper?” she said. “Come on in and I’ll fix you some.”

  But I never let her get me in the house. Their little old house always nearly suffocated me. It was an old chickenhouse, was what it was; Old Man Peters had just kinda rebuilt it. It never had but four little tight rooms, and they were so small and squeezed up and had such low ceilings that I couldn’t hardly breathe when I was inside. I don’t see how they lived through the summertime; it would have been like living in an oven.

  Mabel knew I didn’t like it, too, and it always embarrassed her. She wanted me to come and see her, but then when I did come she didn’t have no nice place where we could go, and that preyed on her mind. Mabel was awful pretty in the face; I was just kinda awkward around her because it took me twenty or thirty minutes each time to get over feeling sorry for her. She’d worked and wanted her whole life, and she always looked like she’d do just anything for somebody who’d give her the chance to have some fun.

  “Aren’t you going to come in awhile?” she said. “We can’t just stand out here on the steps.”

  “No,” I said. “I feel like moving around, how about you? I thought you might like to take a little walk with me. It’s such a bright moonlight night we wouldn’t need no lantern.” That was true. The moon was big and white that night, sailing up over the pastures.

  The Peterses’ house didn’t have a porch, just front steps and back steps, because it was propped up on bricks, but Old Man Peters kept his wagon back behind the barn and I figured that would be our destination. It was a good big Studebaker wagon, and he kept his wagon sheet in it.

  Mabel was agreeable enough to the walk.

  “That’d be nice, Gid,” she said. “Where will we walk?”

  “Just here and there.” She grabbed my hand herself and held on to me tight. I guess she was afraid of snakes. She walked so close to me I was afraid to move my feet for fear of stepping on her. I went dumb then; I could have kicked myself. I couldn’t think of one thing to say. And I was a little snake-shy myself; nobody’s very anxious to get rattlesnake-bit. But Mabel didn’t mind the quiet; she walked along sort of humming to herself.

  “It’s sure nice to see somebody,” she said. “I swear Ma and Pa have been about to bore me plumb to death.”

  “Dad bores me a good deal sometimes too,” I said. I was beginning to get a little excited from her walking so close to me that way. I never could understand how a little thing like Mabel could get me so excited, but she sure could. She was so thin you wouldn’t even notice her if she was standing sideways to you, but once she got near you she sure did make herself felt. We sashayed around by the postpile a time or two and the pigpen once or twice and then I sidled over toward the wagon. I didn’t need to sidle. When I asked her if she wanted to sit down awhile she just nodded, and it wasn’t two minutes till we were kissing like old sweethearts. Mabel never pulled back a time; it was always me. At first I was kind of wishing it was Molly that was there, but then I quit caring so much, and I guess we’d have done the whole works without no conversation or nothing if I hadn’t made the mistake of stopping to ask.

  “You can if you want to, Gid,” she whispered. “I don’t care. And then we can get married and start having babies. That’s what I’ve always wanted to do. You’ll be the best husband in the world.”

  She just barely whispered that in my ear, but it hit me like a bucket of ice water.

  “Goodness, we can’t do that, Mabel,” I said. “Dad would raise too much Cain, and your dad too. Let’s go ahead anyway.”

  She didn’t get mad, or say a word back to me, and she kissed me a whole lot more, but it never meant anything then. She had put on all the brakes. I was so mad at her I could have stomped her for a minute, but she kept on acting sweet and happy and never seemed to notice. She did notice, though; she was just too sly to let on. That was the big difference in her and Molly. Molly was wild, but she was warm, and she wasn’t sly. Mabel wasn’t really a bit wild, but she was really cold and sly. Mabel’s little brain was cold as an icicle.

  You couldn’t guess that from the way she acted in the wagon. She cuddled up with me on the wagon sheet just as long as I wanted to stay, and I did stay a good while, hoping she would change her mind. But she wouldn’t change her mind any more than the moon would change its direction. She sure did want to get married.

  Finally I helped her out of the wagon and we walked back to the house. She never talked at all; she knew she couldn’t do any good talking. But she kept close to me; I practically had to crawl out from under her to get on my horse.

  It was just when I was about to ride away that she began to loo
k real sorry. She had one hand on my ankle, and I was afraid she was fixing to cry.

  “Come back to see me,” she said. “I get awful bored around here, and I don’t like for nobody to come to see me but you.” And before I could get away, I was feeling sorry for her agin. I decided on the way home I would have to come back and give her another try. It had been worth it anyway.

  Only next morning I wasn’t so sure. I hadn’t been asleep but two or three hours when Dad came in and started shaking my damn foot to wake me up. That was sure a long day.

  Five

  JOHNNY GOT BACK FROM THE PANHANDLE ON A SUNDAY night and went to work for us on Monday morning. He rode over about breakfast time, to see how I was doing, I guess. It was branding season and we were getting in some new cattle, so when Dad got back from his morning ride he asked Johnny if he wanted to go to work on a day basis, and Johnny said he did.

  “And when I say work, I mean work,” Dad said. “I ain’t gonna squander no dollar a day for you to sit on your butt.”

  “I ain’t never run from no work yet,” Johnny said. “Of course there’s some kinds I’d rather do than others. But you’re probably that way about it too, aren’t you, Mr. Fry?”

  Dad grunted. He didn’t like much conversation out of Johnny. “The kind I like best is none,” he said.

  I THOUGHT working up on the big ranches might have given Johnny a little responsibility, but it never. He was just as wild and crazy as he’d always been. One thing I noticed, though, he must have done a lot of riding. His new saddle was broken in to where it was comfortable as could be. He let me ride it a time or two, and I liked the way it rode.

  He asked me right off if I had been taking good care of his girl.

  “Mabel, you mean?” I said. “You bet, ever chance I get.”