The Case Against Owen Williams Read Free

dancer, but stiff and nervous, inclined to hold her at arm’s length. She put her head on his shoulder and hummed along.
    â€œâ€˜I was dancin’ with my darlin’ to the Tennessee Waltz.’ I like that song,” she murmured, “don’t you?”
    â€œSure,” he said.
    She looked at his dark eyes, recognizing in their depths a look he would not have wanted her to recognize.
    â€œI had a couple of drinks,” she said. “I’m feelin’ a little tipsy.”
    â€œAll change,” shouted Daddy. “All change.”
    The fiddlers sawed their strings tunelessly, and someone took Sarah’s arm from behind and turned her around away from Williams. It was Huddy Foster, one of Brick’s friends, a drinker, a fighter, small, wiry, quick as a weasel. Sarah was afraid of him, but she couldn’t get away.
    The band started another waltz, and Huddy danced away with her. There was nothing shy about Huddy. He danced her close, one leg almost between hers, his hand low down on her back. When the dance finished, he followed her back to join Brick and Vinny, and the four of them went outside. They stopped in the shadows back of the dance hall, and Brick took his bottle out and passed it around. There was no ginger ale to put into it this time, and Sarah was conscious of the heat of it going down.
    When the band started up again, they went back to the dance hall together. Huddy walked beside Sarah, and she worried that he might be trying to take her over and wondered how she could get rid of him. But inside, he and Brick went off together, and after five minutes, an old boyfriend of Vinny’s came along and asked her to dance, and she went off with him. When Brick came back, he was alone. She had thought he might be angry about Vinny, but he didn’t seem to care.
    â€œLet’s you and me do it,” he said.
    Like Huddy, he held her close, his belly rock-hard against her.
    â€œWhy don’t we go out for a drive some night,” he said. “We could go over the lines some night maybe and go to a movie.”
    â€œVinny wouldn’t think much of that.”
    â€œVinny don’t own me.”
    â€œI know. But she’s my friend. She’s been a real good friend to me, and I don’t want to make her mad.”
    The hard strength of him excited her, but in spite of the rye she still held to the knowledge that no matter what they did together she wouldn’t last either.
    â€œWell,” he was saying, “we wouldn’t have to tell her, would we?”
    After the dance, they went back to the place by the wall that had become their spot for the evening. Vinny was alone, and Sarah thought she saw a flicker of jealousy in her look when she saw her with Brick. But nobody said anything about anything. They simply watched the crowd.
    Further along the wall, Sarah saw Williams looking at her. She met his eyes, not signalling anything exactly, but not breaking the thread either. In the end, it was he who looked away, but after a few seconds his eyes drifted back to her. She put both her hands up to her head and with the palms slowly pushed her hair back from above her temples, lifting her breasts inside her dress and letting them slowly descend, watching Williams all the while as she did.
    But when the music started, it was Herbie Booth who got to her first. She told him no, and he smiled his foolish smile and just stood there. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Williams hesitate and then come on.
    â€œI had this dance promised,” she told Herbie.
    â€œDid you want to dance with him?” Williams asked when they were out on the floor.
    â€œI wouldn’t dance with him if he was the last man in the place.”
    â€œYou were dancing with him before.”
    â€œThat was just a reel. That don’t matter.”
    As they danced, she moved closer to him and again put her head on his shoulder.
    â€œWhat did you do before you went