Whippoorwill Read Free Page B

skin.
    In pain, he quickly dumped the water into the small hip bath then dropped to the floor. He was in the act of taking off the wet shoe when Letty came in from the balcony.
    She saw him taking off his shoes and thought he was getting undressed.
    “Don’t even think about it!” she yelled, and picked up her hairbrush and hit him on the back of the head.
    At this time of night, Eulis was always less than steady on his feet and sitting down made little difference to his equilibrium. The blow from the hairbrush sent him face forward between his outstretched legs. He groaned, both from the shock of the blow and from the pull of unused muscles at the backs of his legs.
    “What did you go and do that for?” Eulis cried, ducking again in fear of a second swing.
    “There’s only one reason a man ever takes his shoes off in a woman’s room and I’m done with that for the night,” Letty said.
    Eulis groaned. “No. No. I wasn’t tryin’ for no poke. I swear. I spilt hot water in my shoe. That’s all.”
    Letty frowned. “Oh. Well then. I guess I’m sorry for hitting you.”
    Eulis shrugged. “It’s all right. It didn’t hurt none. It just startled me.”
    He peeled the sock from his foot and eyed the skin.
    “What do you think? Reckon it’ll blister?”
    Letty snorted. “I reckon it didn’t make it past the first two layers of dirt. That’s what I reckon.”
    Now it was Eulis’s turn to frown. “It don’t pay to insult the man what brings you your bath water every night.”
    Letty sighed and then sat down on the side of the bed.
    “You’re right. I’m sorry, Eulis. No hard feelings, okay?”
    Eulis waited until she tossed the hairbrush onto the other side of the bed and then rolled over and dragged himself upright.
    “Yeah… well… just see that it don’t happen again,” he muttered, and started out the door when Letty called him back.
    “Hey, Eulis, do you ever want more in your life than what you got?”
    Eulis’s head was starting to float right off his shoulders, which always meant he had about five minutes, no more, no less, before he passed out. He preferred passing out on his bed in the back of the saloon, but if Letty didn’t stop her yapping, he wasn’t going to make it down the stairs. However, he knew women well enough to know that if he didn’t answer this question, there would be another and another until they got the answer they wanted, so he shrugged.
    “I reckon so.”
    “Me, too,” Letty said. “What do you want?”
    “That’s easy,” Eulis said. “You know that big fancy bottle of Tennessee bourbon that Will has sitting on the back of the bar? The one that he’s never opened?” He grinned. “That’s what I want.”
    Letty snorted in an unladylike manner and grabbed for the hairbrush again.
    “Get out of my room, you old sot, and take your stinkin’ shoe with you.”
    Eulis ducked as she picked up his shoe and sock and flung them past his shoulder and out into the hall. He made it out of her room just as the door hit him in the backside. It sent him staggering even more, but he caught himself on the stair rail and then turned and glared at her closed door.
    “I wish she hadn’t asked me no question. I knew I wouldn’t have the right answer,” he grumbled, then rubbed his hands on his face, trying to stimulate blood circulation.
    He eyed the shoe that she’d thrown and knew that if he wanted it back, he would have to bend down to pick it up. He also knew that if he did, he’d spend the night on the floor in the hall.
    “I reckon I’ll get it tomorrow,” Eulis said, and started down the back stairs, one shoe lighter than when he’d come up.
    He made it all the way to his room, but when he turned around to sit down, missed the side of the bed and sat down on the floor.
    “Tarnation.”
    It was his last thought of the night as he rolled over on his side and fell asleep.
    Upstairs, Letty was in a similar state of mind, but her fugue was not from drink, it was