Chapter Thirty-two
There she was, cute as a button, famous across the whole country, a woman like no other. I peered around the sheriff office, with all its deadly force, and made up my mind.
“Ma’am, I’m not a big-game hunter. I’m a meat hunter. I go out hunting, I want to put elk steaks or antelope on the table, for myself and family and my friends. I never was one to shoot an elk because of its big rack, or shoot an elephant just to say I did, or kill a Bengal tiger so I could have a taxidermist mount the head, with all those feline teeth bared.”
She studied me for a moment, and I was expecting some smart reply, but instead she turned real soft, there in the dim lamplight.
“I like you, Cotton Pickens,” she said. “You know what the trouble is with road shows, and show people? We’re all lonely. We’re not making friends. We’re all as alone as people get. The show’s going to change every week, people come and go, and nothing’s the same. No homes, no neighborhoods, just ourselves, all bottled up. I’ve a favor to ask you.”
I couldn’t imagine what she wanted, but I nodded.
“Could you sit beside me somewhere and just hold me? That’s all. Just hold me gently. You’re the only person I’ve seen in years who cares about me.”
“I could do that, ma’am, but all I’ve got is the bench in the cell there.”
“Then we’ll make the cell our alpine meadow, full of sunshine and breezes,” she said.
We walked back there, in the dark, and sat down, and she surrendered herself to my arm, and we sat like that almost forever. She didn’t kiss me; she didn’t mess around. She just cozied up, and I felt her relax. She held my hand. Peace overtook her, and it was the thing she needed more than anything in the world. So I sat with her, even while my arm ached, and along about dawn, she straightened up, smiled, and whispered two words that meant something to me.
“Thank you,” she said.
She straightened her doeskin skirt, touched my stubbled cheek once, and walked away.
I hadn’t slept much, but I’d be fine. She would return to her world, and I to mine, and we would remember a few hours when we were each in another world. Maybe some other time and place, or on some other planet, we might have found each other, and lived a life of companionship. But not in this world.
I slept some, and was awakened when Rusty wandered in, looking like hell.
“Bad night? Riley trouble?”
“No, twin trouble,” he said, pouring some ancient java from a pot on the woodstove.
“Woman trouble,” I said. “No man escapes it.”
“I suppose your ma told you that.”
“No, I got that idea myself.”
“The twins are fighting,” he said. “There they are, locked to each other for life, sharing bodies, and they’re fighting. It tears me to pieces. They’re miserable.”
“Still about marriage?”
“Anna’s insisting they go back to the carnival and earn money. No one’s taking care of them here; I keep them in food, and that’s about it. There’s nothing for them. But Natasha’s just as determined to marry me, since I proposed to her, and she won’t go back, and the whole thing’s at a stalemate.”
“And the territory won’t let you marry both. It’s a problem,” I said.
“There’s no solution. It’ll just get worse. It’s tragedy.”
“There’s common-law marriage,” I said. “Just marry Natasha and live with Anna and call her your wife.”
“Cotton, you’re a card. You don’t know women.”
“Where have I heard that before?” I asked. “Blame it on my ma and pa. I don’t have any sisters. Let’s go talk to Hanging Judge Ear wig. He owes us a favor.”
Rusty looked morose. “He’ll find some way to make it worse. I’ll end up shipping them back to the Ukraine.”
But he came along with me. We angled across the courthouse square on a fine August morning, and found Earwig snoring on a couch in his chambers.
“Oh, eh, not much business this morning. Have you something to put in my Charity Jar?”
“Well, if you would do two weddings, you’d get double the donation,” I said.
He eyed me, and Rusty. “More Ukrainian crises?”
“I think you already know the trouble,” Rusty said. “We were wondering if you have any ideas.”
Earwig stared owlishly at Rusty. “You sure got a doozer, my boy. Two poor women, locked together for all their days, each with a different dream, a different will. And one wants to be your bride, and the other wants to put herself and sister on display again. As miserable as that sounds, it’s a life and an income. Am I right?”
“You’re right, sir.”
“Have you tried proposing to both?”
“This isn’t Utah, sir. No, no one will let me marry them both.”
Ear wig pursed his lips and stared into space. “Irons, you go propose to Anna and tell her you’ll find a way to marry both twins at once. And come back and report to me whether she accepts.”
“How you gonna do that, sir, if I may ask?”
“Desperate problems require desperate remedies,” Ear wig said. “I have one in mind that should satisfy the law, satisfy moralists, satisfy religionists, and make your lives happy.”
“All that?”
“I thought to hang one and you could marry the other,” Ear wig said, a tiny smile erecting on his bushy face.
Rusty, he just looked peeved, but I winked at the judge, and then Rusty and me, we went to Belle’s Boarding House to have a go with the Ukrainians.
“How’s he gonna do that?” Rusty asked.
“Beats me,” I said. “Do you want me to sit in on the proposal, or should I go visit the outhouse?”
“You sit in on her. Maybe you should propose to Anna, and we’ll make everyone happy.”
“That’s a little too intimate for comfort, Rusty. No, the twins are yours alone.”
At Belle’s, we clumped up the stairs, knocked, and found Natasha and Anna glaring at each other, as usual. Natasha didn’t even seem happy to see Rusty. The dilemma had exhausted any goodwill anyone possessed.
Rusty, he got right down on one knee, and took Anna’s hand. “My dear Anna, will you marry me, now and forever?” he asked.
“What’s this? You are a madman.”
“No, my dear, I am a man overflowing with the love of both of you in my bosom.”
I thought Rusty was laying it on thick. Natasha, she was studying him like he was a toad. Her biggest joy in life had been Rusty’s proposal, which hadn’t extended to Anna, but now Rusty was robbing her of all her prestige, and turning this into a three-way deal.
“I don’t know if I want you. Natasha can have you. No, I don’t think so.”
“My dear Anna, Judge Earwig says he’ll find a way to marry us,” Rusty said. “Please change your mind.”
Anna turned grouchy. “My only pleasure in life has been to frustrate you and Natasha in your cruel plans to wed without me. Now you are robbing me of my sole pleasure in this miserable existence.”
“I’ll take that for a yes,” Rusty said. “Congratulations, Anna. You’ve accepted. Now wash up, and we’ll see what Hanging Judge Earwig can do for us.”
The twins stared at him, and at each other, and rose. Anna poured water from the pitcher into the washbasin, and took a washcloth and washed Natasha’s face. And then Natasha washed Anna’s face. And then they combed each other’s hair, and straightened their dress.
First Natasha smiled, and then Anna.
“Take us,” Anna said.
I took Natasha’s arm, and Rusty took Anna’s, and we helped the twins down the creaking stairs, and made our slow majestic way to the courthouse as the midday sun smiled warmly on us. People stared and smiled, and a brat boy tried to look under the twins’ skirt, but I snarled at him. He thumbed his nose at me and skittered away.
Somehow, Riley got wind of it, and caught up with us, walking next to Rusty.
We made our slow and stately way up the courthouse stairs to Judge Earwig’s courtroom, and found no one in it. That was either because I kept law and order so well that there were no cases before him, or I kept law and order so poorly that I brought no cases to him. I never could figure out which. But Earwig had a good job, in which he only rarely had to work.
He emerged at once from his chambers, eyed us, and retreated. When he returned, he was wearing his black robe, and carrying some marigolds, which he divided and gave to each bride.
Natasha looked at them, and at him, and began oozing tears. Rusty, he was kicking himself for not stopping to get some flowers beforehand.
“I take it this is a bridal party?” Earwig asked.
“It is, sir.”
“And you wish me to wed both of these lovelies to you, Mr. Irons?”
“I do, Your Honor.”
Earwig, he seemed ready to burst. “I’ve been meditating on this, and I have found a solution.”
I sure was itching to learn it, but I kept my yap shut.
He seemed uncommonly pleased with himself. The courtroom was starting to fill up; word buzzed around Doubtful, and not a few citizens wanted to see the show.
Natasha, she was smiling to beat the band. Anna, she was eyeing the crowds, a little uncertain.
Earwig eyed the crowd, which gave him a captive audience, which pleased him all the more, because he was about to put his natural brilliance on display. I could see it in his face. He was fairly bursting with whatever was percolating inside of his cranium.
“Now, I welcome you all to this joyous occasion,” he said. “I shall be marrying Natasha and Anna to Mr. Rusty Irons, and I will be doing it with all legality, morality, and propriety.”
I saw Delphinium Sanders, the town’s certified prude, whispering heatedly at the rear of the room. Judge Earwig saw her, too.
“We shall have silence here, among those who have come to share this joyous moment,” he said.
Delphinium whispered for a few moments more, long enough to let him know she wasn’t taking orders.
“Now, then, unusual circumstances require unusual remedies,” he said. “These lovely ladies are bonded by nature for life, and each desires in her most secret bosom to share her life with her husband. Which poses difficulties with the law of the land, but not difficulties that are insurmountable. Given the nature of this matter, I concluded that each couple will have to divide its time with the other couple. That is to say, each couple can be married only half the time, instead of all the time. It is unavoidable, given that each bride is attached all her life to the other bride. Therefore, if it suits my petitioners, now standing before me, I shall marry Rusty Irons to Natasha on odd months of the year, and to Anna on even months of the year. Since your vows and marriage contract will embrace only half of each year, there is no need for divorce. Since Natasha will marry Rusty during January and March and May, there is no need for her to divorce Rusty during the intervening months of February and April. Each marriage is for half a year only, alternating months.”
The audience listened, mesmerized.
“What about February? Short month!” Anna asked.
“Ah, my dear, we live in an imperfect world, and the fact is, you will have slightly less time with your husband, but bear in mind that you alone will enjoy leap years. You will have leap year Februaries with your beloved, and Natasha won’t. Is that fair enough?”
She nodded.
It went fast. Within ten minutes, Rusty was married to Natasha on January, March, May, July, September, and November. And to Anna February, April, June, August, October, and December.
And the crowd watched, some with pursed lips. Riley was the first to kiss his moms.