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apologizing? What’s going on between him and Mame? And now he’s asking her all about our promotions and the letters she plans to write. Taking in every word.
    So. No wonder he stopped by here before he came to tell us he was home. Yet Mame hasn’t said one word to me about Ed, nor Ed about Mame. Had she forgotten “the Pact” we three girls made last summer on this very porch? We promised each other we wouldn’t be panicked into getting married. I think the McCabes wanted to support me after I said no to Joe Murphy. A nice enough fellow but not a bit of chat in him. I couldn’t understand why he was even courting me except he was a friend of Mart’s and lived next door and thought it was time to go for a bride. He started appearing in our parlor on Sundays and after about a month he followed me into the kitchen and said, “So what about it?”
    “What about what?” I asked, thinking he wanted a cup of tea or a glass of beer, but no, marriage was the “it” though I had to drag the words from him.
    “Me, marry you, Joe?”
    “Well,” he said, “I’ve a good job in the quarry and likely to be the foreman soon. My mother’s dead, so she wouldn’t have to live with us. All my sisters are married. We’d have the place to ourselves, which I thought you’d like.”
    God, did our house look so crowded he thought I’d marry him just to get some space?
    “And do you have feelings for me, Joe?” I asked.
    “Well, you’re a good-looking woman, Nonie. And all your chattering doesn’t bother me since, as you might have noticed, I’m not a great talker and so you could fill up the silence in any way you wanted.”
    “Well, Joe, that’s nice of you, I’m sure, but I don’t think we’re really suited.”
    “Oh, sorry, I forgot. I love you, Nonie. Mart told me to say that first, but I get so nervous.”
    “Mart told you?” I said.
    “He did. We were thinking you and me are both getting on in years…”
    “You’re forty, I’m twenty-three,” I told him.
    “You’re as old as that?” he said. “I wasn’t sure. Well, most of my friends and your friends are married and there’s not all that many left to choose from. Mart said as well me as any other, since I’m steady and not a drinker and that you’d grab at your last chance to get married.” And then he rubbed his eyes. “Whew, that’s a lot of words came out of me at one time,” he said, as if he’d surprised himself.
    I smiled at him and thanked him for the effort, but I wasn’t going to marry a fellow because he used up a week’s worth of talk on me. I blathered on a bit about the great honor and what a fine husband he’d make some lucky girl.
    “I might even be able to go for a younger one,” he said.
    I agreed that age wasn’t as much of an issue for a fellow. He seemed happy, and I thought I’d done very well, keeping my temper when I wanted to blast him, telling myself he was only a shy guilpín . But then he asked would I help him propose to Rose or Mame McCabe.
    “Which one?” I said, sarcastic now.
    And he said, “Which do you think would have me?”
    The eejit. And then I lost the run of myself a bit and said that all women weren’t as desperate to get married as maybe his sisters had been. Mart had come over to tell me to keep my voice down. I could be heard in the parlor. And I’d told him if he’d mind his own business I wouldn’t have to raise up and defend myself since it seemed my own brother was so anxious to get rid of me.
    Joe spoke up and said, “Don’t blame Mart. He only said you were always moaning about not being heard, and all I’ve done my whole life is listen.”
    Well, I couldn’t keep raging at him, remembering how the Murphy girls would go on and on and on. Not worth yelling at Mart either, and I did make a good story of Joe’s proposal for Rose and Mame. That’s when we resolved not to marry at all unless we felt well and truly in love with a man who loved and appreciated us. If any such