Read Pronto for Free Online

your protection?" Harry saw the man's puzzled look and said, "That's a theoretical question. I'm wondering about my rights."
    "Our being around makes you nervous?"
    It didn't seem worth getting into. Harry shook his head. "Let's forget I asked."
    Raylan said, "We can stay pretty much out of sight except ... Mr. Arno, could you do us a big favor? Don't go out at night, okay? And if you want to go someplace during the day, let us drive you."
    Harry said, "This is for my protection."
    "Yes, sir."
    "Or so I won't run off on you."
    "This's different'n that other time," Raylan said. "You jump bond you become a fugitive from justice." Serious about it.
    Harry said, "I guess I wasn't thinking."
    It seemed to satisfy Raylan.
    Joyce was the one giving him the look.
    He was at the window again where he spent half the day. Joyce watched him from the kitchen. She finished drying the dishes and crossed the room to put her hand on Harry's shoulder and stand close to him.
    "Is he still outside?"
    "In the park getting a cone. The U. S. marshal loves ice cream. You hear him say he's from some county? People from the South do that. Not in Florida so much, I mean people from the south South."
    "I've heard of Harlan County," Joyce said. "You want to know what I think?"
    "Tell me."
    "He's not as dumb as you'd like to believe."
    "I forgot you're from that part of the country. Nashville, was it? And you people tend to stick up for each other."
    "We moved, Harry, when I was two years old."
    "Yeah, but once a you-all, you're one for life," Harry said. "Look at him licking his cone."
    When they were silent and it was quiet in the room they could hear faint sounds from outside, a car starting, voices raised. Out on the beach a photographer and crew were shooting a ninety-pound fashion model in after-swim wear, a girl fifteen or sixteen. Models now were babies. Joyce had three catalog jobs lined up for the winter and was pretty sure of doing aerobic outfits in the sexy underwear book. She looked okay as long as she could wear a stocking to cover her veins and bumps. She didn't mind Harry seeing them.
    They went out weekdays during the football season, saw a movie and had dinner and sometimes she'd stay over. Harry became horny about once a month, always in the morning. Toward the end of his drinking days, a few years ago, he was horny every morning, especially hung over. But he was only normally horny, years before that, when she was dancing topless and he would take her out after to get something to eat. He didn't seem to know what kind of attitude to have about her. Or he was self-conscious about being seen with her in public; though there was little chance anyone on the beach would recognize her. The clubs she worked were in Miami. Harry was prudish, while she didn't feel that dancing with her breasts exposed, when she was doing it, was that big a deal. She said to him once, "You wait for what seems like forever to see what kind of tits you're going to have. Then once you have them, whatever shape or size they are, you're stuck. Mine are o-kay, they're not showstoppers by any means, which is fine with me. I've never ever thought for one minute about getting them augumented, or envied girls who had big ones -- no thanks, have to carry around the load some girls do. Of course, guys love big ones." At least guys who came to topless clubs seemed to. They'd ask why she wore glasses while she performed and she'd tell them so she could see where she was going and not fall off the stage. She told Harry the horn-rim glasses gave her a friendly rapport with the audience. Here was a girl being herself and they loved it, they could relate to her. "Like I was the girl next door." And Harry said, "Or their fifth-grade teacher they used to fantasize about, wonder what she looked like naked." There could be something to that. He asked about guys who ran these clubs hitting on her. She told Harry they weren't her type. As Joy she'd open her act with Led Zeppelin's