The Bride's House by Sandra Dallas Page B

Charlie opened the door, going in ahead of her. Once they were seated, he looked askance at the menu, just as Nealie had the other time she’d eaten there. “You can read, can’t you?” Nealie asked.
    “Of course I can read. I just never ate anyplace that wrote it down.”
    Nealie looked at her own menu then, realizing that it was mostly in English with just a few French words. Nonetheless, she had no idea what the dishes were, and when the man came back to take their order, she said, “I want venison and raspberry ice. No oysters. Don’t you bring me oysters, for I’m not much of a fool about them.”
    “Same,” Charlie said, and when the waiter was gone, he asked, “I guess you ate here before.”
    “Well, of course, I have,” Nealie replied, then a little ashamed of her pomposity, she giggled, “Once.”
    “With Will Spaulding?” Charlie asked.
    Nealie didn’t answer. Instead, she looked around the room, stopping to stare at a woman. “Why, that’s the lady in the play. She isn’t nearly so pretty up close, is she?” Nealie studied the actress and added, “She’s just an ordinary woman and kind of old.”
    “That’s why they call it playacting. It’s not real.”
    “But up there on the stage, it’s like magic. I believe I like the magic better. I wonder what it would be like to be a play actress.”
    “I don’t think you ought to be one, Miss Nealie. They’re not good women. Some of them are … well, you know.”
    Nealie studied him a minute. Of course she knew, and it surprised her, because Charlie rarely had a bad word to say about anyone. She wondered then if he was hidebound. But before she could consider that further, the waiter set down their plates. Nealie carefully picked up her knife, and pinning down the meat with her fork, she cut a single bite. As she put it into her mouth, she watched Charlie cut the venison into strips, then turn his plate so that he could cut the strips crosswise. He stirred the peas and carrots into the potatoes and gravy, then mixed in the meat, and leaning over his plate, he shoveled in a mouthful. Nealie looked around the room, but no one was watching. She cleared her throat, and Charlie looked up, narrowing his eyes. “Don’t you like it?” he asked, looking at her plate, because while he had gobbled a fourth of his food in two bites, Nealie had eaten only a single piece of meat.
    “I’m trying to eat slow,” she said, but that was not the only reason she had eaten so little. She still had trouble holding her fork the way Will did.
    “Well, I don’t know why. It’ll get cold.” Charlie continued pushing food into his mouth, until his plate was almost empty. Then he glanced around the room and saw that the other diners were eating as slowly as Nealie. “These folks all eat as prissy as Will Spaulding,” he said.
    “I guess it wouldn’t hurt a person to learn manners,” Nealie replied.
    “Don’t you think I have manners, Miss Nealie?”
    The girl blushed, because she herself had been sensible of table manners for only two weeks. Besides, she was not an unkind person. “I just learned about them myself,” she said, adding quickly, so that Charlie would not bring up Will Spaulding again, “I read about them in a book that Mrs. Travers has.”
    “Maybe she’ll give me the borrow of that book sometime.”
    “Maybe,” Nealie said, doubting the man would ever read such a tome.
    Charlie speared a piece of meat, then tried to rub off the mashed potato clinging to it, and brought it to his mouth. “How’s that?” he asked.
    He reminded her of a puppy who wanted a pat on the head, so Nealie smiled and nodded her approval, although she considered Charlie as unmannerable as ever.
    The big man finished his meal, then pushed the plate aside. He removed the napkin from his shirtfront and rubbed his mouth, then ran it over his face and set it on the table, as he sat watching Nealie eat. When she was finished, he said, “There’s something I’m