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"Yeah?" He shook his head. "I'll take that butter." He smirked at Willie. "They weren't
too rough for her before." A heat of anger and fear surged through me. I jumped up and grabbed
the butter from the cooling shelf and slammed it down on the table beside Zack's plate. I wanted
to slam him on the head with it but I'd worked too hard to ruin the butter. He didn't seem to
notice my anger except for the smirk getting bigger on his face.

"Out with it Sophie girl, who is it?"

This time I was determined to stop it but it was beyond me. Standing over by the stove
cleaning up the cooking mess I said, as casually as I could, seeing as I was blood-red mad,
"There's nobody, Zack. It's just like Willie said, none of your pals are the kind of men I truly
choose to be spending time with."

He looked at me then, and mimicked, "'Truly choose?'" and then slid into his regular
voice, "Huh! It's my bet someone is feathering your nest right here. The hen don't have to wander
far when she's got a rooster right close to home."

Both Willie and I stared at him, me because he had me nailed to the wall. I tried to
distract him, "That's what I mean, crude talking like that. That's all you know, you and your
pals."

"Smithers?" Willie cut right through it. "You don't mean Smithers?" He stared at Zack
who just shook his head at Willie like he was a simpleton.

"Of course I mean Smithers. Who else is around here? Not the rough guys we work
with. Oh no, it's that Fancy Dan with the smooth hands. I'll bet he's smooth everywhere else too,
eh, Sophie." He leered at me.

I felt my face go crimson. The fire was hot in me. "Don't talk to me like that."

Willie jumped up, outraged. "That's enough, Zack! Sophie's our sister, and Smithers is a
married man. So they like to talk, that's no reason to get foul-mouthed about it. I know Smithers
and he's decent. One more word like that and I leave. And Sophie goes with me."

That startled me. I kept silent but I had no intention of going anywhere. Willie's threat
immediately calmed Zack down. Without me he'd be back to taking care of himself. He didn't
want to do that.

"For God sakes, Willie, I was only kidding. Don't you know nothing? Sit down, eat your
supper. Forget I said anything." He took up the butter and started spreading some on his
potatoes.

Willie looked at him and then at me.

I shrugged my shoulders, like what could we do with Zack, and motioned him to sit
down at the table again. "Forget it, Willie. Finish your dinner. I've also got some pie tonight." He
looked at me again. For one horrid moment I thought he was going to question me about David,
then he shrugged and sat back down.

"What kind of pie?" He was so serious it would have made me laugh if I wasn't so
frightened. I showed him the salal berry pie that I'd made in the cool of the morning with berries
I'd picked the day before with David. He tucked into his dinner, a smile on his face.

We finished our meal in silence, but Willie's words had been like a bucket of cold water
thrown onto a forest fire. They didn't put out the flame I felt for David but I was more in control
now. Willie was right.

David was a married man. And I was beginning to suspect I was a pregnant woman. I
felt disaster just around the corner. I was two weeks past my monthly, not usual for me. In
another three weeks I'd know for sure.

My mind was clear, I must tell David. If I was pregnant I was no more than a month
along. Maybe he would know what to do. Having a baby out-of-wedlock in those days was
unthinkable. Shameful. I was terrified at the possibility.

The day after the argument I went to the beach. I found him near our log. He was happy
to see me and hugged me hard and kissed me right there in the open. I hardly cared. "David,
we've got to talk."

He knew something was very wrong. "Sure, honey, what's the matter?"

We sat on the log and I plunged right in. "I think I'm pregnant."

I certainly didn't expect him to leap up, laughing, and then reach down, grab me and
yell, "Tremendous!" right in my face, but that's what he did.

I was shocked, surprised. "But, David," I tried to say. He didn't hear me.

"Are you sure? Oh, honey. This is wonderful! How far?" At last he was going to listen
to me.

"You act like this is a glorious event. It's not! You're a married man. What's going to
happen to me?" I could feel tears starting but I swallowed them. "David, do you know anyway to
stop it?"

He looked like I had struck him. "You just put that idea out of your head right now. You
could die."

"David, you don't understand. What am I going to do?"

"Do?" He had the simplest explanation of all. "You'll come live with me, of
course."

"With you? And what will Amy think of this fine idea?." I thought he'd gone mad.
Maybe he was "Crazy Smithers" after all.

"Why Amy thinks it's just fine."

"What do you mean Amy thinks it's just fine? She doesn't know about us, does
she?"

He looked bewildered for a minute. "Sure, she knows. I couldn't keep something like
this from her. She's known I love you since last spring, when we planted the roses."

All I could think was that David was off his rocker, and so was his wife.

"Look Sophie, maybe it does sound a little odd, but Amy and I... We don't believe a
wedding band should cut you off from life. No one person can be everything to another. Amy
loves the city, and plays, and crowded smoky rooms full of people. I hate it. So when she leaves
in the summer she does all those things, with men who do enjoy them."

"Does she make love to them, like you do with me?" The whole idea was absurd, but I
couldn't help asking. For a moment I ignored my predicament.

"No, she hasn't. It's just that it's her choice. So far she hasn't met any man she loves but
me. But I'll understand if she does."

"But, David," I was repeating myself. "It's so dangerous. What if she finds someone, and
leaves you?"

"Why ever should she leave me? The core of me is her and the core of her is me. That
will never change. I know that as certainly as I know I love you and you love me. Do you doubt
that I love you?"

"No." I didn't. I was absolutely certain.

"Okay. It's settled. Amy gets back the last week in September. We'll know for certain
whether you're going to be a mother by then."

"David." It was time for some serious talking, of the way the world really is, not the way
David wanted it to be. "This just won't work."

"Sure--"

"No, wait. You've got some starry-eyed notion that Amy is just going to be delighted to
welcome me into her home. She's not. I'll bet everything I have on it, which isn't much. She may
be all you say. If she has allowed you to go with me...knowing all about me...then she is, well,
unusual. I certainly wouldn't have left you alone here with me."

For the first time he was concerned, "You're not a jealous woman, are you, Soph?"

That made me laugh, though it came out bitter. He was worried that I was a jealous
woman. "Frankly, I've never had the chance to find out. I've never been in love, until you."

"How do you feel about Amy?"

Finally, I'd gotten to him. "I don't think about her. She's been gone all summer. It's like
she doesn't exist. I never thought about living with her. I can't believe even now that you would
ever consider it. Why, she'd have to be a saint to do that."
Or nuts,
I thought.

"The Mormons do it."

"What?"

"You know they do, and they get along all right. They don't think it's crazy."

"Maybe they don't but everybody else does." I was suddenly suspicious. "You're not a
Mormon, are you?" That would explain his crazy ideas.

"No, I'm not. But we grew up in Utah, so I've heard stories."

Then I remembered what he'd told me about his growing up, and I was relieved, let me
tell you. An odd religion thrown in would have baked the cake.

"This whole thing is too much for me. I'm getting a headache. Whatever happens I'm not
moving into your house. It's just not right."

"I wouldn't force you to do something you think is wrong, but please, Sophie, at least
think about it."

I promised to do that but I had no intention of giving in. I didn't want to meet Amy, nor
even see her, let alone share her husband in the same house with her.

We parted without even a kiss. He tried but I wasn't feeling too well. I just wanted to go
home, and lie down. He teased me then about being "...just like a wife with headaches and no
lovin'."

I didn't see anything to laugh about. I waved him away and trudged off through the sand.
As I walked up the path to the cabin, I thought how easy it would be to slip and fall, and lose the
baby. Something else within me made me walk even more carefully, lest I fall and hurt the baby.
I knew it was crazy thinking but if I was carrying a child, it was David's as well as mine, and he
wouldn't want to lose another one.

When I got home I laid down for a while until I felt better. Then I started thinking about
Willie and Zack. The road job would close down at the end of September, about the same time
Amy would be back. I still had no notion of living with them, but I wanted to be close to David
for as long as I could, no matter whether I was pregnant or not. Willie would be going home to
Nettie--no problem there--but Zack was going to another construction job, in California, and was
expecting me to go with him. I had to think of a believable reason for staying here in the
cabin.

Telling him I was "in trouble" was out of the question, but what if I told him that Amy
was pregnant and that David had asked me if I could stay and help? No, not just help. If Zack
thought I could earn more money by staying rather than going with him... He wouldn't like it, but
he understood money.

She'd been gone since late June. She couldn't be less than three months along. But did
Zack know that most problems happen in the first three months? I was sure he didn't. Even so,
there were other complications I could dream up.

After I got it satisfied in my mind that I could handle the boys, I put my thoughts to
David. I had best get to know him even better. What did I really know about this man who might
be the father of my child, and who had such strange ideas?

David's father had been a Baptist minister in Virginia. When David was small his
parents moved the family to Utah. Three families came with him from Virginia, all with equal
purpose, to bring the True Word to the Mormon heathens. Their original goal had been Salt Lake
City. Within a week of their arrival, Preacher Smithers and his small, fervent group found out
that, "The Devil had those people caught tightly in his talons." Preacher Smithers decided the
Lord was telling him that he hadn't meant Salt Lake City at all. Better to start small, perhaps
some place where the Devil hadn't got such a firm hold.

Thus inspired they moved, hurriedly, as David remembered it, to a small town about
fifty miles away.

They prayed and worked hard. After fifteen years the score was BAPTISTS:
one
. The Lutheran family changed to 'good Baptist Christians' because the Baptist
church was convenient, and a maybe
two
, the possible a Mormon woman who was
friendly. MORMONS: everybody else, including David's brother who married a Mormon girl,
becoming an LDS convert. David married Amy about that time. She being from the Lutheran
family the Baptists figured they were at least even, but weren't sure.

Preacher Smithers was hearty in his approval of the marriage, considering the disaster
that had befallen the eldest son. He encouraged David to move on to less soul-endangering
surroundings. They feared the exposure of future grandchildren to the predominant religion.
David would have left anyway, as he was filled with a longing for an ocean he'd never seen.

His success as a painter was slow, but he worked lumbering and part-time as a hired
hand. They never starved, and David was content to remain by the sea for the rest of his life.

Their unusual ideas of life were a mixture of what they saw in their growing up, and
from reading. David told me that there was more than one approach to life and marriage. He was
determined not to get set in a mold. "It makes moldy people," he would later tell me.

He had a bit of the preacher in him, too. Not in religious ways, but he loved to talk, and
could at times be most stubborn to have people agree with him. It was amazing to him that Amy
didn't immediately grasp the truth of his ideas. "But, it's so clear!" he would shout.

That was always the end of the sermon, because Amy would say, "Amen, David." He
would purse his lips in annoyance, but stop.

But David's strongest holdover from his father's influence was what he called his
inability to swear properly. I first heard his expression, "Cotton pickin' thunderbolts," when he
went to push a stick farther into a campfire and burned his hand on the fire in the coals. He
dropped the stick and exploded with the oath.

I laughed. I'd expected "Damnation!" at least, and told him so.

"I've tried." Clearly, he was hurt at my laughter. "But it just doesn't work. I had it
pressed in me hard as a youngster that only bad people swear. I never really believed it 'cause
Amy's Dad seemed to get relief from a good "Damn!" now and then. Other than that, I just didn't
hear much swearing where I grew up. But I was willing to learn. After Amy and I left home, I
worked with a lumber crew and practiced everything I heard--not around Amy of course. But,
you know, Sophie, something was wrong." His eyebrows wrinkled in bewilderment.

"Every
damn
came out sounding like
darn
and
Hell!
always
made me nervous. The worse ones were beyond me. They stuck in my throat and sounded weak
when they came out. The guys laughed at me. They called me... oh, never mind."