Read Online Donovan’s Angel by Peggy Webb - Free Book Online Page B

You
know what I mean?”
    They didn’t have the foggiest idea, but that
didn’t stop Ethel Ann. She rarely had a captive audience, which
translated meant one too polite to get up and leave; and when she
did, she took full advantage. Shifting the tray to her hip, she
leaned down to wipe the table.
    “Now you take the Westgates,” she continued.
“Fight like cats and dogs. Even in public. Now I ask you, is that
any way to live?” She didn’t wait for their answer, of course.
“It’s as plain as Yankee Doodle that you two palpitate for one
another. And besides that have the highest admonition for each
other. You know what I mean?”
    They still didn’t. Ethel Ann reached into her
pocket for the check and waved it in the air as she continued her
monologue.
    “This world would be a better place if more
married folks remembered that. Palpitation and admonition. And it
all starts and ends in the bedroom.” She winked at Paul. “Right,
honey?”
    Paul was equal to the occasion. “I couldn’t
agree with you more. You didn’t tell us your name.”
    “Ethel Ann, honey.” She trained her bright
copper-penny eyes on Martie. “Starts and ends in the bedroom,” she
repeated drolly, and then she headed toward the kitchen to gossip
with Mary Muldooney.
    Paul and Martie hurried from the
restaurant.
    “Do you think we’re combustible?” Martie
asked, shooting Paul a pixie smile.
    “Not to mention palpitating,” he said, with a
straight face. They laughed all the way to the parking lot.
    Suddenly Martie grabbed his arm. “Paul, I
almost forgot.”
    “What?” he asked, covering her hand with
his.
    “We can’t leave the Hilton without riding the
glass elevator.”
    “I should think not,” he solemnly agreed.
    So they made their way to the electronic
glass cage that whisked them toward the stars. Paul pulled her into
the circle of his arms, and she leaned there as naturally as if it
were an old habit.
    “You see that constellation?” She pointed to
the Big Dipper. “After Mom died I imagined that she was up there,
riding in the dipper, and that if I concentrated hard enough, she
would know what I was thinking. Even after I learned better, I
still felt that the stars somehow brought me closer to her.”
    Paul tightened his arms around her in silent
understanding. And even after the elevator had returned them to
firm ground, their thoughts were still up among the stars.
    Martie yawned hugely as they stood beside her
red car. “Too much activity for one day,” she apologized.
    “I’ll drive home.” Both of them thought how
right
home
sounded. How natural. As if they were an old
married couple on the way to a session of Ethel Ann’s
palpitation.
    o0o
    Once home, Paul deposited Martie on her back
porch steps, then gathered her into his arms and kissed her until
they were both breathless.
    “Goodnight, Martie.” Then, without another
word, he walked away.
    She watched until he was a faint shadow in
the night. “Goodbye, Paul.”
    o0o
    Church chimes echoed in the morning air as
Martie sprinted down the sidewalk in her neon bright jogging suit,
Baby hard at her heels.
    “Morning, Miss Beulah,” she called, setting
her rainbow-hued bangle bracelets ajingle as she waved.
    Miss Beulah looked up from the water dish she
was filling for her Persian, Falina Theona. In her brown velour
housecoat she looked like a fat partridge as her head swiveled on
its squat neck to watch the progress of Pontotoc’s Jezebel.
    “Brazen creature,” she sniffed. “And on a
Sunday morning, too.”
    Martie whizzed down the sidewalk, turned a
corner, realized she would pass the parsonage, and turned in the
other direction. She didn’t need any more reminders this morning.
Today she was definitely, positively, without a doubt forgetting
the minister. She pushed herself, jogging five miles instead of her
usual four. Ordinarily she would have selected a church, for she
loved Sunday morning services. But not today. Not yet. Being