Marna by Norah Hess Read Free Book Online

Matt knew the girl lied. She was deathly
afraid of the leering drunk. She stared down at him a
minute, then knelt and began to unlace a mud-covered
boot.
    Emery leaned forward and watched her with intently
probing eyes. When she had drawn off the boot and
started on the other one, he growled suspiciously,
"How old are you, gal?"
    Matt's eyes swung to Hertha, and he saw her grow
tense and sit forward as Mama answered, "Thirteen,
Grandpa."
    Emery's lips pulled back over yellow, stained teeth.
"Like hell you are," he snarled. "Me and my friends
have been doin' some figurin'. You got to be close to
sixteen years." He jerked a thumb at his wife. "Old
Hertha there, she's been lyin' to me."
    "No, Grandpa, you're wrong. I'm only thirteen,"
Marna nervously insisted.
    As she fumbled with a knot in the laces, Emery continued to study her. A crafty gleam slid into his eyes,
and without warning his hand shot out to grab the top
of her blouse. Marna jerked, and the material ripped to
her waist.
    Matt gasped. Marna's breasts, milky white and beautifully molded, were bared completely. "God," he whispered, his eyes clinging to the pink-tipped mounds.
    Emery had jumped to his feet, shouting, "Ali ha, don't
tell me them tits belong to a thirteen-year-old. Them
are full growed and ripe, by God."
    Matt forced his gaze to the girl's face. Utter loathing
stared out of the tilted eyes. She was even unmindful
that she stood bare to the waist and that a stranger
stared at her nakedness hungrily. But when Emery
reached a talon fingered hand toward her, she jumped
away from his touch.

    Emery laughed coarsely. "They'll be touched tomorrow night. My friends will be over, and they'll pay me
good money to use that body." He peered into Hertha's
pale, alarmed face and cackled shrilly, "We'll just
throw somethin' over that ugly face, and the men will
have them a time."
    Staggering over to the table, he plopped down on a
bench. Ignoring the plate set for him, he dipped dirty
fingers into a pot of stew. As he crammed meat and
biscuits into his mouth with one hand, his other hand
brought a bottle of whiskey from a pocket. He gulped
down the half-chewed food, then sucked noisily at the
bottle.
    When the drunken Emery finally collapsed on his
bed and Marna had gone into her bedroom, Hertha
picked up Matt's buckskins and came and sat down
beside him. Her fingers skillfully wielding the needle in
and out of the buckskin, she asked solemnly, "What are
we gonna do, Matt?"
    Startled, Matt looked at her. After a moment he said,
"I don't know what you mean, Mrs. Aker."
    Hertha gave him an impatient glance. "You heard
what the old devil said about bringing his friends over
here tomorrow night. Marna is of a delicate nature,
Matt. Her mind would snap if she was used in such a
manner."
    Matt raised up on an elbow. "Look, Mrs. Aker, I'm
sorry as can be for Marna, but I don't see how I can
help her, outside of killing the rotten bastard."
    Hertha put down her sewing and leveled an earnest
look at him. "You owe the girl, Matt She saved your
life."
    Matt squirmed uncomfortably under her gaze. What
the old woman said was true. Without the girl's quick
thinking, they'd be planting him now. But to saddle him
with her was asking too much payment. He looked into
Hertha's waiting face and tried to explain.
    "I know that I owe my life to Mama, but I don't know how I can help her. If I took her back to camp
with me, she'd be in the same fix. My men ain't much
better than your husband. I couldn't keep an eye on her
all the time, and sooner or later they'd get her."

    Hertha resumed her sewing, each stitch tiny and
evenly placed. She came to the end and bit off the
thread. Then, tossing the pants onto the bed, she said
calmly, "They wouldn't bother her if she was your
wife."
    "My wife! Good Lord!" Matt almost shouted.
    Hertha darted a nervous look over her shoulder, cautioning him with a finger to her lips. "Not so loud,