Solon was rich and young and handsome and didn’t have the sense to pour water out of a boot. He went a-drinking in the tavern in the town and got roaring drunk and shouted praise to every woman in the bar, except for Quiana, and when he woke up he had a raging hangover and was powerful in love with Quiana.
“Huh,” he says, and sends his servant to her house to make his case.
“So, uh,” says the servant, whose name isn’t relevant to this story, despite getting a few lines. “He wants to know if you’ll marry him.”
Quiana laughs and laughs.
“He seems pretty set on it,” says the servant.
Quiana laughs harder.
Solon is incensed when the servant tells him about it. There’s rude, and then there’s rude, surely. “Hard-hearted Quiana,” he says to the servant. “I’m fixing to die in the merry month of June, that’ll show her,” he adds.
Quina sees his funeral passing as she’s looking to the east and looking to the west, and she’s struck with remorse. “Gosh,” she says, “he was serious after all.” She goes home, weak at the knees and stuttering at the chest, collapses in her uncomprehending mother’s arms. “Sweet Solon died for me today, and I’ll die for him tomorrow!”
Her mother is unimpressed. “I’m not makin’ your bed, darlin’.”