Songs in Ordinary Time Read online

  “Helen, don’t. Don’t cry.” He felt terrible.

  “Don’t cry! After what Jozia told me, that’s all I can do!” She looked at him and shook her head. “She used it on me. Took that filth and used it on me. ‘No,’ I told her. ‘That’s impossible. It couldn’t be. Not Alice.’”

  “What? What are you talking about?”

  “Well, don’t worry. I called the Monsignor. I called him myself because I knew no one else in this family would have the decency to do it.” She dabbed her eyes with her apron hem. “And he said I wasn’t to take on any more burdens. He said it was their sin, their filth.”

  He sprang at her. “What the hell are you talking about?”

  She drew back, almost daintily, her demeanor sweetened, calmed by his fury. “Alice and the new curate, the two of them! Naked in the rectory. That poor sick man, the Monsignor. I’ll tell you just what I told him. Sin breeds sin, Samuel Fermoyle. Dirt breeds dirt!” Her head snapped back as his hand rose. “Go ahead!” she cried. “The last defilement,” she hissed, glaring at his fist.

  “Don’t say another word about my daughter, do you hear me?” he growled, then stepped away.

  “Oh I won’t! Believe me, I won’t,” she said in a trembling voice.

  Now he understood why Alice couldn’t look at him. His temples throbbed, and yet he was able to remove himself, to do this. “I want my money, Helen. I need it.” He opened his notebook and was steadied by the cool recitation of his figures. He had computed the sum after expenses, room and board, to be six thousand dollars. He glanced at her. “Six thousand dollars in trust…”

  “Gone,” she interrupted.

  He looked up, confused by her smile. She must be kidding.

  “On your haircuts and your shoes and food and laundry bills. On all the money you ever stole from me, the things you broke, the people you owed, Renie’s car you smashed up.”

  “Six thousand dollars, Helen!”

  She was in the closet now, feeling along the shelf over Renie’s clothes. She pulled down a worn tablet and began to read.

  “December 20, 1956, $2, Mrs. Camus, Christmas wreath stolen by Sam. December 29, 1956, $11.85, Atkinson Free Library, Five lost books. January 9, 1957, $102, Renew Upholsterers, Reupholster plum brocade sofa after Sam’s cigarette burns. January 12, 1957, $55, ambulance to Waterbury. May 31, 1957, $13, Mrs. Camus’s American flag slept in by Sam on her back porch, then vomited on. June 8, 1957, $18, Dr. Horace R. Reynolds, House call and medicine, Sam’s tremors. June 9, 1957, $25 fine, District Court, for being a public nuisance. Same date, $45, legal fees to Abner Atkinson. September 1, 1957…”

  “Public nuisance.” He chuckled.

  “September 1, 1957,” she repeated.

  “Shut up, Helen.”

  “Let me finish,” she said, flipping the pages. “The last entry is your total bill paid to the Applegate Corporation. And that was,” she said glancing up, “as of August first, $3,469.” She closed the tablet. “Bringing you to $10,500.34.”

  “Right over the top.” He sighed, his head pounding. “Gotta hand it to you, Helen. I am not only a fucking public nuisance, but a fucking public idiot. You know, that’s the one thing I couldn’t figure out. Why Applegate, I kept wondering, and Doc Litchfield thaid, your thithter only wanth the betht for you, Thammy.” He hung his head over his own meager figures. “Don’t do this to me, Helen.”

  “You’ve done it. Not me,” she said, stepping past him to return the tablet to its shelf in the closet. She began to snap string beans in two.

  “Marie needs my help.”

  She looked at him over her glasses. “What does she need your help for now that she’s finally got herself a boyfriend? Your wife and your daughter, they certainly make a good pair.”

  “Shut up, Helen.” He leaned over the table. She was deliberately goading him. He had to be careful. To call the police and have him hauled out of here would give her great satisfaction right now. “There’s one more thing. Something you and the good Judge neglected to tell me. This is my house. Mine.”

  “This is Mother’s house!” she said, outraged.

  “Yes, and when she dies it’s mine. And the tenements go to…” He read from his notes what Marie had told him. “‘They go to Samuel’s heirs, as well as any issue of my daughter, Helen.’”

  There was no color in her face. Her huge breasts rose and fell.

  “You shouldn’t have exiled Renie in there, Helen,” he said, pointing to the door with its arterial fissures of ancient paint. “You should have produced at least one issue, Helen. Messy, I know, but at least it would have been a good investment.” He couldn’t help laughing.

  “Shut your filthy mouth. You make me sick.” She tried to leave, but he blocked her way.

  “Tell me, Helen, where will you and Renie be living when I throw you the fuck out of here? I know! Maybe the kids will rent you an apartment. In one of the tenements, Helen. Wouldn’t that be great, you and Renie with all those low-class tenants. They love you so much, Helen.”

  “You’re evil,” she said, staring up at him.

  “No. Not evil, Helen. I’ve never been evil, just stupid and weak.”

  “Your self-pity disgusts me. You’ve lived off pity all your life.”

  “You mean Mother, don’t you?”

  “Poor Mother. Do you have any idea how ashamed she’d be if she knew about Alice and that priest?” Her voice broke. “First it was you, and now it’s your children disgracing this family.”

  He laughed. “Oh, oh, oh! What family? You and me and Mother? I know you don’t mean you and Renie! Because he’s just another tenant, isn’t he? I’ll bet he doesn’t know he’s out on his ass the minute Mother’s gone. No. You didn’t tell him, either, did you? Why? Were you afraid he’d want to move somewhere, just the two of you? Disgusting thought, isn’t it? No, better to keep Mother here, keep her alive, so you could devote yourself to her, Helen. Being a saintly daughter’s been a hell of a lot easier than being a wife, hasn’t it?”

  “Get out of my way!” She tried to get to the back door, but he blocked it.

  He was almost enjoying this. “All the poor bastard ever wanted was for someone to be nice to him. You know how pathetic he is? He has a cat in the store and he has to hide it. He has to keep it a secret from you, from his own wife. The poor bastard. You couldn’t even let him have his dog, you—”

  “Stop it!” she cried, looking at Renie’s door, but he knew Renie was at the store. “Please stop it!”

  “You made Howard poison it. I mean, Jesus, Helen! Do you know what his life is like? People laugh at him. My kids can’t stand him. He’s a joke, he’s a fool. Do you know who turned him in to the IRS? Marie! And you know why? Because he’s so goddamn pathetic he tried to force himself on her. On my wife! On his own sister-in-law! So don’t hold your nose for too long, sister. You’ll suffocate. The stink is here! It’s right here with you!”

  Renie waited in his room on his narrow bed. He waited until Sam had gone to work. He waited until he heard the familiar squeal of Bridget’s crib as Helen let down the slatted side to change the old woman’s diaper. And then he slipped out of his room and out the kitchen door. He passed lightly down the back stairs. He passed the rectory and the church, head down, eyes averted, not with shame, but with this pangless numbing grief. Nothing was safe. There was no way to possess love. It would always flee from him.

  The store was hot and airless. A thin veneer of dust claimed every surface. On the back steps the milk had curdled in the dish and the bloodstained tuna was swarming with flies. He went into the bathroom. He tore the pictures from the walls, and then he sat on the closed toilet lid with the telephone book in his lap. He stared at the telephone on the soiled linoleum. Marie had reported him to the IRS. Internal Revenue. The irony of her revenge cut like blades through his heart. Pathetic; Sam was right. It hadn’t been the brandy that night at the Elks or joy at bringing them a turkey, but desire, this blind turbulence, this yearning. He was a
shamed. Everything he had ever done for Marie and the children had been a tainted, venal transaction. It was true. No one wanted to waste their time on a fool like Renie LaChance. Even the cat had escaped through the first unguarded door. His business grew worse every year. What respect was there to be had when his own wife could barely tolerate his presence? He had lost the Golden Toastee line because he had wanted it too much. Better not to care, not to want, not to love, not to feel anything at all.

  He came out of the bathroom and went directly to the gas display model, the one stove hooked up to the main. He opened the oven door, then turned all the knobs to HI. The steady hiss was almost amusing, like air seeping from a huge balloon. With the high ceilings and drafty windows and doors it would take a long time for the lethal fumes to work. Might as well keep busy, he thought, taking the roll of masking tape from under the counter. He began to seal the gaps around the doors and windows. He worked most methodically, butting each strip end to the next, pressing the tape smooth. There would be no doubt as to his intentions. He smiled, imagining everyone’s shock to realize what a man of action he could be. This was the ultimate courage. All the women he called would regret their inability to save him. No, that was impossible, because none of them knew their loving caller’s identity. If only he’d told someone his name, he thought as he began to seal the gap around the front door. He should have spoken up, should have demanded Helen’s love. He glanced up. Across the street a pretty woman tugged her little girl along by the hand as they hurried through Cushing’s parking lot. The little girl tripped and fell facedown. Her screams jolted through him. The tape crackled and peeled away as he forced open the door. The woman had picked up the screaming child and was carrying her into the store. He could not help himself. He hurried across the street. When he got inside the store, the woman was nowhere in sight. Confused, he watched the red lights over the elevator blink down from floor to floor. The doors swooped open and now he was inside.

  “Fourth floor, Mr. LaChance? Mr. Cushing’s office?” Arlo asked, cranking the latticed metal doors closed.

  His heart was racing. He felt dizzy. He had gotten here too quickly. It was all so dreamlike. Maybe it was the gas. Yes, that was it. The gas, and this was the end, the last passage up, up, up. The elevator glided to a smooth stop and the doors opened.

  Maybe it was a baby girl, he thought, a daughter, a sweet and lovely young woman, newly married and just setting up housekeeping. Odd that he had never considered a daughter before. His heart soared as he came down the corridor. It was a long walk. The door seemed so far away. Oh yes. This was so much easier. A daughter would be so much more understanding.

  He opened the door and Mr. Cushing’s wizened head bobbed up. He had been dozing. There were indentations on his cheek from the buttons on his sleeves. “Renie!” He smiled and held out a trembling hand. “I was just thinking about you.”

  Reverend Pease was out of the hospital now, and Luther was tired of working, but at least he’d been well fed. He’d spent the ten days in Asheville washing dishes in the KyDeeHo Family-Style Chicken Restaurant for gas money and a place to stay while the old man got his plumbing cleared. Food was plentiful: right off the plates through the dishwasher’s steamy cubbyhole. Amazing how much came back, whole thighs and biscuits swamped in chicken gravy, congealed, but tasty all the same, he liked to tell the old man. Desserts were the best, though. Every kind of pudding, bread, grapenut, rice and raisin, lemon sponge, butterscotch, and his favorite, deep dark chocolate.

  Every morning Luther went to the hospital expecting to collect the Reverend and be on their way north to find Earlie, and every morning the bald bug-eyed doctor said the old man still wasn’t a hundred percent. Luther could tell the doctor was scared stiff of him, but he didn’t show even a flash of temper until the tenth morning. Clutching Luther’s arm with his cold bony fingers, the old man begged to be taken out of there so they could be on their way. It truly was time to go. Luther would miss the KyDeeHo’s tender chicken, but just his luck, the tiny waitress who’d made room in her bed for him had turned out to be one of them crazy-when-drunk ladies that wanted to fight every breathing soul, including him. Night before last, when the police came banging on the trailer door, he was sure they were going to finally haul him back to prison in Baton Rouge, to the weed-clearing road crew he’d slipped away from one day—like a shadow into the night is what it had felt like. But they took one look at the ice-packed shiner she’d given him, who was three times her size, anyway, and they laughed, asking did he want to be taken into protective custody or did he just want to be on his way? Be on his way, of course. Out of town and long gone before anyone thought to check old wanted posters.

  The doctor had tried being angry, but not too angry, which Luther took as admission he’d done as much for the old man as he could. They drove only a hundred and twenty miles the first day. The old man had to drink a glass of water and take two pills every hour, which was causing him to pee every twenty minutes. He was supposed to rest, which he could do well enough in the car, but he wasn’t supposed to get overheated, which was near impossible in ninety-five-degree heat. He could barely eat. He said his stomach was too flooded. By night the old man was so weak and trembling that Luther was certain he was dying. He rented a cabin and sat up wringing out wet towels to pack on the old man’s feverish head and chest. The old man kept begging for the cold sweet cherries he insisted Luther was hiding.

  “You are a liar!” the old man cried, the few inches he raised his head off the pillow a remarkable feat after all his weakness. “Liar!” he cried as Luther hurried back with another dripping towel. As Luther bent over him he seized the wet towel and flung it, its heavy wetness slapping Luther’s face. Eyes wide, he struggled to sit up. “Liar!” he cried again.

  Holding him down, Luther told him to shut up and lay still or he’d leave. He’d walk out that door. And he would, knew he would, and knew he wouldn’t think twice about it after. No kin of his, the old man was nothing but a terrible burden now, even a danger.

  The old man’s mouth trembled. The whites of his eyes were so yellow and blood-streaked they reminded Luther of the baby clots he was always sickened to find in eggs. It was a sign. Of what, Luther wasn’t sure, but he could feel his blood run cold and the hair on his arms stand up. They were never going to find Earlie. Earlie was dead. The old man wasn’t looking for Earlie. He was looking for someone to die with him. And it wasn’t going to be Luther Corbett. He backed toward the door with the old man still staring at him. The chambermaid would come in a few hours and call an ambulance. He’d be better off dying in the hospital. Luther slipped into the dark and closed the door. Yes sir, he assured himself as he drove off, this was the right thing to do. Crazy old man like that needed a bed to lie in and kinder hands than his. Phew, he sighed, relieved that it wasn’t his problem now.

  The sharp sliver of moon hung like a scythe blade in the black sky. When he was back on the highway he got the old station wagon up to seventy, fast as it would go without shimmying. Duvall said he had bought this car brand new, but then when Earlie found a child’s shoe wedged in the back seat, Duvall forgot and said it must belong to the man he’d bought it from in Tupelo. That child’s shoe had been a sign. He’d forgotten how nervous it had made Duvall. Earlie had been too trusting. Even that last day he still thought he could reason with a snake like Duvall. All Earlie wanted then was to get back to Laydee Dwelley. We got the car, the old man kept saying. We got the car and we’re still all together. Tell him! the old man had begged Luther, but Earlie kept insisting they get their money as well. Earlie and the old man were too easy. They hadn’t lived among the evil. They didn’t know, couldn’t hear it and see it the way he did. He should have been the one to go after Duvall that day, but they knew if he did he’d kill him.

  He kept thinking of the old man, how scared he’d be come morning. And where was he even going? He had no place to go. Alone, he was on the run, a fugitive again. He pulled onto the soft shoulder and t
urned back the way he’d just come.

  The old man tried to lift his head as he came through the door.

  “Here,” Luther said, sitting down and paring away the soft fuzzy skin off one of the peaches he’d just picked. “You just close your eyes now and dream on cherries.” He carved a juicy chunk from the warm peach and put it in the old man’s mouth.

  In the next two days they were able to get as far north as D.C. The old man slept most of the time. When he did wake up it was only for brief snatches of confusion and wide-eyed dreams in which he thought Luther was his father, daughter, wife, and Earlie. Sometimes it was like having the whole Pease family right there in the car. At first he tried to set the old man straight, but he soon tired of shouting, “I’m Luther! It’s Luther you’re talking to,” over the engine noise and the highway roar of the open windows and the old man’s anxious chatter. So he gave in and got to know the family. Lornilda Pease had been a saint of a wife. All she lived for was to make her Reverend husband happy, except in one regard, thus forcing him into “the wilderness for relief,” which is all it was, he kept insisting. “Just physical relief.” Luther smiled and nodded as the old man scolded his daughter for planting bush beans when it was only pole beans he’d ever had. He looked at Luther now and asked if they were almost there.

  “Almost,” Luther assured him.

  “Good,” the old man said. “I haven’t been to the grave, and I promised I would.”

  Luther shivered with a chill. Grave, what grave? Then the old man was asleep again, his head tilted back against the door, his slender fingers twined in his lap, the untrimmed yellow nails curled and bent. If they did find that Earlie was dead, he wouldn’t let anyone tell the old man he’d lost his only living kin.