glided through the swinging door into her kitchen. After doubly replenishing her gin fizz, she emerged with his glass of tonic water.
“Now Mr. Luckie, I want you to know that my guest apartment”—her euphemism for the two rooms above her garage—“though air conditioned, is rather basic.”
“That’s fine for me,” said Felix. “I believe in living without superfluities and worldly impediments. No carbon footprint. A bare monk’s cell is good enough for my requirements. Because I . . .”
“Basic doesn’t mean bare,” she responded with offense. “I have lived in reduced circumstances as a widow since I lost Mr. Swanson. But I’m not yet, thank God, impoverished.”
“I’m sorry for your loss,” said Felix nervously. “How long has it been since the Lord took your husband?”
“He was ‘taken’ by a feed and seed store owner who shot him through the head. Caught him in the act with his wife. At lunchtime. Up against the accounts receivable file cabinet. The Lord had nothing to do with it.”
Felix gulped his drink.
“Well, on to more important matters. The apartment is two hundred dollars a month, as is. I will expect payment in advance on the first of each month. A damage deposit of fifty dollars is also required. As you see, my husband’s untimely demise has forced me to open my home to transients. I will not tolerate tenants chronically in arrears. If you must talk with me about business, please make an appointment. I find it best if renters keep a polite distance.
“You are a single man, unattached. While I do not approve of it, neither will I prohibit conjugal visitation. If you intend cohabitation, that must be negotiated. The apartment and bed are small. I assume your singleness is from women?” she asked, her voice rising.
He nodded hesitantly and took another nervous gulp of his tonic.
“Regardless of your activities within your apartment, I require that you park your car on the street so as not to block my Eldorado in case I need to leave town quickly. Which I may at any time of the day or night. And turn off the air conditioner when you go out. Check the commode. Sometimes one must shake the handle to enable it to seal properly. I do not intend to invest in new plumbing.”
“Yes ma’am. You won’t have any trouble with me. At present, I am on my own, celibate actually. But I do believe it’s true . . .” Here he gazed away from her as if he were looking at something far beyond her living room. That even as he ascends to your height and caresses your tenderest branches that quiver in the sun, so shall he descend to your roots and shake them . . . ”
“Mr. Luckie! You will not attempt to engage me in talk of that nature!” She was pleased that he was more interesting than he first appeared.
“Oh, that’s not me. That’s a quote from my spiritual guide, Kahlil Gibran.”
“Mooselim, I’d guess? Sounds New Age,” she sniffed.
“Actually, he wrote early in the last century.”
Awkward silence.
“And Gibran embraced all faiths equally.”
No response.
“Uh, I’ll be happy to pay for my rent six months in advance. That’s all the savings I have right now, but later . . .”
“That is not required, Mr. Luckie. The terms of payment I have outlined will be sufficient. Besides, I have no wish to become entailed with transients in long-term arrangements.”
Felix, fidgeting in his seat, nervously replied, “Uh, I majored in Ag Ed at North Carolina State. But wouldn’t you know it? When I got out, no jobs in agricultural education, at least not in North Carolina, because of the Republicans and . . .”
“Mr. Luckie, personal revelations are not required. Quite unnecessary for me to know the idiosyncrasies of persons just passing through. We have a business relationship, not one of a personal, social, or self-revelatory nature.”
He blushed and took a nervous gulp. “Yes ma’am.”
As they talked, Alberta Swanson noted that though he was very thin, pale, and slightly stooped in the shoulders, he had a well-proportioned face. A good nose. His rumpled clothes concealed his build, but she estimated that it was unnaturally slight for a man of his age, making him appear vegetarian. His unrestrained, prepubescent demeanor repulsed her but at the same time awakened an odd desire.
At length his phone buzzed. Felix fished it from his pants and glanced at the message: THR YET? JANIS JOPLIN. Quattlebaum.
“Oops. Need to check in with my field supervisor. My boss. Thanks for the refreshment and your warm welcome. I know I’ll enjoy the apartment. And I’m hoping I’ll be here longer than you think!” Felix abruptly rose and thrust out his hand cheerfully. “Can you recommend a nice church where I might visit tomorrow?” he asked.
Mrs. Swanson also rose, glanced at his soft, callow hand, took his near-full glass from him, ignored his question, and led him to the door. “Yes. Well, we’ll see. Place your first month’s rent check in the mailbox.”
Watching him walk jauntily toward his car, she moaned, “Just my luck.”
2
“Brother, can I talk to you about the most important thing in life?”
The man slowly stretched out his full lazy length. . . . “If it’s insurance, I got too much,” he said. “If it’s oil-wells, I don’t touch ‘em, and if it’s religion, I’m saved.” . . .
“That’s fine. There is no greater pleasure than to talk over the big things with a believer.”
“I’m saved,” continued the other, “from making a goddam fool of myself in public places. I’m saved, you little peahen, from putting my head into other people’s business. So shut your damn face and get out of here, or I’ll rip your tongue out of your throat.” . . .
“You’re angry, brother,” said Brush, “because you’re aware of an unfulfilled life.”
—Thornton Wilder, Heaven’s My Destination
The next morning, Sunday—emboldened by a pop tart and a glass of decaffeinated, saccharined tea, unpacked, done with his usual half hour of meditative reading and memorization—Felix ventured forth. Even as early as ten, it was sweltering hot, streets of Galilee shimmering, steamy, musty.
Jefferson Davis Street, the town’s main thoroughfare, was phantasmal, archaic, and empty. The houses he passed, constructed during the town’s bygone era of prosperity, were uniformly Southern Victorian: white, wide porches, sheer-draped windows, dry birdbaths in the yards. They looked vacant. He suspected that the inhabitants were older women, replicas of Mrs. Swanson. Pots of begonia, Wandering Jew, desiccated hydrangea were numerous. Also, overgrown shrubbery stressed by drought, even though the Georgia summer had barely begun.
No lane that crossed Jefferson Davis had been deemed worthy of a street sign. Everyone must know where they are, thought Felix. Galilee looked frozen in place in 1880, fixed and final. Nothing more is needed.
Felix saw neither a soul abroad nor any sign of active
