George Higgins - A change of gravity

Senator Green told him not to do it. He said: "If you do that, Tyrone, if you sell yourself to them, you will be a big fool. Because that is how they do it now. They don't sell us in the markets any more to white planters who will own us 'til they decide it's time to sell us again. What they show us now is this tinhorn fantasy of a great career so that we will sell ourself on it; do it to ourselves. What they will do with you is they will take you down there to Virginia, and give you some hocus-pocus about how grand you're going to be, if you stay with Good Kind Massa Company.

"What that grandness will be, Tyrone, when you finally achieve it and your head has cleared enough so that you can see what you have got, will be a desk and a chair outside of the office where the white boys go inside and shut the door to run the store, and that is where you'll always be, no matter where they send you. And send you they will. They will make you move and move, and then they'll make you move again, all around this great big country, anywhere they need to put a black man's face where folks can see it. No matter what they call it, that will be your purpose. That's what you'll be for. A mannequin, store-window dummy, nothing more 'n that; and you and Carol and your kids will have one lousy life. You wont ever be, anywhere, son.

"You'll always be where you happen to be now, on the way to someplace else. Not where you were before and not where you're going next, never anywhere. And then one day you'll get old and be retired, and you wont know where you want to be, or even where you've been. That's what they've always done to us, kept us on the move. "Noplace" will be your home. And that's no way to live.

"No, you listen to me, Tyrone. I've never let you down. I will find something for you. I will find you a good place."

"What was the other one's name there again now?" Whalen said. "The woman, I mean, not the new black kid. Jeannie, Jeannie Flagg there, 'm I right? Now there is a very nice broad. All of us like her a lot.

Not much to look at, I grant you that, she should lose a few pounds, but still, a very nice broad. Very businesslike woman. Knows what her job is and does it. Very professional person. Last week there we had her in here both nights. Didn't see you at all.

"Anyway, it's been a while we seen you in here. Nice to have you back.

Got something goin' on, have you, getting' too good for us here? You been very busy or something?"

"Not particularly, no," Merrion said, feeling easy and relaxed and in command. "No busier'n usual, for the summer months, at least. I hadda have a woman we've got under more or less loose supervision come and see me in the office this morning. We've been hearin' some things that we didn't like, kind of thing she might be doin'. Kind of a sad case, really. Isn't what you'd call too sharp. Doesn't have a steady job; lost the one she had. No one to watch out for her, take care of her.

Not much you can really do. So I made her come in today. Give her another talkin'-to, see if maybe that'll do a little good, get her straightened out again. Though of course it's hard to say. You know how it is, you guys: want to help the people that you come in contact with, but whether what you do does help, you never really know."

Whalen showed no sign of interest in the woman's problem or identity.

That indicated either that he already knew all he felt he needed to know about Janet LeClerc, or else that he knew nothing and was relying on his good and well-informed friend Ambrose Merrion to bring him up to speed if there was anything about her that he ought to know. All right, then, nothing to be concerned about; it was always hard to know what detail in any offering would capture Whalen's magpie attention as the jewel to be seized, and often necessary to offer several choices.

"Got in a round of golf with Danny after lunch this afternoon. Went down to West Springfield, saw my mother in the home. Geez, those nuns're awful good. They really do good work. All those poor people in there half-gaga, two-thirds of them out of their gourds, no idea which end is up, and those nuns're with them all the time. Don't get any relief. It must be an awful strain on them, hard life to hoe.

Makes you kinda think twice, all this stuff we keep hearin' all the time, cutting' back on Medicare. Nuns look to me as though they're getting' pretty old themselves, getting' right up there. And no young ones comin' up, young girls goin' inna convents, you believe what you read inna paper. Makes you wonder a little, you know? "Well, what's gonna happen, we get old and so forth, take care of us?" Kind of makes you stop and think: "Whoa, what we doin' to ourselves here?"

"Danny's still do in' good, is he?" Merrion wasn't sure but Whalen seemed to be showing more interest.

"Oh yeah, Danny's always doin' great," Merrion said, dialing up his alertness a notch or two. "Doin' very well, he is. Extremely well, in fact. Kicked the shit out of me again out on the course today, for one example cost me the usual twenny bucks. So yeah, I'd say he's doin' all right. Danny's lookin' good."

This'd be out at Grey Hills there, wouldn't it?" Whalen said, slightly disconcerting Merrion by seeming to act as though he, not Merrion, had been the fisherman feeling the soft tenative strike and Merrion, not he, was going to be the fish. "You and him, Danny Hilliard: this'd be the spot there where you two guys always play?"

"Well, ah, yeah," Merrion said, thrilling slightly, finding himself either playing or being played in a game he didn't fully understand but which seemed as though it could be dangerous, 'that's where we belong.

So that's where we generally play. Pay all that money, you know, to belong, get so you know the course pretty good — doesn't hardly seem to make much sense, really, you then go and play somewhere else."

"I heard that's a pretty hard place to get into," Whalen said, musing.

"Heard it costs a lot of money, too. Arm and your other fuckin' leg to go with it, as the fella likes to say. "Course Danny and you, you can prolly afford it. Danny really must've done awful good in that job, what I hear, when he was bein' a rep. House in Bell Woods anna one onna Cape, Martha's Vineyard, wherever it was."

"Well," Merrion said, 'he doesn't…"

"You know I never been on Martha's Vineyard?" Whalen said it with a note of surprise. "Never went there in my life. Always thought I'd like to some day. People say it's so nice." He paused and considered.

"Lots of things I haven't done," he said, and frowned. Then he shook his head once, as though clearing it.

"An' thenna divorce; he had that too, did dun he, few years ago?"

Whalen said. Merrion nodded. "Sure, that's what I thought," Whalen said. "And they can be very expensive. Have to figure that cost him some dough. So I wouldn't know how much he's got left, probably not very much. But still, like I say, must've done awful good, for a guy that was just a state rep. You, you been single, all of your life, so prolly you could afford it." He paused again, as though expecting a comment, but Mernon's mouth had become dry and he did not know what to say. He said nothing.

"But I never could, alia rich guys; I could never belong to no club like that. I know that without even askm'. Hell, I never even been m one. Only golf course I ever even been to was the Veterans', anyone can get in down in Springfield. I went there once with Billy, my wife's kid brother, Billy. He always used to play a lot there, back when he was still alive. He was on total disability, the full one-hundred fuckin' percent. So he always had plenty of time. Money, too. Plenty of time and plenty of money. Guess it ought be that way, though, you got hit with something means you're gonna die that young.

He got sprayed with Agent Orange, Vietnam. So there wasn't any question it was honest; he was sick. You couldn't really begrudge him.