J. Powers - The Stories of J.F. Powers

“At the store, Father.”

“Oh, hello, Earl.”

Earl said that North Carolina could supply, and would air-freight to the customer’s own address. So beds and chests would arrive in a couple of days, Friday at the outside, and box springs and mattresses, these from stock, would be on the store’s Thursday delivery to Inglenook.

“O.K., Father?”

“O.K., Earl.”

Joe didn’t try to do anymore that day.

The next morning, he took delivery of the office equipment (which Mrs P. — Mrs Pelissier — the housekeeper, must have noticed), and so he got a late start on his shopping. He began where he’d left off the day before. Earl, spotting him among the lamps, came over to say hello. When he saw Joe’s list, he recommended the store’s interior-decorating department—“Mrs Fox, if she’s not out on a job.” With Joe’s permission, Earl went to a phone, and Mrs Fox soon appeared among the lamps. Slightly embarrassed, Joe told her what he thought — that the room ought to be planned around the bed, since it was a bed room. Mrs Fox smacked her lips and shrieked (to Earl), “ He doesn’t need me !”

As a matter of fact, Mrs Fox proved very helpful — steered Joe from department to department, protected him from clerks, took him into stockrooms and onto a freight elevator, and remembered curtains and bedspreads (Joe bought two), which weren’t on his list but were definitely needed. Finally, Mrs Fox had the easy chair and other things brought down to the parking lot and put into his car. These could have gone out on the Thursday delivery, but Joe wanted to see how the room would look even without the big stuff — the bed, the chest, the student’s table, and the revolving bookcase. Mrs Fox felt the same way. Twice in the store she’d expressed a desire to see the room, and he’d managed to change the subject, and then she did it again, in the parking lot — was dying to see the room, she shrieked, just as he was driving away. He just smiled. What else could he do? He couldn’t have Mrs Fox coming out there.

In some ways, things were moving too fast. He still hadn’t told Mrs P. that he was getting a curate — hadn’t because he was afraid if he did, she’d ask, as he had, “Who?” Who, indeed? He still didn’t know, and the fact that he didn’t would, if admitted, make him look foolish in Mrs P.’s eyes. It would also put the Church — administrationwise — in a poor light.

That evening, after Mrs P. had gone home, Joe unloaded the car, which he’d run into the garage because the easy chair was clearly visible in the trunk. It took him four trips to get all his purchases up to the room. Then, using a kitchen chair, listening to the ball game and drinking beer, he put up the curtain rods. (The janitor, if asked to, would wonder why, and if told, would tell Mrs P., who would ask, “Who?”) When Joe had the curtains up, tiebacks and all, he took a much needed bath, changed, and made himself a gin-and-tonic. He carried it into the room, dark now — he had been waiting for this moment — and turned on the lamps he’d bought. O.K. — and when the student’s table came, the student’s lamp, now on the little bedside table, would look even better. He had chosen one with a yellow shade, rather than green, so the room would appear cheerful, and it certainly did. He tried the easy chair, the matching footstool, the gin-and-tonic. O.K. He sat there for some time, one foot going to sleep on the rose-and-blue hooked rug while he wondered why — why he hadn’t heard anything from the curate.

The next day, Thursday, he gave Mrs P. the afternoon off, saying he planned to eat out that evening, and so she wasn’t present when the box springs, mattresses, student’s table and revolving bookcase came, at twenty after four — the hottest time of day. He had a lot of trouble with the mattresses — really a job for two strong men, one to pull on the mattress, one to hold on to the carton — and had to drink two bottles of beer to restore his body salts. He took a much needed bath, changed, and, feeling too tired to go out, made himself some ham sandwiches and a gin-and-tonic. He used a whole lime — it was his salad — and ate in his study while watching the news: people starving in Asia and Mississippi. He went without dessert. Suddenly, he jumped up and got busy around the place, did the dishes — dish — and locked the church. When darkness came, he was back where he’d been the night before — in the room, in the chair, with a glass, wondering why he hadn’t heard anything from the curate.

It was customary for the newly ordained men to take a few days off to visit and shake down their friends and relatives. Ordinations, though, had been held on Saturday. It was now Thursday, almost Friday, and still no word. What to do? He had called people at the seminary, hoping to learn the curate’s name and perhaps something of his character, just in the course of conversation. (“Understand you’re getting So-and-So, Joe.”) But it hadn’t happened — everybody he asked to speak to (the entire faculty, it seemed) had left for vacationland. He had then called the diocesan paper and, with pencil ready, asked for a complete rundown on the new appointments, but the list hadn’t come over from the Chancery yet. (“They can be pretty slow over there, Father.” “Toohey, you mean?” “Monsignor’s pretty busy, Father, and we don’t push him on a thing like this — it’s not what we call hard news.”)

So, really, there was nothing to do, short of calling the Chancery. Early in the week, it might have been done — that was when Joe made his mistake — but it was out of the question now. He didn’t want to expose the curate to censure and run the risk of turning him against his pastor, and he also didn’t want the Chancery to know what the situation was at SS Francis and Clare’s, one of the best-run parishes in the diocese, though it certainly wasn’t his fault. It was the curate’s fault, it was Toohey’s fault. “Letter follows.” If called on that, Toohey would say, “Didn’t say when. Busy here,” and hang up. That was how Toohey played the game. Once, when Joe had called for help and said he’d die if he didn’t get away for a couple of weeks, Toohey had said, “Die,” and hung up. Rough. If the Church ever got straightened out administrationwise, Toohey and his kind would have to go, but that was one of those long-term objectives. In the meantime, Joe and his kind would have to soldier on, and Joe would. It was hard, though, after years of waiting for a curate, after finally getting one, not to be able to mention it. While shopping, Joe had run into two pastors who would have been interested to hear of his good fortune, and one had even raised the subject of curates, had said that he was getting a change , “Thank God!” Joe hadn’t thought much about it then — the “Thank God!” part — but now he did, and, swallowing the weak last inch of his drink, came face to face with the ice.

What, he thought — what if the curate, the unknown curate, wasn’t one of the newly ordained men? What if he was one of those bad-news guys? A young man with five or six parishes behind him? Or a man as old as himself, or older, a retread, a problem priest? Or a goldbrick who figured, since he was paid by the month, he wouldn’t report until the first, Sunday? Or a slob who wouldn’t take care of the room? These were sobering thoughts to Joe. He got up and made another drink.

The next morning, when he returned from a trip to the dump, where he personally disposed of his empties, Mrs P. met him at the door. “Somebody who says he’s your assistant—”

“Yes, yes. Where is he?”

“Phoned. Said he’d be here tomorrow.”

“ Tomorrow? ” But he didn’t want Mrs P. to get the idea that he was disappointed, or that he didn’t know what was going on. “Good. Did he say what time?”