Walker Percy - Love in the Ruins - The Adventures of a Bad Catholic at a Time Near the End of the World

“That’s a pretty sight now.” The voice is so close that the dry wood of the partition vibrates like a sounding board.

“They fixing to parade.” A second voice, the sentence uttered civilly, an observation.

“They’ll parade all right.” A third voice, even closer, grim, rich in ironies.

Thunder rolls, covering the voices. Dropping slowly, I sit in the angle, feeling behind me the press and creak of wood as bodies shift weight

“What do we need with him?” asks the third voice.

“Victor’s all right now. He know how to get along with people. Victor what you call our contract man.” First voice: a familiar two-layered voice, one layer speaking to meaning, the other risible, soliciting routine funniness: we might as well be funny as not.

“Contract? Do you mean contact?”

“Contract, contact.”

I recognize two voices but not the third.

The rolling thunder becomes more discrete, coming after lightning cracks. I count the intervals. Two seconds, three. The storm is going away. At the next crack I count four and stand up in the thunder.

Use the potato vine as screen, crane up and over into it, far enough to see through the leaves but not be seen.

The man sitting at the end of the seat, facing the path toward the club, is, I know already, Willard Amadie. Bent forward, forearms on knees, he can look up and see the others, see the path, only by wrinkling his low wide welted forehead. He wears a Marine camouflage coverall. Beside him, propped against the bench, butts grounded, are a rifle and shotgun fitted with straps. Then it was they, not golf irons, that clinked.

Stretched out on the bench, only its forequarters visible, head lolling to the ground, tongue smeared with dust, is a young buck deer.

“No reason why people can’t get along,” says the first voice in the style of uttering platitudes agreeably.

“People?” Voice number three. “What people? I’ll tell the truth, I never know what he’s talking about.”

I know what he’s talking about. People uttered so, in a slight flatting of tone, means white people. Uttered another way, it means black. A third way means people in general.

“I’ll tell you this!” exclaims the first voice, shouting a platitude. “I’m not going have anything to do with people”—second meaning—“who looking to hurt other people.” First meaning. “That’s not what the good Lord intend.”

“The good Lord,” says the third voice. “What is it with this dude? Jesus.”

“Victor is all right. He’s with us. In fact, we couldn’t do without him,” says Willard, looking up from his black welted brow. “He’s for the plan, he’s for the school, don’t worry. Aren’t you, Brother?” The brother too I recognize, though I doubt if number three does. This is Baptist brother: Victor is a deacon in Starlight Baptist Church.

“Sure I’m for it! Education is good for everybody and everybody is entitled to it!”

“I’ll tell you this, Uru,” says Willard. “We need Victor more than he needs us. Where do you think we get our medicine? People respect him.” All kind of people.

“I don’t understand anybody down here. This dude sounds like some old uncle from Memphis.”

“Those old uncles in Memphis are tougher than you think,” says Willard, grinning.

Victor Charles sits opposite Willard, feet planted flat on the ground, hands prone on his knees. A strong, grave, heavy-thighed man, he is purple-black and of an uncertain age. He could be forty and looking older for his dignity. Or he could be sixty and flat-bellied from his life as a laborer. Dressed like a hospital attendant in white duck trousers, white shirt, white interne shoes, he does in fact work in the animal shelter as caretaker. A black belt circles his wide, flat hips, buckle worn to the side and I recall why: so the buckle won’t scrape against the high metal table when he holds the big dogs.

“Look like he not coming,” says Willard after a pause, squeezing his fist in his hand.

Who’s not coming? Me? A corkscrew tightens in my sacrum.

“Where are they going now?” asks the third man.

The other two look toward the coast.

“They marching over to the club for a show this evening,” says Willard. Willard has a slight stammer. Once in a while the words hang in his throat, he touches his eye and out they come, hooting.

“All right Now you know the route Tuesday.”

“Sure I know the route,” hoots Willard.

“How about the brother here?”

Willard and Victor look at each other and laugh.

“I know,” says Victor gravely. “Here,” says Willard, bending over. Something scrapes in the dirt. He’s drawing a map. “Intercept the bus here. Brother, we counting on you to watch them.”

“I’m going to be watching more than them,” says Victor, spreading his fingers over his knees.

“What does he mean?” asks the third man.

“He means you, Brother Uru,” says Willard, laughing.

“Ain’t nobody going to hurt anybody long as I got anything to do with it!” cries Victor. “I mean nobody!”

“I don’t know. I just don’t know,” mutters number three to himself. “What kind of damn country is this?”

“Victor’s going to lead them to Honey Island.”

“That’s right and I’m staying there.”

“What you worrying about, old man?”

“You.”

“Me?”

“Ain’t nobody bothering those little ladies.”

“What in the hell—”

Willard opens his mouth, touches his eye: “Listen!”

There is a crackling in the swamp, a sound that becomes louder and more measured. It is the little safari of birdwatchers.

“See. I told you,” says Willard softly. “They pass here every Saturday this time of day, and on Tuesday the Fourth they’ll do the same.”

“Well well well,” says the third man, pleased for the first time. “Here come our teachers.”

“Teachers?” says Victor Charles. “What you talking about. They the doctors from the Center out for a walk. With their spyglasses.”

“They going too,” says Willard quietly. “We need teachers at the school.”

“You mean they going out to Honey Island too!” cries Victor.

“That’s right, Brother. Some of them, anyhow.”

“Lord to God. Now I done heard it all.”

“Why not, Uncle,” says the third man. “I think it proper and fitting that our children be taught by Ph.D.’s.”

“I think ever’body entitled to an education!” exclaims Victor in his singsong.

The crashing grows louder as the safari works around the hogback. Presently, by standing at the end of the bench, I can see them: Colley and Gottlieb still in the lead, Colley in pith helmet, bermuda shorts, and bush jacket; Gottlieb in his long-billed meshtop hat, the sort retirees wear in Fort Lauderdale. There follow a dozen or so behaviorists, physicians, Love counselors, plus a NASA engineer or two.

Returning to the corner, I discover I can hear by putting an ear to the partition, which acts as a sounding board.

“And I’ll tell you something else,” says the voice at the center pole, a voice without antecedents, black yes, Midwestern perhaps, but mainly stereo-V, an announcer’s voice, a Detroit disc jockey’s voice. “This is war and don’t you forget it. All this talk about some people being nice, listen. They’re nice all right They’re so nice and polite that you mothers been castrated without knowing it.”

“What you talking about, my mother being—” begins Victor, outraged.

“No, what he means, Victor,” says Willard, touching his eye and hooting, “is—”

“Never mind,” says the third man in disgust “Jesus.”

“I hear you say Jesus!” cries Victor.