Stanley Elkin - George Mills

The old man whimpered.

“Stop that whining,” George said, “we ain’t going to leave you. Me and my partner here”—Mills indicated Coule—“going to set you down like a pie on the kitchen table in the truck. The man’s a minister. Like the jig in the picture. Come to bless the eviction.”

Laglichio was in the doorway. “What’s holding it up? Let’s move it, Mills. Who’s this?”

“Reverend Coule,” Mills said.

“Listen, Father,” Laglichio said, “you got a beef, take it up with the city. We got sheriff’s orders to move these people. There’s a deputy downstairs with seals and documents, with notarized instruments like a file cabinet in City Hall.”

“I’m here to see Mr. Mills,” Coule said.

Laglichio shook his head. “George has work to do. It ain’t right he conducts his spiritual business on the taxpayer’s time. Let’s get with it, George. They already signed the papers.”

“I could use some help with these boxes,” Mills said.

Laglichio looked at him. “Just finish up, will you? I’ll be downstairs.”

“My boss is on my ass,” Mills said.

“I’ll help.” Coule lifted a carton of dishes.

“No,” Mills said, “you don’t have to. How’s your lap, Uncle? Think you could handle a few of these if we held them down steady?” He picked up a carton and placed it in the old man’s lap. Another box went on top of the first. A third was stacked on the second. The old man’s head had disappeared behind the cartons, muffling his whimper. “I’ll just peek in the other rooms for a minute, see if I missed anything.” Coule was left with the old man.

“Is this too heavy? Are you uncomfortable?”

“He’s feeling grand,” Mills said and stepped behind the wheelchair. “You know what a forklift is, Uncle?” The old man whimpered. “That’s it,” Mills said, “you got it. Why don’t you step out in the hall, Reverend, see if we’re going to clear that front door?”

Coule, walking backward, steadying the load as Mills pushed. They went toward the elevator as half a dozen blacks watched the strange procession. “Punch ‘Down,’ ” Mills instructed one of the blacks cheerfully. Two black men got into the elevator with them. “Sure,” Mills said, “come on, we’ll give you a ride. Whoo,” he said when the doors had closed, “stinks of piss, don’t it? You brothers got no patience. Stinks of piss, shit, barf and blood. I never been in no jungle, and likely you folks ain’t neither, but I’ll tell you something, I’d vouch you got the smell down. I reckon this is just how it stinks near some big kill. What was you wanting to talk to me about, Reverend?”

Coule glared at him. “I’m no whiskey priest,” he said, his voice at once strained and repressed, tight as a ventriloquist’s. “I’m no one defrocked. I’m clean-shaved. I don’t court the devil like some kid playing with fire. I am not tormented,” he said, his voice on the edge of rage. “My heart’s at the softball game. Someone brings potato salad. Someone brings chicken.”

“Sure,” Mills said. The old man whimpered. Mills hacked a ball of dark phlegm into a corner of the elevator. The blacks stared at him.

“You’re saved?” Coule demanded.

“Who you talking to, Reverend? You talking to me? The Uncle? These spades? We having a revival here in the elevator?”

“You know who I’m talking to. You’re saved?”

“Like money in the bank,” Mills said mildly.

The black men laughed. When the elevator opened on the ground floor there was a crowd in the lobby. Mills stood behind the wheelchair. He turned to one of the men. “Hold that door, will you, Kingfish? Ready, Uncle? Here we go.” He shoved the chair through the milling blacks and out the door toward the waiting truck.

He handed the last of the cartons up to Lewis and started to get into the truck on the passenger side. Coule touched his arm. Laglichio, who was already seated, leaned toward the minister. “We’re running late, Father. I need my man. Can you finish it up?”

“Something come up at church that Reverend Coule needed to tell me about. He’s about done.”

“At church,” Laglichio said. “I never knew he was so devout.”

“My boss,” Mills said when they’d stepped a few paces away from the truck, “gives two-week paid vacations but me and Louise usually don’t go nowhere. Louise’s dad still lives in the city. We drop over once in a while, take the old fellow out for a little drive. I got this ’63 Buick Special but wouldn’t trust it on no long—”

“How?”

“Pardon?”

“How were you saved?”

“That’s between me and the Lord,” George Mills said mildly.

“Don’t talk to me like that. How? ”

“In my sleep,” Mills said. “Sure. In my sleep I think. What are you looking at? It’s the truth. In my sleep.”

“When?”

“I don’t remember when.”

“Are you baptized?”

“I don’t think so. Not that I recall.”

“Do you pray?”

“You mean on my knees? Like that?”

“Do you pray? ”

“Of course not.”

“Have you renounced the devil?”

Mills laughed. “Jesus, Reverend, don’t talk like a fool. If there was a devil and he could work all that shit, would you renounce him?”

“Do you accept Christ?”

“Christ ain’t none of my business.”

“You don’t believe, do you? You don’t even believe in God.”

“No,” Mills said.

“Why did you say that to your wife? Why did you agree to see me? You’re not baptized, you don’t pray, church means nothing to you, you never accepted Christ, and don’t believe in God. You’re thick with sin. Saved! ”

“Who says I ain’t?” Mills asked furiously. “You were there with me on that elevator. You saw me. You heard me. Who says I ain’t? I parted them niggers like the Red Sea. They never touched me. You know how they do people in these projects? They didn’t do me. They never will. Who says I ain’t saved?”

Coule had seen his eyes. They were nothing like the dead woman’s. There was no God panic in them. They weren’t bloodshot with love as her husband’s had been. They glittered with certainty. Coule would ask him if he would preach a sermon.

Louise bought a douche bag, stringent douches. She bought shaving soap, a lady’s discrete razor. She proceeded to cut the devil’s hair, shaving down there till she was bald as a baby.

The griefs were leaking. Everyone was watching the telethon and the griefs were leaking. Everyone was giving to the telethon and sympathy was pouring. There was lump in the throat like heavy hail. Everyone was watching and giving to the telethon and the griefs were big business. The Helbrose toteboard could barely keep up. The griefs were pandemic. There was a perspiration of griefs, tears like a sad grease. He watched the telethon from his bed and was catching the griefs, coming down with the griefs, contaged, indisposed with sentiment.

Cornell Messenger watched the telethon almost every year. He had been with Jerry for seven or eight telethons now. He knew when Lewis would take off his bowtie, he knew when he would cry. I know when I will, Messenger thought.

It was astonishing how much money was being raised. He was positive all the other channels were dark. It was Labor Day weekend, but he was certain that even those off on picnics had seen some of it, that almost everyone had been touched, that this year’s campaign would beat all the others. He expected Frank Sinatra to bring Dean Martin on the show any minute now. He expected everyone to forgive his enemies, that there would be no enemies left. We are in armistice, Messenger thought. Truce is legion, all hearts reconciled in the warm bathwater of the griefs.