“I wrote you a note for you to phone me. Didn’t you get it?”
“I’ll stop by and see you pretty soon, Sis.”
She lowered her voice. “Sid has been worse this week and I don’t feel right leaving him here alone, but I was going to come out there. I’ve been worried about you, Jimmy.”
“Everything is okay.”
“You lost your job, and nine out of every ten people in the county think you ought to be ridden out of here on a rail, so things must be real good for you. Real real good. What are you going to do?”
“I’m not sure yet.”
“Are you looking for a job?”
“I’ve got a couple of ideas.”
“Jimmy, you sound so kind of blah. Are you facing up to things? You’re the kind who always needs a push. You’ve got a wonderful education. You should get away from here. You know that, don’t you?”
“I guess so.”
“I don’t want to sound cruel, but there’s one thing I won’t have you doing. I won’t have you coming here and moving in on us, not unless you can pay your way. If you could, it would be a help, but I don’t see how you’re going to find any kind of a job around here. Jimmy, you come on into town and talk to me tonight.”
“I’ll be around to see you pretty soon.”
“We have to talk.”
“Sure, Sis. We’ll talk it all out.”
On Thursday, the third day of August, Brian and Nan came to the cottage at sunset. They had to sprint to the door through a hard rain that began to come down just as they had parked.
“You given up answering the phone?” Brian asked.
“Too many weird calls,” Jimmy explained.
“They should be dying out by now,” Brian said. “After all, they won.”
“Look at this place!” Nan said, staring around. “If I can borrow a shovel and a wheelbarrow, Jimmy...”
“Don’t bother with it,” he said.
She gave him a questioning look. “I am going to bother with it. In fact, dear, it almost pleases me. You’ve always been such a Mister Neat, it made me insecure when you visited our cruddy little nest. I’m glad to see there’s a little slob in you. You guys go sit on the porch and watch the rain while I housewife this shambles.”
Brian and Jimmy sat on the rear porch. Brian said that at last he felt Borklund had stopped suspecting him of any complicity in what had now become famed as Wing’s Forthright Editorial Policy. Brian began telling him of the changes on the paper, the new assignments, the foul-ups on the things Jimmy had always covered. He stopped abruptly and said, “I get the strange idea you’re not tracking.”
“Go ahead. It’s very interesting.”
“Sure. Sure. What are your plans?”
“I’m sort of formulating them, Bri.”
“Nothing definite?”
“Not quite yet.”
“Then I’ve got something for you. A coincidence. I tried to check it out with you but I couldn’t get hold of you this morning, and I couldn’t get away to track you down.” He handed Jimmy a business card. “Scott is an old friend. And Jacksonville isn’t too bad of a place to live. He’s looking for a guy like you, Jimmy. It’s a newsletter thing. The Southeast Investor. He’ll pay a hundred plus expenses at first and work your tail off. He’s got so many other things going for him, if he can find somebody who’ll work out, he wants to give them the whole load, on a percentage of the net basis. It’s a leg-work problem, plus good clear prose, with a captive analyst to give it the financial slant. It’s made for you, boy.”
“Interesting,” Jimmy said.
“He flew back this afternoon. He’ll be expecting you to be in touch.”
“He just happened to drop in?”
“Just like that,” Brian said with a wide, innocent stare.
“You’re a good man, Haas.”
“You’ll go ahead with it?”
“It’s something to think about.”
“You can’t stay here.”
“These things die down,” Jimmy said.
Haas looked at him in astonishment. “Lots of things do. Everything does, in one sense or another. But be a little realistic, for God’s sake. You put a big crimp in Elmo’s plans. He’ll never be anything more than small time, but he’ll always be as big as you can get in this county.”
“I made him a noble speech. At the moment I almost believed it. He acted kind of sad and martyred, as if a pet hound had bit him.”
“You bitched Elmo and you betrayed the business community and spat in the face of progress, and I don’t think you could get a job washing cars in Palm County. Maybe you could get it, but I doubt you could keep it.”
“I might be able to think of something.”
“Why should you be anxious to stay here, anyhow? What is there here for you? Who is there?”
Jimmy smiled. “There could have been somebody, but I messed that up pretty good too.”
“She asked me about you. She phoned you. She thought you’d left. She was surprised you’re still around. A lot of people are.”
“She still at the bank?”
“They moved her back out to the front desk, even. Sometimes I can’t figure this damn town. She got up on her hind legs and talked to an unfriendly mob. She didn’t let the situation rattle her. Same as Tom. So they’re a couple of folk heroes. All of a sudden nobody is very mad any more. The heat is the common enemy. The purge of the degenerates has ended. But nobody is making room for you, boy. Don’t count on that much amnesty.”
The rain had stopped. Nan came out onto the porch. Soon it was time for them to leave. Brian had to go back to the newsroom. Jimmy thanked Nan for the cleaning job, forcing enthusiasm into his voice. Brian said they’d have to play some chess soon. Nan started to go out to the car with Brian, then sent him on ahead.
“You’ve done some taking care, Jimmy,” she said. “You’ve done it when I was desperate.”
“I was glad to.”
She studied him. “Our turn now, Jim.”
“I’m okay.”
“Are you? I’ve been watching you. It reminds me of me, a long time ago. After I got out of the hospital. The body was mending fine.”
“I tell you I’m all right.”
“I kept telling people that too. But I didn’t want to even wash myself or brush my hair. You sleep a lot, don’t you?”
“I’m between jobs. That’s natural, isn’t it?”
“You can’t read because you can’t keep your mind on it. You stare at television, but the minute it’s over you can’t remember what it was about.”
“Can anyone?”
“Don’t make defensive jokes, Jimmy, please. You’ve had a serious shock, or a series of them. You’re disturbed. I know the symptoms. I know them so well. You should see somebody, you know. Somebody who can help you.”
“I don’t know what makes you think I need any help.”
“Sooner or later you’re going to realize you do, and the sooner you realize it, the easier it will be to get over it. If you won’t go see anyone, at least force yourself to... to stir around a little. Your world is getting smaller and narrower every day. You’re putting up more walls every day. Try to break that pattern, Jim, please. For me. As a favor to me... and Bri. You’re our friend. You know that. We love you. Try to do what we want you to do — for us if you can’t do it for yourself.”
“I keep telling you, I’m...”
“Please, Jimmy.”
He shrugged, forced a smile. “Okay. I’ll stir around, even if it does spoil my vacation.”
On the following day it seemed much easier to stay at the cottage. He took a rusted spinning reel apart, cleaned it, oiled it, reassembled it, then felt so exhausted he took a long nap. After the nap he wrote a long letter of inquiry to Brian’s friend in Jacksonville, telling himself there was no point in phoning or seeing the man before he knew what the working arrangement would be. In the late afternoon, with a sense of accomplishment, he took a huge bundle of laundry to the commercial end of the key and left it off. He drove over into the city intending to stop and see his sister, and then suddenly found himself slowing down for the turn into his own driveway. He went to bed early and slept late.