vocalists like they do the other kind. Rags was kidding when he said it-he used to kid around a lot-but he told me that Janie was the only girl singer in the country who wasn't a coloratura. Or, at least, a lyric soprano. He didn't know where the hell they all came from, he said, since there didn't used to be a coloratura come along more than once every ten years. Well, anyway, he can't say that any more; I mean, about Janie being the only girl who isn't a coloratura. Because Danny Lee isn't one either. She's got the same kind of voice that Janie had-only, well, kind of different-and she even kind of looks like Janie; only Rags gets sore when you say so, so I've never done it but once. Rags is awfully funny in some ways. Nice, you know, but funny. Now, me, when you like a person, when you think a lot of 'em, I think you ought to show it. I mean if you're me, you have to. You can't do anything else, and you wouldn't think of saying or doing anything to hurt them. But a lot of people are different, and Rags is one of them. Take with Janie. I know he thought the world of Janie, but he was all the time jumping on her. Always accusing her of something dirty. She couldn't look at anyone cross-eyed, just being pleasant, you know, without him saying she was running after the guy or something like that. And it just wasn't so. You wouldn't find a nicer girl than Janie in a month of Sundays. Oh, she drank a little, I guess. These last few years, she drank
Now, I was saying that I'd thought about killing Luane that first day of the season. But that isn't really the way it was. I mean, I didn't actually think about killing her. What I thought about was how it would be maybe if she wasn't there. I didn't want her not to be there exactly- -to be dead-but still, well, you know. I started off wondering how it would be if she was, and then after a while I began kind of half-wishing that she was. And then, finally, I thought about different ways that she might be. Because if she wasn't-dead, I mean-I didn't know what I was going to do. And you put yourself in my place, and I don't think you'd have known either.
Usually-during the winter, anyway-I lay around in bed until five-thirty or six in the morning. But that day was the first of the season, so I was up at four. I dressed in the dark, and slipped out into the starlight. I did the chores, sort of humming and grinning to myself, feeling as tickled as a kid on Christmas morning. I felt good, I'll tell you. It was dark and the air was pretty nippy at that hour of the morning, but still everything seemed bright to me and I had that nice warm feeling inside. It was like I'd been buried in a cave, and I'd finally managed to get out. And that was kind of the way it was, too, in a way. Because this last winter had really been a bad one. Take the engineer's job at the courthouse, firing the boilers; now that's always been my job-an hour morning and evening and an hour on Saturday morning-but last winter it wasn't mine. And the school custodian job-four hours a day and two days once a month-that had always been mine, too, and now it wasn't. I talked to the head of the county commissioners, and he sent me to the county attorney. And the way he explained it-about the boilers-was that the commissioners could be held liable for any money they spent in excess of what was necessary. So automatic boilers were being installed, and that was that. I tried to argue with him, but it didn't do any good. It didn't do any good when I talked to the president of the school board, Doctor Ashton. They were dividing my job up among some of the vocational students. I wouldn't be needed now or at any time in the future, Doc said. And he gave me one of those straight, hard-eyed looks like the county attorney had.
So there I was. A hundred and fifty dollars a month gone down the drain. Practically every bit of my winter income, except for a little wood-cutting and stuff like that. Well, sure, I'd always kept a pretty big garden, canned and dried a lot of stuff. And, of course, there were the pigs, and we had our own eggs and milk and so on. And, naturally, I had some money put by. But, you know, you just can't figure that way; I mean, you can't count on standing on rock bottom. You do that, say, and what happens if things get worse? If a rainy day comes along, and that water that's only been up to your chin goes over your nose? Money can go mighty fast when you don't have any coming in. Say you run in the hole five dollars a day, why in a year's time that's almost two thousand dollars. And say you're forty like I am, and you've got maybe twenty-five years to live unless you starve to death…! I tell you I was almost crazy with worry. Anyone would have been. But now it was the first day of the season, and all my worries were over-I thought. I'd just work a little harder, make enough to make up for what I didn't make during the winter, and everything would be fine. I mean, I thought it would be.
I finished my chores. Then, I spread a big tarp in the back of the Mercedes-Benz, and put my mower and tools inside. You're probably wondering what a man like me is doing with a Mercedes, them being worth so much money. But the point is they're only worth a lot when you're buying; you go to sell one it's a different story. I did get a pretty good offer or two for it, back when I first got it-two seasons ago-but I kind of held on, thinking I might get a better one. And, of course, I liked it a lot, too, and I did need a car to get around in, to haul myself and my tools and passengers during the season. So, maybe it was the wrong thing, but it looked to me like I couldn't really lose since I'd gotten it for nothing. So, well, I've still got it.
The man who did own it was a writes a motion-picture writer, who used to come up here for the season. He began having trouble with it right after I went to work for him, and he had me tinker on it for him; and it would run pretty good for a time and then it would go blooey again. He got pretty sore about it. I mean, he got sore at the car. One morning he got so mad he started to take an ax to it, and I guess he would have if I hadn't stopped him. Well, back then, there was a summer Rolls agency over at Atlantic Center-that's a pretty big place, probably ten times as big as Manduwoc. So I suggested to this writer that as long as he needed a car and he didn't like the Mercedes, why not let me tow him over there and see what kind of a trade-in he could get.
Well, you know how it is. Those dealers can stick just about any price tag on a car they want to. So this one said he could allow six thousand on the Mercedes (he just boosted the Rolls price that much), and the writer snapped him up on it. And as soon as he'd driven off, the dealer signed the Mercedes over to me. I tinkered with the motor a little. I've never had to touch it since.
Yes, this writer was pretty sore when he found out what had happened. He claimed I'd deliberately put the Mercedes on the blink, and he threatened to have both me and that dealer arrested. But he couldn't prove anything, so it didn't bother me that much. I mean, after all, a man that's got twenty-five or thirty thousand dollars to throw away on a car, has got blamed little to fuss about. And if he can't protect an investment like that, he shouldn't have it in the first place.
After I'd finished loading the Mercedes, I went in and did a quick job on the house. Which didn't take long since I'd slicked everything up good the night before. I ate breakfast, and then I fixed more breakfast and carried it up to Luane. We had a real nice talk while she ate. When she was through, I gave her a sponge bath, tickling her and teasing her until she was almost crying she laughed so hard. As a matter of fact, she did cry a little but not sad like she sometimes does. It was more kind of wondering, you know- like when you know something's true but you can't quite believe it.
'You like me, don't you?' she said. 'You really do like me, don't you?'
'Well, sure,' I said. 'Of course. I don't need to tell you that.'
'You've never regretted anything? Wished things had been different?'
'Regret what?' I said. 'What would I want different?'
'Well-' She gestured. 'To travel. See the world. Do something besides just work and eat and sleep.'
'Why, I do a lot besides that,' I said. 'Anyway, what would I want to travel for when I've got everything I want right here?'
'Have you, darling?' She patted my cheek. 'Do you have everything you want?'
I nodded. Maybe I didn't have everything I wanted right there in the house, her being pretty well along in years. But working like I do, I didn't have to hunt very hard to get it. Most of the time it was the other way around.
Well, anyway. I got her fixed up for the day with everything she might need, and then I left. Feeling good, like I said. Feeling like all my troubles were over. I drove up to Mr. J. B. Brockton's place, and started to work on the lawn. And in just about five minutes-just about the time it took him to get out of the house-all the good feeling was gone, and I knew I hadn't seen any trouble compared with what I was liable to.
'I'm sorry, Ralph,' he said, sort of kicking at the grass with his toe. 'I tried any number of times to reach you yesterday, but your phone was always tied up.'
I shook my head. I just couldn't think of anything to say for a minute. He wasn't like some of the summer people I worked for- people who just order you around like you didn't have any feelings, and maybe make jokes about you-about the 'natives'-in front of their company. He was more like a friend, you know. I liked him, and he went out of his way to show that he liked me. Why, just last season he'd given me a couple suits. Two hundred and fifty dollar suits, he said they were. And, of course, he was probably exaggerating a little. Because how could
