Leonard’s car and went out to a Mexican restaurant to eat, then decided to try and drive out to Calachase Road and see if we could find Illium Moon’s place. That didn’t work, we’d do what you’re supposed to do. We’d scout around till we found someone who knew where Illium lived.
It was still light, the summer days being long here in East Texas, but the sun was oozing down over the edge of the earth, and the sky in the west looked like a burst blood vessel. The air was a little cool and it smelled sweetly of damp dirt.
Calachase Road is a long road of clay and intermediate stretches of blacktop and gravel. It winds down between the East Texas pines and oaks, and in the summer the air is thick with their smell, and the late sunlight filtering through them turns the shadows on the road dark emerald.
We drove around for a while, saw some houses and trailers, but no mailboxes that said Illium Moon. We finally pulled up to a nasty shack that looked as if a brisk fart might knock it over. It was gray and weathered with a roof that almost had a dozen shingles on it. The rest of the roof was tar paper, decking, and silver tacks. The tiles that belonged up there were in ragged torn heaps beside the house, and leaning against the house was a crowbar and a hammer. A couple window screens were swung free of the windows, dangling by single nails. The front porch and front door were flame-licked black. There was a healthy stack of beer cans by the porch that weren’t even damp, and it had been raining solid for nearly three days. Budweiser was a major label.
Beside the house was a man. He was black and bald and bony and wore a T-shirt that was stained to a color that wouldn’t be found on any paint charts. He had on khaki pants with red-clay knees. His once-black loafers were colored with red clay and gray something-or-other. He had a shovel and he was digging, and he was somehow managing to hang onto a beer can while he did. He looked up when we pulled into the yard.
We got out of the car and walked over to him. The gray something-or-other on his shoes was immediately made identifiable by smell. Sewage.
Up close, we could see he had quite a trench going.
“Hello,” Leonard said.
The man looked at us. His face was boiling in sweat. He opened his mouth to speak and revealed all his front teeth were missing. When he spoke, his missing teeth made him sound a little like he was talking with a sock in his mouth. “Shit, man. I thought y’all’s comin’ tomorrow.” He stood up and pushed his chest out. “I know y’all seen them beer cans, but we ain’t no algogolic’s here.”
Algogolics? What was that? An alligator with alcohol problems?
“You’ve got us confused with someone else,” I said. “We’ve just come to ask directions.”
“Y’all ain’t from Community Action?” he said.
“Nope,” I said.
“Damn, that’s good,” he said. “I’m hoping to get them cans up.”
“What’s Community Action?” I asked.
“They come and see I deserve to have my house weather-proofed or not. It’s for the underprivileged. Figure I tear a few more shingles off the roof, they got to fix the whole thing instead of just spots, which is what they did last time.”
“I don’t know,” Leonard said. “I doubt that dozen or so up there is worth bothering with. I’d go with what I got. But I’d move the shingles in the yard outta sight.”
“I’m gonna tell ’em the wind done it,” the man said. “There was some bad wind with that rain. ’Course, I took ’em off ’fore the rain.”
“That crowbar and hammer look suspicious,” I said.
“I’ll throw ’em up under the house,” he said. “Say, you fellas was Community Action, seen my roof like that, would you fix it?”
“I’d be all over that sonofabitch,” Leonard said.
“That’s what I figured,” the man said. “Wish I hadn’t started taking them shingles off ’fore it rained. Leaks between them tacks. Top of the TV’s all fucked up. Run into the VCR and fucked it too, but I got it at Wal-Mart. They take anything back and give you another. One time I wore some shoes a year and took ’em back. You got to keep your sales slip, though.”
“Digging a new sewer line?” I asked.
“Naw,” the man said, swigging from the beer can and tossing it on the ground. “I’m digging in the old one. I lost my teeth.”
“Ah,” Leonard said.
“Got so drunk last night I was puking in the toilet, and I pulled out my bridge and flushed it. It’s here in the line somewhere, it didn’t go into the septic tank. It’s in the tank, reckon I’m fucked.”
“Sorry about the teeth,” I said.
“They ain’t gone yet,” he said. “We ain’t flushed the commode since, so I’m kinda thinkin’ them teeth’s here somewhere in the line. It runs slow.”
I looked at the line. It was a ditch seething with broken red sewer tile and gray sludge. Flies pocked it like jewels.
“I don’t want to buy no new teeth,” the man said, “and I need to get ’em now so I can flush the trapper. Damn wife shit in there a couple of times knowing it ain’t supposed to be flushed. Can’t go in the house it stinks so much.”
I looked at the house and thought a little shit stink might actually give it some charm.
“We wanted to know about someone might be a neighbor of yours,” I said.
“Shit,” the man said, “these neighbors ’round here are all motherfuckers. Our house caught on fire and these motherfuckers didn’t even bake us a casserole or a cake.”
“That’s cold,” Leonard said. “Listen, this guy may not be a main neighbor of yours. He lives on this road.”
“This a long road, man.”
“Illium Moon’s the name,” I said. “Drives a bookmobile.”
“That motherfucker,” the man said. “Shit, he tried to come by here see we wanted to read some books. I told him I got the TV Guide, and my wife can read it, so what I need a book for?”
“ TV Guide does hit the highlights,” Leonard said.
“That motherfucker’s crazy,” the man said. “He come by here ’nuther time and wanted to know I wanted to fix my place up with some scrap lumber he’s got. Said me and him could do the work. Shit on that. Community Action, they use new lumber and do the work too.”
“You know where this guy lives?” I said.
He pointed. “Down the road a piece there.”
“We been down the road a piece,” I said, “and we don’t know what we’re looking for.”
“He has that van, one with the books, parked out ’side the house,” the man said. “It’s white. And there’s piles of that old sorry-ass lumber and things under tarps there. You didn’t see that, you just didn’t go down a good enough piece.”
“Thanks,” I said. “Good luck with Community Action, and I hope you find your teeth.”
“You do,” Leonard said, “what you gonna do with them?”
“Rench ’em off and use ’em,” the man said.
“That’s what I figured,” Leonard said.
“I’d do more than rinse them,” I said. “You ought to use a little Clorox to kill germs, then rinse ’em in alcohol and then water.”
“I don’t go in for that nonsense,” the man said. “I ain’t never seen a germ, and I ain’t never been sick a day in my life.”
“Okeydoke,” I said.
We left him there, poking his shovel around in the sewage. In the car, Leonard said, “I know it’s an ugly thing to say, him being ignorant as a post and all, but maybe, luck’s with the world, that shiftless sonofabitch will die in his sleep tonight. He ain’t doing nothing but makin’ turds.”
“Yeah,” I said, “and his teeth are in them.”
