The Long-Legged Fly

know, eighteen or so, but really retarded, you know? Cherie used to go see him a lot, tell him stories and all, try to teach him things. You think she might show up there sometime?”

“She might indeed. Thank you, Kirk. You know the address?”

“No, but it’s the only two-story wood house on the next block south. Can’t miss it. White with yellow trim.”

“There’ll be twenty more coming to match what you have. I’ll shove it under the door.”

“No, Mr. Griffin. This is more than enough.”

“I insist. You may have saved me a lot of time and work. And I never knew a student who couldn’t use an extra dollar or two.”

“Well,” he said.

“Can I ask you something?”

“Sure.”

“You have trouble concentrating with all those fine young ladies around all the time?”

“Doesn’t everyone?”

“God, I hope so. I hope it’s not just old men like me.”

“Not hardly.”

“Good. And thanks again.”

I finished the Irish coffee, and another couple of cups without the Irish, and headed back to Metairie. LuAnne was still alone and without parents, Frances Villon remained a thief, and at the two-story wood house I met only suspicion.

I finally convinced the father (Mom had split a long time ago) that I wasn’t a welfare officer or child molester (they probably came down to the same thing in his mind) and was introduced to Denny.

“She was real good with him, Cherie was. Only body ever spent any time with him save me.”

Denny was not only eighteen, he was a giant, almost as tall as myself and built like a linebacker. He had full, slack lips and brown eyes that never blinked. He didn’t talk, but made soft cooing sounds.

“When did you last see Cherie, Mr. Baker?”

“She came by, just for a few minutes, last week. Said she couldn’t stay ’cause of a job interview but she had missed Denny so much.”

“Say anything about when she might make it by again?”

“Said a couple of days. That was Tuesday. Guess she must of got tied up with the new job or something, huh?”

“If she does come back, Mr. Baker, could you give me a call?”

“You’re a friend of her brother, you say?”

“Yes, sir. I can give you his number, if you’d like.”

He looked at me for several moments. “I don’t need his number,” he said. “When you live with someone like Denny, who can’t ever tell you what’s inside him, you learn things most people don’t know. I see the pain and confusion in your face. It’s been there a long time. But I also see you’re a good man, and I know you’re telling me the truth.”

I nodded, and he told me he’d let me know when Cherie showed up again. “She will,” he said. “It’s just a matter of when.”

Isn’t everything, I thought, and headed back to town.

Vicky was home, sitting on the couch with a gin and tonic. She’d taken off her uniform pants but still wore the top, underpants, white stockings. Something about those white uniforms is sexy enough anyway, and it was accented by her pale skin and red hair.

“Posing for Penthouse?”

“For you,” she said, raising her glass. “Want a drink?”

“I’ll get it. You look tired.”

“I’ve had a terrible day. A man we were ambulating died, just dropped dead right there in the hall with family and all the rest of the patients looking on. Then all afternoon it’s the head nurse I have to put up with, going on and on about quotas and priorities as I’m trying to catch up on my work.”

I got my drink, we both sipped, then she went on, her words as ever falling into natural cadences, so musical and lilting you could sink into the sensual pleasures of the language itself and lose meaning altogether.

“She refers to patients as ‘units.’ An acutely ill patient is twenty-five units, a bed bath is two units, an IV is one unit, and on and on. And on.” She sipped again. “It’s rather like a factory, isn’t it?”

“And shouldn’t be?”

“Can’t be. Because things are changing all the time, patients’ conditions, their needs. You can’t very well plot that out on paper now, can you?”

“But the managers, that new, huge and ever-increasing class, must have something to do.” I slipped into a dissembling voice, a mixture of Amos and Andy and sixties cant. “When duh rev’lushun cums, dose wif briefcases gone be de furst shot.”

Vicky didn’t feel like cooking, we both felt like eating, and the only thing in the fridge was very leftover lasagna. The choice came down to ordering from Yum Yum’s, the Chinese restaurant a few blocks away that delivered, or going out somewhere. We had another drink and thought it over. Images of Yum Yum’s greasy paper food cartons (like the kind used to carry goldfish home from the dime store) helped the decision immeasurably.

Chapter Four

We walked for a while and wound up at a creole cafe run by an ageless Cajun and his family. Two kids about nine or ten were seating customers and clearing tables; a girl of thirteen or so was the waitress. The menu was chalked on a board by the door to the kitchen.

We each had a fish soup, fiery red beans and rice, boudin, all of it eased considerably by a chilled bottle of white wine. The bill came to $28.66-I swear I don’t know how the man makes a living. Bouchard came out himself in his bloody, grease-smeared apron as we left, to make sure everything was satisfactory. We told him, as we always did, that it was far more than satisfactory, it was indeed and in fact excellent. “Merci,” he said, and fled back as though relieved to his beloved kitchen.

We were walking aimlessly back toward the apartment, enjoying the flush from the wine and the chilly air, when a car slowed and pulled alongside us. There were two young white guys in it. One had a quart of beer, the other a fifth of whiskey, and they kept passing the bottles back and forth.

“Hey look,” one of them said. “This nigger’s got him a white girl. Must think he’s cock of the walk now, huh?”

“Hey, man, you cock of the walk?”

“Talkin’ to you, nigger.”

I turned, looked at them, waited. This was an old, familiar scene, only the minute particulars of which ever changed. Nothing would happen until they got out of the car. And then it had better happen fast, before they were ready for it.

“Nigger can’t talk,” the driver said.

“Must be one of them dumb niggers.”

“Bear shit in the woods?”

They laughed, drank, laughed some more. The one on the passenger side reached for the door handle.