jutted from the rear wall of the Co-op, just inside the passageway to the grain warehouse. Surely, he told himself, Carol wouldn't turn him down – it wasn't as if he was asking so much, just a night or two of simple hospitality -but just the same, it was best to be prepared.
He had decided, this very morning, to leave the Poroths; had awakened, in fact, with that resolve uppermost in mind, having spent the previous night camped in the farmhouse, sleeping on a mattress in the middle of the living-room floor. He had gotten up shortly after day-break in a sour mood, eyes itching and nose running, his skin covered with cat hairs. This was no way to be passing the summer, hiding in a cat-infested farmhouse while another feline, downright homicidal, lurked somewhere nearby. The whole thing was turning into a bad dream. He wanted out.
The Poroths, unaware of his intent, had been nothing if not solicitous. They had moved aside all the living- room furniture to make a temporary bedroom for him and had made sure that the doors to the house were firmly locked, both front and back. Yesterday, on their way back from Werner Klapp's chicken farm, where they had purchased four new laying hens, they had stopped off in town to buy new screening for Freirs' room and a latch to bolt his door from the inside. Sarr had rigged up a simple wooden floor lamp for him from an old clothing rack and some spare parts found in the storeroom. Obviously the two of them were sorry that events at the farm had taken such a turn; obviously they wanted him to stay for the rest of the summer. It’s probably my money they want, he told himself.
He hadn't yet said anything to them about leaving, though no doubt they sensed the possibility. He wasn't sure just how to bring it up, and besides, there was one thing he'd have to arrange first in private: finding a place in New York where he could stay until his own apartment was vacant. Perhaps Carol would be willing… He would have to propose it as a temporary measure, of course – just until he found a summer sublet. He could ask if he might simply use the couch for a few days; and then, if things developed as he hoped they would…
Getting into town to phone her had seemed a problem. The Poroths would hardly be driving in again, having made the trip just yesterday, and he hated to ask to borrow the truck, especially when he'd have to make up some innocent-sounding pretext for needing it.
It had looked, though, as if he'd have no choice. He'd been seated on the front porch, preparing himself to walk down to the cornfield where Sarr and Deborah were working and ask them for the keys, when from up the road had come the sound of an engine, followed by a cloud of dust the same grey as the sky. Moments later a square yellow van had rattled into view with Hunterdon Oil amp; Gas in large red letters on its side. Sarr had hurried back from the field in time to help the company's driver replace one of the tall silver cylinders that stood behind the house with a new one and to stow the empty cylinder in the back of the van. Afterward, with an apologetic smile – as if this were a betrayal of the Poroths' trust – the driver had presented them with a printed receipt and, attached to it, the bill for last month's gas. The first Sarr had slowly and conscientiously signed, but the bill had left him scowling and shaking his head.
Freirs, seeing his chance, had asked the man if he'd be driving toward Gilead; there were things he needed at the store.
The Poroths had exchanged a glance. 'You should have told us yesterday,' said Deborah,*when Sarr and I went in. We'd have been glad to pick up something for you.' Sarr, meanwhile, had been looking gloomily away, as if he knew that Freirs might be leaving them soon and was resigned to it.
'I need more bug spray,' Freirs had said. 'Something a bit more powerful.'
'But how will you get back?' Deborah had asked as Freirs climbed into the van. 'Should I-'
'He'll find a way,' Sarr had cut in. 'Come on, woman, there's work to be done.' He had turned his back and started off in the direction of the fields.
'I'll get a hitch,' Freirs had yelled, as the van came to life with a roar. 'See you by dinnertime.' Soon they'd been rolling down the road, the farm receding behind them, Deborah's forlorn figure still watching them go, Sarr's already lost behind the house.
He still felt faintly guilty, standing here now before the phone. He was going to betray these people. Deborah, in particular, would be hurt.
He forced himself to think of the city as he slipped a dime into the phone and dialed Carol's number. The memory of New York's hot and sticky streets was beginning to seem almost attractive. There'd be movies to catch up on, and restaurants to try, and Carol 'Please deposit seventy-five cents,' said an unfamiliar voice.
He thumbed in the contents of his back pocket, fixing his face in a smile to help put himself into the proper mood. Okay, he thought, here goes nothing.
Where was Rosie? What could he be up to? She hadn't heard from him in days. This wasn't like him at all.
Carol reached down from the bed, picked up the phone, and dialed again. She let it ring for almost a full minute, her ear pressed close to the receiver, as if, by listening with all her might, she could hear the ringing echo through the corridors of his apartment, the sound of morning traffic in the street below his window, the regular faint whisper of the old man's labored breathing…
No, it was no use. No one was going to answer. She hung up the phone and wondered what to do.
There was really nothing to get excited about, of course. Rosie was probably out of town, attending to business or visiting friends. He would be back this weekend, she was sure of that, because he'd promised to take her to the ballet Saturday and he always kept his promises.
But then, he'd also promised to call her sometime this week, and here it was Thursday and she hadn't heard from him. That was unlike the old man; he usually phoned her every day, often twice, and sometimes even took her out to lunch at one of the Cuban Chinese restaurants in the neighborhood. She had come to expect his little calls, to look forward to them. Perhaps, in a way, she depended on them.
His sudden silence worried her. After all, he was so old and frail; he'd never actually told her his age and she'd never dared ask him, of course, but the more she'd seen of him the more she'd begun to think that he must be eighty at least.
What if he was lying dead, right this minute, on the floor of his apartment? That sort of thing happened often in New York, she'd read about it; there'd been a poor old man in the Bronx who'd died of a heart attack and had lain for months, an entire summer, in fact, his body decomposing, swelling, bloating with maggots and gas until it seeped through the ceiling of the apartment below.
Or what if he wasn't dead but simply in a coma, unable to hear the phone? Or perfectly conscious but simply unable to reach the phone? How horrible she'd just been, then, to let the phone ring for an entire minute; she could almost picture the old man lying there paralyzed, listening to the rings, helpless to stop them, praying that someone would help him…
She swung her legs off the bed and hurried to get dressed. Maybe nothing would come of this, she was probably just being silly, but she wouldn't be able to go to work this afternoon until she'd satisfied herself that he was all right. She had to do something, anyway. She owed him that much.
The phone rang nine, ten, eleven times without an answer.
'Damn!' said Freirs. It was almost noon. Maybe she was on her way to work. Well, he would wait around for a while and try her again at the library. Having gone to so much trouble to get here, he wasn't about to leave without talking to her.
He wondered how he'd kill an hour or so, and wished he'd had the sense to bring a book. He'd thought general stores were supposed to stock magazines or at least the local papers, but the Co-operative had none. He was surprised how much he'd begun to miss the Times. The cemetery across the street held no interest for him in all this heat, the dusty headstones baking in the sun. Briefly he thought of the corpses beneath; at least they'd be cool down there.
His shirt, he saw, was sticking to his back, and there were already sweat stains beneath his arms. With a sigh he rubbed the perspiration on the back of his neck and walked into the main room of the store.
Too bad the Brethren seemed never to have heard of air conditioning; the only trace of refrigeration in sight was the cooler near the back. Bert Steegler, carefully marking catalogues at the front counter, looked up with as little friendliness as he'd displayed when Freirs had entered. Steegler's wife was across the corridor in the post office section, filling out a pile of official-looking forms. Freirs wandered down the nearest aisle, smelling the clean, cozy scent of spice, coffee, and floor wax. One aisle up from the passage leading back to the warehouse stood three large burlap sacks of grain, the first of them open at the top. I wonder whether you plant this stuff or eat it, he thought, running his hand through the kernels.
