personality; it was living-boxes out of 1984 ? The next morning he was back poring over city maps and other books about Nashville.
He quickly memorized street names, routes, alternate routes, key locations; he tried to get a feel for the city; a basic feel for what happened when he went north, went west, went east.
He wore hornrim eyeglasses and was continually massaging the bridge of his nose. His eyes were sore. He worked right through the cleaning lady.
Study, study, study?and then study some more.
After a cafe lunch of eggs, grits, and tenderloin, Berryman drove and walked around the capitol and business sections of Nashville. He was wearing mirrored sunglasses, a Levi?s shirt, cowpuncher jeans.
He thought that downtown Nashville was typical of the New South: it was a small town, with big city pretensions.
The Nashville skyline was a cluster of fifteen-to-twenty-five-story buildings which made Berryman think of a smaller, poorer Houston. The capitol buildings looked like a miniature Washington. A pretzel configuration of parkways added a hint of Los Angeles.
It was a clean city though; and the air was still relatively fresh.
Nashville?s rich and poor alike bought their clothes off the rack. The men wore Sears and Montgomery Ward double-knit suits. Most of them wore white patent leather belts and white loafers with golden chains and buttons.
Nashville women still wore short skirts, and stockings. Thigh ticklers and hot pants were on display in all the department and dime store windows.
The southern city was practicing conspicuous consumption, but most of it was being done in Rich?s department store and Walgreen?s.
To help complete his own ensemble, Berryman stopped in a Kinney?s Shoe Store and bought a pair of beige Hush Puppies. They figured to go well with the green suit, and they were also dress shoes he could run in.
The clerk who packaged them looked from sunglasses to shoes, shoes to sunglasses. ?Don?t look like your type,? she said.
?Mos? comf?table walkin? shoe in America,? Berryman smiled. It wasn?t what you said, it was how you said it.
In the late afternoon, he drove uptown to Horn campaign headquarters. It was located in an unrented automobile showroom on West End Avenue.
Still squinting in the harsh sunlight, he stood outside the storefront and walked its length.
The showroom windows were covered with posters of Jimmie Horn talking
with a wide spectrum of people. All of the photographs were striking; Horn apparently had some southern Bruce Davidson following him around with a camera.
There was Jimmie Horn standing on some grassy knoll with a white football coach. Horn with his wife by their kitchen stove. Horn with Howard Baker and Sam Ervin. Horn fishing off some country bridge with an old black grandfather. Horn with Nixon. With Minnie Pearl. With a young vet just arrested for robbing a gas station.
Berryman felt the correct emotion: a warm friendly feeling about Jimmie Horn.
Behind all the photographs, inside the showroom, a gabby campaign worker cheerfully outlined the mayor?s Independence Day schedule for Berryman. She sat under a faded Sign of the Cat, talking like a parrot.
?In the early mawnin?,? she used a leftover salesman?s desk as her lectern, ?startin? with a pa-rade at nine, the next senator of Tennessee will appear at a celebrity
to be held at Vand-a-bilt Stadium, or rather, Dudley Field.
?Jahnny Cash. Albuht Gohr. Kris Kristoffason. They?ahr just a few of the personalities who will be on hand.
?At noon??she handed Berryman a glossy leaflet entitled
??at noon, there will be a fund-raisin luncheon at Rogah Millah?s King of the Road.
?At fohah,? she smiled like a mother of the bride, ?the mayor will speak to ow-ah black people. This will take place at the Fa?mer?s Market.
?At eight. Mayor Horn will appear with Guvnah Winthrop at the new
Nashville Speedway. This will be ow-ah fawworks show, uh course.?
As the ramble continued, the long-haired youth from the Farmer?s Market wandered in off West End Avenue. He was wearing the same green fatigues, and close up, Berryman could see he was easily in his mid-twenties.
This was Bert Poole, the divinity student later killed by the gunman from Philadelphia.
?Help you?? the garrulous woman called to him.
Poole didn?t answer, or even look up at the voice.
He read some handouts about Horn stacked high on a wooden banquet table. He examined the advertising posters on the walls, and looked at Berryman and the woman with the same critical eye.
Then he popped out the swinging doors, just as quickly as he had come in.
?Comes in here every other day,? the gabby woman said to Berryman. ?Never answers a civil question. Never smiles. Never volunteers to do a little work.?
Berryman watched as Poole crossed West End Avenue, going in the direction of Mason?s Cafeteria. ?Huh,? he
