The Passenger (The Passenger, #1)(52)

The refrigerator.

It dont need parts. It just runs.

Amazing.

I never could understand why they call it a refrigerator. Instead of just a frigerator. It dont do it twice. That I know of.

Good question.

Royal still calls it the icebox.

Well at least he doesnt call it the piano.

His grandmother laughed and then put her hand over her mouth. Well, she said. Not yet, anyways. I’d better hush. Where all did you get to this mornin?

I went up to the pond.

Lord. The time you spent at that pond. You used to have that refrigerator so full of bottles and jars. The things you had in there, I got to where I was afraid to open the door.

You were awfully good about it.

I always thought you’d make a doctor.

Sorry.

I didnt mean it like that, Honey.

I know.

You dont have anything to be sorry about.

Western wiped the beaded water from the glass with the back of his forefinger. Yes, well.

What?

Nothing.

No, what?

Nothing. It’s just that you dont really think that.

Dont really think what?

That I dont have anything to be sorry about.

She didnt answer. Then she said: Bobby, what is done is done. It cant be helped.

It’s not much consolation, though. Is it? He pushed away the glass and rose from the chair. She reached to put her hand on his arm. Bobby, she said.

It’s all right.

Can I say something?

Yes. Sure.

I dont think that the good Lord meant for anybody to grieve that way.

What way is that, Granellen?

This way.

Well. I dont think he did either.

You know I worry about you.

He stopped and turned. He stood with his hands on the back of the chair and looked at her. You think she’s in hell, dont you?

That’s a hateful thing to say, Bobby. A hateful thing. You know I dont think that.

I’m sorry. That’s who I am. Or what.

I dont believe that.

It’s all right.

Please dont go, Honey.

I’m all right. I’ll be back.

He walked out down the driveway and set off along the blacktop road. He’d not gone far before a car stopped and a man looked at him over the top of the partly lowered glass.

You need a ride?

No Sir. I appreciate you stopping.

The man looked out down the road. As if to assess Western’s chances upon it. You sure?

I’m sure. I’m just taking a walk.

A walk?

Yessir.

The car pulled ahead and then slowed again. When Western came alongside the man bent to see him better. I know who you are, he said. As if he’d identified a Nazi war criminal hiking the roads round Wartburg Tennessee. Then he drove on.

When he got back to the house an hour later he got his bags out of the car and closed the front decklid and closed the car door and went in. He got his coat off the back of the chair. The sun hadnt come back and he was chilled. His grandmother was in the livingroom. You’ve not rented out my room, have you? he said.

Not yet.

Who was that girl who was here?

Her name’s Lu Ann. She comes about twice a week.

Where’s Royal?

He’s layin up in the bed. Me and him keeps different hours.

Western turned down the hall and went up the narrow wooden staircase.

His room was at the back of the house, hardly larger than a closet. He dropped his bags in the floor and stood looking out the window. A flicker was moving along one of the walnut tree limbs that hung over the roof. A yellowhammer, in this part of the country. He turned and sat on the small metal bed. Rough gray blanket. In the alcove in the wall opposite were some of his books. Three large silver cups won stock-car racing. A statue of the Sacred Heart. There was a model of a 1954 Ferrari Barchetta built from factory drawings. The body was made of sixteen gauge aluminum hammered out over bucks he’d carved from an oak six by eight. On the wall over the bed was a large square of lacquered linen fabric cut from the fuselage of an airplane. It was pale yellow and had the number 22 painted on it in blue.

He stood up and reached down Dirac’s Principles of Quantum Mechanics, fourth edition. He thumbed through it. The margins filled with notes, equations. Checking Dirac’s work, God help us. He closed the book and laid it aside and sat with his elbows on his knees and lowered his head into his hands.

When she called him for supper he was lying on the bed with one foot on the floor. The room was dark save for the light from the hallway. He picked Dirac’s book up off the floor and got his shavingkit out of his bag and went down the hallway to the bathroom.

When he came downstairs Royal was sitting at the head of the table in the diningroom with a dinnernapkin tucked at his chin. He waited till Bobby had passed along the table into view before speaking in order not to have to turn his head. Hello Bobby, he said.

How are you doing, Royal?

I’m okay. How are you makin it?

I’m all right.

Are you still livin over across the waters?

No. I live in New Orleans.

I was there one time. Years ago.

How did you like it?

I caint say as I did all that much. I got in jail down there.

What did you get in jail for?

Bein dumb. They had rats in there the size of lapdogs. We’d shoot em with paper clips with a rubber band and they wouldnt even look at you. They was always in a hurry. Goin somewheres. I dont know where.