Sailor & Lula (65 page)

“What you mean, ‘didn't'? You still got time to develop one or two more mean deals before Armageddon.”

Beany laughed. Her tears were gone.

“Wish Hedy Lamarr loved me the way you do, Lula, but I guess I get what I deserve. Deliver me from the hand of strange children, it says in Psalms.”

“Like that teenager in Little Rock was on the news,” Lula said, “decapitated his mother, a dog, and a parakeet.”

Beany clucked her tongue. “You're right, Lula, things always could be worse.”

When Lula took over the wheel at McClellanville, she asked Beany if she could borrow her sunglasses. Beany handed them over.

“Thanks, they're darker than mine,” said Lula. “Glare here's bad.”

“Amazin' you don't wear glasses ‘cept to read,” Beany said. “I can't get from the kitchen to the bathroom without mine.”

“I got my mama's eyes, I guess. Marietta never wore any type of eyeglasses. I recall her readin' Eugene Sue's
Mysteries of Paris
to Marcello Santos when he was on his deathbed, didn't have on no spectacles.”

“You're blessed. I started wearin' 'em when I couldn't read the writin' on the squares on the Monopoly board at Oriental.”

“Did I ever tell you about Sailor's recurrin' dream involvin' a kind of board game?”

“No, Lula, what was it?”

“Well, it wasn't really on a board, it was on sand, on the ground. Sailor said the first time he had it he dreamed he was sittin' on the desert floor with a group of Indians, Hopis, perhaps, in the southwest somewhere, Arizona or New Mexico, and there was lines marked out in front of 'em, carved in the sand, creases like, and Sail and these Indians were movin' beads or stones, white rocks, from one place to another. He said they were sittin' on a mesa, all the colors were very bright, tan and beige and blue from the sky.

“After that, the second time he had the dream and the times after, the game was spread out over a much larger distance. There were more lines or creases drawn in the sand, shapes of figures like animals, and the beads or balls now, not stones or rocks, had to travel much further. Sailor told me he and the other players were sittin' with their legs folded underneath 'em on the ground and one of the rules was nobody could stand up to move any of the balls.”

“Did he say how they moved?”

“Yes, this is the good part. They transported their pieces by mental telepathy, by the power of their mind. Ain't that somethin'?”

“Never heard nothin' like it. Did Sailor say if he won or not?”

“No, I don't believe winnin' was the object of the game. Every time Sailor had this dream he told me it got more complicated and he couldn't really explain how the game was supposed to go, just the players bein' able to move the pieces with their thoughts was the important thing.”

Beany shook her head. “Whew, I never knew Sailor had such a deep mind.”

“He used to could surprise me, Beany. There was more to him than most people suspected. Sailor was a special boy.”

“I'm glad you told me this, Lula. Puts Sailor in a whole different light.”

“Beany, if I remember right, there used to be a good Dairy Queen in Wando we can stop at.”

“Okay, baby, I could do with a strawberry double dip.”

Sprinkles hit the windshield and Lula turned on the wipers.

“Oh, one more thing about Sailor's dream?”

“Tell, me.”

“After he passed, I found a bunch of drawin's in his desk, markin's like the ones he described had been made in the sand in the Indian game.”

“I guess he was tryin' to figure it out.”

“Uh huh. That dream was a A-Number One mystery.”

Beany nodded and said, “Sure as shootin', just like ever'thin' else.”

After stopping for an ice cream in Wando and gassing up the Merc, Beany took the wheel for the busy stretch into Charleston.

“One night last week I couldn't sleep,” said Lula, “so I turned on the TV and there was one of Sailor's favorite old black and white movies, Virginia City, with Errol Flynn and Humphrey Bogart as a Mexican bandit.”

“Don't believe I ever seen it,” Beany said. “Think I'd remember Bogey as a Mexican.”

“He weren't real convincin'. Had a drawed on pencil-thin mustache and a bad accent, was weaselly-lookin'. That Errol Flynn, though, was just about scrumptious as a man could get. Makes all these skinny actors today look sick.”

“I'm with you there, Lula. What's the picture about?”

“A Civil War western, where Randolph Scott—who was plenty cute, too, though Sail always said he was a three dollar bill—is with our side and he's sent to Virginia City, Nevada, to get gold to finance the Confederacy. Flynn's a Yankee undercover agent out to stop him. He does, but he likes Scott so doesn't let the Union have the gold, which he buries under a rockslide. Bogart's got a gang of filthy desperadoes ridin' around robbin' everybody. Best part of the movie, though, is when Flynn's double does a header on horseback over a cliff.”

“Who's the girl? That simpy, Goody Two-Shoes person always about to faint ever' time Errol noticed her?”

“You mean Olivia de Havilland. No, she was much prettier than this one. This is a dancehall gal workin' for the rebels who's only a half-attractive blonde with doll-baby ringlets, sort of a third-rate American Marlene Dietrich. Had an annoyin' voice, too. I'll bet even Flynn didn't put it to her.”

A light rain persisted but Beany kept her window down. “I like feelin' the soft drops while I drive,” she said. “It's like they're pokin' me to keep payin' attention to the road.”

Lula kept her window cracked slightly just to catch a tiny breeze.

“But Lula? My best guess is ol' Errol had all his leadin' ladies like chickens-in-the-basket. Them actors and actresses are always at it. I read in some magazine years ago a interview with John Derek—one was married to Bo Derek?—where he said he made fifty movies and durin' each one he went to bed with the actress played opposite him. He said it was expected by the director—unless the director was gunnin' her, too—and, most of all, by the actress her own self, made her more confident. 'Course it helped Derek that he was about the prettiest boy when he was young, even more than that French actor looks so queeny now. Read how he goes to Tahiti every couple years for a face lift.”

“Yeah, I guess so,” said Lula. “But I like to think even in Hollywood there's true romance once in a while.”

“You don't think you woulda cheated on Sailor with Errol Flynn?”

“Uh uh, Beany, not a chance. Can't say I wouldn't have appreciated the offer, but I knew Sail was my man since I was sixteen years old. Even when he was sent up for pullin' that feed store holdup in Texas with that devil Bobby Peru, I stayed true. Also when we was separated after. I believed in my heart it was in the stars that we was meant to be together forever.”

Beany sighed and said, “Lula, that's so precious. I believe you, I always have. But even if I'd been as lucky with a man as you were with Sailor Ripley, I wouldn'ta passed on Errol Flynn.”

I been thinking lately about my daddy how my life might have been different had he not died so early in it. No doubt he would not have approved of my marrying Sailor no more than Mama did so Im certain we would have had a powerful disagreement in that department. I like to think on him sitting in his favorite chair the one with the ripped up armrests torn apart by my cat Blue Eyed Jane named after Daddys specialmost Jimmie Rodgers song. He loved to listen to those old records of Jimmies his granddaddy give him he had em all on 78. Nobody did Jimmie right Daddy said so he made this music that would last as long as anyones and then died from TB. Why Should I Be Lonely had the words I preferred the best of all. Why should I be so lonely why should I be sad though another is taking from me the best pal Ive ever had shes taking the sunshine with her leaving the clouds for me but why should I be so lonesome when theres nobody lonesome for me. This describes my feeling for Sailor having fallen into the embrace of Madame Death who Sail said would be my only rival. How could I know when I was a child and listened to those songs with my daddy that Jimmie had already saw Madame standing in the shadows.

Beany and I spent the night at the Henry Nimrod B & B in Charleston and when I woke up this morning Beany had left me a note saying shed already gone down to breakfast. Imagine my surprise when I found her sitting at a table with a beautiful boy who looked about sixteen but as it turns out is twenty three. His name of all things is Epistrophy Trane Taylor but goes by his initials ET. He was staying at the Nimrod for a couple of days while exploring Charleston hes from Lake Charles Louisiana. Told us his mama and daddy are jazz people so named him after their favorite tune by Monk and middle name after Coltrane. He was just a little kid when the movie ET come out so it was a natural to be called that and it stuck. ET has long wavy light brown hair and green eyes you can imagine looking in em and seeing a jungle lagoon with crocodiles gliding along. You really could get a little lost staring in there I cant explain it better. Anyway Beany seen him and the breakfast room was filled so she asked ET if she could sit at the table with him and he jumped right up and pulled out a chair for her. Turns out ET graduated college last June now its October and has been traveling around by bus and thumb for almost four months trying to figure out what he wants to do with his life. Hes been to the midwest and up and down the east coast sometimes doing small jobs the usual. His degree from of all places Daniel Schmutz University in Switzerland is in computer science so ET could work anywhere with his skills but he says he cant stand the idea of sitting at a desk in front of a computer screen all day I dont blame him a bit. We asked how it was he went to school over there in Switzerland especially being from Lake Charles he said his grandparents live there its where his mama grew up in those mountains. She met his daddy on a holiday trip to NO and they run off together got married she was eighteen and they been living in his daddys home town of Lake Charles ever since. ETs daddy is a car mechanic with his own garage and a trumpet player on the side. His mama runs the business and paints pictures of flowers mostly also she plays the cello. Besides English ET speaks German his mama taught him growing up she didnt speak English
hardly at all when she run into ETs daddy to be. His name is Alastair Taylor his family being originally from Scotland but ET says everybody calls his daddy Duke because of Duke Ellington its the name of the garage Dukes. ET told us hes running real low on money and is hitching his way to Lake Charles so Beany said he could ride with us to NO without asking me not that I would have said no. He accepted and went to get his things from his room just a pack and a guitar. After ET was gone Beany whispered to me not to panic but this boy made her wet at least feel she could be wet then laughed crazy out loud so everybody stared. I been writing this waiting in the car for her and here she is with ET carrying our bags. I got a feeling something out of my control is going on but is it a sign?

“I been readin' this book I picked up in Atlanta, Why God Don't Need to Carry a Gun. Says people ought just listen to their inner voice so there can be peace in the world.”

“What's this inner voice sayin'?” Beany asked ET. She was driving. Lula was in the front passenger seat and ET was in the back, strumming on his Gibson Hummingbird.

“It's the Lord's message comin' through His angels, is what it is. A person's body is sort of a celestial radio station. You got to get tuned in to His frequency.”

“You mean the angels are broadcastin' for Him from inside us?” asked Beany.

“God's disc jockeys,” said ET, and strummed a G major chord. “They're pluckin' on your heartstrings like they do on their harps, singin' ‘Babylon is fallen, is fallen, the Lord's son is callin', is callin'. He who worships the beast and his image shall carry his mark, and dwell ever after without rest in the dark.' ”

“You really believe this, ET?” Lula asked. “What it says in this book?”

“I guess so.”

“There ain't no guessin' when it comes to religion,” said Lula.

ET sang, accompanying himself on his guitar: “Oh God don't need to carry a gun/ And you know He ain't the only one/ No, you and I can be in His number, too/ Lambs and lions and beasts of burden/ Us creatures commanded by His word and/ Then we'll all be raptured with His son.”

“Never heard that hymn before,” said Beany.

“I know,” said ET, “I wrote it myself. Glad as gravy you gals give me a ride. I knew as soon as I seen you both together that it was a sign.”

Lula rolled down her window all the way and let the breeze hit her full in the face.

Somewhere around the turnoff for Edisto Island, Lula drifted off to sleep and dreamed that she was her much younger self alone on a beach at sunset. Suddenly, a big red wave rose up and crashed on the ground in front of her and as the water receded revealed human body parts lying on the sand. Arms, legs, what looked like a neck, even a few heads littered the beach. She was jolted out of this daytime nightmare by a bump.

“Sorry,” said Beany, “couldn't dodge some possum remains.”

Lula recognized the tune playing on the radio, “Little Rain” by Jimmy Reed. Sailor had always said that this was the slowest blues song ever recorded. “Old Jimmy done gone catatonic on this one,” Lula recalled Sailor saying, as the singer slurred the line, “Little rain keep a-fallin' on this here love of mine.”