GENRE FICTION

By Alan Cliffe

Part One: Church­go­ing Men, 1945
Antoinette Timrod

Tony didn’t seem like the other white guys at the El Dorado. I mean, 
not just the obvious thing of being younger than his dad and uncles. He’d
been over­seas for a few years, includ­ing in Italy, like a lot of the young 
men. But somehow his travels made him seem more Amer­i­can than the 
older guys with the mus­tach­es. And he’d look me in the face like he saw 
a human being there, not just a bronze drink-getter whose butt you 
pat instead of thank­ing her when she gets the drinks. He was cleaner 
somehow. And things got a little out of hand.

Tony Iacano entered his father’s study at 2:00 P.M. sharp, as per his
summons. “Sit down, Anthony.” The younger man obeyed. “Are you sure
it’s yours?”

“Pretty sure.”

“Oh, pretty sure,” said Don Piero Iacano, repeat­ing his son’s words
in a pseudo-pompous, mocking voice. “Look, Tony, you’re a grown man.
I sup­port­ed what you did in the war, and I respect it. And I’ve never
tried to tell you who to fuck or not to fuck. But you can’t marry her. And
you can’t just tell her ‘tough shit,’ or send her to Dr. Greene. Because
believe it or not, her father isn’t just another numbers runner like you
think.”

“No shi—”

“No shit is right. I’m a busi­ness­man, Tony. But the busi­ness I’m in,
it’s not all dollars and cents. It runs on friend­ship and respect. And
Aaron Timrod’s a friend. You know, the books have been opened. I could
put you up for mem­ber­ship, but I’m start­ing to wonder if you’ve got the
kind of brains a man needs for that life. I’ve always had high hopes for
you. And you’re the only son I’ve got since we lost Vito. I don’t know
what you’ll end up doing, but I’m asking you—don’t dis­ap­point me.”

“I won’t. I promise you that.”

“Good. As far as the colored girl goes, I’ll speak with Timrod. You’ll
have no part in that. But don’t fuck up like that again.”

“No sir.” A nod from his father told the younger man that the
meeting was over. The two of them stood and shook hands, and Tony
took his leave.

As Aaron Timrod waited for a visitor on an evening in November,
the thought came to him—not for the first time—that he and that
visitor might be more alike than dif­fer­ent. An odd notion, pos­si­bly a
dan­ger­ous one? Maybe, and it might be wise to keep it to oneself. But
con­sid­er it: Piero Iacano was a church­go­ing man and a strict-but-loving
patri­arch and provider to his family, as was Timrod. They had done
busi­ness for years and came to know each other well. They were not
exactly golfing buddies, and never would be. And there could be no
ques­tion of mar­riage between their respec­tive off­spring. There was,
however, a mutual respect between the two men. That respect, as was
usual in their world, was nour­ished and sus­tained by an economy of
favors and advice.

When Piero Iacano came to the door, Antoinette Timrod answered
his knock. She was wearing a large pair of sun­glass­es even though she
was indoors and it was getting dark outside. She sum­moned her father
and retreat­ed to another part of the house as the men sat down in the
parlor. “I appre­ci­ate your coming, Don Piero. It’s not as if you really had
to.”

“Any­thing for a good friend. And I regret that my son seems to have
com­pli­cat­ed things for your family.”

“Well, my daugh­ter has com­pli­cat­ed things for herself. Annie and
I have been praying for her, and our pastor has been of some comfort.
But I have already thought of a pos­si­ble solu­tion. There is a young
fellow who does some work for me …” Here Annie Timrod came into
the parlor with coffee for the two men.

That “young fellow” was one Isaiah Wren, who had come under
Timrod’s men­tor­ship when he was only twenty. He had led a bunch
of teenage delin­quents in trying to rob a high-stakes poker game
con­trolled by the Iacanos. When the shoot­ing stopped, Vito Iacano and
all of Wren’s crew except Wren himself were dead. Wren managed to
survive, ski-mask intact and his iden­ti­ty unde­tect­ed, and find his way to
safety. The robbery, of course, was a stupid and tragic affair. But Timrod
saw some­thing in the young man. Now, at thirty-one, he was one of
Timrod’s best earners. He had already been married and divorced three
times. He had a rep­u­ta­tion as a prodi­gious ladies’ man before, during,
and after those mar­riages. But not one of his divorce set­tle­ments, nor
any one of his less-formal rela­tion­ships, had been com­pli­cat­ed by a
child or chil­dren. People were start­ing to wonder why. Men who were
sup­posed to fear him would smirk when they thought he wasn’t looking.
When Aaron Timrod phoned him one evening and told him to be at the
Timrod house in one hour—just to talk, no big thing—he made himself
ready. As did Antoinette Timrod.

The mag­nif­i­cent four-tier wedding cake from Gino’s, and half the
cost of the hall, came cour­tesy of the Iacanos. Don Piero attend­ed and
left an enve­lope with a gen­er­ous gift for the young couple. Anthony
Iacano did not attend.

 

Part Two: Wafers, 1966 
Ella Spivey

The joke went some­thing like this: a boy—let’s say he’s eight or
nine, about our age then—is sent to church alone with some money
for the col­lec­tion plate. He stops at a store on the way and spends the
money on vanilla wafers instead; he eats a few and puts the rest in his
pocket. When he gets to the church, the sermon has already started. He
sits down as the priest declares that “The Lorrrd is here. The Lorrrd is
there. The Lorrrd is everywhere.”

“Well,” says the boy, in a voice loud enough for the whole
con­gre­ga­tion to hear, “the Lord better not be in my pocket eating my
vanilla wafers.”

The thought of that one cracks me up even more now than when
I heard it, twenty-odd years ago. Maybe it’s the vanilla wafers. It
wouldn’t be as funny if the boy spoke up about, say, a candy bar. As for
the boy who told the story, one Clarence Wardell, I can almost picture
him as the pro­tag­o­nist. Almost, but not quite. Maybe you could get
away with some­thing like that at the Epis­co­pal church where I go now,
but not at West Mount Zion.

I was back there recent­ly for a memo­r­i­al service. It struck me that
a church’s impres­sion on a person might come more from the character
and aspect of the build­ing than from what a preach­er is saying. A
church like West Mount Zion, with dark wood every­where, and the
sanctuary’s two- or three-story-high ceiling with stained glass that the
sun shines through on a good day, can put you in mind of heavenly
realms. That ceiling also made me think of more prosaic matters,
such as how they can afford to heat the place. Not to mention the
main­te­nance of the build­ing overall, the salaries of the preach­er and
others, and the annex they’re build­ing for adult Sunday classes. Of
course, they pass the plate. But the con­gre­ga­tion is smaller and maybe a
touch poorer than it used to be, owing to attri­tion both by death and by
some of the more pros­per­ous members moving to the suburbs.

It may not exactly be blas­phe­mous, but I suppose it is a little
naughty to be think­ing about finan­cial mys­ter­ies during a service. And
maybe it puts you at risk of missing out on the spirit of the occasion.
But what can I say? I fol­lowed my sister into teaching—nowadays I
teach high-school science and social studies—and I’m an activist off
and on. If I hadn’t been ana­lyt­i­cal to begin with, those sub­jects, and the
latter voca­tion, would have made me so. And the older I get, the less I
see the hand of God in this human world. I do still love Jesus. And I’m
pretty sure He still loves me. I might have had impious thoughts in the
sanc­tu­ary, but He didn’t show up and turn over my table at the repast
afterward.

I don’t know if God was at the repast, but Isaiah Wren was. The
most pow­er­ful gang­ster on the West Side—apart from the Iacanos—
father of one, husband to one woman and some­time lover to many,
sat con­fer­ring quietly with Rev­erend Lee. In his con­ser­v­a­tive navy suit
and solid-red tie he was incon­spic­u­ous, albeit rec­og­niz­able, among
the mourn­ers. He could almost have been just one more fiftyish
acquain­tance of the deceased. Only the hard­ness in his eyes served to
show what kind of man he was. I’d never seen him at the church before,
although his Aunt Eula was a main­stay for years before she passed
back in the forties. I was looking over at the gang­ster and the pastor,
won­der­ing about their con­nec­tion, when I sensed another man standing
by my table.

I turned. “Hey, girl.” It was Clarence Wardell. I hadn’t seen him at
the service. But there he was, plate piled with mac­a­roni and cheese and
fried chicken, looking sharp in a gray silk suit and crimson ascot.

Me: Clarence? Sit your­self down.

He bowed gal­lant­ly to the older church ladies at my table as he
sat; they gave him hollow smiles and turned away. He was leaner than
I remem­bered, with a new beard not quite cov­er­ing a long scar on one
cheek. The scar was new too. At least it hadn’t been there when I’d last
seen him. Seven years can change a man, espe­cial­ly if he’s spent three
or four of those years in the joint, but overall he was looking good.

Clarence: So, how you doing? Still teaching?

Me: Yeah.

He smiled as he continued:

Clarence: I heard you were putting some cream in your coffee a
while back.

Me: Oh, you never mind about that. Tom’s a good guy. He’s
study­ing jour­nal­ism. That, and trying to stay out of Vietnam. He wants
to be some kind of hard-hitting reporter, and he thinks I must know
stuff.

Clarence: Well, you do. And I guess he knows a good thing when he
sees it.
I grinned.

Me: Could be. Still, he’s awfully young. Or maybe I’m too old.
Anyway …

Clarence: Too old? Girl, gimme a break. You’re what, thirty-four?

Me: Some­where in there. So … you doing okay?

Clarence: Getting by. I do a little of this and a little of that.

I let that pass. When a man’s being vague about his work I don’t
ask, any more than I’d ask Clarence how things were in the joint. We
spoke of younger days and old acquain­tances for a while as we ate.

Two tables over, Isaiah Wren shook hands with Rev­erend Lee and
made ready to leave. Clarence fol­lowed suit and we said our goodbyes.

 

The Rev­erend Charles Lee’s Journal, June 19 
In the begin­ning, and beyond

As a Chris­t­ian, I believe that God spoke worlds into being, and that
our Savior is the Word made flesh. As a preach­er, I am inti­mate with
words as the tools of my trade. There­fore, I take them seri­ous­ly. I have
been trying in subtle ways—so I hope—to get people to address me as
Pastor Charles rather than Rev­erend Lee. But I expect that on a larger
scale this is unim­por­tant, despite any irri­ta­tion or pref­er­ence of mine.
Try to tell my people that “rev­erend” is a descrip­tor? Forget it. They
want and need to see me as a coun­selor and spir­i­tu­al advisor, not a
gram­mar­i­an. So, yes, forget it, or “fuhged­d­a­boutit,” as that Wren person
would say. He spends too much time around the Ital­ians. As for that
asso­ci­a­tion, he’s start­ing to think he’s the dog and they’re the tail, but of
course he’s wrong. I pray for him every day. Both for his mortal self and
for his soul’s sal­va­tion. This does not mean I want his face to become
a common sight at West Mount Zion. I cannot and would not turn him
away, but awkward ques­tions could arise.

Tom Brennan
From “Re-Entry on the West Side,” Near West Journal,
July issue

Clarence Wardell looked at me the way a Hell’s Angel might look at
me and my Honda 250. “Young brother,” he said, “if you want to know
what goes down in the pen­i­ten­tiary, you’ve got to stop asking about
Black Power and get hip to Block Power. And I know you want to know
about the scar from how you keep looking at it like you’re not looking
at it. Now, turn off the recorder.” I started to do as he asked. “Matter of
fact, it doesn’t matter. Why don’t you leave it running? I called Isaiah
Wren ‘Isaiah,’ just like I did on the outside. But on C Block, in front of
the broth­ers, he was Mr. Wren.”

“He cut you?”

“Didn’t have to. People saw the look on his face and that’s all it
took.”

“But you work for him now?”

“I do what I do. We’re friends, some­times I drive his car. But it’s
about respect.”

“You mean in the joint?”

“Any­where. But cats take it to the tenth power in there.”

 

Ella Spivey

 

A couple of weeks after the service, and just after Tom’s article came
out, I ran into Clarence again as I was getting gro­ceries. We decided
to have a quick cup of coffee at the Bucket of Nails, a nearby beatnik
hangout just start­ing to turn longhair.

Me: Nice of you to talk to Tom. He says his editor wants to see more
of his work now, maybe even put him on staff.

Clarence: The white boy? He’s a good kid. I only gave him what I
thought he could handle. And what­ev­er wouldn’t put anyone back in
the joint.

Me: Well, that goes without saying. Actu­al­ly, I don’t know anything
about that kind of thing.

Clarence: Mmm hm. I hear you guys smoked a joint afterwards.

Me: Yeah. I had to show him how to inhale. But I think he had
a reli­gious expe­ri­ence. You know, Clay, you’re bad. And speak­ing of
reli­gion, I’ve been won­der­ing what Isaiah Wren has on Pastor Charles.
You know I wanted to be a reporter myself before I decided on teaching,
right?

Clarence: Yeah, but Isaiah and the pastor? I know Nuth-ink! For
real, who says anybody has some­thing on anybody else? They’re both
impor­tant men in the com­mu­ni­ty. Maybe they just wanted to talk.

Me: About what? Getting a traffic light put up somewhere?

Clarence: You never know.

“And when the man …” I sang sar­cas­ti­cal­ly, from a song by my
blues-singing uncle. “Comes ’round again,” sang Clarence, and our
voices joined on the last line—“You never know.”

The Rev­erend Charles Lee
From sermon of June 26

There was a stranger who arrived at Gomor­rah with thir­teen pieces
of silver and two harlots. He not only brought them to the inn to ply
their trade; he soon bought the inn. And he turned it into his heathen
idea of a temple. That thir­teen pieces of silver soon became hundreds
more. Yes, many vis­i­tors came, as the weak are easily misled into
mis­tak­ing the profane for the holy, and the holy for the profane. Now,
we know what hap­pened to Gomor­rah. And the stranger was killed
along with almost every­one else. What is less known is that the two
“harlots” were the only sur­vivors of God’s destruc­tion of the city. The
meaning here is not, of course, that one ought to pros­ti­tute oneself.
Although one ought not to cast the first stone either; they were poor
girls, cast out by their fam­i­lies and their tribes. The mean­ings are two:
we must take care not to be misled into mis­tak­ing the profane for the
holy and the used and abused are more blessed than the users and
abusers. (And some­times you have to pull from the apocrypha.)

 

Isaiah Wren

 

Sheeit. Don’t know what that was about. The good Reverend’s got 
a dick like any other man, and he uses it for damn sure. And he’s got 
some fucking balls looking right at me every time he talked about that 
“stranger.” When it’s my money, from my busi­ness­es and my girls, that
pays his bills. You can call me a gang­ster, you can call me a pimp, but I 
keep my promis­es. Maybe he doesn’t care about that. Or maybe he’s got 
a guilty con­science. But I won’t do any­thing drastic. Not yet anyway. One 
thing I’ve learned from both Timrod and the Italians—the smart ones, 
anyway—is you don’t want to get respect mixed up with atten­tion. That I 
don’t need, except from the girls.

At the age of forty-two, Anthony Jerome Iacano still had a casual,
almost boyish manner with asso­ciates, under­lings, and potential
busi­ness part­ners or rivals, and this had served him well. To the people
in his world, his manner con­veyed a truth about him, and a subtle
warning: this man wears his author­i­ty lightly because he is under no
neces­si­ty to wear it any other way. To mistake his infor­mal­i­ty for laxness
could be fatal. That was a mistake that no astute person, and certainly
not his table mate on a certain evening in July, would make.

The two men shared a table in a semi-private room of the Saint
Christo­pher Tavern and Social Club. The lights were dim. But the red
leather uphol­stery of the fur­ni­ture seemed to cast a subtle glow; each
man’s face was clearly visible to the other.

“How’s the boy?” asked Anthony Iacano.

“Golden,” replied Isaiah Wren. “Some scouts are interested.”

“Well, that’s good news. You just might have the next Jim Brown in
your family. But I’m sure it won’t go to his head; you raised him right.
Well, you and Tonette.” A pensive look passed over his fea­tures and was
gone. “How old is he now?”

“Ulysses is twenty-one.”

“A good age to be start­ing a pro career.”

“Yes, and old enough to ask ques­tions about what he was told when
he was growing up. And about what I do, but that’s a cross we’ve all got
to bear.”

“I heard he just asks ques­tions about numbers and God. It seems to
me he’s got focus.”

“Math and God,” said Isaiah, with a sig­nif­i­cant look at Anthony on
the first word. “He knows you can only play foot­ball so long. He might
want to teach or work in finance down the road. We don’t want him
getting mixed up in my kind of work.”

“Does he?”

“Doesn’t seem that way. So, yeah, math, God, and pro-football
players’ salaries. And his skin tone.”

There was a silence lasting about five seconds. “Well,” said Anthony,
“how honest can a father in our line of work be? Do me a favor—let
me know if you figure that out. You’ve got, what, ten years on me? All I
know is, when it comes to Ulysses, we all want the best for him.”

“Indeed.”

Iacano looked Wren in the eyes for a moment, then broke into a
friend­ly grin. “You’re a good man, Isaiah. Let’s have another drink.” He
snapped his fingers and a wait­ress appeared instantly.

Antoinette Timrod-Wren could smell both expen­sive brandy and
another woman on her husband when he arrived home a little after
1:00 A.M. A three-hour, scream­ing-and-shout­ing argu­ment ensued,
punc­tu­at­ed by some slaps back and forth, and fol­lowed by the kind of
exhaus­tion that allows for only two pos­si­bil­i­ties: an uneasy sleep or
some­thing like conciliation.

“Isaiah,” she said, “you might be a pain in my beau­ti­ful ass, you
might fuck every cheap-ass bitch in the city who’s got a pulse and
a cooch, and you might have just about con­vinced your­self that Ulysses
is yours even though I con­ceived him before I ever heard your name.
But there’s one thing you need to know: You really are Ulysses’s father.
There’s more to that than squirt­ing some jizz into a woman. I don’t
give a good flying fuck about Tony Iacano. We raised that boy, and he’s
turning into a good man. Even if his dad’s a gang­ster and his mom’s a
gangster’s wife. He’s got better ideas for himself. And God has plans for
him that have nothing to do with drugs, guns, or hoes.”

“Well, so do I, baby, so do I. I hear you. But the thing is, nobody can
know. Without respect, I’m fucked; it don’t matter how much money I
got or how many tough broth­ers with guns take their orders from me.
Because they won’t be taking them for long if I lose respect.”

“Isaiah, it was twenty years ago. More than that. And the street
might be tough, but it ain’t the pen­i­ten­tiary. I don’t think the younger
guys really care about who fucked who. They’re too busy trying to get
they own dicks wet.”

“Maybe. But speak­ing of which …”
Umm, maybe in the morning.”

 

Tom Brennan

From “It’s a Raid,” West Side Journal, August issue

A police raid on the offices of Dock­side Leisure Ser­vices netted
male con­tra­cep­tives, a kilo of heroin, seven hundred thou­sand dollars
in small bills, a still-func­tion­al 1920s Thomp­son sub-machine gun, an
assort­ment of black­jacks and brass knuck­les, and a list of names with
address­es and phone numbers. A police spokesman told a reporter the
depart­ment is assum­ing it’s a client list. The names were not being
made avail­able to news media at press time. The only arrest during the
raid was that of Isaiah Wren, an ex-convict and known gang­ster, and the
only person on-site at the time.

From police tran­script Lee/Wren 39

“I only gave Wardell the money for your bail so that we could speak
pri­vate­ly. And of course, you under­stand that its source must remain
private. What I want to know is whether my name is on that list.”

“Hell no. Why would it be?”

“Perhaps you can tell me. And I’ll thank you not to use that
lan­guage here.”

“Sorry. But are you sure the list is the only reason? Doesn’t my
tithing mean anything?”

“Your tithing? You cannot be serious. You are the execu­tor of your
late aunt’s estate, and you are simply car­ry­ing out your duty in that
capac­i­ty. I appre­ci­ate that you have thought fit to do so, although you
did not really have a choice. But never think it makes you a benefactor
to this church or confers on you any special status in spir­i­tu­al terms.”

Well, don’t that beat all. He knows damn well there’s nothing left of
Eula’s estate. I don’t have a choice? The fuck I don’t. But the great and
pow­er­ful Lee is one sly moth­er­fuck­er. Biggest mistake I could make right
now is under­es­ti­mate him.

“My spir­i­tu­al status? I never said I had any. All I know is, your job
is to take care of their souls and mine is to take care of their needs.”

“Their ‘needs’? Do their souls not have needs? What in the world
are you talking about? Their bodies’ needs? Or their ‘needs’ for drugs,
gam­bling, and illicit sex? Those are not needs but depraved appetites.”

“Well, you seem to have at least one of those ‘depraved appetites’
your­self, and I don’t remem­ber you turning down the hundred-percent
dis­count for cler­gy­men. Or cler­gy­men named Charles Lee.”

The Rev­erend Charles Lee’s Journal, August 20

Oh, what a char­ac­ter. A benight­ed one. I did not tell him, because
he would not have under­stood, that this church serves the physical
needs of men, the need for phys­i­cal ecstasy, as well as the spir­i­tu­al. We
are not Catholics, we are not Pres­by­te­ri­ans, and if you have ever been
part of a Baptist service (Has Wren? Yes, but that is hard to believe) you
can under­stand that when the Holy Ghost is present, the ecstasy of the
phys­i­cal and that of the spir­i­tu­al are as one. Who needs drugs? Who
needs rock and roll? And who, for good­ness’ sake, needs “soul” music?
(An appalling mis­nomer, that, bor­der­ing on blas­phe­my. Although, as
the young folks love to say, that’s just my opinion. It’s not necessarily
Baptist doc­trine. And I have no quarrel with C.L. Franklin or his
beau­ti­ful daugh­ters. I simply cannot.)

The crucial thing about Wren: when people come to me for counsel,
they say things they would not say to anyone else. And I do not forget.
The Timrod girl’s visit, all those years ago—words fail me. Glo­ri­ous it
was. But no fleshly sin between us, thank God. And in saying that now
I am mindful of a greater gift He gave me: the ability to deduce facts
unknown to my inter­locu­tor from his or her own words.

What is the right term? Sub­li­ma­tion? The truth of Wren’s child’s
pater­ni­ty, and Wren’s own

four­teen youth­ful sins against the laws of God, man, and the
Mafia—in descend­ing order of impor­tance, it is need­less to add—led to
his ongoing mate­r­i­al support for this spir­i­tu­al endeav­or of ours. In this,
one can see and feel the mystery, indeed the sub­tle­ty, of God’s grace to
man.

Part Three: Let it be Known, 1966–67

Tom Brennan
From “Bullets in the Rectory,” West Side Journal,
Sep­tem­ber issue

An enve­lope was found in the late Charles Lee’s safe after his still-unsolved murder. It bore the words “To be opened in the event of my
untime­ly death.” Police pro­to­col man­dates that such doc­u­ments be kept
under wraps until any and all related legal matters are closed. It seems,
however, to have found its way—after dis­ap­pear­ing from a police
evi­dence room—to an inter­est­ed party. A man named in the enclosed
doc­u­ment is now dead. Accord­ing to a police spokesman, the envelope
con­tained a single sheet with these words: “Let it be known that a crew
under the command of Isaiah Wren mur­dered Vito Iacano in 1934.”
Wren, an ex-convict and known gang­ster, was gunned down outside
the Players Lounge, a night­club he owned, two days after Lee’s death
on Sep­tem­ber 29th. The police have not named any sus­pects in either
slaying. Both murders are still under inves­ti­ga­tion. A spokesman had no
comment on the appar­ent theft of the envelope.

At press time it was unknown whether Lee had any heirs. Wren
is sur­vived by his widow, Antoinette Timrod-Wren, and an adult son.
A tearful Timrod-Wren recent­ly told a reporter that “The Church will
provide.”

Ella Spivey

 

There might have been some­thing fishy about Pastor Charles, but I
couldn’t help feeling a certain twinge for him. As for Clarence, I wasn’t
sure whether con­do­lences were in order for his—what? Boss? Mentor?
Friend? Scar-giver? Anyway, it was a few months later and he seemed
to be doing okay.

I had put on Sketch­es of Spain. The three of us were down to the
last of Clarence’s excel­lent weed. But con­ver­sa­tion was still going
strong; that lull you can get when stoned people turn inward hadn’t
set in. I suppose that had to do with both the music and a cool breeze
from the balcony. We’d been talking about an ongoing rent strike in the
neigh­bor­hoods for a while, and we were start­ing to shift over to the
dis­po­si­tion of forces in the community.

Me: It’s inter­est­ing how some of the mil­i­tants intro­duce each other
as the Deacon of This and the Min­is­ter of That. Seems like there’s no
getting away from the church, no matter what you might think about it.

Clarence: Well, I don’t know if the mil­i­tants want to get away from
it so much as pick up where it leaves off. Or maybe steal its thunder.

Tom: Is it just the mil­i­tants? I’m think­ing more of ‘min­is­ter’ as in
who’s going to min­is­ter to whom, and are they going to min­is­ter back.
And whether it gets competitive.

Me: Ah, you’re stoned, sweetheart.

Tom: Could be, but …

Clarence: Well, you’ve got all kinds of min­is­tra­tions going on, in all
kinds of ways. Down on Kinsman, every damn where.

Me: Every­where? For real? I hope that doesn’t hurt me with the
admin­is­tra­tion where I’m at.

Clarence: You silly.

Me: You’re silly. I was silly in the morning when the world had
begun, I’ll min­is­ter to you in the sta-ars and the sun …

Clarence: And you came from the Delta where you danced on the
Earth …

Me: But I split for Ohio, and I see what that’s worth.

Clarence: Damn, if we were slick? We’d be getting paid for this shit.

Coda: Abstract of From Tavern to Pulpit, From Prison to 
Board­room: A Study in Sym­bio­sis (excerpt), with attached 
inter­view by the author. Doc­tor­al dis­ser­ta­tion by Ella Spivey, 
1976

As is well known, an under­ground or “ille­git­i­mate” economy and/
or sub­cul­ture must depend on the above-ground, “legit­i­mate” one for
its own exis­tence. We shall con­sid­er whether the reverse is also true, in
some or all cir­cum­stances, and if so, what sort of truth this is, and what
impli­ca­tions it might hold.

Antoinette Timrod, continued:

When I talked to your friend after what happened—the young white
guy?

Tom?

Yeah. I didn’t say every­thing I was think­ing. I couldn’t, not really. The
thing is, Pastor Charles was almost as much of a mentor to my husband
as my father was. He didn’t even know it. And he shouldn’t have got so
greedy, and so dis­re­spect­ful, or they’d both be alive today. Isaiah barely
went to ser­vices after Eula passed, cer­tain­ly not after our boy got into
his teens. But he’d already learned that when someone comes to you for
counsel, and I don’t care if it’s the tough­est moth­er­fuck­er in the city, you
don’t call them weak, you hear them out, and you help them the best way
you can. Not to buy loyalty, but because if you listen well you’ll know
where they are weak. And Isaiah didn’t learn that from my father or Tony
Iacano. I guess he didn’t learn it quite well enough, because he’s dead, but
the man he learned it from was Charles Lee.
[…]

Looks like Ulysses is having a good season.

Yeah, and he doesn’t want to know from point shaving or any of that
gang­ster bull­shit. Never has.

This story orig­i­nal­ly appeared in Stonecoast Review Issue 18.

Photo by K. Mitch Hodge.