Isn't It Romantic?

Dick said, “Often the royalty are carefree and footloose retirees, such as Archie and Lynette Doolittle of Detroit.”

Owen grinned in reminiscence. “Claimed they were spending their children’s inheritance. Wore those ‘I’m With Stupid’ shirts. Real comical people.”

Mrs. Christiansen continued chidingly, “But they could not speak a lick of French.”

“Oh no,” Owen said, tee-heeing. “You put a shotgun to Archie’s head and he could not get out a merde.”

“Owen,” Mrs. Christiansen said, and when he faced her, she put three fingers to his lips. He hushed.

“Seldom’s founder was French,” she went on, “so it seems perfectly just and charming that you two should be our royalty.”

“For three days?” Natalie asked.

“You will be our guests until Saturday evening.”

Pierre was uncivil over the prospect and was shaking his head from side to side, but Natalie pretended not to notice as she smiled and said, “Oh goody.”

Pierre’s face communicated half loathing and half what-have-you-gotten-us-into?

Mrs. Christiansen sharply said, “Stop tapping your feet.”

And Carlo Bacon said, “Sorry, ma’am.”

Mrs. Christiansen held out both arms and Owen and Dick helped her stand. She asked, “And where is Monsieur staying?”

“With me,” Owen said.

Mrs. Christiansen patted Pierre’s forearm with sympathy and said, “Will you please come with me, Mademoiselle?”

7

Walking south on Main Street, Natalie watched a husband and wife in their eighties pleasantly hold hands on a front porch swing. Calliope music issued from an ice cream truck as it trolled ahead of chasing children. Two barefoot boys with bamboo poles scuffed along in the cool of the bluegrass front yards, sharing the weight of a stringer of cat-fish. Natalie told Mrs. Christiansen, “It is a charming village, Seldom.”

“Oh my yes,” Mrs. Christiansen said. “That Norman Rockwell’s got nothing on us.”

Mrs. Christiansen’s rooming house was just next door, a grand, three-story, Victorian affair, with a wrap-around porch and many gables, each element of carpentry differently painted in imitation of the houses she’d seen on her lone trip to San Francisco. Owen and Pierre watched from the street as Dick gallantly hefted Natalie’s red suitcase from the café for her, carefully set it next to the front door, and rapidly retreated to the front lawn. Mrs. Christiansen noticed Natalie’s puzzlement and explained, “We don’t permit men on the premises.”

Natalie smirked triumphantly at Pierre and said, “No problem.” She went inside.

Owen threw his arm around his newfound pal and escorted him to his gas station across the street, saying proudly, “You got one glorious surprise in store for yourself!”

Owen’s late father had not troubled himself to modernize the gas station, which was a flashback to the forties, just a one-bay garage with a hoist and oiled cinder floor and a full-service area with faded red pumps topped by white globes of illumination that had red-winged horses leaping skyward on them.

The Reverend Dante Picarazzi was there, holding a gas nozzle as he filled an old, faded Volkswagen van that had an excess of New York decals on it. He was a fast-talking priest in his forties, just a little beyond a midget in height, with crow-black hair and mustache and goatee, and without the Roman collar you’d have thought he was an East Coast movie director scouting talent or rural locations.

Owen whispered confidingly to Pierre, “You know that Paul Simon song where he sings about me and Julio down by the schoolyard?”

“I have not heard.”

Owen quoted, “‘When the radical priest come to get us released we was all on the cover of Newsweek.’” And then he surreptitiously pointed to Reverend Picarazzi. “Radical priest was him. When he first got here he was full of opinions, and now he’s just like the rest of us.”

Hanging up the gas hose, Dante said in a Brooklyn accent, “Owe ya a dime, Owen.”

“Duly noted.” Owen draped a heavy arm around Pierre and said, “My French friend here’s staying with me for The Revels.”

The Reverend considered him and said to Pierre, “You poor schnook.” And then he got into his van.

Hanging sideways on the full-glass office door was a sign that read, THE MECHANIC IS OUT. Owen failed to change it as he walked inside. The office was filled with car batteries, hoses, and fan belts, as well as a hundred or so video tapes for rent, a hand-cranked cash register, a rack of Wrigley’s chewing gums, and another of air fresheners that when dangled for some weeks in a vehicle would fractionally reveal the photos of buxom women whose unquenched passions seemed to render them immodest. Hanging from the fluorescent ceiling light was a sign that read, HUSKER FOOTBALL SPOKEN HERE. Owen lifted off some cash receipts that were stabbed onto an upended wooden block with a ten-penny nail pounded through it. He got serious for a few seconds as he effected arithmetic, then he shoved them inside the cash register, saying, “When I’m hither and yon, I’ll let folks fill up on their own and leave me IOUs. We have that kind of town.”