Wayfaring Stranger (Holland Family Saga 1)

“He’ll burn himself.”

“Let him do it or he’ll get riled up again. I’ll go get him.”

I went into the back bedroom to help Grandfather out of bed. I hadn’t latched the screen or bolted the door. It would have made no difference, though. Hubert Timmons Slakely was a man whose greatest enemy was knowledge about himself. He had been humiliated and treated like the white trash he was. Under the bedsheet that hides the identity of every Ku Klux Klansman is a cretinous, vicious, and childlike human being whose last holdout is his whites-only restroom. He is pathologically incapable of change this side of the grave.

Slakely came back through the screen and entered the kitchen, his shadow falling across Rosita. “I’m on to you, Mrs. Holland,” he said.

She stared at him without replying.

“You know what the Jewish piano is, don’t you? The cash register. You’re a kike. You won’t let your husband’s money get loose from your hands. Also, you’re too dumb to see what you’re doing to both y’all.”

“Did you know it’s rude for a man not to remove his hat in someone’s house?” she said.

“Wait till you get up to the women’s prison. I’ll put some interesting notations in your jacket. There’s a section for bull dykes. I’ll make sure you get to meet them.”

“I’m looking forward to it.”

“One day somebody is gonna tear you and that smart mouth apart, woman.”

“That’s what you would like to do right now. But you won’t because there’re witnesses. A man like you doesn’t care for witnesses. They’re inconvenient when you arrest a street prostitute or a hapless Negro or a vagabond. You frighten the defenseless and impose your will upon them in order to hide the fear that governs your life. That’s why I pity rather than hate you.”

I put Grandfather in his reading chair and as I approached the kitchen doorway, I saw Slakely’s right hand, the one tattooed with a chain of blue stars, curl into a fist. I had no doubt that a blow from a man of his size could crush the bones in her face or even kill her. But if I thought I needed to protect my wife, I was mistaken. Rosita Lowenstein Holland did not need protection. Her adversaries did.

“The Krauts should have melted you into a bar of soap,” Slakely said.

He heard me behind him and glanced over his shoulder. It was bad timing for Hubert Timmons Slakely. The stewed peppers and tomatoes on the stove had become as thick as ketchup, bubbles rising like big red blisters to the surface. She flung the pot with both hands into his face, covering his eyes and nose and mouth like a wet red kerchief wrapped around the head o

f a mannequin. He screamed and pushed the heels of his hands into his eye sockets and crashed into the doorjamb, fighting his way blindly through the living room and down the steps into the yard. She wasn’t finished with him. She went through the door after him and poured the rest of the pot onto his head and neck, then threw the pot high in the air and watched it bounce on the lawn.

“Voilà,” she said. “There’s a garden hose by the hydrant if you want to wash off. Thanks so much for dropping by.”

I CALLED A SITTER for Grandfather, went upstairs, and packed a bag for Rosita, and drove both of us to Galveston before Hubert Timmons Slakely could return to the house with his colleagues. I rented a motel room right across from the seawall that had been built after the great hurricane of 1900. I had not told her I would have to leave her there and return to Houston. Rosita was brave and loving and honorable and all things that are good. She deserved none of the things that had been done to her. Leaving her alone was one of the hardest things I had ever done. But I had to distract the authorities from her and somehow neutralize the power we had given Slakely.

“You’re leaving?” she said.

“There’s a taxi on the way.”

“I don’t like being a fugitive, Weldon. We’ve done nothing wrong.”

“They’re not going to get their hands on you again. I’m going to call the state attorney. I’m going to the police station tonight and file a complaint. There’s Grandfather to take care of, too. You’ll have the car, but if you go anywhere, take a cab. Don’t talk to anyone. I registered us as Mr. and Mrs. Malory.”

“As in Thomas Malory?”

“Why not?” I said.

For the first time since we had left Houston, she smiled. Through the curtains, I could see the amusement pier extending from the beach into the surf, the waves bursting against the pilings. All of the rides and concession stands were closed for the season, the long row of windows in the seafood restaurant darkened. “Lie down with me before you go,” she said.

I saw the headlights of the taxi turn off the boulevard into the motel. I went outside and gave the driver three dollars and sent him away. When I came back inside, Rosita had already turned off the lights and undressed and was lying on top of the sheet, one knee pulled up in front of her, her back propped against the pillows. “You look like a painting on the side of a Flying Fortress,” I said.

“Maybe that’s what I am.”

I undressed and got in bed beside her. I put my hand inside the thickness of her hair and kissed her on the mouth. I did not believe then, nor do I believe now, that any woman in the history of the world ever made love like Rosita Lowenstein. It was total and complete and unrelenting, and even after I was physically spent, my desire for her never dissipated. I never knew a woman whose hair was both mahogany-colored and black, one color inseparable from the other, yet always changing, depending on the light. Nor had I ever known one who had eyes that shone like sherry in a crystal glass.

As I write these remarks, I know they are personal in nature and perhaps violate good taste and might be embarrassing to read. They may never be read by another. But they reflect my feelings about Rosita. She never had to seek modesty. It was built into her. Reclining nude on a bed, or making love with an almost animal pleasure, or creating an erotic moment unexpectedly in a conventional situation was simply the expression of who she was.

She never had fewer than three climaxes, and after each one she began all over again with such heat and energy that I thought my heart would fail. I buried my face in the sweat on her neck and the dampness in her hair, and could feel both an ache and a rhythm in my loins that I believed would never end, in the same way that you know your love for another person will never end. That’s what it was like with Rosita Lowenstein. The two of us let go of the world and floated away to a kingdom under the sea where no one would ever disturb us again.

At three in the morning she bit me softly on the ear and released me and lay back on the pillow.