Half of Paradise

Avery went out of the room and Leander pulled the door shut behind him. He shot the steel bolt in place and clamped down the handle of the safety lock. They went down a corridor and up a spiral metal stairwell to the third floor of the building. Leander opened the door to a bare white room with a single window and an iron cage in the center. Avery stood by the window and looked down into the street while Leander unlocked the hole. The courthouse was across the square, with its white pillars and classic façade, and the well-kept lawn in front, green and wet from the water sprinklers in the sunlight, and the Confederate monument in the shade of the trees.

“Get inside,” Ben Leander said.

Avery walked to the open door.

“What do you get out of it?” he said. “Is it the money?”

Leander pushed him inside and swung the door shut. He twisted the key in the iron lock.

“They’re taking you to the work camp next week. You’re goddamn lucky,” he said.

That afternoon Avery had a visitor. Batiste had ridden the bus from Martinique parish to see him. He sat in the waiting room with his hat in his hand, wondering who to ask about Avery. There was a package wrapped in brown paper and tied with cord by his side. Ben Leander came out of his office and asked him what he wanted. Batiste said he wanted to see Avery Broussard, he had some tobacco and breadcake for him. Leander said that he was not allowed to have visitors, no one could see him on that day or any day as long as he remained in the parish jail. Batiste wanted to leave the package.

“He’s in the hole. He can’t get anything from outside when he’s in the hole,” Leander said, to make him understand how things were run in the parish jail.

J.P. WINFIELD

He was in the recording studio of a Nashville radio station. Three mornings a week he did a half-hour show which was put on tape and broadcast in the afternoon. The show was almost over. He stood at the microphone and sang the last number. The announcer sat at the table before another microphone, reading over the typewritten pages in his hand. A very plain woman in a cotton-print dress sat on the other side of the table, nervously twisting a handkerchief around her fingers. There were two men standing beside J.P., one with a guitar and the other with a banjo. They were waiting to do the advertisement. One of the sound engineers in the control room behind the sheet of glass signaled to them when J.P. finished. They strummed and sang the Live-Again slogan:

Live-Again, Live-Again, the sick man’s friend,

It helps you every time,

There ain’t anything like it

That makes you feel so fine.

Drink Live-Again today,

Chase them miseries away,

Get out of bed and holler,

Live-Again for a dollar.

“Yes sir, neighbor, there ain’t anything like it,” the announcer read. “Live-Again has got everything you need to make you get up and stomp around like your old self again. It’s got vitamin potency that drives through your body and makes you shout and holler like you was never sick a day in your life. It ain’t right to waste your life in a sickbed. There’s people all over the country setting around doing nothing because they don’t have the energy to get out and have a good time. Well, you don’t have to be a shut-in anymore. Go down to the drugstore or the grocery and ask for Live-Again vitamin tonic in the black and yellow box with the big bottle inside. There’s a lady with me now who used to be a shut-in. She couldn’t do her chores and her family was falling apart because of her poor health. She heard about Live-Again and she tried it, and now she’s healthy and strong and her family is back together again. Tell the people about it, Mrs. Ricker.”

Mrs. Ricker read in a steady, flat monotone: “I don’t know how to thank the good people who make Live-Again. They made my life worth living. Before I tried Live-Again I didn’t think I could go on anymore. I had to stay in bed all the time and I couldn’t take care of my children and my husband had to spend all our money on doctor bills. The deacon of our church told us about Live-Again, and in a few weeks’ time I was a new woman. This wonderful medicine has saved me and my family and we are happy once more.”

“And believe me, neighbor, it helps everybody,” the announcer said. “Well, that does it for today. You’ve been listening to the J. P. Winfield show. Remember to send us your cards and letters and to buy Live-Again. There ain’t anything like it. So long, neighbors, and may the good Lord watch after you.”

Drink Live-Again today,

Chase them miseries away,

Get out of bed and holler,

Live-Again for a dollar.

The red light over the door went off. The two singers put away their banjo and guitar. Mrs. Ricker twisted her handkerchief around her fingers and looked at the announcer.

“Did I sound all right?” she said.

“What do you think, J.P.?” the announcer said. “Have you ever heard anything like this good woman?” He was a business college graduate who was employed by the station to sell vitamin tonic, glow-in-the-dark Bibles, tablecloths painted with the Last Supper, and pamphlets on faith healing.

The singers laughed and went out. J.P. put his guitar in its case.

“I was never on the radio before,” Mrs. Ricker said. “Will I be on the air this afternoon?”