Underneath the shelter sat a 1967 puke-green Buick. Its streamlined design was now laughable, its wide interior an overstatement of elegance, but dusty, dull, and worn with farm life, though it only got onto the road on the occasional Sunday or Saturday.

Let’s go, said the voice.

Go?

Yes.

But how?

Look in, said the voice. Look in.

Folks in Tims Creek were used to a sort of unworried trust among themselves. There was no reason to lock doors, no one was going to walk in uninvited; there was no reason to put away your hoe, no one was going to take it without asking; there was no reason to take your key from the ignition, no one was going to crank it up unbidden. The keys hung there, silver in the slight starlight.

Get in, said the demon. We’ve got places to go before the sun rises.

Horace got in, complying with the voice, finding less and less will to resist it, beginning to find something like pleasure in acquiescing to it. The old door gave a metal groan as he pressed the button in the latch and pulled it open. Inside the car smelled of lavender and corn and faintly of grease. As Horace sat down on the cold vinyl seat, his skin prickled, and he shivered. Next to him sat a hog with unusually shaggy hair, and in the rearview mirror he saw two eyeless women in blue robes, who began to sing: Michael row the boat ashore, Hallelujah! Michael row the boat ashore, Hallelujah. Horace pumped the gas pedal once, then twice, then turned the ignition gently, hoping that the car would respond in kind and ignite gently, Sister, help to trim the sail, Hallelujah! Sister, help to trim the sail, Hallelujah, but he was jolted by the loud commotion of the carburetor and the sparks and the pistons and the fanbelt and the shaking chassis. And he thought of Mason Sapphire turning heavily over in his sleep and Mrs. Sapphire slowly awakening, thinking, Is that that old Buick, then thinking, Surely not, then upon hearing it being put into reverse and hearing the cogs and gears clunk and the wheels scrunching the gravel in the driveway, perhaps changing her mind, Jordan River is deep and wide, Hallelujah! Milk and honey on the other side, Hallelujah, and maybe she woke Mr. Sapphire, but by the time the old farmer opened his ears he would only hear the car as it was accelerating upwards of sixty-five miles an hour down the highway and perhaps he said through the doldrums of early-morning sleep, Well, it sounds like the old sister, but really, Daisy, who would take the old girl? And at two in the morning, Hallelujah.

Holy Science

Holy Science

A voluntary descent from the dignity of science is perhaps the hardest lesson which humility can teach.

—SAMUEL JOHNSON

James Malachai Greene Confessions

James Malachai Greene

Confessions