“When we got back to the landing and I told Allen we were going to bury the chain with Rebecca’s remains he went into a state of sustained hilarity.

“Nevertheless, I dug deep in the soil. I found the casket. I made the hole very very wide. I wreathed the chains around the casket. And then Allen helped me fill in the dirt and the headstone was replaced, and as I said my prayers Allen prayed with me.

“I felt no shimmer of Rebecca. I felt no dizziness. But as I stood there in the still morning I felt sorrow for all the ghosts I had seen in the cemetery over the years and wondered if I was fated to be a roaming spirit after my death.

“Nothing like that had ever occurred to me before. But I thought of it now. I said another long silent prayer for Rebecca and then I whispered, ‘Go into the Light.’

“And so my first manly task had been completed.

“On to the second: of course Allen knew where Terry Sue lived, and to that spot we drove in the Mercedes. I told Allen I would go in alone, but even before entering the trailer I had a fair idea that Grady Breen, our attorney, had not exaggerated the state of ongoing disaster.

“There were the rusted ruined automobiles that he had described, one an old limousine and the other a pickup truck, neither with any tires, and two toddlers were roaming the yard, both with filthy faces and diapers.

“I knocked, then went in. Tucked at the very end of the trailer there was a voluptuous woman in the bed, a woman with the face of a big china doll, nursing a baby, and a little girl, perhaps ten years old and barefoot, was stirring a pot on the stove of what looked and smelled like grits. The little girl’s arms were covered in bruises and she had a shy fearful manner to her. She had a pretty face and long black hair.

“The closeness of the place, the crowded damp feel of it was overwhelming. And so was the smell. I can best describe it as a mixture of urine, vomit and mildew. There might have been some rotten fruit in the recipe. And certainly there was excrement as well.

“ ‘I’m sorry to break in on you like this,’ I said to the woman. I felt like a giant under the low ceiling. ‘Congratulations on your new baby.’

“ ‘Did you bring any money?’ she asked. Her face stayed lovely—she looked like a Renaissance Madonna—but her voice was full of meanness, or maybe it was just practicality. ‘I’m broke and Charlie’s walked out on me again,’ she said. ‘My stitches are torn and I’m running a fever.’