The next morning at first light Arthur was back in the barn taking the mower apart. It was an old Gravely mower from the 1940s, and it had not run since Mr. Baker died in 1970. Rats had chewed up the wiring, the belts and tires were rotten and crumbling, and when Arthur opened the hood, lizards came skittering out. All morning Essie and Helen heard rattling and clanging, and at noon Arthur came in covered with grease, wiping his hand on a rag he had safety-pinned to his belt loop. He had scrubbed all the gummed-up oil out of the air cleaner with a toothbrush and laid it out on a rag in the sun to dry, and he had taken the carburetor apart and had the float bowl, the needle valve, and the sediment bowl soaking in a coffee can of kerosene. Essie and Helen came out and stood with their hands clutched against their bellies and peered down at the mower.

“Looka here,” said Arthur. “This is the whole fuel system, all varnished up from old gas. I’ve got to get all this cleaned up and cut a new gasket for the sediment bowl and the carburetor. I’ve got to get all this rust and trash out of the gas tank and see can’t I get some fire out of this magneto, then this old Gravely will mow anything you want mowed. This is a fine, fine machine! This old Gravely will mow down all those little sweet gums coming up in there, all that sumac, that Bahia grass that would choke down any other mower, this Gravely will mow it. I’ll mow the whole thing, right up to the fence wire!”

“No,” said Essie, drawing shapes in the air with her arms. “I just want a swath from the bird feeder, curving around the camellia bushes and out into the sunny place, just like at Birdsong.”

“Arthur, quit working on this old thing,” said Helen. “It’s too much for just that little bit of mowing. Essie can get Randy to come over with his Bush Hog on Saturday and mow that strip for twenty-five dollars.”

“He’d scalp it,” said Arthur. “You watch. I’ll have this thing purring like a kitten by Saturday. This is a fine old machine. They don’t make them like this anymore.”

That night when the breeze would blow just right, they could smell a whiff of gasoline through the open windows. Essie was in the living room and Helen was in the kitchen making a tomato sandwich when the telephone rang, but Essie didn’t answer it. She stopped and stood in the middle of the room through the three rings, the outgoing message, then that voice, tired and sorrowful. “I’m in a bad place, baby, I need to talk to you.”

“Essie, pick it up and tell that man we are not his girlfriend, he needs to check the number,” said Helen.