Carpenter's Gothic

by William Gaddis

  — But he's dead, isn't he.

  — Man, is he dead.

  — Tell me something, Billy… He'd settled back digging in the litter for the glazed tobacco envelope, — was your… — What? Hey Bibbs, did you find it?

  — I didn't find it, no. She was standing there in the doorway, quelling the tremor in an empty hand seizing it on the knurl of the sideboard, piano, whatever it was — it's not there, I'll have to ask Paul if he…

  — Ask Paul! I mean that's why it's not there, he's checking it out for the same…

  — Please! rescuing calm to her voice, getting breath, looking from one to the other of them through these conspiring planes of blue on grey, — I don't think Mis…

  — I mean the shape the old man was in when Adolph drew it up now he says he doesn't have a copy, that's just Adolph covering his ass in case the old man screwed up, I mean like I was just telling Mis…

  — I heard you she said, her voice tight as her hand on the dark turn of wood there — and I don't think Mister, Mister McCandless has a lot to do here I wish you'd just come out and let him…

  — No but wait Bibbs wait, I mean where's Paul now, because I was just in California right? So somebody turns on television and all of a sudden it's all these spaced out creeps of Paul's. I mean this Billye Fickert is up there in this black dress like she's in mourning only it's cut right down to her crotch holding up this picture of her little boy that's resting in the Lord's bosom, and I mean this huge black guy in his uniform whipping around in this wheelchair singing and then this creep, this redneck creep Paul was trying to fix up with Longview? this Reverend Ude? I mean he's up there comforting this Mrs Fickert in the bowels of Jesus everlasting life man it looks like he's reaching in there for a handful of raw lung I mean you've got to hear him, like he's shouting about these agents of Satan that have penetrated into high places trying to prevent his glorious mission where he's going even unto darkest Africa to wash them in the blood of Jesus I mean you've got to hear that voice, like he's shouting about Marxism is this instrument of Satan the father of lies and then it drops real low and slows down like he's sliding a hand right into your short hair, pray for little…

  — Billy please it's, no one cares! Now…

  — No no no, no in fact Mrs Booth I'm fascinated.

  — But what… she broke off, suddenly deserted there against the doorframe, — Paul's not even…

  — No come on Bibbs, I mean it's Paul that's running that whole freak show isn't it? like he's supposed to be this big media consultant and all that bullshit? I mean Ude's up there telling everybody to turn on their car headlights and wear a purple ribbon to show they're in this big crusade against these forces of evil infiltrating the government and the regular churches and the Jews to try to put him out of business that's got to be Paul, I mean those headlights and those ribbons that's got to be fucking Paul with his phony military school dress sabre and his box of stones and all his freaked out cheap southern bullshit pray for little Wayne, pray for America I mean that's got to be…

  — Well it's not he, honestly! Paul's not even, he doesn't know any more about the Bible and Satan than you do about, about Buddhism and, and… she got breath as though to stem the colour rising in her face — why it should be fascinating to, why Mister McCandless should be fascinated by what you have to say about Paul it's not, it's just not very…

  — No no I didn't mean, I'm sorry Mrs Booth… waving off the smoke, — I meant Reverend Ude. Reverend Elton Ude? There can't be two of them.

  — What, I mean like you know him?

  — Like the plague, yes. The Lord brought us together once in Smackover.

  — Man you've got to be kidding. In what?

  — In Smackover no, no you don't kid about Smackover.

  People get up in the morning and go to bed at night in Smackover till the day they die and go someplace else, someplace that must look just like Smackover at two in the morning believe me, that's as serious as things can get, Reverend Ude in there washing them all in the blood of where are those little books, those damned little books… He collared the nearest trash bag tearing it open, pulling out pages, scraps, fragments of landscapes, coastlines, a palm size scrip of cheap newsprint stapled together in black and blue — here, here's one, Genesis to Revelation the whole thing boiled down to ten pitiful little pages of illiteracy and hideous cartoons, here's the creation. In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth it looks like he's shooting craps, talk about playing dice with the universe. They're little comic books teaching this comic strip version of the creation, Ude was handing the damned things out all over town, here… He was back digging in the trash bag, — another one here on evolution that's even funnier he gave me a whole fistful of them, came up to me on the courthouse steps and took my arm he wanted me to get right down there on my knees with him and repent, why the Lord sent him to Smackover he told me where is that damned thing…

  — Man like the Lord sent him to Smackover but I mean who sent you, what…

  — Me? digging deeper, coming up with crumpled snapshots, the scanning she'd admired earlier as art, — these forces of evil in high places you're talking about, one of those brawls over equal time in the schools for teaching evolution and this laundered Genesis they palm off as creation science. There can't be a creation without a creator, if there's a clock there must be a clockmaker they've got all the answers, show them a zircon from Mount Narryer in Australia that's four billion years old, show them these fossilized skeletons of Proconsul africanus from eighteen million years ago that have just turned up in Lake Victoria, that may really be the missing link and they'll say fine, just fine, if this creator could produce the heavens and the earth and the whole shebang in just six days he'd certainly be able to produce a real interesting history to go along with it now wouldn't he? They'll point to billion year old Precambrian rocks on top of Cretaceous shale to disprove geological sequence and lump the whole thing into the flood here, it's in this same damned little cartoon book. And God destroyed the earth's inhabitants with water because of man's wickedness. And Noah only remained alive, and they that were with him in the ark and the whole geologic record goes down under forty days of rain where is it, where is it… he'd half emptied the bag by now, — how we've been brainwashed by evolution theory but can't produce the missing link and they jump on the Piltdown fraud, the Nebraska man that turned out to be a pig's tooth so the missing link is a fraud, evolution's all a fraud and geology astronomy physics all of it's a fraud, nothing in there about the fossil fragments in the Samburu hills where the strata's fifteen million years old, nothing about those fossil bones in three million years of volcanic ash up in the Afar Triangle, nothing about all those hominid fossils at that site in the Gregory Rift no, they wanted the missing link it was standing right up there in front of them, braying about the powers of darkness.

  She turned abruptly for the kitchen as though she'd forgotten something there, as though the phone had rung, something boiling over, and then she stood there tapping her fingers on the empty sink staring out the window until she filled the kettle and turned on the stove.

  — Here's another of the damned things here, look at this one Billy… red and black this time, — Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels God, I'd like to take Ude up there with me sometime… He caught up the scanning, spread it flat — here's the top of the Great Rift, three rifts coming together in the Afar Triangle, earthquakes, volcanoes, boiling springs a hundred thirty five in the shade if you can find any, take him up there and show him where his comic books came from no don't tell me about that voice of his, I can still hear it, not at the trial no, not at the trial, they were too damned busy laundering Genesis they couldn't let him in. He'd file a brief as a friend of the court and grab a crowd wherever he could, hand them Genesis and Revelation with a little of Jeremiah thrown in, the wormwood and gall and the Lord coming down like a whirlwind, is not my word like as a fire? saith the Lord; a
nd like a hammer that breaketh the rock? Stupidity like that, you put a hammer in its hand and everything looks like a nail, those looks we got on the courthouse steps once or twice I thought we wouldn't get out of Smackover alive.

  She was back in the doorway. — Do you want some tea or, or coffee? I'm making tea if you…

  — No, no we're quite well fixed here thanks… and she could see that he'd poured a dash into the dirty glass at his elbow. — Same damned thing he's up to out there in your California freak show, telling them this Full Gospel Witnessing's the only weapon we've got against the spread of Marxism even unto darkest Africa, fighting these forces of evil that want to stop his glorious mission of spreading stupidity from one end of the dark continent to the other, I'm not talking about ignorance. I'm talking about stupidity. If you want ignorance you can find it right there, that site on Lake Rudolf up in the Gregory Rift, hominid fossils, stone tools, hippo bones all of it caught in a volcanic burst two or three million years ago that was ignorance, that was the dawn of intelligence what we've got here's its eclipse. Stupidity's the deliberate cultivation of ignorance, that's what we've got here. These smug idiots with their pious smiles they can't stand the idea they're descended from that gang at Lake Rudolf banging around with their stone hammers trying to learn something no, they think God put them here in their cheap suits and bad neckties in his own image almost half the country, did you know that? Almost half the damned people in this country believe that man was created eight or ten thousand years ago pretty much like he is today? they believe that?

  — Well, well no, I mean I didn't know that but, Bibbs? Wait a second, I…

  — No, no sit down Billy I'll tell you something, here take one of these… he thrust over the dented yellow tin, — there's the fossil record of life going back billions of years it's got to be full of gaps, full of arguments about how evolution happened so they use those to say it didn't happen at all. We have the questions and they have the answers, dressing up Genesis and calling it science they go back from Malachi counting up all those begats, begats, begats and the creation took place October twenty sixth four thousand four BC at nine a m, that's what they call scientific method. Did anybody see it? No, no it's revealed right there in the first couple of pages of Genesis, that's what you call revealed wisdom. Talk about having business with the Bible, you walk down the street in Smackover and somebody you've never seen in your life comes right up and asks you if you've been saved as if it's any of his damned business and he thinks it is, the prevailing IQ in this country's about a hundred, did you know that? Good God, talk about a dark continent I'll tell you something, revelation's the last refuge ignorance finds from reason. Revealed truth is the one weapon stupidity's got against intelligence and that's what the whole damned thing is all about… The glass came down emptied and he looked up.

  She'd come right in this time, holding out — these trash bags you asked for, and then, — Billy? where he was struggling upright from the magazine bundle, — Mister McCandless has a lot to do here he's, I don't think you should take any more of his…

  — Right. Right I'm coming, I…

  — No no no, no it's all right Mrs Booth, your brother just wanted to know about this trial in Smackover and that's what the whole damned thing was all about academic freedom to teach this rickety scientific creationism and the judge saw right through it and we won the case, talk about a healthy attitude. We won the case and they won their equal time because the only healthy attitude was to teach neither one of them, wait… he was down sweeping together what he'd pulled from the trash bag, — show you what a judge in Georgia had to say… he dug among crumpled pages, news clippings, — no, no this one's better listen to this. Until textbooks are changed, there is no possibility that crime, violence, venereal disease and abortion rates will decrease, this is a charming Texas couple who keep an eye out for school-books that undermine patriotism, free enterprise, religion, parental authority, nothing official of course, just your good American vigilante spirit hunting down, where is it, books that erode absolute values by asking questions to which they offer no firm answers there, you see? Same damned thing, we've got the questions and they've got the answers, busy in there advising the state committee, there must be twenty of these states where local school boards can't buy textbooks that haven't been selected by the state committee. You think Texas wants one that talks about land redistribution in Central America or anyplace else? You think Mississippi wants a history book that tells the kids Nat Turner was anything but a coon show? You talk about censorship and they howl like stuck pigs no, they let the publishers do that for them. Sixty five million a year, that's what Texas spends on schoolbooks, that kind of money the edition's so big it wipes out everything else, you think any publisher that wants to stay in business is going to try to peddle a fourteen dollar biology textbook to these primates with a chapter on their cousins back there banging around Lake Rudolf with their stone hammers? Finally repealed a law down there that evolution had to be taught as just another theory not a fact, you think that will make any difference? No no no, stupidity's a damned hard habit to break, if it's not in the book you can't teach it, stupidity conquers ignorance and they all go home and read Reverend Ude's literature here, I'll show you something Billy…

  — No well I, I mean I think I better go see if, Bibbs?

  — No no sit down, sit down, look at this, here's his Survival Handbook, four pages they call it a book. Keep handy for future reference, that's any minute now when millions of Christians suddenly disappear from the face of the earth and you're not one of them. They're all up there meeting the Lord in the clouds having a grand time and you're left here with seven years of tribulation but don't panic! Got your little handbook here just do what it tells you, here. Get ready for global war and global famine. Get out of the cities they'll be destroyed, stay away from mountains and islands they'll be destroyed, stay away from oceans everything in them will be killed, get in seven years' supply of food and water and get ready to fight off starving people and wild animals, fix up your house to resist earthquakes and hundred pound hailstones and watch out for demon controlled people and other creatures roaming around out there torturing and killing anybody in sight, Revelation nine, one to eighteen it says it right here, God's word isn't it? revealed to Saint John the Divine? just the way he revealed those three secrets to those kids at Fatima? Same damned thing, fire and pestilence, talk about being blown to Kingdom Come that's exactly what they mean and they can't wait. They can't wait to be snatched up to meet the Lord in the clouds and sit there watching the rest of us tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of his holy angels and the Lord right in there rubbing his hands, they can't wait to see the sun darkened, the stars fall, hailstones and fire, the cities crumbling, the seas turned to blood I'll tell you something Billy, the whole damned thing's a self fulfilling prophecy, I'll tell you something right now. The greatest source of anger is fear, the greatest source of hatred is anger and the greatest source of all of it is this mindless revealed religion anywhere you look, Sikhs killing Hindus, Hindus killing Moslems, Druse killing Maronites, Jews killing Arabs, Arabs killing Christians and Christians killing each other maybe that's the one hope we've got. You take the self hatred generated by original sin turn it around on your neighbors and maybe you've got enough sects slaughtering each other from Londonderry to Chandigarh to wipe out the whole damned thing, here… Suddenly he was up, — give you something real to read if you want the whole story… thrusting books aside in the bookshelf — because none of it's new, none of it's new…

  — No but wait man, I mean I'm not really, no wait, Bibbs?

  And she might have come in, she'd got as far as the doorway again standing there holding them at glare's length when the phone turned her back where she'd come from, pushing aside the tea still steeping in the cup, picking it up for — yes? Hello…? and then — oh… and — oh, and — but is everything… oh. Yes I, I'll be here yes where else would I… yes I'll be here… holdi
ng it, still, before hanging it up as though to give it time to reconsider, to retreat, retract or at the least to offer some reprieve, but the only voice to be heard was the one raised through the doorway behind her.

  — talk about their deep religious convictions and that's what they are, they're convicts locked up in some shabby fiction doing life without parole and they want everybody else in prison with them it's the smugness, that's stupidity's telltale Billy, the damned self righteous smugness here, read this one. God and Jesus appear to a farm boy in upstate New York a hundred and fifty years ago out in the woods where he's praying for guidance, fourteen years old he's guilty as sin that he can't understand and just to make it worse there's the resurrection and the life starting to bulge in his pants so here comes the heavenly messenger, the resurrected angel who'd just happened to bury some plates on a nearby hill there fourteen centuries before with all the news, visions, revelations, prophecies, speaking with tongues, laying on of hands he finally gets it all down in a book that's one more recipe for bloodshed and they're off. Bloodshed in Missouri, bloodshed in Nauvoo Illinois and this time it's his, bloodshed across the Mississippi, Iowa wait, wait don't bother to read that one no, no that's just a sideshow here's the real thing, here's Runciman, three thousand years of religious slaughter have you read Runciman? Staggering piece of work, talk about having business with the Bible just try the Children's Crusade for a sideshow, thousands of kids led into slavery and death by a twelve year old with a letter from Jesus, that's one thing your Reverend Ude's learned since that trial in Smackover. Turn it into a crusade. You can't put the fear of God in them put in the fear of something right here and now, it's all fear, Satan wears a little thin so you tie him in with godless Marxism and you've got a crusade to scare the hell out of everybody, a crusade against the powers of darkness over there washing these Africans in the blood of Jesus and you'll have enough bloodshed to float the Titanic. These churches are all built on the blood of their martyrs aren't they? If Ude really wants to do it right he can always go out and get himself shot, and you know Billy? I think he'd do it…