No Birds Sing Here

by Daniel V. Meier Jr.

  “Why did you tell him I was your wife?”

  “You have to in these small southern towns.”

  “Ha, ha. You see my point.” Malany was triumphant.

  “Well, I admit no place is perfect. It’s a question of choice. The redneckery of a place like this or the savage indifference from Washington to New York. Where we came from, people like us are either ignored, laughed at, or pissed on. I’ll bet you in places like this they love writers, and I’ll go further and say that they’ll even give you credit for the effort.”

  “Ha, ha,” Malany objected. “You’re a disgusting romantic, Beckman, basing judgments on stereotypes. A writer must see individuals and how those individuals fit within the contexts of their environments.”

  Beckman was silent. He did not want to fight with her. He felt he couldn’t win; not from a superiority of mind or will, but because he would see her at the terrible moments of psychic wounding with his gift of psychotelepathy. And to prevent that, he would surrender first. Also, Malany wasn’t really ready to go back. She was willing to give them a chance as individuals, but something was out there that she was afraid of, some absorbing attraction left behind.

  The motel was a loose association of individual cabins arranged in a semicircle behind the main office. Rates by the week, the day, or the hour were taped onto the desktop. A fat woman between thirty and sixty and enveloped in an atmosphere of dirty arm pits took the money, squinting past Beckman at Malany’s car. Beckman paid for three days. The woman grunted. Beckman signed everything she put in front of him. While he was doing this, she lit a cigarette, scattering smoke and glowing ashes.

  “I don’t care what you do so long as you’re quiet and don’t break up the furniture.”

  She dropped the key on the desktop and Beckman, feeling denuded by her unblinking gaze, cat-clawed for the keys, thanked her politely and left. For the first time since he had met her, Malany looked close to tears.

  “Say, it isn’t so bad.” Beckman feigned cheerfulness. “You know how these Ma and Pa places are. It’s probably clean enough to eat off the floors.”

  Inside, Malany yanked back the bedsheets and held up, like a proud angler, a wiggling, coiled pubic hair. She immediately began an inspection conducted in terrible silence, repeatedly flushing the commode, running water in the shower and lavatory, wrathfully ripping away the bedsheets and pillowcases.

  “But Malany, it’s more sanitary with covering.”

  Malany sneered and held out a faded spot on one of the pillowcases. “Oh, God. I never thought I would feel this way again, but I must take a shower, even if the water’s contaminated.”

  She wadded up the bed linen and stuffed it into a corner. Beckman thought he saw the beginning of tears as she hurriedly undressed and rushed to the bathroom.

  Beckman switched on the TV, a disappointing black and white, and sat on the bed, back against wall, separating him from Malany’s mad, tumultuous ridicule.

  Beckman slept little during the night. It was not so much the canvas surface of the bare mattress or the mealy smell of the pillow or even, he convinced himself, the shadowy, silhouetted image of Malany’s body beside his, but more that she had vowed, moments before falling asleep, to return to New York. Without her, the scheme failed; and without her, he faced the very real possibility of admitting that the only thing his life meant was washing dishes in greasy spoons and being lovingly pissed on by Herschel.

  It was becoming morning outside. Beckman watched it happening from their only window. Then, seized with near panic, he slid out of bed, restraining his urgency so that he wouldn’t wake Malany. He dressed quickly, floundering in the gray light and, violating Malany’s purse for the car keys, he felt like a criminal.

  Beckman dreaded starting the car’s engine that early and, although it was irrational, decided to put it off for a while. He walked over to the office and was surprised to find it open. The fat-woman desk clerk stationed behind the counter seemed permanently rooted there. Her glaring, egg-shaped eyes still held the same dull hate, but something was different about her. She looked sweaty, and there was a cut on her right cheek. Beckman wanted to ask her if she had cut herself shaving, but he knew that she would not appreciate the humor.

  Instead he asked, “Is there a restaurant close by open for breakfast?”

  “Towards town, about a mile. A doughnut shop.”

  Beckman thanked her and started out.

  “Mister, would you mind picking up some for me?”

  “No, not at all.” Actually, Beckman was irritated by the request. The thought of buying doughnuts for a gargantuan person seemed servile, wasteful, and simply repulsive. The desk clerk took out a $20 bill from the cash register.

  “One dozen chocolate creamies.”

  Beckman walked back to the car. The morning had lost its innocence. He felt infected by the desk clerk’s money. A stinking force outside of his awareness had once again touched him—undesired but unalterable.

  When Beckman returned, the motel looked literally washed. It was the southern light, different from the poor light of Baltimore or New York; brighter, softer, less threatening hour by hour.

  The desk clerk, overcome with anticipation, jerked her box of doughnuts out of Beckman’s hands and began tearing away bits of cardboard and clear plastic, ignoring the change from her twenty that Beckman left on the counter. He hurried out, hoping to find Malany awake and leaving behind the receding moans and whimpers of the clerk as she stuffed one pastry after another into her mouth.

  Malany was up and standing as coy as a billboard virgin in front of the window. Intense light passed through her filmy, white nightgown. She was a Nordic goddess. Her hair lay in glistening strands over her shoulders. She looked as pure as The Lady of the Lake. Beckman, in spite of himself, glanced at her hands, half expecting to see the hilt of Excalibur raised toward him.

  “Breakfast.” Beckman extended the bag of coffee and doughnuts.

  “My God. I hate to admit it, but I am hungry. Oh, how I hate being a creature of the flesh; how I hate this body. It’s always hurting and wanting, forcing me to eat, forcing me to shit, or that totally pointless reproductive mechanism self-destructing every month. I keep telling myself that I’m going to take up Zen seriously, and transcend this body, but I never get around to it.”

  Beckman extracted the food from its bag and placed it gently on the dresser along with ample napkins and several small packets of sugar.

  “Beckman, I think you are the man-of-action type, after all.”

  “There’s no need to be insulting, Malany.”

  “I wasn’t being, really.”

  Beckman shrugged and bit into a chocolate doughnut. “How much money do you have left?” he asked.

  “Enough for maybe three days if we live like troglodytes, which looks like what we’re doing.”

  “That’s enough,” Beckman said, noticing that Malany enjoyed her doughnut. “I have a very good plan this time. Why don’t you spend the day writing? That is, if you feel like it. If the plan works, you’ll need more poems than what you have in the book.”

  Malany looked interested.

  “Would you like me to drop you off by a park or something?”

  Malany tossed her hair. “No,” she smiled. “All I need is paper, a writing instrument, and to be left alone for a while.”

  Beckman started for the door.

  “When will you be back?”

  He spun around, pleased with her concern. She saw it and countered before he acted foolishly.

  “I only want to know so that the anxiety of waiting for you to come bursting through the door will not affect my work.”

  “What will you do for lunch?” Beckman asked, imagining that he looked ridiculous.

  “If I’m working well, I don’t think about lunch.”

  “I need a picture.”

  “What for?” Malany asked.

  “To put on circulars announcing your poetry reading at the library.”

 
; “I don’t have one. Only the one on my driver’s license. But I don’t know where that is.”

  “Maybe we won’t need it anyway. It’ll be cheaper without it.” Malany made a gesture of dismissal and began taking notebooks out of her suitcase. She had dissolved him out of existence. Beckman left quietly and, driving to the library, he reviewed his basic approach. He was briefly seized for a while by a contempt for Malany and by a sudden urge to keep driving. He thought of California and possibly even Bangkok.

  Beckman considered it a good omen to see “his” librarian at the morning desk. She recognized him, acknowledging him with an oral twitch and a momentary glitter of eyes. She wasn’t stamping books. She wasn’t doing anything until Beckman moved toward her. She hastily began to arrange loose objects on the desk in some type of linear conformity.

  “Good morning, Mister . . . ”

  “Beckman.”

  It was a juvenile game of pretense, and Beckman would play.

  “Oh, yes. You were in yesterday about a library card.”

  “I was wondering if I could get a temporary one.”

  “Certainly,” the librarian nodded. She was a protective mother, a servant of the public’s higher need. She slid, with careful dignity, from her chair and headed more confidently toward the head librarian’s office door. Beckman waited, scanning the notices on the hall bulletin board. A geriatric couple came in and, walking past him with sliding feet, nodded politely and turned hesitantly toward the reference room. The librarian returned and asked him to sign a rather elaborate card with his temporary address.

  The librarian examined the completed card and asked, “Now, Mr. Beckman, what can I help you with?”

  “I was looking for a volume of poetry. It doesn’t seem to be in your card catalogue.”

  “Umm. Did you look in the nonfiction section under poetry?”

  “Yes. Perhaps it’s been misplaced,” he said.

  “Who is the author?” the librarian asked.

  “Malany.”

  “Is that the first or last name?”

  “That’s her only name, at least the only name she will admit to.”

  Beckman followed the librarian to the card catalogue and waited as she methodically traced down the volume, muttering names and numbers to herself.

  “You’re right, Mr. Beckman. It doesn’t seem to be here. I don’t understand unless it’s those colored children. You know, we’ve had to start letting them in and nothing’s been right ever since. Now, mind you, I personally have no objections. Every child should be encouraged to use the library but oh, they are so destructive and so coarse, and their language, it’s terrible. Well, come with me. We’ll check the stacks.”

  “What did you say the title was?” the librarian whispered up from her position on all fours.

  “Song and Saber by Malany.”

  “Yes, by Malany,” the librarian repeated as she crawled diligently along the bottom row of the poetry section.

  Beckman waited, watching the librarian’s shapeless posterior, and wondering what secrets it knew—who had loved it and whom had it loved. It seemed suddenly funny to him that the planner in a pre-determined happening spends much of the time waiting for the right people to do the predicted thing. So, he waited, waited until she had risen to the crouched position of an Olympian sprinter to scan a third row of books. Then, as he had planned, she announced the discovery of the book in a voice croaking with restraint. Beckman and the librarian strode triumphantly side by side back to the center desk.

  “You must really like poetry, Mr. Beckman. I’ve never heard of this book or this author before. She seems . . . very obscure.”

  “Oh, this is only her first publication. It received good reviews from the English faculty at Yale.”

  “Really? Do you know her? You sound like you do.”

  “Oh, yes. We’ve been friends for years. In fact, I’m traveling with her this season, until she leaves for Europe.”

  “You mean she’s here? The author, with you, now?”

  “Well, she isn’t just outside.”

  “Oh. In town, then?”

  “Yes. We’re making a tour of the South and Midwest, trying to learn something about the people and their environment.”

  “For a book?”

  “Well, yes, Malany’s doing another book. With a rural theme and I, uh—it doesn’t matter. I really shouldn’t be talking like this.”

  “Are you a writer also, Mr. Beckman?”

  Beckman tried to appear self-conscious. “You could say that. I have something coming out next year, but I’m not supposed to talk about it.”

  The librarian glanced to both sides, then leaned closer to Beckman and, in the manner of a fellow conspirator, whispered, “I understand.”

  “Thank you,” Beckman said and started to leave.

  “Oh, Mr. Beckman, here’s Miss Malany’s book.”

  “Thanks. Tell you what, I’ve read it several times. Why don’t you read it and tell me what you think of it? Malany would appreciate your opinion, I’m sure.”

  “Why, I’d love to, if you think it’s all right.”

  “Of course it is, and do me a favor. I prefer you don’t mention anything about what we’re doing here. You know what I mean; reporters, crowds, that sort of thing.”

  “Of course. Certainly.”

  The scratchy voices of the geriatric couple rose from the reference room.

  “You see here,” the woman’s voice insisted. “Charles Mason Murphey bought the mill in 1870, and a look at the Confederate Army records will establish beyond the shadow of a doubt that he attained the rank of Major before the end of the war.”

  “That may be true, but that’s as far as the family goes. His daddy was nothing but a horse thief and was once arrested for stealing a mare on First Street, right in front of the old Willoughby Bank.”

  “That’s absurd.”

  “It’s right there in the court records. I can prove it.”

  “Well, you will have to. ” The couple brushed past Beck man with surprising energy. The old man, pink-faced and angry, was in the lead.

  “They come in here every week,” the librarian said. “Local genealogists,” she said with a hint of approval. “It’s very big here, and you’d be surprised at some of the disappointments.” The librarian allowed herself a small chuckle.

  “Oh.” Beckman snapped his fingers as if remembering something important. “I meant to tell you. Malany tries to attend poetry readings when she’s visiting a prominent place. I didn’t see anything on your bulletin board. Do you have poetry readings here?”

  “Oh, of course.” The librarian was indignant. “I don’t know what became of the notices.” She quickly leafed through bits of paper on the desk.

  “Where do you hold them?” It was necessary to hurry, to create a feeling of lost opportunity.

  The librarian stared straight at him. “Why, here. Downstairs in one of the rooms.”

  “Good. When?”

  Her pale eyes alert. “Ahhhh, usually Friday nights at seven. Would your friend like to read?”

  “Only if she’s asked, of course, and provided it doesn’t anger anyone.”

  “Oh, Mrs. Dowell would be more than pleased, I’m sure, for her to read some of her work. I’ll see what she says, but I know there will be no problem.”

  The librarian smiled reassuringly. She had reasserted herself against the threat of equality. Beckman thanked her with servile politeness, just short of the comic, and started for the door, stopping there before going out, and looking back briefly to enjoy the sight of the librarian making her way to the head librarian’s office with the seeded copy of Song and Saber in her hand.

  Beckman found the print shop empty of customers. A young man dressed like a manager, and none too eager, kept looking up from his desk as though he expected Beckman to leave, which, after a self-conscious moment, Beckman considered doing. But it was a question of time now. Time had become important; not in the sense of an eterna
l concept as he used to think of it, but time as a limiting part of the present.

  Since meeting Malany, he had developed a growing sense of urgency, and standing in the print shop waiting for whatever might happen, he became aware, just as though a genetic trigger had been pulled, of the finite qualities of all things. Was this the knowledge that drove people to print, or into a bank with a drawn gun or over a cliff ? The knowledge of meaninglessness, the forbidden fruit of modern humanity?

  The thought stunned Beckman for a while until he was startled by a well-dressed man tapping on the counter in front of him. There was a discussion about what Beckman wanted. The man didn’t seem to understand, so Beckman printed on a four-by-six-inch sample exactly what he wanted: blurbs about Malany and the book, its price, a few additional lies about her background, and her appearance at the library. The man agreed to do fifty copies for $15.

  “Can I wait for them?”

  The man said that he could if Beckman wanted to wait three hours. Beckman said that he would be back for them at four thirty.

  He stopped at a phone booth outside the print shop, asked for the society editor and explained, in an imitation southern accent, that “Malany, the New York and California poetess was in town, accompanied by her novelist companion and that she has agreed to give a reading of some of her best work at the meeting of the Poetry Society of the library.” The editor asked if she might speak with this Malany.

  “I’m not sure where she and her companion can be reached, but I’ve heard that they’re staying with wealthy friends.”

  The editor thanked Beckman cheerfully and hung up. Beckman hung up and stood physically immobile in the phone booth. Something about the tone of the conversation had the discordant sounds of failure. Newspapers must be emphasizing truth and responsibility.

  Beckman stepped out of the phone booth. Time seemed elongated; there were holes in it, and that made him nervous. He was also hungry, and now that he had nothing to do for the next few hours, he began to notice the hunger pangs. He knew that he had used his last twenty cents to make the phone call, knew that it would be a desperate gesture to search his pockets once again. Nevertheless, his hands groped in the cloth bound voids, fingers feeling seams, the linear forms of thread, grains of sand, minute balls of lint, but no money.