Ancient of Days

by Michael Bishop

  On Monday about 10 A.M., I drove into town and stopped first at the Greyhound Depot Laundry to pick up my tablecloths. Ben Sadler, already looking rumpled and dehydrated, had them waiting on the counter. The black woman who operated his steam press—a forbidding-looking instrument with a lid like a coffin’s—also made a point of marking my entrance. Uh oh, I thought. What’s going on?

  My subsequent talk with Ben was curiously aimless, focusing on such weighty topics as the humidity level and hog-market prices. Strange. Ben usually liked to provoke a verbal scrap over the deployment of U.S. forces in Central America or the morality of alcoholic-beverage licenses for local eating establishments. I started to leave.

  “Say,” said Ben, “do you take Newsweek?”

  “I don’t subscribe. Occasionally, I’ll buy a copy. Why?”

  “Have you seen this week’s issue?”

  “Is it out already?”

  “Hy Langton, over at the drugstore, gets his copies first thing Monday mornin’. I bought one right off. He don’t know what to do with the rest of ’em, though—put ’em out for sale or stash ’em down under the register.”

  “Newsweek? With the Playboys and Penthouses?”

  “It’s a eye-opener, the new one. Milly and me—” nodding at the steam-press operator, who looked down in acute embarrassment— “we’ve been discussin’ how much times’ve changed, to let a magazine like ol’ Newsweek use the kinda cover it’s just used. Is it still safe to send your kids down a small-town sidewalk ’thout a blindfold?”

  “But you bought a copy?”

  “I got it for you, Paul.” Even in the morning heat and the heat of the laundry, Ben managed to blush. “Don’t be insulted. It’s not that I think you’re a creep or somethin’. It’s just that, you know, once bein’ married to an artist and all, you’re more sophisticated than most folks in Beulah Fork. You know how to take such stuff ’thout bein’ prurient about it. Isn’t that the word, prurient?”

  “For God’s sake, Ben, what are you talking about?”

  “Here.” With one emphatic motion, he produced the magazine from beneath his counter and plonked it down on the folded tablecloths. The magazine’s cover slapped me hard, but I kept my face as noncommittal as I could. Let Ben and Milly invent a reaction rather than simply relate it. The gossip mills would grind no matter what I did.

  And the cover on the new Newsweek?

  Well, it consisted of a photograph of Adam and RuthClaire standing side by side, frontally nude, Adam to the left, RuthClaire to the right. Adam had his hand raised in a venerable human gesture signifying “Peace” or “I have no weapon.” My ex-wife, although visible frontally from head to toe, was standing with her left leg slightly extended and her body canted a little bit toward Adam’s. Eye-catching as they were, the couple occupied only the vertical right half of the cover.

  The other half contained a pair of clocks side by side beneath the second three letters of the Newsweek logo. One clock had the initials B.C. in its center, the other the abbreviation A.D. In shadow under the clocks hung a clear Plexiglas model of the African continent, while at the bottom of the photo, going from left to right beneath the suspended continent and the primeval couple, floated a string of islands representing the Greater and Lesser Antilles. From the island Hispaniola shot out a sequence of arrows demarcating the wake of a fishing boat on its way past Cuba to the tip of Florida. A legend superimposed beneath the feet of Adam and RuthClaire proclaimed:

  THE NEW PHOTOGRAPHY

  An Art in Militant Transition

  “Bet this gets a lot of bluenoses to cancel subscriptions,” Ben said.

  I didn’t reply, but Ben was probably right. Whoever had taken this photograph had not bothered to air-brush the pubic hair or private parts of my ex and her husband. That was why I thought I knew the photographer’s identity. I flipped to the cover story at the magazine’s heart. Scanning its lead and several paragraphs, I found the name Maria-Katherine Kander repeatedly. In fact, two of the photos accompanying the article were fairly tame portraits—i.e., the models either in shadow or semimodestly draped—from the Abraxas show that had featured Adam’s paintings and the colorful work of various Haitian artists. I had stepped into a timewarp flinging me back to February.

  “Did you know they’d done this, Paul? Had their pictures taken nude?”

  “No. No, I didn’t.”

  It was hard to imagine RuthClaire consenting to such a portrait. She was as naked in this Newsweek cover as I’d ever seen her. Midway through our marriage, she had made up her mind that regular intercourse with me had about it the irresistible romance of changing a flat on a ’54 Chevy jalopy. It was not that she was puritanical or cold, but that for her sex had become a time-consuming process best left to people with nothing more important to do. Her sense that I would probably never father her child had reinforced this cavalier attitude in her. If procreation was out, and pleasure had fled, why bother? At any rate, the last time I’d seen her unclad was the night I’d climbed into a magnolia tree on Paradise Farm to take pictures of Adam in the downstairs bathroom. She had been infinitely more provocative in that setting. In the Kander photo, she seemed to represent Womankind for an alien eye that might not otherwise grasp the concept.

  In a way, of course, that was exactly the point.

  I set the magazine atop the tablecloths and gathered it and them up in my arms. “Thanks for the Newsweek, Ben.” I staggered across the street with this load, dumped the tablecloths into a chair, and told Livia George that, once again, she’d have to handle the luncheon crowd without me. She waved a hand in dismissal. Nothing I did or failed to do surprised her anymore. So, rolled-up Newsweek in hand, I exited the West Bank and climbed into my car.

  Neil Hammond’s jacked-up purple pickup sat in front of my house at Paradise Farm. Hammond was in the living room with a stack of Newsweeks balanced on one of my more fragile-looking end tables holding the magazines in place with the heel of his hand. Adam perched on a wingback across from him, looking penitent and befuddled. My own copy was clutched in my fist like a billy club.

  “You’ve seen it,” Hammond said. “You’ve seen the day’s major disaster.” He gestured at the magazines. “I saw it about an hour ago, when I went to the drugstore to buy my wife an anniversary card. I bought every Newsweek in the damn place. Mr. Langton thinks I’m a world-class pervert. It’s probably blown my cover.” He shook his head. “My cover blown by a magazine cover. Funny, huh? I went to every corner of town buying the damn things up, but the damage has already been done. People here remember Mrs. Montaraz—they remember her well—and a lot of magazines that went out on the racks were grabbed for souvenirs. Tomorrow, the folks who have subscription copies’ll get theirs. There’s no way to put a lid on this. It’s a public-relations disaster, a blow to all we’ve been trying to do in this case.” He lifted his hand from the magazines, which slid to the floor in a cascade of whispery thumps.

  Adam and RuthClaire, Adam and RuthClaire, Adam and RuthClaire.

  I looked at Adam. “What the hell did you two think you were doing?”

  “They’ve contributed to what’s likely to become its most collectible issue—cover intact, of course—of Newsweek magazine, ever,” Hammond said, nudging the pile with his boot. “That’s one thing they’ve done. Newsweek’ll get more letters than they’ve ever received, and nine tenths will be from outraged old ladies, concerned mothers, angry preachers, and so on. Subscriptions’ll get canceled, sure, but every damn newsstand copy will be gone before dinnertime.

  “Do you remember how that flaky Beatle and his Japanese old lady made an album called Two Virgins in the late sixties? They had themselves shot buck-naked for the album cover. Nobody at their damn company wanted to use the photographs, but the flaky Beatle insisted. They sold the damn things in brown envelopes, though. This—” he kicked one of the fallen magazines—“is being sold right out in front of God and everybody with Time and Woman’s Day and Field & Stream. And by ‘God and e
verybody,’ I do mean everybody: Little Bobby, Innocent Little Susy, Sweet Old Aunt Matilda, and, probably worst of all, Crazy Craig Puddicombe.”

  Adam, hands clasped between his knees, looked up. “Neither RuthClaire nor I had any inkling this shot would appear—” gesturing vaguely— “as it so upsettingly has.”

  “But why’d you pose for something like this?” I asked.

  “In April, Mister Paul, long before my surgery, this M.-K. Kander person came to Atlanta on business at Abraxas. About ‘shooting’ RuthClaire and me, she inquired. The idea of the Primeval Couple had great appeal to her. Mister David did introductions. And Miss RuthClaire and this M.-K. Kander person, they took to each other fast. So when her new friend suggests we pose as you see, my wife has no great objection. Nor I. So our photo got taken in gallery room where Ms. Kander had February show. Later, she kindly sends us prints of very same one Newsweek has given horrible honor of its cover.” Adam sought my eyes. “Never did we expect this picture to appear anywhere but in M.-K. Kander private portfolio. This, then, is great shock.”

  “It’s a disaster,” Hammond reiterated.

  I opened out my scrolled copy and held it up. “But why like this, Adam? Why did she want you to pose like this?”

  His growl tentative, Adam said, “The set-up was greatly symbolic. The Primeval Couple, as I have said. My name is Adam, and I am a habiline with origins going deeply past those of even Biblical Adam. So said Maria-Katherine. Miss RuthClaire, to the contrary, is modern woman with life in technological times. So, again, said M.-K. Kander. Our union, she told us, ties up past and future of species in exciting new Now.” He paused. “Maybe this symbolism lacks clarity, but in standing naked beside my wife, I saw no harm for this talented picture-taking person. Early Adam and somewhat later Eve. Miss RuthClaire thought it—you may be surprised—very funny and also enjoyable.”

  “This pose reminds me of something, Adam,” I said. “But what?”

  “Maria-Katherine patterned her shot after the plaques sent out into cosmos aboard Pioneer 10 and 11 spacecraft. They feature naked male and female side by side, the man with his right hand raised. On those plaques, male is taller than female, and islands at bottom are not Cuba and so on, but the sun and planets of our solar system. A miniature of the spacecraft is leaving third such body and flying off between Jupiter and Saturn into cosmic ocean. Again, it was Kander person’s idea to use this pattern. A Plexiglas model of Africa hangs to right because our kind, it seems, did begin there. Miss Maria-Katherine made this continent artifact herself.”

  Hammond twisted his cap in his hands. “You had no idea this photograph would show up as a Newsweek cover?”

  “They would have,” I said, “if the cover story had been about them. The editorial staff would have said so. But this issue’s cover story is about the new photography, and the only release the editors probably needed was from M.-K. Kander.”

  “If we’d known they were going to use it,” Hammond said, “we would have told them what was going on down here. We’d’ve asked them to deep-six the damn thing or at least delay it another week. There’s nothing that topical about ‘The New Photography,’ for God’s sake. They could have waited.”

  Adam stood, thrust his hands deep into his slacks pockets, and, balancing on one leg, picked up a copy of Newsweek with the toes of his other foot. The magazine dangled there like a startled sea creature yanked from its natural element. And then Adam disdainfully dropped it.

  “I am very unhappy with Miss M.-K.,” he said, “very unhappy, indeed.”

  I returned to work. Hammond remained at the house with Adam. At six o’clock that evening, the agent telephoned the West Bank to tell me that something had happened and that he and Adam must leave for Atlanta.

  “Wait a minute. I want to go with you.”

  Livia George, at my elbow beside the cash register, said, “This got somethin’ to do with Miss RuthClaire gettin’ jaybird-skinny for that cover?”

  “Hush, Livia George.”

  “City did this to ’em. City made ’em think they could shuck their clothes for some hotsy-totsy nashunal magazine.”

  “Damn it, get out of my ear for a minute!” I muffled the telephone’s mouthpiece. A couple at a nearby table peeked up at me, disapprovingly.

  Hammond’s voice said, “This isn’t your affair any longer, Mr. Loyd. Niedrach’s just called. We’ve got to go.”

  “T. P.’s my godson. Give me ten minutes and I’ll be there with you.”

  “We’re leaving.”

  “I’ll follow.”

  “That’s your prerogative.”

  “The Montaraz house on Hurt Street?”

  “Goodbye, Mr. Loyd.”

  “What happened? Did Craig call? Did someone see him?”

  But all I had in my ear was a busy signal. I barged into the kitchen and found Livia sullenly slicing tomatoes into a salad. Hazel Upchurch was sautéing mushrooms in a cast-iron skillet. Debbie Rae House, my new waitress, was watching them, bored.

  “Pray,” I commanded. “I don’t know what the hell good it’ll do, but pray. Pray for T. P.” Then I was gone.

  Despite their head start, I caught up with Hammond’s pickup between the two exits sandwiching Newnan, Georgia, on I-85. The sun was lowering itself rung by rung to the western horizon, but daylight still lingered above the heat-browned meadows flanking the interstate, and traffic was brisk in both directions. Doing eighty, I had to hit my brakes to keep from overshooting the agent’s truck, and my own car almost got away from me before I brought it under control and followed Hammond and his habiline passenger into Atlanta without further incident. We parked across the street from the Montaraz house and went inside.

  Adam and RuthClaire embraced.

  Niedrach was present, Davison was not. In the latter’s place were two men in sports jackets and spiffily creased slacks. Neither of these men had yet hit his fortieth birthday. One had stylishly long hair that just touched his collar in back but stayed well off his ears. He was pink-cheeked and clear-eyed, after the fashion of a second lead in a B movie of the 1940s. The other man had an astronaut’s conservative haircut, a nose that had once been broken, and a shovel-shaped mouth that sometimes seemed to move as if it had a will distinct from its owner’s. Feds, these fellows. Latter-day heirs of the late, unlamented J. Edgar Hoover.

  Bilker Moody introduced these men as Investigator Tim Le May (the B-movie second lead) and Investigator Erik Webb (the shovel-mouthed astronaut). They had taken over the case on the Saturday afternoon following the kidnapping, but Niedrach had stayed on to coordinate their investigation with local police departments and the antiterrorist unit of the GBI. Given federal jurisdiction over most kidnappings, this was a somewhat unusual arrangement, but Niedrach’s familiarity with Klan tactics and his knowledge of events precipitated last summer by the Kudzu Klavern had argued tellingly for his uninterrupted involvement with this case. I was glad to see him. He wore his bulldog belt buckle and a navy-blue windbreaker that made him seem out of uniform. He looked like the fatigued, seedy uncle of the younger, more dapper FBI agents.

  Adam approached him. “What has happened?”

  “The bastard phoned,” Bilker Moody said, his upper arms straining the sleeve bands of his sweaty Banlon shirt.

  “We’ve got a tape,” Le May said. “Come into the kitchen and we’ll play it.”

  We filed into the kitchen. The tape machine, with two sets of headphones, was connected to the wall phone beside the door leading to Bilker’s pantry headquarters. Still, you could sit at the kitchen table while listening to or taping a call, and Adam and RuthClaire sat down there with Niedrach, Le May, and Webb. Hammond, Moody, and I found corners into which to wedge ourselves, and Le May turned a dial on the antique-looking recorder. Its milky reels began to turn, but at first all we could hear was the low hum of the refrigerator. Then Craig Puddicombe’s voice said, “A whore and her hibber. For all the world to see.”

  “Where’s Paulie?” RuthClai
re’s voice asked. “Tell me how he is, Craig.”

  “ ’S good’s can be expected, considerin’ what and where he came from.”

  “We’re living apart, Adam and I. We’ve lived apart for nearly ten days now. You know that, don’t you?”

  “No, ma’am. You’re standin’ right next to each other for all the fuckin’ world to see. That’s what you’re doing.”

  “We had no idea that—”

  “That you had your goddamn clothes off? Interestin’ defense, ma’am. Interestin’ goddamn defense.”

  “That the photo would show up as a magazine cover.”

  “Course you didn’t. And the spade who raped a troop of Girl Scouts said, ‘Sorry, angry white folks. I had no ideah I was gonna get caught. No ideah at all.’ ”

  On the tape, RuthClaire began to cry. “What do you want me to do? The photo’s history. Adam and I can’t undo it. So what do you want from us now?”

  “Who said I wanted anything, Missus Hibber Whore?”

  “Then why have you called? Tell me about Paulie.”

  “You’ve surprised the whole damn country, haven’t you? Well, everybody deserves as good as they give, don’t they? A big surprise all their own.”

  “What surprise, Craig?”

  Puddicombe was silent a moment. Then he blurted, “But I do want something. I want you and your hibber to get back together. Now. Today. This very evenin’.”

  “Craig—”

  He broke the connection. On tape, RuthClaire’s voice hurried to ask, “Was that long enough to do any good? Was that—”

  Le May turned off the recorder. “Telephone technology’s changing every day. If an exchange office has a computerized system, you don’t have to rely on taps and pin registers to trace calls. The computer will print out the number for you, then search its memory and identify the owner. This time we got lucky. The number Puddicombe called from belongs to a newly computerized exchange. We asked at all such offices and found an exchange with a recent call to this house. The time’s matched up exactly.”