“Excuse me?”
“After all, the county records aren’t all that accurate.” Carter opens the office door. “And while you’re at it, draw up a mental map of the area and an environmental stress chart of the county.”
A foul-up: City council, at the request of its senior member, a former Spenserian scholar, renames one of its residential streets Faerie Queene Boulevard. Tenants in apartments on Faerie Queene Boulevard move out. Owners complain that they cannot rent property in the area.
Several thousand maps have been printed, bearing the name Faerie Queene Boulevard.
Memos fly back and forth — first within city hall, then between city hall and On-Line, finally within On-Line itself. Thousands of tax dollars later, Words and Phrases reappears on the shelves of the company library.
A recipe comes in the mail. Stew with steak. He makes it for Jill.
“Scrumptious,” she says, scooting next to him on the bed. “Your recipe?”
“The power company’s. It came with their bill.” “Bless them,” Jill says.
He pulls her to his chest. She asks about his wife. “She works at the high school,” he tells her, “balancing PA speakers in the rafters of the boys’ gymnasium.”
“Tell me about your kids.”
“I’ve hired them out to the fair. They have to push the Ferris wheel all day long to keep it spinning.”
She laughs. He looks past her through the window. Outside her apartment on a billboard, a whiskey ad: a giant glass, ice tumbling over blocks of ice.
Toby has flunked his science class — inevitable, like the failure of the city’s fiscal plan and the raising of taxes, but disheartening nevertheless. Toby does not seem upset at the prospect of summer school.
“What does your mother say about it?” Adams says.
“She wants to send me to a doctor.”
“What kind of doctor?”
“A shrink.”
“We’ll see about that.”
“Is there any peach ice cream,” Deidre asks.
“Yes, but finish your hot dog first.”
After dinner Adams walks with them past the Polish dance hall and the cemetery. The evening is cool. The kids enjoy poking around the old neighborhood. Deidre still seems to think she’ll be back here any day.
They encounter the Reverend Sister Rosa on the sidewalk in front of her house. Toby assumes a defensive stance, Deidre hides behind Adams.
“Why, hello, I haven’t seen you in a long time,” Rosa says, extending her arm toward Toby.
“Hi,” Toby says, stiffly shaking the woman’s hand.
“And how are you?” Rosa asks, peering around Adams’ legs.
“Fine,” Deidre answers.
“Lovely evening.”
“Yes,” says Adams, edging the kids past her.
“I was just getting ready to sit out here on the porch with a plate of spaghetti. Would you like to join me? I made a big pot. You know how it is with spaghetti.”
“Thanks, we’ve eaten.”
“I see. Taking a little stroll, then?”
“That’s right.”
“It’s a wonderful neighborhood if you can afford to stay. My husband died six years ago, and it’s been a real struggle.” She has managed to pay off the house, though, and guesses she’ll die in it. “When I’m gone, they won’t have far to carry me,” she says, nodding at the cemetery across the street.
“We live here, too,” Deidre says.
“Used to,” Toby corrects her.
“I know what,” Rosa says, looking sadly at the children. “I’ll bet the kids would like to have their fortunes told, am I right?”
“We’ve got to-”
“On me.” She winks at Adams. “It’ll only take a second and it’ll be fun for them. Maybe they’ll get lucky in love.” Before he can think of a reply, she’s headed up her walk, motioning for him to follow.
“Did you know she’s a witch?” Deidre whispers, tugging on Adams’ pants.
“Shhh,” Adams says. “Be friendly.”
Rosa’s front room is small, lighted by a single lamp with a yellow shade. On the television, underneath the rabbit ears, a stack of newspapers and magazines. Paintings of Jesus and photographs of Eugene Debs cover the walls, garlic stalks wilt in blue vases around the room.
“Can I get you a glass of water?”
The kids shake their heads.
Rosa produces a deck of Tarot cards from her dress pocket and flips through them like a picture book.
“You’re first,” she tells Toby. “Shuffle the cards, and think about what you’d like to know.”
The cards fascinate Adams. He doesn’t believe in their ability to foretell the future, but as a symbol system they intrigue him, and he’s taken with the idea of mapping time. Instinctively, he reaches for the Two of Wands. It depicts a young man looking over battlements to the sea. In his right hand he grips a small globe; in his left he clutches a staff.
Rosa tells him, “This is the lord of the manor. The card indicates riches, magnificence, dominance, skill in science.”
Adams smiles. Rosa adds, “When the card appears upside down in a reading, it indicates sadness, suffering, lack of will.”
Adams lays the card aside.
The Nine of Wands — a young man, head wrapped in bandages, leaning on a staff — reminds him of Jordan: the vacant stare, the air of patience and immobility.
“Cunning, hidden strength, opposition,” Rosa says, tapping the card. “This person is an able adversary.”
The Two of Swords: a blindfolded woman balancing a pair of swords on her shoulders. She sits on a bench with her back to the sea, a crescent moon above. “This would be a very desirable card for you in a reading,” Rosa tells him. “It indicates balanced forces, an end to family quarrels. It can also, in rare cases, mean impotence.”
Toby will be a great man, Rosa predicts, like Churchill or Kennedy. Deidre will have many children.
“I want to be a great man, too,” she says.
“You will, of course you will,” Rosa tells her.
The spaghetti is about to boil over on Rosa’s stove, and Adams uses this as an excuse to get away. Politely, and with thanks, he hustles the children out the door.
“Listen, I’m starting a group séance on Thursday nights. Ten percent discount if you contact two or more spirits. Drop by sometime.”
“Thanks, I will,” Adams says.
“She’s a neat lady,” Deidre muses on the way home. “I liked it, what she said about me.”
“I thought you said she was a witch.”
“That was before I was a great man.”
Adams places his watch on the back porch, next to the barbecue pit. Jordan does not appear. The following evening Adams leaves a ring.
Straightening his desk at the end of the day, he discovers in a stack of papers the program notes from last year’s conference on plate tectonics. Over drinks in a hotel lobby a seismologist from UCLA had turned to him. “In an information-based society, what happens to blue-collar workers?” he said. “You and me, information-gatherers, we’re the elite. But we’re not making plans for people who work with their hands.” Adams was tired. He shared a room with Carter, though their schedules overlapped and they didn’t see each other much. Carter’s presentation had been given a prime spot on the bill — Friday evening, closing night. Adams was relegated to Tuesday afternoon, when many of the conferees were playing tennis or enjoying late lunches.