THIS IS A STORY about an old lady who ordered a young man from an L.L. Bean catalog. He was a nice young man with wide shoulders and a worried smile. He had on a tweed coat and dark tan pants and a nice-looking tie with little squiggly things all over it. His fingernails were clean and his hair neatly combed. He liked to work but he was also a good companion on trips. His table manners were excellent but not noticeable. He liked to talk but knew how to let the other person have their turn. Mrs. Bradlee never did get around to asking him what his profession was, his line of work. There never did seem to be a polite way to ask.
All of Mrs. Bradlee’s friends were getting young men. You could hardly find four for bridge anymore at the Recess Club. Fanny Hawkins had even started dressing like her young man, flat shoes and work pants. Carrie Hatcher pretended her young man was a chauffeur. All they did was drive around talking about themselves. Elsie Whitfield stayed on the coast with hers; they went fishing. It made Mrs. Bradlee sick at her stomach to think of it. One night she dreamed a big Greyhound bus pulled up in front of the old courthouse on State Street and all these young men got out and started spreading out all over Jackson, moving out in all directions. Like a web that had fallen over the world.
Mrs. Bradlee wasn’t having anything to do with it. They weren’t eating dinner at her house. I’ve seen enough, she told herself. I’ve had enough to contend with. Mrs. Bradlee was a widow. She had buried two sons in two wars and a husband from smoking cigarettes. All I want to do from now on is live a normal life, she told her remaining children. So whatever you do, don’t tell me about it. Just come over on Sunday after church while you’re still covered up.
You shouldn’t live alone, her friends were always telling Mrs. Bradlee. She still lived in her house on Lakefront Drive, with all her rooms. They wanted her to get an apartment where they were, at Westchester Arms, or Dunleith Court or Dunsinae Towers. Well, she wasn’t going to move into an apartment. She wasn’t joining the herd. She had been raised in the country. She had seen one cow lead the rest to water. Still, it was getting lonely in the big stone house. If only it could be like it used to be, with her friends coming over for cards. They had even started bringing the young men to Saint James. Right up to the prayer rail, and beyond. Alece Treadway was sending hers to divinity school.
It was too much. In the past Mrs. Bradlee had been known as the leader. She had been the first to cut her hair at college, the first to have a white cook, the first to get a face-lift (when the time came), the first to visit behind the Iron Curtain, when August, her husband, was still alive. Now, with their craze for young men, the crowd had left her behind.
It was all so, well, so messy. And the young men themselves, well, she hated to cast stones, but they were messy too. Well, they were. They wore open-collar sport shirts and tennis sneakers and barely cut their hair. It was too much. It was just too much. Mrs. Bradlee’s knitting needles clicked like a thousand crickets. She was alone in her living room. A beautiful sunset was covering the lake with her favorite shades of blue and pink. Elvie Howard had bowed out of their Wednesday night canasta game, now that she had her swimming pool maintenance friend. He has a degree in Philosophy, she told Mrs. Bradlee, from the East. It’s television, Mrs. Bradlee decided. That’s where they got the ideas. She switched off her own and went into the library to read.
A stack of catalogs was on a table by the windowseat. She began flipping through them, thinking of ordering some clothes for the grandchildren for Christmas. She took a piece of white chocolate from a dish and began to nibble on it, looking at the elegant clothes and shoes and hand-carved decoys, the scarves and ties and stacks of well-made shirts. One model began to catch her eye. He was in several different catalogs. The best picture was on page sixteen of the L.L. Bean catalog. He had such neat hair, his smile was so, well, just right, not too smiley, just enough so you would know he was friendly. His hands were in his pockets. He was standing so tall and straight. I ought to order him, she thought, laughing to herself out loud. She ate another piece of chocolate. Then another. Hello, she said to the photograph. What’s your name?
It was growing dark outside. She pushed a light switch and carried the catalog over to a desk and sat down and took an order blank out of the back and began to fill it in. One, she wrote, here, number 331, color, white, she paused at where to fill in the amount. $10,000, she wrote and added her Merrill Lynch Visa Card number. There, that should be about right. She folded the order blank in halves, stuck it into its envelope, and carried it across the room to the marble table before the fireplace. She dropped it on a silver salver. Here, Mr. Postman, she said, as if she were a child playing at things, take this letter to the warehouse.
A bell was ringing in the hall. The cook was calling her to dinner.
In the morning the envelope was gone. “Have you seen an envelope I left in the library?” she said to the maid. “Well, yes, I did,” the girl said. “I mailed it for you. In the morning mail.”
“Oh, you can’t mail that,” Mrs. Bradlee said. “It was a joke. Those people will think I’m crazy when they open that. They’ll say, here’s a woman in Mississippi who’s lost her mind.”
“What was it, ma’am?” the maid said.
“I ordered something they don’t sell,” she said. The two of them laughed together at that. Mrs. Bradlee liked the little maid. An octoroon named Rivers, a sweet girl who was always neat and clean and smelled good.
It was a week later when the young man came. It was nine in the morning. A Sunday morning. Mrs. Bradlee had been up and dressed for an hour, enjoying the fall colors out the windows. She saw him coming up the walk. “You ordered me,” he said. “And here I am.”
“Go away,” she said.
“I can’t,” he said. “I belong here now. You asked for me. I don’t have anyplace else to be.”
“Have you had breakfast?” she said.
“No,” he said.
“Come in,” she said. “I will feed you.” It was warm in the breakfast room, filled with morning sunlight. “Do you mind if I take off my coat?” he said. “Oh, no,” she answered. “Here, let me take it for you.” She took the lovely tweed coat and laid it across an empty chair. It was the cook’s day off. She fixed eggs and toast and juice. When he was finished he laid his fork and knife neatly along the edge of the plate. “If you’ll excuse me now,” he said. “I would like to use your bathroom.”
She led the way to the guest room. When he returned she suggested that they go to church. “Mr. Biggs, our choir director, has a special musicale this morning. After morning prayer. You might enjoy that.”
“It will be fine,” he said. “I’m sure I’ll think it’s just right.”
You should have seen the eyes when Mrs. Bradlee walked in with him, walked right up front to her regular pew and he helped her in and pulled down the prayer bench and knelt beside her. Thank you, she heard herself pray, you know I deserved this. The music was grand, clear and cold water running over stones. The whole church and all its people melded together by music, one big melodic pyramid. Afterwards, they stood outside and Mrs. Bradlee introduced him all around.
In the afternoon they took naps in their rooms, then went for a walk around the grounds, down to the lake, and back to the house. He walked at just the right rate of speed, not running ahead of her all the time like August did, saying can’t you keep up, if you didn’t talk so much you could keep up with me. Larry didn’t mind how much Mrs. Bradlee talked. He was interested in everything she said.
“How long are you staying?” she asked finally. It was after dinner. They were having coffee in the den. It seemed like the proper thing to say.
“How long did you want me for?” he asked. He was looking straight at her out of his dark blue eyes. He was looking at her as if there were no wrong answers.
“Let me think about it,” she said. “I’m still getting used to the idea.”
“Fine,” he said. “Whatever you say.”
“Where would you go if you left here? Where else would you be?”
“I wouldn’t be,” he said. “There is only here.”
“And you don’t mind?” she said.
“Why should I mind?” he answered. “That’s the way it is.”
“I’m going to bed now,” she said. “I need to sleep.”
“Good night then,” he said. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
In the morning it was Monday. She dressed before she went downstairs. They had breakfast. “Now you should go to work,” she said. “It’s Monday morning.”
“Fine,” he said. “I’ll be back at five thirty.”
“Take the blue car,” she said. “I don’t use it.”
“I will,” he said. “I like cars to be blue. It’s my favorite color.” After he was gone Mrs. Bradlee talked on the phone all morning. All her friends called her one by one. What’s he like, they asked. He likes blue, she answered. His favorite color is blue. Go fishing with us, Elsie Whitfield said. We might, Mrs. Bradlee answered. I’ll have to see. Do you want to? she asked him later. I don’t know, he said. Do you? I don’t think so, she said. It’s so messy. Find a nice way to tell them, he said. Don’t hurt their feelings.
Don’t you need some other clothes, she said. You might grow tired of that coat. That will be nice, he said. We’ll go shopping at the mall.
Many days went by. Many weeks. Christmas came and went. They gave each other gifts. He gave her a bracelet with her name inside. She gave him a bundle of fatwood sticks she ordered from Maine and a tiny sled containing a gold watch. He put it on. His wrist was so perfect. The hair lay so softly along the flesh. Mrs. Bradlee drew in her breath. For a moment she wanted to kiss his hand. God is love, she thought, and reached out to touch his hand instead. We might go to Switzerland for a month, she said. That would be nice, he said. I think that would be perfect.
In January the rain fell and the Pearl River rose and the cold came and stayed. It got into Mrs. Bradlee’s bones. She felt tired even in the mornings. Her appetite was not good. When she passed Larry in the hall she sighed. He was there every morning. He was there every afternoon. Every Friday she filled the blue car up with gasoline. Every month the bills came. Every morning after breakfast he disappeared into the guest room. It made her sick at her stomach to think what he did in there.
She began to be cold to him. She was quiet when they went on walks. She stopped telling him everything. After all, what had he ever told her? She was giving him all her stories. In return, all he knew was blue. Blue skies, blue, blue, blue.
“I think you should play the piano,” she told him one evening. “It would be a good idea for you to play.”
“I’m not a piano player,” he said. “That isn’t what you asked for.”
“You could learn, couldn’t you? You could take lessons.”
“I’ll try,” he said. “I’ll be glad to try.”
“It should sound like this,” she said. She took a Mozart sonata out of its cover and put it on the record player. It was sonata number 13 in B major, played by Wanda Landowska.
“But that’s a woman playing,” he said.
“It doesn’t matter,” Mrs. Bradlee said. “It’s all the same thing.”
He wasn’t any good at the piano. He took lessons for three months but nothing happened. His hands were better in his pockets. His hands were better taking the Maine fatwood and using it to light the library fires at night. They were nice laying his knife and fork across his plate after meals. They were too large for the piano or too stiff or too short. Something was wrong. You’re disappointed, aren’t you, he said at last. Yes, she answered, to tell the truth I am. I think you will have to leave soon. It isn’t a good idea anymore. You will have to find somewhere else to go.
How long should I stay, he asked. I don’t know the right amount of time.
Until Easter weekend, she said. That should be about right.
Maundy Thursday came. They met for breakfast without speaking of it. He looked pale. Eat, she said. You should eat before your journey.
On Good Friday they went to communion. He looks tired, Fanny Hawkins said to her. He looks like he needs a rest.
On Holy Saturday he walked all around the house, all day, out into the yard, and down along the river. He looked very beautiful, and light. He had not gone into the guest room after breakfast. He had barely eaten anything at all. Mrs. Bradlee was beginning to enjoy him again. He seemed so light, so easy to support.
Perhaps I’ll have him stay till summer, she thought, watching his progress across the yard; he was moving toward a line of dogwood trees set against the horizon. Three trees against a blue sky. Yes, I will tell him we will think it over.
The phone rang. It was the refrigerator repairman. What a time to call, she told him. Come Monday. Don’t worry about it now. It broke her concentration. She went back to her afghan. She was knitting an afghan to sell at a church bazaar. When Larry came in he walked by without speaking. He did not come down to dinner. I’ll talk to him later, she thought. The meal was heavy. She drank too much wine and fell asleep earlier than she expected.
In the morning she went to find him. Of course he was not there. She looked all over the house. She looked in all the closets. She looked in the basement and the wine cellar and the attic. She went out into the garage and looked in the blue car. She went to the guest room. She stood in the door. There was nothing there. The door to the guest-room powder room was open. I could look in there, she thought. But I’m not going to.
She went out into the hall and sat down on the stairs. She listened for the sound of footsteps. She thought about the stars. She said the alphabet over and over to herself. It was a trick she had practiced as a child to pass the time. After a while she went down to the library and got out the new catalogs and began to look through them. I might get a young woman this time, she thought. It was a gay thought. How brave, they would all say. A young woman with all the things that can go wrong. I would like a tall one with a long waist, she decided. Long legs and a long waist. A singing voice. Piano skills.