"She said what?" Waldo and Saifon was fighting their ways through two stewed beef baguettes. They was tasty, but hard work. "What gratitude did she get? That frigging drunk whore."
"It ain't easy Saifon, a single woman running a big factory like this."
"She ain't running shit. You and Snowy the accountant run Roundly's and you know it. Half the time she don't know what you're making here. Shoot. Ain't you mad Waldo?"
"You know? I got this feeling when I was in there. It come on me all of a sudden, like heartburn. It scared me some cause I wanted to hurt someone. It passed."
"You ever hurt anyone, Waldo?" He hesitated for a bit.
"Not deliberate." He felt a pang of guilt for saying that.
It was Saturday lunchtime. It would of been overtime day if Roundly's had ever had a union. A lot of things would of been different if Roundly's had a union. Waldo wouldn't of been robbed of his bonus for one. But Mr. Roundly and Mattfield had always been against that kind of thing.
Unions meant organization. Organization meant regimentation. Regimentation meant communism, and our brave boys was over there in Nam fighting to keep communism away from these shores. Sure wouldn't be right to encourage it in the factory.
-o-
Roundly's was burnt to the ground the following day. It was Sunday. Waldo and the other eight people in the chapel heard the scream of Bill Pocock's fire engine. They figured he was letting his son Scott play with the siren again.
Preacher Le Saux was always taxing the minds of his congregation, so when he asked,
"Anyone here smell the smoke?" they thought it was one of them spiritual questions. They thought he was referring to the 'smoke of lust' from the 'tobacco of sin', that kind of thing. So they answered together;
"We smell it. We smell it." Even though they didn't smell no actual smoke.
"No, I'm serious. Can you smell it?"
"We smell it. We smell it."
They was getting quite worked up now and the preacher was frustrated he couldn't make 'em understand that he really smelt smoke. He walked down amongst the flock.
"No. Listen. Hold your noses up and sniff." They held their noses up and broke off into spontaneous rapture.
"I smell your smoke, Lord."
"Puff on that sinful cigarette, sweet Jesus."
It was Waldo first made the connection between the spiritual smoke and the smoke that came floating in through the missing panes in the window.
"That really is smoke," he said.
"I smell it O' Lord. I smell it," said sister Floretta.
"Hold up, Floretta," that really is real smoke." He went over to the door and walked outside.
Eight blocks east, the Roundly's building belched black smoke up into the blue sky. There was flames of purple fire licking out through the windows. The grease and the bird nests all made the place real combustible. It was asking to get burnt down.
Waldo and the congregation stood behind the chapel, watching it burn. Wasn't one of 'em considered running on down there with a pail. Being Sunday, there wouldn't be no one in the plant. There weren't even a watchman. Desire had been too tight-assed to hire one. Funny thing was, even though the entire town depended on Roundly's for its income, there weren't one single person went to help put out the fire, other than Bill. But that was his job.
Some folks dragged their easy chairs into the garden and popped open a can or two. But no one went down there to get a closer look. I guess they was fearful they'd be blamed for setting the fire. A lot of 'em had thought about it. Anyway, the view was fine from most places cause Roundly's was in a dell, and the houses rose up away from it. There wasn't no homes close by, cause that was Roundly land, the land Mr. Roundly had put aside for extensions. There was real loud pops and cracks and stuff exploding, and the breeze brought up hints of just how frigging hot the fire had gotten.
By the time the real fire engines arrived from South Bend, Roundly's was already deceased. From outside, the big black walls didn't look much different. But the inside was gutted.
Waldo, sister Floretta, and preacher Le Saux had found a good spot on the chapel roof to watch the brave South Bend fire officers fight the smoldering embers. The preacher, apart from being an inspiration, was also a collector of town gossip. He looked at Waldo. Waldo looked at him.
"They're gonna blame you for this you know, Waldo."
"Me? Why would they wanna blame me, reverend?"
"Vengeance."
"Gainst Roundlys?"
"Gainst Desire in particular."
"You hear about that already, preacher? Heck. Vengeance ain't something I'm noted for. You know that."
"I know it, Waldo. But the investigators ain't gonna know it. Just you be careful."
"Yes, sir."