Distant+Whispers

plant, with its thick green leaves covering everything high and everything low. It is like everything
else in the Low Country, a thin veneer of beauty and beneath, festering decay. Here, the small rivers
and creeks leak into the rich earth, forming misty swamps, covered by miles of stiff bamboo,
sweetgrass and the gooey, gripping decay of exhausted life.
Once that Sampit River Bridge is crossed, even the educated, the least superstitious, believe the
eerie stories whispered in South Carolina Low Country: that life still talks to death, that the things
below are in communion with the things above, that the shadows dash from one tree to another,
peering out at those who dare to look.
* * *
Evangelist Pat’s white trailer sat on cinder blocks thirty yards off Highway 17. Silver awnings
stretched its entire length. Yellow and purple flowers grew in a rectangular garden that was bordered
by red bricks embedded in the ground at forty-five degree angles. A young oak tree, no more than a
hundred years old, provided shade in the small front yard. Spanish moss hung from its branches like
the beards of Chinese elders.
A salty ocean breeze blew in from the bay, whistling through the pine trees, crossing highway 17
and caressing the modest brick home of Toni which sat facing that of her evangelist friend.
Hers was a small ranch home, surrounded by waist high bushes on three sides of the house. On
one side of her house was a covered patio used to park her car. Next to her carved wooden front door
was a small screened in porch. Her grassy front yard was unobstructed by any trees and exposed all
of her business to any car passing by.
Mikell was amazed at the space inside of the double-wide trailer. Three bedrooms! Nevertheless,
he chose to sleep on the plush couch that dominated the living room area. The bedroom with the
largest bed was decorated with colorful flowered curtains. The bed was intricately made up with
fringed sheets and quilts and pillowcases. An antique nightstand was covered with lace and contained
a bowl of scented soap. It was like a Norman Rockwell painting showing a slice of the perfect
American life. Mikell would have preferred to sleep on the floor rather than disturb a thing in that
meticulously decorated room. If anything fell out of place, he wouldn’t know how to put it back where
it belonged.
The two smaller rooms were less accented but the walls were covered with religious pictures.
On one wall hung a three dimensional picture of a glowing Jesus whose eyes seemed to follow your
every move. Wooden plaques, covered by shiny dark shellac, were arrayed upon another wall. Each
one contained a scripture from the Bible. Everything seemed arranged just so. Mikell felt
uncomfortable in touching anything. Neither did he want to wake up having the Son of God staring at
him from any corner of the room. The couch would do just fine.
He kicked off his shoes and stretched out on the plush sofa. His body succumbed quickly to the
six-hour time difference between Germany and the American South. He closed his eyes and drifted
off to the music of the blue warblers perched in the broad leaved maple trees outside of his window.
* * *
Toni was confused as she pleaded into the telephone. “Daddy, why won’t you speak to him? I told
him that you would help him, daddy...What?...What does that mean?...He’s German? I don’t
understand what you’re saying!...No, I don’t! I don’t understand it at all…What?...Wait a minute,