Free Rock of Ages by Howard Owen Page A

have to rebuild the school by the time they get all of ’em in there at the same time.” William laughs, then bangs on the window glass and yells at them to leave the cat alone. “You want him to bite you again? You want some more shots?” The children, a boy and a girl, stop momentarily to stare at their grandfather, then go back to their pursuit of the cat. The boy has a stick in his hand.
    William shakes his head.
    â€œSo, I expect you’re here for Miss Jenny’s stuff.”
    â€œI suppose so.”
    â€œI reckon we can get it all in that van. Nothing much of any size except the dresser, of course. Come on.”
    Georgia follows him into the hallway and eventually into a back room that is dark even in the middle of the day. William flips a light switch hidden away behind one of the many piles of cardboard boxes carelessly stacked and climbing high along every wall.
    â€œExcuse the mess,” he says. “It seems like we pack everything in here that we don’t know what to do with. Jenny’s stuff, or at least what all she left you, is over here.”
    He leads her to a far corner, through a narrow corridor bordered by more of the boxes. There sits the dresser, a homely pine construct to which age has not been kind. Someone, at some point, painted it a color of green not seen in nature. One of the four drawers has a knob missing. It might be considered, within the generous parameters of a modest farming community, an antique. Georgia knows she will have to take it or seem callous.
    â€œWe just put the letters and all the pictures and stuff in here,” William says, opening a middle drawer. “And the jewelry box.”
    The portrait of Jenny and Harold leans against the dresser. It was done more than 40 years ago, when they were both in their 30s. Georgia hasn’t really looked at it for many years, although it must have been in Jenny’s house during her infrequent visits. She is surprised at how young they look. Harold is thin with dark, wavy hair; he reminds her of John Garfield. Jenny’s curly blonde hair frames a face that seems almost free of worry lines. She looks happy.
    Georgia has heard the story many times:
    A man had come walking up their driveway, working his way along Route 47 from Port Campbell east, offering to do “artistic paintings” of couples, families, anything you want, for whatever he could get. The man came late on the same Thursday afternoon on which Harold had been paid 50 dollars—nearly a week’s salary at the sawmill—by Parker Vinson for the use of his land. Parker Vinson made moonshine and preferred not to make it on land he actually owned, choosing instead to give people like Harold McLaurin 50 dollars here and there for certain concessions. Once, a still was found and destroyed on Harold’s land, but no one had ever seen Harold near it. Actually, there were certain parts of the 120 acres he owned on the edge of Kinlaw’s Hell that Harold made certain he never set foot on. So, the portrait man’s timing was perfect. Harold paid him 20 dollars and a bed for the night in exchange for what had to have been a frivolous expenditure in eastern Scots County at a time when most people were more than happy to immortalize themselves via photography. It was the year before their son was run over by the train, and Jenny wanted Wallace in the painting, too, but Harold said no, he wanted this one to be just the two of them. It was a small thing. How could Harold know? But Jenny blamed him for that more than she did some of his larger, more obvious failings in years to come.
    Georgia pulls the portrait out into the dim light of the naked overhead bulb.
    â€œI can’t believe Jenny and Harold were ever this young,” she says as much to herself as to William Blackwell, who only grunts.
    William gets his second son, Ike, to help him move enough boxes so that they can get the dresser out. Georgia brings the