Read Online Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt - Free Book Online Page A

the least bit concerned. “Well, now you know something about us,” he said. “Tell us about yourself.”
    I said I was a writer from New York.
    “Ah, then you must be the new Yankee I’ve been hearing about. Nothing escapes our notice, you know. Savannah’s a real small town. It’s so small everybody knows everybody else’s business, which can be a pain, but it also means we know who all the undercover cops are, which can be a plus. Now, as for you, I should tell you that you’ve already aroused a fair amount of curiosity. People think you’re writing an exposé about Savannah, so they’re a little wary of you. You don’t need to fret about that, though. Secretly they all hope you’ll put them in your book.” Joe laughed and winked.
    “Savannah’s a peculiar place, but if you just listen to your Cousin Joe you’ll get along fine. You need to know about a few basic rules though.
    “Rule number one:
Always stick around for one more drink.
That’s when things happen. That’s when you find out everything you want to know.”
    “I think I can live with that one,” I said.
    “Rule number two:
Never go south of Gaston Street.
A true Savannahian is a NOG. NOG means ‘north of Gaston.’ We stay in the old part of town. We don’t do the Mall. We don’t do the southside unless we’re invited to a party for rich people out at The Landings. Everything south of Gaston Street is North Jacksonville to us, and ordinarily we leave it alone.
    “Rule number three:
Observe the high holidays—Saint Patrick’s Day and the day of the Georgia-Florida football game.
Savannah has the third-biggest Saint Patrick’s Day parade in America. People come from all over the South to see it. Businesses close for the day, except for restaurants and bars, and the drinking starts at about six A.M. Liquor is a major feature of the Georgia-Florida game, too, but the similarity ends there. The game is nothing less than a war between the gentlemen of Georgia and the Florida barbarians. We get all keyed up for it a weekahead of time, and then afterwards it takes a week to ten days to deal with the emotional strain of having won or lost. Georgia men grow up understanding the seriousness of that one game.”
    “Georgia women grow up understanding it too,” said Mandy. “Ask any girl in south Georgia. She’ll tell you flat out: You don’t start wearing panty hose until
after
the Georgia-Florida game.” I felt myself becoming a fast friend of Joe and Mandy.
    “So, look here,” Joe said. “Now that you’ve come under our protective custody, we’ll be unhappy with you if you need anything and don’t ask for it, or if you get into trouble and don’t holler.”
    Mandy climbed into Joe’s lap and nuzzled his ear.
    “Just make sure you put us in your book,” he said. “You understand, of course, that we’ll want to play ourselves in the movie version. Won’t we, Mandy?”
    “Mm-hmmm,” she said.
    Joe played a few bars of “Hooray for Hollywood” (another Johnny Mercer tune).
    “In that book of yours,” he said, “you can use my real name if you want to. Or you can just call me the ‘Sentimental Gentleman from Georgia,’ because that’s pretty much who I am.
    I’m just a sentimental gentleman from Georgia, Georgia,
Gentle to the ladies all the time.
And when it comes to lovin’ I’m a real professor,
Yes sir!
Just a Mason-Dixon valentine.
    Oh, see those Georgia peaches
Hangin’ around me now.
’Cause what this baby teaches nobody else knows how.
This sentimental gentleman from Georgia, Georgia,
Gentle to the ladies all the time.
    Joe sang with such winsome charm, I had to remind myself that he was the same person who had tapped into the electricity of the house next door and who was, by his own admission,dodging process servers for financial transgressions of God-knew-what proportion. His ingratiating manner made everything he did seem like good-natured fun. Later, as he saw me to the door, he joked and bantered