The Talisman

anger, and forsake wrath:
    fret not thyself in any wise to do evil.
    For evildoers shall be cut off:
    but those that wait upon the Lord,
    they shall inherit his Territory.’
    Sunlight Gardener closed the Book.
    ‘May God,’ he said, ‘add His blessing to the reading of His Holy Word.’
    He looked down at his hands for a long, long time. In Casey’s glass booth, the wheels of the tape recorder turned. Then he looked up again, and in his mind Jack suddenly heard this man scream: Not the Kingsland? You don’t mean to tell me you’ve overturned a full wagonload of Kingsland Ale, you stupid goat’s penis? You don’t mean to tell me that, do yoooooouuuuuuu?
    Sunlight Gardener studied his young male congregation closely and earnestly. Their faces looked back at him – round faces, lean faces, bruised faces, faces flaring with acne, faces that were sly, and faces that were open and youthful and lovely.
    ‘What does it mean , boys? Do you understand Psalm Thirty-seven? Do you understand this lovely, lovely song?’
    No , their faces said – sly and open, clear and sweet, pitted and poxed. Not too much, only got as far as the fifth grade, been on the road, been on the bum, been in trouble . . . tell me . . . tell me . . .
    Suddenly, shockingly, Gardener shrieked into the mike, ‘It means DON’T SWEAT IT!’
    Wolf recoiled, moaning a little.
    ‘Now you know what that means, don’t you? You boys have heard that one, haven’t you?’
    ‘ Yeah! ’ someone shouted from behind Jack.
    ‘ OH - YEAH! ’ Sunlight Gardener echoed, beaming. ‘DON’T SWEAT IT! NEGATIVE PERSPIRATION! They are good words, aren’t they, boys? Those are some kind of gooooood words, OH-YEAH!’
    ‘Yeah! . . . YEAH!’
    ‘This Psalm says you don’t have to WORRY about the evildoers! NO SWEAT! OH - YEAH! It says you don’t have to WORRY about the workers of sin and iniquity! NEGATIVE PERSPIRATION! This Psalm here says that if you WALK the Lord and TALK the Lord, EVERYTHING’S GONNA BE SO COOL! Do you understand that, boys? Do you have an understanding ear for that?’
    ‘Yeah!’
    ‘ Hallelujah! ’ Heck Bast cried, grinning divinely.
    ‘ Amen! ’ a boy with a great lazy eye behind his magnifying spectacles returned.
    Sunlight Gardener took the mike with practiced ease, and Jack was again reminded of a Las Vegas lounge performer. Gardener began to walk back and forth with nervous, mincing rapidity. He sometimes did a jigging little half-step in his clean white leather shoes; now he was Dizzy Gillespie, now Jerry Lee Lewis, now Stan Kenton, now Gene Vincent; he was in a fever of jive Godhead testimony.
    ‘Naw, you don’t have to fear! Ah, naw! You don’t have to fear that kid who wants to show you dirty-book pictures! You don’t have to fear that boy who says just one toke on just one joint won’t hurt you and you’ll be a sissy if you don’t take it! Ah, naw! ’CAUSE WHEN YOU GOT THE LORD YOU GONNA WALK WITH THE LORD, AM RIGHT?’
    ‘YEAH!!!’
    ‘OH-YEAH! AND WHEN YOU GOT THE LORD YOU GONNA TALK WITH THE LORD, AM I RIGHT?’
    ‘YEAH!’
    ‘I CAN’T HEAR YOU, AM I RIGHT?’
    ‘YEAH!!!’ They screamed it out, many of them rocking back and forth in a frenzy now.
    ‘IF I’M RIGHT SAY HALLELUJAH!’
    ‘HALLELUJAH!’
    ‘IF I’M RIGHT SAY OH-YEAH!’
    ‘OH-YEAH!’
    They rocked back and forth; Jack and Wolf were rocked with them, helplessly. Jack saw that some of the boys were actually weeping.
    ‘Now tell me this,’ Gardener said, looking toward them warmly and confidentially. ‘Is there any place for the evildoer here in the Sunlight Home? Huh? What do you think?’
    ‘No sir !’ cried out the thin boy with the buck teeth.
    ‘That’s right,’ Sunlight Gardener said, approaching the podium again. He gave the mike a quick, professional flick to clear the cord out from under his feet and then he slipped it back into the clamp again. ‘That’s the ticket. No room here for tattletale liars and workers of iniquity, say hallelujah.’
    ‘Hallelujah,’ the boys replied.
    ‘Amen,’ Sunlight Gardener agreed. ‘The Lord says – in the Book of Isaiah he says it – that if you lean on the Lord, you’re gonna mount up – oh-yeah! – with wings as eagles, and your strength shall be the strength of ten and I say to you, boys, THAT THE SUNLIGHT HOME IS A NEST FOR EAGLES, CAN YOU SAY OH-YEAH!’
    ‘OH-YEAH!’
    There was another caesura. Sunlight Gardener gripped the sides of the podium, head down as if in