The Second Coming

any people on earth, yet how kind and gentle and loving they are to each other! And happy! When I would come to the village little children would run out laughing with joy to see me, take me by the hand and lead me around the village to visit the old and the sick and the blind—and they were even happier to see me than the children! They believed me! They believed the Gospel whole and entire, and the teachings of the church. They said that if I told them, then it must be true or I would not have gone to so much trouble. During my absence betrothed couples remained continent and cheerful of their own volition.” He sat back and looked up timidly. The bleb on his lip inflated.
    â€œRight!” cried Will Barrett. In his excitement he had risen from his chair and started around the desk. “Tell me something, Father. Do you believe that Christ will come again and that in fact there are certain unmistakable signs of his coming in these very times?”
    By now Father Weatherbee had also risen and had sidled past, keeping the desk between them, nodding and smiling. If only he could get back to the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe and the lonesome whistle of the Seaboard Air Line, the only things in all of America he recognized.
    Will Barrett stopped the old priest at the door and gazed into his face. The bad eye spun and the good eye looked back at him fearfully: What do you want of me? What do I want of him, mused Will Barrett, and suddenly realized he had gripped the old man’s wrists as if he were a child. The bones were like dry sticks. He let go and fell back. For some reason the old man did not move but looked at him with a new odd expression. Will Barrett thought about Allie in her greenhouse, her wide gray eyes, her lean muscled boy’s arms, her strong quick hands. His heart leapt with a secret joy. What is it I want from her and him, he wondered, not only want but must have? Is she a gift and therefore a sign of a giver? Could it be that the Lord is here, masquerading behind this simple silly holy face? Am I crazy to want both, her and Him? No, not want, must have. And will have.

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    This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
    copyright © 1980 by Walker Percy
    cover design by Jason Gabbert
    ISBN: 978-1-4532-1628-6
    This edition published in 2011 by Open Road Integrated Media
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