Chap­ter 23: Bernice’s Bible begins in the thick woods behind a jook joint where Fat­ty, engrossed in the mechan­i­cal intri­ca­cies of an old con­vert­ible, is inter­rupt­ed by Rusty’s shout. His sis­ter, Ber­nice, had arrived, and Fatty’s imme­di­ate reac­tion was one of skep­ti­cism. He wasn’t sure why she was there, but the men­tion of a vis­it from her set the tone for what would unfold. Fat­ty, lean­ing over the car’s hood, was knee-deep in the idea of sell­ing the old vehi­cle he had found behind a demol­ished house. Although uncer­tain of its exact make, he had hope that it might be worth some­thing, per­haps enough to pro­vide him with the “get-out-of-town” mon­ey he’d dreamed about. Yet, as he stepped onto the porch to meet Ber­nice, it became clear that she had more than just fam­i­ly busi­ness on her mind.

Sit­ting down beside his sis­ter, Fat­ty was tak­en aback by the change in her demeanor. For years, their rela­tion­ship had been strained—much of it stem­ming from dis­putes about their father’s estate, and a grow­ing dis­tance between them as their lives veered in dif­fer­ent direc­tions. While he had cho­sen a life of rough liv­ing, includ­ing sell­ing booze from the jook joint, Ber­nice had fall­en into a stricter, more moral path, one that involved rais­ing her chil­dren and cling­ing to reli­gious faith. The years had trans­formed her; the once vibrant and promis­ing woman was now a moth­er with a brood of chil­dren and an increas­ing­ly rigid world­view. The con­ver­sa­tion turned to their father, and Fat­ty, though dis­mis­sive of Bernice’s con­cerns about the past, couldn’t ignore the ten­sion that lin­gered between them. Ber­nice had some­thing for him—a “gift,” as she called it—and though Fat­ty was ini­tial­ly unin­ter­est­ed, the men­tion of mon­ey piqued his curios­i­ty.

The con­ver­sa­tion took a sharp turn when Ber­nice brought up their father’s past deal­ings with the local Jew­ish com­mu­ni­ty. She ques­tioned Fat­ty about the water pipes their father had laid years ago, around the Hayes and Franklin area, and the deep­er con­nec­tion it had with the church. Bernice’s inquiry revealed a poten­tial link to hid­den assets, some­thing Fat­ty wasn’t pre­pared to con­front. This rev­e­la­tion spurred a more com­plex con­ver­sa­tion between the two. Despite their estrange­ment, the top­ic of their father’s unfin­ished busi­ness seemed to weave them back togeth­er, even if only momen­tar­i­ly. The mys­tery sur­round­ing the pipes, the well, and the prop­er­ty hint­ed at a deep­er, more impor­tant matter—one that could shift the course of Fatty’s life.

Fatty’s skep­ti­cism about the pack­age Ber­nice had brought, assum­ing it was yet anoth­er Bible, reflect­ed his long­stand­ing dis­mis­sive­ness toward her attempts to mor­al­ize. He had lit­tle patience for reli­gious talk and even less for the reminder of his past. Yet, as Ber­nice placed the pack­age on the bench and made clear it was not anoth­er Bible, Fatty’s curios­i­ty began to grow. With his eyes nar­row­ing, he asked, “Does that pack­age have four hun­dred dol­lars in it?” The exchange high­light­ed not just the strained sib­ling dynam­ic but also the latent hope that something—anything—could alter the course of his mun­dane exis­tence.

As they talked, Fat­ty real­ized that his life, much like the aban­doned car in the woods, was filled with for­got­ten oppor­tu­ni­ties, old hopes, and the ghosts of past deci­sions. The years of resent­ment between him and Ber­nice had cloud­ed his judg­ment. How­ev­er, in this moment, the men­tion of mon­ey and the mys­tery sur­round­ing his father’s work seemed to offer a poten­tial escape from his stag­na­tion. The idea of a well-hid­den beneath the dirt, lit­er­al­ly and fig­u­ra­tive­ly, served as a metaphor for the oppor­tu­ni­ties buried under years of bit­ter­ness and regret.

In this chap­ter, the empha­sis on Fatty’s chang­ing atti­tude toward his sis­ter and his father’s lega­cy offers valu­able insight into the com­plex­i­ties of fam­i­ly rela­tion­ships and unspo­ken his­to­ry. As the sto­ry unfolds, the read­er is led to con­sid­er the deep-seat­ed emo­tion­al and finan­cial bur­dens that many car­ry with­out acknowl­edg­ing them. The unre­solved ten­sions, both famil­ial and eco­nom­ic, are part of a larg­er nar­ra­tive about her­itage, strug­gle, and the pur­suit of redemp­tion or sim­ply sur­vival. The mys­tery of the water pipes and the poten­tial trea­sure buried beneath them rep­re­sents the pos­si­bil­i­ties that remain even when the past feels like a weight too heavy to bear.

As Fat­ty strug­gles with his con­flict­ing emotions—resentment, guilt, and the allure of a fresh start—readers are remind­ed of the impor­tance of fac­ing the past to tru­ly move for­ward. This chap­ter invites con­tem­pla­tion on the themes of lega­cy, per­son­al growth, and the choic­es that define one’s future. It is a reminder that, while some aspects of life may seem set in stone, there are always hid­den paths, wait­ing to be uncov­ered, that could lead to a new begin­ning.