Chapter 3 Summary

The narrator rents an apartment in the historic part of Savannah and begins to explore his surroundings. He notices piano music constantly coming from the house next door, 16 East Jones Street, and sees visitors coming and going through the unlocked door. After he witnesses an elderly lady breaking the front door windows with a hammer, he decides to wait until he investigates the house further. He visits the Savannah Historical Society, and receives a brief Civil War history of Savannah. He discovers that the woman declared sane despite her love for the tango was a black woman, and finds that Martin Luther King, Jr., referred to Savannah as "the most desegregated city in the South."

The introduction to the house next door begins with a visit from Mandy Nichols, a beautiful, curvaceous singer. She is the girlfriend of Joe Odom, the owner of...