Fonzo and Virgil spend their first hours in Memphis wandering the main streets, looking for a hotel they can afford. In addition to the Gayoso, which has its own entry, they look in the door of another, unnamed hotel, they walk past "frame houses and junk yards," and near Miss Reba's they see "a row of automobile sales-rooms" (191).
According to Clarence Snopes, who cites the Jackson newspaper as his source, Temple Drake is staying "with an aunt" in Michigan after leaving college (176). Apparently the Drake family creates this fiction to cover the fact that Temple has disappeared.
Horace Benbow tells Aunt Jenny about the sermon that "the Baptist minister" preaches the first Sunday after Lee Goodwin is arrested. Horace was not present at the church in person, so it's not clear how he heard about it, but he emphasizes the unforgivingly judgmental nature of the sermon. Jenny replies, "They're just Baptists" (128).
