The Disappearance of Jack Dawkin!

Reflections and Observations -- A Bright Passage from the Fantasies of Youth 

to Illuminations of Advanced Maturity!

This Episode:       

THE DISAPPEARANCE OF JACK DAWKIN!

Folks in Rawbone, Texas called him “The Mercantile Man.”  He owned and operated the general store, and provided all manner of goods and supplies for the town folk, ranchers and

farmers too who lived within a 40-mile radius.  He was always up and at his store mostly before anyone else in the town was astir, and this morning was no exception.  Rawbone was situated almost exactly at these latitudinal and longitudinal coordinates…. 32°54′26″N 96°38′7″W.

Dawn had begun painting the sky various shades of muted grey and blue, then as the morning moved closer to full daybreak, its canvas was splashed with brilliant shades of orange, gold and blue.  It was going to be a fine but hot summer day.  Buford Anders was a short, round man of probable Scandinavian ancestry, though he had no ideas why his forebears settled in this remote part of Texas, and where they’d truly been born.  He wore thick spectacles, and always dressed in white shirt, black string tie, garters at mid sleeve, a striped apron always tied around his abundant middle.  His balding head looked like a melon on which ice cream was scooped, then melted in the sun’s heat and dripping its color down its back and sides, creating a brown and white fringe behind and in front of Anders’ large, pendulous ears. 

A daily obsession just prior to its opening, he swept the front porch of his store.  The wooden surface lay exactly four steps above the surface of the road and just beneath the large hand-painted sign that read, “Buford Anders, Proprietor.”  Soon his customers would begin to appear, to climb those four steps, eager to book or make their purchases of coffee, beans, flour, kegs of nails and other goods, necessities for life on the plains of Texas.  

And then, a faint sound broke the morning calm and caused Anders to stop and turn his bulk toward the long road leading into the town.

“What the…,” he exclaimed, as he squinted and  followed the progress of the oncoming sound.  Slow and rhythmic clopping of hooves increased like the growing drama of an orchestra’s building crescendo.  “What the devil,” Anders murmured.  “I think I know that horse.  Why the deuce is it empty?  The saddle, those conchos…. That’s Cowboy Jack Dawkin’s horse and saddle.  Where the hell is Jack.  Where’s that guitar he always carries, tied to his bedroll?  Rifle’s gone too.  I gotta go get the sheriff.  No way a man as tough and able as Jack Dawkin should lose his horse.”

Wasn’t long before the sheriff appeared, and then several of Rawbone’s citizens as well, as the town began to wake up, loud and lively, horses and buckboards and foot traffic clamoring along its dusty roads.  “Can’t figure it,” the sheriff said.  “Could be Jack was waylaid by Indians, maybe road agents!?  I think I’d better gather up a few of the fellers, a posse like, and go out to look for him.  Aint like a man of his abilities to lose his horse, and himself.  And the geetar!  Where the hell’s that geetar ‘o his’n?”

“Weren’t he a gunslinger at one time, a gambler maybe….  Oh, I think I remembers!  A Indian fighter, too, maybe…?” Asked Hickory Hank Suggins to no one in particular.  Suggins was the town character, just raised like the dead from his drunken slumber and smelling like the horse stable he slept in and the cheap whiskey that kept him permanently inebriated.  Women stared at Suggins with their usual disgust and contempt, staying appropriately downwind.  “I better get to the saloon,” he mumbled, shambling away from the Anders store toward the other end of Rawbone’s main street.

Sheriff Hubert “Handlebars” Pickins wasted no time in deputizing a few of the locals, merchants and cow punchers, to ride with him in search of Jack Dawkin.  “Handlebars” owing to the enormous mustaches that divided his face into two distinct territories.  Among the posse members was Bearclaw Batisse, a half Potawatomi sometime army scout who could track a man straight to hell and back if he had to.  Batisse was a dark-skinned, fine looking man, strong and fit.  He could run miles effortlessly as another, lesser man might do merely walking a hundred yards.  His face wore the blending of his mixed parentage.  Women secretly admired him, his quiet dignity and dark good looks.    

Mavis Pickins, the sheriff’s only daughter had come to Anders’ store with the parson’s wife, Mrs. Mildred Bickel.  “I sure hope he’s not dead somewheres,” said Mavis, as the talk about Jack’s mysteriously riderless horse continued.  “He’s such a fine singer and guitar picker.  Handsomest man in north central Texas to boot!  He loved to sing about all things Texas, made

up many of the tunes he sang, I’m told.”

“Wish he were a church-goin’ feller,” said Mrs. Bickel.  “Would make such a fine addition to the choir in our little church…  if he’s isn’t deceased, of course.”  She sighed audibly, as did Mavis Pickins, each for a very different reason.  Both women watched as the sheriff and his posse rode away.  As the horsemen trotted off a great cloud of dust gathered behind and seemed to swallow them up, like a huge grey-brown beast devouring its prey.  

   

The posse headed in an easterly direction from where the horse had entered the town.  About five miles out, Batisse halted the horsemen, and then dismounted, peering at the ground.  On his knees he scanned the earth looking for signs, got up, sniffed the air and went round the other side of a giant granite boulder.  “There’s the remains of a campfire here,” Batisse announced to the posse, all the them still mounted.  “But I see no tracks leading to or from this campsite.  Can’t figure it.  It’s too unmarked, too clean.  No blood.  No trace of a struggle.  No tracks.  Darn’dest think I’ve seen in all my days of tracking man and beast.”  The men

searched everywhere they figured Jack could have been or gone, scouring a 10-mile area from all points around the center of Rawbone.  Nothing!  No signs, or clues.  No tracks.

In time the Sheriff, Batisse and the posse returned to the town, to their homes or shops or places of business.  Jack was plum gone, disappeared.  Jack’s disappearance happened in the year 1859.  Something like a year passed with no word or sign of Cowboy Jack Dawkin.  And then something strange, almost mystical began to occur in Rawbone.  Late at night, people swore they’d hear unmistakeable singing and guitar strumming, and the soft sounds of hoof beats moving from east to west along the main street of town.  

People said they heard the music of Texas each late night for a long time.  And each night some folks would dash to their windows to try to see the ghost of Cowboy Jack Dawkin, but no one ever saw anything but a star lit dusty road and stuff the wind blew by;  nothing more.

******************************************************************************

In the passage of time, the railroad tracked well north of Rawbone, while the stage line traveled some 20 miles to the south of the old town.  Things would change eventually, but not for the people of Rawbone.  In time there wasn’t even the ghost of a town, not the bones or skeletons of town buildings.  The entirety of Rawbone seems to have been carried off on the shoulders of the wind, with nothing but dust and tumbleweeds left to memorialize a once proud and thriving community.

Some folks claim that Garland, Texas, settled for the most part in 1874 and incorporated as a city in 1891, is situated at the epicenter of what was once Rawbone.  In present day Garland there’s a fine community theatre.  Some of its players and crew members claim they can sometimes hear the strains of Texas-loving tunes, over the haunting and beautiful melodies of a finely tuned guitar, sung by the specter of a singing cowboy.   

Humbly Submitted -- 12-20-18 by Joel K.

Murder Mystery... Chapter Four... "A Final Assault"!

Reflections and Observations -- A Bright Passage from the Fantasies of Youth 

to Illuminations of Advanced Maturity!

This Episode:    A Possible Murder Mystery...  Just Trying it Out, Sort of...

Chapter Four — Mavis and Leonard - A Final Assault!

       Leonard, day bar manager of the famous and highly successful Beech Tree and Basswood Inn, arrived early to perform his usual duties.  It was a Friday, and Leonard habitually preferred a bit of a head start on this typically very busy day at the end of the workweek.  He set up the back bar in his usual manner, confident, or perhaps merely cautiously hopeful, the day would be uneventful.

About 45 minutes following Leonard’s arrival, Jack Roskov, barback and now “assistant chief daytime bartender” as well, reported to work.  Jack had been on the job for a period, at the time, of about three months.  He’d proved himself competent, and the staff grew to accept him as a valued member of the service crew.  “Hey Leonard, how you doing?  I’ll just start filling the coolers, unless you have something else for me to do.” 

“Go to it,” Leonard said.  “I’m OK here.  Got things well in hand.”

Jack said, “Hey, wait a second.  Is that a clip-on black tie you’re wearing?  Did you take some good advice, you know, in case of a Mavis incident?”

“No chance of that,” said Leonard.  “It’s just easier.  I mean, this type of tie.  And besides, I understand she’s on some sort of holiday travel, at least that’s what I hear from a friend of hers who lives in my neighborhood.  I think, I hope she’s had enough of her crazy tirades.  I think she’s accepted things.  I mean, the divorce.  She won’t show up.  I sort of promised Mr. Cruickshank we’ve seen the last of Mavis and her explosive antics!”

If indeed she had been away on holiday, it must have ended, or maybe it never actually occurred.  Just before noon, Mavis stumbled in, already well on her way to an extravagant state of inebriation.  

“Christ, she’s drunk as a boiled owl,” said Jack in a whisper.  “Hello, Mrs. Hoaglund.  How are we today?”

“Shut yer goddamned button and get the hell out of my way,” she shouted and snarled at the approaching Jack.  She didn’t ask for a drink.  No sane bartender would have served her one in any case.  

“Mavis,” Leonard began preemptively, “please just be calm.  Let’s talk. Please don’t behave in an unseemly manner.  There are customers at the bar, and…” 

“You can stick your ‘unseemly’ right up your ass,” spat Mavis, her eyes blazing.  She immediately climbed up on the bar rail as a stupefied Leonard stared in disbelief.  Too quick for him to react or move away, Mavis grabbed hold of Leonard’s tie.  Yanking and releasing the clip-on from Leonard’s collar, the unexpected action sent her backward.  She nearly fell as she slipped off the bar rail, but managed to maintain her balance, a remarkable feat in her condition.

“You rotten goddamned bassoon,” she screamed at the hapless Leonard.  Reacting more quickly than Jack thought possible for someone in her boozy condition, she practically leapt back onto the bar rail. 

“I think she meant to say, ‘baboon’,” said Jack in a quiet voice, directing the comment to a man seated at the bar, one of several shocked patrons.  The man’s eyes became enormous white poker chips, his mouth agape, as he stared transfixed at the crazy unfolding mayhem.

“I heard that, you wormy little shit!”  Mavis aimed the comment at Jack, like a poison dart.  The bar patron stared back and forth, at Mavis, then at Jack, then back to Leonard as if viewing a tennis match that had deteriorated into a violent melee, like an athletic contest turned into a one-sided battle, an assault laced with deadly venom.   
    

Above illustrations shown to depict
the difference between a bassoon
and a baboon!  

Unfortunately for Leonard, the cored and peeled lemons and sliced limes remained on the cutting board easily within her reach.  Within moments, Leonard seemed to morph into a rigid statue on which a flock of angry pigeons had unleashed its collective discharge, one of pulpy splatter, juice and seeds.  The assault, as had occurred a few times previously, was over in moments, and Mavis stormed from the barroom.  As she exited in a drunken, serpentine path, she passed by Jack delivering an elbow to his chest, sending him reeling into the aforementioned bar patron.  The man seemed not to notice, still goggle-eyed in a kind of shocked fascination.

Watching her departure with just his eyes pointed leftward, Leonard came back to himself, no longer the immoveable petrified statue.  “I thought she was out of town,” he said somewhat obliquely, still a bit stiff with astonishment.  He picked up a few bar towels, and headed for the employee wash and locker room.  

Another of the patrons, this man a bit less stupefied compared to the fellow with the poker-chip eyeballs, chuckled nervously.  “I take it that wasn’t staged for our amusement,” he said to no one in particular.  “Holy flaming shit, what a crazy damn spectacle!  Insane!  Holy flaming shit,” he repeated  The entire scene, witnessed from the onset, or eventually in process, by a number of bar and hotel staffers, was reported dutifully to Mr. Cruikshank, the general manager, by “Florence of Arabia” the salad chef.  For reasons never really made clear to Jack or his co-staffers, Florence disliked Leonard with a certain intensity.

“Unrequited love?” Jack mused, when he learned that Florence had informed on Leonard. “Poor old Leonard,” Jack murmured to himself.  “What the hell will happen now?”   
     

Later that same day, just before his day shift ended, Leonard was summoned to the office of the general manager.  Cruikshank’s discomfort was obvious to Leonard as he entered the GM’s office.  Cruikshank was, as usual, immaculately attired and groomed, his thin blond hair so neatly in place as to seem almost artificially attached to his head by a make-up professional.  He wore, as he normally did, a lightly colored suit and matching necktie.  The GM was a pleasant-

looking man.  His oval face was pale and relatively unlined, blue eyed and with a straight nose and wide mouth.  His features worked well to fashion a handsome composite.  He was thin and always presented himself with excellent posture, as if disciplined by a Marine Corps drill sergeant.  

Cruikshank stiffened as if coming to attention, and peered at Leonard over half-moon spectacles.  “Lenny,” he began, “please sit down.  I’m sorry to say this won’t be an easy conversation.  We’ve been friends a long time.”  And then came the inevitable “however” part.  “I simply cannot have this fine hotel, it’s reputation, sullied by the kind of… well, irrational and thoroughly uncomfortable…. I mean, of course, for our clientele…. behavior of your ex-wife, by Mavis.  I believe the best thing to do, at this juncture, is for you to move on.  That is, for you to find a different place to tend bar.  I can help you with that.  As I’m sure you know, I know a good many people in the hospitality business.  I can help you find a new position quickly.  Perhaps just until she, Mavis, can put the matter of your divorce at rest.  Until she finds peace.  I just don’t know what else we can do.  Perhaps at some point you can come back here to work.  I know you’re an intelligent person, Lenny.  I hope you can understand and accept my position in this matter.”

“Of course,” said Leonard.  “I get it, I understand perfectly.  I know you’ve been more than merely tolerant, Herbie.  If you can just give me a week or so, I’ll get things in order.  I’ll find a different job.  I hear they’re looking for an experienced man at the Red Goose.  You probably do too, but I know the owner.  I’ll talk to him; I’ll give him a call this evening.”  Leonard and Cruikshank shook hands and parted amicably.  

Needing a friend of a different sort, Leonard asked Jack to join him after work at the

nearby Margarita Port, a bar they both frequented, sometimes before but mainly after they had finished their day shifts.  The place had the look of a reasonably authentic, if posh, Mexican cantina.  

  “I’ve been asked to leave the Inn,” Leonard began.  “I’m sure it’s for the best.  Perhaps she won’t find me, Mavis I mean, and maybe if and when she does, that insane anger of hers will have ended."

“I wish I could have helped,” said Jack.  “Wish I could have prevented this latest episode.”

“Glad you didn’t do anything to interfere.  She’s nuts.  She would have sued you, taken you to court.  No.  Best to let the thing run its course.”

“Her law suit would have netted her a bag of salted peanuts, not much else,” said Jack.  Both men laughed heartedly, and ordered another round of margaritas.  They chatted amiably into the early evening about adventures and misadventures, relationships both sweet and tragic.  The conversation wandered on, each consuming an impressive number of the salt-rimmed conconctions as their moods softened, laughter and cheer supplanting gloom and apprehension.

   

************************************

Some 30 days or so passed uneventfully following Leonard’s departure from the Beech Tree and Basswood Inn.  Leonard was suitably ensconced at the Red Goose tavern.  The regulars had come to accept him, to enjoy his sense of humor and his easygoing manner.  The Red Goose was located in a kind of rural setting in suburban Redmond, Washington, a good distance from his former place of employment.  A kind of architectural oddity, the building that housed the Red Goose sported large, plate glass windows on either side of its main entrance.  Both windows and doorway sat at street level.  The configuration proved to be a significant misfortune for Leonard and the bar’s owner, one Charley Stackpole, a friendly man in his mid-sixties and a career-long saloon keeper. 

Early one very pleasant mid-autumn evening, a late model Buick purposely drove into and nearly through one of the plate glass windows, causing it to shatter violently with a terrific noise that sent a full house of bar patrons at the Red Goose into near panic.  The car was driven by Mavis.  She exited the vehicle, cautiously in spite of her apparent drunkenness, walked  

Not the exact one, but a good likeness
of the Buick Mavis drove!

unsteadily to the bar, and began to launch her fists, glassware and anything else she could find at and toward the hapless Leonard, breaking a fine piece of mirror on the antique back bar as the “final great assault” ensued.  It was like an unexpected firefight in a brutal mayhem film, one that had the effect of propelling viewers out of their seats and causing every palm to tingle and sweat.

A couple of patrons, both nicely inebriated, tried in vain to grab hold of Mavis toward the end of this latest mad onslaught.  Ever the clever eel, slippery and elusive, Mavis managed to dodge and weave her way from the bar and through the space that was once a proud plate glass window and jump into her car with extraordinary speed and dexterity.  The tires squealed as

she backed away from the wreckage — tires astonishingly undamaged by a million shards of broken glass.  She spun the auto away in a neat half-circle as if she were a well-practiced stunt driver, wrenched the Buick into drive and sped away into the night.  A bar-full of patrons watched her exit with a kind of dazed admiration. 

       Two of the Red Goose’s more colorful habitués were brothers — King Saul and Kid Rufus — the origin of their names a mystery to fellow patrons.  Magnificently bewhiskered, neither had seen a razor in years.  “That was some fancy driving,” said King Saul to his brother.  “I believe I drive better when I’m drunk.”

“Can’t wait to hear you tell that to some trooper if you get stopped drivin’ home from the Goose, wobblin’ all over the road.”  They both chuckled.

“Hold on there,” said King Saul to his brother after a long moment.  “I think you done drove us here today in your pickup?”  They stared at one another, each in turn scratching his chin whiskers.

“I hope she kept up the insurance payments on the Buick,” said Leonard with surprising calm.  “Good lord,” he exclaimed.  “I’d better call Charley.  How in the hell do I explain this disaster.  And how in the hell did Mavis figure out where I’m working.  I did my damnedest to keep it secret!  My god,” he said, addressing no one in particular, “the woman must be psychic...  crazy as a headless yard bird too!” 

Humbly Submitted 11-21-18 -- Joel K.

Chapter Three: Into the West...

Reflections and Observations -- A Bright Passage from the Fantasies of Youth 

to Illuminations of Advanced Maturity!

This Episode:    A Possible Murder Mystery...  Just Trying it Out, Sort of...

Chapter Three – Into the West…. But First, a Ritual

        The auditorium was packed with gowned men and women, different groups of them in different colors, a glorious array of distinctive regalia and insignia.  Everyone wore the requisite graduation cap.  On the heads of most of the graduates in the assemblage, square caps with their colorful tassels abounded.  As he sat there waiting for the remaining graduates to file into the cavernous hall, Jack Rosnov thought how those massed square caps resembled a vast, undulating sea, as heads bobbed and turned in conversation or observation.  He amused himself by thinking that if one of the caps were removed from one of the heads, would it seem as though a great sea suddenly drained, as if a plug were pulled from its floor deep below the surface, causing a great swarm of bodies to rush helplessly into an unseen drain and disappear forever into a great, bottomless trench.

Hating the wait, not wanting to be a part of the pageantry of graduation day, Jack was cursing vigorously under his breath, fuming, expecting his head to blow up in rage at any moment, like a bomb, a mine in an enemy harbor accidentally struck by an invading ship.  And then, finally, everyone was seated on the main floor of the auditorium.  Various university dignitaries trooped in, taking their seats at the long table facing the audience of graduates and their families, mothers and fathers and other relatives seated further back, beaming with pride, situated behind the graduating seniors, masters and PhD candidates.  The ritual commenced, at last.  The university president rose and gave lengthy introductions, finally presenting the prominent guest speaker upon whom an honorary degree would be conferred sometime during the proceedings.

Jack did not hear the name of the commencement speaker as the latter was introduced, nor did Jack really care.  Though he knew he could look up the speaker’s name in the commencement program, he had no real interest, at least not at that moment.  He did notice, however, that the speech was quite good.  He thought he remembered that the speaker was a professor of anthropology or history or, perhaps, social sciences.  The man talked about humankind’s propensity for violent behavior, and tried to make the case that human beings, at least in part, were not responsible for “inventing” its own base, cruel and too often outrageously violent behavior.  

“After all, it was a great ape who took up a club and struck another member of the ape family long before homo sapiens began fashioning weaponry.”  At least that’s what Jack thought the dignitary said.  In the end, the speaker’s message made the point that human beings have the intellectual power to reverse the backward evolutionary slide.  “We have the means to resolve conflicts by using our brain power, vs. using the destructive power of guns, knives, bombs and other more destructive weapons.”  It was that point, that snippet from the commencement address that stuck in Jack’s head, in his memory.

Following the ceremony and the private family party that saw many friends and family members gather in the basement recreation room of the Rosnov family home, Jack took a job, briefly, as a bartender in a tavern at which he had previously worked, “Mario’s on Mason.”  Tending bar was a profession he had used as a funding mechanism for part of his college education, and would use again to bankroll his soon-to-commence, he reassured himself, travels throughout the western United States.  The memory of that commencement gathering occupied a permanent etching in his brain.  It was during that happy celebration at which he once again enjoyed a long conversation and pleasant visit with the young woman who would eventually become his wife.   That event, the future marriage, was, at the time, unforeseen, and several years and a number of adventures removed from the graduation celebration that was happily unfolding, a tapestry of merriment, laughter, story-telling and free-flowing alcohol.

At Mario’s, Jack continued to concoct drinks and draw beers for the faithful patrons who considered the place their club, for many a refuge, for others a place they seemed to regard as home, at least until asked to leave or ejected at 2:00 in the morning, standard weekday closing time.  Mario’s was a kind of legendary east side Milwaukee bar, a “character lounge,” a hangout, a place of careless revelry for local celebrities, an occasional national celebrity and for those who simply wanted “to be somebody.”  Often feeling they succeeded, as into the procession of nights, they absorbed too much alcohol and felt themselves genuinely amusing and interesting, not merely boring drunks given to tiresome jokes and too much loud and forced laughter.  

Mario’s would provide the bankroll that Jack needed to make his escape, extend his empirical reach into the vast, beautifully wild and romanticized west.  Within the space of two months’ time, more or less, Jack and his possessions were packed into the older but serviceable convertible, and then finally on the road.  The odometer would eventually tick off some 180,000 miles before the red Chevy’s engine would burn itself out in a chaotic soup of blackened and co-mingled oil and water, becoming a bulk of fried and unusable scrap.  Jack and a friend would hitchhike home from the old Chevy’s final resting place, a service garage and junkyard in central Wisconsin.

********************************

Navigating the nation's highways with a mixture of giddy anticipation and anxiety, he enjoyed being on his own, driving the Interstate but retreating frequently to back country roads, drinking in the pleasures of summer landscapes and the faces of rural America.  It was a journey of pure joy, of freedom.  Jack knew he’d eventually wind up in Washington State, but savored the unhurried pace with frequent stops, collecting ideas and odd characters and memories of things seen and experienced, jotted into a spiral bound notebook.  Its pages would become smudged and bubbled, a kind of ski slope of moguls in miniature.  He had no camera but never regretted the decision not to carry one with him.

Eventually, two or three weeks into the odyssey, past stone sentries that lined the highway of a western landscape location he wouldn’t later recall, past hills, rivers, mountains, small towns and too many watering holes of a different sort, Jack arrived.  He landed in Tacoma, Washington, the suburb of Ruston to be accurate, near a scenic park bordering Puget Sound, Point Defiance.

Jack would soon reconnect with friends he met while serving in the armed forces, a bit more than four years prior to this “homecoming.”   Some of whom were residents of long standing, and still made Tacoma or its nearby communities their home.  Jerry Smythe was his first contact, closest among the friends with whom he’d soon reunite.  Those who knew him well called him “Jere the Hare,” owing to a bald pate rimmed by what remained of fair-colored fringe, his proud head always termed by his friends, female and male alike, a “perfectly-shaped cranium.”  

One of Jerry’s procession of paramours — Louise — had often announced, “He has a beautifully-shaped dome, and if anyone says otherwise, I’ll bonk his head with a skillet!”  Jerry often regretted ending his relationship with Louise.  “She was the best cook of them all,” he insisted.  The remark a bit cryptic, as he would not discuss nor reveal the nature of his relationships with “all” of the women in his past.  Or, perhaps, if a “serious love affair” had ended badly, crippling forever any need or wish to commit himself to just one of the  women who populated his longings.  Jack would shortly be introduced to the latest in Jere the Hair’s parade of lovers, a Latino named Magdalena whom Jerry called, not surprisingly, "Maggie."

(Special Note:   Next Chapter, if there is to be one!:    "A Grim Discovery!"  Stay Tuned, and thank you for your rapt attention...  Inattention?  Complete Disinterest??!!)

Humbly Submitted, 10-23-18 -- Joel K.

A Possible Murder Mystery... Chapter Two!

Reflections and Observations -- A Bright Passage from the Fantasies of Youth 

to Illuminations of Advanced Maturity!

This Episode:    A Possible Murder Mystery...  Just Trying it Out, Sort of...

Chapter Two
Flying Fists and Lemons!

Seemingly appeased by Leonard’s assertions, Cruikshank eventually departed for his office and the multitude of duties that commanded the attention of the general manager of the busiest, most successful hotel operation in all of Washington State.  As he left, he flipped down  the full bank of lights just inside the south entrance of the barroom.  As was his usual routine, he would not reappear until evening.  It was nearly “opening time,” 11:00 AM.  Re-coloring the almost iridescent and perfectly tailored, lightly-colored suit Cruikshank always seemed to prefer, softly muted light spilled out from the long bar, cascading down the two steps that led into it and flooded the gorgeous “sunken” cocktail lounge with illumination.  The light seemed to darken his apparel, and like a magician's trick, the general manager seemed to disappear, into smoke or a kind of mist.      

As the room became revealed in its warm glow of light, the first thing any onlooker noticed were the enormous natural Douglas firs, as if a forest had taken root under the floor

boards extending their coniferous foliage out of sight above the roof line.  The firs acted as a giant row of columns, a kind of oversized fence between the booths that lined the outer three walls and the interior tables and chairs.  The carpeting, done in a swirling pattern of light and dark blues and soft reds, was interrupted only by a small section of wood flooring placed at the edge of the carpeting nearest the bar.  

On weekends and holidays the floor accommodated dancing in the evenings hours.  During the cocktail hour, from 5:00 until 6:30 PM Monday through Friday, the wood floor became the perch of the “Wood Nymph,” a scantily-clad young woman, costume matching the fabric of the stools and bartender vests, who dispensed silver-dollar-sized ham and beef sandwiches priced at six for a half dollar and, at times, other hot hors d’oeuvres offered at ridiculously low cost or free of charge to “happy hour” patrons.  Most of those who populated the inn’s bar and lounge were transients, business travelers on expense accounts and well able to afford the time and the fare, attracted by cocktail waitresses who, without exception, might have been just at much at home on runways or movie sets.  Cocktail drinkers savored the great and abundant food and low-cost beverages daily, treating themselves, as most were convinced, to their “just desserts,” after-business-hours’ rewards.

Leonard was not to have a pleasant shift this particular day.  It was a Friday, and Leonard mistakenly thought he had actually made it through his workweek without incident.  At precisely 11:05 AM, Mavis entered the barroom, seated herself upon a stool near Leonard’s side of the bar, doing so with her unselfconscious ceremony, placing her purse on a neighboring stool.  She next positioned a large amber ashtray just to her right, then fished through the commodious handbag for her Kent filter-tipped cigarettes and gold lighter, placing those objects just to her left, the lighter on top of the cigarette packet.  The purse stood erect on her right, a kind of sentry between Mavis and any patron who might seat him or herself on the adjoining stool.  The purse was rich looking and quite large.  Jack had returned from his stock-gathering forays into the walk-in cooler and liquor closet.  He busied himself arranging bottled beer in the coolers, labels facing front, bottles perfectly aligned and spaced as if awaiting a military inspection.   He knelt as he continued to fill the beer coolers, eventually looking left and up at Mavis and her neatly placed objects that foretold a lengthy stay.   “That sack is gigantic,” Jack mused.  “She must carry silver ingots instead of a coin purse.”  The handbag was made of sturdy brown leather and matched her shoes.  The woman was dressed fashionably, and obviously had expensive taste.

   

Nodding at her, Leonard said, “Mavis.  Are you alright?”  

“I’m fine, of course, Lenny, and you?”

“Mavis.  Do you think it’s wise of you to be here?”

“Why wouldn’t it be?”

Leonard walked to the other end of the bar, and busied himself with chores that needn’t have been done.  He selected a clean bar towel from a cabinet placed about midway under the long bar and wiped a dry glass, elevating it to the light to inspect it for spots.  Jack watched Leonard and thought, “It’s almost a cliché.  He’s an actor pretending to be a bartender in an old movie.”  Jack approached Mavis and said, “Good morning ma’am.  What may I serve you?”  As he spoke, looking straight into her pale blue eyes, he placed a cocktail napkin on the bar in front of Leonard’s wife.

“I’ll have a bourbon manhattan straight up, and don’t skimp on the bourbon.  In fact, don’t short pour the sweet vermouth either.  Cherry and an olive.”

Jack mixed and then served her the drink.  Mavis emptied the large stemmed vessel of its potent contents almost as fast as one might pour the drink on the floor.

Jack said, “Was the drink satisfactory?”  

Her reply either ignored the question or, thought Jack, confirmed her enjoyment of it, the probable instantaneous “buzz.”  “Another,” she said.  Jack built another, thinking to himself, “Is she out to drink herself into a quick stupor, or is she exceptionally talented?”  He placed the freshly made concoction on the beverage napkin in front of her.  Leonard said from the north end of the bar, “Jack, can you come over her a moment.  I want to ask you something about the glass washer.”  It was a ploy, but he switched on the washer to validate the ruse, and to try to drown out the ensuing, whispered conversation.  “Can you please ease up on those drinks of hers?”

“Why,” the younger man asked.

“Listen.  Mavis is my ex-wife.  To be accurate, we’re separated, but I’ll have a final divorce in a less than two months.  She’s kind of a lush, not only that, but sort of an angry and mean drunk.  If I could legally do so, I’d call the cops right now, but she hasn’t done anything yet.  She will though.  She’ll get crazy.  Violent.  Or maybe she won’t, this time.  I hope.  Just, please, ease up on the quantity of booze you put in that shaker.  OK?”  

Jack agreed to soften the blow of the next manhattan.  He also said he’d try to engage Mavis in some light-hearted conversation.  He’d try preemptively to diffuse any anger that might erupt should she have too much alcohol.  As he left Leonard and returned to Mavis, she said, “Another,” this time in speech that seemed a touch slurred from the first two highly potent cocktails.  Jack tried secretively to short pour the drink, but Mavis had her gaze aimed with eagle-eyed fixedness on Jack’s dispensing of the bourbon.  He said, “I understand you’re Leonard’s wife.  He’s a great guy.  I’m really lucky to be working with him.  He’s teaching me so much about the art of bartending.  What do you do for work?”

“Just pour the drink,” said Mavis, “and I’m watching, so don’t try any short fill.”  

“Uh, yes ma’am,” said Jack.  “These are powerful drinks, Mrs. Hoaglund.  Please be a little cautious.  They can really pack a knock-out.  I know from experience,” he added, a nervous laugh punctuating the comment. 

“Mind your own business, you snotty little nobody!” Mavis snapped.  Jack studied the woman.  Her eyes hardened the even features in an attractive face.  She had light brown hair, coifed and lacquered and brushed away from her face.  Mavis was not quite pretty, but rather “handsome” as some women who are not quite pretty are often described.  Her figure was trim and well formed.  She looked to be and was apparently in good physical condition.  

Leonard moved back to his side of the bar.  As he and Jack passed Leonard said, “Thanks for trying.  I’ll take over.  I’ll try to talk to her.”  Before he could utter a word, Mavis had downed the third manhattan.  She threw the glass over her shoulder.  It hit the floor and broke into a puzzle of shards.  She then stood up on the bar rail, grabbed Leonard’s tie and began hitting him in the face with her hands and fists.  Leonard did all he could to ward off the blows, finally using all his strength and the bar itself as a wedge to release Mavis’s grip on the necktie.  Finally he was able to back away from her outstretched arms and grasping hands, and those formidable fists. 

Unfortunately for Leonard, the cored lemons, all of them now peel-less and pulpy, still rested on the bar.  Mavis began grabbing the lemons, two in her left hand, one in her right, and began pelting Leonard, aiming for his head.  The whole crazy, frenzied attack happened so fast, as if no deterrent could have reacted quickly enough to stop the assault.  And then, as quickly as it happened, it was over.  Mavis, her face now a dark scowl, packed up her cigarettes and

lighter, grabbed her handbag and stormed out through the north barroom door that led to the hotel kitchen.  Leonard was bruised, his nose bleeding badly, his face and hair dripping lemon juice.  The back bar was fragrant, but sloppy, with lemon pulp!  Leonard and Jack began to mop up the mess.

“Don’t say anything to anyone here about this.  OK?  It’s happened before.  I thought she was finished with this kind of thing.  Please don’t say anything to Herb, I mean, to Cruikshank, Mr. Cruikshank,” said Leonard.

“I wouldn’t.  Hell, why would I?  I don’t know and I don’t have any contact with the general manager.  I wouldn’t say anything anyway.  It’s nobody’s business but yours,” said Jack in reply.  “Geez, I really sorry, Leonard.  She’s really, uh, interesting.  Kind of scary.  What was the cause of all that?  I mean, why’s she so angry with you?”

Leonard said, “Hell, I don’t really know for sure.  Probably the separation and divorce.  Rejection, maybe.  Cruikshank has been warning me that the episodes make the customers a bit uneasy.  No shit!  What the hell!  Me too, for crying out loud.  He’s asked me to think about working somewhere else for a while until the thing cools down.  God, I’m glad there was no one else here this morning.  What a break!  Listen, I’m just going to get to the washroom and clean myself up.  Be right back, OK?” 

“Of course,” Jack replied.  “I’ll take care of any customer who may wander in.”  As he watched Leonard stumble away, a bar towel dabbing at his wounds, Jack thought about the incident that had just occurred, and then had an unkind thought.  “If it weren’t so damned pitiful it’d be a heck of a comedy routine.”  He chuckled somewhat mirthlessly to himself and thought, “Poor old Leonard.  Maybe he should wear a clip-on tie.  I'll mention it when he comes back...”  

Jack had been facing the south door as Leonard left, but as Jack turned to face the opposite direction, he noticed Florence the salad chef, whom he secretly referred to as “Florence of Arabia,” a term from which both he and Leonard derived much amusement.  The nickname was applied one morning as Jack watched Florence deftly slicing and wacking at lettuces and other salad greens, arugula, carrots, onions, fresh spinach and other vegetables, preparing them for the lunch crowd.  As she knifed through the various ingredients, they seemed to explode in a great cloud around her blurred, rapidly moving hands, leaping and seeming to soar into the air around her, like a kind of storm, a sand storm, Jack thought.  Like “Florence of Arabia.” 

Humbly Submitted 09-22-18 -- Joel K.