Armadillos & Old Lace (24 page)

“Then I hear a tough woman’s voice shout, ‘Freeze, Elder, or I’ll blow your damned head off!’

“Elder froze. So did I.

“Moments later, after Elder was cuffed and taken away, I spoke to the sheriff.

“ ‘Thanks,’ I said gratefully. ‘But how the hell did you ever find me here?’

“ ‘It wasn’t too hard,’ she said. ‘I’ve had you tailed since you left my office this morning.’

“The old man was still belting it out:

Yankee Doodle went to London 

Just to ride the pony 

I am that Yankee Doodle Boy!!

I am that Yankee Doodle Bo-y-y-y!!!

“ ‘Can’t you shut him up?’ the sheriff said to a nurse.

“The nurse shook her head.

“ ‘No one’s ever been able to,’ she said.”

I paused, my story over. At that precise moment an armadillo walked by the tennis court and Sam took out after him like an express train. I paced up and down the empty court for a while smoking a cigar. There was no one there, but perhaps because of Tom’s story, the valley almost seemed to have a presence in it. It was to that presence that I finally spoke.

“Why do I get the feeling,” I said, “that after all these years we’re all still playing in the Negro leagues?”

New York City

“Four men in an Indian restaurant,” I said, two weeks later as I looked around the table. “What are the chances that all of us will lead happy, fulfilling lives?” 

“Fucking remote,” said Ratso, “if the past is any indicator.”

“Or the present,” said McGovern.

“Oh, there’s always a chance,” said Jim Bessman. Jim was a talented freelance writer and possibly the only optimistic vegetarian I’d ever met in my life.

“There’s always a chance,” I said, “that Ratso will pick up the check.”

“I’ll drink to that,” said McGovern. “In fact I think I’ll have a Vodka McGovern.” He signaled the tall, turbaned bartender, who bowed and came over to the table. It was a fairly coochi-poochi-boomalini Indian restaurant.

“I’ll take a Vodka McGovern,” said McGovern. “A Vodka McGovern,” said the bartender smoothly, as if somebody ordered one every night. “And how would you like this Vodka McGovern?” 

“Equal portions,” said McGovern, “of your best vodka, just-squeezed orange juice—from Israeli or California oranges, if possible. Israeli oranges are the best in the world—”

“Of course,” Ratso and I said in unison. The bartender mumbled something to the waiter in his native dialect.

“—and freshly charged club soda with a squeeze of lime. Just squeeze it, don’t bruise it.”

The bartender was bowing his way away from the table, but McGovern wasn’t quite finished yet.

“In a tall glass,” he called after him. “And stirred but not shaken.”

The bartender nodded his head gravely. When you’re wearing a turban it’s hard to nod any other way.

“Stirred but not shaken,” said Ratso. “That’s the way James Bond orders his drinks.”

“Mr. Bond is not known to me,” said McGovern. “Speaking of James Bond,” said Jim Bessman, “it’s too bad that Rambam couldn’t join us tonight.” 

“Yeah,” said Ratso, looking up briefly from his tandoori chicken. “I was kind of hoping Heinrich Himmler could have dropped by as well.”

“Saw a guy last night,” said McGovern as his Vodka McGovern arrived. “An old man. Looked just like Heinrich Himmler. So I said, ‘I don’t mean to offend you, but you look just like Heinrich Himmler.’ He says, ‘I
am
Heinrich Himmler. I’ve been living in Westchester for forty years and now I’m back and I’m gonna kill six million more Jews and three NFL players.’ ‘Who’re the three NFL players?’ I asked him. He says, ‘You see! Der Fuhrer was right! Nobody cares about the Jews!’ ”

“Nobody cares about the Irish, either,” said Ratso.

“Now that we’ve got
that
settled,” said Bessman, “where
is
Rambam?”

“He’s in Lopbouri, Thailand,” I said. “Jumping.”

“Jumping?” said McGovern. “Why can’t he jump right here in New York?”

“I can think of a few places he could jump
off'”
said Ratso, “and at least one he could jump
up.”
 

“Not with the Royal Thai Paratroopers,” I said.

There is a tasty pistachio ice cream dessert that many Indian restaurants feature. It is called
kulfi.
Unfortunately, “kulfi” is also the way most Indians pronounce the word “coffee.” This can sometimes make for a long, not to mention tedious, evening.

“I’ll have some
kulfi,”
said Ratso to the waiter. “One
kulfi”
he said.

“I’ll just have some coffee,” I said.

“One kulfi,” he said.

“You want coffee?” I asked Bessman.

“I don’t drink coffee,” said Bessman, “but I’ll try some
kulfi”

“Two
kulfis
, one kulfi,” said the waiter.

“I’ll try the
kulfi”
said McGovern, with a hearty Irish laugh that somewhat overwhelmed the subliminal sitar music.

“You want kulfi?”

“Yes. To go with the
kulfi”

“Okay,” said the waiter, “that’s three
kulfis
and two kulfis.”

“Maybe I won’t have that
kulfi”
said Ratso. “I’m watching my diet. But I will have some coffee.”

“Okay,” said the waiter, “that’s two
kulfis
and three kulfis.”

“You know,” said Ratso after the waiter had gone away, “maybe I should’ve ordered decaf.”

Later that night, in the light rain, Ratso bummed a cigar, and we walked through the Village together. Waiting to cross Sixth Avenue, I took out of my coat pocket a letter I’d received from the beekeeper and, shielding it from the rain with my cowboy hat, showed it to Ratso. He read it carefully, puffing on the cigar and shaking his head several times in some untitled emotion.

“Poignant, Kinkstah,” he said. “Poignant. The guy lives such a fragile and isolated life to begin with and then he loses his bees and he’s all alone. It’s hard to believe people like this really can and do exist in the world.”

He handed me the letter. I folded it and put it back in my pocket. We crossed the street against the traffic and the rain.

“Try four men in an Indian restaurant,” I said.

“Start talkin’,” I said, as I picked up the blower on the left. It was later that night sometime after Cinderella’s curfew and I’d been looking through a copy of
Cowpokes
, a collection of work by the World’s Greatest Cowboy Cartoonist, Ace Reid.

“Hill Country update,” said a familiar voice. It was Marcie calling from Texas.

“Spit it,” I said, as I let my mind wander vaguely back to the ranch. I was smoking a cigar and some of the smoke drifted lazily over the cat as she slept under the desk lamp. She didn’t seem to mind.

“According to the Kerrville papers,” said Marcie, “Boyd Elder’s looking at life.”

“So am I,” I said.

“It’s really sick,” Marcie continued. “He’s starting to get marriage proposals and movie offers.” 

“That’s more than I can say for myself.”

“Then there’s the news about Pam and Sam.” 

“Don’t tell me they ran off together?”

“No. Pam is engaged to Wayne the wrangler.” 

“Hell, if I sat around every night watching ceramic leaf ashtrays glaze in a kiln
I'd
probably be engaged to Wayne the wrangler.” I thought very fleetingly of Pam Stoner standing outside the green trailer in the moonlight. Where did summer romances go for the winter?

“What’s the matter with Sam?” I said.

“Well, there’s nothing really the
matter
with Sam,” said Marcie. “It’s just that he seems to have developed a rather unpleasant new habit. He’s started to spend an inordinate amount of his time rolling around in horse manure.”

“When did you first notice this behavior?” I said. “About a week ago when Sam walked into the house and the whole place has smelled like horseshit ever since.”

“I see.”

“You see,” said Marcie, “but you don’t smell.” 

“Well, it’s just a suggestion,” I said, “but how about this possibility. Sam stays in the lodge and assumes responsibility for conducting ranch business from there. You know, closes up the place for the winter, mails out statements to parents. In the meantime Tom moves down to your white trailer and you move over to my green trailer. I don’t know. It’s just an idea.”

“We’ll take it under review,” said Marcie. “In the meantime,
why
do you think Sam is doing this? Is his inner child reaching out through such primitive behavior to express its rage and anger at his traumatic, dysfunctional early background? Do you think
that
could be it?”

“Hardly,” I said, just as Doc Phelps had replied when I suggested that the coast of California was as far away as you could run. “Hardly.

“You ask me why Sam is rolling in the horse manure?” I continued.

“Yes, O great Chief Fuckbrain.”

“The answer is very simple. To paraphrase old Slim: ‘He wants to see the World.’ ”

“You would’ve made a great philosopher, brother dear,” said Marcie. “Or at least an assistant professor at one of the larger Southern party schools. By the way, Pat Knox called for your address. She says she’s sending you a homemade fruitcake.” 

“What does she mean by that?” I said.

Several hours later I’d just sailed into a peaceful dream riding upon the back of Dr. Doolittle’s giant pink sea snail. Into the dream came the unwelcome sound of a Japanese gardener with one of those leaf-blowing devices and I realized the blower by the bed was ringing. I collared the blower and heard a high-pitched, ridiculous, agitated voice.

“Help me!! Help me!!” screamed the faintly familiar macaw-like tones. “Help me!! There’s a giant swarm of bees right outside my window!!”

“Ratso, you nerd—” I said, but the line had been disconnected.

The cat yawned mightily and went back to sleep. I got up and walked over to the kitchen window and looked down at Vandam Street. I thought of what George Christy, the columnist for the
Hollywood Reporter
, had once told me. Years ago Christy had been in a cab with Truman Capote on their way to a Peggy Lee concert. Capote was wearily watching the streets flash by and then he turned to Christy and said, “You know, George, the more I see of life the more I know there are only 150 of us in this world.”

I looked up at the sky and there were about a million stars. A million stars for 150 people. Good odds, I thought, but a slow track.

Suddenly, it’s Hoedown Night at Echo Hill and the same stars are looking down on music and dancing and bales of hay and saddles scattered across the old tennis court; and there are pigtails and ponytails and counselors with packs of non-filter cigarettes rolled up in the sleeves of their T-shirts; and Uncle Tom and Aunt Min are all dressed up in their western clothes and smiling, Uncle Floyd is smoking his cigar, and Slim Dodson is serving up glazed donuts and apple juice; Doc and Hilda Phelps are standing by, stately in their Navajo finery; Dot is clapping her hands to the music and shouting encouragement from the shadows; Earl Buckelew comes riding over on horseback and our neighbor Cabbie is watching from his Jeep with his old dog Rip; and Aunt Joan is teaching the smallest girls a dance.

They stand in a line facing Aunt Joan with their arms around one another’s waists, tragically fragile, impossibly young. And the stars shine down and they dance beneath the constellation of my childhood.

There were ten pretty girls

in the village school

There were ten pretty girls

in the village school

Some were short, some were tall

and the boy loved them all

But you cant marry ten pretty girls.

Five were blondes and four brunettes 

and one was a saucy little redhead 

The girls grew up, the boy left school 

And in ’39 he married
—

the saucy little redhead.

As dawn hustled the stars out of the Manhattan sky I was still sitting at my desk holding the letter from the beekeeper.

Dear Kinky,

As you've probably guessed I’m not one for writing letters. I just wanted you to know that 1'm sorry I hung you out to dry that day.

I also wanted to thank you. I’ve heard that the sheriff saved your life but I believe it was you who saved mine. There's not a lot of people who'd give a damn about saving my life. I’m the kind of person most people call a character or maybe a loner or maybe worse. But I’m really a man who's seen the world and knows that he never wants to be a part of it.

I’m sad to say my bees have never returned. They cannot really be replaced. It may sound funny to most people but I’ve lived by myself all my life and the bees were like friends and family to me. Now I am truly alone in this place. I'm thinking of going to Africa as a mercenary or going to Hawaii and raise orchids. If you ever go to one of those places, I hope you'll try to look me up. If you can find me.

Your friend, 

Willis Hoover

P.S.: Small world department—Hattie Blocker died in her sleep last night. My mama's now the last surviving debutante.