The Rough English Equivalent (The Jack Mason Saga Book 1)

by Stan Hayes

  “I don’t want him to, either. And I’m sorry I showed you to the preacher. It just sort of happened.”

  “But what was he doin’ up here in the first place? You don’t let people up here all that much. But a friggin’ preacher?”

  “I’m sorry this has upset you, sweetie. I guess you better hear the rest of it so you’ll know how upset to get.”

  Cordelia shook her head slowly from side to side. “You got any wine up here?”

  “It’s a little early, but I’ll go get us some if you feel the need. Matter of fact, I’m startin’ to feel the need myself. Let’s go downstairs.”

  They sat in the living room with glasses from a bottle of Pouilly Fuisse for which Serena felt she’d overpaid, but now was glad she’d bought it. “You know where I was day before yesterday?” she asked the still-flustered Cordelia.

  “Where?”

  “In Atlanta; well, Stone Mountain actually, lookin’up at a seventy-foot head of Robert E. Lee with th’ preacher.”

  “Damn! Donchoo lie ta me!

  “No really. We drove over there, six hours over and six hours back, to get a look at it. And I’ll tell you, it’s amazing.”

  “Damn! I didn’t think that anything you had to say about this could possibly surprise me, after what you told me upstairs. Howja get involved with that giiy, of all people?”

  “I got to talking with him at a Salvation Army deal that Jolene Marsh dragged me into a couple of weeks ago. Turns out he’s a lover of sculpture.”

  “Sounds more like a lover of sculptors to me. Does he really know anything about it?”

  “Not much. But his heart seems to be in the right place. He’s fascinated by what it takes to create sculpture. How well do you have to know something to love it?”

  Cordelia sipped her wine before answering. “I think you’re about to find out. How the hell you got from th’ Salvation Army to Stone Mountain and General Lee in two weeks just beats th’ hell outa me. T’say nothin’ of why.”

  Serena’s smile held a tinge of the rueful. “I’m askin’ myself the same question. I’d hate to think that I’m shallow enough to just get a kick out of having somebody like that admire me and tell me that what I’m doing’s important. And at the same time wanta get in my pants, even if he doesn’t really know much about how to do it.”

  “Hell,” Cordelia said with a grin, “If that’s shallow call me knee-deep.”

  Serena observed her model’s change of mood with relief. “Yeah, you can’t really say there’s a lot wrong with that, except that it’s comin’ from such a strange source. You just figure that a guy like that’s blood’s not all that red, and that he’s gonna be throwin’ Jesus at you every chance he gets.”

  “And does he?”

  “Not at all, at least so far. Well, once. We put in a pretty long day in that Dodge of his, just gettin’ there and back. All he wanted to talk about was what I was doin’- and what I’d done.”

  “I know you didn’t let ’im get away with that.”

  “I didn’t wanta get into some kinda conversational tennis match with ’im. I found out a few things about him, but to tell th’ truth it was more restful just talkin’ about art- and me.”

  Cordelia started to reply directly to that, but instead said: “D’you think he really wants to ‘court’ ” -she made quotation marks in the air- “you? How the hell can a Baptist preacher go out with a- what? Atheist? Agnostic? I know you ain’t sittin’ around waitin’ for th’ second comin’. Those goddam Baptists’ll throw his ass out if he’s not careful.”

  “I know it; and I guess he must know it. He seems to be a pretty bright guy, about most things. He did let those proselytizing pants of his down pretty far one time, and I’m not sure he meant to, or even noticed that he had.”

  “Really. Whad’d he say?”

  “It was while we were standing under the sculpture, right after we got there. I said sump’m about how it would’ve inspired the people of the Confederacy if they could’ve seen it. He said ‘Inspiration is everything.’ I said, ‘It certainly is in my work.’ And he said, ‘It is in mine, too. Take faith. You know, it’s not as important that we be completely certain that God exists, as long as we behave as though He does.”

  “Whoa! Honey! He better not be droppin’ that bomb on anybody else in town. He wouldn’ta said it to you, but he knows that if y’all’re gonna get together, he’s gotta be gettin’ yo’ ass inta that big ole Baptist church, one way or another. Either that or he’s tireda makin’ his livin’ thataway.”

  “Yeah. I started to tell ’im that his church-birds might as well have good times in Heaven to look forward to, because they ain’t likely to have many down here. And that if God was really on the job, shit wouldn’t stink and cum’d taste like tapioca. But I didn’t. I don’t know what the ole boy has in mind, but I’m sure I will before long. He’s gotta be lonesome for female companionship, with Celeste Abercrombie dead these two years.”

  “Hm,” Cordelia said, “I forgot that was her name. She wadn’t that much to look at. They didn’t have any kids, so she might notta been that much fun nekkid- if Baptists actually get nekkid. Maybe you’ll find out. You could make room for one more on your dance card these days, I ’magine.”

  “More than that, if I had a mind to, which I don’t,” Serena said between sips of wine. That ole rascal Cueball still does it right well for me.”

  And for some others, too, Cordelia thought, as she said “Don’t seem like you see ’im as much as you used to. I’m glad y’all still please each other after this long. M’self, I just gotta have a lil’ variety now an’ then.”

  Serena ignored the last part of what she’d said. “It seems like it’s hard to find the time, as busy as we both are. He’s not somebody you satisfy in an hour or so. It takes about a half a day to haul that boy’s ashes. If you can’t take that long, you’re just askin’ for frustration.”

  Cordelia pondered that thought for a minute. “Maybe it’ll be easier for ya’ll with Jack off at school.”

  “Could be. His being gone’s gonna make a big hole in both of our lives for awhile, I’m sure of that. And you know what? I wouldn’t be surprised if his hole turns out to be a little bigger than mine.”

  “Yeah, he and Jack seem more like kin than Jack and either one of his real uncles. All that flyin’ and everythang. But it’s time for him to get out in th’ world, and y’all’ve got him as ready as anybody can be to do that. If his goin’ to school don’t get you and Mose closer together, well, some art appreciation from th’ preacher miit do it. Dawno whatsa bad about religion, anyway.”

  “You mean aside from its being the sworn enemy of free thought?”

  “Oh, that.” Cordelia moved to sit beside Serena. “I gotta go. I still wish you hadn’t shown th’ preacher my tits, but it’s done an’ I forgive you. Besides, if y’all ever got down to bidness, he’d forget about ’em in a heartbeat soon as he gets a loada that sweet clit a’yours. Assumin’ he knows what one is.”

  “He can’t be that ignorant,” Serena said as they moved toward the door.

  “Well, honey, you showed me where mine was.”

  “Yeah, but you were thirteen. Shouldn’t hafta do show and tell for a grown man.”

  The parking spot just outside the door to the Bisque Lunch Room was vacant, so the bright mass of the white car’s right side filled the doorway as Lee Webster walked in. Its horn tooted a triple as it went by. “Hey, bub,” he said, squinting into the shade at Moses. “See what celebrity’ll buy you in this town?”

  Moses grunted as he kicked the adjoining barstool around to receive the oncoming burden. “Those goddam girls. Don’t they do anything but drive?”

  “I’m sure they do,” said Webster. “They had the curtains drawn.”

  “Jesus. You know, I sorta liked that heap for as long as I had it. It’d top eighty in second gear if you had enough road to let it wind out. Then I trade it in, old Bishop buys it, it looks like for life, and those
girls start drivin’ it around. Now they’re usin’ the goddam thing to haunt me. Every other time I look up, that damn old white Buick’s lookin’ at me.”

  “Still lookin’ pretty good, too,” said Webster.

  “That’s the hell of it! The goddam thing looks better’n it did when I bought it! They’re hauntin’ my ass with that big white fuckin’ zombie!”

  “Webster shifted on his stool to look squarely at his friend. “Wait a minute, pal. I’d be flattered if those little Boobsie Twins’d pay me some attention. Besides, you know teenagers. Idiot savants or not, you let ’em know they’re gettin’ your goat, they’ll just keep it up.”

  Moses returned Webster’s gaze for a moment, then glanced down the bar at Ribeye, whose interest in their dialogue had picked up as it got louder. “More like clitiot savants, if you ask me. Got time to take a little drive with me?

  “There’s Lee Webster,” said Dolores, tapping the horn in greeting.

  “Bet he’s meetin’ Mose in there,” said Jack from the back seat. Diana sat between him and Ricky, facing a galvanized gray tub of ice and beer on the floor in front of them.

  “Well, he had ’is chance,” said Diana, pulling Jack’s head over and catching his earlobe between her teeth. “Now ya’ll get to have all th’ fun.”

  “Y’all asked Mose first? Be still my heart,” chuckled Ricky, resting the base of his can of Budweiser on bare tanned thigh, just below the hem of her cutoff jeans. He was rewarded with an ecstatic shriek and a backhand to the chest.

  “Qweeeut!” she said, laughing. “That’s cold!”

  “Y’all don’t be messin’ with her ’til we get where we’re goin’,” Dolores shouted from up front. “We’re sharin’ y’all!”

  They’d driven north of town to a small Negro-owned grocery store for the beer, where there’d be no quibbling about how old the buyer happened to be. The Bisque Lunch Room was on the way to their destination, a fished-out pond east of town. “Then get this damn boat movin’,” shouted Ricky, draining his beer, chucking the can into the tub and grabbing another. “Where’s ’at church key?”

  The pond was the better part of five miles out of town, where Main Street turns south and changes back into U.S. 1. Pine thickets dominated both sides of the road. “There it is,” Ricky exclaimed. Dolores turned the white car off the highway to the right, jouncing onto twin ruts that led through a scrubby meadow and into the trees.

  “Dammit, what the hell’ve y’all got us into? This looks liike a friggin’ jungle.”

  “Ya want privacy, doncha?” Jack said, gripping Diana’s other thigh, which felt the way he imagined the mid-section of a ten-foot python would, but hot.

  “This is really niice a’ y’all,” she said. “It just wouldn’t do for us to go over to Georgia this Fall and still have our cherries.”

  “We ’preeshate it,” said Ricky. “But you know what? You never told us why you decided you wanted us to help you out.”

  “Well,” said Diana, smiling lazily as she rested her hands on top of the boys’, “We liike y’all, an’ we know y’all’ve got experience.”

  “Experience?” Jack said in surprise. “In cherry-bustin’? Where’d you get that from?”

  Dolores parked the car behind a clump of brush that obscured it from sight. She opened the white car’s back door just as Jack spoke. “Ah, we didn’t care about that. Tell th’ truth, ain’t much cherry left ta bust. Somebody told us it was gonna hurt, so we just started playin’ with ourselves ’til we could get a couple fingers in. Wudn’t nothin’ to it.” She cracked a fresh beer, took a large swig and slung an arm around Ricky’s neck. “Hay-eey,” she said, darting her tongue between his lips.

  “We didn’t wanchall worryin’ about hurtin’ us,” said Diana. “What we wanchall to do is get us past this damn cherry shit and give us a good solid screwin’.” She unbuttoned her cutoffs and hooked her thumbs over the waist. “C’mon, les’ get nekkid!”

  “Last Valentine’s Day,” said Moses as they drove out Main Street, “those darlin’ little Bishop twins paid me a visit. I don’t know if they told anyone about it; I sure as hell didn’t, until right now. I’m tellin’ you because I don’t want you thinkin’ I’m nuts, and I know it must’ve sounded like it back there. Somebody besides me has to know what these maniacs have been doin’ to me ever since I first laid eyes on ’em. I’ve kept it to myself until now; people around here’d want me locked up, either as a rapist or just plain fuckin’ crazy.”

  “Well,” said Webster, “I can tell this is gonna be way off the record. What the hell’s going on?”

  “Like I told you. Those girls’re not just a little ‘touched;’ they’re the weirdest human beings I’ve ever run across in my life. Remember back in ’52, when Bisque beat Ledbetter, and there was a lotta talk about them tellin’ old Rocky Whitehead what plays Ledbetter’d run, before they ran ’em?

  “Oh yeah. McMillan had a lot to say about that in th’ paper. Needlin’ Rocky and givin’ two cheerleaders th’ credit for th’ biggest football win this town ever had. Called ’em ‘the baffling Bishops.’”

  “Ríni told me a while back that they’ve got that, that...”

  “That what?” Webster asked him when the pause had gone on for half a minute or so.

  “Waita minute. I almost had it. Oh. Tourette’s.”

  “Tour-ets?”

  “Yeah. Makes ’em act wild. Cuss like sailors, only worse. Screamin’, fightin; and the farther they’e apart from each other, the worse it gets.”

  “Damn. When’d their folks find out they had it?”

  “Quite awhile back, I guess,” said Moses. “When they were nine, ten, I guess, from what I remember. And sex’s a big part of it”

  “Sex?”

  “Yeah, sex. Because that’s what’s botherin’ me about them. Listen. This goes back before what I was startin’ to tell you. Before th’ Ledbetter game. I was goin’ home one evenin’, and they passed me up in my old car. A little farther down th’ road, they pulled up. Said the car quit on ’em. Well, I couldn’t get it started, so I put ’em in my car and took ’em home. We got out there, and when they got out, one of ’em- the one sittin’ next to me- kissed me, real quick, tongue and all, with their mama standin’ right there.”

  “Jee-sus.”

  “I don’t think she- mama- saw it. Looked like the other one was blockin’ her view, tellin’ her what had happened to th’ car. But it sure as hell surprised me.”

  “Yeah, I guess,” said Webster, rubbing his temples with both hands.

  “Since then, seemed like every time I turned around I’d see my old car. Parked somewhere close to wherever I was at the time, drivin’ by th’ warehouse, my place- all th’ fuckin’ time. Like they were followin’ me.”

  “J’you ever say anything to ’em?”

  “Hell, no,” said Moses, looking over at Webster as he stopped at a traffic light. “What the hell was I gonna say? And what would they say? They were in a public thoroughfare, completely within their rights. I sure as hell didn’t want them tellin’ their folks that I’d come anywhere near ’em. I’ve had all the woman trouble I want from this town without messin’ with jailbait. But they kept messin’ with me, and still are, just like today. That drivin’ by Ribeye’s’s happened before, rright down to th’ horn-toot.”

  “Hm. So what happened on Valentine’s Day?”

  Moses recapped the twins’ visit to his house, leaving out the “hero” reference. “Holy shit!” breathed Webster, fingers to his temples again. Those little bitches’re sicker’n I thought. “That’s a fuckin’ time bomb. If they told somebody, anybody…”

  “Bingo! Now, see why I go a nuts every time I see that damn Buick?”

  “You shoulda come to town in a Ford or a Chevrolet,” Webster mused.

  “How’s that?”

  “You reckon ole Big Boy woulda bought sump’m like that? No Big Boy, no Boobsie twins drivin’ a car with Kubielski-spoor.”

  “Yeah, b
ut if I’d just flushed that Buick’s coolin’ system before I left Baltimore, I’da never been made an honorary redneck.”

  “Whadja do,” Webster asked, “Elect yo’sef?”

  “As long as you got locals that fart ‘shave and a haircut, two bits’, ” said Moses, I’d say there’s room for a new kinda redneck or two.”

  Chapter XIX. Roll Out the Barrel

  “Mose.” It was Gene Debs, calling, as he would, at the crack of dawn.

  “What?”

  “J’you ever see a Grumman F3F?”

  “A what?”

  “A Grumman F3F. I flew ’em in th’ fleet, back in the thirties. A fighter. Biplane.”

  “What time is it?”

  “What?”

  “I said, what time is it?”

  “Five-twenty. Why?”

  “Because it’s FIVE FUCKING TWENTY! Why’re you calling me at five fucking twenty to ask me about some goddamn airplane?”

  “Did I wake you up? I thought you got up with the fuckin’ chickens.”

  “Not on Saturday. But I’m awake now. What’s the deal?”

  “This here’s th’ deal. I got a call last night from a guy I know out in Waco. He works at the airport where the crop dustin’ school is. There’s an F3F out there for sale. A two-seater! They just made a few two-seaters. The guy says the owner’ll take eight grand for it. I thought you might like a half interest.”

  Moses said nothing for a few seconds. Then he said, “What’d you say it was?”

  “An F3F. Grumman. You know the Wildcat, the carrier-based fighter that we had in th’ war before th’ Hellcat?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, think of a Wildcat with two wings. That’s an F3F.”

  “Oh. Is that a FiFi? We had a few of them come through Gitmo.”

  “These came after the FFs. Much hotter bird.”