The Chronicles of Major Peabody

by Galen Winter

  There are people in the suburbs surrounding Philadelphia who have deep commitments to (but little understanding of) the environment, animal rights and other “feel good” movements. Whenever a hostess informs her guests of the Major’s out-of-doors activities, he is, he says, confronted by aggressive women in flat heeled shoes and tweedy, delicate men who engage him in argument or attempt to secure his approval of some distasteful theory.

  Peabody regularly extracts himself from such situations by brutally ending all conversations. He has become an expert at it. For example, a lady author showed no interest in a then current newspaper headline about a woman who murdered her husband with an axe. She casually dismissed the story with the words “he probably drove her to it.” However, when someone mentioned how a Bryn Mawr man cut off his wife’s head, the woman went ballistic in her outrage.

  If the lady had directed equal anger toward the woman who murdered her husband, the Major would have remained silent. However, the lady’s selective outrage offended him. Peabody successfully terminated her diatribe with a single sentence. When he commented: “She probably was too tall, anyway,” silence occurred abruptly and the author and her coterie of sycophants slowly backed away.

  Peabody’s ploy to avoid what he considers to be ridiculous chatter has been remarkably effective. When a lady advocate of gun control gushed about the two fawns that regularly visited her back yard, the Major brightened up and offered to get a gun and shoot them both. In answer to the question: “Major Peabody, how can you shoot those beautiful pheasants?” he says: “I like to kill things.”

  On this occasion, the party was in full swing and the lovely Stephanie was mingling. I watched the Major as he stood alone, tried (unsuccessfully) not to appear to be bored and, at short intervals, looked at his wrist watch. I went to keep him company. Our hostess had the same purpose and we simultaneously arrived at his side.

  “You’re Major Peabody, aren’t you,” she began.

  “Guilty,” he answered

  “What a delight to meet you. I’ve heard so much about you.”

  “Mmmmmm,” was his response.

  “You spend so much time communing with nature and with her wild creatures. I know you’re a hunter, but don’t you really believe animals merit our protection and should have rights, just as human beings have rights?”

  “I used to dismiss the Animal Rights people as purveyors of anthropomorphic, metaphysical nonsense,” the Major said and his hostess began to look alarmed. He continued: “At first, I was sure such people had undergone brain surgery and the surgeon didn’t put everything back, but now I have reason to re-visit that conclusion. There may be something to Animal Rights after all.”

  The hostess regained her composure and looked pleased. I couldn’t believe my ears. The Major was definitely not under the influence of single malt Scotch whisky. I could think of nothing else that might cause him to make such an uncharacteristic statement. Certainly anyone who knew him would have been stunned. I was so surprised I involuntarily exclaimed: “Oh?”

  “You seem surprised, my boy,” said the Major. “Can it be possible you consider me to be an unreconstructed realist, congenitally unable to give lip service to positions maintained by people who have never worn out a pair of boots in their entire lives and wouldn’t recognize Mother Nature if she knocked them down and sat on them.”

  “Yes,” I admitted, as our hostess again began to look disturbed.

  Peabody smiled at her and went on: “Please be assured,” he said to her, “not a single matter involving the environment and the out-of-doors escapes my attention and careful consideration. Take this matter of Animal Rights, for example. Our Founding Fathers declared all men to be created equal and endowed with certain inalienable rights, including life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The Animal Rights folks claim these constitutional guarantees should be extended not only to men, but also to women and other animals.”

  His statement was reassuring, but the last phrase did nothing to completely erase our hostess’ anxiety. The Major’s sincerity and his next words led her to volunteer another cautious smile.

  “I’m willing to wholeheartedly accept your suggestion to recognize Animal Rights”, Peabody said as he maneuvered her into a corner where she could not escape. “As much as I applaud your efforts,” the Major added, “I don’t believe Animal Rights advocates have addressed a matter that should concern us all. If animals are to have rights, they must also have responsibilities.” A look of uncertainty re-appeared on the hostess’ face.

  Major Peabody smiled at his hostess and said: “I have seen groups of your friends carrying signs and railing against Canadians who, in accordance with their government’s regulations, harvest seals. Polar Bears eat seals. I’ve seen no one carrying signs on the frozen tundra or picketing a Royal Canadian Mounted Police station, insisting they take Polar Bears into custody and prosecute them for murder and cannibalism.

  “Geese trespass on farmers’ posted fields. They steal corn and grain and fly off to protected sanctuaries where the Constable cannot serve them with papers hailing them into court and requiring them to defend themselves against charges of criminal trespass and felony theft. There is no attempt to make them pay civil damages for their depredations.

  “Moreover geese leave their calling cards on golf courses, in parks and on lawns surrounding waterways. If you were to perform their very same acts, the police would be after you in a minute. To my knowledge, not a single goose has ever been charged with indecent behavior or littering.

  “If a teacher gives some schoolboy a well deserved backhander, the School Board and the public at large call it Child Abuse and will have her hide. Female gorillas steal simian babies, fish eat fry, male black bear, if given a chance, will kill their young. Nevertheless, child abuse in the animal kingdom goes unpunished.

  “I believe in Equal Justice. I believe animal wrongdoers should be subject to the same fines and prison terms that are meted out to human criminals. If you are to have any credibility at all, your proposals to give rights to animals must contain provisions requiring the animals to assume responsibilities. You must provide for regulations to bring animal malefactors to justice.

  “I will happily volunteer to work with your Legislation Committee to draft appropriate terminology for an Animal Responsibility law. Please ask the committeepersons to tell me the dates and times of their next meetings and I will arrange my schedule, but, I must inform you now, I believe in the death penalty.”

  A bewildered hostess edged out of the corner, mumbled something about “How very interesting”, and fled.

  At the end of the month when I delivered the Major’s Spendthrift Trust remittance, he recalled the conversation. “Can you believe it?” he said. “In spite of my generous offer to assist them, no one ever contacted me. It must have been my support of the death penalty.”

  It’s Hell to Grow Old

  Jerry Olsen owns hunting land deep in the Maine woods. The land contains a cabin. The cabin contains a wood stove and Coleman lanterns because it is far from electricity and propane gas services. The building consists of one large room with enough double bunks to sleep six – twelve if everyone is real friendly. The walls are decorated with pictures from long out-of-date calendars, horns and a few poorly mounted birds and fish. On a sunny day it might be possible to see through the windows. The floor is covered with linoleum that showed wear and tear twelve years ago. There is nothing inside the cabin that would tempt a thief.

  I know about that cabin. Three years ago I spent two nights there. I intended to spend only one, but when I tried to leave on the morning of the second day, I became so hopelessly lost in the maze of abandoned, muddy, two rut logging roads that I believe it was only by the intervention of a Divine Providence that I managed to find my way back to the cabin before the sun had set and I was left alone in the dark, surrounded by vicious wild beasts.

  This was my second visit to Jerry Olsen’s cabin in the woods. Mr. Olsen
had invited Major Peabody, Doctor Carmichael and two others to join him to participate in what he called The Seventeenth Annual Lying and Opening Day Ruffed Grouse Hunting Competition. He always invited four hunters because he didn’t consider it to be poker unless there were at least five people at the table. The Major and Doc Carmichael always participated in the annual competitions, but there is no guarantee that anyone will be re-invited. If a hunter behaves badly or ground swats a bird, he is blacklisted forever.

  I was again in attendance, not because I was invited, but because the first day of the month occurred in the middle of the planned hunt and I was obliged to deliver the Major’s Spendthrift Trust remittance on that day. This time I had the foresight to demand a detailed map showing the way from cabin to county road. I did not appreciate the little explanatory notes that Mr. Olsen added to his hand drawn map. Notes like: LOOKOUT - Bear Den Here, and BE CAREFUL - Watch for Wolverines and Poisonous Snakes.

  When I arrived at the camp, I expected to find Major Peabody in his usual end-of-month destitute situation. I was surprised to find him enjoying an unaccustomed state of relatively robust finance. However, due to a number of second-best poker hands, the Major was broke before the evening ended. Jerry Olsen, Doctor Carmichael and the other two hunters, particularly the young man called Lefty, were all smiling and jovial.

  The Major, however, was understandably depressed. He grumbled. He left the table. He had a Scotch and water. He punctuated his sips with crotchety comment. Then he retired to his bunk. He was in such a foul mood he didn’t even smile when, at the stroke of midnight, I delivered his monthly remittance. He merely snorted, took the envelope from my hand and crammed it beneath his pillow.

  The next morning, Mr. Olsen prepared breakfast. A ten pound bag of yellow onions lay on the kitchen counter beside him. He was dicing one of them. “Lefty,” he ordered, “get me some potatoes for the raw fries and find a green pepper, too.”

  Lefty heaved a large Styrofoam ice chest onto the table. The top half of the chest held the perishable food. Lefty found a pepper and tossed it to Mr. Olsen. “I suppose we need all this ice for libations,” he said, “but it sure makes this thing hard to lift.” He took the chest from the table and returned it to the floor. Then he picked up the twenty pound bag of potatoes. “These potatoes are heavy,” he complained, hoisting them onto the counter. “Are you trying to give me a hernia?” he asked

  Doc Carmichael sat on the edge of a lower bunk and laced his Chippewa’s. He was listening to them. “Relax Lefty,” he said. “You have nothing to worry about. If you had to carry my game bag, by the end of the day the strain might rupture you, but you don’t shoot that well. Your game bag is never that heavy. You won’t ever run the risk of a hernia.”

  Major Peabody had already finished dressing. From the look on his face, I was sure he was still upset by his reverses at the poker table. His tone of voice confirmed my suspicion. “That’s the trouble with you youngsters,” he muttered. “You don’t keep yourselves in shape. When I was your age I could easily lift my own weight.”

  “When you were my age,” Lefty answered, “I wasn’t even born. That’s the trouble with you old timers. Your mind plays tricks on you. Memory loss, you know. Lift your own weight? Hah! It won’t be long before you’ll have trouble lifting a Scotch and water.”

  Peabody reacted immediately. It was clear that he was still upset by his bad luck at cards. Lefty’s taunt added insult to that injury. Obviously, the Major was also annoyed when Lefty called him an “old timer”. Peabody would never admit that he had lost any of his prowess or was not in the prime of his life.

  “Don’t be snotty, Lefty,” he said. “I’m in better shape than you are.”

  “Don’t get snotty, Lefty,” he said. “I’m in better shape than you are.”

  I recognized what was going on. My area of legal expertise includes estate planning. I draft a lot of Testamentary Trusts for old people. When the aging process accelerates and the wheels begin to come off – especially with men who have led active lives – any suggestion of impairment of their physical abilities is often strenuously denied, even when the effects of age are obvious to everyone.

  I didn’t want to see Peabody agitated by any further insensitive remarks from Lefty. I knew the Major would consider them to be a challenge. They might provoke him into saying something he would later regret. I thought it was time to change the subject. “Well, well, well,” I said as I slid down from one of the top bunks. “Looks like bacon, eggs and raw fries for breakfast. That ought to fill us up. Are you ready to shoot some birds, Major?”

  Peabody disregarded my question. “That’ll be the day, you young pup,” he said to Lefty, walking toward him in a nearly threatening manner. “Unlike you, I’m in excellent condition. I’ve always watched my diet, exercised regularly and taken good care of my body.” That last statement came as such a surprise to Doctor Carmichael that he inadvertently raised his eyebrows, gave a sidelong glance in the Major’s direction and then shook his head in disbelief.

  “Just look at you,” Peabody continued. “Years of drinking Canadian whiskies and other similar unspeakable dissipations have reduced you to such a condition that you can hardly lift a twenty pound bag of potatoes from floor to table. I could life that bag with one hand.”

  Lefty said: “Hah!”

  “And that onion bag, too,” Peabody added in response, “both in the same hand.” He paused for not more than a second before adding: “I could hold them out straight in front of me.”

  “Now, Major,” I soothed. “No need to carry on. Lefty didn’t mean anything. He was just kidding.”

  “You, too?” the Major said, turning to me, “you, too? You think I can’t do it? I’m not kidding. I’ll bet anyone fifty dollars I can take both bags in one hand and hold them out in front of me for a full minute – no, for five minutes - without dropping them.”

  Peabody’s companions looked at each other.

  “OK”, Lefty said. “You’ve got a bet.”

  “I want in, too,” Jerry Olsen said.

  “Me, too,” said the fourth hunter who was still lying in his bunk.

  “Damn right,” was Peabody’s answer. “I can do it.” He looked at Carmichael. “I suppose you want a piece of it, Doc? Don’t be bashful.” Carmichael wasn’t a bit reluctant. Over the years, he had lost plenty on bets with the Major. He was eager to get a bit of it back. I thought it was a good time for me to get in on the bet, too.

  Major Peabody dumped the potatoes and the onions onto the table, took the two empty bags in his right hand and held them out in front of him. “Do you want to begin the timing?” he asked Doc Carmichael.

  Shame

  “Shame on you, sir. Shame on you,” Jerry Olsen said to Major Peabody. Jerry opened his wallet and removed fifty dollars. “I consider your actions to be reprehensible,” he said as he handed the bills to the Major.

  Peabody smiled and moved his extended palm-up hand to me, to Lefty, to the fourth hunter and, finally, to Doctor Carmichael. We all contributed to the stack of bills that filled his hand. “I won’t bother to count the money,” the Major said. “Such an act would suggest that I didn’t trust you to accurately pay your honest obligations.”

  Peabody sat down at the table and moved some of the breakfast dishes to make space. Then, aloud and one by one, he carefully counted the bills. “Ten, twenty, thirty, …”

  “Honest obligation! Honest obligations,” Lefty loudly exclaimed. “This is incredible. Will you listen to the nerve of the man? There’s nothing honest about chicanery and deceit, Major. You’ve taken advantage of our simple innocence. The least you can do is blush.”

  “Blush?” Doc Carmichael asked in amazement. “Peabody is shameless. He hasn’t blushed in his entire life.”

  The Major carefully folded the bills and shoved them into the breast pocket of his wool shirt. “Come now gentlemen,” he said. “It was greed, pure greed that motivated you to take the bet. You are, each one of you, ab
out as innocent as a Chicago Alderman. You took the bet because you thought you could take advantage of me, a helpless and naïve boy from the country.”

  “I can’t take much more of this,” Lefty said. “Please ask him to stop, Doc. I’m just about ready to throw up.”

  Major Peabody merely smiled, tapped the pocket where the two hundred and fifty dollars safely resided and, ignoring the dismay of his friends, returned to his theme. “Last night at the poker table, all four of you treated me in a most unconscionable manner. You dealt me second best hands all evening. It is gratifying to see that the Fates have now evened the score and,” he paused as he favored his companions with a broad smile, “decided to add an appropriate surcharge to compensate me for having to spend the evening suffering through your insulting commentaries.”

  Jerry slowly shook his head. “You conned us into the bet Major. Admit it.”

  “I did nothing of the sort,” Peabody answered. “I bet I could hold the onion and potato bags out before me, in one hand, for five minutes. I had no idea you would think I intended to hold the bags and their contents. Those onions and potatoes must weigh almost thirty pounds. I can’t help it if you all misunderstood the terms of the wager.”

  Doc Carmichael poured a cup of coffee and told us all to resign ourselves to the plain and simple facts of the matter. We had been victimized. “Beware the wounded tiger,” he told us. “Last night we wounded Peabody’s wallet. I should have known he would exact his vengeance. I should have known better than to bet with him this morning.”