She said, “Today gone be the day, you don’t watchit.”
Then she put her hand on that cherrywood box. Now, macabre thoughts aside, it was a beautiful box, and probably very old (though not that23old). The carving was incredibly ornate, and certainly you could not fit the ashes of a grown man inside the thing.
She said, “You wanna see ’em, boychik?”
Obviously, something awful was inside, because Buell had backed away the moment the old woman took the box off the mantel. I felt a little trepidation myself as she stuck her thumbnail into the catch and started to open it.
But then there was a clatter outside, feet shuffling across boards. I looked out the front door and there stood on the front porch the ugliest man I have ever seen. I know that the internal debate over whether to certify ugliness has been going on in the Assessors’ Office for years, but one look at this man would tell you there is not an uglier creature walking the face of the earth.
So ugly was this man that even now I cannot find the words to describe him. Was he unclean? Remarkably so. Was he hideous? Without a doubt. Was he hairy? Yes—but only to a point.
His face was remarkably clean-shaven, not even showing a trace of a beard. In fact, the hairline was almost completely receded, though his dirty, kinky braid ran from the back of his head to his waist. Shirtless, he presented a bare chest. His back, on the other hand, showed a carpet of hair that glistened with sweat. Tendrils poked up from the waist of his pants, a trail of fur touching the center of his belly button and shooting out like rays from the sun. His legs were hairy. His arms were hairy. His ears were hairy. My fingers itched to grab my ruler, my camera, my notebook. Justin Shaw,24 Anthony Victor,25 Toshie Kawakami26—for the love of God, Douglas Williams!27—why was this man bothering with his tongue? He was magnificently hirsute, a textbook study in localized hypertrichosis!
But his face. My God, his face. Everyone knows that symmetry equates with beauty—a certain distance between the eyes, a straight, perfectly aligned nose, a pair of sculptured lips: these are the gifts that God gives beautiful people.
God gave this man nothing.
His nose was squarely out of joint, zigging and zagging down his shovel of a face. His eyes were too far apart on his head, giving him the look of a perplexed minnow. And his mouth. It was as if the awfulness had drained down, settling into his lips, giving them the twisted, wet look of two broken hot dogs resting atop the dirty bun of his cleft chin.
The old woman beamed at him as if he were a god. “Dis my Remmy,” she said, chest puffed out, hands proudly tucked into her hips.
Remmy seemed embarrassed by his mother’s obvious affection. “Afternoon, cher,” he told me, extending a long-fingered hand my way.
Har, I thought. Buell said not to say anything about his har.
I forced myself to shake Remmy’s hand, to ignore the soft feel of hair on his palms, the feral odor coming off his hairy body. Robert, have I ever told you about the time my father took us camping? We left soon after setting up the tent because there was a bear in the area. We never saw the creature, but we could smell him—rotted meat, sweat, and dirty feet all rolled into a motley scent that made his presence known for miles.
That bear had nothing on Remmy Rothstein.
And with them both, I should’ve seen it coming.
DISPATCH: Atlanta Penitentiary, Georgia
SUBJECT: Remmy Rothstein, “The Cajun Jew”
DATE: August 16, 2012
ATTEMPTED RECORD: Longest Tongue in the World (man)
WEATHER: 106 degrees with 100% humidity
ADJUDICATOR: Mindy Patel (badge #683290)
Dear Robert:
Sorry for the abrupt ending to yesterday’s email. There was a bit of a riot. I say a bit because it was only four of us, but you’d better believe that shiv came in handy. Lord, those country girls are strong!
Back to Remmy.
For all his unnatural odor, there was something sweet about Remmy Rothstein. Was it his eyes, which were dark and piercing, like staring into the muzzle of a Glock 19? Being honest, the touch of his hand sent a cha-chunk into my heart, and I swear it was like a shotgun being pumped. (Sorry for all the gun metaphors; this is how you talk in prison. Did I mention we’re in prison now? The jail burned down.) Robert, I just have to tell you, if you didn’t look at Remmy’s face, or feel the prickly hair jutting out from his eyebrows, you’d swear to God he was George Clooney.
And the mouth on him! No, I’m not talking about the silky, soft hair on his tongue (though we’ll get to that later). He was the sweetest talker I’ve ever met in my life. He said I was beautiful. He said I was dainty. He said those moles on my ass look like the face of God. God, Robert! Not balloon animals (though I understand given our Adjudication that day why balloon animals were on your mind).
Was it all true? Am I beautiful? Am I dainty? Who knows? Let’s just say Remmy Rothstein made good use of his 57,78228 times.
But I was not there to fall in love. I was there to Adjudicate a World Record, so I set about telling Mr. Rothstein the procedures for verifying his claim. He told me he understood the process, and we agreed that we would proceed. The proper paperwork was signed (attached) and both Buell and his mother acted as witness.
While he went down to the water to shave his tongue, I used an alcohol wipe to clean the two metal rulers, as well as the measuring tape. I put these all out on a cloth napkin, as instructed in the Manual of Adjudicator Conduct (rev), then tested the batteries in my camera and video recorder.
Mind you, we had to do all this outside in the daylight, but that was fine. I was beginning to enjoy the outdoors by now, and such was the sweat on my skin that the mosquitoes could no longer find purchase. Lemons/lemonade!
Rebekkah joined me outside the cabin, the box in her hand. (Did I mention the old woman’s name is Rebekkah? Thankfully, she’s my cellmate. All those years on the three-legged stool have given her thighs of steel. Combine that with the beard and there is no end to what the ladies will do for her. I haven’t had to wash my own laundry since I got here!)
Rebekkah stood by quietly, her eyes nervously going from me to Buell and back again. He leaned against the shack as he strapped back on his badminton racket, giving her equally beady looks. I kept hearing her earlier warning that he had gotten on her bad side today, but worrying about these two wasn’t in my job description, so I let it go.
Big mistake.
By the time I had tested everything and taken out a fresh pen to write in my notebook, Remmy was back. The sun was peering behind him, and I could see the wifty loops of hair off his shoulders. He rubbed his hands together as he approached. Up close, I recognized the features from the photos he sent in to the Assessors’ Office. The round, red lips. The gouge of the philtrum between his nose and mouth.
Buell hobbled over, unsteady on the peat. Rebekkah stood beside me.
I said, “All right, Mr. Rothstein. Show me your tongue.”
Fuck me. Another riot. More later.
(attachment: Rothstein-Remmy.zip)
DISPATCH: Atlanta Penitentiary, Georgia
SUBJECT: Remmy Rothstein, “The Cajun Jew”
DATE: August 18, 2012
ATTEMPTED RECORD: Longest Tongue in the World (man)
WEATHER: HOT
ADJUDICATOR: Mindy Patel (inmate #4290-6632)
Dear Robert:
I can’t say I was happy to see Rebekkah taken out of my cell. She’s become quite a confidante over the last few days. Thankfully, it was after Shabbat. Did I tell you she’s been teaching me the Kiddush? Anyway, it’s only a week in solitary. I’m sure it’ll go by fast.
As you now know from my earlier attachment, Mr. Rothstein’s tongue was nowhere near the 3.9" to meet the standard for World’s Longest Tongue. In fact, even the width was barely more than the 2.1" average. I couldn’t fucking believe it. Three days in that hellhole of a swamp! Two nights of being shocked out of my sleep by some pervy freak leaning over my bed. Thirty-six hours o
f nonstop sweating. Untold numbers of peanuts shoved up my tailpipe and the fucker had lied the entire time.
I’m sorry for my language, Robert, but prison makes you hard.
And, I have to say, I let Remmy’s lies get to me. I know Potential World Record Holders lie all the time. I know they fake photos and try to get one over on us. I know it’s the Adjudicator’s job to just simply say, “Thank you for trying,” as they head out of town, but I screamed the biggest “WHAT THE FUCK?” ever heard in that swamp. We’re talking Silbo Gomero29 loud. I’m surprised you didn’t hear it all the way up in New York (though I’m sure you were busy watching Diane Sawyer interview Kaitlyn about the Most Dogs in Fancy Dress30 record. Really, Ms. Sawyer? This is news?).
But—Remmy. Poor Remmy of the average tongue. He was crestfallen, though surely he knew when he Photoshopped those pictures that there was no way his tongue was long enough. Did he think we’d just give it to him? Did he think that a record as important as the Longest Tongue in the World was something we would just rubber-stamp through the Assessors’ Office? There are standards and practices. There are ethics. What was I supposed to do—give him the second-longest tongue? There’s a girl in California31 who might have a word or two to say about that!
I remember my first day of Adjudicator Academy when we were told that our integrity was on the line every day, that people depended on us to report the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. We’re certifying World Records! We’re telling one individual that he or she, above anyone else, is the best, the brightest, the gnarliest, the most pierced, the fattest, the oldest, the fartiest, the most reckless—of any other human being in the world. Our motto isn’t just on our badges; it’s on our hearts. This is what the Adjudicator takes on the road with him or her every single day: “For every record you give someone, there’s another person who loses a record.” Could I take away what might be Ms. Tapper’s biggest claim to fame for the sake of a downtrodden Cajun Jew living in a South Georgia swamp?
Could I do that? COULD I?!?!
No, really—I’m asking, because he keeps calling me every day.
DISPATCH: Atlanta Penitentiary, Georgia
SUBJECT: Remmy Rothstein, “The Cajun Jew”
DATE: August 19, 2012
ATTEMPTED RECORD: Longest Tongue in the World (man) DENIED
WEATHER: Look at the date. Look at the location. WTF do you think?
ADJUDICATOR: Mindy Patel (inmate #4290-6632)
Dear Robert:
Sorry. Lights out really does mean lights out here, and my lawyer says after the stabbing (long story) I need to be on my best behavior.
Re: our last—
I know what you’re thinking. It’s not the tongue, stupid. It’s the integrity of the organization. It’s honoring the Adjudicators before me, the ones after me. It’s about the truth.
I believe this. I really do. Which is why I had to be honest with Remmy standing there in that swamp.
“It’s not long enough.”
That’s all I said. It was like watching the air leave a balloon. His shoulders slumped. His head dropped. Even the hair on his arms lost some of its bouffantness. I have seen many a grown man cry, but never have I seen one so broken. My heart felt as if it was crumbling in my chest. I could practically feel his desolation, his loneliness. What did this man have other than his awful mother and freakish older brother? Sure, he was her pride and joy, but that’s like being Hitler’s favorite dog. At the end of the day, what does it really mean? What lasting impression has Remmy Rothstein left on the world other than the strands of hair he leaves in his wake?
I looked at Buell. I could tell he was thinking what I was thinking. He shook his head, but I couldn’t heed his warning. Tentatively, I asked, “Mr. Rothstein, is there another record you might be interested in?”
Remmy was too devastated to understand the question. His voice cracked. “No, cher. I got nothin’.”
Was there ever a bigger elephant in the room?
I looked at Buell again, thinking surely he would call attention to the fact that Remmy’s back looked like a wall in Elvis’s music room. Then I looked at Rebekkah, but she only sneered at me in the threatening way she’d sneered at Buell.
And I know what you’re thinking—a good Adjudicator finds a Record no matter what—but you tell me this, Robert Putrovnik: how do you say to a guy, “No, your tongue isn’t long enough, but Jesus Christ, let me smack a ruler against that nipple hair”? I was really at a loss standing there on that peat mound. There’s nothing in the Adjudicator’s Manual of Conduct on the Road (rev or otherwise) that tells you how to politely suggest that there might be another record to be had.
Because no one seemed to be even close to suggesting that 75% of Remmy Rothstein’s body is covered with hair.
So I said what I could, which is, “I’m so sorry, Mr. Rothstein. Perhaps another time.”
Rebekkah hissed at me. I’m not going to lie—she’s kind of scary when she wants to be, and those thighs could strangle a python (trust me, if there was more time I’d tell you that story).
Buell was the only one who didn’t seem bothered by this. As I said, he’d been silent at first, but maybe it took some time for him to process exactly what had happened. Remmy had lost. He’d lost big. And something told me that Buell saw Remmy’s loss as his own gain.
A huge grin spread across Buell’s face as this realization dawned. He spat on the ground and said, clear as a bell, “Shyster.”
Now, I told you Rebekkah was old, but that doesn’t mean she wasn’t fast.
She said, “That’s it,” and grabbed an ax off the woodpile.
She bolted after Buell so quickly I could barely process what was happening. Buell saw it coming before I did. He took off, pegging his way across the peat, dropping into the shallow water like a lemming, then popping back up on another mound of peat. Rebekkah kept up fairly easily, dodging the sticks and mounds of dirt he threw back at her. I stood there speechless as I watched her catch up with him. She grabbed him by the back of the shirt and rolled him into the water like a hungry gator.
They both disappeared under the churning water. The last I saw of Buell was his stump sticking up in the air. It really was a stool leg. Some duct tape was still attached to the end. It waved like a flag in the wind.
DISPATCH: Atlanta Penitentiary, Georgia
SUBJECT: Remmy Rothstein, “The Machine”
DATE: August 20, 2012
ATTEMPTED RECORD: Hottest Fuck in the World
WEATHER: Does it matter, bitch? Really?
ADJUDICATOR: Mindy Patel (inmate #4290-6632)
Robert—
Sorry about leaving you hanging like that. I had to get up in a bitch’s grill.
So—!!!
As Rebekkah and Buell disappeared under the water again and again, I looked at Remmy and screamed, “Oh my God, she’s murdering him!”
He just shrugged and said, “She ain’t never forgive him for being born with six toes.”
???
Remmy shrugged. “Ain’t no record,” he told me, as if it wasn’t common knowledge that you can’t throw a rock without hitting a polydactyl.
“Six toes?!” I repeated. “That’s why she hates him?”
“On each foot.” He shook his head sadly. “My three nipples, she ain’t got a problem with, but she been kvetchin’ about them toes long as I ’member.” Remmy gave me a knowing look. “Took off that one foot when he was nine. Been gunnin’ for them others ever since.” He stared out into the thrashing water. “Cain’t pretend like this day ain’t been a long time comin’.”
My mouth opened and closed like a fish gasping on the shore.
THIS was what upset her? Not that her oldest son was an albino of indeterminate ethnic origin? Not that her youngest son had sprouted enough hair to cover at least two standard poodles? She lived in a swamp shack with no running water or electricity and, if I was guessing correctly, did her bathroom duty in a metal bucket whose contents,
judging by the trail to the water, were dumped into the swamp every day.
SIX TOES CROSSED THE LINE?
But none of this seemed to matter to Remmy. He was obviously still focused on his World Record loss and not the sound of his mother drowning his brother in the tannin waters of the Okefenokee.
I said, “Shouldn’t we—”
“It’s the way of the swamp, cher.” He shrugged one of his shoulders. The hair stirred in a sudden wind, sending strands into his mouth. He delicately pulled them out between his thumb and finger. His nails were greasy black, like a car mechanic who works nights in a coal mine.
He said, “I’m sorry I brought you all this way, cher. I thought I had a chance.” Tears rolled down his soft cheeks, slid down his chest, then trickled along his happy trail32 like water off a duck’s back.
I couldn’t help it, Robert. I told him, “There are probably other records you can break.”
Only, I was talking about the hair and he thought I was talking about something else. Or maybe I was talking about something else. Who the hell knows? It was so damn hot. I hadn’t slept in days. The exhaust from the boat was still in my lungs. The peanut smell from my car was clinging to me like a spicy Thai roll.
But here’s the other thing, Robert—just to let you know, female Adjudicators have a special kind of hell we go through on the road. I’ll admit it—I get lonely. Sometimes I’ll hook up with a guy at the bar or in a gas station Arby’s or, if I’m really lucky, a Chili’s will have a Ladies’ Night. I’m human, all right? But I never tell them what I do for a living because it invites the inevitable joke: “Bet I just broke some records, darlin’.”
No, they did not. Most of the time, they couldn’t break a two-year-old goat’s hymen (though trust me, I’m sure some of them have tried).
But Remmy… oh, Remmy.
Mystery Writers of America Presents the Mystery Box Page 35