Looking for Przybylski

by K. C. Frederick

  He pulls himself erect for a moment. “Will he tell me anything? Does he know anything? I have no idea, really. But it would mean an awful lot to me if I could believe at least that Martha’s still alive somewhere, that, whatever else I did to her, I didn’t cause her death.” His voice breaks on the last phrase and he clears his throat. “If my son will talk to me,” he continues, “and that’s a big ‘if,’ I want to try to do right by my kids, finally. I intend to tell him I’m not making any demands on either of them, I just want to know if Martha’s all right. I don’t have to know where she’s living, if she’s married or not, any of that. If she needs anything, I’ll be glad to help and I’ll do it through him if she doesn’t want anything to do with me. I just want to find out.”

  Well, Ziggy thinks, some busman’s holiday. “Boy,” he says, “I can sympathize with you. I’ve done a few things myself I wish I could take back. I sure hope things go well for you and your kid.”

  Roy nods. “Thanks,” he says, “I appreciate that.”

  “You must be getting nervous as we get closer to that army base. I know I would.”

  “Yeah,” Roy says. “Nervous and scared. But I have to try this. At any rate, I’ll know pretty soon how all this turns out.”

  “Well,” Ziggy says, “we’ll be getting another bus sooner or later. It can’t be that far to Oklahoma City.”

  “No, it isn’t.” Roy is silent for a long while. “Thanks again,” he says. Then he brightens. “So why don’t we enjoy ourselves while we’re here and find out what these Frontier Days are all about?” They’ve learned from the bartender that the town is celebrating its seventy-fifth anniversary.

  Out in the street they immediately encounter a pair of bearded cowboys engaged in a serious conversation. “Probably a couple of bankers discussing mortgages,” Roy observes. He looks around. “I wonder where the Indians have gone?”

  Ziggy and Roy make their way in the direction of all the activity a few blocks away, the music becoming louder all the while, occasionally punctuated by the popping of gunfire, presumably blanks. Soon they’re smelling sawdust and cotton candy as they enter the area of carnival booths and rides set up in the street. Near the merry-go-round a sign in old-fashioned lettering informs readers that all mature males have been ordered to wear beards for the celebration, and the failure to do so is only one of the violations against the “western spirit” that can send the offender to the “hoosegow,” which the bartender had explained was a mock jailhouse on an elevated platform across from the city hall.

  A couple of minutes after reading the proclamation about facial hair, Ziggy and Roy are challenged by a sharp-nosed red-faced man wearing a huge Stetson hat and boots that look to be made of rattlesnake skin. A badge identifies him as a deputy and, of course, he’s bearded, though his facial hair is thin. “Excuse me,” he says. “I couldn’t help noticing that you two gents have bare chins.”

  “We’re strangers here, just passing through” Roy declares, entering into the spirit of the game. “We’ve got the papers to prove it.”

  The deputy looks them over with mock care before waving away Roy’s offer. “Shoot, fellas,” he says. “Enjoy yourselves.”

  “How are you boys doing?” Sharlene waves to them from under the umbrella of one of the outdoor tables where she’s having a beer with her cowboy friends. “Did you hear what happened to Lennie? He managed to get himself arrested.” She smiles. “It’s just for fun, though.”

  Just like Lennie, Ziggy thinks. “Where is he?” he asks.

  “One of those deputies arrested him and said he was taking him to that jail over there. Actually, Lennie was pretty upset. He didn’t want to go but that deputy was a big guy.”

  “Let’s have a look,” says Roy.

  Carnival music swirls around them and children shriek at the popping of more fake gunfire. The two of them make their way toward the city hall and it isn’t long before they have a clear view of the cage elevated above the street, a backward “S” on the HOOSEGOW sign over the door. It looks to be about fifteen by fifteen and, sure enough, there, behind bars, is Lennie, a picture of despair as he slumps, head in hands, in the chair that’s the only piece of furniture in the cramped space. When the prisoner looks up and sees them, he springs abruptly to his feet and runs to the bars, where he yells, “Get me out of this place. Please.”

  Ziggy’s first impulse is to think Lennie’s overreacting, as usual. After all, this isn’t a real jail cell. But as he clutches the bars a gang of bearded young drunks at a nearby table sends up a loud, nasty “boo.” “Go back to where you came from, city slicker,” one voice booms. “We’re real Americans,” another shouts at Lennie, “and we don’t need your kind out here.”

  “God, guns and guts,” a third one chimes in. “That’s what made the west great.”

  This could get ugly, Ziggy thinks, and Lennie shouldn’t have to put up with this. “Who’s in charge here?” he asks.

  “That would be me.”

  Ziggy turns to see a bearded man in jeans and a Stetson who looks like an ex-linebacker gone to seed. His eyes are the color of dirty water and the deputy badge pinned to his Western shirt a couple of inches above his swelling paunch identifies him as Dewey Rawlins.

  Roy steps forward. “How can we get our friend out of there?” he asks mildly.

  The man cocks his head and looks at Roy, his mouth curled into a sneer. “Oh,” he drawls in all seriousness, “he’s got to serve his full sentence of an hour. He’s only been here ten minutes so far.”

  This guy’s one mean son-of-a-bitch, Ziggy can see. His blood is boiling. “Look, mister,” he says, pushing ahead of Roy, “we don’t live in this town, we’re just passing through. You don’t have any jurisdiction over this man. Let him out of there or I’ll call a real cop, if there is such a thing in this town.”

  Dewey Rawlins’ mouth moves sideways for a few seconds before he speaks, and out of the blue it comes to Ziggy that this pretend deputy looks like a man who’d buy a dog just so he could kick it around. “That little fella there insulted the western way of life,” Rawlins says levelly. “He made remarks to some of our leading citizens that weren’t very friendly.” His mouth finally twists upward into a strained smile though his eyes remain cold and steely. “Hey, this is all in fun. Can’t you fellows take a joke?” The last question sounds like a threat.

  “How do we get him out?” Ziggy persists, stepping close enough to him so that the cowboy can surely smell the beer on his breath.

  The deputy retreats a half step, as if he needs more room to launch a kick, all the while keeping Ziggy locked in his gaze, but Ziggy has no intention of backing down. “The fine is five dollars,” Rawlins says at last, throwing in, “it goes toward the building of a new town library.”

  “Here,” Ziggy fumbles with his wallet and pulls out a wrinkled bill. “Maybe you can buy yourself a book with this. As for us, we’ve got a bus to catch.”

  The man looks at the money for a few seconds as if there’s a chance he might refuse it, but he takes it at last, slowly smoothing it in his hand before pocketing it. He lifts an oversized set of keys from a table near the jail and takes his own sweet time before opening the cell door, muttering something to Lennie as he exits. Lennie hurries past without looking back, though Dewey Rawlins has enough time to hiss something else to him before he’s out of earshot. The prisoner’s release is accompanied by a smattering of “boos” from nearby. The three of them leave the area of the jail as gunshots pop around them.

  “I’m going to look in on Sharlene,” Roy tells the other two when they near her table.

  “Sure thing,” Ziggy says, and he and the silent Lennie walk back in the direction of the saloon.

  “What did that guy say to you back there?” Ziggy asks after a while.

  Lennie snorts. “He said, ‘You’re lucky your friends came for you, you little shit. The snake was next.’ ”

  “The snake?”

  “Yeah, he said with some of their
so-called prisoners they put a rattlesnake into the jail cell with them. It’s horseshit, of course, but that guy’s a sadist who wanted to see me sweat. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’d actually found some big harmless old snake and would have stuck it in with me just to watch me cringe.” When he takes off his glasses for a moment, he looks different—stronger, more determined. Underneath the outer layer, Ziggy can see, there’s a toughness to this would-be comic.

  “What did you say to him that would piss him off so much?” he asks.

  Lennie shakes his head. “From the second that asshole and his friends saw me, they started needling me. One of them said, ‘A nose like that you can only get in New York.’ I mean, those guys have probably seen three Jews in their lives, but that was apparently enough for them. I’m sure old Dewey’s got a swastika in his bedroom. I guess he and his buddies just wanted to put a little scare in me.” Lennie lets out a long breath. “Well, I’ll tell you, I’m tired of being scared. I told him I’d read somewhere that in the Indian language Oklahoma means ‘Shit-hole.’ That’s when Dewey really started to throw his weight around.” Lennie snickers. “I guess some people just can’t take a little joke.”

  “Good for you,” Ziggy says. “That guy needs some lessons in manners. And the same goes for his buddies.”

  When they’re seated in the saloon, Lennie runs his hands through his hair and says, “I’ll tell you, I had some doubts about California, but after this, I can’t wait to get there. I mean, anything would be an upgrade over this place.”

  “Amen to that,” Ziggy says, and lifts his glass. Remembering the hard, cold eyes of the fake deputy, he realizes how much he needs this drink. Jesus, he thinks, there’s a lot more work involved in traveling than I expected.

  Across from him, Lennie raises his glass and downs his whiskey in a swallow. “Whew!” he says. His eyes are glassy and he shakes his head like a dog who’s just had a bath. Then a kind of peace descends on him, or at least such peace as Lennie Kurzweil is able to manage, accompanied by a dopey smile.

  “What’s the joke?” Ziggy asks.

  “If Leah could see me now,” Lennie says. “She wouldn’t believe it.”

  And soon he’s telling Ziggy about his long sad romance with Leah Pritzker. “She’s a librarian in Brooklyn. I’ve known her since grammar school.” He smiles to himself. “Leah’s sexy in a sneaky way. To me, her glasses were erotic objects. I mean, she was always reading and when her eyes were tired she’d take off her glasses and put them down—looking at those smudged lenses, the elegant curve where the glasses fit behind her ears, it would make my . . . my heart jump, if you know what I mean. She’s got this lush black hair that would fall like heavy drapery when she let it down—I can smell that hair when I close my eyes.” Now he does just that for a few seconds, savoring the memory. He and Leah would have stimulating discussions about books, politics, movies, he says. “No,” he corrects himself. “Not stimulating, incandescent.” He shakes his head. “Leah is one smart woman.”

  He’s silent for a while. When he resumes, the light in his eyes is colder. “The problem was, Leah was impatient to get married and start a family—to start her life, really. She didn’t like the uncertainty of my life, the dubiousness of my prospects, you might say.” He takes a deep breath, as if getting ready for what he has to say next, and he sighs. “Finally she gave me an ultimatum and then not only did she break up with me but she started dating my cousin Morris.” He glowers. “This is a guy in every way unlike me, a loudmouth who was on the rise in his father’s glove factory, the kind of guy who’s always said to have excellent prospects.”

  He gives Ziggy a look of disgust. “I mean, it’s transparent, isn’t it? He’s so different from me that the only reason she started going out with him had nothing to do with liking or not liking him; it was just her way of shocking me into getting regular work.” Lennie looks into his empty glass, picks it up and puts it to his mouth again. “In all truth,” he says, “I was wavering. I mean, was this ever going to work out, this dream of mine of being a comic? I didn’t know. But when she brought Morris to the restaurant where I was working as a waiter and in spite of all my protests I had to wait on them, it was the last straw.”

  He’s silent for a while, as if he’s deciding whether or not to continue. When he does, the words come quickly. “I mean, the guy was so pompous that I couldn’t help myself: I just flipped and poured a dish of lasagna into his lap.” He brings the empty glass to his lips once more and slams it to the bar. “I was fired, of course, I was through with Leah, I knew, but I felt strangely liberated by that act and it was then and there that I decided on this LA venture.”

  He looks down at the bar for a few seconds; then his head shoots up. “Listen,” he says with a sudden urgency, “I should have thought of this before, but it came to me in that jail: you never can tell what’s going to happen when you’re traveling. Let me give you an address in case I have some kind of emergency.”

  “Hey,” Ziggy protests, “we’ll be out of this town pretty soon, and if we’re lucky we’ll never see it again.”

  Lennie nods. “I know,” he says, “But still . . . Anything can happen out here, can’t it?” Ziggy remembers the episode in the men’s room and tries to push back the memory. Meanwhile, Lennie reaches into his pocket and pulls out a little notebook. Is this where he writes down jokes? Ziggy wonders. With a ballpoint pen he quickly scribbles something onto one of the pages and tears it out. “What about you?” he asks. “You got any address for me in case something should happen to you?” He tears the sheet in two and hands the part without writing to Ziggy.

  To Ziggy’s surprise, this solemn moment is a bit upsetting. His hand is shaking as he writes his own address and phone number in Detroit and exchanges papers with Lennie. He’s also surprised when he looks at what Lennie’s written. He’d expected to see Leah’s name.

  “Sam’s my agent,” Lennie explains. “He’ll know how to get hold of the important people.”

  “Sure thing,” Ziggy says, pocketing the paper.

  The two of them are silent for a long time while phantom fingers strike the keys of the player piano and Ziggy thinks of how different this bar is from Connie’s back in the neighborhood. He remembers the place on the night of Eddie Figlak’s wake, the people, the noise, the “Helen Polka.” Odd, he thinks, the way time works. It seems months since he was last in Detroit.

  When a replacement bus eventually arrives from Oklahoma City, the passengers are told that they’ll be leaving in twenty minutes—without their previous driver—who’s been instructed to stay with the old vehicle. Though a number of people seem to want to prolong this carnival interlude to the last possible moment, Ziggy notices Miss Lathrop, the woman who’s visiting the graves of presidents, is already in her seat. Lennie’s right: she certainly is eager to resume her hobby.

  “Ziggy,” an excited Lennie is suddenly at his side. “I need your help. We have just enough time too.”

  “For what?” Ziggy asks.

  “You’ll never believe what I discovered,” Lennie says, and he leads him to an alley near the bar where they had a drink. “See that black pickup?”

  “Sure,” Ziggy says.

  “Look at that license plate.” Ziggy can see that it reads “DU-EE.” “That’s his, our deputy’s, I’m sure,” says Lennie. “It’s about his level of ingenuity.”

  Ziggy isn’t too keen about going along with this escapade, but he can’t deny that Lennie deserves his shot at revenge. So he agrees to stand watch at the head of the alley while Lennie deflates two of the truck’s tires. “Come on, come on,” Ziggy urges. “Two is enough.”

  At last Lennie scurries out. “Let’s get on that bus now,” he says. “And I hope it leaves right away.”

  A few minutes later they’re rolling westward. “Good riddance to Dodge City,” Lennie says as they leave town. He chuckles to himself and sings, “I fought the law and I won.” He holds up a hand. “I know it was petty, beneath me, real
ly, but sometimes if pettiness is all that’s available, you might as well be petty. Anyway, it sure felt good.” At that moment, Lennie seems happier than at any other time during the trip.

  At the same time, as the dry, empty landscape moves past, Ziggy’s spirits are sinking. Without the distractions of their last stop, he’s haunted once more by that fainting spell in the men’s room. It could happen to anyone, he keeps telling himself, it could mean nothing at all. Dehydration—aren’t they always talking about that? Then again, who knows what else it could mean?

  “Hey, you’re being pretty quiet,” Lennie observes.

  “I’m having fond memories of Frontier Days,” he answers.

  One thing that’s contributing to his mood is that Roy is leaving them in Oklahoma City, just a few miles away. He hadn’t realized until now how big a part of this trip the tour bus driver from New Jersey has been, especially since his revelation in the saloon. I’m never going to know how that story comes out, he thinks.

  When they get to Oklahoma City at last, everybody gets off the bus and collects their luggage. They have a longer layover here because they’re changing buses.

  “Well, pardners,” Roy says as he takes leave of Ziggy and Lennie, “I hope you both find what you want in LA.” All three of them are standing beside their bags.

  “You too,” Ziggy says. “I hope things go well with your kid.”

  “Thanks.” He lowers his voice. “You’ll look after Sharlene, won’t you?” Back in the town where Lennie’d been briefly imprisoned, Roy had been able to drive off her two cowboy admirers and have a heart-to-heart talk, he told Ziggy.

  “Sure thing.”

  “Well . . .” Roy begins, though he never finishes the sentence. Instead, he picks up his bag and turns away.

  Before he has a chance to disappear into the crowd, though, Sharlene herself races across the bus station to him and wraps her arms around him, almost knocking him over in the process. She squeezes him hard and for a while it looks as if she isn’t going to let him go. When she does at last, her eyes are wet. “Vaya con dios,” Roy manages to mutter.