“Howdy, Mr. Maltby. Seen you sit’n here and thought I’d thank you again for helping me with my bike.”
“Glad to help, Billy. How’s your pa? I heard he had an operation.”
“Real good the docs all say. He’s coming home tomorrow. He don’t have no headaches anymore and ain’t had a numbness spell for a week. They say in three months or so he may be able to go back to work.
“They paid him five thousand dollars, too! Pa says that will get us by easy until he can work again. Pa’s like his old self now. He don’t yell no more and he smiles a lot. First thing he did when he woke up from the operation was to give us all a big hug and then later he just kept telling us how he loved us and how he was sorry for the way he had been acting. Shoot, we knew it wasn’t his fault, but it sure was good to have pa back again.”
~*~
Billy had been doing a lot of thinking about the events of the past few weeks and although he was young and inexperienced he was shrewd for his age and he thought there were a lot of coincidences in this deal. I talk to Mr. Maltby about my family and then when I ride my bike by Doc Collins’ house I see Mr. Maltby talking to Doc Collins. A few days later I’m out in the cornfield across from Mr. Maltby’s place hunting rabbits with my bow and arrow, a little out of season, and I see Doc Collins stop to talk to Mr. Maltby. Doc gets in his car heads toward my house. He turns down the road leading down to Bottom Creek and I hightail it through the woods to come out in back of the house before Doc can get there. That’s no great trick as slow as Doc drives, Billy muses and smiles to himself. Then Doc comes up with this experiment deal that is just what pa needs. Too many coincidences for me, but I know a good thing when I see it. Just so long as it gets me my pa back I’m all for it. I’ll keep my mouth shut.
Billy grabbed his bike, righted it, climbed on, stared thoughtfully at Mike Maltby for a full minute, and then said, “thanks, Mr. Maltby.”
“No need to thank me, Billy. You did all the work. All I did was supply the nuts for your axle.”
“No, sir, not for that, for my pa,” he responded and tore down the lane on his bike.
~*~
Mike was astounded. Now how had Billy figured that out? he wondered. He didn’t have the answer to that question, but he was willing to bet that any boy his age smart enough to figure out this deal was smart enough to keep his mouth shut. Mike had never felt better. Even before Mary’s death and before he started dealing, he had never felt better. He could never recall having helped someone before for no personal gain. He had worked a lot of deals in a lot of places, over a lot of years, but none had felt as good as this one. This one was just for the doing, not for the money and it felt good, really good. He was saddened though by the thought that Mary was not here to enjoy this success with him. She would have been smiling from ear to ear.
Will it always be this way? he wondered. Will I always sit alone under this tree yearning for Mary to be here to share one thing or another with me? Will I always regret not having done any good in this world and not having appreciated Mary while I had her? How many years must I suffer to make up for the suffering I have caused?
~*~
Doc turned into Mike’s driveway and saw him sitting in his chair under the old white oak tree. He was surprised to see a motorcycle parked at the end of the driveway. No one he knew ever rode one of those crazy things. Especially not one so heavily laden. It seemed to him that just about everything imaginable was tied on to that motorcycle, either on back or over the handlebars. He readily identified a sleeping bag and a bag of something that had bumps and points pushing out all around it.
Doc stopped the car, switched off the ignition and climbed out slowly, just like he did everything else these days. He walked across the yard and flopped heavily into a chair.
“Howdy, Doc.”
“What in the world is all that, Mike?” Doc said, motioning up the drive to the motorcycle.
“It’s a motorcycle.”
“I know that. Whose?”
“Mine.”
“What for?”
“A trip.”
“What trip? Why?”
“It’s the middle of September and I’m still sitting under this same shade tree. I’m more depressed now than ever. I need something different.”
“Why? Stephens’ operation was a success and it looks like he will be able to go back to work. You ought to be happy about that.”
“Yeah, but my past life and the way I treated Mary still eats away at me.”
“It would help if everyone knew you were the man been behind the Stephens affair, but that’s not the way you want it.”
“Maybe you’re right. What you told me about what the people around here think of me keeps turning over and over in my mind. What people think of me never meant much in the past, but now for some reason it’s different. Still, I want the Stephens affair just between you and me.”
“Okay,” Doc said with a shrug and then asked, “But why leave?”
“For a little while I felt good about myself, but now the old guilt and doubts are pressing into my thoughts. Day and night, more and more, I dream of Mary and what I didn’t give her and what I’ve done so terribly wrong in my former money-grubbing life. Vern Stephens’ operation can’t erase that.”
“Nothing can erase that, Mike.”
“I know and that’s my problem.”
“I didn’t mean that literally, Mike. I mean you’ll always remember those things. You can’t erase them from your memory, but you can change. You can do good things now. You can find God and start going to church.”
“Still the same old Doc. Church is the answer to everything.”
“No. Church is the answer to nothing. God is the answer to everything and church is where you usually find God.”
“Not me, Doc. Not me.”
Doc’s face fell and his mouth popped open, but he kept his silence.
“I’m not selling out, Doc, but I am leaving. Last week some motorcycle riders passed by here and stopped for a rest on the hard road. I gave them a drink and we talked for a while. After they left I decided that riding a motorcycle around the country could be peaceful. I desperately want and need some peace.
“Plus. Over the years, I’ve been to a lot of places in this country, but I never saw any of them. I was always too busy making deals to notice. So now I’m determined to see some of the country. Peace or not, I’m going to see some country. Just where I’ll go I don’t know. I made my arrangements at the bank, bought a motorcycle, outfitted it, and I’m going to leave.”
When it was evident that he was finished, Doc said sarcastically, “Got enough gear?”
“Figured to start out heavy and maybe lighten the load as I go. Never rode cross country before and I’m not sure what I’ll need.”
“Why do it now?”
“I told you. I want to see some country. Never took the time to just see the sights before. I need some room. I want to find myself.”
“Find yourself!” Doc scoffed and continued, “I thought you were doing real good right here. Got you a nice house in the country and a church to attend regularly, if you would. Get involved here, Mike. It’ll work out.”
“No. I bought that house for a dead wife and I’m not interested in church. I don’t belong here. Never did. The community knows that. You told me as much not long ago.”
Doc replied, “That was before the Stephens affair though. If you’d let me tell them about that it could make all the difference.”
“No. That’s not why I did that, Doc, and you know it. Stephens can never know about that and neither can anyone else. Wouldn’t matter anyway. I just don’t belong here. Maybe if Mary had lived it would be different, but she didn’t. You should understand that. You’ve lost a wife, too.”
“Yes, but I didn’t go riding off into the sunset with a motorcycle because of it.”
“But you had a home here already and a life. I have neither and I never will. I have to find myself.
> “Since I was twenty years old I’ve chased around the country grubbing for more money. Never took the time to look at anything. Every road was just a route to another deal and another dollar.
“I’ve made more money in the last fifteen years than I could ever spend. I’m not proud of how I made some of it; and though I may be rich by many standards, I’m poor. I’m a poor human being and I don’t belong in a nice community like this one.”
“You weren’t a poor human being on that Stephens thing.”
“Maybe, but that don’t make up for fifteen years of stepping on people to get one more rung up the ladder or make a few more dollars. Nothing can make up for that. Nothing can make up for what I did to Mary.
“All she ever wanted was a nice house in the country in a nice community like this and I didn’t see that until it was too late. One good deed don’t make up for that kind of a mistake, Doc.”
“So you’re going off on a motorcycle to make up for the last fifteen years?”
“No. I’m going off on a motorcycle to see some country. That’s all. Like I said. Nothing can make up for the life I’ve led.
“The house is closed up and the bank will take care of anything that comes up. Here is a key,” he finished tossing a key on the table toward Doc and continued, “I was going to stop by your place so that someone would know the score and have a key. You saved me a trip. So long.”
“So long,” Doc said, as he watched Mike walk back up the drive, climb on the motorcycle, hit the electric starter, spin the motorcycle around and head down the driveway to the hard road without so much as a glance back.
The End
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To find other titles by Robert James Allison, visit his website at:
www.RobertJamesAllison.com
Robert James Allison is an attorney who practiced law in Central Illinois for over 25 years. He has since retired from the private practice of law and moved to Louisville, KY. In the 1970s he served in the U.S. Army as a Military Policeman and later was a Captain in the U.S. Army Judge Advocate General’s Corp, Army National Guard. Robert draws on his life experiences in his writing and melds his experiences with his characters to give them a realism which draws the reader into their lives.
Full-length novels by Robert James Allison:
The First Suitor - a romantic suspense
Failed Succession (The First Suitor sequel) - a political thriller
Legal Nightmare - a legal thriller
Scholarly Pursuit - a romantic action adventure
Matters of Faith-a mystery
Fairway Fatality-a murder mystery
The Preacher-a murder mystery
Solitaire’s War (book one) -an espionage adventure
The Path to the Outside (book two) -an espionage adventure
In Search of Evil (book three) - an espionage adventure
Short stories:
A Story for Eloise - inspirational
The Vern Stephens Operation Page 4