The Life of Polycrates and Other Stories for Antiquated Children

by Connell, Brendan

  XVII.

  He wiggled his soft, slimy body into a pair of tight jeans.

  XVIII.

  A roaring crowd of maniacs biting each other’s fingers off and afterwards drooling long strands of pink saliva which fall to the ground like webs as rockets go off overhead, lonely sparks expiring in overdoses of nausea.

  XIX.

  But everyone has their limit and it got to the point where even prostitutes of the lowest order refused to have him as a client—preferring starvation to his oily touch, to his demands which were too perverse even for those initiated in the darkest rites of fornication, and Dino, as passionate as any chamois or barnyard animal, was constrained to seek pleasure from knobby trees, sidewalk cracks and other inanimate objects of symbolic significance.

  XX.

  Passing by that stooping, pigeon-chested man; that stinking urinal, whose hand was extended for a few coins.

  “You need to give to me now,” Dino said.

  “Eh?”

  Dino began to ply through the man’s pockets, located six or eight francs in change. The other was too high to offer resistance and our hero went off and spent the money on two glasses of beer at the Bar Apache and spoke to an old woman whose language he did not understand.

  XXI.

  Sometimes, when a tooth fell out of his rotting mouth, or he noticed how quickly he was growing bald, he would explode in tears of joy.

  XXII.

  When he walked, he made his way in unpleasant rhythmic waves, like a lingering camel.

  XXIII.

  A hunched over creature waddled down the street, a twenty cent cigar protruding from his loose, greasy lips, an aroma of the sewer hanging about his person

  XXIV.

  Everyone is vulgar.

  Peter Payne

  Tell zeal it wants devotion;

  Tell love it is but lust;

  Tell time it metes but motion;

  Tell flesh it is but dust:

  And wish them not reply,

  For thou must give the lie.

  —Sir Walter Raleigh

  I.

  A true crowd had gathered in front of the Tropicana Casino, upright livestock; harelips, evil odours, voices hatchet the air.

  They were all packed against a temporary barrier like those used by police to keep back rioters. Red, white and blue banners hung from the light posts. Twenty-one white stretch limousines were parked side by side in the emptied section of the parking lot, ramps marking them off at either end like book ends. A stage had been set up, a big banner stretched across it saying in gold lettering:

  KAPTAIN PETER PAYNE

  *

  A voice roared out over the speakers, “Ladies and gentlemaaan! —Kaptain Petaaar Paaayne!!!”

  The crowd cheered. Several whistles were audible. A tri-coloured motorcycle spangled with stars buzzed past, the rider waving. He wore a white leather outfit, gold stripes jetting across. Men held small children on their shoulders for a better view. The motorcycle turned around, buzzed back, picking up speed, the rider popping a glorious wheelie that made the crowd go wild. At the end of the run the bike fishtailed, turned back, front tire jacking up, him going the whole length of the parking lot, all the while keeping only one hand on the bike while he waved with the other. He road past, one foot on the seat, one hand on the handle bars, the other limbs outstretched like an acrobat (like Dennis Hopper in Easy Rider . . . Paul Newman in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid). People were stirred, wanted this. They smiled, wagged their heads enthusiastically and cheered.

  “He sure can ride,” said a man, cowboy hat obscuring his shrunken head.

  A little girl stared at the spectacle with wide, impressionable eyes.

  Several young men covertly sipped cans of beer, talking in low voices, their shoulders hunched.

  Peter Payne whined up to the ramp several times, testing the logistics. Finally he gave the thumbs up. He would jump. The crowd became silent. He rode back a couple of hundred yards. A small man in a mechanic’s jump-suit ran up to him. Everyone could see that they were talking. Words exchanged. Gestures vehement. The small man jogged away as Peter Payne revved up his bike. He waved and then buzzed toward the ramp, his motorcycle picking up speed. It hit the ramp and shot into the air. He let go of the handlebars, threw his arms over his head, quickly grabbed them again and he was on the other side. Cameras flashed. Sound issued from open mouths.

  II.

  Peter Payne was born in San Angelo, Texas. His father worked as a ranch hand. The family moved around, from Texas to Colorado, Colorado to New Mexico, then on to Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Montana. His dad was a jack-of-all-trades, getting work where he could, drinking too much, getting fired, going straight, getting steady work, then hitting the bottle harder than ever. When he had money he spent it quickly, buying Peter and his older brother Jack whatever they wanted, even if it meant not paying the rent and bills. Mom bore with it, resigning herself to the wild ways of her man, Preacher.

  He could hear his father outside howling at the moon, deep in liquor. Years later he would remember this with a kind of sacred awe, at the time he lay in his bed wide awake, his brother’s breathing sounding out a comfort (their blood being the same) that could only be effaced by death.

  The light shafted across the room and he lay on the night, TV going low in the living room, Mom's pretty hair streaked with early grey. Preacher out there sitting on the tailgate, sipping Kentucky whisky, happy in the clean expanse and drink and speaking to those lavish stars.

  III.

  “Get your butt in that door!” Pete hissed.

  Blaine sulked his way through the broad doors. The family found seats together in the sixth pew next to a very blond husband and wife with a teenage daughter yellow as straw.

  Old women sat, gripping purses and bibles tightly, faces dry, pious, globs of hunger and senility and protuberances of pain. Some newlyweds pressed close together, the man staring with animal satisfaction at his mate’s swollen belly. Humbled fathers stared at the Aryan Christ before them, their eyes pink from Saturday night’s twelve pack. A dirty-faced boy murmured obscenities under his breath, Satan pricking within him, effing obsessive effs as the sanctuary filled its gut.

  “Aren’t they ever gonna start?” muttered Blaine. Virginia, Peter’s wife, grabbed the boy’s hand, squeezing it tightly so it hurt like hell.

  “You kids need to learn a little religion,” said Peter in a low voice. “When I was a boy I enjoyed church.”

  He lied.

  “These days all these young people act like God forsaken atheists,” commented the blond husband next to them.

  Virginia nodded her head.

  “Lizards,” she mumbled.

  A hush ran over the congregation. The pastor shuffled out, his small eyes taking silent count of his congregation. The organ broke in, hymn books shuffled, whispers were exchanged, Bringing in the sheep they sang, Bringing in the sheep . . . We shall be rejoicing . . .

  Peter prayed to God.

  Dear Lord, he prayed, Dear Lord protect me and my family from harm’s way. When I’m doing those stunts protect me so I will be able to be there for little Sarah and Blaine. And let Blaine see the light of Jesus. Let me be OK doing these stunts for seven more years and then I'll quit dear Lord. Praise be to Jesus Christ. Help me Christ, help me!

  IV.

  Did Peter Payne have a definite perception of the validity of God?

  No. He had faith in an occult substance, decidedly male but undefined, like a lump of clay. He saw afterlife vaguely, as a man half-blind sees the blurred image of his wife being violated as he struggles to release himself from the chair he is tied to. . . . Peter Payne saw God as something separate from himself. He did not consider that God (sitting cross legged atop a pile of shit) created man and the world as a spider does its web. . . . The cruciform speck of gold which hung from his neck was to him not so much the logo of the Eternal as it was of White Honour. . . . It showed that any homosexual tendencies he had
were most likely latent, his money was not acquired through cheating people, his sins were washed clean by virtue of their having been performed under the auspices of European ancestry. The Lord was an ethereal substance which he allowed to molest him, as an altar boy does a priest. Man without God would be like an octopus without a saddle, pumpkin pie without horseradish, a chimney without a negligee . . .

  V.

  “Come on you son of a bitch!” Virginia cried out as she fed the machine another silver dollar.

  All around the vibrant clink of coinage rang out. Money was falling in heaps. Lights went off, sirens sounded. Undoubtedly many were becoming rich at that very moment. A woman walked by, her shirt front filled with silver, her white belly dipping a little over the rim of her pants. Cigarettes burned in every mouth: Pall Mall, Marlboro, Lucky Strike, Camel: straights, menthol, lights, 100’s.

  “I’ve got an addictive personality,” Virginia would tell people.

  She lived to eat. Gambling was a hunger. The buffets at the casinos were phenomenal, gross. Roast beef floated in a thin gravy spotted with white clots of fat. Baked cod, chippy and chewy, a faint taste of sewage to the meat. Fried chicken, the crust aged, effete, a reservoir of oil hidden beneath the skin. Vegetables embalmed in a lukewarm broth, all vitamins judiciously leached from their fibres. Desserts bright, tall, towering, colourful, silicon sweet.

  Bellies distended, rumps hanging low, aqueous, they make their way back to grey moneylust, mud, noxious, grey smoke sifting through their ears, packing against their craniums, hair follicles.

  VI.

  Dad is a motorcycle daredevil. Watch out. If he dies that means no him. So I don’t want to pray. I don't want to pray not because I don’t want Dad to be OK, but because I don’t want to. I don’t want to be stabbed by a spirit, but I don’t want to pray, be bored and pray. Before dinner I just pretend (head bent, churlish, as a criminal might submit to the lash of a whip, inwardly defiant). Mom might whoop me, but I don’t care. I’m Blaine. I don’t care. Because I am not a sweet boy or a sissy and I knew but did not know, wanted but would not believe, would not admit.

  It was early morning and I was walking down the hall. I needed to go so I was walking down the hall and then I heard that scream and did not consider. Did not consider who it was but I knew it was a pain yell, like a real pain and it could have been her. So I opened the door and there was a man hurting her, his back arched up and the skin like it was wet. She was screaming and he was hurting her. He was on top of her and hurting her and then yelled at me and told me to get out. His face was red, not just angry red but like he had been holding his breath, and it was not like I had ever seen it before, but it was Dad, a stranger yet him. Nobody said anything about it, just as if it had never happened. She seemed OK and I didn’t say anything about it. She must not have been hurt too bad because she was in a good mood and made pancakes and bacon and joked and moved around with her big thighs filling out the kitchen. I just hoped she wasn’t hurt bad somewhere I couldn’t see. Because Dad could hurt you bad if he wanted to. I know he could. His arms could hurt you. I don’t care though because I don’t care if I get hurt. I don’t care (it being that this very pain that his mother bore, whirling of blood, tempest of milk and okra, was the agony he felt, being pulled from the other side, mysterious pre-existence-natal-wrack— attracted by the odour of blood, semen—into the fleshy folds of the womb, tortured, shot out, a victim of raw elements, irreversible laws of universal suffering).

  VII.

  “Look Merle, you better go home. I don’t need any drunks on my team. Any boy that’s with me needs to be square. You get it?”

  “Sure Pete, I get it.”

  “You know, you come over and start helping me to set things up and you’re all boozed, or even just got yourself a bad hangover, and that’s no good. I’m going to need you tomorrow, so I want you to be in good shape.”

  “Pete, you know I love you. I’ll listen Pete. You know I don't mean to drink so much. I’ll make it OK Pete. Don't worry, I’ll make it OK.”

  “I hope so Merle. By God I hope so.”

  Peter could not help but get nervous when he caught Merle on a drunk. There was no question that Merle was a good mechanic; and a decent technician provided he was sober.

  “That drinking problem’s a terrible thing,” Peter would say. “My brother had it and it is a terrible thing.”

  My brother had it and my father had it, he thought, but it killed my brother. Preacher was big and of another time and was a match for it or at least a contender. You watch Merle, he told himself, because contender he is not.

  *

  Phoenix, AZ

  10:30 PM

  The night before a jump.

  Payne climbs into his air stream. He eats cold cereal while listening to music and then goes to bed.

  3:30 AM

  Peter Payne wakes to the sound of water. He arises. Merle is standing in the kitchenette peeing on the stove. He is not sober.

  VIII.

  “Virginia, what the hell is this? I got the statement from the bank today and according to it there's five-thousand dollars less in our savings account than there’s supposed to be!”

  “Well Petey . . .” Virginia started.

  “Don’t Petey me Virginia. It’s that damned gambling of yours, isn't it? Hell, I knew it was getting out of control. You go down to those God damned casinos and flush my money down the toilet, don’t you? . . . I’m out there risking my neck—literally risking my God damned neck—to earn some money so me and you and Blaine and Sarah can have a decent middle-class life, and what are you doing but just flushing it all down the toilet!”

  “Oh Pete!” Virginia cried, breaking down.

  She collapsed at his feet, burying her head in his trouser leg. Tears danced onto his shoe.

  “You’ve done wrong Virginia, you’ve done wrong. . . . You’re just letting yourself go and I really don’t know what to do about this. . . . You need help. . . . You know you need some God damned help.”

  “I know I do. I know I do Pete.”

  IX.

  “Why doesn’t that man have a wife?” she would ask.

  “Just look at him,” Peter would inevitably reply. “What female is going to take a man like that?”

  “Well, men without women worry me.”

  No one in fact had ever seen Merle hand in hand with a woman. When the boys would start talking about the female anatomy he would keep silent, even blush slightly. Yet his squalid little apartment was littered with objectionable literature. His mind was obviously not devoid of carnal thought. No one suspected him of being a saint.

  X.

  I bet he sins. I bet he sins more than me. Mom calls me a sinner. She’s fat but I’m a sinner. She drinks pop. Merle doesn’t have a cross around his neck like Dad does connecting him to life. I better watch out that I don’t turn out like him. He always smells bad so my nose wants to run away. I don’t want to smell like that. Dad smells good. Because he’s got that cross I guess connecting him to grass and baked things and I didn’t kill Christ, I swear it wasn’t me though I’m going to sin I know but I’m going to smell good.

  XI.

  Virginia was blowing up, bloating out, tearing the seams of her clothes, making eyebrows rise. She had had a nice figure when they had first met. It was not having two kids that killed it. It was her addiction to food and soda, her mad chase after calories. The fat had no place to go. Her asthma prevented her from much in the way of exercise. Peter found himself cringing before her naked body, caressing it with little enthusiasm. For him bedroom activity became a regular chore. He put her on a diet. He was sick of seeing her tremendous rump wagging around the house.

  “No more pop and junk food,” he said.

  “I don’t eat junk food. I eat people food.”

  “That’s right, you eat people food. Enough for about two or three people. Now it’s time for person food. Singular. You get it?”

  That night at supper he shook his head
when she started helping herself to seconds of the pineapple whip.

  “What’s that got in it? Marshmallows, cottage cheese. That’s no diet food! If you’re still hungry eat some more salad.”

  “Rabbit,” Virginia mumbled under her breath as she stabbed her fork into a leaf of lettuce.

  *

  She lay beneath the covers, a paperback novel in one hand. His back was to her. He lay curled up on his side, eyes closed.

  Why doesn’t he ever make love to me? she thought. I have desires just like every other woman. More probably. He needs to know what I want. I'll give him a hint. I'll ask him if he feels like doing anything.

  “So what do you feel like doing honey?” she said.

  “Sleeping.”

  She put down her book and began to caress his shoulder. She began kissing his neck, reaching her hand around him and running it around his stomach thinking honey come on and turn over my wants and needs with your steam because I don’t like being the way I’m not supposed to and him slowly opening his eyes believing must turn over and do my sacred duty be squeezed as if by a python back-breaker me nailed to a cross well it’s only a bed.

  XII.

  If his brother could visit this man, he, Peter Payne. This man so unlike that boy who had been there wide awake while their father had howled at the moon. . . . This man, children branching off him like strange, somewhat problematic fruit, a heavy woman brushing up against him in the night. . . . A man performing cryptic adult rituals, succumbing to social shackles, living behind a brutally handsome face. He was far from what he had been, as a pile of greasy sausage is far from the pig it once was, comfortably wallowing in the mud.

  Jack had sat there in his trailer cleaning his guns, the swimsuit model pinned to the wall, her breasts full and uptilted, water rolling off her brown, apparently desirable body, insensitive, paper, the room without joy. There was the bottle and he would drink from the bottle, and there was the Horse and Hunt Club and the shooting and there was Peter and memories of violation, tubes of red, jungles of gleaming nerve.