In a Lady’s Service

by Tom Ardies

“Sí.”

  “Who has a young colleague named Gonzales?”

  “Sí, sí. What is it you want?”

  “No, it is what you want, Doctor. My name is Buchanan.” “Oh …”

  Buchanan, disguised once more as the sickly Nanahcub, bumped his wheelchair down into The Jungle, demanding coffee spiked with Courvoisier. Finally, at last, the world was his oyster, his chintzy days a thing of the past. He wondered where he should go first with his millions. Switzerland was appealing. He loved to yodel in the Alps. But there was also the Riviera. Hong Kong. Nakusp.

  How to choose?

  Gonzales was waiting as arranged, eyes hollow, face drawn. Buchanan trundled up to him purposefully and revealed it was he under the cripple’s wraps. They skipped the preliminaries and got straight to business.

  “You brought the salve?” Gonzales asked, his voice a rasp.

  Buchanan nodded, even though, truth told, the ungüento was now in Noli’s tender care, where it would remain until a deal was made. He decided that he should start at ten million. He would come down, of course, that was expected, but not too far.

  “I’m glad you came to your senses,” Gonzales said, making it sound like a complaint. “I’ve been scouring the city for days. Eating on the run. No sleep …” He paused to rally. “Well? Where is it?”

  Buchanan smirked. Did Gonzales think him a fool? “First, there is the small matter of money.”

  “If you insist,” Gonzales said. He produced a remarkably thin wallet and removed a single ten-peso bill. He flicked a finger and sent it sailing across the table. “There—that makes it legal.”

  Buchanan sat stunned and speechless. The two mean digits swam before his eyes.

  “We’re not about to pay more,” Gonzales said. “The drug is as useless to us as it is to you. So let’s just get rid of it—shall we?”

  Buchanan still couldn’t speak. Useless … ?

  “You are a professional, aren’t you?” Gonzales demanded. “You are aware of the side effect?” He cast a caustic look at The Jungle’s shriveled patrons. “We can’t have people happy … life a sheer joy … the world ringing with laughter …”

  Side effect? Buchanan wondered. He had been the silly goose of late. Did this explain his fits of giggles with Contreras?

  “Face it,” Gonzales lectured. “It is our greed and ambition that keep the wheels turning. Let happiness spread its vicious tentacles—and the world would come to a grinding halt.”

  Buchanan was going to protest and then he remembered the trouble with Santa Luisa. The villagers were happy. But nothing got done.

  “You may want that on your conscience,” Gonzales said. “But not I. Not Orozco. We have destroyed our total supply of the drug. The formula has been burned and the ashes scattered. This afternoon we begin shock treatments to impair our memories.” He laughed bitterly. “And you ask us for money?”

  Buchanan turned away, his face burning with shame, and Noli, mistaking this for the signal, rushed forward with a small plainly wrapped package.

  “Your special condoms, señor,” he explained, a clever ruse to hide what was really inside. “The one with the rooster’s comb is best. To awake in the morning, a cock’ll do, tee hee.”

  Gonzales brightened. “Say. I wouldn’t mind trying that myself. Have you got any left?”

  “Sorry,” Noli told him. “You’re too late. I can only fit a right.”

  “For shame!” Buchanan said. “I trust you implicitly, and you’ve been into the salve, haven’t you?”

  “Sí,” Noli confessed. “But I swear I only wanted to smell it. Can I help my long nose?”

  “Very well,” Buchanan decided, accepting that explanation. It could happen to anyone.

  Gonzales’ eyes widened. Slowly, carefully, fingers trembling, his hand started across the table.

  “Take it,” Buchanan told him. “Take it and go.”

  “Gracias,” Gonzales said, spared the indignity of theft. He closed a bony fist around the package and stuffed it deep in a pocket. He rose shakily. “You will not regret this decision. The world owes you. Adiós, amigo.”

  Noli was a trifle perplexed as he watched Gonzales weave out of The Jungle. “The world owes you? Does that mean he didn’t pay up?”

  “It does.”

  “Too bad,” Noli said, shaking his head. “Rivas was around. He says you’ve one more day to settle all debts. Then he is going to kill you.”

  Good grief, Buchanan thought, dropping deeper into despair. He couldn’t have that.

  “I know of a woman,” Noli proposed. “She is very, very rich. Jewels hang from her like grapes. So many diamond rings she can’t lift her hand to be kissed.”

  Buchanan clutched at his arm. “Where?”

  “There.”

  Down the stairs, a shawl over her knees, an old biddy came bumping, barely in control of her wheelchair.

  “You think that’s amusing?” Buchanan demanded, stung.

  “You are in one, too,” Noli reminded him gently.

  Buchanan looked down at himself. So he was. Wordlessly, he stood up, embracing his friend, and then strode out of the place, never to return again.

  There was a murmur in The Jungle. What was this? A cripple who walked?

  Some wonder drug, Noli thought, smiling. The empty tray spun on a blunt fingertip and he moved back to his station.