by James Jones
“What are you doin out roamin around tonight, Bob?” he said with a grin.
Bob French looked at him, grinning and rubbing his hands together. Then he turned to the poker table. “Gentlemen! Gentlemen!” he leered. “I see there is a game in progress! I wonder if I might perchance sit in?”
There was a droning bass rumble of assent from the table, but nobody seemed very happy about it and Frank knew why because he had played with Bob before when he was like this.
“Aren’t you indulging tonight, Frank?” Bob said grinning.
Frank shook his head. “Not tonight, Bob. Just sittin here watchin and havin a drink relaxin.” He had, in fact, had four drinks here. And was getting ready to have some more. How long were those two bastards going to keep on talkin?
“Well,” Bob said. His eyes had almost the bright, cruel eagerness of a hunting bird. Frank decided the old boy was really quite tight.
“I think,” Bob grinned, “I might just have one small drink myself now you mention it. I don’t think one would hurt me.”
The bartender was out working the main bar and Bob went around behind the counter. Keeping up a running chatter all the time to Frank he mixed himself a highball glass two thirds full of martini out of his own bottles on the rack and carried it over to the poker table.
Frank swung around to watch knowing what would happen. Bob French began to win almost at once. He played in an unorthodox way, betting and calling without even seeming to take time to think, and keeping up an incessant pointless—though witty—chatter all the time. This disconcerted the other five players who in contrast had been playing slowly and in almost dead silence; almost immediately all of them began to play badly and too fast.
Frank watched grinning, and feeling his liquor a little. It had taken Frank himself some time to get onto this style of playing of Bob’s when drunk. Because under all the laughing chatter and apparently wild betting Bob was calculating everything just as coldly as any poker player. The trouble was, before long his laughing witty talk and seemingly recklessness had you laughing, too—and letting down. About the only way you could play against him when he was like that was to close off your ears to him and try to just play your cards. But you couldn’t even do that very well because you never knew what he was doing.
He didn’t seem to care so much about winning as he did confusing everybody else and making them lose. It was almost as if something drove him into trying to antagonize everybody, while some obscure form of cruelty peered out of those rebelliously eager eyes of his as he reached out and swept in your money.
Frank couldn’t understand it. Usually, Bob was the kindest politest man there was in the world. A real old-school gentleman. What got into him, to make him act that way? If there was anything Frank could not tolerate, it was bad manners.
It didn’t make him like Old Bob any less. But it sure did make him disappointed in him. —Damn it, how long were those two guys going to talk?
With neither his disapproval, nor his impatience showing on his face, Frank looked around the locker room. Clark and Harry Shotridge were still yakking away. Outside of them—and the poker players—there was no one else around tonight. Except for Tony Wernz IV of course at his customary table in the corner. The figure in expensive sports clothes sprawled in the cornermost chair as if aware this was the farthest point to which he could retreat, one emptied whiskey bottle and one partly full one sitting on the table before him, and so drunk that he appeared in danger of falling off the chair at any moment. This was Anton Wernz IV, father of little Anton V (and also two daughters), main stockholder—or would be—in the Second National Bank, and owner—or would be, when Old Anton III finally died—of the Wernz Investment Loan and the biggest single block-holding of real estate in Parkman and the County. Young Tony IV (who was a man of about forty and a few years younger than Frank) was such an eternal perennial at the back table of the men’s bar that almost nobody took any notice of him anymore, unless they just happened to be looking that way like Frank was now. Of course, they all went over and said a few polite words to him to which he would grunt thickly in return, and a couple of them would always be ready to put him back on his chair if he should happen to fall off which he occasionally did, but outside of that he might as well not even have been here. Usually, big Paul Fredric, the Second National first vice president (now president it was, since Tony had become chairman of the board), would be on hand to see that he got home when Les the pro closed up; although in the past few years, this privileged duty had been relegated to one of younger vice presidents. Or if his wife was with him—she was very prominent in the women’s clubs circle—she would send someone back to collect him and get him out to the car. On the few occasions when nobody from his hierarchy was there, Les the pro, who owed his job to Tony and Marie, would always see that he got home. But almost always there was someone there, either Paul or the young vice president or Tony’s wife, who was president of the local WCTU because both she and Tony were leaders of the prohibition and anti-liquor leagues in Cray County.
Frank, at the bar, enjoyed feeling disgusted with his drunkenness and not a little bit superior, while he drank his own drinks and waited on Clark Hibbard. Tony stared straight ahead slack-faced at the wall beyond the other, and empty, table. The only movement he made was to pour whiskey into the glass with his right hand and raise it to his mouth. As a matter of fact, Frank thought enjoyably, he looked dead. Even so, Frank did not make the mistake of imagining that Tony IV was so dead that he could be taken on any kind of a business or real estate deal. He knew far better.
Eventually—while Bob French continued to laugh and sparkle and win the poker hands—Clark Hibbard and Harry Shotridge concluded their talk and got up from the table. The tall Clark slapped the shorter Harry on the back, and followed him on up toward the bar after a polite word or two to Tony Wernz.
“How’s it going, Tony old man? Having a good time, boy?” Representative Hibbard said in his crisply enunciated editor’s voice.
The numb man might as well not have heard. “Unh,” he said without blinking his eyes or moving.
For a moment, Frank felt sorry for him. It must get pretty sickening to have everybody buttering you up all the time when you knew they didn’t mean a word of it. If that was the result of power and prestige and money, Frank was glad he was only a common little man and content to remain so, by God.
“Fine, Tony, fine; that’s fine,” Hibbard said cheerfully. At the bar, Clark slapped Harry Shotridge on the back again.
“Aint you playin tonight, Frank?” Harry said. “You must be off your feed.”
Frank smiled and shook his head. “Not tonight, Harry. Ain’t feelin competitive enough.”
“You’re probly right at that. Looks like Old Bob is on one of his rampages again,” Harry grinned, and moved to go. “I’ll see you, Clark.”
Clark Hibbard nodded. “Sure will, Harry,” he said. He smiled. “And we’ll talk about that other.”
Harry Shotridge nodded back, like a man who is proud of knowing a great deal more than he is telling, and then slapped Frank on the back. “See you around, Frank,” he said, as he started for the door.
“See you, Harry,” Frank said, and looked after him. He was aware of Clark Hibbard watching him from just beyond his eye range. Could Clark have tumbled to his waiting? Well, it was never a good thing to bring things out in the open too damn quick. Lazily, he swung back around on the stool and cocked his elbows up on the bar behind him. Beside him, Clark Hibbard eased himself up onto the stool next to him.
Frank was aware that Clark had always looked down on him, and had a low opinion of his mental equipment. But this did not bother him any since Clark was that way about pretty nearly everybody. It had already occurred to Frank that Harry Shotridge might have been having the same idea about the bypass, and that that might be what he was talking to Clark about. But he was willing to dismiss that. Harry wasn’t smart enough. He said nothing and waited for Clark.
&
nbsp; “Well, how’s my number one Cray County constituent?” Clark said. “Everything progressing smoothly?”
“Oh, pretty good, Clark. Can’t complain.”
“Now where’s that damn bartender?” Clark said. “He hasn’t been in here for half an hour.”
“Pretty busy out the main bar, I guess,” Frank said.
“I imagine so. I guess I shall have to mix my own damned drink,” Clark said, but he did not get up off his stool. Instead he waited for several moments, watching Frank thoughtfully, which Frank ignored.
“Some poker game,” he said without looking at Clark. No. Harry Shotridge was always having ideas, but little ideas, not big ones like this one.
“It certainly is,” Clark said. He sighed. “Well, I shall never get my drink sitting here,” he said and got up and went around behind the empty bar. “Since it appears I must make mine, I might as well make you another, too. How about it?”
Frank pretended to shake himself and stretched and yawned before he turned around on his stool. He grinned. “Like to fell asleep, by God. Yes. Mine’s about empty.”
“Bourbon and branch water, I take it?” Clark said.
Frank grinned at his little joke and nodded. Clark had affected that precise semi-English accent of his ever since he had come home from Yale with that PhD of his in English literature and it always irritated Frank. It rather made Clark Hibbard look rather somewhat of an ass, he thought.
But you didn’t want to make the mistake of thinking he was an ass. Any more than Tony Wernz. No, sir. His family had been good Republicans since the days of Abe Lincoln. Before they founded the Oregonian even. And playing ball with all those Cook County Democrats up in Springfield on all the sugar bills didn’t make a good Republican a Democrat; it was just the only way he could get along. Frank had fiddled with politics and politicians too long to still believe there was any real difference between Republicans and Democrats, even to themselves. There was only the guys in office and the guys out. The Elected, and the Unelected. One side played up to the Labor Vote in the cities and the other played up to the Farm and Small Business Vote in the country, that was all.
The trouble was—unfortunately—Clark Hibbard was too astute and well trained a politician to ever take sides and lose one vote when he could compromise and gain two. If anybody else had been talking to him about the bypass, he certainly wasn’t going to take Frank Hirsh’s side against theirs. He would play all sides.
“There you are!” Clark said, and set the two glasses up on the bar with a flourish.
Frank yawned elaborately. “Thanks,” he smiled. “I really need this.”
Clark smiled his own thin smile. “And so do I. That makes two of us.”
“Yeah, I see you’re out doin a little early campaignin already.” He nodded his head sideways, toward the door where Harry Shotridge had gone out.
Clark looked at him keenly from behind the bar. Then he pulled the corner of his mouth down and shrugged. “You know how it is. Someone’s always wanting a favor. A person does what he can, and hopes he gets a vote. But probably they go right off and vote against you,” he said and they both laughed.
“Yeah, I imagine it does get pretty rank sometimes,” Frank said with a grin.
“Of course, you understand, I wasn’t referring to Old Harry there, when I said that.”
“Harry?” Frank said. “Of course not.”
“I was thinking more of all the ordinary run-of-the-mill. The Dumbjohns” (Clark had been in the Navy a year in ’42 and ‘43, as a full lieutenant) “who think they own you just because you’re elected to office. Someone with a boy in the pen who’s up for parole; someone else with a son they want to get into West Point; somebody’s daughter they want to get a job for in Springfield.” He paused. “They never leave one alone.” Frank grinned. “You ought to retire from it all, Clark.”
“By God! You have no idea how really close I am to it!”
“What about all those Washington ambitions we used to talk about?”
Clark looked guilty-faced. “Well, that’s the only thing that has stopped me, you know. And I have rather about given that up.”
Frank shook his head. “You might,” he said.
“Might still make it? Well, that is what I keep on telling myself,” Clark said. He came around from behind the bar and got his drink and sat down on the stool again.
“Seriously, Frank, I’ve about begun to wonder if all this helping-the-people business isn’t more of a drain on us politicians than the good we do,” he said, and leaned forward on the bar looking embarrassed. “I’ve about begun to think the people don’t really want to be helped.” His face looked as if he were confessing a secret sin.
“Well, that’s somethin every man must decide for himself, I guess,” Frank said.
“Yes—” Clark said. “Yes, I suppose that’s true.”
“But for myself, I’ll always believe in helping people,” Frank said.
“Well, you always were that kind, Frank,” Clark said. He took a sip of his drink. “Old Bob,” he smiled in his thin way. “It does look like Bob is rather on another of his poker rampages. Doesn’t it?” He was still waiting for whatever it was.
Frank grinned. “Sure does,” he said. The slick bastard. He had no more intention of retiring from politics than he himself had of retiring from business. His wife’s father had all kinds of influence up in Springfield and with the Chicago crowd, and Clark had right away moved upstairs into a different bracket the minute he married her. Of course, he still had to get the vote in his home counties; but he was handling that all right. Yep, Clark was moving out and away from his old small-time buddies. “When Bob’s like that, he always wins,” he grinned.
“Yes, I expect he does,” Clark Hibbard smiled. “He does it almost entirely by psychology, you know. It always appears to me as though he is doing it only just to prove to himself just exactly how dumb most people really are.”
“That’s just exactly the way I’ve always felt about it,” Frank grinned. “Though I never worded it just like that.”
“No, probably not,” Clark said. From a case in his inside coat pocket, he pulled a pair of heavy tinted dark-horned-rimmed glasses and put them on and stared at Frank. “It’s very strange, you know. Here we have a really celebrated man right here in our midst. The most celebrated man we of Parkman here shall probably ever have. And how do we treat him?”
“Oh. but he’s not really all that famous now, is he,” Frank protested.
“Oh, but he is! There, you see? You yourself can’t accept that Old Bob’s that famous. The trouble is, we expect him to live up to his reputation, you see; and here he is, very common, no more brilliant than ourselves, the prey of his emotions apparently just like we are, as vain and egotistical as we are, and so we cannot accept that he is famous. He doesn’t act famous, you see. So we are forced to assume that he is not. And yet I know Europeans and Frenchmen who consider him one of the greatest philosophical poets of this era.” Clark took another sip from his glass, adjusted his glasses with his finger, and stared down at the bar broodingly.
“Well, whether he’s famous or not, I like him,” Frank said, feeling bored but patient. He had been through these things of Clark’s before and had been expecting one tonight. “Bob’s a very nice fellow,” he said, “and I’m sure everybody in Parkman feels that and likes him.”
“You know, I wanted to be a poet once,” Clark said; “I was going to take the literary world by storm.” He sipped at his drink again.
“Yes, I know,” Frank said, without sarcasm. “I remember. You’ve told me about it before.”
“Yes, well,” Clark said. The narrow eyes behind their glasses flickered. He straightened up a little on his stool. “How’s everything with you, Frank?”
“How’s your wife?” Frank said.
“Ah. Betty Lee? Just fine. She’s having the time of her life since she moved down here. She really loves Parkman. . . .
“Right now, I ex
pect she is out in the bar beating the slot machines to death,” Clark smiled. The narrow eyes studied Frank. “And how are Agnes and Dawn, Frank?”
“Oh, they’re fine,” Frank said, and looked back down at the bar and his drink. “You know, Clark, whether you retire from politics or not you can always be proud of what you’ve done for your home counties up there in Springfield,” he said.
Beneath the still-searching eyes, Clark gave him a brilliant smile. “Well, thanks, Frank,” he said. “Thanks a lot.”
“You’ve done an awful lot of good for us home folks up there,” Frank said. “It ought to give you a real feelin of satisfaction.”
“Well, thanks,” Clark said. “You know, it really does. Except when I’ve got the blues. But it helps a lot sometimes, to know some of the people who voted for you feel like that.”
“Well, a lot of them do,” Frank said. “And I just wanted to let you know how I felt.” With this, he suddenly swung himself around on his stool until he was facing the room and the poker table. After a full minute of silence, he said, “Say, that was a hell of a wreck out at the highway junction the other night, wasn’t it?”
The highway junction out east of town was where the new road from the bridge at Israel stopped and turned back onto the old road that still ran through Parkman west and it was a dangerous spot, and would be one until the new road was extended and the bypass built. There was at least one wreck a month out there, but this last one had been an especially bad one.
“Yes, it was,” Clark said, eyeing him. “Yes, it certainly was.” He shook his head.
“I guess we’ll all heave a sigh of relief when that bypass is built,” Frank said.
“Yes, I expect we will,” Clark said.
“I hate to see people get killed like that. For no good reason, you know?” Frank said.
