by Randy Nargi
“He’s an Internet millionaire,” Clayton added.
“No he isn't.”
“He’s going to be.” Clayton was obviously proud of his son.
“We’ve lived here since 1968.”
“And why are you moving?” Vicky asked. It was good to ask one or two innocuous questions during this process. It made the potential customers think you were actually interested in what they were saying.
Doris’s smile faltered. Just for a second. “Like much of Bogwood, our house was built on a bog. And we’ve occasionally had problems with water in the crawlspace. So we decided to move.”
“She’s crazy!” Clayton interjected. “There’s nothing wrong with this house. I am not leaving my moss collection! You're going to have to kill me first. And then you can have your estate sale!”
“Oh Clayton…” Doris sighed. “Mrs. Bell, would you care for some coffee?”
“It’s actually Miz Bell and that would be lovely.”
While Clayton puttered around in his den, Doris served coffee and pie.
“Well, Mrs. Fenwick, I’ll want to take a closer look, but upon first glance I see that you’ve got some nice mid-century modern pieces here. The collectors go wild over that style of furniture.”
“Really?”
“Oh yes. Top dollar.” Vicky smiled and took another bite of pie. It was delicious, but she wasn’t sure of the berry. Maybe hinkleberry? “Every few years a different style of furniture and design becomes popular. Now it’s mid-century modern. Furniture from the 1950s and 60s.”
“Well then I must show you our prized piece of furniture. Let’s take our coffee into the living room.”
They headed back into the living room, a long room in the front of the house. Clayton trailed along, nabbing his own piece of pie along the way.
Doris walked in front of a sleek, Danish-modern hutch, showing it off like she was Vanna White. “Ta da!”
“Wow. This is a nice piece,” Vicky said, as she ran her hand along the edge of the cupboard. “Wonderful condition. Great lines.”
Doris beamed. “Yes, we got it at Danegrim’s Furniture when we first moved in. Unfortunately, it’s much too big for the condo.”
“Well, this should fetch a pretty penny. May I?” She started to slide open a door to get a look at the inside.
“Of course.”
There inside—on one of the shelves—was what looked to be a low potted plant. Before Vicky could get a good look, Clayton lunged at her. “No! Goddamn it, that’s got to stay in the dark. No light!” He slammed the door of the hutch, nearly crunching Vicky’s fingers in the process. She stumbled back. What the hell?!
“Clayton!” Doris was mortified. Again.
“That’s part of my moss collection and it can’t be exposed to light!”
That was the third time he mentioned a moss collection, Vicky mused. She didn’t want to, but she knew she was obligated to ask Clayton about the moss. And that’s how she found herself in the back yard.
7. Clayton’s World of Mosses
Clayton led Vicky out the side door and across a shady lawn. She could tell he was now on his best behavior, trying to be personable.
“I’ve been working on this lawn for years, but look at it.” Clayton reached down and plucked something from the lawn. “Damn grass! It's crowding out the moss.”
Vicky just smiled, and wondered if she was ruining her shoes in the muck that Clayton called a lawn.
A voice from behind the tall hedge called “Yoo hoo, Clayton!” It was a female voice. Older, but still girlish. Clayton either didn’t hear it or chose to ignore it. He motioned for Vicky to follow him around the back of the house.
The area used to be a concrete sport court with a basketball hoop, but the large Douglas Fir trees which surrounded the house cast perpetual shadows. This gave rise to a bumper crop of moss which clung to the concrete surface like a thick outdoor rug. So this is the famous moss collection…? But it wasn’t.
Clayton ambled over to a thick wood potting table in the shadiest corner of the court. On the table were a dozen—maybe two dozen—potted mosses.
“I’ve been collecting and growing mosses and lichens for over 22 years,” Clayton said. He lifted a pot containing a flowering moss. “This one here I got at last year’s NMA conference in Vancouver. That’s ‘National Moss Association.’ It’s a sphagellium mitrosis. Very rare.”
“Uh huh…”
Clayton pointed at another moss. “This is an ancellibum. Only grows on turnips, potatoes, or other tubers. Almost lost it to the early frost last year.”
“Really…”
“Most people don’t know this, but many kinds of mosses are edible. This harburnia, for instance, tastes a lot like slightly runny Muenster cheese. It does turn your teeth green, however. Not permanently. Try a sprig.” He pulled a tuft of moss from the pot and offered it to Vicky. She took it and moved it toward her mouth. The second Clayton turned away, she chucked the moss sprig into the bushes.
“Mmmm…” she said, miming eating.
“One of my favorites is the opeistus koovular or ‘shadow moss.’ This is called the ‘groundhog of mosses’ because in the spring, right around Groundhog Day, the opeistus will either curl clockwise or counterclockwise, depending on the light and the temperature. If it’s clockwise, we’re going to have six more weeks of winter. If it’s counter-clockwise, it’s going to be an early spring. You can set your watch by this moss.”
“Fascinating…” She tried to sound at least a little interested.
“A lot of folks talk about mosses growing on just the north side of things like stumps or trees. It’s kind of an old wives tale, to be sure.”
“I didn’t know that… you know we should probably—”
But Clayton was on a roll. “Fact is, it kind of depends on the type of moss and the climate and where you happen to be. Here in the Northwest, most mosses actually grow on the south side of objects—they like the southern exposure. On other continents, like Australia, they tend to grow on the north or northwest side of things. In South America, everything’s kind of tilted to the east. About ten to fifteen degrees north or south of true east—depending on the elevation, and in the Baltics—”
“Clayton!” a voice called. It was the same older, but girlish voice Vicky had heard earlier. This time she got to see the owner of the voice: a sixty-something woman wearing a big hat and gardening gloves, pushing through the hedge that separated the Fenwick property from their neighbors. Ignoring Vicky, the woman strode right over to Clayton and began scolding him. “Clayton! There you are. Didn’t you hear me?”
“Ummm…” Clayton looked flustered.
The woman finally noticed Vicky. Her eyes squinted a little in disapproval and she turned back to Clayton. “What's going on, Clayton?”
“This lady is helping us with our garage sale, Marie.”
Vicky smiled at the woman and presented her with a business card. “Vicky Bell. Bell Estate Sales. Very nice to meet you.”
Marie ignored Vicky and the business card. She kept her eyes locked on Clayton. “Oh? This is the first I heard of this.”
Clayton shook his head. “Are you out of your gourd?! We just talked about this yesterday. Remember?”
Clearly something was going on here, Vicky thought.
“I guess I must have blocked it out,” Marie said. There was an awkward pause and then Marie rushed over and embraced Clayton. “Clayton. I just can’t stand the thought of you leaving here. Leaving me.”
“I don’t know what to say, Marie. We’ve got the condo—” He tried to disentangle himself.
Marie’s expression darkened. “It’s all her doing, isn’t it, Clayton. You’re just under her spell, aren’t you?”
Clayton became obviously flustered and steered Vicky back toward the moss table. “This ballaricus is a very unique kind of moss that has a growing pattern similar to—”
At that moment, an older gentleman with kind eyes shuffled on to the p
roperty. “Marie?” he blurted. “What are—”
“I’m not coming back to you, David.” The woman held her head up high.
The kind-eyed man looked like he was about to cry. “What are you talking about, Marie?”
“Clayton and I are moving to South America.”
“What the hell?!!” Clayton exclaimed.
Vicky smiled at all the participants in this weird tableau. “I think I’ll just head back in. Mrs. Fenwick and I need to discuss a few details…”
8. A New Arrival
“Here’s another piece we got when we moved in.” Doris escorted Vicky toward a large silver arc lamp. Vicky recognized the style at once. The iconic lamp had an eight foot curving arm which terminated in a big silver shade that was almost globular in shape.
“Rosewood base… good condition,” Vicky commented. “These go for several thousand dollars new.”
“Thousand?!” Doris clearly had no idea of the lamp’s worth.
Clayton entered the room. Apparently he escaped from the family drama in the back yard and decided to butt back into the business at hand.
“Ahem, this lamp is probably worth at least five thousand dollars new. This is the Excelsior model. Top of the line. See that bulb? They don't make a bulb like that any more.” He inadvertently turns the shade toward Vicky, shining the light into her face and temporarily blinding her.
“What are you talking about, Clayton?” Doris scolds her husband. “Of course they still make bulbs like this. I bought one at Shop-Mart right before Christmas.”
“You did not buy a bulb for an Excelsior at Shop-Mart! You cannot get a bulb that emits 2500 lumens at a discount store! That’s a special order bulb!”
At that moment, there was the sound of the front door slamming and moments later a hard-looking, prematurely gray-haired man stalked into the room toting an overnight bag. “Ma, Dad. I'm hungry. Do you have any fish sticks? What’s that Caddy in our driveway? You didn’t get a new car—”
Doris ran over to hug her son. “Xavier!” Clayton clapped Xavier on the shoulder. “Hey kiddo.”
Xavier greeted his parents, then noticed Vicky. “You’re not my regular parole officer…”
9. e-Inmates.com
It wasn’t until later that evening, when Vicky had some time to herself, that she learned about Xavier Fenwick’s background. By Googling him. Naturally.
Mr. Fenwick had mentioned that his son was some kind of Internet millionaire, and at the time Vicky thought that the old man was exaggerating, but it looked like he wasn’t far off the mark. Interesting. Very interesting.
Most of the websites that mentioned Xavier Fenwick discussed his position as founder and CEO of an Internet company called “e-Inmates.com” which Vicky had never heard of. Luckily there was a YouTube video of Xavier at some sort of business conference pitching his company.
In the video Xavier was at a podium, smiling in a way that reminded Vicky of a disgraced politician.
“Everyone makes mistakes in their lives—at some point, and I think it is one’s capacity to learn from those mistakes that truly distinguishes us as humans,” Xavier said. He blinked and got serious. “Let me tell you how it all began. Several years ago, I served some time at Safford Federal Penitentiary. We don’t really need to go into why I was there—the point is, during my 32 months at Safford, I made some very close personal friendships. Very close.” Xavier adjusted his tie and continued. “Whenever men—or women—spend time in a confined area, whether it be a high school, a foxhole, an office, or a medium-security facility—you tend to form some incredibly intense bonds. These are the kinds of relationships that affect you throughout your life.”
He took a sip from a water bottle. “So when I was released from Safford, I tried to get in touch with some of my old buddies. You know, for a variety of different reasons—personal, career networking—some owed me money. Again the specific reasons aren’t really important. What I found out was, that it is very difficult for a private individual to access state and federal prison records—not to mention international prisons. The bottom line is: it was virtually impossible for me to find my buddies. Some of whom it was critical for me to locate.” Xavier got a very intense look in his eyes which actually made Vicky shiver a little—even over the Internet.
“Like most of the entrepreneurs here in the audience, I remember the exact day I came up with the idea for e-Inmates.com. I was at the gym working out, and just kind of daydreaming about a guy I used to throw up steel with… a guy by the name of Martin Duvalier. At that point I was taking some state-sponsored computer education classes and I just put one and two together and thought: what if there was an online directory of inmates and ex-cons where you could go and find old prison buddies? Kind of like Facebook for Prison. Bingo!”
Xavier took another drink of water. Vicky couldn’t help herself from thinking: There was something incredibly…magnetic…about this man.
“So I went back home, jumped on the ‘net and started my preliminary research,” Xavier continued. “I never did find Martin Duvalier. As a side note, I’m pretty sure he’s dead. But fortunately, I did manage to track down a guy by the name of Elliott Braun, who I met in Lompoc in the early 80s. He was very technical. Knew a lot about databases and networks. Actually ended up getting him in trouble with a major financial institution. He laughed, but not in a pleasant way. “But anyway, I recruited Elliott to be my CTO and we put together version 1.0 of e-Inmates.com with a bunch of old servers in my basement. The site really grew, mostly by word of mouth, and today we have over 25 million users.”
The audience applauded at this point, which seemed to energize Xavier. “E-inmates.com is not just for people who served time in prisons. Not at all. We serve the needs of the families, friends, and associates of inmates and ex-cons. We have lots of great features on the site—including chat, email, video sharing, daily deals, message boards and more. It turns out that we serve a potentially valuable demographic segment. Did you know that just about 3% of the U.S. population is currently serving time, has served time, or knows someone who has been an inmate? Advertisers are getting savvy about reaching this audience.”
Xavier finishes up his presentation. “Today e-Inmates.com employs about 120 people and we’re cash-flow positive. I can’t go into detail, but we are in negotiations with some major media companies about some strategic partnerships, and we may, in the near future be evaluating the IPO path. Thank you very much for your time—and be sure to visit us at Booth 312.” More applause and then the video ended.
Wow, Vicky thought. What a guy—
10. Pot o’ Gold
Dick Nickerson crossed the street in downtown Seattle’s trendy Pioneer Square area. Despite his advanced age, his stride was quick and energetic. Dick had a knapsack slung across one shoulder—almost like a high school student on his way to class. Except there weren’t any books in the knapsack. Instead an antique metal desk lamp poked out from the back flap.
Dick made his way to a side street and then ambled over to a sleek modern door-front which looked out of place amid the century-old brick buildings. The door led to a basement recording studio called Hellaballu which catered to ad agencies and commercial production companies. Dick visited the recording studio frequently—at least three or four times a week—something he was supremely grateful for. Especially these days.
He nodded to the pretty, heavily-tattooed receptionist. He could never remember her name. Gretchen? Kerri? Carrie? No matter. She told him he was going to be in Studio C today with Jed and asked if he wanted a latte. The answer was ‘yes.’ Always yes.
“Hello, hello, hello, Mr. Jed,” Dick boomed as he entered Studio C, a good-sized live room which was separated from the engineer’s area by a thick pane of glass tilted at a slight angle to deflect sound waves properly. Jed, the audio engineer was a 20-something sporting the hipster uniform of thick-rimmed black glasses and a bushy beard.
“How’s it going, bro?” Jed said over an intercom.
>
“Peachy. Just peachy,” Dick replied as he moved over to a microphone on a stand in the middle of the room. Nearby was a music stand with some papers, a pair of headphones, and an extension cord.
“Awesome,” Jed said. “Copy’s on the stand there. Take your time and we’ll get a level when you are ready, sir.”
“Sounds like a plan, my man.” Dick removed the lamp from his knapsack, unfolded its tripod legs, and then extended the top of the lamp so it was level with the music stand. He plugged it into the extension cord and flicked it on. The lamp emitted a clean white light which illuminated the sheets of paper.
Dick slipped out of his loafers, pulled on the headphones, put on his reading glasses, stepped over to the microphone, and began vocalizing to warm up.
“Giggly piggly donkey nuts… bebop bittersweet melba monsters…”
On the other side of the glass Jed adjusted sliders on the mixing board.
“Seesaw six-pack in a little orphan ostrich sack.”
“We are good, sir. Thank you,” Jed said.
Dick continued with his string of nonsense words for another minute or so, raising and lowering the volume of his voice and ending with fifteen seconds of lip-smacking noises. Finally he looked at the papers, and asked Jed if there was a target time?
“It’s all about you, Dick. The client said to just go ahead and let you do your thing and they’ll make it work.”
“That’s what I like to hear, Jed. That’s what I like to hear. Let’s do this thing.”
“Sweet. We are rolling, sir…”
Dick cleared his voice and then launched into a rapid-fire performance. “Muclidopine is not right for everyone, and there is a low incidence of side effects which may include dry mouth, persistent headaches and loss of balance, inconsistent or watery bowel movements, blood clotting, sensitivity to light and sound, amnesia, and rectal itching. Muclidopine. For you, for life, for health. Ask your doctor about it today, and get back into the swing of things.”
