by Jack Cady
“Nine. Maybe ten.” The cop looked toward the Canal where rain raised sheets of mist. “Another one just came ashore. It don’t look fresh. Plus, it looks like someone went in last night.” The cop sounded unhappy. “You’d think you’d get used to it. Some guys do. Other guys look for better work.” Then, realizing he was confidential and uncoplike, “We thought we had this job buttoned up. Then one washes in and another goes down.”
“People are starting to wonder,” Bertha said, and spoke the truth.
“Worst stretch of road in the state,” the cop told her. “Not a fast road. It’s technically not unusual. Except, it’s making a name for itself.”
“Folks are scared.” Bertha once more spoke the truth.
“So far it’s a problem for the state investigative unit,” the cop said. “Of course, the officer on the scene has some responsibility. More than that I’d hate to say.” He looked toward the Canal. “Some things you can’t know,” he said, and it seemed almost like he talked only to himself. “That night road is different . . . sometimes you can find out.” By now he definitely talked to himself, and Bertha waited in reluctant admiration. This cop was turning out to be a thoughtful guy; almost unheard of in a cop. Bertha felt warmth rising in her cheeks and elsewhere; this from a woman, who, if quizzed, would say that anyone who experienced racing hormones before eight PM was sicko.
“The coroner handles the hard part.” The cop looked at the rain. “You’d think it would stop. It never rains this heavy this long.”
No one, except Annie, believes Annie has a blessed thing to do with weather. Still, at the time Annie was preoccupied. She would not think to turn off the faucet. Of course, nobody believes Annie has anything to do with causing sun or rain.
“You must put in quite a few hours,” the cop said to Bertha. “Hard work.”
“It keeps a girl busy.” Bertha smiled what she hoped was a brave smile. She felt a little shiver, because Bertha can smell a lead-in a mile off.
“Your bartender comes on nights?”
Bertha told herself that this—this—this was just exactly what she deserved for not having decent help. The cop wanted to know if she was free, evenings. The cop wanted to take her to dinner, or a show. The cop looked serious.
Bertha, being poor at lying, and knowing it, decided to stick with the truth. “Know of anyone honest? I use pick-up help, or none.”
“I get around.” The cop sounded disappointed. “Could be I’ll run across somebody.”
“Do it quick,” Bertha said, then blushed. When a Norwegian blushes the room sort of lights up. Bertha had enough sense to look away, shy; and that is about as promiscuous as Norwegians get. “I’m grounded,” Bertha admitted. “It’s a pretty good business, though. The problem with running a bar is you sometimes put up with drunks.”
“That’s a common police complaint.” The cop chuckled. “I had one the other day who tried to trade a DWI for the name of a murderer.” The cop’s voice sounded not unkindly. “You hear all sorts of stories . . .” He was interrupted as a cueball hopped a rail, bounced high in the air, then hit the floor and rolled quite a ways. Jubal Jim gave a yip from beneath the pool table, and dashed to Petey for comfort. Petey stood, red as a tow truck, embarrassed down to his pool player socks. Hustlers do not hop pool balls . . . unless, a’course, they want to. The shame of it.
“That’ll be a buck,” Bertha said, her tone merciless. Hopped pool balls at Beer and Bait are costly. The buck goes in a tin can. When somebody makes the eight ball on the break, he gets what’s in the can.
Petey patted Jubal Jim, fished a dollar from his shirt pocket. He walked to the bar, still blushing. “Don’t believe everything you hear,” he whispered to the cop, but the whisper was so loud everyone in the bar took notes. For some reason, maybe the hopped cueball, Petey looked guilty enough to hang. He kept his eyes downcast. When he raised his head he looked shifty.
“There’s a problem on the road,” the cop told him. “Something has changed with the sight-distance, or the grade. The slide-rule boys can figure it.” The cop pretended Petey acted normal, but the cop obviously took notes. “There’s another problem.”
“Oh, yes sir.” Petey backed away, made a movement like he would return to the pool table, then thought better about turning his back on a cop. He stood, looking sort of hangdog. Bertha smacked the bar with a damp bar rag, and Bertha was disgusted.
“Something strange happens when cars hit the water, and that’s why people talk about murder.” The cop sounded real positive, which mean the felt confused as everyone else.
“I got it figured out about the cars,” the beer guy said from the other end of the bar. “The Navy’s got a sub fitted with grapples. The CIA forces stuff into the water so the Navy can practice grappling.” The guy gave a polite hiccup.
“You’d better have another,” Bertha advised. “You sound like a man who’s dangerous when he’s sober.”
“There’s something mechanical down there,” the cop admitted. “It must be like a clamp or a grapnel.” The cop smiled. “Does the CIA have that much imagination?” He stood, and motioned to the tow truck kid. “Rain or not, we’ve got to give it a try.” To the beer guy he said, “If you come up with something more let me know.” He checked Petey out, turned to Bertha and smiled, this time sort of shy.
“Don’t make yourself too scarce,” Bertha said, while wondering if she was nuts. She watched the cop leave, then turned to Petey, gave a little sniff and got busy restocking a beer case.
“In case I ever have to punch him,” Petey said apologetically, “I want a sucker punch. Right now he thinks he’s got me running.” Petey absent-mindedly set up a four ball combination and tapped it home.
“I believe it,” Bertha said. “Why wouldn’t I believe it?” Her voice held a small edge of contempt, and Bertha was not happy.
“You’re runnin’ behind on the work,” Petey said. “I’ll give you a hand.”
“I can take care of my own,” Bertha told him, and Bertha sounded colder than ice cubes.
A story circulated along the Canal. By the time the fisherman, who was practically sober, heard it while sitting at China Bay that same evening; the story said Petey not only lost a fortune, but Bertha kicked him out. The story also said some traitor tried to sell out Sugar Bear in exchange for a free pass on a charge of driving while under the influence. There’s always a slight germ of truth in every Canal story.
Happenings At China Bay
Bar light at Lee’s China Bay Taverna is less twirly than at Beer and Bait, and, although goldfish swim happily in their tank, conversations rarely deal with fish. The bartender is allergic.
Subjects include Canal stories as well as opinions about the “nose” and “body” of varietal grocery wines. Talk often centers on the exact curve of the front fenders on ’57 Dodge trucks, or wanders back to the good old days of revolution when people danced somewhat naked in the streets while throwing flowers at police. From that subject will surely rise observations about the indolence of today’s youth, the immorality of teenagers, and tales of remembered passion in the back seats of Studebakers—which, as anyone who ever owned a Studebaker knows—is a damnable lie.
It is, in fact, a tough job to even begin to capture the atmosphere and thoughtful gravity of China Bay. However, a certain fisherman sits there, so there’s no way out of it.
He arrived at China Bay after a thoroughly depressing drive alongside the Canal. Rain rumbled, sloshed, flooded. Annie, beside him, alternated between chirping optimism and downright gloom. She went from anticipatory giggles to low sighs, from chatter to silence; then back to chatter. The fisherman kept his hands ten-two on the steering wheel as the pickup seemed to float. He could not tell if there was more rain in the road or the sky. The road seemed puzzling the best way to persuade the truck into the Canal. The fisherman expressed vile opinions of rain gods, thunderbirds, low-pressure systems, and whatever else might cruise the heavens.
Annie blushed, co
ncentrated, and rain started to slacken. When the fisherman pulled in beside Sugar Bear’s truck at China Bay, sunlight overflooded the landscape and steam rose from roads and roofs.
China Bay sat well attended in early afternoon. The parking lot displayed a concrete mixer, a delivery van, a pristine ’53 Packard, three or four econo-boxes, a few pickups, the bartender’s Jag, and a tanker truck from a dairy region. The silver trailer of the tanker truck carried the picture of a fulfilled cow.
“The milk run,” the fisherman muttered to no one in particular. “Next it will be jam and peanut butter. The world is headed for perdition, I promise you.” He watched as Annie, three times more lovely than ever, hopped from his truck. She fussed at her hair, moistened her lips, and stood poised and impatient. The forlorn fisherman climbed from the truck.
As Annie and the fisherman walked to the Dragon-Lady-red doors the fisherman had one of those queasy feelings that come just before reality alters forever. It was the sort of feeling a guy gets eighty miles offshore, with a thumping piston in his engine, as he discovers a serious leak in the hull. It was the sort of feeling a lady would get who chases a fire truck to a major fire, and the truck pulls up in front of her house. One of those feelings.
When they stepped through the doorway the fisherman paused while Annie headed for Sugar Bear. The fisherman took his time and looked the place over, because this particular fisherman knew enough to keep his back to the wall in bars.
═
Three fat goldfish at Lee’s China Bay Taverna live on the cutting edge of social commentary. As they cruise their protected fish tank, emitting carp-like burps among weaving fronds of underwater plants, faces and situations pass before them like a TV documentary. Along the bar ranges an assortment of working gents.
At the fish tank end of the bar a cribbage game generally occupies two elderly persons. These ancients are greatly valued for stories that carry a frosting of facts exotic and droll. One claims himself an ex-Navy man; and that is probably the case since he wears many a tattoo. The other claims a former career as a diplomat, and perhaps that is true as well; for he always wears a clean and pressed hankie in his jacket pocket. Neither claims to spread anything but pure veracity, although some listeners have doubts as to whether gold can be panned from coal-mines, or African headhunters infiltrate the coroner’s office in Chicago, or Argentine cowboys use motor scooters for chasing steers. In the idiom of the Canal, these geriatric lads are suspected of being “full of it.”
On this day at China Bay the bar was attended by these two old gents, and by the Packard guy who had a forlorn look and a dab of grease on his nose. Alongside the Packard guy sat the milk truck guy. He worked at getting snockered, and wore a baseball cap that read “Dairy Doings.” Next to him were three other gents who only looked confused.
In this early afternoon the fisherman saw China Bay a-click with pool games and under tidy control. It held a beer drinking crowd. Later on, legislators from the Capitol would arrive after a day of organized b.s. and gather to hear random varieties. They would be joined by rich guys from up north, and by an interesting group of young women desiring to understand legislative and economic processes if they were paid; but for now, yep, a beer drinking crowd.
Then the fisherman looked at Sugar Bear, and wished himself elsewhere.
He looked poorly, did Sugar Bear. He sat like a large and liquid lump on the barstool farthest from the fish tank. He had a nearly full glass of flat beer before him, and as he listened to impassioned whispers from Annie, he dripped. It was also clear Sugar Bear had been dripping quite awhile longer than anyone else, because every other soul in the crowd was either dry or mildly soggy.
The fisherman then regarded the bartender, who, it is understood, knows the ways of the universe; and knew enough to be interested by Sugar Bear’s condition, but not awed. The bartender had a mop leaning against the far end of the bar. It was clear the bartender occasionally mopped around Sugar Bear the way one mops around a leaky refrigerator.
“It has something called a load-leveler,” the Packard guy said about his Packard. “Just a little forked hydraulic lift that pushes the fanny up when you put too much load in the trunk. The rebuild shop won’t touch it.” The guy sighed. The milk truck guy burped politely.
“. . . and strictly speaking,” said one of the oldsters (the diplomat with the hanky in his pocket), “there is no New Zealand ordinance against catnapping, so the charge was broadened to feloniously assaulting a feline . . .”
“They are reviewing previous conversations,” the bartender said in a low voice to the fisherman. “Your man has them confused, and the young lady has them stunned. They will shortly revive.” The bartender placed a glass of beer before the fisherman. Then the bartender gave something sounding nearly like a giggle.
“We have a pool on how long it takes your man to stop dripping,” the bartender added. “Costs you one semoleon.”
At China Bay large windows face the Canal, and tall trees rise between China Bay and the beach. On the walls hang Chinese tapestry, beer signs, and pictures of gorgeous Chinese girls, the pictures torn from calendars. These pictures rest comfortably beside calendar pictures of Athens scenes and Greek dancers. One set of pictures belongs to Lee, the other to the bartender.
“Ten minutes,” the fisherman said sadly. “He’ll stop dripping in ten minutes, but I don’t want the bet.”
“You seem to know your man very well.”
“I know the young lady,” the fisherman said. He figured Annie would cast a spell of dryness, and it would take ten minutes to catch hold.
This time the bartender actually did giggle. “Numbers of our lads have journeyed north to search for mystery women. Is she one?”
“She’s only a sweet kid,” the fisherman explained. “And he’s a sweet guy. It’s just that things are sorta star-crossed.” The fisherman’s voice sounded so mournful he felt ashamed. He obviously felt sorry for himself.
“A certain amount of tension will shortly appear,” the bartender said in low but normal voice. “Please do your part by remaining seated. The young lady will be as safe as one can in this troubled and uncertain world.”
And the bartender had that one taped. With Annie’s appearance bartalk slowed, stumbled, fell into temporary silence. Then talk gradually sounded as a whisper, a suppressed murmur, a wave of lonesome expostulation. The amused bartender switched the tape deck to something containing violins and moonbeams. The two old gents dealt cribbage, looked dreamy, and the one who claimed a Navy career spoke of Paris after World War II. He mentioned girls named Nanette and Babette.
Pool games sounded differently, the click of balls sharper as guys took heat in their pants and put it behind their cues. Subdued cussing dwelt around tables, because passion and pool do not mix, not if you want to make the shot. The only sane member present was the bartender.
“It isn’t what you think,” the fisherman said. “It’s worse.”
“I believe the term is murder.” This time the bartender actually did whisper. “During the past weeks our boys have dissected cause and effect on the demise of a child molester. They concluded they understood and approved. Now the killer sits among them, and is attended by a girl who is a daisy.” The bartender, who is slim and who moves liquidly, tugged gently at one earlobe. “Our laddies are confused.”
“She’s from up to Beer and Bait. One of Bertha’s lovey-dovies.” A guy spoke a little too loudly, drummed fingers on the counter, took a rapid and healthy gulp of suds. This was the milk truck driver, and when it came to genes the poor fellow sat shortchanged. His receding chin drooped toward a skinny chest that rode above a potbelly. He looked sadly in need of protein.
As the fisherman began to slip from his barstool with gladness in his heart, because he finally owned good reason to smack somebody, the bartender looked him back onto his seat. “It seems,” said the bartender, “we are to have a dramatic moment.” The bartender did not exactly say, “Sit, Stay, Good Boy,” but t
he look did. The fisherman sat.
The goldfish, who have seen a lot through the eyeglass of their tank, hovered just above fronds behind which they might easily dart and hide. The two old gents, as experienced as the fish, smiled to themselves in anticipation. The Packard guy froze, not understanding that something nasty had been said, but feeling fixed by the slow and inexorable movement of the bartender. One pool game paused as men stood watching, then another, and yet a third, and then a fourth. Silence descended. The bar might have been peopled by monks with vows of muteness. The bartender moved slowly, nearly dreamy. The milk truck guy sat pinioned but indignant before his beer. From the far distance on the Canal came the hoot of a ship’s horn.
Bar rag in hand, the bartender arrived before the milk truck driver, and the bartender gave one of those smiles of regret so often seen among folks who run mortuaries. The bartender picked up the driver’s beer glass, mopped the counter with the rag. The bartender dumped the beer in a sink, then leaned forward, and in a voice as gentle as the fingers of a loving hand, said, “Moo.”
Silence. Each man present heard his own heartbeat. Each man thought about excesses in his own speech, and thought of guilts and misunderstandings. And, each man, as if in defense of sanity, reached for his beer.
“What’n . . .” the Packard guy said.
“Moo,” one of the oldsters chuckled. “Pass it on.”
The other oldster gave a low moo. He sat surprised and pleased. He gave another moo. It is amazing how many different ways there are to say “moo .”
It became the thing to do. As moos spread along the bar like a crashing wave, and as guys really got into it, pool players resumed their games. The moos crescendoed, then faded as the milk truck guy headed for the doorway, never again to be seen at China Bay or Beer and Bait. As the milk truck guy departed the fisherman sat with a load of adrenaline, and no place to put it. Plus, a Canal story began.
