Stork Bite

by Simonds, L. K.

  “Nah, they’re just friends. Like us.”

  “I guess I could go . . . maybe. If—”

  “It’ll be aces,” Jax said. “We’ll paint the town red.”

  Mae told Miriam she was going home to Whitesboro for the weekend. Miriam was her best friend these days and her confidant in most matters, but she was awfully old-fashioned about some things. Mae would not have mentioned she was leaving town at all, except that she didn’t want Miriam dropping by the dry cleaners looking for her. Or telephoning Aunt Vida. For one thing, Aunt Vida would talk Miriam’s ear off. For another, Mae had told Aunt Vida she was going to Hot Springs with her school chums, which was so close to the truth that it was hardly a lie at all.

  On Saturday morning, Mae rode to work with Uncle Bill and walked from there to the Centenary campus, where Jax was waiting in his Sixteen in an alley behind the Administration Building. He took her valise and set it in the backseat, then opened the car door for her.

  “Where are Hollister and Rita?” Mae asked.

  “They’ll meet us at the airfield.”

  As far as Mae was concerned, trains were the most glamorous way to travel. Except maybe for steamships, but Mae had never been on a ship. She held to this opinion, even after flying with Ned in the Jenny and with Jax in the Monoprep. But Jax’s new Cessna was so beautiful that it changed Mae’s mind the minute she saw it. The Cessna was fire engine red, and big. The hefty engine had a ring of cylinders that stuck out like wheel cogs behind the propeller and made the airplane seem almost as substantial as a locomotive.

  Jax opened the Cessna’s door and stowed Mae’s valise behind the rear seat. “Climb on in,” he said. “It’s a little chilly out here just standing around.” Mae climbed into the rear seat, which was as fancy as a railcar, with inlaid wood panels and plush leather seats.

  A red coupe raced past Mae’s window, kicking up dust as it skidded into the hangar. A few minutes later, Jax opened the airplane door, and Hollister heaved two bags behind Mae’s seat. “Good morning, Lady Sheik,” Hollister said.

  Mae smiled and was about to answer when a pale, thin girl plopped onto the seat beside her. She wore a flapper dress that not only was out of style and too large, it was a poor choice for daytime. Her eyes were heavily kohled, and she reeked of stale cigarette smoke under heavy, floral perfume. She gave Mae a hard look and said, “Take a powder, sister.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Hollister’s mine.”

  Jax got in and scooted across to the left seat, and Hollister climbed in beside him. Jax started the big engine and taxied away from the hangar, while Rita hung on the back of Hollister’s seat, giggling and whispering in his ear. “Sit down and buckle up,” Jax said.

  Rita ignored Jax, until Hollister said, “Be a sport, honey, and do what he says.”

  She sat back and sullenly latched the seatbelt across her lap loosely, so that she could still reach around the front seat to poke and tickle Hollister.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Jax lifted off the airfield into a bright winter day. The air was so clear that it seemed as if they could see all the way to Canada and Mexico, to the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, if they could only climb high enough. Jax said as much to the others.

  “How high would we have to climb?” Mae asked.

  “I dunno. I’ll have to ask Ned.”

  They reached Hot Springs, and Jax circled the tallest mountain. “There’s a lookout point there at the top,” he said, pointing. “We’ll go up to it after lunch if y’all want.”

  “Sure,” said Hollister.

  “Sounds like fun,” said Mae.

  Rita said nothing. She was sullen because Jax had forbidden her smoking in the airplane. She’d lit a Lucky Strike as soon as they were airborne, and there had been quite a row before she finally stomped it under her shoe.

  After the hotel’s limousine picked them up at the airfield, after they checked into their posh rooms, and after a lunch of Monte Cristo sandwiches on the hotel veranda, Jax hired a car to drive them up the mountain to the summit. They climbed the lookout tower’s winding staircase all the way to the top, and Jax felt like he was sitting on top of the world.

  Rita paced back and forth on the tower’s platform, chain-smoking and tossing the burning butts off the side onto the rocks and brush below. “That’s a good way to start a fire and burn the whole place down,” Jax said when he could not stand it anymore.

  Rita looked straight at him and flicked her lit cigarette off the mountain, even though it was only half-smoked. Hollister walked over to her and whispered something. She refused to look at Jax after that, but at least she began grinding her cigarette butts under her heel. Jax did not care if she ignored him, but he wondered who the hell she thought was treating her to this little holiday.

  Rita declined the mineral water treatments that Jax had scheduled for the girls before dinner. She went off with Hollister instead, leaving Mae to enjoy the ministrations of the Arlington Hotel alone. Jax suspected that was fine with Mae, since the two women had hardly spoken to each other the entire trip. Jax also suspected that Hollister sprang for another room because his valise mysteriously disappeared from theirs.

  On Saturday evening, the four of them had supper at the hotel, then went to the Southern Club for drinks. Jax picked the Southern Club because that’s where all the wealthy tourists—gangsters, actors, baseball players, and businessmen—drank and gambled. Jax hoped Mae would get a glimpse of someone—anyone—who was famous. After they were seated and ordered drinks, Jax leaned toward Mae and said, “Al Capone comes here all the time.”

  “Are you teasing me?”

  “No ma’am. See that empty table on the mezzanine? That’s where Capone plays poker with his buddies when he’s in town. He comes here a lot during the winter, so we just might see him.” Capone did, in fact, play poker at the Southern Club when he was in town. Red Malone had told him so, and Jax was pleased as Punch when Mae started watching the club’s entrance.

  Jax and Mae nursed gin and tonics, while Hollister and Rita downed whiskeys as fast as the waiter could bring them. When it was time to call it a night, Hollister stood, swayed in place, then staggered toward the coat check. Rita was just as drunk and almost fell down as soon as she got out of the chair. “We’re gonna take a stroll,” Hollister slurred as he helped Rita into her coat.

  “Suit yourself,” Jax said.

  Mae and Jax stopped outside the club and watched Hollister and Rita lean into each other and weave their way up Central Avenue. “How far do you think they’ll get?” Mae asked.

  “As far as the next barstool.”

  Mae did not laugh as Jax expected. She was soft on Hollister, and Jax could see that even running with that little whore Rita wasn’t enough to put Mae off him. “Shall we?” Jax asked, and he ushered Mae across the street to the Arlington.

  Hollister and Rita were bleary-eyed when they all met in the lobby for brunch early Sunday afternoon. Rita still wore the dress she’d had on the day before. Hollister had at least showered and shaved. He was still or already drunk, but not so impaired that he staggered or slurred. Hollister was a bootlegger’s dream. His capacity for whiskey was Olympian.

  “It stinks in here,” Rita said. An unlit cigarette bobbed between her thin lips, which were stained such a deep crimson that they appeared almost black. Her earrings—too large for daytime—stretched her earlobes into pendants.

  Jax wanted to say, “You stink,” but he didn’t for Hollister’s sake. Instead, he said, “You mean the bacon? It smells pretty good to me. Let’s eat.”

  The afternoon sunlight slanted through the windows in the Venetian Dining Room, and a guy in a tuxedo played classical music on a long grand piano. The maître d’hôtel instructed the host to seat them next to a window overlooking the gardens. Jax had found the maître d’hôtel early that morning and tipped him generously for the best table. As soon as they were all seated, a young man in a white waistcoat poured iced water into crystal
glasses at each of their places, and a waiter passed out menus and offered coffee, tea, champagne, and cocktails.

  Before the waiter returned, the captain rolled a cart to the table with a dark green bottle tilted in an ice bucket. He held up the bottle. “Dom Pérignon, nineteen twenty-six. A gift from a secret admirer for the beautiful lady and her party.” He set a champagne coupe in front of Mae, uncorked the bottle, and poured. “I hope you approve, miss.”

  Mae looked confused, but she raised the shallow glass to her lips and sipped. “It’s delicious,” she said.

  “Excellent,” the captain said and poured for the rest of them.

  Jax looked around for Mae’s secret admirer and found him at a table tucked in the corner farthest from the door and half-hidden by a tall potted palm. He was a heavy-set man, round-faced with a receding hairline, and he worked a fat cigar between thick lips. He wore a starched white shirt and dark tie, and his suit coat was folded neatly over the back of the chair next to him. A man in a hat and overcoat, despite the warm room, stood against the wall behind the table. His coat bulged on one side as if he were lopsidedly fat.

  “Mae, look over there,” Jax said. “Corner table.”

  Mae put her hand on Jax’s sleeve. “Is that . . . ?”

  “Yes ma’am. In the flesh.”

  The gangster looked up from his newspaper and made eye contact with Mae. He removed the cigar from his mouth, smiled affably, and lifted his coffee cup in salute. Then he turned his attention back to his newspaper.

  “That oughta blow your wig,” Hollister said.

  “I really didn’t believe all that stuff you said last night,” said Mae.

  “To tell you the truth, I hardly believed it myself. All I can say is, Al Capone has very good taste.”

  “Here, here,” said Hollister and raised his glass.

  Rita said nothing, and she refused to touch the champagne.

  When time came to fly home later that afternoon, Mae and Rita waited in the backseat of the heated hotel limousine while Jax and Hollister readied the Cessna.

  Jax pulled back a tarp behind the rear seat that covered cases of Canadian Club that Red’s men had loaded under cover of darkness the night before. “Would you look at this?” he said to Hollister. “They loaded more than I told them.”

  Hollister elbowed past Jax and looked. “You keep saying this airplane will hold anything you can fit in it,” he said. “Just pile the bags on top.” Hollister pried up the lid on a crate and pulled out a bottle. “For the trip home,” he said.

  “Help me move a few of these forward,” Jax said. “We’ll put the bags in the very back. They’re lighter.” Hollister rearranged the crates, stacking them to the roof behind the rear seat, then they covered the crates with the tarp and stowed the overnight bags aft. Jax opted not to top off the fuel, which he reasoned would lighten the load enough to be safe. “Go get the girls,” he told Hollister. “Let’s get out of here.”

  “What’s all this?” Mae asked when she climbed inside.

  “Medical supplies,” Jax said. He winked and added, “Sometimes I gotta mix a little business with pleasure.”

  The wind was dead calm. Jax taxied to the farthest boundary of the airfield and held the brakes while he poured the coals to the big radial engine. When he released the brakes, the Cessna lurched forward, and Jax had to jerk the stick back to keep her from nosing over on the neglected turf. He eased the stick forward slowly when the airplane had built some speed. The tail skid came up and they bounced across the airfield on the main wheels.

  “This is taking a while,” Hollister said.

  Jax did not respond. He eased the stick back some more and felt the mains lift off, but they quickly settled on the ground again. Jax looked from the windshield to the side window to the windshield again while the wheels skipped along the turf and the airplane quickly approached the end of the airfield. He felt bile rise from his stomach and the stick became wet from his sweating palm. He belched loudly and eased the stick back very slowly, very gently. Finally, the Cessna’s weight transferred from the wheels to the wings and they gained a few inches of altitude.

  “We gonna clear that fence?” asked Hollister.

  “Yeah. Sure.” Jax continued to pull back on the stick, then stopped when the Cessna’s stall warning horn chirped.

  They cleared the fence.

  They were fast approaching the river and the trees along each bank. To their left was Grand Avenue with its two-story houses. Beyond the houses were the mountains. The terrain to the south rose just as rapidly. Jax headed toward the river while the Cessna clawed for altitude.

  “We gonna clear those trees?” asked Hollister.

  Jax glanced at him but said nothing. Hollister opened the Canadian Club and took a long pull.

  They cleared the trees. Barely.

  “My man!” Hollister said. He turned around and said, “You girls okay?”

  “What the hell was all that?” said Rita.

  “You okay, Mae?” Jax asked.

  “I saw my whole life go by just then.”

  “What?” Jax turned around to look into Mae’s face.

  Mae waved her hand. “Just watch where you’re going. Don’t worry about me.”

  “Yeah, watch it,” said Rita.

  Jax turned and looked forward. “I’m sorry about that,” he called toward the backseat. “But we’re good now. We’re fine.” To Hollister he said, “Absolutely aces.”

  “Definitely deuces, but at least I’m awake,” Hollister said. He took another pull of whiskey and handed the bottle to the backseat. “Here, girls,” he said. “Take the edge off.”

  Jax followed the river until the Cessna put a thousand feet of air between them and Arkansas, then he turned south for home. “I told you this bird’ll handle anything we can cram in,” he said to Hollister.

  Hollister laughed. “But not well, my man. Not well at all.” He turned toward the backseat. “Ladies, how about passing that bottle back up here?”

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Hot Springs was too much for Mae to write about in her diary. She could not bear to reduce to mere words all the thoughts and emotions that town aroused, so she only made a brief entry, Feb 21-22, 1931, Hot Springs, Arkansas. All of my yesterdays and tomorrows passed before me.

  Between the pages of her diary, Mae placed an envelope she had found in her hotel room after Sunday brunch. “Miss Mae Compton” was printed in neat, masculine letters on the envelope. Inside was a single page of hotel stationery on which “Room 442. Anytime. Al” was written in looping cursive.

  How had he learned her name?

  The Friday after Hot Springs, Mae walked to the dry cleaners and spread her homework on the counter as she always did. But she was too distracted to study, so she daydreamed about hostessing luncheons for her sorority sisters—anywhere but Aunt Vida’s—and taking dictation in one of the tall office buildings downtown. Fantasizing about having a job drove Mae into her textbook, even though she wasn’t in the mood.

  She was just finishing when Jax pulled up in his big convertible and came into the store. The afternoon was cool and cloudy, and Jax wore a leather jacket over his shirt and tie and high drape pants.

  “Hi, Mae,” he said.

  “Hi, Jax.”

  “Would you mind taking a short ride? There’s something I want to show you.”

  “Uncle Bill will be closing soon,” Mae said.

  “It won’t take long. I promise.”

  Mae did not want to go, but she felt obligated to at least give Jax a few minutes after he had given her a whole weekend in Hot Springs. “Sure,” she said, closing her book. “That’ll be fine.”

  Jax drove Mae to a red brick house with white trim on a corner lot two blocks from Centenary College.

  “What’s this?” she asked.

  “Just come inside with me.”

  Mae followed Jax up the steps to the porch and watched him open the front door with a key that he pulled from his pocket.
They walked into a living room with a picture window. From there, Jax led Mae through the vacant rooms, as Buster had led her through the tiny shotgun cottage in Whitesboro. They stopped in the sunroom, where the windows gave a view of the deep backyard, which was carpeted from flower bed to flower bed with dormant St. Augustine grass.

  “Whose house is this?” Mae asked.

  “It’s yours.”

  “What?”

  Suddenly, dramatically, Jax dropped to one knee and said, “This house is empty. It’s waiting for you.” He pulled a ring—a big diamond ring—from his pocket and took Mae’s hand. Before she could pull her hand away, he slid the diamond up against the modest band that had belonged to Buster’s mother. “It’s waiting for us,” he said. Then Jax pressed a key into Mae’s palm, closed her fingers around it, said, “Just think about it.”

  “Jax, no—” Mae pulled the ring off her finger.

  “Keep it for now,” Jax said as he struggled to his feet. “And the key. At least until you’ve thought it over.”

  “I better walk back to the dry cleaners,” Mae said.

  “I understand.”

  Jax didn’t show up at the dry cleaners the following week or the week after that, and Mae asked her uncle what had become of him. “Jax is spending a lot of time in Bossier City,” Uncle Bill said. “He’s a good salesman, and I asked him to take care of the nuts and bolts of the cleaning contract for the new airfield. There wasn’t much for him to do around here anyway.”

  Mae waited for Jax to contact her, so she could return his ring and the key to the house. When three weeks had gone by without any word from him, she found herself walking to Alexander Avenue after class, instead of to her uncle’s dry cleaners. She let herself in and walked through the house, stopping to examine each room as she had not had time to do with Jax. Then Mae sat on the polished hardwood floor in the living room and imagined how she would furnish the house if it were hers.