Improbable Fortunes

by Jeffrey Price

  Mallomar locked eyes with Buster and leaned in menacingly. “Don’t…fuck…her.” Mallomar held this look for about five seconds then burst out laughing so hard he could hardly contain himself. “Jesus Christ, you should see the look on your face!”

  The next morning, Buster rushed out to the front pasture to lower the irrigation headgates. Rain was in the forecast and they wouldn’t be needing to use their reservoir water. He stood up to see Mallomar drive past and beep his horn, then gesture to the house. Buster panicked. Mallomar meant that his wife was now all alone. Buster jumped on Stinker and raced back. When he got there, he was relieved to discover that she hadn’t yet left her room. Honoring his promise to keep an eye on her, Buster sat down in the living room and obediently waited, slowly leafing through the many Mallomar coffee table books. A book of black-and-white photographs depicting circus freaks during their “off hours” and men wearing women’s hair curlers was particularly interesting. The morning came and went. The afternoon came and went. And Mrs. Mallomar never left her room.

  Around dinnertime, Buster threw two steaks on the grill and heated a can of beans. Very gently, he rapped on Mrs. Mallomar’s door to announce that her supper was ready, but she didn’t answer. So, he left the tray by her door. Returning to his own dinner downstairs, he casually looked out the window to the corral and saw Stinker. With all the fluster of Mallomar’s leaving, Buster had forgotten to unsaddle him. Buster looked up to Mrs. Mallomar’s door. She was still sleeping. Very quietly, he got up and ran outside. It took him no longer than four minutes to unsaddle his horse, comb him out, put some fresh alfalfa down for him, and run back inside. He was just re-tucking his napkin inside his shirt collar before cutting into his steak, when he noticed the cabinet door under the kitchen sink was ajar. He knew that he hadn’t opened it.

  Buster put his knife and fork down and climbed the stairs, three at a time, to Mrs. Mallomar’s bedroom. Her steak and beans were still on the tray outside the room, untouched. He heard a low moan coming through the door, and knocked again.

  “Mrs. Mallomar…ya’ll right in there?”

  There was no answer. He tried the door handle. It was locked. He banged on the door, loud enough to wake up a sleeping person.

  “Mrs. Mallomar, ah gotta know if yor all right. Would ya’ll answer me, please?” There was still no response.

  “Ma’am, if ya’ll don’t open this door, ah’m gonna have to break it down. The mister ain’t gonna be too happy with that.” He waited. Again, nothing. “Welp, you gimme no choice, now, ma’am! Ah’m comin’ in!” Buster was about to put his shoulder to the door, but at the last minute, thought better of it and kicked the door handle with his boot.

  Mrs. Mallomar was lying on the floor. Beside her, was an empty sixteen-ounce bottle of lemon-scented furniture polish. Buster placed an ear on her chest and listened for a heartbeat. She had one, but it was faint. He carefully picked her up—taking care not to touch her any place it wouldn’t be allowed had she been conscious—and placed her back on the bed.

  “Mrs. Mallomar?” He gently tapped the side of her cheek with a thick finger. Her jaw hung loose, her eyes rolled half-way back in their sockets, her breath, not surprisingly, smelled nicely of lemons. Buster agonized over what to do. He thought about calling Mallomar, but that wouldn’t solve the immediate crisis. He considered calling Jimmy, but he hadn’t spoken to her in months—what could she do, anyway?

  Buster decided to call Doc Solitcz. There was no phone in Doc and Ned’s cabin, and he was forced to dial the Stumplehorsts’ main house. Mrs. Stumplehorst answered the phone. As anxious as Buster was to talk to Doc Solitcz, being terse and to the point would only draw suspicion from the old harridan. He had to be cagey about this. He traded pleasantries with her about Vanadium’s chances for precipitation. He commiserated with her about the going prices at the Kansas City packing houses. Finally, just before he was just about to jump out of his skin, he broached the subject of his original intent.

  “Uh, is Doc around?”

  “Yes, I believe he is. It’s not an emergency, I hope?”

  “No, ma’am. No, thank goodness fer that. It ain’t no ee-mergency. Jes wanna ax him a veterinary question.”

  “Well, hold the line, Buster,” she said. “I’ll go fetch him.”

  It seemed like years before Doc came to the phone. By now, all Buster could manage to pass through his tightened larynx was, “Doc, ah need you up here, raht quick.”

  When Doc arrived, he took a look at Mrs. Mallomar. Felt her pulse. Put a stethoscope to her chest. He told Buster to bring him two raw eggs and then wait downstairs. It was quiet up in Mrs. Mallomar’s room for the longest time. Unable to eat, Buster gave his dinner to the dogs. Mallomar might not be too upset if Mrs. Mallomar died, but Sheriff Dudival, not to mention the rest of Vanadium, would definitely have something to say about his presence at yet another death. Finally, Doc Solitcz emerged and stood at the railing overlooking the great room.

  “I need you to make a big pot of oatmeal for me.”

  “There’s another steak, if yor hungry…”

  “The oatmeal is for Mrs. Mallomar, Buster.” With all the latest talk about Buster’s success as a rancher, the Doc had almost forgotten how slow on the uptake he could be. “We need to soak up the poison in the lady’s stomach that hasn’t already been regurgitated.”

  “Ah’ll git right on it!” Buster was grateful for something useful to do as well as the Doc’s implication that Mrs. Mallomar was still alive.

  Three bowls of oatmeal later, Doc emerged from the room and came downstairs. Buster had retrieved a drink for him from the chicken coop.

  “She’s not a very nice person, is she?” Doc quickly swallowed the glass of bourbon and handed Buster the empty glass.

  “Why…what’d she say to ya?”

  “It’s not important.”

  “Ah a-pprec-i-ate you comin’ out here t’night, Doc.”

  “And I’d appreciate you not telling her who I am.”

  “Shor ’nuff.” The Doc headed to the door.

  “You don’t have to run off right away, do ya, Doc?”

  “Well, actually I really ought to be getting back…”

  Buster didn’t relish the thought of being left alone in the house with Mrs. Mallomar again.

  “How ’bout me burnin’ a steak for ya? We got a thousand of ’em.”

  “Sounds tempting, but I already ate Mrs. Stumplehorst’s grilled chicken-on-the-cross.”

  “We got a real movie thee-ay-ter here. Seats thirty people.”

  “I don’t doubt it.”

  “C’mon Doc, why don’t you stick around a piece?” Buster almost begged. “Mr. Mallomar’s got himself the en-tire Hopalong Cassidy Collection.”

  Doc smiled and shook his head. “I gotta get back, kid.”

  “Sure, sure…ah unnerstan.” Morosely, Buster followed him to the door. Doc turned around to take it in one last time.

  “I gotta say, Buster, this is a helluva situation you got yourself in here.” Buster wasn’t sure if the situation he was referring to was good or bad. The fact was, he no longer knew himself.

  “Yeah, it’s a booger, ain’t it?”

  The Doc didn’t smile.

  “It’s a booger, all right.”

  Up until then, Buster had been sleeping in the prefab office that had been used by Mallomar’s architect. Under these new circumstances, he thought it wise to sleep in the main house until he knew that Mrs. Mallomar was going to be all right. Buster opened the different doors around the kitchen looking for the maid’s quarters until he found it. When Mallomar built the forty-thousand-square-foot house, it somehow slipped his attention to provide space for the live-in staff that he would certainly need. At the eleventh hour, he and his architect were able to carve off space for a seven by nine foot room with a small sink and shower. Buster took his boo
ts off and stretched out. His feet protruded a foot and a half past the end of the bed. After several attempts to get comfortable, he decided to take the pillow and blankets and sleep on the living room floor. At least, this way, he could keep an ear out for Mrs. Mallomar in case she needed something.

  Buster dozed off as a weather front moved in from the west and began to gently buffet the big picture windows. He wrapped himself in a dream about Destiny Stumplehorst. That night, he saved her from a dangerous rock slide. His heroics, however, were not rewarded with what Buster yearned for most—to bring her back to his prefab and make love like they had done in the Stumplehorst barn. Lately, all of Buster’s “I’ll Save You!” dreams were confounded by Destiny having to get back to her “boyfriend.”

  A lightning strike hit a tree one hundred yards from the house. For a split second the living room lit up so brightly that Buster could see the bones in his hand. Thunder was booming now with unsettling regularity—sounding like someone was dragging furniture across the wooden floor upstairs. Buster sat up and cocked an ear. Was someone dragging furniture across the second floor?

  Up the stairs Buster bounded once again. The door to Mrs. Mallomar’s room was open. She wasn’t there. He quickly looked around the horseshoe-shaped second floor landing. There was another pop of lightning, and then he saw her. Mrs. Mallomar was hanging by her neck from one of the roof’s steel support rods, under her feet, a tipped-over chair.

  “Mrs. Mallomar!”

  He ran to her and attempted to get her weight off the rope—with one arm cradled under her buttocks lifting, while his free hand fumbling in his pants for a pocket knife. When Mrs. Mallomar fortunately regained consciousness, her first cognizant observation was that Buster’s nose was firmly parked in her crotch as he struggled to reach above her head to cut the rope.

  “Oh my god!”

  “Sorry, ma’am. Jes tryin’ to get you down!” Buster mumbled, her nightgown sticking to his mouth like a plastic dry cleaning bag. Incensed, she began to beat him furiously about the ears. Buster had to endure this until the rope was finally cut. Flustered, he placed her gently on the floor. She stood there, small and scowling at him, and then burst out crying.

  “You fucking idiot! Why can’t you let me die?”

  Angrily she marched back to her room and locked the door. In the morning, Buster got up early and scrambled half a dozen eggs and toasted bread. By now, he had figured out how to work the stove, the microwave and the dishwasher, but the German coffee maker, with all its switches and dials, offered the biggest challenge. Still, he even managed to get that going. He jiggered some hot sauce on the eggs, sat down at the granite counter and stared out at the meadow waving with deep green new grass and wildflowers replenished by the rain.

  “Who said you could stay in this house?”

  Buster had been dreading this moment. Mrs. Mallomar was standing behind him, still wearing the nightgown from last night. There was a purple and yellow brushstroke of broken capillaries around the right side of her neck.

  “Your husband wanted me to stay in the house whilst he were gone.”

  “‘Whilst he were gone,’” she mimicked. “Why? Was he afraid I was going to cap myself?”

  “Well, didn’t you, uh…try to, ma’am?”

  She cocked her head sideways and looked at him like he was crazy.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Last night, ma’am. You had yourself a snoot fulla some furniture polish, then you kinda…hung yorself.”

  “I what?” She obviously didn’t remember anything or was playing dumb—as Mallomar sometimes did.

  “Nevermind, ma’am. Fergit ah said anythin’.”

  “That’s right, nevermind! And God help you if you ever mention a word of that to my husband!”

  “Ah woont have no need to, ma’am.”

  “Oh no? You and fatso seem pretty chummy if you ask me. One might even say intimate. I mean, that’s the only way to explain why he has someone like you around.”

  Buster got the drift of what she was implying, but kept himself in check. He’d sat ringside when Mary Boyle would egg her husband on—hoping he’d slug her so she could get him arrested on a domestic. Buster wasn’t going to fall for that.

  “Can ah get you some eggs?” he said sweetly.

  Mrs. Mallomar harrumphed. “Where’d he hide it?”

  “Beggin’ your pardon, ma’am?”

  “Where’d he hide the vodka?”

  Buster just sat there mute.

  “Don’t you speak inglés? Where…is…the…booze?”

  “Ma’am…ah ain’t at liberty to say.” This was the first time Buster had employed Mallomar’s favorite expression, and he liked the ring of it.

  “You ain’t, huh?” She reached across Buster’s face to an overhead cabinet to get a coffee cup. Her robe parted, exposing her breasts, but she did nothing to correct the situation. Buster turned away and stared off in the distance at Little Cone and Lone Cone.

  “Okay, so where’s the coffee, Clem?”

  Buster gestured proudly to the coffee maker. She looked deadpan into the top of it. The tank that held the water was filled to the top with coffee grounds.

  “Who’s the idiot who poured coffee grounds in here?”

  For Buster, it had been a coin toss as to whether the water was supposed to go in the top or in the slide-out compartment.

  “’Sorry, ma’am, never used anythin’ but an ol’ percolator. Almost had it figgered out.”

  “Uh huh.” As she walked past him, she sniffed the air with a screwed-up face. “Why don’t you figger out how to use the shower whilst you’re at it?”

  She may have been right about Buster’s body odor. It had always been his habit to only change his clothes once a week. This too, he let slide.

  “Ah’m ridin out to the Dander Ranch this afternoon to look at some cattle they got for sale. If you’re innerested, ah’ll saddle you up a pony.”

  “I said, you stink.”

  “We’ve looked at the stock from eight different ranches,” he said unwavering, “We got it narrowed down to two.”

  “Why don’t you check out the Rockin’ Bidet Brand while you’re at it?”

  “Beg pardon, ma’am?”

  “I was just taking another angle on the stink question.” A bidet. Mallomar had three of those delivered to the house. Now he got it. Buster just took a sip of coffee and nodded appreciatively. He refused to be bucked off.

  “You’re sort of like having FiestaWare, you know that? Can’t even give the stuff away once you’re tired of it.”

  “Ma’am, my orders are not to leave you in this here house by yorself. Now, if you ain’t carin’ for breakfast, ah thought maybe yood wanna put on some britches and go fer a ride. Might make ya feel bedder once you got some fresh air in ya.”

  “Fuck you.”

  It was beginning to dawn on Buster that Mallomar had not been entirely forthcoming regarding his wife’s ease of maintenance. Buster had one last trump card to play.

  “Mr. Mallomar give me this note for you to read.” Buster took a doubled up envelope from his pocket and handed it to her. “Dana,” it read, “…your current state of freedom is a matter of my discretion. If you give this poor schmuck any trouble while I’m away, so help me God, I’ll have you committed to a fucking insane asylum. Don’t make me do something we’ll both regret. Marvin.” Mrs. Mallomar ripped the letter in half, then ripped it in half again and again and again and then maniacally tossed the pieces in the air. Buster maintained a straight-face.

  “I’ll jes go now and saddle up a horse for ya.”

  Mrs. Mallomar had little choice but to accompany Buster on horseback to the Dander Ranch. Buster could care less about the cattle, but considered the four mile journey with the missus a task akin to airing out an old sleeping bag. He put Mrs. Mallomar
on Hilary, a gentle mare with a wide back and slow gait that rode like a ’64 Eldorado. Dressed in black pajamas, a big floppy hat, and large black over-sized sunglasses, Mrs. Mallomar looked a bit like Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s by way of Apocalypse Now. Together they clomped along in silence, Buster in the lead. He took a quick look back at her. He couldn’t get over what a sour expression she had on her face. It almost made him laugh. Aside from Cookie Dominguez, Buster had never met such tempestuous people as the Mallomars. Anybody around here would have been tickled to have a speck of their money. There would be barbeques and parties. People would be howling at the moon and setting tires on fire. But not the Mallomars. Why did they make everything seem so complicated?

  They’d ridden for a mile in silence when Mrs. Mallomar finally spoke.

  “What do you say we take a break, Clem?”

  Buster reined Stinker over and found a level place for them to rest. Trained from his days with Jimmy Bayles Morgan’s outfit, he had brought a blanket to sit on as well as a nice lunch. Mrs. Mallomar had lost so much weight in rehab that her rear end, which in its heyday had been something of a masterpiece, was now flat and bony as a bluegill.

  Buster served Mrs. Mallomar a sliced steak sandwich with grilled onions and Swiss cheese on spelt bread that had had its crust removed. She took the sandwich in silence.

  “I’m allergic to wheat. This wasn’t made with wheat, was it?”

  “No, ma’am.”

  “What’ve you got to drink?”

  Buster got up from the blanket and pulled a shaker out of his saddlebag that was packed with ice. He poured it into a large plastic cup. She looked at it suspiciously.

  “What’s this?”

  “A strawberry milkshake.”

  Maybe Buster didn’t know how to work the coffee machine, but he knew how to work the Hamilton milkshake machine that Mallomar insisted on having. According to Mallomar, not only couldn’t he get a proper hamburger in Vanadium, but a decent milkshake either.