Larry & the Dog People

by J. Paul Henderson

  ‘Anyway, it was her who read it and she’s the one that invited me to discuss the manuscript over lunch. She brought another guy with her, the Foreign Rights Director. He struck me as indifferent, more interested in what was going on in the room than he was at the table, and when he did speak all he said was that he’d graduated from Harvard and couldn’t understand why a mainstream publisher hadn’t snapped him up. The agent took more interest in my manuscript though, told me it was brilliant and that I had a distinctive voice and that with a few minor tweaks it would be ready for sending out to publishers. I didn’t feel good about either one of them to tell you the truth, but there was no one else knocking on my door and so I agreed terms with them.

  ‘Three weeks later I heard back from her and she told me she’d decided to send the manuscript to a brilliant – she uses that word a lot – a brilliant freelance editor the agency used. He gets back to her and tells her the story needs work – lots of work! Says the strong silent character at the heart of the book is so strong and silent that he’s verging on the mute and needs to talk more and there should be more action scenes in the story. “And how’s that supposed to happen?” I asked the agent. “The guy lives alone in a remote cabin in the Rockies!” And all she says is that she agrees with everything the editor says and to jump to it. It was then I realised she didn’t have a mind of her own.

  ‘So I changed the book the way they wanted and hated myself for making the changes. I wasn’t happy with the end product and neither were the publishers when they read the manuscript. The next thing I know, this brilliant freelance editor’s bringing out his own book and it’s filled with big talkers and lots of action scenes and the first person he thanks in the Acknowledgements is her. All he was concerned about was me writing like him and all she was concerned about was me being him. I can’t prove anything, but I think there was something going on between the two of them…

  ‘And they made me change the title, too; made me change it from Hail Marys and Snow Gods to The Man who Hid under his Eyebrows. The book was about Catholicism and Nature and nothing to do with a guy’s eyebrows, which were lost anyway after a gas canister blew up in his face halfway through the first chapter.’

  By now Petey was grinding his teeth and Larry didn’t know what to say for the best. Eventually a suitable phrase came to mind. ‘You deserve better, Petey.’

  ‘That’s what Delores is always telling me. And wait till you hear this, Larry. The agent’s had my second manuscript for five months and hasn’t even read the first page! Last time I mentioned it to her she told me to be patient and that she was having personal problems. Who doesn’t have personal problems? Anyway, I’m going to give her another month and if I don’t hear back I’m going to start looking for another agent. No one makes a fool of Petey Muckleberry, Larry, no one. That’s my department!’

  ‘Quite right, too,’ Larry said.

  ‘It’s none of my business, Larry,’ Tank butted in, ‘but if I were you I’d walk around the room a bit more. That frame of yours and those big jug ears make you look like a totem pole when you stand still… You doing okay, Petey?’

  ‘I’m doing fine, thanks. I have the love of a good woman.’

  ‘Well, if that’s Delores you’re talking about then you have the love of three good women,’ Tank said. ‘Amazes me how she’s never crushed you.’

  Petey did look fragile, almost emaciated, and Tank had often wondered if the man had a tapeworm or suffered from an eating disorder. He was a pint-sized version of Larry, a man-sized version of Button, and it made no sense to Tank that he was dating a woman Delores’ size.

  Petey and Delores had met at a Redskins game while Petey was in Washington visiting an old college friend. Delores had gone to the stadium with a colleague from the museum and happened to be sitting next to him. When the people in the row in front stood up – which was most of the time – Petey lost sight of the game and Delores took pity on him – the way she’d taken pity on Button when she’d first seen him at the adoption agency. She asked him if he’d like to sit on her shoulders and Petey accepted her offer and found her shoulders more comfortable and padded than the seat he’d been sitting on. They started to date and had now been together two years.

  ‘Tell me, Petey, why is it that some writers feel the need to be so damn pretentious?’ Tank asked – again out of left field. ‘I read the other day about this woman who thinks she was born with a bunch of literary spirits buzzing round her head and how they keep visiting her and whispering stories into her ear. Do you buy that?’

  ‘No, I don’t,’ Petey said. ‘It was probably something her agent told her to say. Writers should keep their mouths shut and let their words do the talking and stop buying into the idea that they’re celebrities. That’s my philosophy, anyway. You won’t find me on any talk shows.’

  ‘I think you’re getting ahead of yourself there, Petey. I can’t even find you on any bookshelves!’

  Larry came to Petey’s defence and explained the problems he was having with his agent, how she spent most of her time at the hairdressers and was having personal problems.

  The numbers started to thin and Delores suggested they go to the Mitsitam Native Foods Cafe for a drink. There they found three opened bottles of wine on a table marked ‘Reserved’.

  ‘My treat,’ Delores said, ‘and I’d like to thank you all for coming and making the evening such a success. And Petey and I have an announcement to make, don’t we, Petey?’ Petey nodded, and the gang, with differing levels of enthusiasm, waited for news of their impending marriage.

  Delores continued. ‘Petey and I are staging a protest at the FedExField on Sunday and we’d be happy for you to join us.’

  Delores’ current obsession was the name of the city’s football team, the Washington Redskins. It was derogatory, prejudicial, and to her way of thinking as injurious to the Native American psyche as the N-word was to blacks. The controversy wasn’t new but appeared to be in danger of running out of steam and Delores had decided to boil her own kettle and get things moving again.

  ‘So who’s with us?’ Delores asked.

  It turned out no one was. Laura and Alice were busy that Sunday, Mike tied up at church playing the organ and Larry working on his presentation to the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Tank was happy to point out that he was free all day Sunday, but couldn’t think of anything more pointless to do with his time. ‘You’re overthinking things, Delores. There’s nothing negative about the name. Hell, even the majority of Native Americans don’t have a problem with it. How can anyone have a problem with a name that signifies strength and courage?’

  ‘I’m not overthinking anything, Tank. The name belittles Native Americans and it’s a form of ethnic stereotyping. If we can get it changed it will be a way of atoning for the white man’s crimes.’

  She then turned to address the whole group. ‘Our forefathers tried to wipe out the Indians’ culture and religion. They broke treaties, stole their lands and made them live on Godless reservations with nothing to do but twiddle their thumbs and drink alcohol… Cheers, by the way. Good Health, everyone…! And they robbed them of their freedom and their dignity and reduced them to poverty. The plight of the Indian is our guilt and the least we can do is show them some respect by changing the name of the capital’s football team.’

  Petey broke into applause. ‘Well said, Delores! Well said!’

  Delores beamed at him and then looked at Larry. ‘And you’ll back me up on this, won’t you, Larry?’ she continued. ‘The late nineteenth century was when most of the bad things happened to the Native Americans, and this was your period of study, wasn’t it? The bad things happened on your watch.’

  Larry, who was in the habit of withdrawing to the perimeter when discussions flared, not only stood his ground on this occasion but climbed to its highest point. The late nineteenth century was his reason for being, the past his professional life
had been staked on, and without a moment’s hesitation he picked up the gauntlet from the floor of the Mitsitam Native Foods Cafe and stood to face his audience. He was back in the lecture theatre.

  ‘You’re right, Delores: bad things did happen during those years. But you’re wrong to judge events of the past by modern standards. The demise of the Native American was inevitable. You’re not to blame, Tank’s not to blame and I’m not to blame. The direction of history is to blame.’

  ‘I didn’t understand a word of that,’ Alice whispered to Laura.

  ‘It’s what happens when a Stone Age culture goes head-to-head with an advanced industrial civilisation,’ Larry continued. ‘One society is static and wants to live as one with nature, while the other is dynamic and wants to conquer and bend nature for its own purposes. The only common ground they have is the ground they compete for and a clash is inevitable. It’s also inevitable that the weaker and less adaptable of the two parties will be the one to suffer…’

  Larry’s summation was detached – cold, Delores thought. While he appeared to sympathise with the sufferings of the Indians, at no time did he condemn the wickedness of the white man. He argued instead that their forefathers were victims of the cultural values of the time and it was wrong to judge their actions by today’s standards. Neither was it helpful to idealise the Native Americans. Indians should be seen as Indians and not as a symbol of humanity’s innate goodness brought to its knees by civilisation.

  ‘I still have no idea what he’s talking about,’ Alice said to Laura. ‘He’s your friend. Can’t you tell him to sit down?’

  But Larry had finished what he had to say and was already in the process of sitting down, silently congratulating himself on a lecture well delivered but wondering if he should have said more about the locomotives.

  ‘That’s the most common sense we’re likely to hear tonight,’ Tank said, slapping Larry on the back. ‘Pass the wine, will you, Delores? All Larry’s talking has made me thirsty.’

  ‘Well, I don’t care what Larry thinks,’ Delores said after she’d passed the bottle. ‘It’s a free country and my opinion counts as much as his. And working at the museum gives me an insight into the mind of the Native American that he can’t get from reading books. I don’t mean to offend you, Larry, but this is something I feel strongly about.’

  ‘Oh don’t worry on my account,’ Larry said. ‘I’ve enjoyed the evening and our discussion. I wonder though, could I just say a few more words about the impact of the locomotive? The Indians used to call them bad medicine wagons…’

  ‘Maybe another time, Larry,’ Laura said. ‘The Cafe’s about to close and we’re holding things up.’ She then turned to Delores. ‘It’s been a delightful evening, Delores, and I wouldn’t have missed the exhibition for the world. It’s something my Aunt Elizabeth would have enjoyed, too.’

  Delores and Petey stayed to help clear up after the exhibition and the others headed for the museum’s exit. Laura and Alice decided to walk home along the waterfront, and Mike and Larry, who had arrived by Metrobus, started to walk towards the bus stop.

  ‘Hey, you guys can ride back with me if you like,’ Tank said. ‘It won’t be comfortable for one of you, but you’ll both be home quicker than if you wait for either the Metrobus or the Circulator.’

  Mike and Larry took him up on his offer and walked with him to where he’d parked his Smart car. Without being asked, Mike climbed into the trunk. ‘I’m younger than you are, Larry, and I’m wearing overalls. Besides, I owe you for yesterday, man.’

  Tank made an illegal U-turn and pulled into the traffic.

  ‘You know what’s missing in that museum?’ Tank said. ‘Cowboys! How can you have an Indian Museum without any cowboys in it? It’s like having a ham-and-cheese sandwich without any ham in it or going to an Abbott and Costello movie and finding only Abbott in it. It makes no sense to have one without the other. It’s like having peaches without cream or a horse without a carriage.’

  ‘You know what doesn’t go together?’ Mike said. ‘A man your size driving a car this size! Why didn’t you buy something bigger?’

  ‘Tank likes confined spaces,’ Larry explained.

  ‘It’s a pity he doesn’t like cleaning them, then,’ Mike replied. ‘All I can smell back here is Sherman, and his hairs are everywhere. Uji’s going to be wondering what I’ve been up to tonight.’

  Tank ignored the comments and continued to head for Georgetown. ‘I’ll drop you at my house and you can walk from there,’ he said. ‘There’s no point wasting gas.’

  Ten minutes later Tank drew into his drive. ‘How much is the Metrobus these days?’ he asked.

  ‘A dollar fifty,’ Mike answered.

  ‘Okay, just give me a dollar each, then,’ Tank said.

  8

  The Road to Jerusalem

  (Via Charles Town and Arlington)

  The Monday following the exhibition Larry started work on his thesis. The conference on Desert Reclamation was scheduled for October, not for another eleven weeks, but the organisers of the symposium had requested a draft of his paper by the end of August. Unsurprisingly, nothing new had been written on the Desert Land Act since Larry’s retirement, and he was left to review his own research and publications, slicing and dicing the information as he saw fit.

  After five weeks of disciplined routine, and slightly to his alarm, Larry found that he’d reduced his life’s work to an address of no more than forty-five minutes. He read the paper aloud to Moses and timed himself with a stopwatch: forty-four-and-a-half minutes. Nothing wrong with that, he thought. For a Basset Hound though, whose internal clock ticked differently to that of a human’s, the monologue had lasted closer to four-and-a-half hours and when Larry looked up from his paper Moses was fast asleep on the floor, snoring gently. It wasn’t quite the reaction Larry had been hoping for and he decided to read his paper to Wayne that evening.

  Larry and Wayne had fallen into the routine of eating Friday dinner at Larry’s. It made sense for Wayne to familiarise himself with the house and its appliances before he moved in, and also logical for him rather than Larry to cook their evening meal. Wayne had quickly mastered the workings of the oven, but his manual dexterity and grasp of pan handles had caused Larry some concern, especially after Wayne dropped a saucepan full of hotdogs and boiling water on to the kitchen floor. Pans became off-limits, as did the hob, and it was agreed that Wayne would only prepare meals inside the oven. Aware of Wayne’s aversion to vegetables – and Laura’s cautionary mention of scurvy – Larry had also encouraged him to eat salads, something that Wayne had been reluctant to do until Larry introduced him to the world of Thousand Island dressing, a cosmos that magically transformed green leaves and tomatoes into something he found palatable.

  This Friday Wayne arrived early.

  ‘I ain’t due for another twenty minutes, Professor,’ he called through the letter box. ‘Do you want me to wait outside or can I come in?’

  Larry opened the door and invited him inside. ‘You’re welcome here any time of the day, Wayne. Come on through to the kitchen and I’ll pour you a glass of iced tea. Just out of interest, though, why are you so early?’

  ‘One of the men at my house is drinking beer,’ Wayne explained, ‘and he’s not supposed to. None of us is supposed to. It’s against the rules. I told him that and he told me… well, I cain’t tell you what he told me because we’re not supposed to use words like that either and I told him that, too. I told him I’d tell on him for drinking and cussing, and he said that if I did he’d break into my room and put a brick through my television.

  ‘I told him that if he did that he’d have God to answer to because the only shows I watch on television are Christian shows. And I told him something else, too, Professor. I told him that if he did put a brick through my screen I’d get Kevin to come and put a brick through his screen and that Kevin wasn’t a person he�
��d want to mess with if he knew what was good for him because Kevin was fearless and smoked cigarettes when he pumped gas into his car. That quietened him, but his dander was up and so I thought I’d better leave the house and make myself scarce for a while. I’m still telling on him, though.’

  ‘And does Kevin do that?’ Larry asked.

  ‘Do what?’

  ‘Smoke cigarettes when he fills up his tank.’

  ‘No. Not no more, he don’t.’

  Larry had never mentioned to Wayne that he knew Kevin to be dead, but took from Wayne’s answer – that Kevin had stopped smoking – that Wayne was also aware of this, as Laura had intimated, and not living in a state of denial.

  ‘I thought we’d eat pizza for a change tonight,’ Larry said. ‘I went ahead and took one out of the freezer this morning so all you have to do is read the instructions on the box and put it in the oven. And once we’ve eaten, I’d like to read you the paper I’m delivering in Jerusalem. It would be good to get your feedback.’

  Wayne slowly traced the words on the pizza box with his finger and then grunted – the sign that he’d understood them. He took the pizza out of the box, stripped it of cellophane and placed it on a metal tray. He then joined Larry at the kitchen table and waited for the oven to preheat.

  ‘And this speech of yours, Professor, is it about that desert thing you keep talking about?’

  ‘Yes, I’ve been asked to give an overview of the Desert Land Act. I have to explain it to the delegates in forty-five minutes.’

  ‘Wheeeeew!’ Wayne whistled. ‘That’s a long time to talk, Professor. You’ll need to suck a mint or your mouth’s going to go all dry.’

  ‘Oh I’m not worried about that happening, Wayne. I’ve got more spittle in my mouth than I know what to do with. No, what worries me is that forty-five minutes isn’t going to be long enough. I don’t want the delegates going home thinking I’ve short-changed them.’