“Don’t worry,” she said. “They just fancy you.”
“No, they’re talking about my father.”
“So your father’s an anarchist? Big deal. Mine was a drunk and a gambler and pretty poor at both.”
“No, it’s not just that.”
“Do tell.”
“It’s just that time of year,” I went on.
“What time is that?”
“The time when everyone thinks my father’s come back,” I told her. “You can count on it like the leaves changing.”
Alma had no answer and I shouldn’t have expected one. We watched the crowd mingle in the dark of the white room. They ate their cakes and sausages and drank their Coca Cola and bubbly water and felt so sophisticated for going to a gallery, for remaining above the fray. I hated all of them.
Just as I was about to leave, someone called my name from across the room.
“Neal Stephens.”
An egg of a man in a white wool suit and red tie waved from beyond the cheese table, then waddled over, tipping his drink onto his fine shoes, and swearing to himself. I’d seen his picture in the paper.
“Son of a bitch,” I said. “That—”
“You, Stephens,” he hollered. “Neal Stephens, I need to talk to you.”
“Absolute bores,” Alma said. “But this might be interesting. Maybe you made love to his wife?”
“No,” I said. “It’s not that.”
Roland Matheson had made a killing selling crummy boots to Europe’s armies, black boots made of twice-worn leather, sewn with cheap Alabama thread. My toes ached just looking at the piss-ant. He operated out of Denver. Why he’d driven fifty miles north, I couldn’t say.
“I’ve been meaning to talk to you all night long.”
“Well, here I am, sir,” I said. “You want—”
“Don’t sir me. I’m a boot man. I’ve been getting my hands dirty since before you were born.”
“I know who you are, sir. So why don’t you get on with what you were going to say and I’ll get on with what I was going to say and we’ll see how it turns out.”
I reached into my pocket, but I never carried a weapon.
“Oh, so you know me. So did your father and that’s why we need to talk. I want to talk to him.”
“So do I. But we’ll have to go to France or Italy to find him.” The words arrived slurred, a little drunk. I leaned against a statue. Dionysus. Of course it was Dionysus.
“Papers been saying different lately, saying he’s here. Don’t you think I can read?”
Alma pushed in between us—I tried to stop her—I didn’t want saving anymore. “I don’t think you can read,” she said. “But you sure can afford to have others do it for you.”
Matheson eyeballed her. “Aren’t you a little old for that getup?”
“Leave her be,” I said. “You come to my showing and you’ll show good manners. Now say what you’re going to say so I can go back to doing what I was doing.”
“You’re your father’s son and that’s what I’m here about. By my count you owe me $98,346.”
“What? Are you mad?”
“You heard me. Jesse Stephens dynamited my factory and I want it paid back in cash. Wouldn’t take a check from no Stephens.”
The crowd shoved in closer, anticipating a scrap, a real-life western fist-to-cuffs. I got the sense the smart money was on Matheson, and, if I’d had the chance, I’d have bet against me too.
“Good for him.”
“What do you by that mean, boy?”
“A lot of men lost a lot of toes and feet because of your boots, mister, including me.”
I wasn’t cowing but even a bit drunk, I knew I was overmatched. While he looked ridiculous, the mass of him up close revealed me as the featherweight I was. Yet there’s a certain point you reach in an argument when it’s better to get clocked than run away. At least, you believe that before you’ve been clocked enough times.
“I only got nine toes now cause of you and I still miss that toe,” I went on. “It was my toe and it’s your fault it’s gone and I’m not forgiving you and I’d sooner cut off the rest of my toes than toss a goddamn nickel your way.”
I reached for my boot, but stumbled, then steadied myself against Dionysus. Using the pedestal as leverage, I yanked off my boot, revealing that I’d once again forgotten to wash my socks. Alma tried to grab hold of me, but I shook her off. She should have known better. You never stop a man midway through humiliating himself.
“It was a pretty toe,” I said. “My wife loved it. Said it was her favorite. She married me for that fucking toe. It was in our vows.”
It was then, for the climax of my performance, that I pulled off my sock, tearing away the garters, revealing four fine toes, one scarred stump, and a dirty, rarely washed foot.
“You see, see,” I said. “You took my damn toe and made a lot of money off it, so why don’t we call it even, because if I had that much money I’d love to buy my toe back.”
Matheson wiped his monocle on his tie. “Stop it, son.”
I held up my boot to the crowd. “You see this boot? You see it? You see how the threads don’t fray and the heel’s still set and there are no holes leaking trench water into it? Yeah. This is a fucking well-made boot. Real craftsmanship. Had it three years, now. Yours didn’t last three damn months before I got trench foot.”
For a moment, I was proud of myself. I’d made my point and I believed I’d showed the world what type of man Matheson was. If only I could have seen myself, if only I’d stepped out of my body and watched this act play out, well, I’d have known what was coming.
“You’re just like your father,” he said.
“You fucking cocksucker.” I swung my boot, thinking I’d knock him cold, but because I only had one boot on, I couldn’t balance myself right, and, in the end, I softly clipped Matheson’s pillowy neck.
The shoe man didn’t flinch.
Matheson dropped his right shoulder and then swung. I fell back into the pedestal. Dionysus hit the floor, breaking in three.
I woke up sober, looking at Matheson’s Italian loafers.
“Nice shoes there,” I said. “Quality.”
He kicked me in the ribs.
“Apologize, boy,” he told me. “Or the next one breaks your nose.”
Alma helped me to my feet, my jaw stinging like a horse had bucked me.
“Is it your turn to punch him?” she asked. “That’s how it works in America, right?”
I was done.
Alma led me past a horrified Miss Ida and down the stairwell, where I crouched, pulling on my boot. It wasn’t until later that I remembered that my sock was beneath the remains of Dionysius.
“Does it hurt?”
“Yes.”
“Come on, Jack Johnson,” she said. “We should get you home before you cold cock Athena.”
We headed toward quiet, elm-lined Rochelle Avenue, and I was thinking that I needed a long drive, and, after this strike was over, maybe I’d head south to Santa Fe for a week or two, but then I paused, examining the dark, empty space where I thought I’d left my car. I was mostly sober when I parked it there. This wasn’t a mistake.
“Son of a bitch.”
“What is it?”
I wiped my forehead with my handkerchief, and felt sweat rolling down my back even though it was near freezing. In the dark of the space, I saw that the thief had left a note beneath a rock.
“Someone stole it. Someone took my car.”
“You sure you didn’t misplace it? You seem like the type.”
“He left me a note.”
She looked it over, frowning.
“There once was a man drunk in the west
Who most folks called Neal the mess
He took lots of pictures<
br />
Drank too many pitchers
Boy, just go ahead now and confess.
¿En qué pararán estes misas, Garatuza?
El Guapo.”
“This is cute,” Alma said. “Jack Johnson has a secret.”
Did I ever, but she didn’t ask and I didn’t feel like confessing. Instead, I thanked her and told her I’d like to walk off my beating, and, with a bit of reluctance, she went her separate way.
Finally alone, I looked around and saw it was cold and dark. I walked up Rochelle and across Garivogue and I considered stopping into McGuffey’s for a drink, but I couldn’t stand seeing anyone familiar, so I meandered home, keeping the same staggered pace even as the rain fell and filled my boots with water, and it reminded me, at the time, of Lorraine and the trenches because the two were forever connected.
—6—
By the time I reached my porch it was past midnight and I was wet and cold and all I could think of was sleep, but when I opened my door, Gertie Williams, my uncle’s pet Pinkerton detective, was perched on my sofa, looking very much like a cat. Her nose, straight like a rifle, was flattened at the tip as if she’d banged into too many walls, and her heavy green eyes fluttered and sagged like she was a much older, seedier Mary Pickford. She was the last person I wanted to see. Over the past three years, we’d had a few run-ins, mostly over stories I’d written in the New Sligo Eagle, and these run-ins never failed to unnerve me.
But I wasn’t going to be chased from my own house. I sat on the piano bench and saw she was barefooted and had probably been through my things hours ago, and I’m sure she pitied me because I didn’t own much that you couldn’t either drink or fix a camera with.
“I took my shoes off. It’s a sign of respect and I do respect you, Neal. You know that about Gertie, don’t you?”
I grabbed the bottle from the table—one she’d pilfered from my pantry—and took a sip.
“Haven’t seen you around in a while,” I said. “Thought Pinkertons had steady work.”
“Gertie’s been wandering this great Earth, chasing ghosts.”
“And anarchists?”
“Very good, Neal. There’s a reason we all call you the Prince of New Sligo.”
“Nobody calls me that.”
She yawned. “You know how I think your father is such a fascinating creature. I’m just trying to meet him and I searched and searched and lo and behold I think he’s come back to this old dusty town. Ain’t that wonderfully ironic.”
She had an unconventional face, sunken and battered, but still pretty, the sort of pretty that came from years of lean living, the type of face I used to like photographing. She didn’t give anything away.
“Can I take your picture? You’ve got the perfect face for it.”
Usually, women smiled when I asked, but not Gertie. She hid behind her enormous purse, a bag that could easily carry a wallet, lipstick, and a gun.
“I’m awful shy.”
“Okay, no immortality for you.”
“You are silly.” She laid her hand on mine—she was the kind of person who enjoyed touching strangers—then massaged it. “You’re a very silly man.”
“Because I want to take your picture?”
“Maybe,” she said. “But I think that’s just a symptom of your silliness.”
“I’ve always thought of myself as rather stoic.”
She changed tactics. “Have you ever skinned a buffalo? I have. When I was a little girl, my daddy took me and my brothers to the Badlands, and they have a park up there, where all the buffalo roam, like the song.
“We were hungry. You understand?” She brushed her hand through her hair, and then looked down at me with her practiced, serious gaze. “So hungry, in fact, we ate all sorts of creatures. Ate rats and ate field mice and ate opossums and ate raccoons and even ate a prairie dog once and that tasted worst of all because they’re cute little rodents and they got families and no one likes to think that they’re eating someone’s mother. My mother was so hungry she died of it. Have you ever been hungry?”
I took off my boots and socks and sock garters, taking care not to look at my feet.
“But of course you have,” she said. “You were in the war, in the early years, the really lean years when all those boys were eating nothing but shoelaces.”
“Can we talk about something else?”
“I’m sorry. Are you getting weepy?”
“If you don’t play nice, I’ll have the cops put you in handcuffs.”
She fluttered her eyes again, then leaned toward me, and ran her tongue up the side of my cheek. I grabbed the armrest.
“O’Leary. O’Leary. O’Leary,” she said. “See, I said it three times fast.”
I crumpled my empty pack of cigarettes, and then reached for a fresh one.
“Which one?” I asked. “Pretty sure they’re both still dead.”
“Oh, sweet, dearly departed Clyde. Such a tragedy.”
“He was a son of a bitch.”
“No need to bite off my nose,” Gertie said. “I was just being polite.”
“What’s he got to do with me?” I asked.
Gertie laughed. “It’s sad. You really are a narcissist. If you died tomorrow, would we all cease to exist? Men. You all think your cocks keep the world rotating. You fool, O’Leary telegraphed saying he’d seen your father. Sent it just a couple of days before he went and swallowed that bullet.”
At first, I couldn’t make sense of it. Why would O’Leary do that? But then I understood: if O’Leary was telegraphing the Pinkertons, I began figuring, it meant O’Leary was most likely a Pinkerton.
“Ain’t that a gem,” she said. “You can see the wheels in your head turning. Not moving too fast, but you’re still a growing boy.”
“Why was O’Leary working with you? My uncle hates him.”
“You know dear Clyde would have sold his poor mama to the Kaiser if the price was right. Well, there I was enjoying that beautiful lake in Chicago, just having a good old time, when I get this funny little telegraph from Clyde saying he needs help catching your father. Gertie’s help. That’s why I stopped in to see you. To see if you knew where your father was. But, darling, you really think he’s in Europe, don’t you? You adorable little sap. If I didn’t find you so cute, I’d rub it in your face.”
Of course I thought he was in Europe. There was no reason for him to return, not if he liked breathing. My uncle had promised to shoot him on sight. And as far as I was concerned, he could go to hell.
“Why would he come back? Nothing for him here.”
“Let’s talk about something else. We could talk about you,” she said. “You’re fascinating in a morbid sort of way.”
“The strike. Is he here because of the strike?”
“No. Well, perhaps a little. To stick it to your uncle.”
“How?”
“Bang, bang.”
“Kill him?”
“And make his museum go boom.”
“You’ve got to be kidding,” I said. “You know how much dynamite—”
“I know, I know,” she said. “But he blew up that bank in Budapest, which was nearly the same size. What country is Budapest in now? I can’t remember. These anarchists: silly little things. I imagine he’s got it in his pretty little head that there is a sort of symbolism involved.”
“Of course, my father would have to be here to do this.”
“You’re boring Gertie. Now let’s hear about you. It’s been too long, Neal. You know I’ve always fancied you, just a teeny-weeny bit. You have those sad, blue eyes and soft, nimble hands. I’m almost blushing from shyness.”
She leaned toward me and I could still feel the dew from her last lick. It was pretty clear to me, despite my headache, that we were nearing the endgame.
“Why me?” I asked. “
I’m just a poor photographer who got lucky on a few pictures.”
“Oh, you’re much more than that. You’re an artist. Look at me.” She slapped the table. “Gertie said look at her. You’re a great man. Maybe, some day you’ll be even one of the great men of your generation. Who had that theory?”
“Carlyle.”
“Right, Carlyle. I may have been a poor vagabond’s daughter but I’m an autodidact. Do you know what that means?”
“Yes.”
“I’m a researcher of the world, curious of man and machine. I pick up a little here, a little there. Just little nuggets that I stick in my mouth, swish around a bit, then swallow. For instance, the first time I saw your pictures, I all of sudden got this flash across my pretty little eyes and I then understood the importance of boots in the war. All those men always on their feet, just a sole separating them from the dirt, from outright savagery. You did that Neal Stephens. You made shoes interesting.”
“I have my moments.”
“And this all from an anarchist’s son.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
The Lady of San Francisco approached, rattling the picture frames and floorboards. We sat silently, until the locomotive passed into the dark of the prairie.
“You’re a liar,” she said. “You know exactly what I mean. I can see it all over that swollen mug of yours. People look at you funny because of your daddy. It hurts, I know.”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
She took a cigarette from me, lighting it. She was pausing to inhale, for effect. If she’d been born to better circumstances, with better luck, she’d have had her name in lights.
“But your father, Neal. Your father’s returned and everyone knows it and everyone’s scared and they all think you’re in on it, but you’re not, because your daddy doesn’t love you enough to come see you, not after all these years and that has to hurt your feelings.”
I went to the fireplace and pushed some newspapers under a log and lit it, and then I put my boots beside the grate to dry. It was going to be a cold night again and I hadn’t bought coal for the furnace in weeks. That was the sort of careless thing I let myself get away with back then: pretty soon folks would be stripping old buildings to their last splinter.
The Trench Angel Page 5
