Doc walked up to the reception desk, glanced at the old railroad signs and timetables adorning its walls, and made himself known. He asked for a twin-bedded room well away from the railroad tracks: even though the hotel was no longer a station, the lines running alongside it were still heavily used. He paid in cash and checked in as Dr & Mrs Eugene Chaney.
After the cramped conditions of the tour bus, the spacious and comfortable bedroom was a welcome relief. While Nancy showered, Doc unpacked the overnight bag and arranged their belongings. He laid out some fresh clothes for Nancy and waited while she finished up in the bathroom. Ten minutes later they were sitting in the restaurant.
‘You choose for me, Gene. I don’t want to read all the writing.’
Neither did Doc: ‘Steak okay for you?’ Nancy nodded. ‘How about an appetiser? Would you like an appetiser?’ Nancy said no, but that she might have a dessert. ‘Let’s get some wine, Nancy. I can’t remember the last time I had a glass. Red okay with you?’
‘It’s a pity Bob couldn’t have joined us here,’ Nancy said. ‘I suppose they don’t allow niggers to eat here, do they.’
‘You use that word again, Nancy, and you’ll get us thrown out. I keep telling you we’re living in different times now. Things have changed for the better, and in a very small way you and I helped change them. Remember the bus we rode?’
‘The bus we’re in now?’
The bus situation confused Nancy and Doc should have known better than to introduce the subject. For parts of the day Nancy managed to cling to the present, but her fingers would then slip and she’d hurtle back to the past – just as she had done now. Since boarding the bus in Hershey, she’d suggested on several occasions that they stop at a rest area or a diner they happened to pass, and sit with Bob at the lunch counter and demand service. ‘It’s wrong that they’re segregated, Gene. There’s no point us being on the bus if we don’t try and do something about it. What would they say if we returned to Duke and told them we hadn’t done anything? They wouldn’t be happy!’
Doc changed the subject. He’d noticed a ring on Nancy’s finger that hadn’t been there before. He could have sworn it was a ring he’d bought her: an iridescent precious white opal set in eighteen-carat gold. He could still recall the jeweller who’d sold it to him, a man who’d sounded more like a physicist than a sales assistant.
He’d chosen the ring for simple reasons: the opal had been Nancy’s birthstone.
‘Where did the ring come from, Nancy,’ he asked her.
‘It was in my toilet bag,’ Nancy said. ‘I must have put it there for safe keeping.’
‘Is that the opal ring I bought you?’
Nancy looked at the ring and thought for a while. ‘I don’t think so, Gene. I’ve had it for years.’
‘It’s pretty. The Aborigines tell a story of God visiting the earth and bringing a message of peace. He descends on a rainbow and the stones where his feet touch the ground start to sparkle and eventually turn into opals.’
‘Oh, Gene, that’s just the prettiest story. Is it true?’
‘It’s true if you want it to be – just like all things.’
Nancy’s attention was taken by two small children sitting at the far end of the restaurant with their parents.
‘Aren’t they cuties, Gene?’
‘Who?’
‘The children sitting at the table over there.’
‘I’ll have to take your word on that, Nancy. They look a bit blurred from where I’m sitting.’
‘Do you think we should try for a family?’
Doc spluttered. ‘A bit late for that, don’t you think? How would a couple of old fogeys like us manage to bring up a young family? Besides, you spent your whole life around children. I thought you’d have had enough of them.’
‘Did I? What was I doing?’
‘You were a teacher, Nancy. A good one, too.’
‘Well I never. All this time I’ve been thinking I lived on a farm. What a lovely surprise to know that.’
While he was rinsing his mouth with water, it suddenly dawned on Doc that Nancy’s birthday must be close. Although he knew the date of her birthday, he had no idea of the day’s date. He leaned across to an adjacent table, pardoned his interruption and asked the couple sitting there. It was the young woman who replied. She smiled and told him it was October 26.
‘Goddamn, Nancy, it’s your birthday today! How about that? This calls for a toast!’
He lifted the bottle of wine from the table and found it empty. Nancy had had only one glass, so he presumed that unless the couple at the next table had been helping themselves to the wine while his back was turned, he’d drunk the remainder himself. ‘How about a glass of champagne, Nancy?’
‘I won’t, thank you. But I will have an orange juice. Will you join me?’
He called the waiter to the table and ordered an orange juice for Nancy and a large Maker’s Mark for himself. ‘I’m not toasting you with orange juice, Nancy. This is a celebration!’
The drinks arrived and Doc lifted his glass. ‘Happy birthday, old girl,’ he said and, without further thinking, added: ‘Many more of them!’ The stupidity of the remark dawned on him even as he said it.
She smiled and clinked glasses. ‘I hope to goodness there aren’t many more of them, Gene. I don’t think I could cope.’ Her voice was dreamlike but her stare clear.
Doc couldn’t hold her gaze and looked away. He drained his glass and beckoned the waiter.
Doc woke with a headache. He climbed out of bed and took some aspirin. Nancy was still asleep. She had a look of determined concentration on her face, and clenched the bed linen with her fists. He showered, dressed and then gently roused her.
‘Who the fuck, are you?’ she demanded. ‘Gene! Gene, where are you? There’s a strange man in the room!’
It was the start of another day.
They ate a light breakfast in the restaurant and then took a taxi to Vanderbilt. The university had grown since Nancy had studied there, but the old campus remained the same – lots of trees, old red brick buildings and green space. The university was named for Cornelius Vanderbilt, a late nineteenth-century shipping and railroad magnate. He donated the money for its construction but died without ever setting foot on the campus.
‘Does this bring back any memories?’ Doc asked.
‘I think so,’ Nancy replied. ‘Is this where you and I met?’
‘No, that was Duke. You came here after you dumped me.’
‘This is all news to me, Gene. I don’t remember that ever happening. Why did I dump you?’
‘Because you had less sense then than you do now,’ Doc teased.
‘Well, I’m sorry. How long have you been holding this grudge? You should have said something sooner… Gene, oh look Gene: there’s one of those things with a fluffy tail!’
‘So there is,’ Doc said. ‘There are squirrels everywhere.’
They walked slowly around the campus, occasionally stopping in front of a building Nancy recognised, and then continuing.
‘Let’s sit down for a while, Gene,’ Nancy said eventually. ‘My legs are starting to feel tired.’ She sat down in the middle of a flight of steps just as a lecture in the building came to an end.
‘Okay, but let’s move to the side, Nancy. We’re going to get trampled underfoot if we stay here.’
They moved to the side, and Nancy suddenly became concerned. ‘I wasn’t supposed to be in that lecture, was I? You haven’t kept me talking and made me miss class?’
‘No, you have no lectures today – or tomorrow, for that matter. Now stop worrying.’
‘What about exams?’ Nancy asked even more anxiously. ‘Have I got exams this week? I haven’t done any revision!’
‘No lectures and no exams,’ Doc assured her but, for the peace of her mind, thought it would be better if they moved away from the throng. ‘Let’s go and keep the Commodore company, sit with him for a while,’ he suggested.
He took Nanc
y’s hand and they strolled to where Cornelius Vanderbilt surveyed the world from the top of a pedestal. They sat on the grass, near its base. The sun was warming and Doc lit a cigarette.
‘I think you’re forgetting your manners, Gene. Aren’t you going to offer me one?’
‘You don’t smoke, Nancy.’
‘Of course I do! I’ve always smoked.’
Doc saw no harm in giving her one. He lit the cigarette for her, and then watched while she coughed a couple of times and then stubbed it out on the grass. ‘That’s the last cigarette I’m having, Gene. I’m never smoking again! I think it might be an idea if you stopped, too. You smoke all the time.’
‘This is my first today, Nancy, and apart from your conversation, smoking’s the only pleasure in life I have left.’
‘Well, make sure you blow the smoke away from me then, and don’t blow it in the face of that man standing up there. I’m sure he doesn’t want to get cancer, either!’
Doc moved slightly away from both Nancy and the Commodore and tried to enjoy what remained of his cigarette. He stubbed it out and placed it on the ground next to Nancy’s aborted cigarette.
‘Don’t leave them there, Gene!’ Nancy chided. ‘We don’t want the squirrels getting hooked on nicotine. They have a hard enough life as it is.’
Doc laughed. ‘Squirrels have it made, Nancy. They live on Easy Street.’
He lay back on the grass and Nancy lay down beside him. ‘Let’s take a nap,’ she said. Doc closed his eyes and was about to fall asleep, when Nancy nudged him hard in the ribs.
‘Don’t fall asleep, Gene. I want to talk to you!’
Doc propped himself up on one elbow and looked at her. ‘What do you want to talk about?’
‘You’ll never take me back to that place, will you? The place where they made me watch television all day.’
‘The nursing home? Of course I won’t!’
Nancy was relieved. ‘They made me sit with crazy people there, Gene. Did I tell you that? I think they thought I was someone else and didn’t really know who I was. Do people know who you are?’
‘Sure they do, Nancy. How could anyone forget Eugene Chaney III?’
In truth, apart from the people he travelled with, he doubted anyone knew who he really was. His one regret in life was allowing himself to become a caricature of what others presumed him to be, rather than the person he knew himself to be. It was assumed that he didn’t like people, preferred his own company and was a man without feelings. Rather than admit they were wrong, he’d lived up to their expectations.
‘Sometimes I forget who you are, but that’s allowed, isn’t it? I can’t be expected to remember everything these days, can I?’
Doc sat bolt upright and looked at his watch. ‘I almost forgot, Nancy. We’re supposed to meet Bob and the others for lunch at the Loveless Cafe at noon. I hear they have the best pecan pie in the whole of the United States, too – and I’m not about to miss a meal!’
‘If I’m honest, Gene, I think you could afford to miss quite a few meals,’ Nancy said. ‘Now, don’t forget to pick up the cigarette butts!’
Warren Kuykendahl’s Special Cups
When Jack and Eric climbed out of the taxi, Warren Kuykendahl was waiting for them in his front yard. He held out his hand: ‘Y’all are very welcome,’ he said. ‘Any friend of Susan is a friend of mine.’
Jack took Warren’s hand and then Eric held out his own hand. ‘What’s wrong with your hand, son?’ Warren asked, as he gingerly took hold of the proffered washing-up glove.
‘Nothing, sir. I just like wearing gloves,’ Eric replied. ‘They keep my hands dry, and Jack bought them for me.’
‘I’m afraid I have absolutely no idea how to pronounce your last name, Mister… er… um…’ Jack said.
‘It’s Kuykendahl: Kike as in Jew, en as in Nigger, an’ darl as in darlin’ – Kuykendahl.’
The Kuykendahl family had moved to America in the middle of the seventeenth century and settled in the Dutch colony of New Netherland. No sooner had they unpacked their clogs and planted tulips in their front garden, however, than the colony was seized by the British and they were forced to look for new beginnings elsewhere. They migrated southward, staying long enough in Pennsylvania to fight against their old enemy in the War of Independence, and then upped sticks and moved again. Eventually they arrived in Tennessee and settled in the small town of Pulaski. Everything was fine until the outbreak of the Civil War when, once again, the Kuykendahls found themselves on the losing side of an argument.
Instead of following in the family tradition of moving to pastures new when things got rough, Peter Kuykendahl decided to remain in Pulaski and stay pissed-off there. On the Christmas Eve of 1865, he left the house and went for a drink with six of his veteran friends, who were equally pissed-off with life. He returned home that night a little the worse for wear, and told his wife that he and his friends had just formed a new organisation. ‘The Ku Klux What?’ his wife had asked.
Having judged the new world order of equality not to their liking, Peter and his friends decided to do something about it – but only at night and only under the cover of anonymity. They masked and robed themselves in old bed sheets, climbed on horses and set about making the lives of Republicans, carpetbaggers, scalawags and blacks as miserable as possible. In their attempt to restore white supremacy and decency to the region, and prevent former slaves from exercising their newly-acquired civil rights, Peter and his friends burned houses, maimed and killed people.
Warren was intensely proud of his ancestor, and the bigotry that had motivated Peter continued to burn brightly in his own DNA. Although the strict Calvinism of his youth had, in mid years, given way to Calvin Kleins, his deep suspicion of international Jewry and foreigners remained.
‘Tell me Jack: your name – Guravitch. Is that a Jew name?’
‘Yes,’ Jack replied, slightly surprised by the question. ‘My ancestors came from Moldova.’
‘Moldova?’ Warren mused. ‘That used to be communist, didn’t it?’
‘I’m not sure,’ Jack replied truthfully. ‘My family lost interest in the country decades ago.’
‘Hey, Lola,’ Warren called to his wife. ‘Make some coffee will you, darlin’, an’ serve it in the special cups.’
The special cups he’d asked Lola for were mugs he reserved for uncertain visitors and trades people. Despite their claiming friendship with Susan, Jack and Eric – in Warren’s mind – fell into the former category: Jack for his Jewishness and Eric for his washing-up gloves.
‘Eric’s Susan’s cousin, Warren,’ Jack began. ‘He was orphaned recently and he’s trying to find her. I’m helping him. We understand from a man in Hershey that Susan came this way.’
‘I’m sure sorry to hear that, young fellah. Sure sorry. Let’s go to the livin’ room an’ continue the conversation there, shall we?’
Warren led the way to a room that couldn’t have been more different from Fred Finkel’s – yet little the better for being so. It was fully carpeted in thick white shag and crowded with expensive couches, garish objets d’art and all manner of audio-visual technologies. It was a room where the Little House on the Prairie had met and fallen in love with the International House of Pancakes on Main St, and given birth to an amusement arcade of ostentation and lurid colours.
‘This is a very nice room,’ Jack lied. ‘Very comfortable.’
‘I have Lola to thank for that,’ Warren said with pride. ‘She’s got a real flair for design.’
‘Was Lola born poor?’ Jack asked.
‘Why do you ask that?’ Warren asked.
‘I honestly have no idea,’ Jack lied again, shaking his head in puzzlement.
He was saved from any further questioning by Lola herself, who entered the room with a tray of coffees, and wearing a rhinestone leisure suit and a cowboy hat with a large feather stuck in its band.
‘Jack,’ Warren whispered, ‘I don’t feel comfortable talkin’ about Susan with Eri
c in the room. I’m gonna ask Lola to take care of the boy, okay?’ Jack nodded. ‘Hey, Lola, why don’t you take Eric an’ show him the grounds while me an’ Jack have a grown-ups conversation.’
‘Sure, honey. Come on, Eric. Let’s get out from under the men’s feet and do something fun?’
Eric turned to Jack. ‘What about Susan, Jack?’
‘Don’t worry, son. I’m gonna tell Jack all about her, an’ then he can tell you.’ He waited until they left the room.
‘Susan was here,’ Warren said, ‘but she moved on – went to Memphis. She stayed with us for a couple of nights an’ then rented an apartment. Lola took an immediate likin’ to her. My wife’s got great instincts when it comes to people, Jack, and she knew right away that Susan was in a class of her own – and she is. Compared to other girls in this line of work, she’s the bottle of Downy an’ they’re just leadin’ fabric softeners. Bein’ a good friend of hers, you’ll know this yourself.’
‘Actually, I’ve never met Susan. I’m just helping Eric find her.’
‘Well, when you do meet her, you’re in for a treat. Susan’ll take your breath away, that’s for sure. She’s a bright girl, personable too; but she also has this amazin’ natural beauty that’s hard to put a finger on. Closest I can get is to say that makin’ her acquaintance is like cubin’ an oxymoron and gettin’ gravy out of it.’ Jack’s brow furrowed momentarily.
‘Off an’ on, Susan worked for me over a period of years. She travelled around quite a bit in that time, an’ told me that of all the clubs she’d danced in, mine was the best. That’s why she came to me once she’d decided to add chocolate to her act: she knew I’d be the one person to appreciate it. Unfortunate thing though, was that since last seein’ her I’d sold the club – sold it to a lawyer who converted the place into offices – and…’ At this point Warren’s voice faltered, and Jack wondered if his host was going to cry. ‘It damn near broke my heart, Jack. Selling WK’s was like burying a child.’
Last Bus to Coffeeville Page 38
