The Journals of Major Peabody

by Galen Winter

  “We take pity on the poor fellow and elect him District Attorney, thereby providing him with an income. If he is smart, as soon as he learns the basic procedures of his profession, he quits the DA job and quickly builds a successful private practice. If he is stupid, we keep electing him District Attorney. Then when another young lawyer comes to town, we send the stupid DA up to the judge’s bench and elect the new guy to the vacated DA position.”

  “Don’t the other lawyers object to having to practice before incompetent judges,” I inquired.

  “Of course not,” Charlie answered. “Lawyers don’t want smart judges. They want ones they can easily fool. Up here we have stupid judges and incompetent DAs, but we have unbiased juries and that is all you really need to dispense justice.”

  “And since the judge and the DA are both dummies, justice depends on the good sense of the jury,” I said, completing his thought. “Have you ever been on a jury,” I asked.

  “Oh, sure,” Pete said. “I was on one just last month. The Game Warden caught Aksel Jorgenson with too many ducks. We all call the Warden “Officer Dog” because he’s such a miserable SOB. At the trial he got on the stand and testified the ducks were flying and he heard a lot of shooting at Rice Lake. He sneaked over there and found Aksel’s pick-up truck parked behind John Martin’s cabin. Then he hid in the shrubbery behind John’s place and watched the duck blind Aksel had built out in the lake.

  “He knew Aksel was a good shot and it didn’t take long before he saw him drop a number of birds and then begin to pick up his decoys. Officer Dog watched Aksel paddle back to John’s cabin and saw him take seven Bluebill from the skiff and put them in the front seat of his pick-up.

  “Officer Dog was disappointed. Seven Bluebill were the legal limit. His spirits rose when he saw Aksel walk back to the cabin, take the cover off the garbage can next to the back door and remove another seven birds.

  “Aksel told a slightly different story. He testified he shot his limit of ducks, brought them to shore and was just about to drive away when he became curious about that garbage can. He opened it and, too his amazement, he saw all those ducks inside it. He took them out to count them and got arrested. He thought maybe Office Dog put them there to trap him.”

  “The judge told us it wasn’t necessary for the Warden to actually see Aksel shoot those other seven birds. Mere possession of them was enough to convict.

  “That gave us jurors a problem. Aksel had a wife and five kids. Moreover, Officer Dog was such a miserable SOB. He had a well established reputation for making silly arrests. He had given almost all of the jury panel citations for such insignificant violations as not having an approved life jacket in a boat or shooting too may partridge. He even gave one to Charlie for inadvertently shooting an out-of-season deer.”

  Charlie vigorously nodded his head in agreement and added: “The miserable SOB.”

  Then Pete slowly shook his head back and forth. “He gave me one for failure to have an up-to-date fishing license. It was only six years old.”

  “In Aksel’s case, justice was served. We came to the conclusion Aksel never really had possession of those last seven ducks. We found him Not Guilty. Office Dog looked forward to confiscating Aksel’s ducks, shotgun, skiff, decoys and pick-up truck. He was mad as hell when we let Aksel go. We were all happy to frustrate Officer Dog. The miserable SOB deserves lots of frustrations.”

  “Tell him about the time you were on the jury when Daisy shot Ole,” Pete said and Sven took over.

  “Oh, yeah, I remember that one. Ole came home drunk and beat up Daisy again. He did it all the time. Then he started eating dinner and passed out at the table. Daisy went to his arsenal and picked out a shotgun. It was the 28 inch barreled, 16 gauge, full choke, Iver Johnson Champion single shot, probably built in 1945. Yeah, that was the one she took. Ole always claimed he only used it for grouse, but a lot of slugs went thru that barrel whenever a grouse season deer appeared before him.

  “I suppose Daisy wanted to make sure. She loaded the shotgun with double aught buck shot and blew Ole’s head off. She admitted pulling the trigger. Her planning made it obvious the whole affair was premeditated. We came to a verdict and could have left the jury room is less than an hour. It was after eleven o’clock, so we delayed until noon in order to get the county to provide us with a free meal. We got chicken and pizza. It was good.

  “At one o’clock when court reconvened, we found Daisy Not Guilty by reason of Temporary Insanity. Ole beat her up a lot and never bothered to repay any of the money some of us lent to him. Daisy was overjoyed by our verdict. She came to the jury box and thanked each one of us individually. When she got to the foreman, I heard him whisper in her ear: “Ole deserved it. He was miserable SOB”.

  “It seems to me,” I ventured, “that people considered being miserable SOBs have a difficult time of it in the UP.”

  “We do our best to keep it a nice place to live. Remember that attorney?” Sven asked. “The crooked one? The one who charged so much? The one who couldn’t shoot straight?”

  “Oh yes.” Pete answered. “He was a miserable SOB. We fixed his clock good and proper. We had to get rid of him so we sent him to Congress. Now he lives in Washington and doesn’t bother us, except when he comes back to campaign for re-election.”

  I hope no Yooper ever thinks I am a miserable SOB.

  A Social Animal

  The sun was rising when I retrieved Major Peabody’s shotgun and baggage from the airport carousel and loaded them into my auto. He seemed darkly preoccupied and was not his usual ebullient self. The trip from northern Minnesota to Minneapolis and the night flight to Philadelphia must have tired him.

  It was Saturday and I had no real need to go to the office. “Why don’t we go to my place” I suggested. “I’ll fix breakfast and drop you off at your apartment after we’ve eaten.”

  A monosyllable and a short up-down nod indicated the Major’s agreement. It also confirmed my guess. He was definitely not in one of his better moods.

  * * * * *

  I added more coffee to the percolator and plugged it in. The Major likes his morning coffee strong and black. He also likes hash browns made from scratch. By the time the potato was grated, the coffee was ready and I took a mug to him.

  “Coffee? Coffee?” he asked, just as if he’d never heard of it before. “Take it away. I’m not going to drink coffee anymore”, he said with some emphasis. “Have you got anything else?” It was too early for it, but I suggested a high ball. Peabody declined and asked for water. This was, indeed, strange. He seldom took water straight, usually preferring to drink it with a single malt Scotch whisky. He claimed it removed the water’s unpleasant taste.

  During breakfast, he came out of his brown study and began to talk.

  “Frankly,” he said, “Mother Nature’s track record has not been too good. For example, she developed dinosaurs. They had great bodies, but she messed up with their brains which were decidedly second rate. When that experiment failed, she wasn’t even successful when trying to wipe everything out and start over again. Sharks, horse shoe crabs and cockroaches (none of them noted for high intelligence quotients) were all able to outsmart her and survive.

  “Then she searched around for a successor species to run the planet. She considered and quickly rejected the petitions of the ants, the fish and the pterodactyls, probably because they didn’t have opposable thumbs. She settled on the anthropoids. It may be too early to judge the success of her attempt to develop the Homo sapiens as an appropriate ruler of her earthly domain, but I see unmistakable signs that it, too, has been a terrible and a dismal failure.

  “I’ll bet she’s sorry she put her money on the Homo sapiens. I suspect she has finally discovered him to be a worth-less creature. Natural disasters like famine, flood, earthquake and volcanic eruptions as well as unnatural disasters like liberal political philosophies all come to mind as examples of the her initial attempts to get us to follow the Great Auk into extinction.<
br />
  “Once we’re all out of the way, I believe she’ll select the squirrels as our successors. They are smarter than we are. After all, we are unable to deal with such simple problems as keeping them out of our bird feeders. Squirrels, I hasten to remind you, have never been known to create an Inquisition, start a major war, or treat their fellows in thoughtless and inconsiderate manners.”

  “Oh, come now, Major”, I said, “Don’t give up on your species. Look at the brighter side. In spite of everything, there is a basic goodness in the human character. Mankind is doing all right. We may not be perfect, but over the eons, we’ve evolved from abjectly primitive beasts to advanced social beings.”

  The attempt to raise his spirits failed. Peabody laid the cigar in the ash tray and looked at me. After a moment he said: “A social being? Thoughtful and considerate of his fellow man? Do you really think so?” He emphasized the word ‘really’. I answered in the affirmative and he called for a dictionary.

  “Here”, he said. He put his finger on the word and read it and the definition. “Social. Marked or characterized by friendliness or geniality enjoyed in the company of others.’ Friendliness enjoyed in the company of others,” he repeated.

  “Sounds accurate to me,” I said.

  “Aha,” Peabody answered and slammed the tome shut. “There is little friendliness or geniality within the character of the Homo sapiens. Let me tell you what just happened in Minnesota.

  “When a new man is invited into our grouse camp, we try to treat him in a friendly and genial manner during his initiation period. His sense of humor and the stability of his character are tested. The newcomer to our Minnesota camp was a miscreant named Freddie Campbell. At first, he showed the qualities you mention, but the indication of his true nature was shown by the chili he brought to camp.

  “In Campbell’s chili, it was easy to recognized Hungarian paprika, Caribbean hot sauce, Cayenne peppers and jalapeños, separating occasional bits of venison, onions and kidney beans. I’m convinced he got his recipe from Lucretia Borgia who used it to poison those who offended her. Before serving it, he advised us to have no fear because it had been set in the open air for three days and all noxious gases had escaped.

  “My hunting companions’ praise of Campbell’s chili was somewhat muted. They mumbled comments like: ‘I wouldn’t expose my worst enemy to this chili.’ ‘A starving hyena would run from it.’ ‘No self respecting buzzard would be seen near it,’ and ‘The only ecologically responsible way to deal this stuff is to bury it, deeply, in solid granite, the same way they handle contaminated atomic waste.’

  “By the time Campbell finished the dishes (another of the newcomer’s duties), his bottle of Wild Turkey was empty and in a friendly, but straight forward manner, he was criticized for (a) not bringing George Dickel and (b) not bringing enough of it.

  “And so our genial initiation ceremonies for the new man progressed throughout the hunt. He prepared all breakfasts, tended the fire, filled the wood box and kept the cabin ‘man clean’. These responsibilities claimed all of his mornings, but he was able to hunt in the afternoons because lunch consisted of the chili (which remained in the pot, uneaten) and a few sandwiches. He didn’t have to spend much time in luncheon dish washing and general clean up.

  “In the afternoons, when Campbell was hunting with us, he continued to receive our same pleasant attentions. He wandered a bit to the right and left a gap in the line of hunters as we advanced through a new growth of popple. He caught unmitigated hell and was threatened with having to wear a dog’s shock collar if he ever went off course again. You can imagine what happened when he missed a shot.

  “After dinner, charges of allowing a bird to escape were brought. I was appointed to defend him. I proved he was clumsy and inept and was hunting with the safety off when the gun accidentally discharged - a crime less heinous than missing a bird.

  “Nevertheless, he was found guilty. His name and the date of the crime were written on a toilet seat, where it joined the list of those who committed the same sin during previous hunts. Then, in accordance with camp rule # 46, he wore the seat around his neck for the balance of the evening.

  “At breakfast, yesterday morning, Campbell was told he passed his apprenticeship and was now a fully fledged member of the camp. Did he display any of the friendliness and geniality you assign to the Homo sapiens? No, he did not. In spite of the cordial and considerate treatment we so generously extended to him, he was neither friendly nor genial.

  “Just as soon as he received our collective stamp of approval, he showed his true colors. He asked “Do I get to hunt every morning?”

  “That’s right,” was our response.

  “Everybody pitches in on the chores?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Well, that’s just great,” he said. “And to show my appreciation, I’ll no longer use my dirty socks to strain the grounds out of your morning coffee.”

  The Dread Disease

  For as long as I’ve known Major Nathaniel Peabody he’s never experienced a day of illness. I catch cold and get the sniffles every year and whenever a new kind of Oriental flu bug gets off the boat on the West Coast it will hurry to Philadelphia and immediately make its way to my digestive tract.

  During such epidemics, the Major doesn’t even sneeze. When I complain, he smiles and accuses me of hypochondria. The microbes, the viruses and the fungi that attack the rest of us seem to be afraid of him. I’ve often heard his say: “I don’t get ulcers. I give them”. I’m convinced he has the constitution of an ox.

  Peabody, however, explains his good health by declaring the medicinal effects of cigar smoke and aged single malt Scottish whisky. He claims they quickly polishes off all toxic and noxious matter that may have been so ill-advised as to enter his system. When he suggested this theory to his friend, Doctor Carmichael, the medico countered by suggesting the Major’s various dissipations had softened his brain, or, as he put it “what is left of what was, at best, a substandard and poorly wired organ.”

  The only explanation making any sense is this: During the Major’s shotgunning trips to the various strange places he frequents, he must have come in contact with all known diseases and developed immunity to every one of them. Apparently, he has developed the ability to avoid illness. I wish he had developed the ability to plan for his future. I don’t mean planning for some event expected to happen in the distant future. I mean planning the use of his more than adequate guaranteed income in such a manner that it will last for a full calendar month.

  During the end-of-month days when he is penniless (often), it has become my practice to provide him with dinners. This month was an exception. It was only a bit past mid-month and Peabody was already broke. He had gone on an expensive African safari, returning with a financial reserve of nothing more than pocket change.

  On Thursday we ate at Bookbinders. Today it was time for another meal. I telephoned him. You can imagine my surprise when Peabody refused my offer. This was one of the very few times he declined an invitation to dinner. You can imagine my further surprise when he told me he was sick.

  It wasn’t merely a temporary “feeling a bit under the weather” indisposition. Peabody told me he called Doctor Carmichael who ordered him to the Emergency Room where he performed several tests. The Major told me no more. He abruptly ended our phone conversation. Frankly I was worried about him. I called Doctor Carmichael.

  I was told Peabody became exposed to some rare virus during his recent hunting expedition to Zimbabwe. Doctor Carmichael assured me I had no cause for concern. According to the Disease Control Center in Atlanta, the disease, though quite contagious, was not life threatening.

  It would run its course in four days. In the meantime, it would, unfortunately, cause him maximum discomfort - headache, runny nose, nausea, a stomach able to hold few solids, fever and extreme dizziness, together with frequent and explosive attacks of diarrhea. Now I understood why the Major has so abruptly ended our phone conv
ersation.

  I questioned the doctor and was told medical science had yet to find an effective antidote Due to the report of the “quite contagious” characteristic of Peabody’s dreaded disease, I felt it prudent to forebear any personal visit to him. My firm represents a number of casualty insurance companies. We had just finished a successful defense against a slip-and-fall damage action brought against a local restaurant. The chef owed us a favor. I prevailed upon him to prepare and deliver meals to the Major.

  On Monday afternoon, I was drafting the wording of an intricate testamentary trust when the light on my office intercom flashed. My secretary, Charlotte, informed me: “Major Peabody is here”. Her tone of voice translated the words into her intended meaning of: “That terrible Major person wants to waste some more of your time”

  Charlotte doesn’t like Major Peabody. She thinks he is a male chauvinist. She believes he is insensitive to the point of not even being aware of the struggle for equality between the sexes. Her assessment is probably accurate. Personally, I believe Charlotte is disturbed because the gods have, so far, refused to visit the plague or some other appropriate punishment on the Major as retribution for his callous disregard of women’s rights, gun control, shaving the whales and other holy causes.

  “Shall I tell him you cannot be disturbed?” she asked, hoping for an affirmative response.

  “No, Charlotte. Please ask him to come in.” It was time for a break and I wanted to see if the Major had regained his health.

  I was pleased to find Peabody was, indeed, all right. In spite of his four day ordeal, his color was back and he was in good spirits. He thanked me for the courtesy of the catering. “Most kind of you, my boy,” he said. “You have no idea of how impossible would be the task of trying to prepare a meal when the stomach, the sinuses and the intestines are all in revolt. When one orifice is not erupting, another one is. Your kindness is truly appreciated.” Then he asked a disturbing question. “I presume you have made arrangements with the caterer to provide a similar service for yourself?”