by Ed Nelson
What few outside the family knew was that Mum’s real name was Olive. Peg or Peggy or even the more formal Margaret was a nickname given to her by her father and that is what the world knew her as. She had no middle name, weird. Especially when you knew that the people in her father’s family all had four names.
“This is Olive,” Mum spoke into the phone.”
“Yes I will hold.”
“Your Majesty it is nice to hear from you.”
“We are alright. There was no earthquake damage at Jackson House. Rick had a little excitement but that ended well, other than his car fell through a crack in the road.”
“No Liz he wasn’t in it, he was helping people out of a bus at the time. It also fell through after all were off.”
“I know he is a regular hero. We keep a good supply of pins in to puncture his head if it gets too big.”
“No she has decided that being a real princess is too much work, though she liked the idea of being Queen. All we heard for a week after we got home from our visit was, ‘Off with their heads.”
“I know it’s a shame the crown had to give that up.”
“Is there anything in particular that you called for?”
“I will pass that on to him and we thank you for the call, TTFN.”
Mum hung up and asked Dad and me to accompany her to the library.
“Rick the Queen wants me to tell you two things, one be careful she would hate to see her knight in shining armor hurt, and that the messages you have been passing back and forth have been very promising.”
“She didn’t say what they were about or who they are really for?”
“No not a word. Welcome to the world of intrigue. Most of the time you will do things and never know what they were about or learn any outcome.”
She relayed the gist of the Queen’s call.
We returned to breakfast. We had no sooner sat down and the phone rang once more. Mrs. Hernandez answered it, “Jackson House.”
This time she didn’t miss a beat.
“It is the White House calling for Mr. Jackson.”
Dad took the phone.
“Yes I will hold for the President.”
“Mr. President how may I help you on this fine smoggy California day.”
“No we had no damage. Yes it was Rick that helped the people off the bus. I will tell him that.”
Dad listened for a while without saying anything.
“Oh, I will certainly relay that information. Thank you for your call Ike.”
I think Dad was finally forgiving Ike.
“Peg will you and Rick come to the library with me?”
Once more we paraded out of the room. Everyone remaining behind must wonder what was going on.
Dad opened with, “That of course was President Eisenhower. He wanted to make certain we were alright. But he also wanted us to know that the CIA has a certain Chinese dry cleaner under surveillance and they are curious about Rick’s visits. There are many dry cleaners closer to home.”
Uh oh, I didn’t need problems with the CIA.
“Maybe I could talk the pretty young lady in there to have coffee with me?” That way they will think I’m chasing her.”
“I don’t think so Rick. They will draw the conclusion that you are falling into a honeypot trap and take action.”
“I hadn’t thought of that Mum, I guess doing nothing is best.”
“It will drive them crazy when nothing changes about your visits. I am sure the President was asked to call to try to flush something out.”
“It is interesting that we get calls from the Queen of England and the President of the United States within a few minutes of each other and they both refer to a Chinese laundry.”
“Rick, that is more than interesting. China has been effectively closed to the West since the Communist took over. I wonder what is going on.”
“Dad, it looks like the British are having back-channel talks with the Chinese and the CIA know something is going on, but not the details.”
“Be really careful Rick, these guys play hardball.”
“I wonder if the CIA knows I’m a Queens Messenger.”
“One would think so, but it was never publicized to my knowledge.”
“Would it hurt if they knew?”
“Not unless they wanted to try to intercept a message delivery. I don’t think the higher ups would let that happen, it would play hell with US-British relations.”
“Mum from what I saw of those clowns in the CIA that were here, I wouldn’t trust them not to try something stupid.”
“You’re right Rick. I will check back through my channels and see if they have any suggestions.”
While these events and conversations were going on those who remained at the table speculated on what was going on. When we returned a wide eyed group consisting of Mrs. Hernandez, Denny, Eddie, and Mary waited to hear what was happening.”
Denny asked the question that they all had to be thinking.
“Rick are you some sort of spy like James Bond?”
‘Denny you have been reading too much Ian Fleming. I’m sorry I loaned you my collection.”
Mum broke in.
“Everyone listen up, Rick has been acting as a Queens Messenger. You all know he is one. It appears he has been delivering some very sensitive messages for Her Majesty’s Government. He is nothing more than a delivery boy.”
“And I don’t even get a tip,” I joked.
Dad completely changed the subject.
“Rick the property evaluation came in with the proposed changes. If the people are reasonable in their pricing you should do okay in the short term and very well in the long run.”
“Then you think it is a good idea.”
“Most definitely.”
“Then would you please make an offer on my behalf.”
This being under age was a bother.
In the meantime Denny, Eddie, and Mary had started a dialog.
“What’s your name?”
“John Brown, ask me again and I will knock you down.”
“What’s your name?”
“President Monroe, ask me again and you still won’t know.”
“What’s your name?”
“Puddin Tane, ask me again and I will tell you the same.
“Where do you live?”
“Down the lane.”
“What’s your number?”
“Cucumber”
“What do you eat?”
“Bread and meat.”
That’s when Mum threw us out of the room to start our day.
Since I had no plans for the day I hit the books. I was working on the first read through of all my high school text books. Next when they arrived would be going through all the additional texts listed in the schoolbooks bibliography’s to see which ones were worth reading in depth.
I had discovered while all books were useful some were more useful than others. I think some of them were written by some professor who needed to be published, so he regurgitated common knowledge or theories, then forced the use of his book in his classes.
These had become easily recognizable to me as they were almost always published by the university’s publishing house and the prose was so stilted as to be almost indecipherable.
While browsing my bookshelves I found an old favorite, it was about the French and Indian wars in Ohio. That was a brutal time.
Chapter 21
I broke for lunch and went right back at it. Around three o’clock I went out and talked to Ben for a while and then took a ride on George. After that it was time to get cleaned up and dressed for dinner.
Since Monday was British accent day it was also British dinner day. We had a Yorkshire pudding. While Mum always threatened us with Tam Tattlers Tarts for dessert there was a Strawberry Trifle. There wasn’t enough for seconds. From the looks Mum and Mrs. Hernandez exchanged I think I know where it went.
I went back to the books but stuck with airplane stuff until be
dtime. It was a quiet day at the Jackson House. Well other than some interesting phone calls.
There was a call at breakfast. This one was from BSA headquarters. They wanted me to know they had reviewed the events during the earthquake and that while I demonstrated bravery there weren’t any special skills used that were learned in Scouting. There would be no award this time.
They almost seemed embarrassed by that but I was more than okay with it. Enough of this hero stuff. How embarrassed do they think I got every time I received an award for what anyone would have done in my place.
I had just finished breakfast and there was another call for me. This was from Mr. Monroe at Warner Brothers. I didn’t think about it as I said, “Hola.”
He answered with, “No hablo español.”
“Oh sorry, I forgot, it’s Spanish day here.”
“That’s interesting, Rick are you busy this morning?”
“Not really, I have no real plans for the day except some studying.”
“Would you please stop by my office? I have a project that you might be able to help.”
“Certainly Sir, I can be there in about forty-five minutes.”
“That would be great, I will see you then.”
Driving my only T-Bird with the top down as usual was nice. It was a shame you couldn’t even see the mountains because of the smog. Something really had to be done. I know there was talk about changing the fuel in cars and the way cars were made. As long as they could still go fast I didn’t care. Not that I was going fast. I had seen CHIPS too often recently.
Before the song playing on the radio, I always thought of organs as solemn boring things. Baby sure changed my mind.
Mr. Monroe had me admitted immediately. He got right to the point.
“Rick you seem to be able to think out of the box. Your extra board idea has saved the studio a lot of money and made us a lot more responsive. It is being adopted throughout the industry.”
“What I need your help on is with a specific movie. As you know most of the movies made here are from producers who rent out facilities and services. We do produce movies of our own. These are both big budget and small budget movies. It is a small budget movie I would like your thoughts on.”
“We schedule each year movies of the different types; dramas, comedies, and romance with varieties such as westerns, historical, modern kids etc.”
“There is a western getting ready to start. As you know everything on TV these days is a western. The last thing we want is to produce a low-budget ho hum. We want a low budget gotta see.”
“Gee you don’t want much.”
Mr. Monroe had the grace to laugh, “Yeah I know you get what you pay for, but I still want it all.”
“That might be possible if we don’t use many big names or have complicated sets.”
“The only thing I would require is it to be a more serious theme to attract adults and the lead needs to be a handsome male to attract the ladies. I suppose a good looking female lead would help also.”
“Other than that I am free to think outside of the normal scenarios?”
“All yours or I think we will waste our budget this year.”
We then got into the details of who I had to see. Basically I would start with the in-house producer. His office was just down the hall so Mr. Monroe escorted me to him and introduced us.
“Rick this is Mr. Thomas James.”
“Tom this is Rick Jackson.”
Standing and walking around his desk he shook my hand. He was almost as tall as I was and had a chiseled look about him. I wondered why he wasn’t a leading man. That was answered when he opened his mouth and his voice proved to be what I would call high pitched. Not a leading man voice.
His handshake was firm and gave a wonderful first impression. However with that voice he would never make it in the movies.
“Rick of course I have heard a lot about you and watched your movies. More importantly Mr. Monroe and I have talked about getting your thoughts on this year’s B western.”
At least the way had been cleared.
“I will leave you two to get acquainted and take a brief look at the plot synopsis.”
At that Mr. Monroe left. Tom as I was asked to call him, to my Rick, suggested that we have a cup of coffee at the commissary and talk there. That sounded attractive to me so we headed out.
As we crossed the lot we saw the normal mélange of characters. There was President Roosevelt being pushed to a set from make up in a wheelchair.
I saw Robert Mitchum and Peter Ustinov walking across the way. They were dressed like a couple hicks.
There must have been one of the many Homer hero movies being made as there were a whole host of extras in costume.
I was tempted to stop and ask Peter Lawford, Sammy Davis Jr. and Joey Bishop for their autographs but decided that would not be classy at work.
So of course Joey Bishop walked up to me and asked for my autograph. Fortunately I had on a sports coat with some of my publicity pictures in the inside pocket. It was a habit Sharon Wallace had encouraged. Tom had to loan us a pen.
It was almost funny as I was the only one with anything to sign. I am the proud owner of my own picture autographed by all three of them. I would like to see that explained one day.
After he bought our coffee Tom explained that the movie they had scheduled was about some fur trappers who discover gold. They are chased by bad guys who try to get it from them. The story comes across as unreal and contrived. The Indians in it are a pathetic caricature of the real people. The ending has them losing a huge amount of gold in a river and laughing about it, then going back to fur trapping.
If there is ever a looser at the box office as he described it this was it.
“Rick does anything immediately jump to mind?”
Chapter 22
“As a matter of fact something does. This morning I saw my old Ohio History textbook on the shelf. It reminds me of people and events that would make a strong adult movie. Since it has Indian’s it would be viewed as a Western, but it is set prior to and during the Revolutionary War.”
“I don’t know much about that time period in our countries history.”
“It is really the story of opening up what is now Ohio, Indiana and Michigan and adjoining areas that were known then as the Northwest Territory. It was a struggle that started with the Indians against the British, Indians against the French, French and Indians against the British, the British and Indians against the French, and the new Americans against the British and Indians, and the Americans against the Indians.”
“Wow is there a scorecard for that?”
“It’s even worse than that. I have used Indians as though they were a single group. Actually each of the tribes is a separate nation, the same as France, England and Spain.”
“That is one reason there never was a workable peace treaty. The European and then the America governments treated the Indians as a single group. Even though they knew each tribe was separate they never could really understand it.”
“When a treaty was signed it was frequently like Spain ceding part of France. It didn’t go over too well. Add that to the fact that the Indians didn’t understand the concept of landownership. To them the land was there for all to use. They were hunters, not farmers.”
“So this is the time period where traders were selling the Indians infected blankets?”
“Some of that probably still happened but for the most part the tribes were already done for in the sixteen hundreds by small pox. The majority had died from the white man’s diseases. The population was so low they turned to kidnapping to grow their tribes. Historians reviewing newspaper accounts of the day say there were over ten thousand white captives during this time period.”
“This was now a time of hatred and feuds. There was no going back. The attitude of the day for the white settlers was shown in militia call up notices during the revolutionary war. They would simply read, ‘Indian infestation.”
“Some complex characters result from these actions. One of the most famous was Simon Girty of Irish descent. He and his siblings were captured by Indians. Previously he learned to hate the British when they arrested his family for settling in an area that wasn’t declared open. The British fined the family heavily and burnt their home and farm to the ground. His father was killed in a duel reportedly encouraged by the British.”
“His mother remarried only to have the whole family captured by Indians. His step-father was tortured in front of the family then scalped. The children were split up among different tribes.
Girty went to the Mingo’s; he was tested by sending him through a gauntlet. He survived that so they pulled his hair out by the roots only leaving him with a scalplock to signify he was a warrior. What we consider torture they thought of as signs of bravery.”
He lived with them for seven years, adopting their ways. He was traded back to the British as part of a peace treaty at one point. Girty was brilliant. He spoke eleven languages. He worked as an interpreter between the British and the Iroquois for a peace treaty.”
“At the start of the American Revolution he was on the American side. He was so well thought of, what is now Fort St. Mary’s was originally called Girty Town.”
“After he saw American atrocities against peaceful Indian’s he personally knew, he switched sides and fought with the Loyalists after discussing it with the officers in his group. While with the Americans he served alongside George Rogers Clark, Simon Kenton, and Daniel Boone. They all admired him.”
“When he changed sides he was called a renegade and has been known as that ever since.”
“So he will be the villain.”
“Actually no, he is more of a symbol of the complexity of the time. He is a sample of the pioneers fighting themselves. The villain of the story was considered a hero at the time but now is looked at as a psychopathic serial killer.”
“Who was that?”
“Lewis Wetzel the Indian fighter. He was called Death Wind by the Shawnee. Again he was captured as a young man but managed to escape. This marked him for life. He never did anything but hunt Indians after that. He would murder them all; men, women and children.”
