Tales From Gavagan's Bar (20 page)

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They watched him weave his way to the door and
vanish into the night.

             
Willison said slowly: "He needn't have been quite so secretive. That would have been Jean Ribaut's Huguenot colony, and its location is pretty well known. But I'm afraid his lawyer friend isn't going to do him much good."

             
"What do you mean?" said Brenner. "Or do you think there was some trick about that gold half-dollar?"

             
"Look here," said Willison, dragging a newspaper from his overcoat pocket and pointing to an item. Witherwax and Brenner leaned over opposite shoulders to read:

             
Seaplane Base to Rise

             
Jacksonville, Fla. Mar 8
(U
.P.) — The
U.S.
Navy announced today that a new naval air station will be set up on the five-mile stretch of ocean front between Mayport, at the mouth of the Johns River, and Jacksonville Beach. The ground has already been acquired, and work will begin immediately. When complete, the station will house . . .

             
"They'll dredge the hell out of the place," said Willison, with an air of melancholy satisfaction, "and our anonymous friend's pebble will end up as fill for some dock."

             
"Yes," said Brenner. "But won't the Navy look silly when the blade of one of its bulldozers turns to pure gold?"

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"The light doesn't have the power of a regular flashbulb, but it can be used over and over," said young Mr. Jeffers. He aimed his camera at the stuffed owl over the bar. There was a bright, noiseless flash, which caused the owl's eyes to light up yellowly for an instant. A shutter clicked; Jeffers pressed a button, and there was a faint whirr as the little clockwork motor wound the film through the next frame. "No double exposure," said Jeffers.

             
Mr. Gross looked up from his Boilermaker. "I got a cousin by marriage that got run in for that once," he said.

             
"What, making pictures of stuffed owls?" asked Mr. Keating from the library.

             
"No, taking off his clothes in the theatre. He done it twicet, and the second time—"

             
Mr. Witherwax slid his glass across the bar and indicated his desire for another Martini by sign language. "Mr. Jeffers," he said in a firm voice, "I noticed that when you was taking the picture of that owl, it almost looked alive. Did you ever take a picture of someone and almost make them look dead?"

             
"Yeah," said Jeffers, and indicated a man down the bar, one with a rather handsome but time-worn face under a mop of white hair, who was drinking a double Scotch. "This one, now—I'll bet when the picture is developed, he'll look as though he just came out of a coffin." He lifted his camera and the flash went off again.

             
The white-haired man started so violently that he only recovered his drink with an effort. "What did you say?" he almost shouted, taking two steps toward Jeffers.

             
"I'm sorry," said Jeffers. "I didn't mean to be offensive. I only thought you'd make a good subject—"

             
The white-haired man gripped him fiercely by the arm. "What business are you in?" he demanded.

             
"Now, now," said Mr. Cohan, from behind the bar. "In Gavagan's it's against the rule to have fights. When a man is drinking good liquor, he should have no grudges against anyone."

             
"It was my fault, really," said Jeffers, laying down his camera, and turning back to the white-haired man. "If it makes any difference to you, I work in a law office." He produced a card case. "May I buy you a drink and ask why?"

             
"Oh," said the other, with a gasp that might have been relief. "I beg your pardon. Mr. Cohan, will you put both drinks on my check? I thought—" He produced a card case of his own.

             
"That's me, Frederick Moutier. Chevrolet agency; that is, I work for it. I used to have my own business until I had to give it up because of what you just did. In Indianapolis." He smiled glassily.

             
"Do you mean taking pictures of you?" asked Jeffers, incredulously.

             
"Just about. Don't you want something that has a little more taste than that beer? Let me ask you this, my friend; how would you like it if—oh, hell, you just won't get it. Nobody does, not even the damn looney-doctor my wife sent me to."

             
He buried his nose in his Highball. Jeffers, whose low opinion of the psyc
hiatric profession was frequently and forcefully expressed at Gavagan's, encouraged him by remarking that the only time a psychiatrist got anything was when he got it out of somebody's pocket.

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Ha, ha, ha, that's rich! [said Moutier]. Do you mind if
I use it some time when I'm speaking before Rotary? That is, if I ever do again. [His face assumed its former melancholy.] My friend, they've got me on the skids; yes, sir, royally on
the skids. It shouldn't happen to a dog, and certainly not to old Freddie Moutier.

             
Look, it all started with a man named Smith, Leroy Burlingame Smith. I wish I'd never met him. I did, though; we both bought houses in one of those new developments outside Indianapolis, and there we were, next-door neighbors. Well, of course the first thing that happened was the little woman got acquainted with Mrs. Smith, and the next was that we were going over there to play bridge. I'd rather have a little five-ten poker game myself, but you know how it is with women, and I never saw one anyway that had sense enough to lay off inside straights.

             
Well, right away it developed that Smith was an undertaker. Now I know some people feel funny about undertakers, but I always say it's un-American to be prejudiced against a man because of his profession if he's a good citizen. Why, we even have some undertakers in Rotary. So we went over and played bridge, and when we got through they put out some beer and pretzels, and we sat around chatting for a while and getting acquainted. They seemed like a real nice, wholesome couple. He had his own business and I could tell from the way he talked that he probably had an A-l credit rating. In my business you get so you can spot them every time.

             
Well, the women liked each other all right, too, and it wasn't long before we got to be pretty good friends. If we didn't have anything else on, we'd get together in the evening and have some bridge, or maybe take in a movie and sit around a little afterward. But about the time I began to sort of measure him for a new Olds—ha, ha, I had the Oldsmobile agency out there—Leroy began acting kind of funny. I don't mean he was any less friendly. In fact, he was more so, and when I hinted that he might want to make his next car an Olds, he took me up so quick that I never even had a chance to explain the selling points.

             
But when we were playing bridge, he'd sit there with the cards in his hand, and all of a sudden he'd be staring at me, kind of half-asleep, until his wife had to remind him that it
was his turn to play. Then one evening he said he didn't feel like bridge at all, just wanted to listen to the radio. Well, golly, I could have understood it if there had been something special on, like Fred Allen or the Hit Parade, but he just tuned in on some classical music for a whole hour and sat there all through it, staring at me like I was some kind of Frankenstein.

             
["You mean Frankenstein's monster," said Keating.]

             
Do I? I thought Dracula was the monster. Give me another drink, Mr. Cohan. Well, anyway, that's what he did. I remember talking to the little woman about it when we got home, asking her if she heard anything from Elise Smith about Leroy maybe being sick or things not going right in his business. But she said no, she didn't know of anything, and she was pretty sure she would, because Elise was always over there or they were going out together.

             
Well, it was the next morning after he was so funny about the radio that old Leroy called me up at the agency. He said he was ready for his demonstration on the Olds, and would I bring it around and stop in at his shop. I got out the demonstrator and went. The place was a big one with a couple of those potted palms in front and more inside, very dignified. It made a good presentation, you might say. I asked for Leroy and while I was waiting for him, I stood talking to one of the other men in his shop. He kept staring at me real hard, something like Leroy had the night before, and I was just going to ask him what was the matter with me when Leroy came in.

             
He introduced me to his staff and showed me all around the place. I thought it was an awful lot of trouble to take with someone who was just there to demonstrate a car, but you don't catch Fred Moutier telling another man how to run his business, no, sir. So I thanked him, and we were just leaving when, bingo! a big flashlight went off right in my face. I jumped about three feet and said "What the hell!" but Leroy just said: "Sorry I startled you, old man. I thought I'd like a picture of you some time, so I got Hulberd to take one. He's pretty good with a camera."

             
Well, you can't get sore at someone that likes you so much he wants your picture, especially when you're trying to sell him a car, so I just laughed it off, and to make certain Leroy knew I was taking it the right way, asked him to be my guest at Rotary on Wednesday. I was giving a speech I had worked out on "Salesmanship and American Ideals"; maybe you've heard of it. I've given it at a lot of Rotaries and places around the country, about how America is built on the ideal of salesmanship service, and when the government spends a lot of money to give things away, we're getting to be like those Socialistic Communists.

             
Anyway, Leroy bought the car, and the little woman and me began playing bridge again with the Smiths, and even if he did keep up that funny habit of staring at me, it wasn't as bad as before. I forgot all about that picture until one evening we were over at his house, and he got up to go to the can or something, and the two women started gabbing about clothes, so I picked up a magazine that was laying there.

             
It was an undertaker's trade journal, and when I opened, right there smack in the middle of the book was a great big picture of myself, lying in a coffin with flowers piled all around me. Underneath it said: "Arrangements by Leroy B. Smith, Funerary Director of Indianapolis."

             
Well, I got kind of sore. When Leroy came back, I told him what a hell of a trick I thought he'd pulled, and the little woman and I went home. Elise Smith tried to fix it up the next day by coming over and telling the little wife that it was intended as a compliment, and that Leroy thought I was the most perfect subject for an undertaker he had ever seen, but as far as I was concerned that only made it worse, if you get me. We cut out going over there for a while, but the two women kept on being friends, and you know how women are, I guess they might have fixed things up except for something else that happened.