Bingo (12 page)

“Full schedule.” She inhaled gratefully and blew the smoke as Bette Davis would have done it.

“Mildred Adams was in at the crack of dawn.” Mr. Pierre volunteered this information. He also called her “Mildew” behind her back.

Mrs. Adams, as the wife of the bank president, had a high opinion of herself which was not shared by the rest of the community. Charles said she was that way because she was shy. If it was shyness it was effectively disguised.

“And how is Mrs. Adams?”

“She says that Foster is going to appraise your farm, the
Clarion
building, and the lot, too, as well as the equipment, press, type, the whole nine yards.”

“That’s standard, isn’t it? I mean, if a business is on the market and the bank may carry a loan on it, they would need to know what things are worth.”

“Bloodsuckers.” Mother didn’t like bankers.

“They’re just conservative, Mom.”

“You didn’t live through the Depression!”

“Hear! Hear!” Mr. Pierre agreed.

Even Kim Spangler, washing hair in the back, called out from behind the curtain. “You tell her. I remember too.”

“It’s standard operating procedure. There’s nothing wrong with Foster doing his due diligence,” I said.

“Mrs. A. says you don’t have a snowball’s chance in hell. You have few assets except what’s in your head. You’re a woman perilously close to middle age, and furthermore, you’re a lesbian. Her very words.” Mr. Pierre’s eyes darted dangerously.

“Did she say that?” Mother stabbed out her cigarette. “I’ll give her a piece of my mind. And today, too, that stuck-up bitch.”

“Mom, don’t you dare. That would really put an end to the loan.” I turned to Mr. Pierre. “In those words?”

“Close to it.”

“Damn, I hate everyone knowing my business.”

“Get out of Runnymede then.” Mr. Pierre’s voice was far more kind than the statement.

“But financial stuff. The sex bullroar I can take but she can’t be blabbing about my finances. It’s unethical.”

“If we picked our friends on ethics, who’d be left?” Georgette called out from the reception desk.

Funny, Georgette was so quiet I made the mistake of thinking she wasn’t very smart. I was revising my opinion.

I sighed and collected myself. “Let’s keep this to ourselves. If she wants to run her mouth we can’t stop her and maybe she’ll make Foster so damned mad he’ll approve the loan to spite her.”

“I told you your problem is in Baltimore.” Mother’s eyes looked at mine from the mirror.

“Let’s take it a step at a time.”

Mr. Pierre put his arm around my shoulder. “I took revenge. Attack a Friend of Bertha’s and you attack me,
n’est-ce pas?
I gave her hair a poisonous rinse. Her change-of-life red has a definite greenish cast to it.”

“Bless you.” I laughed and kissed him.

I no sooner got through the door of the
Clarion
than Michelle leapt at my desk. “Well?”

“Check my changes. I think we can run it.”

She leaned over me. Lolly lifted her head to observe this. Lolly didn’t like people getting too close. “I have this terrific idea for our Sunday supplement.”

“Shoot.”

Just then, a lumbering compositor—one of the guys who compose the page form, which is almost solid lead—moved through the front office. He winked at Michelle and made her blush. “Nick!” he called at me.

“Yes, Hans.”

“Tell Arnie if you see him that I’m taking an early lunch.” He winked at Michelle again and pushed open the front door.

Her face was red. “He makes me nervous.”

“He likes you.”

She blushed again. “I’m not used to working-class men.”

“Hans?” I’d never once thought of the typesetters, the compositors, the proofreaders, and that backroom gang as working-class people. They were the muscle of the
Clarion
family, kind of like stokers in a battleship. “Hans is Hans. Now what’s your idea?”

“I want to do an article that’s different. What if each of us were to write a letter to ourselves as children?”

“I don’t get it.”

“You write a letter to yourself at five or eight or whatever.”

“That’s a little too vague for me.”

“You put down every idea I have that is psychological!” Her lower lip jutted out.

“I guess I do.” I didn’t want to be nasty. “To me, it’s not news. It doesn’t even belong in the living section.”

“You’re wrong. The Lifestyles section generates a lot of reader interest with self-help psychology.”

“Okay, Michelle, bring me a better idea and I’ll consider it.”

“I have a piece about the bombing of the synagogue after the Rosenberg trials.”

“That’s not current news.”

“You can put it in as a history piece, a remembering. Passover is April fourteenth. Run it then.”

“Let me see it.”

She smacked the pages in front of me, then hovered.

“Michelle, let me read in peace.”

When Michelle arrived at the
Clarion
, she’d displayed a breathtaking willingness to turn guesswork into fact. You’ve got to get eyewitness reports. You’ve got to go to the original documents. You’ve got to spend hours, wear and tear on your car engine, and wear and tear on your feet to get those facts. There’s no shortcut. She’d done her homework on this piece. I knocked out a few florid sentences, but otherwise it was clean.

I put it on her desk. “Not bad.”

“You’ll run it?”

“Unless Charles has an objection, yes.”

Michelle smiled from ear to ear and didn’t bug me the rest of the day.

Louise planned her grand entrance to bingo. She arrived ferociously rouged. As Ed was her escort, she wanted to make sure everyone would notice. Mother knew that. Poor Louise. She thought she was going to be the center of attention, and once again her younger sister held the trump card.

When she saw Mom she screeched, “What have you done?”

“You like it?” Mother patted her silver-white curls.

“My finest creation.” Mr. Pierre framed Mom’s head with his hands.

Over her ears, sweeping back like graceful wings, were two streaks of violent magenta. I’d had time to adjust to it. I’d picked Mother up at her home. Once I recovered from the shock I liked it. As every person entered the bingo hall they reacted either pro or con.

“You look like Madonna.” Louise’s spite illuminated her face.

“I don’t know what Madonna’s got that I haven’t, only I’ve had it longer.”

Ed Tutweiler Walters laughed. This further inflamed Louise but since Ed sat down next to Julia, my aunt had no choice but to sit on the other side of him and make the best of it. The BonBons minus Thacker clogged the remainder of our table.

“Where’s Goodyear?”Aunt Wheeze bent and searched under the table. I could hear the thump of Lolly’s tail.

“He wasn’t up for bingo tonight,” Mother replied.

This was a bald lie. The wretched animal bawled his head off when we pulled out of the driveway but Mother was firm. Ed hadn’t seen Goodyear’s trick yet and she figured he’d call Louise “Louise.” Damned if she was going to have her show ruined. An extra Milk-Bone did not take the sting away for Goodyear as he witnessed Lolly and Pewter get into the car.

Mutzi called out, “Inside picture frame. Now you remember, you must complete a square around your free space. Exactly like a picture frame. Okay, here we go.” He reached into the bouncing Ping-Pong balls. “Number seventy-one, let’s have some fun.”

“I am. How about you?” Mother turned to Ed.

“Yeah. Never a dull moment in this town.” His voice, a light baritone, suited his person.

I was sitting opposite this volatile threesome. I didn’t want to miss anything. Also, I wanted to be able to run if necessary. Mr. Pierre sat next to me.

“Forty-seven. Forty-seven. If I were forty-seven I’d be in heaven,” Mutzi sang out and the older members of our bingo crew laughed.

“Where were you when you were forty-seven, Mr. Walters?” Mother’s teeth gleamed in the light.

“Birmingham, Julia. Don’t be dense. You know he’s from Birmingham.” Louise tried to cut her off at the pass.

“Yes, I know that but I was thinking he might say that he just turned forty-seven.” That was laying it on a little thick.

“Bless you, Mrs. Smith, and please call me Ed.”

“And you’ll call me Juts, of course.”

“Give it a little time, Ed, and you’ll call her plenty else,” Louise dug.

“I hope so.” Mother glowed.

No matter how many times I watched my mother cast her net over a man she found attractive, it fascinated me. Sometimes I thought it was the mongoose and the cobra. Other times I thought it was her wacky humor. You never knew what Julia would do or say. I’d known her from the cradle and I still couldn’t tell you which way she’d cut. The hair, for instance. She fooled me with the magenta streaks.

Mr. Pierre was on my wavelength. He whispered to me: “There goes another one.”

“What’d you say?” Louise’s eyebrows came to a point over her nose.

“That I wished I were in Geneva tonight.” Mr. Pierre dabbed number seventeen, which Mutzi had called out. “Finally! I’ve been sitting here with a nude card.”

“What’s in Geneva?”Wheezie asked.

“They are auctioning off the Duchess of Windsor’s jewelry,” Mr. Pierre answered.

“Were you going to buy something for me?” Louise was the coquette.

“No, I thought I’d wear it myself. Just a simple tiara with diamond drop earrings.” Mr. Pierre’s eyes danced.

Ed started to laugh. A shadow of fear raced across Louise’s face. She was sitting opposite two queers. What would Ed think?

“We nourish our eccentrics. Sometime I must tell you about Celeste Chalfonte, who died on Nickel’s birthday, November twenty-eighth.” Mother dabbed a number.

“He doesn’t want to hear about Celeste.” Louise was close to an inside picture frame.

“Oh, I’d like to know everything about you two beautiful ladies and about Runnymede too,” Ed gallantly offered.

“We operate on the principle that boredom corrupts,” I piped up.

“Number twenty-three for thee-e and me-e-e.” Mutzi was singing again and smacking at Pewter, who was fishing in the glass cage because Mutzi took the top off.

I continued, “See, people think that drugs are the sorrow of America, or drink, or … well, take your pick.”

“Where do I start?” Ed smiled at me. I was beginning to like him.

“I think people get into trouble when they’re bored. The mind needs problems and puzzles and issues. If someone lets his mind go, he’ll get into trouble.” I noticed Mother’s bosoms seemed a bit large. I’d noticed that when I picked her up but then I thought it might be the cut of her dress. Now upon further study I decided it wasn’t just illusion. They were bigger.

“We are never bored in Runnymede.” Mr. Pierre picked up the conversation. “Although I’m not sure our stimulation, as Nickel would wish, is intellectual. Sometimes our stimulation is pure D spite.” He was skating close to the edge.

“We have our fair share of that in Birmingham.”

“Bingo!” Louise’s hand shot up.

The sullen Peepbean, Mutzi’s lieutenant, came over and counted Louise’s numbers. “A winner.” “Goody, goody. What do I get?”

“Twenty-five dollars.” Mutzi rang a big cowbell. “Nickel.”

“What?”

“Get Pewter.”

“How come you’ve got the top off the ball machine?” “Because the feed isn’t working right so I’ve got to reach in and get the balls.”

“All right.” I picked up Pewter, who grumbled furiously. “This’ll shut her up.” Verna brought out some baloney. Pewter accepted this.

Decca, the smallest BonBon, watched the cat eat the baloney
and then tried to eat her own sandwich without hands. Verna gave her a light smack. “No fressen.”

In Runnymede, “fressen” meant to eat like an animal. Maybe it meant that in other parts of the country, too, but I’d never heard the word in my travels. Decca knew what it meant because she stopped. Georgette, next to her youngest sister, young enough to be her own child, wiped Decca’s mouth with a napkin.

Mother pulled out another bingo card. “Ed, one time when Nickel was a little girl she behaved very badly. She still behaves badly but I can’t do anything about it now. I told her she was a little animal and I put her food in the dog bowl and made her eat it on the floor just like a dog. She didn’t give me any trouble for a few weeks after that.”

I laughed. “Mr. Walters, she was a witchy mother.”

“You turned out all right,” Ed complimented me.

“You don’t know the half of it.” Louise was really working on my mood.

Mutzi raised his hands. “Okay, we’re doing a regular game of bingo. Regular game. And I want you to know that if we keep doing as well as we’ve been doing, we can play blackout bingo in a couple of weeks.”

“This sounds like fun.” Mr. Pierre brought back drinks from the bar for everyone.

“Now pay attention. We’re putting up a sample on the board here. Peepbean!”

“Huh?” Peepbean hadn’t been paying attention.

Mutzi said in a nice voice, “Put up the blackout sheet.”

“Oh.”

The blackout sheet was a special four cards printed on one sheet of paper. You paid for four cards. A regular bingo card cost one or two dollars depending on the game but the blackout sheet was going to cost us eight dollars. The pot would depend on how many people showed up. The limit was one blackout sheet to a player per blackout game. This differed sharply from our regular games where you could play as many cards as you wanted. Verna
built herself a little shelf to hold her cards upright so she could keep track of them and she could play up to ten at a time. Mutzi kept explaining to us that
all
twenty-five numbers on one of the cards had to be blacked out, or called. The pot was also determined by how many numbers it took to get the blackout. So if fewer than fifty-five numbers were called, the pot would be pretty big, a couple thousand dollars on a big weekend. If more than fifty-five numbers were called, the pot was reduced.

Half the proceeds of every pot went to Saint Rose of Lima. Without the income the church couldn’t have continued its Meals on Wheels for the shut-ins and elderly. And the church was in constant need of renovation. The first part of Saint Rose’s had been built in 1680. The only church older was Christ Lutheran Church on Emmitsburg Pike right off the Square. As the Germans came here first, they built a church before anyone else. The cornerstone was laid in 1662. Saint Paul’s Episcopal, catty-cornered from Saint Rose’s, wasn’t established until 1707. They made up for being Johnny-come-lately by being richer than the rest of us. The Chalfontes, Rifes, and Yosts endowed Saint Paul’s. Bingo endowed Saint Rose’s. Christ Lutheran missed the boat and kept mounting funding drives which exhausted its membership, of which I was one. We’d have been better off with gambling. I was in favor of craps myself, but the pastor frowned upon my idea. Actually, the pastor frowned upon me. I tried not to let it interfere with my sporadic attendance.