One On The House (3 page)

“San Diego all kinds saloons to go to,” Mrs. Rasmussen said.

“Now that we seen Katy an’ Danny an’ the baby, I’m ready to go!” Mrs. Feeley said.

“The hubble-bubble of the city, the mad pursuit of the dollar to the exclusion of everything else is enervating.” Miss Tinkham finished her first beer. “The taut, hard faces of the people full of resentment at anyone with a serene look have inspired me to write a couplet:

Such asses

The masses!

“Say, that’s swell!” Mrs. Feeley said. “This trip’ll sure make us love the comfort an’ luxury o’ the Ark! Gawd, will I be glad to see it!”

“Ain’t gonna be no luxury,” Mrs. Rasmussen said. “We spent all our money, even cashed our bonds to come up here.”

Mrs. Feeley nodded soberly.

“But it was worth it! Have to have a fresh start…we’ll think o’ somethin’…we always do!”

“Least we paid them taxes ’fore we left,” Mrs. Rasmussen said.

“Seein’ the apartment an’ how nice Katy’s got it fixed makes me want to go home an’ give the place a real good turnin’-out. New paint-job, inside an’ out. I ain’t planted bulbs for over a year; won’t have no flowers to speak of.”

“Wish we could go tomorrow! I’m plain homesick,” Mrs. Rasmussen said.

“Wish in one hand an’ spit in the other…see which one gets full first!” Mrs. Feeley said. “We could get on a bus an’ leave now, but it wouldn’t look right to Katy an’ Danny. They’d think we didn’t have a good time. Sure been good to us. For my part, after three days company an’ fish stink: throw ’em out!” She banged the table with her beer mug. “Three more,” she said to the waiter.

“My limited wardrobe is getting a trifle monotonous,” Miss Tinkham said, “although it was wise of Mrs. Rasmussen to suggest that we each bring only one small bag. I do wish I had my accordion-pleated white chiffon and my black horsehair hat for the races tomorrow!”

“You’ll be lucky if you come back from ’em wearin’ your shirt!” Mrs. Feeley said.

“Low-heeled shoes is good,” Mrs. Rasmussen said.

“Even so,” Mrs. Feeley said, “my feet hurts all the time in New York. The sidewalks is softer in San Diego!”

“There’s just one thing.” Mrs. Rasmussen pondered something carefully before speaking. “We’d oughta get some kind real nice handsome present for Katy an’ Danny.”

“Now how in the name o’ God could we o’ went an’ forgot that?” Mrs. Feeley set her glass down with a thump that brought the waiter. “Might’s well save yourself a trip,” she grinned at him. “Got any ideas, Mrs. Rasmussen?”

“I’m worryin’ about it serious,” she said. “It’s gotta be big, an’ it’s gotta be…well…”

“Spectacular! Impressive! Worthy of those two magnificent people!” Miss Tinkham nodded so heartily that her long jade earrings got tangled in her rope of pearls.

“I feel so small I could sit on a dime an’ my legs wouldn’t even hang over, not thinkin’ o’ that myself.” Mrs. Feeley turned her beer mug round and round in her plump little hands. “Let’s get somethin’ none o’ their friends got, even if it takes every cent we got! Let’s get what they’d want most: big or small.”

“An’ we gotta get it now, ’fore the Navy comes an’ starts packin’ ’em up!” Mrs. Rasmussen said.

“If we set aside the minimum for transportation, we might have a small margin left for investment, say…at the races, for example!” Miss Tinkham said.

“Get a paper an’ pencil, Mrs. Rasmussen!” Mrs. Feeley spoke as though anything could be solved by making a list. “Add up how much we gotta keep out, then let’s put our minds on somethin’ really grand for the present!”

Mrs. Rasmussen opened her capacious bag and the first thing she came upon was the card given her by the gray little man. She glanced at it and handed it to Miss Tinkham. She put up her glasses and read:

G
AYLORD
F
LINK

E
XPERT

IN

S
AFES
AND
T
IME
V
AULTS

H
OTEL
E
NTWISTLE
46 W. 44
TH
S
T
.

N
EW
Y
ORK
C
ITY

“Gawd!” Mrs. Feeley laughed, “as if he wasn’t sorry enough, he’s gotta go an’ have a name like that! Reckon he ain’t no convict if he has it right on his card.” She finished off her beer. “Musta had a egg in his beer, makin’ up to Mrs. Rasmussen like that!”

“Poor boogers lonely,” Mrs. Rasmussen said.

“We’ll send him a lovely postal card on the way home,” Miss Tinkham said. “We have his address and it will serve as a kind of apology.”

“Order the beer,” Mrs. Feeley said, “an’ try to rankle your heads for a good idea about the present…I’m goin’ to shed a tear for Garfield!” She charged off to the front of the saloon where she had seen a door marked
LADIES.
A crowd was massed, leaning over each other craning their necks towards a screen at the end of the room. Mrs. Feeley stopped and looked too. A prize fight was going full tilt, the crowd grunting and dodging with the fighters.

“Talkin’ movies?” she asked a man near her.

“You from the sticks? That’s television.”

“Hmmmmm.” Mrs. Feeley went on into the ladies’ room. When she came back the program had changed and a comedian, dragging his mother in at every line, was delivering jokes freighted with double meanings. For a moment she stood watching the tired, aging actor whip himself into a frenzy.

“I b’lieve that guy’d be dirty if they give him a chance!” she said aloud. “I better go get Mrs. Rasmussen an’ Miss Tinkham!”

The two were huddled over a paper.

“Sure gonna be on short grass,” Mrs. Rasmussen said. “Even takin’ the bus, that’s the cheapest, we’ll just about sneak by. Don’t have much left for bettin’.”

“Never mind about that now…bring your beer an’ come with me! I think we hit the jackpot!”

Miss Tinkham scrambled to her feet and Mrs. Rasmussen plowed after her. The three nudged their way into the crowd. A talent scout was holding an audition on the screen, leering at the young women and ogling the boys.

“Talking pictures in miniature!” Miss Tinkham whispered.

“You from the sticks? That’s television,” Mrs. Feeley said. “Ain’t he the ugly booger? Got a face like a well-spanked bottom.”

A young man began performing on four harmonicas, writhing and twisting like a basket of eels.

“Just like vor-deville,” Mrs. Rasmussen said. “Me an’ Mister sure liked it.”

“If it were only in technicolor!” Miss Tinkham sighed.

“Won’t be long, if they ain’t got it already,” Mrs. Feeley explained. “This ain’t such a very high-class dump.”

“The possibilities are unlimited,” Miss Tinkham said. Mrs. Rasmussen turned to Mrs. Feeley. “It’s sure swell, but we’d never be able to raise the money.” Her amber eyes snapped in a way that belied her words.

“By God, for somethin’ fandangled like that, we gotta raise the money! The three of us will be to bury if we don’t!”

Miss Tinkham made a few practice swishes with her thumb. “When all else fails,” she cried, “we can emulate the Knights of the Open Road…and hitch-hike!”

A big blowsy woman turned around. “Go down to WPIX if you wanna get in the act!”

Mrs. Feeley looked the woman over from head to foot: “Why don’t you go down yourself, with them skinny legs an’ that mouth like a plumber’s rubber-tool? Let’s go back to our own table an’ talk over buyin’ a television set—more than this trash can do, standin’ in bars, gawkin’ for free!” She hustled off to the back room like a baby tugboat.

“Guess that put the local feists to flight!” she said over her shoulder. They were not following her. Mrs. Rasmussen and Miss Tinkham stood as if frozen.

“The Creep!” Mrs. Feeley said. “Gawd, he sure ain’t no quitter!” He was walking slowly towards Mrs. Rasmussen, ignoring the existence of the other two. She walked backwards, reaching out for Miss Tinkham’s hand.

“Don’t let him shatter your aplomb,” Miss Tinkham whispered, “There is safety in numbers.”

Mrs. Feeley was standing in the middle of the bead portieres when the slow-moving group reached her. She eyed the little man closely. “Don’t stand there like a Stoughton bottle! Say somethin’!”

“I’d like to buy you ladies a drink.”

“That’s short an’ to the point,” Mrs. Feeley said. “Get the waiter.”

“The classic opening gambit, Mr. Flink!” Miss Tinkham said.

Mr. Flink blinked.

“Ah yes! We read your card!”

“Could I know…” he began.

“We don’t tell our private affairs to nobody,” Mrs. Feeley said.

“I just wanted to know her name,” he said looking at Mrs. Rasmussen.

“We are what might be called sticklers for etiquette,” Miss Tinkham said. “In a large city, one can’t be too particular.”

“Yeup. White slavers,” Mrs. Feeley said.

The waiter came up with four beers and Mr. Flink produced a roll of bills that a hippopotamus would have had some difficulty in swallowing.

“Is there anything due you besides this?” he asked the waiter.

“Whee! Look at that ol’ bull-moth fly outa that roll!” Mrs. Feeley laughed.

Mr. Flink looked offended but paid the entire tab.

“Never have I been accused of being miserly. When I am with ladies I admire, I never allow them to treat.”

Mrs. Feeley was not impressed.

“How come you ain’t got more friends then? How come you’re tryin’ to pick us up all the time? Looks to me like you’d have to be beatin’ the bags off with a stick!”

“Because I was raised up genteel, that’s why. I admire refined ladies—and alas, they are so few.”

“Don’t see no harm in you buyin’ us a few beers an’ chattin’…long as you keep your manners about you an’ don’t try nothin’ on!”

Mr. Flink produced his wallet.

“I am a veteran of the First World War, a retired lock-expert from the largest factory of time-locks in the world, and a member in good standing of the Woodmen of the World.”

Mrs. Rasmussen looked at Mr. Flink, then back at Mrs. Feeley. “Wouldn’t hardly be no sex-maniacs in the Woodmen o’ the World?” she queried.

“Eminently respectable!” Miss Tinkham declared. “Almost as good as carrying an umbrella and a copy of the
Atlantic Monthly.”

“You’re in like Flynn!” Mrs. Feeley laughed.

“Mrs. Feeley!” Miss Tinkham raised her lorgnette. “Are you sure you read all the details of that case?”

“I’m talkin’ about the one that laid them pavin’ blocks. Say, Mr. Flink, do you know how much it costs to buy a television set?”

“They start at around two hundred and fifty and run up into the thousands, Mrs….uh, Mrs….”

“Feeley! Dammit! Feeley! Up to the thousands?”

“Yes, Mrs. Feeley. But don’t be in a hurry. The price is coming down every day.”

“We gotta buy one right away,” Mrs. Rasmussen said.

“Nothing could be more ideal during those long winter evenings in Alaska! The house will be crowded with admiring and envious spectators.” Miss Tinkham could see the set in operation.

“Alaska?” Mr. Flink squeaked. “You live as far away as Alaska?” He looked despairingly at Mrs. Rasmussen.

“San Diego,” she said. “The set’s goin’ to Alaska.”

“What about the reception?” he asked.

“They ain’t havin’ no reception,” Mrs. Feeley said. “No parties up there. It’s for our niece an’ nephew’s own self. They’ll be tickled to death to get it.”

“Lived in San Diego long, Mrs….ah…Mrs….?” he went back to Mrs. Rasmussen.

“Mrs. Rasmussen. Erna Rasmussen,” Miss Tinkham slipped lightly over the formalities.

“Lived there long, Mrs. Rat-mutton?”

“Rasmussen! Not Rat-mutton, Slope Head!” Mrs. Feeley laughed. “That sure didn’t boost your stock any!”

“Pardon me,” he said. “It is Mrs.?”

“Mrs.,” she said.

“I’m the only one that missed: Miss Agnes Harriet Tinkham!”

Mr. Flink’s eyes, the shape and color of the erasers on lead pencils, slid back to Mrs. Rasmussen. He picked up his beer mug and drained it, still peering at her over the rim. When he set it down, he emitted an eructation that had everything in it but kettledrums.

“Par’on me,” he said.

Even Mrs. Feeley was taken aback.

“That’s better out than your eye,” she said at last.

“Really, you could understudy Lionel Barrymore in
Rasputin.”
Miss Tinkham put up her lorgnette.

“I missed my dinner,” Mr. Flink said.

The ladies looked at each other. He had followed them since five o’clock in the afternoon. They had filled themselves generously with lobster and French fries while he stood emptily outside on the chance that the beautiful lady of his mind would appear.

“Aw, the poor little man!” Mrs. Feeley cried.

“I could do with a bite myself,” Mrs. Rasmussen said.

“My treat,” Mr. Flink said.