One On The House (14 page)

The driver pocketed the money with obvious relief:

“Jeez! I was sweatin’ gum-drops for a while there!”

“Just remember that when we tell you somethin’, it’s so. When’ll you be back?”

“Middle o’ next week….Timmy don’t buy but that little bit, them three half-barrels, hardly worth the bother.”

“If we need more, an’ we will by tomorrow,” Mrs. Feeley bluffed, “we can always call another brewery. One that sells beer cheaper an’ has better treatment for its customers! One that ain’t so goddam snotty!”

“Jeez, lady! Don’t get mad on me! We appreciate the trade. Here’s the phone number.” He fished in his unionalls for a card. “I’ll have the salesman stop in tomorrow.”

“Don’t bother. I’ll send for you when I need you. We ain’t got no time to sit around listenin’ to no drummer’s dirty stories.”

The giant was sweating from his mental effort.

“How about buyin’ youse a beer?” he said.

Mrs. Feeley drew five beers.

“One for Mr. Angel,” she said.

“Man bites dog!” Miss Tinkham said.

Mrs. Rasmussen sized the driver up. “Stop in at noon tomorrow.”

“Beauty Boy’s no piker!” Mrs. Feeley pocketed the fifty-cent piece he laid down. “Keep an eye out for any pie-anna you see lyin’ around. We need one bad.”

“I’ll do that.”

“I’ve got to be going along,” Angel said. “I was just on my way home, when the sign in the window brought me in. Draw us a round.” He reached in his pocket.

“By God, I seen everythin’ now: a cop an’ a beer driver buyin’ a drink in the same day!” Mrs. Feeley laughed. “But your money’s no good in here, Angel.”

“You married?” Mrs. Rasmussen said.

Angel shook his head.

“Stop in around noon tomorrow,” she said.

“Don’t be alarmed,” Miss Tinkham smiled. “Mrs. Rasmussen mothers everything up to and including doorknobs.”

Angel finished his beer and rose.

“You’re welcome, drunk or sober,” Mrs. Feeley said, “but don’t go bringin’ in no more cops, or we’d never make a dime!”

“Don’t let me catch you putting high-bottoms in the beer glasses!”

Mrs. Feeley patted him on the back. “You know me: honest as the day is long! I always give ’em back their glass eye.”

When Angel left, Mrs. Feeley picked up the cigarbox and started for the bar.

“Cleaned out…like the sleeves of a vest! One thin dime…”

“Three ninety-five from the tips,” Miss Tinkham pointed to the coins in the saucer.

“Three ninety-seven,” Mrs. Rasmussen put down the two cents change from her marketing. “You know what? We ain’t marked down the beers we had.”

Mrs. Feeley scratched her head:

“That’s right. You said we had over four dollars in tips. That’s forty beers. We ain’t had ten apiece…not yet,” she grinned. “Wouldn’t it simple-ize the bookkeeping if we just put the tips in the cashbox to cover our beers? Seems like takin’ it outa one pocket an’ puttin’ it in the other this way.”

“It would seem entirely fair,” Miss Tinkham said. “Of course, we do serve quite a lot of beer with the compliments of the house.”

“Best investment ever!” Mrs. Feeley said. “Gift-gaffs make good friends.”

“We got plenty to eat for ourselfs, the next coupla days,” Mrs. Rasmussen said. “I’d like to sneak down to the stores an’ get a little somethin’ to set out for those fellers case they do come in.” She looked longingly at the pile of tip-money.

“Why not?” Mrs. Feeley said.

“Some pretzels or salted peanuts,” Miss Tinkham suggested.

“Get
them
anywhere!” Mrs. Rasmussen went for her mesh shopping bag. “Cramps my style, not havin’ no oven. But I’ll stir up somethin’. Might be like singed-cat an’ taste better than it looks.”

“That’s the half-past four whistle,” Mrs. Feeley said. “I’ll just freshen up in case them fellers do come by.”

Miss Tinkham turned the radio on. The news was as monotonous and uninformative as ever.

“Pap! Pap for the morons…all the truth strained and colored to suit the weak stomachs of the public. Be-bop makes more sense!” A wild clatter of sound emerged from the radio. The sound might have been a crooner trying to swallow a bowling ball, but the rhythm was gay, and Miss Tinkham swung her hips as she wiped the top of the bar.

“Hand me the clout, while you go put your face on,” Mrs. Feeley said. She had fluffed out her springy white curls and dusted her face with powder.

“No one would guess that you had slept on top of a bar last night,” Miss Tinkham smiled.

“Reckon Mrs. Rasmussen will think to spend a dime for the light cord for the lamp?” Mrs. Feeley called.

“I doubt it greatly,” Miss Tinkham said with her mouth full of bobby-pins. “When she has that creative gleam in her eye about food…”

“Don’t see how she’ll have time to do much tonight, but watch her smoke tomorrow…”

A group of men, a dozen or more, came in laughing and banging a lean, taciturn man on the back.

“Beer for all hands,” he said. His sardonic face kept breaking into a little spasm that might have been a gas-pain, but Mrs. Feeley saw it was a smile when one of the men said:

“Smiley’s old lady just had a boy. They phoned.”

Mrs. Feeley was not one to let an opportunity like that slip by. “Here’s to the son an’ heir! An’ a quick recovery to the mother! The beer’s on the house.”

“Say…now!” Smiley was touched. How could this lady know what a boy meant to him after fathering three girls?

Miss Tinkham came out of the washroom radiant in fresh pancake make-up, lipstick, and even mascara. She had on her lovely beads carved like the heads of Egyptian mummies.

“Have a cigar.” Smiley solemnly offered her one from the box he unwrapped.

“Thanks, I will!” Miss Tinkham took one graciously. “Perhaps if I smoke it, the mantle of Miss Amy Lowell’s imagery will descend upon me!”

“Toney, huh?” Mrs. Feeley said as she helped herself to two cigars, “You never expected to hear nothin’ like that, did you? Stick around, bud! Liberal education.”

Miss Tinkham put on her apron and began carrying glasses of beer to the men at the tables. The proud father stood gaping at her with his foot on the rail.

“Don’t take money from none of ’em,” he whispered to Mrs. Feeley. “This had ought to cover it,” he handed her a ten-dollar bill. “Keep track, an’ if it don’t, there’s plenty more where that come from. Nothin’ too good for my son!”

Whitey and his crowd came in.

“Any word about Timmy?”

“He’s some better. We’re awful pleased,” Mrs. Feeley said. Mrs. Rasmussen slipped in the door so quietly that the men scarcely noticed her. When she saw the crowd, she hurried to the kitchen.

“I’ll be right out,” she whispered to Mrs. Feeley.

“You know the first barrel’s finished?” Mrs. Feeley said. “I’m startin’ the second one. What the hell do you s’pose Ol’-Timer’s doin’? I ain’t seen hide nor hair of him since we et.”

Mrs. Rasmussen had no time to speculate on the whereabouts of Old-Timer. She was unwrapping parcels and setting out rows of small paper plates. She had six packages of hot-dog rolls, which she split. She heated water in a bucket and dropped in the three pounds of plump hot-dogs she purchased. When they were at the boiling point, she took the sole respectable saucepan and poured into it two cans of chile. She thinned it down with water and added half a small cellophane package of crushed red hot peppers. While the frankfurters were plumping out even more in the boiling water, she heated the chile. Then she chopped up some pungent white onions into very fine chips. She stuck her head out the door to size up the situation. Mrs. Feeley and Miss Tinkham were drawing beer and running from the bar to the tables with loaded trays. Some men stood up at the bar.

Smiley protested loudly against anyone else treating.

Whitey stood right up to him.

“I appreciate your sentiments, Papa!” he grinned. “An’ I thank you for the beers. But you’re not gonna refuse me the right to set up a few…how many are we, Mrs. Feeley?…to drink to Timmy’s good health, are you? Timmy made a little gain today. Beer all around, please ma’am.”

Mrs. Feeley knew there were twenty-three men in the place. Apparently they came early and stayed late. Since she had started the treating, she thought it was only fair to Timmy to charge for the beer that she and Miss Tinkham were treated to. She also planned to make up the arrears to Mrs. Rasmussen, slaving away over one miserable gas-burner. She took her a cool glass of beer.

“Somethin’ smells good,” she said.

Mrs. Rasmussen wrinkled her nose.

“Done the best I could. I’m glad I chanced it. Just had a feelin’…but they ain’t near enough. Have to split the hot-dogs in two so’s the guys can have two apiece.”

She set her glass down and went back to the kitchen. She split the rolls, put margarine on them, then placed half a frankfurter in the roll, sprinkled it liberally with chopped onion, then ladled a big spoonful of the hot chile gravy on it.

“Gimme a hand while they’re hot, Miss Tinkham!” They both carried trayfuls of the rolls into the bar.

The first man that saw the rolls said: “Will you sell one o’ those? I’m starved!”

“They ain’t for sale,” Mrs. Rasmussen said. “Help yourself.”

The men got up from the tables and helped themselves. They looked at each other in embarrassment.

“Feel like a heel, not payin’ for the dogs,” one said.

The first customer let out a yell that would have raised gooseflesh on one of Satan’s own imps.

“Fire!” he shouted. “Gimme some beer, quick!” Mrs. Feeley obliged.

“Sure good, though!”

“Have another,” Mrs. Rasmussen said. “We’ll have somethin’ better next time.”

All the customers invited the ladies to have beer with them.

“Okay if we drink it later, when the smoke clears away?” Mrs. Feeley asked, taking the dimes. She had to keep a clear head to count the money and make change. In spite of Smiley’s edict, all the boys were buying.

An’ that’s proper joss, as Danny would say, Mrs. Feeley smiled to herself. Looks like I’ll have to call Beauty Boy tomorrow, though I was only bluffin’ at the time!

Mrs. Rasmussen came up behind her.

“You know what time it is?” she asked.

“My stomach says it’s about nine at night, but it’s only six-thirty. We can’t stop now, not while we got ’em in here! Ain’t this lovely?”

“Sure is. But they don’t have a baby every day.”

“I know it,” Mrs. Feeley nodded, “but I’m gonna chase Smiley to the hospital to see his wife, or home—one or the other.”

“Why?” Mrs. Rasmussen gasped.

“I don’t want his wife sore at us. He’s spent over twenty dollars now. Maybe he can afford it an’ maybe he can’t. Don’t want no ill-will around here.”

“Now that’s right.” Mrs. Rasmussen sat down on the stool at the bar.

“Hey, Smiley,” Mrs. Feeley said. “Ain’t you goin’ out to see the stem-winder?”

“Aw, it ain’t his first!” Whitey said.

“Yeup. But what about his wife? She’s lyin’ there pinin’ for the sight o’ Laughin’ Boy!”

“She’s right!” Smiley picked up his lunch kit. “Them weenies was swell. Thanks for everythin’. Lemme know tomorrow an’ I’ll square it with you if you come out on the short end.”

“That’ll be the day!” Mrs. Feeley shook hands with him. “You come in tomorrow an’ let us know how they are.”

Smiley weaved his way out of the bar. One of the men at the bar said:

“He’s sure tickled it’s a boy. I gotta be gettin’ home too. Them dogs hit the spot. Mighty nice of you. Never had no free eats before.”

“You was too young to remember the old free lunch,” Mrs. Feeley said. “All kinds o’ sausages, cheese, salad, hard-boiled eggs, pickles, all them things. Food was cheap. People helped theirselfs an’ et along with their beer. Saved a lotta accidents!”

“Sure leveled me off. I won’t forget it.”

“All the free lunch I ever seen,” Whitey said, “was somethin’ like clam broth. You could have all you wanted free. Then they’d sell you a nice hot roast beef sandwich at cost…or less. But I never heard of givin’ away eats. You’d oughta let us pay, with the expenses so high today.”

Mrs. Feeley shook her head.

“All we want is your trade. Buy your beer here, an’ we’ll throw in a little somethin’ to hold body an’ soul together till you get home.”

“Get us drunk with one hand, an’ sober us up with the other?” Whitey laughed. “But it was swell. See you tomorrow.”

Whitey’s crowd left with him. Four men sat on in a booth deep in a discussion of atomic energy. All at once Mrs. Feeley decided it had been a long day. She let out a yawn that would have made even a miser on the verge of bankruptcy feel sleepy.

One of the men looked at the clock. “Am I gonna catch it! Could we have just one more round, ma’am? Then we’ll go quietly.”

To draw four decent beers, Mrs. Feeley had to start on the third keg. For a moment she wondered how they could have drunk so much. Mrs. Rasmussen musta lit a fire in the chile! ’Course they’re only small glasses. Not much like our sixteen-ouncers at the Ark! A swift wave of fatigue and homesickness came over her. “We wouldn’t put you out,” she said to the men, “but we been up since six an’ Mrs. Rasmussen ain’t had a chance to cook our supper yet.”