The Midnight Cool Page 11

  I think you oughta quit talking and get some rest.

  Whatever you say, Charlie boy. You’re the boss.

  California

  Bristol

  Maura has a plan. She is going to be rich.

  I didn’t come all this way to empty chamber pots, she tells Billy. Nor to be chained to a stove with a dozen little brats tugging my apron. I’m going to rise up.

  To Solar Hill? he asks. Why do you want to go there? No fun up there.

  Solar Hill! I’ll live in a place that makes those houses look like tenant shacks. I’m going to California. To San Francisco. Get my name up on a marquee.

  She keeps a scrapbook, pictures of famous actresses. Newspaper stories of their wealth and talents. She can’t read, but someone has read it all to her enough times that she can recite them, word for word, from memory.

  Lillian Russell, who pedaled lazily around Central Park on a bicycle monogrammed with diamonds.

  Sarah Bernhardt. The Divine Miss Sarah, who, when she traveled, had to take out an extra suite in her hotels for the flowers sent by admirers.

  Lola Montez. Who, by showing a little leg while she sang and danced, shook more money out of the California gold rushers than the gold rushers ever shook out of the California hills. Who kept so many coins in her stockings that they jangled when she walked. Who kept a bear cub as a pet. Just for fun.

  She rattles off all of this for Billy. Then she points to a photograph of Sarah Bernhardt. Ropes of pearls and smoky eyes.

  If you look closely, she says, you see it. They all have something in common.

  Billy looks. They sure are pretty.

  Come now, Bill Monday! Look closer. Use your eyes.

  He looks, but all he sees is finery, feathers, jewels, silk, and lace.

  She puts the scrapbook away after that, carefully wrapping it in paper. He makes a joke about it, but she has grown serious, a furrow between her dark brows. Then she shows him the cigar box where she saves her money. She has a stack of bills, more money than he would have imagined, nearly enough for a train ticket. When he sees it he feels himself sober up. An emptiness in his heart, as if he has already lost her.

  They named a gold mine after Lola Montez, she says solemnly. They named a mountain after her too.

  A Plan

  The plan came to Charles in a flash, up at the auction house that Saturday. Hit him on the head with a handful of Kuntz’s peanut shells. Lloyd Bonnyman had been out in the lot that morning, showing off some of the mules he had bought for the British Army.

  Don’t just do your bit for the war, he had said to the gathered young men. Don’t just do your bit, but do your all.

  In the ring the peanut shells rained down on Charles and he looked over at Lloyd Bonnyman in his derby on the other side of the podium and it hit him. If all the money was in war mules, like Twitch kept saying, then he would get into the war mule business. He could do it. All he needed to do was show up with some knockout mules, parade them around in front of Bonnyman, and then tell him he knew where to get plenty more. And he knew right where to go for the mules. There was a breeder just over the line in Kentucky. He was famous up there. Pen Pendergrass was his name. Bred the best mules in the state. Charles wagered he was too far out of Bonnyman’s territory for Bonnyman to have discovered him. He could go up there and buy mules on credit, bring them down here and sell them to Bonnyman. Pay for the mules. Start collecting his paycheck. Take care of Billy. Go see Catherine Hatcher outside the Paradise Theater and stuff ten bucks in her collection box.

  After the auction he went straight to town and sent Pendergrass a wire. Then went to the depot to buy a train ticket, without even thinking he ought to wait for a telegram in reply. He went back to the shack and told Billy what he had done, and Billy winced and smiled around his missing teeth.

  Somebody taught you good, he said.

  Plenty of Name

  Billy could never tell him. Never. He would sooner die than tell him.

  He had once known an old colored man, born a slave. A welded knot of scars crisscrossed his back from whippings. His name was James Washington Pliny Abraham Page.

  When I was born we had nothing, the old man told Billy. My mother, she said, when a child’s born with nothing, you give him plenty of name.

  Billy understood that Charles’s story was the same. He had been born with nothing and his mother had given him that story because she had nothing else to give him. And who was Billy to take it away?

  In the end, it was simple. Maura’s gift to Charles had been that story. Billy’s was allowing him to keep it.

  Breed More Mules

  Breed More Mules!

  By Chancellor “Pen” Pendergrass

  The Southern Kentucky Agriculturalist

  October 1914

  What is the future, the young folk sometimes ask me. And I always reply with the same:

  What? Mules! When? Now!

  Consider the mule, my friends: a special animal indeed. God did not make him. Man made him. He is a hybrid. The perfect result of an imperfect union. His father is a donkey and his mother is a horse, and he combines the best traits of both species and inherits the bad traits of neither, is more intelligent than the two put together, and is truly greater than the sum of his parts. He can do double the work of a horse on half the feed and worse care. He plows straighter, lives longer, and hardly ever needs to see the doctor.

  Yet the humble long-ear has been the victim of much mudslinging. Stubborn, stupid, and dull are only some of the epithets bestowed by the misinformed. But a mule is not stubborn. No, he is smart. He understands his own limitations; unlike a horse, he will never work himself to death.

  The mighty mule has but one fault. This is his inability to make more mules. His hybridism means sterility, and his sterility means that every mule is the end of his line. The last branch of a stunted family tree. The period at the end of a short sentence. No hope of progeny, no pride of posterity for these humble beasts.

  Young men, take heed: we need you to make more of ’em.

  Let us eschew the eagle as the symbol of this country. Let us adopt instead as the symbol of our great nation the unsung hero of these shores, the muscle behind all great American endeavors. Yes, let’s see a golden statue of a long-ear atop every capitol dome from sea to shining sea. A mule on the lawn of the White House. On the face of the dollar bill.

  This is the greatest nation in the history of the world. Our future is dazzlingly bright. But to get there we’ll need even more power, more muscle, more brute effort. And who built this country? Mules, my friends, and don’t you forget it.

  The framed article hung by the door of Pendergrass’s office, surrounded by photographs of his champion donkey jack studs, the sires of his beloved hybrids. Big black jackasses with white noses and balls big as grapefruits. Each frame bore a silver plate engraved with the animal’s name. Jupiter. Queequeg. archimedes. blackjack. ponderosa.

  Charles straightened his collar in the reflection of one of the frames. He had been waiting long enough now to read the article three times. No hope of progeny, no pride of posterity—he had committed that one to memory. He had studied every donkey in turn. Top-shelf asses. Even finer quality than he had expected. He knew it as soon as they made the turn off the main road and he saw the sign.

  pendergrass’s asses

  jacks at stud

  jackstock and mules for sale

  home of ponderosa

  grand champion donkey jack, kentucky state fair

  1913–1914–1915–

  Now he was getting nervous. He crossed to the window on the other side of the office, chewing his knuckle. Pendergrass had wired him back telling him he was welcome to come, but that he had nothing for sale at the time. He had to figure out a way to convince him to sell mules he did not want to sell for money Charles did not have.

  Well, he thought, stranger things are happening.

  Two days ago, Catherine had shown up at the shack. Came right down an
d knocked on the door. He began to sweat, just remembering it. Doc Walker had told her what had happened, and she wanted to see Billy. When she sat down by his bed he had taken her hands and patted them for a long time. Just patted them and patted them, his hand on hers making a little cupping sound. A wistful doped-up look on his face. Charles had stood by the door, frozen, madly jealous of the attention she was giving Billy, ashamed of the smell of the place, the strip of flypaper behind the woodstove, the dirty horse blankets piled on Billy’s bed.

  I tried to warn you, she said, looking from Billy to Charles with tears in her eyes.

  It’s my fault, Charles said weakly. I didn’t listen.

  It’s nobody’s damn fault, Billy said.

  She said that after the horse had killed the man in Nashville she had begged her father not to sell her.

  He told me that it was a freak accident, she said, shaking her head. He convinced me that it could have happened anywhere, with any horse. But I should have known better than to trust my father. The only reason that poor man was killed was because of his secrecy and double-talk. You see, it all happened when he went to bail Edmund out at school. He took the mare and surrey instead of the Pierce-Arrow because he didn’t want to draw attention to his trip, and then he left her at a low-class stable for the same reason. He didn’t want word getting back to Richfield, what he was doing down there. When the man was found dead in her stall that morning, he even managed to keep it out of the newspaper. Same as Edmund’s trouble.

  She pulled her hands away from Billy’s, and clasped them in her lap. All this secrecy. All this equivocating. My father’s reputation means more to him than . . . oh, that poor man! His poor family. I tried to go see them. My father found out, and forbade me. Practically locked me up in my room.

  And how on earth did you talk him into letting you come down here? Billy had leaned back against the folded blankets. He looked completely drained. Charles was still glued to the doorway.

  He’s got no idea I’m here.

  Well then you ought to get on out of here, Billy said gently. Don’t know how we’d explain you if anyone came along.

  She shot a colluding look at Charles that made his knees weak. Don’t worry about that. I’ve thought about that. And the thing is, Mister Monday, I’m a fast talker myself.

  Even here in the office at the front of Pendergrass’s house Charles could hear the racket of the braying mules. He looked out the window. The barns were up on a hill, in great long shed rows. All around them, cross-fenced pastures shone. A man on horseback was riding through a pasture of little jennet donkeys. Out in the yard a magnolia nearly as big as the ones at Everbright spread its black arms. Near it stood a small rose garden.

  Pen Pendergrass burst into the office, swearing at someone behind him in the hall.

  If they want to murder that animal, he was saying, they can do it on their own goddamn land.

  Hardly looking at Charles, he crossed to the desk and began to search through the stacks of paper. He was older than Charles had expected. White hair, white mustache, stooped shoulders. It took a few moments to notice he only had one arm. The empty sleeve hung by his side. He had either forgotten or not bothered to pin it up.

  Welcome, welcome, welcome, he said, still shuffling papers. The white mustache jumped. How the hell are you, how was your trip. Always happy to show a man around the place but you’re wasting your time. Got nothing for sale this time of year.

  Well— Charles stammered.

  Speak up, boy! Speak up! A man’s got to assert himself. This country was not built by the meek.

  Pendergrass pointed to the portrait of Washington above the desk.

  That man right there. General Washington. You think he stammered when he met a man? Hell no. He stuck out his hand and said, ‘Hello, I’m George Goddamn Washington, and who the hell are you?’

  Well I’m Charles Goddamn McLaughlin. And I need some mules.

  Ha! Good boy! Pendergrass smiled. You want to know why I keep him up there, son? Not because he’s the father of this country. But because he’s the father of the American mule.

  Charles grinned.

  It’s not a joke, boy! They ought to teach it in school. Trust you’ve heard of a little war called the American Revolution. Well when that was finally over, General Washington was a happy man, because now he could get down to what he really wanted to do, which was study the problem of animal power for this brand-new country. The ox was too slow and the horse too delicate for the virgin fields. He had a hunch about mules, but American donkeys were too puny to breed good ones. American donkeys’ equipment just snapped off in the big American horse mares.

  Pendergrass snapped his fingers. He was still smiling up at the portrait. Charles could see his chest rising and falling.

  Well the general knew for a fact that Spain had the best mules in the world, and the best donkeys to make them with. Lucky he’s got connections. Calls up his old friend Lafayette, who calls the king of Spain. Says, ‘Send your best donkey to Mount Vernon.’ And he did. Name was Royal Gift.

  Pendergrass put his hand over his heart.

  Wouldn’t I love to go back in time and see that donkey. He must have been impressive. Washington set him up at Mount Vernon, put out the call for the best horse mares. And they came from all directions, only Royal Gift—he didn’t deliver! They couldn’t get him in the mood. Wouldn’t even look at a mare. It’s a complicated business, you know, trying to breed a horse to a donkey. Like trying to bring together two magnets at the same pole. Poor George. But give up? Never! Not on the Delaware, not with a jackass! He got right down to finding another donkey. This one all the way from Malta. This was his life’s work, remember! Put his best men on the job of getting him delivered. Finally got that breeding program going. Started breeding good jackasses, and men from all over came to him to breed their horses to them. The American mule was born. The general’s greatest contribution to this country.

  Pendergrass saluted the portrait. Charles, caught up in the moment, did the same.

  You see, my boy, George Washington was a man of vision. He might have been a great military man, but his quest to make the perfect mule shows that at heart he was a man of the imagination. Like Edison, or Ford. And the power of the imagination is stronger than the power of the sword, at the end of the day.

  Pen Pendergrass leapt towards the door. Charles’s heart was pounding with excitement.

  But what are we doing sitting here talking, son? You want to meet my mules!

  They headed up the hill to the barns. Pendergrass charged ahead, his one arm pumping, toes pointing out to the sides, his empty sleeve flapping like a banner. Charles struggled to keep up with him. The old man was like a locomotive.

  His heart had pounded like this in the shack when Catherine gave him that conspiring look. And just as she had promised, when Dillehay’s son showed up a few minutes later to collect the rent, she smooth-talked him so fast. Charmed him out of any suspicion. She flashed him a big smile and said she was canvassing for the Fatherless Children of France. Natural as anything. You would have never known that a moment ago she had been sitting there crying. When he told her she was wasting her time trying to get anything from Billy and Charles, she took his arm and batted her eyes and said, Well then, Jack, let’s go up and see your mother. And out she had swept with him, the poor fellow looking equally helpless and thrilled. It was like some kind of magic trick. As soon as she was gone Charles could not believe she had even been there.

  The brays grew louder as they approached the barns, and Pendergrass raised his voice to compete until he was nearly shouting. A wolf had been killing his neighbors’ chickens for weeks, he said. Several had gone after him with dogs and guns but had no luck. Now they were all setting out poisoned meat. Pendergrass refused to cooperate.

  He paused and swept his good arm towards the distant woods.

  I don’t care if he’s killing your goddamn chickens, he growled. That wolf’s life is worth ten thousand goddamn
chickens. A wolf, he’s the wilderness. And we need wilderness. Because a man cannot be a man without the wilderness at his back.

  They arrived at the first barn. Someone was driving a manure spreader out to the fields. Charles whistled at the team. They were fine mules, perfectly matched. Pendergrass beamed and said they were Kate and Duplicate, full sisters. Another team, Pete and Repeat, were standing in a paddock nearby.

  Sometimes I think, if only I could churn em out on an assembly line. The way old Mister Ford does up there in his factory in Detroit. Then I’d really be making some money.

  Yessir, Charles said.

  Slaves and mules, boy. Slaves and mules built the South. Everything.

  It’s awful ugly, what they did to those people.

  You can’t build a country this great this fast without a whole lot of ugliness and that’s just a fact. Washington knew that and it pained his heart all his life. Jefferson knew it too. Neither of them could figure out how to get around it.

  They went on to the line of small paddocks where the jacks were kept. The donkeys watched them approach.

  Pendergrass lifted his empty sleeve and shook it. The nearest jack perked up his head and swung his big ears towards them.

  Ain’t he something, Pendergrass said. That there’s my Ponderosa.

  The donkey was huge, not only in size but in presence. A great dark gravity to him, ears that went on and on. He regarded them with his mysterious donkey eyes.

  Pendergrass rubbed the donkey’s nose.

  Tough life, ain’t it? Eat, sleep, screw. Drew the short straw, didn’t you, you old fool?

  He stood back and admired the animal for a moment.

  Just a big nuisance, is what he is.

  Then he beckoned to Charles to come along. He had just installed mechanical water troughs in every paddock. An alarm sounded in the main barn when the water level dropped too low. He explained the engineering of it in great detail. He was nearly as proud of it as his animals.