One Good Deed(5)

He lay back on the bed. But his Elgin wristwatch told him it was too early to go to bed. Probably too late to get a drink, though number 14 on his DOP don’t list was no bars and no drink. Number 15 was no women. So was number 16, at least in a way, though it more specifically referred to no “loose” women. The DOP probably had amassed a vast collection of statistics that clearly showed why the confluence of parolees and alcohol in close proximity to others drinking likewise was not a good thing. And when you threw in women, and more to the point, loose women, an apocalypse was the only likely outcome.

Of course, right now, he dearly wished for a libation of risky proportion.

Archer put on his jacket and his hat, scooped up his cash, and went in search of one.

And maybe the loose women, too.

A man in his position could not afford to be choosy. Or withholding of his desires.

On his first day of freedom he deemed life just too damn short for that.





Chapter 3



HE FOUND IT only a short distance from the hotel. Not on the main drag of Poca City, but down a side street that was only half the length of the one he’d left—but it was far more interesting, at least to Archer’s mind.

If the main street was for checker playing and marble musical babies, this was where the adults got their jollies. And Archer had always been a fan of the underdog with weaknesses of the flesh, considering how often he fell on that side of the ledger.

The marquee was neon blue and green with a smattering of sputtering red. He hadn’t seen the likes of such since New York City, where it had been ubiquitous. Yet he hadn’t expected a smidge of it in Poca City.

THE CAT’S MEOW.

That’s what the neon spelled out along with the outline of a feline in full, luxurious stretch that seemed erotic in nature. To Archer, Poca City was getting more interesting by the minute.

He pushed open the red door and walked in.

The first thing he noted was the floor. Planked and nailed and slimed with the slop of what they’d been serving here since the place opened, he reckoned. His one shoe stuck a bit, and then so did the other. Archer compensated by picking up the force of his steps.

The next thing of note was the crowd, or the size of it anyway. He didn’t know the population of the town, but if it had any more people than were in here, it might qualify as a metropolis.

The bar nearly ran the length of one wall. And like on the bows of old ships, sculpted into the corner support posts of the bar were the heads and exposed bosoms of women—he supposed loose ones. And every stool had a butt firmly planted on it. Against one wall fiddle and guitar players plucked and strummed, while one gal was singing for all she was worth. She had red curly hair, a pink, freckled face, and slim hips with stiff dungarees on over them. Her notes seemed to hit the ceiling so hard they ricocheted off with the force of combat shrapnel.

Behind the bar was a wall of shelves holding every type of bottled liquor Archer had ever seen and then some, by a considerable margin. He reckoned a man could live his whole life here and never grow thirsty, so long as the coin of the realm kept up.

Indeed, happening on this place after being behind bars this morning and enduring a long, dusty bus ride and encountering less than friendly citizens hereabouts, Archer considered he might be in a dream. With three years of probation to endure, he felt like a large fish with a hook in its mouth. He could be yanked back at any moment, and that lent force to a man’s whims. Thus, he decided to take full advantage while he could.

Sidling up to the bar, he wedged in between what seemed a colossus of a farmer with a rowdy beard and hands the width of Archer’s head, and a short, thick, late-fifties-something, slick-haired banker type in a creamy white three-piece suit far nicer than Archer’s. He also had a knotted blue-and-white-striped tie, with reptile leather two-tone shoes on his feet, a fully realized smirk in his eye, and a woman less than half his age on his arm. Resting on the bar in front of the man was a flat-crowned Panama hat with a yellow band of silk.

Archer caught the bartender’s attention and held up two horizontally stacked fingers and tacked on the words “Bourbon, straight up.”

The gent, old, spent, and thin as a strand of rope, nodded, retrieved the liquor from the vast stacks, poured it neat into a short glass, and held it out with one hand, while the other presented itself palm up for payment. It was a practiced motion that a man like Archer could appreciate.

“How much you charging for that?” he asked.

“Fifty cents for two fingers, take it or leave it, son.”

“What’s the bourbon again, pops?”

“Only one bourbon in these parts, young feller. Rebel Yell. Wheat, not rye. You don’t like Rebel, you best pick another type of alcohol or another part of the state. Give me an answer, ’cause I ain’t getting any younger and I got thirsty folks with folding money want my attention.”

“Rebel sounds fine to me.”

He passed over the two quarters and settled his elbows on the bar with the short glass cupped in both hands. He hadn’t had a drink in a while. He’d banged one back the day before prison, just for good luck, so he reckoned it was a certain symmetry to have one the day he left prison. He was into balance if nothing else these days. And moderation, too, until it proved inconvenient, which it very often did to a man like him.

The banker eyed Archer, while his lady ran her tongue over full lips painted as warm a red as a sky hosting a setting sun.