The Last Nickel

by D Bedell

One

A clump of July flies rose from the Angel City Cafe screen door as Tom Stackwood opened it to let the boy go in first. Two or three flies made it inside where the counterman waited disapprovingly with flyswatter in reach. Tom followed the boy and let the screen door slam with the snap of a proud new spring. The counterman winced and waved stiffly to the stools with wood seats at the bar in front of him. They were his only two customers; it was still a little early and the farmers had not yet come to town for Saturday night supper and games of pool.

Stackwood preferred a booth against the wall, but guided the boy to the stools worn shiny from jeans and overalls preparing for Sunday repentance on Saturday night. The boy spun the seat on its pedestal under the despairing eye of the counterman. Tom chided the boy and motioned for him to sit.

“How much is a hamburger today?” Stackwood asked as he sat.

“Nickel,” the counterman grunted. “Make ya’ two for eight cents.”

“One for the boy.”

The counterman nodded and headed to the kitchen. “Won’t take long,” he said.

Stackwood absently felt the nickel in his pocket, reassuring himself once more that it was still there. It was all he had for the spare boy seated beside him. 

Last of it ‘til payday.

The boy stared at himself in the mirror behind the bar. He wondered if he looked that way to everyone. It was hard to tell what people saw. Sometimes they just looked away. He was used to it, especially when he had a spell. It always happened at the worst time, especially in church when he was trying to pray. Half the congregation thought he was possessed and the rest just pitied the Stackwoods. The preacher prayed for him to be relieved of his affliction. He fingered the still tender scar on his forehead, seeing it reversed in the mirror.

Got to pray harder.

The counterman returned with the hamburger on a small plate with two pickle slices and a scrap of lettuce on the side, his steps heavy on the linoleum floor worn black in his path. He slid the plate across the counter. A napkin was not offered. The boy looked at Tom who nodded for him to eat. As he ate, the boy wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. When he finished, Stackwood took the nickel out of his pocket and slid it across the counter near the flyswatter. 

“Let’s go, Eli. We’ve gotta cow to milk,” Tom said.

Eli slipped from the stool and gave it a last spin under the counterman’s glare. Stackwood gave a slight smile, the only kind he had. As they left the cafe, Tom saw the boy had a blank look in his eyes, a sign of an impending seizure. Stackwood had parked his second hand 1932 pickup in front of the General Merchandise a block down the street. He hurried Eli along to get to the truck and off the mainstreet sidewalk.

Please wait.

The spell struck the boy and he dropped like an empty flour sack, his arms and legs thrashing against the sidewalk with sharp slaps. A low guttural howl came from him. People in stores looked out and those on the street went another way. Stackwood was embarrassed and knelt to restrain the boy from harm, placing his hand under the boy’s head to keep it from slamming into the concrete. When it passed, the boy began to cry as Tom helped him up and into the truck. “Let’s go home, Eli,” he said. “It’s been enough of a day.”

Two

Hugo Haupt, owner and counterman of the Angel City Cafe, watched Tom Stackwood open the screen door and motion the boy Eli inside. The slam of the screen door irritated him as most things did.

Just got a new spring.

He waved to the stools in front of him to avoid the trip to a booth against the wall that he knew Stackwood would want. The boy spun the stool seat on its pedestal. 

“How much is a hamburger today?” Stackwood asked as he sat.

“Nickel,” Haupt grunted. “Make ya’ two for eight cents.”

“One for the boy.”

“Won’t take long,” Haupt said as he headed to the kitchen.

In the kitchen, Haupt rolled three day old hamburger into a ball and used a spatula  to press it flat on the grill with a sizzle. He set the spatula aside, took a bun from the bag, and put it on a small plate. Two slices of pickle and a scrap of lettuce provided garnish. The meat was bleeding through and he flipped it over, pressing it flatter to fill out the bun. When it was done he took the plate to the boy and slid it across the counter. He did not offer a napkin. The boy looked at Stackwood and then began to eat, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Haupt snorted.

When Tom and Eli left, Haupt took the nickel and dropped it into the cash register with a lonely clink. He picked up the flyswatter and began to hunt. 

Three

Marjorie Stackwood stood akimbo on the porch and watched Tom pull into the yard to park the pickup. Eli was slumped in the seat, listless. Tom was out of the truck before Eli stirred and got out.

“I s’pose you spent your last nickel in town,” she barked.

“Eli needed a hamburger,” Tom replied, wary of the impending invective.

“We got food here,” she snarled. “Should’a saved it.”

Tom sighed and said, “C’ mon Eli, let’s milk the cow.”

Supper was ready after the milking. Tom looked at the fried salt pork, lamb’s quarter greens, and cornbread with trepidation. Juice from the greens had gotten to the cornbread. He picked up the knife and fork to cut the pork. Eli teased the meat with his fork.

Same shit everyday.

“Eat your supper, Eli,” Marjorie snapped.

“Not hungry,” Eli mumbled.

“Spoiled your supper with a hamburger, didn’t ya?” Marjorie accused. She glared at Tom. “Should’a saved that nickel,” she declared, satisfied with her harridan wrath.

Tom ate in silence and took his plate with utensils to the sink when he was done. “Goin’ outside to smoke,” he said.

“Shouldn’t be spendin’ money on that either,” Marjorie called after him before she went back to berating Eli for not eating.

The sounds of twilight cicadas drowned out Marjorie’s rantings and Tom was relieved that he could not hear her. She was his brother’s widow and Eli’s mother. He had married her after a year of public grieving to follow the scripture. The boy had been all right before the accident last year.  He liked the boy well enough in their mutual bond of suffering.

Gettin’ throw’d outta the truck is what did it.

Four

Eli had a bad Saturday night with spells and couldn’t go to church Sunday morning. Tom volunteered to stay home with him while Marjorie went to her declared devotions in Angel City. She could drive herself, but didn’t like it and didn’t want to agree with Tom. Finally, after a long silence, she agreed.

“I don’t like it. Leavin’ you two here alone,” she bemoaned. 

“We’ll be fine. Eli’s sick,” Tom replied.

“I’ll see if the preacher can come this afternoon.”

Tom flushed. There were few men he disliked more than Preacher Cherry and Marjorie knew it. The smug little man made Tom’s skin crawl. How could a man his age still have baby fat?

Damn little good that’ll do.

Eli rested the morning and didn’t have any more seizures. Tom sat on the porch and smoked his cob pipe filled with Prince Albert. Marjorie did not approve of smoking and was vehement in her disgust for his occasional whiskey and craps game. It did not concern him beyond enduring her castigations. Payday was next Friday and he would be out that night with the “hoot owls” at Sutter’s Cut on Angel Creek. Saturday, he and Marjorie would go to the General Merchandise for staples and tobacco. She would rail about it fervently in front of the storekeeper who had seen it before and always stayed silent while he placed the cans of Prince Albert on the counter. Marjorie would complain bitterly all the way home that they could go to St. Joe to shop if he saved the money he spent on tobacco and sin with his no account friends. 

Hope that damn preacher don’t come.

Tom was disappointed in his hope.

Five

Preacher Cherry pulled his ‘34 Chevy into the yard behind Marjorie and saw Tom Stackwood sitting on the porch smoking his cob pipe. 

Smokin’ on Sunday! No wonder that poor boy’s sick.

Cherry parked and got out at the same time as Marjorie. He lifted his hand and called, “Blessings, Tom.”

Tom nodded and knocked out his pipe on the porch post. He stood and waved noncommittally. “Blessings,” he mumbled.

Going to be a long day.

Eli stood at the kitchen screen door and watched Cherry be led in by Marjorie.

“Hello, Eli. Blessings,” he said.

“Blessings,” Eli replied ritually. He liked Cherry, but didn’t feel like an afternoon of praying. He thought about saying he didn’t feel good and going to his bed, leaving Marjorie to have the preacher to herself in pious display. 

That would be a lie.

Eli chided himself for trying to avoid praying. He thought it might make a difference and wanted to take no chances. 

Faith. That’s what the preacher says.

Faith or fate descended on Eli with a seizure that startled Cherry. He had not seen the boy thrash so violently before and wondered if there was more than sickness at work.

Is it the devil in him?

Cherry prayed over Eli until the boy eventually calmed. Marjorie smiled with satisfied vindication. Tom didn’t see anything different than Saturday in Angel City when all he had done was hold Eli’s head off the sidewalk. He hadn’t thought to pray.

Makes no goddamn difference.

Tom hoped Cherry would leave soon, his duty done. Cherry stayed for supper at Marjorie’s unrelenting behest and Tom’s dismay at the prospect of more praying. Eli was quiet as he ate his fried salt pork. Cherry ate more than the others, his soft hands adept with knife and fork.

Six

On Monday, Tom drove to his job on the Narrows Bridge WPA project. The work was hard and treacherous on the Nishnabotna River crossing, but the forty dollars a month was all he had for them to live on. July heat, mosquito swarms, and cottonmouths made the days harder. One of the crew had passed out from the heat and had to be leaned against a willow to come around in its sparse shade. A circle of manila rope had been laid around him to fend off snakes. 

Payday’s comin’.

The week passed with aching slowness. On Friday, Tom had some whiskey with a couple of the crew before he drove home. He knew Marjorie would smell it and become shrill, but didn’t care in the whisky glow: He had plans to shoot craps at Sutter’s Cut, telling himself he would only bet a nickel at a time.

He washed up outside at the cistern pump before he went inside the house, rinsing his mouth and chewing some wild mint leaves before he went inside. It didn’t help; Marjorie confronted him accusingly.

“You been drinkin’ already!” she hissed.

“Goin’ out tonight,” he said with whiskey bravado.

“Wastin’ more money!” she declared.

“We’ll go to the store tomorrow,” he said flatly to divert her.

She turned on her heels and said “Don’t expect supper or nothin’ else.”

Alright with me.

The game had already started on an old Army blanket by lantern light when Tom got to Sutter’s Cut. A jar of ‘shine was being passed around. He sipped whiskey when it was handed to him and he passed it on. On the third pass, he decided to place a bet. Rollo Rathbone, storekeeper at the General Merchandise, had the dice and was usually lucky. 

It’s just a dollar and that’s it.

Rathbone rolled a point and doubled his bet. Tom put another dollar down to win on the roll. 

What the hell? Hear about it anyway.

Rathbone rolled eleven and Tom had four dollars in his stack. He let it ride. Rathbone still had the roll. A couple of shooters dropped out of a game that had become too rich for WPA wages. Rathbone rolled another point and then a seven. Tom had eight dollars. He bet against the pass line and Rathbone shot craps. Tom had sixteen dollars. He took another gulp of whiskey and picked up ten dollars from his stack. It was his roll and he made his point. He upped his bet to ten dollars. It was just him and Ratbone now; the others were making small side bets on the two. Rathbone matched the bet and Tom rolled eleven. It was give and take with Rathbone until Tom won the biggest pots anyone of the hoot owls had seen. In the end he walked away with one hundred dollars of Rathbone’s money, two and half months pay. He could hardly believe it as he climbed unsteadily into his truck. As he drove, he remembered another night when the boy had been riding in the back.

When he got home, Marjoried was waiting in the kitchen.

“Did you lose it all?” she demanded. “You smell like a saloon.”

“I won a little,” holding out his winnings

“I don’t care; it’s wages of sin,” she screamed and snatched the money from his hand. “I’m gonna throw it in the stove.”

“Goddamn it! There’s a hundred dollars there,” Tom shouted back.

Marjorie stopped and looked at the money in her hand. “We’re goin’ to St. Joe tomorrow,” she whispered dumbfounded.

Tom smiled to himself.

The wages of sin.

‘Pull Quote’

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