The Feet of God

20 - AN AFFAIR TO REMEMBER

Ma sang out, “Rufus, dear, your Ma needs another drink.  Be a lamb and come fix her one.”

The response from the porch was another heaving retch.

“I’ll get you your drink, Ma,” I volunteered, taking my opportunity to slip behind the smoke-mirrored bar.  “Or maybe not.”  I held up the empty bottle for all to see.  “It looks like you’re completely out of booze.”

“You have a lot to learn, newbie lamb.”  Ma’s eyes darted toward Bob with silent instructions.

“To the bat cave it is,” Bob jumped up and went over to an empty bookcase at the side of the bar.  With a slight push the shelves rolled aside on hidden casters, and Bob disappeared into some sorta secret passageway.  Rufus skulked back into the parlor wiping his lips with the back of a sleeve, as Ma hummed to herself in creepy contentedness.  Soon enough Bob reappeared loaded down with bottles.  A light kick to the bottom of the shelves rolled everything back into place.

Ma spoke as Bob restocked the bar.  “First, we have to protect the younger Seekers from any possible danger.”  She held up her empty glass and tilted her head, indicating she wanted to be freshened.  Bob rushed right over and filled the old lady’s glass with ice cubes and liquor.  Reloaded, Ma continued her talk.  “I know how gossip and all sorts of crazy rumors can fly about.  I’ve found it useful to spread some myself.  But I have it on good authority from a source in DC that Moses and his crowd provided charities and agencies with the retinal scanners.”

Bob gasped.

Ma nodded, “They intend to block The Path.”

“No,” Bob cried out.

“Yes, Remington wants to stop us from getting our share.”  She took a long pull on her cocktail.

Bob touched the hem of Ma’s garment.  “I can’t believe Moses could be so hateful toward our peaceful community of simple gatherers.”

“Believe, o little lamb,” the old woman slurred.  “Believe.”

Ma took her time sipping and smoking, as she seemed to be dredging up memories of events from a shadowy past which was somehow difficult to share.  “Moses was always a force to be reckoned with in the industry.  He packed a lot of asses into movie theater seats and made piles of money for the film studios.  He had juice.  And I must give him credit, he learned his lines.”

“But,” she flapped her arms, “Moses Remington was a ham actor of the first magnitude, a star who pretentiously considered himself a serious artist when he was chewing up scenery in crappy features like Punishment Pony, the awful hairy ape series, and in my opinion, the worst of them all, the R-rated comedy, Combat Gyno with Felicity Fontaine.”

Ma nodded at Bob to signal she needed another helping of scotch.  “Around this time he got a mysterious invitation to a very private affair in Bel Air.  All I can say is, two days later he returned wearing a Run, Ron, Run button.  He was a changed man.  Almost like he’d gotten an alien implant in his brain.  It was the end of us.  I moved out and got involved in the underground press, and he became the mouthpiece for nuclear waste, no-down mortgages and political causes.”

Ma sank deeper into her chair.  “Now after all these years he’s here.”

“Why, Ma, why?” Bob asked.

“To settle a score.”

“I don’t believe it,” Rufus piped up.

The old woman slammed her empty cocktail glass on a side table and stirred herself to her feet.  “Believe,” she repeated, her mustache bristling.  “Truth is always the strangest fiction.”  She glided outside for some fresh air and we followed close on her heels, stepping high over the remnants of Rufus’ unexpected bout of illness.

Suddenly blue lights appeared in flashing urgency through the shade of tall trees, and an official-looking government vehicle sped into the front yard.  A tall, dark Native American-looking dude in a crisp gray uniform presented himself.

“Who’s that?” I whispered in Bob’s ear.

“Marshal Stern Bear,” she whispered in mine.