Bagombo Snuff Box: Uncollected Short Fiction Page 13

  “I was looking at your eyes,” said Falloleen.

  Otto snapped his fingers. “And then it came to me! By heaven, something was all wrong with ordinary cosmetics in the moonlight. The wrong colors came out, blues and greens. Falloleen looked like she’d just swum the English Channel.”

  Falloleen slapped him with all her might.

  “Whatja do that for?” bellowed Otto, his face crimson from the blow “You think I’ve got no sense of pain?”

  “You think I haven’t?” seethed Falloleen. “You think I’m striated plywood and plastic?”

  Otto gasped.

  “I’m sick of being Falloleen and the style show that never ends!” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “She’s dull and shallow, scared and lost, unhappy and unloved.”

  She twitched the yellow handkerchief from my breast pocket and wiped it across her face dramatically, leaving a smear of red, pink, white, blue, and black. “You designed her, you deserve her, and here she is!” She pressed the stained handkerchief into Otto’s limp hand. Up the ramp she went. “Good-bye!”

  “Falloleen!” cried Otto.

  She paused in the doorway. “My name is Kitty Cahoun Krummbein,” she said. “Falloleen is in your hand.”

  Otto waved the handkerchief at her. “She’s as much yours as she is mine,” he said. “You wanted to be Falloleen. You did everything you could to be Falloleen.”

  “Because I loved you,” said Kitty. She was weeping. “She was all your design, all for you.”

  Otto turned his palms upward. “Krummbein is not infallible,” he said. “There was widespread bloodshed when the American housewife took the Krummbein Vortex Can Opener to her bosom. I thought being Falloleen would make you happy, and it’s made you unhappy instead. I’m sorry. No matter how it turned out, it was a work of love.”

  “You love Falloleen,” said Kitty.

  “I love the way she looked,” said Otto. He hesitated. “Are you really Kitty again?”

  “Would Falloleen show her face looking like this?”

  “Never,” said Otto. “Then I can tell you, Kitty, that Falloleen was a crashing bore when she wasn’t striking a pose or making a dramatic entrance or exit. I lived in terror of being left alone with her.”

  “Falloleen didn’t know who she was or what she was,” Kitty sobbed. “You didn’t give her any insides.”

  Otto went up to her and put his arms around her. “Sweetheart,” he said, “Kitty Cahoun was supposed to be inside, but she disappeared completely.”

  “You didn’t like anything about Kitty Cahoun,” said Kitty.

  “My dear, sweet wife,” said Otto, “there are only four things on earth that don’t scream for redesigning, and one of them is the soul of Kitty Cahoun. I thought it was lost forever.”

  She put her arms around him tentatively. “And the other three?” she said.

  “The egg,” said Otto, “the Model-T Ford, and the exterior of Falloleen.

  “Why don’t you freshen up,” said Otto, “slip into your lavender negligee, and put a white rose behind your ear, while I straighten things out here with the Scourge of Wall Street?”

  “Oh, dear,” she said. “I’m starting to feel like Falloleen again.”

  “Don’t be afraid of it,” said Otto. “Just make sure this time that Kitty shines through in all her glory.”

  She left, supremely happy.

  “I’ll get right out,” I said. “Now I know you want to be alone with her.”

  “Frankly, I do,” said Otto.

  “I’ll open a checking account and hire a safe-deposit box in your name tomorrow,” I said.

  And Otto said, “Sounds like your kind of thing. Enjoy, enjoy.”

  Ambitious

  Sophomore

  George M. Helmholtz, head of the music department and director of the band of Lincoln High School, was a good, fat man who saw no evil, heard no evil, and spoke no evil, for wherever he went, the roar and boom and blast of a marching band, real or imagined, filled his soul. There was room for little else, and the Lincoln High School Ten Square Band he led was, as a consequence, as fine as any band on earth.

  Sometimes, when he heard muted, wistful passages, real or imagined, Helmholtz would wonder if it wasn’t indecent of him to be so happy in such terrible times. But then the brasses and percussion section would put sadness to flight, and Mr. Helmholtz would see that his happiness and its source could only be good and rich and full of hope for everyone.

  Helmholtz often gave the impression of a man lost in dreams, but there was a side to him that was as tough as a rhinoceros. It was that side that raised money for the band, that hammered home to the school board, the Parent Teacher Association, Chamber of Commerce, Kiwanis, Rotary, and Lions that the goodness and richness and hope that his band inspired cost money. In his fund-raising harangues, he would recall for his audiences black days for the Lincoln High football team, days when the Lincoln stands had been silent, hurt, and ashamed.

  “Half-time,” he would murmur, and hang his head.

  He would twitch a whistle from his pocket and blow a shrill blast. “Lincoln High School Ten Square Band!” he’d shout. “Forward—harch! Boom! Ta-ta-ta-taaaaaa!” Helmholtz, singing, marching in place, would become flag twirlers, drummers, brasses, woodwinds, glockenspiel and all. By the time he’d marched his one-man band up and down the imaginary football field once, his audience was elated and wringing wet, ready to buy the band anything it wanted.

  But no matter how much money came in, the band was always without funds. Helmholtz was a spender when it came to band equipment, and was known among rival bandmasters as “The Plunger” and “Diamond Jim.”

  Among the many duties of Stewart Haley, Assistant Principal of Lincoln High, was keeping an eye on band finances. Whenever it was necessary for Haley to discuss band finances with Helmholtz, Haley tried to corner the bandmaster where he couldn’t march and swing his arms.

  Helmholtz knew this, and felt trapped when Haley appeared in the door of the bandmaster’s small office, brandishing a bill for ninety-five dollars. Following Haley was a delivery boy from a tailor shop, who carried a suit box under his arm. As Haley closed the office door from inside, Helmholtz hunched over a drawing board, pretending deep concentration.

  “Helmholtz,” said Haley, “I have here an utterly unexpected, utterly unauthorized bill for—”

  “Sh!” said Helmholtz. “I’ll be with you in a moment.” He drew a dotted line across a diagram that was already a black thicket of lines. “I’m just putting the finishing touches on the Mother’s Day formation,” he said. “I’m trying to make an arrow pierce a heart and then spell ‘Mom.’ It isn’t easy.”

  “That’s very sweet,” said Haley, rattling the bill, “and I’m as fond of mothers as you are, but you’ve just put a ninety-five-dollar arrow through the public treasury.”

  Helmholtz did not look up. “I was going to tell you about it,” he said, drawing another line, “but what with getting ready for the state band festival and Mother’s Day, it seemed unimportant. First things first.”

  “Unimportant!” said Haley. “You hypnotize the community into buying you one hundred new uniforms for the Ten Square Band, and now—”

  “Now?” said Helmholtz mildly.

  “This boy brings me a bill for the hundred-and-first uniform!” said Haley. “Give you an inch and—”

  Haley was interrupted by a knock. “Come in,” said Helmholtz. The door opened, and there stood Leroy Duggan, a shy, droll, slope-shouldered sophomore. Leroy was so self-conscious that when anyone turned to look at him he did a sort of fan dance with his piccolo case and portfolio, hiding himself as well as he could behind them.

  “Come right in, Leroy,” said Helmholtz.

  “Wait outside a moment, Leroy,” said Haley. “This is rather urgent business.”

  Leroy backed out, mumbling an apology, and Haley closed the door again.

  “My door is always open to my musicians,” said Helmholtz.

/>   “It will be,” said Haley, “just as soon as we clear up the mystery of the hundred-and-first uniform.”

  “I’m frankly surprised and hurt at the administration’s lack of faith in my judgment,” said Helmholtz. “Running a precision organization of a hundred highly talented young men isn’t the simple operation everyone seems to think.”

  “Simple!” said Haley. “Who thinks it’s simple! It’s plainly the most tangled, mysterious, expensive mess in the entire school system. You say a hundred young men, but this boy here just delivered the hundred-and-first uniform. Has the Ten Square Band added a tail gunner?”

  “No,” said Helmholtz. “It’s still a hundred, much as I’d like to have more, much as I need them. For instance, I was just trying to figure out how to make Whistler’s Mother with a hundred men, and it simply can’t be done.” He frowned. “If we could throw in the girls’ glee club we might make it. You’re intelligent and have good taste. Would you give me your ideas on the band festival and this Mother’s Day thing?”

  Haley lost his temper. “Don’t try to fuddle me, Helmholtz! What’s the extra uniform for?”

  “For the greater glory of Lincoln High School!” barked Helmholtz. “For the third leg and permanent possession of the state band festival trophy!” His voice dropped to a whisper, and he glanced furtively at the door. “Specifically, it’s for Leroy Duggan, probably the finest piccoloist in this hemisphere. Let’s keep our voices down, because we can’t discuss the uniform without discussing Leroy.”

  The conversation became tense whispers.

  “And what’s the matter with Leroy’s wearing one of the uniforms you’ve already got?” said Haley.

  “Leroy is bell-shaped,” said Helmholtz. “We don’t have a uniform that doesn’t bag or bind on him.”

  “This is a public school, not a Broadway musical!” said Haley. “Not only have we got students shaped liked bells, we’ve got them shaped like telephone poles, pop bottles, chimpanzees, and Greek gods. There’s going to have to be a certain amount of bagging and binding.”

  “My duty,” said Helmholtz, standing, “is to bring the best music out of whoever chooses to come to me. If a boy’s shape prevents him from making the music he’s capable of making, then it’s my duty to get him a shape that will make him play like an angel. This I did, and here we are.” He sat down. “If I could be made to feel sorry for this, then I wouldn’t be the man for my job.”

  “A special uniform is going to make Leroy play better?” said Haley.

  “In rehearsals, with nobody but fellow musicians around,” said Helmholtz, “Leroy has brilliance and feeling that would make you weep and faint. But when Leroy marches, with strangers watching, particularly girls, he gets out of step, stumbles, and can’t even play ‘Row, Row, Row Your Boat.’ “Helmholtz brought his fist down on the desk. “And that’s not going to happen at the state band festival!”

  The bill in Haley’s hand was rumpled and moist now. “The message I came to deliver today,” he said, “remains unchanged: You can’t get blood out of a turnip. The total cash assets of the band are seventy-five dollars, and there is absolutely no way for the school to provide the remaining twenty—absolutely none.”

  He turned to the delivery boy. “That is my somber message to you, as well,” he said.

  “Mr. Kornblum said he was losing money on it as it was,” said the delivery boy. “He said Mr. Helmholtz came in and started talking, and before he knew it—”

  “Don’t worry about a thing,” said Helmholtz. He brought out his checkbook and, with a smile and a flourish, wrote a check for twenty dollars.

  Haley was ashen. “I’m sorry it has to turn out this way,” he said.

  Helmholtz ignored him. He took the parcel from the delivery boy and called to Leroy, “Would you come in, please?”

  Leroy came in slowly, shuffling, doing his fan dance with the piccolo case and portfolio, apologizing as he came.

  “Thought you might like to try on your new uniform for the band festival, Leroy,” said Helmholtz.

  “I don’t think I’d better march,” said Leroy. “I’d get all mixed up and ruin everything.”

  Helmholtz opened the box dramatically. “This uniform’s special, Leroy.”

  “Every time I see one of those uniforms,” said Haley, “all I can think of is a road company of The Chocolate Soldier. That’s the uniform the stars wear, but you’ve got a hundred of the things—a hundred and one.”

  Helmholtz removed Leroy’s jacket. Leroy stood humbly in his shirtsleeves, relieved of his piccolo case and portfolio, comical, seeing nothing at all comical in being bell-shaped.

  Helmholtz slipped the new jacket over Leroy’s narrow shoulders. He buttoned the great brass buttons and fluffed up the gold braid cascading from the epaulets. “There, Leroy.”

  “Zoot!” exclaimed the delivery boy. “Man, I mean zoot!”

  Leroy looked dazedly from one massive, jutting shoulder to the other, and then down at the astonishing taper to his hips.

  “Rocky Marciano!” said Haley.

  “Walk up and down the halls, Leroy,” said Helmholtz. “Get the feel of it.”

  Leroy blundered through the door, catching his epaulets on the frame.

  “Sideways,” said Helmholtz, “you’ll have to learn to go through doors sideways.”

  “Only about ten percent of what’s under the uniform is Leroy,” said Haley, when Leroy was out of hearing.

  “It’s all Leroy,” said Helmholtz. “Wait and see—wait until we swing past the reviewing stand at the band festival and Leroy does his stuff.”

  When Leroy returned to the office, he was marching, knees high. He halted and clicked his heels. His chin was up, his breathing shallow.

  “You can take it off, Leroy,” said Helmholtz. “If you don’t feel up to marching in the band festival, just forget it.” He reached across his desk and undid a brass button.

  Leroy’s hand came up quickly to protect the rest of the buttons. “Please,” he said, “I think maybe I could march after all.”

  “That can be arranged,” said Helmholtz. “I have a certain amount of influence in band matters.”

  Leroy buttoned the button. “Gee,” he said, “I walked past the athletic office, and Coach Jorgenson came out like he was shot out of a cannon.”

  “What did the silent Swede have to say?” said Helmholtz.

  “He said that only in this band-happy school would they make a piccolo player out of a man built like a locomotive,” said Leroy. “His secretary came out, too.”

  “Did Miss Bearden like the uniform?” said Helmholtz. “I don’t know,” said Leroy. “She didn’t say anything. She just looked and looked.”

  Late that afternoon, George M. Helmholtz appeared in the office of Harold Crane, head of the English Department. Helmholtz was carrying a heavy, ornate gold picture frame and looking embarrassed.

  “I hardly know how to begin,” said Helmholtz. “I—I thought maybe I could sell you a picture frame.” He turned the frame this way and that. “It’s a nice frame, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, it is,” said Crane. “I’ve admired it often in your office. That is the frame you had around John Philip Sousa, isn’t it?”

  Helmholtz nodded. “I thought maybe you’d like to frame some John Philip Sousa in your line—Shakespeare, Edgar Rice Burroughs.”

  “That might be nice,” said Crane. “But frankly, the need hasn’t made itself strongly felt.”

  “It’s a thirty-nine-dollar frame,” said Helmholtz. “I’ll let it go for twenty.”

  “Look here,” said Crane, “if you’re in some sort of jam, I can let you have—”

  “No, no, no,” said Helmholtz, holding up his hand. Fear crossed his face. “If I started on credit, heaven only knows where it would end.”

  Crane shook his head. “That’s a nice frame, all right, and a real bargain. Sad to say, though, I’m in no shape to lay out twenty dollars for something like that. I’ve got to buy a new tire for
twenty-three dollars this afternoon and—”

  “What size?” said Helmholtz.

  “Size?” said Crane. “Six-seventy, fifteen. Why?”

  “I’ll sell you one for twenty dollars,” said Helmholtz. “Never been touched.”

  “Where would you get a tire?” said Crane.

  “By a stroke of luck,” said Helmholtz, “I have an extra one.”

  “You don’t mean your spare, do you?” said Crane.

  “Yes,” said Helmholtz, “but I’ll never need it. I’ll be careful where I drive. Please, you’ve got to buy it. The money isn’t for me, it’s for the band.”

  “What else would it be for?” said Crane helplessly. He took out his billfold.

  When Helmholtz got back to his office, and was restoring John Philip Sousa to the frame, Leroy walked in, whistling. He wore the jacket with the boulder shoulders.

  “You still here, Leroy?” said Helmholtz. “Thought you went home hours ago.”

  “Can’t seem to take the thing off,” said Leroy. “I was trying a kind of experiment with it.”

  “Oh?”

  “I’d walk down the hall past a bunch of girls,” said Leroy, “whistling the piccolo part of ‘The Stars and Stripes Forever.’”

  “And?” said Helmholtz.

  “Kept step and didn’t miss a note,” said Leroy.

  The city’s main street was cleared of traffic for eight blocks, swept, and lined with bunting for the cream of the state’s youth, its high school bands. At one end of the line of march was a great square with a reviewing stand. At the other end were the bands, hidden in alleys, waiting for orders to march.

  The band that looked and sounded best to the judges in the reviewing stand would receive a great trophy, donated by the Chamber of Commerce. The trophy was two years old, and bore the name of Lincoln High School as winner twice.

  In the alleys, twenty-five bandmasters were preparing secret weapons with which they hoped to prevent Lincoln’s winning a third time—special effects with flash powder, flaming batons, pretty cowgirls, and at least one three-inch cannon. But everywhere hung the smog of defeat, save over the bright plumage of the ranks of Lincoln High.