Old Mack's Tales

James Franklin "Big Boy" Jennings Tale
By Ron McKinney © 12/12/06

From the sidewalk at the foot of the stairs Agnes Parker and Vivian Shields saw the three men huddled around the table on the landing, saw the glass gallon jug of whiskey they passed from hand to hand.  In spite of her arthritic hips, Agnes climbed her steps two by two. When she reached the landing, Doctor Barnes had the jug to his lips.  Agnes dropped her shopping bag with a clatter, snatched the jug from the doctor's hands and threw it down the stairs.  The jug narrowly missed Vivian, who dodged in the nick of time, and it smashed on the sidewalk.

"Where's Ruth Erlene?" Agnes shouted.

"That was perfectly good whiskey, Agnes.  It's rude to waste good whiskey," Doc Barnes said, wiping his mouth and stubbled chin with the back of his hand.  "Ruth's inside with her baby . . . it's a girl, Agnes.  Mother and daughter are both doing just fine."

"Mack," Vivian said, panting for breath as she reached the landing, "What are you doing out here?  Why aren't you in with your wife where you belong at a time like this?"

"Now, Missus Shields, we were just celebrating," said the tall, bulky man in denim jeans with the cuff turned up, a collarless white shirt and suit coat.  His balding head glistened with perspiration and his sunburned face wore the crooked smile of a boy caught red handed.  "It ain't every day a man becomes a grandfather, you know." Frank Jennings said.

"Or a father," Mack said.  Mack looked at the two angry women and decided he'd be safer inside than out.  With one hand on the opened the door to his apartment, Mack grasped the doctor's shoulder and thanked him.  He shook hands with the other man and said:  "Frank, I'm glad we got this chance to talk.  Seems you've always been too busy down at that chili parlor of yours.  I may drop by on my way back to Lawton later tonight, if you plan to be around."

"I'll be there, Son.  That woman of mine is out at her ranch in Rush Springs.  Somebody has to run the store.  You come on by.  I reckon it's high time we got better acquainted," Frank Jennings said quietly.

"Leave, James Franklin.  Leave right now, and I don't want to see you back here again, you old sot." Agnes hissed.

"Wait downstairs for me Frank," Vivian said.  "I'd be obliged if you'd walk me home.  Mister Shields is still at the elevator loading out grain.  I'll look in on Ruth and the baby.  And be down in a few minutes.  Wait for me."

Frank Jennings lumbered down the stairs limber legged like a mountaineer.  When he reached the sidewalk he kicked the broken glass from the sidewalk onto the gravel beside the near set of tracks.  It glistened in the light of the street lamp.  Well, at least we put a good dent in that old jug before Agnes got her hands on it, Frank thought.  And there's always more where that came from.

Leaning against the lamp post, Frank Jennings rolled a smoke and thought about the cases of bonded whiskey stashed at his brother-in-law's place.  He and Frank Cosgrove had gone in fifty-fifty on the booze smuggled in on the train by the dining car head Negro.  The two Franks had a virtual monopoly on bonded whiskey, and their clientele were the businessmen of the town: the bankers, the editor of the weekly Marlow Review, the owner of the mercantile store and even the Ford dealer who'd put him out of business by opening his car dealership across the road from his livery stable.

"Hey, Big Boy" Doctor Barnes shouted at Frank.  "I'll stop in at your café after while.  I haven't eaten a thing all day.  You got a mess of that chili cooked?"

"Always, Doc--I'll be down to open the store, soon's I escort Miss Vivian home.  That won't be more than fifteen, twenty minutes.  I figure I ought to stop at Papa Calhoun's house while I'm in his neighborhood and let him know Ruth Erlene and the baby are doing okay."

Since the stock market crash, Vivian Shields and her husband had risen financially to the same plane as the bankers and other lights of the town.  The drought caused shortage of grain kept the market price high enough to realize a healthy margin on the grain in their elevators.  The paradox amused Frank almost as much as the banks going broke.

Looking up at Vivian from the sidewalk, Frank Jennings felt a shadow of his past envy of the business men of the town, including Mayor Shields.  There had been a time, a year or two after his wife Ina passed, when he had set his cap for Vivian Shields.  Vivian shields wore low heeled shoes, silk stockings that hid the varicose veins in her legs.  Her new cloth coat was just as stylish as Agnes's. They were obviously doing okay in spite of the crash in the stocks and commodities markets.

Frank chuckled.  He was recalling what had been, back before the Great War, when there was still a market for good horses.

He did a lot of business with the army at Fort Sill, until they replaced mounted cavalry with tanks.  But the death knell for the horse trade was rung by the proliferation of cheap cars and the Army's transition to trucks.  Frank thought about Mack.  He wondered whether Mack would get away from the mules that still drew the army's field kitchens, and become a truck driver. . .after a bit of thought, Frank opined that Mack was too feisty and independent minded to make anything of himself in the Army, which was as poorly paid as it was equipped.

As she eased into the small apartment, Vivian took off her new hat.  Her smile faded and tears streamed down the creases in her cheeks as she looked at Ruth Erlene and her baby.  She pawed through her bag until she found a hanky.

Vivian's eldest daughter had made her a grandmother six month earlier, but she was living in Oklahoma City and Vivian seldom found time to visit her.  She had known Ruth all of her life.  Vivian felt closer to her than she did to her own.  Vivian blew her nose, and then moved over to peek at the infant. She kissed Ruth on the cheek and asked how it went.

"I reckon I ruined that new blue skirt we made, Viv.  I was aiming to take that placket out and wear it.  But my water broke and it's got blood stains on it."

"Where'd you put it Ruthie?  I'll go soak it in some cold water and that stain will come out.  Don't you fret about that.  I've got lots of left over goods at home.  We'll make some now things soon's your up and about.  Is there anything you need, honey?  You let me know.  Okay?"

"You've already done so much for me Viv.  I don't know how I'll ever be able to repay you." Ruth said.  "Ouch!" Ruth said, looking down at the baby.  "I'll swear it feels like she's got teeth Vivian."  Although Laura Mae was sound asleep on Ruth's breast, she still had a grip on the dry breast.  When Ruth tried to move the baby, it clamped down harder on her nipple and continued to suck.

Vivian stepped over and broke the seal of the baby's mouth with a gentle prod of her forefinger and resettled the baby's head on the opposite breast.  "That's how you do it, dear." Vivian said, winking at Ruth.  "You gotta show 'em whose boss right off, or they wear you down before they're two years old."

Mack got up from the rocking chair and offered it to Vivian.  She shushed him and whispered: "I can't stay.  I've got to get on home and fix supper for Mister Shields."

Vivian looked at Mack's dusty, wrinkled uniform and scuffed calf-high laced riding boots.

"Are you staying the night, or heading on back to camp?" Vivian asked.

"He's going back to camp." Ruth asserted, "He's absent without leave now.  The longer he stays the worse the punishment's going to be.  I just hope they don't throw him in the stockade again.  They don't collect any pay for bad time, you know.  Maybe his Captain will go easy on him this time, if he gets back to camp sober.  They put a pretty high value on his baseball playing, you know.  Spring Training starts this week, if the President doesn't have to use them to put down the riots at the banks. 

Oh, Vivian, did I tell you President Roosevelt was talking to me on the radio while the baby was being born?" Ruth said drowsily.

"I feel really tired now, Viv.  I think I'll take a little nap.  What should I do with the baby?  I don't have a bassinette or a crib for her yet."

Vivian pulled out a drawer in the dresser standing near the bed, emptied it, and then took some bath towels out of a cupboard to make a nest in it.  She took the sleeping infant from Ruth and placed her in the drawer.  It was a snug little bed.

Agnes came into the apartment carrying a pot of tea, two cups and saucers and some sugar cubes.  She put the things on the table and then turned to Mack.

"Skedaddle on back to Fort Sill, Mack.  I'll stay here with Ruth tonight.  And mind you, don't be hanging around with old Frank Jennings.  You drink any more of that rotgut; you might kill yourself on that motor going back to camp." 

Mack stood up.  He was at a loss for words, outnumbered three to one, it was time to leave. He planted a kiss on the forehead of his sleeping wife and hastily retreated from the apartment.

Vivian and Frank Jennings stood under the street light, apparently waiting for him as Mack came down the stairs.

"I reckon y'all best go on, Frank.  I'm heading back to Lawton while I can still ride.  I'll catch up with you another time for that talk, if you don't mind."  Mack wheeled his motorcycle out from under the stairs and pushed it a block down to Main Street before cranking the engine.

"Well, Frank.  I guess we can go too." Vivian said, grasping the arm Frank offered her.

They walked south, parallel to the tracks to Second Street, where they turned right.  After Frank handed her off at her front porch, he crossed the street to the small house that resembled a railroad box car without wheels.

Papa Calhoun came out of his house in Union-Made Bib Alls and his red woolen underwear.  He walked a short distance into his side yard along the garden path with Frank.  They stopped at the earthen berm that covered the old man's cyclone cellar.   They sat on the bricked retaining walls beside the steps leading down into the underground shelter facing each other.  Papa Calhoun filled and lit his pipe.  Like most Civil War veterans in the town, Calhoun wore his white hair long as an Indian's and his beard covered his bib.  In Frank's eyes Papa Calhoun hadn't changed much over the past twenty years that he'd known the man.  Papa seemed just as spry and sharp witted at eighty-nine as most men of forty, and he was still an active builder.  Little wonder, Frank thought, that most folks in town knew and respected Cloudy Calhoun and called him "Poppa." Even the Yankee veterans respected him.

"Ruth Erlene and the baby are just fine, Papa," Frank said.  "She named the baby Laura Mae.  It was a beautiful baby. . . .Frank choked up.  "Lord, she reminded me so much of Ruth . . ."

"It's okay, Frank.  Ina's accident wasn't your fault, Son.  You just have to put that behind you, Frank and get on with your life.  I probably felt the same as you when my Elizabeth passed.  The only way I muddled through it was to keep myself busy working.  You know what I mean?  Don't be dwelling on the past.  It's gone and can't be changed.  You've got a family and a pretty good business going in town now.  Concentrate your mind on those thing you have, and it'll be a better day tomorrow.  You'll see."

Papa Calhoun took his pen knife out of his pocket and carved the dottle out of his pipe. He slapped the briar bowl against the callused palm of his huge left hand.

"I try to limit my drinking to a glass of whiskey mornings and nights, Frank.  I don't aim to tell you your business, Son, but it might clear your mind if you were to cut down a mite."

"You're right, Papa.  I aim to quit drinking altogether--someday soon."

"How was your visit with your kids out in California, Frank?" Papa said hoping to cheer the man up.

"They're all doing fine.  Loise and Lawrence are both working at Fox, making cowboy movies, wrangling horses and doing stunts with them.  Mary and Tessie are living in Hollywood. Lorene's in Fontana married again-this time to a businessman who has a son.  Sylvia's and her daughter Erlene live in Redlands.  They're all doing real well, all things considered. 

"The problem was those folks in California ain't very kindly to strangers.  They have a peculiar attitude, as if they invented the country instead of us taking it away from the Mexicans in a war.  You know what I mean?"

"Well, Frank, I'm glad you came home.  Folks here know you and they like you.  This is where you belong.  I have to get up early, Frank, so I reckon I'll be going to bed now."

Frank Jennings Part 2

Frank Jennings walked toward Broadway only a few blocks west of Calhoun's place.  But then he suddenly changed his mind and headed in the opposite direction--toward the railroad tracks.

After crossing First Street, Frank cut through a vacant lot, crossed the ditch and then the tracks.  He found himself standing in the middle of the oiled dirt road staring across a quarter acre of freshly tilled garden at the old house.  Other than peeling paint on the front porch and more weathering of the board and batten siding, the only noticeable change was the addition of a gable-roofed mud room built out from the old kitchen door.  Frank recalled  Papa Calhoun  offering to build just such an improvement before Ina passed, but he hadn't felt up to it then.

The oak tree between the old barn and the house had grown fuller and taller.  Frank could see the chain wrapped around the largest lower limb with the double-sheave block he hung up there to hoist hogs for scalding.

On the ground under the tree limb lay the old cast iron kettle used for scalding hogs, for rendering lard and for washing clothes.  The kettle was tipped on its side, just as it was when he last saw the place.

Now the horse corrals are gone.  The old barn's hinged double doors are missing.  In their place a single door, mounted on rollers is hanging from a steel rail mounted between the header timber and the doors of the hay mow.  The new owner probably parks his car or tractor in there, he figures. There are no signs of live stock on the place at all.  New grass is sprouting over the hump in the ground where the cyclone cellar is buried. 

Close by the cellar stands that fancy brick washing machine Papa Calhoun dreamed up after Ina's accident.  "That old man sure is something," Frank mumbles to himeself.

Papa figured it out on paper at our kitchen table, Frank remembered him jotting down a list of things he'd need to make it and telling Papa that he would scrounge up the materials and help build it.  Frank salvaged the fire brick lining the fire-box and all the rest from the fireplace and chimney of a house in the country that had burned to the ground. 

Franks old pals, Will Ferguson, a carpenter and Ed Cox, a blacksmith, both pitched in to make Papa Calhoun's idea a reality.  It was the project itself that kept Frank from losing his mind, but having his friends close by was a blessing too.  Hauling those bricks home, mixing the mortar for Papa to set them, kept Frank too busy to dwell on his misfortunes.

Staring at the chimney, standing on the near side of the washer, Frank could picture in his mind the parts hidden behind it and remember those cold, clear days when they had worked on it.  He could see Ed Cox in his long, leather apron and gloves cutting the steel barrel lengthwise, making the hinges so it opened like a clam's shell.  And there was Will Ferguson making the wooden cylinder that fit inside the steel tank, nailing the lath to the round ends, while Papa was laying up first the fire bricks and then the red bricks that made up the sides and the chimney.  It had taken only a few days to assemble, but a lot of muscle.  Now there it stood after all these years.  Frank wouldn't be surprised if the tank had rusted out in the meantime and its bearings seized up so the crank couldn't turn that inner drum that held the clothes to be washed.  But when they finished building it, it had worked just fine.  In his mind Frank could see his pals and the old man standing around it drinking good whiskey as the fire behind the door off that old Franklin stove heated the water carried from the well in pails to fill the tank.  Will Ferguson had doubted that the chimney would draw, but he'd been proven wrong as the plume of white smoke rose nearly straight up from it on that windless day. 

He could see his girls standing well away from the contraption, fearful that it would explode.  Mary Veda hadn't been there to see it, Frank remembered--she had already married Bill Ridley and moved to Oklahoma City by then.  He had to think a minute to recall why Beulah wasn't there, then he remembered that the family who took her to raise had moved to Virginia.  And the boys, why they had both gone to work on that cattle ranch down near Fort Worth by then.  Only Sylvia Lee, Tessie and Lorene were there that day, and they had just come back from their grandfather's farm up in Tibby where they'd been staying since their momma's passing.  No question in Frank's mind that Sylvia Lee was the one with the gumption to step forward and crank that washing machine the first time.

Frank regretted the fact that Sylvia Lee had dropped out of school to mother her younger sisters, to cook and to clean house for him.  Sylvia Lee had been. . .only twelve when she took on all of those responsibilities and never complained.

Sylvia told everyone she knew about that wonderful machine that washed clothes by simply turning a crank.  So it wasn't long before Papa Calhoun was building them for others.  While the old man still built a house now and then, building cyclone cellars and washing machines for folks became his mission.  Frank remembered Papa saying: "The work is closer to the ground, and I dread falling from a roof nowadays."

Frank was still standing in the road reminiscing when a truck loaded with sacks of feed corn came down the hill from Shields' Yukon Grain Elevator Company.

The truck stopped short, but it startled him and got Frank's mind off the old home place.  He moved to the shoulder.

The truck driver offered Frank a lift.  "I was fixin' to stop at your place for some of that Chili, before heading over to Lawton, Frank.  You're welcome to ride, if you're headin' that way."

"I'm much obliged, Roger.  I been day dreaming, I reckon.  Doc Barnes just delivered Ruth Erlene's baby and made me a grandpa again.  It was another girl.  Wouldn't you think a man with so many daughters one of them could produce a boy?"

Roger laughed.  "I got three boys, Frank.  But none of 'em is big enough to help me none.  Say, Frank, what ever happened to your boys?"

"They were working on a ranch down near Fort Worth for years, and riding rough stock in rodeos.  But then they took a notion to move to Hollywood and become cowboy actors in the movies."

"No kidding?  You mean in real movies, like Tom Mix and Gene Autry done?"