Don’t worry, this isn’t Groundhog’s Day. I’ve decided to upload audio versions of my short fiction so you can enjoy them podcast-style. This required re-posting this story. In between each newsletter, I’ll be sharing some of my short form writing. Some, like this one, will be older. Some will be new. The first one is, in some ways, a special one.
Bartleby’s Miracle Tonic
Crik-crik-crik-crik-clak-crik-crik
I listened for this sound. I listened with my whole body. Do you know that sort of listening, where you try to open yourself wide as if trying to summon some other senses beyond the ones that are failing you? I clutched the rope with all my might, its coarse, twined strands digging into the flesh of my hands, biting with every lurch and twist. I held on for dear life, and wished my hands were calloused again. Ahead, somewhere, was Bartleby’s wagon. Brown dust stung my eyes, impossibly thick. I could not see the end of my arms, though of course I could feel them. I could not see the wagon, though I could hear it. I tried to conjure the picture of it in my mind, as though it might make it easier to follow. I was so afraid. So afraid I’d be lost to the dust. I imagined the wheels, cracked red paint flaking from the split wood of the spokes. Crik-crik-crik-clak-crik. They rhythm of them was comforting, as was the discordant sound where the forward left wheel rim had been broken and hastily mended.
I tasted the dust. Grit and earth in my mouth. I spat it out, but only succeeded in swallowing more. Concentrate on the wagon, I told myself. I imagined it not as it is, but as it must have been long before I first saw it. Bold colors blazing, apple red and evergreen; ornate swirls and decorations. On the center of each side, inscribed in grand letters upon a swirling yellow-painted banner: “Bartleby’s Miracle Tonic.” I was crying now, involuntarily. Dispassionate tears flowed from my reddened eyes. Such tears always feel strange, as if someone else were crying them. Wet and trickling and mixing with the dust to form rivers of brown sludge on my face; products of basic physical reactions to the foreign agents in my eyes.
“You still alive back there, m’boy?” Bartleby’s voice called out from the brown mass before me. There was no real concern in his voice. But then, I expected none. I did not call out, nor attempted any sort of response, already struggling with the taste of the storm in my mouth. Bartleby did not bother to ask again. After what seemed like hours of struggling through the dust storm, it was over. I coughed and spat and rinsed my eyes out with the canteen.
“Now don’t you go wastin’ that water, boy. You’ll wish you had it ‘fore long.” I eyed him miserably. He laughed–his nasty, phlegmy laugh–before taking a deep swig of his own canteen. It was not filled with water, but rather liquids of a harsher temperament.
“Why couldn’t we have just stopped?” I spat on the ground, and the spittle was brown and rough. “Stopped, ‘til the storm blew over?”
“Timing, my boy, is everything. Now be a good lad and try to get some of the dust off the ol’ wagon.”
“Yessir,” I said. I must have let my reluctance creep into my voice too much.
“Now don’t you go acting like that! You’re the one who wanted to come along with me, remember? Now git to it!” Bartleby’s tone was harsh, but I could see in his eyes that he was just enjoying giving me a hard time. I rubbed my hands together, trying to stop the sting of the rope burns. Bartleby saw me and grabbed my hand.
“Ha, that’ll teach you. I told you you’d regret it.” I said nothing.
I shaved a few pieces of soap into the bucket, poured about half of what water was left in my canteen in it and let the soap dissolve a bit. I grabbed the old scrubbing brush, its bristles barely clinging to its bone handle (it might have been an expensive horse grooming brush, ages ago) and got to work. I was worried about scrubbing the decaying paint off the old thing, but only a few flakes relented. I took the opportunity to scrub my arms and face in the soapy water. Finally, I was done, and the effort hardly seemed worth it. The old box was clean, but it still looked faded and worn. The once brilliant reds and greens were now sun faded pink-browns and limes. The yellow of the banners had faded nearly to white, the words obscured.
Bartleby emerged from behind the wagon in full regalia. He traded his usual drab cotton shirt and brown slacks for his “entertaining” outfit. It had probably been expensive at some point; a black suit with tails, faded to gray in splotches by the sun and a dandy top hat set at an angle. His undershirt was yellowed and wrinkled. Only one part of his attire looked right; his cane. It was a bright, polished silver. Ornate decorations of claws and fangs swirled around a blood red ruby on its very top. I’d looked at it once, in the dead of night, while Bartleby slept. I remember staring at the ruby, getting lost in the glint of the moonlight splintering through the ruby’s facets. I’d been mesmerized, and absently wondered how much it was worth.
“Why can’t we get a respectable looking operation, Bartleby?”
“And what, may I ask, do you have in mind?”
“Well...” I hesitated, already anticipating his reaction. “Maybe something like Otto Danzing has.” He flew into a rage. His face trembled, veins popping in his forehead. His long, stringy white hair flailed about as he shook his head in fury. I knew it was coming and, in fact, I sort of enjoyed pushing his buttons.
“Otto Danzing?” He spat and shook his fist in the air. “That pompous, preening, over the t–Danzing? You want us to be more like Danzing? Danzing is an idiot. He’s got his velvet cloak and his gold and his dancing girls. Bah! The problem with Danzing is he looks too expensive. You’re going to put off half your customer base looking like that.”
We had run into the The Great Otto Danzing about two weeks back. It was an unusual occurrence, as Hobbleston—the city we’d earmarked to sell our wares—was larger than we were used to. It was also a great deal smaller than the cities that Danzing played. He did have quite an act. His box wagon had a frame of (what at least looked like) gold with red velvet curtains for walls. When it was time for the show, the sides of the wagon swung out. Two gorgeous women, decked out in exotic, near-transparent veils and flowing gowns danced about as strange music filled the air. The townspeople’s eyes were wide. A few of the mothers shielded their children’s eyes, not sure of the appropriateness of the display. They needn’t have worried. The dancer’s outfits revealed nothing. I know. I looked.
The strange music swelled with instruments I had never heard, and a great billow of purple smoke shot up from the center of the splayed wagon. Children squealed, women fainted, and men stood motionless as The Great Otto appeared out of nowhere. He had a long, purple velvet cloak with a high collar, a bright white tunic, and frilly lace about his chin and sleeves. His brilliant blue eyes pierced your soul. That was an act. He offered his potions and his cures, performing simple illusions as the dancing girls made the sales. Finally, when all the money was collected, he took the collection buckets in his hand. He threw the change into the air, and the crowd held out their hands as the money shimmered down like rain upon them. I’ll admit, I was holding out my hand too. Money is money, and they certainly weren’t going to get it back from me. Of course, before it touched our hands it disappeared. I asked Bartleby to explain the trick of it to me, but he refused. He doesn’t deserve it, but we working men keep each other’s secrets. I didn’t believe him. I’d seen the way they had talked to each other. Their body language told me everything I needed to know. They had known each other a long time. They were not friends. I read body language well. That’s why Bartleby kept me around, to read if a crowd was turning against us.
“Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to look a little more expensive. Then we could get to the larger towns,” I said. Bartleby just shook his head and looked at me pityingly. His rage had subsided, and he’d defaulted back to his usual laid back demeanor.
“We go where I say we go. You stick around long enough it’ll all make sense. And even if we wanted to go to the larger towns, we’d still look like this.” Bartleby grabbed his lapels and tugged at them proudly. “Can’t look like common beggars or they’ll wonder how you came about such amazing stuff. Can’t look too slick or they smell a snake. Y’see?”
“Can we head out? I’m getting hungry.”
“Sure, sure. We better get going so we can get there a good hour before sunset.” Bartleby got into the driver’s seat of the wagon and gave Ol’ Jeannie a wallop and set her off full gallop. I was never allowed to ride on the wagon. Bartleby said Jeannie couldn’t handle the extra weight on a long trip. I think he just liked to torment me. He hadn’t really kept it a secret.
We arrived at the edges of Calico. The town wasn’t much different than most of the town’s we’d been too. All of them were in their final death throes. A few shops were open, a few bullheaded prospectors hoped the veins of the earth might still give up some of their fortunes, and a few families tried to fight the notion that they’re home was fading around them. Everywhere we went, it was the same story. We’d pass by perfectly respectable towns, thriving and alive and full of money. I’d asked old Bartleby why we never stopped at those sorts of towns. He’d just look at me with weary eyes, like I was the dumbest thing in the desert short of a rock and explain.
“That’s not where we go. Your boy Otto might go there, but not us,” said Bartleby.
“Think of it, though. Going someplace with people who actually have two coins to rub together!”
“Bah, those people just keep going on rubbing their coins. That’s why they’ve got two of ‘em. Besides, this isn’t about money. It’s about changing lives.” I gave up trying to figure Bartleby after that. As we reached Calico, a tall, thin man whose balding head seemed incongruous with his youthful features, walked towards us. He didn’t need a badge to tell us he was the law, he had it all over him.
“Alright boys,” he said in a fairly congenial tone, “You can just turn that wagon right around. We don’t need any magic dust, herbal remedies, or–”
“Miracle Tonic?” asked Bartleby as he rested Jeannie’s reigns and hopped down from his perch.
“Or tonics.”
“Even miraculous ones?”
“Especially miraculous ones.”
“Aw, you hear that lad.” He turned to me and looked at me as though he were a kindly uncle and I his obedient nephew. He only acted this away around others. “He says this town doesn’t have an interest in our wares. Oh, what a blessed town this must be then! Free from disease! Free from care! What a thriving metropolis!” Bartleby got very loud at this point, his voice carrying across the distance to the town. The townspeople of Calico stopped and looked at the scene. Even if they couldn’t hear Bartleby, they could see the wild gesticulations he was making while talking to the lawman. I had to smile. Bartleby was the flame, and the moths scurried to him in their faded dresses, their earth-stained cottons, and their frayed suits. He had them.
“What’s all this then, Barry?” A plump, red-faced woman (whose too-tight corset pushed her already ample breasts up near her voluminous chin) was the first to arrive.
“Miss Sherry, git back. All of you, git back. This is none of your business.” The lawman was very young, preternaturally balding or not, and his voice carried absolutely no weight with these people. I wondered how long he’d been the law. A few months, I guessed. Miss Sherry seemed to be the voice of the people. She was probably the local brothel owner, I decided, but then that might have just been wishful thinking.
“Maybe you should let us decide that,” said an older miner, his face stained with dirt and his hand clutching a rusted pan in his hand. “What’s the man selling?” Bartleby smiled. This was his cue.
“My good people,” His voice boomed over the chatter of the crowd, instantly quieting it. “I present to you, Bartleby’s Miracle Tonic! The finest tonic in the world and guaranteed to cure whatever ails you! Yessir and Yes Madam and yes, you little one–this tonic is for you. M’name’s Bartleby and this tonic was mixed in the exotic apothecaries of the Orient to my specifications. Step up, step up. Who wants a bottle? Only ten cents. A mere ten cents!”
“Oh, well never mind. Escort him out, then,” said Miss Sherry, who rolled her eyes and started to walk away, taking the crowd with her.
“Now wait just one minute my good lady. I know how you feel. Seen one snake oil salesman, seen ‘em all, right?” asked Bartleby.
“Right. Barry, use your gun if you have to.” Miss Sherry kept walking, and lawman Barry reached for his gun.
“Now just wait,” Bartleby had a small measure of panic in his voice. It was a tough crowd. “Now what if I were to show you a proper demonstration? Y’see, I got a secret for you. All the frauds and crooks that shuffle through your town–The Swinehearts and Amazing Stephane’s and Grandiose Otto’s–they don’t got what I got.” The crowd’s interest seemed piqued again. I covered my mouth so they couldn’t see the big dumb smile on it. I wasn’t a very good straight man, really. “The difference is... mine works.”
“Fine, a demonstration then. Who’ll it be?” the old miner said.
“Well, we need someone who is in a shape most dire...” Bartleby surveyed the crowd, looking up and down at the menagerie of pathetic faces that had assembled around him. Finally, he locked eyes with an older woman, her back hunched at nearly a ninety-degree angle. As he called her forward, I remembered the first time I sold with Bartleby. Do you want me in the crowd, so you can call me up? I’d been around enough to know that was the usual way of it. That was the first time he looked at me with the weary, pitying look I was so familiar with now. Don’t be a damn fool, boy. There’s about eighty people in this town. Y’think they’re not gonna figureout they never seen poor little cripple Timmy before? Nah, to make this work right you gotta pick someone who’s been around forever. The woman seemed to fit the bill. She was in her early fifties, but life had been unkind to her. I found out in the days that followed, before we skipped town, that she was the Widow Bannister. She’d come to Calico with her husband, her daughter and her daughter’s husband. All of them were gone now, taken by accidents or disease. She was the only one left, and she hobbled along the dirt streets of Calico with her old bent back selling breads and other baked goods to earn her way. She’d been like that as long as anyone here had known her, some said she was born that way. She was perfect for Bartleby’s needs.
“Ah, my good woman. Thank you, thank you for being such a willing participate. I promise the tonic’s ingredients will cause you no harm.” I knew that this was, strictly speaking, true. But only strictly speaking.
“I don’t see’s how I should care much.” The Widow Bannister gripped the smooth green bottle in her arthritis-twisted hands. Her hands shook as she spilled a few drops of the tonic into her throat. I ran my tongue along the roof of my mouth, remembering the taste of the tonic. Bartleby forbade me to try it, saying I’d be sorry if I did as a good merchant never sampled his own wares. The one time I had tasted it, was by accident. The wagon’s forward left wheel broke, sending a few bottles of tonic crashing into one another. I was sopping up the spill with a rag when I noticed one small dribble of it had clung to my thumb. I sucked on my thumb, tasting the forbidden wetness of the tonic. It tasted sweet, thick, and impossible. The latter because I knew the ingredients that went into it.
“Oh my.” The Widow Bannister managed to utter, before sitting down in the dirt and grime.
“Is she all right?” Miss Sherry wondered aloud.
“If you’ve poisoned this woman–” the lawman, Barry, threatened.
“Calm yourselves down. Just you wait.” Bartleby watched with narrowed eyes, as though he could see beyond the woman’s skin. Maybe he could.
“It’s all right. Don’t none of you make a fuss. I feel.... I feel...” Her eyes grew wide, as if she had just remembered something truly amazing, and she got up with one great hop. She stood straight and tall, and stretched her arms wide, as though she were using them for the first time. She felt behind her at her lower back and looked happily from the crowd to Bartleby and back again. “I can’t believe it! How?” She looked so much younger now, and she ran about in a happy jig. If I didn’t know better, I would’ve sworn she was working with us, the whole scene looked too fake. I’d seen more convincing displays in the heat of the revival tents back home. The crowd looked at her in stunned silence, for the briefest of an instant, before turning to Bartleby.
They called to him, plunged money into his face. He had them. I grabbed a crate of the tonic from the back of the wagon. I stood there, holding the small, wooden crate. Bartleby handled all the transactions, trading bottles for money and giving change when needed in graceful, practiced motions. I never knew how he did it, I was already lost as to who had purchased the tonic and who was waiting for it. There were about thirty people there, at the edge of town, with more coming every minute as people whooped for joy and excited children ran to spread the news. The lawman, Barry, just stood back and watched us with suspicious eyes. It was going to be a long afternoon that could stretch into the evening. I grew a bit restless. I eyed the bottles of tonic thirstily, but then I felt the pain in the palm of my hands from where the rope had burned and cracked them. I missed my callouses; they’d been hard won from years of labor. Then they were gone in an instant, in an errant lick of a finger. Bartleby, damn him, had been right. He usually was. The bastard.
Night fell and the crowd dispersed. I hungrily ate some biscuits the newly slim (but amazingly barely less buxom) Miss Sherry had given to me. She gave me a wink and a smile when she handed them to me and let her pinky finger caress my hand. I looked forward to Bartleby giving the go ahead to close shop so I could be on my own time. Our wagon was still in the same spot it had been when the lawman stopped us, about thirty feet from the town limits proper. Bartleby stared out at the little town as people laughed and sang with joy, their earthly cares cleansed from them. I’d seen it all before. Old Widow Bannister (although that designation no longer fit her) danced all about the town, lost in a dream and humming a song I didn’t recognize. Her long blonde hair shimmered in the moonlight, and I began to think unsavory thoughts about her. Then I remembered the crooked old crone she had been hours before, and whatever lust had been building drained away. For the most part. I thought of Miss Sherry and wondered what sort of new tricks she might try in her new body. I wanted her to try them all on me. If only Bartleby would close shop. Still, he stared, as though he was waiting for something.
“Alright, alright.” My impatience got the best of me. “No one’s coming, surely. We’ll hook them tomorrow.” I got up off the ground and wiped the grease from the biscuits onto my trousers.
“Sit.” I was about to protest but thought better of it. I sat back down near the broken wheel of the old wagon when I spotted her. She was young, in her early twenties perhaps, with mousy brown hair bunched into two haphazard ponytails on either side of her head. She had been standing behind a post that held up the canopy of an abandoned dentist’s office. She saw that we had spied her and walked shyly toward us. After a few steps, she looked back to the town, before chancing a few more steps. She was graceful in her own way, with deep brown eyes that looked almost black in the waning moon. Finally, she reached us.
“Uh, hello Sirs. I have a request. I just wondered. Well...” She looked at both of us, clearly mulling the benefits and negatives of a choice in her head. Finally, she looked at me with some suspicion and softly asked, “Mr.... Bartleby, is it? Could I have a private word with you, over there. No offense to you, Sir.” I didn’t know what the wench was going on about, but I couldn’t really have cared much anyway. She had that preening, soft look about her as though she might faint at the drop of the hat. I didn’t care much for women like her. I liked women whose skin was a little more lived-in.
“Why, of course m’lady. Over this way. Cover your ears boy.” I shot daggers into Bartleby’s back as the woman whispered into his ear. I hate the way he made me feel like a child. But I obeyed and cupped my hands over my ears. I thought, strangely, that it sounded a bit like the ocean. Or what I imagined the ocean might sound like. There was something in Bartleby’s tone that had a way of settling my more volatile passions. I fumed over this while waiting for the conversation to be concluded. I saw Bartleby grab a bottle of tonic from the crate and give it to the young girl. She tried to pay, but he would here none of it. She smiled appreciatively.
“Helen, what the hell are you doing out there?” It was Barry, the lawman.
“Oh, Barry, give it up!” The girl smiled at Bartleby and mouthed a “thank you” to him before running to her husband. “It’s alright! He didn’t even charge.” The lawman narrowed his eyes and gazed at us suspiciously.
“Oh, alright. It’ll be good evidence if we find out this is some trick, Bartleby. Now you two close up shop. Miss Sherry’ll get you set up for the night.” I certainly hoped so. On our walk to town, leading Jeannie and the wagon, I pressed Bartleby for details. He laughed heartily, before coughing phlegm into his red handkerchief.
“Haw, well... now, you didn’t hear this from me–strict merchant/customer privilege you see–but it seems the young lawman has trouble cocking his pistol.” Bartleby laughed again, a deep and nasty laugh. I felt a bit sad for the guy. Lord knows I might even have trouble if faced with that homely, dour face every night.
The night with Miss Sherry was good, but a bit below my expectations, really. She seemed a bit depressed afterwards. I think she hadn’t really gotten the reaction she wanted out of me. She kept apologizing, saying she didn’t know what was wrong. She felt like she was learning all over again. I told her it was fine. The best part of the night was hearing all Miss Sherry’s stories about the townsfolk. We sucked back a few spoons of Absinthe and lay in her generously proportioned bed and I indulged in the sensation of her well fluffed pillows and the feeling of warmth beside me. Dawn broke and I slipped out of Miss Sherry’s boudoir, her perfume covering up the stink of my flesh. I really wanted a shower, but I knew there was no time for that. I reached Bartleby’s room and knocked a few times. After getting no answer, I tried the latch. It was open, and his bed was made. Either Bartleby was a particularly conscientious guest (I knew that wasn’t true), Miss Sherry had an amazing maid staff (that wasn’t it, as the maid staff was Miss Sherry, and she was still asleep) or Bartleby hadn’t even slept in his room.
When I made it down to the wagon, Bartleby was already serving a stream of about twenty customers, a few of which were return visitors. Their diseases and deformities were all healed, of course. They just discovered the side effect of Bartleby’s Miracle Tonic; the healing process tended to restore a bit of youth as well.
“Well look what the rooster coughed up.” Bartleby shot me a disdainful look, before returning to the practiced smile he wore when handling customers.
“Mornin’ to you, too.”
“See to the returns and stow that lip.”
“Yessir.” I started collecting the empty bottles from the returning customers, giving them a cent in exchange. It saved us on buying new bottles and seemed to encourage repeat visits and mass consumption of the tonic, as the customers knew we wouldn’t be hanging around long. Before long another crowd of people began to gather around the wagon. They were late comers. Or, as Bartleby called them, the “doubters and cowards” who waited to see what happened to their neighbors before buying themselves. Bartleby also called them the “slightly smarter ones.”
“Yessir, come one, come all. Let ol’ Bartleby soothe what hurts, heal what ails ya. You’ve seen your friends, your families, and your enemies all partake and benefit. Now do you want t’be left out? No Sir! No Madam! So up and at’em!” It was interesting to watch. The repeat customers plopped down their used bottles, paid their nine cents, and drank the new bottle down in one gulp. Some even repeated the whole process right there. The new ones sniffed the tonic and then took a sip or two, waiting for some great change. When it came, they’d almost surely down the whole bottle as well. One man, by the name of Joseph Waller–his eyes vacant and fixed on the distance, a victim of a childhood malady– drank the whole bottle down on his first go. The milky white faded from his eyes, turning a brilliant blue. He looked up at the sun for the first time and looked around at the people around him and cried. Behind him, in the distance, Young Miss Bannister still danced about, twirling her dress, and humming the same queer tune. I think she’d gone quite mad.
I enjoyed a big lunch at Miss Sherry’s. It was quite a spread; biscuits, bacon gravy, eggs over easy, and fried hash browns. As I shoveled the food into my mouth, I briefly thought about what it’d be like to marry the woman. She’d surely make any man a fine wife. She moved the food around on her plate miserably, and only ate a few bites. A bit of her old spark had left her, it seemed.
“Doin’ okay Miss Sherry?” I asked.
“That’s not my name, you know,” she said, moodily.
“Oh?”
“Nah, it just sounds good for an old whore running an old whore house.”
“Now you’re n–”
“Eat your biscuits,” she said curtly.
“Yes mam,” I didn’t need any dramatics. It didn’t matter much anyway; Bartleby and I’d be off in a few days.
“Evenlyn Crawfield,” she said, after a moment of blissful silence.
“What’s that?”
“My name. Evelyn Crawfield is my name.”
“Okay.” I got up then. I was done with my lunch, and it was getting pretty overwrought. A shame, really, she might’ve been worth marrying, Miss Sherry. Evenlyn Crawfield, though, I didn’t care much to know better. She hung herself that same night. If there’s one thing I regret about our stay at Calico, it’s not saying one kind word to her. Bartleby just told me that’s what I get for getting all mucked up in their affairs. Like I said, the bastard has an annoying habit of being right.
The wind started changing on the third day in town. The discovery of slender, youthful, and very dead Miss Sherry swinging from the rafters of her brothel was just the beginning. The crowd grew larger than I’d ever seen it. At least a hundred and fifty people to be sure. It seemed like most of the town was there, and those who weren’t there were probably being held by lawman Barry. There’d been a rash of thefts in town; money missing from the bank, purses stolen, and secreted stash’s of cash disappearing. At least all Barry’s likely suspects were gathered in one place for him, empty green bottles in one hand and ten, twenty or thirty cents in the other. The crowd shoved and jostled for a good position before the wagon. Children ran wild about town, some of their parents barely children now. Joseph Waller yelled at his wife, unaffected by the tears streaming down her face as she clutched their youngest child.
“You ol’ hag! Thought you had me fooled, did ya? Thought you could pass yourself off to the crippled old blind guy, huh?” the man asked. His blue eyes were icy. “I don’t want to see you or that horse-faced thing you call our child again.”
Any other day, judging by what dear, departed Miss Sherry told me, the scene would have been cause for much gossip and commotion amongst the townsfolk. Now, I was the only one listening. Or at least I thought I was, until I caught Bartleby’s eye. He asked me a silent question. I looked around at the crowd; their faces, so recently filled with joy, were now showing the traces of advancing desperation. I nodded my head once.
“I think we’re about to run out of stock, my boy,” he whispered to me as he took a fresh crate of tonic from my hands. In reality we had a half dozen crates left, of course. “Time for the big push.” I crept around the back of the wagon and slowly climbed into the driver’s perch. I took the reins of old Jeannie, and patted her hind haunches.
“Now, my good ladies and gentlemen. I want to thank you all for being such fine customers. So fine, in fact, you’ve cleaned me and the boy out!” A wave of panic and sorrow erupted in the crowd. “Now, now, I know it’s a sad case indeed. It’s clear how much you love this fine tonic. Have no fear, though the ingredients are rare, I’ll have a new batch mixed up by my friends in the Orient post-haste! It’ll be about six months or so, but I will return.” The panic turned into wails of desperation.
“But I haven’t had one bottle! I think those who haven’t gotten a bottle yet should get one first!” bellowed a portly man, with thinning hair and a thin moustache.
“Why should we suffer because you didn’t bother to get in on a good thing?” Joseph Waller asked, to the agreement of most of the crowd. The crowd began to squabble amongst themselves, and Bartleby was about to make the “big push” when a sound pierced the air. The sharp crack of a gunshot. I ducked behind the wagon; sure it was an angry customer coming to claim any amount of tonic he wanted. Another gunshot followed and Bartleby, who was not easy to spook, ducked along with the rest of the crowd. After a few seconds, when no further shots were heard, we all tried to gain some measure of composure. That’s when we heard it. I’ll never forget the sound. Never. Helen, the lawman’s wife, let out a sharp wail. She screamed like the banshees of legend, streams of tears flooding her face. She trembled as she walked into the town square, clutching a pistol in her hand. She stumbled before the crowd a moment, as if frozen in time. She looked up at us, with her deep brown eyes and mousy frayed hair blowing in the wind. I’m not sure what she wanted in that moment. I’ll never know. She raised the pistol to her temple and shattered the contents of her small little head and sent them spilling out the other side. As she slumped over onto the street, the red blood mixing with the dust and grime of the earth, children screamed. Three women in the crowd, along with two of the men, fainted and crumpled into the dust as well.
The crowd rushed to the woman and called for the doctor, but he was nowhere to be found. They stumbled around in mute silence. Joe Waller used his shirt to wrap Helen’s fractured skull, futilely trying to stop the blood from spilling out anymore. The tonic had been momentarily forgotten, and the townspeople tried to grasp what happened. A few minutes later, two of the men searched Helen and Barry’s small apartment above the Sherriff’s office. They discovered the lawman Barry slumped over the young town doctor, their naked skin still glistening from their quickly halted exertion. They were entwined and matching bullet holes burbled up the precious lifeblood from within them. The people of Calico wandered around the town, unable to grasp what was happening to them.
“Well, push now or forever hold your push, I guess,” Bartleby mumbled near me. “Ladies and gentlemen, I know today has been a sad day, a horrible day, for you all.” I grabbed the reins of ol’ Jeannie tight. “To that end, I wish to thank you for your patronage even as we must depart your town.” Bartleby grasped the rope at the back of the wagon and rested one foot on the flat standing plank at its rear. In the other hand he held the last crate of tonic, as though it weighed nothing at all.
“So, my dear friends, I give you this–my gift to you, from the deepest wells of my heart to soothe your deepest sorrows!” With a bow and a flourish, Bartleby laid the last crate of tonic on the ground. With a sharp tug on the reins, I sent Jeannie into full gallop. I could not see Bartleby behind me, as the dust Jeannie was kicking up was too great, and I had to concentrate on the task at hand. But I knew he was smiling, his gregarious smile full of crooked yellow teeth, and jauntily waving at the townsfolk of Calico. They would stare at us, as the wagon rolled off into the distance in a cloud of dust. They would only stare a second though, before their eyes would meet that rickety old crate. It would be filled with a dozen gleaming emerald bottles, each holding a few precious ounces of Bartleby’s Miracle Tonic. They would pounce and rip and tear and kick. Glass would break, children would roar, women would bellow, and men would scream.
We rode on for only a few minutes before we rounded a hill and came upon a stream. Bartleby insisted we stop. I protested, fearing we were still too close to Calico.
“Have you not learned anything? None of those’ll be following us.” Bartleby sat up on the driver’s perch of the wagon and watched as I lugged the crates of empty green bottles to the stream and filled them. It was a slow, laborious process. I kept looking behind us and listening, but there was nothing to see and nothing to hear. As I finished filling a crate, I’d hand it up to Bartleby. He’d take a swig of his canteen to wet his mouth and get the juices flowing. He’d draw his mouth up dramatically, running his tongue around the inside of his mouth. Finally, when it had built up enough, he’d release a great wad of spit into each bottle and close it up with a cork. As I said, it was a long and laborious process. We’d finished a couple crates worth when my listening paid off.
“Shush!” I said to Bartleby, as he was noisily calling up another load of spittle. I could hear it plain as day. A soft, whimsical hum filled the air. It was a song I did not know. It was a song I had heard before. The formerly old Widow Bannister, naked as the day she was born and covered with smears of blood, emerged from behind the hill. She smiled at us sweetly and flung her blood-encrusted blond hair about her as she danced. She sang and hummed and whispered. I tried not to notice the delicate swivel of her hips, the delicious bounce of her breasts or the rather magical way her nipples pointed in random directions away from her body. She saw me looking at her and she laughed at me and passed by me. She danced and shimmied up to Bartleby, who–for the first time I’d ever seen–seemed genuinely surprised.
“Oh, my dear Mr. Bartleby,” she sang in a soft trill. “We’re not all fools. Oh no we’re not! We’re not all fools my dear Mr. Bartleby.” She stopped next to him and brought her face mere inches away from his. “Peek a boo. I see you. I see you.” There was a moment of silence between them. “I see you!” She laughed and thrust herself away from him. She danced merrily away from us then, beyond the bend of the hill, and off into the desert–away from Calico–and towards the shifting horizon. We stared at her, until she danced with the heat-distorted air itself and disappeared.
I looked at Bartleby with wide eyes, but he just smiled and shrugged his shoulders. I guess even he could be wrong sometimes. The bastard.
Notes on Bartleby’s Miracle Tonic (from its original posting August 23, 2021): Today is my birthday. It’s one of the reasons I picked this particular story to start publishing through this newsletter. Because it represents, in a way, my birth as a writer. Or, more specifically, a rebirth. Although I wrote a lot in my high school years, I went through a really rough time after I graduated and was out in the “real world.” I wrote some scattered poetry and song lyrics. But it wasn’t until 2006, when I wrote this story, that I actually tried writing fiction again.
Bartleby's Miracle Tonic