Patrick McLean - How To Succeed in Evil

Topper says “Yer outta your old, wrinkly head. These rednecks aren’t going to help you. They’re probably all related. Haven’t you seen any movies?”

“Well, what would you have us do?” asks Agnes, not really wanting to hear the answer.

“You go back home. I’ll find some tanks, roll in there, blow the whole joint up and get him out.”

“NO! You know very well how Edwin feels about senseless destruction.”

“Yeah, but that’s because he’s an egghead. He’s not a get-it-done kind of guy like me.”

Topper cannot not persuade Agnes to see things his way. So with the midget in tow, she marches into the Hims Chapel County Seat, through a door that reads Sheriff’s Department and in a loud voice, asks “Is this the local constabulary?”

Earl, or more formally, Deputy Sheriff Earl Trotter, looks up at Agnes in a way that suggests he has no idea what a constable is, much less a constabulary, but is willing to adopt a shoot-first-ask=questions-later policy towards whatever it might be. His ears are set a little too high and his eyes are set a little too close together. When he asks, “Whut?” his features seem to jump off the top of his head.

“Law enforcement,” says Agnes, “I am seeking the local authorities.”

“That’d be sheriff Jessup.”

“Is he about? I should like to file a complaint.”

“Oh no, ma’am he don’t like complainers.”

“Very well then, a missing persons report. I have reason to believe that my associate is being held to the North of here by –”

“Now just wait a minute Ma’am. Iffn you know where he is, he ain’t exactly missing now is he?” Earl looks at Topper realizing for the first time that there is a midget in the room. None of this makes sense to Earl.

“Deputy, a man is being held against his will!”

Earl’s eyes flash back and forth between Topper and Agnes. “Well, ma’am, we in the profession would call that kidnapping.”

“I care not what you call it.”

“Well, it’s important, cause we’ve got different forms for different things, see if you had lost some livestock –”

“No, no, no. you dolt. A person, a man, has been kidnapped. And I need you to –”

Earl holds up his hand. Feeling that he is exercising his finely tuned powers of observation, Deputy Earl asks, “Ma’am, are you aware you are being tailed by a midget?”

“Painfully,” says Agnes, wringing every bit of emotion out of the word.

“Screw this noise,” says Topper, “This shitkicker’s getting us nowhere.” As Topper walks out, the last thing he hears is Earl saying, “Now ma’am, about how long do you reckon that rude little fella has been surveilling you?”

Agnes tries to explain, once again, about Edwin Windsor being held against his will. Earl wants none of it. “Ma’am, are you sure you don’t want to file a complaint against that rude little fella.”

“No,” says Agnes, “Remarkably, that annoying little man is the least of my troubles today. Now about this kidnapping.”

“Oh Ma’am, I can’t do nothing about that. You’re just gonna have to talk to the sheriff.”

“And where is he?”

“He’s out ma’am.”

“When do you expect him to return?”

“Can’t say. He comes and goes a lot. O-fficial business and all.”

Agnes is not the kind of woman who can be dissuaded by a weak-chinned man. “Very well,” she says, “I shall wait.” And she plants herself in a chair as if she has every intention of growing roots.

The hours pass. The deputy is not comfortable with the strange English woman in his workspace. He had thought she would grow tired and bored and leave. But she does not. With each passing moment, Agnes is more at home in her environment. First, she flips through a magazine. Then she gathers all of the magazines in the sitting area, removes the subscription cards, and piles them alphabetically by subject. Next, she organizes the furniture. Wherever she steps, order follows.

The Deputy protests, “Hey, look, now just look, you can’t –”

Agnes counters, “But it is such a frightful mess.”

“But this is important po-lice business.”

“All the more reason that it should not be shoddy.”

Of course, Agnes knows exactly what she is doing. A little more time and she will have broken him completely. As she thinks this, she hears the rumble of heavy equipment. With her innate English instinct for tragedy, she knows Topper is about to ruin everything.

A blast of an air horn rattles the windows in the Hims Chapel Sheriff’s office. Agnes hears the grinding of gears and an unmistakeable high-pitched cackle. The midget is afoot!

“Whut in the hell is that?” asks the deputy as he reaches for his gun belt.

Agnes does not answer. She drops a stack of files and bustles out the door as fast as her proper old feet will carry her.

Outside she sees a flatbed truck with a bulldozer on it accelerating hard towards the north end of town. As the truck roars past her, Topper throws her a little wave. He appears to be standing high above the wheel on a naked woman’s lap.

“Oh my God,” says Agnes. She is certain that she has just seen the first Harbinger of the Apocalypse.

At the far end of main street, Topper flattens a few parking meters and a defenseless shrub. Squeezed onto the bench seat next to Topper, are the Sheriff and a man named Clarence Johnson. The Sheriff is laughing so hard Topper can’t even hear the engine. Hims Chapel is a very small, and very dull, place. This evening is already the third best time the Sheriff has ever had. And, just like the stripper that Topper is using to work the pedals for him, this night is frighteningly young.

After taking out the parking meters Topper overcorrects, hops a curb, mangles a stop sign and then manages to wrestle the rig back onto to the road.

“Whattya call this thing?” asks Topper.

“Suicide Knob,” answers Clarence. He should know, it’s his truck.

“I LIKE IT!” cries Topper.

From the reasonable end of town, Agnes watches the truck disappear. Coins from the parking meters rain down on the pavement, spinning and shimmering to a rest. As the sound of the truck fades into the distance Agnes asks the night, “How did this happen?”

The night does not answer. But in small towns, boredom is always to blame.

So it was that Topper, Clarence Johnson, and Sheriff Cooper wound up drinking together in a small sad strip club off Alabama State highway 109. They bought each other lap dances, talked the coarse language of men and generally enjoyed themselves.

After he was pretty sure the Sheriff was drunk enough to tell the truth, Topper asks, “So whattya know about this Rielly woman?” Despite intoxication, Topper was still very much on the job.

“She owns most of the county. But I never did like her though. Rich. And not just rich, thinks she’s better than everybody else. Looks down on people,” slurs Sheriff Cooper.

“I hate people who look down on me,” says Topper. They all laughed. “Except for her,” Topper says, pointing at one of the women, “she can look down on me anytime.”

“You a’right boy, you all right,” says Sheriff Cooper. “I like a fella knows how to enjoy himself.” Glasses of brown liquor clink together and dive down throats.

“It’s just a shame you’re only half a man,” says Clarence, needling Topper out of pure boredom.

“Half a man? Sheriff, you need to arrest this man. He’s got bullshit pouring out of his mouth. Can’t be sanitary.” The men roar in laughter.

“No, no, I like you and everything little man, but it’s not like you can do an honest days work,” says Clarence.

“Honest day’s work!” cries Topper. “I’m a friggin lawyer. If I did an honest days work, I’d be out of a job.” Topper points to the sheriff, “And so would he!” More laughter.