George Saunders: CivilWarLand in Bad Decline: Stories and a Novella

But that’s neither here nor there.

Mr. Alsuga pulls out the summer stats. We’re in the worst attendance decline in ten years. If it gets any worse, staff is going to be let go in droves. He gives me a meaningful look. I know full well I’m not one of his key players. Then he asks who we have that might be willing to fight fire with fire.

I say: I could research it.

He says: Why don’t you research it?

So I go research it.

Sylvia Loomis is the queen of info. It’s in her personality. She enjoys digging up dirt on people. She calls herself an S&M buff in training. She’s still too meek to go whole hog, so when she parties at the Make Me Club on Airport Road she limits herself to walking around talking mean while wearing kiddie handcuffs. But she’s good at what she does, which is Security. It was Sylvia who identified the part-timer systematically crapping in the planters in the Gift Acquisition Center and Sylvia who figured out it was Phil in Grounds leaving obscene messages for the Teen Belles on MessageMinder. She has access to all records. I ask can she identify current employees with a history of violence. She says she can if I buy her lunch.

We decide to eat in-Park. We go over to Nate’s Saloon. Sylvia says don’t spread it around but two of the nine can-can girls are knocked up. Then she pulls out her folder and says that according to her review of the data, we have a pretty tame bunch on our hands. The best she can do is Ned Quinn. His records indicate that while in high school he once burned down a storage shed. I almost die laughing. Quinn’s an Adjunct Thespian and a world-class worry-wart. I can’t count the times I’ve come upon him in Costuming, dwelling on the gory details of his Dread Disease Rider. He’s a failed actor who won’t stop trying. He says this is the only job he could find that would allow him to continue to develop his craft. Because he’s ugly as sin he specializes in roles that require masks, such as Humpty-Dumpty during Mother Goose Days.

I report back to Mr. Alsuga and he says Quinn may not be much but he’s all we’ve got. Quinn’s dirt-poor with six kids and Mr. A says that’s a plus, as we’ll need someone between a rock and a hard place. What he suggests we do is equip the Desperate Patrol with live ammo and put Quinn in charge. The Desperate Patrol limps along under floodlights as the night’s crowning event. We’ve costumed them to resemble troops who’ve been in the field too long. We used actual Gettysburg photos. The climax of the Patrol is a re-enacted partial rebellion, quelled by a rousing speech. After the speech the boys take off their hats and put their arms around each other and sing “I Was Born Under a Wandering Star.” Then there’s fireworks and the Parade of Old-Fashioned Conveyance. Then we clear the place out and go home.

“Why not confab with Quinn?” Mr. A says. “Get his input and feelings.”

“I was going to say that,” I say.

I look up the Thespian Center’s SpeedDial extension and a few minutes later Quinn’s bounding up the steps in the Wounded Grizzly suit.

“Desperate Patrol?” Mr. A says as Quinn sits down. “Any interest on your part?”

“Love it,” Quinn says. “Excellent.” He’s been trying to get on Desperate Patrol for years. It’s considered the pinnacle by the Thespians because of the wealth of speaking parts. He’s so excited he’s shifting around in his seat and getting some of his paw blood on Mr. A’s nice cane chair.

“The gangs in our park are a damn blight,” Mr. A says. “I’m talking about meeting force with force. Something in it for you? Oh yes.”

“I’d like to see Quinn give the rousing speech myself,” I say.

“Societal order,” Mr. A says. “Sustaining the lifeblood of this goddamned park we’ve all put so much of our hearts into.”

“He’s not just free-associating,” I say.

“I’m not sure I get it,” Quinn says.

“What I’m suggesting is live ammo in your weapon only,” Mr. A says. “Fire at your discretion. You see an unsavory intruder, you shoot at his feet. Just give him a scare. Nobody gets hurt. An additional two bills a week is what I’m talking.”

“I’m an actor,” Quinn says.

“Quinn’s got kids,” I say. “He knows the value of a buck.”

“This is acting of the highest stripe,” Mr. A says. “Act like a mercenary.”

“Go for it on a trial basis,” I say.

“I’m not sure I get it,” Quinn says. “But jeez, that’s good money.”

“Superfantastic,” says Mr. A.

Next evening Mr. A and I go over the Verisimilitude Irregularities List. We’ve been having some heated discussions about our bird-species percentages. Mr. Grayson, Staff Ornithologist, has recently recalculated and estimates that to accurately approximate the 1865 bird population we’ll need to eliminate a couple hundred orioles or so. He suggests using air guns or poison. Mr. A says that, in his eyes, in fiscally troubled times, an ornithologist is a luxury, and this may be the perfect time to send Grayson packing. I like Grayson. He went way overboard on Howie’s baseball candy. But I’ve got me and mine to think of. So I call Grayson in. Mr. A says did you botch the initial calculation or were you privy to new info. Mr. Grayson admits it was a botch. Mr. A sends him out into the hall and we confab.

“You’ll do the telling,” Mr. A says. “I’m getting too old for cruelty.”

He takes his walking stick and beeper and says he’ll be in the Great Forest if I need him.

I call Grayson back in and let him go, and hand him Kleenexes and fend off a few blows and almost before I know it he’s reeling out the door and I go grab a pita.

Is this the life I envisioned for myself? My God no. I wanted to be a high jumper. But I have two of the sweetest children ever born. I go in at night and look at them in their fairly expensive sleepers and think: There are a couple of kids who don’t need to worry about freezing to death or being cast out to the wolves. You should see their little eyes light up when I bring home a treat. They may not know the value of a dollar, but it’s my intention to see that they never need to.

I’m filling out Grayson’s Employee Retrospective when I hear gunshots from the perimeter. I run out and there’s Quinn and a few of his men tied to the cannon. The gang guys took Quinn’s pants and put some tiny notches in his penis with their knives. I free Quinn and tell him to get over to the Infirmary to guard against infection. He’s absolutely shaking and can hardly walk, so I wrap him up in a Confederate flag and call over a hay cart and load him in.

When I tell Mr. A he says: Garbage in, garbage out, and that we were idiots for expecting a milquetoast to save our rears.

We decide to leave the police out of it because of the possible bad PR. So we give Quinn the rest of the week off and promise to let him play Grant now and then, and that’s that.

When Visitors first come in there’s this cornball part where they sit in this kind of spaceship and supposedly get blasted into space and travel faster than the speed of light and end up in 1865. The unit’s dated. The helmets we distribute look like bowls and all the paint’s peeling off. I’ve argued and argued that we need to update. But in the midst of a budget crunch one can’t necessarily hang the moon. When the tape of space sounds is over and the walls stop shaking, we pass out the period costumes. We try not to offend anyone, liability law being what it is. We distribute the slave and Native American roles equitably among racial groups. Anyone is free to request a different identity at any time. In spite of our precautions, there’s a Herlicher in every crowd. He’s the guy who sued us last fall for making him hangman. He claimed that for weeks afterwards he had nightmares and because he wasn’t getting enough sleep botched a big contract by sending an important government buyer a load of torn pool liners. Big deal, is my feeling. But he’s suing us for fifty grand for emotional stress because the buyer ridiculed him in front of his co-workers. Whenever he comes in we make him sheriff but he won’t back down an inch.