A Winter's Tale

This happened a while back. Maybe 10 years ago. I had taken a temporary job to augment me social security checks. A necessary step because I was still mesmerized by my rather hefty salary that stopped when I took myself out of harness. All of a sudden, my income dropped like a fizzled balloon. Only my spending habit was still floating high. As you might expect, I had the credit card blues.

No big deal, I told myself. Just go get a job, any job and work that balance down. So I did and found myself holding down a cashier job in a gas station, slash convenience store. This one was adjacent to the university, so we got a lot of business from the college crowd.

The owners of this thriving place were a man and wife team who demonstrated some amusing eccentricities. She was an elementary school teacher. He had been a high school teacher, who apparently failed to make the grade. And was now a not too dynamic businessman. In other words, he was a frustrated teacher type. To put it bluntly, a guy who believed his opinions were of the highest quality.

To show you what I mean, here’s a couple of examples. This store was a crowded place, really too small for all the merchandise the owners stocked. Consequently, the coffee setup was not easily seen. Many a time, a stranger would come in, dash around a bit, pause, and then throw me a puzzled glance, which said: “Where the hell’s the coffee?”

The coffee machine was hidden by the cashier counter. It actually faced away from the entrance, as if it were ashamed of itself. You really had to hunt for it if you didn’t know where it was. For the cashier, it was in a splendid place. You only had to take two steps from the cash register in order to get more coffee brewing. All the coffee trappings were likewise stashed in a less than obvious place. The cream and sugar and the hot chocolate dispenser – and all those nasty little flavored things people seem to need in their coffee - these items were on the back bar of the cashier’s station. Which meant that anyone getting a cup of coffee could easily carry on a conversation with the cashier. And vice-versa. And the owner – I can’t exactly remember his name, but I believe it was Ted – well Ted, whenever he was loitering by the cashier stand (and he was there more often than necessary) Ted always ‘instructed’ the new customer in the ways of mixing and matching the various coffee flavoring options. Many a time I noticed the customer making one of those obvious facial expressions that said: “Get off my back, buster. I drink my coffee the way I want it.” But Ted was oblivious to people’s sensitivity. He insisted that his customers take advantage of his suggestions.

This is only one example. Another: Many times a lost traveler (we were just off the Interstate) came in for directions. I was well acquainted with the town and the neighborhood and was quite happy to give the information requested. If Ted happened to be around, he never failed to jump in and make a point of giving ‘better’ directions. The unhappy traveler usually looked confused, because his mind was already attempting to process the information I had begun with, when out of the blue came Ted with this other set of data and pushed it into his brain - and all of sudden nothing computed.

Well that was Ted. And his wife was not much different. They both had a somewhat and not too subtly hidden superior attitude, which seemed to regard the rest of the world as somehow mentally deficient.

This entire preamble to set the stage.

This is what happened: One day, round two o’clock in the afternoon, an hour before my going home, a UPS driver came in with a package. It was addressed to someone who had no connection with the establishment. Nevertheless, although the name had nothing to do with us, the street address did. The package was definitely sent to us. Naturally, I questioned the UPS guy. What was this all about?

He explained that this package had instructions. It came from an electronic firm in Southern California. I live in Virginia. The convenience store, slash gas station was 3000 miles from Southern California. The label on the package established the contents as being a set of speakers for a sound system. The deliveryman explained that the package was for a college student who didn’t get home from classes until late in the afternoon and he was not willing to have his expensive speakers sitting at the front door to his apartment. So he had decided to have the set mailed to us (his building was behind the store) for safekeeping. He would be in later to claim the package with proper identification.

Well. I took all this in, wondering how the UPS man had been informed of all the intricacies of this arrangement, but I didn’t ask him, being a rather unassuming type, and rather gullible to boot. So I took the package and laid it on the back counter, intending to pass on the information to my relief. At three, I was ready to head home. But the man due to work the next shift hadn’t come in yet.

No problem, said Ted. He’d watch the store until Bill arrived. Bill was frequently late. Well Bill never arrived it seemed until about an hour later. So Ted – and then Ted and his wife (have forgotten her name entirely, can’t even make a stab at it) who always came in after school to check on Ted, together minded the store until Bill arrived.

I went home, had an agreeable supper, read the second half of a good book and turned in early completely at peace.

But at the store, all kinds of strange things were happening. I learned about it all the next morning when I arrived for work at 7 A.M.

As soon as I walked in the door, Mildred, the manager (yes, the owners paid for a manger – keeping track of the stock, ordering the merchandize, tallying the inventories, balancing the books, was either too much for them or beneath them, I could never decide which) zoomed out of the back office and rushed up to me full of excitement.

“Call me,” she said, “the minute Al comes in.”

Al and his crony came in every morning. They were sheriffs – or rather from the sheriff’s department. Their job was to drive all over this part of the county keeping the peace and otherwise harassing owners of broken-down, rusty vehicles.

In case you are unaware, it is the custom for agents of the police to frequent convenient stores, ostensibly to hang around for a half hour in order to deter crime. Actually, this devious maneuver is nothing more than a cover. It boils down to them simply having access to free coffee and donuts. These two sheriff’s men, Al tall and skinny about 55 and his partner George short and too fat to chase down a criminal -, in they came every morning for their coffee and donut and a look at the newspaper. Crime stoppers.

“Don’t forget to call me the minute Al comes in,” she repeated and then jumped back into her office nook.

“What’s up?” I asked following her into the crowded back room. She had cartons of cigarettes all over the tiny room, doing her daily inventory. Cigarettes were treated like gold.

“Well,” she said, pushing me out of the office, “I’ll tell you up front, can’t leave the cash register unattended you know.”

And with that, she told me the whole story, while we both sipped coffee. What had happened the evening before after I had gone home.

It seemed that Ted and the missus, between handling the usual late afternoon transactions, spent most of their time puzzling over the mysterious package. To them, it was obviously a suspicious package. From California, they mumbled to each other (according to Mildred). Who knows what goes on in California? They convinced themselves that the so-called package of speakers had to be full of stash. Why else have it delivered here?

So they called the cops. The city police came promptly and they had brought with them a canine cop. The dog bounced all over the place as soon as they arrived. The package was placed on the floor for the dog to sniff.

“Well,” Mildred said, her eyes wide open. She was a short dumpy looking middle-aged gal. “The dog went wild!”

She said she had come out of the office and was witness to the whole thing.

A plan was devised to catch the dope smoking college student who no doubt was making a fortune selling marijuana to his comrades and comradesses.

The cops would confiscate the package, taking it to headquarters. When the culprit arrived to claim his package, he would be told that the boss had locked it up in the safe for security. He would be told to come back in an hour when the boss would return and he could then get his package. Meanwhile, the cops were to be kept abreast of things, and they would be there to arrest the slob.

This was a battle plan from the 1st World War.

“So,” I asked Mildred. “How did it turn out? What’s the sheriff’s office have to do with this? This is a city affair. Ain’t it?”

“The kid came into to get his package. We told him the made-up story. We called the police to let them know how everything was going to plan. They’d have an hour to get here and be ready to grab the kid.”

“So?”

“So, they said we should tell the kid to come to police headquarters and get his package.”

“What?”

“Yes. It turned out the package was clean. Only speakers”

“This is a wild story you’re telling me, Mildred. So why the sheriff?”

“Al came in for a cup of coffee before going off duty. I told him what happened and asked if could find out more about it. The sheriff’s office is right next door to the police station, you know.”

Mildred went back to counting cigarette cases in her office while I stood guard of the cash register, taking in money from the few drivers who didn’t use their credit cards at the pump. College students came in and out for their coffee and junk food fixes.

Finally, Al and his crony arrived. Mildred shot out of the back office like a firecracker. She must have had her eyes peeled to the peek-a-boo cameras. She scrambled up to Al, and out of her mouth shot him her burning question.

“Well?”

“Well nothing,” replied Al. “It’s all true. There was nothing in the package but two speakers.”

“And that’s it?” I asked.

Al gave me a sour look.

“What about the dog?” I asked. “How come he went wild?”

“The dog? Oh, him. Well, they’ve sent him back for more training.”

I drive into town every once in a while. I live 20 miles away. And every once in a while I find myself passing by the gas station where I worked for six months paying down my credit card. And every time I pass the place, I remember that incident. And when I do, I can’t help wondering if that canine cop ever got back his job.

The word count to this tale comes to 1932 words…the year I was born. Is that a coincidence or what?