The Doghouse is not a big town, however, so it was not long before Mario reined in and wheeled the cab through a narrow gateway into a large walled courtyard.
Along one wall was a livery tending to the needs of the horses. On the opposite wall, under a well-weathered colonnade, stood a stout door, much abused by time and circumstances. The door’s green paint was peeling off. Numerous cuts, gashes and nicks in the wood of both door and frame gave evidence that the customers were not a particularly sober and upright sort.
Above the colonnade stood—or rather, leaned slightly askew—a sign (very badly lettered) which proclaimed:
THERE AIN,T NO SUCH THING AS A
FREE LUNCH
Gwendolyn and I grabbed our belongings and followed Mario inside. The place, to all appearances, was a classic provincial alehouse: numerous tables and chairs, a long, long bar, a few small windows high in a back wall, and several curtained alcoves or private rooms. Behind the bar was a small kitchen from which emanated a variety of amazing smells. The air was thick with tobacco and cooking smoke, not to mention alcohol vapors. A subdued hubbub filled the room, which soon changed to cries of loud greeting when the customers spotted Gwendolyn. We took our places at the bar. The tapster, a fat and placid-looking man, made a slow but inevitable progress up the long bar, like a stout ship moving through a canal, propelled by ritual wipes of the counter with a towel.
” ‘Lo, Mario. ‘Lo, Gwendolyn. Long time. And who’s your friend?”
Gwendolyn introduced me. “And this is the Tapster, Benvenuti. What’s the free lunch, today? Arsters? Arsters and beer?”
” ‘Course it is,” snapped the Tapster. “Just like it’s been for the past twenty years and more.”
“I’ll have some,” said Gwendolyn. The Tapster eyed me.
“I’ll have oysters and beer, also.” The gathering fury on his face warned me. “Arsters, I mean! Arsters!”
He waddled off, wiping the bar, then passed through a curtain into the kitchen.
“What is it about shellfish,” I complained to Gwendolyn, “that people will commit mayhem over pronunciation?”
She and Mario frowned at me, like bishops regarding a heretic.
“A quahog is a quahog, a clam is a clam, and an arster is an arster,” came their joint pronunciamento. I sighed, but let it go. I’m bold, but I’m not crazy.
The Tapster returned, bearing great pots of ale and a platter full of mollusks.
Famished, I started to dig in, then hesitated.
“Uh, tapster, a question. What about—?” I avoided the obscenity. “What I mean is, the sign above says there is no free lunch.”
“Well, of course there isn’t! What are we—witless nihilists?”
“He’s new,” said Gwendolyn, devouring her “arsters.”
“Oh. Well, then, young man, let me explain the customs of the Mutt. In this happy and prosperous little place, we handle the exchange of goods and services rather differently from those benighted lands groaning under the yoke of”—here, a tight jaw, a grim lip, jowls quivering with contempt—”money. Keeps the Consortium off our backs, you understand? Not to mention the usurers and the rest of the world’s drones. So it’s like this. You come in here looking for something to eat and drink, but naturally I can’t sell it to you because if I did, before you know it I’d be a subsidiary of the Consortium—whether I wanted it or not—and the next thing you know all of my customers would boycott the place and the next thing you know I’d be run out of town on a rail, if I was lucky and the General’s dogs were in need of a rest. So we can’t have that. So instead I give everybody a free lunch. Booze is on the house too, of course.”
He proceeded to give the counter a solemn wipe of his cloth.
“Now, of course if people didn’t help me out, I’d soon be starving on the street. And then they’d miss out on their free lunch. So out of the goodness of their hearts they provide me with the various services which I require. Everything make sense?”
I thought it over. “Yes, I think so. Your system reminds me a bit of a book written by one of my relatives. Proudhon Sfrondrati-Piccolimini, you may have heard of him? If I recall, he argues—”