delivered the Junction City Gazette every day, and Dirty Dave Duncan collected it – from Sam and God knew how many other homeowners in the Kelton Avenue section of town – once a month. Sam had seen him many times, trundling his shopping cart full of green plastic garbage bags across town toward the Recycling Center which stood between the old train depot and the small homeless shelter where Dirty Dave and a dozen or so of his compadres spent most of their nights.
He sat where he was for a moment longer, drumming his fingers on the kitchen table, then got up, pulled on a jacket, and went out to the car.
CHAPTER 5
Angle Street (I)
1
The intentions of the sign-maker had undoubtedly been the best, but his spelling had been poor. The sign was nailed to one of the porch uprights of the old house by the railroad tracks, and it read: ANGLE STREET
Since there were no angles on Railroad Avenue that Sam could see – like most Iowa streets and roads, it was as straight as a string – he reckoned the sign-maker had meant Angel Street. Well, so what? Sam thought that, while the road of good intentions might end in hell, the people who tried to fill the potholes along the way deserved at least some credit.
Angle Street was a big building which, Sam guessed, had housed railroad company offices back in the days when Junction City really had been a railway Junction point. Now there were just two sets of working tracks, both going east-west. All the others were rusty and overgrown with weeds. Most of the cross-ties were gone, appropriated for fires by the same homeless people Angle Street was here to serve.
Sam arrived at quarter to five. The sun cast a mournful, failing light over the empty fields which took over here at the edge of town. A seemingly endless freight was rumbling by behind the few buildings which stood out here. A breeze had sprung up, and as he stopped his car and got out, he could hear the rusty squeak of the old JUNCTION CITY sign swinging back and forth above the deserted platform where people had once boarded passenger trains for St Louis and Chicago – even the old Sunnyland Express, which had made its only Iowa stop in Junction City on its way to the fabulous kingdoms of Las Vegas and Los Angeles.
The homeless shelter had once been white; now it was a paintless gray. The curtains in the windows were clean but tired and limp. Weeds were trying to grow in the cindery yard. Sam thought they might gain a foothold by June, but right now they were making a bad job of it. A rusty barrel had been placed by the splintery steps leading up to the porch. Opposite the Angle Street sign, nailed to another porch support post, was this message:
NO DRINKING ALLOWED AT THIS SHELTER!
IF YOU HAVE A BOTTLE, IT MUST GO HERE BEFORE YOU ENTER!
His luck was in. Although Saturday night had almost arrived and the ginmills and beerjoints of Junction City awaited, Dirty Dave was here, and he was sober. He was, in fact, sitting on the porch with two other winos. They were engaged in making posters on large rectangles of white cardboard, and enjoying varying degrees of success. The fellow sitting on the floor at the far end of the porch was holding his right wrist with his left hand in an effort to offset a bad case of the shakes. The one in the middle worked with his
tongue peeking from the corner of his mouth, and looked like a very old nursery child trying his level best to draw a tree which would earn him a gold star to show Mommy. Dirty Dave, sitting in a splintered rocking chair near the porch steps, was easily in the best shape, but all three of them looked folded, stapled, and mutilated.
‘Hello, Dave,’ Sam said, mounting the steps.
Dave looked up, squinted, and then offered a tentative smile. All of his remaining teeth were in front. The smile revealed all five of them.
‘Mr Peebles?’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘How you doing, Dave?’
‘Oh, purty fair, I guess. Purty fair.’ He looked around. ‘Say, you guys! Say hello to Mr Peebles! He’s a lawyer!’
The fellow with the tip of his tongue sticking out looked up, nodded briefly, and went back to his poster. A long runner of snot depended from his left nostril.
‘Actually,’ Sam said, ‘real estate’s my game, Dave. Real estate and insur-‘
‘You got me my Slim Jim?’ the man with the shakes asked abruptly. He did not look up at all, but his frown of concentration deepened. Sam could see his poster from where he stood; it was covered with long orange squiggles which vaguely resembled words.
‘Pardon?’ Sam asked.
‘That’s Lukey,’ Dave said in a low voice. ‘He ain’t havin one of his better days, Mr Peebles.’
‘Got me my Slim Jim, got me my Slim Jim, got me my Slim Fuckin Slim Jim?’ Lukey chanted without looking up.
‘Uh, I’m sorry – ‘ Sam began.
‘He ain’t got no Slim Jims!’ Dirty Dave yelled. ‘Shut up and do your poster, Lukey! Sarah wants em by six!
She’s comin out special!’
‘I’ll get me a fuckin Slim Jim,’ Luckey said in a low intense voice. ‘If I don’t, I guess I’ll eat rat-turds.’
‘Don’t mind him, Mr Peebles,’ Dave said. ‘What’s up?’
‘Well, I was just wondering if you might have found a couple of books when you picked up the newspapers last Thursday. I’ve misplaced them, and I thought I’d check. They’re overdue at the Library.’
‘You got a quarter?’ the man with the tip of his tongue sticking out asked abruptly. ‘What’s the word?
Thunderbird!’
Sam reached automatically into his pocket. Dave reached out and touched his wrist, almost apologetically.
‘Don’t give him any money, Mr Peebles,’ he said. ‘That’s Rudolph. He don’t need no Thunderbird. Him and the Bird don’t agree no more. He just needs a night’s sleep.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Sam said. ‘I’m tapped, Rudolph.’
‘Yeah, you and everybody else,’ Rudolph said. As he went back to his poster he muttered: ‘What’s the price?
Fifty twice.’
‘I didn’t see any books,’ Dirty Dave said. ‘I’m sorry. I just got the papers, like usual. Missus V. was there, and she can tell you. I didn’t do nothing wrong.’ But his rheumy, unhappy eyes said he did not expect Sam to believe this. Unlike Mary, Dirty Dave Duncan did not live in a world where doom lay just up the road or around the corner; his surrounded him. He lived in it with what little dignity he could muster.
‘I believe you.’ Sam laid a hand on Dave’s shoulder.
‘I just dumped your box of papers into one of my bags, like always,’ Dave said.
‘If I had a thousand Slim Jims, I’d eat them all,’ Lukey said abruptly. ‘I would snark those suckers right down! That’s chow! That’s chow! That’s chow-de-dow!’
‘I believe you,’ Sam repeated, and patted Dave’s horribly bony shoulder. He found himself wondering, God help him, if Dave had fleas. On the heels of this uncharitable thought came another: he wondered if any of the other Rotarians, those hale and hearty fellows with whom he had made such a hit a week ago, had been down to this end of town lately. He wondered if they even knew about Angle Street. And he wondered if Spencer Michael Free had been thinking about such men as Lukey and Rudolph and Dirty Dave when he wrote that it was the human touch in this world that counted – the touch of your hand and mine. Sam felt a sudden burst of shame at the recollection of his speech, so full of innocent boosterism. and approval for the simple pleasures of small-town life.
‘That’s good,’ Dave said. ‘Then I can come back next month?’
‘Sure. You took the papers to the Recycling Center, right?’
‘Uh-huh.’ Dirty Dave pointed with a finger which ended in a yellow, ragged nail. ‘Right over there. But they’re closed.’
Sam nodded. ‘What are you doing?’ he asked.
‘Aw, just passin the time,’ Dave said, and turned the poster around so Sam could see it.
It showed a picture of a smiling woman holding a platter of fried chicken, and the first thing that struck Sam was that it was good – really good. Wino or not, Dirty Dave had a natural touch. Above the picture, the following was neatly printed:
CHICKEN DINNER AT THE 1 ST METHODIST CHURCH
TO BENEFIT ‘ANGEL STREET’ HOMELESS SHELTER
APRIL 15TH
6:00 To 8:00 P.M.
COME ONE COME ALL
‘It’s before the AA meeting,’ Dave said, ‘but you can’t put nothing on the poster about AA. That’s because it’s sort of secret.’
‘I know,’ Sam said. He paused, then asked: ‘Do you go to AA? You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to. I know it’s really none of my business.’