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The Cut of Pride
Jim Misko
Publication Consultants
Category:
Mainstream
Publisher: Northwest Ventures Press
Type: Fiction
Pages: 292
Copyright: 2011
ISBN-13: 9780964082632
Price: $8.99 (eBook)
A young man takes a job on an isolated mink ranch on the Oregon coast and gets involved with the dysfunctional family that owns and operates it.
Jeff Baker should have kept going in the fall of 1955. Only days out of jail and in need of money, the aspiring writer takes a job on a small, isolated mink ranch off the Oregon Coast. Jeff soon realizes that what is supposed to be simple, temporary employment is going to change his life in ways he could not have foreseen.
Ranch owners, Rose and West Helner, live with their two disabled sons in a run-down house on the desolate property. The long-married couple has a scarred history and live an alienated co-existence. Each seems eager to have a new listener around and tries to coerce Jeff into his way of thinking; all too often Jeff finds himself drawn into the continual conflict between them and forced to take sides. He soon realizes that Rose uses the mink ranch as a way to bind her husband to a subservient role and keep her wheelchair and couch-bound sons dependent on her.
Two traumatic incidents open his eyes to what happened to a previous employee and he struggles with his promise against what he has learned.
In the midst of this turmoil, Jeff finds romance with Rassel, the neighbor’s daughter, but their relationship is soon tested when she asks Jeff to leave the ranch and take her with him. The killing of calves for mink food, the slaughter of cows, the skinning of mink, the constant death of living things, begin to alter Jeff's perception of reality and bring out his darker nature, a side of himself he has always struggled to control.
Isolated, trapped, and holding two secrets close to his breast, Jeff longs to go back to the real world and become a serious writer. Sometimes walking away is not easy.
Excerpt
The Hide Buyers
A Ford pickup pulled up the driveway with smoke coming out under the running boards and a fan belt squeak that was so loud it drew me out of the salting shed. It stopped and a small cloud of dust and exhaust engulfed the car, passed over it, and dissipated against the slaughter-house. Two men got out. The driver, the smaller of the two, took off his hat and rubbed a handkerchief around the inside of it, then settled it on his head, turned and looked at me.
“The missus around?”
I shook my head. “Gone to town. Can I help you?”
The larger one put his hands on his hips, stuck his head out and glared at the driver. “I told you we should have called first.”
“Can we see the hides?” the driver asked.
“Who are you?” I said.
“Hide buyers.”
“Let me ask Paul.”
I found Paul in the living room listening to the government books on records that had been delivered by mail this week. “Paul—there are two guys here say they are hide buyers. They want to see the hides. Do you think it’s okay?”
His head snapped upright, his blind eyes sparkling. “I’ll come out.”
“You don’t—“
“I’ll come out. I get ten percent of the hide money.”
“Okay. Need any help?”
“Yeah—I took off my shoe that was hurting me. Can you put it on?”
I found it half under the couch. Ronny was asleep.
Paul said, “Those Jews—we gotta be careful with them. Every hide is a throw-away when they look at them. Let me think a minute.”
“Maybe we ought to tell them to come back when Rose or West is here,” I said.
“Naw. We can handle ‘em. Help me get out the door to my wheelbarrow.”
I pushed his wheelchair through the living room and kitchen and out the door to the porch where he kept his wheelbarrow parked.
It amazed me that Paul, who lived in his wheelchair inside the house, had enough leg strength to push the wheelbarrow up the hill to the slaughter house. It was a heavy contraption that West had fashioned from a wheelbarrow and two car wheels. Paul would lift the rear by the two handles, shove it forward and take a couple of awkward steps behind it, then set it down and catch his breath. But today, with the hide buyers already in the salting shed, he made the entire distance in two drives. Two level boards placed between the handles provided him a stable place to sit between drives. When he got to the hide shed he positioned the wheelbarrow near the entrance.
The two men stood on the concrete floor looking at Paul and me.
Paul, his head tilted down and shaking in his typical mode, turned his face up to the men and smiled like had just found his long lost brother. “Hi, gentlemen. I’m Paul, their son.”
The two men looked at one another, then the driver leaned forward and stuck out his hand. “My name’s Sydney.”
Paul lifted his right hand. It waved around but Sidney followed it, caught it, and then shook it. “Glad to meet you, Paul.”
The larger man stood looking at Paul, his hands still on his hips in the reverse mode with thumbs pointing forward, elbows back.
“Where did you guys come from today?” Paul said.
The driver looked at the other buyer. “Eugene,” the big man said.
“Good weather there?”
“Usual for this time of year. How many hides you got?”
“I like Eugene. It’s a nice clean town and the girls are wonderful there.”
The big guy turned his head away.
“You guys live in Eugene?”
“Yeah—near there—in Springfield.”
“You ever been to the saw mill there on the main road?”
“Drive by it all the time.
“My Dad used to work there. Back in the late forties. He worked the mill pond.”
“Look—we’ve got several places to go today and we need to see about your hides. Can you make a deal on them or do we need to see your folks?”
Paul waved his right hand and his head moved up and down and in circles like a showman. “I am authorized to make hide deals. I’m a part owner of the hides. Have you seen them yet?”
The big guy moved forward. “We’d like to do that right now.”
Paul twisted his head when the big man spoke. “Have we met?” he said.
“This is my brother, Mort,” Sydney said.
“He’s with you?”
“Yes. We go together to buy the hides. Could we see them now?”
Paul turned to me in an authoritative manner with a mild frown on his face. “Jeff, will you please show these gentlemen the hides and be sure to count them.”
We kept a paper tally sheet on the outside wall of the hide shed so that we knew how many hides had been put in there, salted, trimmed and ready for sale.
“Here’s our tally sheet,” I said.
Mort didn’t even look at it. “We don’t go by that.” He climbed in the hide room and pulled the top hide up, turned it over, ran his hand over the hair side and pinched the neck skin. Then he pulled the next three up and did the same. “How many you think you’ve got?”
Paul looked toward me, the frown still on his face as he worked at putting a pinch of snus in his lip. “How many, Jeff?”
“The tally sheet says 460 plus 300 in the freezer.”
“That’s 760 then,” Paul said. “Let’s see—at $4.00 apiece that’s…”
Mort interrupted. “We haven’t paid $4 since the war.”
“Now, Mort,” Sydney broke in. “Don’t get argumentative. These people want to sell their hides. We buy hides. We need to come to an amicable agreement.” He seemed to be thinking on it with the edge of a hide in his hands like looking at it longer would give him some special answer to the price. After a pause that allowed Paul to complete the act of getting the snus from the can to his lip and then cap the can and return it to his top overall pocket, Sydney said, “$2.50 is the best we can do in this market, with $1 off for any holes in the hide.”
Paul snorted and looked away. I didn’t know how much he could see with his damaged eyes but he had positioned the wheelbarrow so that Sidney and Mort were back lighted from the window and he looked away from them.
“Jeff—when did that other hide buyer say he would be out to look at these?”
I hadn’t heard about any other hide buyer. I didn’t want to lie, even to help him in his negotiations. “I don’t recall,” I said.
“Oh, that’s right. You weren’t in the house when he called.” He lowered his head and sucked on the snus. “Four dollars a hide is a fair price,” he said.
“I’ve looked at ten of them and two have holes in them,” Mort said. “That’s twenty percent. If you have 760 hides and twenty percent have holes in them we could go maybe to $2.75 each. More holes we’d have to cut the price.”
Paul jerked his head up. “I doubt you’ll find ten percent have holes. But I’d let them go for $3.50 each right now.”
Mort moved toward the door. “Let’s go, Syd, we’re not getting anywhere here.”
They both started for the car. Mort pulled the passenger door open as Sydney reached for the door handle and turned. “Paul. I like your bargaining stance. You’ve got a good head on your shoulders. But the market’s not that good for calf skins right now and there is a flood of them on the market. Before we go, can we make a deal right now at $2.95 a hide?”
In a move that I’ll remember the rest of my life, Paul stood up and crossed his arms across his chest. He spit the snus into the gutter, wiped his lips and smiled. “I’ll let you have ‘em for $3.00 a hide with no discount for any holes. That’s my final offer.”
Mort got in the car and slammed the door shut. Sydney opened his door and started to get in. He put his left leg back out and stood half in and half out of the car. “We gotta deal at three dollars a hide?”
Paul nodded.
“OK. We’ll send the truck by to pick ‘em up. He’ll have a check for you then. Seven hundred and sixty hides in all.”
Paul nodded.
I didn’t think the pickup would start but it backfired once, and the starter seemed to get some juice from that, and it started with a burst of exhaust, and down the driveway it went.
Paul fell backward onto his wheelbarrow, his arms flailing and laughing so hard I didn’t think he would be able to catch his breath. “Two thousand two hundred and eighty dollars,” he said.
“Less what is owed to the Johnson kid for salting that day,” I said.
“That don’t amount to nothing.” He squirmed on the wheelbarrow seat like a little kid. “Don’t that beat all. Three bucks a hide.”
“What did you expect?” I said.
“I wanted more than the two-fifty they paid last time. The car companies are using calf hides for trim in their cars and I thought the price might go up. Heard it on the radio market report.”
“Well—I’ll be damned.”
“Those guys drive Cadillac’s in town. When they come to buy hides they dress poor and drive that stinky old pickup.”
“Could you see that Sydney’s hands?”
“No.”
“They were soft and well-manicured.”
He nodded.
“You want any help getting back to the house?”
“Yeah. That would be nice.”
I turned the wheelbarrow around and pointed it in the right direction. Paul leaned on the handles and started it down the slope dragging his left foot. He stopped twice going down. I helped him into the wheelchair and through the front door. We barely got through the door and he yelled out to Ronny.
“Ron—I got ‘em. I got ‘em.”
Ronny, who was confined to the couch or bed for the last fifteen years, squinted his face and gave his version of a laugh.
“We got two hundred and twenty-eight dollars for our share.”
Ron squirmed on the couch and brought his left leg up off the floor. I got the feeling they had something in mind for the money.
West and Rose got back late in the day before the last mink feeding. At supper everyone acted normal so I didn’t mention the hide buyers.
Just before coffee and desert, Paul lifted his head and turned to Rose. “When do I get my check?”
“What check?”
“My ten percent check.”
Rose acted confused. She put coffee and a chocolate layer cake on the table. “I don’t know of any ten percent check.”
“Sure you do.”
“For what?”
“The hides.”
“The hides?”
Paul nodded. “Buyers came by today and I sold them.”
“You sold them?”
“Yes.”
Ronny was giggling on the couch, his left leg rising and falling.
“I never said you could sell the hides. We do that,” she said.
West cut a piece of cake and gave it to Paul then cut another for himself.
“I sold ‘em.”
Rose looked at West. He shrugged and put a bite of cake in his mouth.
A smile started over Rose’s face as she poured the coffee all around. “And how much did you get for them, Mr. Businessman?”
“Guess.”
“Two-fifty?”
Ronny pounded the couch with his left hand, his face contorted in a facsimile of a smile. Paul could hear him and half-turned his head to acknowledge his brothers antics.
“More,” Paul said.
“More?”
Paul nodded.
“Two-seventy five?”
This sent Ronny into convulsions. Paul was sucking in air and snorting as he shook his head. “More,” he laughed.
For the first time since I had been there, Rose looked perplexed. “My god, Paul. Did you point a gun at him?”
Paul slapped the table with the flat of his hand, threw his head back and the whole table shook with the vibrations of his laughter. I thought Ronny would fall off the couch. West turned to look at him to see if he was going to have to leave the table and catch him.
“Three dollars,” Paul finally blurted out.
“How much off for holes?”
Paul shook his head, his smile widening as it moved from side to side. “Nothing.”
“No hole discount? What am I missing here?”
“I heard it on the radio on the market report. Calf hides were up so I thought I’d see how far. I started at four dollars.”
“How many did we have?”
“Jeff said 760.”
“My gosh, that’s…”
“Two thousand two hundred and eighty dollars,” Paul threw in. “And ten percent of that is my check for two hundred and twenty-eight dollars.”
West stopped chewing and looked up. “That’s more money than I’ve got.”
It was silent for a minute. Even Ronny quieted down and sat very still.
Rose smiled. “Paul, honey, you don’t have a bank account so I’ll just hold it for you.”
“You could cash it and give me the money.”
“You’d just lose it. It’s yours and Ronny’s. It is to be used for something you need.”
“I want to feel it and count it.”
“Honey,” she said as her voice softened and she put her hand over his arm. “You couldn’t see to count it.”
His head dropped into his traditional chin-on-his-chest position, accentuating the bones on the back of his neck.
Ronny was dead still. Partially wrapped in a blanket, he looked like a mummy escaped from his tomb.
“I just wanted to count it.”
“I know. I know.”
That was the first time that I heard the clock on the mantel where the calf money was kept.
Rose stood up to clear the dishes from the table. “OK. When I go to town Friday, I’ll cash the check. How do you want it?”
Paul’s head snapped up. “Twenties.”
“Twenties it is then.”
Paul’s lips formed a grin that went clear back to his molars. He tossed his head back toward Ronny, who had come to life and was thrashing his left arm and leg through the air.
“Hot damn,” Paul croaked out. He turned his wheelchair and pushed himself in toward the couch. When he got close to Ronny they bumped legs and both of them tossed their heads back, laughing.
“Paul. Watch your swearing,” Rose said.
West had both elbows on the table, sipping his coffee looking out the window at the unfinished house on the hill.
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