Read Online Stern Men by Elizabeth Gilbert - Free Book Online

pegs. The men said little.
    Sometimes Angus would say, “Have you ever seen such luck?”
    Sometimes he’d say, “I’ve seen better hands on an amputee.”
    Sometimes he’d say, “Who dealt this sorry rag?”
    Ruth’s father beat Angus soundly, and Angus put down his cards and told them a terrible joke.
    “Some men are out fishing one day for sport, and they’re drinking too much,” he began. Ruth’s father put down his cards, too, and sat back in his chair to listen. Angus narrated his joke with the greatest of care. He said, “So, these fellas are out fishing and they’re really having a time and drinking it up. They’re getting awful stewed. In fact, these fellas get to drinking so bad that one of them, the one named Mr. Smith, he falls overboard and drowns. That ruins everything. Hell! It’s no fun having a fishing party when a man drowns. So the men drink some more booze, and they set to feeling pretty miserable, because nobody wants to go home and tell Mrs. Smith her husband is drowned.”
    “You’re terrible, Angus,” Ruth’s father interrupted. “What kind of joke is that for tonight?”
    Angus continued. “Then one of the guys has a great idea. He suggests maybe they ought to hire Mr. Smooth-Talking-Jones to go break the bad news to Mrs. Smith. That’s right. It seems there’s a fella in town, name of Jones, who’s famous for being a real smooth talker. He’s perfect for the job. He’ll tell Mrs. Smith about her husband, but he’ll tell her so nice, she won’t even care. The other guys think, Hey, what a great idea! So they go find Smooth-Talking-Jones, and he says he’ll do the job, no problem. So Smooth-Talking-Jones puts on his nicest suit. He puts on a tie and a hat. He goes over to the Smith house. He knocks on the door. A woman answers. Smooth-Talking-Jones says, ‘Pardon me, ma’am, but ain’t you the Widow Smith?’ ”
    At this, Ruth’s father laughed into his beer glass, and a thin spray of foam flew from his mug to the table. Angus Addams held up his hand, palm out. Joke wasn’t finished. So he finished it.
    “The lady says, ‘Why, I am Mrs. Smith, but I ain’t no widow!’ And Smooth-Talking-Jones says, ‘The fuck you ain’t, sweetheart.’ ”
    Ruth toyed with that word in her mind: Sweethaht, sweet-hot . . .
    “Oh, that’s terrible.” Ruth’s father rubbed his mouth. He was laughing, though. “That’s terrible, Angus. Jesus Christ, what a rotten joke to tell. I can’t believe you’d tell a joke like that on a night like this. Jesus Christ.”
    “Why, Stan? You think it sounds like someone we know?” Angus said. Then he asked, in a strange falsetto, “Ain’t you the Widow Pommeroy?”
    “Angus, that is terrible,” Ruth’s father said, laughing even harder.
    “I’m not terrible. I’m telling jokes.”
    “You’re terrible, Angus. You’re terrible.”
    The two men laughed and laughed, and then settled down a bit. Eventually, Ruth’s father and Angus Addams commenced playing cribbage once more and grew quiet.
    Sometimes Ruth’s father said, “Christ!”
    Sometimes Ruth’s father said, “I should be shot for that play.”
    At the end of the night, Angus Addams had won one game and Stan Thomas had won two. Some money was exchanged. The men put away the cards and dismantled the cribbage board. Ruth returned the board to the closet in her father’s bedroom. Angus Addams folded up the card table and set it behind the sofa. The men moved into the kitchen and sat at the table. Ruth came back down, and her father patted her bottom and said to Angus, “I don’t imagine Pommeroy left his wife enough money to pay you for that nice coffin your brother built.”
    Angus Addams said, “You kidding me? Pommeroy didn’t leave any money. There’s no money in that goddamn family. Not enough money for a pissant funeral, I can tell you that. Not enough money for a coffin. Not even enough money to buy a ham bone to shove up his ass so the dogs could drag his