He finds it in the paper, of all places. Among listings for yard sales and liquidations that no one sees, there it is, a help wanted post. A few vague lines, no experience needed, just the right disposition and an ability to pour drinks.
Knox shows up with the paper in hand, as if they might not believe. A little wooden plank nailed to the wall, numbers carved. He holds the paper up to match the two. Still he isn’t sure, and so, he decides to knock.
A slide pulls along a runner, a little window there. Dark eyes staring. Knox speaks but the eyes only watch.
“There was an ad. In the paper.”
He holds up the fold of pages. The dark eyes dart. The little window disappears.
There is a sharp huff with the door’s opening, like the airlock on a deep space ship adrift. The man who stands there holds hat to chest. Thin hair side parted and pomade slick. Knox bows only just.
“There’s an opening? At the bar.”
The doorman looks him over again and then steps aside. Knox crosses. He holds the paper still. Held in two hands, a totem. The doorman shuts and bolts the door behind him.
The room is an expanse of den. Plush sofas and old rockers and cobbled tables and chairs. A long bar like the plank of an old ship. Knox heads on to that waiting galley.
A bartender hovers. A man of some years, his beard grows in full white. He smiles and he nods and he goes on smiling. Knox lays out the paper. He pushes it flat with a hand.
“I came to see about the job.”
The bartender only looks at him. The look goes on. Then a nod. a hand up. One moment. The bartender steps through a door into a backroom. Now Knox is alone at the bar. A few patrons mill. At tables, in chairs. Much of the room is but waiting for bodies. A fire burns in a hearth. Chairs pulled close to that heat.
The bartender does not return first. The door opens again and there is a man. face slender and stern. The man steps to the bar’s end and he waves Knox nearer.
“You’ve come for the ad.”
Knox says he has.
“You pour drinks.”
“The ad said I didn’t need experience.”
“But you pour drinks.”
“I have. At a private function.”
“Private function.”
“A house party. And a wedding one time.”
The man nods. He pats pockets. He reaches into a jacket, the kind of suit cut fallen out of fashion for decades or more. He brings out a notepad and turns pages over and turns more.
“You drink?”
“At work?”
The stern man looks on. He pats pockets again. He turns up a stub of pencil and he makes a little note there and he looks up again.
“You’re not at work yet.”
“Is this a test?”
“It’s a question.”
“I’ll have a drink here and there.”
The stern man makes a note. He points and the bartender is all of a sudden there. He says order a drink. He says have a minute. I’ll be at a table when your drink comes. Look around the room. Take it in. Then he steps away.
A pause now, and he looks. The room. Mismatched furniture and faces and clothes. A hodgepodge of types flopped among dusty throws. Men in suits, some fine, some cheap. Some very, very old. Knox asks what they have and the bartender says everything there is and Knox orders a scotch of middling vintage. The bartender steps away.
There comes a kind of pull, like a held breath loosed. The club’s front door opens and closes. A moment of breathlessness between. Then the moment is done and a man stands there shaking off a rain that minutes prior was nowhere around. The man steps to the bar and waits. The whitebeard bartender comes close and the man orders. The bartender nods and then for a moment only stands, a little lost. Then he is pouring a glass half full, he is setting it before the man. Another minute goes by and he brings a class to Knox, and Knox sips, and the bartender stands, set adrift again.
“Is this a good job?”
The bartender looks around as if shaken from a dream. He says it is a fine job, a fine job. Then he smiles.
Knox finds the stern man’s table. He sits down with his drink. The stern man’s focus remains on his notebook for a minute, longer. When he looks up he nods at the bartender and a drink comes right away. He sips, he stares. After a moment he asks a question, and another, basic interview fare. Knox answers each with the right amount of truth. It goes on. The stern man consults his notebook. He asks Knox, do you want another drink?
“Is this a test?”
“You can get it yourself.”
“Are you sure? There’s gotta be some town ordinance.”
“We were here before any town ordinance and we will be here long after.”
Knox gets up. He goes to the bar. Shelves of warm wood lined with dust caked bottles. He runs a hand along. When he finds the one he pours. He sips and pours a little more.
The pull comes again. That gasp from the front door. The man who steps into the room wears a lackadaisical frizz of hair, a scarf hanged low. Behind him through the open door a hard fall of snow pools. The door closes with a thump.
The frizz man comes to the bar, and Knox is there, he leans with authority. The frizz man asks for a drink and Knox looks to where the stern man sits, and he gets a nod, he pours the newcomer a drink. The frizz man puts glass to lips, testing, then nodding. Good, good.
Back at the table.
“You’ve served your first.”
“How did I do?”
“How do you think you did?”
Knox shrugs. He doesn’t speak. He waits, and seconds go by, a quiet moment. The stern man makes a note. Then the pull. A drained feel for only a moment and then a slap with the door’s close. A man there. Suit cut from cloth thick and old, the flat cap of some yesteryear’s style. He steps ahead with a word.
“Whoosh.”
Loud, absurd. At home.
Knox looks at the man, and he turns back, he looks at his glass. He takes a drink. He asks the stern man, is the place licensed in some kind of way, do I need a permit? He asks other questions and voices other thoughts, and each of these in descending order matters less and less. And he watches the door, more and more he keeps his eyes on the door, each hiccup and gasp as some new man appears in that arcane passageway. All kinds. An old time dandy’s suit, hat cocked just so. A schlub in sweats and a stretched tee. This one. He gets eyes from the stooge at the door, but he’s allowed, as one by one they all are.
“Can you keep a secret?”
He’s jarred, Knox is. The abruptness of the question. The naked earnestness.
“Yeah. Yes. I think so, yeah.”
“It’s the only thing that matters.”
“What is?”
“The bottles all have labels. Most do. The funny names for a drink don’t mean anything. Trust me. Trust me. Can you pour a drink?”
“I’m pretty sure.”
“That’s half of it.”
“What’s the other half?”
“Keeping secrets.”
Knox is nodding. He’s turning to the white haired bartender and waggling a finger. One more. A nod back. The door gasps again. The man now shines. Victorian aura. The world behind him claps with passing hooves. Then the door is shut tight again. Only so long. That huff once more. Like a breath only gasped. People are dragged in their chairs. These comfortable members. Heads turn every one.
There is a wave among the gathered. Some shift running along a nerve beneath the waterline. A stranger stands at the door. The tee and jeans of anybody. Eyes wide, pupils dilated like moons fried. Animal fear in those eyes. One arm still outstretched where he’s shoved the doorman away.
There is a stretch of violent nothing. Not a tension but a thing like it, electric in the air as all remains still. Then the world breaks loose. Men standing and moving, fast, fast. The frizz grabs the stranger and they struggle. The schlub joins the fray. Others. Pulling the stranger, holding him down. He struggles under their many hands held to his limbs and body and then he doesn’t, a thing now stilled, pacified.
A debate ensues. Men in a huddle discussing. Sometimes quiet, sometimes not. The dandy, the schlub, others. Flat cap. All the white the stern faced man watches. He watches their fretting, the indecision. Every word. Then he is standing. Chair scooting loud on these old floors. Heads turn to see. He is crossing the room, he is reaching into his coat. From within he produces a pistol. Drawn with a duelist’s practiced hand. His step takes him among the gathered. Body’s part to allow his passing. The stranger lies there on the floor. He’s gibbering some prayer meaningless now. Some excuse. An explanation too late. The stern man aims the pistol. The shot is impossibly loud.
Quiet now. The debating is done. The men all move away. They sit, they drink glasses empty. The stern man returns to the table. The pistol falls to the table face with a clunk.
“I should apologize.”
Knox sits too far forward. Tendons show in taut neck. Fingers pull at the wood. He’s saying something, some stream of thinking far too late arrived. Call the cops. Oh no. Oh my God. The stranger lies still very dead.
The stern man reaches back into his coat. He takes out a cigarette case. Silver and fine. He takes one and lights it and breathes. A cloud blue and circling. He stares now, he stares hard.
“Can you keep a secret?”
“You shot that man.”
The stern man shrugs.
“That man wasn’t a member. Can you keep a secret?”
“We need to call the cops.”
The sigh now comes soft.
“I’m going to ask you this, and I need you to really hear. It’s the only thing that matters. In all the world it is the only thing that does. Can you keep a secret?”
Knox stares. His mouth opens and closes. In time he says a word, but it isn’t the right one.
***
A man sits in a cafe. A chain place like a million of the same. He sips a coffee and sets it back and he shakes a newspaper open. He turns pages. Headlines, sports, the funnies. The want ads are there, this antique link to certain needs. Among yard sales and liquidations there is a listing. A private club needs a new bartender.
— Craig Rodgers is the author of several books, dozens of stories, countless notes, and one convoluted plan to fake his own death.