Mysterious Stranger

Restlessness

All of Talent had a restless streak that

seemed to run down the middle of town

like a human version of Main Street.

Rolo’s bones were never satisfactory.

Big Mike had a love/hate thing with Lizzie,

and Harry Reems’ horn embouchure was

a failed memory.

The philologist Carl Hicks was overthinking

everything and prone to depression, while

Tex fixated on the old Fury, drinking damn

near as much as the wag Ted, whose liver

was in “dreadful shape,” according to Doctor

Feilgud, an ancient practitioner and deliverer

of bad news.

Boomer, finally kicked out of school, was

considering a military career when he got

caught stealing beer and played the fool

while hiding in an alley adjacent to Knott’s

Deli, telling the arresting officer that he was

about to go "kill him some Arabs," and wasn’t

that "pretty cool?"

Not to mention poor Rex Dern, surviving on

fish and memories of his ex-wife who, like

Ted’s, left him for a life with a moneyed man.

Oh yes, the restlessness in Talent had finally

reached a peak, and things were nearly out

of hand when Buddy Dooley, an old-school

P.I., mysteriously arrived.

TS