hannah's men

        Cap began sleeping late.  He would remain in his room until he was certain he would not encounter Hannah. He knew it was her nature to clean up any mess she found in his pub. And Jimmy-Scamp could be trusted to complete bar preparations.
        The dark wood beams gave him a pleasant snug feeling. The row of white trimmed windows added to the ambience of a captain's chamber aboard a windjammer.
        Yet a stone resided where his heart had been.
        Soon after hearing that his beloved Hannah had begun sleeping with Mister Radcliff, Cap began to ail. Physically as well as mentally. His bowels refused to function right. His appetite had expired. He felt stoved up, as if something had torn loose from his gut. His pepperfried intestines ran plumbed with crushed ice. He killed insects obsessively, hunting them in every cranny.
     

                                                                                *


        Today shortly after seven o'clock she knocked and called for him.
        Twice.
        And he listened to her going away.



                                                                                  *


         A five foot mirror was nailed to the closet door. He admired himself with extreme vanity, completely aware that the glass distorted his reflection, making him appear thinner, taller, thus younger to a degree. By jowl and chin and waist, youth sang again.
         He studied this most excellent image.
         In the eyes it was still there. The hurt.
         How long had it been since he had been so amourously horsekicked?


                                                                                    *


        On the way down to the galley he met her as she was climbing the stairs. Wearing that mauve gingham gown, she allowed her bosom to brush against his, her eyes seeking his.
        "Good morning, my captain. Are you feeling better?"
        He stormed past her, boots clubbing down the stairs, leaving her confused, perplexed, and frightened.
        "Cap! Cap! Speak to me!"
        He whirled and confronted her, eyes full of rage, blistered in betrayal. "How long is that white faggot staying at the inn?"
        "Mister Radcliff?"
        "Mister Tip Top Cheerio Radcliff. Who else?"
        "He has not told me."
        The wounded old man pounded on to the galley. She followed meekly. Then with a fury she had never seen in him before, he spat upon his immaculate galley deck. "Chinga! Mierda!"
        "Don't curse, Cap. Please."



                                                                                        *


        In the dimness Cap lighted his tallow candles. His altar to the holy saints was littered with coconuts and cowries. All afternoon he had sat there upon the floor drinking yerbabuena and thinking of Hannah Ramirez and how she had often walked past his door and down the hall, her buttocks swaying as if she were leading a conga line. Now with the coming of night he was stoned enough to call forth his Orishas.
        The mayombrero witch he had visited in Spanish Town specialized in revenge. Black magic.
        Cap learned all that he could from this blind man with white eyes.
        He learned of the danger.

                                                                                     *


        Evening seeped into the room. Orishas from Cap's imagination arrived subtly, perhaps as a lavender mist. Above Mister Radcliff's sweat-soaked bed, bloody veins in the marbled plaster revealed death-threats. His brain bubbled and throbbed and a thousand icepicks swarmed between his ears.
        A whole day had passed and he was not yet dressed.
        There was this memory. A gentle thump on the door. His laundered clothes had arrived. No one was in the hall when he retrieved the parcel. No one saw his nakedness.
        Too bad. I am quite remarkable.


                                                                                           *

        Then, at last, that cryptic knock. Hannah.
        "It's open."
        Hannah slid inside and latched the door. The gloaming grew palpable in the room. She asked the man sitting on the edge of the bed with a bottle of Pinch, "Have you given up living?"
        "Is my dissipation that complete?"
        "You stink from the soul on out."
        His laugh sounded like a death-rattle. "Make yourself at home. Have a drink."
        She shuddered. "No. I hate whiskey."
        "I'll shower and gargle. Won't be long. Promise."
        He excused himself and disappeared into the bathroom.
        Something else smelled badly. The bed linen. Evidently he had been shooing away the maid on the past few afternoons. Hannah Ramirez did not make love on soiled sheets. While Mister Radcliff cleaned his body she would clean his bed.
        When he emerged she was sitting in the wicker chair and sipping her Dubonnet. His nakedness amused her. He seemed to be a handsome man.
        He had doused himself with Royall Lyme. "Whiff!"
        "Whiff is right." Giggling and feeling much better.
        Then he asked her about the ceiling.