La Vendetta Di Le Sournois

This entire story is really very amusing, being one that is astonishingly tough to wipe away from the depths of my mind. What else was I to do but cachinnate wildly at the time? What else may I do now, but just chuckle about the entire course of events, as I recollect them here for my own amusement? I sit at my desk before my monitor screen, and simply just allow my intellect to wander amid the power of distant recollection, while I make a permanent record of the events from my own personal notes of the time, as they unfolded. Honestly, I might just still be snickering away in regard to this matter on the hour of my one-hundredth birthday.

It all happened a while back, maybe just a touch more than twenty years ago, yet no more than twenty-five, and most certainly no less than two times ten . I shall always recall a certain face; an onion slick head, a short, but firm, though somewhat stout body. He might have been thirty at the time.

This bald head possessed a wry smile, that bore an appearance which caused one to feel slightly nauseated. I never could comprehend the reasons why it caused those who gazed directly upon it to feel so sickened, but it most certainly did, nevertheless. Maybe it was this putrid scent of stale cigarettes that he always carried about his person, combined with a gradually radiating fume of rotten teeth, eh? We may never know for sure.

The man's name was Le Sournois. Frequently he spoke in tones of English and Cajun French combined, shifting exclusively to Cajun French when angered to any degree. His personality was rugged individualism, independent thinking. He was very blunt in his speech, but extremely creative in his intellect at the same time. He also was in possession of a tendency for inventive entrepreneurship. Strangely enough, I observed that he was gregarious only when first spoken to; but at the same time, very aloof.

Actually, I got along very well with Le Sournois, since I, myself, was something of the same personality. I met him at my place of employment. I had already been working at this particular location for over a year and a half by the time that I met Sournois. The facility in which we both were employed at the time, was a large bus terminal sitting in the midst of the Lafayette metropolis. It was almost like an antique rural oasis with its own personality, sitting in the midst of a well-developed city metropolis.

This massive bus station always had lights that needed maintaining, appliances on the inside of the terminal that frequently malfunctioned, grounds that needed grooming, among a whole host of other necessary duties. The grounds consisted of over three hundred acres, and several thousand more in total surrounding the facility, that the maintenance crew was expected to do a security patrol around every morning at the first light.

I already knew well of the negative motivations constantly dealt out by the administration on a weekly basis. These negatives included but were certainly not limited to: how unreasonable the management was in general, the overtly crass manner in which the chief brass blatantly encouraged and literally sanctioned harassment of all the workers by their fellow coworkers.

Allowing harassment from one's coworkers was a method utilized by authority in performing the act of managing personnel at this facility, since the authority there lacked the imagination and the calculating comprehension of management through positive motivation, to develop any sort of alternative method that would accommodate a positive flow on the ground among rank and file employees. Indeed the management inside this facility actuality designed to create a hostile, tense work environment,

Then there were the endless lies that management told in regard to our announced raises, for the purpose of giving justification to the supposed sudden reality that we were never to receive a raise. An account was published once inside a corporate journal entitled, “Good Times At The Bedlam Bus Corporation,” clearly stating that the management had emphatically received a raise themselves during those dark and difficult days, however. A single brisk calculation between the number of employees at the manager level, and the dollar amounts indicated by the journal in their rises, in company with a total on what the workers would have received via their now vaporized raises, revealed unto all of us on the ground the true story in what we were really dealing with. The concluding result was that motivation for pride in the company, and general respect among the workers for the management, was almost nonexistent.

At the same time the management there were engaged in their own programs of petty theft from the company, utilizing company tools and vehicles for their own personal projects while on company time; and making secret back-room passes at the female office employees, even though the penalties for doing so were devastating to both themselves and the corporation in which they were employed, to say the very least.

I know well what I speak of here, since this authority went way out of its parameters to accuse the employees of these same activities, always threatening us with leveraging the maximum in penalties should we ever wind up being apprehended; and always being very adamant in the fact that we most emphatically would wind up being nabbed, since they all well knew that we were guilty, and specifically whom! It was only a matter of time before their searching beams of brilliant light would reveal all secrets held in confidence of the darkness, they so readily assured us.

These oppressed ladies, on the other hand, were offering a few of us whom they knew to be both suspicious and trustworthy, loads of valuable information that we could support with our own covert observation. Just to put it bluntly here, the management in this facility was guilty as sin, lest any reader should harbour doubts about matters at hand!

Our immediate supervisor was a man named Jerry Jones. Jerry was an ex-air force veteran who had served in Vietnam, among a series of additional wars during the course of his twenty-year military career. I would also label him as a genius mechanic of large or small engines, or any appliance that was electrical or mechanical in general.

I vividly recall a number of incidences where our immediate supervisor, Jones, Sournois, and myself showed this incapable high command up for being the stooges that they really were all along. I get a kick out of it over coffee or wine and in the company of true friends, even to this very day; so many years into the future from the time of the event, being now many hundreds of miles away from the place where these situations occurred.

On the other hand, good ole Jerry could not nail four two by fours into a square, let alone function to any capacity as a carpenter, mason, or concrete man. For that reason when such obligations materialized, he placed yours truly into the position of foreman over any such task that might present itself. Certainly, Jones was a humble, caring personality and supervisor, unlike those among his superiors.

The terminal grounds attracted untold varieties of wildlife, and it was Jerry’s additional responsibility to keep the terminal road areas free of traffic from the beasts of the field. The problem was that there existed only one effective method to accomplish this assigned objective.

It was my own observation at the time, that Jerry himself was the object of persecution from the high command, just as we, the tradesmen and workers, were. These people enjoyed taking advantage of Jerry’s well developed electrical and mechanical abilities for free work on their personal vehicles, own private homes; and general work around the bus terminal where saving them money meant that they would receive an in-hand cash credit in the form of a percentage commission gain, while poor Jerry received nothing at all for his extracurricular labour that he so obligingly performed for these managers on company time.

Because of his military conditioning to never question his superiors, he repressed what we might presume would have been a natural tendency to make a stand against his oppressors, when he felt that he or his subordinates were being abused. Please understand, however, that good ole Jerry was well aware of what was going on at the time.

Jerry himself, on the other hand, personally needed their employment, since he netted a really good deal in rental payments on a ranch style brick home that sat right there in the midst of the facility grounds. It was almost like having his own farm, considering that he also had completely unfettered access to so much undeveloped and developed property. In fact, this was the company's crass justification for taking advantage of poor old Jerry such as they did. All of this goes without adding into this nefarious mix, that his military retirement check was really not adequate enough to sustain himself on, as I was shocked to discover.

Still, however, he was being used for an advantage in an elitist gain, and he well knew it. At times his gestures revealed the fact that he questioned whether or not his living arrangement was worth the price that he had to pay for it in so many ways other than money; although as one would presume, he never once verbalized this feeling of his to his subordinates, and certainly not to any of his superiors.

Man, how the classification of “military retiree” sure had changed in the past twelve years or so, I thought in silence back then to myself. Back in my day as a youth growing up, being classed as “military retiree” meant sitting in the shallow end of a somewhat large pond in an old wooden chair, dressed in ragged blue jeans while wearing a large straw hat, holding a cane fishing pole, catching fish one after another, and continuously turning up cans of beer all day long from sunrise to sunset. As kids we almost made our own retirement from collecting the accumulated piles of aluminium cans from around these ponds, crushing them, and recycling them for hard green cash at the local recycling facility.

This lifestyle these people would do for the six warm months out of the year; then jet out to Ocho Rio, Jamaica, for the purpose of living it up in a seaside apartment that they had purchased while in service, that they otherwise had rented out for more hard cash while they drank it all up back home.

Many times early in the morning during the security patrol, Jerry, myself, and Le Sournois would load up in his company-issued cherry red, Chevy Suburban cruiser, toss in his Savage twenty five twenty rifle and a hat full of extra ammo, then head out into the undeveloped oasis behind his house there on company grounds. In the back of this Suburban cruiser, we kept a four by three, by eight, wooden box, thrown together from scrap found laying around the terminal. As we rode around the terminal grounds we would proceed to take turns at the rifle, soon filling the box up to the rim with a variety of wild game. This game included Canada Geese, deer, 'coon and opossum in company with far too many beaver, squirrel and rabbits for me to even recollect at this point down the timeline.

When we filled the box, we would ease away from the facility on a narrow overlooked backwoods dirt road that allowed us to pass right through a break in the fence surrounding the grounds, where we would divide the game up into thirds, being very careful to quickly drop a third off at each person’s home right there in the edge of the metropolis. I certainly do not know about the other two, but I filled my large four by eight by five feet freezer in no time flat, with loads of fresh wild meat, and even some fresh bass craftily gathered right from the terminal pond.

Sometimes Jerry would drop by the house late in the evening for the purpose of going on a night hunt, where we would collect much more, which I would sell to a kind gent at the flea market way down in Thibodaux the following weekend; but that tale will have to be a story all of its own, for another day.

You see, it was a small matter for us to deal with, but the high command at this terminal employed a man who was their scout, their warden on the grounds, their eyes and ears among us, although officially he was one of our maintenance co-workers. He was a disgustingly dark, rot complected, short kind of individual, somewhat reminiscent of a foul troll directly out of a timeworn fairy tale; who walked around like he was always lost in figuring out what he was supposed to do with himself, yet scared that somebody, somewhere, would call his hand for being so. Sournois and I called him Leur Fou, but could never figure out specifically if he was their fool, or they his. Constantly as we patrolled the area, we were compelled to scout any horizons ahead with our handy, dandy, military surplus spyglass, in search for him.

Seins Exotiques, the enticing custodian supervisor back at the terminal, or our kind inside collaborator, would keep us well informed via two-way radio by clandestine code arranged a forehand, of Leur Fou's position there on or near the terminal. If he could not be located, then we assumed that he must be out on the grounds in search of us, so we knew to always remain doubly alert.

Leur Fou was not very intelligent about his movements out in the timberland on the site, so when we knew him to be on his own hunt, we virtually always spotted him sitting inside his assigned company vehicle, parked in his hiding place chopped from within the thicket, consumed in exaggerated visions of his own craftiness. Thus because of his disgusting arrogance and general ignorance at large regarding one possessing talent in moving across the land unnoticed, we could keep a careful eye upon him at all times.

What was so amusing was when the high command held these frequent collective meetings informing us all that they well knew something counterproductive to be up with us, and they curtly informed us again that they would find out exactly what we were up to, and that we would suffer most terribly for our misdeeds. As this unprofessional command spoke these foolish words, their mouths seemed to drip with anger, as their limbs shook and trembled.

I myself, personally could not have been more amused! The toughest task imaginable is to be greatly amused, yet still, maintain a poker face in spite of it all. I label this unfortunate situation as just being another hazard of my chosen occupation at the time. As we listened and observed, many of us silently anticipated the next opportunity to take a slap at these foolish monkeys running the circus around here, so that we could have our pleasure next in watching them try to figure out specifically who it was that did so. There was truly a real danger in exercising such temptations, however.

Every Christmas all of the employees received one turkey and one ham. We could take our choice in whether this turkey or ham was cured or cooked beforehand inside the purchase package. The high command, however, received two turkeys and two hams. Most proceeded to store their hams and turkeys inside a freezer located there in the centre of the custodian supply room, which also doubled as the company meeting room on the backside of the terminal.

One day at lunch break I sauntered into the custodian supply room, and not a single soul was present. I casually opened the freezer and took immediate note of the many hams and turkeys, and simply could not resist the compelling urge. On top of the adjacent refrigerator lay a stack of large brown paper grocery bags. Quickly as a flash of springtime lightning, I snatched up a bag, popped it open, then dropped both a turkey and a ham carefully inside.

Just as casually as though nothing dramatic was going on, I walked this meat out of the terminal and directly into my candy red GMC Sonoma pickup truck that I drove at the time. It wasn’t that I was in need of the meat, you understand, it was the great commotion that I knew my theft would cause, resulting from the ridiculously exaggerated situation that the high command would make of it due to their sheer arrogant personalities, and the fact that I knew I could remain immune from their attempts to prosecute. The management had slighted us out of their own knowledge that they were immune due to state laws allowing it, so us attacking in a reverse due to our own form of immunity, was only right.

I also knew that a blame game among the employees would surely follow; therefore all that I had to do was to simply remain quiet with my poker face, sit back, and savour the amusing sights that my actions were sure to generate. If I was lucky, maybe even one of my avowed enemies would get blamed for the dirty deed, and literally be legally charged for stealing the ham and turkey, as unbalanced as these authorities were. The very thought of any such possibility manifesting really gave me both great nerve far beyond my ability to withhold, and my assured success offered a pleasure beyond descriptive words at the time.

When I stepped back into the supply room, not a soul was present even after all of this action, and all else seemed to be dead for quite some distance beyond the room. Maybe all of them had driven out for lunch? I simply had no way of knowing.

I opened up the nearby refrigerator door once more again, spotting a rather luxurious precooked turkey ham sitting comfortably inside there on the top shelf before the light. The temptation to add more fuel to the fire was far more than I could ever resist, especially since I had pulled the other theft off without a single hitch, or even a hint of any possible hitch.

I carefully opened my razor sharp Swiss Army knife, quickly whacking the ham in half, then turning the cut half back toward the light in just the exact position that it was discovered sitting in. I dropped the cut half into a bag, then carried it back toward my personal locker in the rear room of the supply area. I wrapped this ham half inside a large green bandanna that I always carried, then shoved it and the bandanna inside my own personal locker compartment, which I secured with my own combination padlock. There I knew it would keep perfectly well for a number of days, giving me sufficient time to consume it.

Before I exited out of the room, I cut a thick slice from my half inside the locker, then walked back inside toward the refrigerator, where a brand new loaf of rye bread sat proudly on top. I unwrapped the tie on the bread bag, then snatched out two slices of bread from the centre of the loaf. I slapped my thick luscious slice of hickory smoked ham in between the bread slices, with a broad satisfied smile, then made my way out of the supply room. I had a measure of time remaining in my lunch break yet.

I casually walked to the front door of the terminal, then stood around on the outside, nonchalantly observing the passengers load up and unload their bags into various vehicles, as they made their way onto and off the many buses parked there in the huge yard. I suddenly heard feet shuffling behind me as some unknown individual walked up. I snapped around, seeing the director, Blague Capitaine, walk up to address me.

“Well hello there Brewmaker,” he said. “Having a sandwich, I see, on your lunch break?” he continued, wearing a smile that bore an air of repressed spitefulness.

“Yeah Sir.., and it’s a mighty fine one too, I tell you,” I replied with a hearty laugh of my own, and a smile born from a feeling of invincible defiance.

“What kind is it?” he continued to inquire.

“I think it’s hickory smoked ham,” I replied. “I am not sure what the specific ingredient was that the wife put in it for me, but me thinks it’s hickory smoked ham since it tastes so much like it. Do you like hickory smoked ham?,” I asked with an unconscious air of dark sarcasm.

“Oh yeah, I am familiar with it,” he snapped with that smile again. “I have some, but I don’t know when I will get around to eating it. Maybe one day soon,” he said with his intimidating smile.

“Yeah?, well it sure is some Jim Dandy, fine eating, I tell ya. I won’t forget this meal for a long time to come,” I replied as I took another bite when I was absolutely sure that he was looking.

Some two months later I was out on the backside of the terminal repairing fences, lights and signs. I get a call on the two way for me to come into the custodian supply room for a meeting. I make my way into the supply room. and I discover that a huge round table has been assembled during the time that I was labouring on the outside, with the entire facility staff positioned around it.

Before the crowd looms the assistant director, who was a thin, dark-skinned Mexican, named Otro Tonto, standing rigidly before a podium, instructing us all to be seated and to get quiet immediately! Frankly, I did not even know what this meeting was in regard to. I simply just sauntered up and took my nearest available seat. The whispered talk was stirring like a buzzing beehive inside the room.

“Ladies and gentlemen, let's get quiet, and please be seated,” firmly spoke the assistant director. He beat solidly upon his podium with a wooden ruler in obvious anger, to give emphasis to his words. The room suddenly quietened down.

“We have some serious business to discuss here. There has been a major offence on these premises; and when I determine specifically who the guilty one is, I am going to terminate him right here on the spot, as well as taking the fullest measures allowable by law to engage prosecution. What I am speaking of is this ham that has walked out of our freezer here.

“ Not only that, our cooked ham there inside the refrigerator had been sliced in half, with the cut half turned back toward the light. This ham is ours, the management’s, and not a single another soul, and I am royally perturbed about the matter! I can tell you all that much, right now. Do any of you know what I am speaking of here?”

He signed deeply as he gazed around the room, then continued to speak.

“Look, people, I know that this ham business seems trivial, but there has been a lot of stealing going on around this facility here. Let's get something straight.., and get it straight right now.., this stealing is going to stop. Do all of you hear me? This stealing on these premises is going to stop, and now!”

There was a period of absolute silence that felt like hours.

“If the guilty would simply just turn himself in, then we could make some arrangements and negotiations, and maybe we would not have to get so serious here in regard to this matter. I might actually be a bit forgiving in regard to this entire situation; but if I have to play detective and extract this information out, then my anger will know no compassion. So if the guilty will just drop on by the office, right?, and fess up, then we can be on with real business here,” Otro Tonto continued.

Another span of what felt like endless silence followed, with everyone glancing backwards toward everyone else.

“Come on now?,” suddenly spouted El Titere, one of my coworkers who feigned friendship to all of the others, but always gave me the feeling that he was in some secret league with the chief enemy authority; although he deeply resented Leur Fou, who very often resorted to making false claims about him to the company authority when he could find no true wrong.

“We are all adults here, now. This is kindergarten stuff here.”

He turned back around toward Tonto with a snarl on his face.

“Cut the child stuff here, Tonto !,”

El Titere continued to speak hard toward the assistant director with a stern, somewhat angered face.

“Just about everybody inside this place right now is fifty years old, or better,” he spoke with both arms outstretched as he sat.

Another span of seemingly boundless time transpired.

“Come on now, just be out with it so all of us can go on, for Pete’s sake here!,” El Titere spouted as he gazed around upon all of the workers in an appearance of disbelieve at the materializing situation.

He suddenly turned back around to face Tonto, with both palms upward and his two arms extended outward sideways.

“We don’t know, man! Hell, maybe it was one of these contractors that you always have going in and out of this place here,” he continued.

Otro Tonto may have lived among some real fools, but this cowboy had no intention of ever being one of them. I knew well that the high command had not a clue as to specifically who the guilty culprit was, or else Tonto would have never made such a ridiculous offer of amends. The painfully obvious anger witnessed in Tonto informed me that my ploy was striking all of them, and everybody else concerned, deep inside the craw. The hints of an elegant success simply generate its own silent level of pride. My mouth simply zipped itself all by its own might. I simply could not have moved, even if I had wanted to open up.

Honestly, I was tempted to play around with the situation a bit, just to see what kind of additional stir existed that I could create from my tactfully designed questionnaire; and in this present day and time, I really do believe that I could have pulled it off with ‘nary a hitch', but I thought it far more prudent to simply remain quiet, and behold the glorious action as it unfolded there before me. Maybe I should be glad today that I chose to do so, lest I may have cramped my own style, had my position been somehow exposed.

“Do you mean that we are going to have to do that most humiliating of things? Are all of you going to push us to go that distance?,” roared Otro Tonto. “ Really now.., I mean.., like the man just said there.., we’re all adults here, and this disgusting situation is really getting more ridiculous by the minute! Now, who or whomever the guilty is, just come out and fess up, so that we all can be on with more important things around here!”

More time passed as the room quietened. Soon Otro Tonto pointed his finger at the person on the left-hand end of the oval table.

“Did you do it?” he asked.

“No” the worker spoke as he shook his head.

“Did you do it? he asked the next one. This worker replied the same.

Otro Tonto made his way around the table. It was obvious from his actions that he was intentionally saving me for the last one, just as I had already anticipated. Soon he pointed his finger at me and asked; “Did you do this; and if you did not, then who might have done it, since you are the only one left?”

I took a deep breath, then shook my head in dark sarcasm.

“Well now.., let me see, here, old buddy, ole pal there? You and me.., well fellow.., we go back a long way now, ole Le Tonto there. We once drank beer together, and had some really fine times doing a little Tom cattin’ around town, do you recall? And a little “what not” just to go along with it, if all of you know what I mean here?,” I slurred as I gazed around the room.

“Hmm? What am I really supposed to make of this? You, comin’ at me like this about such frivolous business here. Now, don’t you think that you might have been just a touch unprofessional, if not outright disrespectful?”

Tonto’s eyes suddenly lit up like welding arcs on a Lone Star skyline at night time in mid-December.

“Now wait just minute, here. This business really is frivolous, but it is honestly just the tip of the iceberg. Lots of riffraff has been going on at this job site, now let me tell all of you that much. There are going to be some heads that will roll around here soon.

“I mean, for Christ sakes here,” Tonto continued to roar, “ just consider for a moment the level of infraction..,the general level of theft here alone, and the use of company tools for personal projects on company time; not to mention the sexual harassment of our female associates, has to ALL come to a halt,...and now! Enough is simply enough! Do all of you get what I am saying, here?

“Listen to me.., right here,” he said as he slammed gravel down hard upon the podium before himself. “We will catch these culprits, no matter who they are! Do you get me? We will find you out and prosecute to the fullest extent possible, and allowable by law. We have the record of theft in loads, and all of it could possibly be charged to this single person, whenever it is that we catch him..; and we will, don’t you ever doubt about it!”

I went back outside following the meeting. In the end Lou Fou resorted to calling us inside an office room, one by forlorn one, asking us the same pointless, pathetic questions, while he played being a coo coo’s version of Sherlock Holmes. Honestly, the potential for charges was real indeed, since no checks existed in this provincial system that I lived in at the time, to regulate specifically what any of these imbecilic authorities could claim, or to what extent. The opposition still needed leverage though, and I well knew better than to give it to them. The tension in the air created a pressure that really, far more excited than it ever frightened!

I snicker when I recall that the situation produced a splendid rush way out here in no man’s land, just to be honest in regard to my personal feelings in the matter at the time. There existed no legal recourse, or any other form of legitimized recourse in the system at large, in restitution for wrongs committed by employee management toward workers; so what other option did rank and file employees have when we felt abused by this authority, but to initiate a cat and mouse game of hide, run, grab, or break, and who done it?

Hell, what could they do? Throw me into prison for stealing ham? Fire me? Is that all? Bahh, cat scat! I’ve already been fired more times than a Gatlin’ gun, so what’s one more time to me? I was far too busy laughing in disbelief at the entire scene to ever worry about being prosecuted for stealing ham, or trying to jig with one of their ten cent clerical floozies that all of them kept tucked away inside the main building surrounding themselves with! I’ve turned down better than the best of them could ever hold for me, so how dare any one of these blunder buses accuse me of anything rude, brutishly risque, or covetous, way out here in the combat zone! The more that I thought about the situation at hand as a whole, the angrier it was that I became.

After this ridiculous masquerade intending to intimidate, I raced upstairs to the top floor in the three-story bus terminal, just as bloody soon as the opportunity presented itself. El Sournois had only recently talked his way into a splendid part-time addition to his full-time occupation of a horticulturist. He was now the official mediator between the workers and the high command, with his own personal office, and resources. Nobody else wanted the assignment, so he gladly assumed it, with no competition.

In front of him sat his own latest company-issued computer, which he nonchalantly sat in front of, as he entertained himself with the latest bawdiness, and it’s most recent star performers. As I told him of those current events, he glanced up toward me; then nonchalantly glanced back down at what he was viewing, laughing a quick chuckle as he did so. When I completed my task of informing him as to the latest events occurring downstairs, he glanced up long enough to give me a rather shallow response.

“Je pense qu'il est temps pour Otro Tonto et Blague Capitaine de recevoir un autre indice! Somehow, what we have already sent to them out of the goodness of our heart, just isn’t delivering them the message. What do you think about it?” he asked, as he streaked that wry nauseating smile.

I laughed slightly through my own puzzled smile.

“ Somebody certainly needs to do something. I wish that we could take some sort of legal recourse, rather than respond in the manner that we have been so rudely motivated to do,” I replied with a long sigh.

“Well ‘tis true, but unfortunately there is not,” he responded without ever glancing up at me. “ The legal system creates a wall for them to hide behind, and literally attack us. They call it at will employment. They are free to claim anything, then fire any one of us, for any reason that they can imagine; or no reason at all, just to be blunt about it. So we are forced to take recourse in a manner that plays on the fact that for them to condemn, they must be in sole possession of undeniable proof. Yes! In light of this information, I must agree that they need another hint to simply back off,” he said as he continued to gawk down at his computer screen.

“How are we going to deliver this message?,” I asked in earnest. “What we need is something with more punch, yet done so in a manner that will not jeopardize our position, or be serious enough to cause real problems later on, should we be discovered.”

Sournois took a deep sigh as he continued gazing at the monitor screen, with a ragged toothed grin.

“ I don’t know, but something is bound to come to mind, I guess,” he assured me.

I glanced around the room and noticed an entire shelf of VHS video cassettes carefully arranged inside their clearly labelled boxes, sitting behind Sournois on a bookshelf as he gazed away at the computer screen.

“Damn son, it looks like you have your own video collection, for your personal pleasure around here. Wow!”

He glanced up as I spoke, soon replying;

“Yeah well, they are just old boring technical demonstrations, of one sort or another. Most are virtually never used. I suppose that they will order me to toss them soon. The only ones presently used are the ones on the topmost shelf there.”

“Oh yeah? Used by whom, for what?,” I inquired.

“Blague Capitaine will motor on down to the bus terminal manager’s association there when he receives his special invitation. The city mayor is virtually always present at these meetings, and requests for him to give demonstrations proving the viability of this bus station here inside this metropolis, and its latest restorations. What these tapes consist of are the latest restorations and additions, playing them up as advantages to both the city at large, the people surrounding the terminal and the terminal employees. Far as I am concerned, they are almost like a sales video of some sort,” he stated without glancing toward me, as he continued viewing the rude sights on the screen before him.

“Where is this meeting to be held at?,” I inquired farther again.

“At the ballroom in the Ford Motor building, over on fourth street there.”

“ You mean the one held on the seventh floor of that massive fifteen-floor complex that we hear about so often, it seems?,” I asked in shock.

“Yep, that’s the one,” he snapped as he chuckled again at the sights there on the screen.

“Damn a bear!,” I suddenly spouted. “There must be a huge mass of people that attend such a mundane meeting.”

“There is, man. Half of the city hall will be there. The metropolis business council will most certainly attend, along with a host of other entities. This subject will only be one of a number, involving both business and government. Like I said earlier, the mayor of this metropolis will be there, but so will the mayor of a dozen other municipalities, of equal or more size, from several different states, seeking to take notes from the businesses and the municipality management.

“ Ole Blague wants to look competent and valid to them all, you know since they could make or break the Bedlam Bus Corporation. And, you know, if they were to ever decide that the BBC here was not valid, then the old do-do head would be out of a job, and really good paying jobs sucking ass for a living, just don't come around much on a daily basis!

“Then afterwards all of them saunter on across the street to Darlin Dolly Dolickers for a few drinks, courtesy of the good residents in this metropolis, do a little ballroom dancing with the local groupie styled doxies; then it’s off to the nearest no-tell motel, complete with the pink hearts, the shake stakes, and the whirlpools,” I tartly replied, as we both chuckled heartily.

Sournois glanced up from the screen toward me suddenly.

“I can see that you’re catching on to how this place works around here. Just think about it every new year. All of this risque activity is done courtesy of the house, but without our permission, of course. Is that not just so inconsiderate of them?” he spoke with that famous wry grin.

“Yeah, man.., ever so inconsiderate,” I replied with a slight laugh. “I wish that there was some kind of way that we could kind of.., shall we say.., spice things up for them just a bit? ,” I said as I gazed upon the huge shelf filled with VHS cassette tapes. “What do you feel about it, there, Sournois ole boy? Maybe none of them, or their groupies, will even need a shake stake when we are finished with them.”

Sournois began laughing and shaking his head from side to side like he could never stop even if he wanted to.

“What kind of grunge are you talking about there, oh Brewmaster?” he grinned as he spoke in obvious sarcasm.

“I would never tell.. When is their next meeting?,” I asked while wearing my own smile.

“In about a month or so, I think,” he continued laughing, then commenced shaking his head from side to side as he gazed upon me.

“In some ways, I guess that I cannot blame ole Blague. His old lady looks like she was once one of those man-sized alley cats way over there on Newberry street. The way he whimpers up to her, I will bet that she would bitch slap him if he looked at her wrong, once they make it back home,” I said as both of us nearly fell over in laughter.

“Yeah, I guess that a little fore-purchased nympho strange on the side there would be the perfect escape for old Blague, from time to time.; just as long as he doesn’t get caught!” spoke Sournois, shaking his index finger up and down as he spoke the words in slow motion. Again, both of us laughed heartily at the picture in thought.

“Or better yet it might be her with the damn ramrod doing the bung punching, and she looks like the type that would ride ole Blague all the way to hell and back!,” I replied in sarcasm regarding the situation at hand.

We both nearly collapsed onto the floor with laughter.

There was a stack of papers on Sournois desk. As we chuckled I picked one of them up, and to my shock and surprise, it confirmed the account of this next meeting on the fourth street. To give more fodder for the flame being struck, it even informed us of the specific film display that was being planned at that very moment.

“What do you think?” I asked him as I read the account on the page.

“Well.., I just don’t know. I honestly have determined to give this job up the day after tomorrow. There is not much excitement in it, and even less pay. It will be somebody else here in this seat when the meeting occurs, not me,” he replied, still laughing as he continued shaking his head at the emerging thought.

A month came and went without much occurring. I had not spoken with Sournois much during this time anyway. I decided to swing past the custodian lounge and chat a bit with Miss Seins Exotiques, who possessed a look on her face of one desiring to crawl underneath the table, or possibly even, suddenly bolt away from the work site all together.

“What in the world ?,” I asked as I laughed at her with the shock of surprise.

“You haven’t heard?” she asked me with round eyes large as saucers.

“No, of course not, I have been diligently working,” I snapped with the grin of anticipation.

“Ole Blague Capitaine and Otro Tonto both are raging maniacs around this place here, man. They really have it out for all of us. They have even sworn to prosecute if they can prove who done this last dirty deed. I have heard that a big city investigator is coming in from way over in New Orleans, to check this matter out. Right now, the one that is on the hook for suspicion is Jeanie, that new broad who is working in the mediator's office upstairs. Many claim that both Blague and Otro Tonto both, have a thing going on with her, right up there inside the back rooms, on this very job site here.”

“ Yeah, and she doesn’t look all that bad, either” I spouted with a short laugh. “But what is new around here? They are always threatening to prosecute for things that they can never prove.”

“Yeah, and that is half of the problem,” she said. “They will never try to pin anything on that tramp. She has them both right by the balls, you know. They are, however, going to do an all-out search for any small detail that might just suggest it on anybody else, and then slam them with everything it is that they possess.”

“Well what happened?,” I inquired with a chuckle. “I can’t wait to hear about this,” I said with a laugh, rubbing my hands together in anticipation.

Miss Bodacious, as I called her with that thin, all revealing low cut dress, and a fear-filled face, glanced around again with that appearance of wanting to hide ‘neath the desk that she was sitting in.

“Well, it’s like this,” she intimated in a near whispering voice. “You know that they hold that meeting every now and again uptown.”

“You mean the one out on the fourth street that they hold ever so often, then one that we all seldom hear about in regard to exact specifics?,” I inquired anxiously, playing dumb, just to be sure of what she was about to tell.

“Yeah, that’s the one. The one where Blague and Tonto give these demonstrations, where they have to sell the viability of this place to the people around here,” she said.

“Yeah,” she continued in a rather low, nearly whispering tone. “ Well, they slapped one of those videos in, and this otherwise boring film played for about fifteen minutes..; and then suddenly the most debauched scene that anyone’s eyes had ever beheld, appeared.., right there on the big screen before all of those important officials! I think I was told that the scene was a close-up bacchanalia, with absolutely nothing left to the imagination, if I recall rightly.”

“Oh now? Do please bless their poor virgin eyes,” I slurred as I commenced laughing. I attempted to cease in my pleasure of the moment but somehow failed in the effort.

“Well, I am telling ya, they are checking for fingerprints and pulling people in for questioning already. It really is a genuine rod-rammed-deep-in-the-rump deal around here. The newspapers will be getting in on this matter, I fear. It’s a big damn deal for sure, and nothing less!

“Some of those people present claimed that the scene was one of debauchery more explicit than a body could ever even imagine. They gave me all of the profane details. You just would not believe it!

“What made it worse was that before Tonto could halt the film, this disgusting scene had almost displayed all that it had to show,” she said with a gasp and repressed laugh combined, while still maintaining her saucer eyes.

“Oh, do tell?” I said with a spontaneous, near uncontrollable laugh. “The devil must be having a field day around this place, for sure!”

“I don’t know,” she said as she finally laughed herself, then suddenly appearing as if she might begin crying. “Just be careful around this place. That’s all that I have to say. They are looking to make a kill, and somebody has to go down hard for this dirty deed.”

Well, needless to say, the management never made a catch, to their great continuing exasperation. May the good Lord please bless their poor souls. Time passed and soon the winter months returned. Jerry, myself, and Sournois continued on engaging in our hunts. I slew three deer that year on company grounds, and didn’t even use a bow or a gun! My personal technique went like this;

During my security patrol, I was instructed to ride around the parameters of the entire corporate estate. Around this estate was a twelve feet tall, chain linked fence. A narrow two-rut dirt road ran along beside the fence on the inside, approximately thirty yards away from it. Often we would see deer running along between the Suburban and the fence, in groups of twos and threes.

When they moved toward the road, I punched the gas pedal of the Suburban, racing up beside them to cut them off. In a near panic, the deer raced back toward the fence, smashing into it headlong, obviously believing in the midst of their panic, that they could make it through into the forest beyond. These deer would smack the fence solidly five or six times, then beeline back for the road again.

Again I punched the gas pedal, pulling up in front of them, causing them to beeline again back for the fence in a greater panic. Five or six more times they would smack the fence wire headlong, bleating at their frustration in failing to make it through, and no doubt the pain of crashing headlong into the chain-link fence.

This process repeated itself for a number of times until the deer finally collapsed almost immediately beside the Suburban that I was driving. Their necks popped like dry midsummer twigs. It was a simple matter to place the deer into the passenger area in the rear of the suburban floor, then transport the carcases to each of our homes.

When we were not on the hunt for game, we were loading up ground maintenance equipment on the sly, for the purpose of engaging in sideline work during our winter downtime. All of us had our particular specialities. My speciality was picking up dump truck loads of mulch down at the local landfill, then hauling it to customers all throughout the county in which I lived at the time. I even hauled loads in from as far away as two to three counties over, when I could negotiate a level of compensation high enough to justify the effort that I was being requested to make, and the level of risk that I would be forced to absorb in doing so.

One time I motored all the way to the beach, some two hours away, just to service a well paying she-lion customer that I loved to humorously refer to as Miss Tig Bitties. For my trouble, I was paid two hundred dollars in CB to the power of three! That’s black market slang for cash between-the-bimbo’s-breasts, just in case, there are readers who have never heard the term. Leur Fou and the high command were never the wiser for me or any one of us for doing it. I was back on site by lunchtime, when I usually ran into the other employees anyway. Sometimes, even to this very day, when I reflect back on all of the possible negatives that could have potentially occurred, the odds that we were willing to gamble with still amaze me into an astonishment.

At long last winter was finally winding down that year. By mid-March, I had known Le Sournois for a year and a half. By ten o'clock that March 15th, the snowflakes had begun to fly for the last time. This phenomenon was rare in my part of America, but it was certainly not unheard of. By twelve high noon, the snowfall had dramatically thickened and was accumulating to the point that it had already covered the ground. It was very obvious that by 1600, the grounds and the roads would have it piled up.

Since the phenomena is rare, such occurrences tend to catch the entire statewide system completely off guard. The result is that complete roadways and neighbourhoods virtually get snowed in. Commerce, in essence, comes to a grinding halt for a week or so, and on some rare occasions, even a bit more.

The high command had ordered us to tie all of the equipment down at the storage shed in the rear of the immediate terminal grounds. I cheerfully raced into the facility to do my honest part of the chores at hand. When I walked through the gate, Le Sournois was already there.

“Are you going to stay tonight?,” he asked in his heavy Cajun accent.

“No, I don’t believe that I will,” I replied as I laboured.

“Why not? They are paying some good overtime, man,” he snapped with that smile. “They are paying me around the clock, in time and half, just for agreeing to stay here on-call all night and to work. There is a bunk room in the rear of the terminal where I can sleep, wash, and eat; since there is a small kitchen in there, so they have informed me. One doesn’t get opportunities like this very often. I figure that I will make two thousand dollars next week alone, plus my regular time pay of the five hundred dollars. You really should reconsider, man,” he attempted to convince me. “ That is a cash bundle to the good of my home, for sure!”

“Yeah, man? Well, I have already been here long enough to witness this management make many such promises. They are always wanting people to labour on their behalf, for nothing, especially when they are in some sort of jam, like this one. I am telling you.., that they always promise the moon and the stars on a silver platter; but they have yet to deliver, and I have been here for two years now. In other words, just to put it bluntly, these pigs already have it figured out how they are going to weasel out of coming through on their promises to you before they even made you the promise,” I curtly, but so directly informed him.

“That’s so negative of you to think like that,” Sournois spouted in an obvious display of disgust at my blunt honesty, as he shook his head slowly from side to side in astonished disbelief. “ Can't you see the details that I am driving at, man? They have no choice, but to pay me. They have already told me that they would, and in front of witnesses at that.”

“Did they put it in writing?,” I asked. “Spoken words alone mean nothing in this place. In time, you’ll come to learn all of these facts for what they are, Hoss.”

“No, but they just can’t refuse to pay out like that!” he spouted in a show of continuing disgust at my warning.

“ Well, because of their past record that I have personally observed, I am going to hit that time clock today at 1600 hrs, wave my goodbyes, and go the hell on home; that’s what I am going to do. Come tomorrow morning I am going to simply call-in on sick leave, while still receiving my compensation for the day, just as if I had been present out here on the job. I will think about you as I am drinking thick rich coffee in the morning, and playing in the freshly fallen snow with my young son.

“But please don’t misunderstand me, man, I really do wish you well, right from the bottom of my heart. I really do hope that these sons of bitches finally do what they say they are going to, for once in this world. I am just warning you that they have a constant past record for intentionally failing to deliver, and I am just not willing to take the chance with precious time, myself. My personal time means way too much to me, just to give it away for free like that.”

For the remainder of the day, I laboured diligently, tying down canvas to cover the equipment and covering the plant cuttings with polyethene plastic; as well as collecting the power and hand tools, placing them inside the storage room so that they would be protected from the coming ice and snow. It seemed like 1600 would never arrive, but it finally did, and boy was I glad since the temperature was continually dropping.

I bid my adieu to Sournois, who remained inside the facility at hard labour, headed back over toward the main building, then punched that time clock without ever regretting or glancing backwards. I couldn’t help but beep my horn in a bot of harmless jest at ole Sournois, labouring away there inside the plant nursery cage, as I made a left hand turn onto the main road from the facility.

For a week and a half, I enjoyed my coffee in the morning, and play time in the snow with my young son. We built snow angels, snowmen, and tossed snowballs at one another. At lunchtime we ate freshly prepared spaghetti with meatballs while enjoying homemade snow ice cream for dessert; as we finished off our evenings with steaming cups of hot cocoa and rich buttered toast, a time-honoured family favourite during cold weather. I hardly ever thought of work then, since I had called in, and was paid regardless. Far too soon the roads had been scraped, the snow and ice turned into a water slush on the asphalt pavement, and it was back to work again.

Another week and a half had passed at work before I even realized it, and my days had been spent out on the roadways around the terminal repairing lights, signs, electrical sockets, and plumbing pipes, with Jerry. I had hardly even spoken to anyone else during this time since my work assignments tended to last for the duration of the entire day. Finally, a lull came in the work; and around lunch time, I thought that I would drop by the custodian supply room just to see how Mrs Seins Exotiques, the custodian supervisor, was doing, and maybe speak fondly with a few others who were more than likely present.

Upon my walking through the doorway of the supply room, to my shock and surprise, there was Sournois screaming in Cajun French what I presumed to be curses and throwing various articles across the room like an enraged madman. I honestly did not feel that he even noticed me when I stepped inside. I walked over to the custodian supervisor, who again possessed the appearance of wishing to dive beneath the desk that she was sitting at.

“What in the world is wrong with him?,” I asked her, pointing in his direction.

“You haven’t heard?” she asked me as she gazed upward with those scared saucer eyes.

“I have not a single clue, just to be honest about it,” I retorted, casually forgetting about the fact that he had worked day and night on-call for so many long hours.

“They didn’t pay him,” she said with profound emotion. “They only paid him for three extra hours above his regular hours, and that was only in straight time; not time and a half as they had promised him, and certainly not for the entire time that he worked. They claimed that they could justify this because there had been a recent holiday during the time that you were out, so he was not eligible for overtime pay regardless of how long he had laboured.”

“Well, why then, pray tell, did they inform him that they would pay him at a time and a half, around the clock, when they asked him to stay over?” I inquired.

“We both know the answer to that question,” she gazed up at me saying with a deep sigh.

“I bluntly informed him that these people had a track record for wanting free labour, promising the moon and the stars, then delivering nothing at all,” I informed her in reply. “ I had witnessed this phenomenon four times before. He took the gamble and lost, but this management held true to their past history. He went into this business with his eyes wide open. He can never say that he wasn’t forewarned.”

“Well it’s a huge mess, and soon to be one for all of us,” she informed me. “He has been up there in the office screaming that everybody should have been forced to work if it was going to be without wages for the time, not just him. They are actually even scheming about how they are going to implement some sort of program for accommodating this new demand for charity labour. Can you believe this?”

“Unfortunately for them, charity labour doesn’t pay my bills,” I replied with a disgusted snort. “I have things to do when I leave here that does, however. I simply do not have time to spare like that.”

“Je vais montrer à ces chiens quelque chose! Qui pensent-ils qu'ils sont? Juste qui pensent-ils qu'ils sont?,” screamed Sournois, viciously punching the custodial supplies stored in cardboard boxes, as I eased back out of the storeroom area.

From that point onward, Sournois was definitely not the same person that he had been before this incident, being unusually aloof and always to himself, even when I was nearby. At times I felt that he was angered by the fact that I had given him a hard honest warning, and the fact that I had been right caused him to somehow resent me for it. Four days later he approached me wearing a firm, rigid expression.

“You are being assigned to work with me for the next couple of months. You know that, don’t you Brewmaster?” he asked through what appeared to be tightly clenched teeth.

“No, but whatever,” I snapped. “I am here to do my eight, and then hit the gate, myself,” I said in a casual reply of light sarcasm, hoping to break the ice. Sournois never even cracked a smile.

“Come with me while we take a little ride in the company flatbed there,” he commanded.

“Where are we going?,” I inquired.

“Come along and see,” he said.

We both hopped into the old flatbed, then motored down Neighborhood Drive, until we arrived at the place where Crusoe Street meets it. Here inside this T, if you will, was a large plant nursery. Sournois eased into the front area of the nursery, pausing the truck and asking me to examine a handwritten list that he handed me. The list consisted of an order for four hundred mums, two hundred azaleas, nine flowering pear trees, and two flowering crab apples.

“Look, man, this is what I need you to do. While I am in there speaking with Slim Tim, the owner of this business, you busy yourself loading this stuff up. We have tons of work to do today. When you finish you are free just to hang out in the plant displays, or just knock on the shed windows there so that we can give you a cup of coffee; then you can just sit out in the truck there if you are tired of walking around looking.”

“No problem to me, man. It’s all in a day, ”I replied with a quick chuckle.

Sournois exited the old flatbed truck, making his way toward the tin covered shack there by the plant displays. A shelf that could be raised to expose an opening in the side also swivelled backwards to use as a desk, revealing the inside of the shack and the cash register area, where the purchase was made and orders were taken. I could not see either Sournois or Slim Tim inside the shack upon my glancing up, while out in the plant display yard.

I busied myself with the list, gathering up the plants and carefully placing each one in organized fashion onto the bed of the truck. I had the plants carefully selected and loaded up in less than an hour. I didn’t feel like sitting around inside the cab of the truck very much, but I still wanted that cup of coffee. I stepped up to the door on the shack, knocking, whereupon Sournois handed me a well-made cup of Maxwell House drip.

I walked around looking at the plants, taking notice of the prices, while I sipped my coffee. The prices seemed to be fair, just to be honest about it. Small azaleas, potted, were about five dollars apiece. Mums were about a dollar apiece. Flowering pear and crab-apple trees were about thirty dollars apiece.

I walked around until I became really bored. I figured that at least another hour had passed. Finally, Sournois stepped out the door of the building, wearing a broad smile on his face for the first time since he had been cheated out of his money.

“Well I guess that it’s time for us to hit the road again,” he quickly said with the same cheerful smile.

We both made our way into the truck, exiting the nursery, then riding for a few miles before pausing at a local hardware store.

“Help me gather these items,” he said as he handed me another handwritten list. “While you are loading them up, I will be at the counter making the payment.”

I carefully glanced down at the list. I noticed a gas powered edger, a trimmer, four garden hoes, three rakes, nine rather expensive lawn mower blades, and three gasoline cans.

Sournois made his way into the store first, quickly moving toward the store manager behind the cash register. I commenced gathering the requested materials. About as soon as I had finished gathering the requested items and placing them onto the truck, Sournois had finished speaking with the store owner at the cash register.

These items were anything but inexpensive. I had noticed the edger and the trimmer at three hundred dollars each, the hoes and rakes at thirty dollars apiece, the high-quality mower blades at more than twenty dollars each, and the gas cans priced at fifteen dollars each. That amount pencils out on the back of the nearest envelope scattered on the dashboard of the flatbed, to around $1025.00, just case anyone missed it.

We motored on back toward the main bus terminal, showing up on site at around 1300 hours. We made our way back toward the storage shed in the rear proximity of the terminal.

“Help me offload all of this stuff,” he said, as the truck eased into a stop before the shed.

Sournois got out of the truck, took out a key that opened the door to the shed. He disappeared inside, then suddenly the pull door in the front of the shed lifted to reveal him standing patiently. I exited the truck, then proceeded to offload the tools and equipment that he had just purchased. The plants went into a fenced in area attached to the rear of the storage shed. We called it the cage.

The next day was about the same story, except that we loaded the plants up much more quickly and were out of the nursery in less than an hour. The tools and equipment we had purchased and loaded inside of thirty minutes. On our way back to the terminal, we paused in an obvious rear parking lot, just in the woods underneath a massive live oak tree standing behind a local basement pub known as the Climacteric Lounge. The sight of our position from the road was completely sealed from view.

Here it was inside this lounge that we spent our time playing billiards and drinking large doses of the local draft, which was on sale at two frosty, foaming mugs full, for a dollar. That comes down to fifty cents apiece, for those of you not paying attention anymore. By lunchtime, we had arrived back on the job site again, except we were full of good Coors draft without anybody ever being the wiser.

“Nobody ever said that we couldn’t sideline for a little fun, every now and then, did they?” he said with his second smile directed toward me since the time of him being cheated out of his money.

Since it was only my nature to do so, a forlorn habit developed from working offshore security jobs in war zones over the years. I kept a careful daily record of our times to the hardware store and the nursery, and daily events, in general, tucked away into my uniform shirt pocket. I jotted down specifically how many and how much money it was that everything cost.

I neglected to ever mention this fact to Sournois. It was not that I intended some future harm for him, but that the thought to make mention of my note taking, simply slipped from my mind at the time, since my curious habit for such activity was so well ingrained by the day of this event.

According to my records, for the next month and a half, we motored down to the local hardware store and the nursery, three times a week. As we placed the new tools inside the shed and the new plants into the fenced-in holding area, I began to misplace certain specific tools or plants that I recalled placing inside on earlier occasions. Tools such as the trimmer and edger seemed to have vaporized, and fruit trees such as a pear, peach, and the fruiting apple tree that was purchased, in company with two of the gas cans, were presently nowhere to be found. Hand tools such as pipe cutters, hammers, axes, hoes and rakes, I began to feel were eerily being misplaced, and nowhere to be found around the shed presently.

“Have you seen these tools?,” I would ask him.

“No, I haven’t, but I saw Leur Fou and Tonto both in here two days ago. Neither one of them don’t know that I was around anywhere at the time, but indeed I was. I even went as far as to enter notation into my personal journal,” he replied, without even the slightest hint of knowing anything else; and I by this point in the story, was certainly never going to tell.

One specific time that really makes me laugh to recall, involved the vanishing of a Troy Bilt tiller! Not a single person around ever knew anything about the location of this one most valuable item. Since the management never bothered to mention this vanishing act of the tiller, what Sournois and myself figured was that it surely must have been one of them who took it; or an accomplice, more than likely Leur Fou.

On numerous occasions, both Leur Fou and Otro Tonto had been witnessed down at the storage shed by a number of other people, carrying away hand tools of various sorts. All that I know is that the total of the tools which we had purchased, by now was over eight thousand dollars., all charged by company card to the courtesy of the Bedlam Bus Corporation.

In regard to the tiller, I haven't a single fact-based clue. Matter of fact, all that I really do know for sure is that I didn’t have anything to do with any of this funky monkey business!

About all that I would do during the winter, downtime is hideout, making a living riding the clock, when there was nothing else available to do since we never received work orders. One of my favourite places to hide was the storage shed, but only at certain specific times.

One occasion when I was walking around inside the shed trying to pass the time, I discovered a set of business cards with a picture of the old cartoon Tasmanian devil on the front side. Above him was the caption “Artists In Nature By Chosen Design.” I flipped the card over and another caption read; “For all of your horticultural needs call 716-987-5432. We really eat up the competition!”

During the course of the following fall, the management began to really rub the face of Sournois into the dirt, all of us workers felt. Their crass rudeness toward him was painfully obvious. They gave him assignments so large that they well knew he couldn’t complete them within the ridiculously narrowed time limits that they had catalogued and established. This inability to fulfil a time order would amount to a classification label of non-fulfilment of job duties, and they all brazenly let him know that the situation was being notated.

When he did complete an assignment on time, in spite of his designed complications, Otro Tonto would walk over the entire area just to quibble about it until he could find something frivolous to expound upon, then crassly claim that Sournois was just as incompetent at his job, as the management obviously was at theirs. As far as I was concerned, it was perfectly clear that this corrupt management was attempting to force Sournois into resignation by harassment.

“Come help me construct these flower beds, Brewmaker, if you would,” Sournois asked me one following fall day. I grabbed a flat shovel and we both began scraping up a shovel full of dirt.

“Go down about three inches,” He continued. “They are wanting this bed here to cover almost a third of an acre, and they want it completed in two days.”

“That’s a lot of trimming there, Sournois, and even more flowers,” I said with a smile and an air of sarcasm.

“Yeah, but it’s what they want, and what we both have been assigned to. We have no alternative choice in the matter.”

“In two days? Who do they think that we are, Mighty Mouse, or something?,” I said, attempting to break the ice that I knew was building.

Sournois wasn’t laughing at my jokes. His face was just as firm and rigid as it had ever been.

“As I said, man, it’s what we both have been assigned to do. Do I think that their orders are ridiculous, betraying their incompetence with their absurdity? Of course, I do, but orders are damn orders, man. They want a third of an acre flower garden constructed in two days, then that is exactly what they will get,” he spoke as he paused to measure the walls of the hole that we had dug out.

By 1300 we had dug the entire area that we laid out previously, down to the properly established level. It would take the remainder of the day to level the entire area out with only shovels to work with.

“Where is our bobcat, man?,” I asked Sournois.

“Seems to me like it’s never here when we are in need of it. Have you noticed that?” he shouted as we laboured on, with ne’er a single pause.

We spent the remainder of the day driving stakes on either side of the huge flower bed, pulling the string until it was taut, and our line level had informed us that it was level. We put our ruler down in places where the depth was exactly three inches, then moved it into areas where it was not. These areas we had to carefully scrape away in order that we could peel them down with the flat shovel until we lowered the bottom of the bed to exactly three inches. About the time that we had completed the bed, Otro Tonto raced out of the main building with a ruler in hand to check behind us both.

“Since it is almost time to go, just one-quarter inch off anywhere, fellows, and I am firing you both, right here on the spot. You have had plenty of time, and there is simply no excuse what so ever. We have to get this work out here completed.”

“Don’t ever let me be the one to tell you, that you’ll get what you ordered,” spoke Sournois with that forever nauseating smile.

“Well, we certainly hope so, cause you have until tomorrow on this one assignment; and if you should complete that one, then we can move on to the next one. If not.., then you’ll both just have to go,” spoke Otro Tonto with an air of insolence.

Just as soon as we completed our security around the following morning, we both went to work setting out the azaleas, red tips, other flowers and bushes, according to an ordered radiating sun design. In the centre, we had a concrete garden fountain and bench. We laboured diligently on this project until noontime. After the lunch break, Sournois confronted me for the purpose of giving me more instructions.

“Listen carefully to me, man. Take that dump truck and go pick up a load of that mulch from the landfill over there behind McDonald's on old 103. It fits the bill perfectly for what these people want here by being inexpensive, and relatively close at hand. They demand it to be that way, nothing else will do for them,” he said to me again.

“But that is bad mulch,” I whispered in shock and surprise, “ with all of those weed seeds, onions, kudzoo, and lord knows what else.”

Again his face became very firm as he spoke to me.

“Like I said before, man..; go take that dump truck underneath the shed out back, and get me what I ordered. They demand it to be cheap, getting very irate with me when it is not. Nothing else under the sun will do for them. I honestly tried to convince them otherwise.”

“No problem, then,” I said as I made my way toward the shed. I eased into this old diesel truck with the key permanently positioned inside the ignition, firing it up, and heading out onto the street in the direction of the landfill. For five dollars even, I had them a whopping dump truck load of freshly made mulch. Since it was only about three miles away, I made it back in no time flat. Very soon I had this heavy mulch load back at the terminal, watching Sournois give me hand signal instructions in the side mirror, about specifically where he wanted me to drop it.

I leapt out of the truck, seizing up a rake to help Sournois spread the material. Before the day would end, I would wind up getting them seven more loads of mulch from the same place.

When at long last we finally finished, the flower bed with the concrete fountain and the bench, were really attractive, just to be honest about it. The management raced out from the terminal wearing broad smiles, elated that their goals were finally being met according to their order.

For the next month or so we constructed more of the same, but making use of square designs in the rear of the terminal, rather than in a sun design, and always completing the task on time as they had ordered us to do. When the last load of mulch had finally been dumped into the flower beds, the smiling faces of management could not have radiated more contentment in their appearances.

One day when we were out on the road with the company flatbed, Sournois paused at this BP service station, where a very attractive young lady worked as a cashier.

“Wait right here for a few moments,” he firmly instructed me. “I’ll be right back in a few.”

While he was gone I noticed a few scattered print out papers that I had witnessed him bringing in from the flower nursery a few days ago. I picked one of them up, instantly noticing where it was a billing statement from the nursery back to the Bedlam bus corporation. Azalea bushes were recorded as being ten dollars apiece. Flowering pear, peach, and crabapple trees were recorded as being $100.00 a piece in some places, and fifty dollars apiece in others. Mums were recorded as being three dollars a piece.

When I reflected back into the depths of my mind, I distinctly recalled observing Sournois exiting the tin covered shed in a couple of prior times, walking in company with Slim, the nursery owner, as they engaged in some apparently cheerful conversation; while he shoved four noticeably large handfuls of cash money into his front wrangler shirt pocket; abruptly behaving as though he was somewhat insecure about having done so where I could observe, when he realized what he was doing.

By now Christmas had already come and gone. We were in the last remaining months of winter as we know it in my part of the US. From here on out Sournois employment and mine was to plant the flowering trees and the shrubs around the perimeter of the entire facility.

We needed to construct more beds, but of a smaller nature, being long and very narrow. We also set out shrubs, flowers, and trees along the roadside from the facility, back out the quarter mile toward the main roadway. This involved us making beds and mulching the plants. We wound up setting out all of our trees and shrubs that we had on hand, often going back to pick up more from the same place over on the T between Neighborhood Drive and Crusoe Street. We always picked up our mulch from the landfill out on old 103, as we had done so earlier.

At long last, that springtime rolled around. Our duties with the flower gardens and trees had finally been completed, as far as setting them out was concerned. According to my own personal records, Sournois had spent more than twelve thousand dollars in flowers, trees, and shrubs alone; all of it being charged on the corporate credit card, with clear company permission.

With the weather beginning to warm in April, the newly constructed flower beds were looking better than ever. The falling of April showers encouraged the sprouting of new richly green grass. The onions and the kudzu began to break ground with the grass and thickly growing dandelions until one day it became increasingly noticeable.

At first, it was Sournois and me who were assigned to hand pull the stuff. As a bit more time passed, and this crud grew to the point that it was noticeably getting out of our control, the entire maintenance staff was being called out to assist in this effort of eradication. It was around this time that I noticed Sournois putting in his resignation when I spotted him turning in his company uniform.

During the next three weeks following the resignation of Sournois, the weeds had sprouted to the point that not only were all of the company maintenance employees assigned to remove it, so were the custodians. Finally, the complete facility staff was being called out to lend a helping hand. This meant that the entire busing facility literally had to be temporarily closed.

According to Blague Captain and Otro Tonto, the facility lost ten thousand dollars an hour, and I recorded that the facility had been closed for approximately seven hours over a seven day period. Based on the information that I was given at the time, this seven-hour period amounted to seventy thousand dollars alone lost by the company due to these infernal weeds. The resulting scenario was that another strategy for dealing with this growing negative situation had to be devised, and quickly for the management to save face in light of this horrible bleeding wound.

Farther into the city there existed the local Gardens And Amusement Committee. In their employ were at least twenty semi-professional landscape artist. Blague Capitaine negotiated a deal with this committee chair president, where he could rent these employees for a few months, then pay rent for the personnel to replace them from another business entity in a distant municipality, who would perform their job duty assignments while they were away. Since the two supervisors knew one another personally, and the situation was an outright emergency for Blague and his sidekick, Tonto, all of this negotiation was arranged at a slight discount for the Bedlam Bus Corporation.

For the next four months, these people were to labour away, stripping up all of the mulch and topsoil from the entire flower bed area. To make matters worse, all of the bushes, flowers, and trees that Sournois set out, had eerily commenced to wither away, and die! All of this dying plant matter and topsoil needed to be stripped away by his rented labour crowd. Blague and Tonto were noticed walking around the entire busing terminal, wringing their hands, constantly running their fingers through their hair, as if they knew something wasn’t quite right on more than just a few occasions; but yet none of them, or anyone else for that matter, could positively lay a finger on specifically what. My cowboy buddies and I still laugh about this sight over ice cold draft, to this very day.

To do a back of the envelope estimate on the cost for this golden lesson in ethics, let us return to our point of origin, and initiate with our original figures. This beginning sum was the original purchase total the first time that Sournois and myself rode out to gather tools and supplies. According to my own personal notes, the computation pencils in on the backside of our figurative envelope at $1024.00, to be exact about it, if readers can recall.

Sournois already had eight thousand dollars charged on the company card for tools alone. The total amount now pencils out to $9024.00. Well for the next two months we motored on out to pick up more tools and supplies, three times a week. $1024 times 24 equals $25,076. Now we shall add the $9024.00 to it for a new sum of $34,100.00.

In addition to the above, we are compelled to throw in the wages paid out in rent for the hired-in crew, as well as their replacements at their originating location. Since there were twenty employees who worked forty-hour weeks for four months, who averaged $25000 a year; and since four months is a quarter of a year, we are at liberty, to begin with, the figure of 25000 divided by four, which computes to 6250. 6250 times twenty employees equal $125,000. We may then double this amount to account for the shipped in replacements, which raises our figure to $250,000 respectively. Our final sum total is to add this figure in with the $34,100. This brings our grand total up to a jaw-dropping, whopping $284,100.00!

In the midst of this astronomical computation, I almost neglected to figure in the $10000.00 a day, for every hour that the facility was closed down if readers shall recall. Since the facility was closed for seven days, that figure computes to $70,000.00, elevating our new total to a mind-staggering $354,100.00!

Any tools sold on the second-hand market would have amounted to an in-hand cash money sum, profitable to a minimum of eight thousand dollars, at the very least; but we are compelled to suspect that far more was gained in cash value that virtually doubles the untaxed value, and since many more additional tools were purchased than our aforementioned $8000.00 sum total earlier in the story. This cash figure alone would certainly more than cover the promised two thousand dollars, lost, with interest; and adequately compensate for all due raises denied by our ineffective management, plus some extra beer money, to make this emerging scenario a tad bit more exciting.

After all, to use the logic of the Bedlam management, what can be accomplished most assuredly be executed. Its all about efficiency and raw profit; any moral convictions, everybody else, including the management, be damned! The laws are on our side, that is why the management is compelled to validate any accusations made. The only problem that they have, is that they can't.

Just to be honest about the situation at hand, this figure was actually very conservative, since our true original order consisted of several hundred flowers and assorted goods that we neglected to figure into the sum total. In the name of keeping the storyline here simple and straight to the point.., to put the matter rather bluntly; however a person may wish to slice and dice the scenario down inside this story, add in, or withhold for the purpose of deriving calculations in this account.., the true sum total of this unique experience is still an astronomical price to pay for a corporation’s ludicrous incompetent high command, and a useless damn scemo king’s two thousand dollar snow job!