Stop Story: The Gold Mask

[Steven Hunley]

I was hungry and could eat a horse. Not that I would mind you, it's just an expression. You wouldn't say it in France though, they'd think you were serious. The French picked up eating horsemeat when Napolean retreated from Moscow that time in the winter. Horsemeat and frozen croissants. What a meal. And the French are supposed to be so good with food. It made me sick. But not sick enough to pass on dinner.

The dining room was impressive. DuFarge collected art of all sorts. All kinds. The silverware had been used by Louis and Marie Antoinette right before she said the infamous line,

"Let 'em eat cake."

The plates were used by the Pope. The walls had a Chagall on one side and a Gauguin on the other. The crystal chandelier over our heads had hung in the Summer Palace in St. Petersburg right before they shot the Czar.

To tell you the truth the whole place made me uncomfortable. It gave me the creeps.

"What's to eat?" I asked and shifted in my seat.

"Anything you like," said Dufarge. He lit a cigarette. The lighter was Faberge.

"I'll take a Big Mac and some fries," I answered.

I was only trying to be funny.

Nobody laughed.

[Nikhar]

Heya guys, i must congratulate both of you for writing such a gripping story. Its really hard to believe that two guys are writing the story and that the plot wasnt completely formulated well beforehand since the parts merge so incredibly. Please do continue. Eagerly awaiting for the next bit.

[MatthewFarlow]

Thank you Nikhar! On with the story:

In fact, it seemed as though my remark had gone unnoticed. Dufarge closed his lighter up and took a puff on his cigarette.

Cigarettes always intrigued me. The way a smoker draws on it is the loudest form of silence in my mind. The way Dufarge was pulling on the smoke was not desperate by any means. He was controlling the nicotine, not the other way around. It's the way these sorts of things were meant to be used.

In any case, he asked Alice if she was impressed with the room. She of course said yes, and added that not much had changed. My eyes were bouncing around the room as those two continued their conversation without me. I knew I should have been listening, considering how suspicious I was, but the room was too interesting for that. Even the ceiling was ornate.

The horse feeling came back again, and my impatience brought me back to the conversation. Dufarge was almost done with that cigarette by now, and he asked Alice if she was still dancing.

A pair of doors swung open and interrupted her. Two waiters and a waitress appeared, Dufarge pulled quickly on the cigarette and then put it out in a presumably pure silver ashtray. The meals were carried to each of us and simultaneously their covers were removed. Steam emerged from each of them.

In front of me was the biggest burger I have ever seen. Apparently my joke was not taken as one. And that was a good thing.

[Steven Hunley]

I ate my hamburger and should have noticed the sly glances flying back and forth between DuFarge and Alice but I was too busy Macking down.

A silver tray with a gilded top appeared. When the top was lifted it revealed a roll of sushi.

"What's that?"

"It's the finest puffer fish," chirped Alice, "You should really have some."

"It's a delicacy." explained DuFarge.

"Im up for anything," I answered. That's the trouble with me, always up for anything. Alice gave me a slice hand to mouth. I should have noticed, when she placed it in my mouth, that instead of wipping her fingertips on her lips, she wiped them off on her linen napkin.

Alll I noticed was the fire-engine red of her nails. Damn they were sharp and well-shaped! Just like her.

Another thing I should have noticed but didn't was that neither DuFarge and Alice had any. As Lou Reed says in the last line of his song Rock and Roll,

"Not one tiny bit."

The next thing I knew I was on my back staring at the ceiling. Something was missing. The chandelier from the summer palace. I turned my head to the right. No Gauguin. Then to the left. No Chagall. I got up on my legs built by Perelli or Michellin. Like rubber. The whole house was empty and when I got out the door and looked back a "For Rent" sign was in window.

Gee, sometimes a guy is just outa luck.

[MatthewFarlow]

Well, it took me about an hour or two to get the faintest idea of what happened. I was disgusted and all I really wanted was a shower. A shower does wonders for your nerves.

So, back in the house I went. I snooped my way around the place looking for a bath. I found the bathroom, but there were no bath fixtures to speak of. No showerhead, no shower.

I headed upstairs in search of another bathroom. No dice. That one, too, had been robbed of its valuables. I searched the room that we were to stay in, hoping that a trace of Alice would be around. There was not. They even managed to remove the bed and the wardrobe and I wondered how that happened. I did however pick up a couple of soft, overripe oranges.

I felt alone especially in this big, empty house. I solemnly slogged down the steps of the staircase and out the back door. It was terribly dark out, but I needed a walk.

I stripped an orange and reflected some. A lot of this did not make sense. I didn't even know how much time had passed. The most puzzling of all, however, was that godforsaken 'For Rent' sign. It puzzled me for two reasons. One: it was in the worst location of all. Nobody could see that sign from the main road because the driveway was so long. And two: it was in English. France is a French country; they speak French there. So an English sign was out of place. How they even got one, I do not know; I never brought it up with either of them.

I deduced that they left it for me to find. To really make clear that they weren't coming back. They were gone for good.

By the time my orange was consumed, I was upset enough to simultaneously shed my clothes and run into one of Dufarge's former ponds. It made me feel a lot better to swim around in there. After a long while, I heard some rustling in the bushes a field away. I froze and then silently swam to shore, quietly collected my clothes, and frantically sprinted back inside.

I went hugged the walls as I found my way in the dark. I was looking for someplace to sleep when I came across the library. Inside, there was a coushionless couch. There were a couple of books scattered around the library floor. I picked up a small one by the couch but it was too dark to even read the title, so I placed it on my pile of clothes and dozed off.

When I awoke, it was light, but not bright. I picked up the book and read the title out loud: “Betting on the Muse – Poems and Stories – Charles Bukowski.” I dressed and stowed the small book in my coat pocket. I ate the rest of the oranges and headed out the back. On the lawn, sitting, with its eyes closed, was one of Dufarge’s peacocks. I had nothing to give it, nor was I feeling particularly charitable, so I strolled past it towards the garage in hopes of finding a forgotten car.

All that I found in that big four-car garage was an old ten-speed bicycle. As I wheeled it outside, the peacock was patiently waiting there for me. I hopped on the bicycle and pedaled slowly down the driveway. Looking back, the peacock was following. I paused at the end of the driveway to manually open Dufarge’s gate. The peacock caught up and again patiently waited for me.

A nasty idea popped into my head. Dufarge would want that big teal bird.

I held the gate open for the peacock and closed it behind. As I left the unoccupied palace, and closed the insigniaed gate, I wondered how the real-estate agent was planning to market a home with 'JD' stamped on everything.

[Steven Hunley]

Have you ever pedaled down a country lane in France with a peacock under your arm? I can, and I can tell you one thing Mon Ami. It's tough to steer.

But there was no way, no matter how tough the road, no matter how Van-Gogh maddenly bright the sun, that I was going to let go of that bird.

It was my key, my plan, my device to locate DuFarge. I recalled what he'd said while giving us the tour of the garden.

"See that bird?, he said proudly, " I 've raised it since it was a chick. It has the run of the place and will never leave. I wouldn't take ten million for it."

That's just it. It wouldn't leave the place. In such a hurry to leave they couldn't catch it in time. Probably hid out. Probably gave them sh*t too.

But it was my ace in the hole. When I reached the next village I called up one of my "friends" that worked for Le Monde. He was one of the origninal
"French Connections."

"Place me a full page ad, Frenchie," I told him. "Say I found a peacock named Louise in an abandoned estate for rent."

It was pretty funny, DuFarge naming "him" Louise. What a pair of huevos he had!

Now all I had to do was sit back, chug back some Perrier and Hennessy and wait. It always gripes the French when they know someone drinks Hennessy rather than Courvoisier. An English man makes the stuff!

Each little sip was sweet revenge. Oh was it yummy!

And as for the bird? " He weren't nothing special," as they used to say in the American movies.

He worked for chicken feed.

[MatthewFarlow]

"I figured I had some serious waiting to do so I whipped out that book, you know, the Bukowski one, and I flipped through its pages. I stopped at one poem, The Laughing Heart, and read it," said Worth.

He sat across from me at the interrogation table. Somebody had turned the vents on and the moving air made the light swing again. Worth closed his eyes as if to channel his past. I think he mentioned something of a photographic memory before. He began slowly:

"The Laughing Heart," he cleared his throat.
"Your life is your life.
Don’t let it be clubbed into dank submission.
Be on the watch.
There are ways out.
There is light somewhere.
It may not be much light but it beats the darkness.
Be on the watch.
The gods will offer you chances.
Know them. Take them.
You can’t beat death but you can beat death in life.
Sometimes the more often you learn to do it, the more light there will be.
Your life is your life.
Know it while you have it.
You are marvelous
The gods wait to delight in you," the man paused, "Now, ain't that a beauty?"

I smiled and we mutually paused for a moment.

"Well, I liked that poem a lot, I must say and I must have read it a dozen times in that old French pub. I was sitting by the window for some light. Something blocked the sun. It was a dark figure and it tapped on the glass. I stood up and headed outside. Children were flocking around Dufarge's bird, playfully harassing it, patting it on the head. I didn't bother with them. The figure obviously meant business and I wasn't going to keep myself, the bird, or the mystery waiting. STOP.

[Steven Hunley]

The dark figure cleared his throat,

"We saw your ad in le Monde. What's the price you're asking for the return of the bird?"

I felt like I was in The Maltese Falcon. I wanted to sound tough, just like Bogart's Sam Spade."

"I want back the mask, and the key to the estate for my inconvenience and expenses."

He had no expression on his face, he was giving nothing away for free.

"What if I just hit you over the head right now, and ran off with the bird?"

"Then you'd be..." and suddenly the day went dark.

When I woke up, the kids were tossing small green berries at my head as I lay there in the mud and rocks.
My cheek was pock-market from resting in the gravel.
The bird and the car were gone. The first thing I did was run off the kids and reach in my pocket. The tiny GPS unit was flashing a signal. I'd slipped a bug in the bird's food. Now, wherever he went, I could follow the electronic scent. I couldn't have been out for too long, the map made him only thirty or so miles away. I dusted off my clothes and hopped in the nearest car. If DuFarge wanted to play Gold Finger, I was willing to play James Bond.
I'd trail him to Switzerland if that's what it took.

And I certainly owed a bump on the noggin to old Odd Job there. My judo was probably as good as his. And for once, I'd have surprise on my side.

STOP

[everyadventure]

I'm beginning to wonder which of you will receive the royalties from this fine piece of literature...

[everyadventure]

Surprise, yes, but time? Not so much. I was woefully uneducated about a bird's digestive tract (I seemed to recall something about gizzards and rocks?), and I had no idea how much time I had before my plan went splat.

"Où allez-vous?" asked the driver of the taxi car I'd jumped into. Stupid Frenchies, why couldn't they speak English like the rest of the civilized modern world?

"You speak English?" I asked.

"Oui. Where are you going?" he asked, cigarette waggling between thin lips.

"Well, I'm not quite sure yet. But I'll give you directions as we go," I said, eyeing the blip on the GPS unit.

"Vous Américaine stupide," he muttered, and accelerated. The wild goose chase had begun, and I was going to snare me a peacock.

STOP
Was that all right?

[Nikhar]

That was bloody awesummm Steve.:-D

now it would appear as the narrator' master plan. To put up the advertisement, (after getting the chip into the bird's stomach), leaving the bird out in the open, knowing he'd be knocked down and the bird stolen. So that now he could actually follow the bird and know Dufarge's whereabouts.

[MatthewFarlow]

Darkness had fallen by now and the tracker's phosphorescent glow was reflecting on my concentrating eyes.

The cabbie cleared his throat. He had grabbed my attention although I'm unsure that that was his intention. "Ood you like un cigarette?" he offered. I was unable to see the front seats of the car on account of light produced by the screen, but I watched the burning ember on the end of his cigarette sway in unison with his words.

"No." I looked back down. The radio was turned on shortly thereafter and, following a quick session of channel surfing, slow reggae beats overpowered all other sounds.

The GPS device indicated that our buzzard had been motionless for some time. I warned the cab driver that we were approaching the destination and he turned off the music and slowed the vehicle until I told him to stop.

I got out and walked to the side of the road. There was no bird around there. There was hardly anything around there. I patrolled the road to double and triple check for any bird when my driver honked. He rolled down his window and leaned out.

"The post!" he gestured to a stake on the right side of the road. I walked over to it and found a path leading somewhere that was invisible to me from that position. I looked back at the cabbie and he shoed me with his cigarette hand, gesturing that I could take my time. I took my first step onto the path and, Squish, I had found the bird's 'discarded' bug.

STOP

[Steven Hunley]

I knew right then I was hot on his trail. There was a hill just before me with a stand of trees on top.
Then, outa nowhere, for it seemed like nowhere, I hear the call of a peacock. Them as soon as I noticed it...it stopped.
The cab left and I skirted the hillside, went all around it. The brush beneath the trees was impenetrable. I could only sit and wait to hear it again.

So that's what I did. Sit and wait. Hours later I sat still, unmoving, just listening, like a rock.

"There must be some way to get that bird to squabble!"

I just knew it. But what was it?

Finally came the dawn. From my side of the hill I was greeted by a pastoral scene unequalled. Rolling green hills, winding roads in the distance, and it was so quiet, but hark! What was that? The sound of a caliope far off.
I got up, stretched, and walked towards the noise.

About a mile away was a circus set up in a field. I figured I could smell the coffee from right where I was.
They had what I needed. Coffee.

In minutes I was walking between cages of animals and eating another stale croissant and a cup of coffee. The lions could smell it. The elephants could smell it,and the zebras too. I admit, it smelled good!

Even the peacocks and peahens looked my way, along with the monkeys.

Hey, what kinda monkey was I anyway?!

Peahens???!!!!

"Hey Garcon", I said to the boy who was feeding them, "How much to rent the little lady here?"

"She must be back before the performance!" he warned.

"I'll return her long before that."

And with the bird in a cage I could hardly lift, I made my way back to the stand of trees on the hill and sat down and lit a cigarette.

"I'll just let nature take her course."

Then I had me a smoke.

"The hen didn't like being cooped up much."

When he said this to me during the interview in his cell he looked around the room. I understood what he meant. Tears formed in his eyes the second he made the statement.

"So she started crying real loud."

[MatthewFarlow]

It was a boisterous bark from that petite, little buzzard. But, before long, I could hear a second bird in the distance calling out between her cries.

"Gotcha," I whispered and marched, bearing a bird, in the direction of 'Louise'. I heard quick light footsteps coming towards me. Two legs. Could it be, I thought, that they would allow Louise to roam uncaged? The bushes rustled slightly and out came Alice. STOP.

[Steven Hunley]

"Ah Ha!"

Alice stopped dead in her tracks. If I could express in words the look on her face I would. Let's just put it this way. Ever since that day, when you look in the dictionary for the word astonishment, you'll see a picture of Alice.

She took another step towards me and said,

"Put down that silly bird."

Then she gave me a hug I'll never forget and a kiss beyond any description that wouldn't be X rated and banned in five European countries. I still have burn marks down my throat from her tongue.

" Darling, I'm so glad you're here," she whispered all teary-eyed.

Her hand grasped a part of my anatomy that can't be mentioned in public.
Lust was about to raise it's ugly head.

It was an Oscar-winning performance and that's the truth. I was ready to vote for her myself.

Too bad I'm not a member of the Academy. STOP