Little Giant

Little Giant
by Mark Plimsoll

        Inside "The Soda Jerk's Olde-Fashioned Ice Cream Shoppe" in the old downtown section of Main Street, two policemen talk to the owner, which would be the owner's wife in a State without Common Property conditions on matrimony. A petite white woman, Chivy Gore wore her hair hard-burnt into a curly bird's nest mass. She wears a loose gray T-shirt, slacks, and a fixed expression like an old doll in Grandma's attic- one that scares children and makes young dogs bark.
        She stood beside the one table, round and white and surrounded by low white wooden folding chairs, like lawn furniture. The rest of the furniture in the gift shop sat too tall, fatigued one's dangling legs. Wrought iron, wiry, welded metal high-backed chairs arranged in twos around equally tall tables that resembled flower stalks, too small, too tall. Stuck up like lily pads in a dry pond.
        She looks way up at the tall policeman and says "Ah say-ed to they-um, That table is reserved. They-et's what Ah said."
        The policeman took notes. "Then what happened?"
        "He didn't even start to move. He sat they-err slumped in the chay-err, put his arm and his filthy shirt on the table, actin' lahk he was wont to start reading the paper Ah leave they-err for mah reg-lar customers. Then he starts up tah give me excuses, you know, name-dropping. Say-ez he knowed Roberto Boliche, who sat there when he came in, with Al Beer. Then he mentioned Minnie Pigeon. So what? Ah tells him again, That table is reserved. He reaches out to the middle of the table, grabs the little paper Reserved sign and reads it. Then he say-ez how the sign is un-American. Say-ez everybody's equal in America, stuff lahk they-et."
        "Had people reserved that table?"
        "It's always reserved, everyday, for mah long tah-eem friends. Everybody knows that, if they-ee come in here reg-lar. Mah family has three gen'rations hair in De Laguna, and they-ee know Ah know ever-body worth knowin'."
        "So did they move to another table?"
        "No, he starts in ta give me a civics lesson."
        "What do you mean?"
        "He say-ez everyone equal in America, and should be treated equally, and that the US Constitution expressly forbids, that's zactly how he said it, expressly forbids titles of nobility, so we shouldn't even call each other Sir."
        "Were you calling him sir?"
        "No sirree! Well that's not exactly true, I started calling him Sir right then. I repeated it too, 'til he got up to change tables. Then his wah-eef put up her finger and wagged, like so, negative, and said something to the girls behind the Bar, and they left.
        "Just a moment. Let me ask the girls what she said."
        The police man walks to the soda bar slowly, scribbling, then stops chewing his gum and asks the two perky blonde high school girls, obviously at their first job, what the man's wife said.
        "She said I'm sorry, I don't feel well. I don't want my ice cream. And then they left."
        "Was that all she said?"
        "Yep."
        Chivy chirped in "But then he comes back in¦"
        The policeman holds up his pen to quiet Chivy, and faces the two blonde pomeranean lapdogs that leaned towards him, flexing their forearms on the ice cream cooler.
        Chivy Gore stood there a while, resentful of that token of authority above her own.
       
        Chivy said "Then he went out and traheed to start his o' beater of a car, thing hardly started, so Ah was able to rat down the license plate number."
        "So you want to press charges of Criminal Mischief?"
        "Yes!"
        "Let me tell you this- when we talked to him at his residence, his Mexican wife came out, real upset and crying, obviously pregnant, and said that her womb hurt, that's what she said in pretty good English. We offered to call EMS to come examine her. You might want to think about pressing charges."
        Chivy snorted through her nose and put her hands on her hips, arms akimbo.
        The policeman says "Please, take a seat or stand over there a ways, and I'll be with you in a minute." Then he turns to the girls and talks to them in a low voice.
        Chivy Gore calls out towards the ice cream counter, "Girls, tell the officer what you told me his eyes looked like."
        The eyeballs of the two girls grow big and round, and ping-pong between Chivy and the officer. Their ponytails flick with each frantic dash of their gaze. Their hands clutch the counter like cat's paws.
        The girls pull their hands off the counter and wiped them, as if sweaty. They look at each other for clues on how to proceed.
        The policeman holds up his pen hand to shush Chivy Gore, then turns to the girls and says "Do you have anything to add?"
        "No, not really." They both chirped, smiling and looking inquisitively insecure, glancing toward their boss.
        "When they came in the first time, did your boss greet them or have any discussion with them?"
        "No, she was in the back. They came in and went right over to the Reserved table to shake hands with Al Beer and Roberto Boliche."
        "They seemed to know each other?"
        "Seems like it. He introduced his wife to them."
        "So those two men saw what happened?"
        "No, they left while he and his wife stood at the bar and ordered ice cream. Well Mr. Boliche did."
        "So he and his wife went over to the table and sat down to wait for their order?"
        "Yeah."
        "Was anyone else in the store?"
        "No, not in this part of the store. I think All Beer was looking at stuff over in the greeting card section."
        "Do you know if anyone had reserved that table?"
        "It's always reserved, always got that sign on it, for our regular customers. For Mrs. Gore's friends. Local merchants and such."
        "So people don't generally call up and reserve the table?"
        "No, not as long as I've worked here."
        "And how long is that?"
        "About seven months now."
        "How would you describe what happened between Mrs. Gore and this man?"
        "She came out from the back and saw them at the reserved table, and asked them to move."
        "What exactly did she say?"
        "We can't really hear too good from way over here."
        "No other clients in the place?"
        "No, not really."
        "Plenty of places to sit would you say? Then what happened."
        The blonde with the sloped shoulders says "The man tells Mrs. Gore something like he deserves equal treatment under the law, because we're in America."
        The other blonde girl, with eyes the color of the braces on her teeth, says "Ah rahlly didn't unnerstan much, 'cept he said 'Real Americans' shouldn't even call each other Sir because it's against the Constitution, what did he call it¦ said it was in the Constitution¦"
        "Titles of Nobility?"
        Blonde with braces says "Yeah that was it. So he sits they-err, doesn't look lahk he's ginna budge, and talks about how America was founded on equality and equal treatment, and that we really shouldn't even call men Sir because it's against the Constitution, so Mrs. Gore keeps interrupting him, you know, to get him to hurry up and move, saying Sir, Sir! Sir! Over and over. Like that."
        The other girls says "Yeah, that's when he tells Mrs. Gore that she should read the constitution and become a real American."
        The other girls says "That's when the man's wife got up to apologized for not feeling well. And they left."
        "Together?"
        "Yep."
        "Do you think she felt alright when she came in?"
        "Ah dunno, but she ordered a big malted ice cream."
        "Did they pay for their ice cream?"
        "No, they left with the ice cream in the blenders."
        "All this happened pretty fast?"
        "Yeah."
        "Do you know why he came back in the store and ripped up the sign?"
        "Well I guess he was mad."
        "Did he look mad?"
        "No, not really. But Ah thought he acted strange, right from the moment he came in, lahk you could tell he wasn't born and raised around De Laguna. His ah-eez were all red, like he was on drugs or sumpin."
        Mrs. Chivy Gore beams at her employee. The girl flashes her braces back in acknowledgement of a job well done."
        The policeman glances at Chivy Gore, then asks the other girl "Was he shouting or anything? Did he use foul language?"
        "No, but when he returned, he walked through the place and said in a loud voice, My wife is pregnant and those are the only comfortable chairs in the place. Then he takes the sign off the table and rips it into pieces as he walks back towards the door."
        "He walked past Mrs. Gore?"
        "Yes."
        "Did you see him touch her in any way?"
        "Well, no, not really, he didn't even seem to pause, he walked right by her. He was looking at her, but I didn't hear that he said anything."
        "Then what happened?"
        "Mrs. Gore shook her shirt out, and I saw pieces of paper fall. Then so she runs over to the front window. We could hear him try to start his car."
        The policeman walks over to Chivy Gore and says "We've talked to the subject and his wife at his home, and they feel that you discriminated against them on account of her being Mexican. She understood you to say that the table was for Americans only. That would be against the law, Mrs. Gore. It might look like you put that sign there permanently to give you opportunity to discriminate against people."
        "I didn't refuse service to people, they could have eaten their ice-cream at any other table."
        "You called in a report of Criminal Mischief. What exactly do you base that on?"
        "They didn't pay for the ahs-cream, and after he gits his wah-if in the car, he comes back here, walks rat past me in the middle of mah shop. He goes direct to the table and takes mah Reserved sahn out of it's holder, then walks back through the store, ripping it into pieces. He walks up and as he passes me, he reaches out and pulls the front of mah shirt and throws the pieces down mah collar."
        The policeman lets his hands fall to waist level, and looks at Mrs. Chivy Gore, and repeats her words. "He walked up to you, pulled the front of your T-shirt, and threw the pieces of the sign down your collar?"
        "Yep."
        "That's not what he told us."
        "That's whut happnt. What did he tell you?"
        "He said he ripped up the sign and threw it in the trash."