Chapter 5: Out to Lunch
The next morning Leaflow walked out into the garden, a trowel in one hand and a bucket of flower bulbs in the other. These were to replace the ones he had ruthlessly trimmed out the other day, as well as plant an empty bed with new ones.
He came to a stop just beside the patio steps, realizing that he was not the only one in the garden. A woman sat on the edge of one of the raised beds, one hand outstretched to cup the single flower left on a golden poppy. Her inky hair fell forward around her face, which was lost in reverie. It was Miss Rillcoe.
She looked up after a moment and Leaflow gave her a slight bow, speaking politely.
“Greetings.”
“You must be the gardener who did this garden?” She asked, taking him in with a glance that was neither frightened nor hostile.
“That is correct,” he set the bucket of bulbs down next to a nearby bed.
The woman was quiet for a few seconds, before remarking, “I like it. It is not beautiful as some flower gardens are, but I feel a sympathy with it.”
“Oh?” Leaflow gave her a gravely quizzical look.
“Yes.” Her face was straight and earnest as she fluttered the bright blossom with her fingers, “so hemmed about and put in its place...seemingly cold and distant to everyone. No one here really likes me for myself. That’s why I want to leave soon...I don’t know why I’m telling you this.”
The last words were spoken dryly, with a touch of a wry smile.
“Most people don’t know why when they tell me anything,” the cloaked one glanced up at a window on the second story, where a face was pressed against the glass, nose smeared grotesquely over to one side, “but I wouldn’t say that no one here admires you.”
Miss Rillcoe followed his glance toward the mansion, but before she found what he was looking at the face had disappeared.
Later that day Eugene cornered Leaflow to ask, “what did she say?”
“She said my garden reminded her of a prison,” Leaflow told him, “and that all of the house servants are so rude she is thinking of leaving.”
---
It had taken a lot of explaining and apologies to get Mr. Ruble to forgive them. But in the end Eugene’s powers of persuasion had pulled them through so that all three of the adventurers still had their jobs. After the first week they were given their paychecks and a day off. True to his promise, Maniac wanted to spend his money on a good restaurant in town, inviting the other two to come with him for lunch. Eugene was wary about going, as they were still wanted men, but a fancy meal tempted him and he thought that they would be no less safe in an expensive restaurant than they were in the mansion. Either one was an unlikely place to find convicts hiding out. It was only chance encounters which they had to fear, where ever they were.
Before leaving for the restaurant Eugene had one small commission to carry out. He made sure that he was tidy in the mirror first, straightening the collar of his new coat. Or rather, the one he had borrowed for the afternoon. It had pleased him when he saw it hanging in Harry Ruble’s wardrobe, as it was a bright red color. Not only was that his own favorite hue, but Eugene had a feeling that it fit the lady guest’s tastes as well.
Once his hair and coat were straightened out the young man picked up a tray which lay on his bed nearby. It contained another rose, this one deep burgundy, and a folded note with ‘Irene’ scrawled across it in curly handwriting. It also had a glass of wine on it, but that was incidental to his plan.
Moving with the quiet steps habitual to him, he made his way down to the guest’s room and knocked. An abstracted voice bade him to enter, upon which he found Miss Rillcoe sitting at her desk once again, typing on her computer.
“Thank you. Set it there,” she indicated the spot without looking up. In silence, as always, Eugene slid the tray into place and stepped out of the room. He started to walk away, but then could not resist staying nearby to see what happened. There was a sigh, a rustle of paper and then a stretch of quiet before Irene’s voice came to him sharp and clear.
“Why--That man!”
The door burst open with such fury that Eugene barely had time to get out of the way. He heard the woman’s feet tap all through the house until, finally, she found her quarry.
“Harry Ruble, how dare you write me a letter like this?” Her voice was cold and contained, but deadly.
Eugene muffled his laughter in his one good hand and hurried out of the house to join his two companions, who were waiting for him by the gate. He had just stuck a spoke in the young master’s wheel that would not come out easily, if at all. Grinning hugely, he strode over to where the other two stood watching him.
“It’s a beautiful day.”
“Ah, it certainly is,” Maniac looked up at the blue sky and slapped his stomach, “as big a meal as we can hold, where-ever we desire. Money is a useful tool in this old world.”
“But not to be confused with happiness,” Eugene returned cheerfully, putting hand companionably on each of their shoulders. Or rather, a hand on Maniac and a hook on Leaflow, who gave it a glare and only bearly let it stay in place. They strolled out of the gate and down the gravel road into town, talking and joking in their normal half-mocking manner all of the way into the more populous parts of the city. There they broke up and went a little more quietly, not wanting to draw attention to themselves in the streets.
The restaurant Maniac picked out was on the corner of a block, with a short lawn and shiny green bushes around it. Semi-transparent curtains hung over the windows. Black vehicles with silver trim sat in the parking lot and the sidewalk did not have a crack in it. It looked expensive. The sign read ‘Callagiros’ in purple letters with wooden grape leaves clinging to them.
“This place?” Leaflow stopped, peering up at the sign as if it was faintly shocking or unethical.
“Yes, it looks pretty good,” Maniac shrugged, “I ate in a place like this before and they had the best service imaginable. Then again, I had an AK-47 with me and a partner with a baseball bat, so they had to be nice.”
Eugene snorted, following after his friends, “you don’t have to be rough to get good service in this sort of place, as long as you know how to act.”
“Politely, I suppose?” Maniac bared his teeth over his shoulder in a grin which fit his name.
“No,” Eugene tucked his hook into the front of his jacket so that it was out of sight, and he looked a little like a long-haired Napoleon. “Rich.”
The air inside the restaurant was air-condition, smelling only faintly of spices and not at all of grease. The floor was tiled, the reception room shut off from the dining space so that any 'unpleasantness’ could be eliminated before reaching the elect. The head waiter at the desk was mostly bald, had a long nose and a small mouth. His expression was one of entire servility, as long as you measured up to his standards. His clothes seemed to be wrinkled only in the correct places.
“Yuuuhs?” He looked down that long pointer of a snoz right at Maniac and the skin along the top of the nose wrinkled.
“We came for something to eat,” the big man returned, with a grin suggesting that the waiter would make a fitting appetizer if nothing else was available.
The waiter’s eyebrows rose up onto the top of his forehead, eyelids drooping. “Indeed? That is, perhaps, why you came to a restaurant? Do you have the, ahem, capability to pay for such a meal?”
“You bet,” Maniac continued to grin, but now cracked his knuckles as well.
“If you are trying to intimidate me--” The waiter began. This was when Eugene decided to step in. He came to the front, gave a small smile and a bow, “perhaps there is a misunderstanding here. My manservant only means to make sure we have a good seat and the right service. So many places are, well, below average you know. Everything will be payed for promptly, when we are through with them.”
“I see,” the waiter sniffed, but seemed to feel an energy from the young man that was more acceptable his standards, “well, my apologies for making you wait, sir. Please follow me and everything will be to your taste, I am sure. Are your, ahem, manservants eating as well?”
“Of course. A table for three on this, our day of celebration,” Eugene waved his visible hand magnanimously, taking in both of his companions. Leaflow’s eyes sparkled with suppressed mockery and Maniac transferred his cannibalistic grin to Eugene, but all he said was, “lead the way, boss.”
The table was in the center of the aisle, but at the back of the room. It had around it padded chairs with iron curls on the backrests, and bronze knobs on the feet. A frosty white tablecloth with grapevines dyed into it topped the eating surface. Laying on the table were white menus with curling, vine prints around the words.
“Will this do for you gentlemen?” the waiter inquired.
“Perfectly,” Eugene nodded his thanks. The table was really bigger than they needed and much more exposed than he would have preferred, but he did not feel like arguing the point. It would have seemed suspicious, as well as in poor taste.
“Can we have drinks, master, or do servants only get water?” Maniac asked sarcastically, flipping up his menu with a loud flick.
“Oh, cut it out,” Eugene left his on the table so that he could flip the pages with his only hand, “it got us in here, so stop complaining.”
“I could have got us in here too, I’ve done it before,” Maniac continued to grouse, jerking through the pages too fast to actually see what was in them.
“Not without a gun and a bat,” Eugene snorted, “and we don’t need that sort of attention being drawn to us anyway.”
The stilled atmosphere of the place worked on them all after that, so that they fell to seriously perusing the list of eatables. Leaflow searched through it once before wishing aloud that there was a bread and cheese platter in it, or even better a French baguette with cheddar cheese and mint tea on the side. In the end, he had to settle for soup, sandwich and a salad with a glass of orange juice. Maniac ordered a giant T-bone steak with all of the fixings and three types of craft beer. He also ordered a fresh salmon salad on the side, though he said that he wanted the fish more than the lettuce leaves or tomatoes.
Eugene carefully inspected the menu before ordering lamb cutlets a la’Degoutant Surcreme, olive Pate-boue and garlic yogurt with basil sauce. He took a glass of Merlot wine to go with it, after a slight hesitation over Cabernet Sauvignon which put the waiter on edge.
“My, my, our little boy has quite a refined appetite,” Maniac said once the waiter had left again, “what’s it say on this menu? Ah, yes, a meal to tempt the most discerning palette. I tried tempting a pallet once and only got splinters in my knuckles for the effort.”
“It probably wasn’t a discerning pallet then,” Leaflow put in, folding his hands wisely together on the table top, “most of them are made of some sort of wood. Pine, most likely. It isn’t the best wood for choosing your dinner for you.”
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“Now, the question is,” Maniac said, laying his chin on his fist to peer over at the topic of their conversation, “is he old enough to drink that fancy wine he ordered, or should we drink it for him?”
Eugene leaned back and folded his arms behind his head coolly.
“If you try it I’ll have you thrown out of here. You know I can.”
Which was true, though troublesome for his two companions. No matter what they said he was the only reason they had been allowed into the restaurant. He watched them from lazy eyes for a little bit, before thumping down on the chair and adding, “though I suppose it’s only fair if we all three pay for this meal jointly. Did either of you see the prices on the menu?”
Maniac shook his head, while Leaflow made a gesture to show that he would rather have not.
“Well, they aren’t cheap,” Eugene shrugged, “but we’ve got enough between us to fill the bill.”
It was not long before the waiter returned, bringing their drinks. The food followed shortly afterwards, first unto their table and then down their throats. They had cleaned the plates rather admirably, Maniac even sucking on his T-bone until it was white, by the time the bill was brought. It was delivered on a sliver platter with three mints on the side, which were instantly pocketed by Eugene without the other two seeing.
“Let’s see now,” Maniac picked up the bill, “one steak, with fixings. Salads, sandwich, fancy things...wait a minute. Waiter, what’s this?”
The man with the long nose leaned over to peer at the paper, before fluttering his fingers, “ah, that is your drinks, sir.”
“Yes, between twenty and fifty dollars apiece, is see. But we only ordered one glass of wine!”
The waiter hesitated, trying to remember what had been brought. In a sudden burst of temper Maniac leaped to his feet, snatching him by the collar and shaking him viciously, “first you won’t let me in here, now you overcharge me!”
The poor waiter’s teeth were chattering together so that he could not answer. A man at another table jumped up, laying a hand on Maniac’s arm. He was a tough looking customer himself, perhaps a CIA agent.
“Sir, why don’t you--”
His words were halted by a strong blow in the mouth, which Maniac delivered with one hand while still holding the gasping waiter with the other. It was at that point that the waiter made his worst mistake of the day.
Feeling like he had been made ridiculous, he decided to fight for his honor instead of begging for mercy. He picked up the steak knife which was laying on the table for their meal and gave his captor a valiant jab in the chest, “now sir, unhand me!”
Maniac barely felt the prick, but it was enough to drive him into a frenzy, “Yahh!” Grabbing the waiter up in both hands he lifted him entirely into the air and threw him against the nearby tables. Glassware shattered, forks went flying and the waiter crumpled on the ground along with the tipped-over table. Eugene tried to jump up and restrain his friend, but the man whom Maniac had hit in the mouth had recovered by now, almost as maddened as Maniac was himself. Picking up a fancy chair he swung it at the raging butler, smacking him on the arm.
Maniac roared like Waffle in a tantrum and the whole restaurant disintegrated into a brawl. He jumped to tackle the other man and they fell to the floor punching, while other customers began to either flee or join in. Eugene began to be kicked and smacked whenever he tried to get in to help his friend or draw him away, until he found himself standing on a chair hitting out at anyone who came near with a brass candlestick. A sense of wild abandon had gripped him, so that he saw everything through a red mist.
He felt a hand grasp his ankle and struck out at it, but before the blow could connect he was jerked off of his feet and pulled under the table. He swung back his deadly, sharpened hook to deliver a cut to whoever had grabbed him, afraid of being pummeled. Then he saw the green glowing eyes and his head cleared enough to realize that it was Leaflow who had pulled him down.
“Eugene,” the cloaked man said sharply to bring him to himself, before speaking more quietly, “we have to get Maniac and leave this place. The waiter just crawled off to call the police.”
“How do you know?” Eugene turned to peer out at the mess which was growing in the expensive, fancy room.
“I saw him go. And I doubt he’s the only one,” Leaflow rubbed a gloved hand on his hood, “then I was hit by a flying beer mug and took shelter down here. We should get out of here quickly, or else we will not only be in trouble for this, but be discovered and recaptured by the prison authorities.”
“Great,” The thief tried to make out their friend among the struggling mass and eventually spotted him, pinned down under another man but biting his arm like a bulldog until his captor cried out.
“How are we going to get him out of this?”
At that moment Maniac rolled closer, throwing the one pinning him down off and kicking out at another man who was holding a ladle in his hands like a club.
“You grab one leg, I’ll get the other,” Leaflow crawled closer to the edge of the table and made a sudden snatch, grasping Maniac’s ankle firmly. Eugene jerked forward to get the other, using his hook to catch the top of the boot and reel him in. Maniac fought and struggled as he was hauled under the table, until Leaflow glared down at him and said his name.
With that he stopped rolling around and blinked, “oh, it’s you two. Help me knock out a few of these buffoons, would you? Some of them are rich bikers and there is a spy or two as well.”
“Maniac, we have to leave. They’re calling reinforcements,” Eugene pulled him over to the side of the table closest to the wall, looking up at the window there. He was just wondering how he would get it open when a chair went spinning by him and smashed it to tinkling slivers. Wincing, he drew back.
Now the fight had gone on so long that no one knew who they were fighting, or why. Men in dress suits with at least a touch of drink in them hit out at each other, throwing whatever came to hand and kicking at the people who went down. Women screamed and hid in the corners, or joined the brawl to swing away at the others with their purses.
“The more people in the fight the better,” Maniac bared his teeth in a ferocious grin, struggling to get away again.
“They’re calling the police, you numbskull! Follow me,” Eugene knocked a few jagged bits of glass out of the window with his hook and crawled out. Leaflow shoved Maniac to get him going and they both followed. On the sidewalk outside, the noise of the battle within was somewhat dimmed, but the sound of sirens on the street was rapidly approaching.
“That waiter would have given them a description,” The thief growled, “we have to get out of town, now.”
“This way,” Leaflow directed them along the sidewalk and down an alley leading toward the west, “if we must leave town there is only one way to fly. We need my car.”
“I wish you had kept a better grip on your temper,” Eugene glared at Maniac, who was covered in bruises and scrapes and seemed quite pleased with it.
“Heh, I wasn’t going to let that stuck-up prod-nose put anything over on me,” the brawler said, unabashed.
“And yet, it would have been better to pay for the wine than meet the eventual taxes for all of this,” Leaflow put in, drawing them around a corner toward an old garage with rusty trucks from the forties sitting in the yard beside it.
“What do you mean by 'eventual taxes?’ Who’s going to make us pay?” Maniac snatched the corner of his cloak, stopping him for a moment.
“We’ve made ourselves pay by losing our jobs,” Leaflow returned, twitching the cloth away imperturbably, “though I must say, things were getting a bit dull. At least this way we get my car and our freedom back in one blow.”
“Or a dozen,” Maniac rubbed his knuckles, which were cracked and bleeding from using them as battering rams repeatedly.
Leaflow led them in to a side-door of the garage, where they found a thick-set, weaselly fellow leaning over a workbench full of gears, shafts and broken power tools. He looked up sharply when they came in, snapping a curse at them by way of rebuke and inquiry. Leaflow explained that they had come for his car and asked where it was.
“Out back,” the mechanic growled, holding out a hand without looking at them, “where’s my money?”
“I thought the deal was that you would keep it in here,” Leaflow replied, without giving him anything.
“Not enough room in here.”
“It fit at first.”
“I had to move something else in later. It’s out back if you want it!”
Leaflow continued to press him without flinching, “did you even put the hood up when it went outside?”
The mechanic shrugged, “I dunno. If you didn’t have it up, I didn’t bother.”
Leaflow’s eyes glowed brighter in wrath, “Maniac, hit him please.”
No sooner was it said then his friend’s fist swung forward and hit the mechanic squarely on the jaw. He collapsed back on the floor, stunned for a moment and staring at them with bloodshot eyes. Slowly one hand came up to feel his face and a cracked lip on it.
“Thank you, Maniac.” Leaflow took the fresh cash from his pocket and threw it down to the man on the floor, “now would each of you mind contributing a little to pay him off? I didn’t quite have enough left over myself.”
In silence they both added a few hundred to the pile, before following the cloaked man outside.
“I don’t see how hitting him helped...” Eugene began, feeling a little disgusted by all the violence he had seen that day. But when he saw Leaflow’s shoulders stiffen ahead of him he added, “though I can hardly blame you when you’d already promised to pay him and he’d gone back on his words.”
Around the back of the garage was a graveled lot with old oil barrels, rusty gears and an inexplicable sewing machine laying around its outer edge. In the center was parked a car, a convertible in fact, which was painted a bright sky-blue.
“Nice,” Eugene moved over to run a hand down the engine’s hood, his estimation of the cloaked man suddenly rising a few points, “a ‘66 Mustang. And in good condition too.”
“Or it was until Mr. Gillick got hold of it,” Leaflow muttered, leaning in over the driver’s side door, “if he’s fried my car, I’ll roast him.”
“Good, we’ll save him for dinner,” Maniac threw himself into the back seat of the car with a faint squish, laying full length across it. The convertible had been parked in the shade and seats had not entirely dried out from the rain more than a week ago. When Leaflow turned the key it started just fine, with a rumble and a purr which evidently put him in a better mood.
At least, he leaned over and opened the door for Eugene, inviting him to take the passenger seat without mentioning roasting the garage man again. As he began to back out of the lot they heard the sound of sirens start up off in the city again.
The little convertible bumped out of the back lot in reverse, before spinning on to the paved road and taking off. The wind whipped in Eugene’s hair as he glanced back behind them. No police cars were in sight, but they were definitely cruising the city not far behind. He felt a pang of regret as they began to leave the more populous areas behind. Though they were back on their course now toward the eventual end of riches and triumphant homecoming, he was leaving something behind in the mansion. The fascinating Miss Rillcoe.
“As long as our getaway is secure, I think I’ll take a bit of a nap back here,” Maniac told him, catching his gaze, “my arm is beginning to ache from the fight.”
And with that, he was asleep, snoring loudly. Eugene looked down and saw that his arm was turning red and black from being hit with the chair, though he had flopped it inconsequentially over the back of the seat beside him as if he didn’t care.
“Huh, if my arm looked like that I wouldn’t be sleeping. I would be crying my eyes out,” the thief commented, turning back to look straight ahead so as to avoid motion sickness.
Leaflow glanced over at the sleeping man, before turning back to his driving, “he must be nearly indestructible.”
“Or too stupid to notice,” Eugene still felt a little miffed at having lost their secure jobs, though the feeling that they were getting somewhere fast was quickly soothing that sensation away.
After a few more minutes they were in the suburbs of the city, then pulling in to the surrounding farmland. Gray buildings and concrete faded to the greens, yellows and blues of fields or open pasture. Bright little flowers bloomed in the ditches on each side, flagging the many eatables which no one ever thought to consume. The sun was warm on Eugene’s head. He enjoyed it, having grown up in a temperate climate with plenty of sun. The air felt nice as well, cool and fresher than any he had breathed in some time.
Turning on the radio, Leaflow slapped it a few times until it began to work. Crackles still ran through the noise now and then, but nothing worse.
“The damp gave it an intermittent connection,” he explained, “perhaps if it runs in the warmth for a little bit it will dry out.”
“You must really like this car,” Eugene said with just a touch of envy, “I’m surprised you paid that pawnshop-mechanic-garage-man anything at all. Especially the full price owed.”
Leaflow shrugged, “I had given my word I would. Even if he went back on his, I should keep it. Besides, he’s the sort who would have called the cops if we didn’t pay, but will take the blow with only a day of grumbling. Maniac’s punch was much more satisfying to me than keeping any money would have been.”
“Well, at least we got a free lunch out of this whole deal,” Eugene folded his arms behind his head and put his boots up on the dash, “though I would have made that fellow pay for whatever damage he has done.”
The music soon soothed him to sleep as well, not to awaken until they entered another city and slowed their pace to suit it. Then Eugene awoke with a jerk, sitting up and rubbing his eyes. He glanced around to see a small town surrounded by low hills which supported vineyards and orchards in flowing lines. The buildings of the city all were built low, many of them being adobe with arched windows and shady porches. He looked up at the sun and saw that it was beginning to sink toward the west. Leaflow was piloting them skillfully toward one of the larger buildings on the edge of the street.
“Where are we?” Eugene asked with no originality.
“San Cortuze,” the driver returned, pulling to a halt in the parking lot, “I thought that we should probably stop at a hotel for tonight and continue in the morning. The towns are only going to get sparser as we travel northwards.
“Why are we going north at all?” Eugene asked, stifling a yawn, “shouldn’t we start to head east now? The address on this envelope is of a city a few states to the east.”
“North-east actually,” Leaflow corrected, stepping out, “and the easiest way to get there is to head up the highway almost one hundred miles and cross the mountains to the east there.”
Maniac jumped up on the back seat, stretching to his full height, “sounds good to me. And we can get dinner while we are here.”
Eugene rolled his eyes, hoping that their next meal did not turn out to be as much of a scene as the last one had been.