Inflating a Dog (The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy) by Eric Kraft (novels to read for beginners .txt) 📗

“It’s only for this one time,” she said, “just the opening night, the grand opening. How would it look if Elegant Ella had to greet the cream of Babbington society without her elegant fella?”

I saw a car come around the bend from the direction of town.

“Hey,” I said. “Here comes somebody.”

“Oh, my God,” said my mother.

A car pulled up, but it wasn’t what we’d been hoping for: it was a wreck, a jalopy. Out of it rolled a distinctly inelegant little man, rumpled and sweating in a baggy brown suit, with a porkpie hat pushed back on his head, a cigarette dangling from his mouth, and a big Speed Graphic camera in his hand.

My mother glided to the bow with a walk I’d never seen before. My father’s expression suggested that he’d never seen it before, either.

“Good evening, good evening,” she gushed in a voice not quite her own. “Welcome to Ella’s Elegant Excursions. I’m Ella.”

“Winky Wills,” the little man announced, extending his pudgy hand toward my mother. His cigarette bobbed as he spoke. “Ace photographer. Babbington Reporter.”

“Oh!” said my mother, thrilled, scared, flustered. She shook his hand vigorously, then turned to us and nearly screamed, “This is Mr. Winky, everybody!”

“Wills,” he said, struggling aboard. “But it don’t matter. Winky’ll do.”

He shook my father’s hand, and mine, then turned to Patti and gave her a professional appraisal. “How’s about a little cheesecake before the boat gets crowded, toots?”

“Gee, I — ”

“Great advertising, kid.”

“Well, okay.”

He got her to perch on the low cabin over the engine, cross her legs, and pull the hem of her dress up over her knees.

A car crunched to a stop in the gravel beside the bulkhead. Then another, and another. Doors opened, doors slammed.

My mother said, “Good evening! Good evening! Welcome to Ella’s Elegant Excursions. I’m Ella,” and “Welcome, welcome, welcome,” again and again. She cried it, she gushed it, she giggled it. She was so grateful to them all for showing up.

And more and more excursionists did show up. For a while there was an unbroken line of them, stepping aboard, being handed aboard by my mother, getting their pictures snapped by Winky Wills, standing beside my mother in her slinky satin gown, or beside Patti in her slinky satin gown. With every arrival, my mother checked her guest list, and despite the fact that there were so many eager excursionists, she worried that the mayor would not show up.

“Ohhh, Peter,” she said. “Do you think he’ll come?”

“Sure he’ll come,” I said, though I had no reason for thinking that he would. “Don’t worry, Mom.”

“I don’t know,” she said. “He may have bigger fish to fry.”

“Oh, Ella,” said Patti, laying a hand on my mother’s bare shoulder, “don’t you worry. Tonight you’re the biggest fish in Babbington.”

My mother gave Patti a hug of thanks for that encouragement, and as she did so the mayor’s car pulled up. How did I know it was the mayor’s car? The mayor’s was the only car in town driven by a chauffeur, a miniature of the Babbington town flag flew from the radio antenna, and the license plate said MRMAYOR.

My mother’s eyes widened, she stood tall, and she glided to the bow. “Why, Your Honor!” she said, as if his arrival had been the last thing on her mind. “Mr. Mayor!” she said, as if he hadn’t ever been invited to sample Ella’s Elegant Excursions gratis. “My goodness,” she said, consulting her clipboard with the merest suggestion of a frown, as if she didn’t expect to find his name there. “Welcome,” she said, as if despite his having blundered in uninvited he was indeed welcome, as any stray would be welcomed by so generous an outift as Ella’s. Where had she learned all this? From the magazines she read? Were there articles about running your own aquatic excursion business? How to dress? How to speak? How to handle the arrogant late-arriving big shot?

The mayor at that time was L. D. Gerber. He was short, fat, and vain. His wife was a head taller than he, and she thought herself slim. It may have been an issue of perceptual distortion. For this occasion, Mrs. Gerber, to her everlasting credit in my mind, had dressed herself in a pink gown accented by a feather boa. She struck a particularly festive note, and unlike the mayor, who seemed to want to treat the evening as a reelection rally, she seemed inclined to have a good time.

“Oh, my dear,” she said, clasping both my mother’s hands as she lumbered aboard, “what an elegant fantasy you’ve created!”

Patti arrived with champagne. For a while, she and I circulated among the excursionists, pouring champagne and passing out pastel sandwiches. The excursionists greeted one another and sipped and chattered. More than once, as Patti squeezed through the growing crowd, I saw men and women alike turn and crane their necks to get a look at the glorious way white satin slid across her bottom. Everywhere there was an air of eager anticipation. Arcinella’s deck was becoming more and more crowded — overcrowded.

My mother caught up to me and tugged my sleeve. “Peter,” she said, “you’d better cast off and get the show on the road before anybody else shows up. We’ve got all we can hold — and then some.”

“Aye, mom,” I said.

With the assurance of an old hand, somebody who’s been through it before and actually does know what he’s doing, I cast off the bow and stern lines and backed Arcinella out of her slip. I took her downriver toward the bay, smooth as, well, silk sliding across a nubile bottom. When we reached the broad waters of the bay, my mother leaned in through the wheelhouse window. “Patti and I can’t keep up with them,” she said. “Is there any way you can give us a hand? Pour champagne or pass hors d’oeuvres?”

“Um, sure,” I said. “I can tie the wheel for a