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{in answer to your question} phillip gardner “I’ve got some good news for you,” Hank said. “And I’ve got some bad news for you.” Hanging loosely at his side was a pruning tool, its long handles allowing the large beak-like cutting edge to rest against Hank’s boot. In front of him, a man with his forearm squashed in Hank’s pipe vise shifted unsteadily from side to side like a man standing in a life raft. One of his eyes was swollen shut, and blood caked his nostrils. His upper lip was a thick, dry scab. The man, Darryl, kept looking back with his one good eye at his arm as if he had ordered it to come along, but the disobedient purple swollen wrist, meaty palm and sausage fingers had mutinied. “The bad news, Darryl, is that my buddy, Hawk here?” Hank hoisted the pruning tool—“he’s going to cut off one of your fingers.” Darryl sucked in a breath that seemed to inflate his whole body like a Thanksgiving Day parade balloon. The air sputtered out of him. “The good news is that you get to choose which finger, and under the best of circumstances, you might only lose a pinky.” Darryl began hop scotching. Hank sighed audibly. “Shit, Darryl, you got nine more. It’s not like I’m cutting off one of your ears. Fair thing would be to castrate your sorry ass. Under the circumstances, I’d say that clipping off just one finger? Clip, clip? That would be a gesture of kindness. Know what I mean, Darryl? Pretty soon you won’t even miss it.” “Ohhhh,” Darryl said. “No, Hank. No, Hank.” “Now Darryl,” Hank said. “Best to get over whether or not you’re gonna lose a finger and set your mind on losing only one. We’ve been friends for a long time. I’m trying to give you some good advice here, Darryl. I haven’t gotten to the really bad news yet.” “Ohhhh,” Darryl said. His body had assumed a sprinter’s position, but there was the problem of the numb, flattened arm in the vise. And as Darryl studied the purple hand with its thick veins the color of cat gut, the look in his wide, wild eyes spelled a kind of jilted disbelief. “Damn it, Darryl,” Hank whined, “I’m giving you a choice, man. You act like you are not captain of your own ship. I’m giving you a chance to tell the truth.” A kind of evangelical force swept over Hank, and he lifted the cutting tool like a Biblical slate. “You can do the right thing here!” he shouted. “No, Hank. Please, man. I’m beggin’ you, man.” Drawing himself up to full attention, Hank assumed a school principal pose, pacing, jamming his left hand into his trouser’s pocket, then swinging the pruning tool before him like he was conducting an orchestra. “Facts is facts, Darryl. Facts is facts. Let me make you a list.” He jerked his fist from his pocket and held it in the air tomahawk-like. When he had Darryl’s attention, he raised the fingers as if he were taking an oath. “Let me appeal to your good sense, Darryl. If you tell me the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, you get to keep theses four.” He tucked the pinky into his palm. “If you tell me part of the truth, you get to keep these three.” The pointer bowed. “Now if you lie to me—and that is a choice, Darryl, I want to remind you that you are in control here; you and only you get to decide, Darryl. I don’t want you to feel like you don’t have a voice in this. We all have free will.” Darryl began a clumsy version of Fred Astaire. “I’m begging you to tell me the truth, man. Look at me. Hear me now. My heart is filled with compassion for you Darryl, even after what you done. Can’t you see? Read my lips, Darryl.” Hank hooked two fingers under Darryl’s chin and lifted it. “I want you to know,” he paused to let his words sink in, “that even if you do lie to me, I’m not going to cut off all your fingers. I’m not that kind of man, Darryl. I’m not. That would be cruel. Do you know what I mean, Darryl? Darryl? Are you listening, Darryl?” “I’m listening, Hank.” His words came out in panted breaths. “I’m listening.” “Good.” Hank dropped Darryl’s chin and looked up, whispering as if to himself. “A man with no fingers? Now that’s an ugly sight, Darryl. That’s a man with all nubs, you know what I mean, Darryl? ‘N-u-b-s.’ Even the word has an ugly ring to it. So, if you do lie to me, I’m leaving you with something. I’m taking the pinky and the pointer--” Hank paused, tilting his ear as if he were receiving a voice from above. Then he looked at Darryl. “That-kinda-rhymes-don’t-it, Darryl? Pinky-and-pointer, pinky-and-pointer?” Hank’s head did that tick-tock thing, and he smiled at Darryl. “Pointer-and-pinky?” Feet churning, Darryl’s body was positioned like a relay runner urgently awaiting the baton. Hank bent low, eye to eye with Darryl, and tilted his head like a curious puppy does. “If you lie, I’m taking the thumb, Darryl. I’m taking the thumb with the other two. But I’m a man of my word. I’m leaving the middle two. No matter what, Darryl. No matter what, I’m leaving you with those. My gift to you, Darryl. I’m not taking everything from you like you did from me. I could, but I’m not, ‘cause that’s the kind of man I am, Darryl. I want you to remember that I’m leaving you with something. Something so that if you do lie to me, Darryl? You can wave bye-bye.” |
