Chapter 1

 

My name is James or Jimmy Deek and I'm a detective with the city police department. I was a bachelor for a few days because my wife, Kate, had gone off to help take care of her ailing father. I didn't like being alone, but I didn't fault her for feeling the need and having the desire to go help. People who won't take care of their parents are about the lowest form of life to my way of thinking.

I usually do what little drinking I do at home, but I was lonely and went out for a drink. When I bend my elbow outside the house it's usually at Mike Hannigan's bar. Mike is a retired cop and Hannigan's is a cop's bar, but I didn't want to be around cops that night.

Off duty or not, cops talk shop. I was working a murder case that had me baffled and I had had it with shoptalk for a while so I went to the Onyx. The Onyx bar is neither upscale or dive. It's somewhere between the two extremes. I went in and went to the bar where I ordered a Rolling Rock, one of America's best bottle beers.

About halfway through the bottle of fine beer a vaguely familiar drunk came up to me. I saw him in the mirror.

"You look like a cop," he said slurring his words. I ignored him and continued to sip my brew. "You smell like a cop, too," the fool said.

I pondered his comments. I am aware we walk funny. That comes from being or having been in uniform with a wide assortment of stuff on our belt. You have to walk with your arms slightly out, so I got the 'walk like a cop' part. I hadn't noticed any peculiar odor from us cops, but being a former smoker maybe my sense of smell was gone. I was willing to accept that, but my drunken anatomist would have none of it.

He grabbed my shoulder and whirled me around to face him. He was a large man, but that didn't surprise me. Small men seldom start bar fights.

"Sammy, bear witness to the fact that this citizen laid hands on me," I said to the bartender.

"You got it," the barkeeper said.

"Please go away," I said pleasantly to the big drunk.

"What's the matter," the man sneered. "You yellow, without all your cop buddies for backup?"

"Yes, that's it, now please go away, sir."

"No way," he said. "Got to whip some cop ass tonight."

There is a time to talk and a time to stop talking. I stopped talking and drop-kicked him in his balls. Suddenly he didn't want to fight any longer. I think he just wanted to moan and gag, so I let him.

"You want me to call it in?" the bartender asked. I nodded.

A few minutes later a patrol car arrived and Sergeant Vera Henry came in the bar trailing a partner.

"What's wrong with him?" Sergeant Vera asked, looking at the still moaning and gagging man on the floor.

"Swallowed his balls," I said. "How you doing, Vera?"

"A lot better than that guy," she answered. "You do that?"

"Yeah, check with Sammy and he'll tell you I was attacked and defended myself. Who's your partner?"

"Damned if I know," she answered. "I just got him today. Reckon I should call for a bus to take him to the ER?"

"Whatever you think," I said. "You are senior uniformed officer here. If it were me I'd toss him in the car's cage and haul him to the iron-bar hotel."

"I take it you'll make a warrant?" she asked.

"Yeah, I have to now. Otherwise he'll sue the city."

"What makes you think he still won't anyhow?" she said helping her partner get the man to his shaky legs. "Come on, asshole," she said to the man. "Let's get you to the ER and let them try to find both of your balls. I'll tell them you're coming in to make the charge, Deek."

"Who the hell is that?" I heard her partner ask.

"That's Jimmy Deacon. This poor fool tangled with the meanest man in town and the meanest man in the whole state of Kentucky," she grinned over her shoulders at me to let me know she had heard the story.

The story had managed to grow over the years so when I had the chance I retold it to keep it semi-believable. This is the story I tell and every word is true...as best I can remember.

 

Chapter 2

 

The meanest man in town

 

A couple years ago I was stuck a small town in Kentucky. It was so small you could stand in the middle and see the entire little town.

I was there because the city police car I was driving developed trouble. I had delivered a prisoner to the fine folks in Ohio and was on my way home. I got off the interstate and after a long drive to nowhere I ended up there with a water pump that had completely stopped pumping. There was a half-ass garage and the man said he could order another pump and fix my car for me. I agreed because I had no choice.

One day became two days and two became three and still no part arrived. It didn't take very long for me to become bored so one afternoon I wandered down to a beer joint to see what was going on, if anything.

I sat at the chipped and nicked bar and sipped on a cold beer, watching the locals watch me when an old timer sidled up and took a seat beside me.

"Howdy," he said cutting his eyes over toward me, "Stranger, huh?"

I assured him I was, while thinking he had to be the only man in town that had to ask.

"Buy me a beer and I'll tell you 'bout the meanest man in town," he said.

It is probably indicative of the boredom I was suffering but I laughed and agreed to his proposition. The old timer didn't say another word until the beer-tender sat a cold long-neck down in front of him. He took a long pull from the bottle and sat it down carefully, almost reverently.

"Bendigo Morgan," he said giving me a quick glance. "is the meanest man in this county, or any other county for that matter. Most folks call him Ben, if they call him at all."

"So what makes him the meanest man?" I asked.

"Well sir," He said finishing the beer quickly, "That's a long story. I ain't got much meat on my ass so let's sit at a table. Johnny, bring us a couple more beers." The bar man looked at me for confirmation and when I nodded he grabbed a couple of bottles and followed us to a table in the back.

"Ben Morgan runs a saw mill up the road a piece," The old man said. "Sometime back Ben went off to the city and got his self a wife. Somebody said he got her out of a whorehouse, but I don't know 'bout that. One thing I do know, she is a mighty fine lookin' woman. Now you got to understand that Ben's one big ugly sonofabitch. Six and a half feet tall and weighs near three hundred pounds. Not much is fat either. That woman he come back with ain't but five feet or so tall and I'd doubt that she would weigh a hundred pounds. Her name's Megan. Ben calls her Meg. Anyway the day he brought her home Ben parades Meg all over town. Both stores, feed store, post office, all over the place and ended up here at Johnny's place. They sat right over there at that there table. I'm getting a mite dry," he said cocking an eye at me. "You 'bout ready?"

I ordered us another round and he started again.

"Damndest thing I ever saw," The old man said. "Ben had three or four beers and then he whipped out his dick. Biggest dick I ever saw, too. This place was full of people. Men and women. 'Meg,' Ben says, 'Get down here and give me some head.' Boys howdy, that little gal turned forty shades of red, but damned if she didn't get right to it. Right there in front of everybody she sucked that big bastard off. Swallowed his load, too."

"Didn't anybody say anything?" I asked.

"Hell no," he cackled. "We enjoyed the show, if you want the truth. Besides who in their right mind would say anything to a feller as big at Ben Morgan. He's whipped just about everybody in town, one time or 'nother. Most everybody was glad he had a woman. Before he got Meg any woman in the county was fair game for him. It wasn't nothing at all for ol' Ben to go to somebody's house and demand the use of the woman. I guess he fucked nearly every woman in the county at one time or another. It would take a fool for a man to deny him. When Ben went for Tom Woods' young daughter, Tom bucked him and Ben nearly killed him. Then Ben took the girl and Tom's wife to his house and fucked them both for nearly a week."

"Tell him about the preacher's wife," another old man said.

"Yeah that was a while back," my storyteller said with a loud belch. "We had us a new preacher feller come to town. Brought his young wife with him and that was his first mistake. His second mistake was taking his wife when he went up to the sawmill to call on Ben. Ben hated preachers, but he loved their women. According to what the preacher told later, when he knocked on Ben's door, Ben opened it and knocked the preacher plum out cold. Didn't even say howdy. When the preacher came to he was tied to a straight chair and had to watch Ben fucking his new wife. According to the preacher, Ben fucked his little woman all that day, that night, and most of the next day before he set them loose. He told the preacher that he had some mighty good gash."

"That preacher took his wife and hauled ass out of town, didn't he?' the other old timer added with a cackle.

"Yeah, somebody told me the wife didn't want to leave, but the preacher sure as hell did. Anyway Ben settled down some after he got his own woman. Every Saturday afternoon, ol' Ben would bring his new bride in here and sell her services for beer," the old timer said. "For a bottle of beer she will give a man a hand-job. Suck you off for two beers. For a six pack you can take her in the back room and fuck her."

"What does the law say about that?" I asked.

"Ha! What law? The closest thing we got to a lawman is a county deputy that comes through here a couple of times a week and he's scared shitless of Ben. If he came in while Meg was working I guarantee he'd turn around and leave without opening his mouth. No sir, Ben can pretty much do what he wants to do. Couple of weeks ago Ben had Meg put on a show for Johnny's customers. After she had sucked off most of the customers and fuck a few more, Ben made her lay down on the table and fuck herself with a beer bottle. He slapped the hell out of her when she stopped. He got her right back to it."

"Wow," I said. "I guess he is a mean man."

"Shit, that ain't the half of it," the old man said. "Plenty men whore out their wife. No sir, there's more to the story, but it'll cost you a hamburger and fries and a lot more beer."

I suspected that I was sitting with the champion liar of the state, but it beat being bored, so I agreed.