The Traveller’s Friend

Rasher, Mono and JP filed religiously into the bar. With some satisfaction they found their end of the counter had not been defiled by heathen worshippers. They took their places at Donleavy’s shrine and arranged themselves into comfortable positions. JP spread out his hands in priest like fashion and made an entrance announcement.

            “Rasher, Mono. You are both true friends. I would like the drinks tonight to be on me. In fact I want to buy ya drink for the week. Maybe even a month. So how about it?”

            “Bejaysus.”

            “Would a bear shit in the woods?”

            “Did ya get the six balls or wha’?”

            “I know. Great-aunt Gertie died and left ya an oil well. Wha’?”

JP spread out his wings again looking for a calm.

            “I have indeed come in for an unexpected addition to my normally hazardous pecuniary situation and I would like to share it with ya. Also I would like to get rid of it in a way that the dragon doesn’t get to know of it.”

            “Our lips are sealed, JP.”

            “Well except when we’re drinking that is.”

JP took out his wallet and, with it held under the bar counter, quickly opened and closed it. There was a wad of dog-eared notes clearly visible in the split second that they saw its contents in the dim light of Donleavy’s pub. There were certainly hundreds of euros there. Both men let out a low whistle.

            “So how did ya come by this money and why can’t the dragon know about it. Don’t tell me ya robbed Mrs. O’Brien in the post office?”

            “You’ve ripped off the children’s allowance account?”

            “Ya fecked it from the sacristy after Masses last Sunday?”

            “You’ve started selling your body down by the docks?”

            “You’re pimping for the little blonde one that lives in number 43?”

            “Ya’re dealing drugs?”

JP held up his hands again.

            “Well actually drugs do have something to do with it,”

Rasher and Mono looked at each other askance. This wasn’t the answer they were expecting. Could it be true? Could JP really be involved in a drugs racket? He was a weird one that was for sure. He had a history of being off beam. But drugs! It wasn’t possible. There was along silence in which JP seemed to be reveling. He took out his pipe and his tobacco pouch. He laid them on the bar counter and went rooting for his lighter and Swiss army knife. When he had everything in order he opened the tobacco pouch and took a long smell of the contents.

            “Know wha’s in here, lads?”

There was no answer.

            “Best Mexican marijuana. Some of the best in the business. Want a sniff?”

            Both men sat motionless and silent.

            “Now, who’s for a few pints? And some big cigars?”

Still neither man spoke. JP shifted his arse slightly off the barstool and motioned to catch Donleavy’s attention as the bar owner did his lap of the horseshoe shaped bar.

            “Donleavy”, JP beckoned in a louder than usual voice, “give us three pints and three of them corona cigars that have been sitting there forever. I hope they’re still fresh. Me and me mates are having a bit of a celebration. And have a cigar yourself. Ya deserve a break.”

Donleavy made a beeline to the end of the bar, his barman’s nose smelling profit.

            “Of course they’re fresh. Each one hand-rolled on the thigh of a virgin and each one immediately wrapped in plastic to maintain her nubile scent. Wha’ more can I say?”

            “Hopefully very little more”, JP replied.

            “Well, I will say one more thing. Wha’ are ya celebrating men?”

            “Let’s just say that I’ve diversified my income portfolio and my current financial position is more liquid. Now I’m going to liquidate my assets in favour of liquid, if ya get my drift.”

Donleavy started pulling pints.

            “Loud and clear, JP. You liquidate for liquid. I serve liquid and increase my liquidity. Everyone is happy all around. At least I think so. Mono and Rasher there seem to have faces as long as a Friday evening tailback. Ya’d want to give them some happy pills if ya want a celebration.”

            “Oh, I’ve got something to make them smile alright. Happy pills come in all sorts of shapes and sizes.”

            Mono and Rasher still sat motionless with mouths open catching flies. JP was still smiling like a Cheshire, enjoying their discomfort with every passing moment. He took up his pipe and having stuffed the bowl went to light it. Rasher nearly calved.

            “Jaysus, JP, don’t light up in here. Ya’ll stink the place out. Everyone knows the smell these days. We’ll be shaggin’ nicked before ya can say ‘same again’.”

JP continued his lighting up ritual, blowing toxic nebulae towards the yellowed bar ceiling.

            “Calm down, my man. Don’t panic. It’s only baccy. It’s not really grass.”

Mono was still very uncomfortable. He pushed away the pint that Donleavy had served up in front of each of them.

            “Look JP. We’ve been friends a long time. But I won’t take drink off ya if ya’ve been making money from drugs. There’s been too many young fellas down our estate who’ve shagged themselves up with drugs. I won’t have any part of your ill-gotten blood money. D’ya hear. No shaggin’ part. Ya can stuff your drink. And your bleedin’ cigar. Ya can stuff it where the sun don’t shine and I hope it burns your bleedin’ prostrate on the way up.”

            JP blew out a few more puffs using his moustache as an environmental filter. He took a big swallow from his pint and then licked the cream and nicotine from his ronny.

            “Alright. Alright. Pipe down. It was only a bit of fun. Yes I did make some dosh from drugs. But only indirectly. And nobody got hurt. Well nobody’s health got hurt anyway. I’d say my nephew had a bit of a pain in his arse but ya can’t really count that. In fact it probably did the little gobshite the power of good. Put some manners on him for a change,”

            “JP, ya’re not making sense. Wha’’s all this about your nephew? Wha’ the hell has your nephew to do with any of this?”

            “Drink up there lads and I’ll tell ya. This is a good one, I promise ya.”

            “No JP”, they both answered together. Rasher continued on. “No drink from ya ‘til we know wha’ this is about.”

            “Your drought lads. No skin off my nose. But this is a good one.”

JP drained his glass with his second slug and for more emphasis he took the pint from in front of Rasher and placed it in front of himself.

            “Ya know the wife’s sister’s young fella? The little jumped up shit that works for the pharmaceutical company.”

They both nodded.

            “Well the last time he was over he was really getting on my wick. He loves the smell of his own farts and has his head stuck so far up his own arse that he wouldn’t know daylight if it bit him on the same arse. Always calling himself an executive and keeps telling me and the dragon how he’s back and forward to the States like a trans-Atlantic pilot. To listen to him ya’d think the little pen-pusher ran the whole global organization.”

They both nodded more vigorously.

            “Well when he was in full swing in our kitchen last week he kept going on and on and on about this big visit they were going to have at their company this week. Apparently the organization’s chief bottle washer was going to be over from the U.S. Jaysus, the way he talked about him ya’d think this fella never belched or farted. Ya’d like to see him shaving just to make sure he bled when he cut himself. And of course the nephew was the main mover and shaker. Of course. The bottle washer was coming over to see him and him alone. Corporate Titans together. It took me all me time not to puke in the kitchen sink. It was all laid on so thick you wouldn’t cut it with a chain saw.”

JP went back to his pint, well Rasher’s pint really, and fed his ulcer with another large wincing slug. He needed to take a little rest then to let the belch percolate upwards. He reached for his pipe and then thought better of it and unwrapped the cigar, bit the end off it with great drama, and lit up.

Mono’s impatience exploded.

“JP, wha’ the hell has any of this got to do with anything? I ain’t drinking no pint until ya tell us wha’ the feck is going down here.”

JP took Mono’s pint and lined it up behind the half full glass and beside the empty.

            “Patience. I’m getting there. Now where was I?”

Mono and Rasher whined in exasperation and thirst. JP took a long luxurious drag from the corona.

            “Oh yeah. The nephew. The visit. Well, I’ll tell ya something. I thought it was time he had his comeuppence. And no better buachaill than yours truly to give him a dose. So wha’ did I do?”

JP allowed himself a few more drags from the corona and then cooled his palate with the rest of Rasher’s pint.

            “Well…. Any ideas?”

            “Jaysus JP, get on with it. No. No ideas. Ya chopped off his knees with the chain saw. Ya put a wine cork up his arse to stop him putting his head up. Wha’ the hell did ya do?”

            “Nah. Both good ideas mind ya. Nah. I paid a visit to the bypass.”

Mono and Rasher looked at each other as if this was supposed was to explain everything. They shrugged to each other. Meanwhile, JP began to work on Mono’s pint.

            “Bypass. Bypass. So wha’? So ya wanted to avoid going into town. Big swinging ones. Wha’ the hell are ya whittling on about? Get to the point – we’re getting thirsty here.”

            “Well, my trusted friends – your thirst if of your own making. If ya trusted me like I trust you we’d all be pints in by now.”

            “JP – get on with if for the love of Jaysus.”

            “OK. OK. I went to pay a visit to our good friends in the caravans on the bypass.”

            “The knackers?”

            “Please, Mono, please. We must value diversity in our community. I went to visit some of the members of our traveling community who were temporarily berthed in their caravans on the bypass.”

            “Yeah? And? So?”

            “Still no penny or euro or cent dropping? I’m disappointed in ya. I gave them some interesting information of where they might temporarily relocate themselves and their caravans”

Rasher looked at Mono. Mono looked at Rasher. Whether it was penny or euro or cent – there was a sound of currency dropping.

            “Ya cute hawk.”

JP sucked on the corona and then sucked again on Mono’s pint. He seemed intent on having the three pints drunk before finishing his story.

            “I tell ya men. It was like precision planning. They moved in outside the company on the morning of the visit. I’m just sorry I couldn’t have been there myself. Me main man – Traveller Numero Uno told me the nephew was planking. I’d told them the time of the visit and Numero Uno held out negotiating right ‘til the last minute. Even when they agreed a price per caravan to move, the clown of a nephew arrived down with the company chequebook. I ask ya – where would ya find the likes of it. He had to send a flunky to the bank for cash and the transfer of funds only just about took place in time for the caravans to be moved.”

            The two men looked at each other and then at JP.

            “Ya’re a bastard JP, ya know that, don’t ya?”

            “Yeah.”, JP replied contentedly.

            “So wha’ was in it for you?”

            “Well all good agents get their fifteen percent. Unfortunately our bypass colleagues come from one of the best stables for negotiators. I could only succeed in agreeing ten per cent. As it was I don’t know wha’ the nephew agreed per caravan so I’d be pretty sure they even stiffed me on that. But I don’t care. We’re going to drink for a month and the nephew sweated blood and planked himself. All in all, I’d say it was a good day’s work. Wha’ do ya think?”

It was Mono that replied immediately.

            “I still think ya’re a bastard.”

            “Ya’re probably right. Now, wha’ are you drinking?”

            “Nothing. Ya drank it, ya bastard.”

            “Well faith, so I have. Donleavy, three more pints, hold the cigars.”

            JP took the last glass with only a gulp-full left in it.

            “Ya know lads I want to raise a toast but I’m buggered if I know who to drink to. Should we thank the drug companies for having lots of money, should we thank the nephew for being an arsehole or should we thank Numero Uno for delivering?”

Mono licked his lips waiting for a pint that was well overdue. He knew exactly how this was going to be played.

            “We’ll drink to the Traveller’s friend who’s going to supply us with drink ‘til all his ransom money runs out. And JP – count it out there and leave it with Donleavy – cause if one red cent of it goes anywhere else then ya’ll feel the fire of the dragon. And now – me and Rasher will have whiskey chasers. We’ve waited bleedin’ long enough.”

Whiskey was called for.

          “Oh”, said JP as if he’d nearly forgotten, “and I send a gift card to Peter Casey explaining everything and thanking him for keeping these types of opportunities in the front part of me brain.”

           “Nice one.”          

           “I’m sure he’ll add you to his Christmas card list.”