Click on image to enlarge.

	Regular				Club
You Pay:	$6.25				$5.31

eBook Category: Fantasy/Humor
eBook Description: The Lucky Nickel Saloon, Second Ave, Laramie, Wyoming Territory, U-S-of-A has been invaded by dadgum Martians! Only these dadgum Martians don't look like your regular Martians. No sir, they look like Earth chickens. Only these chickens have lips. And as everbody knows, chickens with lips lisp. Or is that Sheriff Ben Dover I'm thinking of? Never mind. Unlessen we want to be Tooken Over, us regulars got ourselves a saloon to save!

eBook Publisher: Fictionwise.com, Published: Yard Dog Press, 2006
Fictionwise Release Date: April 2007

13 Reader Ratings:

Great	Good	OK	Poor

Available eBook Formats [MultiFormat - What's this?]: eReader (PDB) [223 KB] , ePub (EPUB) [245 KB] , Rocket/REB1100 (RB) [188 KB] , Adobe Acrobat (PDF) [665 KB] , Palm Doc (PDB) [212 KB] , Microsoft Reader (LIT) [205 KB] , Franklin eBookMan (FUB) [250 KB] , hiebook (KML) [483 KB] , Sony Reader (LRF) [280 KB] , iSilo (PDB) [175 KB] , Mobipocket (PRC) [219 KB] , Kindle Compatible (MOBI) [269 KB] , OEBFF Format (IMP) [307 KB]
Words: 60947
Reading time: 174-243 min.
Microsoft Reader (LIT) Format: Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud ENABLED
Adobe Acrobat (PDF) Format:  Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud DISABLED
All Other formats: Printing DISABLED, Read-aloud DISABLED

"...there just isn't anyone doing what Ken Rand does, much less doing it better."--Selina Rosen, author of Strange Robby

Mick pushed the whiskey bottle across the bar to me and sobbed like a wee tad in mid pout. Mick grunts, mostly, when he talks at all, which ain't often, being of a taciturn nature and Irish. But sob? I cottoned he wanted to tell me something of a dire nature and was having his usual difficult time spitting it out past his brick-red beard.

"What?" I requested elaboration. I gripped the bottle of whiskey I'd bought in both my hands as if I expected Mick to ask me to give it back, still pretty full, imaginize such a thing. But I'd IOU'd it fair and square. Mick had so noted with a pencil stub in his itty-bitty notebook that he kept in his apron for such notes. He'd dropped the IOU in a ceegar box which he kept under his bar for his strongbox with all the other IOUs, and maybe a few coins or two but I didn't hear any rattle therein when he hefted it.

I clutched bottle and offered "What?" as his behavior was most peculiar alarming. What else ought I to do?

Banky, waiting for me to fetch up said bottle, heard us and looked up from his seat at our regular matchstick-stakes poker-playing and whiskey-drinking table across the sawdust floor. His gun hand went twitchy near his ever-ready Colt as his gun hand is wont to do when strangeness looms in our favorite haunt.

The Lucky Nickel Saloon, Second Ave, Laramie, Wyoming Territory, U-S of A, was quiet as only Banky and I were present, and Mick. Charlie was off on his temporary day job guarding the henhouse back of Miss Dolly Dubois' Residence for Refined Ladies, thus we didn't hear him snoring nor passing wind from his usual place under the piano. Other fellow-regular Casper was also not among us for unknown reasons and Jack Thatcher hadn't arrived yet, but he's usually late anyways.

Mick didn't say diddly. From his place behint the bar, he buffed a shotglass with a snotrag. He gandered at me from under brick-colored caterpillar eyebrows that matched his scattery thatch of hair that matched his briarpatch beard of similar coloration with such a doleful look you'd think somebody had stole his jackknife. His jaw muscle quivered like he had a mouth full of chaw. He didn't chew.

"What?" I repeated, only louder, as Mick was dang near deef, and added what I thought to be an eloquent shrug to illustrate my meaning. Mick could hear a little now and then, as when Banky touched off a shot or when a drunk cowboy insulted his affianced, or when a paying customer parted the batwing doors, coin purse a jingle. He could hear the diff twixt spur-jingle and coin-jingle right clear.

Beyond the batwing doors, down dusty Second Ave, a wagon rattled past, a dog barked, a steam whistle tooted, and somebody carpentered nearby with a hammer, a woodenish tappity-tap-tap. I reckon the carpentry had something to do with the Swenson's Family Circus, Zoo, Hippodrome & Extravaganza! setting up for a show, upcoming two days hence, of a Saturday eve. Typical June day, a Thursday, it was, clear sky and not too hot. The onliest thing hearable inside the saloon was me saying "What?" and Mick buffing that glass till it squeaked--scritch-scritch-scritch.

Mick could read lips some, and I'd spoken as clear as tequila, but he stayed mum and buffed glass till it shone like a diamond and the rag started smoking. Then he sighed. It sounded like a cold wind off boot hill, that sigh.

"What, what?" Banky joined in. Our conversation had startled the twitchy-fingered gunslinger and he had moved lickity-split from table to barside.

"The IOUs," Mick indicated.

"I repeat," I repeated--

"What?" Banky reinforced.

"Got to stop."

"What?" me and Banky gasped. If I'd had chaw, I'd of swallowed it for certain sure.

I turned to Banky standing at my elbow. "Did you hear--" I wondered at the same time he queried "Did he just say--"

Having what ordinary folk would call a conversation with Mick was out of the question, but us regulars--I'm Tom Dooley, by the way, at your service, and I might as well introduce myself as nobody else in this here narrative is going to since I'm the one doing all the narrating--were used to his taciturnity and we'd long ago figured out how to coax from him the required or desired information. It took patience, is what it took.

But what we got, when we finally got it, as Mick might have so voiced it if he'd been inclined to slap more than three words together in the same week, might have sounded something like this:

"Gentlemen, I've been persuaded that accepting IOUs instead of cash remuneration for services rendered in this establishment is contrary to sensible business practice. Thus I take this opportunity to inform you regulars--for it is from none else that I accept said IOUs--that you must henceforth and evermore compensate all services rendered in cash, paid immediately. To be more specific, credit will no longer be extended."

Or somesuch prattle.

"Whyfor?" me and Banky pondered, worry lines etched across our collective furrowed brows.

Us regulars--which is me and Banky and Charlie and Casper and Jack Thatcher--we-all had been getting credit at the Lucky Nickel since we became us regulars, way back when, back when Mick's bar consisted of a patched and tattered and dirty canvas tarp shading an outhouse door laid over two pickle barrels and his liquor got fetched out of a bucket with a tin cup, one flavor, what he called Mick's Pretty Damm Good Irish Likkir. We doted on the Lucky Nickel's tranquil ambiance, amiable propriatorship, fine service, pretty good lunch fair when available, level floors, not-too-watered-down whiskey, semi-clean outhouse, and credit. Hence we come often--oftener than other folk as it happened that whole weeks passed now and then when we was the onliest patrons to part batwing doors and bend elbows within.

Times were bad back then. Then they got good and by and by the Lucky Nickel acquired a mostly-unleaky roof, walls made of mostly-straight wood slats, a batwing door, a dozen or fifteen cuspidors, a potbelly stove, a piano but it don't work mostly, a few chairs and tables, and a real bar, with a brass rail at the foot thereof.

Then times got bad again, which brings us to the present, story-wise.

It's just bad luck and evil times that prevent us-all from getting regular employment and thus paying for our accustomed recreation with coin immediate. Hence the IOUs, which we paid back, mostly, when and if we ever got employ. Times are hard Out West in this the Year of Our Lord Eighteen Hundred and Ninety-Nine, which is why we-all took out an extra IOU the day afore to celebrate the continued good fortune of our fellow-regular Charlie, who was temporarily employed guarding the whorehouse henhouse, as told. Drinks to Charlie, and we did so every day for the past almost a whole week of his continued employ, and of course it was on IOUs rather than cash. I mean, if we was working in order to earn cash to pay for our liquor, how would we afford the time to drink same?

I thought Mick cottoned that, or maybe he extended us IOUhood because maybe he too was once a lush before he got religion and a business license. Or maybe he just liked us, who knew? Leastwise, none of us ever was so smartass and contrary as to affront his noble hospitality by refusing to conduct commerce with IOUs. T'wouldn't be neighborly.

We was regulars, we was, and there's something brotherly to being regular and all, something about loyalty and comradeship and country tis of thee and all such palaver that defines the Old West and Americanism and the Fourth of July and apple pie and state's rights and all such like, if you get my drift.

Asides, we couldn't get credit nowheres else.

Snotrag buffed shotglass, scritch-scritch-scritch.

"Whyfor?"

Banky drew his Colt reflexively but didn't shoot nor drop it as he recovered and reholstered. Nothing to shoot at. Just reflex is all. He sat on his gunhand, frowning.

We knew whyfor, me and Banky.

"Miss Emma," Mick solemnly affirmed our silent frowny-bear suspicionizing. Scritchscritchscritch.

Mick was affianced to Miss Emma Drummond, who resided at Miss Dolly Dubois' Residence For Refined Ladies, already mentioned, two blocks down Second Ave, turn a right at Grant, the big two-story white house with the flowered hedge out front and the red light, a half a block toward the stockyards, where she practiced the entertainment trade with her fellow gals. Miss Emma had been agitating for a nuptial date since she and Mick became affianced a few months back, but she was getting more and more agitating of late, near as impatient as Banky in her nature, and just as armed, though her choice of weapon was rolling pin.

Mick said his beloved had insisted he inform us regulars right off, which meant this very a.m., of the new credit policy. The fact that only Banky and me was present to so inform now caused him a degree of consternation as required vigorous shotglass buffing to reinforce his ponderage. He decided, finally, that if he told us two now, he could discharge his telling duty and we two could relay the dire news to our fellow regulars bettern he could.

The demand for an end to credit for us regulars, he related with the tones one usually hears in a funeral for a favorite dog, coincided with an ultimatum for immediate marriage.

Immediate, that is, marriage.

In the silence that ensued with this last news, you could have heard a cockroach fart.

"When?" I enquired at last, my voice as squeaky as batwing doors.

"Starting tomorrow," Mick declared, pet-funeral-toned.

"I didn't mean 'When do we start having to pay in cash?'" I exasperated. "I meant--"

"When's this wedding set for?" Banky finished, as he is of the impatient sort, as told.

"Sunday." Scritchitchitch.

Day after the circus was to show.

I rolled up a butt and lit it on the flame emerging from Mick's overworked snotrag. Mick tossed the frazzled rag remnant in a water bucket where it smoked and sizzled and he snatched up another rag and started buffing the same shot glass.

Today was Thursday.

Banky counted fingers. "Three days."

Mick nodded. The shotglass bust as it'd been shined clear through and glass shards flew thither and yon tinkling onto the bar top.

Banky took out his Colt and began oiling it, third time this a.m., stony-faced. Mick got an itty-bitty dust broom and began sweeping up glass shards offen the bar, stony-faced. I pondered some too.

Mick was in love and us regulars knew such an affliction was not easily dissuaded. We'd seen ex-fellow regular Tom Murphy fall in love with a mermaid he'd caught on the Platte and marry her and run away with the circus to which she belonged, where he now serves as strongman. The Swenson's Family Circus, Zoo, Hippodrome & Extravaganza! stopped by for a show now and then, and Tom'd drop in for a quick toot, and we expected to see him drop by later today or early tomorrow when the circus arrived again, but he wasn't a regular no more. It broke our collective hearts, but who were we to tell Tom Murphy so? He'd given up regularship for his spousal duties and he had to travel a lot.

And fishing. He was the best of us that ever drowned a worm, but his beloved was related to fish on her mother's side, so he give up fishing too. That much in love.

As was Mick, as far as we could tell. But he was conflicted, we could also tell. He liked us regulars, I reckon, but his affianced liked us regulars a bit less than she liked ticks and deadbeats, and I think, deep in her cold heart, she didn't take to the saloon trade neither. Kept hinting to Mick as how she'd like to open a millinery shop, sell hats and ribbons and such folderol.

A tea-tottler, Miss Emma was, mostly, but, as far as I knew, not a temperance fool, yet, anyways. Still, she could make life miserable for us regulars, and Mick too, I reckon, though it's hard to tell what Mick thinks as he says little and if he smiles or frowns or expresses anything, a body cannot see under his briarpatch beard to discern his true disposition.

So we tried to help Mick by conspiring to postpone or even scuttle the marriage boat. We'd done so a time or three since Valentine's Day, but we were having to get more and more creative as Miss Emma was a most worthy adversary. She was as steadfast in her determination to wed as a hound digging up a bone in the back yard. Here she was again, making life for us regulars untranquil. As if forcing Mick to close every Sunday a.m. to accompany Miss Emma to church wasn't bad enough. We regulars knew he didn't want to do it, but he was that much in love, as told.

Now, we had us three days to figure how to conjure up another wedding postponement. Not to mention doing something about this new cash-only policy foolishness which started tomorrow.

Mick swept glass shards, frowning, thinking. Banky oiled pistol, frowning, thinking. I did some frowny thinking too, such as to give myself a migraine.

Thus we didn't hear Casper part the batwing doors and step inside afore he uttered, "Dudes! Is this, like, the Lucky Nickel Saloon, Second Ave, Laramie, Wyoming Territory, U-S of A?"

We-all looked Casperward. There was a chicken on his head.