Ruby's Pearls Elecmag 14/RUBYV14.ZIP/RUBY14-2

Text File | 1992-10-25 | 9KB | 146 lines

    Copyright 1992(c)
                              THE EVICTION
                           By Sylvia Cuolahan

         This is a story of innocence betrayed, fatal  knowledge, and
    human triumph.
         We open on a huge garden where fruit, vegetables, animals,
    just about everything grows in a riot of fecundity. Joe Adams and
    his girlfriend, Evelyn Temp-Tress live in a cottage owned by
    their landlord, Mr Al Mighty. Mr Al Mighty has a very busy life
    as mayor, sheriff, chief prosecutor, civil and criminal court
    judge.
         Joe and Evelyn met at the town bar-b-que where they found
    themselves gnawing on the same rib.
         "Evelyn, I think we should live together. I'm lonesome and
    Al Mighty says that the cottage looks awful," Joe grinned. "I'm
    such a slob."
         Evelyn turned her baby blues on him and just smiled, licking
    the sauce from her pouty lips. "I'll clean up your house. I kinda
    like the place and, anyway, where are you gonna find cheap rent
    like this  now-a-days?"
         He showed her around the cottage and the garden. Lions and
    lambs frolicked together; dinosaurs and horses, raced each other
    around a field nearby.
         "There's just one thing," he said, and pointed to a tree at
    the far end of the garden. "Don't go near that tree, and don't
    touch the fruit."
         "Why hasn't anyone picked the fruit? It looks delicious. I
    could make one hell of a chutney out of the green fruit, and the
    ripe fruit would be nice with cheese after meals," Evelyn opined.
         "Golly no!" Joe Adams looked around in terror. "Don't even
    think such a thing. The landlord would throw us out. He sends the
    fruit commando around. He can tell if any is missing."
         Evelyn finally met the landlord. He drove up with one of his
    assistants, Gabe. When Gabe wasn't trying to sort out Mr Al
    Mighty's many problems, he played horn at night in a band. Al
    Mighty needed a shave, looked like he hadn't bathed in a couple
    of centuries, smelled like an old plant, and every time he opened
    his mouth, he shouted. The man must be deaf as a haddock, Evelyn
    thought.
         "Mr Mighty," she yelled, cupping her hands to make him hear,
    "why can't we eat the fruit from that tree?"
         "Because I said so," he roared. "It's the Tree of Knowledge;
    you don't need it anyway. No one eats from it but me." He turned
    to Joe, "What's the matter with that woman? Why is she shouting?
    Is she deaf?"
         Joe smiled, rubbing his hands together nervously as Mighty
    bellowed on. "Bloody people are a nuisance; some day I'm going to
    flood the lot of you and start all over. By the way, there's a Mr
    Rep Tyle coming to stay in the tree-house."
         With that, he banged the door shut and fumed darkly about
    the ungrateful people that inhabited his realm.
         Rep Tyle's taste ran to snake skin coats and shoes. Around
    his neck was an enormous gold chain from which hung a golden rat
    astride a calf. On his rather flat head, he wore a coarse
    baku-straw fedora, which he tipped rakishly to Evelyn as she
    passed by. A spicy haze of smoke from his Paul Garmirian
    Belicosos cigars hung in the air everywhere he went. His voice
    had a breathy quality. When he spoke, he licked his lips,
    mesmerizing Evelyn by the movement of his strange looking tongue,
    in and out. She found him fascinating as she watched him install
    a wine cellar in the tree house.
         The days passed, golden with perpetual summer, the air
    redolent of rare blooming flowers. Joe and Evelyn tended the
    garden and the animals contentedly; everything under their care
    throve. One day while Joe and Evelyn were at the pool, Rep
    sauntered over. He removed a fresh cigar from his breast pocket
    and looked down at Evelyn. Joe waved him aside, Rep was standing
    in his sun. Joe liked an even tan.
         "Sure is hot," Evelyn stretched and smoothed more suntan oil
    on her pretty little body.
         "Hey! Cut that out! You're gunking up the towel with that
    smelly oil,"  grumbled Joe.
         Evelyn made a rude face at him and turned back to Rep.
    "What's wrong with eating that fruit over there?" she asked.
         Rep's eyes glittered, "Why nothing, actually it'ssss...
    deliciousss... and quite nutriciousss." His hooded eyes never
    closed. They fixed on her intently.
         "Shut up Evelyn, we'll get into trouble." Joe looked up as
    Evelyn and Rep strolled over to the tree. "Don't go over there,
    you know how upset Mighty will be if he finds out." She ignored
    him. Joe put his hand up to shade his eyes. "What are they
    doing?" he asked aloud of no one.
         Evelyn turned around, she had a half eaten piece of fruit in
    her hand and juice running down her face. Joe scrambled to his
    feet. "Oh gosh Evelyn, now you've done it."
         He started to say something else but she shoved a piece in
    his mouth. It was succulent, ambrosial. The taste was unlike
    anything this garden of delights had offered him. Joe looked at
    her. His eyes reflected joy, bewilderment, disbelief. He felt a
    torrent of conflicting emotions that sent him reeling out of
    control. The all-encompassing knowledge stunned him, rendering
    him momentarily mute. He wanted to run and hide; there was
    nowhere to go.
         "Actually we didn't pick it," hissed Rep softly, "it
    wasss... lying there."
         A screeching of wheels announced the arrival of the
    landlord. "I bloody knew it," Al Mighty shrieked, charging down
    the path to the cottage, arms waving hysterically. The veins
    stood out on his neck, his eyes bulged. "Now I'll have to produce
    famine, floods, pestilence. I haven't even had a chance to create
    locusts yet. The municipal budget isn't ready for this. It takes
    money to produce a real calamity." He was spitting with rage.
    "Get your clothes and get out! Never come back!" He was
    apoplectic.
         Sounds of struggle could be heard in the yard, where two
    lions were fighting over a bloodied lamb's body. In the field, a
    Tyrannosaurus Rex attacked a colt, tossing it in the air as the
    mare looked on helplessly.
         Joe sniveled, Rep slithered up the tree. Evelyn turned on
    Mighty and waggled her finger in his astonished face.
         "We ate your lousy fruit. I enjoyed it." She spun around.
    "I've had enough of you Joe, You're a spineless idiot. And you,"
    she pointed her thumb at the scowling Mighty, "I think your rules
    are silly." She disappeared into the house.
         Joe looked after her, she was so brave; she was gorgeous.
    Why hadn't he seen it before? He followed her to the door of the
    cottage and stood there while she threw some clothes into a
    suitcase. They met Al Mighty at the gate on the way out.
         Joe looked back at the garden just once.
         Evelyn looked Al Mighty in the eye, then, straight ahead.
                                   ***
         Her first two children were brothers whose sibling rivalries
    split the family. One brother murdered the other, shredding her
    mother's heart.
         After years in the field, their backs nearly broken with
    grinding labor, hands raw from the plow, they sat in front of
    their fire of the evening and occasionally spoke of the garden.
         Rep Tyle founded a family owned and operated pest control
    company. His dedicated descendants are still running the
    business. They have been vilified over the years, but most give
    them grudging respect for their efficient work.
         Evelyn died at a great age with the knowledge that she
    founded in her loins a dynasty.
         Al Mighty, given to biliousness, rages and pouts,
    distinguished himself in succeeding years by producing floods,
    disease, destruction of cities, famine and pestilence. One of his
    most notable achievements however, was the deliverance of his own
    chosen people from bondage. He had one son; the last of his line.
    This son, a brilliant orator, went about the countryside
    preaching love, compassion and tolerance. He so alarmed the
    populace and the local rulers, that he was betrayed by one of his
    followers, tortured, tried and executed by the Romans for
    sedition.
                                   END