SERIALIZATION OF “the Zany Time Travels of Warble McGorkle” – Chapter 33 of 61
Poetry and Kidnapping Don’t Mix, and Warble Considers It a Good Day to Dye
CHAPTER 33
Poetry and Kidnapping Don’t Mix, and Warble Considers It a Good Day to Dye
At the end of Ms. Trieste-Trench's monotonic reading of 'The Documents,' her three victims are ready to surrender: Tony Perez is laying on his back with his hands covering his face, moaning; Orlando Cepeda is sitting down, bent forward at the waist, looking at his shoes and weeping inconsolably; radiating away from Don Mattingly (who is curled up in the fetal position) in a random haphazard pattern are tufts of hair—his own, which he has yanked out as a result of the extreme frustration he felt while enduring the seemingly never-ending diatribe. His right arm begins to involuntarily jerk spasmodically upward and then back down against his side, in a manner eerily reminiscent of Joe Morgan waiting for a pitch (before the days of preemptive strikes, that is). Up, down. Up, down etc. etc. ad nauseum ad infinitum.
"What next, boss?" Marianne asks Warble, exhausted after her three hour stint of reading 'The Documents' to her captive audience (Warble also added the three-page, small print legal disclaimer he had had to sign when renting the storage unit, getting Marianne to read it between the Constitution and the Gettysburg Address).
"Bean ice," Warble icily and resolutely responds.
"What do you mean? I have been nice. I am being nice," Marianne insists.
"No--bean ice—give them some bean ice. That'll fix 'em," Warble explains.
"Oh! Bean Ice--What flavor?" Ms. Trieste-Trench asks.
"I don't know--which do you think they would prefer: coffee, cocoa, or vanilla?"
“Beats the living daylights out of me—I'll ask 'em,” Marianne offers. “Say, fellas,” she says, bending down to get a good look at the three baseball players. “It's feeding time.
Which flavor will you have today: Coffee, Cocoa, or Vanilla?”
"Coffee, Cocoa, or Vanilla what?" the three ask in unison.
Warble claps his hands over his ears. “Those infernal midgets are going to drive me to distraction with that diabolical din. They sound like Alvin and the Chipmunks when they do that,” he complains, walking to the far end of the storage unit. “Their malevolent and Machiavellian leader Alvin alone is bad enough, but the whole pathetic passel of 'em, I just can't bear it.”
Marianne ignores Warble (she's catching on). She answers the captives' joint question. "Ice--ice, whaddayathink?"
"Ice?" the three ask--again, uncannily, in unison.
Warble can't take it anymore. He rushes up to them to explain. "YES, ICE!! You know the old Rodgers and Hammerstein show tune: 'You scream, I scream, we all scream for ICE!'"
"Oh, you mean ice cream," Orlando says, realizing as he says it that he could stand a little something to eat.
Warble sighs contentedly, grateful the trio didn't answer in unison this time. “Of course. But as Tina Turner said, 'What's cream got to do with it?' If it was cream, it would be viscous and you would either drink it or feed it to your cat. Like the Eye-talians, who are too busy smoking cigarettes and making whoopee to mince words, we just call it "Ice" around here."
“What? None of us smoke, Warble,” Jacques objects (remember, he's the fitness trainer and wouldn't stand for such tomfoolery).
“I guess you're right, Jacques,” Warble agrees, grabbing his chin between thumb and forefinger. “But haven't you ever heard of poetic license?”
“Poetry and kidnapping don't mix, Warble,” Jacques counters, logically.
“Says who, LaRue? What you so crudely refer to as “kidnapping” is all for a good cause— to save humanity from the dastardly clutches of these slack-jawed miscreants who would sap the very strength from their fellow consumers and Americans if left to their own dark and dirty devices.
“And besides, I did bring along some whoopee cushions, just in case things get dull and we need something to do--so don't try to tell me we don't imitate the Eye-talians at least in that respect.”
“Don't you dare sabotage my seat with one of those, Warble,” Mary warns, “or I'll whup your cushion good!”
Chastened, and for once speechless—and, to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth, more than just a little bit intimidated--Warble retreats again into the corner of the aluminum shed.
A short time later Warble tries to save face by bringing up an “interesting” anecdote from history that he thinks will impress everybody, and sort of goes along with the previous conversation, too:
“One of the great eras, or epochs, of mankind was the Eye-talian Sauce Age, which was preceded by Adolescence and followed by the Ice Age. The Eye-talians were so irate that the Ice Age was not named the "Eye-talian Ice Age" that they blew up Mt. Vesuvius in an insane and suicidal act of unparalleled depravity, desperation, and downright terrorism du jour.”
Everyone (captives, accomplices, even the canine) looks at Warble, just to let him know they heard what he said, but don't care beans about it, with faces as straight and deadpan as is humanly (and doggedly) possible. Warble feels as if he's been slapped, and retreats again to the far corner of the storage unit, where he sits on his haunches a spell, sulking.
Warble is not one to be kept down for long, though. An idea soon comes to him, and he leaps up, just barely missing hitting his head on the (admittedly low) ceiling.
"Today is a good day to dye!" Warble proclaims.
“What? Why?” Ward wonders, thinking Warble has lost what's left of his marbles.
“Because our helpless captives will be humiliated by it, of course, Robespierre. One should always humiliate one's captives—otherwise they might think you're soft and thereby lose respect for you – or even develop Uppsala Syndrome. We have to make an example of them, make it so nobody else wants to fall into our clutches.”
“Clutches?” Albert perks up. “If we have clutches (Side note: Albert does not think of the mechanical type of clutch, because the Arodnap has an automatic transmission), that means we have eggs. We can turn that Ice Cream into Frozen Custard, and even make up some Orange Julius, provided we can scrounge up some orange juice somewhere.” He starts looking around the storage unit, although there's nothing in it besides what his fellow travelers and he have brought in.
“Orange Jews? You mean Protestant Jews?” Warble asks. “I've never heard of such a thing. Go take a nap, Albert, you're obviously overwrought and distraught... Now, back to the business at hand: We will forthwith commence to torturing our captives.”
“Torture, Warble?” Mary asks, alarmed. “Isn't that against the Geneva Convention?”
“Maybe so, Mary, but we're not in Geneva anymore. We're in—where are we? Oh, yeah, Philly. When in Philly, do as the fillies do, I always say. So don't worry your pretty little head about a little teeny weeny bit of torture here or there, Mary. It's really for their own good, in the long run, you know.”
Soundtrack note: If I didn't hate the song with a purple passion, I'd call for “Philadelphia Freedom” by Elton John here. So how about “Freedom” by Jimi Hendrix?
“Just what type of torture do you have in mind, Warble?” Jacques asks.
A diabolical grin spreads across Warble's face. “We will dye their hair in shades and patterns not even Dennis Rodman would concoct in his wildest dreams,” Warble answers, cackling maniacally. “Yes, today IS a good day to DYE!!!” he exults.
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Blackbird Crow Raven’s “the Zany Time Travels of Warble McGorkle” is being serialized in this space each Sunday and Thursday; it is also available in its entirety from here.
You can listen to the recording of this excerpt, by the author’s alter ego, here: