The Tenth Caller

By Michael Bronte

He’d been up there with the biggest of them, shock-jock extraordinaire, on the biggest stations, in syndication in every major market in the country. It had been quite the fall, all right, his last gig ending when the station manager didn’t accept the fact that jail time was a valid excuse for not showing up for work. With good behavior, he was out in two years, but he’d become a media scum at that point, blackballed and forgotten, doomed to doing the graveyard shift on godforsaken AM at a 5,000-watt piss-ant station in Andersonville, Indiana, home to a million cold crows, where the highest rated program was the tornado report.
Andersonville, Indiana—not exactly the center of the radio broadcast universe, but at night and under the right atmospheric conditions, the “mega-signal of the Midwest” can be heard for a thousand miles, and in the wee hours between midnight and six a.m., the lonely, the depressed, and the depraved gather on the broadcast doorstep of Gulliver McKnight to confide in his wisdom. Some call it a cult following. Others call it a radio freak parade. At 3:16 a.m. on November 8th, Gulliver takes the tenth call, but the caller isn’t interested in the chicken dinner Gulliver is giving away. He’s into murder.
There hasn’t been a murder in Andersonville in twenty years, and now there are two in as many months. After some investigation, it’s discovered that the killings are but the most recent in a string that goes back decades, and it’s Julie Hernandez’s job (Julie’s a he, not a she) and Sam Olsen’s job (Sam’s a she, not a he) to stop this serial killer who’s found that calling in to Gulliver’s show is an interesting new way to get his jollies. The killer calls repeatedly, he’s always the tenth call, and he knows Gulliver from way back. The question becomes: who is he, and how is he always the tenth call? Oh, he’s into riddles too.
Ultimately The Tenth Caller is a story of inner conviction, or stubbornness, depending on one’s point of view, with enough insight thrown in so that it could be interpreted as persistence. Good thing for Julie, for the last intended victim turns out to be his own fiancée.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Michael Bronte
• Release date: Aug 31, 2015
• ISBN: 9781311540409

Michael Bronte

Michael Bronte is a graduate of Union College in Schenectady, New York, and George Washington University in Washington, D.C., and lives with his wife of 38 years in New Jersey. "All of the heroes in my novels are everyday people," says Bronte. "Any of them could by your next door neighbor. None of us really know what we're capable of until the time comes for us to reach beyond the boundaries of our everyday lives. Remarkable feats of courage are performed everyday, by everyday people. It's amazing."​ As a young teenager I remember reading paperback mysteries under a huge oak tree outside my parents’ neighborhood grocery store in Dalton, Massachusetts, a small town located in the heart of the Berkshires. I can recall pulling a book from the rack and getting locked in to those novels as the fragrant summer breeze of Berkshire County tried to turn the page before I was done reading it. I don’t know why, but I was greatly affected by a book titled The Fan Club, by Irving Wallace. When I was done reading it, I can still recall thinking that someday I’d be able to write a book like that on my own; I knew I could do it.Well, the idea stayed dormant for over thirty years while I did what I thought I should have been doing for a living (looking back, it all seems so trivial sometimes) until I rekindled my infatuation with writing novels. Now, many years after that, and many mistakes and many failures later, there are several Michael Bronte novels available for those of you who like mystery, suspense, action-oriented stories with true-to-life characters.

Book preview

The Tenth Caller

by

Michael Bronte

Copyright ©: Michael Bronte

All Rights Reserved

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

To Stacia, who helped immensely.

Table of Contents

Thursday, November 8th… 3:16 a.m.

Saturday, November 10th … 5:02 p.m.

Monday, November 12th … 10:22 a.m.

Monday, November 19th … 11:29 p.m.

Tuesday, November 20th … 2:31 a.m.

Thursday, December 6th … 3:07 a.m.

Friday, December 7th … 7:31 a.m.

Monday, December 10th … 11:48 p.m.

Tuesday, December 11th, 4:50 a.m.

Friday, December 14th … 9:02 p.m.

Sunday, December 16th… 4:06 p.m.

Monday, December 17th… 8:11 a.m.

Tuesday, December 18th … 7:54 a.m.

Saturday, December 22nd … 2:27 p.m.

Wednesday, December 26th … 8:08 a.m.

Thursday, January 3rd ... 4:27 p.m.

Friday, January 4th… 11:46 p.m.

Monday, January 7th ... 7:16 a.m.

Tuesday, January 8th … 9:40 a.m.

Wednesday, January 9th ... 11:12 a.m.

Thursday, January 10th …7:22 a.m.

Monday, January 14th…10:00 a.m.

Tuesday, January 15th …9:13 a.m.

Wednesday, January 16th … 12:17 a.m.

Friday, January 18th …9:18 a.m. Pacific Time.

Saturday, January 19th…4:03 a.m. Central Time.

Sunday, January 20th... 12:12 a.m.

Thursday, November 8th… 3:16 a.m. Three hours to go until blessed relief. Shivering, Gulliver poured another splash of vodka into his orange juice and pushed a button on the console in front of him. Are we ever gonna get any heat in this place, or what?

In the control room, Manny leaned into his microphone. Hey, I’m an engineer, not a heating repair man. It’s winter. Bring a sweater. He clicked off and held a spread hand up to the glass. And five, and four, and three, two....

Welcome back, angels of the night, wherever you are. This is Gulliver McKnight, your midnight cowboy, beaming out to the universe from central Indiana. That was the Moody Blues, cruising into your consciousness, or your unconsciousness perhaps, but either way me and Manny are here for ya’ angels, just like always, tryin’ to make sense of it all. Comin’ up is some James Gang and then a little something for you Hendrix freaks out there, but right now we have to pay some bills so we can afford to get some heat into this dump. He pushed the mike away and saw Manny scrambling behind the glass. Hey Manny, takin’ five.

You ever hear of something called a play list, for Christ’s sake?

Fuck the play list Manny. Just do some spots. I need a cigarette. Manny gave him the finger. Gulliver grabbed his orange juice and smiled back. Like him, Manny would rather have been someplace else, but also like him, Manny was on the downslope of life. Like it or not, this was it until something better came along, but there was a distinct possibility that would never happen. Gulliver fished his last Parliament from the box and stepped out the back door of WXKO, AM Classic Rock, where the smell of stale cigarettes lingered in the air despite the never-ending wind that whipped across the cornfields of Butt-fuck, Indiana, more commonly known as Andersonville. It was home to the mega-signal of the Midwest—right— and a million cold crows. He took three quick drags on the cigarette and crushed it out next to countless others that already littered the filthy ashtray there. He scooted back inside before he froze to death.

Manny was giving him a dirty look through the dirty glass of the tiny studio, but he paid Manny no mind. Like he gave a fuck about Manny and his problems. He had problems of his own, primary among them being the fact that his former wife, his former agent, and his former employer were all suing him for some version of breach of contract, and none of the three would be the least bit hesitant of making a trophy of his testicles in lieu of the money they wouldn’t get. He wasn’t broke, he was worse than broke, and the chances of becoming un-broke anytime in the near future didn’t look dim, they looked so far less than dim that a bat couldn’t find its way out of that hole.

It had been quite the fall. He’d been up there, with Imus, with Howard Stern, with the Greaseman, in syndication, in every major market in the country, at $250K per. Before that he’d been Slammin’ Sammy, shock jock extraordinaire on WCHI in Chicago. He’d done morning drive with Donny Simpson on WKYS in D.C., and he’d been the velvety Johnny Black, doing the set-up gig before Frankie Crocker on WBLS in New York. But that was years ago, before he’d been fired—not that getting fired was any big deal; he’d been fired before, but it had always been because some tight-asses clenched their sphincters over something he’d said on the air. It went with the territory. The last time was different. The last time, his boss didn’t accept the notion that jail time was a valid excuse for not showing up for work. With good behavior, he was out in two years, but he was media shit at that point, blackballed and forgotten, doomed to doing voiceovers for car dealerships. Now, he was doing the graveyard shift on godforsaken AM at a 5,000-watt piss-ant station where the highest rated program was the tornado report. The only saving grace was that he had a following—as he called it. Others called it a cult. At night and under the right conditions, the AM signal could be heard a thousand miles away, and in the wee hours of the morning, the lonely, the depressed, and the depraved gathered on his broadcast doorstep to confide in his wisdom. His real name was Gordon Powers, and he was happy that he’d already paid his light bill this month.

Manny’s voice came through the studio speakers. Ten seconds, Tarzan. I gotta take a piss.

Fine. Gimme something where I can take some calls.

And five, and four, and three, two....

Back to ya’ babies.... Babies had no teeth, like the rednecks who were listening, Gulliver thought to himself. Like signals from the infinite universes of space, we are but pulses of plasma in the stream of humankind.... Manny smacked the glass and held up a CD as he pointed to his crotch. And for the lucky plasma-ass who can tell me when this song was first recorded, we’ll give away a complete dinner for four at Chucky’s Chicken Barn. This version was recorded by Neil Young. I’ll take the tenth caller. He glanced at the glass as Manny rushed toward the door. That long enough for ya’ Manny? You can take a leak and spank your monkey by the time we find ten hayseeds who can remember their own phone number. Manny gave him the finger again as he bolted down the hall.

Neil Young’s high wail flooded the studio speakers as grating guitars screamed out what could have been a melody in a mellower version. As it was, the notes served to bring the voice, soaring off on its own flight, back toward harmony. Gulliver reached into the backpack lying next to his feet and pulled out the pint of Smirnoff he brought with him every night. This night it was almost empty, and he was only halfway through his shift. The first light on the console started blinking.

WXKO. This is Gulliver.

Is that really you? It was a woman. The voice was slurred and raspy, and sounded distinctly southern.

It’s me. Where you calling from?

Tuscaloosa. Your signal’s bouncin’ off the planets, baby; comin’ in loud and clear.

What are you doin’ up this time of night?

Just smokin’ a little weed and lis’nen to you.

A joint sounded good right about now. How many cigarettes you smoked tonight?

I dunno. Maybe a pack. Why you askin’?

You got a man?

Yeah.

Where is he?

Right here next to me, passed out.

Is he naked?

He was.

Are you naked?

I was. Ain’t now.

If you win, how you gonna collect your prize from way down in Tuscaloosa?

I expect you to come down here and bring me my chicken. Am I the tenth caller?

The second light started blinking on the phone console. Sorry baby. You’re the first.

I haven’t been the first in a long damn time.

I know what you mean.

Can I answer the question?

Sorry baby. Gotta go. Don’t do anything stupid.

I love you, Gulliver.

I love you too, baby. He punched down on the second blinking button. This is Gulliver.

1974.

Sorry, wrong answer. Click. This is Gulliver.

Yeah, this is Rocco from Brooklyn. Is this Gulliver?

Yeah. You whack anybody lately, Rocco?

Naw, not for a couple ‘a months. Why, you need a favor or somethin’?

Manny came back into the control booth and started clearing the calls. Not right now, Rocco, but I might put a contract out on myself if I don’t get out of this hole pretty soon. Thanks for callin’.

Hey, wait a minute. Am I the tenth— Click.

You got the calls, Manny?

Manny waved from behind the glass. Gulliver tossed his headphones on the console and poured the rest of the vodka into his cup. Neil Young’s screaming guitar blasted through the studio speakers, cutting into the alcohol headache forming behind his eyes. By 6:00 a.m. it would be a raging pulse all the way to the base of his neck. He saw the lights flash on the phone console and then go out almost immediately as Manny cleared the calls, not giving so much as a hello to the lonely fucks on the other end of the line. The console went dark and stayed that way, and Gulliver wondered if they’d even get ten calls. He checked his cell phone, which was sitting nearby. Suddenly, as the song was ending, the volume through the studio speakers came down and Manny’s voice broke through.

We got the tenth caller, man.

Then give the winner his chicken.

Manny banged on the glass. This was your idea. Line six.

Gulliver looked up. Manny was pointing into the phone, his features tightly knit. Gulliver scratched the stubble on his chin, debating whether or not to put the call on the air. Finally, he put his headphones back on and impatiently punched the only blinking light on the bank of phone lines in front of him. From the look on Manny’s face, he decided to take it off the air. Congratulations. It’s your lucky day.

What the fuck kind of name is Gulliver anyway? Why don’t you use your God-given name, Gordon?

Who is this?

Never mind who this is and answer my question.

The song was ending, and Gulliver made a rolling motion to Manny. Pressing his headphones to his ears, Manny nodded, and Neil Young was replaced by Janis Joplin.

Is that important to you?

Your mother gave you a name, why don’t you use it? Are you ashamed of it, asshole? Are you ashamed of your mother? The voice sounded altered and far away, as if it were on a speakerphone.

Take your pick.

She was a fine woman, you ungrateful bastard. Gulliver and Manny locked eyes. It was you that fucked everything up.

Gulliver swallowed some of his vodka and orange juice. She was a drunk and a slut, he spat into the microphone. There was a different man at breakfast every Sunday morning. The line went silent for almost half a minute. Gulliver glanced at Manny who was staring at him intently. Gulliver leaned closer to the mike and kept his voice low, as if it was trying to get close to the ground. Do I know you, man?

You fuck! Don’t act like you don’t know who this is!

Gulliver did a mental sweep as Manny sat motionless, his greasy curls dangling in his eyes.

The voice dripped with disdain. You’re going to walk away from this, aren’t you, you slimy bastard? Just like you’ve walked away from everything else in your worthless life.

Walk away from what, man? What are you talking about?

Put me on the air so I can tell the world what a disgusting piece of shit you are.

Manny shook his head vigorously.

Sorry, man. You’re cursing too much.

Put me on the air! Now!

Gulliver shot back the rest of his drink. He touched the microphone with his lips as Manny quickly punched up another song. Who is this, man?

Silence, but the line was still open. Some moments later the voice came through, barely a whisper. You have to put me on the air. I’m the winner. I’m the tenth caller. Then screaming so that it hurt in Gulliver’s ears, Let me talk to the world, you bastard!

Gulliver didn’t respond. Finally, he growled, I’m not putting you on the air, man.

The voice came back immediately, quivering with rage. I’ll make you pay if you don’t put me on the air.

How? How will you make me pay? Gulliver shouted back.

You’ll see, the tenth caller responded with a sudden calmness. And whatever happens will be on your head.

What the hell is that supposed to mean, whatever happens?

Just keep reading the paper, asshole. You’ll know.

Saturday, November 10th … 5:02 p.m. The late afternoon rays coming through the ragged curtains were like spears piercing his eyes. He checked the time. He didn’t remember setting the alarm clock when he went to bed. Good thing. Had it gone off, the shrill beep would have been like a chain saw cutting into his skull. He remembered drinking that last shot of tequila at 8:40 that morning, however, then toasting Bugs Bunny for once again having outwitted Elmer Fudd. Andersonville only had one bar open at that hour—a sticky little place called The Shamrock—catering mostly to lifelong alcoholics and workers coming off the third shift at the three appliance assembly plants in the area. As it was for him, six in the morning was the end of the workday for them, and a couple of belts at the end of the work week meant downing shots and beers in front of the Saturday morning cartoons, while their kids at home downed Cocoa Puffs and milk in front of the same programs. His morning was midnight, and he normally went to bed with the sun at its peak. His life was upside down, in more ways than one.

Still in his clothes, Gulliver dragged himself off the bed. Detecting the reek of something nasty and hoping it wasn’t him, he shuffled to the refrigerator and looked at his choices: coffee creamer and beer. Just thinking about either made him gag. There wasn’t enough coffee to make a pot, and the only food was a wrinkled apple and some microwave popcorn. He actually debated the popcorn, but decided something more substantial was in order given that he could still feel the tequila sloshing around in his stomach. How many did he drink?

He took a piss and stumbled out to the car, checking his pockets to make sure he had enough for some hot coffee and a couple of depth charges at the Dunkin’ Donuts. He found a five and wondered where the other ninety-five had gone from the hundred he’d gotten from the cash machine at 6:15 that morning. Into his shot glass, he guessed. There was a new dent on his SUV.

The engine coughed to life, and he crunched over the frozen gravel of his driveway, shivering behind the wheel. The sun was going down and it settled in behind some thick gray clouds that sucked whatever warmth there was from the day. The radio crackled through the din of the tire noise, and he turned up the volume to hear WXKO’s weekend voice lamely trying to be humorous.

Just stick to the music, he spat, turning off the radio. Who wanted to listen to that shit?

Figuring there was a good chance that he was still legally drunk, he wound his way carefully to the state highway. The road led to a Walmart shopping center—the social center of Andersonville, he thought caustically—on the outskirts of town.

Inside the donut shop, the pimply-faced kid behind the counter gave him his coffee and donuts and asked, Ain’t you that Gulliver guy from the radio station?

Fame in a small town had its drawbacks. Yeah, Gulliver grunted. How much?

Three sixty-five. I love your program, man. I listen to you all the time.

He threw down the five and took his coffee and donuts to an empty booth as far away from the kid as possible. Not surprisingly, he was the only customer, seeing as not a lot of people had breakfast at 5:30 at night. He got his change and grabbed a newspaper that someone had left in another booth. With the kid safely to his back, he proceeded to delve into his feast.

He’d only picked up one section of the paper, the sports section, and he scanned the headlines, not getting into the small print as reading would require way too much work. The coffee was bitter and steaming hot, perfect for cutting through the seemingly inch-thick film on his tongue. He turned the pages, sipping the coffee and feeling its warmth as it trickled down to his stomach. He ate the first donut, got up to get a napkin, and, seeing as he wasn’t much of a sports nut, checked to see if the rest of the paper was lying around. He found the A-section of the Madison County Herald Bulletin in another booth. The big news was in the A-section, the big news in Madison County usually revolving around corn, the price of corn, and what the fuck you could do with corn. He grabbed the paper without looking at it, noting that the glazed donut he’d just eaten didn’t sit well with the coffee and tequila churning inside his stomach.

You got a bathroom? he called to the pimply-faced kid.

The kid thumbed to a hallway near the cash register. Gulliver looked at the front door momentarily, deciding it would be better to lose the breakfast he’d just eaten in private. He shuffled quickly down the hall and burst into the men’s room. It was filthy. He took to the stall and dropped his pants, waiting to see which way his stomach decided to push its contents. He felt it settle a bit and decided to wait out the misery. The newspaper was turned to its middle and he turned it back to the front page, trying to focus while his guts twisted in pain. The words jumped off the page: Murder in Madison County. A twinge of interest cut through his distress and his eyes converged on the words beneath the headline. It was the second murder in as many months in the county, and he remembered reading the news copy about the first one on the air. The words had been written a thousand times in newspapers throughout the country, but they were no less tragic when he’d read them: a sixteen-year-old girl had disappeared on her way home from school, and her body was found a week later in a wooded area. She’d been raped and strangled—the stereotypical sick-shit crime. As far as he knew, it was still unsolved. With knitted eyebrows, he skipped around the page trying to catch a key phrase here and there: hadn’t been a murder in the county in over four years and now there were two… arson… charred body… beyond recognition… dental records… police asking for clues… computer search of missing persons reports… angel of the night. He stopped and read the phrase again: angel of the night. Quickly, he traced back to the beginning of the paragraph. A source at the county sheriff’s office had let it slip that the victim was female, and a piece of paper had been found beneath the body, charred and probably part of a larger document, a letter perhaps, written by hand. The only legible words were angel of the nig… and police speculated that the partial word was night, but didn’t have any clue as to its meaning or if there were other words on the page that had been burned away. At this point, it was impossible to tell if that piece of information was pertinent, or not. Angel of the night. Hmm, thought Gulliver as his intestines coiled like a snake.

Monday, November 12th … 10:22 a.m. Hernandez looked at the trail of black footprints he just laid down on the white linoleum. Chief Bergmann was following them like they were breadcrumbs, his scowl deepening with each step.

I see you were out at the scene, Bergman said. Nice of you to bring some of it back.

Hernandez stamped his feet and clouds of black dust billowed from his shoes, making it worse. Sorry, he said.

Bergmann jumped back so as to not soil the cuffs on his trousers. Well? he asked, still scowling.

Hernandez flipped through the glossy photos he was holding. Hard to tell, oh Great One. We could sift through every inch of the place and still come up empty. It burned pretty hot.

Hernandez knew that Bergmann hated being played with like that.

Keep me posted, Bergmann ordered as he whirled and headed back to his office. And Hernandez, he called back over his shoulder.

Yeah?

Get someone to clean up this goddamned mess.

Hernandez chuckled. Driving the chief crazy was usually the highlight of his day. Julie—short for Juliano—Hernandez flipped through the pictures one more time, then closed the folder and began to review his notes. They were good notes—thorough to say the least. It was better to write too much about a crime scene rather than too little, a fact he’d discovered the hard way. One of only three detectives on the Andersonville police force, he’d never really had a mentor in the department who’d officially trained him in the proper way to conduct a homicide investigation. They were all too busy just taking cases as they came: robberies, car thefts, stolen bicycles—they did it all.

There was another, deeper reason for him not having had of a mentor, however: his name ended with a z. He was the only Hernandez or Rodriguez or Martinez to reach the new but exalted position of detective, and while no one would openly admit to feeling resentment that a z person had been promoted into the position, it had become obvious almost immediately. Tall and light skinned, handsome some said, part of his genealogy traced back to the Alps of northern Italy—hence the name Juliano, which was his grandfather’s name—but the fact that he didn’t look like the stereotypical z person didn’t make things any easier. He was only thirty-three, younger than most of the uniforms that had put in for the job, but that only served to make Hernandez synonymous with shit. The only way to prove that he deserved the shield was to do the job better than any non-z cop could do it.

The county boys had always taken the juicy stuff before Andersonville had its own squad of investigators, but this one took place on his watch and Julie was lucky enough to have been on duty at the time. He wondered if lucky was the right adjective. He read through his notes once and went back to the beginning and went through them again. It looked like the source of the fire was the body itself, but he was waiting for official word from the county ME for the exact cause of death. He had a hunch it was something other than the obvious, and he bet himself a nickel that the body had been torched in order to cover up the real cause of death.

He read the list of objects bagged for examination by the lab boys down at county, but nothing stood out. Lifting prints at the scene was impossible. The only interesting tidbit was how the particular slip of paper—the one with the words angel of the nig… written on it—had gotten underneath the body. The words seemed to have been written by the victim, with a charred journal, or diary, with what appeared to be the same paper and the same handwriting, having been found at the scene. He was waiting for word from the county boys on that too. The phone rang, startling him.

Detective Hernandez?

Yeah.

This is Morgan down at the MEs office.

Yeah, sure. You got cause of death on that fire victim yet?

That’s why I’m calling. You lost your bet.

Hernandez hesitated. You mean....

Yeah. She was alive.

Jesus Christ.

I hope she’s with him now. She certainly deserves it if she went through what I think she went through.

Which was? There was some hesitation on the line. Morgan, you there?

Morgan’s voice came back thick, with a distinct quaver to it. She was wide awake the whole time, man. The way I figure it, someone poured gasoline all over her while she lay there—probably had a gun on her or something—then lit her up like a volcano. That body burned so hot that the fillings in her teeth had begun to melt. It must have been something awful for her.

Hernandez absorbed the horror of what he’d just heard. How long do you figure she was alive before she.... I mean, how long did she feel pain?

I don’t know for sure. I’ve never seen anything like this before. A couple of minutes, I’d guess. I can’t even imagine.

Neither can I. Julie flipped some pages in his notebook. Were you able to zero in on how old she might have been?

Well, we’d have to have the dental x-rays to make a positive ID—I’ll have word on that tomorrow—but, yeah, I can ballpark it for you.

Well?

My guess? Sixteen, maybe seventeen. I’d bet your nickel on it.

Jesus, Julie breathed into the phone. Just like the last one.

Yeah, Morgan noted. That’s what I said too.

Monday, November 19th … 11:29 p.m. The few lights that were burning were like eyes in the darkness, following him as he made his way to the end of his street. What houses he could see stood outlined against a charcoal sky, their edges snagging a few glints of blue-cheese light from an almost full moon. Gulliver felt his SUV rock from the never-ending wind that came directly from the coldest place on the planet and blasted into Andersonville night after night after night. Noting the time on the dashboard clock, he turned down Main Street and headed for the truck stop near the interstate. It was out of his way, but everything else was closed and he was out of smokes. He checked the time; he’d be all right as long as he got to the radio station by quarter ‘til. It didn’t take a lot of preparation to talk to his nocturnal zombies anymore. He pulled into the stop and hurried from the car, plunking down $8.50 for two packs of Parliaments and dodging the hanging paper turkeys that dangled from the ceiling outside the snack bar. Thanksgiving was only a few days away, and he wondered if he’d be among the poor souls partaking in the delicious feast of pressed turkey loaf with bottled gravy, canned yams, powdered mashed potatoes they served there on Thanksgiving. He knew what they served because he’d been there the year before. He could still smell it.

He got back in the car and headed for WXKO, the classic rock beacon of the Midwest. Right. More like the classic rock armpit, he thought. The streets of Andersonville were deserted save for the few poor souls, like him, who had to be out and about for some reason and wouldn’t be able to enjoy the comfort of a warm bed for several hours yet.

He came to a light and waited, debating whether or not to run it seeing as he was the only one at the intersection and there wasn’t another car in sight. Then he spotted one of Andersonville’s eight police cars idling dark in the lot of the Kroger’s supermarket. It was catty-corner from the light, and he figured it would probably be a good idea to wait it out. They’d come after him for sure simply because they had nothing better to do. He pushed the on button on his radio, set to 1310 AM, and listened to the nationally syndicated call-in show that preceded his gig five nights a week. The radio personality was Robert Dickson, the show was from L.A., and unlike the sickos that called in on his show, Robert’s callers sounded like normal people. They called in about this or that: investment advice, renters messing up an apartment and what-do-I-do-about-it, do I really need a lawyer to sell my house? Robert was a conservative fellow, probably looked like Walter Cronkite, Gulliver guessed, not a lot of risky advice given out here. He listened to the next caller.

My daughter is nineteen, out on her own, and has decided not to come to the house for Thanksgiving. She says she wants to give thanks by not watching football with me and her boyfriend this year, but wants to give food to the homeless. A mid-western accent; could have been from anywhere: Kansas, Ohio, down the street.

And you have a problem with that? Robert asked probingly.

The caller/father went on with his question/problem, which was: he’d like to be with his daughter at Thanksgiving—the mom in the family had passed—and he’d even go so far as to help her at the homeless shelter, but he didn’t see the homeless in the same light as she did. She thought the homeless were unfortunate. He, the caller/father, thought most of them were lazy freeloaders who were happy enough to mooch change and food for a living. What do I do?

Do you think all of them are freeloaders?

"Most of them, yes. Hell, there’s plenty of work out there. We can’t find enough people to fill the open jobs down at the plant where I work. But that’s not to say I