Emmetsburg: Fifty

George Bremer's office was just up the stairs. With each step John was tearing this moment apart. He wondered what George would say, or if he would think John a fool. By the time he reached the top of the stairs John wasn't certain himself. When he reached the Sheriff's door John was convinced that he was indeed. Despite himself John's hand went out and knocked without confidence on the door. Without awaiting a reply John turned the brass knob and pushed his head through the gap.

The room was a fog of bitter cream-white cigar smoke, carrying herbal chill. It hung as strands and nebulous banks, scattering sunlight [pouring through half open blinds in a rhythm of shadow and light. George sat in the far corner of the room upon a small wooden chair, away from his desk and almost lost to dingy shadow.

The cigar was a mere stub between George's teeth, where it was more chewed than smoked any longer. With the thumb and forefinger George pulled the stub from his teeth. He gave a casual nod and gestured John into the room. John obliged, sweeping a hand before his face and disturbing filaments of smoke there.

“Best close the door, John.” he said with a whimsical quality. “Mildred hates the smell. Like having two wives. Don't imagine how them Arab fellas do it. Got enough on my plate with just one, and Mildred.”

John managed a smile. “Something again air, George?”

“Not as long as I can see it!”

“Don't know, George,” said John, waving at the smoke again. Not that it really bothered him all that much.

George leaned forward in the chair and stretched to tap a butt from the open window. “Wife won't let me smoke at home.”

“Can't imagine why.”

“Never had a taste for the smoke, eh?”

“Never cared for it personally.”

“Cigarettes,” George began, thoughtfully, “are for young boys, the nervous and the condemned, but a cigar, John, a cigar is for the thinking man.”

“That so,” said John.

George popped the cigar back into his mouth, moving it from one side to the other between his teeth. “But you didn't come here to talk about cigars, now did you. What can I do ya for?”

“Need to see Stanton.” John felt as if he had forced the words out, like spitting out something vile and distasteful.

George was immediately against the idea, shaking his head strongly from side to side. “John, I'm...”

“I'm asking this one favor,” John said quickly, almost pleading, at least as much as his ego and soul would allow.

George leaned back, tipping back in the chair and chewing the end of his cigar, as though it helped him to think.

“What's your business with this fella?”

“Can't say.”

“Something that might concern the law, John?”

“Nothing like that.” John looked him square in the eye. “Business between him and me.”

“Nothing to do with that girl?” George asked.

“Nope.”

George studied the cigar in his fingers and pursed his lips. He rubbed his bent brow roughly with a thumb and forefinger.

“Put me in an awful spot, John, anyone should hear of this.”

“Five minutes is all I'm asking.”

Man could get in a lot of trouble in five minutes.” George took a deep breath and let it out slowly. His gaze hovered near the floor a moment. Tapping out a butt, he threw the cigar back between his teeth and looked up at John. “I'll give you two.”

John nodded his appreciation. “Two'll do just fine.”