nature’s holy elixir.
The towers house swarms of bats. Max thinks bats are cool. He enjoys seeing them swarm out on a summer’s evening.
The whole strange place is Max’s imagination given form, weird because Max wanted it weird. And he could afford to build it that way.
A smaller version faces it from across Delor Street. The Weider family shanty.
Max originally meant that to be his brewery. When it went up it was the biggest beer-making operation in all TunFaire. Two years later it was too small to handle demand. And Max’s wife, Hannah, was pregnant for the third time. So he tossed up the monster across the way.
Max and Hannah produced five children: Tad, Tom, Ty, Kittyjo, and Alyx. Alyx was the baby by half a decade. Tragedy stalked the family, maybe punishing Max for his worldly success. Tad died fighting in the Cantard. Tom and Ty survived? with Tom gone mad and Ty condemned to a wheelchair. Kittyjo and I were an item once upon a time but she was too loony for me.
My pal Morley Dotes says the absolute first rule of life is, don’t get involved with a woman crazier than you are. A rule I haven’t always pursued with due diligence. Because of more immediate distractions.
But like I said, tragedy hounds Max Weider. Tom and Kittyjo were murdered. Hannah died that same night, destroyed by the shock.
I climbed the steps to the main brewery entrance. An old, old man sat behind a small table in a cubby just inside. He was a retiree putting in a few hours of part-time. He was almost blind. But he was aware of me because I came in with a creak of hinges and a blast of cold air.
“Can I help you?”
“It’s Garrett, Gerry. Looking for the boss. He here today?”
“Garrett? You ain’t been around in a while.”
“Cold and snow, Gerry. And nothing happening to worry the boss.” My function is to stimulate the consciences of the brew crew. So they don’t surrender to temptation. Not too often, in too big a way. “What about the boss?”
“If he’s here, he came over underneath. And he don’t do that much no more. Less? en it’s really foul out. So, chances are, he ain’t here. Yet.”
Max is a hands-on owner who visits the floor every day.
By “underneath” Gerry meant through the caverns below the brewery. Those were the reason Weider chose to build where he did. The beer is stored there till it’s shipped.
“How’s business? Any cutbacks because of the weather?”
“I hear tell a ten percent drop-off on account of it’s hard to make deliveries. The local brew houses picked up most of the slack. The boss didn’t lay nobody off. He’s got the extra guys harvesting ice. It’s a good year for that.”
“So I hear.” They would be cutting the ice from the river. “Thanks, Gerry. I'll head on across.”
Would he believe I was just looking for the boss? The whole brewery would know I was on the prowl before I found Max. Any villainy would scurry into the shadows to wait the danger out.
Privilege, private law, is vibrantly alive. Max Weider is a comfortable practitioner. He cares for his troops. Most return the favor by limiting their pilferage.
It seemed colder outside. Because it’s always hot inside the brewery. From the fires used to boil water and warm the fermenting vats.
The steps up to the Weider mansion door had received only a half-hearted cleaning since the last snow. I understood. We’d all had enough of that.
I knocked.
The man who answered was new. And a disaster on the hoof. If there was a race that could mix with the human, his ancestors had mixed it up. There had to be a half dozen kinds of human in the blend, too.
He would be five feet tall on his tippy-toes on his best day. His head was huge for his height and almost perfectly round. With a couple saucers smashed onto the sides where his ears belonged. The only hair on him was a huge, drooping black mustache. Its twisted ends hung four inches below his nonexistent chin. His eyes were slits stuffed with chips of
The towers house swarms of bats. Max thinks bats are cool. He enjoys seeing them swarm out on a summer’s evening.
The whole strange place is Max’s imagination given form, weird because Max wanted it weird. And he could afford to build it that way.
A smaller version faces it from across Delor Street. The Weider family shanty.
Max originally meant that to be his brewery. When it went up it was the biggest beer-making operation in all TunFaire. Two years later it was too small to handle demand. And Max’s wife, Hannah, was pregnant for the third time. So he tossed up the monster across the way.
Max and Hannah produced five children: Tad, Tom, Ty, Kittyjo, and Alyx. Alyx was the baby by half a decade. Tragedy stalked the family, maybe punishing Max for his worldly success. Tad died fighting in the Cantard. Tom and Ty survived? with Tom gone mad and Ty condemned to a wheelchair. Kittyjo and I were an item once upon a time but she was too loony for me.
My pal Morley Dotes says the absolute first rule of life is, don’t get involved with a woman crazier than you are. A rule I haven’t always pursued with due diligence. Because of more immediate distractions.
But like I said, tragedy hounds Max Weider. Tom and Kittyjo were murdered. Hannah died that same night, destroyed by the shock.
I climbed the steps to the main brewery entrance. An old, old man sat behind a small table in a cubby just inside. He was a retiree putting in a few hours of part-time. He was almost blind. But he was aware of me because I came in with a creak of hinges and a blast of cold air.
“Can I help you?”
“It’s Garrett, Gerry. Looking for the boss. He here today?”
“Garrett? You ain’t been around in a while.”
“Cold and snow, Gerry. And nothing happening to worry the boss.” My function is to stimulate the consciences of the brew crew. So they don’t surrender to temptation. Not too often, in too big a way. “What about the boss?”
“If he’s here, he came over underneath. And he don’t do that much no more. Less? en it’s really foul out. So, chances are, he ain’t here. Yet.”
Max is a hands-on owner who visits the floor every day.
By “underneath” Gerry meant through the caverns below the brewery. Those were the reason Weider chose to build where he did. The beer is stored there till it’s shipped.
“How’s business? Any cutbacks because of the weather?”
“I hear tell a ten percent drop-off on account of it’s hard to make deliveries. The local brew houses picked up most of the slack. The boss didn’t lay nobody off. He’s got the extra guys harvesting ice. It’s a good year for that.”
“So I hear.” They would be cutting the ice from the river. “Thanks, Gerry. I'll head on across.”
Would he believe I was just looking for the boss? The whole brewery would know I was on the prowl before I found Max. Any villainy would scurry into the shadows to wait the danger out.
Privilege, private law, is vibrantly alive. Max Weider is a comfortable practitioner. He cares for his troops. Most return the favor by limiting their pilferage.
It seemed colder outside. Because it’s always hot inside the brewery. From the fires used to boil water and warm the fermenting vats.
The steps up to the Weider mansion door had received only a half-hearted cleaning since the last snow. I understood. We’d all had enough of that.
I knocked.
The man who answered was new. And a disaster on the hoof. If there was a race that could mix with the human, his ancestors had mixed it up. There had to be a half dozen kinds of human in the blend, too.
He would be five feet tall on his tippy-toes on his best day. His head was huge for his height and almost perfectly round. With a couple saucers smashed onto the sides where his ears belonged. The only hair on him was a huge, drooping black mustache. Its twisted ends hung four inches below his nonexistent chin. His eyes were slits stuffed with chips of
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