The next story is an account of an afternoon in August 1978. I scribbled some notes that October, and wrote a first draft in January 1979 and a second in January 1980. I never submitted it for publication.
The summer day was edging toward 5 p.m. Mel and I were just north of Hoquiam, Washington, on U.S. 101 trying to hitchhike back to his car.
Grubby and unshaven from a five-day hiking trip in the Olympics, we did not look reputable. Mel made up for this by manic thumbs-up motions and springing about on his toes.
His antics seemed to work. A late-model Dodge sedan, the plain type often owned by utility districts, swerved onto the gravel. Inside were two loggers.
We got in, and the car pulled back into traffic. “I’m Bud Bishop,” said the man in the passenger seat. He was about 38. He stuck out his hand and I shook.
He jabbed his thumb at the driver. “This here’s Hoppe. Dean Hopkins is his name. Ya want a beer?”
“Sure,” Mel said. They had two six-packs of Blitz.
Hoppe reminded me of Lennie in Of Mice and Men. He was 52, and looked like he’d started drinking in grade school. His skin was as wrinkled as an old tarp. His eyes were too small, like a monkey’s, and too far below his eyebrows. His nose looked like it had been bashed with a hammer and shoved sideways.
He had on a kid’s baseball cap with the bill flipped up. His work shirt was spotted with grime, and his baggy gray pants were held up by suspenders. He was happy and drunk, cruising down Highway 101 in the logging-company car.
Bud did the talking. “Where you guys goin’?”
“Quinault River.”
“In the river? You want us to throw you in the river?”
Hoppe grinned drunkenly and said, “We c’n throw ’em off the briiIIIIIdge” — dragging out that word like stretching a piece of chewing gum until it sagged.
We told them our story. We had come off a 50-mile hike in Olympic National Park. When we got back to the trailhead in early afternoon, we found that somebody had ripped out the spark-plug wires and the radiator cap in Mel’s car.
“Shiiiit,” said Bud. “It’s them teepee creepers.”
“Huh?”
“CanOOOe bailers,” said Hoppe.
“Indians,” said Bud, as Hoppe chuckled at the city boys.
We allowed that maybe it was the Indians and maybe it wasn’t. In any case, we had hitched a ride south to Aberdeen, and bought the wires and cap at an auto-parts store. All we wanted to do was get back to Mel’s car, fix it, and head home to Seattle.
Two hitchhikers and a gas station appeared at the village of Humptulips. Hoppe pulled in for gas, and Bud waved at the hitchers, a pimply guy about 19 and his ugly girlfriend. Bud had promised these two a ride, so they climbed in the front seat.
Hoppe had gone in to take a leak, and the kid referred to him as an “old alcoholic.” Bud didn’t like that. “Sure, he drinks a lot,” he said. “But he’s a damn good worker. He’s been a logger 30 years — hell, it’s all he’s got brains for.”
Hoppe ambled back, sporting the same idiot grin, and plowed the overloaded Dodge back onto 101. He reached under the seat for a bottle of R&R, and had a swig. A few miles down the road, he let the hitchhikers out.
Bud was still bothered by the kid’s remark. He turned to me. “If you was that kid, askin’ for a ride, would you ’a’ said that about Hoppe?”
“Nope.”
“Hoppe,” he said, louder this time, “That kid was sayin’ you was an alcoholic.”
“ThAAAAs what I am,” slobbered Hoppe. “AlcoHOLLLLic.”
A few minutes later Hoppe said, “Le’s stop at the red cock.” He pulled over at a roadhouse with a sign, “Red Rooster.” Inside it was done up in cedar shakes and antlers. Some log-truck drivers were at one end of the bar, and a cheap-looking woman at the other.
Hoppe had been seated only 30 seconds before he started hollering the bartender’s name. The man brought four cans of beer — Blitz, which he had plenty of in the car. Hoppe gurgled about the woman, who was seated near the men’s room.
“I gotta pee,” he said, getting up.
“Better steer clear o’ that piece o’ ass up there, Hoppe,” said Bud. Hoppe swerved around her as if she were a snake.
We walked back to the car. “Had t’ git outta thERE. Tongue was gittin’ stiff,” Hoppe said. He fired up the Dodge, remarking, “This radiator leaks so fast you can’t fill it up.”
“Yep. Had a girl like that once,” said Bud.
Hoppe swerved onto the highway in front of an oncoming car, and we were back to worrying about drunk driving.
“Hey,” said Bud. “You boys know the right order to put those plug wires in? I bet you don’t.” “I think so,” said Mel.
“What kinda car is it?”
“ ’64 Comet wagon.”
“One five three six two four,” said Bud, proud of himself.
“That’s right,” said Mel. Bud should have made Mel say it, I thought; he was the one trying to prove something.
“Hey, Hoppe,” said Bud, jabbing him, “I bet these guys could even start a fire.”
“Sure can,” said Mel. “We just about burned down the forest last night.”
“You better not,” said Bud. These were loggers, and that wasn’t a funny joke.
“Hey Hoppe, I think we’d better drive these college boys to their car, jus’ to see if they can get them plug wires in right.”
Good, I thought. We needed the ride. I just hoped Hoppe could stay on the road. He was barreling along at 55 and weaving. He fiddled with the air vent. “Shhhhhit. Can’t git this to blow right.”
“Yep,” said Bud. “Had a girl like that once.”
Pretty soon Bud started in on the government. The government was buying up all the old homesteads in the park. “Damn gov’mint already got Lake Ozette. Well, I got five acres, and sure’s hell they gonna want it.”
We said something about writing to his congressman, and he laughed. “Naw. If they want it, they’ll get it.”
Hoppe turned into the dirt road to Bud’s place, and hit the breaks. “Piss-stop!” he said, swinging the door open and unzipping his fly. We all did.
Bud’s place was a mobile home in a clearing among the trees. Scattered around were a castoff Cadillac de Ville and several wrecks, plus a truck that maybe worked and maybe didn’t.
Bud’s wife and two kids looked dumb and harassed. The wife was sour at the sight of us, because it meant that Bud had to leave again. He called her a stupid broad, issued some commands, and piled us into his Caddy. We roared off to Hoppe’s to feed the horses—a chore that had to be done before dark—and then it was off to Mel’s car.
We each slugged down another beer, except Hoppe, who swigged R&R. He got to explaining why none of his family was home.
“Bunch a hikers, city folk, who didn’ know for’ards f’m bAAAck’rds.”
“Had a girl like that once,” said Bud.
“’n they had all this stuff — beds ’n cAAArd tables. They had to rent hoRRses. Plenty a’money. So the ol’ woman, she’s up at these fools’ campgroUUUUnd–” The word drowned in spit.
“You sure she’s at the campgrOUUUUnd?” mimicked Bud.
“Aw cmOOOOOn, Bud.”
We reached the trailhead at dusk. There was Mel’s “Rolls C’nardly,” the ’64 Comet wagon that “rolls down one side of the hill and c’n ’ardly make it up the other.” Mel snapped on the distributor cap and spark-plug wires. Bud supervised, waiting to see if Mel really knew the firing order.
He did, but he had missed one thing: the vandals had also ripped the spring off the throttle, disconnecting the gas pedal. So Bud had the last word after all. He rummaged in his Caddy and pulled out a floppy spring from a hair dryer.
“This oughta git ya home,’’ he said. “See, you college boys would’a been up shit crick without me.”
Mel’s Comet wagon got us home, though he had to pull up on the gas pedal with his foot when he wanted to slow down. He forgot a few times, so there were a few hairy moments, but we got home all right.
© 2018 Bruce Ramsey