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Spelling "Warrant" by William Doreski As we line up for dinner Kevin asks if spelling “warrant” with an “e” is ever warranted. Meanwhile the big northwest wind ponders through spruce and hemlock, settling old scores. The lake sighs. The twin haunted islands, compact and smug, hover in the starlight. Dinner is the same every night: lobster stew, followed by vanilla pound cake glazed with orange sauce. Gossip places me elsewhere, in France or Romania, my hands filthy with embezzlement. The bank went bankrupt. The vault yawned open like a mid-Victorian tomb. I stole barely enough to fund a few months at this off-brand resort in the Canada Rockies. Seated at last with Kevin, Jay, and three women from Brazil who speak no English, I explain that “warrant” always requires a pair of aces, two rooks, a warrior, a nebbish, and a twit. Kevin gestures at the women. They think his antics obscene. Lobster stew arrives in a big ceramic pot. I pour the chardonnay. Kevin muses, “warrant, warrent,” till Jay whacks his shoulder to silence him. The women laugh in Portuguese. Jay and Kevin smirk and blush. The lake slops and gargles and snores in a grave universal language, its sense of humor warranted by lamplight piddling on ripples: foolish kisses expended on subjects indifferent to love. |
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