CORKY'S FEAT

 

Carlos always felt as a non-entity and afraid or suspecting his white peers in Venezuela and the US.

His friend, Bill Craigie, an aspiring poker professional, and part-time bellman at Atlanta’s Regency Hyatt House Hotel one day quizzed him,

“Carlos, why do you go to those black dives? It is sad to end up dead of knife wounds in an alley.”

“Bill, you speak as a white American. Remember, I am a Latino living in your country. I am acceptable to most of you because I am white, tall, strong, and articulate in English.

My socio-political preferences caused me rejection and ostracism in Venezuela.

I spent most of my life here and became too attached to American values. The way blacks suffer here in Atlanta reminds me of things inflicted on some of my people and myself back home.

Before I came to the US, I sided with the underdogs. At twelve, I was a fat roly-poly kid, a perfect target for the bullies in my neighborhood. The groups of kids that gathered in street corners terrorized me.

I was no longer a bully’s target after I attended a military school in Virginia.

I provoked them and beat thoroughly and conclusively their sorry asses.

“In those places you call ‘black dives,’ I enjoy the best jazz in this city.”

“Carlos, just be careful. My poker addiction brings me into contact with dangerous characters. I wear a denture because someone lost a fortune through one of my clever bluffs and punched my teeth out. See you back at work.” He left.

******

Once, at Donn Clendenon’s, his favorite nightclub, Carlos met Don Oglesby, another bellman at the Regency.

“What are you doing here, Carlos? You are a grain of rice on a black bean soup,”

“Are you tone deaf, Don? The music here is fantastic. Are there comparable white joints? Besides, they are more expensive.”

Carlos and Don became friends. At lunch break, Don always sat with him.

One day, he took his lunch break early. Usually, he came later into the hotel’s employee mess hall and shared a long table with his Cuban and Mexican colleagues. This time, he sat alone before his other coworkers came to lunch. None but Don sat at the same table. This was a revelation.

Mike Cluver, his bell captain, was one of the few that, on occasion, sat with him. Mike was a special guy. He could play well a tiple, a Colombian variation of a guitar. He spoke Spanish and German fluently. His father was an Anglican pastor, stationed in Colombia and Germany for many years. Carlos thought he was clever.

Coincidently, after guiding guests, Don and Carlos shared one of the Regency’s transparent elevators. The view from the twenty first floor was breath-taking. Four guests were in the elevator. One of them, a man, stared at Carlos and Don.

“Sponging off guests, right? Is that all you boys can do?”

The taunt was unanswered; Carlos kept remembering the man’s face while he was busy.

Carlos enjoyed roaming Atlanta downtown in his free time. On this occasion, he spotted the guy who taunted them in the elevator. He saw him enter the Oyster bar. Later, he walked out and went into a boutique a couple of doors away.

Carlos entered the boutique and faced him.

“Don’t you remember me?”

The man, puzzled, asked who he was.

“I am the bellman you insulted at the Regency. I think you are a fat bag of chicken shit.”

The man tried a swing. Carlos weaved and hit him on the paunch. He fell backwards on a glass show case and broke it. Then he picked up a chair, but Carlos easily wrested it out of him and shoved him against a dress display. He cried in despair at one of the scared store girls.

“Hit the holdup alarm!”

Carlos realized that he was the proprietor.

Without running, he left and took off his jacket.

An alert policeman caught up with him and soon he was in a cell.

They allowed him a phone call, and he called Mike Cluver.

After listening to his account, Mike said,

“Do not worry, soon I will have someone help you.”

The help that came was a thin, young Jewish lawyer fresh from the Georgia bar exam.

“Carlos, Mike told me of you. What he did not tell me is that you are eager to try one of our Georgia jails. You risk a four-year sentence. Assault, battery, destruction of private property and shouting obscenities in the city.”

“Oh hell, I don’t know what got into me. If I am imprisoned, Social Services will take my seven-year-old son out of my custody.

Corky, as Carlos knew him afterwards, looked sternly at him and said,

Carlos, you better grow. I will do my best to help you.

As he came into the court, Carlos realized he did not have a chance. The boutique’s girls were present as witnesses. After hearing from the aggrieved party, the judge was ready to pronounce the sentence. Corky interrupted and said,

“Your honor, allow me to speak privately to the plaintiff.”

“Yes, you can, just make it quick. I have a busy schedule.”

Corky and the boutique owner left the courtroom and stood in the court’s hallway.

“Listen, if you insist on having my customer jailed, I will make it expensive for you.”

“Yeah? How are you going to do that?” replied Carlos’s accuser.

“I am going to tell my wife to stop buying from your boutique,” said Corky.

The man laughed and relaxed. Corky then gave him his argument.

“My client is a nut. Look at what he did. He is going to lose his son’s custody over a fight. Can you imagine what he might do once he comes out of jail? I will have him pay for your damage and apologize. The judge is going to fine him heavily to offset court expenses and will issue an injunction that will cause his imprisonment if he approaches you again. He will have to pay my and your lawyer's fees.”

They returned to the hall, and the plaintiff said. “Your honor, I withdraw my accusation as long as this man abides by the conditions his lawyer has proposed.”

The matter ended there. It was a valuable, if expensive, lesson for Carlos.