Watching Jeopardy

 -1-

The body was discovered the same night that Mickey Welton made his appearance on Jeopardy. As a singular event, the discovery of a dead body was prodigious news in a town which boasted only nine thousand citizens, especially if foul play was suspected, but when coupled with a local man’s appearance on a nationwide television game show, it grew to gargantuan news, and it made September the twenty-first, nineteen ninety-nine, the biggest night ever in the history of Rainbow, New Brunswick.

*

Pete Golliger sat on the third stool in from the front door of The Frying Dutchman, Rainbow’s number one greasy spoon, and the home of the finest raspberry pie in the entire world, at least that’s what the hand-written sign in the window said. Behind the counter, Henry Van Etten, the Frying Dutchman himself, was using the remote control to adjust the color on the twenty inch Magnavox that sat on a jerry-rigged shelf above the microwave. Henry found ‘The Frying Dutchman’ a clever name, he being of Dutch descent and a restaurateur on top of that. It probably hadn’t crossed his mind that the other three thousand owners of establishments in North America called ‘The Frying Dutchman’ had mistakenly found it clever as well.

That was a helluva rain shower we had, said Pete looking out the window onto Main Street. A storm had blown into Rainbow about an hour earlier and had dropped an inordinate amount of precipitation on the small town in less than fifteen minutes.

Is that too green? Henry wasn’t paying attention to Pete. He was looking up at the Magnavox.

Pete looked up at the aged television set. No, but I think it needs more red.

Well, then it’s too green.

What?

You’ve got two hues on a color t.v., Pete. You’ve got your green hue and your red hue. If it needs more red then that means that it’s too green, so, you turn the green down.

Why can’t you just turn the red up?

No, you can’t do that, no. You start turning the hues up and before you know it you have to roll off some of the contrast, and then some of the sharpness and then you’re really up shit creek. No, best to pull back on the hues. It makes for a more even and subtle tone on the set. It’s easier on the eyes.

Two hues, huh?

Two hues.

I didn’t know that.

Well, you should start watching more television.

Yeah, I guess maybe I should.

Pete didn’t have time for television these days, being one of the only two policemen left in Rainbow, but, before long he was going to have more time on his hands than he would know what to do with. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police were swallowing up most of the local forces in the province – Moncton, Bathurst and Campbellton had already fallen to the Mounties – and the Rainbow force would be absorbed next. September the twenty-eighth was the target date. One week away. After that, Pete and the other remaining cop in town, Wood Lynch, would be cut loose with a modest stipend and a firm handshake as parting gifts.

The Rainbow police force used to be five strong, but, when they heard about the takeover six months ago, the other three members of the force, including Police Chief Walt Steeves, found employment elsewhere. Walt took a position fairly high up in the Halifax-Dartmouth Police Force in the neighbouring province of Nova Scotia, and at last report was doing very well there. In fact, his first week on the job, he talked a jumper down off the bridge to Dartmouth. As luck would have it, the jumper shot himself in the head the next day, but, Walt reasoned that he couldn’t be everywhere. So, Pete Golliger and Wood Lynch were now enforcing Rainbow’s laws all by themselves. They hadn’t really talked about which one of them was the ranking officer. Pete was nine years older at forty-four, but Wood had been a member of the Rainbow force for a year longer than Pete, having joined just after he turned twenty-three. It wasn’t that important who was in charge anyway, seeing as how the biggest threat to the community was Duffy Higgenson, the Parkinson’s Disease-afflicted dentist on Main Street. Duffy’s unsteady hand had wreaked enough havoc on the local citizenry to qualify as a minor crime spree.

Pete Golliger was not a native of Rainbow. Pete was raised in Toronto, but had always had a curiosity about places that he had never seen, and every so often that curiosity developed into a wanderlust. When Pete finished high school, he took a year off and backpacked his way west to Vancouver, then south down the west coast of the United States into Mexico.

It was in Acapulco that Pete realized his money was just about gone, and with it, his wanderlust. That was when he afforded himself the luxury of a bus ticket and headed home. This time up through Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee, where he and a woman passenger from Cincinnati talked the bus driver into taking a detour in Memphis so they could get a photograph of themselves in front of the gates at Graceland. Then on through Kentucky to Ohio, where the woman from Cincinnati said goodbye to Pete by planting a big kiss right on his nineteen year-old mouth. He and the woman were not romantically involved at all. She had to be at least thirty, Pete estimated. In fact, the only thing they had going on between them was that photograph in front of Graceland, and a couple of thousand miles worth of friendly conversation. Maybe she just felt like doing something outrageous. Maybe that was why she kissed him. Maybe she felt a fondness for this good looking nineteen year-old. After all, his was the first face she saw when she boarded the bus back in Shreveport, and he had smiled at her. She welcomed this after the solemn visit she had just had with her sister. Her sister had found a lump in her breast and the woman had taken the bus down to be with her only sibling when she got the test results back. The news was not good. Mastectomy. Double. Maybe this was why the woman gave Pete the big kiss. Maybe she figured, What the hell? You only live once, and in some cases not long enough. Pete wished that he had returned her kiss to show her that he felt a fondness for her too, and so she wouldn’t feel alone in her outrageousness, but he was so surprised by her action that he didn’t have time to gather himself, and before he knew it, the kiss was over, she said See ya, Pete, and she disappeared into the bus station. That night, his bus passed through Michigan, across the border into Ontario and back to Toronto.

After his year of travel, Pete bounced around at a few jobs and eventually wound up working for a moving company. He had worked his way up to assistant manager of the outfit by the time he was twenty-eight. This was when he met a real estate agent named Heather Walsh. They were married when Pete was thirty-one and divorced when he was thirty-two. Pete used to say It was a marriage made in heaven that went straight to hell.

Heather and Pete had been married only six months when she announced that she had fallen in love with an American real estate agent and she was moving down to Buffalo to live with him, leaving Pete to file for divorce. Now, it wasn’t the fact that he lost Heather that stuck in Pete’s craw. He wasn’t even too annoyed that it was, in his opinion, the uncomely city of Buffalo that she was moving to. It was the swiftness of Heather’s fall for this American fellow that Pete could not quite comprehend. When Pete was courting Heather, it took him two months just to get a date with her, then another three years to get her to marry him. How could she meet, fall for, and run off with another man in only six months?

Six months, Pete said to his lawyer when he went in to file the divorce papers. And that’s assuming she met him on our honeymoon! It was probably only four or five months. And he was an American for chrissake. He didn’t even live in the same city as us! How in the hell could it possibly happen?

It’s the real estate business, Pete, his lawyer told him. I deal with real estate people all the time and believe me, the pressure is so intense–the competition so fierce – that sometimes two agents are forced into one another’s arms as a comfort more than anything else. They find solace in someone who is going through the same hell that they are.

They’re selling bungalows! countered Pete. They’re not invading goddamned Normandy!

It was right after his marriage ended that Pete got another case of wanderlust, and made the decision to leave Toronto and go east. He had never been to the Maritimes and he thought maybe this would be a good place to start fresh, so, he put what furniture he had into storage, threw a few things into his Pontiac Grand Am, and headed east on the Trans-Canada Highway.

Pete had not planned on stopping in Rainbow, New Brunswick. In fact, he was speeding right by it at about one hundred and thirty kilometers an hour, when officer Walt Steeves pulled him over.

Damn it, thought Pete. Shit, shit, shit.

The officer approached the car as Pete watched him in his side view mirror. Pete thought the man looked a little overweight to be a cop, but maybe the qualifications were a little more relaxed out here, or maybe things appeared larger in the side view mirror than they actually were.

Afternoon, said Walt. License and registration please.

Pete had his wallet at the ready and he reached in and pulled out both pieces of information and handed them to the officer.

Where you headed? Whenever he wrote out tickets, Walt liked to make small talk.

East, replied Pete.

Well, you’re going in the right direction. How far east?

I’ll probably stop in Prince Edward Island.

That’d be a good idea. Otherwise you’ll be in the friggin’ ocean. Walt walked around to the rear of Pete’s car to get the license number, then he approached the car window again. I see you’re an Upper Canadian.

I’m a what?

An Upper Canadian. You’re from Ontario.

Oh, yes. Yes, I am.

I also see your inspection sticker’s expired. Walt tapped the little blue sticker on Pete’s front windshield with his pen.

Shit, Pete thought. He hadn’t even noticed that his safety inspection was three months overdue. He had been preoccupied with the divorce. I’m sorry, Officer. I forgot all about it. I’ll get it renewed as soon as I get to where I’m going.

Oh, you’ll get it renewed a lot sooner than that, Jim, Walt said, tearing the ticket off and handing it to Pete. Follow me. There’s a service station bout’ a mile from here.

But, I’m . . . . Pete didn’t finish his sentence. He was going to say he was in a hurry. He had to be somewhere. But, he wasn’t, and he didn’t. Why not get the car inspected here? What the hell else did he have to do? He followed Officer Steeves to an exit that said ‘Rainbow Business District.’ The fact is, this was the only exit to Rainbow, so whether you were going to the business district or the suburbs or the Rainbow Golf and Country Club, this was the exit you took. The exit turned onto Nylander Street, where they passed a small park with a large gazebo in the center of it. Moran Park, named after the town’s first mayor, Lowell Moran.

At the first stop sign they turned left onto Main Street and about five hundred yards down the road, Pete saw what he assumed must be the business district. They passed Proctor’s Electric, a Sobey’s grocery store, a medical center housing the offices of an optometrist, two general practitioners, and a dentist, Doctor Duffy Higgenson. There was a Tim Horton’s Donuts, Ingersoll’s Hardware, The Frying Dutchman, Doug Petty’s La-Z-Boy Furniture Store, and a wealth of trees. Pete was impressed with how the town seemed to have taken the care to leave plenty of trees on their main thoroughfare. He knew they weren’t newly planted because they were big elm trees. Had to be a hundred years old, these trees. And they seemed to separate the businesses from one another. Tim Horton’s, elm tree, hardware store, elm tree, furniture store, elm tree.

Nice, thought Pete.

At the end of the business district where Main Street ended and split into two different streets, Holly Street and Koonary Road, was Glen Makarides’ Esso Station. It was situated right smack in the middle of the fork, with entrances off both Holly and Koonary. A prime location for a gas station.

Walt Steeves climbed out of his cruiser and was greeted by Glen Makarides himself. Glen was in his fifties but looked seventy. He wore coveralls, and had a cigarette in is mouth with an ash that was a good inch long.

Got an inspection for you, Glen. Can you fit me in?

Sure thing, said Glen. Put him into the second bay. He didn’t remove his cigarette when he spoke and the ash didn’t drop.

Walt waved to Pete and pointed to the second bay of the garage where Glen was opening the door. Glen turned and directed Pete in until his car was perfectly situated over the hoist. Pete got out of the Grand Am and walked to the rear end where he found Glen staring at his license plate.

From Upper Canada, huh?

Yeah. Toronto, said Pete.

Well, I won’t hold that against you, Glen smiled and hit the lever that raised the hoist. This’ll take bout’ a half hour. The ash dropped onto his coveralls and Glen brushed it away casually, as if it was a common occurrence.

Might as well have a seat, came Walt Steeves’ voice from the other bay.

Pete turned around to find the officer sitting in a green and white checkered lawn chair just inside the number one service bay door. This was Pete’s introduction to a quaint Rainbow custom. For some reason, as Pete was to find out, many Rainbow citizens liked to sit on lawn chairs in their garages and watch the traffic pass by out on the street. It was as if they wanted to go outside, but not all the way outside. So, Pete sat himself down in the lawn chair next to Walt Steeves and they passed the wait with some small talk. Every once in a while, Walt would wave to somebody driving by out on Holly Street and they would honk their horn and wave back. One of them even waved to Pete and Pete obligingly waved back.

Who was that? Pete asked.

Laura Pooley’s girl, Rachel. Been out west for a few years. Probably thinks you’re somebody she should know.

Pete had just been introduced to his second quaint Rainbow custom. Everybody in Rainbow was referred to as their parent’s children. Bob Trimble’s boy, Charlie, Harry Kirk’s boy, Gordie, etc.. And so, even though Rachel Pooley was thirty-five years old and had three children of her own, she was still Laura Pooley’s girl, Rachel, and she would remain so until Laura passed away, at which time Rachel would acquire her own identity.

As the half hour inspection turned into an hour, Pete discovered that Walt was very easy to talk to, as Walt would prove years later by talking that jumper down off the bridge to Dartmouth. Pete began to wonder if everybody in this town was as easy going and friendly as this forty-something police officer with the sizeable girth. Wouldn’t hurt to find out, he thought.

By the time the inspection was finished, Pete had decided to stay overnight in Rainbow. That one night turned into the next eleven years of his life.

*

Tell me this, Pete, said The Frying Dutchman, still fiddling with the hue situation on the Magnavox. How in the hell does a kid growing up in the family that he grew up in, turn out to be so smart?

Beats me. He just got lucky I guess.

Of course, he is adopted. Probably helps that he didn’t inherit his old man’s brain matter.

Couldn’t hurt.

And now he’s going to be on Jeopardy. Gonna be right up there on my television set. Right there. Unbelievable. Henry paused for a moment, as he stared up at a car commercial out of Bangor. He’s Canadian, you know. The host? Alex Trebek?

Yes, I knew that, said Pete. He stared up at the car commercial too. A man wearing what appeared to be a Superman’s cape over a grey double-breasted suit was shouting into the camera.

We’ll take anything for a trade-in!! Anything!! Drag it in!! Push it in!! Pull it in!! Just get it down here to Super Manny Kerwin’s Ford today! That’s Super Manny Kerwin’s Ford, where we put the satisfy in satisfaction!!

Henry paused again. He wasn’t one to speak without thinking. There is no satisfy in satisfaction.

No, there isn’t, agreed Pete.

What a stupid fuck.

Pete checked his watch. Seven-twenty. He would be off duty at eight o’clock. He and Wood had been working in eight hour shifts since the rest of the force moved away. Wood had come on duty at four a.m. today, then Pete took over at noon. Wood was scheduled to work from eight p.m. until four a.m., and then it would be Pete’s turn for the early morning shift. This system seemed fair to both men. Besides, things were slow in Rainbow on most days, and there were plenty of opportunities to grab an hour’s nap on the cot at the police station, so the men were never overtaxed by the schedule.

Slow tonight, Henry, said Pete, looking around the empty diner.

Well, sure it is. Everybody’s home watching Mickey.

Pete sipped his coffee. Good, he thought to himself. This will be a slow night even by Rainbow’s standards. Maybe Wood can make use of that cot tonight.

He had no idea how wrong he was.

 -2-

It was eleven months ago that twenty-five year old Mickey Welton had heard that the television game show, Jeopardy, was going to be holding a contestant search in Bangor, Maine, which is about two hours south of Rainbow. Mickey decided that he would like to try out for the show because he had always done well at the game while sitting in front of the television at home, and after all, how different could it be with millions of people watching you, and two socially-stunted eggheads trying to buzz in ahead of you? So, without telling his parents, Jack and Myrna, and under the pretense of driving his younger sister, Peggy, down to the Bangor Mall to buy some shoes for the upcoming Teens Against Tuberculosis charity dance – a title which would indicate that there were some teens out there who were pro tuberculosis – Mickey headed south with Peggy to take part in the auditions. The reason for not telling his parents was simple; If his father knew that Mickey was going down there, and if Mickey didn’t win a spot on the show, then Jack would ridicule the boy. It wasn’t that Jack Welton was mean-spirited. He simply didn’t know any better. Ridicule was a big part of his growing up and he was just passing it on.

I’m nervous, Peg, Mickey said as he wheeled the family’s blue Toyota four-door into the parking lot of the Superior Bangor Hotel. The Superior was where the contestant search was being held, and prominently displayed over the front entrance of the hotel was a banner that read Welcome Jeopardy Hopefuls.

You’re gonna do good, Mickey, said Peggy. I mean, Jesus, you’re the smartest guy in Rainbow.

Yeah, well being the smartest guy in Rainbow is like being the prettiest girl in Rainbow. It isn’t saying much.

It took Peggy a good fifteen seconds before a light went on and she said, Hey! I am the prettiest girl in Rainbow. And she was too.

They walked into the hotel lobby, Mickey, wearing his only suit, the one he would be wearing on television if he made the cut, and Peggy wearing tight jeans and a tight orange top that emphasized her splendid physical gifts and made her bright red hair seem almost fluorescent. Mickey was feeling very much like Gomer Pyle must have felt the first time he left the filling station in Mayberry and headed up to Mount Pilot. Peggy didn’t feel that way at all. Peggy felt as if she belonged anywhere and everywhere. They say that it’s not unusual for siblings to be as different as night and day the way Mickey and Peggy were. In this case though, there was a simple explanation for it. Both Mickey and Peggy were adopted. Mickey, when he was two years old, and Peggy, three years later when she was one

The two Welton children looked around the hotel lobby. They were about to ask the desk clerk for directions to the Jeopardy room, when Peggy noticed a sign over by a set of stairs on the other side of the lobby. The sign read simply, ‘Jeopardy’, and a red arrow pointed up the staircase. Mickey and Peggy climbed to the top of the stairs where they saw a smaller ‘Jeopardy’ sign with another arrow pointing down a hallway. This sign led them to a large meeting room, outside of which they found a skinny man with thick, black-rimmed glasses seated at a fold-up table. It was the kind of flimsy table that Mickey and Peggy’s parents and their friends used to play Hearts on up at the camp every summer. The sign on the desk said ‘Jeopardy contestants sign up here.’

Is this where you sign up to become a Jeopardy contestant? Mickey asked.

The man looked at Mickey for a moment, then down at the sign on his desk, and then back at Mickey.

Are you sure you want Jeopardy? Wheel of Fortune’s gonna be here next month. Why don’t you wait for them?

The man’s sarcasm was not lost on Peggy. He wants Jeopardy, thank you.

If you say so.

The skinny man looked at Peggy. She had seen that look before. It was usually followed by drool. Still looking at Peggy, the man spoke to Mickey. What’s your name, Sport?

Mickey Welton.

The man took his eyes off Peggy’s chest long enough to write Mickey’s name down on a master list and then handed Mickey a booklet measuring eight by ten.

This is your test. You’ve got twenty-five minutes. Right through there. Pencils are inside. The man pointed to the door behind him. He was looking at Peggy again.

Thanks, said Mickey, and he took two measured steps toward the door.

As Peggy moved to follow her brother, the skinny man held his hand up to her.

Hang on, Rosemary. Only people taking the test are allowed inside.

Oh. Peggy looked at Mickey and gave him a thumbs up sign. Good luck. I’ll wait for you down in the lobby.

Mickey tried to force a confident grin, but failed miserably and then disappeared into the ‘Jeopardy’ suite.

The skinny man had not taken his eyes off Peggy. He looked at the attractive young redhead like a shark looking at a bucket of chum. You can wait out here with me if you like, he said.

I’d rather crap glass, said Peggy, and with those parting words, she retired to the lobby.

The two basic steps to qualify as a Jeopardy contestant are 1) taking a fifty question test, and for those that pass the test, 2) playing a mock game. If you pass the test and do well in the mock game, you are put in the active file for the current tape year. Being put in the active file, however, does not guarantee that you will be invited to appear on the show. That day at the Superior Bangor Hotel, Mickey passed the test with flying colors, and he did very well in the mock game too. He won it, in fact. But, he was still surprised when, in March of the following year, he received a telephone call from a member of the Jeopardy staff asking if he could be in Los Angeles for a taping in June. He had made it! He was going to be on Jeopardy!!

I don’t understand, said Myrna, when Mickey gave his mother the news. You’re going to be on Jeopardy?

That’s right, said Mickey.

Well, when did you audition for this show?

In October, when I drove Peggy down to Bangor to get some shoes.

Oh? Myrna was puzzled. She looked at Mickey and then at Peggy. Well, did you get the shoes?

Yes, mum, replied Peggy.

Oh, good.

Mickey’s father was equally dismayed by the news that his son was going to be on nationwide television.

Are you sure they got the right Mickey Welton? Jack said over dinner that night. The Welton family dinners were never eaten at the dining room table, but on t.v. trays in the living room.

Dad, it’s me. They got the right one.

Well, how do you like that? Gawd-damn. So, this test was pretty easy then, was it?

Not really.

For Mickey it was, said Peggy. Because he’s the smartest guy in this whole town.

He certainly is, added Myrna, and she reached out and rubbed Mickey’s arm lovingly.

Yeah, well let’s not forget one fact, said Jack. Population nine-thousand.

And so with that brand of encouragement from his father, twenty-four year old Mickey Welton headed off to Los Angeles for the taping. He had never traveled this far in his young life. The occasional trip to Bangor and one excursion to Montreal to see the Canadiens play were the extent of Mickey’s worldliness. He had a chance to go to the University of Toronto when he finished high school, but with his family living on only Jack’s salary as a cable installer for the local cable t.v. outlet, Mickey decided it was best to get a job and pitch in. He had been working selling furniture at Doug Petty’s La-Z-Boy for the past three years.

Mickey had prepared well for Jeopardy. He read every trivia book he could get his hands on. He even enlisted the services of Bonnie Hoyt, a local high school teacher, to help him get ready. Bonnie helped Mickey in the areas of English Literature and American History. Mickey had watched a lot of Jeopardy and he knew that those two categories came up quite a bit in one form or another. Mickey’s own specialties were sports, television, and geography, so he figured between the two of them, he and Bonnie had all the bases covered. Mickey was determined not to humiliate himself on national television, so he and Bonnie worked together three times a week for three straight months to make sure that would not happen.

When Mickey returned from Los Angeles that June, Jack and Myrna and Peggy were waiting for him at the Bangor airport. (It was much cheaper to fly out of Bangor than Fredericton or Saint John.) Mickey gave his mom and Peggy hugs, and said hi to Jack, and of course they all wanted to know how he did on the show, but he couldn’t tell them. He was not allowed to tell anybody the outcome of the match. This was one of the stipulations outlined in the Jeopardy agreement that Mickey had to sign before he taped the show.

What the hell do you mean you can’t tell us? said Jack as they waited by the luggage carousel.

I can’t. It’s the Jeopardy rules.

Jeopardy rules? Screw the Jeopardy rules. Did you bring any money back or not?

I can’t tell you.

Aw, for chrissake.

A woman standing beside the Welton’s at the carousel became interested in the conversation. I’m sorry. I couldn’t help overhearing. Were you on Jeopardy?

Yes. I just got back from taping in Los Angeles, replied Mickey.

Oh, isn’t that exciting? Well, congratulations. Did you have a good time?

Yes, very nice, thank you.

When is the show going to be broadcast?

September the twenty-first.

Oh, well, I’ll have to tune it in.

You do that, Mrs. Buttinsky, Jack said. Now, do you mind if I continue my conversation with my son?

Mickey, Peggy and Myrna all looked away, as if this action would disassociate them from the man who was embarrassing them in public once again. Mrs. Buttinsky moved to the other side of the carousel. Mickey, Peggy and Myrna watched as the luggage began to drop. Jack was saying something about the ineptitude of the airport baggage handlers, but his family members blocked out his words. They just wanted to get away from there as quickly as they could. More luggage dropped, and with each piece that wasn’t Mickey’s, Mickey, Peggy and Myrna died a little inside.

*

When the evening of September the twenty-first rolled around, the Welton family was gathered in the living room of their modest two storey home on Bagnell Street. Mickey, Peggy, Jack, Myrna and Gran Welton, the family matriarch sat staring at the television, and in the den, just off the living room, sat Buster, the dementia-ridden patriarch of the Welton tribe. Buster, approaching his seventy-seventh birthday, preferred the comfort of his big old La-Z-Boy chair and the reassurance of his black and white t.v. set. In Buster’s mind, he was still living in an age before the advent of color television, and certainly no one would begrudge him the solace that he found in his memories of the old days.

So, there they sat, with only fifteen minutes to go before Mickey’s name would be etched into the Rainbow history books for all eternity. Jeopardy would be coming on at seven-thirty on WLBZ-TV, the NBC affiliate in Bangor, Maine.

Come on, Mickey, Jack implored, Surely to God you can tell us how you did now.

It’ll be on in fifteen minutes, Dad, said Mickey stubbornly. You can’t wait fifteen minutes to find out?

Well, I don’t know why you can’t tell us. What are they going to do, send the game show police up here to arrest you? Jack took a defiant pull on his bottle of beer as if to say, "I’ll bet you don’t have an answer for that one, Mr. Smartest Man In The Whole