Trip to court costs the Hunting Club a well-guided hunt
"I can't wait to hear this story," white-haired Judge Hill said from behind his extremely tall bench.
The Hunting Club members carefully studied the floor, toed the scuffed floorboards of the old courthouse and waited for someone else to say something ... anything.
Doc cleared his throat, and everyone waited for pearls of wisdom to fall from his lips and get us out of trouble.
Instead, he just nudged Delbert P. Axelrod, who said nothing.
"Well," Judge Hill began again. "Ned, maybe you better tell me what happened and why these boys are standing in front of me this evening."
"Yessir," Constable Ned said. "I was driving down Highway 42 when I saw this one right here ..."
He pointed at Delbert.
"... running out of the parking lot of Adolph's motor court wearing nothing but a pair of wool socks, pantyhose and a T-shirt that says 'Alaskan Hookers Work Best.'"
Ned paused when Delbert finally broke his silence. "The shirt really says 'Alaska Hookers, Singles, Doubles or Triples, Have It Your Way.' Rev here brought it back to me from Alaska." He opened the upper part of his coat. "See?"
"Um humm," Judge Hill said. "Since you're the first one to speak, maybe you better tell me about why you were running through the snow in a pair of pantyhose."
Delbert looked at us for help, but we were still too mad at him to say anything, so we just waited.
"All right, see, Rev here started it."
"I did not!" I yelled, but calmed myself when Constable Ned took a step toward me. "I just told you that I heard pantyhose helps you stay warm and keeps you from getting rubbed raw if you ride a horse all day."
"See?" Delbert asked. "There. He said it again. I was a little worried about getting rubbed too much when we rode horses into the back country tomorrow to hunt elk. So Rev here had a pair in his suitcase."
Judge Hill looked at me.
"Ahem," I began. "I had those old pantyhose in an inside pocket of my hunting bag because I carried them on a pheasant hunt a few weeks ago to put the birds in to keep the feathers fresh, so I could have one stuffed."
"Does that work?" Judge Hill asked, suddenly interested.
"Yessir," Wrong Willie agreed. "I've done it for years. You just cut the legs off, slide the bird in head first ..."
"You cut the birds legs off first?" Constable Ned asked.
"No," Doc joined in. "You cut the legs off the pantyhose. If you don't, then you have the panty part all flopping around ..."
"Never mind," Judge Hill interrupted. "Go on, Delbert."
"So we were in the hotel room talking about our elk hunting trip, because I've never been hunting here in Colorado, and I got worried about my legs, so Rev told me about his wife's pantyhose, and I told him I might try them."
"But he was embarrassed about putting on women's foundation garments in front of us," Woodrow chimed in. "And who could blame him, because none of the rest of us would ever be caught in our wife's drawers?"
"They ain't drawers," Jerry Wayne spoke up. "Drawers are different."
"What difference does it make?" Willie instinctively argued, because they've been at it since they were kids. He obviously forgot where he was.
"It will make a lot of difference if the Judge here puts us in jail because Delbert was cross dressing," the Cap'n said.
"I wasn't cross dressing. I just put them on to see if I'd wear them, but the hair on my legs itched real bad and poked through, and I didn't like the look, so I started to sit down and take them off and I lost my balance and fell against the commode. When I did, the tank broke and water shot all over the bathroom, and you know judge, the water up here is really cold in the wintertime."
Judge Hill nodded in agreement.
"So I ran out of the bathroom to get help, but I didn't know how slick wet pantyhose feet are, especially with the socks in them."
"You had your socks on inside of the hose?" Judge Hill asked, making a note on his paper.
"Well, the floor was already cold, so I just slipped them on over my wool socks, and just for the record, I put them on over my boxer shorts, too."
The Cap'n began to snicker. I felt my face flush, because I wanted to laugh too.
"Go on," Judge Hill said, smiling.
"Well, I ran out of the bathroom, and my feet slipped, and I fell and cut Doc's feet out from under him and he fell backwards and ..."
"I landed on my tailbone," Doc growled around the grin on his face. "It still hurts, and I'm getting too old to fall like that."
"Understood and noted," Judge Hill said, writing some more.
"So Doc got up and tried to hit me with his belt, and it smacked across the backs of my thighs and that hurt like fire, so I jumped up on the bed ..."
"And he landed right on my stomach," I said. "Knocked the breath out of me and made me spill my drink, so I kicked at him ..."
"And he fell on the other bed and we bumped heads," Jerry Wayne said, pointing to the lump on his forehead.
"And Jerry Wayne jumped up and swung at Delbert," Woodrow said.
"And Delbert ran out the door and across the parking lot," I said.
"And that's when I picked them up and brought them in," Constable Ned said, wrapping up our story for us.
We were all snickering and grinning like idiots when the Judge broke out in loud guffaws, causing Constable Ned to laugh. We joined in with full laughter.
We didn't laugh, though, about the fine for public lewdness, fighting, disturbing the peace, destruction of private property or the court costs, but the Judge was a pretty good guy and told us where the elk were holed up in a little valley just out of town.
The Cap'n totaled it up, and the fines were slightly less than the cost of a guide, so we figured it was a wash.
I just wish he'd given me back those pantyhose, because the wife didn't know I'd taken her last new pair.
Reavis Wortham's e-mail address is r.wortham@tx.rr.com.
Share this story:
Google
Yahoo
digg
del.icio.us
facebook
Slashdot
