Lucky Strike

By the time that Leo and Stanley met, the Bittenhopper’s had been in Bakersfield for over a decade.  Ben was content in his surroundings and job, making enough money to get by and enjoy just a few select luxuries that he favored such as smoking Lucky Strike cigarettes and going to the movies.  He had in fact just returned from seeing The Flying Ace when he interrupted Leo and Stanley’s first meeting.  As he walked back from the theater he remembered that there was a piece of unfinished work that Stanley had promised to complete by the next day and he decided to stop by his son’s clock repair shed to remind him.  As much as he disliked going to the place, he just planned to duck his head in the door for a minute to speak to Stanley.  As he did so he observed Leo, a stranger to him of course, standing by the work bench although no one else was in sight.

The Flying Ace

“You here getting work done by my boy?” Ben asked.

“If you mean the clockmaker here, well, not exactly but I stopped by to talk to him.  You’re his Dad?”

“Where is he then?”

Leo motioned toward the darker area at the back of the shop.  Several seconds later Stanley emerged with a clock in his hands.

“Hey Dad, what are you doing here?”

“Just stopping for a second to remind you about that work for Jack Peters.  He’s coming for it tomorrow so you better get over to our place and get it done.  Who’s this fella?” 

“I’ll get it done, I said I would.  You better go before you get the vapors or something,” Stanley replied in a friendly but mocking tone, a small smirk on his face.

“Funny boy, very funny.  This fella?  Who is he?”

“What’s it to you?” Leo asked before Stanley could reply.

“I just ain’t seen you around before and I wondered.  Nothing wrong with being new, we all were at one point or another around here.  I just like knowin’ the people, that’s all.”

“Le, umm, yes,  Lee’s my name and I’m just here for a bit, shouldn’t be anyone you need to remember anyway.”  Internally, Leo scolded himself for almost blowing his alias which could have been an issue as he had introduced himself to Stanley very clearly as Lee O’Dare.  

Ben started closing the door and called back over his shoulder, “Don’t you forget that work Stanley.” 

Once he was gone Leo let out a low laugh.  “Kind of rough on you, huh?  Treats you like a kid.”

“It’s always that way, but he’s not a bad character.  Just sees me as a youngster still I guess.  We work together, me and him, gold and silver stuff mostly.  He’s right though about that other job, I really need to close up here.  This one will work for you, I think.”  He extended the small clock he had in his hands to Leo, who took it and gave it a quick glance before nodding.  “It’ll do.  How much?”

“I have to say that I don’t get many folks that come here just to buy a clock.  I’m not really a seller you know?  I just fix ‘em for people.”

“Yeah, well I like used things and I heard about you when I was asking around town about some other business ventures I’m looking into.  It peaked my interest.”

“What did?” Stanley replied, an openly quizzical look on his face.

“The work you do, I mean, mostly the stuff with your Dad I guess.  I heard you two were goldsmiths but I figured you might be more interested than he would be in a business proposition I might have for you.”

“Fixing clocks?”

“Not, not that at all.”

Stanley still looked puzzled and stayed that way as Leo paid him for the clock and then left after saying, “It’s just an idea for now but I will come around and we can get to know each other a little better.  Maybe then we can discuss business.”

Over the course of several more visits and some additional time the two of them spent hanging out together around Bakersfield Leo confirmed several key factors about Stanley.  One was that he did not have much of a conscience when it came to small crimes that did not seem to hurt anyone.  He even admitted that on occasion he had pulled a minor scam on customers that irritated him, were too demanding or whom he just did not like.  This usually involved substituting inferior material in some piece of metal work or inflating the price on a simple job.  He had to be careful of course as his father was a completely honest business man, so the opportunities had been few and far between up to this point.  It also became apparent that Stanley was not happy with his own lot in life, wanting to make more money and have better things.  He also very much wanted to woo one, or preferably some, of the pretty ladies he saw around town or who came to him with repair work.  He figured he needed money to do that properly.  And lastly, although older, Stanley was willing to have Leo, or Lee as he knew him, be the captain of their operation.  

That operation was one that Leo had developed as he sought out opportunities for a viable criminal enterprise in Bakersfield.   He was determined to find a way to run his own operation, to be his own man and not have to work for anyone else, preferably ever again.  He was tired of the demands, rules and betrayals he had experienced at the hands of those he had worked for previously and believed this move to the west coast was his chance to establish himself as a top operator.  Initially nothing had presented itself other than offers to work for other criminal operations, all of which he had turned down.  Then one day, while he was sitting outside of a bar and smoking a cigarette, he observed a local scam artist selling pyrite to an unsuspecting traveler who believed it to be gold.  Although he had no intention of getting into that swindle, a fortuitously overhead conversation the next day did give him another, similar idea.  That discussion happened to be between two men at the general store and it centered on the idea of electroplating.  Leo was unfamiliar with the term but he gathered enough to realize that it generally involved making things that were not gold or silver look like they were in fact those precious metals.  He probably would not have connected that idea with profit if he had not observed the pyrite scam the day before, but the beginning of an idea now formed in his head.  All he needed was a qualified and willing tradesman, one who needed money, had few scruples and was willing to work for Leo.  In Stanley, he had found such a man.  

…to be continued