“We do like guns, for self-defense,” Stapler said. “Nothing illegal about that.”
“How about that whole rape thing?” Rae asked. “About how, sometimes it might be a reasonable activity?”
“That’s all theory,” Stapler said, flapping one hand dismissively. To Linstad, he said, “Go back out front, watch the register and send Jason back here. Let’s see what he has to say.”
Linstad went, and a moment later, Jason came through the door. “What’s up?”
Rae explained, and Jason said, “Doesn’t have anything to do with us. I saw that girl on TV, that’s about it.”
Lucas pressed them: they didn’t move. They knew nothing about 1919.
Stapler said, “You know who you oughta talk to, is that Stacy chick on TV.”
Lucas: “That Stacy...”
Stapler waved again. “Whatever her real name is. She’s been all over the media. You guys are running around trying to find 1919 and you wanna know what? The only one making anything off the whole 1919 thing is her. I’m in the coffee shop all day with that TV going on the wall and she’s all over it.”
“She does this thing with her mouth,” Jason said, running histongue around his upper and lower lips. “Like she’s dying to give us all blow jobs. Course, she won’t be giving them to the likes ofus.”
“Easy,” Rae said. “She’s a teenager.”
“Name only,” Stapler said. “She’s coming on like she’s hot to trot and then she’s all, ‘I’m a victim fighting back,’ and she gets those teary eyes. Bullshit. I bet she’s pulling down more money than I’ll make in ten years running this place.”
Another man came through from the front, a hulk, a lard-can head, shoulders a yard wide in a plaid shirt, all of it set above hips barely a foot across, with spindly legs dangling below. He had a voice like a bass guitar: “What the hell? Ron told me you was back here.”
Stapler said, “Hey, Darrell... U.S. Marshals asking about 1919.”
“What? The year?”
“The group, the website.”
Darrell, who was wearing a photographer’s vest, said, “Never heard of it. Are they like us?”
“No...”
Bob asked, “Sir, are you carrying a firearm?”
“Sure, isn’t everybody? I’m all licensed.”
—
LUCAS FOUND HIMSELF CONVINCED. Forlorn Hope was a bunch of sad sacks with guns. He wouldn’t be totally surprised if one of the men went off some day and shot up a store or a newspaper or a school, or was busted for rape, but they probably knew nothing about 1919.
Rae pushed a few more questions out—why the “Woke Café” she asked, and Stapler said that woke people were aware of the various kinds of tyrannies inflicted on individuals by the American culture, including the tyrannies inflicted by women on helpless men.
“I’m not suggesting you do this,” Rae said, “but... you know, you want sex, you go to certain parts of town...”
“Hookers?” Darrell blurted. “We could go to hookers. Some do. But that’s not what we’re looking out for. We want women who want us. We’re entitled to women who want us. Everyone’s entitled to somebody who wants them.”
“Okay,” Rae said. “I don’t see how you solve that problem.”
Darrell was getting angrier. “You think I like being like this? You think any woman gonna want me like this? You think—”
“Whoa, Darrell, save it for the meetings,” Stapler said.
“Fuck it,” Darrell said, and he disappeared back into the café.
Lucas called it off: “Mr. Stapler, I’m sorry we had to bother you, but you see our problem, I hope. If you hear anything at all, please call me; we’d be grateful.”
