Familiaris

by David Wroblewski

The Beast—known to the world as Alfons Svoboda—fancied himself a Colossus of the New World sort, Rooseveltian and bootstrappian. He spoke not to a person but to an audience of one, and his stories portrayed a man bestriding the vast agricultural-industrial Midwest, wholly self-made, worldly, canny, adventurous, capable of heights of idealism one instant and bare-knuckled negotiation the next—a human electromagnet reorienting the iron filings in the souls of his fellow men. Autobiography tended to erupt from The Beast in the evenings, when his constitutional bourbon was in full circulation, and thus evenings were when Mary was liable to point out to The Beast that his aspect was more Taftian than Rooseveltian, the likely source of any detectable awe among the populace. Also, that what he was was a cash register salesman.