Drunks, Gentlemen & Hats !

He is built like a barn door, and has eyes as dead as only a barn door should have . Yet those eyes are alive, and alert enough to pick up the most imperceptible of the nods that his customers give him from time to time.

You give him a nod, and he gets you a refill. You gesticulate a scrawl in the air and he brings your bill. You tip him and he accepts it as though he is doing you a favor. The beer isn’t cold enough, you trash him, and he simply shrugs. He never cracks a smile, never even frowns. You’d think he is a robot. Until. . .

A guy sitting on the next table, pickled to his gills , gets up and staggers to the door. Mr. Robot quickly gives him a hand , and whispers something in his ear. I haven’t the vaguest what he has said , but can see that it is not taken very kindly by the drunk. The Robot collects a resounding slap from the drunk, but shrugs it off as nonchalantly as you’d shoo a fly away. He then snuggles close to the drunk, dips his hand deftly into the drunk’s pocket, grabs something and pockets it himself. This action is over in two seconds flat, but I am sober enough to catch it. The drunk hasn’t a hope in hell of having a say against this big, pick-pocketing brute, and gives up. The Robot half drags, half carries the drunk out of the pub and is back in five minutes.

I have had enough of this place. What the heck, I say. If the waiters are pickpockets, the Manager must surely be a bank robber. One hefty slug of my beer, and I set the glass down. I gesticulate a scrawl in the air, and the brute brings my bill. I put down the exact amount today. No way am I going to tip this conniving scoundrel today. In fact not ever. Sober as I think I am , I must be just a tad tipsy, because otherwise I would never start anything I can’t finish with a man twice my size and more. As I brush past him, I whisper in his ear “Try and pull that pickpocket number on me, and see where it gets you !” His dead-fish eyes see right through me, and he shrugs. He shrugs a little too much for my liking, I decide, and go out the door. I have taken but a few steps towards the Rickshaw-stand, when I feel a hand on my shoulder. A rather heavy hand, needless to say. ‘Payback time’ I mutter to myself and curse myself silently for the caper I had just pulled back in there. One thing you have to say for it when you are two beers down, is that while you are drunk enough to do something ever so slightly silly, you are also sober enough to summon some fleet-footedness when the chips are down. But before I could think of brushing the hand off my shoulder and legging it, he spoke. “I most certainly would have picked your pocket too, sir!” He said. “Had you too been drunk enough to insist upon driving home all by yourself in that condition. And you too would’ve been packed off in a cab already paid for. I swiped just his car keys, and bundled him off home. And yes, before you ask, I was a top-notch, thorough-bred pickpocket before I was busted. I did my time, and straightened up enough to land this job!” More than the relief of the feeling that this situation is not going to turn hostile, remorse fills me up. I offer him my hand, he shakes it vigorously, and gives me a warm hug. And before we part ways, he throws in a rejoinder. “That little demo of my craft back in there, Sir ! That was never meant to be hidden, in case you are lavishing compliments upon yourself on how well you can hold your beer. I am a reformed alcoholic myself , and know my levels of quantities and buzz only too well. Two beers are enough for a man to get his wallet picked and not know it!”

He handed me my wallet. I didn’t have a hat on to take it off to him.