there were two little booths in the coffee shop and billy wynn and ray rainey were waiting in one of them.
maria got a cup of coffee and a doughnut at the counter and took them over to the booth.
billy had his cowboy hat on the seat beside him, so maria sat beside ray. this gave her a view of the bus through the front door.
there were two other passengers from the bus seated apart from each other. at the counter. and a waitress. otherwise, the place was empty.
maria could see bill, the driver, through the glass door, standing outside smoking.
rainey turned and looked at maria through his thick glasses. “well?’ he asked maria. “what have you got for us?”
“it’s about money,” maria began.
“what isn’t?’ asked billy.
“money that is rightfully mine,” maria continued.
billy snorted at this and started to say something, but ray held up his hand. “just let her tell her story.”
“i was born an orphan child,” maria began, “ in a palace that was rightfully mine, under the bluest skies in the world, and the whitest clouds.
my father was a mighty hunter, who had been killed a few months before i was born, by the biggest hungriest tiger in the world, whom he had sworn to kill or die trying.
my mother died a minute before i was born so i was born to a dead woman. in the kingdom where i was born, this meant that i was cursed. the priests and archbishop of the kingdom declared that i was cursed.
when my mother was buried beside my father, my evil aunt and even more evil grandmother send me away, to an orphanage in a cave in the himalayas, where i was treated horribly.
but i escaped and lived in the mountains with a tribe of wild half-men, half-apes.
then i was taken in by monks, in the oldest monastery in the world, located in a cave in deepest china, where i learned many things.
when the war broke out and the japanese invaded china, i escaped to shanghai and then to alaska where i panned for gold, and then down to san francisco.
while all this was going on, hitler invaded my rightful kingdom, and my grandmother and aunt escaped to america with all their gold and fabulous jewels.”
“that’s a lot of escapes,” billy interrupted maria. “everybody escaping every which way.”
“that’s what life is,” maria replied. “you just keep escaping and escaping until you can’t escape any more.”
rainey had kept a straight face . “go on,” he told maria. “i hope you are getting to the point, because we have to get back on the bus, remember.”
“darn!” maria exclaimed. “that reminds me, i still have to buy - you fellows excuse me for a minute.”
maria got up and headed back to the ticket office.
to her relief, there was an old man - no doubt the “preacher” - now behind the counter.
back in the coffee shop billy and rainey looked at each other and laughed.
“i bet she was in the circus,” said billy.
“i bet she was too, “ said rainey.
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