Allen Collins called on his cell phone from North Dakota on July 15.
“Mr. Ben, I got a problem.”
Allen had just finished successfully a two-year program at a community college. This summer he would decide whether to go on for a bachelor’s degree or take a job in the quail plantation economy where he had grown up as the son of a plantation manager. He was torn between the two futures, for he had worked beside his father since childhood and loved everything about the quail plantation world, especially the dogs and horses. His father was a close friend of Ben and Sam, as were many in the unique culture of Southwest Georgia, where very rich and very poor and all those between of several races blended in unique harmony fostered by many, including not insignificantly Ben and Sam.
“What is the problem, Allen?”
“Well, as I think you know I drove up here a week ago with four horses, two broke and two green, and a deal to break derbies and start puppies for Mr. Kline. He was going to have twenty hauled up here this week, but he just called and said he wasn’t. Said his wife wouldn’t come up here with him in six weeks to see them worked and compete in a couple trials, she’s too scared of the Covid and maybe he is too. He said it’s an Act of God so he does not owe me anything.”
Ben’s blood boiled. He knew Kline, a Come Here to Georgia who had flown in from Silicon Valley after unloading a Unicorn on an unsuspecting buyer and escaped with hundreds of millions of dollars, using some to buy a quail plantation. Sam said a Unicorn was a start-up technology company worth a billion dollars, more than Ben could contemplate much less understand.
“Where are you staying, Allen?” Ben asked.
“I’m at the rented property my dad had helped me line up, a thousand acres of mixed prairie pasture and fallow crop land up here in the North part of the State near Canada and Montana.”
“Let me see what I can do. Can you hold on a couple days?
“Sure. The kid who was going to haul the dogs up was supposed to stay and work with me but he’s not coming now.”
“We’ll see what we might turn up.”
When Allen hung up, Ben called Sam. “Got time for lunch? Need your help with a problem.”
“Yea. Meet you at Millie’s.”
The Curmudgeons ducked into the back booth and Millie handed them a menu.
“What can I get you, Sweeties”
They saw catfish and pointed to it simultaneously.
“Slaw and greens?” They nodded. She had sweet tea on the way.
“What’s the problem?” Sam asked.
“Allen Collins is stuck up in North Dakota, no dogs to train. That new comer Fred Kline who bought Big Bend Plantation reneged on a deal to send him twenty derbies and puppies to start and train. We need to call in some chips and get him some to break.”
Before they had finished their catfish and the berry pie with ice cream special, the curmudgeons had made a list of plantation owners or their managers who owed one or both of them some favor and that they might lean on to get a pup or derby to send up to Allen. They divided up the calls to make tonight.
“How we going to get the dogs up there to Allen?” Sam asked when they finished the list.
“I’ll call that fellow Kline, threaten to sue him if he doesn’t send one of his minions up there with the dogs and to stay til the end of September and help Allen bring them back.”
Sam smiled. “Let me call him. I just cured him of something embarrassing.”