Ricky Lee

Ricky Lee tends bar at the Red Wheel, a roadhouse on the edge of Hemingford Home, Nebraska, a town so small that its business district makes neighboring Swedholm look like New York City. He is a fixture of Ben Hanscom's weekly routine: every Friday night Ben comes in for two beers, every Saturday for four or five, always leaving the same five-dollar tip under his beer stein. Over the years, Ricky Lee has come to count on these visits, and Ben has become far and away his favorite customer—not just for the steady ten dollars a week and the fifty left under the stein each Christmas, but for the man's company itself, which Ricky Lee considers worthwhile company, a rarity in a honky-tonk where talk always comes cheap.

The Night of the Call

On the evening of May 28th, 1985, Ricky Lee is surprised to see Ben Hanscom walk into the Red Wheel on a weeknight. Ben looks pale and distracted, and when Ricky Lee reaches for the Olympia tap, Ben stops him. Ricky Lee sets the stein down and walks back over, alarmed by the look on Ben's face—not stage fright or a virus, but the look of a man who has just taken a terrible blow. Ben tells him he has received bad news from home, and when Ricky Lee asks what his bar whiskey is, Ben orders a steinful of Wild Turkey. Ricky Lee pours it, the neck of the bottle chattering against the rim, and declares the drink on the house.

Ben then demonstrates a trick he learned from Peruvian Indians: he squeezes raw lemon juice into his nostrils, then drinks a third of the whiskey in one go. The lemon juice makes his eyes tear and his face flush, but the whiskey goes down without him feeling it. He repeats the process, drinking two more big swallows, and then another gulp, until he has consumed most of the stein. Ricky Lee, horrified, tries to stop him, but Ben insists the damage has been done.

The Gift and the Farewell

Ben reaches into his vest pocket and produces three cartwheel silver dollars—1921, 1923, and 1924—which he insists on giving to Ricky Lee's three boys. Ricky Lee protests, but Ben is insistent. He explains that there used to be four silver dollars, but he gave one to Stuttering Bill and the others long ago. Ricky Lee is fascinated by the coins, knowing they are worth far more than their face value in pure silver alone.

Ben drains the stein and, though he should be flat on his keister, his eyes remain sober. He tells Ricky Lee that he is flying tonight—not driving the plane himself, but taking United Airlines. When Ricky Lee asks where he is going, Ben looks thoughtfully down at the old scar on his belly—the letter "H" carved there by Henry Bowers when they were kids—and says he is going home. He gives the silver dollars to Ricky Lee's kids and slips out into the night.

The Aftermath

Ricky Lee watches Ben's Cadillac pull out of the dirt lot, its taillights dwindling away to red points down Highway 63. Annie, the waitress, scolds him for letting a man who has taken on a boxcar full of booze drive away, but Ricky Lee shakes his head. He tells her he doesn't think Ben will kill himself, though the way he looked tonight, it might be better for him if he did. He adds that he doesn't think they are ever going to see that old boy again.

Ricky Lee's fear is rooted in a memory: Gresham Arnold, a rumdum of local repute, had come into the Red Wheel one night, sweet as horehound candy, set up drinks for the house, and then gone home and hanged himself with his belt in an upstairs closet. Ben Hanscom's eyes that night had looked a little bit like Gresham Arnold's eyes. Ricky Lee prays to Jesus that he never feels as scared as Ben looked in that moment.