With: Mr. Kaufman, maybe Miriam if she's around?
Location: The Kaufman Butcher shop
When: Late July/Early August, 1876 (soon after Bridget goes to live with the Wentworths)
Time of Day: Morning
Brendan stopped outside the butcher shop, took off his hat, and pushed open the door. "Mr. Kaufman?" he called. How had it come to this? Asking for a job slaughtering and dismembering the very animals he'd used to care for? He reminded himself it wouldn't just be cows. It might be pigs and chickens, too. Like that made it any better. But, if he was hired here, he would at least have a job. That would get him one step closer to Bridget.
He hadn't tried to see Bridget yet because he'd realized Mrs. Wentworth wasn't the type to allow any sort of nonsense. She probably thought he was a no-account delinquent, anyway. Well, he'd show her. He'd get a job and prove that he was at least worthy to visit Bridget and talk with her for a while.
But getting a job had proven to be more difficult than he expected -- no one wanted to hire a (rumored) murderer and former Evergreen hand -- and so he'd ended up here. Maybe the Jewish Mr. Kaufman would be sympathetic to his plight, although being shunned because you were Jewish and being shunned because of your bad choices were two completely different kettles of fish.
Storyteller / Shared NPC
The Kaufmann Butcher Shop was quite new and built along the fashion of the place Mr. Ezekiel Kaufmann once worked in back in New York City. There were plenty of hooks from which hung various animal carcasses on the side walls. Beneath the main counter was a glass display case with all sorts of sausages, jerky, and other sorts of sliced meat on display. The floor was covered with a thick layer of sawdust which was swept up at the end of every day and replaced in the morning with fresh.
Now, of course, the actual half of the business where the bloody work of slaughtering took place was not in view for the customers, it was grim work and would no doubt upset queasy stomachs of customers. There was also a small basement storage with barrels of salted meat kept as cool as possible.
Into this strange world, stepped in Brendan Connelly.
"Mr. Kaufman?" he called.
From the back a young lad stepped out, clad in a bloody apron, he was maybe eleven, twelve if Brendan had to guess. Not that it mattered.
"Hello, would you like to buy something, sir?" Abraham smiled at the customer.
Brendan had ambled over to the glass case to look at all the meat. With his mouth watering, he scanned the smorgasbord of offerings there. The sight reminded him that it was hard to eat without a job. So far he'd done all right, but he couldn't keep drifting around town aimlessly.
He frowned in bemusement when the young boy walked out. Well, this certainly wasn't Mr. Kaufman. Was it? Arabella had talked about Miriam but hadn't mentioned a boy. If there was a son to help with the business, it wasn't likely that the actual Mr. Kaufman would need him.
"Well..." he hesitated, once again wrestling with pride. Asking around for work wasn't getting any easier even though he was doing it more often. Finally he looked at the boy and gave him a smile. "I was actually hopin' to talk to your Pa. He around?"
He knew this boy surely wouldn't have the authority to hire him, so he needed to talk to the person who could.
Storyteller / Shared NPC
Well..." Finally Brendan looked at the boy and gave him a smile. "I was actually hopin' to talk to your Pa. He around?"
"Sure is, he's in back. Just a minute," the boy seemed quite willing to please then spun about and disappeared into the interior of the building.
It didn't take long before a short solidly built man emerged with the lad following him right up. The man was wearing a full length apron, spattered with blood, and equally bloody work gloves.
"Good day, young man, Abraham said you wish to speak with me?" there was a definite accent there... part New York with a bit of German.
Brendan shifted his weight from foot to foot while he waited for the young man to return. What if the kid just decided not to come back? Not to get Mr. Kaufman? But return he did, in the wake of an older bearded man. Now this was Mr. Kaufman.
"Yeah, I do," he began, then, thinking he should show a little more respect if he wanted a job, he started again. "Yessir, I do. I wanted to see if you needed any extra help around the place. I know my way around animals pretty good."
After making this declaration, he stood staring at Mr. Kaufman's bloody apron, fiddling with the brim of his hat. There wasn't much more he could say. If the man asked who he was -- if he somehow didn't know already -- he would have to be honest. But until he was asked, he didn't feel like volunteering the information.
Storyteller / Shared NPC
Mr. Kaufmann actually approved when the young cowboy, for he certainly looked that part - not a townie, corrected to 'yes sir'. Before he could say anything though Abraham piped up.
"Even dead ones?" the boy grinned.
"Abraham, you stay quiet now. This is between this gentleman and myself. Go back to your duties," the elder Kaufmann frowned, he was a no nonsense type.
"Do not mind him, he needs to know his place," the butcher explained then got back to the real subject of the conversation.
"So extra help, eh? Tell me, before we discuss such things, would it not be more proper if we knew each other by name. Let us start with your name."
Brendan broke into a grin at the young boy's question. He didn't mind the interruption one bit. Before the boy turned to obey his father, he nodded at him. "Mostly live ones, but a couple dead ones."
He'd butchered the odd cow or two during his time as a cowpoke, and he knew enough about the outsides of animals that he figured there wouldn't be much more to the inside of them. But even if he was wrong, he knew he was a fast learner.
Then he focused his attention back on Mr. Kaufman, who had asked the dreaded question. Damn. Well, here went nothing. Locking eyes with the older man, he said clearly, "Brendan Connolly," then hastily tacked on, "sir."
After waiting only a second, he decided to forge ahead. "And you must be Mr. Kaufman? I've heard about you from Arabella Mudd." Well, he'd mostly heard about Miriam. But surely there'd been some tidbits about Mr. Kaufman, too?
Perhaps Arabella was not the best person to reference when in search of a job, but neither was she the worst. Whatever her faults were, she always had others' best interests at heart. Hopefully this Mr. Kaufman had seen Arabella at her best, and not at her worst like Brendan had.
Storyteller / Shared NPC
The elder Kaufmann now wished to know the job seekers name, it always helped to know the name of a person you conversed with.
"Brendan Connolly," then hastily tacked on, "sir."
The name was completely unfamiliar to the veteran butcher but then he did not read the local newspaper.
The young man added, . "And you must be Mr. Kaufman? I've heard about you from Arabella Mudd."
"Ahhh, yes, Miss Mudd, my daughter Miriam's friend," Mr. Kaufmann nodded, his facial expression telling nothing.
"So then, you would start at the bottom. You must be wlling to do any work I give you. If you are...what is the word? Squeamish... or cannot abide at the sight of blood, you will not fit in here," he was blunt alright.
Oddly enough, Mr. Kaufman didn't seem to care about Brendan's name once he'd said it. And he didn't react one way or the other when Brendan mentioned Arabella. Most people had strong reactions to the girl. Well, that was probably for the best.
"I ain't squeamish." He could at least say that truthfully. Lord knew he'd seen more than enough of his share of blood in the past few months, what with first Billy's death and then Crabbe's. There was no reason he couldn't handle cutting up cows and pigs and chickens.
"So you could use the help, then?" he asked, deciding to press his advantage. After all, the butcher had his own son working for him. Unless the family had lots of customers in town, he found it hard to believe that Mr. Kaufman might really need him.
Storyteller / Shared NPC
"I ain't squeamish," the young man declared sounding confident.
"Well, that is good to know. The job does get a bit......messy," Mr. Kauffman nodded, pleased to hear it.
"So you could use the help, then?" asked Brendan.
"Yes, yes I could. My Abraham helps around here of course but his mother and I both want him to go to school, be properly educated. School is during the day, right when my place is open," answered the proprietor.
"Now though, I must see how you do. I will not simply hand you a regular position only to have it all fall thru. You will need to prove yourself. Not simply the work, but being here on time, being willing to both learn and follow my instructions. And getting along with the customers, even the annoying ones."