“Back in my day,” the old man cackled, spitting a stream of tobacco juice that narrowly missed a passing chicken, “we had a feller in our town by the name of Leo Smoot, though most folks called him ‘Lyin’ Leo’ for the pure and simple reason that the man would climb a tree and tell three lies before he’d stand flatfooted on the ground and tell the truth.
It wasn’t malicious, you understand. Leo was a craftsman. He didn’t lie to cheat you, he lied for the same reason a bird sings—because it was his nature, and he was damn good at it. His lies were works of art, grand and ornate as a courthouse clock. The unvarnished truth was just too plain and poorly furnished for a man of Leo’s expansive imagination.
Why, he once told the Widow Jenkins that the reason his cow only gave buttermilk was because she’d been frightened by a churn as a calf, and the Widow, who was sharper than a briar, nodded solemnly and asked if that’s also why his chickens laid hard-boiled eggs. Leo, without so much as blinking, said, ‘No, ma’am, that’s on account of they’re so fond of the hot springs over yonder.’
His greatest performance, the Sistine Chapel of his falsehoods, commenced one Tuesday at the general store. He was holding court by the pickle barrel, and he began to feel a powerful itch on his nose. Now, a normal man would scratch it. But Leo Smoot saw an opportunity.
‘This nose,’ he announced, tapping the offending appendage, ‘is a barometer of human deceit. It begins to itch whenever a falsehood is spoken within a hundred yards.’
The crowd, which had gathered hoping for just such a performance, murmured its appreciation. It was a magnificent lie, a self-referencing marvel, for the nose was, at that very moment, itching because of the whopper he’d just told about it.
Well, the town constable, a man with the sense of a stump and a fondness for catching people out, decided to test the theory. ‘Is that so, Leo?’ he said. ‘Then tell me, is it true you own the fastest horse in the county?’
Leo, who owned a swaybacked nag that moved with the urgency of molasses in January, drew himself up. ‘It is an established fact, Constable. Why, just last week, I raced a bolt of lightning from the old mill to the creek bed and won by a full two lengths.’
The moment the words left his lips, his own nose, the traitor, began to itch ferociously. His hand shot up to scratch it, but he caught himself. His eyes widened in panic. The crowd leaned in.
‘See!’ the Constable roared. ‘It itches! Your own nose condemns you!’
‘That’s not it!’ Leo cried, his face contorting as he fought the urge to claw at his snout. ‘It’s… it’s… It’s the collective false modesty in this room! It’s overwhelming my instrument!’
Desperate, he tried to tell a truth to soothe the infernal itching. ‘I… I am a man!’ he declared. The itching intensified, the lie about his nose’s power still hanging in the air, polluting the entire enterprise. ‘My… my name is Leo Smoot!’
The nose was now a raging beacon of untruth. It was turning a violent shade of red, twitching and pulsing like a live frog in a hot skillet. Leo was dancing from foot to foot, slapping his own cheeks and ears in a futile attempt to distract from the central agony.
‘ALRIGHT!’ he finally bellowed, his will broken. ‘My horse is slower than geology! The cow gives normal milk! I ain’t never been to Paris, France, and I don’t have a pet alligator that can play the harmonica!’
With each confession, the itching subsided a little. He stood there, panting, a man stripped of his finest creations, exposed in the naked, humdrum truth.
There was a long silence. Then the storekeeper, a practical man, spoke up. ‘Well, Leo,’ he said, ‘that’s the first time I’ve ever seen a man scald hisself with his own coffee. Reckon that nose of yours does work, after all.’
Leo just shuffled out, a broken artist. He was quiet for a whole week, which the town found more disturbing than any of his lies. But the following Tuesday, he was back by the pickle barrel, telling everyone how he’d cured his nose’s affliction by bathing it in the light of a full moon and the tears of a truthful politician. And the whole town smiled, because things were right again. The fish were swimming, the birds were flying, and Lyin’ Leo was lying.”
*****
And, you know I would never leave you while neglecting the obligatory shameless self-promotion. New Yesterdays is available through the following links: Books-A-Million, Barnes & Noble, and Amazon as well as your favorite bookshops. The Audiobook is available from Libro.fm, as well as Amazon.
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