Quarter of Two

Harry Buschman

Seems to me it's been quarter of two forever, but it don't make a particle bit of difference in this town––nobody's goin' nowhere anyhow. Nobody's meetin' nobody neither. In fact, in this town if you got somewhere to go, you'd better not be here. It's hard to get someplace from here.

That there clock used to be in front of 1st Royal Trust National Savin's and Loan until somewheres back in the thirties it went belly up. Right after FDR told everybody we had nothin' t'fear but fear itself, it went bust. Well, I don't reckon it meant a lot to FDR but it sure was a kick in the ass to a lotta folks here in Fort Royal.

All that was eighty years ago and you'd think by this time we folks would have forgotten all about it. We woulda, too, exceptin' we're right back in the same kinda thing again. Along comes another depression and we're left holdin' the bag. There's a pizzeria where the bank used'ta be and that's gone bust too––only thing that's left is the clock out there on the street tellin everybody it's a quarter of two. That's the same thing as tellin' everybody there's nothin' t'fear but fear itself.