Indiana Jones and the Legend of the Hatshop
Posted: Sat Aug 01, 2009 12:31 pm
1936
“They don’t know what they’ve got there.” Jones said, frowning.
The woman beamed. “Well, I know what I’ve got here. Buy you a drink? You know. A drink.” Together they left the government building, descending broad granite stairs to the street below. A taxi waited at the curb.
“By the way,” Marion asked as she stepped into the car. “What happened to your favorite hat?”
“Oh, I left it on the boat. Katanga will send it when he can, along with whatever else we left in his cabin.”
A week later, Jones received word that his and Marion’s abandoned belongings had arrived. The professor smiled as he pried open the lid and faced a folded stack of unwashed shirts. He was halfway into the crate before he found what he was really looking for, a sweat-stained brown fedora.
Unceremoniously stuffed into the hat’s crown was a lady’s dress, once white. When he tossed the gown aside, a wad of something fell at his feet—a pierced gold disk wrapped in crumpled leaves of notepaper. On the innermost sheet, a note hurriedly scrawled: This trinket belongs to you, no? Have a care for yourself, Indy. The days are dangerous. And no bit of gold is worth your life. -K.
Turning the headpiece of the Staff of Ra over in his hand, Jones sighed aloud. “How true, my friend. You take care as well.”
The next day’s chores began with a visit to the hat makers. The old fedora required cleaning and blocking, and only one shop handled Jones’ orders. A small bell announced his opening of the door.
“Dr. Jones! Always a pleasure, sir. Good to see you looking so well. I trust you’ve been vacationing…in Florida? Now, how can we serve you today?”
Swales’ greetings always followed the same pattern. A cheerful hello, a compliment, a discrete inquiry into the professor’s much-rumored travels.
“Florida sounds nice. But I’ve never the time. Actually, Mr. Swales, it’s my hat again. The brown one,” he started.
“No, no. Not again. Didn’t we just clean-and-block, was it—last month?” Opening the hatbox Jones set on the counter, the hatter remonstrated with shakes of the head and a deliberately loud exhalation.
“Dr. Jones, Dr. Jones. Something tells me you’ve been adventuring again. More naked savages with blowguns? Perhaps a pack of Thugs is responsible for this?” Swales held out the battered hat.
Jones gazed thoughtfully at the hat, looked the hat maker in the eye and offered a plausible series of reasons. “Actually, there was a fire. A Nazi. Quite a few Nazis. Some snakes. And—” he pauses, rubbing his chin, “I had a run-in with a mirror. But I hardly remember that.”
“Well, I can clean and re-block your fedora. But I have to tell you that the block we’ve been using for your hat has suddenly gone missing. I took on a young apprentice. She was a university student I believe, a Miss Nadoolman. Anyway, now she’s taken off. And one block apparently disappeared with her. Strange when you think about it. With regular customers like yourself, Dr. Jones, we stamp a client’s name on their preferred hat blocks. Oddly enough, she took one of only two that were stamped with your name, leaving the other, older block. Now, what should we make of that?”
“I have no idea. Shame, you know. I really liked that look.”
“Well, I can use a similar block, the older one we used for your hat a year or so ago. Before that trip you made to—was it India, perhaps? I seem to remember a certain fondness you expressed for that fit.”
“That’ll be…just fine.” Settling for less was never comfortable for the professor. Neither was lying.
“I’ll replace the liner and sweatband with duplicates of the original brand, Herbert Johnson. We’ll have it ready by the end of the week,
Dr. Jones.”
“Excellent. As always.”
“And please try to keep from destroying the hat for a little while at least. You obviously have a fondness for this old fedora, worn as it is. But you must understand that rabbit has its limits, and I don’t know how many more times I can, ‘resurrect it from the dead?’ You do understand,” Swales pleaded.
“Yes, sir. I understand perfectly. Thanks again for your service. Sorry about the girl.”
“It’s alright. She didn’t have a heart for the work anyway. In fact, I think she went into costuming or some such thing. See you Thursday next, Doctor.”
“Thursday it is!”
1957
Weeks, years and two wars later, adventuring (as Swales called it) took its toll on the old fedora until it was finally retired. It rested in a place of honor as an American relic, on Indy’s desk.
It was the spring of ’57 when an old friend called and begged for Jones’ assistance. In preparation for the new dig, the professor stopped into the hat maker’s shop and ordered a second brown fedora. Two weeks later he was back to pick up the hat. This time a rude electric buzzer signaled his arrival.
“Mr. Delk, Mr. Kitter? Hel-lo?”
“Delk here. I’m on the phone. Be with you in a second!”
Jones looked about the shelves, taking note of the new trends. Plaid bands and dyed feathers graced the more contemporary models.
“That’s right, and now that you've found the right ribbon those hats will be perfect. Hey, I have to go John, I’ve got a customer. Ok, goodbye. Dr. Jones, indeed! Now, how many times do I have to tell you to call me Steve?”
“Sorry. How’ve you been, Steve?” Jones asked.
“Good, good. But with Marc making hats over in West Germany these days, I’ve got more work than I can manage alone. But you didn’t drop by to listen to my troubles. You’re here to pick up the new fedora. Don’t sell many of them anymore. Straws for summer and stingy brim hats are what everybody’s after now. Pity. Your fedora’s in the back. Let me get it for you.”
As Delk slipped between the gabardine curtains at the doorway to the workroom, he called back to the professor.
“I looked for you yesterday.”
“It’s finals week and the students keep me jammed in the office. Everybody wants an A.”
“Don’t you do it. Kids these days don’t want to work for anything anymore. Now, where is that…yes, right here. Hey, I’m throwing in a great old box. They don’t make them like this anymore. It’ll be right at home with your old bits of stuff.”
The hat maker stepped back to the counter, the box between his hands. “Now, let’s give it a look. Here you go.”
“VE-ry nice. It’s -it looks just like my old hat -it’s perfect.” Jones offered, his fingertips following the curve of the brim.
“It’s actually a bit better,” Delk pointed out. “Feel. It’s not rabbit, it’s beaver. It’ll take more of a beating than your old hat. And it’s a tiny bit darker so it’ll hold its color better over time. You know, I dare say this hat might be able to take whatever you can throw at it.”
“Well it certainly looks like it Steve. You even found the ribbon I asked for.”
“Well, we did,” the hat maker corrected. “And a pain it was, too. But you haven’t noticed the best part yet. The block. Remember Swales? ’Course you do. When the old gent retired, we found a newspaper clipping of you in his files. Must have come from…oh ’36, before the war anyways. Well, in that picture you’re actually wearing your old hat. We knew it came off a distinctive block, and so I made you a new block based on your old hat. But here’s the best part. Marc’s been doing some poking around in some old hat shops in Europe and guess what he found?”
“I have no idea.”
“A fedora block, with your name on it. You coulda knocked me over with a feather. I knew you only shopped here, and we’ve no idea how it got over there. It’s a mystery.”
“Imagine that.”
“Anyway, I remembered that when it came to blocking this fedora. So! What do you think?”
“I think I got myself a right fine hat, Steve. You up to making another one, maybe in grey?”
“I can do grey. For you, I’d do blue, green, RED if you asked for it. Maybe not red.”
“Grey will be fine. I usually stick to grey when I’m just around town or traveling. Plus at my age, I’m getting an increasing number of invitations to retirement dinners and wakes. Helps to be prepared, you know.”
“Dr. Jones, at your age—you’re just getting started, you know? Gotta break this hat in, take it somewheres interesting. Exotic. Like Peru. Or Bali. I was in the Pacific, you know. ’43 to ’45, right there in the thick of it.”
“Grey, Steve.”
“Yes, sir. Grey, you got it. And if I’m gonna make you another fedora for, for bad days, like the grey one, what say I make you another brown one? And whatever you gotta do, you’ll be prepared. Like a Boy Scout.”
“I was a Boy Scout. A long time ago.”
“Me, too. So, you and me—we’ll both be prepared. Just let me make a note here. Two new fedoras for my good friend, Indiana. One grey. And another brown one. Gotta get ya'll ready for…whatever.”
“So what do I owe you?”
Patting the old box on the counter, Delk smiles. “Well Marc and I were talking about this hat and we decided that this one’s on the house. It’s pleasure making a hat like this. But the next two: thirty-nine a piece, and we’ll call it square. Is that a deal?” And he offers his hand.
With Delk’s hand in his own, the professor agrees. “It’s a deal. Take care, my friend.”
“Enjoy the hat!”
“I always do.”
I've been playing with the idea that Indy's gear would've been purchased and cared for over the years and how what we know about his actual gear and who made it might fit into a story featuring Indiana. So I guess you could think of the above as a coming attractions trailer. Now I guess I actually have to take care of everything else. 
Someone is paying attention. What a wonderful way to characterize Swales and Steve. You captured them well. Except Steve needs a "ya'll" in there somewhere. 
Great story. Belongs in the Indy expanded universe.
Thanks everybody! It was fun to do. I tried to cram everything in there I could (I even gave Bending Oak a cameo). Now I just have to find a way to make it work with the even larger gear story I'm working on. 
Ooooh!! Can't wait! 
