Getting Excised

SEVERAL WEEKS AGO his mother had forwarded the notice from the Commonwealth. It informed him, bluntly, that he had 19 days in which to pay the overdue excise tax for 1967 on his "BHW--1955-250cc." He thought he'd paid it last February, but the cancelled check was nowhere in the litter of his records, so here he was in the City Treasurer's Office.

"Hi! I talked with someone on the phone yesterday about an overdue excise tax..."

"Oh yes. Well, you want to see Mr. Tierney; he's the Deputy."

The Deputy emerged from behind a frosted glass partition. He looked at the notice, looked at a list, did a less-than-lightning mental calculation, and issued his pronouncement, "Well, to clear things up, you'll have to give me $9.03, plus a $1 filing fee to the Registrar."

"What! The notice says an excise of $2.00."

"'Plus interest and fees as prescribed by law...'We sent you out three notices before this one, and that's..."

"Listen, would you please check and make sure I didn't send you the tax? I couldn't find the cancelled check, but I was certain I'd sent it." (Christ. Evidently the amount of the excise was added to your bill every time they sent you a notice!)

He waddled back toward what appeared to be a vault and went in. About five minutes later the vault disgorged him. As he came back to the window, "Deputy" was clutching two of those damn blue forms.

"Well, son, it seems you failed to pay on two vehicles. To clear things up it will cost you, let's see, $19,35, plus two $1 fees at the Registry."

"WHAT!" That blast jolted the entire secretarial staff; probably the first time in weeks they were all awake at once. Visibly restrained, then, "Would you please explain to me how that figure is computed? I get the uncomfortable feeling I'm being taken for a ride."

Hold it! We don't take nobody for a ride here, that's just the tax that's been figgered for you, and if you don't want to pay it..."

"Listen, when I've got to pay that much for a lousy excise on a cycle, I figure I've already bought an explanation of why it's so high."

"We sent you three notices to 28 Roseland Street on this one, and three notices there on the other; then one to your home address, the one you brought in. This one you registered in July of 1967, and this one..."

"Yes, and I sold it and transferred the registration from it to the other one I got in August. Then I moved out of 28 Roseland Street in September, and I never received any of the notices you sent to me there."

"Well, that's not our fault."

"Well is it mine? How can I know I owe you something if I don't get the bill..." Then I noticed something else. "Hey, why should this one have an original tax of $3.30 on it when the tax on the other cycle is only $2.00?"

NOW CONVINCED he had an imbecile on his hands, the Deputy said, "This one was registered in July which is one month earlier than the other..."

"...which was registered in August. Yes, I know that; I registered them. But don't you see, the registration was transferred from the first to the second. If the charge from July to December is $3.30 and from August to December $2.00, then I should get $2.00 back on the first bike."

The bureaucratic mind strained, digging, not for an answer, but for the phrase from the statutes learned by rote for situations like this. "Well, if you wanted an abatement, you had to come in before June, 1968."

"But how could I, I didn't receive any notices before then. How could I ask for an abatement if didn't even know I was being taxed twice."

By this time, another portly type had materialized from behind that damn counter. A different approach: fatherly. He came up and, emphasizing his points with pats on the shoulder, issued the ultimate rebuttal. "Son, there are ten thousand every year who don't get their bill. So the Commonwealth passed a law requiring everyone to come in and ask for his bill. So you've got no legal leg to stand on. And if you don't pay, you can never register a vehicle here again."

After a few more minutes of generalized bitching, he noticed that a small crowd had gathered to watch the action. He looked like a student, and it was a helluva lot of fun watching one of them smart-ass Harvards get screwed.

He took one look around and decided it was time to stop providing free entertainment. So he scrawled a check, watched the stubby pencil OK the releases (which had to be mailed to the Registry, with $1 each). Then he strode down the hall and out the door.

And as he walked back up Mass Ave his mind played with the delightful image of City Hall exploding, belching yellow-orange-black flame-smoke from its windows, bloating at its middle, and then crumbling to the ground.