Thomas Tryon - The Night of the Moonbow

Willa-Sue, still seated on the glider with his personal property lying with her dolly in her lap.

“Give me that!” he snarled, snatching the wallet; the red packets she had taken from it fell on the ground, and he bent and scrabbled them up and stuffed them into a pocket.

“Balloons,” Willa-Sue said, burring her lips and rolling her eyes.

“You tell him, Baby Snooks.” Looking down from the loft window the boys couldn’t help laughing, which didn’t help matters.

As Reece scowled up at them, then down at Willa-Sue, her features began to contort; a loud scream was on the way. Reece, the color drained from his face, seized her and began to shake her. But the effect, though hardly surprising, was the opposite of what he intended. Willa-Sue began to screech as if she were being murdered. In an attempt to silence her squalling, Reece shook her harder.

“Don’t do that!” Leo raced across the turf, and tried to grab Reece’s arms to restrain him. From every barn window campers hung their heads out, shouting that Big Chief was being jumped by Wacko Wackeem, and Pa reappeared on the porch, now with Ma in tow, calling for Willa-Sue to come inside.

In the midst of this bedlam Dagmar Kronborg’s Pierce-Arrow pulled into the drive. The car door opened and she hurried toward the porch to see what the trouble was. By the time she reached Reece, he had yanked Willa-Sue’s doll from her hand. He raised it overhead, then brought it savagely down against the mouth of the pump, smashing the china head into fragments. Screaming louder than ever, Willa-Sue ran to hide her tear-stained face in her mother’s skirts, and while Ma tried vainly to comfort her, Dagmar retrieved the headless doll from Reece.

' “What can you be thinking of!” she demanded, outraged. “A grown man picking on a child like that!”

“She was in my car, the little nitwit!” Reece thundered. “In my glove compartment! She embarrassed me.”

Dagmar made a sour face. “Oh, that is too bad,” she said tartly. “You know what she is as well as I do. Allowances must be made. Grown men don’t do this sort of thing, only spoiled little boys. Look at what you have done to this poor doll.” She shook the broken toy in his face.

Humiliated in front of the campers ogling the scene from the barn, Reece turned away; his gaze fell on Leo.

“It’s all his fault,” he said. “He was supposed to be watching her.”

“No, he wasn’t,” declared Hank, who had by now climbed down from his ladder and walked over. “I was supposed to watch’er. Guess I got carried away with my polishin’. But don’t blame Leo, ’twasn’t his fault.”

“Henry is right,” said Dagmar to Reece. “And it will do you no good looking for a scapegoat. Why should Leo be made responsible for the child?”

“He’s always playing with her, isn’t he, encouraging her to act nutty?”

“Don’t be asinine. You know you are talking utter nonsense.”

Reece glowered at her; his frown deepened as he saw Augie taking a drink at the pump.

“What’s he doing drinking from our cup?” he muttered. “He is thirsty, I expect,” Dagmar snapped. “Would you have him drink from the spigot?”

But Reece was no longer listening. He had stormed away to the Green Hornet, where he vaulted neatly over the side and sped off in a cloud of dust.

As he disappeared around the corner, Dagmar stared sadly at the broken doll. “What a shame. I wonder if it can be repaired.”

Leo, down on his hands and knees picking the pieces from the dirt, looked up at her. “It’s a little like Humpty Dumpty, but I’ll try.”

“Good!” she said, giving him an approving nod. Then she went into the office with Ma while Leo, having retrieved all the pieces he could find, retreated to the barn to see what could be done about making the doll whole again.

A quarter of an hour later, order had been restored around the compound. The craftworkers had, for the most part, returned to their beaded belts and hammered ashtrays. Tears dried, Willa-Sue now swung in the rubber tire under the catalpa tree, while Leo, back in the Swoboda corner, tried to fit the fragments of the doll’s head together.

When Dagmar reappeared, instead of driving away she came across the compound to lean in at the barn window. “But that’s wonderful!” she exclaimed of his work. “You’re meticulous,” she added. “I like that.”

Leo blushed; he thought he was making a botch of it. The pieces of the doll’s head were chipped and made uneven joins, giving the face the look of a Frankenstein’s monster.

“It will be better when the eyes are in,” Dagmar said. Leo shook his head. Though he’d scoured the area, he had found only one eye.

“Well, in the kingdom of the blind the one-eyed doll is king,” Dagmar said, laughing, and Leo was forced to laugh too, though it embarrassed him to have her there while he worked.

She waited until he set the doll down; then, when he looked up, she nodded approvingly. “I like your boat, too,” she said. “You are making strides.”

“It’s really Fritz’s work,” Leo said. “I’m just helping him out.”

“Don’t be so modest,” she retorted. “According to Ma, Fritz says you are very clever.”

Again he blushed. But because she seemed genuinely interested, he soon forgot his shyness and opened up a bit. They talked some more about the model village, and about Fritz, whom she liked; Leo could tell.

“And your counselor? What does Reece think about this village of yours?”

Leo was embarrassed again. “He calls us Santa’s helpers.” Dagmar covered her smile with her hand. “Reece doesn’t like Fritz much. Or me,” he added glumly.

“Is that so?” she asked sharply.

Leo nodded. “He doesn’t think I fit in. I’m too different.” Dagmar became indignant. “Well, I should hope you are different! The only reason the world turns is because some people dare to be different. Most- people are like so many sheep. You just go right on being as different as you like. As for His Majesty, don’t pay him any mind. He doesn’t own the whole world, you know, nor his father either. Just the whole of Tolland County.” They laughed together; then, crooking her finger, Dagmar motioned him from the barn. Leo left his stool and covered his work, saying he had to quit anyway, it was time for swim.

“Come along with us,” Dagmar said. “It’s on our way. We can drop you off, and you can tell your friends you had a ride in my auto.”

Leo was speechless. He knew it was against the rules for any vehicle except Hank’s jitney to “ride” the campers. Dagmar, however, obviously paid no attention to such strictures, and led him to her automobile, where she introduced him to Augie. He smelled of shaving lotion, and his smile made Leo like him right away.

“Tack,” Dagmar said, as Augie held the door and helped her in, Leo after her,

“What’s tack?” he asked.

“Swedish. Means ‘thanks,’ ” she said, pushing her short, sturdy legs out in front of her and propping her small feet on the footrest.

He liked that; tack had an interesting sound. He settled himself comfortably in the handsomely appointed interior, impressed by the folding foot-rests, the little chrome ash-receiver, cleverly set into the armrest, the tasseled handles, the shades of amber silk that drew up and down on slender, braided cords, the tops of magazines revealing their names in the puckered side pockets. The motor purred like a leopard, and the upholstered seat felt soft and bouncy, as if he were riding on a feather bed.

They went over a bump and Leo’s head touched the upholstered ceiling above his head. “Whoopee – bump!” exclaimed Dagmar and they laughed again together. Then suddenly she turned to him and said, “I was surprised when Ma mentioned that you’d stopped playing your violin. Is it true, you’re not practicing these days?”