Eileen Gunn - Questionable Practices

He hopped down from Sasha’s lap and went to the box where she kept all her doll clothing, everything that wasn’t currently being worn by one or another of her dolls. In a kind of fury, he rifled through them, briefly holding up items of dress and impatiently flinging them away.

“ Baby clothes!” he growled. “What am I supposed to do with baby clothes? Don’t you have any grown-up dolls? One with a bit of masculine sartorial flair, perhaps?”

“Well, there’s this,” Sasha said doubtfully. She pulled Benjamin’s Halloween costume out of a box on the closet floor. He’d gone as Mr. Bojangles, the famous tap dancer.

“A costume ? Am I a mountebank, then, to be clad in entertainer’s motley?” But Mr. Chesterton tried on the checked trousers, and they fit to his irritated satisfaction. The green vest, he conceded, suited him rather well. And the homburg, once he donned it, didn’t look at all as tawdry as it had in the box. “It’s not the clothes,” he said, surveying himself in the mirror. “It’s how one carries oneself.” Then, on all fours, he bounded out of the room and down the stairs.

Sasha followed.

“Hand me down the glass cane on the mantelpiece,” Mr. Chesterton said. “The one your mother never lets you handle.”

Stretching up on her tiptoes, Sasha did as she was told. Once Mr. Chesterton had the cane in his paw, he got up on his hind legs. Standing thus, he was even taller than was Sasha herself. Dressed as he was, and holding the cane in such a dapper manner, he looked almost human.

A bell clanged directly outside the house.

“Ah,” Mr. Chesterton said. “Right on time.”

He opened the front door.

A gleaming black locomotive with bright brass trim waited at the curb, on tracks that had never been there before, white smoke puffing impatiently into the night from its stack. Behind it was a short train of three wood-sided passenger cars, one sleeper, and a dining car, all painted green-and-gold, and a bright red caboose. From the platform of the caboose, the brakeman swung his lantern, urging them toward the front-most car. The conductor leaned down to help them aboard. “ ’Evening,” he said. “How far are you folks going?” He did not so much as blink at Mr. Chesterton’s appearance. For him, apparently, an elegantly dressed dog walking on his hind legs was an everyday occurrence.

“All the way,” Mr. Chesterton said. He gestured brusquely toward the horizon, where a vast, star-flecked shadow dominated the sky. It took Sasha a moment to realize that the shadow was a tree, larger than anything this side of the moon, and that what looked like stars were actually ornaments. “Right straight to the top.” He handed the conductor a pair of pasteboard tickets.

“Right-oh, sir!” The conductor briskly punched the tickets, led them to the sleeping car and opened a compartment door. Then he saluted snappily, spun on his heel, and was gone. With a jerk, the train started forward.

The car was empty save for they two. Sasha stared out the window at the passing town with its neat houses like cunningly-detailed toys, each with a tidy yard no larger than a handkerchief and trees so small she could have picked them up with her hand and stuck them in a pocket. “Where are we going?” she asked.

“To see the Big Guy,” Mr. Chesterton said. “The lord of all things, who lives in the sky.”

“Do you mean… God?”

“Don’t call him that,” Mr. Chesterton snapped. “He’s nothing of the sort — though he’d like you to believe he is.”

And that was all he would say.

For a time they watched the passing land in silence. The town fell behind them and the tracks slanted gently upward. Evidently they were starting the long spiral up the tree and into the sky.

Then Mr. Chesterton yawned and stood. “I’m going off to get myself a beer,” he said. “Don’t wait up for me.”

He disappeared down the corridor. Leaving Sasha alone with her thoughts, to fret and worry.

Not long after, a tall and distinguished-looking man in a Pullman porter uniform knocked on the compartment door. “Good evening, young miss. I’m just here to make up the beds,” he said, and deftly set to work, popping down the upper berth from the ceiling and folding back the seats, fastening curtains, attaching the headboard. In less time than it took to tell, he’d added sheets, pillows, and blankets. “There!” he said, smiling. “All done.”

Sasha sat down on the lower berth. “Thank you.”

The porter’s face grew serious. “You look unhappy, little missy. Is there a problem?”

“No… yes… I don’t know.”

“Well then, why don’t you tell me all about it?” He stood listening with such patient sympathy that in no time at all Sasha found herself pouring out her heart to him. She told him everything she knew.

“Hmmm,” the porter said when she was done. “Well, you are in a pickle, young lady, and no doubt about that . However, others have been in worse situations and turned out well. You need only consider Moses or Temudjin, both of whom overcame early setbacks to become highly regarded gentlemen. For that matter, Harriet Tubman was born a slave, and rescued not only herself but many neighbors and family members from that unspeakable condition. You’re a bright young lady, and not hincty. Not a bit hincty, nossir. So with a little perseverance, you could well redeem your brother. Despite the company you keep.”

“Mr. Chesterton? He’s a good dog!”

“Mr. Chesterton, as he chooses to call himself, is a bit of rascal,” the porter said sternly, “and I fear he’s not as reliable as he ought to be. But his heart is sound, so long as he stays away from… certain substances. Trust him, but keep him on a short leash.”

Then the Pullman porter leaned down and in a voice so low it was almost a whisper said, “My name is William, but they call me Big Bill. If you find yourself at the station up above without a ticket home, just tell any porter that Big Bill said you were a special friend. We are a Brotherhood and, though we are only human, we will do what we can to see you home safe.”

Then he smiled again. “Meanwhile, you should take your mind off your troubles with a little light entertainment.” From a compartment Sasha had not noticed before, he withdrew a stack of comic books. “I keep these for situations like this. You may take them with you, but don’t tell anybody where you got them.”

Sasha was enormously touched. “You’re very nice to me,” she said.

The porter winked conspiratorially. “Well, we colored folk have got to stick together, don’t we, young miss? Whatever our station is on life’s railroad.”

Then, with a punctilious bow, he was gone.

The comic books he left behind were filled with bright drawings and exciting stories. There was Baron Munchausen at the End of Time and Deros of Broadway and Isaac Newton, Robot Fighter and Yaa Asantewaa Warrior Queen Versus the Demons of Entropy . There were even three issues of The Adventures of Mr. Chesterton , and those were the best of all. In them, Mr. Chesterton was always fighting evil elves. Sometimes they got the upper hand, because he was too easily distracted by a stogie, a glass of whiskey, or a chew toy. But always he managed to save the day, chasing off the pasty-skinned, pointy-eared villains with a growl and disposing of their leader with a sharp thump on the head with his walking stick. In one, he even battled Morningstar the Living Sun, a being which could destroy entire planets with a single casual solar flare, and yet Mr. Chesterton triumphed over it with his usual swagger. There was no enemy, it seemed, he could not defeat.

Sasha wasn’t supposed to read comic books, because they were trash, but these ones made her feel powerful and safe and protected. She knew they were only stories, but she was glad that the porter had given them to her, although she hoped she would never need to ask him or his friends for a free ride home. She had been brought up to pay for whatever she received. Her parents would not like her accepting charity.