Зенна Гендерсон - The Anything Box

"But she's got a husband," I cried after her as she herded Danna across thecourt.
"There are other things to look for besides husbands," she called back.
"Anna wants a husband! Anna wants a husband!" Deet and LaNell were dancingaround me, teasing me singsong. Kathy smiled slowly behind them.
"Shut up," I said. "You don't even know what you're talking about. Go on toschool."
"It's too early," said Deet, digging his bare toes in the dust of the frontyard. "Teacher says we get there too early."
"Then stay here and start cleaning house," I said.
They left in a hurry. After they were gone, Deet's feet reminded me I'dbetter wash my own feet before I went to school. So I got a washpan of waterfrom the tap in the middle of the court, and sitting on the side of the bed, Ieased my feet into the icy water. I scrubbed with the hard, gray, abrasivesoap we used and wiped quickly on the tattered towel. I threw the water outthe door and watched it run like dust-covered snakes across the hard-packedfront yard.
I went back to put my shoes on and get my sweater. I looked at the bed. Igot down on my stomach and peered under. Other things to look for. There wasthe familiar huddle of cardboard cartons we kept things in and the familiardust fluffs and one green sock LaNell had lost last week, but nothing else.
I dusted my front off. I tied my lunch-money dime in the corner of ahandkerchief, and putting my sweater on, left for school.
I peered out into the windy wet semi-twilight "Do I have to?"
"You said you would," said Mom. "Keep your promises. You should have gonebefore this. She's probably been waiting for you."
"I wanted to see what you brought from Mrs. Paddington's." LaNell and Kathywere playing in the corner with a lavender hug-me-tight and a hat with greengrapes on it. Deet was rolling an orange on the floor, softening itpreliminary to poking a hole in it to suck the juice out.
"She cleaned a trunk out today," said Mom. "Mostly old things that belongedto her mother, but these two coats are nice and heavy. They'll be good coverstonight. It's going to be cold. Someday when I get time, I'll cut them up andmake quilts." She sighed. Time was what she never had enough of. "Better takea newspaper to hold over your head."
"Oh, Mom!" I huddled into my sweater. "It isn't raining now. I'd feelsilly!"
"Well, then, scoot!" she said, her hand pressing my shoulder warmly,briefly.
I scooted, skimming quickly the flood of light from our doorway, andsplishing through the shallow runoff stream that swept across the court. Therewas a sudden wild swirl of wind and a vindictive splatter of heavy, coldraindrops that swept me, exhilarated, the rest of the way to Mrs. Klevity'shouse and under the shallow little roof that was just big enough to cover theback step. I knocked quickly, brushing my disordered hair back from my eyes.The door swung open and I was in the shadowy, warm kitchen, almost in Mrs.Klevity's arms.
"Oh!" I backed up, laughing breathlessly. "The wind blew—"
"I was afraid you weren't coming." She turned away to the stove. "I fixed
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some hot cocoa."
I sat cuddling the warm cup in my hands, savoring the chocolate sip by sip.She had made it with milk instead of water, and it tasted rich and wonderful.But Mrs. Klevity was sharing my thoughts with the cocoa. In that brief momentwhen I had been so close to her, I had looked deep into her dim eyes and wasfeeling a vast astonishment. The dimness was only on top.Underneath—underneath—
I took another sip of cocoa. Her eyes—almost I could have walked into them,it seemed like. Slip past the gray film, run down the shiny bright corridor,into the live young sparkle at the far end.
I looked deep into my cup of cocoa. Were all grownups like that? If youcould get behind their eyes, were they different too? Behind Mom's eyes, wasthere a corridor leading back to youth and sparkle?
I finished the cocoa drowsily. It was still early, but the rain wasdrumming on the roof and it was the kind of night you curl up to if you'rewarm and fed. Sometimes you feel thin and cold on such nights, but I wasfeeling curl-uppy. So I groped under the bed for the paper bag that had myjamas in it. I couldn't find it.
"I swept today," said Mrs. Klevity, coming back from some far country ofher thoughts. "I musta pushed it farther under the bed."
I got down on my hands and knees and peered under the bed. "Ooo!" I said."What's shiny?"
Something snatched me away from the bed and flung me to one side. By thetime I had gathered myself up off the floor and was rubbing a banged elbow,Mrs. Klevity's bulk was pressed against the bed, her head under it.
"Hey!" I cried indignantly, and then remembered I wasn't at home. I heardan odd whimpering sob and then Mrs. Klevity backed slowly away, still kneelingon the floor.
"Only the lock on the suitcase," she said. "Here's your jamas." She handedme the bag and ponderously pulled herself upright again.
We went silently to bed after she had limped around and checked the house,even under the bed again. I heard that odd breathy whisper of a prayer and layawake, trying to add up something shiny and the odd eyes and the whisperingsob. Finally I shrugged in the dark and wondered what I'd pick for funny whenI grew up. All grownups had some kind of funny.
The next night Mrs. Klevity couldn't get down on her knees to look underthe bed. She'd hurt herself when she plumped down on the floor after yankingme away from the bed.
"You'll have to look for me tonight," she said slowly, nursing her knees."Look good. Oh, Anna, look good!"
I looked as good as I could, not knowing what I was looking for.
"It should be under the bed," she said, her palms tight on her knees as sherocked back and forth. "But you can't be sure. It might miss completely."
"What might?" I asked, hunkering down by the bed.
She turned her face blindly toward me. "The way out," she said. "The wayback again—"
"Back again?" I pressed my cheek to the floor again. "Well, I don't seeanything. Only dark and suitcases."
"Nothing bright? Nothing? Nothing—" She tried to lay her face on her knees,but she was too unbendy to manage it, so she put her hands over her faceinstead. Grownups aren't supposed to cry. She didn't quite, but her handslooked wet when she reached for the clock to wind it.
I lay in the dark, one strand of her hair tickling my hand where it lay onthe pillow. Maybe she was crazy. I felt a thrill of terror fan out on myspine. I carefully moved my hand from under the lock of hair. How can you finda way out under a bed? I'd be glad when Mr. Klevity got home, eggs or no eggs,dime or no dime.
Somewhere in the darkness of the night, I was suddenly swimming towakefulness, not knowing what was waking me but feeling that Mrs. Klevity was
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awake too.
"Anna." Her voice was small and light and silver. "Anna—"
"Hummm?" I murmured, my voice still drowsy.
"Anna, have you ever been away from home?" I turned toward her, trying inthe dark to make sure it was Mrs. Klevity. She sounded so different.
"Yes," I said. "Once I visited Aunt Katie at Rocky Butte for a week."
"Anna . . ."I don't know whether she was even hearing my answers; her voicewas almost a chant ". . . Anna, have you ever been in prison?"
"No! Of course not!" I recoiled indignantly. "You have to be awfully bad tobe in prison."
"Oh, no. Oh, no!" she sighed. "Not jail, Anna. Prison—prison. The weight ofthe flesh—bound about—"
"Oh," I said, smoothing my hands across my eyes. She was talking to asomething deep in me that never got talked to, that hardly even had words."Like when the wind blows the clouds across the moon and the grass whispersalong the road and all the trees pull like balloons at their trunks and onestar comes out and says 'Come' and the ground says 'Stay' and part of youtries to go and it hurts—" I could feel the slender roundness of my ribs undermy pressing hands. "And it hurts—"
"Oh Anna, Anna!" The soft, light voice broke. "You feel that way and youbelong Here. You won't ever—"
The voice stopped and Mrs. Klevity rolled over. Her next words camethickly, as though a gray film were over them as over her eyes. "Are youawake, Anna? Go to sleep, child. Morning isn't yet."
I heard the heavy sigh of her breathing as she slept. And finally I slepttoo, trying to visualize what Mrs. Klevity would look like if she looked likethe silvery voice in the dark.
I sat savoring my egg the next morning, letting thoughts slip in and out ofmy mind to the rhythm of my jaws. What a funny dream to have, to talk with asilver-voiced someone. To talk about the way blowing clouds and windymoonlight felt. But it wasn't a dream! I paused with my fork raised. At leastnot my dream. But how can you tell? If you're part of someone else's dream,can it still be real for you?
"Is something wrong with the egg?" Mrs. Klevity peered at me.
"No—no—" I said, hastily snatching the bite on my fork. "Mrs. Klevity—"
"Yes." Her voice was thick and heavy-footed.
"Why did you ask me about being in prison?"
"Prison?" Mrs. Klevity blinked blindly. "Did I ask you about prison?"
"Someone did—I thought—" I faltered, shyness shutting down on me again.
"Dreams." Mrs. Klevity stacked her knife and fork on her plate. "Dreams."
I wasn't quite sure I was to be at Klevity's the next evening. Mr. Klevitywas supposed to get back sometime during the evening. But Mrs. Klevitywelcomed me.
"Don't know when he'll get home," she said. "Maybe not until morning. If hecomes early, you can go home to sleep and I'll give you your dime anyway."
"Oh, no," I said, Mom's teachings solidly behind me. "I couldn't take it ifI didn't stay."
"A gift," said Mrs. Klevity.
We sat opposite one another until the silence stretched too thin for me tobear.
"In olden times," I said, snatching at the magic that drew stories fromMom, "when you were a little girl—"
"When I was a girl—" Mrs. Klevity rubbed her knees with reflective hands."The other Where. The other When."
"In olden times," I persisted, "things were different then."
"Yes." I settled down comfortably, recognizing the reminiscent tone ofvoice. "You do crazy things when you are young." Mrs. Klevity leaned heavilyon the table. "Things you have no business doing. You volunteer when you're
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young." I jerked as she lunged across the table and grabbed both my arms. "But
I am young! Three years isn't an eternity. I am young!"
I twisted one arm free and pried at her steely fingers that clamped the
other one.
"Oh." She let go. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you."
She pushed back the tousled brush of her hair.
"Look," she said, her voice almost silver again. "Under all this—this
grossness, I'm still me. I thought I could adjust to anything, but I had no
idea that they'd put me in such—" She tugged at her sagging dress. "Not the
clothes!" she cried. "Clothes you can take off. But this—" Her fingers dug
into her heavy shoulder and I could see the bulge of flesh between them.
"If I knew anything about the setup maybe I could locate it. Maybe I could
call. Maybe—"
Her shoulders sagged and her eyelids dropped down over her dull eyes.
"It doesn't make any sense to you," she said, her voice heavy and thick
again. 'To you I'd be old even There. At the time it seemed like a perfect way
to have an odd holiday and help out with research, too. But we got caught."
She began to count her fingers, mumbling to herself. 'Three years There,
but Here that's—eight threes are—" She traced on the table with a blunt
forefinger, her eyes close to the old, worn-out cloth.
"Mrs. Klevity." My voice scared me in the silence, but I was feeling the
same sort of upsurge that catches you sometimes when you're playing-like and
it gets so real. "Mrs. Klevity, if you've lost something, maybe I could look
for it for you."
"You didn't find it last night," she said.
"Find what?"
She lumbered to her feet. "Let's look again. Everywhere. They'd surely be
able to locate the house."
"What are we looking for?" I asked, searching the portable oven.
"You'll know it when we see it," she said.
And we searched the whole house. Oh, such nice things! Blankets, not
tattered and worn, and even an extra one they didn't need. And towels with
washrags that matched—and weren't rags. And uncracked dishes that matched! And
glasses that weren't jars. And books. And money. Crisp new-looking bills in
the little box in the bottom drawer—pushed back under some extra pillowcases.
And clothes—lots and lots of clothes. All too big for any of us, of course,
but my practiced eye had already visualized this, that, and the other cut down
to dress us all like rich people.
I sighed as we sat wearily looking at one another. Imagine having so much
and still looking for something else! It was bedtime and all we had for our
pains were dirty hands and tired backs.
I scooted out to the bath house before I undressed. I gingerly washed the
dirt off my hands under the cold of the shower and shook them dry on the way
back to the house. Well, we had moved everything in the place, but nothing was
what Mrs. Klevity looked for.
Back in the bedroom, I groped under the bed for my jamas and again had to
lie flat and burrow under the bed for the tattered bag. Our moving around had
wedged it back between two cardboard cartons. I squirmed under farther and
tried to ease it out after shoving the two cartons a little farther apart. The
bag tore, spilling out my jamas, so I grasped them in the bend of my elbow and
started to back out.
Then the whole world seemed to explode into brightness that pulsated and
dazzled, that splashed brilliance into my astonished eyes until I winced them
shut to rest their seeing and saw the dark inversions of the radiance behind
my eyelids.
I forced my eyes open again and looked sideways so the edge of my seeing
was all I used until I got more accustomed to the glory.
Between the two cartons was an opening like a window would be, but little,
little, into a wonderland of things I could never tell. Colors that had no
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names. Feelings that made windy moonlight a puddle of dust. I felt tears burnout of my eyes and start down my cheeks, whether from brightness or wonder, Idon't know. I blinked them away and looked again.
Someone was in the brightness, several someones. They were leaning out ofthe squareness, beckoning and calling—silver signals and silver sounds.
"Mrs. Klevity," I thought. "Something bright."
I took another good look at the shining people and the tree things thatwere like music bordering a road, and grass that was the song my evening grasshummed in the wind—a last, last look, and began to back out.
I scrambled to my feet, clutching my jamas. "Mrs. Klevity." She was stillsitting at the table, as solid as a pile of bricks, the sketched face underthe wild hair a sad, sad one.
"Yes, child." She hardly heard herself.
"Something bright—" I said.
Her heavy head lifted slowly, her blind face turned to me. "What, child?"
I felt my fingers bite into my jamas and the cords in my neck getting tightand my stomach clenching itself. "Something bright!" I thought I screamed. Shedidn't move. I grabbed her arm and dragged her off balance in her chair."Something bright!"
"Anna." She righted herself on the chair. "Don't be mean."
I grabbed the bedspread and yanked it up. The light sprayed out like asprinkler on a lawn.
Then she screamed. She put both hands up her heavy face and screamed,"Leolienn! It's here! Hurry, hurry!"
"Mr. Klevity isn't here," I said. "He hasn't got back."
"I can't go without him! Leolienn!"
"Leave a note!" I cried. "If you're there, you can make them come backagain and I can show him the right place!" The upsurge had passed make-believeand everything was realer than real.
Then, quicker than I thought she ever could move, she got paper and apencil. She was scribbling away at the table as I stood there holding thespread. So I dropped to my knees and then to my stomach and crawled under thebed again. I filled my eyes with the brightness and beauty and saw, beyond it,serenity and orderliness and—and uncluttered cleanness. The miniaturelandscape was like a stage setting for a fairy tale— so small, so small—solovely.
And then Mrs. Klevity tugged at my ankle and I slid out, reluctantly,stretching my sight of the bright square until the falling of the spread brokeit. Mrs. Klevity worked her way under the bed, her breath coming pantingly,her big, ungainly body inching along awkwardly.
She crawled and crawled and crawled until she should have come up shortagainst the wall, and I knew she must be funnelling down into the brightness,her face, head and shoulders, so small, so lovely, like her silvery voice. Butthe rest of her, still gross and ugly, like a butterfly trying to skin out ofits cocoon.
Finally only her feet were sticking out from under the bed and theythrashed and waved and didn't go anywhere, so I got down on the floor and putmy feet against hers and braced myself against the dresser and pushed. Andpushed and pushed. Suddenly there was a going, a finishing, and my feetdropped to the floor.
There, almost under the bed, lay Mrs. Klevity's shabby old-lady blackshoes, toes pointing away from each other. I picked them up in my hands,wanting, somehow, to cry. Her saggy lisle stockings were still in the shoes.
Slowly I pulled all the clothes of Mrs. Klevity out from under the bed.They were held together by a thin skin, a sloughed-off leftover of Mrs.Klevity that only showed, gray and lifeless, where her bare hands and facewould have been, and her dull gray filmed eyes.
I let it crumple to the floor and sat there, holding one of her old shoesin my hand.
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The door rattled, and it was gray, old, wrinkled Mr. Klevity.
"Hello, child," he said. "Where's my wife?"
"She's gone," I said, not looking at him. "She left you a note there on the
table."
"Gone—?" He left the word stranded in mid-air as he read Mrs. Klevity's
note.
The paper fluttered down. He yanked a dresser drawer open and snatched out
spool-looking things, both hands full. Then he practically dived under the
bed, his elbows thudding on the floor, to hurt hard. And there was only a
wiggle or two, and his shoes slumped away from each other.
I pulled his cast aside from under the bed and crawled under it myself. I
saw the tiny picture frame— bright, bright, but so small.
I crept close to it, knowing I couldn't go in. I saw the tiny perfection of
the road, the landscape, the people—the laughing people who crowded around the
two new rejoicing figures—the two silvery, lovely young creatures who cried
out in tiny voices as they danced. The girl one threw a kiss outward before
they all turned away and ran up the winding white road together.
The frame began to shrink, faster, faster, until it squeezed to a single
bright bead and then blinked out
All at once the house was empty and cold. The upsurge was gone. Nothing was
real any more. All at once the faint ghost of the smell of eggs was
frightening. All at once I whimpered, "My lunch money!"
I scrambled to my feet, tumbling Mrs. Klevity's clothes into a disconnected
pile. I gathered up my jamas and leaned across the table to get my sweater. I
saw my name on a piece of paper. I picked it up and read it.
Everything that is ours in this house now belongs to Anna-across-the-court,the little girl that's been staying with me at night.Ahvlaree Klevity
I looked from the paper around the room. All for me? All for us? All this
richness and wonder of good things? All this and the box in the bottom drawer,
too? And a paper that said so, so that nobody could take them away from us.
A fluttering wonder filled my chest and I walked stiffly around the three
rooms, visualizing everything without opening a drawer or door. I stood by the
stove and looked at the frying pan hanging above it. I opened the cupboard
door. The paper bag of eggs was on the shelf. I reached for it, looking back
over my shoulder almost guiltily.
The wonder drained out of me with a gulp. I ran back over to the bed and
yanked up the spread. I knelt and hammered on the edge of the bed with my
clenched fists. Then I leaned my forehead on my tight hands and felt my
knuckles bruise me. My hands went limply to my lap, my head drooping.
I got up slowly and took the paper from the table, bundled my jamas under
my arm and got the eggs from the cupboard. I turned the lights out and left.
I felt tears wash down from my eyes as I stumbled across the familiar yard
in the dark. I don't know why I was crying—unless it was because I was
homesick for something bright that I knew I would never have, and because I
knew I could never tell Mom what really had happened.
Then the pale trail of light from our door caught me and I swept in on an
astonished Mom, calling softly, because of the sleeping kids, "Mom! Mom! Guess
what!"
Yes, I remember Mrs. Klevity because she had eggs for breakfast! Every day!That's one of the reasons I remember her.
Hush!
June sighed and brushed her hair back from her eyes automatically as she
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marked her place in her geometry book with one finger and looked through the
dining-room door at Dubby lying on the front-room couch.
"Dubby, please," she pleaded. "You promised your mother that you'd be quiet
tonight. How can you get over your cold if you bounce around making so much
noise?"
Dubby's fever-bright eyes peered from behind his tented knees where he was
holding a tin truck which he hammered with a toy guitar.
"I am quiet, June. It's the truck that made the noise. See?" And he banged
on it again. The guitar splintered explosively and Dubby blinked in surprise.
He was wavering between tears at the destruction and pleased laughter for the
awful noise it made. Before he could decide, he began to cough, a deep-chested
pounding cough that shook his small body unmercifully.
"That's just about enough out of you, Dubby," said June firmly, clearing
the couch of toys and twitching the covers straight with a practiced hand.
"You have to go to your room in just fifteen minutes anyway—or right now if
you don't settle down. Your mother will be calling at seven to see if you're
okay. I don't want to have to tell her you're worse because you wouldn't be
good. Now read your book and keep quiet. I've got work to do."
There was a brief silence broken by Dubby's sniffling and June's scurrying
pencil. Then Dubby began to chant:
"Shrimp boatses running a dancer tonight
Shrimp boatses running a dancer tonight
Shrimp boatses running a dancer tonight
SHRIMP BOATses RUNning a DANcer to-NIGHT—"
"Dub-by!" called June, frowning over her paper at him.
"That's not noise," protested Dubby. "It's singing. Shrimp boatses—" The
cough caught him in mid-phrase and June busied herself providing Kleenexes and
comfort until the spasm spent itself.
"See?" she said. "Your cough thinks it's noise."
"Well, what can I do then?" fretted Dubby, bored by four days in bed and
worn out by the racking cough that still shook him. "I can't sing and I can't
play. I want something to do."
"Well," June searched the fertile pigeonholes of her baby sitter's
repertoire and came up with an idea that Dubby had once originated himself and
dearly loved.
"Why not play-like? Play-like a zoo. I think a green giraffe with a mop for
a tail and roller skates for feet would be nice, don't you?"
Dubby considered the suggestion solemnly. "If he had egg beaters for ears,"
he said, overly conscious as always of ears, because of the trouble be so
often had with his own.
"Of course he does," said June. "Now you play-like one."
"Mine's a lion," said Dubby, after mock consideration. "Only he has a flag
for a tail—a pirate flag—and he wears yellow pajamas and airplane wings
sticking out of his back and his ears turn like propellers."
"That's a good one," applauded June. "Now mine is an eagle with rainbow
wings and roses growing around his neck. And the only thing he ever eats is
the song of birds, but the birds are scared of him and so he's hungry nearly
all the time—pore ol’ iggle!"
Dubby giggled. "Play-like some more," he said, settling back against the
pillows.
"No, it's your turn. Why don't you play-like by yourself now? I've just got
to get my geometry done."
Dubby's face shadowed and then he grinned. "Okay."
June went back to the table, thankful that Dubby was a nice kid and not
like some of the brats she had met in her time. She twined both legs around
the legs of her chair, running both hands up through her hair. She paused
before tackling the next problem to glance in at Dubby. A worry tugged at her
heart as she saw how pale and fine-drawn his features were. It seemed, every
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time she came over, he was more nearly transparent
She shivered a little as she remembered her mother saying, "Poor child.
He'll never have to worry about old age, Have you noticed his eyes, June? He
has wisdom in them now that no child should have. He has looked too often into
the Valley."
June sighed and turned to her work.
The heating system hummed softly and the out-of-joint day settled into a
comfortable accustomed evening.
Mrs. Warren rarely ever left Dubby because he was ill so much of the time,
and she practically never left him until he was settled for the night. But
today when June got home from school, her mother had told her to call Mrs.
Warren.
"Oh, June," Mrs. Warren had appealed over the phone, "could you possibly
come over right now?"
"Now?" asked June, dismayed, thinking of her hair and nails she'd planned
to do, and the tentative date with Larryanne to hear her new album.
"I hate to ask it," said Mrs. Warren. "I have no patience with people who
make last minute arrangements, but Mr. Warren's mother is very ill again and
we just have to go over to her house. We wouldn't trust Dubby with anyone but
you. He's got that nasty bronchitis again, so we can't take him with us. I'll
get home as soon as I can, even if Orin has to stay. He's home from work right
now, waiting for me. So please come, June!"
"Well," June melted to the tears in Mrs. Warren's voice. She could let her
hair and nails and album go and she could get her geometry done at the
Warrens' place. "Well, okay. I'll be right over."
"Oh, bless you, child," cried Mrs. Warren. Her voice faded away from the
phone. "Orin, she's coming—" and the receiver clicked.
"June!" He must have called several times before June began to swim back up
through the gloomy haze of the new theorem.
"Joo-un!" Dubby's plaintive voice reached down to her and she sighed in
exasperation. She had nearly figured out how to work the problem.
"Yes, Dubby." The exaggerated patience in her voice signaled her
displeasure to him.
"Well," he faltered, "I don't want to play-like anymore. I've used up all
my thinkings. Can I make something now? Something for true?"
"Without getting off the couch?" asked June cautiously, wise from past
experience.
"Yes," grinned Dubby.
"Without my to-ing and fro-ing to bring you stuff?" she questioned, still
wary.
"Uh-huh," giggled Dubby.
"What can you make for true without anything to make it with?" June asked
skeptically.
Dubby laughed. "I just thought it up." Then all in one breath, unable to
restrain his delight: "It's-really-kinda-like-play-like, but-I'm
going-to-make-something-that-isn't-like-anything-real-so it'll-be-for-true,
cause-it-won't-be-play-like-anything-that's-real!"
"Huh? Say that again," June challenged. "I bet you can't do it."
Dubby was squirming with excitement. He coughed tentatively, found it
wasn't a prelude to a full production and said: "I can't say it again, but I
can do it, I betcha. Last time I was sick, I made up some new magic words.
They're real good. I betcha they'll work real good like anything."
"Okay, go ahead and make something," said June. "Just so it's quiet."
"Oh, it's real quiet," said Dubby in a hushed voice. "Exter quiet. I'm
going to make a Noise-eater."
"A Noise-eater?"
"Uh-huh!" Dubby's eyes were shining. "It'll eat up all the noises. I can
make lotsa racket then, 'cause it'll eat it all up and make it real quiet for
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you so's you can do your jommety.""Now that's right thunkful of you, podner," drawled June. "Make it a goodone, because little boys make a lot of noise.""Okay." And Dubby finally calmed down and settled back against his pillows.
The heating system hummed. The old refrigerator in the kitchen cleared its
throat and added its chirking throb to the voice of the house. The mantel
clock locked firmly to itself in the front room. June was absorbed in her
homework when a flutter of movement at her elbow jerked her head up.
"Dubby!" she began indignantly.
"Shh!" Dubby pantomimed, finger to lips, his eyes wide with excitement. He
leaned against June, his fever radiating like a small stove through his
pajamas and robe. His breath was heavy with the odor of illness as he put his
mouth close to her ear and barely whispered.
"I made it. The Noise-eater. He's asleep now. Don't make a noise or he'll
get you."
"I'll get you, too," said June. "Play-like is play-like, but you get right
back on that couch!"
"I'm too scared," breathed Dubby. "What if I cough?"
"You will cough if you—" June started in a normal tone, but Dubby threw
himself into her lap and muffled her mouth with his small hot hand. He was
trembling.
"Don't! Don't!" he begged frantically. "I'm scared. How do you
un-play-like? I didn't know it'd work so good!"
There was a choonk and a slither in the front room. June strained her ears,
alarm stirring in her chest.
"Don't be silly," she whispered. "Play-like isn't for true. There's nothing
in there to hurt you."
A sudden succession of musical pings startled June and threw Dubby back
into her arms until she recognized Mrs. Warren's bedroom clock striking seven
o'clock—early as usual. There was a soft, drawn-out slither in the front room
and then silence.
"Go on, Dubby. Get back on the couch like a nice child. We've played long
enough."
"You take me."
June herded him ahead of her, her knees bumping his reluctant back at every
step until he got a good look at the whole front room. Then he sighed and
relaxed.
"He's gone," he said normally.
"Sure he is," replied June. "Play-like stuff always goes away." She tucked
him under his covers. Then, as if hoping to brush his fears—and hers—away, by
calmly discussing it, "What did he look like?"
"Well, he had a body like Mother's vacuum cleaner —the one that lies down
on the floor—and his legs were like my sled, so he could slide on the floor,
and had a nose like the hose on the cleaner only he was able to make it long
or short when he wanted to."
Dubby, overstrained, leaned back against his pillows.
The mantel clock began to boom the hour deliberately.
"And he had little eyes like the light inside the refrigerator—"
June heard a choonk at the hall door and glanced up. Then with
fear-stiffened lips, she continued for him, "And ears like TV antennae because
he needs good ears to find the noises." And watched, stunned, as the round
metallic body glided across the floor on shiny runners and paused in front of
the clock that was deliberating on the sixth stroke.
The long, wrinkly trunk-like nose on the front of the thing flashed upward.
The end of it shimmered, then melted into the case of the clock. And the
seventh stroke never began. There was a soft sucking sound and the nose
dropped free. On the mantel, the hands of the clock dropped soundlessly to the
bottom of the dial.
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In the tight circle of June's arms, Dubby whimpered. June clapped her handover his mouth. But his shoulders began to shake and he rolled franticimploring eyes at her as another coughing spell began. He couldn't control it.
June tried to muffle the sound with her shoulder, but over the deep,hawking convulsions, she heard the choonk and slither of the creature andscreamed as she felt it nudge her knee. Then the long snout nuzzled againsther shoulder and she heard a soft hiss as it touched the straining throat ofthe coughing child. She grabbed the horribly vibrating thing and tried to pullit away, but Dubby's cough cut off in mid-spasm.
In the sudden quiet that followed she heard a gurgle like a straw in thebottom of a soda glass and Dubby folded into himself like an empty laundrybag. June tried to straighten him against the pillows, but he slid laxly down.
June stood up slowly. Her dazed eyes wandered trance-like to the clock,then to the couch, then to the horrible thing that lay beside it. Its glowingeyes were blinking and its ears shifting planes—probably to locate sound.
Her mouth opened to let out the terror that was constricting her lungs, andher frantic scream coincided with the shrill clamor of the telephone. TheEater hesitated, then slid swiftly toward the repeated ring. In the pauseafter the party line's four identifying rings, it stopped and June clappedboth hands over her mouth, her eyes dilated with paralyzed terror.
The ring began again. June caught Dubby up into her arms and backed slowlytoward the front door. The Eater's snout darted out to the telephone and thering stilled without even an after-resonance.
The latch of the front door gave a rasping click under June's tremblinghand. Behind her, she heard the choonk and horrible slither as the Eater lostinterest in the silenced telephone. She whirled away from the door, staggeringoff balance under the limp load of Dubby's body. She slipped to one knee,spilling the child to the floor with a thump. The Eater slid toward her,pausing at the hall door, its ears tilting and moving.
June crouched on her knees, staring, one hand caught under Dubby. Sheswallowed convulsively, then cautiously withdrew her hand. She touched Dubby'sbony little chest. There was no movement. She hesitated indecisively, thenbacked away, eyes intent on the Eater.
Her heart drummed in her burning throat. Her blood roared in her ears. Thestarchy krunkle of her wide skirt rattled in the stillness. The fibers of therug murmured under her knees and toes. She circled wider, wider, the noiseonly loud enough to hold the Eater's attention—not to attract him to her. Shebacked guardedly into the corner by the radio. Calculatingly, she reached overand clicked it on, turning the volume dial as far as it would go.
The Eater slid tentatively toward her at the click of the switch. Junebacked slowly away, eyes intent on the creature. The sudden insane blare ofthe radio hit her an almost physical blow. The Eater glided up close againstthe vibrating cabinet, its snout lifting and drinking in the horriblecacophony of sound.
June lurched for the front door, wrenching frantically at the door knob.She stumbled outside, slamming the door behind her. Trembling, she sank to thetop step, wiping the cold sweat from her face with the under side of herskirt. She shivered in the sharp cold, listening to the raucous outpouringfrom the radio that boomed so loud it was no longer intelligible.
She dragged herself to her feet, pausing irresolutely, looking around atthe huddled houses, each set on its own acre of weeds and lawn. They were alldark in the early winter evening.
June gave a little moan and sank on the step again, hugging herselfdesperately against the penetrating chill. It seemed an eternity that shecrouched there before the radio cut off in mid-note.
Fearfully, she roused and pressed her face to one of the door panes. Dimlythrough the glass curtains she could see the Eater, sluggish and swollen,lying quietly by the radio. Hysteria was rising for a moment, but sheresolutely knuckled the tears from her eyes.
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The headlights scythed around the corner, glittering swiftly across the
blank windows next door as the car crunched into the Warrens' driveway and
came to a gravel-skittering stop.
June pressed her hands to her mouth, sure that even through the closed door
she could hear the choonk and slither of the thing inside as it slid to and
fro, seeking sound.
The car door slammed and hurried footsteps echoed along the path. June made
wild shushing motions with her hands as Mrs. Warren scurried around the corner
of the house.
"June!" Mrs. Warren's voice was ragged with worry. "Is Dubby all right?
What are you doing out here? What's wrong with the phone?" She fumbled for the
door knob.
"No, no!" June shouldered her roughly aside. "Don't go in! It'll get you,
too!"
She heard a thud just inside the door. Dimly through the glass she saw the
flicker of movement as the snout of the Eater raised and wavered toward them.
"June!" Mrs. Warren jerked her away from the door. "Let me in! What's the
matter? Have you gone crazy?" Mrs. Warren stopped suddenly, her face
whitening. "What have you done to Dubby, June?"
The girl gulped with the shock of the accusation. "I haven't done anything,
Mrs. Warren. He made a Noise-eater and it—it—" June winced away from the
sudden blaze of Mrs. Warren's eyes.
"Get away from that door!" Mrs. Warren's face was that of a stranger, her
words icy and clipped. "I trusted you with my child. If anything has happened
to him—"
"Don't go in—oh, don't go in!" June grabbed at her coat hysterically.
"Please, please wait! Let's get—"
"Let go!" Mrs. Warren's voice grated between her tightly clenched teeth.
"Let me go, you—you—" Her hand flashed out and the crack of her palm against
June's cheek was echoed by a choonk inside the house. June was staggered by
the blow, but she clung to the coat until Mrs. Warren pushed her sprawling
down the front steps and fumbled at the knob, crying, "Dubby! Dubby!"
June, scrambling up the steps on hands and knees, caught a glimpse of a
hovering something that lifted and swayed like a waiting cobra. It was slapped
aside by the violent opening of the door as Mrs. Warren stumbled into the
house, her cries suddenly stilling on her slack lips as she saw her crumpled
son by the couch.
She gasped and whispered, "Dubby!" She lifted him into her arms. His head
rolled loosely against her shoulder. Her protesting, "No, no, no!" merged into
half-articulate screams as she hugged him to her.
And from behind the front door there was a choonk and a slither.
June lunged forward and grabbed the reaching thing that was homing in on
Mrs. Warren's hysterical grief. Her hands closed around it convulsively, her
whole weight dragging backward, but it had a strength she couldn't match.
Desperately then, her fists clenched, her eyes tight shut, she screamed and
screamed and screamed.
The snout looped almost lazily around her straining throat, but she fought
her way almost to the front door before the thing held her, feet on the floor,
body at an impossible angle and stilled her frantic screams, quieted her
straining lungs and sipped the last of her heartbeats, and let her drop.
Mrs. Warren stared incredulously at June's crumpled body and the horrible
creature that blinked its lights and shifted its antennae questingly. With a
muffled gasp, she sagged, knees and waist and neck, and fell soundlessly to
the floor.
The refrigerator in the kitchen cleared its throat and the Eater turned
from June with a choonk and slid away, crossing to the kitchen.
The Eater retracted its snout and slid back from the refrigerator. It lay
quietly, its ears shifting from quarter to quarter.
The thermostat in the dining room clicked and the hot air furnace began to
hum. The Eater slid to the wall under the register that was set just below the
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ceiling. Its snout extended and lifted and narrowed until the end of itslipped through one of the register openings. The furnace hum choked offabruptly and the snout end flipped back into sight.
Then there was quiet, deep and unbroken until the Eater tilted its ears andslid up to Mrs. Warren.
In such silence, even a pulse was noise.
There was a sound like a straw in the bottom of a soda glass.
A stillness was broken by the shrilling of a siren on the main highway fourblocks away.
A choonk and a slither and the metallic bump of runners down the threefront steps.
And a quiet, quiet house on a quiet side street.
Hush.
Food to All Flesh
O give thanks unto the LORD . . . who giveth food to all flesh: for his mercyendureth for ever. Psalm 136
Padre Manuel sighed with pleasure as he stepped into the heavy shade of thesalt cedars. It was a welcome relief from the downpouring sun that drenchedthe whole valley and seemed today to press down especially hard on the littleadobe church and its cluster of smaller buildings. Padre Manuel sighed againwith regret that they could manage so little greenery around the church, butit was above the irrigation canal, huddled against the foot of the bleakEstrellas.
But it was pleasant here in the shade at the foot of the alfalfa field, andacross the pasture was the old fig tree with the mourning dove nest that PadreManuel had been watching.
Well! Padre Manuel let the leaves conceal the nest again. Two eggs now! Andsoon the little birds—little live things. How long did it take? He sat down inthe grass at the foot of the hill, grateful for this leisure time. He openedhis breviary, his lips moving silently as the pages turned.
And so it was that Padre Manuel was in the south pasture when the thingcame down. It sagged and rippled as if it were made of something soft insteadof metal as you'd expect a spaceship to be. Because that's what Padre Manuel,after his first blank amazement, figured it must be.
It didn't act like a spaceship, though. At least not like the ones thatwere in the comics that Sor Concepciуn brought, clucking disapprovingly, tohim when she confiscated them from the big boys who found them so much moreinteresting than the catechism class on drowsy summer afternoons. There was noburned grass, no big noise, none of the signs of radiation that made the comicpages so vivid that, most regrettably, Padre Manuel usually managed a quickread-through before restoring them at the day's end. The thing just flutteredon the grass and scooted ahead of a gust of wind until it came up against atree.
Padre Manuel waited to see what would happen. That was his way. If anythingnew came along, he'd sit for a while, figuring it all out—but slowly,carefully— and usually he came out right. This time, when he had finishedthinking it over, he got a thrill up and down his back, knowing that God hadseen fit to let him be the first man on earth to see a spaceship land. Atleast the first to land in this quiet oasis of cottonwood and salt cedar heldin a fold of the desert.
Well, after nothing happened for a long time, he decided he'd go over andget a closer look at the ship. Apparently it wasn't going to do anything moreat the moment.
There weren't any doors or windows or peepholes. The thing was bigger thanyou'd think, standing back from it. Padre Manuel figured it might be thirty
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feet through, and it looked rather like a wine-colored balloon except that itflattened where it touched the ground, like a low tire. He leaned a handagainst it and it had a give to it and a feeling that was like nothing he everfelt before. It even had a smell—a pretty good smell—and Padre Manuel wasabout to lick it to see if it tasted as good as it smelled, when it opened ahole. One minute no hole. Next minute a little tiny hole, opening bigger andbigger like a round mouth without lips. Nothing swung back or folded up. Theball just opened a hole, about a yard across.
Padre Manuel's heart jumped and he crossed himself swiftly, but whennothing else happened, he edged over to the hole, wondering if he dared stickhis head in and take a look. But then he had a sort of vision of the hole shutting again with his head in there and all at once his Adam's apple felttoo tight and he swallowed hard.
Then a head stuck out through the hole and Padre Manuel got almost dizzy,thinking about being the first man on earth to see something alive fromanother world. Then he blinked and squared his shoulders and took stock ofwhat it was that he was seeing for the first time.
It was a head all right, about as big as his, only with the hair tight andfuzzy. It looked as if it had been shaved into patterns though it could havegrown that way. And there were two eyes that looked like nice round gray eyesuntil they blinked, and then—Madre de Dios! —the lids slid over from theoutside edges toward the nose and flipped back again like a sliding door. Andthe nose was a nose, only with stuff growing in the nostrils that was tightand fuzzy like the hair. It was hard to see how the thing could breathethrough it.
Then the mouth. Padre Manuel felt creepy when he looked at the mouth. Therewas no particular reason why, though. It was just a mouth with the eyeteethlapped sharply over the bottom lip. He'd seen people like that in his time,though maybe not quite so long in the tooth.
Padre Manuel smiled at the creature and almost dodged when it smiled back,because those teeth looked as if they jumped right out at him, white andshiny.
"Buenos dias," said Padre Manuel.
"Buenos dias," said the creature, like an echo.
"Hello," said Padre Manuel, almost exhausting his English.
"Hello," said the creature, like an echo.
Then the conversation lagged. After a while Padre Manuel said, "Won't youget out and stay for a while?" He waved his hand and stepped back.
Well, the space man slid his eyelids a couple of times, then the hole gotbigger downwards and he got out and got out and got out.
Padre Manuel backed away pretty fast when all that long longness crawledout of the hole, but he came back wide-eyed when the space creature began topush himself together, shorter and shorter and ended up about a head tallerthan Padre Manuel and about twice as big around. He was almost man-lookingexcept that his hands were round pad things with a row of fingers clear aroundthem that he could put out or pull in when he wanted to. His hide was stretchylooking and beautifully striped, silver and black. All tight together the wayhe was now, it was mostly black with silver flashing when he moved and he hadfunny looking knobs hanging along his ribs, but all in all he wasn't anythingto put fear into anyone.
Padre Manuel wished he could talk with the creature, to make him welcome tothis world, but words seemed to make only echoes. He fingered his breviary,then on impulse, handed it to the creature. The creature turned it over in hissilvery tipped hands. It flared open at one of the well-worn pages and thecreature ran a finger over the print. Then he flipped the book shut. He ranhis finger over the cross on the cover and then he reached over and lifted theheavy crucifix that swung from Padre Manuel's waist. He traced its shape withhis fingertip and then the cross on the book. He smiled at Padre Manuel andgave the book back to him.
Padre Manuel was as pleased as if he'd spoken to him. The creature was a
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noticing thing anyway. He ran his own hand over the book, feeling with a warmglow (which he hoped was not too much of pride) that he had the only breviaryin the whole world that had been handled by someone from another world.
The space creature had reached inside the ship and now he handed PadreManuel a stack of metallic disks, fastened together near the top. Each diskwas covered with raised marks that tried to speak to Padre Manuel's fingertipslike writing for the blind. And some of the disks had raised pictures ofstrange wheels and machinery-looking things.
Padre Manuel found one that looked like the ship. He touched the ship andthen the disk. He smiled at the creature and pushed the plates back togetherand returned them to the creature. He was a noticing thing too.
The space creature ran his fingers lightly down Padre Manuel's face andsmiled. Padre Manuel thought with immense gratification, "He likes me!"
The creature turned from Padre Manuel, lifted his face, his nose flaring,and waddled on short, heavy legs over to a greasewood bush and took a bite,his two long teeth flashing white in the sun. He chewed—leaves, stems andall—and swallowed. He squatted down and kind of sat without bending, andwaited.
Padre Manuel sat, too. Then the creature unswallowed. Just opened his mouthand out came the bite of greasewood, chewed up and wet. Well, he went fromtree to tree and bush to bush and tried the same thing and unswallowed everymouthful. He even tried a mouthful of Johnson grass, but nothing stayed down.
By this time, Padre Manuel had figured out that the poor creature must behungry. Often on these walks to the pasture, he would take an apple or somecrackers or something else to eat that he could have offered him, but it sohappened that this time he had nothing to offer. He was feeling sorry when thecreature shrugged himself so the knobs on his ribs waggled, and turned back tothe ship, scratching as though the knobs itched him. He crawled back into theship.
Padre Manuel went over cautiously, and almost got a look inside, but thecreature's face, teeth and all, pushed out of the hole right at him. PadreManuel backed away and the creature climbed out with a big box thing under hisarm. He scoonched himself all up together again and put the box down. Hemotioned Padre Manuel to come closer and pointed at one side of the box andsaid something that ended questiony. Padre Manuel looked at the box. There wasa hole in the top and some glittery stuff on the side of it just above a bigslot and the glittery stuff was broken. Only a few little pieces were hangingby reddish wire things.
"What is it for?" he asked, making his voice as questiony as he could.
The creature looked at him and slid his eyelids a couple of times, then hepicked up a branch of greasewood and pushed it in the top of the box. Then hewaggled one hand in the slot and stuck a few of his fingers in his mouth.Padre Manuel considered for a moment. It must be that the box was some kind of food-making thing that had broken. That was why the poor creature was actingso hungry. Que lбstima!
"I'll get you something to eat, my son," said Padre Manuel. "You waithere." And he hurried away, cutting across the corner of the alfalfa field inhis hurry, his cassock whispering through the purply blue flowers.
He was afraid someone might start asking questions and he wasn't one totalk much about what he was doing until it was done, but Sor Concepciуn andSor Esperanza had taken the old buckboard and driven over to Gastelum's to seeif Chenchita would like to take a job at the Dude Ranch during the vacationthat had just begun. She had graduated from the tiny school at the mission andsomething had to be found to occupy the time she was all too willing to devoteto the boys. Padre Manuel sighed and laid the note aside. God be thanked thatthis offer of a job had come just now. The Gastelums could use the money andChenchita would have a chance to see that there was something more in theworld than boys.
Padre Manuel raided the kitchen and filled a box with all kinds of thingsand went back out to the pasture.
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Well, the creature tried everything. Most of it he un-swallowed almost assoon as it went down. Padre Manuel thought they had it for sure when he triedthe pork roast, but just as they were heaving a sigh of relief, up it came—allthat beautiful roast, mustard and all. The creature must have been prettyupset, because he grabbed Padre Manuel and shook him, yelling something athim. Padre Manuel recoiled, but his hand went to the band of tight fingersthat circled his arm. He laid his hand upon the cool smoothness of thefingers.
"My child!" he rebuked. "My son!" He looked up into the blazing silverygray of the eyes above him. In the tight silence that followed, Padre Manuelrealized, with a pleasurable pang, that he had touched a creature from anotherworld.
The creature stepped back and looked at Padre Manuel. Then he picked up apinch of dirt and sprinkled it on his head and smiled.
Padre Manuel bowed gravely. Then he, too, smiled.
It was almost dark before Padre Manuel gave up going around the pasturewith the creature, trying to find something he could stomach. He was carefulto avoid the tree where the dove's nest was. Surely if the creature couldn'teat the egg from the kitchen, he wouldn't be able to eat a dove's egg. Hesighed and started home.
Gonzales' bull was stretching his neck through the barb-wire fence, tryingto reach the lush green alfalfa just beyond his tongue's reach. "You tellNacio to plant his own alfalfa," said Padre Manuel. "And don't break the fencedown again. To die of bloat is unpleasant and besides, there is a hungry thingin the pasture tonight."
He glanced back across the field. The trees hid the ship from here. Good.It was pleasant to have a little secret for a while. Then he began to worryabout the creature. This matter was too big to keep to himself too long. Itmight be very important to others. Maybe the sheriff should be told. Maybeeven the government. And the scientists. They would go mad over a ship and acreature from another world. There was Professor Whiting at the Dude Ranch.True, he was an archaeologist. He looked for Indian ruins and people longdead, but he would know names. He would know whom to tell and what to do. Butunless Padre Manuel found something that the creature could eat, it would be adead creature long before letters could go and come. But what was it to be?
The matter was in his prayers that night and after he turned out the light,he stood at the window and looked up at the stars. He knew nothing of themexcept that they were far, far, but perhaps one of those he could see was thecreature's home. He wondered what God's name was, in that world.
Next morning, as soon as Mass was over, Padre Manuel started out to thepasture again. He was carrying a bushel basket full of all lands of thingsthat might perhaps be eatable for the creature. There were two bars of soapand a sack of sugar. A length of mesquite wood and a half-dozen tortillas.There were four dried chili peppers and a bouquet of paper roses. There weretwo candles that regrettably had been left in the sun and were now flat dustycurlicues. There was a little bit of most anything Padre Manuel could thinkof, including half a can of Prince Albert and a pair of canvas gloves. A tincup rattled against a canteen of water on top of the load. Irrigation wasn'tdue in the pasture for three days yet and the ditch was dry.
Padre Manuel was just fastening the pasture gate when he heard a terriblebellering, and there was Gonzales' bull, the meanest one in the valley,running like a deer and bellering every time he hit the ground.
"The fence!" gasped Padre Manuel. "He broke in again!"
Behind the bull came the space creature, his short, stubby legs runninglike the wind. But the wildest, most astonishing thing was how the rest of himcame. His legs were running all the time, but the rest of him would shoot outlike a rattler striking, flashing silver lightning in the sun and then he'dhave to wait for his short legs to catch up.
Well, the bull and the creature went out of sight around the salt cedarsand there was one last beller and then lots of silence. Padre Manuel hurried
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as fast as he could, with the basket bumping him every step, and there, rightin front of the spaceship, was the bull, very dead, with its neck folded backand a big hole torn in its flank.
Padre Manuel was slow to anger, but he felt his temper beginning to rise.To destroy the property of others! And Gonzales could so little afford—But hedidn't say anything. He looked around quickly while he waited for the creatureto make a move. He could see all kinds of unswallowed stuff around the ship.Stuff that probably had been a rabbit and a gopher and an owl and even a bullsnake. Then the poor thing gave a groan and unswallowed the piece of bull hehad eaten.
"Hello," said the creature.
"Hello," said Padre Manuel, then he uncapped the canteen and poured out acup of water. He held it out to the creature, thinking as the cup was taken,"A cup of cold water in Thy Name," and blinked as the creature lifted the cupand emptied it on his head, his hide fairly crawling up to meet the water.Padre Manuel filled the cup again and again until the canteen was empty,reproaching himself for not having thought of water the night before. Thecreature's hide rippled luxuriously as Padre Manuel indicated the basket he'dput down by the ship.
The creature looked at it hopelessly and went back, with sagging shoulders,to the ship. He reached inside and lifted out something and held it out toPadre Manuel. The Padre took it—and almost dropped it when he saw what it was.It was another space creature, no bigger than a kitten, mewling and pushingits nose against Padre Manuel's thumb.
"Madre de Dios!" gasped Padre Manuel. "A little one! A baby! Where—?" Heturned in astonishment to the space creature. The creature ran his hand downhis ribs and Padre Manuel saw that all the waggly knobs were gone. Thecreature reached into the ship again and brought out two more of the littlecreatures. He held one of them up to a round silver spot on his ribs.
Padre Manuel stared at the creature and then at the kitteny thing.
"Why, why!" he said, wide-eyed with amazement. "Why Senora, Senora!" And hecould hear some more mewling coming from the ship.
Well, the space lady put down the little ones and so did the Padre and theycrawled around on their hands and feet, stretching and pushing together forall the world like little inch worms, taking bites of anything they couldfind. But eveything unswallowed almost as fast as it swallowed.
The space lady was going through the bushel basket, biting and waiting andunswallowing. Pretty soon she'd tried everything in the basket, and she andPadre Manuel sat there looking kind of hopeless at all the unswallowed stuff.Padre Manuel was feeling especially bad about the little kitten things. Theywere so little, and so hungry.
He picked one up in his hand and patted its nudging little head with hisfinger. "Pobrecito," he said, "Poor little one—"
Then he let out a yell and dropped the thing. The space lady snarled.
"It bit me!" gasped Padre Manuel. "It took a chunk out of me!"
He pulled out his bandana and tried to tie it over the bleeding place onthe ball of his thumb.
All at once he was conscious of a big silence and he looked at the spacelady. She was looking down at the little space creature. It was curling up inher hand like a kitten and purring to itself. Its little silver tongue cameout and licked around happily and it went to sleep. Fed.
Padre Manuel stared hard. It hadn't unswallowed! It had eaten a chunk of him and hadn't unswallowed! He looked up at the space lady. She stared back.Her eyes slid shut a couple of times. In the quiet you could hear the otherlittle ones mewling. She put the space kitten down.
Padre Manuel stood, one hand clasped over the crude bandage, his eyes darkand questioning in his quiet face. The space lady started toward him, hermany-fingered hands reaching. They closed around his arms, above his elbows.Padre Manuel looked up into the silver gray eyes, long, long, and then closedhis eyes against the nearness.
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Suddenly the fingers were gone. Padre Manuel's eyes opened. He saw thespace creature scoop up her little ones, the quiet one, the crying ones, andhurry them into the spaceship. She slid in after them and the hole began toclose. Padre Manuel caught a last glimpse of silver and black and a last glintof the white pointed teeth and the hole was closed.
He watched the wine-colored ship dwindle away above the Estrellas until itwas gone, back into space. He waved his hand at the empty sky.
Then he sighed and picked up the canteen and cup and put them into thebasket. He shooed away the flies that swarmed around him and, lifting thebasket, started back across the pasture.
Come On, Wagon!
I don't like kids—never have. They're too uncanny. For one thing, there'sno bottom to their eyes. They haven't learned to pull down their mentalcurtains the way adults have. For another thing, there's so much they don'tknow. And not knowing things makes them know lots of other things grownupscan't know. That sounds confusing and it is. But look at it this way. Everytime you teach a kid something, you teach him a hundred things that areimpossible because that one thing is so. By the time we grow up, our world isso hedged around by impossibilities that it's a wonder we ever try anything new.
Anyway, I don't like kids, so I guess it's just as well that I've stayed abachelor.
Now take Thaddeus. I don't like Thaddeus. Oh, he's a fine kid, smarter thanmost—he's my nephew—but he's too young. I'll start liking him one of thesedays when he's ten or eleven. No, that's still too young. I guess when hisvoice starts cracking and he begins to slick his hair down, I'll get to likinghim fine. Adolescence ends lots more than it begins.
The first time I ever really got acquainted with Thaddeus was the Christmashe was three. He was a solemn little fellow, hardly a smile out of him allday, even with the avalanche of everything to thrill a kid. Starting firstthing Christmas Day, he made me feel uneasy. He stood still in the middle ofthe excited squealing bunch of kids that crowded around the Christmas tree inthe front room at the folks' place. He was holding a big rubber ball with bothhands and looking at the tree with his eyes wide with wonder. I was sittingright by him in the big chair and I said, "How do you like it, Thaddeus?"
He turned his big solemn eyes to me, and for a long time, all I could seewas the deep, deep reflections in his eyes of the glitter and glory of thetree and a special shiningness that originated far back in his own eyes. Thenhe blinked slowly and said solemnly, "Fine."
Then the mob of kids swept him away as they all charged forward to claimtheir Grampa-gift from under the tree. When the crowd finally dissolved andscattered all over the place with their play-toys, there was Thaddeussquatting solemnly by the little red wagon that had fallen to him. He wasexamining it intently, inch by inch, but only with his eyes. His hands werepressed between his knees and his chest as he squatted.
"Well, Thaddeus." His mother's voice was a little provoked. "Go play withyour wagon. Don't you like it?"
Thaddeus turned his face up to her in that blind, unseeing way littlechildren have.
"Sure," he said, and standing up, tried to take the wagon in his arms.
"Oh for pity sakes," his mother laughed. "You don't carry a wagon,Thaddeus." And aside to us, "Sometimes I wonder. Do you suppose he's got allhis buttons?"
"Now, Jean." Our brother Clyde leaned back in his chair. "Don't heckle thekid. Go on, Thaddeus. Take the wagon outside."
So what does Thaddeus do but start for the door, saying over his shoulder,"Come on, Wagon."
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Clyde laughed. "It's not that easy, Punkin-Yaller, you've gotta have pullto get along in this world."
So Jean showed Thaddeus how and he pulled the wagon outdoors, looking downat the handle in a puzzled way, absorbing this latest rule for acting like abig boy.
Jean was embarrassed the way parents are when their kids act normal aroundother people.
"Honest. You'd think he never saw a wagon before."
"He never did," I said idly. "Not his own, anyway." And had the feelingthat I had said something profound, but wasn't quite sure what.
The whole deal would have gone completely out of my mind if it hadn't beenfor one more little incident. I was out by the barn waiting for Dad. Mom wasmaking him change his pants before he demonstrated his new tractor for me. Isaw Thaddeus loading rocks into his little red wagon. Beyond the rock pile, Icould see that he had started a playhouse or ranch of some kind, laying therocks out to make rooms or corrals or whatever. He finished loading the wagonand picked up another rock that took both arms to carry, then he looked downat the wagon.
"Come on, Wagon." And he walked over to his play place.
And the wagon went with him, trundling along over the uneven ground,following at his heels like a puppy.
I blinked and inventoried rapidly the Christmas cheer I had imbibed. Itwasn't enough for an explanation. I felt a kind of cold grue creep over me.
Then Thaddeus emptied the wagon and the two of them went back for morerocks. He was just going to pull the same thing again when a big boy-cousincame by and laughed at him.
"Hey, Thaddeus, how you going to pull your wagon with, both hands full? Itwon't go unless you pull it."
"Oh," said Thaddeus and looked off after the cousin who was headed for theback porch and some pie.
So Thaddeus dropped the big rock he had in his arms and looked at thewagon. After struggling with some profound thinking, he picked the rock upagain and hooked a little finger over the handle of the wagon.
"Come on, Wagon," he said, and they trundled off together, the handle ofthe wagon still slanting back over the load while Thaddeus grunted along by itwith his heavy armload.
I was glad Dad came just then, hooking the last strap of his stripedoveralls. We started into the barn together. I looked back at Thaddeus. Heapparently figured he'd need his little finger on the next load, so he wassquatting by the wagon, absorbed with a piece of flimsy red Christmas string.He had twisted one end around his wrist and was intent on tying the other tothe handle of the little red wagon.
It wasn't so much that I avoided Thaddeus after that. It isn't hard for grownups to keep from mingling with kids. After all, they do live in twodifferent worlds. Anyway, I didn't have much to do with Thaddeus for severalyears after that Christmas. There was the matter of a side trip to the SouthPacific where even I learned that there are some grown-up impossibilities thatare not always absolute. Then there was a hitch in the hospital where I waitedfor my legs to put themselves together again. I was luckier than most of theguys. The folks wrote often and regularly and kept me posted on all the hometalk. Nothing spectacular, nothing special, just the old familiar stuff thatmakes home, home and folks, folks.
I hadn't thought of Thaddeus in a long time. I hadn't been around kids muchand unless you deal with them, you soon forget them. But I remembered himplenty when I got the letter from Dad about Jean's new baby. The kid was acouple of weeks overdue and when it did come—a girl—Jean's husband, Bert, wasout at the farm checking with Dad on a land deal he had cooking. The baby cameso quickly that Jean couldn't even make it to the hospital and when Mom calledBert, he and Dad headed for town together, but fast.
"Derned if I didn't have to hold my hair on," wrote Dad. "I don't think we
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hit the ground but twice all the way to town. Dern near overshot the gate whenwe finally tore up the hill to their house. Thaddeus was playing out front andwe dang near ran him down. Smashed his trike to flinders. I saw the handlebars sticking out from under the front wheel when I followed Bert in. Then Igot to thinking that he'd get a flat parking on all that metal so I went outto move the car. Lucky I did. Bert musta forgot to set the brakes. Derned ifthat car wasn't headed straight for Thaddeus. He was walking right in front ofit. Even had his hand on the bumper and the dern thing rolling right afterhim. I yelled and hit out for the car. But by the time I got there, it hadstopped and Thaddeus was squatting by his wrecked trike. What do you supposethe little cuss said? 'Old car broke my trike. I made him get off.'
"Can you beat it? Kids get the dernedest ideas. Lucky it wasn't much downhill, though. He'd have been hurt sure."
I lay with the letter on my chest and felt cold. Dad had forgotten thatthey "tore up the hill" and that the car must have rolled up the slope to getoff Thaddeus' trike.
That night I woke up the ward yelling, "Come on, Wagon!"
It was some months later when I saw Thaddeus again. He and half a dozenother nephews—and the one persistent niece—were in a tearing hurry to besomewhere else and nearly mobbed Dad and me on the front porch as they boiledout of the house with mouths and hands full of cookies. They all stopped longenough to give me the once-over and fire a machine gun volley with mycrutches, then they disappeared down the land on their bikes, heads low, rearends high, and every one of them being bombers at the tops of their voices.
I only had time enough to notice that Thaddeus had lanked out and was justone of the kids as he grinned engagingly at me with the two-tooth gap in hisfront teeth.
"Did you ever notice anything odd about Thaddeus?" I pulled out themakin's.
"Thaddeus?" Dad glanced up at me from firing up his battered old corncobpipe. "Not particularly. Why?"
"Oh, nothing." I ran my tongue along the paper and rolled the cigaretteshut. "He just always seemed kinda
different."
"Well, he's always been kinda slow about some things. Not that he's dumb.Once he catches on, he's as smart as anyone, but he's sure pulled some funnyones."
"Give me a fer-instance," I said, wondering if he'd remember the trikedeal.
"Well, coupla years ago at a wienie roast he was toting something aroundwrapped in a paper napkin. Jean saw him put it in his pocket and she thoughtit was probably a dead frog or a beetle or something like that, so she madehim fork it over. She unfolded the napkin and derned if there wasn't a biglive coal in it. Dern thing flamed right up in her hand. Thaddeus belleredlike a bull calf. Said he wanted to take it home cause it was pretty. How heever carried it around that long without setting himself afire is what gotme." "That's Thaddeus," I said, "odd." "Yeah." Dad was firing his pipe again,flicking the burned match down, to join the dozen or so others by the porchrailing. "I guess you might call him odd. But he'll outgrow it. He hasn'tpulled anything like that in a long time."
"They do outgrow it," I said. "Thank God." And I think it was a realprayer. I don't like kids. "By the way, Where's Clyde?"
"Down in the East Pasture, plowing. Say, that tractor I got that lastChristmas you were here is a bear cat. It's lasted me all this time and I'venever had to do a lick of work on it. Clyde's using it today."
"When you get a good tractor you got a good one," I said. "Guess I'll godown and see the old son-of-a-gun—Clyde, I mean. Haven't seen him in a coon'sage." I gathered up my crutches.
Dad scrambled to his feet "Better let me run you down in the pickup. I've
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gotta go over to Jesperson's anyway."
"Okay," I said. "Won't be long till I can throw these things away." So we
piled in the pickup and headed for the East Pasture.
We were ambushed at the pump corner by the kids and were killed variously
by P-38s, atomic bombs, ack-ack, and the Lone Ranger's six-guns. Then we
lowered our hands which had been raised all this time and Dad reached out and
collared the nearest nephew.
"Come along, Punkin-Yaller. That blasted Holstein has busted out again. You
get her out of the alfalfa and see if you can find where she got through this
time."
"Aw, gee whiz!" The kid—and of course it was Thaddeus—climbed into the back
of the pickup. "That dern cow."
We started up with a jerk and I turned half around in the seat to look back
at Thaddeus.
"Remember your little red wagon?" I yelled over the clatter.
"Red wagon?" Thaddeus yelled back. His face lighted. "Red wagon?"
I could tell he had remembered and then, as plainly as the drawing of a
shade, his eyes went shadowy and he yelled, "Yeah, kinda." And turned around
to wave violently at the unnoticing kids behind us.
So, I thought, he is outgrowing it. Then spent the rest of the short drive
trying to figure just what it was he was outgrowing.
Dad dumped Thaddeus out at the alfalfa field and took me on across the
canal and let me out by the pasture gate.
"I'll be back in about an hour if you want to wait. Might as well ride
home."
"I might start back afoot," I said, "It'd feel good to stretch my legs
again."
"I'll keep a look out for you on my way back." And he rattled away in the
ever present cloud of dust.
I had trouble managing the gate. It's one of those wire affairs that open
by slipping a loop off the end post and lifting the bottom of it out of
another loop. This one was taut and hard to handle. I just got it opened when
Clyde turned the far corner and started back toward me, the plow behind the
tractor curling up red-brown ribbons in its wake. It was the last go-round to
complete the field.
I yelled, "Hi!" and waved a crutch at him.
He yelled, "Hi!" back at me. What came next was too fast and too far away
for me to be sure what actually happened. All I remember was a snort and roar
and the tractor bucked and bowed. There was a short yell from Clyde and the
shriek of wires pulling loose from a fence post followed by a choking
smothering silence.
Next thing I knew, I was panting halfway to the tractor, my crutches
sinking exasperatingly into the soft plowed earth. A nightmare year later I
knelt by the stalled tractor and called, "Hey, Clyde!"
Clyde looked up at me, a half grin, half grimace on his muddy face.
"Hi. Get this thing off me, will you. I need that leg." Then his eyes
turned up white and he passed out.
The tractor had toppled him from the seat and then run over top of him,
turning into the fence and coming to rest with one huge wheel half burying his
leg in the soft dirt and pinning him against a fence post. The far wheel was
on the edge of the irrigation ditch that bordered the field just beyond the
fence. The huge bulk of the machine was balanced on the raw edge of nothing
and it looked like a breath would send it on over— then God have mercy on
Clyde. It didn't help much to notice that the red-brown dirt was steadily
becoming redder around the imprisoned leg.
I knelt there paralyzed with panic. There was nothing I could do. I didn't
dare to try to start the tractor. If I touched it, it might go over. Dad was
gone for an hour. I couldn't make it by foot to the house in time.
Then all at once out of nowhere I heard a startled "Gee whiz!" and there
was Thaddeus standing goggle-eyed on the ditch bank.
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Something exploded with a flash of light inside my head and I whispered tomyself, Now take it easy. Don't scare the kid, don't startle him.
"Gee whiz!" said Thaddeus again. "What happened?"
I took a deep breath. "Old Tractor ran over Uncle Clyde. Make it get off."
Thaddeus didn't seem to hear me. He was intent on taking in the wholeshebang.
"Thaddeus," I said, "make Tractor get off." Thaddeus looked at me with thatblind, unseeing stare he used to have. I prayed silently, Don't let him be tooold. O God, don't let him be too old. And Thaddeus jumped across the ditch. Heclimbed gingerly through the barbwire fence and squatted down by the tractor,his hands caught between his chest and knees. He bent his head forward and Istared urgently at the soft vulnerable nape of his neck. Then he turned hisblind eyes to me again.
"Tractor doesn't want to."
I felt a yell ball up in my throat, but I caught it in time. Don't scarethe kid, I thought. Don't scare him.
"Make Tractor get off anyway," I said as matter-of-factly as I couldmanage. "He's hurting Uncle Clyde."
Thaddeus turned and looked at Clyde.
"He isn't hollering."
"He can't. He's unconscious." Sweat was making my palms slippery.
"Oh." Thaddeus examined Clyde's quiet face curiously. "I never saw anybodyunconscious before."
"Thaddeus." My voice was sharp. "Make—Tractor—get —off."
Maybe I talked too loud. Maybe I used the wrong words, but Thaddeus lookedup at me and I saw the shutters close in his eyes. They looked up at me, blueand shallow and bright.
"You mean start the tractor?" His voice was brisk as he stood up. "Geewhiz! Grampa told us kids to leave the tractor alone. It's dangerous for kids.I don't know whether I know how—"
"That's not what I meant," I snapped, my voice whetted on the edge of mydespair. "Make it get off Uncle Clyde. He's dying."
"But I can't! You can't just make a tractor do something. You gotta runit." His face was twisting with approaching tears.
"You could if you wanted to," I argued, knowing how useless it was. "UncleClyde will die if you don't."
"But I can't! I don't know how! Honest I don't." Thaddeus scrubbed one bare foot in the plowed dirt, sniffing miserably.
I knelt beside Clyde and slipped my hand inside his dirt-smeared shirt. Ipulled my hand out and rubbed the stained palm against my thigh. "Never mind,"I said bluntly, "it doesn't matter now. He's dead."
Thaddeus started to bawl, not from grief but bewilderment. He knew I wasput out with him and he didn't know why. He crooked his arm over his eyes andleaned against a fence post, sobbing noisily. I shifted myself over in thedark furrow until my shadow sheltered Clyde's quiet face from the hotafternoon sun. I clasped my hands palm to palm between my knees and waited forDad.
I knew as well as anything that once Thaddeus could have helped—Whycouldn't he then, when the need was so urgent? Well, maybe he really hadoutgrown his strangeness. Or it might be that he actually couldn't do anythingjust because Clyde and I were grownups. Maybe if it had been another kid—
Sometimes my mind gets cold trying to figure it out. Especially when I getthe answer that kids and grownups live in two worlds so alien and separatethat the gap can't be bridged even to save a life. Whatever the answer is—Istill don't like kids.
Walking Aunt Daid
I looked up in surprise and so did Ma. And so did Pa. Aunt Daid was moving.
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Her hands were coming together and moving upward till the light from the
fireplace had a rest from flickering on that cracked, wrinkled wreck that was
her face. But the hands didn't stay long. They dropped back to her saggy lap
like two dead bats, and the sunken old mouth that had fallen in on its lips
years before I was born puckered and worked and let Aunt Daid's tongue out a
little ways before it pulled it back in again. I swallowed hard. There was
something alive about that tongue and alive wasn't a word I'd associate with
Aunt Daid.
Ma let out a sigh that was almost a snort and took up her fancy work again.
"Guess it's about time," she said over a sudden thrum of rain against the
darkening parlor windows.
"Naw," said Pa. "Too soon. Years yet."
"Don't know ‘bout that," said Ma. "Paul here's going on twenty. Count back
to the last time. Remember that, Dev?"
"Aw!" Pa squirmed in his chair. Then he rattled the Weekly Wadrow open and
snapped it back to the state news. "Better watch out," he warned, his eyes
answering hers. "I might learn more this time and decide I need some other
woman."
"Can't scare me," said Ma over the strand of embroidery thread she was
holding between her teeth to separate it into strands. " ’T'won't be your
place this time anyhow. Once for each generation, hasn't it been? It's Paul
this time."
"He's too young," protested Pa. "Some things younguns should be sheltered
from." He was stern.
"Paul's oldern'n you were at his age," said Ma. "Schooling does that to
you, I guess."
"Sheltered from what?" I asked. "What about last time? What's all this just
'cause Aunt Daid moved without anyone telling her to?"
"You'll find out," said Ma, and she shivered a little. "We make jokes about
it—but only in the family," she warned. "This is strictly family business. But
it isn't any joking matter. I wish the good Lord would take Aunt Daid. It's
creepy. It's not healthy."
"Aw, simmer down, Mayleen," said Pa. "It's not all that bad. Every family's
got its problems. Ours just happens to be Aunt Daid. It could be worse. At
least she's quiet and clean and biddable and that's more than you can say for
some other people's old folks."
"Old folks is right," said Ma. "We hit the jackpot there."
"How old is Aunt Daid?" I asked, wondering just how many years it had taken
to suck so much sap out of her that you wondered that the husk of her didn't
rustle when she walked.
"No one rightly knows," said Ma, folding away her fancy work. She went over
to Aunt Daid and put her hand on the sagging shoulder.
"Bedtime, Aunt Daid," she called, loud and clear. "Time for bed."
I counted to myself. ". . . three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine,
ten," and Aunt Daid was on her feet, her bent old knees wavering to hold her
scanty weight.
I shook my head wonderingly and half grinned. Never failed. Up at the count
of ten, which was pretty good, seeing as she never started stirring until the
count of five. It took that long for Ma's words to sink in.
I watched Aunt Daid follow Ma out. You couldn't push her to go anywhere,
but she followed real good. Then I said to Pa, "What's Aunt Daid's whole name?
How's she kin to us?"
"Don't rightly know," said Pa. "I could maybe figger it out—how she's kin
to us, I mean—if I took the time— a lot of it. Great-great-grampa started
calling her Aunt Daid. Other folks thought it was kinda disrespectful but it
stuck to her." He stood up and stretched and yawned. "Morning comes early," he
said. "Better hit the hay." He pitched the paper at the woodbox and went off
toward the kitchen for his bed snack.
"What'd he call her Aunt Daid for?" I hollered after him.
"Well," yelled Pa, his voice muffled, most likely from coming out of the
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icebox. "He said she shoulda been 'daid’ a long time ago, so he called herAunt Daid."
I figured on the edge of the Hog Breeder's Gazette. "Let's see. Aroundthirty years to a generation. Me, Pa, Grampa, great-grampa,great-great-grampa—and let's see for me that'd be another great That makes sixgenerations. That's 180 years—" I chewed on the end of my pencil, a funnyflutter inside me.
'"Course, that's just guessing," I told myself. "Maybe Pa just piled it onfor devilment. Minus a generation— that's 150." I put my pencil down realcareful. Shoulda been dead a long time ago. How old was Aunt Daid that theysaid that about her a century and a half ago?
Next morning the whole world was fresh and clean. Last night's spell ofrain had washed the trees and the skies and settled the dust, I stretched inthe early morning cool and felt like life was a pretty good thing. Vacationbefore me and nothing much to be done on the farm for a while.
Ma called breakfast and I followed my nose to the buttermilk pancakes andsausages and coffee and outate Pa by a stack and a half of pancakes.
"Well, son, looks like you're finally a man," said Pa. "When you can outeatyour pa—"
Ma scurried in from the other room. "Aunt Daid's sitting on the edge of herbed," she said anxiously. "And I didn't get her up."
"Um," said Pa. "Begins to look that way doesn't it?"
"Think I'll go up to Honan's Lake," I said, tilting my chair back, onlyhalf hearing what they were saying. "Feel like a coupla days fishing."
"Better hang around, son," said Pa. "We might be needing you in a day orso."
"Oh?" I said, a little put out. "I had my mouth all set for Honan's Lake."
"Well, unset it for a spell," said Pa. "There's a whole summer ahead."
"But what for?" I asked. "What's cooking?"
Pa and Ma looked at each other and Ma crumpled the corner of her apron inher hand. "We're going to need you," she said.
"How come?" I asked.
'To walk Aunt Daid," said Ma.
"To walk Aunt Daid?" I thumped my chair back on four legs. "But my gosh,Ma, you always do for Aunt Daid."
"Not for this," said Ma, smoothing at the wrinkles in her apron. "Aunt Daidwon't walk this walk with a woman. It has to be you."
I took a good look at Aunt Daid that night at supper. I'd never reallylooked at her before. She'd been around ever since I could remember. She was as much a part of the house as the furniture.
Aunt Daid was just soso sized. If she'd been fleshed out, she'd be about Mafor bigness. She had a wisp of hair twisted into a walnut-sized knob at theback of her head. The ends of the hair sprayed out stiffly from the knob likea worn-out brush. Her face looked like wrinkles had wrinkled on wrinkles and all collapsed into the emptiness of no teeth and no meat on her skull bones.Her tiny eyes, almost hidden under the crepe of her eyelids, were empty. Theyjust stared across the table through me and on out into nothingness while herlips sucked open at the tap of the spoon Ma held, inhaled the soft stuff Mahad to feed her on, and then shut, working silently until her skinny neckbobbed with swallowing.
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