Dandelion Wine Read online

  "July Fourth and all that, dandelion-wine making and junk like bringing out the porch swing, huh?"

  "Says here, I ate the first Eskimo Pie of the summer season June first, 1928."

  "That wasn't summer, that was still spring."

  "It was a 'first' anyway, so I put it down. Bought those new tennis shoes June twenty-fifth. Went barefoot in the grass June twenty-sixth. Busy, busy, busy, heck! Well, what you got to report this time, Tom? A new first, a fancy ceremony of some sort to do with vacation like creek-crab catching or water-strider-spider grabbing?"

  "Nobody ever grabbed a water-strider-spider in his life. You ever know anybody grabbed a water-strider-spider? Go ahead, think!"

  "I'm thinking."

  "Well?"

  "You're right. Nobody ever did. Nobody ever will, I guess. They're just too fast."

  "It's not that they're fast. They just don't exist," said Tom. He thought about it and nodded. "That's right, they just never did exist at all. Well, what I got to report is this."

  He leaned over and whispered in his brother's ear.

  Douglas wrote it.

  They both looked at it.

  "I'll be darned!" said Douglas. "I never thought of that. That's brilliant! It's true. Old people never were children!"

  "And it's kind of sad," said Tom, sitting still. "There's nothing we can do to help them."

  Seems like the town is full of machines," said Douglas, running. "Mr. Auffmann and his Happiness Machine, Miss Fern and Miss Roberta and their Green Machine. Now, Charlie, what you handing me?"

  "A Time Machine!" panted Charlie Woodman, pacing him. "Mother's, scout's, Injun's honor!"

  "Travels in the past and future?" John Huff asked, easily circling them.

  "Only in the past, but you can't have everything. Here we are."

  Charlie Woodman pulled up at a hedge.

  Douglas peered in at the old house. "Heck, that's Colonel Freeleigh's place. Can't be no Time Machine in there. He's no inventor, and if he was, we'd known about an important thing like a Time Machine years ago."

  Charlie and John tiptoed up the front-porch steps. Douglas snorted and shook his head, staying at the bottom of the steps.

  "Okay, Douglas," said Charlie. "Be a knucklehead. Sure, Colonel Freeleigh didn't invent this Time Machine. But he's got a proprietary interest in it, and it's been here all the time. We were too darned dumb to notice! So long, Douglas Spaulding, to you!"

  Charlie took John's elbow as though he was escorting a lady, opened the front-porch screen and went in. The screen door did not slam.

  Douglas had caught the screen and was following silently.

  Charlie walked across the enclosed porch, knocked, and opened the inside door. They all peered down a long dark hall toward a room that was lit like an undersea grotto, soft green, dim, and watery.

  "Colonel Freeleigh?"

  Silence.

  "He don't hear so good," whispered Charlie. "But he told me to just come on in and yell. Colonel!"

  The only answer was the dust sifting down and around the spiral stairwell from above. Then there was a faint stir in that undersea chamber at the far end of the hall.

  They moved carefully along and peered into a room which contained but two pieces of furniture--an old man and a chair. They resembled each other, both so thin you could see just how they had been put together, ball and socket, sinew and joint. The rest of the room was raw floor boards, naked walls and ceiling, and vast quantities of silent air.

  "He looks dead," whispered Douglas.

  "No, he's just thinking up new places to travel to," said Charlie, very proud and quiet. "Colonel?"

  One of the pieces of brown furniture moved and it was the colonel, blinking around, focusing, and smiling a wild and toothless smile. "Charlie!"

  "Colonel, Doug and John here came to--"

  "Welcome, boys; sit down, sit down!"

  The boys sat, uneasily, on the floor.

  "But where's the--" said Douglas. Charlie jabbed his ribs quickly.

  "Where's the what?" asked Colonel Freeleigh.

  "Where's the point in us talking, he means." Charlie grimaced at Douglas, then smiled at the old man. "We got nothing to say. Colonel, you say something."

  "Beware, Charlie, old men only lie in wait for people to ask them to talk. Then they rattle on like a rusty elevator wheezing up a shaft."

  "Ching Ling Soo," suggested Charlie casually.

  "Eh?" said the colonel.

  "Boston," Charlie prompted, "1910."

  "Boston, 1910 ..." The colonel frowned. "Why, Ching Ling Soo, of course!"

  "Yes, sir, Colonel."

  "Let me see, now ..." The colonel's voice murmured, it drifted away on serene lake waters. "Let me see ..."

  The boys waited.

  Colonel Freeleigh closed his eyes.

  "October first, 1910, a calm cool fine autumn night, the Boston Variety Theatre, yes, there it is. Full house, all waiting. Orchestra, fanfare, curtain! Ching Ling Soo, the great Oriental Magician! There he is, on stage! And there I am, front row center! 'The Bullet Trick!' he cries. 'Volunteers!' The man next to me goes up. 'Examine the rifle!' says Ching. 'Mark the bullet!' says he. 'Now, fire this marked bullet from this rifle, using my face for a target, and,' says Ching, 'at the far end of the stage I will catch the bullet in my teeth!'"

  Colonel Freeleigh took a deep breath and paused.

  Douglas was staring at him, half puzzled, half in awe. John Huff and Charlie were completely lost. Now the old man went on, his head and body frozen, only his lips moving.

  "'Ready, aim, fire!' cries Ching Ling Soo. Bang! The rifle cracks. Bang! Ching Ling Soo shrieks, he staggers, he falls, his face all red. Pandemonium. Audience on its feet. Something wrong with the rifle. 'Dead,' someone says. And they're right. Dead. Horrible, horrible ... I'll always remember ... his face a mask of red, the curtain coming down fast and the women weeping ... 1910 ... Boston ... Variety Theatre ... poor man ..."

  Colonel Freeleigh slowly opened his eyes.

  "Boy, Colonel," said Charlie, "that was fine. Now how about Pawnee Bill?"

  "Pawnee Bill ...? "

  "And the time you was on the prairie way back in '75."

  "Pawnee Bill ..." The colonel moved into darkness. "Eighteen seventy-five ... yes, me and Pawnee Bill on a little rise in the middle of the prairie, waiting. 'Shh!' says Pawnee Bill. 'Listen.' The prairie like a big stage all set for the storm to come. Thunder. Soft. Thunder again. Not so soft. And across that prairie as far as the eye could see this big ominous yellow-dark cloud full of black lightning, somehow sunk to earth, fifty miles wide, fifty miles long, a mile high, and no more than an inch off the ground. 'Lord!' I cried, 'Lord!'--from up on my hill--'Lord!' the earth pounded like a mad heart, boys, a heart gone to panic. My bones shook fit to break. The earth shook: rat-a-tat rat-a-tat, boom! Rumble. That's a rare word: rumble. Oh, how that mighty storm rumbled along down, up, and over the rises, and all you could see was the cloud and nothing inside. 'That's them!' cried Pawnee Bill. And the cloud was dust! Not vapors or rain, no, but prairie dust flung up from the tinder-dry grass like fine corn meal, like pollen all blazed with sunlight now, for the sun had come out. I shouted again! Why? Because in all that hell-fire filtering dust now a veil moved aside and I saw them, I swear it! The grand army of the ancient prairie: the bison, the buffalo!"

  The colonel let the silence build, then broke it again.

  "Heads like giant Negroes' fists, bodies like locomotives! Twenty, fifty, two hundred thousand iron missiles shot out of the west, gone off the track and flailing cinders, their eyes like blazing coals, rumbling toward oblivion!

  "I saw that the dust rose up and for a little while showed me that sea of humps, of dolloping manes, black shaggy waves rising, falling ... 'Shoot!' says Pawnee Bill. 'Shoot!' And I cock and aim. 'Shoot' he says. And I stand there feeling like God's right hand, looking at the great vision of strength and violence going by, going by, midnight at noon, like a glinty funeral trai
n all black and long and sad and forever and you don't fire at a funeral train, now do you, boys? do you? All I wanted then was for the dust to sink again and cover the black shapes of doom which pummeled and jostled on in great burdensome commotions. And, boys, the dust came down. The cloud hid the million feet that were drumming up the thunder and dusting out the storm. I heard Pawnee Bill curse and hit my arm. But I was glad I hadn't touched that cloud or the power within that cloud with so much as a pellet of lead. I just wanted to stand watching time bundle by in great trundlings all hid by the storm the bison made and carried with them toward eternity.

  "An hour, three hours, six, it took for the storm to pass on away over the horizon toward less kind men than me. Pawnee Bill was gone, I stood alone, stone deaf. I walked all numb through a town a hundred miles south and heard not the voices of men and was satisfied not to hear. For a little while I wanted to remember the thunder. I hear it still, on summer afternoons like this when the rain shapes over the lake; a fearsome, wondrous sound ... one I wish you might have heard...."

  The dim light filtered through Colonel Freeleigh's nose which was large and like white porcelain which cupped a very thin and tepid orange tea indeed.

  "Is he asleep?" asked Douglas at last.

  "No," said Charlie. "Just recharging his batteries."

  Colonel Freeleigh breathed swiftly, softly, as if he'd run a long way. At last he opened his eyes.

  "Yes, sir!" said Charlie, in admiration.

  "Hello, Charlie." The colonel smiled at the boys puzzledly.

  "That's Doug and that's John," said Charlie.

  "How-de-do, boys."

  The boys said hello.

  "But--" said Douglas. "Where is the--?"

  "My gosh, you're dumb!" Charlie jabbed Douglas in the arm. He turned to the colonel. "You were saying, sir?"

  "Was I?" murmured the old man.

  "The Civil War," suggested John Huff quietly. "Does he remember that?"

  "Do I remember?" said the colonel. "Oh, I do, I do!" His voice trembled as he shut up his eyes again. "Everything! Except ... which side I fought on ..."

  "The color of your uniform--" Charlie began.

  "Colors begin to run on you," whispered the colonel. "It's gotten hazy. I see soldiers with me, but a long time ago I stopped seeing color in their coats or caps. I was born in Illinois, raised in Virginia, married in New York, built a house in Tennessee and now, very late, here I am, good Lord, back in Green Town. So you see why the colors run and blend.... "

  "But you remember which side of hills you fought on?" Charlie did not raise his voice. "Did the sun rise on your left or right? Did you march toward Canada or Mexico?"

  "Seems some mornings the sun rose on my good right hand, some mornings over my left shoulder. We marched all directions. It's most seventy years since. You forget suns and mornings that long past."

  "You remember winning, don't you? A battle won, somewhere?"

  "No," said the old man, deep under. "I don't remember anyone winning anywhere any time. War's never a winning thing, Charlie. You just lose all the time, and the one who loses last asks for terms. All I remember is a lot of losing and sadness and nothing good but the end of it. The end of it, Charles, that was a winning all to itself, having nothing to do with guns. But I don't suppose that's the kind of victory you boys mean for me to talk on."

  "Antietam," said John Huff. "Ask about Antietam."

  "I was there."

  The boys' eyes grew bright. "Bull Run, ask him Bull Run ..."

  "I was there." Softly.

  "What about Shiloh?"

  "There's never been a year in my life I haven't thought, what a lovely name and what a shame to see it only on battle records."

  "Shiloh, then. Fort Sumter?"

  "I saw the first puffs of powder smoke." A dreaming voice. "So many things come back, oh, so many things. I remember songs. 'All's quiet along the Potomac tonight, where the soldiers lie peacefully dreaming; their tents in the rays of the clear autumn moon, or the light of the watchfire, are gleaming.' Remember, remember ... 'All quiet along the Potomac tonight; no sound save the rush of the river; while soft falls the dew on the face of the dead--the picket's off duty forever!' ... After the surrender, Mr. Lincoln, on the White House balcony asked the band to play, 'Look away, look away, look away, Dixie land.' ... And then there was the Boston lady who one night wrote a song will last a thousand years: 'Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord; He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored.' Late nights I feel my mouth move singing back in another time. 'Ye Cavaliers of Dixie! Who guard the Southern shores ...' 'When the boys come home in triumph, brother, with the laurels they shall gain ...' So many songs, sung on both sides, blowing north, blowing south on the night winds. 'We are coming, Father Abraham, three hundred thousand more ...' 'Tenting tonight, tenting tonight, tenting on the old camp ground.' 'Hurrah, hurrah, we bring the Jubilee, hurrah, hurrah, the flag that makes us free ...'"

  The old man's voice faded.

  The boys sat for a long while without moving. Then Charlie turned and looked at Douglas and said, "Well, is he or isn't he?"

  Douglas breathed twice and said, "He sure is."

  The colonel opened his eyes.

  "I sure am what?" he asked.

  "A Time Machine," murmured Douglas. "A Time Machine."

  The colonel looked at the boys for a full five seconds. Now it was his voice that was full of awe.

  "Is that what you boys call me?"

  "Yes, sir, Colonel."

  "Yes, sir."

  The colonel sat slowly back in his chair and looked at the boys and looked at his hands and then looked at the blank wall beyond them steadily.

  Charlie arose. "Well, I guess we better go. So long and thanks, Colonel."

  "What? Oh, so long, boys."

  Douglas and John and Charlie went on tiptoe out the door.

  Colonel Freeleigh, though they crossed his line of vision, did not see them go.

  In the street, the boys were startled when someone shouted from a first-floor window above, "Hey!"

  They looked up.

  "Yes, sir, Colonel?"

  The colonel leaned out, waving one arm.

  "I thought about what you said, boys!"

  "Yes, sir?"

  "And--you're right! Why didn't I think of it before! A Time Machine, by God, a Time Machine!"

  "Yes, sir."

  "So long, boys. Come aboard any time!"

  At the end of the street they turned again and the colonel was still waving. They waved back, feeling warm and good, then went on.

  "Chug-a-chug," said John. "I can travel twelve years into the past. Wham-chug-ding!"

  "Yeah," said Charlie, looking back at that quiet house, "but you can't go a hundred years."

  "No," mused John, "I can't go a hundred years. That's really traveling. That's really some machine."

  They walked for a full minute in silence, looking at their feet. They came to a fence.

  "Last one over this fence," said Douglas, "is a girl."

  All the way home they called Douglas "Dora."

  Long after midnight Tom woke to find Douglas scribbling rapidly in the nickel tablet, by flashlight.

  "Doug, what's up?"

  "Up? Everything's up! I'm counting my blessings, Tom! Look here; the Happiness Machine didn't work out, did it? But, who cares! I got the whole year lined up, anyway. Need to run anywhere on the main streets, I got the Green Town Trolley to look around and spy on the world from. Need to run anywhere off the main streets, I knock on Miss Fern and Miss Roberta's door and they charge up the batteries on their electric runabout and we go sailing down the sidewalks. Need to run down alleys and over fences, to see that part of Green Town you only see around back and behind and creep up on, and I got my brand-new sneakers. Sneakers, runabout, trolley! I'm set! But even better, Tom, even better, listen! If I want to go where no one else can go because they're not smart enough to even think of it, if I w
ant to charge back to 1890 and then transfer to 1875 and transfer again crosstown to 1860 I just hop on the old Colonel Freeleigh Express! I'm writing it down here this way: 'Maybe old people were never children, like we claim with Mrs. Bentley, but, big or little, some of them were standing around at Appomattox the summer of 1865.' They got Indian vision and can sight back further than you and me will ever sight ahead."

  "That sounds swell, Doug; what does it mean?"

  Douglas went on writing. "It means you and me ain't got half the chance to be far-travelers they have. If we're lucky we'll hit forty, forty-five, fifty. That's just a jog around the block to them. It's when you hit ninety, ninety-five, a hundred, that you're far-traveling like heck."

  The flashlight went out.

  They lay there in the moonlight.

  "Tom," whispered Douglas. "I got to travel all those ways. See what I can see. But most of all I got to visit Colonel Freeleigh once, twice, three times a week. He's better than all the other machines. He talks, you listen. And the more he talks the more he gets you to peering around and noticing things. He tells you you're riding on a very special train, by gosh, and sure enough, it's true. He's been down the track, and knows. And now here we come, you and me, along the same track, but further on, and so much looking and snuffing and handling things to do, you need old Colonel Freeleigh to shove and say look alive so you remember every second! Every darn thing there is to remember! So when kids come around when you're real old, you can do for them what the colonel once did for you. That's the way it is, Tom, I got to spend a lot of time visiting him and listening so I can go far-traveling with him as often as he can."

  Tom was silent a moment. Then he looked over at Douglas there in the dark.

  "Far-traveling. You make that up?"

  "Maybe yes and maybe no."

  "Far-traveling," whispered Tom.

  "Only one thing I'm sure of," said Douglas, closing his eyes. "It sure sounds lonely."

  Bang!

  A door slammed. In an attic dust jumped off bureaus and bookcases. Two old women collapsed against the attic door, each scrabbling to lock it tight, tight. A thousand pigeons seemed to have leaped off the roof right over their heads. They bent as if burdened, ducked under the drum of beating wings. Then they stopped, their mouths surprised. What they heard was only the pure sound of panic, their hearts in their chests.... Above the uproar, they tried to make themselves heard.