Preacher's Boy

"You see, Willie"—I felt just like Pa must when he's trying to explain the Bible to thick-headed parishioners—"it stands to reason, don't it? If a person don't believe in God, then he don't have to worry about all that stuff in the Bible anymore. Why, just now I was sitting here thinking I wanted to cuss those durned Westons for taking our best hole. So I just went right ahead and helped myself. I can cuss anytime I feel like it now. The commandments don't apply."

"The Ten Commandments?"

What other commandments were there? "Sure," I said. "If I need to lie or steal or cuss or"—and here I felt a little shiver go through me as I said it—"or do somebody in..."

Willie was up on his feet staring down at me like I'd suddenly turned into a porcupine.

"Or be wicked on Sunday or commit 'dultry—"

"Hush your mouth, Robbie Hewitt. Suppose your father heard you talking this way."

"I would never tell him," I said grandly. "It would break the poor man's heart."

Willie sat down again, still considering what his best friend had become. Finally he lay back against the bank. "You better think this through careful, Robbie," he said quietly.

"You think I ain't give it proper thought?" I said. "Why, it's practically all I think about anymore." Which was not true. I thought an awful lot about motorcars and bicycles. (Was there any chance of my ever owning a pair of wheels?) And would the members want to throw Pa out after the next annual meeting of the congregation because he wasn't thrilled enough about eternal damnation? I—though I could hardly confess it even to myself, much less to Willie—I even thought about Rachel Martin, who sat right in front of me at school—how it might feel to give one of those corkscrew curls of hers a proper yank, just to see if it boinged back in place like a pond frog. But faced as I was with the end of the world, it didn't seem fitting to have thoughts about girls with dark brown curls hanging down their backs. Anyhow, thoughts of Rachel Martin made me a little itchy under the collar, even when I never breathed them out loud.

We were quiet a long time, lying against the bank, chewing our wood-sorrel sticks, our lines only moving with the gentle current, the smell of the new-mown fields in our noses, the hum of insects in our ears. At the time it seemed the Fourth of July would last forever. But there was a sadness already in the lazy call of a crow, as if it knew that everything was all downhill from here, like it was the beginning of the end of our last summer on earth.

"So," said Willie, and when he did, I realized that he had said it more than once and I hadn't been paying attention. "So, what do you want to do?"

At that moment I didn't want to do anything but lie against the bank of the North Branch and get mildly drunk on the smells of midsummer and listen to the stream laughing past and the insects busy humming in my ears. I didn't answer. Willie didn't ask again. I think he was content, too. It had been a great parade, even with having to pull that bum wagon with Letty aboard.

I allowed myself the luxury of a daydream of next summer's parade. Me on a pair of wheels from W. R. Nichols in Tyler. The ad in the Tyler paper was framed in a double-thick black-lined box. I had the words memorized: "Bicycles, the most complete of any in the city and I will sell them at any price you want!"

That was a lie, of course, because the ad went right on to say the price Mr. Nichols wanted.

"Prices from $20 to $125," which was sure not any price I wanted, my total savings at the moment being a whopping $1.35. But there was this tantalizing phrase at the bottom of the lying ad: "A large number of secondhand wheels almost given away in the basement of the Nichols Block. Come and see me!"

All right, it sounded a little bit like the witch in "Hansel and Gretel" inviting the young folks into her gingerbread house, but I could hardly resist walking the ten miles to Tyler to find out. What did "almost given away" mean, exactly? A dollar thirty-five? That would certainly be a giveaway compared to $20 or $125. Just who on God's green earth would pay $125 for a pair of wheels? Boy, if I had $125, I wouldn't waste it on any fancy bicycle. I'd go straight out and buy me a Winton motorcar like the one I saw in Tyler. I sighed. No, motorcars probably cost a fortune, more like a thousand dollars than a hundred.

4. Missing Elliot

NO FISH THAT AFTERNOO

N—TOO HOT AND THE WRONG spot—but supper made up for it. We hadn't had as good a meal since the Reverend Pelham left town. Ma roasted up one of the older chickens that had given up laying. It was hardly tough at all the way she did it. On top of chicken we had baked beans and Indian pudding and some kind of custard.

Pa was very jolly and talked about the parade. He even spoke kindly of how good me and Willie had been pulling Letty the whole length of the parade route. I guess he hadn't heard about my little alteration with Ned Weston. At least he never mentioned it. He and Ma had stayed for all the speeches on the town hall green. Mr. Weston had surprised everyone by only speaking an hour and a half—a full forty minutes short of his previous record.

As good as supper was, we hurried it a bit. The band concert was due to begin at six-thirty, while it was still light, and we didn't want to miss any of it. And yes, Letty could stay up for the fireworks. Both Beth and I were obliged to object. We'd never been allowed to stay up that late when we were five, but it was a halfhearted protest We were all in too good a mood. Besides, if Letty was put to bed, one of us might be recruited to stay home with her. We couldn't take that chance.

By quarter past six we had a blanket spread out on the green. We're a big family for one blanket, so we held to sit close together. I huddled against Pa. "You cold, Robbie?" he asked. I nodded yes, so he put his arm around me. I wasn't really cold, but somehow I was feeling that if I got more than an inch away from the warmth of his big body, I was likely to freeze. Was that what being out on your own in the cold, cruel world meant? Was it like the coldness you feel on a summer night when you can't get close enough to your pa's big, warm presence?

It didn't last. Letty keeled over, dead asleep, and Pa reached out and picked her up and held her, cradling her head against his chest. She didn't even wake up when the band started tuning up, just kind of stirred a bit and settled down.

"I guess I'll go sit with Willie," I said.

"All right," Pa said, smiling. I wanted him to say something like "Don't go. Sit here with us," but he didn't.

I would have really enjoyed the band concert except I couldn't get over how cold it was—though it was July the Fourth and not dark yet. But then the concert ended and the fireworks were on. It's hard to think about much else when the sky is exploding: rockets whizzing and whining and blasting to great umbrellas of shattered light all over the town and as far as the mountains on either side. I wondered, but not in a scary way, mind you, just wondered if the end of the world could hold a candle to those fireworks for aerial excitement.

"Robbie, have you seen Elliot?" I jumped up at the sound of Pa's voice. He had startled me there in the dark, my mind being on the convulsions of light in the sky. He was standing behind me, a kerosene lantern in one hand.

"No, Pa, no I ain't." I could tell he was worried when he didn't correct my grammar.

"You boys help me look for him?"

"Sure, Mr. Hewitt." Willie was on his feet now, tucking his shirttail into his pants, all business.