The Anything Box Part 8

"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 thought.i.t 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 G.o.d." 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 G.o.down and see the old son-of-a-gun-Clyde, I mean. Haven't seen him in a c.o.o.n'sage." I gathered up my crutches.

Dad scrambled to his feet "Better let me run you down in the pickup. I've gotta go over to Jesperson's anyway."

"Okay," I said. "Won't be long till I can throw these things away." So wepiled in the pickup and headed for the East Pasture.

We were ambushed at the pump corner by the kids and were killed variouslyby P-38s, atomic bombs, ack-ack, and the Lone Ranger's six-guns. Then welowered 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. Youget her out of the alfalfa and see if you can find where she got through thistime."

"Aw, gee whiz!" The kid-and of course it was Thaddeus-climbed into the backof the pickup. "That dern cow."

We started up with a jerk and I turned half around in the seat to look backat 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 ashade, his eyes went shadowy and he yelled, "Yeah, kinda." And turned aroundto wave violently at the unnoticing kids behind us.

So, I thought, he is outgrowing it. Then spent the rest of the short drivetrying to figure just what it was he was outgrowing.

Dad dumped Thaddeus out at the alfalfa field and took me on across theca.n.a.l and let me out by the pasture gate.

"I'll be back in about an hour if you want to wait. Might as well ridehome."

"I might start back afoot," I said, "It'd feel good to stretch my legsagain."

"I'll keep a look out for you on my way back." And he rattled away in theever present cloud of dust.

I had trouble managing the gate. It's one of those wire affairs that openby slipping a loop off the end post and lifting the bottom of it out ofanother loop. This one was taut and hard to handle. I just got it opened whenClyde turned the far corner and started back toward me, the plow behind thetractor curling up red-brown ribbons in its wake. It was the last go-round tocomplete 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 awayfor me to be sure what actually happened. All I remember was a snort and roarand the tractor bucked and bowed. There was a short yell from Clyde and theshriek of wires pulling loose from a fence post followed by a chokingsmothering silence.

Next thing I knew, I was panting halfway to the tractor, my crutchessinking exasperatingly into the soft plowed earth. A nightmare year later Iknelt 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 eyesturned up white and he pa.s.sed 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 hisleg in the soft dirt and pinning him against a fence post. The far wheel wason the edge of the irrigation ditch that bordered the field just beyond thefence. The huge bulk of the machine was balanced on the raw edge of nothingand it looked like a breath would send it on over- then G.o.d have mercy onClyde. It didn't help much to notice that the red-brown dirt was steadilybecoming redder around the imprisoned leg.

I knelt there paralyzed with panic. There was nothing I could do. I didn'tdare to try to start the tractor. If I touched it, it might go over. Dad wasgone 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.

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 G.o.d, 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.

Her hands were coming together and moving upward till the light from thefireplace had a rest from flickering on that cracked, wrinkled wreck that washer face. But the hands didn't stay long. They dropped back to her saggy laplike two dead bats, and the sunken old mouth that had fallen in on its lipsyears before I was born puckered and worked and let Aunt Daid's tongue out alittle ways before it pulled it back in again. I swallowed hard. There wa.s.something alive about that tongue and alive wasn't a word I'd a.s.sociate withAunt 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 thedarkening parlor windows.

"Naw," said Pa. "Too soon. Years yet."

"Don't know 'bout that," said Ma. "Paul here's going on twenty. Count backto the last time. Remember that, Dev?"

"Aw!" Pa squirmed in his chair. Then he rattled the Weekly Wadrow open andsnapped it back to the state news. "Better watch out," he warned, his eyesanswering hers. "I might learn more this time and decide I need some otherwoman."

"Can't scare me," said Ma over the strand of embroidery thread she washolding between her teeth to separate it into strands. " 'T'won't be yourplace this time anyhow. Once for each generation, hasn't it been? It's Paulthis time."

"He's too young," protested Pa. "Some things younguns should be shelteredfrom." He was stern.

"Paul's oldern'n you were at his age," said Ma. "Schooling does that toyou, 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.i.t-but only in the family," she warned. "This is strictly family business. But.i.t isn't any joking matter. I wish the good Lord would take Aunt Daid. It'screepy. It's not healthy."

"Aw, simmer down, Mayleen," said Pa. "It's not all that bad. Every family'sgot its problems. Ours just happens to be Aunt Daid. It could be worse. Atleast she's quiet and clean and biddable and that's more than you can say forsome 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 takento suck so much sap out of her that you wondered that the husk of her didn'trustle when she walked.

"No one rightly knows," said Ma, folding away her fancy work. She went overto 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 herscanty weight.

I shook my head wonderingly and half grinned. Never failed. Up at the countof ten, which was pretty good, seeing as she never started stirring until thecount 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 kinto us, I mean-if I took the time- a lot of it. Great-great-grampa startedcalling her Aunt Daid. Other folks thought it was kinda disrespectful but itstuck to her." He stood up and stretched and yawned. "Morning comes early," hesaid. "Better hit the hay." He pitched the paper at the woodbox and went offtoward the kitchen for his bed snack.

"What'd he call her Aunt Daid for?" I hollered after him.

"Well," yelled Pa, his voice m.u.f.fled, most likely from coming out of the 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 b.u.t.termilk 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 ap.r.o.n 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 ap.r.o.n. "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 k.n.o.b at theback of her head. The ends of the hair sprayed out stiffly from the k.n.o.b 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.

"Doesn't she ever say anything?" I finally asked.

Pa looked quick at Ma and then back down at his plate.

"Never heard a word out of her," said Ma.

"Doesn't she ever do anything?" I asked.