I felt a little quiver of fear at the odd question. Should I grab Punky and try to make a run for it?
“Well, what do you see?”
I saw a root, but I was pretty sure that wasn’t the right answer, so I stayed quiet.
Walt turned the root over in his hands. “When I found this, it was just an old elm root. A couple of days later, I saw a critter in it, just waiting to be carved.”
A light came on in my head. “Oh, I see. It’s a fox.”
Walt smiled. “The average person sees only what’s in front of him. The artist sees things that aren’t there.”
I realized Walt had called me an artist, but the clock on his wall said it was five minutes past two. “Can we go now?” I asked cautiously. “My folks will be worried.”
“Not yet,” said Walt. “We haven’t solved the problem of the rodeo clown. Wait here.”
Uh-oh, I thought. He’s been stringing us along. He’ll be back in a minute with the security guard, and we’ll be in big trouble.
But Walt came back alone, with Punky’s socks tucked in the bib of his overalls. Giving the rodeo clown to Punky, he said, “You’re a man who loves clowns, and it so happens I’m a man who loves red socks. Just this once, I’m willing to make a trade. Shake, and we’ve got a bargain.”
As Punky shook hands with him, I dug into my jeans pocket and pulled out what cash I had left. It wasn’t much—just seven dollars—but I offered it to Walt.
“No, thanks,” he said, waving the bills away. “It wouldn’t be right for me to take your money after we’ve already, closed the deal. You all just go on about your business, but Punky, don’t pick up any more treasures, okay?”
“Yeah, buddy.”
By the time Punky and I reached the general store, it was a quarter past two. I hurried him through the store, but my parents were nowhere in sight. That was odd. Dad was seldom late for anything. Maybe they had already been here and left, and were out looking for us now.
I decided to do what Mom had always said I should do if I got lost—sit down and wait until she found me. Sitting down sounded like a good idea anyway. My legs felt as if I’d worn them off at the ankle, and Punky’s short legs had to be tireder than mine.
We went across to the gazebo and found some empty benches in the shade. I chose a seat where I could see the whole main street and the door of the general store.
Members of a band came to the stage and began tuning their instruments, and people straggled in to enjoy the show. Punky sat contentedly, playing with his rodeo clown. Except for checking my watch every couple of minutes, I didn’t take my eyes off the general store for fear I’d miss my parents again. I memorized every crack in every plank on that store, and I was beginning to hate the looks of it.
The show ended, the audience left, and a new crowd drifted over to claim seats for the next event. Still there was no sign of Mom and Dad.
It was after three, and I was worried. Even if the trailer was loaded with furniture, it couldn’t possibly take them an hour to travel nine miles.
I tried to imagine what could have caused my parents’ delay. Maybe they were waiting for another roll-top desk to come up for sale. Maybe they’d had engine trouble or a flat tire.
By four-thirty, I was downright scared, and Punky had practically chewed his fingers down to the bone. I allowed myself to feel anger toward my parents, to mask the panic that was building in my chest.
“I’m starved,” announced Punky.
The only food places within sight of the general store were the ice cream parlor and a little hut where funnel cakes were being fried.
“What do you want—ice cream or a funnel cake?”
“Big Mac.”
“We can’t get a Big Mac. We can’t get any kind of hamburger right now. How about a strawberry cone?”
“Big Mac.”
“Please, Punky, have some ice cream for now, and just as soon as I can, I’ll get you a Big Mac.”
“Oh, all right,” he agreed, holding up two fingers. “Two dips.”
I was tempted to leave him alone just long enough for me to get the ice cream, but I decided not to chance it. He might try to follow me and get lost, and then what would I do?
We bought two cones and went back to the gazebo. Our bench was taken, so we sat down on the grass.
When Punky finished his ice cream, he said, “I’m tired, D.J. Go home.”
“I know,” I replied, absently stroking the back of his neck.
“Want Shirley and Sam.”
“Me, too.”
“Go home—now.”
“We can‘t, Punky. We can’t go home without Mom and Dad.”
Punky burst into tears. “I’m sick, D.J.,” he howled, and I couldn’t tell if he was really sick or if he was just trying to scare me into taking him home.
“Where does it hurt?” I asked, touching his forehead. It felt hot, and beads of sweat had formed across his upper lip. He was trembling, and when I laid my head against his chest to listen to his heart, I thought it was thumping much too fast.
I jumped up, rammed my hands into my pocket, and retrieved the bottle of nitroglycerin. I shook out a pill and placed it under Punky’s tongue, and tried to decide whether to yell for help.
In a moment, Punky grinned wickedly and asked, “Go home now?” and I knew he’d played a trick on me.
“You rascal,” I cried, but I hugged him anyway.
Punky’s faking convinced me that we couldn’t wait here any longer. He was exhausted, and that could bring on a real spell with his heart. I had to do something, but what? Who could I turn to for help?
Whittlin’ Walt.
I coaxed Punky off the grass, and we trudged over to the woodcarving shop.
Walt listened to my story and scratched his head. He wrote down my parents’ names, the name of the auction arena, and the description of our car and trailer. He even asked about other relatives and wrote down Uncle Bert’s phone number. Finally, he suggested we wait in the office while he made some phone calls.
After about fifteen minutes, Walt came back. As soon as I saw him, I knew something dreadful had happened. Every crease on his forehead seemed deeper, and his eyes were clouded with pain. I wanted to put my hands over my ears to block out whatever it was he would say.
“Delrita,” he croaked, stopping to clear his throat, “there’s been an accident. The trailer—it jack-knifed.” His voice dropped to a whisper as he said, “Your folks—”
I leaped to my feet. “They’ll be all right, won’t they? They’re just banged up, and the car won’t run.” I laughed hysterically. “Dad’s been wanting a new car, and now he’ll get one and—”
“Delrita,” said Walt, placing both his hands on my shoulders and gently pushing me back into the chair, “your folks were killed. Instantly.”
ELEVEN
Going Home
The words were a lightning bolt, surging through my body.
Walt touched me, but I jerked away from him. Time stopped for me. I was falling through a deep, black hole, where screaming sirens wailed and faded and wailed again.
Punky’s terrified voice dragged me out of the pit. “D.J.! D.J.!”
The wailing ceased, and only then did I realize there were no sirens. The screaming came from me.
Punky was gripping both my hands, his pale face deathly white. Deathly white. His heart. The pills.
I heaved myself out of the chair and fumbled for the nitroglycerin. My hands were shaking so much that I couldn’t undo the cap. It was just as well. Punky’s coloring had already improved.
Walt was watching me, wringing his hands.
I wanted to kick a hole in the wall. I wanted to throw a chair through the window. I wanted to run into the shop and stomp all the carvings to splinters.
The blood was pounding in my ears so hard that ... Blood. My parents’ blood. My stomach heaved, and I pressed my hand across my mouth to keep from throwing up.
Understanding none of the situation
but seeing my distress, Punky stroked my arm and said, “I love you, D.J. You love me?”
I thought my heart would break as I gathered him into my arms and wept. Punky was all I had left of home, and I clung fiercely to him, for fear that he, too, might die and leave me all alone.
“Don’t cry, D.J. Don’t cry,” he soothed as tears streamed down his own cheeks.
Shudders wracked my body, and my teeth chattered violently. Finally I had no tears left—only hiccups and a creeping numbness.
When Walt handed me some tissues, I blew my nose, then held a clean tissue for Punky. “Blow,” I said automatically, and he did.
It struck me then that Punky needed me to be strong, to see us through, to get us back to Tangle Nook somehow.
Walt tried talking to me again, but he didn’t try to touch me. I hoped he understood why I’d jerked away from him before, because I was just too tired to tell him.
“The highway patrol told me there’d been a wreck on Route 76,” he said softly. “I called your Uncle Bert’s house and found out it was your folks. I offered to drive you and Punky home, but Mrs. Holloway said her husband is already on his way.”
“Queen Esther.”
“I beg your pardon,” said Walt, glancing at me sharply as if I’d lost my mind.
“Mrs. Holloway is Queen Esther. Aunt Queenie.”
“Oh.”
There was silence for a moment, until Walt looked at his watch and said, “It’ll be another couple of hours before your uncle gets here. I’ll take you to my house in Branson and call the highway patrol again. They can tell him where to find you.”
“Thanks,” I mumbled.
“I’ve got kids and grandkids. If they were in a spot like you are, I’d hope somebody would help them.... Are you all hungry?”
The thought of food made my stomach churn, but Punky said, “I’m starved.”
“Where would you like to eat?”
“McDonald‘s! Big Mac!”
“Come on, then,” replied Walt. “My treat.”
The numbness oozed out of me as I left Silver Dollar City. A thousand years had passed in one day, and I felt older than dirt. Oh, how I yearned to roll back the clock just a measly twenty-four hours, to stop my world from turning upside down.
Punky made himself at home in Walt’s house. He pulled a footstool over until it was touching the TV set, and sat rolling his crayon pieces and playing with his clowns.
Even with my jacket buttoned up to my neck, I couldn’t get warm as I waited for Uncle Bert. When his car pulled in behind a police escort, I pried myself out of the chair.
It was like watching a scene on TV—the police car driving away, Walt going to the door, Uncle Bert stooped and unsteady as if he were a hundred years old. His eyes were red and watery, and he had forgotten his toupee.
“Bald head,” Punky greeted him, getting up stiffly and going to his brother.
Without speaking, Uncle Bert hugged Punky and reached for me. I couldn’t hug back. It was all I could do to stand up.
Walt shrugged off Uncle Bert’s thanks and walked with us to the car. Squeezing my arm, he said softly, “Delrita, life has dealt you a terrible blow, but you’ll get through it.” He handed me a small package wrapped in brown paper and tied with string. “This won’t mean much to you right now,” he said, “but maybe someday it will.”
“Thanks,” I mumbled, stuffing the package into the pocket of my jeans jacket.
“Queenie sent along pillows and blankets, so you could rest on the way home,” said Uncle Bert, helping Punky into the front seat and fastening his safety belt. “Fasten yours, too, Delrita,” he said.
I obeyed, thinking dully that seat belts hadn’t saved my parents.
During the first few miles, Punky talked about what we’d seen at Silver Dollar City. Then he drew his feet up onto the seat and fell asleep with his head on the pillow in his lap.
I gathered my blanket around me and shivered in the backseat, not from the cold but from electrified nerves.
The ride seemed endless. Uncle Bert tried now and then to make conversation, but his voice kept cracking and he wasn’t able to finish what he started.
I dozed off for a few minutes—long enough to see my parents’ car smashing through a guardrail and rolling end over end into a chasm of death. I awoke with a screech that caused Uncle Bert to jump at the steering wheel and Punky to stir in his sleep. From then on, I didn’t dare close my eyes.
Not until we reached Tangle Nook and Uncle Bert turned right instead of left did it occur to me that Punky and I wouldn’t be going home. The realization was like having a knife twisted in my chest. I had never spent the night away from my parents, and except for the two times when Punky was hospitalized, he hadn‘t, either. Even then, the nurses had had to hide his trousers to keep him from getting out of bed and walking home.
Uncle Bert’s large split-level house was as brightly lit as a hotel, and I fought back nausea at the thought of sleeping there.
A ghostly figure ran out to meet us. It was Aunt Queenie in her nightclothes—no makeup, hair flying loose—clucking like a sympathetic hen.
When Uncle Bert picked up Punky instead of waking him, Aunt Queenie said, “I declare, Bert, he’s too heavy for that,” and hurried ahead to open the door.
I drew a deep breath and followed them inside. As bad as I hated to stay here, I couldn’t leave Punky alone.
Uncle Bert put Punky to bed with his clothes on, against Aunt Queenie’s objections. She’d brought pajamas, clean clothes, and toothbrushes from our house.
Her eyes were full of questions, so I grabbed the bag and escaped into the bathroom. I was shocked to see my reflection in the mirror. My eyes were bloodshot, and my long brown hair was matted, the bangs on my forehead greasy.
I turned the shower on hot, wanting the scalding needles of water to ease the hurt in my chest. They didn’t. They only made the bed feel colder when I left the bathroom and slipped between satin sheets.
Satin. Cold. Casket. I scrambled out of bed, ripped off the coverlet and wrapped it around me, arid lay on the carpeted floor.
I drifted into a fitful sleep, only to be awakened in the wee hours of the morning by Punky, who turned on the light and came sobbing across the room. “My home,” he said.
It took a moment for my eyes to adjust and for me to realize where I was and why. Drawing a ragged breath, I tried to make Punky understand. “We can’t go home. There‘s—there’s nobody there.”
“My home, D.J. My bed.” His almond-shaped eyes were round with anxiety, and his face was dirty.
“I know. I want to go home, too, but we can’t.”
“Want Shirley, Sam, my bed.”
“I know, Punky. I know.” The tears were building in my own throat, and I swallowed hard.
Punky lay down across my feet. “Please, D.J.,” he begged. “My home. Please.”
I couldn’t stand it. Freeing my feet, I got up and said, “Okay, but you’ll have to be quiet, or we’ll wake Uncle Bert.”
I pulled on a pair of jeans under my nightshirt, picked up my shoes, and started down the dark hall. We sneaked into Punky’s room for his shoes, then through the house and out the back door.
It was probably two miles from Uncle Bert’s place to our house. Alone, I could have covered them in half an hour, but with Punky already worn-out from the long day at Silver Dollar City, every step was a chore.
Tangle Nook was eerie, deserted, and I found myself pulling Punky from streetlight to streetlight, avoiding the shadows.
I prayed that no one would bother us, because I didn’t see how we could run. When I spotted a patrol car, we hid behind a shed, but it made me feel safer to know the police were on the prowl.
I turned onto Magnolia Street to stay away from the highway, away from McDonald’s and any other businesses that might be open all night.
Punky was wheezing and wearing down fast, and I remembered I’d left his nitroglycerin in the pocket of my dirty jeans. I rememb
ered something else, too, which would be a disaster if Punky thought of it. We’d left his lunch box in Uncle Bert’s car.
The Shackleford house looked even shabbier in the dark, its broken porch rails gapping like missing teeth. I felt a choking anger that my father—a good, loving, honest man—was dead, while Avanelle’s father was in jail for committing some terrible crime. I wanted to scream “It’s not fair!” for all the world to hear, but I trudged on, coaxing Punky, who was getting slower with every step.
At last we reached the house, but I didn’t have a key. I had to climb on a lawn chair and crawl through the bathroom window so I could unlock the front door for Punky.
In the bathroom, Dad’s shaving kit lay open on the sink, next to Mom’s hairbrush, tangled with strands of dark, almost curly hair. A wave of dizziness swept over me, and I gripped the door to keep from falling.
I must have stood there for a long time. Eventually, Punky’s voice penetrated my despair, and I staggered through the house and let him in.
After Punky was settled in clean pajamas in his own bed, I went down the hall and into my parents’ room. The digital clock on the nightstand winked away the seconds while my mind replayed little incidents from the past. I saw Mom catapulting onto the bed, screaming that she’d seen a mouse. I saw Dad jabbing a broom underneath the bed and beating a bouncy ball senseless.
In the corner was Grandma’s rocking chair, its seat and arms worn slick with use. I closed my eyes and felt Mom’s arms around my small, feverish body as she rocked me to and fro.
Hanging from one burnished brass knob of the highboy was the God’s eye I’d made in second grade by weaving green and black yarn geometrically around a cross of Popsicle sticks.
“Let’s hang it here on the highboy,” Mom had said. “It’ll be the first thing I see every morning, and the last thing I see every night—a reminder that God is always watching over us.”
I removed the God’s eye and clutched it to my chest. Then I fell backward across my parents’ bed and cried myself to sleep.