I Don't Know How the Story Ends (17 page)

I should have left out the potatoes. The man stuck his hand in his pocket, probably feeling about for spare change we could not in good conscience accept. “There's a Yukon picture shooting across the street,” he said, “but girls aren't wanted. If it would help, maybe I can…”

“Oh pleeese!” Sylvie clasped her hands together. “Our stepfather's gone on another bender, and he promised to beat us if we don't bring home money for booze. The last time I had bruises for days…” She was trying to fall to her knees, but I got hold of her arm and kept her upright, meanwhile shaking her elbow to make her shut up.

The jingle of Mr. Ritter's pockets ceased as he looked from me to her. “I'm beginning to think you have a future in the pictures, little girl.”

“She exaggerates,” I hastened to say, “but we do need work. Isn't there anything we could do? Maybe”—I was improvising desperately—“sweep out your office? Straighten the shelves?”

He'd had enough. “Good night, ladies. I don't know what you're selling, but I ain't buying. If you're serious about work, go ask 'em at the office. Otherwise—”

Oh joy! Ranger's hand popped around the doorway, fingers raised in a “victory” salute. Then it disappeared.

“We'll do that.” I hurried to make amends. “I'm sorry for my sister, sir. She's seen too much Lillian Gish. Thank you for my time—I mean, your time…”

This was all covering action for Ranger's retreat. I needn't have bothered however, for firm footsteps were approaching directly behind us, and a nasally voice called out, “Mornin', Merle! Would you have a thirty-five millimeter twenty-aught lens lying around?”

Mr. Ritter nodded a brief dismissal to us. “Step in and see what I've got, Jimmy.”

There are a lot of Jimmys in the world, but when I turned, I was face-to-face with the last one it would be advantageous to meet. Not that we had ever met, except on film, but I recognized him. And I could tell that after a second look he recognized me.

“What the Sam Hill…” he began as Sylvie blurted out:

“Papa!”

Talk about getting caught up in a part! She had never even seen Jimmy Service on film but had guessed who he was, and that was the chief relationship she knew him by. But there was no time to marvel over that. I grabbed Sylvie's hand and took off running, as his voice bellowed after us, “Hey, you—
stop
!”

Down at the Station

With a rabbitlike instinct, Sylvie somehow found her way back to the spot where Ranger had earlier led us in. We scurried through the gap in the fence, only to find that our pursuer had taken the more direct route, right through the gate. Once on the sidewalk, our eyes met. Again he bellowed, “
Stop
!
”

Sylvie darted right into the street, and I had no choice but to follow. Behind us Mr. Service was yelling, “
I want to talk to you
!
” Dodging tin lizzies and delivery vans, we safely reached the other side, where a throng of actors, prop men, and musicians provided temporary cover. Looking back, I saw Mr. Service by the curb, prudently waiting for a streetcar to pass. It was, I noticed distractedly, the nine forty-five northbound, meaning we had almost ten whole minutes before our car came by—ten minutes that we could not leisurely kill at the stop with Ranger. We had to keep out of sight at all costs.

Meanwhile, Mr. Service had crossed the street. “Doesn't he have work to get to?” I fretted.

“Maybe this is it,” Sylvie suggested.

“We're going to have to lose him so we can slip away to the streetcar stop!”

“I know. Follow me!” While all attention seemed to be on the director, who was now shouting through his megaphone, Sylvie ducked right under the dividing rope and threaded through the musicians who were tuning up.

We edged around the platform of the panorama, hoping its sheer hugeness would give us cover to break across the wide lot behind it. From there we could disappear among the bungalows and cottages and work our way circuitously back to the streetcar stop where Ranger would be waiting. It seemed an excellent plan until I glanced back and met the malevolent glare of Jimmy Service, some yards away but closing fast!

“He's spotted us!” I gasped.

“Let's go under!” Sylvie leaped toward the platform of the panorama, but I grabbed a leg before she could get under it.

“That's the first place anyone would look! This is better—” I jumped up on the platform and darted over to a pile of papier-mâché boulders, placed in what was supposed to look like natural abandon. There was room in the narrow space to hide us, and a bushy cedar tree would give us additional cover. We flattened ourselves against the painted canvas. My pulse was pounding in my ears.

“What if they—” Sylvie began.

“Shhhhhh!” A man had just come around the curve, and though his face couldn't be made out through the cedar, I knew who it was.

He paused. Then he crouched to peer under the bottom edge of the platform. I nudged Sylvie—
didn't I tell
you?

She whispered, “Isobel—we're about to be in the picture!”

A sudden stillness had fallen, and we heard voices calling for Jimmy Service. Sylvie's hunch was correct—he was the cameraman for this shooting. That seemed like a lucky break, but before we could make a run for it, a voice shouted, “
Go
!
” and with a lurch the entire monstrous machine began to move.

“Keep still!” I told Sylvie, as the floor rumbled and the panorama crawled. “Stay down, and with luck nobody will notice us back here. As soon as we can, we'll jump off and make a break for the trees.”

“Now!” she hissed.

“No!” I grabbed her arm and held her down. The little orchestra was coming into view, busily thumping out the storm music from
William Tell
, and if we jumped, we'd jump right into their laps.

“But we're almost in front of the camera!”

“I know—keep still!”

Easier said than done, for at that moment a very stiff breeze whipped my hair in my face and tore away Sylvie's bow, which had become droopy with all the running. We were headed right into a wind machine.

“What was that…?” I heard someone call, as the aforementioned bow sailed in front of the camera—and next, we were in the middle of a raging snowstorm!

White flakes caught by the wind machine swirled angrily by, and one of them caught in Sylvie's throat. My hair whipped around so wildly that it doubtless showed above the rocks—with that and Sylvie's coughing and her phantom hair bow, I was amazed the director didn't call for a cut.

Then I saw why, as a dogsled slowly passed in front of us—a sled with real dogs running on a treadmill, driven by a man in an Eskimo parka. The scene must have taken hours to set up.

“We'll make a break for it as soon as we're out of camera range!” I shouted over the wind.

But then, over the crank of the machine and wail of the motor and gagging of Sylvie and directing of the director, I heard another noise—the
clang-clang
of a streetcar bell.

We had no choice. “
Now
!
” I screamed to Sylvie, and with a firm grip on her hand I pulled her to the edge of the platform and jumped off.

We had the clear advantage of surprise. The whole crew was stunned motionless as we dodged people and equipment. Once past the crew I raised a hand to wave frantically at the streetcar, shouting, “
Wait
!
”

Ranger leaned out into the street, urging us on. The car was not up to full speed yet, and it looked as though we might make it—indeed I was sure we would—with just a smidgen more of effort—a last burst of speed—and suddenly something grabbed my arm and stopped me flat!

“
No
!
” I screamed, as Jimmy Service began:

“All right, girlie, what's up—”

Sylvie's violent instincts are useful sometimes. She hauled off and kicked him in the shin.

Surprise and pain loosened his grip. We'd lost a couple of precious seconds getting free, so catching the streetcar was a near thing. Ranger had worked his way to the rear platform and leaned out as far as he could, reaching for us. Sylvie grabbed his arm and sailed aboard, right into the stomach of a curious passenger who sat down very abruptly with Sylvie in her lap. Then Ranger's hand swung out for me, and brushing his fingertips gave me the necessary jolt for one last surge.

We hung to the same bar, watching Jimmy Service shrink in perspective, still clutching his shin. “Is that who I think it is?” Ranger asked.

I nodded, too breathless to speak.

“Criminy. Don't tell Sam. I mean, not before. I'll tell him once we get the shot.”

Sweaty and disheveled, I could only nod in reply. Not without a twinge of conscience: Sam's house was so close to Keystone that Jimmy Service could walk home between takes and see if the camera was where it was supposed to be. And since it wasn't there, Sam wouldn't have to guess about his father's mood this time. He'd be furious, with consequences fearful to contemplate.

But we
had
to get the shot at the station. It was unthinkable to come so far and not finish. “If Sam faces the music, we all do,” I said. “We'll go over to his house—and explain to his father—”

“Calm down, Isobel,” Ranger said, though I hadn't known I was so obviously uncalm. “We'll work it out somehow…after the film's safe in the can.” We rode a few blocks in silence before I could tell him what happened at the panorama, making his high spirits rise again. “That's bully—you getting right into the picture. Sounds like something I would do.”

• • •

We got to the station with a few moments to spare. Aunt Buzzy's auto was parked on a side street with Masaji leaning against the door, but he didn't see us run around to the baggage agent's office for our rendezvous.

Sam was halfway through a cigarette—his fourth, to judge by the ends stubbed out on the baggage wagon nearby. On seeing us, he straightened up and stuffed something in his trouser pocket. It looked like rosary beads. “What took you so long? The train's due right now.”

“Long story. Here's the lens.” Ranger handed over his knapsack. “All set up?”

“Yeah, but it'll take a few minutes to get this on.” Sam pulled the lens out for examination. “I hope the mounts match up.”

“Golly, me too.” Ranger gulped. “Better go. And, Sam—meet me right after. Pretty important, savvy?”

Sam shot him a wary look but nodded just before disappearing into the station.

“Now that is what I call cutting it close,” Aunt Buzzy said, not bothering to hide her irritation as the three of us pelted up to the west platform.

“Where are the flowers?” Mother asked.

“Flowers?” I repeated, forgetting the pretext already.

“We stashed 'em—” Ranger began, at the same time Sylvie piped up with:

“We dropped 'em—”

“Look at you!” Mother exclaimed. “You look like you ran all the way to the San Fernando Valley to pick them yourselves. How did you get—” A loud whistle interrupted her.

“Mattie!” Aunt Buzzy shouted over it. “The train!”

Ranger took my arm and pulled me forward as the big, black locomotive clacked by, swishing steam. “Where's Daddy?” Sylvie shrieked behind us. “Boost me up, Ranger!”

He bent down enough to let her climb on his back, where she made so active a pilot that he had to keep saying “Cut it out” and “Stop kicking me.” Finally she screamed.

“
There he is
!
Down that way, talking to the train man.
Daddy
!
”

I strained on tiptoe, peering in the direction she pointed. My heart leaped into my throat.

Three cars down, turning away to tip the porter—shockingly thin and pale, but undoubtedly him. I turned to Ranger and nodded wordlessly.

He let Sylvie down with a warning: “Don't get away from us. The lens has to get us all together.”

“Ranger!” I blurted out. “Your glasses.”

“Oh yeah.” He hurriedly took them off and folded them away in his pocket. “Thanks.”

We pushed our way forward. A quick glance upward at the station window showed a glint of sunlight off the camera's single eye, trained on our object. I must have been breathing but didn't feel like it, especially when I caught a clear glimpse of Father through a gap in the crowd, smiling as the porter touched his cap and turned away.

Sylvie could no longer hold herself. “
Daddy
!
” she cried again, breaking away from Ranger's grip.

“Nuts,” muttered Ranger, who seemed as tightly wound as we were, for less reason. “Come on—we've got to keep up with her.”

We were very close now. Sylvie shot through a gap in the crowd and jumped, wrapping herself around the man like a monkey.

Ranger sighed, squared his shoulder, and strode forward, right hand outstretched. Father turned at the impact of Sylvie hitting him, and I froze.

Or rather the world around me seemed to freeze, all except Ranger, still striding, perhaps so intent on his own part that he failed to notice at first that Father had no right hand to shake. In fact, Father had no right arm.

And his face on that side had been so rearranged that it no longer looked like Father at all.

Another Way to Lie

My world stopped. And then it broke.

My memory of the next few moments is in pieces—or maybe I was the one in pieces. I remember Sylvie sliding off him and Ranger stammering and the smile that froze on Aunt Buzzy's face and the truly indescribable expression on my mother's. I saw them as though peering through those broken lenses on the battlefield.

I could not simply walk up and embrace him the way Mother finally did because my mind and my body seemed to be in two different places. One finally nudged the other forward, and my father mashed me briefly with his one arm against his uniform, scratchy and stiff. He felt different: thinner, less solid somehow. He even smelled different, of smoke and filth and bleach embedded deep in his clothes, or perhaps in his very skin. Only his nervous half laugh sounded the least bit like him.

I don't remember our ride back to the hacienda, crammed into the Packard driven by Masaji, as reticent as ever. And once there, I had no idea what to do next.

Aunt Buzzy took over a role she understood, pointing out some of the curiosities of the front room. But when she wanted to show him the grounds, Father interrupted with, “If you don't mind, Buzzy—a little later? A two-day train ride…” He trailed off as she blushed and made apologetic noises countered by his reassuring noises, and after a painful second or two, she said, “Let your wife show you to your room—dinner's at seven.”

Then Sylvie, who'd been admirably tactful thus far, burst out: “But, Daddy, where's your
arm
? And what happened to your
face
?”

Mother and Aunt Buzzy both cranked up the apologetic noises, but Father said, “I know you want to hear that, Kitten, but let's wait until dinner, eh? I promise to tell all.”

Sylvie was clinging to his arm. Mother automatically reached for the other arm, faltered, and clutched his shoulder instead. They went off to the west wing, but Mother was back in the drawing room within fifteen minutes. Somehow, this did not bode well, nor did the intense conversation she and Aunt Buzzy engaged in after that, with warning looks every time a child came near.

The afternoon was desperately quiet. Sylvie sought refuge with Bone, and Ranger had not come home with us, generously announcing he would take the streetcar to allow more room in the auto for Mr. Ransom and his luggage. I knew he was on a mission to smooth the way between Sam and Jimmy Service, but I'd broken my promise to go along. Nothing seemed to matter anymore, least of all the picture.

Some film can't be cut.
What happened, happened, and there was nothing I could do about it. In the blaze of real life, I kept seeing Father's face. The missing arm we could probably stop missing; the shock of nothingness could wear off. But his face was the shock of
somethingness
.

From the left he looked the same: a mild blue eye, straight nose, strong chin, a mouth with a little upward tick at the corner. But on the right side, all those features mashed into each other, making him look like a battered bare-knuckle fighter: one eyelid glued shut over an empty socket, the lower lip bulged out, the cheekbone smashed. I kept remembering that soldier on the train during our journey to California—deprived of his mask, his face a thing to apologize for.
Sorry, miss. Sorry…

At Esperanza's extravagant welcome-home dinner, which no one could eat much of, Father explained why the bad news had not reached us before he did. “I owe you all an apology,” he said. Even his voice was damaged, the words a bit slurred by his twisted mouth. “I understood from the War Department that you'd been informed of what happened, but if they sent a letter, it must have gone astray somehow.” (
Close-up on envelope in a mud puddle
, I thought.)

“That's no excuse though. I wrote you a long letter as soon as I was able but tore it up. It was weeks before I could write another, and by then I assumed you knew the worst and could read between the lines…”

“But what happened?” Sylvie burst out again, bouncing up in her chair. She was sitting next to Ranger, who put a hand on her head to push her down, though he obviously wanted to know as much as any of us.

“That's just what I was working up to,” Father said. Another interval, and when he spoke again, the words came faster: “We got news of a cease-fire on the right flank at about seven p.m. That meant time to go out and collect the day's blood toll so everybody could settle in for the night.” The good side of his mouth twitched, but it didn't look like a smile. “We were down by two orderlies—one sick and one dead. So I went out with the ambulance.”

“Was this the first time you'd done that?” Mother asked in a tight, clipped tone.

My father hesitated, as though debating whether to lie. “No.”

“But you told us you stayed in the rear at all times.”

“I didn't want you to worry. What good would that do?” A sharp edge crept into his voice, which I had never known him to use with her. “We were often short on orderlies and drivers, and there were times I substituted for both. Men were dying on the field, but if the ambulance went out, some of them might be saved. A precious few compared to all who were lost, but it seemed a risk worth taking. You see? My Tilda?”

At the sound of his pet name for her, two spots of color appeared high on my mother's cheekbones and her scar flashed like a little dagger. “Do you think I might have understood if you had explained it that way? If you had told me the truth instead of treating me like one of the girls, who must be jollied along with silly jokes?”

Aunt Buzzy, who had been anxiously awaiting Esperanza to come and serve coffee, now jumped up to serve it herself. “There's no point in dwelling on what's past, is there, Mattie? Let him finish the story.”

“There's not much to finish.” When Father picked up the cup she had just poured for him, his hand trembled so that some of the coffee sloshed out. He set the cup down without taking a sip. “It was already dark, with a pall of smoke over no-man's-land, and we were going as fast as the bumpy ground would allow. I was standing on the running board of the passenger side, trying to direct the driver. He was listening to me more than watching the ground, so he didn't see the trip wire that went off, right under his front wheel. He was killed, and I joined the ranks of the wounded. Though I didn't really know that—or anything much—until I woke up in a hospital in Lyon two days later.”

He took a deep breath, grabbed the rose-patterned china cup, and gulped half the coffee down. “And now,” he hurried on, “I hate to pass on dessert, but I'm afraid I can't stay awake for it. If you'll excuse me—”

We couldn't linger long after that, and Esperanza looked reproachfully at how little we'd eaten when she cleared the table. Mother and Aunt Buzzy closeted themselves again, Sylvie raced off to find Bone, and Ranger looked meaningfully at me, a look I failed to answer.

So he cornered me in the rose arbor where I'd barricaded myself behind
Treasure Island
. “I have a
lot
to tell you.”

“Nothing I want to hear.”

“Oh, yes, you do,” he insisted with every bit of his insufferable one-track-mindedness. “Unless you don't care about Sam.”

After a moment, I sighed and lowered the book.

“When I told him about your run-in with Jimmy Service at Keystone, he turned white. I mean it—absolutely
white
. Then he started talking about hopping a freight train to Mexico. But cooler heads prevailed, meaning mine, for a change. What do you think about that?”

“Just get to the point.”

“Right. I went home with him, and on the way, he unfroze enough to tell me he might have gotten something in the picture that would—”

“I don't want to hear about the picture. At all.”

“But it's part of what I'm telling you!”

I picked up the book again and stared resolutely at its pages.

“All right!” Exasperated, Ranger reached over and slapped the book down. “So when we got to Sam's house, the old man was there, and plenty mad. I went in first, like a dauntless youth, and explained the whole thing was my idea but I couldn't have done it without that fine piece of equipment and he should know that his son is a genius and it must be because the acorn never falls far from the tree. I laid it on pretty thick. But it worked! Mostly. When Sam finally came in, the old man smacked him—not very hard, just to remind him who was boss and all that. But he was pretty interested in what we got, and when I told him about the station—”

“So Sam is not in danger?” I interrupted.

“Looks like it. Because when we were telling him about the station—”

“Good,” I said, raising my book again.

“C'mon, Iz! Just hear me out.” I pulled my feet up on the bench and curled around
Treasure Island
like a wad of obtuseness. “All right. You don't want to talk now. I understand. I'll wait.” He hesitated, as though my mind might be changing already. But when it didn't, he sighed gustily and left me alone.

I uncurled enough to see the page before my face but not the letters, which were too blurry to make out.
You
don't
understand!
I thought fiercely, hugging my sobs tight. I saw my father off to war, but a stranger returned. Not the hero in the picture beside my bed, but someone ravaged and broken. Would I ever have my father back?

Mother failed to read to us that night, or even tuck us in. Aunt Buzzy did instead, with some twittering about how we all needed time and must be patient, and so on. Sylvie took it meekly, but soon after Aunt Buzzy had turned off the lights and said good night, she crept over to my bed.

“Could you tell me a story?”

This was the last thing I wanted to do, but as she crawled in next to me, I sighed and launched the old formula. “Once upon a time there was a little girl, six years old—”

“Not
that
one,” she said. “Another story.”

“I don't know any others.”

She kicked me under the covers. “Yes, you do! You read all the time.”

It was story or fight. But she'd been good all day—especially for her—so I began with something that started like
The Water-Babies
but grew into something else altogether:

“There were four children living peacefully in an enchanted garden—Flower Babies, I suppose—surrounded by fragrant orchards under sunny skies. Until the day that one of them discovered…an eye. Yes, a single eye, with lid attached, exactly like a human eyeball only bigger. At first it just blinked at them. Then it began showing them things: marble palaces like the Taj Mahal, and vast emerald oceans and exotic bazaars.”

“How?” Sylvie asked. “How did it show them things?”

“Um… It would blink, and then a beam of light would shoot out from it, and they would see the pictures by gazing into the light. Then after a while one of the boys got the idea of putting up a screen, so the pictures would be clearer.

“They were so charmed with the eye that they kept it in a box lined with moss (where it seemed quite content), and every time they gathered around, it would show them more and more extravagant sights. They came to neglect their work of tending the garden and spent hours—days, even—gathered around the eye in its cozy box.

“And then, so gradually they didn't even notice at first, the eye began showing them things they didn't want to see. Spiders and snakes and hungry children in lonely attics and parents quarreling. Then men fighting and bombs exploding and other things too horrible to mention, until the children decided they must get rid of the eye.

“But after every attempt to leave it outside the garden, it always managed to roll back. Finally the children decided that the eye must be returned to where it came from. But where was that?”

I had to pause, because I didn't know. By this point in a story Sylvie was usually asleep. But not this time.

“Where did they have to take it?” she demanded with another kick.

“I'll tell you if you stop that!”

“I'm sorry, Isobel… Please could you finish the story?” She hardly ever apologized, so I had to come up with something.

“By watching and listening carefully, they gradually figured out that the eye belonged to a giant—a Cyclops—who was rampaging his way through the countryside looking for it. What they were seeing is what he saw. Or would have, if the eye were in his head instead of a mossy box. Since he couldn't see, he was blundering into things and causing random destruction: lots of shots—scenes, that is—of villagers fleeing in terror. Finally they recognized one of the villages nearby and understood that the giant had reached their own neighborhood. So they took their courage in hand, along with the box, and went in search.”

“And did they find him?” Sylvie asked after too long a pause.

My well of invention was going dry. “Yes, they did, and he was just about to stomp them in a blind fury when his own eye winked at him. Overjoyed, he popped it right back in his head and was so delighted that he invited the children to his magnificent mountain to live with him, but they were smart enough to refuse. So they went back to their garden and lived happily ever after. The end.”

Sylvie wasn't satisfied. “It shouldn't be that easy. To return the magic eye, I mean.”

“Believe me,” I said, “it won't be.”

• • •

And indeed it was impossible to stop seeing things we did not wish to see. Next morning Father tried to talk to me—just light questions about what we'd been doing all summer, but it was so hard to look at him that I made an excuse about overdue books at the library. As the hours dragged, I couldn't help noticing how he and Mother continued to avoid each other or how hard Aunt Buzzy was working to keep everyone's spirits up. Even Titus Bell's arrival on Tuesday failed to lighten the swampish atmosphere.