Chapter 5
I
f I hadn't seen it for myself, I wouldn't have believed it. He seemed the same and yet not. The grainy black-and-white film image made him look older, but, of course, I reminded myself, he was older. Nearly five years had passed since I'd seen him last. We were neither of us as young, naive, or trusting as we'd been.
It was his eyes, though, that helped me know for sure it was my Slim. They were harder and more cautious, but unmistakably his. I could see the same hunger, the need for something more that pulsed though him as he lay next to me scanning the sky for something he knew existed only by faith. The pull was so strong it blocked out every other source of light and compelled him to drop all the baggage of life, excess or essential, to make himself light enough the journey he had to take alone.
Outwardly, he was changed, but the most important part of him wasn't diluted. He stood tall, a celluloid image stopped in time, young and strong and sure, ready to face whatever it was that had woken him on so many nights, be it dream or demon, or one and the same. One thing I understood, though I still can't understand how, was that no matter what he met over the dark and seamless ocean, he had to meet it alone, and it would change him; he would be drawn into a tide over which he had no control and from which there was no possibility of retreat.
All the while, as this cloudy vision circled in my mind and an indefinable sense of dread rose within me, the one-dimensional image of Slim smiled, waved, and patted the plane with deceptive confidence. No one but me realized there were more angles in this picture than the screen could possibly reveal.
“God help you,” I whispered to the shadow. “God protect you.”
Mama was as transfixed as I. Her mind was filled with thoughts of her own, but when she heard me speak she leaned closer and patted my arm. “Eva, don't worry. He'll be all right. It's a wide ocean, but if it
can
be crossed I'd bet on Slim. He'll make it.”
“Oh, Mama,” I moaned as the screen went black and the end of reel slapped a circular clack. “I'm so afraid for him. It's not the flight that threatens him, but what lies on the other side, something that stretches out much farther.”
“What do you mean?” Mama asked uncomprehendingly.
I shook my head, trying to force everything into focus, “I don't know exactly, but it is stronger than the ocean and more powerful. He's prepared for that. What's ahead is unknown and more dangerous, something that can kill your soul, not just your body. I can't tell you how I know that or exactly what it is, but he's not ready for it.”
We drove home in silence. I lay my head back on the seat and stared out at the black night sky, the same sky that blanketed Slim, and wondered if the stars shone as brightly over New York as they did over the prairie and if he would sleep this night. I knew I wouldn't.
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For the next few days it seemed people everywhere were talking about him: Charles Lindbergh, who was standing by on a lonely field somewhere in New York, watching the skies and hoping that they'd clear just long enough to welcome him inside before closing behind him so the long awaited match could commence in private, as it was meant to be.
Charles Augustus Lindbergh. How strange his name sounded. Colder and more closed than the man I knew. “Slim” seemed more human and real to me than “Charles Lindbergh.”
People in town remembered his visit. Now it seemed everyone had a story to tell about the time they flew with Lindbergh, even the ones who'd never in their lives had five dollars to spend all at one time and couldn't possibly have made the trip, but I couldn't blame them. Nobody famous had ever been born in Dillon or even passed through before. It didn't hurt anything for them to take a little slice of the fame for themselves and keep it in their pockets.
Papa and I walked into Dwyer's drugstore just in time to hear one of the many debates about Slim's chances. “Well, if you ask me,” Mr. Dwyer drawled, “I think the papers are right. They're callin' this Lindbergh fellow the âFlyin' Fool' and that's about the size of it. Here he is, getting ready to fly across the ocean all by himself and with only one engine in a skinny little plane that looks like a tin can and is probably just about as safe. I don't call that bright.”
The other men standing around the counter guffawed at Mr. Dwyer's description of the plane, which the papers had told us was named
The Spirit of St. Louis.
” Dwyer grinned and went on, encouraged by his audience. “Is there a Saint Louis? For Lindbergh's sake, I hope so. That boy's gonna need a whole choir loft full of saints on his side to make it to Parisâtwo on each wing, two on the propeller, and one real big one, Gabriel maybe, holdin' up the tail.” Mr. Dwyer howled and slapped his knee in appreciation of his own joke, and the rest of the crowd joined in.
I smiled inwardly to think of the men of Dillon suddenly becoming aviation experts. Mr. Dwyer was a big man. Not big the way some farmers are, with wide, muscled shoulders and spreading midsections hard as rocks; he was just fat from a life of eating well and working indoors. Looking at his stomach bulging under his white work apron, it was hard to imagine a man of such girth squeezing into the cockpit of a plane.
“Morning, Glennon.” The storekeeper smiled at Papa and nodded to me. “What can I get for you today?”
“I need some alum,” Papa said, “and what have you got that'll help this foot of mine. It keeps swelling up on me ever since Ranger stepped on it last month.”
Mr. Dwyer squinted in thought. “Well, stayin' off it'd be the best thing, but it being time to plant I don't suppose that's a possibility. Let's see if soaking it in Epsom salts does the trick.”
I walked to the candy counter and eyed the sweets, considering which kind to take home to Morgan for his birthday the next day while Mr. Dwyer gathered up the rest of our order.
“Say, Glennon,” Mr. Parker, Clarence's father, called to my father across the crowded shop. “What do you think about this Lindbergh boy? Seems I recall he stayed with you folks when he was here, didn't he? You think he's got a chance in the world of seeing Paris?”
Papa rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “He's going on only one engine, it's true, and it seems that all the other, more experienced flyers have thought that backup engines and teams of pilots are the way to go. Maybe they're right. Admiral Byrd's team is using the same strategy, and he's quite a pilot. On the other hand, so far all those boys with all that experience have failed. Young Lindbergh seems to think the thing is to fly lighter and faster. He might be on to something. I don't know him well. He camped out in the field and only ate one meal with us, but I'll tell you one thing, that young man is awfully smart and determined. I went out with him one day to help him work on his engine, and he sure knew the inside of the plane.” Picking up the box of alum Mr. Dwyer had set down on the glass counter, Papa continued: “He might crash, and he might die, but no matter what the papers say, the boy's no fool. Whatever his plan is, he's thought it through. I guess he's got as good a chance as anybody.”
The men were quiet for a moment before Mr. Dwyer spoke. “You might be right at that, Glennon. I suppose you might. It'll sure be something if he does make it.” Papa paid him for the medicines and the striped paper bag full of lemon drops for Morgan. We nodded our good-byes. As we left I could see that, despite their dire predictions, every man in that store was rooting for Slim. Every pair of eyes reflected a touch of jealousy and admiration for the young man with courage enough to live large. Being farmers and naturally pessimistic, they were sure it was impossible, practically impossible anyway, but if he did make it all the way to France, wouldn't that be something? They'd be able to say they'd seen him in person, so they'd live a little larger too, just by virtue of having known him.
It wasn't just people in Dillon who were excited about Lindbergh's flight. The whole country waited to see what would happen to the good-looking young flyer in the tiny, lonely plane. The newspaper reports did everything they could to foster the image of a wholesome, midwestern boy fresh off the farm. They had him perpetually grinning and affable, simple and humble, and nothing like he really was: an ambitious and serious young man, much more complex and interesting than a cheerful boy-next-door.
“Listen to this, Mama,” I said, opening the paper. “After a test flight the reporter has him patting the plane and saying, âBoys, she's ready and rarin' to go!' He'd never say that,” I scoffed, “especially not to a bunch of strange reporters. He doesn't talk like that at all! Why are they doing this? Making him into someone he's not.”
Mama shrugged her shoulders as she stirred the batter for Morgan's birthday cake. “Eva, people expect a lot from their heroes. On the one hand, they want them to be like their sons and brothers, not too educated, not too proud, not too smart. Probably because if people really do have to be remarkable to accomplish remarkable things it means most of us never will. If you have to be
born
with a great destiny it might mean the rest of us are here just taking up space. Nobody wants to read that in their morning paper, even if it's true.
“On the other hand, people want heroes to be without human flawsâunfailingly honest, immune to temptation, fearless. And if they aren't, the same crowd that was so quick to put them up on a pedestal will pull them down even quicker.”
“But that's crazy, Mama.” I tossed the newspaper aside in disgust. “If heroes aren't just as flawed as the rest of us, where is the bravery in that? I would think that heroism means overcoming your fears and failures long enough to do something great. Isn't that more difficult than not having fears in the first place?”
Mama shrugged her shoulders again. “Eva, if you haven't already, you'll find out soon enough that just because something is true doesn't mean it gets reported that way in the paper.”
“Well, it ought to be,” I answered irritably. Then I picked up the paper and began reading again, because no matter how annoyed I might be, when it came to hearing about Slim, even shallow or badly written news was better than none at all.
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We made a red velvet cake with chocolate icing and chicken-fried steak for Morgan's birthday supper. Morgan ate three slices of cake and, ignoring Mama's raised eyebrows, I let him, even though I wondered if I'd be up half the night tending a child with a bellyache. I was. Ruby joined us for the party and gave Morgan a counting picture book. Mama gave him a new cap with earflaps that buttoned down. Papa had carved a little wooden biplane with a bright red propeller that wound up with a rubber band and spun so fast it melted into a scarlet blur.
My present was the lemon drops I'd bought at Dwyer's, along with a quilt for his new bed in the room Papa had added on to the house the month before. It was one of the prettiest quilts I'd ever made and so right for Morgan. It was like a painting of fabric just for him. The setting cotton sun shone rays of light across the plains and spilled a spectrum of color over the clouds, gold blending to vermilion, creeping upward to the deep night sky until it joined the border of midnight blue I'd embroidered with golden-white stars.
Morgan's eyes shone as he unwrapped the soft folds of cotton and brushed the little starpoints with his fingers. “Oh, Mama!” he whispered in wonderment without taking his eyes off the quilt. “It's just like my dream! You stitched my dreams right out of your fingers! How'd you do that?” he marveled, turning his gray-blue eyes to me, amazed, as though discovering the woman before him was more magician than mother.
That night I tucked him into bed with his new toy plane right next to him. He was still fingering the quilt, tracing the outlines of the clouds as he sucked on a lemon drop. I leaned down to kiss him on the head, then settled myself comfortably on the edge of the bed.
“Do you like your quilt, baby?”
“It's the whole sky on my bed! Look,” he said soaring the wooden biplane over the quilted landscape, “I can fly my plane over Papaw's fields and over here to the hills, all the way to Kansas! 'Bout a million miles!”
“Kansas isn't quite a million miles away, but almost,” I said with a smile. “And what about here?” I pointed to the starlit border. “Where do you end up when you fly over there?”
He shook his head solemnly. “Oh, you can't fly there. That's heaven over there, where my papa is.”
“Where your papa is?” I frowned. “Who told you that?”
Morgan wound the propeller of his plane with his finger absentmindedly. “Nobody 'zactly. I just been thinking about it. Johnny McCurdle said I didn't have a pa. I said I did too, that Papaw was my pa, but Johnny said that wasn't right. He said Papaw was your pa, and I didn't have one.”
I sucked in my breath, searching his little face for signs of worry, my mind speeding ahead trying to anticipate his questions and come up with a story true enough to help him know who he was and vague enough to preserve his pride.
“But that can't be right,” he continued wisely. “Everybody has a pa, so I thought about it a long time and I decided if my pa isn't here that means he must be in heaven.” He left off playing with the plane and looked up at me trustingly. “That's right, isn't it?”