Part 1 (1/2)
Moon over Manifest.
by Clare Vanderpool.
Manifest townspeople of 1936
ABILENE T TUCKER: new girl in town new girl in townGIDEON T TUCKER: Abilene's father Abilene's fatherLETTIE AND R RUTHANNE: friends of Abilene friends of AbilenePASTOR S SHADY H HOWARD: still a little shady still a little shadyHATTIE M MAE M MACKE: still writing ”Hattie Mae's News Auxiliary” still writing ”Hattie Mae's News Auxiliary”IVAN D DEVORE: still postmaster still postmasterVELMA T.: still the chemistry teacher T.: still the chemistry teacherSISTER R REDEMPTA: still a nun still a nunMISS S SADIE: still a diviner still a divinerMR. UNDERHILL: still the undertaker still the undertakerMR. COOPER: the barber the barberMRS. DAWKINS: owner of Dawkins Drug and Dime owner of Dawkins Drug and DimeMRS. EVANS: woman who sits on her porch and stares woman who sits on her porch and stares
Santa Fe Railway
SOUTHEAST KANSAS MAY 27, 1936.
The movement of the train rocked me like a lullaby. I closed my eyes to the dusty countryside and imagined the sign I knew only from stories. The one just outside of town with big blue letters: MANIFEST: A TOWN WITH A RICH PAST AND A BRIGHT FUTURE MANIFEST: A TOWN WITH A RICH PAST AND A BRIGHT FUTURE.
I thought about my daddy, Gideon Tucker. He does his best talking in stories, but in recent weeks, those had become few and far between. So on the occasion when he'd say to me, ”Abilene, did I ever tell you 'bout the time...?” I'd get all quiet and listen real hard. Mostly he'd tell stories about Manifest, the town where he'd lived once upon a time.
His words drew pictures of brightly painted storefronts and bustling townsfolk. Hearing Gideon tell about it was like sucking on b.u.t.terscotch. Smooth and sweet. And when he'd go back to not saying much, I'd try recalling what it tasted like. Maybe that was how I found comfort just then, even with him being so far away. By remembering the flavor of his words. But mostly, I could taste the sadness in his voice when he told me I couldn't stay with him for the summer while he worked a railroad job back in Iowa. Something had changed in him. It started the day I got a cut on my knee. It got bad and I got real sick with infection. The doctors said I was lucky to come out of it. But it was like Gideon had gotten a wound in him too. Only he didn't come out of it. And it was painful enough to make him send me away.
I reached into my satchel for the flour sack that held my few special things. A blue dress, two s.h.i.+ny dimes I'd earned collecting pop bottles, a letter from Gideon telling folks that I would be received by Pastor Howard at the Manifest depot, and my most special something, kept in a box lined with an old 1917 Manifest Herald Manifest Herald newspaper: my daddy's compa.s.s. newspaper: my daddy's compa.s.s.
In a gold case, it wore like a pocket watch, but inside was a compa.s.s showing every direction. Only problem was, a working compa.s.s always points north. This one, the arrow dangled and jiggled every which way. It wasn't even that old. It had the compa.s.s maker's name and the date it was made on the inside. St. Dizier, October 8, 1918 St. Dizier, October 8, 1918. Gideon had always planned to get it fixed, but when I was leaving, he said he didn't need it anyway, what with train tracks to guide him. Still, I liked imagining that the chain of that broken compa.s.s was long enough to stretch all the way back into his pocket, with him at one end and me at the other.
Smoothing out the yellowed newspaper for the thousandth time, I scanned the page, hoping to find some bit of news about or insight into my daddy. But there was only the same old ”Hogs and Cattle” report on one side and a ”Hattie Mae's News Auxiliary: Charter Edition” on the other, plus a couple of advertis.e.m.e.nts for Liberty Bonds and Billy b.u.mp's Hair Tonic. I didn't know anything about Hattie Mae Harper, except what she wrote in her article, but I figured her newspaper column had protected Gideon's compa.s.s for some time, and for that I felt a sense of grat.i.tude. I carefully placed the newspaper back in the box and stored the box in the satchel, but held on to the compa.s.s. I guess I just needed to hold on to something.
The conductor came into the car. ”Manifest, next stop.”
The seven-forty-five evening train was going to be right on time. Conductors only gave a few minutes' notice, so I had to hurry. I shoved the compa.s.s into a side pocket of the satchel, then made my way to the back of the last car. Being a paying customer this time, with a full-fledged ticket, I didn't have have to jump off, and I knew that the preacher would be waiting for me. But as anyone worth his salt knows, it's best to get a look at a place before it gets a look at you. I'd worn my overalls just for the occasion. Besides, it wouldn't be dark for another hour, so I'd have time to find my way around. to jump off, and I knew that the preacher would be waiting for me. But as anyone worth his salt knows, it's best to get a look at a place before it gets a look at you. I'd worn my overalls just for the occasion. Besides, it wouldn't be dark for another hour, so I'd have time to find my way around.
At the last car, I waited, listening the way I'd been taught-wait till the clack of the train wheels slows to the rhythm of your heartbeat. The trouble is my heart speeds up when I'm looking at the ground rus.h.i.+ng by. Finally, I saw a gra.s.sy spot and jumped. The ground came quick and hard, but I landed and rolled as the train lumbered on without a thank-you or goodbye.
As I stood and brushed myself off, there was the sign not five feet in front of me. It was so weathered there was hardly a chip of blue paint to be found. And it looked to have been shot up so bad most of the words were gone. All that was left read MANIFEST: A TOWN WITH A PAST MANIFEST: A TOWN WITH A PAST.
HATTIE MAE'S NEWS AUXILIARY.
CHARTER EDITIONMAY 27, 1917I am pleased as punch to be commencing this groundbreaking column in the Manifest Herald Manifest Herald. My experience last year as a.s.sistant copy editor of the Manifest High School newspaper (Huzzah, huzzah for the Grizzlies!) has provided me with an eye for the interesting and a nose for news.After Uncle Henry talked it over with his people at the paper, he decided to give me a column anyway. What with our nation involved in a great war and our young men leaving our sweet land of liberty, we must be vigilant on the home front. President Wilson has asked all of us to do our patriotic duty in supporting the war effort, and already many are answering the call. Hadley Gillen says Liberty Bonds are selling quicker than half-inch nails at the hardware store. Mrs. Eudora Larkin and the Daughters of the American Revolution are sewing victory quilts.Even Miss Velma T. Harkrader generously devoted our last week of senior chemistry cla.s.s to making relief parcels for our lads in arms. Despite a minor explosion while we mixed her dyspepsia elixir, the parcels turned out beautifully, each wrapped in red-white-and-blue gingham, and I am sure they will be received with great appreciation.Now, it is time for me to hang up my crown as Manifest Huckleberry Queen of 1917 and trade it for the hardscrabble life of a journalist. And here is my pledge to you, faithful reader: you can count on me to be truthful and certifiable in giving the honest-to-goodness scoop each and every week.So, for all the whos, whats, whys, whens, and wheres, look at the backside of ”Hogs and Cattle” every Sunday.HATTIE M MAE H HARPER Reporter About TownBILLY b.u.mP'S HAIR TONICListen up, fellas. Do you have a dry, itchy scalp? Wish you had more hair on your head? Is your hair turning the color of the old gray goat? Then Billy b.u.mp's Hair Tonic is for you. Just rub a little on your hair and scalp before bedtime, and when you wake up, you'll already notice a clean, tingly feeling. This means your hair is growing back, and in the same color you remember from your high school days. That's right, men. The ladies will notice the hair on your head and the spring in your step. Get your Billy b.u.mp's Hair Tonic today at your local barbershop. Tell them Billy sent you and get a free comb. Works on mustaches and sideburns too. But avoid contact with ears and noses.Buy a Liberty Bond and save American liberty!
Path to Perdition
MAY 27, 1936.
First things first after jumping from a train: you needed to check and make sure you still had what you jumped with. That was always easy for me, because I never had much. Gideon said all you needed was your traveling pack and a good head on your shoulders. I had both, so I figured I was in good shape.
Heading for a grove of trees that looked half alive, I found a creek. It was only a trickle but it felt cool and clean on my face and hands. Now I could face the preacher I was to stay with for the summer. How my daddy ever got hooked up with a preacher, I can't say, as he's not a churchgoing man. Apparently the preacher had taken in a wandering soul now and again, and Gideon had been one of them. In any case, Pastor Howard was expecting me and no amount of dillydallying would change that fact.
I hunted up a good fence-running stick and rattled it along the first fence I came to. Gideon and I found that sounds filled up an empty quiet. When I was younger, we spent many a walking hour singing, making up rhymes, playing kick the can. Now the sound of stick on fence carried off into the trees, but it didn't fill the emptiness. For the first time I could recall, I was alone. Maybe I'd try the rhyming. Gideon would start with a line and I'd come up with another that rhymed. The clatter of the stick provided a nice rhythm for the rhyme running in my head. I wish I had a penny and I wish I had a nickel. I'd trade 'em both in for a coffee and a pickle. I wish I had a quarter and I wish I had a dime. I'd buy a stick of gum before you could tell the time. I wish I had an apple and I wish I had an orange- I wish I had a penny and I wish I had a nickel. I'd trade 'em both in for a coffee and a pickle. I wish I had a quarter and I wish I had a dime. I'd buy a stick of gum before you could tell the time. I wish I had an apple and I wish I had an orange- I realized I'd rhymed myself into a corner with orange orange when my stick came to a gate. A wide wrought iron gate that had every manner of doodads welded right into it. Forks, kettles, horseshoes, even the grate off an old potbelly stove. Looking closer, I ran my fingers over the black iron letters sitting along the top of the gate. The letters were kind of crooked and a little uneven but they looked to read when my stick came to a gate. A wide wrought iron gate that had every manner of doodads welded right into it. Forks, kettles, horseshoes, even the grate off an old potbelly stove. Looking closer, I ran my fingers over the black iron letters sitting along the top of the gate. The letters were kind of crooked and a little uneven but they looked to read PERDITION PERDITION. Now, Gideon and I had been to enough church services, hoping to get a hot meal afterward, that I'd heard the word a time or ten. Preachers used it. They told people to give up their evil ways or follow the devil straight down the path to perdition.
Why somebody would want that word welded on their gate, I can't say. But there it was. And weeds wrapped their way up through the ironwork, daring you to enter. And there was an actual path. Beyond the gate, leaves and dandelions lined a long gra.s.sless swatch of ground all the way to a dilapidated old house. The paint was worn off and the porch swing hung crooked, like it was plumb out of swing.
Surely no one lived there. A train car or a shantytown by the railroad tracks seemed a more welcoming place. But one of the front curtains fluttered. Was someone watching? My heart beat like a bat's wings. For the time being, I was content to stay off that Path to Perdition. The town wasn't far ahead, so I put my stick to the fence and continued walking.
This time I did my rhyme in a quiet voice. ”I had a little cat and it had a little kitten. I'd put it in my lap wherever I'd be sittin'.”
There was a break in the fence but another started up again around a cemetery. Gravestones stood in the wispy gra.s.s, seeming to watch me go by. The hair at the back of my neck p.r.i.c.kled as the ground crunched behind me. I stopped and looked back. There was nothing but blowing leaves. I moved on, clattering my stick as the trees grew thick around me. ”I had a little dog and his name was Mike. I always let him sit wherever he'd like.” The branches clawed at me and I stumbled on a tree root, landing hard on my knee. It was the knee that had gotten cut a couple of months back. It had scarred over, but the stretched skin felt like it was still working at keeping things together. I ma.s.saged it a little and brushed the dirt off.
There it was again. Maybe not a sound, but a movement. I held my breath, listening to the quiet, then continued toward lights at the edge of the trees. ”I once had a horse and his name was Fred. He ran all day, then-”
Another loud crunch behind me, then a man's voice.
”He dropped dead.”
Shady's Place
MAY 27, 1936.
I swung around in the dimming light. A man stood holding a pitchfork as tall as he was and only slightly thinner. Everything about the man was thin. His clothes, his hair. Even his scruffy whiskers were spa.r.s.e on his face. swung around in the dimming light. A man stood holding a pitchfork as tall as he was and only slightly thinner. Everything about the man was thin. His clothes, his hair. Even his scruffy whiskers were spa.r.s.e on his face.
”Is this yours?” he asked.
At first I thought he meant the pitchfork. Then I saw the compa.s.s dangling from his fingers. I checked my satchel in a panic. The outside pocket had torn open when I'd fallen.
”I'm Shady Howard. You must be Gideon's girl.” I let out the breath I didn't know I'd been holding. He handed me the gold compa.s.s. I hung it around my neck and tucked it into my s.h.i.+rt. ”When you didn't get off the train, I thought you might be making your own way into town.”
He said it like he had jumped from a train or two himself. With his worn plaid s.h.i.+rt and brown pants that had been st.i.tched and patched, he looked the part.
”Are you related to Pastor Howard? The preacher at the First Baptist Church?”
”There's folks that call me Pastor Howard. But you can call me Shady.”
I kept my distance, not knowing exactly what he meant. ”Do they call you that because you are are the preacher at the First Baptist Church?” the preacher at the First Baptist Church?”
”Well, that's a kind of interesting story.” He started walking, using his pitchfork as a walking stick. ”You see, I'm what's called an interim pastor. Meaning the old one left and I'm just filling in till they can get a new one.”
”How long you been filling in?” I asked, thinking maybe he hadn't had time to order his preacher clothes yet. Or shave.
”Fourteen years.”
”Oh.” I worked to put on some manners. ”So you weren't in the church business when my daddy was here?”
”No, I wasn't.”