The Unplowed Sky (35 page)

“Sure you will, honey, but I wish—” Someone was coming down the stairs. Shaft broke off whatever he had meant to say. “How's about I make some of my special walnut pancakes?”

“Yippee!” Rory whooped.

“You must be tired of cooking,” Hallie protested.

“Not for my family,” Shaft chuckled, tying his beard out of the way. “Hallie, if you'll open up a can of applesauce and heat it with molasses, it tastes real good poured over the pancakes.”

“When're we gonna open presents?” Jackie yelled. His new knife-pocket boots clopped down the stairs with a satisfying racket.

“Soon as you wrap yourself around a couple of these pancakes,” Shaft called. “Say, are we celebratin' your birthday today on top of Christmas?”

Jackie nodded, hugging Smoky who meowed, as if explaining that she had wanted to sleep with Jackie last night, but Shaft had been gone a long time and needed a soft warm kitty, too. “I was six day before yesterday. But I wanted to wait for you, Shaft, and Rory and Garth. We'll have my cake today, and I bet I can blow out all the candles!”

“Bet you will,” Shaft said. “All right, birthday boy, you get the first pancake. Sit down and see what you can do with it.”

“Sounds like we're already having a merry Christmas,” said Garth, helping Meg to the table.

Jackie finished first. Shaft helped him through the difficult wait for the others by giving him a pan of crumbs. “Scatter these for the birds, son, so they can have a Christmas breakfast, too.”

As soon as Jackie came back in, the cardinals fluttered down, the male bright crimson against the snow, his mate gray brown with ruddy touches. They were joined by a host of larks and sparrows, so Jackie begged more crumbs. “Do you think they'd like some of my birthday cake?” he asked.

“I doubt that chocolate's their favorite flavor,” Hallie laughed. “But we have lots of crumbs. I save them to put on top of macaroni and cheese, you know.”

“And this pancake's scorched a tinch past brown,” said Shaft.

So the birds had their Christmas feast outside while, inside, the humans enjoyed theirs. When Hallie started the dishes, Shaft steered her firmly into the front room. “Rory and me'll see to the dishes today—and we'll see to these
after
the presents on account of Jackie's gonna bust if we wait much longer.”

Meg spun her chair smartly around by the tree. Some new presents had appeared since the caroling last night, including one very large box wrapped in brown paper with a big red bow. “Let me hand the presents to Jackie,” Meg appealed to Garth. “Then he can deliver them. But he gets to open one first because he's the youngest.”

Garth glanced at Hallie, who nodded, but Jackie with supreme effort said, “Let's give Smoky and Laird their presents first.”

Laird wurfed jubilantly and galloped away with the bone Jackie had put in a shoebox that morning. Smoky batted a tinkling plush ball till Jackie tired of retrieving it from under the davenport and looked expectantly at Meg.

She scooted a large box forward. “This one's from me, Jackie!” The cardboard was decorated with crayoned Christmas trees and cardinals. Meg ripped at it as eagerly as Jackie and beamed when he cried out in delight.

“A train! And a track and station and a tunnel and—and—”

“The locomotive's got real piston rods,” Meg pointed out. “Wind it up and it pulls the coal tender and rest of the cars. And there's a crossing signal and semaphore and railroad gate and telegraph poles!”

Shaft whistled. “Hey, Jack, if you'll let us, we'll all have some fun with that!”

“Yes, but everybody's got to get their presents first,” Jackie said a bit regretfully. His excitement over handing out gifts rekindled as he turned toward the tree and picked out the small package that held Meg's watch. “Meg, you're next youngest!” He thrust the parcel into her hands. “Here! You can't guess what it is, not in a jillion, million years!”

She gasped at the shimmering white-gold bracelet and the dainty case. “Jackie! It—it's even more beautiful than I thought it could be. But it cost too much! You'll have to let me pay you for some of it.”

“I didn't got quite enough money,” Jackie confessed. “Hallie helped.”

Meg's radiance dimmed. “Oh. Well—thank you, too, Hallie.”

Stung and hurt, though she had expected nothing more, Hallie had to swallow before she could say, “I hope you'll enjoy it.” She couldn't tell whether Garth's frown was for her, his daughter, or because he had intended to give Meg the watch on some future occasion.

“Ladies before men,” he said, rising. “This one's for Hallie from Shaft and me, but it's too heavy for you to lift, Jack.” Garth set the big box with the red bow in front of her, got out his pocketknife, opened the top, and lifted out what Hallie thought at first was a small suitcase till she saw the turning lever at the front.

Shaft hooked a footstool forward so Garth could set the case on it. “Open the lid, honey,” urged Shaft, chuckling at her puzzlement.

Hallie flipped up the brass clasps and lifted the hinged lid. “A phonograph! A portable one! It's wonderful! And the top holds records!”

“It'll play ten- and twelve-inch records—two of 'em on one winding,” Shaft declared proudly. “Just listen to this!” He wound up the motor, put on a record, and carefully set down the playing arm. Male voices rose merrily in “I'm Looking Over a Four-Leaf Clover.”

“Will you let me wind it, Hallie?” asked her brother.

“Of course. Just don't get it too tight.”

“We got you Vernon Dalhart singin' ‘The Prisoner's Song' and ‘Wreck of the Old 97,'” said Shaft. “And there's some mighty fancy fiddlin' from Eck Robertson and Henry Gilliland.”

“You fiddle better than anyone, Shaft.” Hallie squeezed his hand. “But it'll be marvelous to have music while you're away.”

“This present's for Shaft, Jackie,” said Meg, calling him to the gleeful task of giving Shaft the meerschaum.

“Boy howdy!” Shaft flourished the box with his name embossed in gold. “My grandpa had a meerschaum, but it didn't have such a fancy case. You kiddies shouldn't have spent so much, but I sure will take care of it and think of you when I'm enjoyin' my evenin' pipe.”

Meg's gift to her father was a blue blanket bathrobe and Rory got pajamas. The brothers seemed pleased with the sweater jackets from Hallie and Jackie, and Shaft was delighted with his warm slippers and flannel shirt.

To Hallie's dismay, Rory's gift was an elegant seed-pearl necklace with a pearl and sapphire festoon. It was the gift of a lover, and Garth's eyes narrowed. Hallie thanked Rory but, to save her life, she couldn't pay the natural compliment of fastening it around her neck.

Jim Wyatt's gift to Meg was a music box. Jackie got a two-propeller biplane. For Hallie there was Coty's Muguets des Bois perfume and a note that said he would miss all of them next summer, but he'd located a good used engine he could afford so he'd be running it.

On the card with a box of handkerchiefs for Hallie, Meg had signed her name and Jackie's with no attempt at holiday greetings. The girl flushed when Hallie thanked her as pleasantly as if the gift had required much thought and effort. Jackie must have asked the Donnellys to get him a long piece of paper; for on a four-foot strip of pink butcher paper, he had drawn dinosaurs roaming amidst palm trees and belching volcanos while great winged creatures flew overhead.

“I love it, Jackie,” she said truthfully, giving him a hug. “I'll get a frame made for it and keep it for always.”

Meg shrieked happily over the Ouija board Rich Mondell sent her. Jackie was thrilled with a jointed crocodile that meandered over the floor when wound up, opening and shutting its jaws. Hallie's present was
The Congo and Other Poems
by Vachel Lindsay. “
Lindsay is America's troubadour. Read these poems to Jackie, and he'll soon be chanting them along with you. Lindsay wrote a poem about harvesting wheat in Kansas. I wish he could have tasted your cooking, Hallie!”

Jackie was thrilled with his gifts from Hallie, his ukulele from Shaft, fire truck from Garth, and bow and arrows from Rory, but he couldn't keep his eyes off the train set.

“All right, lad.” Garth gave him a pat on the shoulder. “You've held out just fine, but Shaft'll help you fix your railroad while Rory and I bring in Meg's last present.” He grinned. “We'll call it Meg's, but we'll all enjoy it.”

Meg caught his sleeve. “What is it, Daddy? I was getting scared you'd forgot me!”

“You know I'd never do that. You're going to have to figure out where to put it, because once it's installed, you can't be scooting it around.”

“What
is
it?” Meg implored. Her father and uncle hurried out of the room and she turned to Shaft. “Do you know? Tell me! I'll see it in a minute anyway.”

“So you just wait that minute, girlie. Hmm, Jack, I guess this piece of curved track joins to the straight like this—”

Garth and Rory brought in a polished wooden cabinet and set it down near Meg. “Open that top door,” Garth said.

For a moment Meg just stared at the handsome mahogany with the latticed scrollwork over a frieze-covered upper panel. “A—radio! Oh, Daddy!”

The MacReynoldses had bought a five-tube table model the last year Hallie lived with them. The first commercial radio station began broadcasting from Pittsburgh in 1920, with the results of the November election when Harding and Coolidge defeated the Democrats. Since then, stations had sprung up all around the country. Farmers who could afford radios got them for market and weather reports. The music, news, educational programs, and other features had been a lot of company for Mrs. MacReynolds, and Hallie had enjoyed them, too.

Radios were expensive, though. Her glimpse at them in the catalog before she riffled swiftly by gave prices of close to $100 for similar consoles.

Of course there were “easy payments,” about $15 down and the same amount each month till paid, with interest. After the bank failure that ruined her father, Hallie was afraid of debt. Had she aspired to such a luxury, she would have saved till she could pay cash. She hoped Garth had though she understood his wish to make up for being away from his crippled daughter.

Meg's fingers trembled as she pulled down the carved door to reveal knobs that turned the set on and controlled volume and tone. As everyone gazed at what still seemed near magic, Garth said, “It won't work till we set up the aerial, so you have to decide whether you want it here or in the kitchen. I vote for the kitchen since it's where we are most of the time we're indoors.”

“It'll get dirty in there,” Meg protested.

“But it's
cold
in here when the stove's not going,” Jackie whimpered.

“I can polish it every day with furniture oil,” Hallie offered.

Shaft absentmindedly stroked Smoky, who had draped herself from shoulder to shoulder with her chin hooked above Shaft's collarbone. “Why not move that little table at the foot of the stairs and put the radio there? That way you can hear it in the kitchen and the front room, too, when the door's open.”

“Let's try it,” Garth said.

Shaft got to his feet, still caressing Smoky. “You figger out the directions and tubes and stuff while Rory and me redd up the dishes.”

Meg gazed longingly at the phonograph. Hallie started to tell her she could play it all she wished but checked herself. It might not hurt to let Meg ask for something. Hallie smoothed and folded the reusable paper and ribbons, storing them in a box for next year.

Next year. Would she be here then? She didn't think so. Not if Meg was still so difficult. Not if Garth were so mistrustful. But taking Jackie away from Meg whom he adored—Even if Shaft came with them, it would be terribly hard on the little boy. Why,
why
couldn't they all be a family? Last night, singing carols, it had almost seemed they were.

It still looked that way, Jackie absorbed in his train, Meg closing her eyes to move the Ouija marker, the men talking about detector-amplifier storage battery tubes, voltmeters, battery testers, and aerials. But while Hallie was delighted with the phonograph and Jackie's mural and touched at being remembered by Jim Wyatt and Rich, she was troubled by Rory's expensive gift and oppressed by Garth's coolness.

What she wanted more than any lavish present was for Garth's eyes to glow as they sometimes had, for that sweet wildness to flow between them, for him to smile and act as if he liked to be with her. Instead he behaved as if it were an ordeal.

Hallie put the wrapping box in the sideboard and started for the kitchen. As if the words were jerked from her, Meg blurted, “Is it all right if I play your phonograph?”

“Use it all you like.” Hallie smiled. Somehow, after all the rebuffs, she still hoped that sometime Meg would smile back freely and happily. “After all, we'll soon be listening to your radio.”

“Yes,” said Meg, winding the motor, “but phonographs are still nice because you can play what you want to hear.”

The strains of “Bye-bye, Blackbird” followed Hallie into the kitchen. Garth had gone outside to see about where to run the aerial. Rory caught her wrist. “Aren't you going to put on your necklace?”

She freed herself and began making cranberry sauce. “I'm going to save that necklace for you, Rory, till you find someone as special as it is.”

“I already have.”

“No, Rory.”

“I can wait.”

Shaft grunted. “You've never waited long. Now are you dryin' dishes or lollygaggin'?”

As soon as the two men finished the dishes, they joined Garth in working with the radio. Jackie made his wish and blew out his candles to strains of Christmas music and the new apparatus was kept on the rest of the afternoon. It was Shaft's fiddle they listened to that night, though, and sang more carols as he played and Jackie strummed his ukulele.