Chapter Seven
A Trip to Deerpath
“I DON’T know where we’re going to put all of you,” laughed Aunt Claire. “I think this car was originally intended to hold five passengers.”
Grandma got in first, and seated herself comfortably in the back. Billy and Katherine ranged themselves beside her on the seat, and James came panting up at the last minute, carrying a stool and a cushion, so that he could sit on the floor. Grandma counted heads.
“Where’s Davey?” she asked. “Everybody’s here but Davey.”
Just as they called him he came trudging up the steps of the rock garden, carrying Butch. Butch was wearing his best suit, red trousers with a bright, yellow cotton blouse, and a little bright red hat cocked over one eye.
Mom groaned. “Oh, Davey,” she said, “why do you have to bring him along? We’re crowded, and he’s so hard to take care of when we get to Deerpath. Don’t you remember all the trouble we had the last time you took him along? Do you remember how he got away from you and started throwing lemons and oranges around in the store?”
Butch put both hands to his heart in an attitude of prayerful entreaty. Everyone laughed, even Mom.
“Well, all right this time,” she said, “but never again.”
Davey settled down blissfully on Grandma’s lap, and Butch sat on Davey’s lap. They looked like a happy three-layer banana cake.
All the way to Deerpath they played White Horse. They were divided into two teams, one for each side of the road. The object was to find white horses and count them. The team with the highest score won. However, if the car passed a cemetery, the team on the same side of the road as the cemetery forfeited its entire score.
Janie was captain of one team, and Billy was captain of the other. The hunting wasn’t very good as they drove along. It seemed that all the horses were far back in the fields working. Janie had a score of 3 and Billy had 2 when they reached the top of a hill just at the outskirts of the village.
“Cemetery!” called Aunt Claire, and Billy’s team lost its score.
Janie was jubilant. “We won! We won!” she exulted. But, Grandma, buried under Davey and Butch, spied victory walking down the road toward them.
“Look what’s coming,” she cried. “Two white horses pulling a load of hay.”
“Oh yes,” said James. “But that only gives your side two, and we have three.”
“Look what’s following,” said Grandma smugly. Hitched to the rear of the load were two of the whitest horses you ever saw. There were loud cheers from Billy’s team as they pulled up in front of the village store.
Janie was patronizing. “You were just lucky,” she said. “That wouldn’t happen again in a hundred years.”
Grandma was the last to crawl out of the car. She shook out her skirts ruefully. “And to think,” she said, “that I pressed this dress just before I started out.”
They split up in groups to do the shopping. The boys made straight for the hardware store that sold fishing supplies. They didn’t buy anything very often, but they would stand for hours in wistful admiration.
The girls went to the drug store to buy picture postcards to send home to Katy’s folks, and Mom and Aunt Claire went to the grocery store.
Grandma, Davey, and Butch started off down the block to a large old-fashioned country store that sold odd lots of almost everything imaginable. You could buy anything from nuts and bolts to flowered chintz. You could buy rubber boots, embroidery cotton, lemon squeezers, and imitation Christmas trees, and sometimes they would all be piled up on one counter.
Mr. Seaman, the proprietor, remembered Grandma from other summers and welcomed her as an old friend.
“How do you do, Mrs. Murray,” he said. “How have you been all winter, and how is your son and his wife? We have a nice stock of white nurses’ oxfords that you might like.”
“No, Mr. Seaman,” said Grandma politely. “I’d like to see some oilcloth for the kitchen shelves.”
“We have that too,” he said, and led her over to the other side of the store.
David stood before a mirror and tried on winter caps such as farmers wear doing chores. They were all much too large for him, and as he discarded them, one by one, Butch would try them on his head, and then throw them on the floor. Grandma looked around and soon put a stop to their foolishness.
Mr. Seaman wrapped her packages, and they started back down the street to the drug store. If the Murrays separated in Deerpath, it was never for long. They always met by common consent at the soda fountain. Billy and James got there first, and they were sitting in a booth reading a comic book and waiting for the others. Just after Grandma walked in with David and Butch, Janie and Katherine arrived. Janie seemed disappointed.
“We’ve looked all over, and they don’t seem to have any fireworks this year.”
Billy waved his hand, as if by that gesture to banish all her difficulties. “Don’t worry,” he promised. “I know where they sell them. It’s a wayside stand on the way home. I’ll get some for you.”
“Oh good.” Janie looked relieved. “I was beginning to worry.”
Mom and Aunt Claire wandered in just then, and Mrs. Skinner came over to take their order. James had a dish of strawberry ice. Davey wanted a chocolate ice-cream cone. Billy ordered a vanilla cone with chocolate “jimmies” sprinkled all over the top. Katy had root beer and Janie had a coke. Grandma wanted root beer, and Mom and Aunt Claire had sodas.
After everyone had ordered, Davey ran over next to Mom and whispered in her ear. She nodded and gave him a penny. He took it over to the counter, and offered it to Mrs. Skinner.
“Please, Mrs. Skinner,” he said. “May I have a sucker for my monkey?”
The ride home was complicated with the addition of a great many packages. Mom seemed to have bought enough supplies to feed even the hungry Murrays for a week. The amiable little car took a deep breath and expanded to hold them all.
Billy kept a lookout for the roadside stand he remembered from the year before. “It’s just beyond the second turn in the road,” he said, “after we pass the farmhouse where we buy currants.” There it stood, just as he said. The farmer was out tacking red, white, and blue bunting to the posts as they stopped the car.
“Yes I have fireworks,” he said. “I’m just unpacking them. If you folks will wait a while, I’ll bring the packages down and you’ll be the first to make a selection.” He went back to the farmhouse, and in a short time returned with his arms full of bundles. Billy and James helped him unfasten strings, and then the beautiful and colorful display lay before them.
It was hard to choose. Billy decided upon salutes, giraffe crackers, and one Roman candle. James hunted around for his favorite brand, that came in a long narrow box. They were smaller than giraffe crackers, but they were packed much tighter, and they made a much louder explosion. Katy bought lady-crackers quickly and quietly, while David was still spreading out his pennies. Jane was torn between skyrockets, which were flamboyant and expensive, and the more conservative lady-crackers. She stood on one foot and then on the other. Finally, she bought one skyrocket and two packages of lady-crackers.
Davey came back to the car beaming. He had two packages of giraffe crackers and some pin wheels and a flower pot. He was feeling very adult.
“Goodness,” said Aunt Claire, as she looked over his assortment. “You’ll blow us to kingdom come!”
Once more they started off for home. Just as they were about to turn off the main highway, Billy leaned out of the window and shouted and waved at a passenger car. It was Hoyer, he explained, and the Byrnes twins and Johnny Engelhardt. “They’re all kids in my class,” he added. “They’re probably going out to Harwood’s.”
Everyone helped to unload the car when they reached the cottage gate. As soon as the perishable food was put away Mom sat down at the table with Grandma and Aunt Claire and began to talk over plans for the week-end holiday.
“It’s rather hard to plan exactly,” she said, “because you never know who is coming.”
“Pshaw,” said Grandma calmly. “Just have a lot. If we have fine weather, plenty of food, and good friends gathered around, the party is a success before it starts.”
“That’s right,” Mom agreed, “and that removes all my uncertainties except the weather.”
There was a pleasant prickly feeling of anticipation in the air. The children were very well behaved. Janie didn’t lose her temper, and Billy didn’t tease. James was rumored to have been seen with a dish towel in his hand after meals, and Davey trotted around like a little lamb. Even Butchie declared a short truce. He was quiet and good.
Thursday was the Fourth of July, and all day Wednesday the Murrays raked and weeded and polished and cleaned. Daddy arrived at sundown and was greeted with joy. Aunt Claire had baked homemade bread, and Mom had baked cakes. Davey had decorated the lake front with flags, and the boys were most anxious to show their father a long picnic table they had set up on the terrace. Daddy held his arms up in the air and laughed at their eagerness.
“One at a time, boys,” he said. “I’ll have to have something to eat before I start out on this tour of review. I’ve been so busy all day that I haven’t had a bite since breakfast.”
In a little while he walked around and admired everything. “You certainly have worked hard, and you’ve been very good children,” he said. “And, because you’ve been so good, I’m going to take you over to the firecracker stand and buy you some firecrackers.”
The response to this sounded like a football game, and looked like one too, for that matter. Poor Daddy was literally overwhelmed. Everyone tried to hug him at once, and he fell to the ground with them in a laughing, whirling nigger-pile.
“Hey, Mom,” he called. “Get me out of this. These kids are too much for me.” They pulled him to his feet and brushed him off. Mom waved to them as they started away. “Don’t be too long,” she said. “Remember, tomorrow is a big day.”
They were home again by eight o’clock, and in bed by nine. In spite of the excitement, they were quiet, and they soon fell asleep. When Mom came in to check up before her bed time, she smiled to see Billy fast asleep with a string tied to his wrist. It stretched across to the other side of the room, where it was securely tied to Davey’s toe. They had their firecrackers neatly stacked under their beds.
Mom called Grandma and Daddy and Aunt Claire, and they tiptoed up stairs. Daddy laughed and marveled at the plan.
“Good night, folks,” he said. “We’d better sleep while we can. Something tells me that it’s going to be noisy around here tomorrow morning.”