The Calder Game
Page 16
The fact that Miss Knowsley was both Art Wish’s aunt and Nashy Rip’s cousin didn’t improve her case in the eyes of the police. She and Pummy and Georgia had all of their meals at the kitchen table, and Miss Knowsley, who tended to be emotional at the best of times, frequently burst into tears or thumped the table with her fist.
She still felt the Americans were to blame. “Poisoned my Artie, that’s what they’ve done — poisoned his brain many years ago!”
She refused to believe he’d done anything wrong, and said many rude things about the Thames Valley Police. She would NEVER speak with them again. “I already knew they were not to be trusted,” she muttered to Pummy. “They’ll pay for this, they will!”
“Yeow!” Pummy chimed in.
All three enjoyed quantities of bacon that week. Georgia Rip, who had been living alone with her father since the death of her mother two years before, seemed happy to be around Miss Knowsley; her father, moody and angry much of the time, wasn’t an easy man. The young policeman watching the house marveled at all the delicious smells coming from the kitchen. He once knocked on the back door in order to compliment Miss Knowsley on her cooking, hoping to be asked in for a bite. No such luck: The door was slammed in his face. The young girl later peeked out at him from behind a curtain, as if he were someone to avoid.
Even the black cat had glared at him, with his one unforgettable eye.
Calder, Petra, and Tommy did lots of things to pass the time.
First, they did a great deal of talking. His voice still hoarse, Calder described what had happened while he was lost — the strange way words shifted in his brain, as if they came alive in all that darkness.
“It was like my mind borrowed part of Petra’s mind,” Calder said.
“Hey! That happened to me, too,” Tommy added. “I started thinking like Petra last night, while I was alone in the park, and the whole time we’ve been looking for you, numbers have been popping up in the weirdest ways. You know, like your pattern stuff.”
“And I’ve been problem-solving like both of you guys, rearranging letters and symbols like Calder, and also feeling braver because of Tommy,” Petra added. “It’s as if we’re not in our familiar places anymore.”
Although he said nothing about it, Calder was amazed at how relaxed Petra and Tommy seemed with each other. What had happened while they were alone together? He knew it wasn’t a good idea to ask, but he hoped this would last. It was new for the three of them, and made doing things together much, much more fun. The balance had changed, and he was no longer stuck in the middle.
The three of them also talked about the power of wishing. Tommy told Calder about his incredible find, the 1752 coin, and about how he’d thrown it into the Queen Pool. He felt sure that the coin had made a difference. He also mentioned the fate of the Button’s blue button.
Calder thanked his old friend. He knew how much Tommy’s treasures meant to him. He also thanked Petra for all her looking and thinking and wishing.
“Wishes can be so strong,” Petra mused. “It just doesn’t make sense that Mr. Wish is a bad man. With his WISH-WISH message, he planted the idea of wishes in everyone’s head.”
“Plus, he dreamed up the Calder Game, which has been a giant gift to thousands of people around the world,” Walter Pillay added. “And he started the Free Art: Share It! foundation, which has given so much to all of us, but to children in particular.”
“That’s a funny name for a foundation, isn’t it?” Calder asked.
“I like it,” Tommy said. “Art should be free.”
“It’s almost as if he knew that he, Art, might be losing his freedom,” Petra said.
Calder picked up a bedside pad of paper and a pencil and began writing things. “Hey,” he said after several moments. “HEY! If you write the name of his foundation in capital letters, you’ll see that the letters in SHARE IT spell out ART WISH, if you turn the E into a sideways W. That’s the kind of thing I would do. I knew I liked that guy!”
“The man likes games,” Walter Pillay remarked.
When the news about Arthur Wish’s anonymous gift to Woodstock and subsequent injury hit the American newspapers, there was a renewed rush to visit the Calder exhibit in Chicago, and a new crop of people threw themselves into the Calder Game. Hearing about Art Wish’s idea of making an idea-mobile by giving Calder sculptures to five communities in the world had started people thinking. Other people gave valuable things, and posted mobiles made from the idea of their gifts.
The museum reported that the submissions in the Take Five room had become so marvelous and meaningful that they were planning a separate exhibit, after Alexander Calder’s mobiles were taken down, of ordinary people’s idea-mobiles.
There was a plan to make a citywide Chicago exhibit of Take Five mobiles that spring and summer, posting large versions of individual mobiles on buses, on street displays, and on the sides of buildings.
Americans didn’t seem concerned at all about the news that Art Wish had possibly stolen his own gift in order to relocate it. Why not? After all, he wasn’t really stealing it.
The British police were less forgiving, although they reluctantly admitted that they didn’t consider Arthur Wish’s actions to be a crime.
They were also miffed when a fresh piece of graffiti turned up by Trafalgar Fountain in front of the National Gallery in London. It said, in stenciled yellow letters:
FREE ART WISH
WISH FREE ART
ART WISH FREE
ART FREE WISH
FREE WISH ART
WISH ART FREE
Encircling these six lines were versions of the WISH-WISH stencil, with the Is crossing to form an X, just as they had in Woodstock. The WISH signs looked like stars floating around the longer message.
All day, coins flew by the dozens into the fountain. London street-cleaners were forbidden to get rid of the graffiti, at least for the time being.
When the Minotaur was retrieved, very carefully, from the bottom of the Queen Pool, most of Woodstock crowded around to watch. And, one by one, the locals helped: Before the sculpture was loaded into a waiting truck, hands reached out to remove pondweed or brush off a gob of mud. Townspeople of all ages followed the truck as it rumbled slowly back toward Woodstock and the town square. Once the sculpture was unloaded, examined by experts, and pronounced to be in perfect condition, many volunteers worked to clean and polish it. Others brought sandwiches and cookies and tea. Somehow, everyone knew where they wanted the sculpture to go, and it was soon back in place, next to the WISH-WISH stencil. Surrounded by lots of stone and a scattering of leaves, the Minotaur shone in the fall sunshine.
“Marvelous we never dredged leaves from the pool,” one voice remarked. “Nice soft cushion.”
“Marvelous it survived the adventure,” said another, nodding.
“Yes, the wishes all worked,” yet another voice said, as if the whole thing had been planned.
Strange events were happening in both the United States and England, and they clearly had a great deal to do with one man, a man who still wasn’t able to speak.
While they waited for Calder to gain strength and hoped that Art Wish would recover, an odd foursome traveled back and forth to the hospital in Woodstock every day.
Sometimes the group dozed or read, and sometimes they all played the Calder Game.
Among the mobiles that were taped to Calder’s hospital wall was one called Tricks of Time, made by Mrs. Sharpe; one titled We Five, by Petra; a Treasure mobile by Tommy; and one called Word Equations, about the sound-ideas Calder remembered from his days inside the Cascade. Walter Pillay made a mobile from drawing the shapes of the five largest rocks that were so carefully moved to reveal his son. He titled it Rocks, and the outlines he drew on paper looked oddly like shapes Alexander Calder would have loved. Doctors and nurses watched the collection grow, and then asked if they could add some of their own.
“How about a new code?” Tommy asked Calder one day.
“Fabulous!” Petra said, and immediately began working on the list. The other four added on to it. Mrs. Sharpe called a bookstore in Oxford and ordered an art book with photographs of many of Alexander Calder’s mobiles. She also ordered a surprise for Calder, delivered in the same package: a new set of pentominoes, complete with its own wooden box.
Calder whooped with delight.
“It’s beyond cool, Mrs. Sharpe!” he crowed, and even managed to give her an awkward, double-bony hug.
“Don’t strangle me, boy!” she said, obviously pleased. She settled back in her chair, patting her bun into place and studying the pictures in the Calder book.
While Calder played around with his new pentominoes that afternoon, the other four made up the list of twenty-six. Here is what they came up with:
“There!” Mrs. Sharpe waved a piece of paper triumphantly in Calder’s direction. “We’ve written something in Calder Code. Can you read it?”
Calder puzzled over the string of shapes, which looked more like weird jewelry than a language. His finger moved back and forth across the page:
“I will!” He grinned. “It’s great, you guys!” Amazingly, Mrs. Sharpe didn’t correct him. She didn’t even seem to mind being included as one of the guys.
“Wonderful, just wonderful. I love a challenge,” she was heard muttering.
Calder handed over a tidy rectangle he’d drawn while they were working on the Calder Code, with directions. “It’s a pentomino maze, but one with no dead ends,” he said triumphantly. “I’ll never make anything with dead ends again.”
Calder’s maze was really a game, and he wrote out these instructions:
RULES FOR CALDER’S GAME
Begin with a 6 x 10 rectangle. Place the Start and Exit along one side, but anywhere you’d like. The object is to travel along the greatest number of squares, without going over the same spot twice and without stopping. Once you “step into” a pentomino, you must slide along it for the longest distance possible, either straight or around corners, then enter an adjoining piece and do the same thing. Travel until you find the exit. When you are out, put an X on every square you didn’t travel on. The object is to get the fewest number of Xs. The lowest score wins.
“Here is a game board and a sample game. On this one, the score is six,” Calder explained.
That evening, the day before Calder was discharged from the hospital, Arthur Wish opened his eyes.
“Boy.”
The nurse by Arthur Wish’s bed rang the emergency buzzer wildly. “He’s awake! Quick! Bring the Boy!”
Calder was more than happy to come, and soon a small group including Tommy, Petra, a detective, Mrs. Sharpe, and Walter Pillay moved slowly down the hallway toward the Critical Care room.
Art Wish looked blank until he saw Calder. A tiny smile flickered across his face. “Yes,” he said. “Yes.”
And then the shadow-thin boy and the man with the bandaged head sat together until the man gained enough strength to speak. It was clear that just the sight of Calder made things better; the man seemed immensely relieved.
When Art Wish was finally able to talk, he told this story:
He had noticed Calder by himself in town, and then making his pentomino mazes in the graveyard. When the boy came into the Lyon Tea Shop, ordered a sandwich, and gave the name “Calder,” Art Wish knew they should talk. Calder then forgot his maze diagrams, and Art Wish picked them up, planning to return them — their meeting seemed almost inevitable. Recognizing that these drawings were the work of an enterprising thinker, Art Wish decided to see if the American boy would share his reactions to the Minotaur.
Art Wish went on, his face suddenly growing sad, “You see, I was feeling quite confused. I’d given the Minotaur to Woodstock just about the time the show in Chicago opened in September, but hadn’t visited it yet. Then, while sitting in the exhibit shortly after the Minotaur was installed, I had an idea: I’d make a giant mobile by giving five Calder sculptures from my own collection to five communities in the world. You know, with the thought of making great art available for anyone to enjoy. I would only pick pieces the artist had named after creatures. The Minotaur would be the first part of this unusual mobile.
“I was very excited and rushed home, went through the names on all of my large Calder sculptures, picked four to give away and four wonderful places in the world to receive them, and then returned to the Take Five room several days later and hung my idea. The next day I got on a plane for England. I came directly to Woodstock.
“Part of my plan was to record local people’s reactions to the art. I wanted to be sure that each piece was in the right place. And I wanted to document what I did, kind of like the British artist Banksy. I also wanted to remain anonymous. I thought I’d get far more done if I didn’t have a name. I was thinking I might even, one day, make a book from it.”
The detective nodded, his mouth turning down in a well-maybe curve.
“Terrific idea, your anonymous mobile made of donated Calder sculptures,” Mrs. Sharpe said in a stern but very kind tone. “Shows great vision.”
“Thank you,” Art Wish said quietly. “Anyway, I then arrived here, and was disturbed and saddened to hear all the negative feelings about the Minotaur. Even my aunt hated it. I was interested in what children thought, especially, but there weren’t many children around. I tried to speak with a young girl who seemed intrigued by the Minotaur, but she ran away. I really didn’t know what to do. And then I met Calder here —” Art Wish paused and gave Calder another smile, “— and I knew he’d be a help in solving this puzzle.
“I’d already made plans to have the Minotaur moved, but I wasn’t yet sure where to relocate it. It seemed like the perfect solution, to involve a creative kid. So off we went.”
Here Art Wish had to rest. When he felt able to speak again, he said softly, “My big mistake was to remember. I’d spent one wonderful summer with my aunt here, as a kid, and never forgot the Cascade. As a boy, I’d heard the story about a secret platform in those rocks, and always dreamed of finding some part of it. I thought maybe I’d be allowed to stay longer in Woodstock if I did. You know — as a kind of local hero.” He smiled.
“Well, once we got into the park, I told Calder the old story. He was excited, and suggested we look at the spot, possibly even as a place to relocate the sculpture. And there we were, walking along the edge of the rocks, and he suddenly seemed to lose his balance, stumble, and fall between two boulders. He disappeared. I’ve never witnessed anything like it! He absolutely disappeared. There was a horrible rumbling sound, like rocks rubbing, and he was gone. Gone! Scariest thing I’ve ever seen.”
Mr. Wish’s eyes filled with tears. “I’m so sorry,” he said to Calder.
Calder shook his head, as if to say there was no need to be sorry.
Mr. Wish closed his eyes, but kept talking. “And then everything went wrong. My cell phone wasn’t working. There was no one around, and I ran along the bank to get help. As you know, it’s quite a distance to the gates, and I was panicky. Maybe I wasn’t careful. I must have slipped and hit my head on a rock, but I don’t remember doing that. I only remember a flash of terrible pain and then the next thing I knew, I was in the hospital here.”
“Bad injury on the back of your head,” the detective said. “Looked more like someone hit you with a blackjack, then tried to hide you in that dense grove of bamboo. You’re lucky to be alive.”
“Hmm,” Art Wish said, his expression troubled.
“And what about the WISH-WISH sign?” Walter Pillay chimed in.
“Oh, that!” Mr. Wish gave another weak smile. “I’m a big Banksy fan. Maybe I was just adding a little touch of Banksy to the picture. I made the stencil, and asked the men who moved the Minotaur that night t
o paint it on.”
“You said ‘men’ just now,” the detective interjected. “Happen to remember their names?”
Art Wish shook his head. “I only spoke directly to one, a really big fellow, and as I didn’t give him my name, I couldn’t exactly pressure him for his.”
Walter Pillay nodded. “Yes, I understand.”
“I don’t,” the detective muttered.
“I do,” Calder said. “Understand, I mean. I like all the stuff you’ve done. This has been an awful experience, but a kind of wonderful one, too.” Tommy and Petra were nodding.
“I think we all see one another differently than we did before this happened,” Calder said. “All of us.”
“Yes, the wind came up —” Mrs. Sharpe began. She paused.
“And changed us all,” Petra said softly.
While Arthur Wish was recovering, the other five stayed in Woodstock for another two days, enjoying the town and lots of friendly smiles and pats on the back while all the police business was wrapped up. Walter Pillay was treated to a number of free ales, and Mrs. Sharpe to some delicious sherry.
Miss Knowsley was all fluff and flutter, having been released, but made a point of snubbing every police officer in Woodstock. She even crossed streets and rushed out of stores in order to avoid them, as if she might catch a terrible disease. Pummy became even fatter, if that was possible. He enjoyed a number of large, jolly meals in the dining room at Miss Knowsley’s over the next week, meals that included the two Pillays, Mrs. Sharpe, Tommy, and Petra. Calder felt he owed Pummy a great deal, and lots of roast pheasant and mutton found its way under the table.