by N. D. Wilson
The other was an old woman in France. Her husband had returned from the First World War with some very strange stories and a small sapling in a tin cup. He had told her its name then, and the name of the man who had given it to him, and she had never forgotten either. The tree is in her backyard garden now, squat and strong, and before her husband died, years ago, he made her a jewelry box out of one of its limbs that had been torn off in a storm.
Henry did not know these people. He had looked at the small wooden door with its pale grain and silver-lined keyhole, and he had dragged his fingers across it, unable to read the story the wood told. “What are you?” he’d asked out loud.
Henry had continued chipping plaster and uncovering doors until he could count thirty-five in all, and he had no doubt there were more. Most of them were wood, but of all different sizes, grains, and colors. The shapes varied as well as the designs. Some were plain, and some had surfaces so intricately carved that getting the plaster out of all the curves and crannies had been impossible. Some had knobs, some small handles, some slides or things Henry had never seen. There was one with nothing at all. He had pushed and pulled and lightly thumped on every single one, but without effect. And then, always, he had gone back to chipping plaster, making his newly sharpened knife dull and duller. A large blister now crowned his thumb from pushing on the blade to keep it open, and the knuckles on both of his hands were missing skin.
Henry tiptoed through the rubble and dug some clothes out of the crammed drawers in his dresser. He pulled them on and then went down to the kitchen to find the broom and dustpan. He also saw the clock in the dining room and realized why nobody was up. He swept all the dust and gravel off his floor and the floor of the attic and once again dumped it onto his blanket. He cleaned off his walls, his lamp, his dresser, and his nightstand. No matter how much he swept, there was some dust so fine that it only scurried away from the broom and drifted into the air.
Eventually he gave up on the finer stuff, moved his antique Kansas basketball poster to cover part of what he had done to the wall, wondered where he could get more posters, and grabbed the corners of his blanket to carry it out to the side of the barn.
He dragged the makeshift sack to the stairs and began lugging it down, one stair at a time. He had not realized how heavy it would be. By the time he had reached the fourth stair, he was sweating, and every time he moved his blanket, dust swirled out and clung to his skin. When he reached the bottom of the second flight of stairs, he was in pain. In the mudroom, he sat down to catch his breath and put on his shoes.
When Henry finally reached the barn, he turned to look back at the house. He had plowed an obvious trail through the tall grass with his sack of plaster, but there was nothing he could do about it now. He looked at the small pile of plaster he had dumped the night before and compared it to the size of his new sack. He was going to have to go farther from the house.
Rather than drag his sack through the even-taller grass and weeds that led to the fields behind the barn, he buckled down, hoisted the blanket over his shoulder, and staggered off. He didn’t know how far he should take it, but he figured he wouldn’t be able to carry it for very long and would dump it when he stopped.
The grass beyond the barn rubbed against his elbows as he moved through it. Then the tall grass ended, and there, at his feet, was an old irrigation ditch. Henry dropped the blanket, grabbed two of the corners, and watched his demolition work slide down the bank into the still water. Then he sat. He was sweating, and now that he wasn’t moving anymore, his sweat made him cold in the slight morning breeze. He lay back into the tall grass, ducking under the moving air, and was warm. The sun played around in the tops of the weeds, pointing out the seeds they carried high and, in them, a villainous intent to fill the Earth.
Exhaustion crawled out of Henry’s bones, and he slept.
If water bugs could see more than a yard, then several of them would have noticed the bottoms of Henry’s feet and the legs of his pants. Such far-sighted bugs would have had a much better view of Uncle Frank. He was sitting next to Henry’s knees with his legs stretched down the bank into the ditch. In his right hand he held a wooden baseball bat, and with his left he searched the bank for pieces of plaster. When he found them, he tossed them gently into the air, where he either hit them across the ditch with the bat or missed and watched them hop down the bank and into the water. Occasionally he looked at Henry’s face. Dotty had told him how early Henry had been up and how he’d begun his day on the stairs. Frank’s job had been to find Henry, and now he had.
Frank Willis was a thoughtful man, even if he didn’t always look it. As he sat and tossed bits of plaster, he was thinking. Most people from Henry, Kansas, the ones who thought he was thin, would have assumed his thoughts were limited to the things directly in front of him. They would have assumed he was thinking about his nephew, a filthy blanket, and bits of plaster scattered down the bank and gathered in the water at the bottom of the ditch.
Frank had noticed these things, but they only made him think of another summer, the summer when he first tumbled into Henry, Kansas—when he had tumbled in and never tumbled out. Only a year or two older than his nephew was now, he had propped himself up beside this same irrigation ditch beside this same barn. He had looked out over the sprawling landscape and smooth sky and wondered where exactly he was supposed to be.
Henry twisted in his sleep, and his foot slid down toward the still water.
“Henry,” Frank said. “Wake up, boy.” He reached over and shook him by the shoulder.
Henry woke up with a twitch and blinked at his uncle. Uncle Frank held up a piece of plaster between his finger and thumb, smiled, tossed the plaster in the air, and missed it with the bat.
“Bad dream, Henry?” he asked. “You didn’t seem to be enjoying it too much, so I roused you.”
Henry watched Uncle Frank pick up another chunk of plaster. This time he hit it well into the field on the other side of the ditch.
“Yeah,” Henry said. “Not so much a bad dream. More a weird one.”
“You like it out here by the fields?” Frank asked.
Henry nodded.
“So do I,” Frank said. “Helps me think.” Frank looked over at him. “You know, Henry, I’ve gained some worldly wisdom since we last spoke of tumblin’ weeds.” He raised his eyebrows. “I used to think a Japanese businessman and his money were soon parted. Now I’ve learned different. It’s only true if you’re from Texas.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, just an hour or two after the auction closed on my tumbleweed, some guy piles on there sellin’
‘Genuine Texas Tumbleweed.’ He throws in a certificate of authenticity and a little framed photo of the weed where he found it. My buyers backed out and bought his stuff.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, Uncle Frank.” Henry glanced at the blanket and the plaster and then looked quickly back at his uncle. “What’re you going to do with all the tumbleweed in the barn?”
“Set it free.” Frank sighed. “It’s wild stuff anyway. Wasn’t meant to live in captivity. My heart breaks to see it in a cage and all that.” Three straight plaster chunks floated into the air. Frank only missed the last one.
“Do we have to take it back?” Henry asked. “Back to the culverts?”
“Nope. I’ll just throw it in the yard. The wind’ll do what it always does, and the weeds will tumble until the world does what it does and they all drop into another culvert.”
Frank braced himself with the bat and clambered to his feet. Henry followed him.
“Or maybe they’ll roll free for a while,” Frank said. “I’d like to think they could see some things, make a few pilgrimages before they settle.” He turned and faced Henry. “Well, we got a busy afternoon ahead of us, so we better loosen up and head back.”
“What do we have to do?” Henry asked.
“I sharpened your knife up a bit last night, but I wanted to put a little better edge on it.” Frank
held the bat up. “And I dug this out of the barn so we could play some baseball.” He stepped off through the tall grass. “And don’t forget your blanket,” he said over his shoulder. “You might want to shake it out. It’s lookin’ pretty gritty.”
Henry did shake out his blanket, then nervously followed Uncle Frank back toward the barn.
“Heard you fell down the stairs this morning, Henry,” Uncle Frank said. “You don’t seem too much worse for wear. I’ve been down those myself. Only I broke my collarbone.”
“Yeah,” Henry said. “It was early. I thought I’d slept in again.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that,” Uncle Frank said. “Boys should sleep in during the summer. I don’t know how else people expect them to grow. Dots says I got to get you a clock for your room, though. I don’t think I have anything in the barn. Not anything that works. We’ll see if she asks again.”
Frank began whistling, glanced back again to make sure Henry was far enough behind, and then swung the bat through the grass. The barn loomed beside them.
“Do you have any more old posters, Uncle Frank?” Henry asked. He was trying not to sound guilty. “In the barn, I mean? That I could hang up in my room?”
Frank stuck his lower lip up toward his nose while he walked. “Not sure. I’ll look around, though.” He stopped at the back door. “Let’s start with your knife. We’ll take a little batting practice after lunch. Where is your knife? You must have grabbed it, because I left it on the counter.”
“Yeah, it’s up in my room. I’ll get it for you.” Henry ran around his uncle, kicked off his shoes in the mudroom, and scrambled up both flights of stairs. In his room, he threw his blanket back onto his bed, kicked his filthy clothes from the night before underneath, grabbed his knife off his dresser, and then hurried back down. He found Uncle Frank sitting at the dining room table.
“Don’t know why a boy shouldn’t run,” Frank was saying. “He’s just excited to get his knife sharp.” He was unrolling an old cloth. Aunt Dotty stepped in from the living room. She smiled.
“Careful, Henry. You won’t have much knife left when he’s done, and he’s not too good at straight lines.” She ducked away before Frank could answer.
“It’ll be sharp!” he yelled after her. “Don’t know what she’s complainin’ about. Okay, Henry, fork it over.” Henry did, and Uncle Frank examined it.
“Tell you the truth, Henry,” he said, “I don’t know why I ever bought you this knife.”
Henry’s heart sank. He had thought it was impossible for his uncle not to be suspicious about his blanket and all the plaster, and now trouble had finally come.
“It’s worthless,” Frank continued. “The blade’s already down to a nub and the tip’s broke off. I can still sharpen her up for you, but you need a new one. You take off and do whatever you wanna do. This will take me a little while. I’ll holler when I’m done.”
“Your cousins are playing out in the barn if you like,” Dotty said from the living room, and the vacuum growled to life.
“Thanks!” Henry yelled. But he went upstairs to his room. When he got there, he found Henrietta kneeling on his bed, looking at the wall. Her hair was pulled back into a tight braid.
“I took the poster down already,” she said. “I hope you don’t mind.” She glanced back at him and her smile was wide. She looked different without her thick curls, smaller even. Henry watched her put both hands on the wall and run them over the doors. “What are they all for?” she asked.
“Probably to put things in,” Henry said. “I mean exciting things,” he added.
Henry flopped down beside her, and the two of them stared at the little cupboard doors.
“How many more do you think there are?” Henrietta asked.
“I bet they cover the whole wall,” Henry said.
“You tried to open every one?” She reached out and wiggled a knob.
Henry nodded. “I did. I wrecked my knife getting the plaster off last night, and I won’t be able to use it tonight because your dad is sharpening it again. He’ll wonder if it’s dull again tomorrow.”
Henrietta looked at him. “There are some old tools in the basement, and some more in the barn. I bet there’s a chisel. Do you want me to check?”
“That would be good,” Henry said. “It took me forever last night. I kept worrying that I was scratching the doors. I hope we don’t mess any of them up.”
“I like the white one best,” Henrietta said, and pointed. “It looks happiest. Some of the other ones don’t seem to want to be here, but the white one seems just fine.”
“What do you mean?” Henry sat up straight. “I think it looks neat, too, but how could it look happier than the others? I don’t think you can call them happy.”
“Well, what about sad? That little metal one looks sad.” And she pointed again. It was the smallest door Henry had uncovered, no more than four inches tall by five inches wide, with a keyhole on the left side. Its metal surface was grooved and still held bits of plaster. A small black panel was inset toward the bottom.
“I don’t think it looks sad at all,” Henry said. “It’s been stuck in the wall for however long. It’s probably glad to be out again.”
“I don’t think it wants to be in our attic,” Henrietta said. “It looks like it’s supposed to be somewhere else. What do you think the black part’s made of?” She leaned forward and picked at it with her fingernail. “I think it’s plastic.”
“What?” Henry stuck his finger beside Henrietta’s. “Plastic’s not that old, is it?” He scratched and felt something pile up against his fingertip. “Oh,” he said, and sat back up.
“What? What is it?” Henrietta grabbed at his finger to look at it.
“I think it’s paint,” Henry said, picking the black out from beneath his nail. He looked back at the little panel in the door. “It must be glass that someone painted over.”
“Really?” Henrietta began scratching at the panel with both hands. “We could see through it with a flashlight.”
“Henry?” Aunt Dotty’s voice drifted up two flights of stairs. “Your lunch is ready. Come on down. Henrietta, you, too, if you’re up there.”
Henrietta sat up quickly.
“Can we just pretend like we didn’t hear?” Henry asked.
“No. Then she’ll just come up. Let’s go. We can do it later.” Henrietta stood up and pulled Henry to his feet.
“Henry!”
“We’re coming, Mom!” Henrietta yelled, and the two of them thumped down the stairs. Henrietta stopped suddenly, and Henry bumped into her. She bent over and picked up a piece of plaster off a stair. She looked up and down the entire flight and made a face at Henry. “Mom will notice,” she said.
Anastasia and Penelope were already eating when they got there. Uncle Frank sat between them, working Henry’s knife across a stone. Two plates of grilled cheese and two glasses of milk sat across the table from the girls.
“What have you been doing, Henrietta?” Anastasia asked, chewing. “I thought you said you were gonna come back out and play.”
“I did,” Henrietta said as she and Henry sat down.
“But I saw Henry and we started talking.”
“What about?” Anastasia asked. “Zeke Johnson?” She picked at a lump of cheese between the bread crusts, stretching it into a string.
Henrietta glared at Anastasia.
“You’re being rude,” Penelope said.
“I’m not,” Anastasia said. “She said she was coming back, and I just want to know what they talked about. You two always talk about Zeke.”
“Girls,” Uncle Frank said, “I don’t think it matters. You can all play after lunch.”
Henry looked at Henrietta. Her jaw was locked shut. Penelope was red.
“We were talking about lost doors and secret cities and how to find them,” Henry said, and he took a bite of his sandwich.
“Fun,” Penelope said. “I found a secret door in the bathroom once.”
“And—listen, Henry,” Penelope said. “Mouse droppings and a shower mat. You know those rubber things with all the suction circles on the bottom? There was one of those.”
“So what did you do with it?” Henry asked.
“Set traps for the mice and closed it back up,” Uncle Frank said.
“I can show it to you,” Penelope offered. “If Dad will let me take it back off.”
“Nope!” Dotty yelled from the kitchen. “I don’t want you breaking the paint all up again. There’s a more important door your uncle can show you, Henry. It’s much harder to get open than the bathroom panel.” She walked into the room, drying a skillet with a rag. “Frank, I ran into Gladys and Billy at the store yesterday. Do you know what he said to me?”
The girls went very quiet. Frank didn’t look up.
“Hello?” he asked, and kept rubbing Henry’s knife.
Dotty hit him with her rag. “He said that. And so did she. But the important part was when he said, ‘Frank ever get that door open?’ Do you know what I said? What I said was—Are you ready for this? I said, ‘No.’”
“Ah,” Frank said. He lifted Henry’s knife up to his mouth and dabbed the blade with his tongue. “That’s my honest wife. I appreciate you lookin’ out for my dignity.”
“And then I said I would give him a call to come by and open it. I’d rather not be a liar, Frank.” She crossed her arms. The skillet dangled on one hip, the rag on the other.
“Dots, excellent wife, I appreciate that. I’ll get that door open and accommodate you spaciously within the room hidin’ behind it. But Billy Mortensen will have nothing to do with it. He threw a baseball game in the state playoffs our senior year, and you know it.” Frank glanced up. “I’ll only see him socially. He’ll never bill me.”