The Avion My Uncle Flew

by Cyrus Fisher

  I tried once more. “He told me that too. The house is burnt down.”

  My father sighed and shook his head.

  My mother said, “Johnny, it isn’t good for you to imagine things.”

  It wasn’t any use to attempt to make them believe me, even when I said that they could ask Albert tomorrow when he came for me if he hadn’t seen the man.

  My mother must have talked with my father about what I’d said at dinner, that night. I didn’t feel like eating—I was too much disturbed. They brought in food for me to eat later on, and stayed there, to make sure I’d at least try to stuff it down. I could see they were worried about me, too.

  It was such a mess, I didn’t half believe what had happened myself any more. I repeated I was sorry if I’d made a mistake. My mother said she was sure it wouldn’t happen again. I asked, “Are you going to sell your home?” hoping she would. That would mean I could stay with my parents and not go to St. Chamant.

  My mother shook her head. “Half an hour ago, I talked to Paul long-distance. He doesn’t want to sell. If he doesn’t, I don’t either. He hopes to rebuild the Langres house. I want him to, too,” she said, lifting her head, proud and trusting. “You and Paul can live in the little hotel in St. Chamant. It will be quite comfortable.”

  My father said, “Johnny, your uncle Paul is coming here tomorrow or the next day. I think you’ll like him. He plans to try to build an avion he’s invented.” My father stopped, as if he was doing his best to interest me and cheer me up. “Do you know what an ‘avion’ is, Johnny?”

  I didn’t care what an avion was.

  He said, “‘Avion’ is French for ‘airplane.’”

  Well, when somebody starts talking about avions—airplanes—it’s almighty hard not to be interested even if you have an idea the whole world is coming apart. I said, “My oncle’s inventing an airplane?”

  “That’s right. As I’ve told you I’ve written him a couple of times about you. Today when we talked to him on the long-distance telephone, he said he’d be here tomorrow, or the next day, maybe, so your mother and I can leave for England.”

  I said if I went to England with them I could learn to walk there just as well as being shunted off to a little French town where I didn’t know anyone.

  My father replied that was the difficulty: In England, my mother and he would live in London. He was going over there as a member of the Allied Aviation Commission. Because of a shortage of trustworthy translators, he had arranged for my mother to be put on as a temporary government employee, to help translate documents. Both of them would be very busy, and have no time for me. It couldn’t be helped. This was government work, for our country. They hoped I would understand and realize how important it was.

  I couldn’t argue against them.

  I was stuck. After eating, they left me alone for a time. I kept thinking about the white-faced man in the parc. They came in to tell me “Bonne nuit” and afterwards, in the dark, I still thought of that man. I wondered if I’d see him again if Albert took me to the parc. If I saw him, I’d know for sure whether he was someone else or the same man who’d tried to buy my mother’s property in St. Chamant.

  All that night, I didn’t get much sleep.

  A couple of times I thought I heard noises at my door. Perhaps no one ever actually came down the hotel corridor. I don’t know. Anyway, both times I thought I heard the noises I lifted straight up in bed. Probably it doesn’t make sense, but immediately I imagined Monsieur Simonis or Fischfasse, whatever his name was, was attempting to get in at me. I don’t know why. I can’t explain that. I simply had the fear. The first time I got to the door and listened and got back to bed, too, despite my leg. I walked. I was so scared and concerned I didn’t have time to worry about my leg or how my leg hurt when I used it for walking.

  It’s a funny thing what you can do when you have to do it. Once I was in bed I lay there and sweated and felt the pain and wondered how I’d ever done it—but the second time that noise came, I didn’t stop to wonder. I just did it again.

  Halfway back to the bed the second time, I realized what I was doing. I sort of halted. I grit my teeth and deliberately put all the weight of my body on my bum leg. And that leg didn’t flop out of joint like it used to at all. No sir, it hurt—but it stuck smack in place and stayed there.

  I expected to fall, too. It made me kind of mad, thinking of all the days I’d wasted in bed or had been wheeled around like an invalid. When I did get into bed, I didn’t care so much that my leg was hurting. I realized if I hadn’t been such a baby and had tried my leg more frequently, my mother wouldn’t have asked that hotel porter, Albert, to wheel me around—and I wouldn’t have run into Monsieur Fischfasse.

  Next morning, my father didn’t go to work as early as usual. He stopped in to see me. First, he said, “Bon jour, Jean.”

  So I said, “Bon jour, father.”

  He said, “You should say, ‘bon jour, mon père.’ That means ‘good morning, my father.’ ‘Mon père’ is French for ‘my father.’”

  So I said, “Bon jour, mon père.”

  He laughed. He was pleased. He sat down. He said, “C’est un beau jour?” and he was still laughing, because of how I must have looked at him. I don’t think he expected me to figure out what he’d said this time. But I fooled him, in a way.

  I remembered from yesterday when that white-faced man had said, “Le jour est beau, non?” My father had said practically the same words except for that “c’est” thing. I knew already that “est” was our “is.” Somehow, after walking last night, I must have felt better. Anyway, I made a guess. I decided “c’est” might be something like “it is”—and I replied, “Oui, mon père. Le jour est beau,” and waited to see if I’d answered as I should have. It was like a game.

  He said, “Johnny, you are picking up a little French, aren’t you? That’s fine, Johnny.” He was as pleased as could be. I asked about that “c’est.” I’d been nearly right. It meant “it is”—actually, it meant “it’s,” so I had guessed almost on the dot when my father had told me, “It’s a beautiful day.”

  He became more serious. “Johnny, I don’t want you to think we’re running out on you. You know we’re not, don’t you? All last night I worried. I’m sorry about yesterday when I lost my temper because I thought you were insulting Monsieur Simonis. I’m willing to accept your word you did think he was someone else.”

  It made me feel weak and funny inside to hear my father talk that way, as if he’d done something wrong. Yesterday, I’d thought my father and my mother were shunting me off from them. Now when I looked up at him and saw how thin and tired his face was, with the scar red and ugly, all at once I knew I didn’t ever have to worry that they were trying to get rid of me. All along they’d known I was able to walk—if only I put my mind to it. I’d had to be scared nearly to death before finding that out. I guess I felt a lump in my throat. I’d planned to blame them and tell them I knew they didn’t like me anymore and kick up a row for being left behind.…

  You see, I’m aiming to put everything down here, just as it happened, even if it makes me appear a pretty low sort of person, as I guess I must have been.

  But I didn’t do what I planned. I looked up and told my father, “If oncle Paul’ll let me help build his avion, maybe I’ll have lots more fun than going to England.”

  Well, his face cleared. He smiled. He said, “Johnny, you watch me fix that for you.”

  I said, “Would you like to watch me do something?”

  He said, “You bet, Johnny.”

  I threw off my covers and I walked clear to the door and almost got all the way back. I wasn’t scared like I’d been last night so I could feel the pain more this morning. When the pain came I wasn’t used to having so much of it. I had to stop. My father grabbed me. Even if I was going on thirteen, too big to be hugged by my father—he did hug me. I’m not ashamed to write it down here. He carried me back to my bed and called my mother. To hear him, you�
��d have thought I’d done the most wonderful thing in the world.

  “Johnny,” he said, all of a sudden, “here I’ve been worrying all night because I was afraid you’d be angry at your mother and me. You’ve surprised me. You have, and I’m proud of you, too. I’ll make a bargain with you. What do you want most to have?”

  I didn’t have to do any thinking to answer that. I said, “A bicycle with a high gear and a low gear like the one Bob Collins has.”

  “I’ll tell you what I’ll do,” said my father. “You go down to St. Chamant with your uncle Paul, without complaining. If in the three months you’re there you can learn to use your leg again and walk—you don’t have to run—just walk, Johnny, I’ll buy you a bicycle. I’ll get one from England. With gears on it.”

  Mother was smiling. She said, “Bob’s bicycle hasn’t any lights, has it? I’ll tell you what I’ll do, Johnny. If you can learn to walk again in three months you ought to be able to learn enough French to write me a letter. Remember, I was born in France. I love France. Nothing would please me more, next to having you walk again, than having you stop being so stubborn about the French. If you can learn enough French in three months to write me a letter, not very long, I’ll promise to buy you one of those electric lights—” She hesitated. She appealed to father. “Oh, Richard, you know the lights I mean. Not the ones with a flashlight battery, but real lights, just like the automobiles have.”

  “A dynamo,” said my father, grinning. “They have bicycles in England and France with electric dynamos to run the lights. That’s what you mean.”

  “Yes,” said my mother, smiling again. “That is exactly what I mean. What do you say, Johnny?”

  What could anybody say, being offered the chance to get a bicycle with a high gear and a low gear and electric lights from a real electric dynamo? Nobody back in Wyoming had ever seen such a scrumptious thing. I could just shut my eyes and imagine myself wheeling out such a bicycle on a dark night and simply flicking the switch and putting it in gear and riding over to Bob Collins’ or into town, having everyone gaping at me, wondering what in nation I was on.

  Why, I tell you: For a bicycle like that, I guess I would have promised to sprout wings and a halo, to go to church every day in the week, to keep my nails clean, to wash behind my ears, and to do my school lessons without ever being told. Instead, all I had to do was go to a French town with mon oncle, build an avion there, probably fly around in the avion and have a noble time doing it—and walk and learn French. Anybody could do that—was what I then believed, at least.

  So I said it.

  “It’s a bargain,” I said.

  “We’ll make it you have to be able to walk two miles,” said my father.

  I said, “I’ll walk twenty miles for—”

  “Two miles will be enough, Johnny.”

  “And write at least two pages in French,” added my mother.

  “It will be easy,” I said.

  I was so pleased and excited, all my worries about that white-faced man passed away, as though it had all been a bad dream.

  A little later I got to thinking more about the promise I had made to learn French. I put down all the French words I knew so far. When I was finished, I was surprised I knew so many. Here they are:

  1. Montagne

  2. Oncle

  3. Bon

  4. Jour

  5. Est

  6. Beau

  7. C’est

  8. Nuit

  9. Jean

  10. Monsieur

  11. Mon

  12. Père

  13. Parc

  14. Oui

  15. Non

  16. Le (jour)

  17. Bonne (nuit)

  18. Avion

  Knowing how to say “it’s” was helpful. With that “c’est” I could make sentences. I could say, “C’est mon père;” “C’est mon oncle;” or, I could say, “Le jour est beau;” and, “Le parc est beau;” or I could ask myself silly questions like, “Est mon oncle le parc?” And answer myself, “Non, le parc est le parc.” Maybe it seems foolish, but I found it was fun. It was a start toward getting that dynamo, I figured. I looked at all the words and said them over and I had them down cold and I hadn’t even tried to learn them.

  4

  ONCLE PAUL

  I was in bed next morning when that Monsieur Simonis telephoned to ask if my mother had decided to sell the property. By the time I was up, I heard my father and mother talking about it.

  Monsieur Simonis had been cross, learning he was refused. My father said he was glad my mother and Paul were keeping the property. It had been owned for generations by members of the Langres family. If Paul succeeded in inventing a successful new avion, perhaps he would receive enough money from it to rebuild the house and settle once more in St. Chamant.

  “I hope he does,” said my mother. “I do hope so, very much.”

  My father looked at his watch again. He waited until about eleven, but mon oncle Paul didn’t arrive. He said probably Paul would catch tomorrow morning’s train. He kissed my mother and gave me a pat and went off to work, late.

  At one-thirty, Albert appeared on the dot to take me for my ride in the wheel chair. My mother thanked him for attending to me during the past week and said today would be the last time he’d have to give me an outing in Paris. I was leaving tomorrow for the country.

  “Oh, by the way,” she said. “Johnny mentioned he encountered a French gentleman in the park. He became rather confused over the name. You don’t happen to remember, do you, Albert?”

  “I am most sorry, madame.” He smiled sheepishly at me. “I get tobacco. I leave Master Jean, and for one or two minutes I go get tobacco. Iss wrong to do that?”

  “Of course not,” said my mother. “Johnny’s quite safe at his age in Paris for a minute or so, certainly. You didn’t see anyone, then?”

  “No, madame,” said Albert, pulling at his cap. “I am most sorry.”

  “Never mind. It isn’t important.” My mother bundled me up and watched Albert wheel me to the elevator.

  Outside, on the sidewalk, Albert asked, “You see somebody in the parc, yess?”

  “Yes,” I said, thinking Albert was so dumb it wasn’t any good to try to explain to him.

  Albert didn’t ask any more questions. He pushed me around the opera house, waiting on the corner while all the bicycles and the horses went by. Gasoline was still scarce; there weren’t many automobiles around. The streets were lined with shade trees, the leaves out and green and pretty. It was a beautiful jour, the sun shining.

  He pushed me up more streets, humming that silly tune to himself. By and by he stopped humming and filled his pipe. I was beginning to enjoy myself, thinking that I’d made a big mistake ever to believe that someone visiting my father could have been the same man whom I’d met in the parc. I started thinking about mon oncle, wondering why he was so set on building an avion and if I’d like him and whether he was big or little, all the questions you ask yourself about somebody you expect to meet.

  I didn’t notice until too late that Albert had headed the wheel chair down toward that same blessed little parc. I said, “Wait a minute, Albert—” but it was like trying to tell a mule where to go. Albert sucked loudly on his empty pipe. He smiled at me.

  He said, “I get a little tobacco, pliss.”

  “Look here,” I said, “I don’t want to stop here in this parc. I don’t care for this parc at all.”

  “Yess,” said Albert, still smiling.

  But he shoved me into the parc. There under the green trees, was the man whom I’d met—and he was the same man I’d seen with my father and my mother. I couldn’t mistake him. Coldness slid all down through my spine. I gave a jerk—and tried to lunge out of the chair. Albert stuck his big hand on my shoulder and held me down, pinned where I was.

  Monsieur Simonis—to call him by the name he’d given himself in front of my father—stood up from the bench, long and thin, his green eyes cruel. “Bon jour, Jean,�
�� he said, making his face smile!

  We were alone, Albert and him and me, surrounded by the trees, with a little stone fountain over to one side splashing water into the sunshine.

  “Well?” he said, coming to me, his teeth showing in his white face.

  I didn’t reply—I couldn’t.

  “Well?” he asked again, laying his long stiff fingers on my shoulder. “Perhaps you can help me persuade that foolish mother of yours she should sell her land in St. Chamant.” He reached down with his long fingers and dug his nails into my leg, twisting it.

  It happened so suddenly, so unexpectedly, I wasn’t prepared at all. I opened my mouth to yell. The next instant, he clapped his other hand over my mouth. “This will teach you,” he whispered, “to pay attention to what I am saying. I want no noise out of you, foolish boy.”

  I wriggled, expecting Albert to lay in on him and help me—to shout—to do something. But I caught a glimpse of Albert, grinning away, puffing at that empty pipe of his, seeming to enjoy what was happening.

  Monsieur Simonis removed his hand. I slumped back, catching my breath.

  Monsieur Simonis ordered harshly, “Listen carefully, silly boy. I have informed myself all about you. You are an only child and your parents are in the habit of spoiling you. Is that not true?”

  Even if it was true, it wasn’t pleasant hearing him say that. And in addition to what he said, he had a manner, an attitude, that went way and beyond his words toward filling me with absolute horror of him. I don’t think I can ever explain. I can see now, too, how clever he was. He never said anything which could be reported against him. If I told anyone it sounded merely as if he’d stopped me and out of the kindness of his heart had said St. Chamant wasn’t a very good place to go to and my parents should know that fact. You see, it wasn’t so much what he said, but the way he said it which conveyed an altogether different meaning to me and let me know he was determined I wasn’t to live in St. Chamant. He was sinister and cruel and he allowed me to see he was. He went on, his eyes as green as a cat’s. He said, “I suggest—do you understand? I suggest that St. Chamant would be a very inhospitable place for a boy of your age. Your parents are making a very great mistake to—” He didn’t finish. Albert whistled a warning. Just like a big skinny cat, too, Monsieur Simonis whirled about and sprang through the trees, vanishing.