“Do I what?”
“You’re not listening.”
“What I was thinking was…we need to explore all avenues, like I said. So tomorrow? There’s no school, so we can head out to that shantytown. Put the word about.”
“What word? The Reverend said those places are dangerous. He said they’re desperate, some of those hoboes. Though they looked okay to me the other day. Just rough maybe.”
“I’ll go then, if you’re chicken,” said Scoop. “I can do the investigating myself. If we find your father, maybe you won’t mind so much about your mother.”
Elsie stared at Scoop. Could he really think that as long as she had one parent at home, it wouldn’t matter where the other was? Maybe it was easier for him—his father couldn’t come home no matter how much anyone else wanted him to. Dead is dead and done for, as Nan would say.
Elsie felt a chill as soon as she thought the words. Surely she’d know. She’d feel it somehow, if Father was dead. Wouldn’t she?
CHAPTER TWELVE
“I’ll need a description.” Scoop rooted around in his pocket for his pencil.
“You know what Father looks like.” Elsie didn’t want to admit that sometimes she could hardly remember her father’s face. She took out a photograph from her back pocket and smoothed it against her knee. “I pinched this from Mother’s suitcase. She’d packed it to take on her trip to New Westminster.”
Scoop grabbed it. He peered at it and nodded. “This will do. Better than a description.” He took his notebook from his overalls, opened it up and carefully laid the photograph between the pages.
Elsie could already feel the empty space where the picture had been. She’d got used to putting her hand in her pocket during the day, just to be sure the snapshot was still there. At night she stuck it under her pillow, then imagined she could feel it under her head all night, like the story about the princess and the pea. “I want it back, mind,” she told him.
“Sure,” said Scoop. “When the Reverend told you not to go to the shantytowns, what did you do?” he asked. He rolled up his trouser leg and picked at the edges of a scab on his knee.
“The magic nod,” said Elsie. “That says I heard him. But no promises.”
“That’s the ticket. So you could come if you want to.”
“What about Mother?”
Scoop flapped an arm in the air. “She’s just in New Westminster, waiting for her friend to die. There’ll be a letter soon.” He rolled down his trouser leg and then looked up at her again. “Do you think it will be a long, slow, agonizing death?”
Elsie didn’t say anything. It was another of those questions that didn’t really need an answer.
She and Scoop sat with their feet in the gutter, flicking stones at the few cars that passed by. Even though they missed every time, it was almost as good as skipping stones on the river, where the tugboats steamed past dragging log booms. She would have suggested that they go down there now, but Nan had said to stay close to home. With Father gone, then Mother and Uncle Dannell, perhaps Nan wanted her close by for her own sake. Not for Elsie’s. Besides, the Reverend Hampton was coming by after supper. Elsie had told him she needed some trousers; the ones she had were at least three inches too short for her already, and her ankles got cold on the way to school. He had promised to see what he could find in the church rummage. She would go indoors when the Reverend got here.
After Scoop and Elsie arranged to meet at the end of the block outside Lewis’s Repair Shop the next morning, they practiced whistling. Scoop could only spit noisily. Elsie whistled “Yankee Doodle” right through without hardly taking a breath.
“What are you children doing sitting in the dirt?” Elsie turned to see Nan coming down the path toward them. “I’ve been calling you for supper, miss. Time for you to go too, young man. Get on with you.”
“Where’s the fire?” muttered Scoop. He leaned over to give Dog Bob a tummy tickle. Then he stood and hitched up his pants. He was the only person in the world who wasn’t scared of Nan.
He said goodbye, then strolled down the road, his hands in his pockets, his elbows sticking out in triangles as he rocked from side to side. Nan laughed as she watched him go. “He’s a case, that one. Come along now.” She put one hand on Elsie’s back as they walked toward the garage, Dog Bob trotting ahead of them. “And that hat comes off as soon as you go inside,” Nan told Elsie. “How many times!”
But Elsie wasn’t listening. Uncle Dannell said that with the proper training, Dog Bob would have been the perfect sheepdog. Even without it, it was in his nature to try and keep everyone in his pack together. It had to do with instincts, he told her.
Maybe she had the right instincts for finding her father. If he was down in the shantytown with all the other hoboes, she would find him and bring him home.
As she waited for Scoop the next morning in front of Lewis’s Repair Shop, Elsie studied the radios in the window. She ran her finger down the glass, then rubbed the black smudge off on her coat. She paced back and forth along the sidewalk, dodging out of the way when someone wanted to go into the shop. Dog Bob drifted off to sniff around, then came back and sat beside Elsie for a bit before leaving again.
After she had asked three passersby the time, Elsie figured Scoop wasn’t coming. She checked the street one way, then the other, so many times she was almost dizzy. She could go over to his house. But if he was stuck at home doing chores, he’d want her to stay and help. She did enough of them at home now that there was only Nan and her.
A streetcar rattled past with a boy hanging off the back, one arm and one leg stuck out in a V. He yelled as he passed, but she couldn’t make out what he was saying. Scoop had tried that once. He’d ripped his pants and got a long gouge along his leg when he fell off. Try explaining that to Nan if she tried such a stunt, thought Elsie.
Checking one more time that Scoop wasn’t coming, Elsie looked toward home once, and then she headed off in the direction of the shantytown alone. She stuck her hands in her pockets and stuck her elbows out like Scoop, to make herself feel brave. Dog Bob would keep her company, even if her best friend had left her high and dry.
The closer Elsie got to the shantytown, the fewer cars were on the road. There weren’t many newspaper vendors about either. Or ladies with their shopping bags and high heels. Most of the storefronts Elsie passed were all locked up, with strips of wood making big Xs across the windows. Others had metal grilles and fat padlocks keeping them shut up tight. Two young men tottered past, leaning against each other as they gulped from a bottle sticking out of a paper bag. When one of them dribbled down his jacket, he pulled up the lapel to his face and licked it off.
Elsie moved closer to the shuttered storefronts. She looked straight ahead as she hurried on. Dog Bob kept up most of the time. When he strayed, she clicked her tongue, and he came back right away.
They were alone on the street now. Elsie really wished Scoop was with her, whistling and talking a mile a minute. But she was not such a chicken that she couldn’t go alone to find her father.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Elsie stepped across the train tracks, kicking through the litter and old cans that drifted between the rails in the squally wind. The air was smoky; the stink of something sweet mixed with something bitter hung in the air.
Dog Bob followed the trail of garbage, his nose down low so he didn’t miss a single smell. Soon he looked as small as a cat in the distance. He’d come back in a minute, Elsie thought. She pulled her hat down tight and buttoned her jacket all the way. She tried to walk with a Scoop-like swagger, but she needed her hands out now in case she tripped over the rubble. Her knees felt soft, as if there were no bones in them.
“What are you doing here?” A man had come out of nowhere. He stared down at her with damp red-rimmed eyes. His shoulders were tucked up high, almost to his ears. A tattered brown scarf was wrapped across his body.
“I’m looking for my father,” said Elsie. She shoved her hands in her jack
et pocket.
The man spat a long stream of tobacco juice onto the ground and stared at her.
“His name is Joe Miller,” she told him.
“Half the guys here are called Joe. I don’t know about no Miller.”
“He’s not very tall and not very short. He’s a bit round. But not fat. He’s got dark hair and brown eyes…”
“Hey, fellas!” When the man yelled, more hoboes emerged from nowhere. One of them almost tripped as he came toward them. They shuffled to stand around her in a circle.
“I’m…I’m just…I just wanted to know if you have seen my father,” said Elsie.
“His name is Joe,” said the first hobo. One side of his lip slid up higher than the other in an unfriendly smile.
Another man laughed, a harsh laugh that turned into a cough. He spat onto the ground and coughed again. “Joe! That should make it easy,” he said.
When Elsie looked closer, she could see that one of the hoboes wasn’t much older than Scoop. Even though his skin was not as bristly as the others’, his face was just as red and chapped. Freckles ran all the way up his forehead and disappeared under his cap. He scratched his neck and stared back at her. “Seen enough?” he asked.
“I’m looking for my father.” Her voice sounded thin.
“If he’s here, he prob’ly don’t want to be found,” said the man who had tripped. He picked up a plank from the ground and leaned on it. “And if he’s not here, you’re in the wrong place.” Before Elsie could step away, he reached forward and flipped her hat off her head.
“Hey!” She barely managed to grab it before the man did. She grazed her fingers as she pulled it up off the ground, getting a whiff of his dirty body as she did so. She turned her hat around in her hand to straighten it. She smacked it hard against her coat to get the dust off, then pulled it down hard on her head. “That’s mine,” she said, almost to herself.
The men still stood around her, not speaking.
Elsie’s chest felt as if it had filled with ice. She knew she would cry if she stayed here much longer, surrounded by these dirty, unfriendly men. She didn’t like the look in their eyes. Or their smiles. And she didn’t like their silence.
She was just wondering how she was going to get away, when, in the distance, a man walked between the rows of shacks, pulling a dog along on a rope.
“Dog Bob!” Elsie took one step to run toward the man. “Hey! That’s my dog!”
The other hoboes shuffled together to form a wall of smelly tweed and stained raincoats.
Peering between them, she could see Dog Bob pulling against the rope. “Here, boy!”
He pulled even harder when he heard her voice. But the man holding him yanked on the rope until Dog Bob’s front legs were off the ground, his legs pedaling the air as if he was riding a bicycle.
Elsie looked from her dog to the men standing around her. Staring down at her, they eased closer together, not saying anything, making a barrier between Elsie and Dog Bob’s kidnapper. Their hands were in their pockets, their chins tucked down into their chests.
“Give him back.” Elsie’s voice wobbled. “That’s my dog.”
One of the men leaned forward and stared right into her eyes. “Says who?” He spat. She stepped back as a slimy gob landed on her jacket. She wanted to say, Elsie says. That’s who. That’s what Scoop would have done.
The hobo who spat was still peering at her. And the others weren’t lifting a finger to help her. She felt very small, and her legs were starting to get shaky. She took one step backward.
The men took one step toward her.
As Elsie took another step back, her foot caught on a chunk of stone. She felt her ankle twist as she stumbled to catch her balance.
The men stepped forward again. Bigger steps this time.
Elsie could smell smoke and sweat and a stink like rotten potatoes. In a sliver of light between the hoboes, she saw Dog Bob being hauled away by the man. But she felt frozen in place, with a chill creeping down her legs and up into her collar. The Reverend had been right. She shouldn’t have come. With or without Scoop.
But then she thought of Dog Bob, always running back and forth trying to keep track of everyone. It was her turn now. If she didn’t get Dog Bob back now, he might never come home. And what would she tell Uncle Dannell?
Elsie longed to be holding her uncle’s meaty hand. She wished Scoop was here, jumping up and down with bright ideas and daring plans. But there was only her, with a bunch of dirty men staring at her, waiting to see what she would do next.
When a car horn suddenly blared from the road behind her, it was as if someone had poked Elsie with a sharp stick. “I want my dog!” she yelled. She looked into each man’s face and hung onto her jacket lapels with both hands as she tried to make herself bigger and taller. “That’s my dog. That’s Dog Bob. And I want him back.”
One man stepped away from the group. Another looked down at the ground and scuffed at something that wasn’t there. The one who reminded her of Scoop muttered, “She’s just a kid.”
Behind them, Dog Bob was still pulling on the rope, his feet scrabbling in the dirt. He whimpered, and his nose was glistening.
Elsie used her elbows as if they were pointy and dangerous, like Scoop’s, to shove past the men. She was surprised when they shifted away to make room for her. As she kept walking on her cold shaky legs, she sensed the men standing behind her, watching to see what she would do.
As Elsie got closer, the man holding Dog Bob’s rope did not let go. But he didn’t keep dragging the dog away either. He just stood there, looking over her head at the men behind her. She ran toward Dog Bob and dropped to her knees, gathering him into her arms. He trembled as he lapped her neck with his tongue.
“You are my dog,” she said into his warm side. “And I won’t go home without you.” Then she lifted her head and looked at the hobo holding him. “This is my dog. I want him back.” The man only had one eye. The other was just a big bulgy lump under a flap of skin that went all the way down to his nose. Elsie looked away from him to where the men all stood in a silent huddle, waiting for her to do something.
She rubbed her chin in Dog Bob’s bristly fur. Then she lifted her face and heard herself say something that Nan said all the time. Something she had never imagined coming out of her own mouth. “You should be ashamed of yourself,” she told the man.
His good eye blinked.
Elsie liked the voice that had come out of her mouth. She sounded like someone who meant business. Even Dog Bob was listening to her, his head cocked to one side. “You should be ashamed of yourselves,” she said again. This time when she yanked on the rope, it came loose in her hand.
The one-eyed man who’d stolen Dog Bob stepped back. He looked at the other men, who were all looking anywhere but at her, lighting cigarettes, mumbling to each other.
As Elsie stood up, Dog Bob was so close to her, she could feel his warmth against her leg. Holding his rope tightly in one hand, she turned to the men who were slowly moving away, their backs to her now, as if nothing had happened. “You should ALL be ashamed of yourselves!” she yelled. Her voice echoed through the alleys between the shacks.
These men, with their stubbly cheeks and grubby hands and trembling chins and shiny eyes, were all the things that the Reverend had said they were. They were angry and defeated and desperate. And the shantytown was not a safe place to be. She should not be here.
Elsie knew it now.
She held on tightly to Dog Bob’s rope as she headed back toward the railroad tracks and the street beyond. If she let go, he would follow her home to make sure she got there safe and sound, because that was his job. He was so close to her, he could almost have shared her shoes.
But Elsie held on tight to her uncle’s dog as she stumbled away on her rubbery legs.
Scoop had once told her that heroes show they are brave by walking away from their enemies without looking back. But Elsie knew the reason heroes don’t look back—it’s becau
se they don’t want anyone to know they’re afraid.
She was so scared, she couldn’t stop her teeth chattering.
But she had saved Dog Bob from the one-eyed man. She had got herself out of the scrape. And she still had her hat.
Elsie kept her back straight as, very carefully, watching every step, she put one foot in front of the other until she knew the shantytown was well behind her. Until she and Dog Bob had crossed the railway tracks. Until they had made it back onto the other side of the road.
Her breath was so hot in her chest, it felt like knives poking at her. Her ankle hummed with pain. Holding the rope tightly, with Dog Bob trotting along beside her, Elsie started toward home.
Because even heroes knew that home is always the safest place to be.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Still panting, her foot aching, Elsie slowed down to walk the last few blocks. She rubbed the front of her coat with a piece of newspaper she found stuck to a fence, and stamped her feet to get the shantytown dust off her boots.
When she got home, it was not even lunchtime. On the table were two soup bowls and spoons, with a cup and saucer at Nan’s place and a glass at Elsie’s. She gave Nan a long hug and waited until her grandmother let go of her before she stepped out of her arms.
“You sickening for something?” Nan touched Elsie’s cheek with the back of her hand. “You are a bit flushed.”
“I’m fine,” she said. But she wasn’t. She felt like a slice of bread with the middle chewed out. All empty and hollow, with her crust folding in on her.
“There’s soup,” said Nan. “But perhaps you should have some corn mush and hot milk.” This was her cure for almost everything. Usually Elsie hated the feel of gummy cornmeal behind her teeth, the wrinkled skin on the warm milk. But suddenly that’s what she wanted more than almost anything in the world. “Do we have currants?” she asked. “Can I have it in bed?”
Silver Rain Page 5
