Sinbad and Me Read online

  My uncle Fred is a big friendly guy built like a Mack truck. He’d love getting down on his knees and having a tug of war with Sinbad. It was as clear as if I was there watching. I heard every fake growl, every hearty laugh, every loving thump on Sinbad’s chest when they both decided it was a draw; I even heard the house shaking as they wrestled. I sat, chin in hands, smiling and listening. But then I’m known for my great imagination.

  The next morning was a shining clear day, just perfect for taking a trip. Pop didn’t rub it in that it was my own fault I wasn’t going along. That’s one of the good things about my folks. If you goof they figure you’ve got enough intelligence to understand what happened and that you’ll try to do better next time. I handle Sinbad the same way. After all, he’s part of the family.

  Mom had already prepared enough food for Sinbad and me to last a week but it was like she couldn’t stop.

  “All right, Mother,” Pop yelled, “Let’s move it. There’s only a boy and a big fat dog here.” He leaned down and thumped Sinbad’s lean backside, “I was only kidding,” he told him. “You’re not really fat, just husky.”

  Sinbad grabbed his ankle and held on, to show he understood. Pop gritted his teeth and went down slowly.

  “I’m ready, I’m ready,” Mom said, banging pots in the kitchen, slamming cupboard doors, putting things away. She came to a flying stop outside. “I thought we were in such a big hurry,” she said to Pop.

  “Sure,” he said, getting up on one knee. “You explain it to him.”

  Sinbad whirled around and banged Pop in the chest, and he went down again, grunting.

  “He’s your dog, Steve,” he said, “Maybe it’s time you told him I’m your father.”

  Pop and Mom finally sneaked out, making believe they weren’t going anyplace. But Sinbad heard the car start up and I had to put the heavy leash on and take him outside or he would have gone right through the window.

  They had a good ten hours drive ahead of them so they couldn’t spend too much time saying goodbye. I tried explaining to Sinbad but he cocked his big head to the side and made that funny parrot sound peculiar to big bulldogs. It meant: “Hey, what about me?”

  Mom came back and gave us both a hug, a head rumpling and a kiss before she got back into the car. Sinbad still looked terribly sad.

  “I’ve left Aunt Martha’s number on the gateleg table in case you have any problem.”

  “We’ll be okay, Mom. Don’t worry,” I said, and Pop started to ease the car out in reverse.

  “It would be nice if you two stayed out of trouble,” she said, a thin vertical line between her dark blue eyes.

  “I’ll drink to that,” Pop said, raising his fist high.

  I had to laugh. “What could happen here in Hampton?”

  She smiled uneasily. “I don’t know. Maybe you’ll think of something.” Then she added: “Well, if you do, don’t!”

  Pop signaled “so long” and wheeled the old the old heap around. Then he leaned out the window and yelled down at Sinbad: “Take care of my boy!”

  Sinbad whined and lunged forward and I had to hang on tight and lean back with all my own weight, one hand on his thick studded collar and the other around his chest. He made that terrible throaty parrot sound again like his heart was breaking.

  “They’re only going for a few days,” I told him. “You sound like being stuck with me is real punishment.”

  He turned quickly at that and licked my face so I didn’t have any complaints either. Pop’s car had made the turn now at the top of the hill and was humming out of sight down Steamboat Road.

  “Come on,” I told Sinbad, “If you really want to complain about something, now hear this: I got to go to school and you got to go inside. I’ll see you in a couple of hours. Don’t eat up the house.”

  He let out another outraged whine but I managed to get him into the house. Then I locked up the door on him, got my bike, and took off up the hill, leaning all my weight on the pedals. I didn’t feel the least bit lonely or worried.

  That part came later.

  CHAPTER 5

  How To Tell A Bank From A Pineapple

  The green shade on old Mrs. Teska’s store door was still drawn so I guessed she was having some of her arthritis trouble again. When she gets that she stiffens up so she can’t move, or just barely creaks around. Otherwise she would have been sitting on her stone stoop in the sun, waving to me with her wooden cane, the sun glinting on her silver– rimmed glasses.

  After school, I would stop in to see how she was.

  Mrs. Teska’s been there in that old store ever since I can remember. She came over to this country when she was a very young girl, and although she’s close to seventy now there isn’t a single wrinkle on her face. Well, maybe a few around the eyes, which are steel blue and almost always smiling even though she’s troubled with a bad back.

  She’s some kind of Czech or Serbian. She still talks very broken English. I have been talking to her all my life, and I still have trouble understanding her at times.

  But she’s very bright and understands everything.

  It’s nice that she’s always so cheerful and smiling because she’s had nothing but bad luck since she came over on the boat from Europe. She’s told me most of her life story. The man she came over to marry had an accident and I think was already dead when she got off the gangplank.

  But she didn’t give up. Even though she didn’t know the language, she found work. Many years later she finally did get married. This husband passed away soon afterwards, too. Then she had bad luck with her kids, a boy and a girl. They both left years ago to live their own lives and she’s been alone ever since.

  Except for me, that is. We became good friends when I was a very little kid. She used to always have an ice cream cone for me or a lollipop, and naturally I didn’t refuse. I didn’t know she was poor or anything, and it all came out of the store like magic.

  Later, she got into the habit of giving me a big silver dollar every year on my birthday. She started after I was two so I already have ten of them. When I’d ask her where she got them, she would smile mysteriously and say: “I got big secret silver mine.”

  Boy, I can see how it’s got to be mysterious, living hand to mouth the way she does, with so little business in that little store. But even when I was older and had more sense and didn’t want to accept the silver dollars, she made me. She said she would always have one for my birthdays. I figured out a long time ago her secret is simple. When she first came over to this country, like most foreign people she didn’t trust the paper money and saved silver instead.

  Once when I told her how sorry I was for her hard life and tough luck, losing her husbands and all, she muttered something like, “the curse of the kum.” But that didn’t make sense to me. I have trouble understanding her anyway.

  So, whenever Mrs. Teska can’t move around much because of her bad back, I take over her store. She leaves me a key. I open up before school and bring in the milk deliveries or the bread or whatever comes that day. Sometimes, after school, I sweep up and dust. Then, when her spell of stiffness is over, she comes down and does the cleaning job right.

  In the winter, when her steps get iced, I come over and clear them and the path. If she took a flop at her age she’d get hurt. Her beat–up wooden cane with the silver knob on top that she always carries has a rubber tip now, but I don’t take any chances.

  I owe her for a lot of ice cream cones and cokes and potato chips. Not to mention all the silver dollars. She says not to worry, I’ll pay her back someday. But it’s more than just paying her back. We’ve got a kind of relationship. Like she’s my grandmother or something.

  Well, I got to school. There were some new kids from our other school, a few big scientific brains like me who had flunked out, and the teacher, Mr. Snowden.

  I’d seen this new science teacher around school since his recent transfer. He was short and stocky with very wide shoulders and a deep chest. He looked like a nic
e guy but troubled. He was young and didn’t have too much hair on top of his head so maybe that’s why he was troubled.

  This being the first day, he didn’t put out too much or act like he expected us to. He knew we all were secretly ashamed for flunking. It didn’t matter whether we’d been lazy or careless or just plain dumb. None of us wanted to flunk again. And he knew that too.

  So it wasn’t a stiff session. He had a good sense of humor and kept us laughing.

  We got out a little before noon. Some of the kids were staying around to play ball but I wanted to see if I could find any part–time job.

  By the time I got to my bike Mr. Snowden was coming out to take a breather. He had a sandwich in waxed paper in one hand, a book and an apple in the other, and he was heading for that big shady oak. He offered me a choice of apple or sandwich, just by the motion of his hands. I told him no, thanks, I wasn’t hungry yet, and he nodded.

  “Oh, Steve, by the way,” he said, “is your father Dan Forrester, the painter?”

  “Uh–huh,” I said.

  “Gosh, I like his work,” he said simply, “I just saw an exhibition of it last week, at the Modern Art Gallery. Very exciting work.”

  “Yeah,” I said, “That’s some of his newer stuff. He’s starting to pour it on now.” My dad’s painting knocks me out, that’s a fact.

  Mr. Snowden said then, kind of shy, “I’d like to meet him.”

  “He and my mom just went up to Maine for a quick vacation.”

  “Oh?” he said, “That’s great.” Then he looked at me and smiled, “Not meaning to pry, but who’s taking care of you meanwhile?”

  “Sinbad, I guess,” I said.

  “Sinbad?”

  “My bulldog.”

  “English bulldog?” he asked.

  I nodded.

  He looked wistful. “That’s the greatest dog there is. I had one myself, when I was about your age.”

  “What happened?”

  “He got himself killed,” he said, trying to make it sound a long time ago. “Some stupid speeding driver,” he added.

  I guessed how he must have felt. If Sinbad ever was killed, I’d want to die, too.

  “Well,” I said, after a while, “I gotta be going—”

  “All right, Steve. See you tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow’s Saturday,” I reminded him.

  “I mean Monday,” he said with a wry expression.

  “If you’d like to meet Sinbad someday,” I said, my bike wheeled out and ready, “maybe I can bring him down, huh?”

  “Fine,” he said, “And in the meantime, if you get into any kind of jam, I’m boarding at that house on the corner of Hebron and Maple—”

  “The Flemish Colonial with the ‘Dutch Kick’ roof?” It was a house that always interested me.

  “What was that?” he said.

  “The Dutch invented their own kind of gambrel roof,” I told him, “They flushed the gables and flared out the eaves. The dog–house dormers you got are later additions.”

  “That’s mighty interesting,” he said.

  “Well old houses are my hobby,” he said.

  “I see,” he said thoughtfully.

  “There’s an awful lot of good houses in Hampton.” I pointed across the street. “That one’s a saltbox, modified. You can tell by the break in the extension roof.” I looked farther down the street. “There’s a garrison house. They called it the Garrison Colonial. That overhang was in case they had to fire down on any attackers close to the walls. It’s kind of like a fort.”

  Mr. Snowden gave me a look as if I suddenly came down from Mars. “And you flunked science?” he said.

  I tried to explain. “Houses mean a lot to me. Science sort of leaves me cold. I just feel like I’m outside it, if you know what I mean.”

  He nodded. “It’s natural to be blocked when something has no meaning for you.” He looked like he wanted to tell me something and didn’t know how to begin. “Maybe,” he smiled, finally, “we can educate each other. I wish I had your knowledge of houses.”

  “That’s not hard to get,” he said.

  He pointed to the other side of the street, “Okay if I pick one?”

  “Sure,” I said. “You want to know about the bank?”

  “I think it’s a bank,” he said “But you tell me.”

  It was an old two-story red brick building.

  “Greek Revival style,” I said. “After the old Greek temples. The narrow end is turned to the street. The Colonials have the long side parallel to the street. The ridge, the big triangle on top, is the pediment. This one is a dentilled pediment. The dentils are the toothlike small ornament blocks below it and the cornice.” I stopped to see if he was interested before I went on.

  “The part underneath is called the entablature. That’s the architrave, frieze, and cornice. They all rest on the columns. That little window inside, above it, is called an eyebrow window.”

  He bit into his sandwich and nodded. He seemed pleased.

  “The portico,” I pointed out. “That’s the covered entrance. Those white columns are fluted Ionic. But that window over the door doesn’t go with it. That’s a sunburst fanlight. See, how it spreads out like a fan? That’s late Georgian.”

  He bit into his apple like he couldn’t get over it.

  “There’s something else wrong there,” I said. “The anthemion.” I pointed to the doorway of the bank.

  “Anthemion?” he repeated.

  “That ornament over the doorway. Inside the swan’s neck pediment. That’s the trademark you can’t miss for Greek Revival. It’s supposed to be the leaves of a honeysuckle. This one’s a pineapple.”

  “So what does that mean?”

  “The pineapple design is Georgian, too, I think it stood for hospitality. Anyway, that proves this isn’t pure Greek.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t say that,” he said, “It’s been pure Greek to me.” He shook my hand suddenly. “Doctor, I’ve enjoyed this lecture tremendously.”

  He had a nice easy way of kidding.

  “That’s okay,” I said.

  When I took off on my bike he was still standing there looking at the bank across the street like he was seeing it for the first time.

  That’s what I mean. About how interesting it is to know about old buildings.

  CHAPTER 6

  Strangers On Steamboat Road

  After leaving Mr. Snowden I went up and down Main Street looking for some part–time job. But no luck. So I headed for home. It was a little after three and I was getting hungry. When I’m hungry so is Sinbad.

  The library, my last try for a job, is only about a mile from home. I took the short cut that eliminates some of the Steamboat Road traffic, and saved about fifty yards and a couple of minutes.

  The way it turned out I’m not sure it was worth it.

  Mrs. Teska’s store is on Steamboat Road, just up the hill from my house. There aren’t many other houses around and the traffic thins out. I’ve always meant to ask her why she built her store in a section where there wasn’t too much business. She seemed too intelligent a person to make a bad guess like that. Though she only went to school for a few years in the old country, she’s got brains. I’d sooner talk to her than lots of college grads, if you want to know the truth.

  Anyway, the short cut I took came out through Cotter’s Alley. Otherwise I’d have seen the big black car long before.

  It was a new Lincoln Continental, the kind you might see cruising along Highway 27 to Southampton or Montauk, or 25 to New York. But not in front of old Mrs. Teska’s general store on Steamboat

  Road. Maybe whoever owned it ran out of cigarettes, or needed milk for a baby, or had to call about a flat tire.

  I leaned my bike against the rail at the corner of her low porch, and looked. The tires were okay. There was nobody in the car and no blankets or bottles or junk either, so that eliminated the baby idea.

  Suddenly I heard men shouting and then Mrs. Teska crying. I just could
n’t understand anybody yelling at the poor old lady because she couldn’t give them directions, or happened to be out of cigarettes or cigars.

  There came a crash as if a box had fallen down, and the sound of a man yelling something like, “Mean business!” Then the door was flung open. Two tall men wearing dark business suits came out. They came out so fast and unexpectedly that we bumped. Because I was going in fast too. The heavy–shouldered guy I hit was knocked off balance, back a step into the other fellow. His lips twisted into a snarl. Then he got a better look at what hit him.

  He said, in a very flat voice, “Sorry kid,” and walked off across the yard. He yanked the car door open and got in. The other fellow didn’t even look at me. He walked around, slid into the driver’s seat, and hit the ignition.

  The car roared off in a jackrabbit start, the tires screeching.

  They must have been doing sixty by the time they zoomed around the first turn, about two hundred yards ahead, on Steamboat. There was a stop sign three blocks away and I wondered if they knew about it. The way they were going, they’d have trouble.

  The little silvery bell over the door tinkled when I went in. But old Mrs. Teska didn’t even notice me. She was sitting stiffly in her chair rocking back and forth very fast, and breathing hard.

  “What happened, Mrs. Teska? What did those guys want?” I figured they wanted something.

  She just kept rocking and breathing like trying to catch her breath. Then I saw apples dumped all over the floor.

  I picked them up one by one, wiping them off with a rag and putting them back in their box. Some had rolled over near her chair. The old lady gave no sign.

  I’d picked up the last apple when I noticed her hand resting on the arm of the rocking chair was clenched tight around a little white piece of folded paper. Then I heard her muttering something in her foreign language.

  For the first time I noticed she had tears in her eyes.