Hildie found a cast-off red wagon and arranged her sturdy self in it. She ran her hand lovingly around its rusted rim. “Not even one little thing?” She pleaded, for her parents had warned her they would not buy her anything.
“Might not go for much,” Mim said.
“We’ll see,” John said, heading back toward Ma.
Hildie followed, pulling the wagon behind her. Then she set herself to kneeling in it, sitting in it, trying out the handle and all the wheels, her green balloon bobbing overhead.
A ripple of attention passed through the crowd. On the porch of the old Fawkes place stood the auctioneer. He was as tall as Gore, but trim and upright. Despite his red plaid shirt open at the neck, there was something sharply formal about his stance which set him apart from the country Saturday slackness of the people waiting for him. His features were fine and tense and his skin was burned almost as brown as his hair. He stood looking out over the crowd, his hands in his pockets. Directly over his head, elaborate carved fretwork hung from the eaves, laced in and out with thick brown stalks of wisteria. Above the porch was the central window, and higher still, at the peak of the roof, a weather vane with a lynx turning restlessly in a light breeze beneath a pointed lightning rod. At the auctioneer’s heel sat a young golden retriever, the tip of her tail moving in tentative friendliness as she waited to walk with him into the crowd.
Finally, a half smile of welcome on his lips, the auctioneer moved down his front steps, across the road, and into the crowd between his house and the bandstand.
The people were beginning to fill in the seats and to settle themselves for the auction. They opened a way before Dunsmore, and he paused to nod and shake hands with everyone from Harlowe.
When he reached the Moores, he stopped and looked at them. “The Moores, perhaps?” he said. “From up on Constance Hill?”
John looked at Mim.
“Lord sake,” Ma cried. “How’d you know that?”
The auctioneer threw back his head and laughed. “I’ve been hoping you d come. You folks do keep to yourselves. I’ve met almost everyone else by now. And I’ve heard about Hildie’s corn-silk hair.” He reached out and placed a broad palm on Hildie’s head.
Hildie stood with her mouth open and allowed herself to be caressed.
The auctioneer stepped back and put his hands on his hips.
“Do you like that red wagon, little lady?” he asked.
Hildie clapped her thumb into her mouth and lifted trusting blue eyes to the auctioneer in assent.
“Now there’s a lady knows her own mind,” he said to Mim with a broad smile, his dark eye catching momentarily on her face. “Now, Hildie. If you’ll just give up that precious wagon. Oh, only for a minute or two, don’t worry. I’ll kick off the whole shebang with your little wagon. That way your daddy can buy it for you right off.”
But instead of letting go, Hildie plumped her bottom firmly into the bed of the wagon and hung on.
“Now, Hildie, I’m a man of sterling honor, can’t you tell?” he asked.
Hildie caught her bottom lip in a shy smile.
He lifted her out of the wagon, kissing her on the forehead as he set her down next to Mim.
He held out his hand to John. John, caught off guard, paused for an awkward second, then shook hands. “So glad to meet you folks at last,” said the auctioneer.
“We’ve heard it’s quite a show,” John mumbled.
Then the auctioneer picked up the rusty wagon and carried it off with him. The dog turned to follow. Hildie watched for a second, then turned and headed off herself after the auctioneer, the dog, and the precious wagon.
“Hildie,” John called sharply, but the child didn’t turn.
“Let her be,” Ma said. “What harm can come to her in Harlowe?”
Perly Dunsmore climbed up the stairs onto the bandstand and rapped his gavel on the wooden railing. Hildie followed him up. He paused and lifted her high onto a bureau behind him where she stuck her thumb back into her mouth and kept a sharp eye on her wagon. The dog lay down at his feet.
Mim turned to John with a grin, but he tipped back in his chair with annoyance.
“This little girl here is Hildie Moore,” said Dunsmore, his words lengthening into a drawl, and his air of distance dissolving so completely that the lines of his face seemed literally to rearrange themselves. The deep timbre of his voice took on a burly quality, and he was transformed before their eyes into someone who was clearly born to be an auctioneer.
“Now Hildie Moore is a very special pal of mine,” he went on, and she’s picked out this fine little magical chariot here to kick off the bidding at this auction—on this most sensational cotton-picking high falutin lollapalooza of a Saturday auction Harlowe’s seen yet. Now, what am I offered for this all-American humdinger of a wagon, the dream of every big-eyed thumb-sucking whipper-snapper this side of Powlton?”
Hildie blushed. She took her thumb out of her mouth and sat on her hand for safekeeping. On Perly Dunsmore’s left, Gore held up the wagon for everyone to see.
“Fifty cents,” John called.
“Fifty, fifty. Do I hear a big round shiny silver dollar?” Perly’s voice gained momentum like metal wheels rolling over the joints in a railroad track.
A young woman in shorts and a halter stood at the edge of the crowd with a little boy in a white sailor suit. “Seventy-five,” she said.
“Seventy-five, seventy-five. Come on, folks. Let’s not be scrimy. Remember this is for the little ones. Where’s that big round shiny silver dollar?”
John raised a hand.
“Dollar, dollar. Do I hear a dollar and a quarter?” chanted the auctioneer.
The woman nodded, and her little boy jumped on the end of her hand.
“Yes sirree, this is more like it. A little elbow grease on this gilt-edged rust, a little spit and polish on the squeaky wheels, a little muscle power on this bent axle right here, and this little old chariot here’ll be fit for a gladiator. And now I’d like to hear a couple of big round shiny silver dollars and then I’ll hand the lucky winner keys and registration, bill of sale and license plates. Who knows, folks, where the rusty wheels will take you.”
“Dollar and a half,” called John.
Dollar and a half. Dollar and a half. Do I hear two? Going, going, going, gone. For a dollar and a half to the prettiest little lassie I’ve had my hands on in many a day. Perly caught up Hildie from her perch behind him and swung her high over his head for everyone to see, then handed her over the railing to Mudgett who swooped her down and settled her in the small rusted wagon.
A teenaged boy with hair almost to his shoulders pulled the wagon down the grassy aisle to where the Moores were sitting, and John paid him. “You Jimmy Ward’s boy?” John asked.
The boy nodded.
“All you kids got those freckles just like your pa,” said Ma. “I’d know a Ward a mile away.”
“Dad’s a deputy, I hear,” John said. “Always get a turnout like this?”
“Nope,” said the boy. “But now they’re puttin’ notices in all the papers. Even the Boston papers.” He grinned and shook his head in the direction of the bandstand. He always carries on like that. Guess that’s the main thing brings them out.”
“An old-time Yankee auction,” Perly was saying-his body swaying in a strange stillness, his words flying out over the crowd with a life all their own-“is the crossroads of America. An old-time Yankee auction is where the best of the old meets the best of the new. It’s where recycling meets up with the old saying, Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without. It’s where the best of the old-timers meet the best of the newcomers. You’ve got people on your right and people on your left. You’ve all got things to offer, and I sincerely hope that this here seventh old-time Harlowe auction will help you get together.