"We might see the whole world, sonny. A little at a time. It'll be flappin' great up there, in the clouds —on the wind . . ." Rory sat twirling the tuft of his tail, thinking. The lemming was very young, very eager. Rory tried to remember how he had felt at that age. That was a long time ago. He guessed he had been pretty eager, too. He could remember his mother, when he was younger than Crispin, leaning over his bed in the underground cave while the hot desert wind blew down from above. He could remember her tucking him in at night and telling him the stars were shining, up above the sand. He could remember her bringing him yucca root and cactus pears when he was sick, and—well, he could remember a lot of things, when he tried. He guessed maybe he'd better give a little thought to the care and feeding of young lemmings. I'm taking on something, Rory thought, raising a youngster. It had been a long time since he had had to account for anyone but himself.
Crispin began to doze. The fire threw long shadows into the darkness. Rory contemplated the good supper they had had and felt a sudden quiet pleasure in the circumstances that had brought him here.
At last he carried the sleeping lemming to bed, then climbed into his own cot and lay looking up at the black silhouette of the plane that towered over them, her wide double wings slightly lifted, and he could hardly believe what he had set out to do. Maybe his dream was only a dream. Maybe he would never fly her.
"Well I'm flappin' well going to try! No, not try! We're going to do it! Just you see if we don't!" he said softly to the darkness. And then he turned over and slept.
CHAPTER 10
charlie gribble liked buying things at the hobby shop when he had the money, which was seldom. But now he was loaded because the kangaroo rat had pulled a wad of bills out of his pack and handed it to him with the supply list.
"I've never seen a pawful of money like that!" Charlie had said, staring.
"You'd be surprised how much of that money I've found, sonny. Quarters and dimes, a dollar bill, even a five or ten sometimes. People are a pretty careless lot. And if the owner's gone and lost it, I don't feel bad about picking it up. If I didn't, someone else would, and I can't hardly go running down the street shouting, 'Who lost this dollar bill?' can I?
Charlie grinned. "No, I guess you can't."
"Then, some of that money came from scrounging stuff in dumps and selling it, same as you. I even found a diamond ring once, down inside the motor housing of an old washing machine. I can tell a real diamond, sonny, and that sure was a beauty."
"But how do you sell stuff like that? I thought you didn't like talking to people."
"I don't need to talk to people. I just carry whatever I have through the mail slot or a window—at night, of course—and I leave a note asking the pawnbroker or the junk salesman to put the money in an envelope, under the door. I suppose I get the short end of the deal sometimes, but in my case, sonny, it's about the only comfortable way to do business. Now, all this stuff you're going to buy for me—if you hadn't come along I'd have had to slip it out of the store at night and leave the cash, and some of those things are pretty big to be slippin' out through the mail slot. I'm glad we met up, sonny. This arrangement is going to work just fine."
Now Charlie entered Hobie's Hobby Shop with a fist full of green clutched against Rory's list. The list read:
One small hammer
Three screwdrivers, assorted
Exacto Knife
Small crescent wrench
Two D flashlight batteries
One toggle switch
Five pairs small brass hinges, with screws
Balsa wood: 1/4" stringers, two sheets 1/8"
Paint: one jar white, one jar red
Thinner
Paint brushes, one small, one medium
Airplane glue
Airplane paper
Box of pins
One six-twelve propeller
Several Champion V-2 spark plugs
One set points for Champion 60 engine
Hobie, the proprietor, was a skinny old man. He stayed brown and leathery in spite of his indoor job by flying model planes every weekend, over at Channing Creek. Hobie took Charlie's list and went about filling it silently. When he got to the six-twelve propeller, he fished around in a box, then looked up sadly at Charlie. "Sold the last six-twelve prop last month, Charlie."
"Well, could you order one?"
"I have an order in. It hasn't arrived yet."
"Could you order it again? Maybe something happened."
"I guess so," he said gloomily. "It oughtn't take more than a week—ten days at most. But the way the mails are . . ." He sighed and looked at the list again. He read the last two items. And then he raised his sad, bloodhound eyes once more to stare at Charlie. "Points, Charlie? Points? Spark plugs? What do you think this is, a museum? I haven't had a V-2 spark plug in here in ten years. Let alone points, Charlie Gribble!"
"But I . . ."
"What'd you do, dig some old relic out of your dad's attic?"
"Well I—well I . . ." Charlie couldn't think of an answer without actually lying. Hobie looked annoyed. Then he looked suspicious.
"It isn't some plane your dad doesn't want you fooling with, Charlie? Does your dad know . . ."
"Oh, my dad knows all about the planes I work on," Charlie said uneasily.
"Well you can tell him for me, you'd be a lot better off sticking to that jet you built, and not complicating my life—and yours—with all this antique stuff. I can't get stuff like this, Charlie!"
Charlie's face fell. "Can you think of anyplace else I could try?"
"Anyplace else? I'm the only hobby shop in town. You know very well there's nothing in Channing Creek or Leadtown. Well, if you want to write away, I suppose . . ."
"Yes sir," Charlie said, "I want to."
Hobie dug around in his desk until he found the addresses of three collectors of antique airplane engines. A Mr. Don Defosse in Tazewell, Georgia. A Mr. Majewski Harris in Loveland, Colorado. And a Miss Mary Starr Colver down in Sulpher, Nevada. Charley wondered briefly what Miss Mary Starr Colver was like. He had never heard of a woman interested in model planes.
"Maybe one of these people can help you," Hobie said. "I don't know if Champion even makes that kind of spark plug any more."
Charlie paid for his purchases and left, wondering what would happen if Rory's condenser turned out to be no good, which was a distinct possibility. I'd never find a condenser, Charlie thought. Well, he guessed he'd face that when the time came. The sun was getting low, and he could smell suppers cooking. He was late again, and Mrs. Critch would be snorting like a bull. He tied the package on his bike and was about to take off when the sky above his head darkened suddenly and he ducked automatically under the drugstore awning: starlings were coming in. They descended on the town in a wave of screeching black bodies, heading first for the big electric sheet lights and sign board lights as they always did, fighting each other for the warmest places as they settled on every available surface. Charlie waited until they had landed and no longer hovered over his head, then he beat it for home.