The Tin Can Tree

'You all right?' the driver asked.

'I want to go back.'

'Ma'am?'

'I want to go back where I came from. Can I take my bags off my bus and wait for the next one going back?'

'Why, surely,' the driver said. 'You on that bus over there?'

'Yes. I know this is -'

'Women got a right to change their minds,' the driver called. He was already heading toward her bus, and Joan followed him with her untouched Coke bottle still in her hands.

'I always do this,' she said. 'But this time it's -'

'You got the right,' said the driver.

'This time it's different. I can't help it, this time; I'm not just -'

But the driver didn't hear her. He was walking up ahead of her and laughing over his shoulder, thinking it was all a joke. She stopped trying to tell him it wasn't.

13

Something was wrong at home. James knew it instantly, the moment he stepped out of the pickup carrying his two bags of groceries. There on the porch stood the Potter sisters and Ansel and Mrs Pike, all huddling together, and Mr Pike was a little distance away from them. He was facing toward the road, frowning down at an Indian elephant bell that he held in his hand. When he heard the pickup door slam he looked up and said, 'James.' The light from the setting sun turned his face strange and orange. 'What's wrong?' said James.

'We can't find Simon.'

'Well, where is he?' he asked, and then to cover up the stupidity of that question he said quickly, 'He was here at lunchtime.'

'We thought you might have him with you,' Mr Pike said.

'No.'

They all kept looking at him. Even Ansel. James hoisted his groceries up higher and then said again, 'No. No, I've been running errands all afternoon. All by myself.'

'Well, then,' Mr Pike said. He sighed and turned back to the others, who still waited. Finally he said, 'He's not with James.'

'Maybe he's with Joan,' James offered.

'No. Joan must have gone off somewhere, but after she left Simon was still around. Lou says so.'

James looked over at Mrs Pike. She was dry-eyed and watchful; her arms were folded firmly across her chest.

'When was the last time you noticed him?' he asked her.

'I don't know.'

Ma'am?'

'I don't know,' she said, with her voice slightly raised.

'Oh.'

'We called the boys he plays with,' Mr Pike said, 'And we called the movie-house.'

'Did you ask about buses?'

'No. Why?'

'I'd do that,' said James. He climbed the steps at his end of the porch and set the groceries on Ansel's chair, and then he straightened up and rubbed the muscles of his arms. 'Call the drugstore,' he said. 'Ask them if he's -'

'Well, I went to the drugstore, to see if he'd gone there for a soda. Mary Bennett was on; only been there a half hour or so, but she hadn't seen him.'

'Might have gone earlier,' said James. 'Did you look at the bus schedule?'

No I didn't. What would I want to do that for?'

'Just in case,' James said. 'Who was there before Mary Bennett?'

'Tommy was, but I can't find him. If it weren't for Lou I'd just sit and wait for Simon, but Lou thinks he left with a purpose. Thinks she might have sent him away somehow.'

James looked over at Mrs Pike again. For a minute she stared back at him; then she said, 'You believe he's on some bus.'

'I didn't say that,' said James.

'You think it.'

'Now, Lou,' Mr Pike told her.

'I can tell.'

'Well, it wouldn't hurt to ask,' said James. 'I'd track that Tommy down, if I was you.'

'Oh, now,' Mr Pike said, and accidentally clanged the elephant bell. Everyone jumped. 'Sorry,' he said. For the first time, Ansel lost his blank tense look; he winced, and leaned back limply against the front of the house. Mr Pike said, 'Sorry, Ansel. But where would he take a bus to?

'There's lots of places,' said James.

'Not as many as you'd think,' Ansel said. 'World's shrinking.'

'Hush,' James told him. He jingled his keys thoughtfully. 'Roy, can I use your telephone?'

'What for?'

'Let him,' Mrs Pike said. The Potter sisters stepped closer to her on either side and patted her shoulders, as if she had suddenly had an outburst of some kind. 'You know where it is,' she told James.

'Yes, ma'am.'

He walked toward the Pikes' end of the porch, with everyone's eyes following him. At the door he stopped and said, 'Did he have any money?'

'He gets an allowance,' said Mr Pike. 'I don't know if he saved it.'

'Did he get some this week?'

He was asking this of Mrs Pike, but she just shook her head. 'I don't know,' she said. Finally James turned back again and went on inside.

It was Tommy Jones's mother who answered the telephone. Her voice was breathless, as if she had had to come running from some other part of the house. 'Hello?' she said.

'Mrs Jones, this is James Green. Is Tommy there?'

'No, he's not.'

'Do you know where he is?'

'No. Is this about Simon still?'

'Yes, ma'am.'

They haven't found him?'

'No. Do you think Tommy'll be getting back soon?'

'I really don't, 'she said. 'He's off someplace with his girl. Shall I have him call?'

'No, thank you. Sorry to bother you.'

'It's no bother.'

He hung up and stood thinking a while, and then he went out to the front porch again. In just the short time that the telephone call had taken the colour of the evening had shifted, turning from sunset into twilight. The others were standing where he had left them, still looking in his direction as if their eyes had never moved from the spot where he had disappeared. ‘Tommy's not there,' he said.

'Well, I could have told you that,' Mr Pike said irritably. He swung his arms down, making the bell clang again, and started toward the front yard. Tm going to round up a couple others,' he called back. 'We'll look in all the places where he goes, and ring bells or fire guns if we find him. Want to come, James?'

'I'm not sure that's the way,' James said.

'Only thing I can think of. Mind if I use your truck?'

'Well, wait,' said James. He came down the steps and crossed over to Mr Pike. 'No, I'd like to take the truck and follow up an idea of my own, I think I -'

'When I was a little boy…' Ansel announced, and everyone turned around to look at him. He had recovered from that last clang and was standing erect now, placing the tips of his fingers together. 'When I was a little boy, I had to tell my mother everywhere I went. It was a rule. And I could never go out of hearing range of this old Army bugle, that my father would stand in the doorway and blow at suppertime -'

'If you could come along,' Mr Pike told James, 'and bring a noisemaker of some kind, why, we could start by -'

'I was thinking of Caraway,' James said.

'Caraway?'

'I was thinking that was where he might've gone.'

'Oh, Caraway,’ Mr Pike said impatiently. ‘I been there. No, more likely he went off on some hike or other, and forgot to let us know.’

'Well, I'd like to try Caraway anyhow,' said James.

'But James, that's a waste of-'

'Let him,' said Mrs Pike, and once again the Potter sisters closed in on her and patted her shoulders. 'Hush, hush,' they whispered. James pulled out his billfold and checked his money; there was plenty for gas. He turned to Mr Pike.

'I'm sorry,' he said. 'I just feel I know where he's at.'

'Well, that's all right,' said Mr Pike. 'Sure wish I could have the loan of your pickup, though.'

'I'll make the trip as fast as I can.'

'Well, sure.' Mr Pike sighed, and then he set off wearily across the yard. He carried the elephant bell upside down, with his fingers poked through the inward-curling teeth of it to hold the clapper silent. When he reached the gravel road he turned back and said, 'Ansel? You feel up to coming along?'