The Neddiad Page 3

  And everything was sharper, brighter, clearer—I don't know if it was because the air was purer, or because we were high up, or why, but everything I saw was cranked up, realer than real. I loved my looking-out-the-window job.

  There were more meals in the diner, and more stories from Colonel Ken Krenwinkle. I had begun to catch on that some of what he said was fact and some was not. But I didn't care—they were all good stories. And there was sitting around in the double drawing room, looking after the parakeets and listening to cowboy music on my father's Wave Magnet radio, from the radio station in Trinidad, Colorado.

  CHAPTER 7

  The Indian Building

  It felt like much longer, like days, but we had only been on the train for twenty-four hours when we pulled into Albuquerque, New Mexico.

  "We're here for about an hour," Mr. Frederick told us. "If the family would like to take a little walk, stretch your legs, possibly acquire some souvenirs, you have plenty of time to do so. Just come back when you hear the conductor shouting All aboard!'"

  We hopped off the train. The first couple of steps on firm ground felt funny—but good, familiar. There were train guys scurrying, doing things, and bunches of passengers milling around. Some people who had been missing exercise were striding up and down the platform, pumping their legs and waving their arms. There were genuine Indian people selling stuff spread out on cloths on a lawn, and behind them was a neatlooking building—the Indian Building. We walked along a little path and went in.

  There was all kinds of great stuff inside! The ceiling was high, and there was a tall fireplace with the remains of a fire in it. There was the smell of wood smoke and sweetgrass in the air. Fastened to the stone chimney above the smoldering fire was a chief's headdress made of eagle feathers. There were pots, and dolls, and cloth, and ornaments spread out on tables. At one end of the room there was a loom set up, and two women were weaving something.

  My mother and father and Eloise took a fast look around, and then you could tell they were done. The Indian stuff didn't interest them.

  "Let's look at the station now," my father said.

  "I want to stay here," I said.

  "Don't wander away, and be sure to listen for the conductor," my mother said.

  "Yes, don't miss the train," Eloise said.

  "The station is supposed to have very good architecture," my father said. "Sure you don't want to come see it?"

  "I want to stay here," I said. "I'll be fine."

  I didn't know exactly why I wanted to stay in the Indian Building. It was extremely quiet. When you've been on the train for a long time, you forget that it is constantly making noise. You sort of tune out the rattles and rumbles and thumps and vibrations. There weren't many people in the Indian Building, and no one was talking. The only sounds were the sounds of the loom, whisks and muffled thumps.

  I couldn't quite work out what the Indian Building was supposed to be. It was a little like a store, but it wasn't clear to me if the things in it were for sale. It was a little like a museum, but it wasn't set up like a museum—nothing was behind glass, and you could pick up and handle things. It reminded me, in a way, of the reading room in the Belmont Avenue branch of the Chicago Public Library. Same kind of quiet. Only instead of books, there were things.

  I got interested in a figure carved out of bone, or maybe it was an antler off an elk or some animal like that. It was a crazy little dancing guy playing a flute. He was dancing, really dancing—he wasn't moving, of course, but he almost looked as though he could. I picked him up and ran my fingers over the smooth bone. I put him down, faced him this way and that way. He looked good, and different, from every angle.

  Whisk. Thump. Whisk. Thump. The ladies at the other end of the room were working the loom. The little flute-playing guy was dancing. I could almost hear the music, in between the whisk—thump. I could almost hear drumming, fast and light. I imagined the little guy moving to the music with quick little steps, playing his flute. Whisk-thump-thump-thump, whisk.

  The pots were shaped to fit the hollow of somebody's hand; they had designs on them in fine black lines. Whisk-thump-thump-thump. Whisk. Wood smoke. Sweetgrass. When the little guy danced, there would be guys gathered around a big drum, tapping it light and quick, and singing, their breaths fitting in between the drum thumps.

  Well, I was getting what the Indian Building was. It was all one thing: the fire, the headdress, the flute guy, the loom, the stuff on the tables. You could look at everything a piece at a time, think about it, pick what you liked, or you could just be there and take it all in at once—and if you did that, it sort of all came alive, and you knew something.

  That is what I was thinking when this guy said something. It was an Indian guy, not tall, not short, not young, not old, not handsome, not ugly—just this guy standing there. What he said was "Exactly right, kid."

  "What's exactly right?" I asked him.

  "You are. The way you're doing it. Exactly right."

  "Feels right," I said. "How does it work?"

  "Who knows?" he said. "But I'll tell you this—hundreds of people come in and out of here, and not many catch on. Here. Take this."

  He took something out of his pocket and put it in my hand. It was a little turtle carved out of stone.

  "What's this?"

  "Little turtle carved out of stone. Take care of it at all times."

  "Will it bring me good luck or something?" I asked.

  "Possibly. I don't know. Just hang on to it."

  "Is your name Melvin?" I asked.

  "Yes."

  "Are you a shaman?"

  "In my spare time."

  "It's a neat turtle," I said. "Thanks."

  "Don't let anybody get it away from you," Melvin said. Then he said, "Train is leaving."

  "All aboard!" the conductor was shouting.

  I ran for the train.

  CHAPTER 8

  Mile 1,332 to Mile 1,691

  Chicago is mile 0, Albuquerque is mile 1,332, and Flagstaff is mile 1,691. There are stops at Gallup and Winslow in between, and the train travels at an average speed of approximately seventy-two miles per hour.

  In the station at Albuquerque, my father had bought two engineer's hats, made out of that soft stripey denim, one for him and one for me—they had the Super Chief insignia printed on the front. He also got us two red bandannas like the engineers wear around their necks.

  My mother had gotten a whole stack of new magazines, and Eloise had bought a book about the route we were traveling on the Santa Fe Railroad. It was a pretty interesting book—I had a chance to have a look in it because Eloise had not finished the book she was already reading, about the Erie Canal in New York State.

  Those are the things my family got in Albuquerque—and I had my turtle, which I did not show them.

  It was typical of Eloise that she would want to read a book about the things that were rolling past the windows but hardly spent any time looking at them. In fact, none of my family was glued to the windows like I was. My father loved the train itself—which I did too. He was having fun ordering different things in the dining car, and talking with Colonel Ken Krenwinkle and the other passengers, and playing cards with the Marsh Brothers, and having his hair cut and his shoes polished.

  My mother was the same wherever she was—except at home she liked to do household projects and was always taking down the curtains and washing them, and putting the curtains up, and shampooing the carpet, and polishing the walls. She'd get Eloise to help her. When she wasn't doing things like that, she would cook, and bake banana cake, and when she wasn't doing that she liked to take the bus downtown and buy things at Marshall Field's department store. In between, she would sit happily, flipping through magazines, looking for ideas about things she could cook, and things she could clean, and things she might like to buy.

  It's not that they wouldn't have been interested in the turtle, and how I happened to have it—it was just that they would have thought it was in the
same category as the things they had brought on board, and I knew it was something different. Something sort of secret.

  CHAPTER 9

  Left Behind

  To this day, I don't know how I got confused in Flagstaff, Arizona. For some reason or other, I thought the train was going to make a long stop, the way it had in Albuquerque. I had been standing at the end of the corridor after supper, talking to Mr. Washington, when we pulled into the station. He opened the door and folded down the steps to the platform and went off to help some passengers with their luggage, and I just stepped down, meaning to stretch my legs.

  I took a little walk along the platform. A street ran alongside the tracks, looking like a street in an old-fashioned western town. Another street led away up a hill, and maybe a block along, I could see a lot of lights, and people milling around, and horses—with cowboys on them! I could hear hoots, and yippees and yahoos, and guns being shot off! I looked both ways and ran across the street. It was chilly, but I had my sweater on, and my engineer's hat and neckerchief.

  It just took a few seconds to go up the hill to what I supposed was the main street. There was some kind of cowboy parade going on! People lined the sidewalks, all the stores were lit up, and there was music playing. And the cowboys were all dressed up—so were the horses, with fancy saddles and bridles with lots of silver decorations. There were cowgirls too, looking pretty, on fancy horses. There were Indians in really nifty costumes with big war bonnets. People on the sidewalks were shouting and cheering, and the riders waved to the crowd and made their horses wheel and rear up on their hind legs. The cowboys also whooped, and once in a while one of them would shoot off his six-gun.

  It was just great. I sort of squeezed between the adults and struggled right up to the curb with a bunch of other kids. Some of the horses were just fantastic—golden palominos, and paints, and spotted Appaloosas.

  I loved it. And the town was great too—I liked the way everything looked. I wished I could stay longer, but I thought I'd better hurry back before the train left.

  Of course, the train was long gone when I got back to the station. What's more, I hadn't been missed. I had free run of the train and went everywhere, so it would be quite a while before it dawned on any of my family that I hadn't been seen for some time. Then it would take time for them to decide that maybe they should go looking for me, and more time for them to realize that I was nowhere to be found. Add to this, as I found out later, it so happened that one of the parakeets had gone missing at the same time I did, and my mother, father, and sister were searching all over the double drawing room and out in the corridor for a good half-hour. It was Henry, my personal parakeet. They finally found him on top of the light fixture in one of the tiny bathrooms in our compartment.

  In fact, they never did realize I was missing. They found out I was still in Flagstaff when Mr. MacDougal radioed a message to the conductor that he had me, and I was safe.

  CHAPTER 10

  The Tin Hat

  By the time I got back to the station, the train was gone, whoever had gotten off the train was gone, the taxicabs were gone, and the baggage handlers and the railroad guys were gone. The waiting room was empty, except for one guy in a blue railroad suit with brass buttons. He was sweeping the floor.

  "Hello, hogger," the guy in the blue suit said to me.

  "Hogger?"

  "Yes. Aren't you a hogger, a hoghead, a driver ... an engineer?"

  "Oh, because of the hat! No, I am not an engineer."

  "I thought you looked a little young to be a hoghead, but then you might have been a young-looking midget. So, what do you do on the railroad?"

  "I don't do anything," I said. "I was a passenger on the Super Chief."

  "You're a peep? And you missed your varnish? The Super Chief is highballing and you're stuck out on track seven."

  I didn't get a word of it. Mr. MacDougal explained that peep is short for people, meaning a passenger, a varnish is a passenger train, highballing means going down the track at maximum speed, and stuck out on track seven means you're screwed. Mr. MacDougal told me he was the tin hat, or station master.

  "I'll radio a message to the pin puller—that's the conductor—and let him know where you landed. Come on into the office."

  Mr. MacDougal talked into a thing that looked like a telephone. "This is Flag. Put the skipper on," he said. "I've got a pint-size peep on the siding. Missed his snoozer. Let me know what you want done with him.

  "Have a seat, young man. The brains—that's the conductor—will tell your folks you're alive and kicking and radio back to me. Have you put on the nosebag? The lizard scorcher at the Chuckwagon Café across the street could send over a sandwich."

  I told Mr. MacDougal that I'd had my dinner.

  "Well, just sit there and let off steam," Mr. MacDougal said. "We should get a message back pretty quick."

  And pretty quick there was a loud buzz, and Mr. MacDougal picked up the receiver. Whoever was on the other end did most of the talking. Mr. MacDougal said "uh-huh" a lot, and wrote things down in a little notebook. Then he said, "Tell Mr. Wentworthstein that we'll make sure his boy gets there" and put the receiver down.

  Then he picked up the regular telephone and dialed a number. "Charley, this is MacDougal down at the station. We have a stranded passenger, a young fellow. Can you fix him up with a room for the night?" Then Mr. MacDougal listened for a while, and looked at me. "I'll ask him. Neddie, are you a stable and steady young man?"

  I told him I was.

  "He says he is. Neddie, your nerves are good? You're not afraid of spooks and goblins, are you?"

  I told him I was certainly not.

  "He seems a manly little chap to me," Mr. MacDougal said. "I'll send him over. Railroad will pay, and collect from his dad. So long, Charley."

  Mr. MacDougal fished a little book out of a desk drawer and filled out a form. Then he tore the form out of the book and handed it to me. "Sign this. It's a receipt for fifty dollars, for your expenses along the way, which the railroad is advancing to you, and your father will pay us back." He unlocked a drawer and counted out some bills. I signed the receipt.

  "Now, here is the schedule," Mr. MacDougal said. "I am supposed to get you onto a train to Los Angeles—which will not be easy, since everything is booked up solid. When you get to Los Angeles, either your father will pick you up at the station or someone will put you in a cab to the Hermione Hotel, which is where your family will be staying. I've written down the name. Your folks will be there from tomorrow morning on. Tonight, you will stay up the street at the Monte Vista Hotel, which is jam-packed because of the cowboy jamboree in town, and has only one room available—and it's haunted. Do you have any objection to sharing with a ghost?"

  "Uh ... is it a nice ghost?"

  "Very nice ghost from what I hear. I don't think it's the kind that keeps you up all night."

  "In that case, it suits me fine," I said.

  "Good lad. You can sign for your meals at the hotel. Come down here in the morning to see if I was able to get you on a train."

  I thanked Mr. MacDougal and made my way up the hill to the Monte Vista Hotel.

  CHAPTER 11

  In the Old Hotel

  You couldn't miss the Monte Vista Hotel. It was the tallest building in town, and had a big electric sign on the roof, in capital letters. I went in. The place was full of cowboys. A lot of them were in the bar, and a lot of them were standing around in the lobby, hitching up their belts and spitting into spittoons. I walked up to the desk. A guy with slicked-down red hair—I guessed it must be Charley—said, "You the kid? Here's your key. Room 107—it's up those stairs."

  I looked around the lobby, and listened to the sound of spit hitting the spittoons. The cowboys were interesting to look at, and they were good spitters. There was a kid my age in the lobby. He was a handsome kid, wearing a cowboy hat. He was leaning against the wall and spitting. He wasn't bad at it either. I went over and leaned next to him, and took aim at a spitto
on.

  "Not bad," the kid said.

  "I practice a lot," I said.

  "That's a neat hat," he said.

  "It's a hoghead hat," I said.

  "Mine's a Stetson," the kid said. "You want to trade?"

  "For keeps?"

  "Let's see how we look," the kid said. We swapped hats.

  "How do I look?" the kid said.

  "You look like a hogger," I said. "Try the bandanna."

  "You look like a cowboy," the kid said. "You want to make the trade?"

  "My father gave me the hat," I said.

  "So? My father gave me that one. Your father a railroad man?"

  "Shoelace man," I said. "Your father a cowboy?"

  "Nah, movie star," the kid said. "I'm Seamus Finn."

  "I'm Neddie Wentworthstein."

  "My father is Aaron Finn. You know who he is?"

  "Not sure."

  "Did you see The Three Musketeers?"

  "Wait! Is he the guy who played Dart-Onion?"

  "That's him. He was Dart-Onion, and he was Count Luigi in The Swordmaster."

  "He's good! Is he like that in real life?"

  "Nah, he's an actor. He's in the bar, studying the cowboys so he can be one. Are you here with your father?"

  "I'm on my own. I understand the room where I'm staying has a ghost."

  "No fooling?"

  "So I'm told."

  "A real ghost? How do you know?"

  "Come with me," I said to Seamus Finn. I walked him over to the desk. "Charley," I said. "Does room 107 have a ghost in it?"

  "Yes, but it's not a real bad one," Charley said.

  "It's really a real ghost?" Seamus Finn asked Charley.

  "It's a ghost," Charley said. "You know, it appears, it vanishes. Would you say that was real, or not real?"