Feathery Touch
NOTE: If you haven’t been following this from the beginning, and if you want to know the full sequence of events, start with the introduction. Click on Archives on the right.
Hank Dumpty looks as if he is asleep at the wheel of his old chalky blue F150, stopped outside Diddlie’s house at the top of Oval Street. The engine is running with a rhythmic squeak, as if it were young and calling for food from its nest under the hood. Grey exhaust blends into the mist around the hollies on the edge of Diddlie’s front yard. I walk through patches of morning mist over to his window. It is cracked open and he is asleep all right, leaning back in the seat, mouth open, snoring quietly with his big fingers woven together across his gut between the unbuttoned sides of his brown leather jerkin.
“Morning Hank!”
Hank opens his eyes and runs a hand over the great egg of his bald head.
“Huh? Where the hell’s my hat?”
“Down by your shoulder.”
“How did that happen for heaven’s sake?”
He reaches back and pulls his Aberford Tweed Driving Cap out from behind his neck and puts it back on his head.
“Don’t know Hank.”
“How are you doing Fred?”
“Having a stroll in the mist.”
“Don’t know where the hell Diddlie’s gone. She said 9 AM sharp.”
“Well, it’s gone 9:20 now.”
He doesn’t turn towards me, but goes on looking out through the moisture running down the windscreen past a wet hickory leaf stuck under the driver side wiper. Two crows seem to be commenting as they watch us from the dripping oak branches across the street.
“You seen her this morning?”
“No, but I know she’s got an old friend in town.”
“She said something about moving a piece of art.”
“I didn’t know she was a buyer.”
“I don’t think it is hers.”
A Toyota Prius approaches slowly up Oval Street hill indicating a left turn, but stops short of the driveway facing Hank’s truck. The engine kicks on ending the car’s electronic quiet. Hank looks past me towards the car. The headlights go out.
“You know that silver car?”
“I think I’ve seen it here before. Don’t know whose it is though.”
The left side passenger door opens. Two long denim covered legs emerge placing black boots cautiously on the ground. The jeans have black leather fringes sewn around the bottoms.
“Fred…Hankie!”
“Daisy! What’s the hold-up?”
After Daisy gets out, the car turns onto Diddlie’s gravel driveway and parks. The passenger side window opens, and some one yells “Thanks Hank!” as it goes by. He looks over as Daisy walks towards us.
“Is it icy here?”
“No, the leaves are slippery though. Its still in the high thirties.”
“Sorry we are so late Hank. There’s ice all around my place. Had to spread grit which I couldn’t find right away.”
“Thanks for what by the way? What is this art piece Diddlie wants to move?”
“Need to move some of Lark’s stuff, Hank.”
“Lark’s stuff? What are we doing here then?”
“Well some of it is here at Diddlie’s.”
“Aha, how big?”
“Nothing you can’t handle.”
“Diddlie called me about moving a piece of art.”
“I know, Lou is away, and…”
“Yup, I am the fall back.” Hank scratches his cheek. “Done it before.”
Diddlie had gone into her house as soon as the car parked. Now she is running from her porch waiving to the Toyota departing in its own cloud, and over to Hank’s truck.
“Hi Fred.” She is out of breath and grabs my arm. “Are you going to help?”
“I guess I can help.”
“You guess? You’ve got to do more than that!”
She pulls the hood of her bright yellow sweatshirt up over her hair sparkling with moisture as passing headlights break through the mist for an instant. The words Glamour College, in purple gothic script, bend across the curve of her breast.
“I’ve got about a dozen boxes of Lark’s stuff in the spare room.”
“Is it all that political campaign material you two were distributing?”
“No it is not. It’s personal stuff, books and clothes and so on.”
Daisy isn’t wearing her bowler but she keeps her hood up.
“She’s also got a glass piece I designed for Jake, but he never picked it up.”
Diddlie starts flirting with Hank through his window. Daisy rests an arm on the truck’s side and bends slightly to look through the window.
“Hi Hank, are you going to come out honey?”
“I was telling him about the art glass.”
“That’s right Daisy’s big stained glass…yeah, mustn’t forget that.”
“So where is Lark?”
“Hank, Lark’s got her hands full at the moment.”
“It is over there behind Mr. Liddell’s hutch, all wrapped up.”
“Aha, full of what?”
Diddlie is giggling, but not Daisy.
“Lark’s got a new man in her life and he is going to move in.
Diddlie stored this stuff while they repainted.”
“Well that’s part of it.”
“They could have rented one of those containers for that, and put it in the driveway.”
“No, No, Hank.”
“What do you mean Diddlie?”
“You know Daisy.”
“What?”
Diddlie tries to communicate with a look.
“No Did., what are you talking about?”
“A few things Augie doesn’t need to see, okay?”
“Oh! enough said, Diddlie.”
“I mean we didn’t move all this stuff at once, okay?”
“Okay, but I still don’t get it Diddlie.”
Diddlie pulls on my arm and points toward something draped in a blue tarp behind Mr. Liddell’s hutch mounted on two paint-stained sawhorses.
Hank is drumming his fingers on the steering wheel while idly whistling but there’s more breath than notes coming out.
“Yeah, enough said. Time to get moving.”
Hank opens his door a crack.
“Excuse me ladies, I want to get a closer look at what we are dealing with here.”
He leaves the engine running and climbs out. We all follow him over to the carport. Hank looks in at Mr. Liddell and then reaches for the tarp.
I can see Mr. Liddell moving about in a lot of straw. Then his pulsating pink nose presses through the chicken wire door of the hutch. Diddlie rushes inside again.
Hank turns and watches her go with his hand still on the tarp.
“What’s that sound?”
“I think it is the Red Queen, Hank.”
“That doesn’t sound like a dove to me.”
Daisy coaxes Mr. Liddel, who has moved back into the privacy of a straw curtain he kicks up against the opening.
“It isn’t a dove. It’s a parrot.”
“You sure she isn’t a myna bird Fred?”
“Yes, the Red Queen is a grey parrot with a few red tail feathers.”
Diddlie appears with a tray full of empty pint glass beer mugs, which she leaves on top of a tea chest. Then she goes back in and returns with a big steaming pot, which resembles Daisy’s hammered copper coalscuttle, but it is marked on one side with ‘Enjoy’ and ‘Drink Me’ in bold silver letters on the other. She puts it down on the cement floor, and starts dipping mugs in.
“Here, have some mulled cider. Here Hank.”
He takes a hot dripping pint mug full, as a strong scent of cinnamon mixes with the damp in the air and the tea-like aroma of fallen wet leaves. Hank holds up his mug.
“Skol!”
Some mist rolls in and Diddlie strides out of the carport and disappears into the cloud. Mr. Liddell is rummaging around covered in straw. Hank pulls aside the tarp behind Mr. Liddell’s hutch with his free hand.
“This looks about the size of a door.”
“Yeah, that’s what it is. A door with three glass panels.”
“So why didn’t Jake take it?”
Daisy throws back her hood and swigs her mulled cider.
“Daisy, where’s your hat?”
“It won’t fit under this hood…I know Hankie…I feel kind of naked without it too.”
“Look fine to me kid.”
“I don’t know about Jake. He made a down payment for the materials and I never heard from him again.”
Diddlie returns with cider in one hand and a small plastic tool box in the other.
“How long ago was that?”
Hank shakes his head as Diddlie offers him the tools. So she puts the box down next to the cider pot.
“Years ago. About the time of the financial crash.”
“Aha, now where do you want to put it?”
“I am lending it to Lark until he pays it off. Then we’ll unhinge it and hand it over.”
“It’s as good as a gift, Daisy.”
Daisy shrugs. Diddlie reaches up to put her glass of cider down on top of Mr. Liddell’s hutch and starts gesticulating.
“Yeah, and good riddance! I only took it as a favor to Daisy as she was having complications.” She gives Daisy a hug. “…and because I am next door to that SOB Trip, so it would be easy to give it to him. Not that he will ever pay up!”
“Okay then. I’ll back up the truck.”
Hank moves Mr. Liddell’s hutch and saw horses away from the tarp draped door to make room to work, then walks back to his truck blowing mist into the hollies. The tailgate rattles with vibration as he goes into reverse and the squeaking turns into a shriek and then stops. He gets out of the truck and opens the hood, and sprays something into the engine and gets back in. Hank’s F150 crunches slowly over the gravel, back towards us until we can smell the exhaust with our mulled cider.
“Drink up Fred.”
“This stuff is hot Did!”
Daisy steps behind the hutch and starts clearing the tarp off the door revealing a layer of bubble wrap over the glass.
“Well, leave it here with mine to cool off.”
Diddlie leads me back into her house to the spare room stacked with cardboard boxes of various sizes.
“Okay, lets get started!”
“You are in a hurry!”
“Yes, Maximillian is coming to stay tomorrow and I want this stuff out of here before he can gnaw his way into it.”
“You have some pretty weird and unruly guests.”
“It isn’t a person Fred, Maximillian is Hank James’ dachshund. Wake up, will you!”
“Yeah okay, here’s a lovely red dawn!”
I look around the room and see a bright red lacquered wooden chest set aside from the boxes. The rounded top is cracked along its length and there’s a key in the lock with curled paper label attached by old brown string. It is written in an old fashioned script in a foreign language I don’t recognize. Diddlie’s face is close to mine looking at it with me as I open the lid.
One of the hinges is loose.
“Careful Fred.”
“It is loose but not broken.”
“Honey that is private. You shouldn’t be so nosey.”
“No, but it looks interesting.”
The inside is shiny black. Looks like inside of the lid might have been decorated with gold leaf but there are only a few traces left around the rim. Several long necklaces with large beads in black and pearl and Lapis blue are jumbled together with a gold chain on top of green, yellow and pink silk scarves.
“This must be some of the stuff from Hungary that Daisy gave Lark after she got that trunk from her Uncle Theophilus.”
“Uncle who?”
“You remember, Gladstone Theophilus! The intelligence officer in WW II.”
“Or it might have been his older brother, the one with the Hungarian Fascist minks!”
“Among other things, yes.”
“Wait a minute, look, this is just the top tray.”
“Fred, no!”
“Why not? We’ve gone this far.”
“She puts her hand on mine and pulls away.
“Much too far.”
The Red Queen flies in circling the pile of boxes fluttering wildly. There’s more cinnamon in the air with every flap.
“Don’t look up! Try not to sneeze Fred!”
Diddlie stands up.
“Why not?”
“Queenie, here Queenie! Come on sweetie, lets go back in the living room.”
The bird drops a grey feather brushing against the curtains and jingling the old brass rings against the rod.
“Off to bed! Off to bed” says Queenie landing on the highest box in the stack.
“Queenie, be careful sweetie.”
Diddlie doesn’t answer me from the doorway, where she holds out her finger for the Red Queen to find a perch. Queenie flutters close over my head to the proffered finger and I feel the feathery touch.
