The Dragon in the Ghetto Caper Read online

  “You can’t get lost in Foxmeadow. All the dragons are locked out.”

  “What dragons? For God’s sake, Yakots, a guy can’t have any kind of serious discussion with you. You keep bringing everything back to dragons. What dragons are you talking about now?”

  “Only one. The one you’re searching for. The one I’m going to help you find.”

  “Just find your way out of here for now, Yakots.”

  Edie did. They had not been long lost, not even long enough for Sister Henderson to get uncomfortable.

  “Happy National Black History Week,” Andy said as soon as Sister had folded herself into the car.

  “So it be,” Sister said. “Ah don’ hol’ too much with Black Hist’ry Week. Ah figgers it’s like white choc’lit, somethin’ that started out black bein’ converted inta somethin’ white, an’t’ me, it always taste a li’l bit waxy. But I thanks you anyways, Andy.”

  So for National Black History Week they went on their appointed rounds just as they did every other week. Andy thought about Sister after they got home. She was so sure of what she was that she didn’t need a week to remind her. That was the first time that he had ever thought about Sister, instead of thinking about himself in relation to her. She probably had thoughts all the time. She probably had more thoughts than she would ever say. Sister was like her ghetto: full of secrets and a secret kind of dignity.

  * * * *

  In March their garden got loud with pink. On Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays there was little to do except see and smell. There was a lot of time for memory training. A lot, a lot of time. Andy was grateful for Thursdays.

  Edie was reading the fishing equipment pages, and Andy was making more mistakes than he ever had. “I think we ought to start another garden, a garden of wild things,” Edie suggested.

  “Wild things, Yakots? You mean weeds? You want me to cultivate weeds?”

  “Even the most important and dignified flowers were once weeds. Even roses. It’s hard to transplant a wild thing like a wild flower or a dragon; for them to grow properly, they need a certain amount of neglect.”

  “There you go again, Yakots, bringing dragons into the conversation when I’m not interested in dragons. I’m interested in detectiving.”

  “You’re interested in dragons all right.”

  “I am not. I am not. I am not. They’re just what come out when I sit down to draw, for God’s sake.”

  “Which came first?” Edie asked. “The dragons or the detectiving?”

  “It’s not a question of that—of which came first. The dragons just came. I never decided to draw dragons. They just came. They appear on any paper that I happen to be drawing on. I never make a decision about it.”

  “Tell me when the first dragon came.”

  “Are you trying to get out of this memory training, asking all these questions? Are you trying to distract me?”

  “Well, yeah,” Edie replied.

  “I knew you wouldn’t work out as a sidekick, Yakots. Don’t consider yourself permanent. You may be replaced at any moment.”

  “Am I fired, boss?”

  “I didn’t say that. Just don’t be too confident. Just consider yourself pro tern.”

  Edie looked back down at the catalog. “We were learning hand-tied flies when we left off.”

  “If you insist on my telling you about my first dragon, I’ll tell you about my first dragon.” Edie said nothing. “Because I happen to remember my first dragon very well.” Edie closed the catalog and looked up, smiling. Andy picked up his glass of Coke, crossed his legs, gave the ice in his glass two stirs, one while looking down and one while looking up. Then he began. “I was in the third grade when it happened. We were in singing class, me and the rest of the third grade, and we were singing. The song we were singing was ‘Michael, row the boat ashore, hallelujah.’ We were lined up in three rows, the whole third grade of us. Row one started the song, and when they got to ashore, row two was supposed to start and then row three. We were also supposed to make rowing motions with our hands and sway back and forth. I was in row one, and it’s a known fact that if you ain’t got rhythm, music is a lot of work. It’s not easy to keep track of the words and row and sway at the same time. Well, everyone, even row three, had finished singing, and everyone had stopped rowing and swaying. Everyone but me. I was concentrating so hard that I didn’t realize that everyone else was finished, and I sang a solo for about a hundred or maybe a thousand minutes before I realized that I was doing it.

  “After music we had art. We were told to draw Michael rowing the boat ashore. To have you draw what they have you sing is what they call coordinating the arts at Emerson. That’s when I drew my first dragon. Michael was a dragon. So was his boat.”

  Edie said, “If I could draw, I would draw a lot of dragons, too.”

  “Well, I don’t do a lot of dragons. I do only dragons. They’re what come out. And I don’t go to music class anymore.”

  “Now will you tell me why you decided to become a detective?”

  “You’ve had enough for today, Yakots. Maybe I’ll tell you more some other time.”

  Andy wasn’t sure that he would tell Edie at all. He was boss. He had to keep some things for himself. Even Sister Henderson did that. After all, he wasn’t quite twelve years old, and not much had happened to him. It wasn’t like being twenty-nine years old, for God’s sake. By the time he would be twenty-nine years old, he expected to have hundreds of happenings and about eight or nine famous cases inside himself. Then he could spare telling. Right now there was no point in telling Edie why he had decided to become a famous detective. He wouldn’t tell right now. He’d wait a few years until he knew.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  By the Thursday before Easter everyone at the Chronisters was completely involved with the wedding except Mr. who was completely involved with work. That week when Sister Henderson climbed into the back seat of the car, Edie turned to her and said, “I want to make a donation myself this week. For Easter.”

  Sister Henderson raised her eyebrows. “Why, Ah’m supprized at you, Miz Yakots.”

  “Why?” Edie asked. It’s Easter, and I need total involvement. As it says in the Bible about charity in Matthew, Chapter VI, verse three.”

  “Well, aw right,” Sister said, reaching over the front seat and taking the five dollar bill that Edie held out. “Like you and Matthew say: six three. Do you want it boxed?”

  “That won’t be necessary,” Edie answered.

  They completed their rounds in silence, except for an occasional clicking of her tongue by Sister Henderson. When they arrived at Brother Banks’s, Sister left the car and started down the path. She stopped, shook her head and returned to the car. “Are you sure you want this total involvement?”

  “Of course she’s sure,” Andy said. “What do you think she is? An Indian giver?” He stopped short. “Not that I have anything against the Indians any more than I do against you Blacks. Except maybe your manners.”

  Sister Henderson paid no attention to him. She closed her eyes and clutched her bags to her and said, “Ah jes don’ know what t’ say.”

  “Try thank you,” Andy suggested.

  Sister Henderson continued nodding her head. “Ah jes don’ know what t’ say, Brother Maytag,” she said as Brother Maytag and his friend were walking down the steps of Brother Banks’s house.

  “Don’t worry, sistah,” he answered. Brother Maytag and his friend drove out, talking to each other and not even waving to Andy and Edie.

  Andy turned toward Edie. “That’s another thing about the ghetto. They may have sidewalks and dignity, but they sure don’t have manners.”

  “Don’t confuse manners and kindness.”

  “Don’t tell me that. My sister Mary Jane writes a fourpage thank-you note for two lousy tea towels, for God’s sake. And here, you’re giving Sister five whole dollars, and she doesn’t even say a thank-you.”

  “Maybe your sister Mary Jane just likes to write
thank-you notes. I did. Of course, we didn’t get many presents, Harry—he’s my husband—and me. But for those we got, I liked to write thank you. Mostly because it is so hard for me to say it.”

  “Do you like big weddings?” Andy asked.

  “I love them.”

  “Mary Jane’s making a bigger celebration than national Black History. As far as I’m concerned, they’re a big waste.”

  “They’re not such a waste. They’re a form of theater. If you watch them good, and I’m a good watcher for the same reason that I’m a good listener, you can find the people who have dragons. They’re the people to seek out.”

  Andy hardly noticed that she had mentioned dragons again; he was wondering if the Yakotses were on the invitation list. All the invitations had been addressed, ready to be mailed on Monday. He decided that it would be interesting to check when he got home. It would be nice (and also not nice) if they were invited. If they were, they were. And if they were not, they were not. He, Andy, certainly wouldn’t do anything to help one way or another. If Edie came, she would probably wave like a windmill all during the ceremony and talk to everyone all out of sync and embarrass him. To death. In front of all the rest of Foxmeadow plus two families’ worth of relatives.

  Sister Henderson returned to the car, still shaking her head. “Brother say he supprized at you, too. He say that if you hit, you’ll break up the ole Banks.” She continued mumbling all the way home. Andy paid no attention.

  Construction activity, on the hospital, had picked up, and some of the side streets were temporarily blocked by concrete mixers and sand trucks moving across them. They did not get lost again, but they did get slowed down jogging in and out of side streets; it was past five when they pulled into Edie’s driveway.

  Andy popped out of the car, “See ya, Yakots,” he yelled.

  “Wait a minute,” Edie said. “I made you pysanky.”

  “Are you being vulgar again?”

  “Come see,” Edie insisted.

  She led Andy through the house to the kitchen where an old wicker basket, a small one, was sitting on the counter top. Inside the basket were the three most beautifully decorated eggs that Andy had ever seen in his life. No green fake straw. Just the eggs.

  Stay cool, Andy thought to himself. Stay cool. “They’re neat,” he said. He cleared his throat and added, “They’re very neat. You might even say that they’re extremely neat.” Edie watched him, eyes bright, nodding. He looked up and caught her eye. “Oh, well, Yakots, these are absolutely the most gorgeous Easter eggs I have ever seen in my entire life. How in the world do you do them?”

  “They’re Ukrainian. My grandmother taught me. They’re called pysanky. Someone has to make them at Easter. The fate of the world depends on it. If no one makes pysanky, the chained monster will break out and devour us all.”

  “Do you really believe that?”

  “It’s an old Ukrainian belief. The Ukraine is part of the USSR.”

  “I didn’t realize that they had dragons in communism.”

  “Dragons are everywhere. Even on the other side of the world in China. You have to hunt for them in Foxmeadow. The dragon is a necessary creature. You’ve got to know your dragon, but you’ve also got to keep him under control. That’s why I make pysanky every Easter.”

  “May I take my eggs home? My pysanky?”

  “They’re for you and your dragon,” Edie said.

  Andy started out the door, carrying the basket. He turned and said, “Don’t taper any more toward normal, please. When your sentences improve, you become very hard to understand.”

  “You’ll understand me better when you understand your dragon.”

  Andy opened his mouth to say something but said, “Well, Happy Easter,” instead. After he closed the door he leaned against the jamb and whispered, “I think she’s nuts, for God’s sake. ‘The dragon is a necessary creature’! I just draw them. She really believes in them, for God’s sake!”

  His house was still empty when he arrived home. He carried the basket to his room and put it on the highest bookshelf so that it would be safe. The eggs were safe there, but he couldn’t see them. He moved them to his desk. He lay across his bed and couldn’t see them while lying down, so he tenderly moved them over to the edge where he could. He lay back down on his bed and smiled at his pysanky. He realized that that was not a cool, tough thing to do. But it was perfectly all right to do it. He was alone, and no one was there for him to be cool for.

  He wandered around upstairs, into Mary Jane’s room. Presents, boxes of new clothes and honeymoon underwear and travel folders were heaped on the extra twin bed, on her dresser, on the floor. He wandered back into his room to allow the pysanky to catch his eye as he walked past his desk. Then he went into his parents’ room and walked around. The pysanky would never fit on his mother’s desk. Hers was covered with two big boxes of invitations, standing on edge like files in a drawer. They were all addressed and stamped. Ready to go. Lying on top of the boxes was a list of those who were invited. His mother would check them off as they accepted by return mail. Seven pages of legal-sized lined yellow paper, stapled together. Andy looked for the Y’s. Yakots was not there. That settled that. No worry about Edie’s acting foolish at the wedding.

  He walked back into his room to let the basket catch his eye again. It did. He took it from the desk and lifted the eggs, one by one. What a lot of work went into each.

  He wouldn’t mind if his mother had invited Edie. She had invited practically everyone else in Foxmeadow. She could have invited the Yakotses—even if they were only renting.

  He examined the eggs again. He wished he had a grandmother who could teach him skills of the Ukrainian tribe. Or any tribe. The only tribal skill his mother could pass down was her tennis forehand. He wished he were Ukrainian. Of course, he didn’t believe that about the dragon and the fate of the world. He didn’t believe in dragons. He believed in being cool and tough and famous. Now, if Edie were cool, he wouldn’t mind if his mother had invited her.

  He wandered back into his mother’s room. There were stacks of extra invitations and there was a stack of small squares of tissue paper. There were envelopes in three sizes, two with stickum and one without. Invitations to weddings were very complicated. Maybe that was the tribal skill that his mother would pass down to him—invitation assemblage.

  They couldn’t be that hard to assemble, he thought. Just put smaller parts into bigger parts and put a piece of tissue between each part. That’s hardly anything at all to learn, for God’s sake. Who did his mother think she was?—passing down a silly bit of a skill like that and not inviting Edie besides. After Edie had gone to all that trouble to make him pysanky.

  He returned to his room, carrying the assembled invitation. He took his first and second grade report cards from his desk drawer. Before he had learned to write, his mother had signed all of his school reports. Vivian J. Chronister. (He got the J. in his name from her, from Jackson, his mother’s maiden name.) He addressed an invitation to Mr. and Mrs. Harry Yakots in his mother’s handwriting, then he walked back to his mother’s desk and placed the Yakotses between the Wylies and the Yeagers. His forgery was fine. Quite neat. Ball point pens helped. They made handwriting look loopy and undistinguished.

  When he finally sat back down at his own desk, he placed the basket of pysanky in full view. He began to doodle, and pretty soon it became a dragon. The dragon was in a cage, and the cage was hung with pysanky; the dragon was smiling. And so was Andy.

  And so was Edie when she met Andy at the door the following Tuesday. “Oh, Andy, the most marvelous thing has happened. Harry—he’s my husband—and I got invited to your sister’s wedding. Will you come with me this afternoon to pick out a wedding present? What do you think she would like?”

  “A ninety-day flea collar.”

  “She doesn’t need that. Even if Mary Jane had a dog, it would never have fleas.”

  “She really needs a good, swift …”

  �
��Sh, sh, sh,” Edie said. “Don’t say it. We’ll find it together.”

  Edie was not difficult to shop with. She looked fast and decided fast. But nothing seemed right until they reached the second floor of Dalton’s. There they came upon a display of art needlework and a sign saying:

  * * *

  BE CREATIVE

  Design Your Own Pillow

  Mr. Morgan LaFay

  will be in this department

  on May 12

  to help you design

  your own needlepoint art

  * * *

  “Andy, Andy, that’s it,” Edie exclaimed. “That is absolutely it.” She pointed to the sign, and Andy read it. “We don’t have time to wait for Mr. Morgan LaFay, but we don’t need him. I’ll buy the blank canvas now, and you’ll draw on it, and I’ll do the needlepoint. I’ll give Mary Jane a needlepoint pillow for her wedding present.”

  “I only do dragons.”

  “Of course that’s all you do. And that is just what Mary Jane needs. She should have a dragon to start her marriage off right, don’t you think?” Andy shrugged. “Well, look at how she’s such a nerd without one.”

  “Did you call Mary Jane a nerd?” Andy wasn’t sure what a nerd was, but it sounded as if it fit Mary Jane.

  “A nerd is a nonperson. A person without dragons. We’ll just have to give her a dragon, Andy.”

  So they bought a blank canvas and chose yarns in the colors of their garden, plus black, because you can’t think “dragons” without some black.

  * * * *

  Andy had not finished drawing the dragon by

  Thursday, but they didn’t want to disappoint Sister Henderson, so they drove to her house from Emerson.

  She came skipping and bouncing to the car, the least dignified Andy had ever seen her look.