Wanda Hickey's Night of Golden Memories (28 page)

House after house it went like this, until finally, at the end of four miles of humiliating defeat, I emerged a bent, stooped, tiny, wizened, nine-year-old Willy Loman—footsore and weary, without so much as a single seed sold. Finally, weeks later, various aunts paid for my stock, but I was left with this last unsold package of nasturtiums.

As that old sensation of self-pity overwhelmed me, my knuckles ached once again from knocking on unyielding doors as I stared through misty eyes at those brilliant nasturtiums. For some reason, I found myself wondering whether the seeds would actually grow and what they would produce if they did. I have heard that ancient grains of wheat taken from the tombs of Pharaohs have been made to sprout and prosper. Tenderly, I placed my remaining stock of seeds next to Wimpy. For a moment, I thought perhaps I might go out this afternoon, knock on a few apartment doors on my floor and maybe make a sale. But then the old fear took over and I knew I couldn't do it.

Right on the heels of the nasturtiums, as if by evil design, I came across a mint-condition flat-white can of
White Cloverine Brand Salve, another relic of my ill-fated career as a boy salesman. The ad in the comic book had read: “Kids!
YOU
may be the one to win this beautiful
SHETLAND PONY
! He will be awarded, along with thousands of other prizes, to winners in our big Sales Sweepstakes. Just help distribute to your friends and neighbors that old family stand-by White Cloverine Brand Salve.” It pictured a smiling, freckle-faced, redheaded kid holding the reins of a brown-and-white Shetland. I clipped the coupon. God only knows what horrors would have descended on the household if I
had
won a pony.

Shortly thereafter, an enormous case full of White Cloverine Brand Salve arrived, and another trial by fire began. Once again, I was tested and found wanting. After 17 giant suppertime fights, and after I had sold only three cans of salve—one to my mother, one to Mrs. Kissel and one to me—my father wrapped the whole thing up and sent it back to the Cloverine people, hollering: “LET THE BASTARDS SUE! THEY CAN'T GET BLOOD OUT OF A ROCK! IF YOU EVER SEND ANOTHER DAMN COUPON IN, YOU WON'T SIT DOWN FOR A MONTH!” That ended that, technically, but nothing had ever sealed the ugly gash in my soul.

Next came my battered, rainbow-tinted Official Tournament Model Duncan Yo-Yo, its paint worn smoothly away along the groove from endless hours of Walking the Dog, its string knotted and blackened, trailing off into the mass of memorabilia. I pulled and tugged at it.
Something was attached to it. Out of the depths it came like a struggling freshwater catfish, glinting dully in the faint gray light of my apartment. I held it up, suspended from the yo-yo string, to examine it. Slowly spinning before my eyes was one of the true treasures of my youth, my Melvin Purvis G-Man Badge. I searched quickly and discovered, still intact and ready for action, its matching set of Melvin Purvis G-Man Escape-Proof Handcuffs, just like the ones John Dillinger had slipped out of so many times. I knew that somewhere down in the tangle must be my Melvin Purvis G-Man Book of Instructions on HOW TO STOP CRIME. It was. I glanced at the first page, entitled “HOW TO TELL A CROOK”: “G-Men have found that crooks cannot look an honest man in the eye. Always look at the eyes of suspects for the telltale evidence.” I remember the day I tried it on Grover Dill. “What are
you
lookin at?” was all he said before he hit me in the mouth. I guess Melvin Purvis never had to deal with anybody like Grover Dill.

As you have no doubt deduced, there was a period in my life when I was an implacable foe of crime. Every week I listened intently as Warden Lawes of Sing Sing intoned on the radio: “Attention! All citizens be on the lookout for Harry Rottenstone, known as Harry the Fink, wanted for armed robbery in Oklahoma. He is five feet, eight and one half inches tall, usually of mean disposition, a diagonal scar running from left ear to jaw, steel-blue eyes, tattoo on right forearm of red heart: MOTHER. This man is armed and presumed dangerous. Notify the police. Do
not
attempt to take him singlehandedly.
Notify your local law-enforcement office. This is Warden Lawes saying ‘Good night.'”

Every day after that, I coolly surveyed all passing strangers for telltale scars. Eventually it had to happen, and it did. I spotted a thickset steelworker getting on a bus and ten minutes later reported him to the big cop who helped kids across the street in front of Warren G. Harding School. The feeling of stark righteousness and bravery that I experienced at that moment, coupled with my natural fear of cops, is still fresh in my memory.

“Officer! I just saw Harry the Fink! He got on the Island Steel bus!”

“Harry who?”

“Harry the Fink! I heard about him on the radio. He robbed Oklahoma!”

“Oh, for God sake! You're the ninth kid today that's seen Harry the Fink! Last week it was Iron-Lip Louie. They oughta make listening to that damn Sing Sing program against the law. I'll Harry-the-Fink you! Get in school. You're late.”

Between Warden Lawes and Mr, Keene, Tracer of Lost Persons, the cops must had had their hands full night and day. Mr. Keene was always announcing about how somebody had wandered away from his wife and seven kids in Minneapolis and was last seen wearing a blue suit and driving a black Plymouth with the name “Bubbles” written on the trunk. A population with its eye peeled for runaway husbands and escaped embezzlers did not make things easy down at the old precinct house.

I knew that somewhere under this pile of junk must be my FBI in Peace and War Official Fingerprint Kit, for which I had sent in two Lava soap wrappers. You
needed
Lava soap to get that crummy, sticky black ink off your fingers after you got the kit. I remember running the rubber roller, loaded with ink, right up the back of my kid brother's neck, a dismal incident that could well have been one of the contributing factors that led directly to World War Two.

A flash of red caught my eye and another trophy of another long-lost afternoon confronted me, a battered, bright-red plastic fireman's hat bearing the motto:
ED WYNN TEXACO FIRE CHIEF
. For one brief, feverish season, this Fire Chief hat was an absolute
must
for every right-thinking kid. Ed Wynn came on the radio with that big old siren, with the fire bells banging, wearing a hat exactly like this beauty. They gave them away at the Texaco station to anybody who could afford gas, and also at the World's Fair.

Gingerly, I placed it atop my head to see if it still gave me that old feeling of pizzazz. I arose, walked to the window and, for reasons that are obscure to me, raised the glass and stuck my head out, high over the roaring canyon of the Manhattan street. The sun bore down weakly as I said to myself:

“You are absolutely the only guy in all of New York that is wearing an Ed Wynn Fire Chief hat at this minute. You are unique. Hurray!”

At that instant, a gust of frigid wind struck me smartly on the left side of my cranium. I felt the Fire Chief
hat lift slightly, and in an instant it was gone. I stared as it turned over and over, drifting down toward the traffic jam, a tiny, red, uproarious Ed Wynn horselaugh volplaning down to the sidewalk.

In a panic, I rushed into the kitchen and pressed the button on the phone that connected me with the doorman far below. His voice filtered up through the hum.

“Yeah?”

“MY FIRE CHIEF HAT JUST FELL OUT OF THE WINDOW!”

“Yer what?”

“My, uh—” I suddenly realized what I was saying.

“My, uh-my Fire Chief hat.”

“Fire Chief hat—out the window.”

“It's red! It says Ed Wynn on it.”

“Ed who?”

“WYNN! ED WYNN!” I was shouting.

“Don't he live on the third floor? In 3-C?”

“NO! ED WYNN, THE FIRE CHIEF!”

“You got a
fire?
You want me to call—”

“LOOK, GODDAMN IT! THERE'S A RED FIRE CHIEF HAT ON THE SIDEWALK IN FRONT OF THIS BUILDING, GET IT AND BRING IT UP TO ME!”

There was a long pause, until finally: “OK. If you say so.…” He hung up. I rushed back to the window to peer down. Sure enough, I could see the midget figure of the doorman far below, looking up and down the street. My God! A tiny kid had my hat on his head! Without thinking, I shouted down 16 floors:

“GIMME BACK MY HAT, KID!”

Instantly, dozens of passers-by peered up, hoping to see another suicide. I saw the doorman tangle with the struggling kid far below. A few shadowy faces appeared at apartment windows across the avenue. Stealthily, I pulled down the window and hid behind my madras drapes. What am I doing? Skulking back to the sofa—my Jack Armstrong Pedometer clicking, the cockamamie on my left hand glowing brightly—I sat down and tried to get a grip on myself. I know what I'll do. I'll wrap all this junk up, throw it in the back of the closet, get dressed and go down to P.J.'s. The hell with this. I'm a grown-up man. What do I want with an Ed Wynn Fire Chief hat?

It was no use. I couldn't kid myself. I wanted my hat back. For years I had never once thought of my hat and didn't even know I still had it, and now I wanted it more than anything in the world. Even my cutout cardboard Grumpy mask, which I got from
Pepper Youngs Family,
didn't seem to help. I stuck my nose through the cutout hole in the mask and snapped the two cracked rubber bands over my ears, my eyes staring bleakly out through the slits in Grumpy's map.

I sat for a moment, wanting to go back to the window to see how the doorman was doing but afraid they'd spot me across the way. Suppressing the thought, I returned to the box and resumed my excavations. Rummaging about, I next rediscovered my old blue-steel bicycle clip for my pants. I snapped it on the left leg of my pajamas to see if my ankles had gotten fatter. It was
then that I noticed my old canvas delivery bag from the time I had a magazine route:
COLLIER'S, LIBERTY MAGAZINE WAS
emblazoned in red letters on the side. Tucked in the bag was an old Nabisco Shredded Wheat Color Card. I could see where I had badly colored Niagara Falls with Crayolas. I pulled the shoulder strap down over my neck and was amazed to find that the bag came up under my armpit It used to hang down around my knees. It must have shrunk. I was attempting to adjust it when my doorbell rang.

He's got it! I leaped to the door, flinging it open. Al, the Ukrainian doorman, stood in the hallway, holding my Ed Wynn Fire Chief hat.

“You got it! GREAT!”

“That kid sure put up a fight.” He extended his paw, holding the battered plastic helmet.

“He can get his
own
hat!” I hissed. I noticed that Al had an odd look on his face.

“How come you're wearin' that mask, mister?”

I had forgotten completely about my false face, which I was still wearing. I figured I'd better play it cool:

“Oh. that's Grumpy. I'm doing a little work here this morning.”

“Oh, I see,” he said, backing off a bit as he noticed my bicycle clip and my
Collier's
delivery bag.

I reached out for the Fire Chief hat and knew immediately that I had made another mistake. The screaming yellow Jap on my hand, his blood gushing forth, lit up the entire hallway. Al started slightly and said:

“I never knew you was in the Marines. I was in the
Navy. You oughta see the tattoo I got on my backside! Gung Ho!”

“Oh, that. I was just doing a little painting around here.”

As I took the precious Fire Chief hat from his grubby claw, he noticed the Jack Armstrong Pedometer that hung from my right knee.

Retreating hastily—clicking with each step—I mumbled my thanks and slammed the door. There was no doubt about it. I knew I would have to move. When the doorman told this story around, I would be cooked.

Pouring myself a neat brandy, I began to straighten up the joint, ruffling through the still-untapped drift of effluvia that remained in the box. What further horrors lay here entombed? What as-yet-unrealized embarrassments? There was my Joe Palooka Big Little Book, my Junior Birdmen of America Senior Pilot's License, even the four-color Magic Slide Rule Patented Piano Lesson that had guaranteed to teach me to play in just seven minutes. There was my Mystic Ventril-O, with which I had unsuccessfully attempted to mystify my friends by throwing my voice into trunks, hollering in a comb-and-tissue-paper voice: “HELP! Let me out!” There was my Charles Atlas Dynamic-Tension Muscle-Building and Chest Expanding Course, my periscope, my match-cover collection, the magnifying glass with which I had set Helen Weathers on fire. It was all there.

Gingerly I tilted the huge box over onto its side. A tinkling, squeaking, musty avalanche spilled out over the floor-and my benighted youth lay shimmering before me
like some surrealistic collage of adolescent dreams: my Tom Mix Whistling Ring, which never whistled; my Captain Midnight Photomatic Code-O-Graph badge and Secret Squadron Bomber Wings, which lost their pin the very first instant I tried to attach them to my pullover and caused a fit of hysterics that has become legendary in my family, a fit that resulted in my mother banning
Captain Midnight
listening in our house for almost a month. Rolled in a sad little ball were the tattered remains of my Jack Armstrong pennant from Hudson High, a school that, by an odd coincidence, flew the same colors as the orange-and-white Wheaties box. I thought for a moment how well it would look over my desk at the office, and then sadly dismissed the thought. Lovingly, I fingered my Huskies Club pin, an athletic organization sponsored by the people who manufactured Grape-Nuts, a cereal that I remembered chiefly for its ability to crack false teeth. For a moment I stared off into the middle distance, seeing with stark clarity that dramatic instant when my grandmother's dentures shattered with a loud report on a mighty spoonful of that nutlike cereal, known for its gentle laxative action. Grandma was never quite the same after that. Lou Gehrig, who was the president of the Huskies Club, maintained in many a comic-strip advertisement that it was because of Grape-Nuts that he was able to follow Babe Ruth in the Yankee batting order.