The Dream Peddler Read online

  “Thank you,” said Evie, taking the bundles. “Please come inside,” she added automatically.

  Violet stepped in and looked around, uncertain whether she should remove her things. She had intended to stay for a while and warm up, but she’d had no idea what the house would be like. For some reason she hadn’t pictured Evie all alone here like this. She had imagined something more like a wake already in progress, crowds of purposeful women bustling about, other people she could talk to. This was different, this was just the two of them, with the shadow of a boy in between.

  “I won’t ask how you are holding up,” Violet began.

  “Thank you,” Evie said again.

  Violet made as if to move toward the parlor, then stopped self-consciously. Seeing her hesitate, Evie offered, “Oh, won’t you sit down?”

  “Thank you, thank you.” She sat on the sofa while Evie stood in the doorway, still holding the ham in its paper packaging and the tin of corn bread cut carefully into squares. “Why don’t you set those down in the kitchen?” Violet suggested gently.

  “Yes, of course.” Puzzled, as if her hands had forgotten their contents, Evie went into the kitchen and put her gifts on the counter. She filled the kettle.

  She came back and sat down across from Violet. “It will be nice to have that food for George when he gets back,” she murmured.

  “I have some news, Evie. Would you like to hear it?”

  “Of course.” The way Evie stared at Violet made her wish there were someone, anyone else, in the room with them.

  “A man has come into town,” she said, her voice tripping into the quickness of gossip. It sounded wrong in her ears, in the hush of Evie’s stricken house. “He’s some kind of traveling salesman, I believe, although for some reason he’s being a bit secretive about what it is he sells. He seems all right, I think. I’ve agreed to let him board with me for a while.”

  Evie nodded.

  “He seems an all right sort of fellow,” she said again. “His name is Robert Owens. And he . . . well, he’s heard about your trouble, and he wanted to know if he might be of any help. Maybe he could go out with the other men who are searching?”

  Still Evie said nothing, and Violet rushed on.

  “I did not intend to tell him. It’s just I was upset when I heard, and he asked me why. I told him without even thinking.”

  Evie seemed to wake up to what was being said.

  “Oh, no. That doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter at all.” She looked down at her own hands for a moment, the ones that had forgotten the ham and corn-bread packages. “He sounds a nice man. He doesn’t even know us.” She lifted her head. “If he wants to help look for Benny, I don’t see why he shouldn’t. But the group has already organized this morning, and I don’t know what places they’ve checked and what they haven’t.” She sighed. “I guess if they’re still looking tomorrow, I can make sure George gets word to you about where he should be in the morning, when they all meet.”

  Violet bounced her head vigorously. “Yes, that sounds a plan. I’ll let him know. It’s very good of you, Evie.”

  Evie said nothing. It was not good of her at all, but there was no need to argue.

  For a while they sat with the silence holding its leaden breath around them.

  “Should we have some tea?” Evie asked.

  Violet sighed outward, wondering how long politeness would require her to stay.

  “That would be lovely. I can warm up before I head back.”

  Evie rose to return to her kitchen. Violet would not realize she had only offered, had only thought of the tea because as she sat there, her mind had been racing over the ways to escape from Violet, from her staring white face with the huge blue eyes and spinster hair pulled back so tightly from her temples.

  Chapter 5

  The Whitings’ phone rarely rang, since so few others in town even owned a phone. Messages were usually sent through the trusted bodies of children, coursing through back lots and parting the tall, golden grass of the fields like wind. They would arrive wherever they had been sent and gasp out their important words, waiting for a response and a payment in cookies, in lemonade to dampen down the dust coating their lips.

  Once in a while, the phone would ring because someone had gone into Jenkins’s and asked to use theirs. Normally Rose would not have answered the phone. There was something about its smug insistence on braying into the silence, interrupting her thoughts, that made her hate it. She preferred generally not to acknowledge its existence. If Sam chose to pick it up, that was fine with her. But today Sam was lying on the sofa in his office with another headache. She’d been waiting, ready to turn away any patient not in danger of dying, but the house had been quiet. From time to time, she nudged open the office door and peered at him. The last few years had deepened those curving lines across his brow and silvered the tips of his hair like a sly frost. For these hard hours of headache, he would appear older even than he was, and she did not want the noise to disturb him.

  When it rang this time, Rose walked into the hall where the phone resided stylishly upon a polished mahogany side table and lifted the earpiece. By the time she set it down again, her face had changed, and she went to the wardrobe for her coat. Her hand was on the doorknob when she remembered, went back for the pencil and paper on the phone table, and scribbled a note for Sam. She left him sleeping still, turning over in his pain from time to time like game on a spit.

  * * *

  * * *

  Robert was not expecting any customers yet. After he told Cora what he was selling, he assumed she would whisper to anyone who shopped in the general store. He must wait quietly while news of him spread through the town, testing each home like a spring virus. He sat in Violet’s living room reading a book the afternoon she took her gift of food down to the family of the missing boy. If you had asked him what book he was reading, he could not have told you. He crossed one leg over the other and back again, felt the cloth binding shift under his fingertips.

  In fact, the first client of the dream peddler was already outside. His name was Tobias Jenkins, the younger brother of Cora. He stood with his hands in his pockets on the porch of Violet’s house, shifting his weight from foot to foot. He stared at the door a full minute, until it swung open and startled him backward.

  “Come on,” Robert’s voice boomed jovially out at him. “I seen you come down the road, heard you come on up the steps, but I haven’t heard a knock yet. I can’t stand it any longer. A man can’t think, you know, with someone just hovering outside on the porch in the cold, can’t think at all. I had to put down my book.” He jerked his head backward, indicating that Tobias should step inside.

  The young man didn’t seem inclined to speak. He glanced around the room, from doily to doily.

  “Come on, now, don’t be shy,” said Robert. He sat down on the big rocker by the birdcage, folding his hands on his lap. He did not rock. The young man looked like he was still thinking of bolting, and Robert did not want to risk making him dizzy. “It’s all right, boy. Miss Burnley’s not even home. It’s just the two of us men.” He looked over at the sofa, and Toby slunk toward it, and his tall frame came down and dented it deeply. The sofa sighed as if pleased.

  “You could start off by telling me your name. If you like.”

  Toby’s face grew hot, which meant his skin was beginning to blush, and he inwardly cursed his red hair. “Tobias Jenkins, sir. I’m Cora’s brother. Everyone calls me Toby.”

  Now Robert began to rock slowly, gently, as if by this movement he might hypnotize his prey.

  He leaned forward conspiratorially.

  “Well, son,” he said. Low, even though there was no one else in the house. “Listen to me now. I’m going to go ahead and guess, since you’ve come to me, there is something you want in your dreams. I can make that happen, I promise you. And there’s no need to be embarrassed.
I’ve made dreams for all kinds of people, some of ’em kind of common, some of ’em downright strange. And I think I can just about guarantee that whatever you’re hoping for, it’s not something I haven’t heard before. What are you, about sixteen?”

  Toby nodded. “Seventeen next month, sir.” His voice sounded too high to himself, and he cleared his throat trying to work it down.

  “Young man, I can probably take a few guesses as to what you might be after, but it’ll be easier if you just go on ahead and tell me. If it’s a dream I can give you, it’s yours.”

  Toby thought about this. “So there are some you can’t do?” he asked. This had never occurred to him.

  Robert smiled. “Well, sure. I’m not going to pretend with you. Some things just can’t be conjured, not with any certainty. Let’s say a man comes to me and says he wants to dream of . . . heaven. So he can know what it’ll be like, so he can find out if his mama is there waiting for him and all that kind of thing. I can maybe make a dream of heaven, but how do I know it will be a true likeness? I can make heaven for him, or for you, but would they be the same? Some things I have to refuse to make guarantees on. Most of the time, I can deliver. But there is the rare case when it is just something that’s out of my hands.”

  Toby thought about this. “Sir,” he said, “I think my request will be simple enough.”

  Robert’s hands folded over his suspenders. “Go ahead, then.”

  Toby leaned in as the rocker came forward and halted, tilting against the floor. “I would like a dream of a girl. A good one.”

  “Go on.”

  “You need more . . . details?”

  “I need a bit more than that.”

  Toby shrugged his big shoulders. “Sir, I dream about girls all the time. I’m sure most of my friends do, too. But here’s the thing.” He lowered his voice almost to a whisper. “I’ve never really been with a girl, see.” Toby paused, as if waiting for some surprise to register on Robert’s face. “A lot of my dreams, they just turn out bad. She doesn’t like me, or she lets me kiss her and then she just runs away, and even though my legs are much longer than hers, I can never catch up. I’m tired of dreaming of running. I just want to catch her for once. I just want to know what it’s like, and”—he was almost rose-colored now with earnestness—“I want her to like me, to . . . want me.”

  Robert thought about this for a while. The breeze outside bent the wash freezing on the line. “Tell me, is there a particular girl you would like in this dream? Someone you know, perhaps?”

  “Oh, no, sir, I mean . . . I’m not particular, any girl would do, I think. I guess I’d like it if she were pretty.”

  Robert smiled again and let the rocker ease back to its center. “Toby,” he said, “I’m quite sure I can help you. Give me just a moment.”

  Toby listened to the receding creaks as Robert went upstairs to his room. When he returned, he was carrying a case, just as gently and carefully as you would an infant. He set the case on its side on the coffee table and unlatched it and lifted the lid. He studied the rows of bottles carefully, selected one, and held it up to the light. Its contents were purple as jelly. He shook it gently, then opened a smaller, empty vial and poured a modest amount into it. He stoppered it with a cork and held it out gingerly, as if rough handling might damage it.

  “Take this just before you plan to sleep,” he instructed. “Take it all, leave none behind in the vial.”

  Toby held the glass tube carefully. “And what do I owe you, sir?” he asked.

  Robert shook his head. “You know what, Toby? That’s all right, that’s on me. You’re the first customer I’ve had so far, and I’ll be satisfied if you just take that product and see how it works. If you’re happy, feel free to come back for some more, and we’ll arrange a price. See”—he lowered his voice confidentially—“not everyone is like you. Not everyone is willing to take a chance. Too afraid of looking like fools, I guess. But you will see, what I have does work, and if you would spread the word for me, why, that’s payment enough for now. I’d be much obliged to you, actually.”

  “Well, gosh, Mr. Owens, that sure seems like a fair deal to me. I’ll try this out for you.” Toby stood up. Robert Owens stood as well, and the youth towered over him shyly. Robert grinned, and after a moment Toby mirrored him.

  After seeing his customer out, the dream peddler returned to his rocking chair and listened to the young man whistling as he went back down the path. The little bottle churned in the darkness of Toby’s pocket. The smudged warmth of their hands upon it faded quickly in the winter chill.

  * * *

  * * *

  When Samuel Whiting finally awoke, he listened, wondering just how long he had been asleep. The roiling waters of migraine had tossed him on the shores of silence, and he knew that Rose had gone. He sat up slowly into his own stiffness, tilting his head this way and that, stretching his neck. At his age the sofa was no place to sleep, but he kept on doing it. He’d lie down with the intention of spending ten minutes waiting for the throbbing behind his eyes to subside, and come to hours later, blinking at he knew not what time or light.

  Samuel didn’t like it when Rose left him alone. Her presence made everything work: made the curtains breathe at their windows, the gold in the wallpaper brighten and preen. Without her, Sam was clumsy, splashing water over the sides of the basin, forcing the tight windows up too high until they shrieked. He stumbled over footstools that had not moved in twenty years.

  Most people assumed Rose had bewitched Sam into the marriage by her beauty, but Sam knew that Rose understood it was not the case. He only ever loved Rose because she was herself. He had never known anyone before who cared so little for public opinion, who was immune to prejudice and criticism. To him it indicated some kind of strength of personality, of dignity, which he could never himself hope to have.

  Sam Whiting was unusually rich for a country doctor, who was often paid in chickens and jars of vegetables by his farming patients. Samuel’s father had come from money and invested wisely himself, but his wife’s fondest dream was to have a physician for a son. Sam never gave much thought to what he most wanted for himself. There was no need to think of money, so he could do whatever he chose. Pleasing his mother seemed like the best thing to do. Everyone he knew enjoyed pleasing their parents. Until he met Rose.

  She was visiting her cousins in the city, and they brought her to a ball. Rose was wearing a yellow dress with her namesake flower tucked a few times into the coil of her hair. As she danced, the hair would make its way loose from its pinnings, a few black strands that stuck in the sheen on her neck. Eventually a golden rose fell down to the floor, and it was squashed and kicked around until it skittered off to the side of the room, where Samuel rescued it.

  That night Rose laughed too loudly for her aunt’s taste, ate too much to be ladylike, and danced until she went over on her ankle and had to be helped to a chaise to lie down. Never having asked her to dance, Samuel was just thinking how careless he’d been to miss that chance when he was prevailed upon to look at her ankle. As he bent over Rose and nervously probed the flesh above her foot with his stammering fingers, his coat fell open slightly and Rose could see into it, could see the crushed little flower hanging out of his inner pocket. Samuel never noticed; he was intent on keeping his features still, so his face would not betray how much he enjoyed the silk of the stockings between his skin and hers.

  For Rose he abandoned his city practice and moved to a small farming town, because she did not want to leave the place where she had grown up. Their pantry was always stocked with gifts from grateful neighbors, and Samuel bought Rose fine-quality fabrics for dresses and a baby grand piano for music, and rugs and lamps with rose-colored shades, all with the money his family had and very little with money he actually earned. Sam spent his time peering into inflamed red throats and between women’s opened laboring legs, and sometimes even into
the orifices of farm animals, while Rose tended her garden and wandered the forests and eventually gave birth to the miracle of Evie.

  He had no idea now how long Rose had been gone. He wandered through the rooms, and his gaze fell on the phone table. Had Rose written something on the paper there? He went over and picked it up, and then he found out where his wife had gone. He was stroking the hair of his beard with his free hand as he read, and he went on rubbing for a while as though polishing his chin, as though the motion would push the news into him through his skin.

  Sam went to the front hall to put on his things. It was too late to join the party that was now looking for Ben, but he could go on his own. He would go out right away and start his own search. Outdoors he’d be able to breathe. The idea of it would shrink, surely, just like everything else in the cold, and he’d be able to see around it. As Sam stepped out his front door, though, a black horse trotted up to his gate and a flustered rider dismounted and floundered up the snowy lawn.

  “Dr. Whiting, sir,” he gasped out, and as Sam could see who it was, he knew exactly why he was here.

  “It’s Mary’s time, sir. She’s awful bad. I’ve come to fetch you back for her.”

  With a sigh Sam put on his hat and followed Billy Thomson down the steps. His own trouble seemed to dissipate on the air, spreading out into vagueness around this sharper pinpoint of birth. He went to saddle his own bay mare. The horses both knew their way, and the men leaned over them silently. Sam was cursing the timing of this arrival of Billy’s child, all those months of waiting whittled down now unluckily into this day. This was their fifth, and every time Bill panicked just as he had with the first. Sam had no heart to tell him he doubted they would get there in time. Most likely the women would catch Mary’s baby as it slipped out, its path already forged by the four that came before it.