I had reached perhaps the midpoint of the plank ladder, breathing shallowly of the rising clouds of pulverized cement dust and carbon monoxide fumes, a subtle mixture that forms one of the more insidious anesthetics yet devised, dulling the senses and clouding the soul, when it happened. It was more felt, at first, than heard-a long, low gurgling sensation pushing up suddenly from the gut and exploding in the brain like some great comber of some ancient sea, on a lost, forgotten beach: KAARRROOOMMMMPPHHHHH!.
For a split second the great sound hung in mid-air and then, unthinkingly, my ancient GI reflexes working magically and smoothly, I hurled myself to the clapboards, digging in as I landed. The bombardment had begun!
I clung to the earth, waiting for the second round of the bracket, which should come, I hastily calculated, off to my right. Suddenly I became aware of an insistent rapping on the back of my neck as an elderly crane-like citizen behind me croaked: "Get up, you b.u.m. If you"re going to sleep on the sidewalk, at least find a doorway, you soak!"
He stepped over me and sheepishly I regained my feet. Up and down the line I saw other ex-GIs brushing themselves off and once again moving forward in the unending stream of Twentieth Century Man, bound for G.o.d knows where. My mind raced as I peered down through the haze of the great canyon of excavation that lay just beyond the barricades. And then I could smell it, an acrid, faint, delicious, familiar, naggingly pleasing scent-Dynamite! The real thing!
Minutes later I sat pensively at a tiny corner table of Miserables Miserables, waiting for my luncheon date to arrive and vaguely conscious of a difficult-to-define sense of nostalgic pleasure and euphoria. Could it be the b.l.o.o.d.y Charlie I was drinking? No, I had barely touched it. As I idly and comfortingly fingered the smooth, sleek surface of my Diners" Club card-my protection against the world-the way a gunfighter of old must have absently fondled his Smith & Wesson Thirty-Eight, I tried to a.n.a.lyze my sudden sense of warmth and well-being. It had started immediately after the blasting operation at the construction site. Could there be a connection? No man wants to admit that he is a secret Atom Bomb fan, so I hastily rejected this transient thought. Yet somehow I could not deny that the tiny whiff of blue smoke had awakened some ancient memory, some long-dormant pleasure. I absently munched one of the new No-Cal composition cashew nuts which are featured at the boite boite as I raked my memory for a clue. The pleasant sound of diners" voices mingled with the Muzak and the popping of corks. The sizzling of the grill and the hum of air-conditioning lulled me as the b.l.o.o.d.y Charlie began its soothing work. Out of the din, voices and sounds of the past emerged, dripping ooze and slime like some ancient creatures unearthed from long-sealed caverns. Dynamite! as I raked my memory for a clue. The pleasant sound of diners" voices mingled with the Muzak and the popping of corks. The sizzling of the grill and the hum of air-conditioning lulled me as the b.l.o.o.d.y Charlie began its soothing work. Out of the din, voices and sounds of the past emerged, dripping ooze and slime like some ancient creatures unearthed from long-sealed caverns. Dynamite!
Let"s admit it. There are few sounds more soul-satisfying, more frightening, more exciting than an explosion. Explosions of one kind or another have always been part of great Folk celebrations from weddings to Wars. I sipped my drink and mused on the first time I had heard that primal roar of exploding black powder. And then it hit me. My G.o.d! Tomorrow was the Fourth of July!
The Fourth of July! It had crept up on tiny cats" feet on the scale of the calendar, unnoticed, unsung, unbombarded. It was then that I knew where those pleasant tinglings of mingled regret and exhilaration that we call Nostalgia had come from. Yes, in just a few hours it would be the Glorious Fourth. And here I was without so much as a sparkler to my name. I ordered another drink and settled down comfortably into my soft eiderdown bed of remembrances of things past. There are times when you just have to let it go.
As I idly mulled the twin olives in my cla.s.sical Charlie, the Northern Indiana landscape of the late Depression era began to take form, shadowy and persistent, amid the green and gold bottles behind the mirrored bar directly ahead of me. The blackened stumps, snaggle-toothed and primal, of the steel mills and the oil refineries lay etched against the hazy gray-green horizon of the July skies of the Great Lakes. Somewhere off in the distance the construction crew set off another dull, thumping blast that jiggled the silverware on my table, and it all began to come back.
Dynamite, heat, and excitement were all intermingled in that Fourth of July ritual that has long since departed. What is there about a solid, molar-rattling explosion that sets the blood a-tingling and brings the roses to the cheeks? There are muddle-headed souls who will tell you over and over that Man is basically a peaceful and quiet creature, destined ultimately to while away his golden days strumming lutes, penning odes, and watching birds. I have never yet witnessed a turtle preparing to ignite the portentous fuse of a Cherry Bomb. No, it remained for Man to concoct black powder from the innocent elements of the earth and ultimately to split the atom, all in pursuit of that healing balm-the thundering report.
And nowhere was this particular pleasure more honored and indulged than in the mill towns of Northern Indiana. Even today there are countless veterans of those fireworks barrages-hearing partially gone, a high, thin, singing sound in the cranium, sporting stunted, stubbly eyebrows, vaguely jumpy from borderline sh.e.l.lshock-who search in vain for the Fireworks Stand to a.s.suage their deep hunger for the celebrating concussion, the better to honor our glorious American past.
The Fireworks Stand. Even setting the words down stark and simple on the page causes my hand to tremble and my brow to dampen in delicious fear, the sort of fear that only a kid who has lit a Five Incher under a Carnation milk can and has hurled himself p.r.o.ne upon the earth awaiting The End can know. Even the look look of cla.s.sical fireworks was magnificent! The Five Incher-hard, cool, rock-like cylinder of sinister jade green, its vicious red fuse aggressive and yet quiet cradled in the palm of the hand-is an experience once known never forgotten. of cla.s.sical fireworks was magnificent! The Five Incher-hard, cool, rock-like cylinder of sinister jade green, its vicious red fuse aggressive and yet quiet cradled in the palm of the hand-is an experience once known never forgotten.
The Cherry Bomb. Ah, what pristine geometric tensile beauty; a perfect orb, brilliant carmine red, packed chockablock with latent tenor and destruction. The Torpedo, an instrument malevolent and yet subtly complex, designed for hand-to-hand celebration. Many a grown man today carries in his shins a peppering of tiny round pebbles buried deep in the flesh from too close familiarity with the roaring Torpedo-a shrapnel victim of the Glorious Fourth. For the uninitiated I at this point must explain that the Torpedo was perhaps an inch high, a half-inch in circ.u.mference, symbolically striped in the colors of our country, made to be hurled against a brick wall or a pa.s.sing Hupmobile, a contact weapon of singular violence that sent its ignitors, tiny rock fragments, showering over an area of fifty yards or more.
The Pinwheel-an expensive device largely used for flamboyant show and yet responsible for some of the major conflagrations of the past. Whole blocks, and indeed in some cases entire towns, disappearing under the roaring flames to the applause of the mult.i.tude. I speak with more than average authority on these matters since my father, a genuinely dedicated fireworks maniac, owned and operated a Fireworks Stand every year during my larval stages.
The Depression lay over the land like a great numbing blanket of restlessness and frustration, but on the Fourth the sky would be filled with skyrockets, booming aerial bombs, and hand grenades, because n.o.body had anything else to do in those days. They could scratch, and make beer, and just stand around. Once in a while they"d go down to the Roundhouse and see if they could pick up an extra day somewhere, but mostly they"d just sit on the porch and chew tobacco and spit. That"s what the Depression was. One of the good things about the Depression, and why a lot of people look back on it with a nutty kind of nostalgia, is because n.o.body n.o.body made it in the Depression. So n.o.body had a sense of guilt. Goofing off was just a natural thing to do. In the Depression n.o.body did anything. It was a license to fool around, and they fooled around in big ways. made it in the Depression. So n.o.body had a sense of guilt. Goofing off was just a natural thing to do. In the Depression n.o.body did anything. It was a license to fool around, and they fooled around in big ways.
I remember guys sitting on their front porch, tossing dynamite-I mean blasting blasting dynamite!-out on the streets, just for kicks. Northern Indiana is full of primeval types who"ve drifted up from the restless hills of Kentucky and the gulches of Tennessee, bringing with them suitcases filled with dynamite saved over from the time Grandpaw blew up the stumps in the Back Forty. And they brought it to the city with them, because you never can tell, and since they never had any money for fireworks there was only one thing to do. And they did it. They would sit on their porch on a quiet, hot, Fourth of July, rocking back and forth in the swing, breaking dynamite sticks, which come about six inches long, into sizes approximating a green Two Incher, like busting off a chunk of a Baby Ruth candy bar. Old Dad, his cigar clamped in his teeth, would Scotch-tape a little fuse on the end, raise it with suitable flourishes to his cigar-b.u.t.t end- dynamite!-out on the streets, just for kicks. Northern Indiana is full of primeval types who"ve drifted up from the restless hills of Kentucky and the gulches of Tennessee, bringing with them suitcases filled with dynamite saved over from the time Grandpaw blew up the stumps in the Back Forty. And they brought it to the city with them, because you never can tell, and since they never had any money for fireworks there was only one thing to do. And they did it. They would sit on their porch on a quiet, hot, Fourth of July, rocking back and forth in the swing, breaking dynamite sticks, which come about six inches long, into sizes approximating a green Two Incher, like busting off a chunk of a Baby Ruth candy bar. Old Dad, his cigar clamped in his teeth, would Scotch-tape a little fuse on the end, raise it with suitable flourishes to his cigar-b.u.t.t end-bbzzzzzzzzz-hold it aloft for a split second, flip it back by the garage, and dive for the floor.
KKKAAAABBBOOOOOOMM!!.
Rufe is celebrating his ancient heritage. Crockery would crash for blocks around, old ladies would be hurled into the s...o...b..ll bushes, but no one seemed to care. After all, the Fourth is the Fourth. There would be a slight delay as Rufe fused another nuclear bomb, and: BAAARRROOOOOOOM!.
Tin cups would rattle for miles around, windows shatter and smash.
Dynamite was the milk of life to the average hillbilly of the day. He celebrated with it, feuded with it, and fished with it. The Sporting instinct runs strong in the hills. When the fishing season would open, the river would literally be aboil with TNT.
POOOOOOOOOOMMMM!!.
An underwater explosion has its own peculiar excitement, a kind of long, drawn-out subterranean gurgle, and then the air for miles around would be filled with catfish, a thundercloud of sunfish drifting over the county for twenty minutes or more, hundreds of the Sporting Elite fielding them in bushel baskets.
The more civilized celebrants, however, on the Fourth, shot their Relief check in one orgy of fireworks buying. Fireworks come in a number of exotically lethal varieties. Among them was the cla.s.sical Dago Bomb. This was never construed as an anti-Italian name, being more pro than anything else. The Dago Bomb was the ne plus ultra ne plus ultra of the fireworks world. A true thing of beauty and symmetry, it came in several sizes, four to be exact: the Five Inch, the Eight Inch, the Ten Inch, and the Sure Death. In more effete circles it was known as an Aerial Bomb, but among real Fireworks fans it was most often known as the Dago Heister. It actually looked like those giant non-existent firecrackers that occasionally show up in cartoons, a red, white, and blue tube with a wooden base stained dark green, a long red fuse, and the instructions printed on the bottom: of the fireworks world. A true thing of beauty and symmetry, it came in several sizes, four to be exact: the Five Inch, the Eight Inch, the Ten Inch, and the Sure Death. In more effete circles it was known as an Aerial Bomb, but among real Fireworks fans it was most often known as the Dago Heister. It actually looked like those giant non-existent firecrackers that occasionally show up in cartoons, a red, white, and blue tube with a wooden base stained dark green, a long red fuse, and the instructions printed on the bottom: "Place upright in a clear, un.o.bstructed area. After igniting, stand well back. Not recommended for children. The manufacturer a.s.sumes absolutely no responsibility for this device."
Theoretically this infernal machine was to be lit by an expert hand. It would then explode with the first, or minor, explosion, which propelled an aerial charge of pure white TNT into the ambient air, theoretically vertical, for several hundred feet, and then-Devastation!-not once but several times, depending on the size of the Dago Bomb in question. It was not cheap, the smallest going for fifty cents and the largest for around three dollars, which in the days of the Depression was truly a capital investment in destruction.
The legends surrounding this mysterious weapon are countless. The mere sight of one of the larger specimens on the shelves of a Fireworks Stand sent waves of fear and nervous excitement through the Sparkler Buyers. It was truly the Big Time.
It was a Dago Bomb that played a key role in the legend that was Ludlow Kissel. Mr. Kissel had found his true medium in THE THE Depression itself. Kissel worked in Idleness the way other artists worked in clay or marble. G.o.d only knows what would have happened to him were it not for the Depression. He was a true child of his time. He was also a magnificent Souse. The word "Alcoholic" had not yet come into common usage, at least not in the Steel towns of Indiana. Nor were there any lurking Freudian fears or explanations for the cla.s.sical appet.i.te for Depression itself. Kissel worked in Idleness the way other artists worked in clay or marble. G.o.d only knows what would have happened to him were it not for the Depression. He was a true child of his time. He was also a magnificent Souse. The word "Alcoholic" had not yet come into common usage, at least not in the Steel towns of Indiana. Nor were there any lurking Freudian fears or explanations for the cla.s.sical appet.i.te for potage potage that Kissel nourished. He was a drunk, and knew it. He just liked the stuff, and glommed onto it whenever the occasion demanded. And if the Store-Boughten variety of Lightning was not available, he concocted his own, using raisins, apricots, Fleischmann"s yeast, mola.s.ses, and dead flies. that Kissel nourished. He was a drunk, and knew it. He just liked the stuff, and glommed onto it whenever the occasion demanded. And if the Store-Boughten variety of Lightning was not available, he concocted his own, using raisins, apricots, Fleischmann"s yeast, mola.s.ses, and dead flies.
Nominally, Kissel worked in the roundhouse, and for over thirty years had been on the Extra Board, being called only in extreme emergencies, which occurred roughly once every other month or so. He invariably celebrated a day of work by holing up in the Bluebird Inn for perhaps a week, and then would return home, propelling himself painfully forward on one foot and one knee. He was compensating for a tilted horizon. The sound of Kissel crawling up the gravel driveway next to his house was a familiar one, and it took him sometimes upwards of three hours to make it from the street to the back porch. At 3 A.M A.M., lying in my dark bedroom, it was kind of comforting to hear Mr. Kissel struggling up the steps of his back porch. Inching painfully step by step.
Thump (One) Long pause....
Thump (Two) Longer pause....
ThuuUUMP (He"s made three in a row!) (He"s made three in a row!) Split-second pause....
Dump DUNK b.u.mP K-THUMP DUNK b.u.mP K-THUMP!
He"s back at the bottom.
Many"s the time I"ve slipped off to sleep with this familiar sound of human endeavor battling over overwhelming odds-Kissel trying to make the kitchen door. And then the voice of Mrs. Kissel, a large flower-print ap.r.o.ned lady who read True Romances True Romances voraciously, would call out: voraciously, would call out: "Watch the steps, Lud. They"re tricky."
She loved him.
Kissel, one Fourth of July, played a leading role in a patriotic tableau which is even today spoken of in hushed, reverential tones in the area. It was a particularly steamy, yeasty, h.e.l.lish July. The houseflies clung to the screen doors and the mosquitoes hummed in great whirling clouds in the poplar trees. It was in such weather that Mr. Kissel reached his apogee. He was not a Winter Souse. There was something about the birds and the bees and the hot sun that set off a spark in Mr. Kissel"s blood and stoked an insatiable thirst for the healing grape. His stocky, overalled figure reeling through the twilight, leaving a wake of flickering fireflies, was as much a part of the Summer landscape as the full golden moon. Parishioners sprinkling their lawns and s...o...b..ll bushes would nod familiarly to him as he wove through the fine spray of their bra.s.s nozzles.
The Fourth in question dawned hot and jungle-like, with an overhang of black, lacy storm clouds. In fact, a few warm immense drops sprinkled down through the dawn haze. I know, because I was up and ready for action. Few kids slept late on the Fourth. Even as the stars were disappearing and the sun was edging over the Lake, the first Cherry Bombs cracked the stillness and the first old ladies dialed the police. Carbide cannons which had gathered dust in bas.e.m.e.nts for a year roared out, greeting the dawn. And by 7 A.M A.M. the first dozen pairs of eyebrows were blackened and singed, and already the wounded were being b.u.t.tered with Unguentine and sent back into the fray. Long lines of overheated w.i.l.l.ys Knights, Ess.e.xes, and Pierce Arrows inched toward the beaches. Babies cried, mothers wept, and husbands swore. Parades fitfully broke out, and the White Sox prepared to battle it out in the big Fourth of July doubleheader with the St. Louis Browns, Futility meeting Hopelessness head on. The sun rose higher and higher and at its zenith blazed down with an intensity of purpose and effectiveness equal to its best work in Equatorial Africa. The asphalt simmered quietly and stuck to the tires and the tennis shoes of the pa.s.sing parade. Lilac bushes drooped fragrantly and the cicadas screamed from the cottonwoods. Through it all the steady, rolling barrage of exploding black powder in one form or another paid homage to our War of Independence.
As the day wore on, this barrage grew in intensity, because all true fireworks nuts learned from infanthood the art of rationing and husbanding the ammunition for the crucial moment, which came always after dark.
Kissel had not made his appearance throughout the long morning and early afternoon. He was undoubtedly stoking his private furnace in preparation for his gala gala, which, when it came, was worth waiting for. Shortly after noon a few drops of rain sprinkled down, just enough to dampen the shirt and the rosebushes, but not the spirits. Little did we realize that we were shortly to be the observers of a scene that would be discussed and recounted through the long Winter months of years to come. The event became known simply as Kissel"s Dago Bomb.
The White Sox and the Brownies had painfully worked their way into the top of the Third of the first game, a scoreless tie, when Kissel appeared on the shimmering horizon, weaving spectacularly and carrying a large paper bag as carefully as a totally committed drunk can. Kissel was about to celebrate the founding of our nation, the nation which had provided such a bounteous life for him and his.
At first no one paid much attention to the struggling figure as it inched its way from lamppost to lamppost and fireplug to fireplug. Little girls burned sparklers on porches, and I was carefully de-pleating a string of Chinese ladyfingers. These are tiny firecrackers with pleated fuses, all woven together, and designed for the rich and profligate to fire off simultaneously by simply lighting the main fuse. No kid in his right mind ever did that that, but instead we carefully disengaged, fuse by fuse, the ladyfingers and fired them off one by one, under garbage cans, on porches, and behind dogs. My mother, at regular intervals, called from the kitchen window the Fourth of July watch cry of all mothers: "Be careful! You"re going to lose an eye if you"re not careful!" This was, of course, purely ritualistic, and was only a minor annoyance. Flick had already suffered a flesh wound of a routine nature, his right hand was swathed in grease-soaked gauze, the result of demonstrating that he could hold a Three Incher in his hand when it went off, and still survive. He was now back on the scene, working as a lefty. In short, it was a Fourth like all other Fourths, up to the moment that Kissel took his stance.
He had disappeared into his house to prepare for his ma.s.sive statement of Patriotism. Shortly afterward he reappeared on the front porch and stumbled down the steps, carrying in his right hand the largest Dago Bomb that had ever been seen in the neighborhood. It was a Dago Heister of truly awesome stature, being fully a foot and a half high and a good three inches in diameter, and was the first all-black Dago Bomb anyone had ever seen. This point has been argued over many a cold Wintry afternoon. Some reports have it that Kissel"s Dago Bomb was not a Dago Bomb at all, but some sort of mortar sh.e.l.l. Others maintain that it was indeed a Dago Bomb, but of a foreign make, possibly Chinese, as the somber menacing color was highly unorthodox. Suffice it to say that no one ever really determined just where Kissel obtained the weapon, or its true nature, as Kissel himself was hazy on most details of his life, and this was no exception. His only comment later, which was never disputed, was: "I sure got one!"
When Kissel emerged from his front door and came down the steps carrying his work of the Devil, the neighborhood almost magically knew that something big was about to happen. Sparklers flickered out; kids ran through vacant lots and over driveways; heads appeared at windows. The crowd gathered. Kissel, with that peculiar deliberateness of the perpetually fogbound, laboriously prepared to detonate the black beauty. He placed it dead in the center of the concrete roadway and stood back to survey the scene, weaving slightly as he worked. The crowd drew back and watched, silently, excitement hanging over the mult.i.tude in a thin blue haze. Fireworks of that magnitude rarely were seen and commanded instant respect. The ebony monster stood bolt upright, silently, with a cool quality of the truly lethal; understated but potent.
Shimmering waves of heat caused the scene to take on a strange unreal, flickering quality. The neighborhood fell silent, and only the dull mutterings of distant fire barrages broke the stillness. A few errant drops of tepid rain sprinkled the concrete as we waited. The skies overhead were gray and threatening, with ragged edges of black cloud shimmering in the July heat.
Kissel, at Center Stage, struggled to find a match the way drunks invariably do, going through pocket after pocket after pocket; fumblingly, maddeningly, and finding only pencil stubs and bra.s.s keys. It seemed to go on forever until finally someone-this point later was also much in dispute; no one quite knew who actually handed him the book of matches-solved the problem. Kissel took the book of matches in hand, paused for a moment, and belched, a deep, round, satisfying, shuddering burp of the sort that can only come from a vast internal lake of green beer. The crowd applauded and shifted impatiently, all eyes riveted on the dull black menace that stood with such dignity in the center of the concrete roadway.
Finally Kissel struck a match, which instantly went out. He struck another. It too flickered and died. Another and another. There was, I might add, a slight breeze which puffed fitfully from the Northwest. The audience grew restive, but no one dared leave. In fact, more viewers of this historic event were arriving by the minute. Kissel, as is so often the case with the ma.s.sive drunk, seemed totally unaware of the drama he was creating and with maniacal intensity struggled with his match-book, lighting match after match. Suddenly, out of the crowd, a kid darted, an experienced detonator of high explosives of all sorts, who shoved into Kissel"s palsied hand a stick of briskly smoldering punk. The kid, according to witnesses who testified later, uttered one word: "Here," then turned, and scurried back into the throng and into the pages of local Folk history forever.
Kissel, thinking at first he had been given a cigar, gazed at it numbly for a moment or two and then dimly perceived that here was the means of lighting the fuse of the colossal black Dago Bomb.
The fuse on this type of insanity is of the coated variety, and in this case was about three inches long, a black, stiff, powder-impregnated length of fiber. It doesn"t take much to light them, and once lit, the die is cast. Kissel shuffled forward, punk in hand, and made several futile pa.s.ses at the fuse, the magnificent bomb remaining aloof and cool throughout. With each pa.s.s the crowd retreated, and then, with the inevitability of Greek drama, in the muttering silence the telltale hiss sounded forth clear and unmistakable. The fuse was lit!
Immediately the a.s.semblage rolled back in a mighty wave, turned and waited while Kissel continued to attempt to light the fuse, totally unaware that time was growing short. Someone called out: "Kissel! Hey Kissel, for G.o.d"s sake, it"s lit!"
Kissel raised his head questioningly and said: "What"s lit?"
The ominous hiss continued and then, suddenly and without warning, stopped. Occasionally these fuses are tricky, and extremely dangerous. They have been known to lie dormant like this for hours, seemingly extinguished for no good cause. Obviously this black menace was one of the treacherous.
Kissel returned to his fight, again touching punk to fuse. And this time the fuse, in its unpredictable way, hissed frantically. Kissel, at last seeing that his monster was was lit, attempted his getaway. He reeled in a half-circle, befuddled, trailing punk smoke behind him and then, staggering forward, knocked the black monster over on its side-hissing fiercely with only seconds remaining! lit, attempted his getaway. He reeled in a half-circle, befuddled, trailing punk smoke behind him and then, staggering forward, knocked the black monster over on its side-hissing fiercely with only seconds remaining!
The crowd, seeing this catastrophe unreeling before its eyes, to a man hit the dirt. Those on the fringes dove into s...o...b..ll bushes; others simply moaned piteously and dug in. It was good training, as events turned out, for later years.
The Dago Bomb lay on its side, its ugly snout pointing toward the houses which lay across the lawns 200 feet or so away. Cooler members of the mob shouted to those in the houses. "Look out, it"s coming! Close your windows!" The fuse sputtered on.
Kissel himself, now aware of the nature of the rapidly approaching catastrophe, made a futile but certainly courageous attempt to right the bomb. Someone yelled: "Get down, Kissel, you"ll get killed!"
Kissel fell over backward and lay flattened out on the concrete, waiting for the call of his Maker.
Then it happened. There are events which lend themselves readily to the descriptive phrase; the words of pen or tongue, and then there are things which happen that cannot be adequately communicated. The incident of Kissel"s Dago Bomb must be cla.s.sified as one of the truly indescribable. Suffice it to say that the bomb was well made and of an order of efficiency that fireworks manufacturers rarely achieve. With a definite clipped, stinging report the aerial bomb, lying horizontally on its side, propelled its deadly cartridge of dynamite out along the earth, skipping, humming, singing in an instantaneous trajectory that struck terror into the very marrow of the bones of those fortunate enough to be on the scene. This Dago Bomb was obviously designed to send its aerial charge at least 500 feet into the air. For an instant or so we were not aware of what sort of aerial charge it was prepared to deliver. We soon found out.
The cartridge, which seemed abnormally large as it emerged from the black maw of Kissel"s Folly, skimmed over the sidewalk, parting the spectators like the Red Sea. Over the lawn and the driveway, and with a sharp, audible "click" and whistling sizzle, under Kissel"s front porch. And for a long, pendulous moment the universe stood still. Fingernails clawed the earth, heads burrowed into hedges.
KAA-ROOOM!.
The first thunderous explosion rocked the neighborhood. The slats of Kissel"s porch bellowed outward; the floor tilted instantly downward. A great yellow, swirling cloud of dust rose over the lilac bushes. A second or two pa.s.sed as an eternity, and then another, and louder, detonation thundered over the landscape: KA-KAA-BAA-ROOOM!.
This time it caved in the rose trellis of the house next door to Kissel"s. The crowd heaved and dug deeper as two more giant explosions-KAA-RAAA-BOOM! BOOM!-sounded almost as one, these two under Mr. Strickland"s Pontiac.
A heavy cloud of dust swirled for a moment and all was still, except for the pattering of the quiet raindrops.
Kissel slowly pulled himself to his knees and made his statement, which is even today part of that great legend.
"My G.o.d, what a doozy!"
Kissel had said it for all of us. As the crowd slowly got to its feet amid the quiet tinkling of gla.s.s and the heavy, sensual smell of oxidized dynamite, they were aware that they had been witness to History.
I idly stirred my third b.l.o.o.d.y Charlie as off in the middle distance another m.u.f.fled blast bloomphed and jiggled the bottles behind the bar. Kissel faded back into his landscape and I pensively chewed a cashew nut as I vainly struggled to return to the Here and Now. After all, fireworks, we all know, are dangerous and childish playthings that have no place in the hard-hitting, On-The-Go Male"s life of today. A pa.s.sing cab sent a reflected shaft of light across the mirror behind the bar. It broke into a thousand colors amid the bottles, and subtly I was reminded of yet another historic moment in the annals of the Fourth of July celebrations. Those colored lights reminded me irresistibly of my father and the time the Roman Candle struck back.
The Roman Candle is a truly n.o.ble and inspired piece of the pyrotechnician"s art, being a long slender wand that spews forth colored, flaming b.a.l.l.s that arch high into the midnight sky, one after the other, with magnificent effect. It is held in the hand, and is one of the few pieces of fireworks that bring out talent and skill on the part of the operator. The Roman Candle is graded according to the number of fireb.a.l.l.s it can discharge, ranging from eight to, in some cases, as high as two dozen, but these are very rare and expensive. There are few experiences that rival for sheer ecstatic pleasure and total, unadulterated joy the feel of a Roman Candle in full bloom, sending its fireb.a.l.l.s up into the dark heavens with that distinctive-Plock-ssssssss-Plock-ssssssssPlock sound, and the slight but sensual recoil as each colored light arches heavenward. My father was unquestionably one of the great Roman Candle men of his time. That is, until that awful night when he met a Roman Candle that was fully his match, if not more.
He was so irresistibly drawn to Fireworks that, as I have mentioned, he became the proprietor of a Fireworks Stand early in my youth, and this made him a marked man in the neighborhood. A Fireworks Stand is a unique commercial establishment that has, like the May fly, a short but very merry life. For those who have never seen a Fireworks Stand a brief description would not be too far amiss. They were usually wooden stands, ex-fruit dispensaries, or what-have-you, covered with red, white, and blue bunting, over which a large red-on-white sign simply stated FIREWORKS FIREWORKS. The interior of these stands was usually a blazing inferno because the July sun knows no mercy. They were dusty and hot, but the shelves were lined with the greatest a.s.sortment of bliss and ecstasy this side of the Biltmore bar. s.p.a.ce does not allow a full description of all these magnificent creations. The Mount Vesuvius, for example, a silver cone that when lit and placed on the ground spewed forth a great shower of gold, blue, and white sparks high into the air, emulating the eruption of its namesake. The racks of slender, sinuous Roman Candles, of several calibers, and the lordly monarch of them all, the Skyrocket. Skyrockets were available in a wide variety of potency and weight, just as the rocketry of our s.p.a.ce program of today. The tiny twenty-five-center hardly larger than a Five Incher, wired to a yellow pine stick topped with a red nose cone, was made to be launched from an upright, empty quart milk bottle, and on up the scale to the big Five Dollar Rocket that stood a full four feet and was launched from a special angle-iron and handled with extreme care, it being possible to bring down a pa.s.sing DC-3 with the proper hand on the sights.
The Pinwheels also came in many sizes and colors and could, if misused, be spectacularly disastrous. I personally saw one Pinwheel climb right up the side of a garage, over the roof, and spin a block and a half down the alley before it finally burnt itself out, and then only after burning down 300 feet of fence and two chicken coops.
There were many other forms of fireworks of a lesser nature, such as Red Devils, which were a particularly nasty piece of business, being red paper-covered tablets designed to be scratched on the pavement and ground under heel to a sputtering, hissing, general nastiness. They did not explode; merely hissed and burned and gave stupendous hotfeet to anyone who happened to step on them. Of course there were the more prosaic Firecrackers and Cherry Bombs of all sizes and varying degrees of destructiveness, and the odds and ends for grandmothers, girls, and smaller kids; the Sparklers, the Cap Guns, and the strange little white tablets, aspirin-size, that when lit produced a long, sinuously climbing white ash and were called "Snakes." All of these and more my father dispensed over the counter from his Fireworks Stand out on the state highway, where the heat waves rose and fell and the Big Time Spenders bought the stuff by the bags full for their blondes and their egos.
I was considered unbelievably lucky that my Old Man not only owned a Fireworks Stand with all that great stuff on the shelves, but that I actually was allowed to slave away my life in it. Some of my golden moments were spent dispensing Torpedoes and Cherry Bombs and black powder Five Inchers to various slope-browed delinquents of all ages on long, hot, late June and early July afternoons when other kids were out hitting out flies and fistfighting.
As the actual Fourth drew closer, our stock of fireworks slowly dwindled until the actual day of the Fourth itself, our peak moment. Fireworks Stands work strictly on speculation and my father ordered his stuff from the General Motors of the fireworks world, an outfit called the Excelsior Fireworks Corporation. They did not take any unsold material back, which meant that as the Fourth drew to a close what was on the shelves was ours to shoot, to explode, to detonate, to revel in, to memorialize America"s struggle for Independence.
It was the Depression, of course, and few families had more than a couple of dollars or so to spend on gunpowder, and our entire neighborhood would wait for our return near midnight from the closed stand on the last moments of the Fourth of July. About 11:30 P.M P.M., the sky above filled with bursting aerial bombs and Skyrockets, and off in the distance the rattle of Cherry Bombs and Musketry thrumming darkly, my father would say: "Let"s close up," and immediately begin to load what was left of our stock into the Oldsmobile. Usually we had left a few of the greatest, heaviest, and most expensive pieces as well as several pounds of torpedoes and Sons O"Guns, a few huge rockets, and a couple dozen big Pinwheels and a rack or two of heavy-caliber Roman Candles.
My Old Man, eyes gleaming, cheeks flushed, would hurl us homeward through the dark, on his way to the most glorious moment of his entire year. He was in the saddle and was prepared to split the skies with a shower of sparks and fireb.a.l.l.s and the eardrums of the neighbors with giant Dago Bombs. Every year the neighbors waited for this great moment, and the Old Man knew it. He was a magnificent sight, surrounded by boxes of ammunition as he singlehandedly bombarded the heavens on behalf of Freedom and the Stars And Stripes. He was a true artist of pyrotechnics, and rose to his absolute fullness of artistic power when clutching a Roman Candle, his body swaying sinuously with the innate rhythm of the born Roman Candle Shooter as he sent ball after ball arcing higher and higher into the midnight skies, to the roar of the crowd.
Fourth of July was almost always a day of intense, ragged excitement for everyone, usually skirting danger on one side and ecstatic celebration on the other. It caused a kind of homicidal recklessness to set in to the Individual, and certainly the Ma.s.s. The night my father encountered his devilish, avenging Roman Candle was no exception. All day cars had carried off great loads of our wares, but now it was over, and the neighborhood was about to witness my father"s annual debauch. They stood on porches and in driveways and watched from windows as in the vacant lot on the corner my father hauled out his boxes of surplus fireworks.
He programmed his displays like a true showman, starting off with a few nondescript Pinwheels and Mount Vesuviuses, gradually working up through the lesser Skyrockets and Aerial Bombs to his final statement, a brace of great Roman Candles, twenty-four-ball beauties fully five feet in length and two inches in diameter; spectacular examples of the ancient art of fireworks.
I stood in the darkness with my brother and the other a.s.sembled urchins of the neighborhood, watching my father in his finest hour. He was ten feet tall, at least, the biggest father in miles around, until that incredible moment the Roman Candle struck back.
The applause had grown from stage to stage, through the Skyrockets, and now he stood in the center of the arena, the flickering lights of distant aerial displays outlining him against the night sky as he took his last two magnificent Roman Candles that he had saved purposely for the last, the largest and most powerful of the lot. He was one of the few Roman Candle men who ever dared to use both hands simultaneously, timing each ball to rotate one with the other, thereby achieving an almost continuous display of spectacular Roman Candle artistry.
It was now no more than a minute or two before midnight, and another Fourth of July would be history. He was a stickler for time, and the dramatic effect. Carefully, and of course theatrically milking the moment for all it was worth, he lit both Roman Candles, held his elbows sharply out from his body as they hissed briefly. The crowd surged forward, waiting for his usual masterful display. They knew this was his Grand Finale.
The first ball-PLOCK-arched green and sparkling from the left hand, high up over the telephone wires and toward a distant cloud, PLOCK PLOCK-the right hand spit a golden comet. My father, his left hand spinning simultaneously, sent it even higher than the first. His timing was magnificent! PLOCK PLOCK-the left hand shot a scarlet streak upward even higher, PLOCK PLOCK-again the right hand, PLOCK PLOCK-now they were coming faster and faster as my Old Man picked up the beat, and the crowd sensed a performance in progress that was to become cla.s.sical in its execution.
On the far horizon the steel mills caught the reflected light of the flickering lightning of a gathering summer storm, PLOCK- PLOCK-my father sent another ball blazing white into the northern skies, PLOCK PLOCK-a blue one, this time toward the Big Dipper. PLOCK PLOCK-a green arrow darted toward the moon. The audience swayed in unison as my father, both arms weaving magically, the beat and the pulse of his synchronized Roman Candles paid homage to General Washington and the Continental Congress; the Boston Tea Party and the Minutemen. It was almost midnight now and my father, instinctively showing the great finesse and technique of a born Roman Candle Beethoven, knew that he was down to the last two b.a.l.l.s.
PLOCK-the right hand sent a yellow star into the firmament. PLOCK PLOCK-the left. And then something was wrong. The left-hand Roman Candle faltered. A few tiny sparks sizzled briefly. He spun the tube out and upward again; down, out and upward, meanwhile the right-hand weapon-PLOCK-sent its pellet upward. Suddenly, without warning an alien sound: K-tunk!
And from the south end of the left-hand Roman Candle a large red ball emerged. From the wrong end! He leaped high, but it was too late. The ball skittered along his forearm, striking his elbow sharply, and disappeared into the short sleeve of his Pongee sport shirt!
The crowd gasped. A few women screamed. Children suddenly cried aloud as my father, showing the presence of mind of a great actor in the midst of catastrophe, shot his final ball from his right hand toward the North Star, as simultaneously the red ball reappeared from between his shoulder blades, his Pongee shirt bursting into spectacular flames. With a bellow he raced up the sidewalk, over the lawn, and trailing smoke and flames he disappeared into the house. A brief second of silence, and the sound of the shower could be heard roaring full blast from the darkened home.
Stunned for an instant the crowd remained silent, but then loosed a great roar of applause. They knew they had witnessed the finest performance of a great artist. Midnight tolled, and the Fourth was over.
"Would you care to order, sir?"
I was jerked back into the present by the waiter, who had shoved a huge menu in front of me.
"I guess so," I answered, "it looks like my date is not going to show."
It was just as well. Outside in the clanging street the blasting continued, and here in Les Miserables des Frites Les Miserables des Frites the bottles rattled. I sat quietly for a moment and watched the heat shimmer on the taxicabs outside, and then, raising what remained of my Charlie, I said to myself: the bottles rattled. I sat quietly for a moment and watched the heat shimmer on the taxicabs outside, and then, raising what remained of my Charlie, I said to myself: "Well, here"s to the Fourth," and began to read the menu. It was time to eat.
XVII
I SHOW OFF I SHOW OFF Flick looked puzzled.
"A b.l.o.o.d.y Charlie? How the h.e.l.l do you make a b.l.o.o.d.y Charlie?"
"You mean you don"t serve b.l.o.o.d.y Charlies here?"
Flick rummaged under the bar and finally found his Bartender"s Guide Bartender"s Guide.
"Forget it. You will not find it listed in that rag."
I could see that Flick"s professional curiosity was piqued.
"Do you mean a b.l.o.o.d.y Mary?" Mary?"
"No, I said a b.l.o.o.d.y Charlie. Charlie, as in Charlie Company. If I recall rightly, Flick, you were in the Artillery. "C" for Charlie."
"Well, all right, how do you make a b.l.o.o.d.y Charlie?" He sounded skeptical.
"Okay. If you have the makings, I"ll be glad to whip us up a couple."