Still, I went to him the next day, and explained what had happened. He listened, and did me the courtesy of not laughin, although his mouth twitched a few times. I'm willin to sniculate that it did have its funny side--at least until last night it did--but not s'much when you had Hallie McCausland breathin down your neck.
"Yes, I can see how that would get your ma's goat," Pop said. "She was always a heller when someone tried to get the best of her. But for Christ's sake, Alden, it's only fireworks. When she sobers up she'll see that."
"I don't think so," I said, not wantin to add that Ma never really sobered up anymore, just went from tiddly to crocked to asleep to hungover and then back to tiddly again. Not that I was much better. "It ain't s'much the fireworks as it is that trumpet, you see. If she could shut up that fuckin trumpet on the Fourth of July, I think she'd be satisfied."
"Well, I can't help you," Pop said. "There's plenty of bigger fireworks out there for sale, but I won't truck in them. I don't want to lose my vendor's license, for one thing. And I don't want to see no one get hurt, that's another. Drunks shootin explosives is always a recipe for disaster. But if you're really determined, you ought to take a ride up to Indian Island and talk to a fella there. Great big Penobscot named Howard Gamache. Biggest goddam Indian in Maine, maybe in the whole world. Rides a Harley-Davidson and has feathers tattooed on his cheeks. He's what you might call connected."
Somebody connected! That's exactly what we needed! I thanked Pop, and wrote the name Howard Gamache in my notebook, and next April I took a ride up to Penobscot County with five hundred dollars cash in the glovebox of my truck.
I found Mr. Gamache sittin at the bar of the Harvest Hotel in Oldtown, and he was as big as advertised--six foot eight, I'd guess, and would weigh around three fifty. He listened to my tale of woe, and after I'd bought him a pitcher of Bud, which he drank down in less than ten minutes, he said, "Well, Mr. McCausland, let's you and me take a little jaunt up the road to my wigwam and discuss this in more detail."
He was ridin a Harley Softail, which is a mighty big sled, but when he was on it, that thing looked like one of the little bikes the clowns ride in the circus. Butt cheeks hung right down to the saddlebags, they did. His wigwam turned out to be a nice little two-story ranch with a pool out back for the kiddies, of which he had a passel.
No, Ardelle, the bike and the pool ain't particularly important to the story, but if you want it, you'll have to take it my way. And I find it interestin. There was even a home theater set up in the basement. Jeezly Crow, I felt like movin in.
The fireworks was in his garage under a tarp, all stacked up in wooden crates, and there was some pretty awesome stuff. "If you get caught with it," he said, "you never heard of Howard Gamache. Isn't that right?"
I said it was, and because he seemed like an honest enough fella who wouldn't screw me--at least not too bad--I asked him what five hundred dollars would buy. I ended up gettin mostly cakes, which are blocks of rockets with a single fuse. You light it, and up they go by the dozen. There was three cakes called Pyro Monkey, another two called Declaration of Independence, one called Psycho-Delick that shoots off big bursts of light that look like flowers, and one that was extra-special. I'll get to that.
"You think this stuff will shut down those dagos?" I asked him.
"You bet," Howard said. "Only as someone who prefers to be called a Native American rather than a redskin or a Tomahawk Tom, I don't care much for such pejorative terms as dagos, bog-trotters, camel jockeys, and beaners. They are Americans, even as you and I, and there's no need to denigrate them."
"I hear you," I said, "and I'll take it to heart, but those Massimos still piss me off, and if that offends you, it's a case of tough titty said the kitty."
"Understood, and I can fully identify with your emotional condition. But let me give you some advice, paleface: keep-um to speed limit going home. You don't want to get caught with that shit in your trunk."
When Ma saw what I'd bought, she shook her fists over her head and then poured us a couple of Dirty Hubcaps to celebrate. "When they experience these, they're gonna shit nickels!" she said. "Maybe even silver dollars! See if they don't!"
Only it didn't turn out that way. I guess you know that, don't you?
Come the Fourth of July last year, Abenaki Lake was loaded to the gunwales. Word had got around, you see, that it was the McCausland Yankees against the Massimo Dagos for the fireworks blue ribbon. Must have been six hundred people on our side of the lake. Not so many over on their side, but there was a bunch, all right, more than ever before. Every Massimo east of the Mississippi must have shown up for the oh-fourteen showdown. We didn't bother with piddling stuff like firecrackers and cherry bombs that time, just waited for deep dusk so we could shoot the big stuff. Ma n me had boxes with Chinese characters stacked on our dock, but so did they. The east shorefront was lined with little Massimos waving sparklers; looked like stars that had fallen to earth, they did. I sometimes think sparklers are enough, and this morning I sure wish we'd stuck to em.
Paul Massimo waved to us and we waved back. The idiot with the trumpet blew a long blast: Waaaaaah! Paul pointed to me, as if to say you first, monsewer, so I shot off a Pyro Monkey. It lit up the sky and everyone went aahhhh. Then one of Massimo's sons lit off something similar, except it was brighter and lasted a little longer. The crowd went ooooh, and off went the fuckin trumpet.
"Never mind the Funky Monkeys, or whatever they are," Ma said. "Give em the Declaration of Independence. That'll show em."
I did, and it was some gorgeous, but those goddam Massimos topped that one too. They topped everything we shot off, and every time theirs went brighter n louder, that asshole blew his trumpet. It pissed off Ma n me no end; hell, it was enough to piss off the pope. The crowd got one hell of a fireworks show that night, probably as good as the one they have in Portland, and I'm sure they went home happy, but there was no joy on the dock of the Mosquito Bowl, I can tell you that. Ma usually gets happy when she's in the bag, but she wasn't that night. It was full dark by then, all the stars out, and a haze of gunpowder driftin across the lake. We was down to our last and biggest item.
"Shoot it," Ma said, "and see if they can beat it. Might as well. But if he blows that friggin trumpet one more time, my head's gonna explode right off my shoulders."
Our last one--the extra-special--was called the Ghost of Fury, and Howard Gamache swore by it. "A beautiful thing," he told me, "and totally illegal. Stand back after you light it, Mr. McCausland, because it goes a gusher."
Goddam fuse was thick as your wrist. I lit it and stood back. For a few seconds after it burned down there was nothin, and I thought it was a dud.
"Well, don't that just impregnate the family dog," Ma said. "Now he'll blow that bastardly trumpet."
But before he could, the Ghost of Fury went off. First it was just a fountain of white sparks, but then it shot up higher and turned rose-pink. It started blowin off rockets that exploded in starbursts. By then the fountain of sparks on the end of our dock was at least twelve feet high and bright red. It shot off even more rockets, straight up into the sky, and they boomed as loud as a squadron of jets breakin the sound barrier. Ma covered her ears, but she was laughin fit to split. The fountain went down, then spurted up one last time--like an old man in a whorehouse, Ma said--and shot off this gorgeous red n yella flower into the sky.
There was a moment of silence--awed, don't you know--and then everybody on the lake started applaudin like crazy. Some people who was in their campers tooted their horns, which sounded mighty thin after all those bangs. The Massimos was applaudin too, which showed they was good sports, which impressed me, because you know folks who have to win at everything usually ain't. The one with the trumpet never took the damn thing out of its holster.
"We did it!" Ma shouted. "Alden, give your Ma a kiss!"
I did, and when I looked across the lake, I seen Paul Massimo standin at the end of his dock, in the light of those electric torches they h
ad. He put up one finger, as if to say, "Wait and watch." It gave me a bad feelin in the pit of my stomach.
The son without the trumpet--the one I judged might have a lick of sense--put down a launcher cradle, slow and reverent, like an altar boy puttin out the Holy Communion. Settin in it was the biggest fuckin rocket I ever seen that wasn't on TV at Cape Canaveral. Paul dropped down on one knee and put his lighter to the fuse. As soon as it started to spark, he grabbed both his boys and ran em right off the dock.
There was no pause, like with our Ghost of Fury. Fucker took off like Apollo 19, trailin a streak of blue fire that turned purple, then red. A second later the stars was blotted out by a giant flamin bird that covered the lake almost from one side to the other. It blazed up there, then exploded. And I'll be damned if little birds didn't come out of the explosion, shootin off in every direction.
The crowd went nuts. Them grown boys was huggin their father and poundin him on the back and laughin.
"Let's go in, Alden," Ma said, and she never sounded so sad since Daddy died. "We're beat."
"We'll get em next year," I said, pattin her shoulder.
"No," she said, "them Massimos will always be a step ahead. That's the kind of people they are--people with CONNECTIONS. We're just a couple of poor folks livin on a lucky fortune, and I guess that'll have to be enough."
As we went up the steps of our shitty little cabin, there come one final trumpet blast from the fine big house across the lake: Waaaa-aaaah! Made my head ache, it did.
Howard Gamache told me that last firework was called the Rooster of Destiny. He said he'd seen videos of em on YouTube, but always with people talkin Chinese in the background.
"How this Massimo gentleman got it into this country is a mystery to me," Howard said. This was about a month later, toward the end of last summer, when I finally got up enough ambition to make the drive up to his two-story wigwam on Indian Island and tell him what happened--how we give em a good battle but still come off on the short end when all was said and told.
"It's no mystery to me," I said. "His friends in China prob'ly threw it in as an extra with his last load of opium. You know, a little gift to say thanks for doin business with us. Have you got anything that'll top it? Ma's awful depressed, Mr. Gamache. She don't want to compete next year, but I was thinkin if there was anything . . . you know, the topper to top all toppers . . . I'd pay as much as a thousand dollars. It'd be worth it just to see my ma smilin on Fourth of July night."
Howard sat on his back steps with his knees stickin up around his ears like a couple of boulders--God, what a mighty man he was--and thought about it. Cogitated on it. Judged his way around it. At last he said, "I have heard rumors."
"Rumors about what?"
"About a special something called Close Encounters of the Fourth Kind," he said. "From a fellow I correspond with on the subject of gunpowder amusements. His native name is Shining Path, but mostly he goes by Johnny Parker. He's a Cayuga Indian, and he lives near Albany, New York. I could give you his email address, but he won't reply unless I email him first and tell him you're safe."
"Will you do that?" I asked.
"Of course," he said, "but first you must pay heap big wampum, paleface. Fifty bucks should do it."
Money passed from my small hand to his big one, he emailed Johnny Shining Path Parker, and when I got back to the lake and sent him an email of my own, he answered right back. But he wouldn't talk about what he called CE4 except in person, claimed the government read all Native American emails as a matter of course. I didn't have no argument with that; I bet those suckers read everyone's email. So we agreed to meet, and along about the first of October last year, I went up.
Accourse Ma wanted to know what sort of errand would take me all the way to upstate New York, and I didn't bother tellin her no made-up story, because she always sees through em and has since I was knee-high to a collie. She just shook her head. "Go on, if it'll make you happy," she said. "But you know they'll come back with somethin even bigger, and we'll be stuck listenin to that Eye-Tie cock-knocker blow his trumpet."
"Well, maybe," I said, "but Mr. Shining Path says this is the firework to end all fireworks."
As you now see, that turned out to be nothing but the truth.
I had a pretty drive, and Johnny Shining Path Parker turned out to be a nice fella. His wigwam was in Green Island, where the houses are almost as big as the Massimos' Twelve Pines, and his wife made one hell of an enchilada. I ate three with that hot green sauce and got the shits on the way home, but since that ain't part of the story and I can see Ardelle's gettin impatient again, I'll leave it out. All I can say is thank God for Handi-Wipes.
"CE4 would be a special order," Johnny said. "The Chinese make only three or four a year, in Outer Mongolia or someplace like that, where there's snow nine months of the year and the babies are purportedly raised with wolf cubs. Such explosive devices are usually shipped to Toronto. I guess I could order one and bring it in from Canada myself, although you'd have to pay for my gas and my time, and if I got caught, I'd probably end up in Leavenworth as a terrorist."
"Jesus, I don't want to get you in no trouble like that," I said.
"Well, I'm exaggerating a bit, maybe," he said, "but CE4's one hell of a firework. Never been one like it. I couldn't give you your money back if your pal across the lake happened to have something to beat it, but I'd give you back my profit on the deal. That's how sure I am."
"Besides," Cindy Shining Path Parker said, "Johnny loves an adventure. Would you like another enchilada, Mr. McCausland?"
I passed on that, which probably kep me from explodin somewhere in Vermont, and for awhile I almost forgot the whole thing. Then, just after New Year's--we're gettin close now, Ardelle, don't that make you happy?--I got a call from Johnny.
"If you want that item we were discussing last fall," he said, "I've got it, but it'll cost you two thousand."
I sucked in breath. "That's pretty steep."
"I can't argue with you there, but look at it this way--you white folks got Manhattan for twenty-four bucks, and we've been looking for payback ever since." He laughed, then said, "But speaking seriously now, and if you don't want it, that's fine. Maybe your buddy across the lake would be interested."
"Don't you ever," I said.
He laughed harder at that. "I have to tell you, this thing is pretty awesome. I've sold a lot of fireworks over the years, and I've never seen anything remotely like this."
"Like what?" I asked. "What is it?"
"You have to see for yourself," he said. "I have no intention of sending you a pitcher over the Internet. Besides, it doesn't look like much until it's . . . uh . . . in use. If you want to roll on up here, I can show you a video."
"I'll be there," I said, and two or three days later I was, sober and shaved and with my hair combed.
Now listen to me, you two. I ain't gonna make excuses for what I done--and you c'n leave Ma out of it, I was the one that got the damn thing, and I was the one who set it off--but I am gonna tell you that the CE4 I saw in that video Johnny showed me and the one I set off last night wasn't the same. The one in the video was a lot smaller. I even remarked on the size of the crate mine was in when Johnny and me put it in the back of the truck. "They sure must have put a lot of packing in there," I said.
"I guess they wanted to make sure nothing would happen to it in shipping," Johnny said.
He didn't know either, you see. Cindy Shining Path Parker asked if I didn't want to at least open the crate and have a look, make sure it was the right thing, but it was nailed up tight all over, and I wanted to get back before dark, on account of my eyes ain't as good as they used to be. But because I come here today determined to make a clean breast of it, I have to tell you that wasn't the truth. Evenin is my drinkin time, and I didn't want to miss any of it. That's the truth. I know that's kind of a sad way to be, and I know I have to do somethin about it. I guess if they put me in jail, I'll get a chance, won't I?
Me n Ma unnailed the crate the next day and took a look at what we'd bought. This was at the house in town, you understand, because we're talkin January, and colder than a witch's tit. There was some packin material, all right, Chinese newspapers of some kind, but not nearly so much as I expected. The CE4 was probably seven feet on the square, and looked like a package done up in brown paper, only the paper was kind of oily, and so heavy it felt more like canvas. The fuse was stickin out the bottom.
"Do you think it will really go up?" Ma asked.
"Well," I said, "if ours don't, what's the worst that can happen?"
"We'll be out two thousand bucks," Ma said, "but that ain't the worst. The worst'd be it rises up two or three feet and then fizzles into the lake. Followed by that young Eye-talian who looks like Ben Afflict blowin his trumpet."
We put it in the garage and there it stayed until Memorial Day, when we took it out to the lake. I didn't buy nothing else of a firework nature this year, not from Pop Anderson and not from Howard Gamache, either. We was all in on the one thing. It was CE4 or bust.
All right; here we are at last night. Fourth of July of oh-fifteen, never been nothin like it on Abenaki Lake and I hope there never will be again. We knew it had been a goddam dry summer, accourse we knew, but that never crossed our minds. Why would it? We were shootin over the water, weren't we? What could be safer?
All the Massimos was there and havin fun--playin their music and playin their games and cookin weenies on about five different grills and swimmin near the beach and divin off the float. Everyone else was there, too, on both sides of the lake. There was even some at the north and south ends, where it's all swampy. They were there to see this year's chapter of the Great Fourth of July Arms Race, Eye-Ties versus Yankees.
Dusk drew down and finally the wishin star come out, like she always does, and those electric torches at the end of the Massimo dock popped on like a couple of spotlights. Out onto it struts Paul Massimo, flanked by his two grown sons, and goddam if they weren't dressed like for a fancy country club dance! Father in a tuxedo, sons in white dinner jackets with red flowers in the lapels, the Ben Afflict-lookin one wearin his trumpet down low on his hip, like a gunslinger.