In God we trust_ all others pay cash - Jean Shepherd [51]
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., 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!)
Split-second pause.…
Dump DUNK BUMP 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 aproned lady who read True Romances 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, hellish 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 snowball bushes would nod familiarly to him as he wove through the fine spray of their brass 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 basements for a year roared out, greeting the dawn. And by 7 A.M. the first dozen pairs of eyebrows were blackened and singed, and already the wounded were being buttered with Unguentine and sent back into the fray. Long lines of overheated Willys Knights, Essexes, 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 passing 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, which, when it came, was worth waiting for. Shortly after noon a few drops of rain sprinkled