—Forged, tempered, and burnished by a master craftsman in Pittsburgh, my eye, I muttered.
Next, I went in search of some genuine tools. But after opening every kitchen drawer and rummaging through every closet, I proceeded to the mudroom, where I sifted through every cubbyhole and basket to no avail. For a moment, I considered shooting the safe with one of the rifles, but given my luck, I’d probably be hit by a ricochet.
So I went down to the dock, where Woolly was admiring the view.
—Hey, Woolly, I called from dry land. Do you know if there’s a hardware store in the neighborhood?
—What’s that? he asked turning around. A hardware store? I’m not sure. But there’s a general store about five miles up the road.
—Perfect. I shouldn’t be long. You need anything?
Woolly thought about it for a moment, then shook his head.
—I’ve got everything I need, he said with a Woolly sort of smile. I’m just going to wander around a bit and unpack my things. Then I thought I might take a little nap.
—Why not? I said. You’ve earned it.
* * *
? ? ?
Twenty minutes later, I was roaming the aisles of the general store thinking they must call it that because it generally has everything but what you’re looking for. It was like someone had tipped a house on its side and shaken it until everything that wasn’t nailed to the carpet came tumbling out the door: spatulas, oven mitts, and egg timers; sponges, brushes, and soaps; pencils, pads, and erasers; yo-yos and rubber balls. In a state of consumer exasperation, I finally asked the proprietor if he had any sledgehammers. The best he could do was a ball-peen hammer and a set of screwdrivers.
When I got back to the house, Woolly was already upstairs, so I returned to the office with my tools. I must have banged away on the face of that thing for about an hour with nothing to show for it but some chicken-scratched metal and a sweat-soaked shirt.
The next hour I spent searching the office for the combination. I figured a wily old moneymaker like Mr. Wolcott wouldn’t be so careless as to leave the combination of his safe to the vicissitudes of memory. Especially considering that he lived into his nineties. He must have written it down somewhere.
Naturally enough, I started with his desk. First, I went through the drawers looking for a diary or address book where an important number might be logged on the final page. Then I pulled out the drawers and flipped them over to see if he had written it down on one of the undersides. I looked under the desk lamp and on the bottom of the bronze bust of Abraham Lincoln, despite the fact that it weighed about two hundred pounds. Next, I turned my attention to the books, flipping through their pages in search of a hidden scrap of paper. That endeavor lasted as long as it took me to realize that flipping through all the old man’s books would take me the rest of my life.
That’s when I decided to wake up Woolly—in order to ask him which of the bedrooms was his great-grandfather’s.
Earlier, when Woolly had said he was going to take a little nap, I didn’t think anything of it. As I mentioned, he hadn’t gotten much sleep the night before, and then he’d woken me at dawn in order to make the hasty exit. So I figured a nap was exactly what he intended to take.
But the moment I opened the bedroom door, I knew what I was looking at. After all, I had stood on that threshold before. I recognized the suggestion of order—with Woolly’s belongings lined up on the bureau and his shoes set side by side at the end of the bed. I recognized the stillness—set into relief by the delicate movement of the curtains and the murmur of a news broadcast on the radio. And I recognized the expression on Woolly’s face—an expression that, like Marceline’s, radiated neither happiness nor sorrow, but which did suggest some semblance of peace.
When Woolly’s arm had fallen from his side, he must have been too far gone or too indifferent to bother lifting it up, because his fingers were brushing the floor, just like they had at the HoJo’s. And just like then, I put his arm back where it belonged, this time crossing his hands on his chest.
At long last, I thought, the houses, cars, and Roosevelts had all come tumbling down.
—The wonder is he hath endured so long.
As I was leaving, I turned off the radio. But then I turned it on again, thinking that in the hours ahead, Woolly would probably appreciate having the occasional commercial to keep him company.
* * *
? ? ?
That night, I ate baked beans out of a can and washed them down with a warm Pepsi-Cola, the only things I could find in the kitchen to eat. So as not to crowd Woolly’s ghost, I slept on a couch in the great room. And when I woke in the morning, I went right back to work.