Dreaming of Bavaria

A 1920's East Coast bootlegging roadtrip.

June 1928

Dear Mr. Chaplin,

 

            I’m writing from the ends of Baltimore.  That’s across the country from you, and so much land between.  I’ve never seen any of the places our coastlines close in, but I imagine rolling plains crawling with cowboys and Indians and herds of buffalo.  My sister Tillie says, though, that there are no more great herds of buffalo, and that the Government’s put away the Indians just like they put away our brother Tom.

            We’re fast leaving the city.  I was born in Baltimore, and I’ve lived here all my life.  In twelve years, I’ve passed through every street and alleyway a million times.  But at least there’s the dockyards to keep things exciting.  My mother doesn’t like it when I slip away to go down there.  But Tillie and Bob understand.  When Ma yells at me for wanting to go, Tillie just gives her laugh, a laugh like two champagne glasses clinking together, and Tom nods with Ma and winks at me, signaling me to slip out the back door as soon as Ma’s got her back turned.

            Is it wicked, Mr. Chaplin, that I do a thing like that?  If you think it is, what I’m doing now you’d probably find far worse.  But you strike me as a gentleman who didn’t always listen to his own mother.  Maybe she wanted you to stay in England, but you came all the way to California to make your life.  Anyway, I’m inclined to think God understands in matters like these.  Otherwise, why would he have filled the world with so much to see?

           

            The buildings of Baltimore are growing small behind us but standing stiff and straight, as though in outrage at the fact that we’re making them shrink and disappear from our sight.

            Atlanta, Georgia, is our destination. When you think about it, Mr. Chaplin, the journey we’re on is a short one. Now, it’s not as short as a drive to the countryside, or even to Our Nation’s Capital.  But it’s still not as long as the trip you made to America.  What was it like being in the middle of the sea?  The rest of the voyage I can imagine: leaving foggy London, sailing away from an English port, putting out to sea with the land in sight, and then, long after, sighting land again. But what was it like there in the Atlantic’s dead center, surrounded by blue waters and empty skies on all sides, and knowing that these waves led to so many different places?

           

            In the distance Washington’s stone temples sit spaced wide apart.  They seem to watch us with invisible eyes.  Even so, I’d like to stop here and meet the President one day, under good circumstances.  Have you met Mr. Coolidge?  Does he seem like a good sort of man?  Miss Franklin, my teacher at school last year, told me of course the President is kind.  She told me that all of our elected leaders are kind, or else The People wouldn’t elect them. Well, we’ve passed Washington at last, and we all give a breath.  I look back.  Some of the monuments are still easy to spot amid the trees.  Domes and white rooftops loom like low hills, whittled by the hands of men to their stony hearts.

 

            In spite of all your journeying, Mr. Chaplin, I don’t know as you’ve ever been to the Southeast.  So I want to give you a picture of it as best I can.  As I write this, for instance, green land rolls by, dotted with white board houses, like drops of cream on a tablecloth.  Sometimes we see women standing on their porches staring into space, or else out on the grass, hanging sheets to dry. 

 

            Somewhere in Virginia, we stop at a small restaurant.  The woman who serves us is what you’d call middle aged.  But I’ve learnt that people who’ve had hard lives often appear older than they are.  Maybe she’s really only Tillie’s age. She looks very tired, with dark circles under her eyes, and as she sets down the last plate, she sways slightly on her feet.  But somehow I know she won’t fall. Her face is tired, but it’s also strong, like my grandmother’s face in the old tintype we have in our parlor.  The waitress works quickly, her movements smooth like a machine’s, and she keeps her eyes down.  I work hard to get a glimpse of them.  They’re like little black bits of slate, hard, reflecting nothing back at me. 

When she leaves, I turn to look at more familiar faces. I suppose I should tell you about the people I’m travelling with. 

            I’ll begin with my sister Tillie.  Tillie is older than me by twelve years -- almost the same amount of years as my whole lifetime.  In that big head start, Tillie’s had time to get into everything. She’s mad about music, and loves art. Real art, she says.  She likes strange things, like the work of a man called Duchamp, who put a bicycle wheel on a stool, or, better yet, something much newer, something she’s seen in what art journals she manages to come by: Surrealism.  She says there are men in Paris who are trying to show their dreams to the world.  What would you paint to show your dreams to the world?  I’m not sure what I’d do, since Tillie says it can’t just be good dreams, but the fears we have inside ourselves.

            Among the people Tillie admires are Joan of Arc, Zelda Fitzgerald, Susan B. Anthony, Margaret Sanger, and Annie Oakley.  Women have to be strong, she says.  She keeps her hair short and smokes cigarettes.  She votes whenever there’s call for it.  Every day of her life she runs over her lashes with mascara so it seems her eyes are two blue stars in her head.  That last thing sounds a bit like a Surrealist painting, now I think of it, but Tillie prefers to model herself after film stars.  She’s mad over It, and says Clara Bow is too divine.  I like your movies better, Mr. Chaplin.  I’ve seen every one of them since I started going to the pictures.  A few months ago, Tillie and Bob took me to see The Circus.  It was funny, with all your tricks, but at the end I cried.  I brushed my tears away quickly, though, because I don’t know as your movies are supposed to make people cry, however they end. And besides, another part of me was happy, because even though he’s alone, the Tramp walks off into the sunset, bound for new adventures.  What can be a better ending than that?

            Tillie likes Clara Bow, though, and all that sort of picture.  And then there’s the talkie, Mr. Chaplin.  What will become of films now?  It’s strange to think of going to a movie house and hearing talking, not music.  Ma and I went to see The Jazz Singer, and we couldn’t believe our ears.  But I think I like it better quiet.  Maybe that’s because I’m quiet myself.  Ma says when Tillie was born, she took nearly all the noise, and Tom and I had to share what little was left.

            Besides Tillie, there’s Bob.  Bob is Tillie’s fellow, and has been for five years.  They met sneaking into a dancehall in the Colored section of Baltimore.  So far as Ma knows, though, they saw each other for the first time at the Baltimore Public Library. Bob’s favorite thing in the world is to dance with Tillie. He is very handsome, with blonde hair, blue eyes, and fine white teeth he always flashes in a smile.  He stands straight as a pole but is graceful as a blade of grass in the wind, and his skin’s tanned by the sun.

            Bob is our primary driver on these business jaunts.  The business was Tillie’s idea, and she can drive a car just fine, but a man at the wheel is more likely to pass by unnoticed.

            The fourth person in the car is our second driver, Owen.  When he’s not driving, he shares the back seat with me.  Owen has red hair and a temper to match, but mostly he sits quiet, his fingers fiddling with an old tin case.  I can see them spring back as he pops the latch, over and over again he does it, and the road goes by beneath us, like a moving sidewalk at a fair.

 

            Steadily Owen drives us through the night, our headlights cut through the blackness, exposing the road ahead as a cat must see things in the dark.  And it goes on like this, on and on.  We rarely stop now, and when we do, it’s at deserted service stations where boys barely older than me look on at us, curious, and seem just about to open their mouths to ask where we’re going, when -- we pay our money and off we go again.

 

            We pass on through the hills and grasses of Virginia.  We stop in towns for lunch and dinner and drive on through the night. 

            At a service station, an old man hobbles to our car window and holds out a lined palm, coated with a sticky brown layer of filth. He opens his mouth to explain himself, but his teeth have all gone. He rocks back and forth in his short, slumped frame, and shuffles his shoes against the faded asphalt.  We can’t understand what he’s saying, but he goes on just the same, shaking his head to make his argument stronger, I think, as what wisps of hair are left to him fly up from his scalp and stand like ragged soldiers at attention.  I want to say something back, but what’s there to say?  And Tillie gives her grand laugh, but kindly, and hands him two whole dollar bills.  The man’s eyes are small, each one like an ant that lives in the cavern of its socket, but at this gift they widen to normal size. He works his mouth to mumble “Thank you,” but already we’re gone. 

            The constant movement makes sense, as we want to be as fast as possible about getting to where we’re going.   Now it’s Bob’s turn to take the wheel.  He drives for hours, until he can’t keep his eyes open, and then he hands the wheel to Owen again.

 

            Coming on to Winston-Salem, a small place all lit up as twilight arrives to turn the sky sapphire blue.  We pass through quickly, flying down the streets.  I turn and get up on my knees to look out the back window.  The lights of the restaurants and hotels make golden patches on the dark pavement.  On the sidewalk, a group of teenagers is staring after us wildly.  I can’t imagine what must be like to grow up here.  I don’t know as it’s much different than growing up in Baltimore, in the end, but it’s strange to see new streets and think that for these people they’re as familiar as the streets of my city are to me.

We need to get out of the city and stay away from towns.  It would be foolish to leave a trace of ourselves anywhere.  Hours have passed by, and the full moon glows down at us, brilliant as a desk lamp.  Do you like moonlight, Mr. Chaplin?  I put my hands and arms into its rays and see my skin shining ghostly white, and imagine I’m someone else, in some other place.

As we move deeper into the countryside, the tall trees surround us, like kind old relatives.  Suddenly, Tillie starts singing.  Some Vaudeville number she heard years ago, and Bob, as always, picks up the man’s part when it comes.  It seems each of them knows every song that’s ever been sung. 

What do you know like that, Mr. Chaplin?  I guess you have so much in your mind.  For Owen, it’s tricky things -- knots near impossible to untie, locks near impossible to open without a key, safes whose dials, he once told me, are like someone yapping away, giving up all their secrets.

At last, far away from everything, we stop for the night.  A site in deserted country miles from the city lights.  Bob and Owen get out of the car and pull out a small bundle from the floor of the Ford. In a matter of seconds, Bob’s got up a little tent.  He’s a practiced hand by now -- even in the dark he can do it.  He and Owen crawl inside and I lie across the back seat of the car, and Tillie lies across the front seat.

 

I’m not tired, Mr. Chaplin. I could go on driving through the night, for all my life.  But everyone else is already asleep.  I hear their breathing flowing gently among the calls of the crickets.

Why are we here, sleeping like gypsies beneath the starry sky?  I suppose now is a good time to tell you.  You see, our car is heavier than it seems.  Beneath the seats and inside them, and underneath the floor, are bottles and small barrels of gin, rum, brandy, and beer.  I don’t feel ashamed of the fact. Even people in the Bible drink, so why shouldn’t we be allowed to today?  Tillie says our drives are about more than delivering liquor; we’re delivering freedom. 

The only thing that sometimes makes me hesitate is my mother.  Ma doesn’t exactly know what to make of all this.  She’s forbade me to go along on these drives on numerous occasions, but I always end up going just the same.  She wants to make a respectable life, and be a law-abiding citizen and all.  When I ask Tillie about it, she only shakes her head, and her laugh grows small and low.  Then she says to me,  “Ma follows the law, but look at what the law’s done for her.”

The crickets have done their job, Mr. Chaplin, and I feel myself slowly drifting into sleep.  So I’ll stop writing for now and bid you good-night.

 

            I meant to begin this letter again yesterday, Mr. Chaplin, after the night in the moonlit field.  I wanted to explain to you about the police.  Most of them say they follow the Government’s laws to the letter.  But most of the time, if one of them stops us and searches our car, and finds our hidden cargo, he can be bribed away with a certain share of the merchandise.  It’s not a great thing, as it means we’ve lost some of our profit, but it’s better than spending time in prison. 

            Other policemen don’t even bother us.  They’ve been bribed by someone or other in our brotherhood to look away when they see something suspicious.  As for any other cop who might cause trouble, as you can see we go out of our way to avoid them.

            But yesterday, we very nearly got into a fine mess.

            That morning, we’d packed up and set out again on the road.  Already the Appalachians were coming into view, distant purple-gray shadows.  I sat up straight at the sight of them -- we were almost to Helen.

            The hours seemed to fly as fast as we did down the winding roads.  At times, the car wobbled from side to side, and Tillie gaily laughed and laid down the book she’d been holding.  She likes to read to us as we drive.  For this trip, she’d picked up something by Theodore Dreiser, called A Hoosier Holiday.  The title sounds merry and warm to me, but the book itself is sad.  It’s all about Dreiser and an artist friend on a drive to Dreiser’s childhood home, and full of sorrowful memories and several unpleasant occurrences along the way.  Maybe, in some ways all journeys are sad.  Because eventually they’ll end, and then where will you be?  Maybe it’s something like that that makes Dreiser such an unpleasant fellow in the story.

            So, this is the book Tillie put down as we zipped along the winding roads, and she laughed, and Bob laughed, and I laughed, and, laughing, Owen made the car go faster -- and then Tillie yelled out “STOP!”

            Owen slammed down on the brake pedal.  “What is it?” I asked, and I’ll admit I was nervous.

            Without answering, Tillie flung open her door and bolted out of the car.  Bob did the same. 

            “Come on, Frances!” Owen called to me from the front seat, and we got out as well, and followed Tillie and Bob up a green hill.

            “What is it?” I wanted to ask again.  But I knew better.  So I ran and waited to see.

            Over the hill, there it was: a wooden floor, and on it a group of people, moving as a band played on a platform before them.  A country dance.

            Now my worry lightened and left, like a piece of paper picked up by the wind.  Tillie and Bob reached the dance floor, and I arrived laughing after them.

            The townspeople welcomed us.  It was a dance to raise money for one of the local churches, and Tillie and Bob gave generously.  Then, they called to the band to play something fast, and up they ran to the center of the floor, and I knew they’d be there without stop till the band stopped playing for the afternoon.  All around them people were dancing as well, sometimes close together when the crowd concealed them, other times separated by a respectable distance as older folk looked on from the sidelines.

            Owen found himself a pretty girl in a flower print dress, and they moved their legs and arms in a frantic fling.  Among all the others, they were like waves in the sea. 

            On and on the music went, now slow, now fast, and all twinged with the lilty, off-key note of mountain music.  This isn’t like what I imagine they dance to in Hollywood, Mr. Chaplin.  Still, I like it. I looked on and let my foot tap time on the floor.

            And I was so wrapped up in the scene: the whirling swirls of the women’s skirts, the parallel motions of the men’s legs, a pair of pigtails flying, two straight lines silhouetted against the blue sky...that I didn’t notice the three or four boys who’d gathered around me.  Finally, one of them said hello.

            I said nothing back.  It’s not that I don’t care for boys, Mr. Chaplin; I just don’t care for people I don’t know.  In a letter, I can tell you everything in my mind, but when I’m just face to face with someone, what is there to say?  Half the things I’ve written here wouldn’t make for what people expect in normal conversation.  So I prefer to say nothing.

            My strategy seemed to have worked, because soon the boys went away.  But in a few minutes time, they were back. 

            “This girl here thinks she’s too good to talk to me,” I heard one of them say.  “Ain’t that so?”

            I kept quiet. 

            “Well, I know how we can remedy that.”

            I’m no fool, Mr. Chaplin.  I moved to leave, but the boys grabbed my arms and legs and hauled me off my chair.  “Let’s dunk her in the lake!” one suggested.

            I struggled, but I knew it was useless.  And I still didn’t say anything.  I didn’t want to let them think they’d won.  And anyway, I know how to swim.  I prepared myself for the cold water.  I’d swim away without uttering a word.

But  -- “Hey!”  Owen’s voice came like a gunshot through the crowd.  “Let her down!”

The boys laughed and carried me towards the edge of the dance floor.

“Let her down now, or you’ll regret it!”  No one has a temper like Owen.  He stood now glowering over us, a hand raised so menacingly, even I was frightened.  I wriggled out of the boys’ grips.

“Hey, stranger, you can’t tell our boys what to do, now!” someone yelled.

“Who says he can’t?!” It was Bob.  The dance music died away.

And so began the biggest brawl I’d wager they’ve ever seen in those parts. The boys who’d held me took their shots, and so did a good part of the townspeople, but then others of them turned against their fellows, and soon it was like another kind of dance altogether. The women, too, laid in, their hair falling from their neat buns and plaits.  Tillie and I were among them. 

We punched, we ducked, we pulled at some of the women’s loose hair, and they turned ‘round and did the same to us.  The band had gone now, and one of them must have gone over to the sheriff’s, because suddenly a police car showed up, and a few cops burst out from it yelling over the crowd.  And I swear that through the tangle of people and the still-flying fists, my eyes met Tillie’s, and Bob’s, and Owen’s, and time seemed to freeze.  I knew we were all thinking about my brother Tom.

When my father died, our family was all alone in the world. But Tom had soon found a way to support us, taking from the cash registers of Baltimore.  He never took much, Mr. Chaplin, and he never hurt anyone.  What he did, he did for our family.  But one afternoon, something went wrong.  While the shopkeep was putting the money from the till into the bag Tom was holding out, a clerk was slipping out the door to summon the police. Now Tom is in a cell in Baltimore County, four years served, and eleven more to go.

So there you have it, Tillie, Tom, and I are criminals. But Tom wouldn’t have been if we hadn’t needed money, and Tillie and I wouldn’t have been if Tom hadn’t been put away. We’d tried to live our lives honest enough, but when Tillie had heard what had happened, well, a strange shadow had fallen over her eyes.  A few months later, she told us she and Bob were taking a trip. Watching them prepare, I understood what the trip really was.  They’d managed to get an old Ford from one of Bob’s friends, and they’d fixed it up so it was full of hidden hollow spaces.  Then, Tillie told us she’d invited Uncle Floyd to come for a visit.  I understood what she meant almost right away.  Uncle Floyd lives in Detroit, and when he came to visit us this time, he brought a present with him: liquor he’d gotten from Canada.  Tillie and Bob would take a load of it to South Carolina, and keep most of the profit.  I wanted to tell them not to go, that it wasn’t safe.  But we needed the money.  And there was something else. When I looked at Tillie, and when I thought of Tom, something made my blood boil in time with theirs.  We’re brother and sisters and none of us has a place in the law. 

And I thought, too, what it would be like to travel new roads and see new people, out of Baltimore and into the world beyond.  How could I not understand it all?  So instead of begging her not to do it, I begged Tillie to let me go with her.  Maybe a part of her wanted to say no, but she looked in my eyes and knew my blood was boiling, and told me I’d be in their car whenever I had school holidays.  Ma doesn’t like it, but there it is.  She’s the only one of us who’s innocent.  She takes in sewing for a living, and makes wedding dresses for the good, poor women of Baltimore. 

Now, on the chaotic dance floor, we exchanged glances.  We could feel the police drawing closer like a chill up our spines.  At the same moment, the four of us bolted out of the crowd and ran a wide arc around the cops, tearing up the green hill.  Down the other side, we fair flew to the Ford, and threw open the doors and piled inside, and before we knew what was happening, Bob started the car and we were driving away.

            We straightened ourselves and sat silent, catching our breaths.           

“Well,” Tillie finally said, as the little town receded from us, “that’s the worst dance I’ve ever been to.”

            To my surprise, Bob looked back at me.  “You all right there, Francie girl?”  Tillie grinned and reached back to squeeze my hand.  I nodded.  We were moving, we were free. We headed for the mountains, and we didn’t stop driving until early today.

 

            Have you ever driven in the mountains, Mr. Chaplin?  What a mad thing it is.  Bob stomped down on the gas pedal and we rushed rapidly upwards.  Round and round more curves than a corkscrew we went, and the cold mountain air rushed in through the open windows, and we laughed and laughed and dared each other to look down at what was below us.

            Sometimes I did look, and it’s strange, because half the time all there is to see is the tops of trees.  Other times, it’s all in plain sight, the sheer drop down the mountain’s pine needle-strewn side.  Sometimes I gasped for breath, sometimes I could breathe easy.

            And then, more corkscrew curves, and we drove straight into Helen, Georgia.  Helen is a town founded by Bavarian settlers.  Building the place up, they made their houses to look like the cottages they’d left back in their homeland.  We stepped out onto the dirt road and looked around.

            People were going about their daily tasks.  Mothers were playing with their young children, the postman was delivering letters, shopkeepers were displaying their wares in store windows.  But something here made my hair stand on end and my skin prickle.  These houses, these mountains -- if I forget everything, if I forget who I am, if I don’t look ahead or behind me to see Bob or Tillie or Owen, I can imagine I’m really somewhere in Bavaria, and all the people who live here will speak to me in German, and when I’ve seen my fill of the little town, I’ll wave goodbye and go on to the next village on the next mountainside, and so on and so on until I reach Munich, or Paris, or Rome, or even your London, Mr. Chaplin.  All of it just off the mountain.

            We went to see a client who bought half our wares.  We’ll be back with more in a few weeks’ time, and he’s glad to hear it, as it’ll soon be Oktoberfest, something they celebrate in Germany.  For that particular festival, people drink all the beer they can manage.  These are meager times, though, and no matter how much beer they buy from the likes of us, most of what the people here will drink is moonshine.  The townspeople who know what we’ve brought give us grateful looks as we drive by.  Tonight we’ll stay at an inn, and have a fine German breakfast in the morning.

 

We left Helen early this afternoon.  As always, I was sorry to go, and I didn’t look back as we drove away.  Down we spiraled, back down the turns of the mountain.  Today Tillie was reading us poetry from a big anthology she’d bought at a used bookshop.  We turned the corners so fast, shrieking and roaring with laughter, and set the poetic meters flying over the hills.

When we’d gotten to flatter land, she handed me the book.  I turned to my favorite, Edgar Allan Poe, and commenced to read his best poem, “The Sleeper.”  If you haven’t read this one, Mr. Chaplin, you really must.  It’s so beautiful and eerie, like walking in moonlight.  Everything is white and silver. 

Every year on his birthday, Tillie, Tom, and I used to go to a graveyard on the outskirts of Baltimore where Poe is buried.  We’d leave flowers for himself, his wife, and his dear aunt, and read one poem before we left.  Nowadays it’s me and Tillie and Bob who go.  But I always write Tom about it.  We’ve always hoped the poet’s ghost might rise and visit us.  So far, no luck, though.

 

The land’s been flat for a while, and mostly deserted.  Now and then we see houses and barns scattered apart like people who no longer talk to each other.  The sun is shining hotly down, and the pine trees here seem to reach for it so eagerly they’ve stretched their trunks to impossible heights.   Owen is reading “The Highwayman.” 

Church bells ring as we come into a small farming town.  In the spring and fall, students who’ve gone home to work their family’s land for a few hours will know to come back to the high school by the sound of these bells.

But now the streets are mostly deserted in the midday heat.  At times I spot an old man sitting on his porch, rocking and spitting tobacco.  A ways behind Main Street, up a tangle of bumpy dirt roads, is a familiar house.  A spindly old man wearing tattered coveralls and a day’s beard stubble comes out to greet us.   About fifty paces behind follows Lee.  Lee’s light brown hair is the color of bird’s feathers, and it’s always the first thing I see of him, as he walks with his head down.  

            Lee is Old Dan’s son, though it’s hard to believe.  His mother’s younger, about my own mother’s age, and she’s in the kitchen now, making biscuits by the smell of it.  Tillie hops from the car and waves gaily to Old Dan, then slips into the house.  I’m not sure whether she’s going to help Lee’s mother, see if she can snatch a fresh-baked biscuit, or find the old gramophone in the parlor and put a record on.

            Bob and Owen step from the Ford and shake Old Dan’s withered hand.  They’re all great chums.  I think Old Dan is a distant cousin of Owen’s.  We always stop here for a day or two before continuing on to Atlanta.  Lee is my friend.  We were born in the same year, on the same day.  He comes towards me now.

            The clothes he wears are ones I know he wouldn’t normally wear on an ordinary day: trousers and a long, white cotton shirt, like how Tom Sawyer dressed.  I know that normally he’d be in coveralls like his Pa.  But he always dresses like this for our arrival, and I’ve never said anything about it.

            “Lee.”

            “Frances.”

            We shake hands.  His is hand is callused and warm.  It always makes me realize how cold my hands are.  The only callus I have is a bump on the side of my right ring finger -- a writer’s bump, Ma’s told me it’s called.

            “How was y’all’s trip?” he asks me, and his red cheeks deepen.  He’s embarrassed by his accent. I don’t say anything about that, either, but I wish I could, as I don’t mind it at all.  It reminds me of good things, like Helen and this place.  It’s something different.

            “Fine, and how are things here?”

He shrugs.  “So,” he starts in again, and this time I can’t see his cheeks, because he’s started walking and I’m following him to our favorite spot in the shade of a small barn.  “What’s new in all the country?”

            This is what I bring to Lee.  He asks me about everything.  About Baltimore, and what I’ve been doing this year, and especially about what I’ve seen at the cinema.  And then he asks me about the people I’ve seen on the road, and the things that have happened.  When I finish telling him about the dance, he stares at me strangely. His green eyes are clear, as I imagine seawater is.

            “Well, shoot, whyn’t you say something?”

            I shrug.

            “Did you want those boys to carry you away?”  He stops, but not long enough for me to answer, and gives a nod.  “I reckon you did.  You’re always watchin’ everything, Frances.  I bet you were hopin’ you’d see what was at the bottom of that lake.”

            At this, we both laugh.

            Lee brushes the hair from his eyes.  “Wish I’d been there,” I hear him mutter.

            “You wish you were everywhere I’ve been,” I reminded him.

            “I’d have beat those boys -- How could they have just tried to carry you away like that?!”

            “Ah, don’t worry about it,” I said.

            We were quiet for a while, then.  That’s what I like about Lee.  We always have things to talk about, but he likes the quiet, too.  Cicadas and june bugs sang out in the tall yellow grasses before us. I wondered how many that little bit of land held.

            “One day, I’m going to go somewhere really far,” I said.

            Lee turned to me.  “And I’ll come with you.”

            I wondered where we could go.

            “Anywhere, so long as it’s out of this town.”

            And it’s funny, Mr. Chaplin, because I knew what he meant. Lee’s town is small and dull, and they don’t even have a movie house.  But Baltimore is nearly the opposite, and still I feel the same way Lee does.  It seems like nothing is big enough, or that everything stays too much the same.

            “What if we joined the circus?” Lee suggested.  “It comes by here at the end of every summer.”

            And then Lee’s mother’s voice rang out to us from the house.  It was suppertime already.  Already the sun was setting, and without my having noticed.  The yellow grasses had become orange, and now were fading into smoky brown.

            “Here....” Slowly Lee reached out for my hand.  “The ground’s uneven.”  We walked carefully back towards the house, and when its lit windows were in sight, we broke into a run, skipping and gamboling up to the front door.  And there his hand left mine, and he opened the door, and soon we were all sitting laughing round the kitchen table, and Old Dan and the rest were swapping tall tales.

            We left a few hours later, so as to reach Atlanta before dawn.  I’d rather we’d stayed longer, but I’ll be back -- it’s only the start of summer, after all, and we’ve got more trips to make.  Lee and I nodded to each other, and then Owen put his foot to the gas pedal, we were off again, tearing away down the dirt roads, Tillie giggling softly so as not to wake the neighbors.

           

Atlanta is always dull when we arrive.  The sky is lightening to soft gray, making all the world feel like someone who doesn’t want to leave his bed.  But this is only the case for one part of the city.  You see, after General Sherman had burnt the place to the ground during the Civil War, the survivors just built a new city on top of the old one.  There are still old storefronts and cobbled streets, whole streets, underground.  We cut the Ford into a lot behind a rundown house where a greasy-looking man in a natty suit signals us down into a tunnel.

            Slowly, slowly we drive down.  I reach out my arms to touch the damp stone walls.  Then the tunnel ends, and we’re on one of the subterranean streets.  These old stores are good for hiding things.  A man in a white suit emerges from the shadows.  Bob and Tillie get out of the Ford, and the three stand, discussing.  The man owns one of Atlanta’s best speakeasy’s, Tillie’s told me, so we should get a good price for what we’re selling.  Finally, Bob motions to us and Owen and I leave the car, and I stand aside while Owen undoes all of the complicated latches and locks to reveal rows of shiny bottles.  The gentleman in white makes a gesture of his own, and a car slowly drives up to us, and we load the bottles into it, and the car drives away into the distant darkness.

            We get back into the Ford, and drive up through the tunnel to see Atlanta in full light.  It’s another city, the same as the rest, but it’s surrounded by thick clumps of green trees.  I can’t say as I’ve much more time to gaze around, though, Mr. Chaplin, because we blaze away as fast as we can go.

           

            So we’ll return home to Baltimore, where we’ll wait for Uncle Floyd’s next shipment, and then we’ll make another run.  Up and down the same portion of country we’ll go.  But someday I want to go out, sideways, over.  It’s not enough, these miles, and I don’t know as our whole country is. 

            I want to see the world one day, Mr. Chaplin.  I want to see more than any book can describe, more than any moving picture can show me.  One day, like Owen’s hands I’ll pick all locks and escape all that holds me.  For now, I’ll lay back against the newly hollow seat and dream of the real Bavaria.

               

Author's Note

Another nostalgic piece. I wrote this in college, for a class about American Roadtrips. The assignment was to write about our dream American roadtrip. At the time, the roadtrip I most wanted to take in America would have been in the 1920's, one of my favorite historical periods. I have a fascination with non-violent crime, so I figured it might be fun to go on a roadtrip with some small-time bootleggers (no guns or Mafia stuff directly involved). It was a tricky project, because I don't drive. Though not everyone could drive in the 1920's, bootleggers sure could. So I had to choose a narrator who would reasonably take the back seat. I also wanted to have someone who would feel as I do about America, that there is so much to see there - but then again, there's so much else to see beyond the ocean. No matter how much Frances travels the coast, there will always be that longing. The project was fun for a number of reasons; I was able to make references to lots of cool 1920's stuff, as well as to things I like, or one of the roadtrip books we'd read in class. A historical note: All the places are real, some I've been to and some I haven't, but though I was in a place with amazing research facilities when I wrote this, I wasn't able to find a road map of the eastern United States ca. 1928, so the actual route may not have been possible to travel at that time. The photo for this story is a classic car in Atlanta's Underground, that I took in 2008. I retouched it to look old, using the awesome website www.befunky.com.

Reviews

[Alysa Salzberg]

Hi Raven, Thank you so much for your kind and honest critique. I will definitely take what you said, into account. As for the knowledge Frances has, it's explained by her knowledge of cinema, books, and the things her avant-garde sister tells her. I think Oktoberfest would be easy to know for anyone who dreams of travel - even back then there were public libraries, school, etc. As for the diction, I also have some issues with it. Thanks for letting me know. Maybe some day I'll go back and work on this piece a little more. Again, I appreciate the thorough, honest critique, and I'm glad, above all, that you enjoyed the story.

[The Raven King]

First off I want to say I enjoyed this very much. I am a history buff, a film buff and I know a thing or two about Mr. Chaplin. You are a very gifted writer and you drew me into your story. My main criticisms (other than this being the most incriminating letter ever written in the history of letter writing) have to do with the narrator and the diction. I felt the main character, Frances, was far too educated and worldly. I know that by creating such a intelligent and knowledgeable character you are able to immerse your reader in the times and give them a more in-depth look at what is going on in the world. But I think you sacrifice authenticity. It's very romantic to have this young woman talk about the Surrealist Movement and Ocktoberfest and Munich and so many other interesting historical tidbits. I think a lot of this information would not be available to a lower class woman in the 1920's. She speaks too perfectly and missing are the obsolete words and phrases that would, for me, authenticate this piece for me. You use a few phrases of the day, but they are very sparse. I would like to see more. The diction is a bit too modern and exacting and it drew me out of the story at some parts. I enjoyed your descriptions of people and places. The places were always described with wonder and seen as beautiful and the people while rarely beautiful were also seen as such and also with wonder. Overall this was highly enjoyable and I will be reading more of your stories. Thank you.

[Nadia Vincent]

This is a very enthralling piece of writing, very captivating. You talk of the past so well and make it so easy to picture all of the tiniest de details.
The characters are all individual and have their own separate voices. The letter itself is very sweet, I can sort of relate with Francie, and how she finds it easier to write about so many things than talk with strangers.
A very wonderful piece of work, stunning and touching in so many ways.