By midmorning she had achieved the outline of the arcade. Six penciled columns rose on the wall, their center lines seven feet apart, their capitals still only a few ruled scrawls. Standing on a ladder with thumbtack, pencil and string, she traced five half-circles between them. Then, swiftly, she ran a line high on the wall between the columns, all the way across. It was the sea horizon.
At last, standing back, she looked up at her morning’s work. Her fingers were trembling. She had imagined it so many times, she had sketched it so often on paper, hardly daring to think there would one day be a real succession of round arches marching across a thirty-five-foot stretch of wall. Now the two-dimensional surface fell away, revealing a deep space beyond the room, a kind of porch or gallery opening on a mock outdoors. The penciled lines were so light, no one else would notice them, but to Annie the essential framework was there. The wall had become a not-wall. It was framed in solid elements and poised in open air.
There was a knock at the door. Simultaneously her new telephone rang. Annie froze, then picked up the phone, said, “Just a minute,” and went to the door.
It was a stranger, a guy in a baseball cap. He was juggling three pebbles, tossing them up, catching them neatly, his eyes darting after them, not looking at Annie.
She stared at him, too surprised to speak.
“I was just wondering,” he said, pocketing the pebbles, “if you’d like somebody to paint your window frames.”
“My window frames?” Annie couldn’t think. “Excuse me, there’s someone on the phone. Wait a minute.”
“Annie?” said the powerful voice on the line.
In spite of herself Annie felt a lurch of joy. “Jack?”
“Annie, look, I’ve got to talk to you.”
Her old grievances came flooding back. Jack was one of her post-divorce boyfriends. He had walked out on her three years ago to move in with a girl named Gloria. She couldn’t forgive him. Warily, with her eyes on the stranger at the door, she said, “What is there to talk about?” The stranger had turned away. His jacket said WATERTOWN BRAKE AND MUFFLER.
“A thousand things. God.” Jack grunted with disgust. “Look, I’ll be out on Friday, okay?”
Say no. Hold out against him. “Well, okay,” said Annie.
She hung up and went back to the stranger. “Look,” she told him, “I’m not going to bother with the window frames now. Too many other things to do first.”
“Well, all right.” Smiling, he turned away. The pebbles reappeared. Annie could see them rising and falling above his head as he ambled down the walk, heading for the odd-looking vehicle parked in the driveway, a pickup truck with a wooden structure mounted on the back, a sort of gypsy caravan. A stovepipe stuck out of the roof.
Impulsively she called after him, “How much would you charge?”
A couple of bananas appeared from nowhere and soared into the air. He named a reasonable price.
Annie laughed loudly and made up her mind. “Well, I don’t see why not. When do you want to start?”
“Right now, if you’ve got the primer. The wood has to be primed first.”
“Well, I could go out and buy some.” Annie looked uncertainly at her car.
“I’ll wait.” He pulled a paper bag out of his pocket. “I’ll eat my lunch down the hill.”
“Fine.” Annie went back inside, closed the door, and hurried into her bedroom. She combed her hair and pulled a jacket over her shirt and jeans. Then she went around the house locking doors against the juggling stranger.
As she got into her car she could see him down the hill, sitting on the grass, which must still be damp from the gentle spring rain of yesterday. He was facing away from the house, eating his lunch.
He was a traveling mountebank. Who could tell what he might magic away, if he managed to get inside? The new stainless-steel sink, the beautiful new stove, the CD player?
With a flick of his clever fingers he might even—it was idiotic, but Annie couldn’t help glancing back over her shoulder at the north side of her house—he might even destroy her precious wall.
And so the prince was hired as the Imperial Swineherd.
Hans Christian Andersen, “The Swineherd”
Chapter 5
“Know then, my husband,” answered she, “we will lead them away, quite early in the morning, into the thickest part of the wood, and there make a fire, and give them each a little piece of bread.…”
The Brothers Grimm, “Hansel and Gretel”
It was moving day for the Gasts. Bob and Roberta scurried around their Cambridge apartment, labeling cardboard boxes, ordering Charlene and Eddy to pack up their toys. “For heaven’s sake, Charlene,” said her mother, “your poor dolls. Be more careful. They cost a fortune. Why don’t you wrap them in tissue paper?”