The Man in the Tree Read Free

up. He used this as an excuse not to go to church with

his parents, but there were other reasons. The first time he went to

Sunday school, the lesson was about David and Goliath, and after that,

for a while, he had a new nickname. The hard pews in church made his

bottom ache, and he did not understand the purpose of all that varnished

wood, the tall organ-pipes, the minister in his pulpit talking on and on,

the bad singing.

When he had a nickel and had spent it, he could always reach into

another world where it was still in his pocket. If he wanted more,

he could multiply the nickel as he had done with the beetle. From the

time he found this out, he always had money for candy or anything else

he wanted, and he sometimes treated other children to a bottle of pop

or a package of gum. Once or twice they asked him for money, saying,

"Come on, you're rich," and he foolishly gave it to them.

One day his mother said to him, "Gene, Mrs. Everett says Petie told her

you bought him a model airplane. Did you?"

He saw that he was in trouble, although he didn't understand why, and

he said, "Petie's a liar. He lies all the time."

"But she says Zelda Owens saw you. And I talked to her mother, and Zelda

says you gave her some money, too."

"Only a quarter."

She put her hand on his jaw to make him look at her. "Gene, tell me the

truth. Did you give Petie the money to buy that airplane?"

"Aw -- yeah."

"But where did you get the money?"

He knew that if he told the truth his father would beat him for lying. He

told his mother that he had found a five-dollar bill on the street. She let

him go, but he knew she thought he had stolen the money.

That night while his mother was washing the dishes, his father made him

sit down in the living room and gave him a lecture about stealing. Gene

insisted on his story about finding money on the street; the guiltier

he felt, the more vehement he became. At last he said, "You believe

everybody else, but you won't believe me," and ran into his room.

After that he never gave other children money, and whenever he got

anything for himself that he could not have bought with his allowance,

he smuggled it into the house and hid it.

Gene Anderson never had any of the usual childhood illnesses; once in

a while he had a fever, but it passed away overnight. When he was seven

his mother took him to the dentist for the first time, and he disliked

this so much that from then on he examined his teeth every night, using

a little piece of mirror that he had found behind the garage, and when

he discovered a cavity, he made it go away. After a while he must have

learned how to recognize them without looking; he stopped thinking about

cavities, but he never had another.

One Saturday when he was eight, his father took him downtown to

Dr. Rodeman's office where he was to have his tonsils out. He was

apprehensive about this, but his father told him that it would not hurt,

and that he could have an ice cream cone afterward.

Dr. Rodeman made him lie down on his table and put a little gauze mask

over his face. Something sweetish and stinging dripped onto the mask;

his lungs were full of tiny bright needles. In terror of his life, he

reached out and did something without knowing what it was. He heard the

doctor say, "That's funny, this can seems to be empty. Just a minute."

Then he understood what he had done, and when the doctor brought another

can, he made that one empty, too. Dr. Rodeman took the mask away' and

stood looking at him with an odd expression. He told Gene's father that

they would have to come back next week, but they never did, and he never

had his tonsils out.

Gene knew that his parents suspected there was something strange about

him, other than his tallness, but they never talked to him about it. He

knew that they were worried about his future. Once a visitor stupidly

asked him, "And what do you want to be when you grow up?" Gene was almost

as tall as he was. "I