The Wishmonger: Chapter Three

Chapter 3

The Festival of Wishes

The clank of spoons and the soft crunch of cereal greeted Roger as he entered the kitchen the next morning. The bright sunlight was a welcome change from the cold moonlit terror of the night before.

Roger’s mother, looked up from her crossword puzzle between bites, “First day of the festival, you and Joey have big plans?” His mother was referring to the annual Festival of Wishes. It had been held every year since anyone could remember, in honor of Jeremish Wish.

Roger poured cereal into a bowl and reached for the milk, “Joey’s out of town. I thought I’d just hang out around the festival, listen to the storytellers.”

The festival attracted the best storytellers from near and far. Roger looked forward to hearing the legend of Jeremish Wish again. Roger’s father choked on his cereal and muttered something under his breath.

“ Did you say something, dear?” Jeanie asked her husband. James Pine looked up.

James' tired eyes blinked, “I said, Why? They won’t tell you anything you haven’t already read.” Roger’s father didn’t have much use for wishes or festivals, orstorytelling for that matter.

“I’m just curious about the fountain. Thought I might ask around, see what people remember about it.” He regretted the words before they even left his mouth but it was too late. Nothing to do now but hunker down and wait for it to blow over.

“Remember? The only thing people need to remember about that stagnant frog pond is that they’re better off to forget!” it wasn’t as bad as he’d expected.

Roger smiled in what he hoped was a disarming fashion, “Yeah, I guess you’re probably right. I just wish…”

His father inflated with rage, stood from his chair and
leaned across the table an inch from Roger’s face, “what did you just say?” it came out half growl half whisper.

Roger remembered the sign, the prohibition against wishing and his father’s reaction to it, “I didn’t mean it like that. What I meant to say was it would be nice if…” before he could finish his father cut him off.

“But you didn’t say that, you said…I wish!” His father came around the table and stood behind his chair, “what, what do you wish? Go on Roger, finish it. And you better make it a good one because if you finish that wish in my house it will be the last thing you utter here, do you understand me?”

James Pine was not a violent man, but something about wishes scared him bad. Roger wondered what it was. What terrible secret could cause a mild mannered, loving father to puff up like a spitting cobra. He wanted to ask. Instead he said, “ yes, sir”, and sat quietly.

Roger watched his father deflate, like a tire with a slow leak. He sat heavily in his chair, “Roger, I’m sorry…it’s just…” James Pine pushed his chair back, picked up his briefcase from the counter, kissed his wife, patted Roger on the head and left for work.

“I’m sorry Dad. It just…slipped out.” Roger said as his father closed the door to the garage behind him. He looked up with tears in his eyes, “I didn’t mean it, Mom. You know I didn’t mean it.”

“Oh, sweety, your father didn’t mean it either. It’s just …some things… change people. Your father wasn’t always afraid like this. I guess being back here just makes it stronger.”

Roger stared into his mother’s face, searching for understanding. Looking for an answer, some clue, “Like what, mom? What does he have to be afraid of?”

His mother sighed heavily, “I wish I could explain it, someday when…” she couldn’t finish it. She knew it wasn’t enough.

Roger decided at that exact moment that he would trust his mother. He was going to tell her everything.

“ Mom, I think you’d better sit down.” He took a deep breath and continued, “I don’t know what’s going on in this town but that fountain is not gone, and I can prove it. Old man Winters told Joey bishop that every body thought the old fountain was buried when they built the court house.

He said the fountain they buried wasn’t The Wish Fountain at all. He said the real fountain was somewhere else, in a place no one remembers. Mom, Joey said Mr. Winters got real serious when he told him. He said he couldn’t die without someone knowing. Mom, he must have been telling the truth, because he died the next day. And there’s something else.”

Roger paused for effect, “I know it’s real, and I know it works because I saw it myself.”

His mother sat, stunned, “How is that possible?”

Roger grinned, pleased with the effect the revelation was
having on his mother, “I saw it in my dream. Remember? Well Joey showed me a picture of the fountain, it was the same! Don’t you think that’s weird?”

Jeanie Pine looked stunned, or maybe she was…trying not to laugh? “Oh, Roger, honey, for a minute I thought your were serious!”

Roger started to protest. Then it occurred to him that if his mother didn’t believe him, he might be better off with her believing it was all a joke. He laughed, “You should have seen your face.”

“ Roger, with an imagination like that, you might be a storyteller yourself some day.” She sat quietly chuckling to herself, “Old man Winters, that was a nice touch. It sounds like something a dying man might say.”

“Yeah it does, right? That’s what made me think of it.” Roger smiled.

His mother hugged him, “Thanks, I needed that after this morning.”

Several inflatables were being installed noisily on the back lawn of the library. The town hall was all but invisible under a flurry of banners and pennants. The largest banner read, “Welcome to Wishful’s 75th Festival of Wishes”.

Roger bought a snow cone and slurped as he strolled down the sidewalk between tables of wishing wells and postcards of the town hall that read , “Wishfully Thinking of you.”

He stopped outside the pool hall and peered through the window. He noticed his shoelace was untied. Roger set his snow cone on the window ledge and carefully knelt down to retie it. As he stood back up his heart skipped a beat. There, on a stool in broad daylight was the little old man who had winked at him in his dream! He sat in front of a crowd in the storyteller’s tent spinning a yarn.

There was something odd about his clothing. It wasn’t the antique styling. Dozens of vendors and towns people dressed to their Victorian nines for the festival every year. It was the way he wore it. Somehow, it didn’t look like a costume on him. He looked like he belonged in it.

As Roger stared the man turned and caught his eye, and winked! Or maybe his dreams were getting the better of him, either way Roger got the feeling that this old man knew something that Roger desperately wanted to know!

He scooped up his snowcone and hurried across the street. He found a seat near the back of the tent. The old man was just finishing his tale, The Legend of Jeremish Wish.

“ Knowing that it was his only chance Jeremish Wish took his last five dollar gold piece out of his pocket. He walked to the edge of the pool and watched the Spring bubbling up to fill it. He closed his eyes tight and flipped the coin up into the air carrying his wish with it down through the cool clear water.

As we all know his wish came to pass and the town of Wishful sprang up from the prairie. One day, nothing but tall prairie grasses as far as the eye could see. The next, a bustling Victorian village , with Jeremiah Wish, its founding father unanimously elected as the town’s first mayor. And right on that very spot they erected a fountain, The Fountain of Wishes, and people say that anyone with a sincere wish only needed to toss a coin into the bubbling water and it was as good as done. ”

The story teller bowed to the smattering of polite applause and passed his hat. Roger dropped his change in and waited. The man folded up his seat and started out of the tent. Roger hurried to catch up.

The storyteller stopped and looked down at Roger, “Something I can help you with, young man?”

Roger swallowed, “Uh, yeah…I was wondering …why aren’t wishes allowed now? If your story is true?”

“Well now, ‘course the stories true. Things change, that’s all.” The storyteller turned to go.

Roger didn’t know when he might get a chance like this again and he wasn’t about to let it slip away so easily. “ I don’t understand. Aren’t wishes a good thing?”

“Some people think so.” The man said.

“But why do you celebrate the festival of wishes, when you’re not allowed to make any of our own?” Roger asked the man.

The man smiled quietly, “You can make all the wishes you want for the next three days. The fountain’s right over there. Pitch in your penny and wish away.”

Roger gathered his nerve. He had the feeling this man might be the only one that could answer his question, “Where’s the real fountain? A friend of mine told me it was never destroyed. I have a feeling you know. Was it destroyed, and if not where is it?”

“Now hold on there young man those kind of questions will get you nothing but trouble. Maybe you’d best go on home and ask your Dad about that.”

“That’s just it. I can’t ask my Dad. He hasn’t even lived here since he was a kid. He says wishes are nothing but a foolish waste of breath. I need to know, are wishes real?”
Roger gasped as the man grabbed his arm and began to drag him along.

They turned off the busy street away from the carnival like atmosphere of the festival. The old man stopped and looked around cautiously. He bent down and whispered hoarsely into the boy’s ear, “Who put you up to this?”

“No one, I don’t know what you mean?” Roger was scared by the old man’s serious expression.

“I’m an old man, I don’t have time for games, who was it? Who told you to ask me that, was it Mayor Wish?” the old man’s gaze pierced Roger like a knife.
“Mayor Wish? Why would he?…” Roger was very confused.

The old man looked around again, “It’d be just like them to use a kid. You tell them I told you nothing, nothing, do you understand?”

“Tell who? I just got here, I don’t know anybody to tell.” Roger winced the old man’s bony fingers were starting to dig into his skin.

The storyteller shook Roger, “You tell them I said nothing!”

“Okay, okay, nothing, I got it.” Roger pulled away.

The old man scurried out into the street. By the time Roger recovered enough to follow him, he was gone. He stopped a couple on the sidewalk, “Excuse me, did you see a little old man come out of there”, he indicated the alley he’d just exited.

“No, sorry, sure didn’t” they walked by Roger peering back at him over their shoulders.

Roger wondered where the little man had gone to so fast. He was beginning to regret pushing for an answer. Maybe the old man didn’t know anything. Maybe. Roger turned to go. His disappointment was getting the better of him. If only he had taken more time. He wondered why the old man wasn’t more nervous.

He had seemed more angry than afraid.

Roger looked up, and coming right toward him was a very nervous looking man decked out in full Victorian splendor. A shopkeeper sweeping the walk greeted him with, ‘good morning mayor’. So this was mayor Wish!

From his black top hat to his white spats he looked every inch the Victorian gentleman. Roger stepped aside and turned to watch him pass, wondering why the mayor was in such a hurry. As he started to turn for home Roger stopped. Something had caught his eye. Peering out from behind a tree watching Mayor Wish’s march down Main Street, right where he was sure the young couple must have seen him, was an old man, the storyteller!

Roger ducked behind the nearest building and peered around the corner. The storyteller checked both ways, seemed to hesitate a moment when he didn’t find Roger where he’d expected him and then set out in the same direction as the mayor.

Roger wondered if he’d seen him. Then he wondered if it mattered. Then he wondered if he should follow the man. Finally he grew tired of wondering and decided to take action. He followed the storyteller down the street, ducking behind trolley stops, and waste bins whenever the man looked back. He followed him through down town and up Mulberry street.

They were now in one of the oldest parts of Wishful. Two and three story Victorians rose on either side. Some restored with brightly painted facades and neatly trimmed hedges, some in disrepair with overgrown jungles for gardens.

After pausing to look behind, the man turned up a narrow track. The boy waited until the old man had rounded a bend and then followed him onto what turned out to be a paved drive.

The trees overhead formed an arched canopy and what autumn light filtered down through the tangled branches painted speckled patterns of light and shadow on the cobblestone path. Roger forgot himself in the adventure of trespassing onto unknown territory and quickened his pace.

He rounded the bend and stopped. The old man should be in plain sight, the drive ran on straight for quite a distance, Roger hesitated uncertainly.

“I wonder where he’s gone” he said to himself, turning to look behind as a gnarled hand grabbed his shoulder and another snaked around and clamped itself over his mouth.

“Promise you won’t scream?” hissed a voice. Roger nodded and the hand over his mouth relaxed slightly. “Why are you following me?” the old man asked, stepping around in front of Roger.

“I don’t know. You acted strangely, I guess I was curious.” Roger replied.

“Curious? That’s dangerous you know. You know what they say about the cat.” The old man chuckled. Here in this more sinister surrounding he seemed less threatening somehow. Roger began to relax.

“What am I going to do with you, you just won’t take no for an answer, will you?” the old man was smiling broadly now.

“My mother says I have extraordinary tenacity,” the boy smiled.

“Oh she does, does she? What is your name boy?”

“My name?”

“Yes the thing they use to call you for supper.” The old man seemed amused by the boy’s confusion.

“Oh, that. My name is Roger, what’s yours?”

“ My name doesn’t matter, but you can call me whatever you like.”

Roger peered at the old man , “Matthias, I think.”

“Matthias, what kind of name is that?” the old man sneered.
“You said whatever I like, I like Matthias.” Roger countered, confidently.

“Well, so I did, so I did, well played. Come on.” And without another word the old man took off down the drive at a quick pace.

“Wait, where are we going?” Roger huffed to keep up.

“To see it of course,” the old man answered as if it were the silliest question he’d heard all day.

“To see what?” Roger had caught his breath and was now matching Matthias stride for stride.

“I hardly see the point in telling you when I can show you in a matter of minutes,” Matthias grinned.

Roger gave up his questions and focused on keeping up. After what felt like a mile the two rounded a bend and walked up to a tall iron fence.

A double gate blocked their path with a hulking, ancient padlock and chain bundled around its center. Roger pulled up expecting Matthias to pull out a key and unlock the heavy chain. Matthias had no such intention and walked clean through the gate and continued down the drive on the other side.

___________________________________________________________________________

Ah, yes, the inciting incident. The boy decides to follow the old man, Alice follows the rabbit, Dorothy sets off to see the Wizard and so the adventure begins!

Since childhood I was fascinated by the idea of wishes and fountains and wells and would hardly let my dad walk by a small, man made body of water without tossing a penny into it. I never really believed it was magic, but somehow,reviewing what I wanted from life in that way kept me on track.

Later it occurred to me that many people have this same relationship with religion, particularly Christianity. They don't really believe in the power of it, but they allow it to be practiced in little, controlled ways, like the Festival of Wishes in Wishful. Just enough to keep people happy, but not enough to mess up the lawn.

It has always been my experience that God takes a pleasure in messing up my life, or at least the parts that I am proudest of. Anything that I think I could have done without his help he is quick to show me that that is an illusion.

The people of Wishful, like many Christians, have decided they have outgrown their beliefs. They are bigger than wishing, and can relegate it to a holiday, where they explain the way it used to be to their children, all the while breathing a sigh of relief that they no longer feel the need for such superstition. Underneath they all secretly long for the power of the gospel to be real, to come alive.

Ironically this is exactly what God is waiting for, is an opening large enough to get his finger in, just a little, to remind us that he is real. Once we acknowledge him, then the possibilities are endless, but I am getting ahead of myself.

So, who is the old man? Where is he taking Roger? Is he one of the good guys, or will he reveal a dark side? Check in tomorrow to find out! Leave me a comment to let me know what you think! Thanks for reading!