“Come around here,” said the boy. “Now you see that-there? That’s the ignition key. When you turn that-there you’re ready to go ahead. Now, you push this do-hickey to the left. That puts her on battery—see, where it says Bat. That means battery.” They craned their necks into the car. The twins were standing on the running board.
“No—wait. I got ahead of myself. First you got to retard the spark and advance the gas, else she’ll kick your goddam arm off. This-here—see it?—this-here’s the spark. You push it up—get it?—up. Clear up. And this-here’s the gas—you push her down. Now I’m going to explain it and then I’m going to do it. I want you to pay attention. You kids get off the car. You’re in my light. Get down, goddam it.” The boys reluctantly climbed down from the running board; only their eyes looked over the door.
He took a deep breath. “Now you ready? Spark retarded, gas advanced. Spark up, gas down. Now switch to battery—left, remember—left.” A buzzing like that of a gigantic bee sounded. “Hear that? That’s the contact in one of the coil boxes. If you don’t get that, you got to adjust the points or maybe file them.” He noticed a look of consternation on Adam’s face. “You can study up on that in the book,” he said kindly.
He moved to the front of the car. “Now this-here is the crank and—see this little wire sticking out of the radiator?—that’s the choke. Now watch careful while I show you. You grab the crank like this and push till she catches. See how my thumb is turned down? If I grabbed her the other way with my thumb around her, and she was to kick, why, she’d knock my thumb off. Got it?”
He didn’t look up but he knew they were nodding.
“Now,” he said, “look careful. I push in and bring her up until I got compression, and then, why, I pull out this wire and I bring her around careful to suck gas in. Hear that sucking sound? That’s choke. But don’t pull her too much or you’ll flood her. Now, I let go the wire and I give her a hell of spin, and as soon as she catches I run around and advance the spark and retard the gas and I reach over and throw the switch quick over to magneto—see where it says Mag?—and there you are.”
His listeners were limp. After all this they had just got the engine started.
The boy kept at them. “I want you to say after me now so you learn it. Spark up—gas down.”
They repeated in chorus, “Spark up—gas down.”
“Switch to Bat.”
“Switch to Bat.”
“Crank to compression, thumb down.”
“Crank to compression, thumb down.”
“Easy over—choke out.”
“Easy over—choke out.”
“Spin her.”
“Spin her.”
“Spark down—gas up.”
“Spark down—gas up.”
“Switch to Mag.”
“Switch to Mag.”
“Now, we’ll go over her again. Just call me Joe.”
“Just call you Joe.”
“Not that. Spark up—gas down.”
A kind of weariness settled on Adam as they went over the litany for the fourth time. The process seemed silly to him. He was relieved when a short time later Will Hamilton drove up in his low sporty red car. The boy looked at the approaching vehicle. “That-there’s got sixteen valves,” he said in a reverent tone. “Special job.”
Will leaned out of his car. “How’s it going?” he asked.
“Just fine,” said the mechanic. “They catch on quick.”
“Look, Roy, I’ve got to take you in. The new hearse knocked out a bearing. You’ll have to work late to get it ready for Mrs. Hawks at eleven tomorrow.”
Roy snapped to efficient attention. “I’ll get my clos’,” he said and ran for the house. As he tore back with his satchel Cal stood in his way.
“Hey,” Cal said, “I thought your name was Joe.”
“How do you mean, Joe?”
“You told us to call you Joe. Mr. Hamilton says you’re Roy.”
Roy laughed and jumped into the roadster. “Know why I say call me Joe?”
“No. Why?”
“Because my name is Roy.” In the midst of his laughter he stopped and said sternly to Adam, “You get that book under the seat and you study up. Hear me?”
“I will,” said Adam.
Chapter 30
1
Even as in Biblical times, there were miracles on the earth in those days. One week after the lesson a Ford bumped up the main street of King City and pulled to a shuddering stop in front of the post office. Adam sat at the wheel with Lee beside him and the two boys straight and grand in the back seat.
Adam looked down at the floorboards, and all four chanted in unison, “Brake on—advance gas—switch off.” The little engine roared and then stopped. Adam sat back for a moment, limp but proud, before he got out.
The postmaster looked out between the bars of his golden grill. “I see you’ve got one of the damn things,” he said.
“Have to keep up with the times,” said Adam.
“I predict there’ll come a time when you can’t find a horse, Mr. Trask.”
“Maybe so.”
“They’ll change the face of the countryside. They get their clatter into everything,” the postmaster went on. “We even feel it here. Man used to come for his mail once a week. Now he comes every day, sometimes twice a day. He just can’t wait for his damn catalogue. Running around. Always running around.” He was so violent in his dislike that Adam knew he hadn’t bought a Ford yet. It was a kind of jealousy coming out. “I wouldn’t have one around,” the postmaster said, and this meant that his wife was at him to buy one. It was the women who put the pressure on. Social status was involved.
The postmaster angrily shuffled through the letters from the T box and tossed out a long envelope. “Well, I’ll see you in the hospital,” he said viciously.
Adam smiled at him and took his letter and walked out.
A man who gets few letters does not open one lightly. He hefts it for weight, reads the name of the sender on the envelope and the address, looks at the handwriting, and studies the postmark and the date. Adam was out of the post office and across the sidewalk to his Ford before he had done all of these things. The left-hand corner of the envelope had printed on it, Bellows and Harvey, Attorneys at Law, and their address was the town in Connecticut from which Adam had come.