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Morse

Of such as Morse, the poet said “He who has no house will now not build him one.” Morse was one of the people he spoke of, one of those people who seem like detritus on a seashore left by a retreating high tide after a storm, but he got along. His needs were few and his income modest, derived from long-ago occurrences and settlements after strange events in distant spaces no longer relevant or even remembered very well.

He was well into older middle age. At one time he had a more normal life which had only very slowly evaporated; the jobs, the house, the wife, the children, the relatives and friends and neighbors died or moved away or mysteriously disappeared, last seen waving from a street corner maybe a long time ago. Morse, if he thought about it at all, supposed life was like that. At one time he had expected better things, but he had not set his heart upon them and he accepted their departure or failure to show up as part of the order of things.

With nothing much to do or look after, and not disposed to become a television zombie, Morse drifted randomly around the neighborhood from day to day to see what was what.

The neighborhood he lived in was a declining slum, but it was peaceful, not of much interest to gangs or slumlords. Someday in the not too far off future it would be annihilated by one developer or another for a spiffy cheap project, and later junked for another generation of poor people, or people like Morse; but that day had not quite arrived yet. As the neighborhood awaited its fate, its vacant lots multiplied and received curious items which Morse was sometimes moved to inspect. Most, but not all of them, were broken or worn out or maybe never of any use, of course, but everything has a history, which made them vaguely interesting to Morse. A large rusty tricycle, for example, of a design popular generaions before, back before the war or the war that followed it or the election or the boom or the crash. What had brought it out from its hiding place after so many years and happenings? And why?

Objects of course were mute and silent and only one's imagination could speak for them. So the objects became a kind of society or world for Morse. while the dogs, cats, police, beggars, vermin, and street folk of the neighborhood had grown familiar with him to the point of boredom. But sometimes middle-sized street children or teens would follow him around to see what he had turned up. One of these was the Indeterminate Samantha, a small skinny person who was not quite a teen-ager, not quite grown up, did not go to school much or have a real job, and who had gotten into the habit of watching Morse from time to time. Watching over him, one might say.

In fact, on the day we're talking about, the Indeterminate Samantha had gone around to see what Morse was doing, and she was followed by her sidekick or younger brother or whatever he was, often called (but not necessarily) Charlie.

It had happened that an old truck had appeared in a rather large and mostly empty, indeed, abandoned parking lot which was vaguely attached to a now disused railway, abandoned since the commuters and students who had used it once had moved on to new lives and new routes and the people who ran the trains had forgotten it. The parking lot seemed to pull in abandoned objects and thus had become a kind of a center for Morse's peregrinations. Needless to say, it had no official function or status. The trunk had been dropped off a truck which immediately departed.

Morse had an understanding way with junk. The trunk might be said to have been waiting for him.

Encounering its appearance on his route, followd by Samantha and Charlie, Morse studied the trunk for awhile. It did not seem to contain living animals, liquids, acive garbage or dead bodies, all of which were to be treated with caution, if not strictly avoided. Morse pushed the top open with a stick. The lock had been broken, but the trunk itself was in relvatively good condition. Morse peered over its edge. The inside of the trunk seemed bigger than the outside, and at the bottom it was very dark.

Morse leaned in to get a better view. Suddenly he lost his footing and fell into the darkness. Much to his surprise he did not fall very far; instead, it seemed to him that he was just drifting down into softness. He could not seem to get a firm grip to drag himself out. The bottom was too soft.

“Samantha”, he called. “Can you give me a hand here?”

Her voice seemed to come from very far away. “What? What's going on?” she cried.

“I fell in the trunk and can't get out,” called out Morse.

Samantha's head appeared at an improbable distance. “I can't see you,” she called, again from very far away.

“Can you get help?” called Morse.

“I have to go to my music lesson,” called Samantha. “You told me to never miss my music lessons. I am sure you don't want me to skip them.”

Confronted with this implacable logic, Morse thought about it for a moment, and then called out “Well, on your way to your music lesson, see if you can't get someone to come over here.” He relaxed to await events.

A good while later there were noises, first from far off, and later closer up. Morse knew Samantha and Charlie had returned.

“So what did you learn at your music lesson?” he asked.

Samantha hummed the first few bars of “I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles” or “Somewhere Over The Rainbow,” songs that break your heart with the lightest of touches, it was said.

“I know those songs. They're very familiar. I think my mother used to sing them,” said Morse.

“'I'm Forerver....'That's a very old song,” said Samantha. That's about a hundred years old, I think. It's so old that people make fun of it, but it's a beautiful song, isn't it? It's a sad song about a poor girl who can't make anything work for her. So it's like the national anthem for people like me.“ She and Charlie climbed over the edge of the trunk and jumped into it.

”This is very nice,“ said Samantha, ”although it could use some better lighting.“ She looked around in spite of the darkness. ”If we fixed it up, we could get married,“ she said. ”You could sit on the front porch, if it had a front porch, and smoke your pipe. And Charlie could be the dog.“

”I think I“m a bit on in years to start another family — a big long in the tooth,” replied Morse.

“Your teeth aren't so long,” said Samantha, “but I suppose they're long enough. You're a wolfie type. But, yeah, you do look worn down a bit. Maybe you'll have to be the dog. Hard for a dog to smoke a pipe, though, I suppose it could be done. But this is obviously a witching trunk and as long as we stay in it we can make it be anything whatever we want forever.” Samantha occasionally visited a botánica store up a nearby street and had some knowledge of obscure things.

Down in the darkness, looking around with their fingers, they found things. If they held them up to the light from above, they could just barely see them.

One thing was a was a piece of clothing, a houndstooth jacket. When Morse saw it he felt a chill. It was identical to a jacket his grandmother had worn, a long,long time ago, which he hadn't seen since those days.

“That pattern is called houndstooth. Very popular at one time. Very slick. This trunk has come a very long way,” said Morse.

Samantham pulled it further up, modeling it, so to speak.. She preened a bit. “It's very nice. But there's something else there, under the jacket.”

It was true. The jacket did not lie flat in the bottom of the trunk. Samantha bent down, searched with her fingers in the dark, and pulled up the jacket. Something fell out of it. : Underneath it was a doll, not a baby doll but one of the Barbie type, representing a pretty young woman. Its hair was black, its skin fair, its body full-figured, it stared upward with bright blue eyes. As Morse stared at it, its eyes almost seemed to move. A mighty chill passed through Morse: the doll had the same complexion, the same hair color, the same figure as his mother had had, once very long ago. It was a visitation. Morse almost wanted to weep. He held the doll and studied it. He couldn't say anything.

“There's something else down here,” said Samantha, plunging into the dark again. It turned out to be a little silvery metal comb. She handed the comb to Charlie, since he had not gotten anything yet. He looked at it dubiously so as to preserve his dignity and put it in his pocket. “All right,” he said, “Let's get the hell out of here.” He was a bit spooked. Charlie and Samantha put their hands together in a secret bouncing grip and with a mighy effort bounced a struggling Morse up and out. He fell in a heap next to the trunk, somewhat rumpled but unshaken, and got himself up. Samantha climbed easily over the edge, followed by Charlie. They jumped down.

“Isn't this nice?” said Samantha. “We all got presents from your grandmother. We are going to remember this day. That is because we love each other. Hola y adiós, Abuela,” she declared.

Then they walked off to wherever they were going. At the last moment but one, Samantha stopped. “Look back,” Samantha called out. “Wave good-bye.” The spirits had to be thanked for their gifts.

She knew that if they ever returned to the lot, the trunk be gone. It had come to see them from another place, another world, another time, a sign of something, and, its mission or intention completed, would go back into the invisible, immortal stream of things, like everything else.