Gardiner's Garden Basket
Part One
“WHALE...
eye’p... SUPPOSE.”
“You
suppose WHAT?”
“WHALE... eye’p.”
“WHAT?”
“WHALE...”
Old Fetch (“Fetchy” or “Old Fetchy”) said with a furtive glance at my face
followed by a quick return of his eyes to contemplating the folded down
tailgate of his pickup truck. “EYE’p SUPPOSE... you... don’t happen to have...”
he says as his head and face lift back up from the tailgate gaze and peer into
my face “.... .... a FAIR price... on the BASKET”.
“I’m
using the damn basket.”
“Your
using GARDINER’S basket”.
“YES.”
“WHALE...”
“IT’S
MINE.”
“WHALE...
eye’p... SUPPOSE”
“You
don’t want that basket.”
“WHALE...
I’ve always LIKED IT”.
“Yeah
but that was AFTER I got it.”
“WHALE... I was THERE TOO.”
“WHALE... I was THERE TOO.”
“YOU
COME BY... on weasel just like you always do”.
“WEASEL!”
“Weasel
and you know it”.
“WHALE.”
“I
ALREADY had it IN the truck. You
seen it IN THERE. THEN you’s
STARTED.”
“WHALE...”
“I
already OWNED IT fair and square:
I already RESCUED IT. It’s
MINE. I’m USING IT.”
“Camp
SEE that would MAKE the difference.”
“CAN’T
SEE that its over there FULL OF TOMATOES?”
“Them
summer gold is GOOD ain’t THEY”.
“You
want to buy it FULL don’t YOU.”
“WHALE...
could be full... eye’p... SUPPOSE”.
“JESUS
is YOU’S the WEASEL”.
“WHALE...”
“WELL...”
I mimicked.
“Whale...
MAYBE TODAY.
“I
ain’t gonna sell it to you
“WHALE...”
“OK: TWO TWENTY-FIVE.”
“WHALE
NOT THAT!”
“Take
it or... LEAVE IT.”
“WHALE.”
“You
just come by THINK’EN.”
“WHALE: SUMMER NOW... sees... WHALE...
“Tomato
season.”
“Whale.”
“Garden
season.”
“WHALE...
BASKET season I SAY this morning.”
“Yeah
but that’s pretty special. We’ve
talked about THAT.
“WHALE...
that you don’t just SELL a BASKET like THAT”.
“They
buy ‘em... once they find out.
“Find
out?”
“YOU
had to FIND OUT”.
“WHALE...”
“YOU
DID and I remember it.”
“YOU
was GO’EN to her (talking a sales pitch) and that woman just TURNED and said
I’LL BUY IT”.
“Yes. And you ain’t been the same since. Good one too; early. That old wire repair along the bottom. Wire on the handle too. Higgins’s farm... shed; found that
one.”
“WHALE...”
“WELL
I HAD to take you DOWN TO THE RIVER and BAPTIZE YOU RIGHT THEN.”
“WHALE...
you did TEACH me.”
“Some
TEACH.”
“WHALE.”
“You
STILL ain’t got one YET.”
“WHALE.”
“STILL
STUCK on the one’s I GET.”
“WHALE...
I LOOK NOW.”
“And
come out with?”
“Whale.”
“And
GET IN WITH.”
“I
AIN’T GONNA BEAT YOU.”
“But
you’ll WEASEL”.
“WEASEL: You’re the WEASEL.”
“Just
doing my job.”
“YOU
HAD HIS (Gardiner’s) BASKET IN YOUR CAB.
THEY AIN’T EVEN LEFT YET.”
“Didn’t
say a word either.”
“Course
you wouldn’t.
“NOT
ME: THEM. They wouldn’t KNOW a garden basket if
it FARTED AT ‘EM.”
“WHALE...
they’d know SOME; that... WHALE... that HE USED IT: Could know THAT.”
“Maybe...
maybe not.”
“But
you always know’d that basket I know.”
“Not
just THAT basket. The whole GARDEN
BASKET; all of ‘em. I LOOK for
those. YOU know THAT. Now YOU look for ‘em. Because of ME you do.”
“WHALE...
THEY ARE SPECIAL. Once you
know. I mean... WHALE... YOU KNOW
your RIGHT.”
“HIS
(Gardiner’s garden basket) BE... Oh Jesus... Well... HIS wife’s MOTHER’S. Then probably HER MOTHER’S. That’s Wilton (Maine) way. SO... THAT’S an early one. SO HER MOTHER’S. That FARM. Let’s see:
THAT’S got to be twenty-five years ago NOW. So... nothing in there. So it got all the way over here. He always said it was her MOTHER’S”.
“BACK
THERE; the FARM. Don’t remember
YOU IN THERE.”
“Well...
the basket’s eighteen fifties; Civil War.
So... probably... FIVE generations at least.
“THEN
GARDINER.”
“No...
him too. His wife used it. Probably they brought it over. When the mother died. That’s the usual way. One uses it... dies... next one picks
it up.”
“Jesus
how you know that... “
“Well
LOOK AT the DAMN basket. It don’t
GET like that from being USED BY YOU.
Got to be GENERATIONS.
And. Of course... IT’S OLD;
an OLD BASKET. IT’S MADE right;
OLD right. ON the FARM most of
‘em.”
“THAT
ONE... Gardiner USED THAT ONE”.
“Well
I knew that when I went IN THERE.
I knew it was in there. I
took it right out. Then you seen
it. In the truck. I rescued it.
“WHALE...
I ain’t gonna PAY YOU. But... I
LIKE THAT ONE”.
“I’ve
found better than THAT.”
“Some
you have: I seen. But:”
“GARDINER’S”
“Whale.”
“I
took it right out. On the
porch. Right there. Always right there in the summer. Fall too. They took it in after that; for the winter.
“WHALE...
now... eye’p suppose you SEEN that PHOTOGRAPH that the HISTORICAL SOCIETY has
out.
“OH
you weasel; you JUST SEEN THAT?”
“EYE’P”
“SEEN
IT. WITH THE BASKET”
“Just
the TOP”.
“Yeah
but... It’s THE BASKET.”
“WHALE”.
“They’re
sitting there just like always”.
“WHALE...
they was NINETY-FOUR”.
“TWO: Ninety-two”.
“DIED
TOGETHER.”
“Four
days”.
“SHE
DIED.”
“Then
Gardiner. He said to me once that
it was OVER when she dies. He said
that.
“WHALE
...that was their WHOLE LIFE.
“They
first KISSED when they were FOURTEEN.”
“WHALE
THAT TOO”.
“He
used the basket when I’d visit him.
They should of got a picture of THAT. Him in the garden.
She wouldn’t come out anymore.
He’d go out with the basket.
That’s where I first SEEN the basket. Actually TRIED to buy it THEN.
“SPECIAL
I’d say”.
“The
basket”.
“WHALE...
that TOO. But them two. DEAD NOW.”
“You
figure that’s got to be a rare photograph for the baskets; the actual USERS
pictured WITH their basket”.
“It
IS the basket. I think about it;
that basket. Come over to SEE
it. Didn’t figure you’d be USING
it.”
“I
do. Not always. I got quite a few I’ve taken out. RESCUED she (my wife) says.
I rotate ‘em. Each one I
know it. You know; where I got
it. How I got it.
“YOU
SAY you just can’t BUY THEM. Your
right about that. I DON’T EVER SEE
one. Now; I look TOO.”
“Got
to be found in the houses.
Rescued. Too old and BEAT
UP for the dealers. THEY Don’t
KNOW. GARDEN BASKET; WHAT’S
THAT.”
“Well
now I SEEN YOU sell ONE.”
“Yeah but that’s AFTER they FIND OUT.”
“Yeah but that’s AFTER they FIND OUT.”
“Whale...
Gardiner ‘ould SIT THERE WITH his basket.
Remember THAT? It ‘ould be
full too.”
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