"PADDY DWINK"

                                PADDY DWINK                                                                 
                      A short story from Oxnard Bow
                            Offered by: Peter Yule

         Now horse drawn wagons in town were not as common as they had been when I was a younger man. I can still recall seeing as many as two, or three come into town at the same time. Of course during the war years when gasoline was in short supply they did make a brief comeback. There was one wagon in particular that came into our town year after year on a regular basis. Every year, in the spring and in the fall the big old wagon with its faded white canvas top pulled by two aging Belgian horses would roll into town. Looking like the storybook picture of the wagons that had crossed the continent in the century gone by, this wagon would make its way into town and roll to a stop right in the middle of Main Street.

         This wagon and the man who drove it were legendary long before their time in these parts. This was the wagon and indeed the life of one Paddy Dwink. Every man woman and child of any age would surround Paddy Dwinks wagon just as soon as it came to a stop. Paddy would jump up on his seat  and spring into action just like a carnival barker. He would greet everyone by name and then jump down to the ground, removing an old flat iron from a box at the side of his wagon. He would walk up to his team of horses and tie off the bridal of one horse or the other. He would then drop the iron to the ground between them. He would always explain to the crowd that neither horse was smart enough to know which of them had been tied, so they would both just stand firmly in the same place until he removed their impromptu tether. “Someday,” he would say,  “someday these old boys will figure out on their own that they could move that iron, and they will undoubtedly go off on their own leaving old Paddy behind. Yes, someday. Why they have seen enough of this state that they are probably just itching to head out for Maine, just for the pretty scenery.”

         Well with this chore done, Paddy would climb back up on to his high seat and take a pad of paper from its place beneath it, and the chewed-up pencil from behind his ear. Paddy was ready for business. He would stand tall above the crowd so he could see and be seen by all. He always looked the same, never changing his appearance. Red and black plaid pants of heavy wool, bright-red suspenders, a dark-green coarse wool shirt with rolled up sleeves, and a pair of Gold wire framed glasses balanced on the end of his nose. One lens was broken and patched in several places. He bit down hard on the end of a very large deep bowled, hand carved Irish pipe, which I think had never been seen lit. Paddy would start out by looking around and talking with every person gathered by their first name. Paddy had memorized the names of every person and their children in the entire town. He would continue like a showman for a full hour or more, and then in his own way he would eventually get to the reason for his visit.

         “Well folks,” he would say, “it’s been a long ride and there is work to be done, so who is going to be first to help old Paddy along.” A hand would go up somewhere in the crowd, and Paddy would lean down and pass the block of paper and the pencil to the person who had raised his hand first.  He would continue his chatter as the block of paper and pencil made its way into the crowd and back. “Who will be next, who will help old Paddy to keep the boys in oats this year” referring to his horses. Another hand would go up and again the paper and pencil would go out and back. After some time of this exchange, Paddy would reclaim the pad and pencil and remove from it all of the notes now written on it. Some notes he would carefully fold and put into his shirt pocket, others he would remove and read and roll up into a ball and discard. As this went on folks would walk around his wagon peering in at every chance to see what Paddy had inside. In time Paddy would again stand tall and remove a dozen or so notes from his pocket and read out the names aloud. “Frank Taylor, you’ll be first he shouted, and Joe Dawes, I’ll be over your way next,” and so it went. Each note handed up to Paddy listed on it a specific job that had to be done, and the amount of money that would be paid for the job. Paddy would consider each offering and select from them only the jobs that he thought he could do well. He would discard the ones that did not suit his skills or those  that paid too little.

         Paddy Dwink was a true Yankee craftsman, with unbelievable skills in most every known trade. He carried with him in his wagon all manner of tools collected for over forty years. He also had parts and pieces for every known machine or household device that he had ever encountered. If you hired Paddy to do a job, and he accepted, he would do it better and faster than anyone else. He would use his own tools and his own methods, and any parts that he might find in his wagon, were always included without further charge.  He never asked for more than the job offered. He never limited his time, but he would pick and choose  just enough jobs to keep him busy in town for two or three weeks. After that time he would move on, going further north in the spring and further south in the fall. Paddy was a good and honest man, and when he came to work for you, he would take his meals with the family, and sleep out in his wagon at night. There were several times that Paddy worked at our house and when he did I watched his every move, listened to his every word, and learned from him skills that would last a lifetime. In the evenings Paddy would set out on the porch, or in the kitchen where he was working and tell endless stories of his travels and of the people he met and of the chores he had done. Some of the stories seemed to me to be stretched out just a little, bordering on being tall tales, but on the whole, Paddy was a fine example of a free man, who truly enjoyed life.



                                        PADDY DWINK
                                          Chapter Two

         When Paddy first came to our house, it was to dig a new well, and lay in pipe to connect the well to the house. The house in which I lived with my mother was owned by my aunt, My father had passed on several year earlier. I remember my aunt planning to write her note, to make her offer to Paddy. “I can’t pay him too much,” she would say. “It wouldn’t be right to the other folks in town if I pay him too much!” She muddled over her offer for several days before Paddy actually arrived in town. Standing in the crowd she scribbled her offer to him, explaining well the task at hand. Her offer was ten dollars a day, and two home-baked chicken pies when he was done. Well for the ten dollars a day, and my aunts terrific chicken pies, Paddy added her name to his list of chores to do. Third down from the top was where he placed it. I remember that his first chore was to help old Mr. Kramer to put a new roof on his house. That would take about three days, with both men working together.

         When folks planned on hiring Paddy, they would have all of the materials needed for the job delivered to the house before he arrived. That’s how it was with Mr. Kramer. When Paddy drew up in his wagon, the tar paper, the shingles and roof edge all lay neatly on the ground beside the house. Two tall ladders rested against the house, and the job was waiting for the masters’ arrival. Well, Paddy arrived very early and unhitched his horses and set them out to pasture in  a nearby field. Next he uncovered his wagon, and after removing several large crates from it. The wagon began to take on a whole new look. Paddy had taken a long square beam from beneath the wagon, and stood it on end, fitting it into a heavy iron bracket anchored to the floor of the wagon. He proceeded to attach a large crosspiece of wood to the very top using a bracket made just for the task. Soon his lifting-boom as he called it was ready and firmly in place. He proceeded to hoist each of the large rolls of tar paper and the bundles of shingles from the ground to the roof without a hint of strain. He could well have done this single handed. He grinned widely at the ease with which his contraption worked, and marveled out loud at the time that he would save by using his device. Hauling shingles from the ground to the roof was not a chore that would amuse Paddy Dwink.

         Soon both men were hard at work laying tarpaper and placing and nailing new shingles atop of Kramer’s house. They would stop at regular intervals to check to see that the rows were straight and each time, Paddy would take a sip from the brown flask that he kept by his side when he worked. By nightfall of the second day, the job was done  and at first light of the third day, Paddy was once again up on the roof trimming the edges and putting the lead flashings around the corners of the house. Before breakfast he had cleared away all of the old roof materials, swept the walkways and looked one more time with pride on a job well done. Mr. Kramer came out, looked up at the finished job, and handed Paddy an envelope. Paddy never opened it. He went over to his wagon, climbed up and lifted the front edge of his big seat. He slipped the envelope into a strong metal box that was screwed down directly beneath the seat. He jumped down from the wagon, thanked Mr. Kramer and hitched his team back to the wagon. This was the way of Paddy Dwink.

         Now on his third day in town, Paddy headed over to the south side to do a chore there, that he said would also take just two days to complete. On the morning of the fifth day, before the sun was up, we were awakened to the roar of a loud engine that seamed so close to the house that all of the windows were shaking. Paddy had arrived, and had already freed his horses to wander in our backyard. He had opened his wagon and swung out a two cylinder engine, reclaimed from an old pump house. He had refitted it  to the task of drilling wells. Yes, Paddy would not be digging a well by hand as had been thought. He was a man of modern thinking and he would drill a new well deeper than planned that would be able to hold up during the driest of seasons.

         The un-muffled engine roared as the drill bit went deeper and deeper into the earth. Auntie appeared on the rear porch, still dressed in her nightgown and robe. Standing on the porch with her hands over her ears she yelled and tried to get Paddy’s attention. It was to no avail. I saw her trying and I walked over to Paddy and tapped him on the shoulder, pointing toward my aunt now very distressed that such a noise would be coming from her yard at his hour of the morning. Paddy clenched down on his pipe, turned toward my aunt, and winked at me. He gave my aunt a big smile, waved nicely to her and quickly turned his back toward her, pushing the engine to a new and higher noise level. Auntie ran into the house and returned moments later wearing her dress and boots as she came out. She bounded from the porch and went straight toward Paddy.          He pressed the drill bit a little harder and just as she neared him, he stopped the engine. With a pixies’ grin, he greeted auntie and quickly reached down picked up some wet black dirt from the ground, and placed it into her hand. “There it is Mrs. just as nice as can be. Rich black water filled soil, why in just another ten minutes or so I can shut down this noisy old machine and you will have fresh water by nightfall. Was there something you wanted? he asked.” Paddy had a way of stemming trouble before it began, and was always quick to satisfy the ladies. Paddy knew that this job would go faster than planned and he could save time by starting early. He would still get his two chicken pies as agreed to. Auntie was speechless standing there in her yard before sunrise holding a handful of wet black dirt now oozing water from between her fingers.

         She had lost a battle of wits before it even began. “Mr. Dwink, I would appreciate it if in the future you would not start work until after sunrise.” Paddy responded that he just thought everyone in Oxnard Bow got up early, to make a good breakfast before starting out to work. He had given auntie a hint that he expected breakfast, and she could not ignore it. “Mr. Dwink, I have my breakfast at dawn, and not before. You can join us inside in one-half hour if you like.”

         Paddy went on with his work, and in a few moments time had drilled to the depth that he felt was sufficient. He withdrew the drill bit from the hole and set it to one side. Next he took a long section of pipe and drove it into the well hole, adding a second section and a third as they disappeared into the earth. In the half-hour time frame Paddy had completed the task of setting the well to new depths at the rear of our house. He wiped the dirt from his hands and moved now to the rear porch. Auntie had been watching, and met him at the door with a large tray on which she had placed fresh rolls, eggs with bacon and a pot of coffee.

          “You sit right down there, and Peter and I will join you out here on the porch. Why it is such a beautiful morning, and you boys are just covered with dirt. We will all take our breakfast right out here on the porch.” Paddy took the tray from auntie and moved toward the table setting the tray to rest. He poured a large cup of black coffee from the big pot for himself, and then poured a smaller cup adding milk to it and offered it to me. Auntie, now standing with us quickly informed Paddy that I was just a boy, and not old enough for coffee. “Nonsense,” he replied, “why this boy can work just like a man, and he is most assuredly old enough for coffee my dear woman. You can trust Paddy Dwink on that.”          That was it. On that day on that porch, I had my first cup of coffee, right alongside of a workingman that I was growing to like a great deal.

         Before noontime the well was capped. The pump was connected and the pipe laid in to the house. I ached all over my body and my hands were blistered from helping Paddy. He on the other hand showed no signs of strain from the job, and wasn’t even sweating. The job was done in record time and we stopped for lunch and again auntie who had been watching was ready for us. We ate our lunch on the porch so as not to track any dirt into aunties’ kitchen. She had been busy all morning baking two chicken pies for Mr. Dwink as had been agreed to. She gave him a small envelope that he placed into his pocket unopened.

         Following lunch, Paddy brought his horses to the front of the wagon. He hitched up his team and drove to the front of the house, stopping in the roadway by the white picket fence. Paddy jumped down and carefully placed his envelope in the box beneath his seat. He then took an old burlap bag and a shovel from within the wagon and proceeded to bag up the droppings left by his team. When he had finished he brought the bag to the walkway and left it there. Auntie, who had of course been watching stepped from the front door asking “just what is this all about.” Paddy responded that she should leave the bag there in the sunlight until after the next rain storm passed by. “After the rain has gone,  he said, just rake the contents into the ground over there by those rose bushes. You will see new roses as big as sunflowers in just a few days time.”

         Paddy put his shovel back in the wagon and climbed aboard. Auntie again came from the house carrying a large neatly wrapped cardboard box, containing two fresh baked chicken pies, and a full tin of fresh baked biscuits. Paddy was indeed grateful and waved back several times as he drove off toward his next chore.


                                          PADDY DWINK
                                            Chapter Three

         
         Paddy continued his work around town over the course of the next weeks. After completing his last contracted task he drove his wagon back into town, coming to a stop in front of the schoolhouse. He tied off his horses to the familiar flat iron to hold them in place. Paddy looked over the outside of the schoolhouse, and made several trips into the back of his wagon.

         The schoolhouse had been opened for a few years now and was beginning to show signs of wear. Miss Dalton, who had come to town in the year the school opened as its’ only teacher was still very much in charge. She took great pride in the school and the upkeep of the building, and had only mentioned the need for a coat of paint to Paddy. There was no money to buy paint, and to pay Paddy. There had been no offer, no job slip passed in.

         Miss Dalton was inside the one room school, giving extra help to a few students during the summer break. It was her way of staying busy in the summer months. On seeing Paddys’ wagon now standing in the schoolyard she announced a brief recess to the children and sent them outside. Paddy entered the room, removing his hat and walked around the room looking at the entire place. He rubbed the walls with an old rag, and could plainly see the need for paint. When he had finished his examination of the building, he walked to the front of the room to where Miss Dalton was seated at a large oak desk. “Well Miss Dalton, I do believe you were quite right in your facts. This old place sure could use a fresh paint job.” “Mr. Dwink, I thought I made it quite clear that we simply do not have the money for paint and certainly none for labor. We simply can not afford to do this at this time. Perhaps next year we could stretch a bit for the outside.” “My dear Miss Dalton, I did not ask for payment, but I will need your help.” “But Mr. Dwink, I have never painted a thing in my life.” “Oh not to paint my dear, that is a mans’ job, but you can wash and cook,” he asked. “Well yes of course she replied. “Very well then, you will cook me supper tonight, and tomorrow you will be here early to wash the walls. That old woodstove has left a layer of soot on them that must be removed, and you will be in complete charge of that. “But again Mr. Dwink, I must remind you that we can not pay you.” “Miss Dalton, if you will meet my terms, I will paint your school, now what time is dinner?”

         Realizing that this was an offer that could not be refused, Miss Dalton stated that dinner would be promptly at six o clock. She extended her hand to assure that there was an agreement, and her hand was quickly and softly accepted in the large calloused hands of Paddy Dwink. A bargain had been struck.

         That evening, Paddy left his wagon in town and stabled his horses. To the great surprise of everyone that saw him he was a changed man. He had changed his clothing for his Sunday best. He strutted across the center of town, clean shaven wearing an unbroken pair of glasses in  a tailored suit with necktie polished leather shoes, and carrying a large bouquet of flowers. How very strange he must have appeared, no one ever having seen him this way. He walked with a spring in his step and a glow on his face directly to Miss Daltons front gate. A very shocking sight indeed in our small town.

         Paddy arrived at Miss Daltons, who now lived in a small cottage just a short distance from the school, at five minutes before six-o-clock. On reaching the gate, he brushed the dust from his shoes straightened his tie and walked to her open doorway. Miss Dalton stepped out onto the porch, and was herself dressed for the arrival of her visitor. She wore a soft blue cotton dress with white cuffs that she had only worn to church for special events. Paddy presented her with the bouquet and politely she received his gift offering. Together the two went inside.

         Later that evening, well past the supper hour, Miss Dalton and Paddy Dwink were seen sitting together on the front porch of the simple home, into the hours well beyond nightfall. Folks who had themselves walked by that evening recalled hearing laughter and bits of friendly conversation, and they heard Paddy Dwink now calling Miss Dalton by her given name of Elizabeth. Two people, one born in England, and one born in Ireland had found friendship in Oxnard Bow.

         For the next four days, Paddys’ wagon would appear at the schoolhouse each morning and together he and Miss Dalton worked at scrubbing and scraping and patching the school house. Within a few hours of the first day, several other people stopped by to lend the couple a hand, and the work and the time just seemed to fly by. On the evening of the first day, Paddy and Elizabeth were invited to dinner at Mr. Adams home, and on the second day to the home of Mrs. Ganz. The work at the schoolhouse continued and each day more men and women came to join the fun and enjoy the spontaneous joy of the new couple. The schoolhouse never looked so good. Fresh paint inside and out. New window casements, a better stove and new racks to hold the firewood. It was obvious that Mr. Dwink had no intentions of seeing the work end, but it did. On Friday evening, Mr. Dwink found comfort in an old rocking chair that was now firmly a fixture on Miss Daltons porch.
         
         On Saturday, Paddys’ big old wagon was drawn to the front of Mr. Adams store. Paddy removed the large metal box that had been bolted beneath the front seat, and entered into Mr. Adams back room. He left the box with Mr. Adams for safe keeping. He emerged from the store, and waved to all of the townsfolk that happened by on that beautiful day. How strange it was that now, Paddy Dwink left town in the summer of the year, heading south when everyone knew he should be going north. How very strange.

         Sunday the church bells rang out their call to services. The air was alive and sweetened with the scent of new growth, and fresh beginnings. The breeze gently wafted across the town and windows were opened everywhere. The Minister called the congregation to worship and friends who had been standing out in the front of the church now moved silently to worship. The Minister walked in last, and closed the large white doors behind him. As he turned to his flock, the doors opened once again, and into the church, now arm in arm walked Miss Dalton, and Paddy Dwink, looking radiant and aglow in appearance to all. Miss Dalton, now over  thirty and Mr. Dwink, just a few years older would be married in that church just one month later, to the cheers and applause of everyone in Oxnard Bow. Truly a couple born half way around the world had been brought together by the divine hand of Gods Grace, and everyone offered blessings upon this couple.

         With help from new friends, Paddy Dwink purchased from Mr. Adams a small piece of land in town next to Billy’s garage, and built and opened the first hardware store in town. His horses were put to pasture in Mrs. Ganz’s fields, and his wagon parked forever in front of his hardware store. By the end of his first year a proud new sign hung over the door to the store, proclaiming P. Dwink & Son. Hardware and Tools For Every Use.



                                              by Peter Yule