“Yes. I did. I had a nice summer.”
Epilogue
Three weeks after I had returned home I received a small package with the following letter inside:
Dear Gooner:
You know I don’t write so good so Glennis is doing this for me except I’m worried she won’t say what I want and I don’t trust the big...
There, right there she hit me. I didn’t say nothing wrong and she whacked me, so you can see things ain’t changed a whole lot.
I thought I’d killed Ernie when I ran over him with a wheelbarrow full of sand when he wasn’t looking but I didn’t. Kill him, I mean. The son... There, she hit me again. Ernie laid there for a minute and then got up and made it under the granary before I could get the wheelbarrow turned around for another run on him. I would have turned faster except I wetted the sand down to make it good and heavy and the extra weight slowed me some.
Everybody else is fine. Pa broke a finger but it don’t seem to bother him none. Ma is cooking. Glennis is looking all moon-eyed at Clyde Peterson... There, she hit me again. But she is. He’s took to hanging around smelling at the gatepost... I wish she’d stop that. I keep getting whacked and don’t even mean it.
Buzzer is all right although he seems cross sometimes and popped me once last week.
I found some graves back down off the house from homesteaders and was thinking I’d dig them up and look for treasure but I’ll wait until you come back for that.
Well, that’s all for now. Oh, Louie come in the other day and told me to mail you what’s in the package. He said you’d know what it was.
Bye, you old gooner, and I hope you can come home soon.
Harris
I unwrapped a piece of paper in the box and found the small figure that had been me in Louie’s diorama. I held the mouse-furred little statue for a long time, rolling it in my fingers, then I put it on a windowsill where I could see it while I drifted to sleep that night and dreamed of horses and farms and corn and girls with blond hair and Tarzan and Gene and a bicycle that did a hundred miles an hour, carrying a freckled boy in bibs...
About the Author
GARY PAULSEN has written nearly two hundred books for young people, including the Newbery Honor Books Hatchet, Dogsong, and The Winter Room. He divides his time between a home in New Mexico and a boat on the Pacific Ocean.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Table of Contents
Copyright
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Epilogue
About the Author
