Free Nothing by Chance by Richard Bach Page A

hayfield, in close to the ring.
    The dime-store itself was a long narrow room with board-wood floors, and the smell of popcorn and hot paper hung in the air. There were elements of forever: a glass-front counter with its chutes and trays of candy, a worn sheet-metal candy scoop half-buried in Red-Hots, a square glass machine filled with multicolored jawbreakers, and way down at the end ofthe room, at the point where the long counters converged in the distance, a tiny voice sifted to us: “Can I help you boys?”
    We felt almost apologetic for being there, travelers from another century, not knowing that folks don’t walk into dime-stores in the middle of the day.
    “I need some crepe paper,” Stu said. “Do you have any wide crepe paper?”
    The little tiny lady way off down the rows walked toward us, and walking, she grew. She was a full-size person by the time she reached the paper goods section, and there, surrounded by marble-paper composition folders and nickel Big Gun notebooks, was the material for Stu’s wind-drift indicator. The lady looked at us strangely, but said nothing more until she said thank you and we walked bell-jangling through the doorway and out into the sun again.
    I needed heavy oil for the biplane, and Stu and I walked out a side street to the implement dealer’s. Paul went exploring down another street.
    The implement dealer’s place was a rough-floored wooden cave, with stacks of tires, bits of machinery and old advertising scattered about. The place smelled like new rubber, and it was very cool inside.
    The dealer was a busy man and it was twenty minutes before I could ask if he had any heavy oil.
    “Sixty weight, you say? Might have some fifty, but sixty I don’t think. What you usin’ it for?”
    “Got an old airplane here, takes the heavy stuff. Fifty’s OK if you don’t have sixty.”
    “Oh, you’re the guys with the airplanes. Saw you flyin’ around last night. Don’t they have any oil at the airport?”
    “Nope. This is an old airplane; they don’t carry the oil for it.”
    He said he’d check, and disappeared down a flight of wooden stairs to the cellar.
    I noticed, while we waited, a dusty poster stapled high on the planks of the wall: “‘We Can … We Will … We Must…’ Franklin D. Roosevelt. Buy US War Savings Bonds & Stamps NOW!” There was a picture in stark colored silhouette of an American flag and an aircraft carrier sailing over some precise scalloped water-ripples. It had been nailed to that wall longer than our parachute jumper had existed on the earth.
    We browsed among the pulleys, the grease, the lawnmowers for sale, and at last our man returned with a gallon can of oil.
    “This is fifty, best I could do you. That OK?”
    “Fine. Sure do thank you.”
    Then for $1.25 I bought a can of Essentialube, since there was none of the barnstormer’s traditional Marvel Mystery Oil available. “The Modern Motor Conditioner—It Powerizes” the label said. I wasn’t sure that I wanted the Wright to be powerized, but I had to have something for top-cylinder lubrication, and this promised that, as well.
    Our rule said that all gas and oil was paid from Great American money, taken off the top before we split the profits, 501 made a note that the Great American owed me $2.25, and I paid it out of pocket.
    By the time we got back to the airport, there were two cars of spectators on the field.
    Stu laid out his chute for packing, and I wanted to learn something about it, so Paul took the time to fly two young passengers in the Luscombe. It was a good feeling, to see Paul flying and making money for us while we worked with the thin nylon.
    For once Stu talked and I listened.
    “Pull out the line guide, will you … yeah, the thing with the angle-iron on it. Now we take all the lines from these risers …”
    The packing of a parachute was a mystery to me. Stu tookgreat care to show how it all was done, the laying of the suspension lines (“… we don’t call