Free Something I've Been Meaning to Tell You by Alice Munro

I’ll tell on you? Is that it?”
    I was so ashamed at having to ask him to connive this way I couldn’t nod. I just looked at him and he saw
yes
.
    â€œWell I won’t. I won’t in the slightest way mention it or embarrass you. I give you my word of honor.”
    Then he changed the subject, to help me out, seeing I couldn’t even thank him.
    â€œWhat do you think of this sign?”
    It was a board sign lying practically at my feet.
    SEE THE WORLD FROM THE SKY. ADULTS $1.00 , CHILDREN 50¢ . QUALIFIED PILOT .
    â€œMy old sign was getting pretty beat up, I thought I’d make a new one. That’s what I’ve been doing with my time today.”
    The lettering wasn’t all that handsome, I thought. I could have done a better one in half an hour.
    â€œI’m not an expert at sign making.”
    â€œIt’s very good,” I said.
    â€œI don’t need it for publicity, word of mouth is usually enough. I turned away two carloads tonight. I felt like taking it easy. I didn’t tell them ladies were dropping in to visit me.”
    Now I remembered the children and I was scared again, in case one of them had waked up and called me and I wasn’t there.
    â€œDo you have to go so soon?”
    I remembered some manners. “Thank you for the cigarette.”
    â€œDon’t forget. You have my word of honor.”
    I tore off across the fairgrounds, scared I’d see the car heading home from town. My sense of time was mixed up, I didn’t know how long I’d been out of the house. But it was all right, it wasn’t late, the children were asleep. I got in bed myself and lay thinking what a lucky end to the day, after all, and among things to be grateful for I could be grateful Loretta Bird hadn’t been the one who caught me.

    The yard and borders didn’t get trampled, it wasn’t as bad as that. All the same it seemed very public, around the house. The sign was on the fairgrounds gate. People came mostly after supper but a good many in the afternoon, too. The Bird children all came without fifty cents between them and hung on the gate. We got used to the excitement of the plane coming in and taking off, it wasn’t excitement any more. I never went over, after that one time, but would see him when he came to get his water. I would be out on the steps doing sitting-down work, like preparing vegetables, if I could.
    â€œWhy don’t you come over? I’ll take you up in my plane.”
    â€œI’m saving my money,” I said, because I couldn’t think of anything else.
    â€œFor what? For getting married?”
    I shook my head.
    â€œI’ll take you up for free if you come sometime when it’s slack. I thought you would come, and have another cigarette.”
    I made a face to hush him, because you never could tell when the children would be sneaking around the porch, or Mrs. Peebles herself listening in the house. Sometimes she came out and had a conversation with him. He told her things he hadn’t bothered to tell me. But then I hadn’t thought to ask. He told her he had been in the War, thatwas where he learned to fly a plane, and now he couldn’t settle down to ordinary life, this was what he liked. She said she couldn’t imagine anybody liking such a thing. Though sometimes, she said, she was almost bored enough to try anything herself, she wasn’t brought up to living in the country. It’s all my husband’s idea, she said. This was news to me.
    â€œMaybe you ought to give flying lessons,” she said.
    â€œWould you take them?”
    She just laughed.

    Sunday was a busy flying day in spite of it being preached against from two pulpits. We were all sitting out watching. Joey and Heather were over on the fence with the Bird kids. Their father had said they could go, after their mother saying all week they couldn’t.
    A car came down the road past the parked cars and pulled up right