Free The Ears of Louis by Constance C. Greene Page A

the floors sloped. When Louis went to visit, he and Matthew put out their arms to balance themselves as they ran through the dining room into the downstairs bedroom. The windows were made of many panes of glass which had bubbles in them and there were wooden shutters which locked on the inside. Matthew said they were Indian shutters. Settlers locked them when the Indians attacked. Sometimes Louis and Matthew crouched down low in front of the windows, peering out into the night, imagining they saw a man carrying a tomahawk behind every tree. The sound of the television in the kitchen was very reassuring.
    The fireplaces in Matthew’s house were so large both Louis and Matthew and Jenny, Matthew’s sister, could all stand upright inside. Matthew’s room was on the third floor. It had only one window but that window looked out at an apple tree. That made up for a lot of things. Matthew had pried up a piece of one of the wide floor boards. Underneath was a space about six inches long and six inches wide. Just the right size to hide things in. It held some dried worms from last year, a box of marbles, a set of false teeth, three old eyeglass frames without glass and a number of other treasures.
    Louis and Matthew talked very little. Matthew’s father called them “the silent wonders.” They sat on the bank of the river that flowed through Matthew’s back yard for hours, staring into the water, counting stones on the river bottom. Or shading their eyes, like Daniel Boone, looking out into the woods for deer or a rattlesnake. Once in a while, they’d drop a string with a worm attached into the water, hoping for a fish to bite.
    Once, Matthew told Louis, he’d found a heron with a broken wing standing in the river. He and his father had thrown an old sheet over the heron’s head to keep him from panicking, and had taken him to the Humane Society.
    â€œWhat happened to him?” Louis wanted to know.
    â€œProbably when the wing got better, they let him go,” Matthew said. Louis hoped so. Matthew was an authority on wild life. He read books about bears and turtles and beavers. Bears sleep six months at a stretch and deer shed their antlers and grow a whole new pair, he told Louis.
    Every day after school Matthew set his Havaheart traps. He had two, one very small to catch rats, weasels, and chipmunks. The other, a birthday present, was bigger.
    â€œWith that one,” Matthew said, “I might get a muskrat or a skunk.” Louis and Matthew often watched a muskrat family, father and mother leading the way, swim along the river bank sedately, in single file, the babies in a neat row, until they came to their home, a hole burrowed into the river bank. Louis thought watching that muskrat family was one of the best things he had ever done.
    Matthew never called anybody names. He took people for what they were. He never got wild and crazy, like some kids, running and shrieking and hitting people on the head. But the best thing about him was the way he looked. He had the roundest face Louis had ever seen. Matthew looked, Louis thought, like the man in the moon. Or like pictures he’d seen of the man in the moon in old storybooks. Before the astronauts got up there and found out there weren’t any living creatures on the moon. Louis was sorry to hear that. But maybe there were men who’d got word the astronauts were on their way so they hid in a crater or something. Matthew agreed with him that this was a possibility.
    Matthew was round all over. He had round pink cheeks and round gray eyes and a round stomach. Even his nose holes were round. If Louis could’ve looked like anyone he wanted, he would’ve chosen to look like Matthew.
    Last time he’d gone to play at Matthew’s, Louis had worn his football helmet. He’d decided to wear it all the time to hide his ears. Anyway, it was football season so he had a good excuse.
    They got some cookies and milk and