{ W h o } Walt, Dave { W h a t } mail call and...? { W h e r e } the post office, for starters { W h e n } Monday { R a t i n g } TBD
Dave had purchased a post card depicting the Liberty Bell in all its historic glory to mail home to his parents and brothers in Richmond. He'd written a brief, cheery note on the back: Weather unseasonably warm, by Yankee standards! Liberty Bell unfortunately still cracked. Dave never wrote anything that could be taken seriously, and his family in Richmond never wrote back. How could they? He was traveling. On the move. Incommunicado. It wasn't strictly true--Czerwinski's subscribed to a mail forwarding service--but it was better that way.
By contrast, the envelope addressed to Sister Barnabas Maguire, St. Joseph's Academy, Emmitsburg, Maryland was fat with several pages closely packed with Dave's cramped handwriting. Descriptions of the places the carnival had been. Stories about the performers and the freaks and the customers who came to see them. Questions and answers, because Kate always wrote back.
How is Mother doing? he'd written in this latest letter. Is she well? Tell me the truth. The carnival will be passing through Richmond. Should I visit? I will, but only if you tell me I should. Which was taking the coward's way out, Dave thought, since Kate's reply might not even make it back before the carnival moved on. But he'd deal with that issue when it happened. There were weeks, yet, before Czerwinski's reached his home town. Dave joined the line at the post office and shuffled ahead as the clerks at the high marble counter waited on each patron in turn.