“Wow! Look at this!” Ron exclaimed. “A whole spool of wire! Why would he throw that away?”
“Here, let me see.” Jerry took the spool. He half closed his blue eyes, and squinted at the spool, turning it over in his hands. He wrinkled his freckled nose. “It’s corroded on one side, that’s why.” He tossed the spool back to Ron.
“So what?” Ron caught the spool and flipped his shaggy black hair from his round face. “I can still use it.” He stuffed the spool into his jeans.
Jerry tugged at a length of spaghetti tubing. It popped out of the carton, and he inspected it closely. It was split down one side. He threw it back. “I guess Mr. Gormley hasn’t had much business this week…no decent junk,” Jerry said and scuffed along the alley in the shadow of the power-line pole that stood behind Hal’s Hobby Shop. Next to the pole there was a rusty oil drum stuffed with papers and boxes. In the first box he opened, he found half a plastic Gemini space capsule model. But although he rummaged deep among the papers and boxes, he couldn’t find the other half. He threw the plastic back into the trash. “Nothing here, either,” he said. “Come on, let’s go home.”
Jerry flipped the kickstand up on his bike and was about to swing his leg over the seat when out of the corner of his eye he caught a metallic gleam. It came from the weeds along the alley—a spot halfway between the television carton and the metal trash barrel. Jerry leaned his bicycle against the power-line pole, walked over and lifted the tiny metal object from the ground. It was rectangular, the size and shape of a domino. Tiny knobs extended from either end and a third knob from one side. It felt slippery, like a quarter covered with quicksilver, yet it was light as balsa wood. The upper surface was covered with short, silver-colored brush-like wires. Jerry touched them. The wires felt soft and silky as fur.
“Ron! Come here!” Jerry cradled the tiny object in his hand.
Ron dropped a broken television knob back into the trash and loped to Jerry’s side. He put his plump hands on his knees and peered closely. “What is it?”
“Search me!” Jerry said. “Maybe it’s a modular circuit from a transistor radio.” He had heard the older boys in electric shop talking about modular circuits, but he hadn’t seen one yet.
Ron shook his head. “Nope, it’s not that. Remember when I dropped my transistor radio through the bleachers at the football game last week and it smashed all to pieces?”
“Yeah?”
“Well, it had a modular circuit and nothing like this gismo fell out of it. Say, aren’t those wires moving?”
Jerry drew the object away from Ron’s face. “You’re breathing on them, that’s why. Man! I’d sure like to know what this gismo is!”
Ron put his hands in his hip pockets. “Hey! I’ll bet it came off one of those remote control planes…like the one in Hal’s window.”
“Yeah!” Jerry opened his hand and looked at the gismo more closely. He could see no visible seams or screws holding it together.
Ron reached into his pocket. “I’ll trade you this spool of wire for it.”
Jerry grinned and shook his head. “Nothing doing! I’m keeping it!”
“Why?”
“It’s something I can use, that’s why!”
Ron mounted his bike. “How can you use it if you don’t know what it is?”
Jerry slipped the gismo into his right-hand pocket and climbed on his bike. “Don’t worry, I’ll find out what it is!”
When he coasted his bike up the driveway, his eight-year-old sister, Dodie, was slamming a rubber kickball against the garage door. The ball bounced back and hit his bike. Jerry reached down and grabbed the ball. He leaned his bike against the maple tree by the front porch, tucked the ball under his arm, and loped around the corner of the house toward the back door.
Dodie flipped her red braids over her shoulders and started after Jerry. “You give that back, Jerry Cole!”
Jerry ran ahead of her keeping just out of reach until he came to the back steps, then he looped the ball over her head. It hit the garage wall with a bang and bounced away onto the front lawn.
Dodie stamped her foot. “Brothers!” she exclaimed, and ran after the ball. Jerry slammed through the back door into the kitchen, fragrant with baking.
“Hi, Mom,” he greeted his mother who was taking a pan of cookies from the oven. He closed his eyes and sniffed loudly. “Don’t tell me—peanut butter! Right?” He opened his eyes.
His mother smiled. “Right!” She handed him a hot cookie on the end of the spatula.
“Thanks.” Jerry tossed the cookie back and forth in his hands to cool it, then popped it into his mouth and munched loudly. He wiped his greasy hands on his jeans and felt the gismo in his pocket. He pulled it out. “Ever see a gismo like this, Mom?”
His mother slipped a second pan of cookies in the oven. “What’s a gismo?” she asked.
Jerry reached for more cookies. “Oh you know! It’s a—a gadget, a—a thing!” He stuffed a cookie into his mouth. “Have any idea what this is used for?”
His mother took the gismo and turned it over. “Is it a brush of some kind?”
“Don’t think so—not with those knobs on the ends.”
Mrs. Cole handed it back. “I’m not a very good guesser, Jerry. Ask Dad when he comes home tonight. He’ll probably know.”
Jerry stuffed a few more cookies into his pockets, and tossing the gismo into the air, started through the hall. His older sister, Lou, just turned fourteen, lay on her back across the hall runner. She was talking on the telephone. Jerry pretended not to see her and raised his foot as though to step on her stomach.
Lou let out a little screech and grabbed his foot. “Jerry Cole! You stop that!” She gave his leg a twist and threw him off balance. Jerry fell, knocking the telephone out of Lou’s hand. The gismo slithered across the floor.
“Hey, Mom!” Jerry yelled, “Who left a rolled-up rug in the hall for people to fall over?”
“You little monster!” Lou exclaimed. She pushed him away and reached for the telephone. “Not you, Linda,” she said into the phone, “this stupid brother of mine!”
Jerry got to his knees. “I’ve lost my gismo.”
“Your what?” Lou asked.
“Ah, here it is!” Jerry reached behind the leg of the telephone stand. He sat back on his heels and stroked the gismo’s silky wires.
Lou sat up. “Is that thing alive?”
“Yeah!” Jerry snaked the gismo along the floor toward Lou.
Lou jumped to her feet. “Mother-r-r, Jerry’s got a mouse or something in here!”
Mrs. Cole came into the hallway. “That’s enough, Jerry,” she said sternly. “And Lou, tell Linda good-bye. I want you to set the table for supper.”
Jerry stood up and clumped toward the stairs. “Sisters!” he muttered to himself.
After dinner, Jerry brought the gismo into the living room. His father was watching a local newscast about a recent UFO sighting near Bridgeville.
Jerry sat down on the couch beside his father. “Man! I’d sure like to see one of those UFO’s close up, wouldn’t you, Dad?”
Mr. Cole smiled. “If there’s anything to see… They could be optical