“By all means let him invest the money. As for your idea . . . you know how he feels about stuff like that. He’s not only the richest man in Harlow—in the whole state of Maine, for that matter—he’s also the only one who doesn’t have a television.”
“He’s got an elevator,” I said. “And he uses it.”
“Because he has to.” Then Dad gave me a grin. “But it’s your money, and if this is what you want to do with twenty per cent of it, I’m not going to tell you no. When he turns it down, you can give it to me.”
“You really think he will?”
“I do.”
“Dad, why did he come here in the first place? I mean, we’re just a little town. We’re nowhere.”
“Good question. Ask him sometime. Now what about some dessert, big spender?”
* * *
Just about a month later, I gave Mr. Harrigan a brand-new iPhone. I didn’t wrap it up or anything, partly because it wasn’t a holiday and partly because I knew how he liked things done: with no foofaraw.
He turned the box over a time or two in his arthritis-gnarled hands, looking bemused. Then he held it out to me. “Thank you, Craig, I appreciate the sentiment, but no. I suggest you give it to your father.”
I took the box. “He told me you’d say that.” I was disappointed but not surprised. And not ready to give up.
“Your father is a wise man.” He leaned forward in his chair and clasped his hands between his spread knees. “Craig, I rarely give advice, it’s almost always a waste of breath, but today I’ll give some to you. Henry Thoreau said that we don’t own things; things own us. Every new object—whether it’s a home, a car, a television, or a fancy phone like that one—is something more we must carry on our backs. It makes me think of Jacob Marley telling Scrooge, ‘These are the chains I forged in life.’ I don’t have a television, because if I did, I would watch it, even though almost all of what it broadcasts is utter nonsense. I don’t have a radio in the house because I would listen to it, and a little country music to break the monotony of a long drive is really all I require. If I had that—”
He pointed to the box with the phone inside.
“—I would undoubtedly use it. I get twelve different periodicals in the mail, and they contain all the information I need to keep up with the business world and the wider world’s sad doings.” He sat back and sighed. “There. I’ve not only given advice, I’ve made a speech. Old age is insidious.”
“Can I show you just one thing? No, two.”
He gave me one of the looks I’d seen him give his gardener and his housekeeper, but had never turned my way until that afternoon: piercing, skeptical, and rather ugly. These years later, I realize it’s the look a perceptive and cynical man gives when he believes he can see inside most people and expects to find nothing good.
“This only proves the old saying that no good deed goes unpunished. I’m starting to wish that scratch ticket hadn’t been a winner.” He sighed again. “Well, go ahead, give me your demonstration. But you won’t change my mind.”
Having received that look, so distant and so cold, I thought he was right. I’d end up giving the phone to my father after all. But since I’d come this far, I went ahead. The phone was charged to the max, I’d made sure of that, and was in—ha-ha—apple-pie working order. I turned it on and showed him an icon in the second row. It had jagged lines, sort of like an EKG print-out. “See that one?”
“Yes, and I see what it says. But I really don’t need a stock market report, Craig. I subscribe to the Wall Street Journal, as you know.”
“Sure,” I agreed, “but the Wall Street Journal can’t do this.”
I tapped the icon and opened the app. The Dow Jones average appeared. I had no idea what the numbers meant, but I could see they were fluctuating. 14,720 rose to 14,728, then dropped to 14,704, then bumped up to 14,716. Mr. Harrigan’s eyes widened. His mouth dropped open. It was as if someone had hit him with a juju stick. He took the phone and held it close to his face. Then he looked at me.
“Are these numbers in real time?”
“Yes,” I said. “Well, I guess they might be a minute or two behind, I don’t know for sure. The phone’s pulling them in from the new phone tower in Motton. We’re lucky to have one so close.”
He leaned forward. A reluctant smile touched the corners of his mouth. “I’ll be damned. It’s like the stock tickers magnates used to have in their own homes.”
“Oh, way better than that,” I said. “Tickers sometimes ran hours behind. My dad said that just last night. He’s fascinated with this stock market thingy, he’s always taking my phone to look. He said one of the reasons the stock market tanked so bad back in 1929 was because the more people traded, the farther behind the tickers got.”
“He’s right,” Mr. Harrigan said. “Things had gone too far before anyone could put on the brakes. Of course, something like this might actually accelerate a sell-off. It’s hard to tell because the technology is still so new.”
I waited. I wanted to tell him some more, sell him on it—I was just a kid, after all—but something told me waiting was the right way to go. He continued to watch the miniscule gyrations of the Dow Jones. He was getting an education right in front of my eyes.
“But,” he said, still staring.
“But what, Mr. Harrigan?”
“In the hands of someone who actually knows the market, something like this could . . . probably already does . . .” He trailed off, thinking. Then he said, “I should have known about this. Being retired is no excuse.”
“Here’s the other thing,” I said, too impatient to wait any longer. “You know all the magazines you get? Newsweek and Financial Times and Fords?”
“Forbes,” he said, still watching the screen. He reminded me of me at four, studying the Magic 8 Ball I’d gotten for my birthday.
“Yeah, that one. Can I have the phone for a minute?”
He handed it over rather reluctantly, and I was pretty sure I had him after all. I was glad, but I also felt a little ashamed of myself. Like a guy who’s just clonked a tame squirrel on the head when it came up to take a nut out of his hand.
I opened Safari. It was a lot more primitive than it is today, but it worked just fine. I poked Wall Street Journal into the Google search field, and after a few seconds, the front page opened up. One of the headlines read COFFEE COW ANNOUNCES CLOSINGS. I showed it to him.
He stared, then took the newspaper from the table beside the easy chair where I’d put his mail when I came in. He looked at the front page. “That isn’t here,” he said.
“Because it’s yesterday’s,” I said. I always got the mail out of his box when I came up, and the Journal was always wrapped around the other stuff and held with a rubber band. “You get it a day late. Everybody does.” And during the holiday season it came two days late, sometimes three. I didn’t need to tell him this; he grumbled about it constantly during November and December.
“This is today’s?” he asked, looking at the screen. Then, checking the date at the top: “It is!”