The Avion My Uncle Flew Read Online Free PDF

don’t mean he really had sticks inside his clothes. However, he was so tall and skinny and stiff, it was as though his arms and legs were made of sticks nailed together.
    I thought maybe he’d been sick or perhaps during the war he hadn’t had much to eat. But right away, I learned I was wrong on that guess. Confiding and friendly, he told me how he and his family had been forced to run away when the Germans came and he had gone to Spain to live. He and his family had returned to France only a few months ago. He said Spain was better than France. People ate better in Spain. I’d read newspapers. In the newspapers the facts were different. People were starving in Spain. I wondered what he meant. He didn’t explain.
    He leaned over. In his soft way he said, “You mustn’t call me ‘Mister Fischfasse.’ You must say ‘Monsieur Fischfasse.’ Monsieur is French for mister.”
    So I repeated, “Bon jour, Monsieur Fischfasse,” wanting Albert to come quick.
    He said that was fine. Then he said, “Le jour est beau?”
    I didn’t get any of that at all. At least, at first I didn’t think I did. I must have looked puzzled because he started laughing. He had a queer laugh. It was soft and short and the only way to describe it is to say it was like the way some of the coyotes laugh, even though some people might tell you coyotes don’t know how to laugh. I’ve heard coyotes laugh; and when they laugh it’s because they’ve worked out some plan to fool people and are tickled by it. If you hear that laugh you’ll find you’ve got shivers running down your spine. Well, hearing Mr. Fischfasse’s soft short laugh somehow put shivers down my spine.
    I forgot right away his laugh had bothered me because he reached across and laid those long dry fingers of his on my arm and said gently, “Le jour est beau, non?” repeating his question.
    Well, I got a couple of words out of it. I got “jour” and I got the “non.” “Jour” was “day”—and I guessed the “non” was our English “no.” I told him that was all I understood.
    He explained he’d been asking me a question in French. Nobody had to tell me it was in French. I knew that much! He said “ le jour” meant “ the day” and probably I ought to have known that. And “est” was “is;” and “beau” was the word the French had for “beautiful.” So he was asking: “The day is beautiful, no?” Simple. In other words: “Isn’t the day beautiful?”
    I asked, “What do I say?”
    He said, “You can reply ‘oui.’ That means ‘yes.’”
    The fact is, le jour was beau. It was a beautiful day, all right, but I wished Albert didn’t have to take so long to get tobacco. I didn’t enjoy being with Monsieur Fischfasse, even though he was laying himself out to be agreeable.
    He didn’t try any more French on me. He asked if I’d heard any more about being sent to St. Chamant, explaining he’d received a letter from his son this morning and wanted to write him telling about me. I replied it looked as if I was stuck unless I could persuade my mother and my father to take me with them to London.
    He said, “You must try to persuade them, Jean. Yes, indeed.” His face twisted suddenly and looked mean. “I do not think you would like St. Chamant. I do not think so, at all.”
    I asked, “What’s wrong with St. Chamant?” looking around, hoping to see Albert.
    â€œThe people are most disagreeable there.”
    That didn’t make sense to me. He couldn’t know whether or not the people were disagreeable, having never been there himself. Inasmuch as my mother had come from St. Chamant I didn’t appreciate the fact he was so much against it and I said, “I might like it. My mother was from there,