Tunes for Bears to Dance To

An elderly man emerges from a psychiatric hospital as he does every morning, carrying a bag. He is watched by 11-year-old Henry Cassavant, who lives in a tenement next door and whose cast prevents him from following the man. Henry broke his kneecap tripping over the steps of his school bus at the end of the school year. When his mother points out that the proper name for the next-door building is an “institution for the insane” (2), Henry reflects that the man doesn’t look “crazy” or “insane.”

Henry is awkward with his crutches and compares himself to his athletic older brother, Eddie, who has been dead for nearly a year. His parents are engulfed in grief over Eddie’s death, which frustrates Henry. He wants his cast removed so he can go back to his afternoon job helping Mr. Hairston at the Corner Market. Henry worries that Mr. Hairston will give his job to a neighbor, Jackie Antonelli, whom Henry dislikes. However, Mr. Hairston says Henry’s tasks will simply go unfulfilled until Henry returns. He calls Jackie a “greaseball,” prompting Henry to reflect that Mr. Hairston’s favorite pastime is to make nasty comments about passersby, referring to them with racial and ethnic slurs. Henry, who especially sympathizes with a widowed Polish customer, tries to avoid Mr. Hairston’s company for this reason, although he is grateful to have a job. His father hasn’t worked since Eddie died, and his mother doesn’t make much waitressing at a diner.

Henry misses his old town, Monument, and his neighborhood of Frenchtown. His parents moved to the third-floor tenement in Wickburg, a larger city, after Eddie’s death. However, they “[have] not left Eddie behind in Frenchtown” (7), even though they don’t display his baseball trophies. Eddie died of a broken neck after a car accident.

The day after Henry’s cast is removed, he follows the elderly man, who speaks to himself silently as he walks erratically through the streets. He carries a black bag and occasionally tips his hat to an imaginary person. The man stops in a dilapidated part of town and knocks at the door of a vacant store. Someone lets him inside.

Overcome with curiosity, Henry tries to open the store’s locked back door; it is opened by a “giant” who demands to know what Henry wants and causes him to trip and fall. The man suddenly turns kind, viewing Henry with soft, regretful eyes, and offers to show Henry what is going on inside. Henry runs away, although as he walks home, he is sorry he didn’t enter the store.

Henry reports for work that afternoon, and his first job is bringing a bin of potatoes up from the cellar. He has many fears, but most of all he fears the rats that scurry around the cellar. Mr. Hairston says goodbye to Mrs. Pierce, a customer who lives in Henry’s building, and then criticizes her wart. Henry is amazed at how two-faced the store owner is, smiling as he waits on people and then insulting them. Mr. Hairston thinks most people are unintelligent and misses the days of wartime rationing, when he could make customers stand in lines for their goods and rule the store “like a dictator” (14).

Mr. Hairston’s daughter, Doris, arrives. She is a year older than Henry and is a pale girl with deep, haunted eyes. Though she has never spoken to Henry before, on this day she whispers, “Hello.” Henry notices an ugly bruise on her cheek and asks about it, but Mr. Hairston orders her upstairs and claims that Doris fell down. That night, Henry—who previously attended a Catholic school—prays for Doris, his hardworking mother, and his father, who is too grief-stricken even to indulge in his pastime of gambling. He also prays for Eddie and hopes that if his brother’s soul is stuck in purgatory, the prayers will get him closer to heaven. Finally he says a prayer for the elderly man, asking Jesus to watch over him.

The next day, Henry follows the elderly man again, more curious than ever about his black bag and the way he tips his hat. The man hides from Henry but then fearfully confronts him. After Henry says he won’t hurt the man, the man cries, making Henry also cry. Henry confesses that he has been watching the man and wondering about his movements. He reveals that his leg is broken and that his brother is dead. This prompts the elderly man to repeat the word “dead” with a pained cry.

At the store, the “giant” shouts with relief; he was worried because the elderly man was late. Inside the store, Henry sees a dozen people seated at benches and doing crafts with machines or their hands. The large man explains that the place is an arts-and-crafts center supported by the city for people who can’t afford lessons, supplies, or a place to go. The elderly man pulls a sheet off his bench and reveals a miniature village with houses, barns, and tiny wooden figures. The large man explains that Mr. Levine—whose first name is Jacob—is a wood carver who is recreating the village where he once lived. Henry introduces himself to the large man, whose name is George Graham.

Henry marvels at the painted miniatures: buildings, animals, and people going about daily village life. George praises Mr. Levine’s patience as he whittles soft balsa wood. Mr. Levine gives Henry a carved, painted duck and says in Yiddish that Henry’s presence gives him pleasure. George explains that as a former army translator, he speaks Yiddish, though he is not Jewish himself. As Henry reluctantly leaves, he shakes Mr. Levine’s hand. George asks Henry to return, saying that the elderly man has no family and that he believes Henry reminds Mr. Levine of his dead son. Henry promises to come back.