"Sometimes the pictures you see aren't true," he said. "You know that." He took out his blue handkerchief and made me blow my nose. "Like when you see pictures in Gramma's mind about her hurting me," he said. "She never does, you know. So the pictures aren't true. It's just what we call imagination."
"But your pictures are bad! They make me scared," I said.
"We all make bad pictures like that, but we don't mean them," Gramp said. "Remember how you said that you'd like to eat the whole apple pie last Sunday? You probably made pictures of doing that. But you never did, because you know that Gramma and me should have some of it too." I guess Gramp can explain just about everything.
So I told him where Mr. Van had hid the money under a box of brown sugar. Gramp smiled and started the car.
He let me steer while it was going slow. "Who's my Chum?" he asked.
"I am," I said, and I laughed real happy.
The next day when I got up Gramp was gone.
I went back of the barn and played. I got a bunch of tin cans and punched holes in them with a nail like Gramp showed me, and I made steps out of rocks and put a can on each step. I poured water in the top can. It ran through the holes from each can to the other all the way down the steps.
I heard our car come in the front yard.