The Great Dimpole Oak

By Janet Taylor Lisle and Stephen Gammell

An ancient oak tree has seen glory and tragedy—but nothing quite as spectacular as the showdown that’s brewing

For nearly a thousand years, the Dimpole Oak has towered over this small East Coast town, witnessing the passage of history: duels and revolution, lovers’ trysts and traitors’ hangings, victory parades and midnight conspiracies. The farmer who owns the land beneath the tree likes to tell stories of the murders and witch trials that took place in its shade. Local children play on the oak’s great roots and dig for buried treasure. The townsfolk plan a Dimpole Oak Day to celebrate their landmark. Meanwhile, far away in India, a swami has a holy vision of the oak, and begins a journey to find it. Back in Dimpole, two boys take inspiration from the blackguards and pirates of the old farmer’s tales, and challenge a local bully to a confrontation under the oak. As all these plots and plans converge, the mighty oak stands ready to witness another grand event. This ebook features a personal history by Janet Taylor Lisle including rare images and never-before-seen documents from the author’s own collection.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Media
• Release date: Jan 29, 2013
• ISBN: 9781453271827

Janet Taylor Lisle

Janet Taylor Lisle (b. 1947) is an author of children’s fiction. After growing up in Connecticut, Lisle graduated from Smith College and spent a year working for the volunteer group VISTA (Volunteers in Service to America) before becoming a journalist. She found that she loved writing human interest and “slice of life” stories, and honed the skills for observation and dialogue that would later serve her in her fiction. Lisle took a fiction writing course in 1981, and then submitted a manuscript to Richard Jackson, a children’s book editor at Bradbury Press who was impressed with her storytelling. Working with Jackson, Lisle published her first novel, The Dancing Cats of Applesap, in 1984. Since then she has written more than a dozen books for young readers, including The Great Dimpole Oak (1987) and Afternoon of the Elves (1989), which won a Newbery Honor. Her most recent novel is Highway Cats (2008).

Book preview

The Great Dimpole Oak

Janet Taylor Lisle

Contents

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A Biography of Janet Taylor Lisle

1

IT WAS A VERY old tree. How old exactly? Well, that was one of its intriguing points—no one in Dimpole knew. There were theories. People had their stories. According to one, the tree was nearly a thousand years old and grew out of the place where a Viking raider once spat.

Some folks snorted at this. They said Dimpole was located fifty miles from the coast. They said Vikings had flat feet, which is why they took up sailing to begin with, and they never could have walked so far. These doubters believed in other stories about the oak’s origins: It was planted by an Indian queen in 1492; it was planted by a groundhog in 1526; it was planted by a lightning bolt out of the blue. Or by wind. Or by flood. The infuriating thing about the oak was that with not much known for sure, all sorts of ideas came floating up around it. There was no way to tell what the real truth was.

Infuriating, yes, but what a magnificent tree! However the oak had started, it had grown up well. It was hundreds of feet tall, tens of feet thick, with roots as big as fire hoses coiled around its base. Everyone liked to sit on these roots and look out across the valley around Dimpole. Or they leaned back and gazed up, imagining shapes and faces in the ancient tangle of limbs overhead.

One root rose up and arched clear of the ground before plunging back into the soil. This the children rode, bucking and shrieking in the afternoons. But if a certain old farmer appeared, as he often did, they would stop riding for a while and listen to certain peculiar tales.

The Dimpole Oak was not located in the town of Dimpole but just outside, in the country. It grew in a hayfield that belonged to the farmer. He claimed ownership of the tree as well and he had his own ideas about it.

This oak is a family tree, he explained to whoever would listen. It was here when my great, great granddaddy came on the land. It’ll still be here when my great, great grandchildren set foot in the world—which they haven’t done yet by a long shot, he’d add, squinting up at the tree with a satisfied smile.

According to the farmer, many strange events had occurred under his tree during the hundreds of years it had stood in the family field. His granddaddies had kept a record. They had passed the record down to each other, and then down to him, which was a good thing because otherwise the stories might have been lost, he said.

Murder has been committed here, the farmer told the children of Dimpole in his gravelly voice. And the blood of the victims has seeped down between these roots, he’d whisper, tapping his foot.

He told how thieves had plotted there, crouched together in winter moonlight. He described the criminals who had been hanged there and left to dry for days in the sun.

He recounted details of the famous Black Witches’ Congress of 1685, when neighborhood cats were killed in cold blood and a young girl had disappeared. Sometimes, late at night, an eerie scream can be heard echoing across the fields, the farmer said. It might be a nighthawk or a cat on the prowl. It might be someone’s nervous imagination. But it might be …

The old farmer would wink. "There’s human blood in these branches and human sweat and human tears. It all came up the trunk, it did, from things that happened right here where I’m standing.

And look here, look! The farmer was always beckoning and whispering. See all these carved hearts and lovers’ initials? Some of them were cut more than three hundred years ago. It’s peculiar when you think about it, isn’t it? The carving’s still here long after the real hearts were buried and rotted in the ground.

There were neighbors living nearby who did not like the farmer’s stories. The way they saw it, the great oak was too noble and historic to be bogged down in a lot of grisly nonsense.

Watch out for that farmer, they warned visitors who stopped to ask the way to the tree. He’s a crazy old fellow. He’s got blood on the brain and half of what he says is a boldfaced lie.

Many of the farmer’s neighbors had grown up with the oak. They believed it was just as much their tree as his. All the farmer’s talk about his great granddaddy and grandchildren made them cross. Hadn’t they ridden the tree’s root when they were children? Hadn’t they camped out under it and tried to climb up it and lived around it all their lives?

Moreover, they noted, the oak was history. And no one person can own history.

That tree saw the British Red Coats march by on their way to a battle with the American colonists in 1775, said Mr. Harvey Glover one October day, down at the Dimpole Post Office. He was the town postmaster, a bird-like young man with darting eyes.

That’s right. A battle in which the Red Coats were defeated! exclaimed plump Mrs. George Trawley, who came daily to pick up her mail. She smoothed down her bulges proudly at the thought of her country’s victory.

Did you know that our great President, Abraham Lincoln, stopped to sleep under our tree on a journey through these parts during the Civil War? asked Miss Shirley Hand, an unusually pretty schoolteacher who lived in Dimpole. She handed the package she was carrying through the mail window to Mr. Glover and lowered her eyes sweetly.

Is that true? asked Mr. Glover. I thought it was George Washington during the Revolution. Miss Hand had extremely long lashes, he noticed, as he reached for the rubber stamps.

I’m glad to hear you say ‘our tree,’ Mrs. Trawley told Miss Hand, as there’s some that would take every leaf and twig for themselves, never thinking of the rights of others.

Mr. Glover nodded. He leaned over the counter and spoke with hushed voice.

The farmer is a sick man who ought to be in a hospital somewhere instead of wandering around scaring children with silly stories.

Who’s he been scaring? asked Miss Hand. She smelled delightfully of lavender scent, Mr. Glover noticed. It happened to be his favorite perfume.

Why, everybody! he replied, more loudly than he had intended. A child can’t go up there to ride the root anymore without the old fellow scooting out from some bush and grabbing him.

Grabbing him! said Miss Hand with a horrified look.

Well, ahem. Mr. Glover coughed. Not grabbing exactly, but cornering. Then he tells his crazy stories about murder and hanging and branches full of blood. None of them are true, you know. He only does it to get attention.

Not nice, murmured Mrs. Trawley. Not nice at all. The little ones come home with their eyes popping out and the older ones get bad ideas.

The poor things! exclaimed Miss Hand. I hadn’t a notion this was going on.

Not to mention … Mr. Glover continued. (He shot an admiring glance toward Miss Hand’s flushed cheeks.) Not to mention the damage done to our tree’s reputation. Why, left to the farmer, our great oak would become a lurid sideshow attracting the worst sort of people. Even now, there is no control over who comes to see the tree. He lets everybody in, for whatever reason.

Something must be done, cried Miss Hand. For the sake of the children!

A national treasure is in grave danger, agreed Mrs. Trawley.

I will organize a meeting, Mr. Glover announced masterfully. Before it is too late.

So, with a happy feeling that he had made a great impression on Miss Hand, Mr. Glover set to work compiling lists of names. He tracked down telephone numbers, bought note pads and sharpened pencils.

None of which will do the least bit of good, Mrs. Trawley confided to Miss Hand later, in private. Poor skinny Mr. Glover. He is not and never will be a leader of men.

Miss Hand was surprised to hear this. Mr. Glover had seemed perfectly nice to her. She was especially impressed by his concern for the children. But if Mrs. Trawley knew better …

Mrs.