John Fitzgerald GB 06 Return of (5 page)

Danny turned to face Tom. “What’s it going to be?” he asked. “Do you give us back our money or do we unsuspend your sentence or whatever they call it?”

Tom didn’t even look worried. “The only person who can revoke my suspended sentence is the judge who sentenced me,” he said. “You fellows say I swindled you-I say I didn’t. We’ll leave it up to Harold Vickers to decide who is right and who is wrong.”

We all went to the Vickers home. Harold was the son of the district attorney and going to become a-lawyer. That was why I’d asked him to be the judge at Tom’s trial. His mother looked surprised when she saw about twenty kids on her big

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front porch when she opened the door after Tom had knocked. She said Harold was in his room and busy.

“It is very important, Mrs. Vickers,” Tom said. “Please call him.”

Harold looked annoyed when he came to the front porch wearing his glasses with the thick lenses. “What do you kids want?” he asked. “I’m busy packing and getting ready to leave on the morning train to go back to high school in Salt Lake City.”

Tom explained about Parley’s offering Chalky to anybody who could ride him and about betting the fellows that he could ride the jackass-

“I rode the jackass,” Tom continued, “and won two dollars and eighty -cents from the fellows who bet. Now they say I swindled them and want you to revoke my suspended sentence.”

Harold looked around at the fellows. “I haven’t time to hear each one of you give testimony,’^ he said. “Choose one of you to act as spokesman for the group.”

Danny stepped forward. “I’ll do it,” he said, “Tom knew he could ride the jackass when he made the bets and that makes it a swindle.”

Harold looked at Tom. “That sounds as if you did swindle them,” he said.

“Your honor,” Tom said, “according to the dictionary and the law a swindle is getting money or property from somebody by fraud or deceit. Am I right?”

“That is true,” Harold said.

“And according to the dictionary and the law a fraud is tricking somebody into giving you something by lying to them,” Tom said. “Am I right?”

“You are,” Harold said.

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“Well, your honor,” Tom said, “I didn’t deceive or lie

to anybody. I told the fellows that I knew I could ride the

jackass before we made any bets.”

Harold turned to Danny. “Is that true?” he asked. “Well. yes,” Danny admitted. “But we thought he was

lying.”

“Your honor,” Tom said, “it is not my fault they didn’t believe me when I told them I knew I could ride the jackass. And Parley offered to give the jackass to anybody who could ride him. He didn’t say I couldn’t gentle the jackass by making friends with it. So how can anybody say I swindled them?”

Harold thought for a moment. “The court rules.” he said, “the defendant did not use fraud or deceit and there-fore is not guilty of swindling anybody. The sentence remains suspended. And if you kids were stupid enough to bet after he told you he knew he could ride the jackass, you were jackasses yourselves for betting. Court is adjourned.”

The fellows were very quiet as we walked back to the Benson place. I didn’t know if it was because The Great Brain had made fools out of them or because they liad lost their money betting. Tom borrowed a halter and rode Chalky to our corra! with me and Frankie following on foot. He didn’t have any trouble when lie put our packsaddle on tlie jackass. It was too big, but tlie burro let Tom lead him around the corral a few times carrying the packsaddle. Then Tom removed it and motioned to me.

“Now J.D..” he said, “I want to make sure Chalky knows human beings are his friends before I sell him. Get on him and ride him around the corral a few times.”

I figured that wild jackass might be Tom’s friend but

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that didn’t mean he was mine. “I don’t feel like getting pitched off on my behind,” I said.

“I tell you he won’t buck.” Tom said. “He’s plumb gentled.”

“I would rather Chalky told me,” I said.

“If you are afraid,” Tom said, “I’ll let Frankie ride him.”

That was enough to force me to ride the jackass. I sure as heck didn’t want to be known as a fellow who was afraid to do something his six-year-old brother wasn’t afraid to do. I got on Chalky. He didn’t buck. I rode him around the corral a few times. Then Frankie wanted to ride the burro. Tom let him until Mamma called us tor lunch.

After eating I went to the campgrounds with Tom to sell Chalky. The streams in the mountains around Adenville had a lot of beaver dams in them. Trappers who caught beaver and other wild animals for they” furs always came to Adenville for provisions. It was closer to the beaver dams than any other town. There were usually three or four trappers at the campgrounds. But when we arrived there was Just one, a man named Brussard. He said he didn’t need a burro but knew another trapper who did. After some hag-gling Tom sold Chalky for six dollars.

“I’ll bet,” I said as we left the campgrounds, “that he sells Chalky for more than six dollars.”

“I don’t believe he would cheat a friend,” Tom said.

“Speaking of cheating,” I said, “boy, oh, boy, are you backsliding.”

Tom grabbed my arm and spun me around. “And just what do you mean by that?” he asked.

“For my money,”* I said. “you were betting on a sure

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thing when you bet you could ride Chalky, which makes it a swindle even if you did pull the wool over Harold’s eyes.”

“I proved it wasn’t a swindle,” Tom said, “and Harold as the judge agreed. Now along comes my own flesh and blood and accuses me of being a swindler and backslider. I think we will just let Mamma and Papa settle this. I’ll tell my side of the story and you tell yours. I’m sure they will decide in my favor and punish you for calling your own brother a swindler and backslider.”

Boy, oh, boy, my little brain and big mouth had done it again. I knew with that dictionary business and with Harold agreeing it wasn’t a swindle, that Tom could easily convince our parents he hadn’t swindled anybody. And I knew my punishment would be the loss of my allowance for at least a month and the silent treatment. Other kids in town just got a whipping when being punished. Our parents punished us by taking away our allowance and giving us the silent treatment which was ten times worse than a whipping. It meant that Papa and Mamma wouldn’t speak to us and would practically pretend we didn’t exist for a day, a week, or even longer, depending upon what we had done.

“I’m sorry I called you a backslider and swindler,” I said.

“I’m not going to let you oft with just an apology,” Tom

said as he took a penny from his pocket and handed it to me. “What’s that for?” I asked staring at the penny. “Mamma wants the vegetable garden weeded again

tomorrow,” Tom said. “I’m paying you one cent to weed my

share.”

“Oh, no, you don’t.” I said. “I’m not weeding your half for just a penny.”

“Would you rather I tell Papa and Mamma that you

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called me a backslider and swindler?” Tom asked.

“I’ll weed the garden,” I said, knowing he had me over a barrel. “But why the penny?”

“So Mamma and Papa won’t be suspicious when you tell them you are going to weed the garden by yourself,” Tom said. “All you’ve got to do is to tell them I paid you to weed my share of the garden and you won’t be telling -a lie. You don’t have to tell them how much I paid you.”

“Thanks,” I said, but I sure as heck didn’t feel grateful.

I knew The Great Brain had swindled the fellows out oi” two dollars and eighty cents. I knew he had blackmailed me into weeding the garden again. He was still the same old swindler, crook, confidence man, and blackmailer he had always been. His great brain and money-loving heart would never let him reform. And tomorrow, the last Saturday before school started, other kids would be playing and going swimming and having fun while I pulled weeds all day. I felt so down in the dumps that I wished I haa three legs. Then I could run around the block on two legs and use the other one to kick myself all the way for not having sense enough to keep my big mouth shut.

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SCHOOL STARTED ON MONDAY morning. Kids who had gone barefooted most of the summer now had to wear shoes. Faces had to be scrubbed shiny. Uncomfortable clothing had to be worn. Mr. Standish was still the master of the first through the sixth grades in the common school. Mr. Harvey Monroe became the master of the seventh and eighth grades at the Academy. Lessons had to be learned. Books had to be studied. Homework had to be done. It was like going to prison after the carefree summer vacation, and enough to make a fellow sit right down and bawl.

Papa asked Tom what he thought of Mr. Monroe during supper after our first day of school.

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“I guess he will be all right,” Tom said after swallowing a mouthful of pot roast. “But he is very young to be a

teacher.”

“He graduated from the University of Utah last June,” Papa said. “This is his first teaching contract.”

“That explains it,” Tom said. “He sure was nervous his

first day.”

School always began at the same time the ranchers were rounding up cattle for market. Papa received an advertisement every fall from the Bruford Brothers Meat-Packing Company in Kansas City. He ran the advertisement just about when school started-This year he published it in the September 6 edition of the Advocate, the day after school began. The advertisement notified all cattlemen that Mr. Paul Simpson would be in Adenville during the week beginning September 11 to buy cattle for the company.

When the advertisement appeared the cattle ranchers started rounding up beet animals for market—mostly four-and five-year-old steers and older dry cows. The ranchers brought the cattle to Adenville a day or two before Mr. Simpson was due to arrive. They put them in the livestock loading pens by the railroad spur track. From there the cattle would be shipped by rail to Kansas City.

All the ranchers liked dealing with Mr. Simpson because he always offered a fair price for cattle. He treated the small ranchers with just a few head to sell the same as the big ranchers with a hundred or more head to sell. I guess that was why cattle buyers from other meat-packing companies very seldom came to Adenville.

The Saturday after our first week of school every kid in town was down at the loading pens. We watched drovers for big ranches like the Flying W put their cattle in large sepa-

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rate pens. The smaller ranchers with just a few head of cattle to sell put their cattle all together in a big pen. When the sale of the cattle belonging to each small rancher began, cowboys on cutting horses would separate the cattle belonging to each rancher by the brands on them and run them through the chute to be tallied.

Monday morning it was back to school again. The Academy was just two blocks from the common school-Frankie, who was’ in the first grade, waited with me for Tom at noon and after school. When we arrived home for lunch that day Mamma told us Papa wouldn’t be eating with us. “Why not?” Tom asked.

“He hung up the telephone before I could ask him,” Mamma said. “Then I remembered that Mr. Simpson is due to arrive on the eleven o’clock train this morning. Your father always has lunch with Mr. Simpson at the Sheepmen’s Hotel while getting news about the cattle business.”

When Tom, Frankie, and I got home from school that afternoon Mamma and Aunt Bertha were in the kitchen making Parker House rolls for supper. We always had a glass of milk and some cookies after school before changing into our play clothes. I could see Mamma was upset about something.

“All I can say. Bertha,” she was saying as we entered the kitchen, “is that it is a fine how-do-you-do when the wife of the editor and publisher of the Advocate has to find out about a train robbery second hand.”

“A train robbery!” Tom shouted. “Where? When?” “The eleven o’clock train was held up twenty-five miles north of town,” Mamma said, “and poor Mr. Simpson was killed by the robbers. But did I find out about it from your father? No. I learned about it from Mrs. Smith, who heard

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about it t-rom Mrs. Olsen, who heard about it from Mrs. Larson. And when I finally reached your father at the Advocate office he said he would tell us all about it when he came home for supper.”

“I’m not waiting,” Tom said, with an excited look on his freckled face. “I’m going to the Advocate office.”

“No, you aren’t,” Mamma said sharply. “Your father said he was very busy, and that means he doesn’t want to be disturbed.”

We were all “waiting in the parlor when Papa arrived home for supper. I expected to hear Mamma really tell Papa off for not letting her know about the train robbery. But she didn’t. She smiled and kissed him as she always did.

Tom looked as if he was going to explode with curiosity. “The train robbery!” he exclaimed. “What about the train robbery?”

Papa sat down in his rocking chair. “I had to tear down

h.

the front page of tomorrow’s edition of the Advocate,” he said, “and set type for the story of the train robbery and the murder of Mr. Simpson. The type is all set and ready for the Washington press. I’ll have to work tonight.” -

Then Papa told us what had happened. Nels Larson, the stationmaster, had received the usual telegram from the station master at Cedar City that the train had left there on time. This meant the train should arrive in Adenville at eleven o’clock. Mr. Larson waited until eleven thirty and then telephoned Uncle Mark. He told my uncle the train must have been in a wreck from a rock slide or something or it would have been on time. Uncle Mark got Dr. LeRoy, Papa, and some other men to organize a rescue party. By the time they had blankets, medicine, shovels, and everything needed for a train wreck loaded-into a wagon, the train

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pulled into the station almost an hour and a halt late. Uncle Mark quickly interviewed trainmen and passengers and then left with a posse. Papa interviewed trainmen and passengers and went to the Advocate to write the story and set type for it.