I'll start with a silly story I wrote years ago...
Those Boys and Me
Those Boys and Me
William
Percy, well, he decided that life wasn’t fair, so he decided to rob a bank and
be a famous gangster. I always knew Billy would turn out bad; he was always the
worst boy in school. Always getting himself in trouble, always starting fights,
and always pilfering pies from windowsills where they were left to cool. Oh, he
knew better all right. He was the most lectured boy in town and there wasn’t a
housewife in the vicinity who hadn’t expounded to him the sins of stealing and
lying, and what his just reward would be when his life ended, by hanging,
probably, or in some other criminal way. But he gloated over his
accomplishments to the rest of us, and the bank robbery he had not yet done.
“Yep, I’ll
be famous. More so’n the president hisself,” he boasted. “and I’ll be rich too!
I’ll buy all the chewin’ gum I want, and a horse, and maybe even a train.”
Well, to say the least, us boys, we were mighty envious of Billy, but we dared
not even think of robbing banks or rich folk. Preacher Dan White preached
plenty on sin and just to listen to his descriptions of everlasting torment and
agony raised the hair on his faithful parishioners heads. But Billy, he never
went to church. And us boys dared not tell on Billy’s intentions to rob the
bank, for he swore that if any of us did, he’d come back later with a gang and
string us all up like so many fish. There was never boys more whist and mum
about anything.
Well, us
boys, we knew we couldn’t let Billy rob a bank, but we daren’t tell anyone that
he planned to do it. Finally, Billy didn’t want to wait any longer to do his
iniquitous act. We warned him of his everlasting punishment and pleaded with
him to be sensible, but he was resolved.
“Tonight
I’m going to creep in at the barred window on the top. I can squeeze through,
and I can get to it on the branch of that big tree. And by tomorrow I’ll be
rich!” As we heard those words, envious sighs escaped from us, but we piously,
(or maybe superstitiously) refused to take part in his crime. Billy left us,
day dreaming of tomorrow’s bounty.
“Hey
boys,” says I, “we can’t let Billy rob that bank!” “I know,” bawled all my
companions peevishly, “but what can we do?” We sat and moped for a while, everyone
hoping that someone else would figure something out. But our reasoning always
came back to this: we couldn’t warn anyone because our lives were more valuable
than a lot of stolen money. And Billy Percy never exaggerated on his revenge.
Now Billy,
he was mighty superstitious; the most spooked boy in town. It was decided that
our course of action must be along this subject. We had a howling contest and I
must confess, there was never a group of boys more frightened at their own
noises. Finally Jimmy Jackson was picked. His howl, more like a screeching,
yodeling roar, raised our hairs to their fullest extent. That night after our
suppers, we went to our beds, but it was by a preset agreement that we all
crept from our chambers and gathered in the shadow of the great tree next to
one side of the bank, while the watchman sauntered lazily to the other, and
then trudged over to the saloon. That was just fine by us. It was a night with
a quarter-moon which rendered but little light. This fact served both Billy’s
and our purposes. Jimmy, a bed sheet in hand, shinnied up the tree and hid on
the bank roof behind a great chimney. I was stationed high up in the tree with
a can of water, perfectly hidden by a thick shield of leaves. The rest of us
were stationed at intervals leading directly from the bank to Billy’s house. We
had not long to wait for the culprit. He came creeping along, rubbing his
rabbit’s foot. He seized a branch, and hauled himself up. He cautiously climbed
up further, and soon stood on the branch which would carry him over to the
bank. All at once, Jimmy, rising from behind the great chimney enshrouded in
his sheet, danced forth in the weak light upon the flat roof of the bank, and
let forth a tremulous streak which chilled my blood. Billy’s face, red from his
exertions, turned white as milk and his teeth chattered so hard the branch he
was perched on swayed and moaned. All at once, I let a little water drip down
in Billy’s neck, and since it was a perfectly clear night, his dread turned
into mortal fear. He ran pell-mell down that branch, and the yodeling Jimmy
chased him across, always staying close behind. Once they were on the ground, I
scrambled down, and we were off. Now, when Billy glanced behind, there were two
ghosts on his tail. Billy was in such a fright that his feet were lent wings
and he sped on, sure that his eternal punishment was at his heels. Jimmy and
me, well, we were laughing so hard, we almost died. As we ran along, the other
chaps stationed along the way left their hiding places one by one and joined in
the chase, so that now not one, but no less than a legion (in Billy’s eyes) of
ghosts was in full pursuit of him, shrieking like the devils we were
impersonating. If we thought Billy had run fast earlier, we were very much
mistaken. He left us in the dust and sped on like the trains he had coveted. He
ran into his house, up to his parent’s room. Us boys, we crept up under the
window, and heard our reward.
“Mammy,
Mammy, save me! I won’t ever be bad again, long as I live!” and above that
racket rose the puzzled exclamations of a mother and the dignified roars of a
father aroused from sweet repose at the hand of a lunatic son quavering out
tales of ghosts. In the end, us boys, dying from laughter, sleep having
thoroughly fled us for the night, stumbled away to our homes. We were still
thinking of it in our sleep apparently, as our mothers gathered together later
and discussed the new phenomenon of boys bursting out in laughter in the middle
of their sleep, an occurrence seeming to have struck them all at once.
As long as
he lived, Billy was never bad again. He became the model boy, and in church, no
one’s hairs stood up more vertical than Billy’s. And to this very day, Billy
doesn’t know it was us who had chased him that night. We still gather
sometimes, those other boys and I, and reminisce about how we spared the world
of a gangster in a most amusing way.
