Sugar Creek Gang Set Books 1-6 Read online

  I don’t suppose I can tell Old Man Paddler’s story as he told it, and maybe it’ll sound more like me telling it than him. But I’ll do the best I can because it’s a real story.

  As I said, as soon as he heard about the robber being caught and put in jail, he didn’t act worried or afraid anymore. So now he had us sit down and listen. Big Jim sat on a chair with Little Jim on the cot beside him, and the rest of us sprawled on the floor. The old man sat in the only other chair in the cabin, one he himself had made out of hickory years ago. Sitting there, he looked just like one of the pictures of Moses I’d seen in my Bible storybook at home, my parents having bought me one with a lot of pictures in it when I was little.

  Old Man Paddler had been traveling around the world, visiting a lot of countries, staying maybe a month or two in each place. He was rich, you know. Then he got to thinking maybe he was too old to travel anymore, and if he died he ought to do something with all the money he’d buried back on the hill beside the swamp.

  I guess if you’d seen us boys while he was telling us that story—with his kind old eyes looking at us as if we were his very own grandchildren, his long whiskers bobbing every time his chin moved—you’d have thought we all should have been named Dragonfly. That was the most exciting story we’d ever heard, and our eyes were almost popping out of our heads—anyway, they were wide open every minute of the story.

  “When I got back here from my trip around the world,” Old Man Paddler said, “I was so tired I didn’t feel very well. So I stopped down there by my spring to get a drink and rest, wondering if anything had happened to my cabin while I was away. I hadn’t intended to stay so long when I left, you know. Then I looked up and saw smoke coming out of the chimney!

  “Who’s in my cabin? I thought. I hurried up the hill and pushed open the door. There sitting at my table and drinking coffee was a man who looked almost exactly like me. It was just like looking at my twin, or else in a mirror, and I began to wonder if maybe I was losing my mind, being so old.

  “‘Who are you?’ I asked.

  “And the strange man just laughed and said, ‘I’m Old Man Paddler, of course. What do you want?’ and he swore at me.

  “Well, right away I knew I hadn’t lost my mind, and that the man wasn’t me, because I don’t swear. Haven’t since I was a little boy and let Jesus Christ come into my heart.

  “‘You can’t swear in my house!’ I told him.

  “Well, that man stood up and glared at me,” Old Man Paddler said, “and then all of a sudden he grabbed me and pulled me inside and pointed a gun at me and shouted, ‘I am Old Man Paddler! Do you hear? And you’re just a visitor! Come here! I’m going to cut your whiskers off!’

  “I’m not very strong anymore, and I couldn’t have done anything to protect myself, so all I could do was beg him not to. Anyway, he seemed to change his mind and said he guessed he’d kill me instead and throw me into the swamp. ‘Everybody thinks you’re dead anyway, and we’d just as well let it be true!’ he said.

  “First he tied me up and threw me on the bed. Then he got a mirror and came over to where I was and began looking into it. He’d look first at me, then into the mirror.

  “‘I look exactly like you,’ he said. ‘I’m certainly glad you came home so I know exactly how I’m supposed to look.’

  “I had to admit he did look just like me. I kept lying there, wishing my nephew would come. You see, about a week before I came home, I’d sent a letter to my only living relative out in California, telling him to please come to see me, as I was getting old and had a lot of money to give him before I died. In that letter I told him where he would find a map that would explain where I’d buried my money, so in case anything happened to me before he got here he’d know where to find it. I explained the map too, just in case he wouldn’t be able to figure out what the different things meant.”

  The old man stopped a moment, and we all sighed, waiting eagerly for him to finish. That map, we knew, was the one we’d found in the old sycamore tree day before yesterday.

  “Well,” the old man went on, while I shifted my feet to a more comfortable position, one of them having gone to sleep because I was sitting on it, “my twin stood there glaring at me, trying to decide what he’d better do with me. I tell you, boys, I’m an old man, and I thought maybe my time had come to die. So I just shut my eyes and started praying and telling the Father in heaven I was ready if He wanted me.

  “But then I remembered again all that money I’d buried and was going to give my nephew, and maybe he wouldn’t even get my letter, and the money would be wasted. In my travels around the world, I’d seen so many places where missionaries were needed, and I thought that maybe in a few minutes I’d be in heaven seeing Jesus face-to-face and He’d ask me why I hadn’t used some of that money for missionary work …”

  Then the old man went on with his story. “The robber heard me praying, and it made him angry. ‘Shut up!’ he shouted and raised his fist like he was going to hit me. So I did stop praying out loud, although I kept right on praying silently, knowing God could hear anyway, and telling Him I was ready to die because I knew He’d sent His Son, Jesus, to save me, and I had believed on Him in my heart.

  “‘All right, Grandpa!’ the fierce-looking man said roughly. ‘Let’s get those whiskers off! Or shall I take you out somewhere and bury you?’ He came over to me and took hold of my beard and gave it a little jerk. Then he laughed and said, ‘They’re real whiskers all right, and your hair is genuine too. I lost a wig and beard just like the ones I have on now down by the swamp a few days ago.’

  “He stood there looking at me as if he was trying to think of some way to get mine off so he could use them himself in case he needed them. I could see he was a wicked man and might do anything. And with his gun pointing straight at me, I began to think how I might save my life for a little while at least, so I said, ‘Maybe you’d like to know where my money is buried.’”

  The old man poured himself another cup of sassafras tea. “All the time I was hoping my nephew would come, yet afraid to have him come because he might get hurt. So I told the robber where to dig, and he must have decided to let me live a little while longer, for he put a gag in my mouth and went away, leaving me all tied up like you found me. Just as he went out the door, he said, ‘Listen, Grandpa Paddler, if you’ve lied to me, I’ll come back! And you can tell this world good-bye!’ And that was the last I saw of him.”

  The old man sighed as if he was tired of talking.

  Anyway, that was his side of the story, and you know what happened after that—how the robber had seen us boys digging there by the rosebush and that night had come back himself and we had captured him.

  We thanked Old Man Paddler for telling us the story and promised to come back and see him again and that we’d go see his nephew and tell him his uncle was alive and well and not to worry. He thanked us over and over again for coming to untie him, and then we left.

  Down by the spring where Dragonfly and I had gone for water, we all lay down one at a time and drank, horse fashion. Then we looked back up at the cabin. Blue smoke was rising slowly out of the chimney, and the old man was standing in the doorway, his long white whiskers shining in the afternoon sun.

  He lifted his hand and waved good-bye to us—no, he had both hands raised, like in the pictures in my Bible storybook where an old prophet was raising his hands to bless somebody. For a minute I thought of the funny cloud I’d seen the other night, which had looked like an old man with long gold whiskers reaching down to his waist.

  Then we started down the hill toward home, not forgetting to stop at the swimming hole for a good swim so we could tell our folks we wouldn’t need a bath tonight, this being Saturday and all boys having to take a bath on Saturday night whether they want to or not.

  Some of us had to take them even oftener than that.

  12

  Did I tell you that we nearly always went to town on Saturday nights? We had to, you know, to buy gr
oceries and things. So when we were dressed, Dad called and soon we were driving along in our car toward town, which was about five miles away.

  “Now, don’t you get into any mischief!” Dad said to me when we stopped in front of the big fountain on the main street.

  I slid out of the car and ran over to where Poetry and Dragonfly were waiting for me.

  “Hello, Bill,” they said.

  “Hello, Dragonfly. Hello, Poetry.” They were both wearing their Sunday clothes.

  We stood watching the water spraying down from above and falling into a big cement pool right in front of us. Electric lights shone down on it from lampposts all around. You could see maybe a dozen goldfish swimming around in the pool.

  With the water splashing and the band playing up the street and hundreds of people standing around talking and laughing, and especially with Poetry and Dragonfly there, all of us liking each other a lot, it seemed good to be alive.

  “I wonder if it’s deep enough to swim in,” Poetry said.

  I was thinking the same thing, and probably so was Dragonfly. And do you know we had to go away and quit watching that fountain because it made us want to go swimming so bad it made us feel sad all over! We started walking along Main Street, Poetry in the middle and Dragonfly and me on each side of him.

  All of a sudden Dragonfly said, “Psst!” just as he always does when he’s seen or heard something important.

  So we stopped quick to find out what it was.

  “It’s Circus’s dad!” he said. “See him walking crazylike? I bet he’s drunk again!”

  And sure enough, he was.

  “I hope he hasn’t got a gun,” I said, remembering that he always carried one when he went hunting, and he was an awful good shot.

  He kept shuffling along, reaching out with each foot as though he was having trouble finding the sidewalk.

  “Let’s follow him to see where he goes,” Poetry said.

  Pretty soon he staggered up to a place where they sell beer and kind of fell against the door. Then he pushed it open and went inside.

  We stood looking in through the smoky-glass door panel and saw him lean up against the bar, throw down some money, and say something to the bartender. It was disgusting to see the big, fat-stomached bartender take the money and give him another glass of beer, when I knew Circus’s folks were poor and needed all the money they could get for food and clothes and things.

  I was glad Little Jim wasn’t with us. He would have felt bad about it. He liked Circus so well that he wouldn’t have had any fun at all. As it was, it sort of took away the good taste of the bag of peanuts we were eating right that minute.

  We went on walking around, feeling kind of sad. Pretty soon we saw Circus himself sitting alone on a bench in front of an empty store building, looking like he’d lost his best friend.

  “Hello, Circus,” I said, and Poetry and Dragonfly said the same thing. We offered him some of our peanuts and sat down beside him.

  “What’s the matter?” I asked.

  But he didn’t answer. He just kept sitting there, looking unhappy, not even taking any peanuts. I noticed he didn’t have on nearly as nice clothes as the rest of us, though they were clean and neat. His shoes were old too, but he had them pretty well polished, and they looked all right. He had a very good mother.

  “Wait a minute,” Dragonfly said. He got up and ran down the street and came back with a big bag of fresh popcorn, knowing Circus liked popcorn better than anything.

  But Circus didn’t even take any popcorn, and we didn’t try very hard to make him. We all sat there feeling unhappy, none of us saying anything for a long time.

  And finally Circus said, “Dad’s drunk again.” Then he sighed and took some of my peanuts and Dragonfly’s popcorn.

  Up the street, the band was playing a beautiful number, “The Stars and Stripes Forever.” People were walking past in front of us, going both ways, talking and laughing. Everybody seemed happy except us.

  “That’s a pretty band piece,” Circus said. “I always wanted to play in a band. Maybe someday I’ll run away from home and get a job and make enough money to buy a cornet.”

  “Doesn’t your mother like you anymore?” Dragonfly asked.

  Circus choked on the popcorn he had in his mouth and coughed a little. Then he said, “Maybe if I ran away and got some work, I could send her the money I made.”

  Just then Circus’s dad came shuffling down the street.

  In an instant, Circus was out of his seat and running into an alley as fast as he could go with us right after him. I thought maybe he was going to run away from home right now, and I didn’t want him to because I knew how his mother would feel.

  In the alley about a block from the main street, we stopped behind somebody’s garage, where there wasn’t any light, and listened for a minute to see if anybody was coming. Nobody was.

  “He’s mad at me,” Circus said, “’cause I went into the saloon about a half hour ago and told him to stop drinking or I’ll tell Mother. He’ll give me a terrible lickin’ if he catches me.”

  Right beside us was a telephone pole, and I couldn’t help but think that, if Circus was happy, he’d likely be halfway to the top of it by now. There was also the brightest, roundest moon up in the sky, and if Poetry had been happy, he’d probably have started to say:

  “Hey, diddle, diddle,

  The cat and the fiddle,

  The cow jumped over the moon;

  The little dog laughed to see such sport,

  And the dish ran away with the spoon.”

  We stayed there in the shadow of that little garage for maybe five minutes, thinking and saying different things.

  I was wishing Circus was my brother so he could have my dad for his daddy when all of a sudden we heard footsteps coming down the alley. We crowded down behind a big box and waited. And would you believe it? In a minute two men stopped there in the dark, and one of them was my dad and the other was Circus’s. You can guess we had a hard time keeping still, and I can’t tell you how weird I felt inside.

  “You’re making a big fool out of yourself!” my dad said disgustedly.

  Circus’s dad swore and said, “I don’t want any more kids! Three girls and one good-for-nothing boy is enough!”

  My fists doubled up when he said that. I knew he was talking about Circus, and I reckon maybe it isn’t wrong to get mad at something like that.

  I peeped out from behind the box, and I could see my dad standing there tall and straight in the moonlight, looking clean and good. Circus’s dad was slouched over with his hat on crooked and some of his mussed-up hair sticking out on one side. His tie was twisted, and his face, what I could see of it, looked terrible.

  For a minute I remembered what Big Jim had said that afternoon about sin, quoting from the Bible, “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked!” I decided nobody could fool God. It was like my dad had just said—Circus’s father was making a big fool out of himself.

  “Now you listen, Dan Browne!” my dad said roughly. “You’re not drinking another drop tonight, do you hear?”

  “‘S’none of your business!” Circus’s father grumbled back and swore again. “It’s my money, and I’ll spend it like I please. Anyway, when a new baby comes to my house, I’ve got a right to celebrate.”

  But now my dad was getting angry—with the right kind of anger. He just reached out his big strong hands, grabbed Circus’s dad by the shoulders, shook him the way a big dog shakes a rat, and said, “You ought to celebrate by getting down on your knees, Dan Browne, and praying to God Almighty that He’ll forgive your sins and make you a good father to your children and a decent husband to your wife. Mrs. Browne is one of the grandest little women that ever drew breath, and your boy is one of the finest boys in the county. And you—shame on you, Dan Browne!”

  Well, my dad wouldn’t let Circus’s father go home that night, because he knew he’d make all kinds of trouble and maybe do something terrible. So he hunted up the tow
n marshal, which is the same as a policeman, and they locked him up in jail, which is where he belonged.

  And that’s how we came to learn that Circus had a new baby at his house too. Also, that’s how Circus came to stay all night at my house. With the new baby at his place, there might be a lot of excitement. Besides, Big Jim’s mother was staying there, too, to help take care of the baby, so there wouldn’t be enough beds. Circus said he would just as soon sleep in the barn—he’d done it before when his dad was mad at him about something.

  But they wouldn’t want a noisy boy around right now, so my dad drove all the way to Circus’s house to tell them that Circus was going to sleep with me that night, his folks not having a telephone because his dad used most all their money for whiskey and beer. Then Dad stopped at Big Jim’s house and made arrangements for somebody to do the chores at Circus’s the next morning, since Big Jim lived right across the road from them anyway.

  13

  When we got back to our house, it was after ten o’clock, more than an hour past the time I usually went to bed in the summer.

  Charlotte Ann was wide awake when we came in and was making a terrible noise. Circus and I went in for a minute to see what all the fuss was about. Miss Trillium, the nurse, was holding her, and that little thing stopped crying the minute we came in. Or, I should have said, the minute she saw Circus!

  “I know how to look at girls,” he said to me, grinning. “I’ve got three sisters.”

  “Four,” I said. “You’ve got a new one at your house.”

  And he said, “Yeah, that’s right,” sort of disappointed sounding.

  “Good night,” I called to Mom in the other room, after watching Charlotte Ann drink her milk for a while. She was the cutest little thing! Even Circus looked at her as if he thought so too, and I got to thinking that maybe he liked his sisters better than he let on. Most boys don’t want to let anybody know they like girls at all, even when they do.