Great Brain At the Academy

by John D. Fitzgerald

  Jerry nodded his head. “I’ll help,” he said.

  Tom was right about Jerry. The red-headed kid was game for anything. But Phil wasn’t.

  “Not me,” Phil said. “If we get caught we’ll all end up with demerits.”

  “Me neither,” Tony said. “Go peel your own spuds.”

  “Come on, Tom,” Jerry said. “I’ll help you. Let these two ‘fraidy cats go back to bed.”

  That made Phil angry. “I’m no ‘fraidy cat,” he said.

  “Then prove it,” Jerry said.

  “All right, I’ll help.” Phil said.

  The three of them looked at Tony.

  “Haw,” Tonysaid—

  They all stared at Tony for a moment. Finally Tom spoke.

  “What do you mean by ‘haw’?” he asked. “Do you mean ha like in ha, ha,’ or haw like telling a horse to turn left, or what?”

  “I don’t know.” Tony said.

  68

  “What do you mean you don’t know?” Tom asked. “You just said it.”

  “When my father has an argument with my mother or my uncle,” Tony said, “and he doesn’t know what to say he always says ‘haw.’ “

  “In other words, you don’t know what to say,” Tom said. “Well, all you’ve got to say is I am not a ‘fraidy cat’ or ‘I am a ‘fraidy cat.’ “

  “I’ll help,” Tony said.

  They all slid down the banister to the ground floor and then tiptoed into the kitchen. Tom showed them where the paring knives were kept. Thirty minutes later all the potatoes were peeled and Jerry, Phil, and Tony were upstairs in the dormitory. Tom was sitting there doing nothing when Father Petrie entered the kitchen at five o’clock.

  The priest was a short, very fat man with big jowls. He placed the palms of his hands on his fat belly and looked at Tom with twinkling eyes.

  “Bless my soul,” he said, his jowls wobbling as he spoke. “You must be Thomas Fitzgerald.”

  “Yes, Father,” Tom said.

  The priest walked over and looked at the tub containing all the peeled potatoes. “Bless my soul, Thomas,” he said, “you couldn’t possibly have peeled all those potatoes in an hour.” •-

  Father Petrie left the kitchen shaking his head. He returned in a few minutes with Father Rodriguez.

  “You must have awakened the boy before tour o’clock,” Father Petrie said.

  The superintendent stared at the tub of peeled potatoes. “There is no other logical explanation,” he said.

  69

  Then he looked at Tom- “You are excused for now, Thomas.”

  Tom went up to the dormitory where Jerry, Phil, and Tony were waiting on Jerry’s bunk. He told them what had happened. They all laughed so much they had to hold their hands over their mouths.

  “We’ve got Father Rodriguez and Father Petrie plumb mystified,” Tom said before they all went to bed.

  The six o’clock bell woke them up. All the boys washed up and changed into their Sunday clothes. Then two eighth graders left to serve as attar boys. At six thirty another bell rang and Tom went with the others down to the chapel for mass. Then they went to the dining room for breakfast before going back to the dormitory.

  “My folks are coming to see me today,” Phil said.

  Jerry shook his head. “I wish my folks lived in Salt Lake City so they could visit me,” he said.

  “That reminds me,” Tom said. “I’ve still got eight bars of candy.” Then he stood up. “You fellows who are having visitors today, don’t forget to ask (or money if you want any candy.”

  All the kids had ignored Willie Connors and I guess the silent treatment was hurting him. He came over to Tom’s bunk.

  “I said I was sorry,” he said, “And I promise not to snitch anymore.”

  Tom and the other fellows pretended not to hear. Willie went back to his bunk and began to cry.

  Tom was sitting on a bench with Jerry and Tony in the yard that afternoon when Sweyn came over to them.

  “Father Rodriguez just sent for me,” he said. “He asked me where you had learned how to peel potatoes so

  71

  fast. I told him you had never peeled a potato before in your life. You always hired J.D. to do it when Mom or Aunt Bertha was sick.”

  “Why couldn’t you keep your mouth shut?” Tom said, plenty angry. “You signed a statement not to interfere. Now you are going to have to help me because I’ll need a lookout.”

  “I don’t know what you are talking about,” Sweyn said, “but whatever it is the answer is no.”

  Tom shrugged as if he didn’t care. “Then I guess I’ll have to tell all the kids you refused to help your own brother,” he said. “And I’ll also tell them you can’t be trusted because you broke your signed statement.”

  Poor Sweyn knew he was trapped. By the time Tom got through telling it the kids would have more respect for Willie Connors than for him.

  “All right, you little blackmailer,” he said. “What do you want me to do?”

  “I’ll tell you after supper tonight,” Tom said. “My great brain has to work on it a little longer.”

  After visiting hours were over Tom sold six bars of candy. And because he didn’t want the other two bars to go stale he divided them up with his three friends.

  Father Rodriguez woke up Tom at four o’clock again the next morning, Tom waited until the priest had left the kitchen and then sneaked up to the dormitory. He woke up his three friends and Sweyn. They all slid down the banister to the ground Hoor.

  “Father Rodriguez has to come through the dining room to get to the kitchen,” Tom whispered. “S.D., you station yourself just inside the entrance to the dining room where you can see the door of his bedroom. I have a

  72

  hunch Father Rodriguez will be checking on me this morning. If you see him open his bedroom door you run into the kitchen and tell us. Then the four of you hide in the pantry until he is gone.”

  Tom’s hunch was right. He and his three friends had only been peeling potatoes for fifteen minutes when Sweyn came running into the kitchen.

  “He’s coming,” Sweyn whispered.

  Tom was sitting all alone in the kitchen with a potato in one hand and a paring knife in the other when the superintendent entered the kitchen.

  “Did you want something, Father?” Tom asked as innocent as could be.

  The superintendent looked at the peeled potatoes in the wooden tub. He didn’t say a word but walked out of the kitchen shaking his head. He paid another visit to the kitchen fifteen minutes later. Again the four boys hid in the pantry and Tom greeted the superintendent with a big innocent smile.

  Father Rodriguez didn’t return to the kitchen until five o’clock. Father Petrie was with him. By that time all the spuds were peeled and Jerry, Phil, Tony, and Sweyn were back in the dormitory.

  “I know for a fact,” the superintendent said to Father Petrie, “that I didn’t make a mistake about the time this morning. I checked my alarm clock with my watch and also with the clock in the library. And I checked on Thomas twice.”

  “Bless my soul,” Father Petrie said, placing the palms of his hands on his belly. “There is only one logical conclusion. Thomas is without a doubt the fastest potato peeler in the world.”

  73

  The superintendent just shook his head. “You are excused, Thomas,” he said.

  Tom was chuckling all the way back to the dormitory. His three friends were waiting on Jerry’s bunk.

  “Father Rodriguez will rue the day he sentenced me to peeling spuds for just riding on a locomotive,” Tom said. “And he’ll be sorry he ever tangled with my great brain.”

  Jerry shook his head. “Wish we could tell all the kids about the good joke we played on him,” he said. “None of the kids like him except maybe Willie Connors.”

  “We can’t tell anybody,” Tom said, “or the next kid sentenced to peeling spuds will do the same thing.”

  Tom began his first day of school that Monday mornin
g. His life was controlled by the big bell on the ground floor. The six o’clock bell was the signal for all the boys to get washed up and dressed. Then the four kids assigned to the dining room and kitchen left. The six-thirty bell called the boys to chapel for morning prayer. Another bell sent them from the chapel to the dining room. From the din-ing room they went back to the dormitory. At eight o’clock the sound of another bell sent them to the classrooms on the second floor.

  Father Rodriguez was standing in front of the blackboard in the seventh-grade classroom. He assigned each seventh grader to a desk.

  “You will find textbooks for the courses Father O’Malley will teach you on your desks,” he said. “You will be studying beginner’s Latin, geography, American history, advanced arithmetic, English grammar, general science, and beginner’s civics. You will also find a book entitled Key of Heaven, which is a manual of prayers and

  74

  instruction for Catholics. I will teach this course, which embraces the catechism, epistles and gospels, and Christian doctrine. It will be your first course each day.”

  Tom discovered that there was no such thing as recess at the academy. Students remained in the classrooms from eight o’clock to twelve noon. They had forty-five minutes for lunch and then went back to the classrooms until three o’clock. Father O’Malley told the seventh graders they could do their homework between the time school let out and suppertime and between seven and nine o’clock in the evenings. And he gave them homework to do for every course.

  But there sure as heck wasn’t any homework done that afternoon. It was initiation day for the seventh graders. Rory Flynn addressed them as soon as they arrived in the dormitory.

  “You little seventh graders have been found guilty of wanting to go to school at the academy,” he said. “The punishment is a trip through the torture tunnel.”

  Then the eighth graders each got a textbook and stood with their legs apart in the aisle.. Willie Connors got in line with them but he wasn’t there for long. Rory grabbed the tattletale and without a word marched him back to his bunk. Then he got back in line.

  “The torture tunnel is ready,” he said. “All you little seventh graders get down on your hands and knees and crawl through one at a time.”

  Tom didn’t like having Rory giving him orders. “What if we refuse?” he asked.

  Sweyn looked at him, “Don’t be a spoilsport,” he said.

  Tom sure as heck didn’t want the fellows to think he was a spoilsport. “I’ll go first,” he said.

  75

  He got down on his hands and knees and began crawl-ing between the legs of the eighth graders. Each one whacked him on the rump with a textbook. Jerry came next. And then one by one the rest of the seventh graders crawled through the torture tunnel. Fun was fun but Tom thought some of the eighth graders, especially Rory, could have taken it a little easier. Three of his classmates had tears in their eyes as they came out of the torture tunnel.

  If Tom thought that was the end of the initiation he was mistaken. Rory put a chair at one end of the dormitory and sat down on it.

  “We will now prove that all seventh graders are dummies,” he said. “Line up and come one at a time to sit on my lap.”

  All the seventh graders looked at Tom as if expecting him to go first. He walked over and sat on Rory’s lap, wondering what this was all about. He didn’t have to wonder for long. Rory grabbed hold of the back of his neck as if Tom was a ventriloquist’s dummy.

  “I’ve got a dummy on my lap who thinks he is a rooster,” Rory said- “Crow like a rooster, dummy.”

  “Cock-a-doodte-doo!” Tom pretended to crow like a rooster, as both eighth and seventh graders laughed.

  Jerry was next on Rory’s lap.

  “I’ve got a dummy who thinks he is a cat,” Rory said. “Show me you are a cat, dummy.”

  “Me-ow, me-ow,” Jerry said.

  One by one the other seventh graders had to sit on Rory’s lap. He made them bark like a dog, moo like a cow, whinny like a horse, caw like a crow, roar like a lion, croak like a frog, cry like a baby, and howl like a wolf.

  Then Rory stood up, “I guess that proves that all lit-

  76

  tie seventh graders are dummies,” he said. “Os habent, et non loquentur.”

  Sweyn laughed. “Oculos habent, et non videbunt,” he said.

  Billy Daniels nodded his head. “Ares habent, et non audient,” he said.

  “And,” Larry Williams said, “Nares habent, et non odorabunt.”

  Then all the eighth graders began to laugh like all get out,

  “And don’t forget, fellows,” Rory said, “when we want to say something we don’t want these little seventh graders to know about, all we have to do is to speak in Latin.”

  Tom didn’t like the idea of anybody saying anything he couldn’t understand. He walked over to Sweyn.

  “What did you fellows say in Latin?” he asked.

  “After proving all seventh graders are dummies,” Sweyn said, “Rory said they have mouths and speak not. I said they have eyes and see not. Billy said they have ears and hear not. And Larry said they have noses and smell not-But don’t ask me to translate any more Latin for you. Like Rory said, when we want to say something to each other we don’t want you seventh graders to understand, we will speak in Latin.”

  Tom admitted this was one time when even his great brain couldn’t help him. He knew he couldn’t learn Latin any faster than Father O’Malley taught it to him. Sweyn told him that was the end of the initiation but seventh graders would be forced to wash up twice and stand at attention in the mornings for the rest of the week.

  It was a good thing Tom had a great brain. There was

  77

  no time to do any homework before supper. And after supper he had to spend almost an hour in the chapel doing the penance Father O’Malley had given him. This left him Just one hour to do all his homework.

  During his third and fourth mornings of peeling spuds Tom was surprised that Father Rodriguez didn’t come to check on him. But he got an even bigger surprise on his fifth and last day. When he and the superintendent arrived in the kitchen at four o’clock that morning he found Father Petrie waiting for them.

  “This morning, Thomas,” Father Rodriguez said, “you are going to have an audience. Father Petrie and I are going to sit right here and watch you peel all those potatoes in less than an hour.”

  Tom knew he was cornered and only his great brain could save him. But how? He mustn’t show any surprise. He had to convince the priests that he alone had peeled all the potatoes on the other four mornings and at the same time get out of peeling them this morning. His great brain came to his rescue.

  “First I have to hypnotize myself,” he said.

  Father Rodriguez stared at him. “Hypnotize yourself?” he asked,

  “Bless my soul,” Father Petrie said, “you look as if you mean it, Thomas.”

  Tom put his index fingers to his temples and shut his eyes. He began rocking back and forth.

  “I am the fastest potato peeler in the world,” he chanted softly, “I am the fastest potato peeler in the world.”

  He kept saying this over and over until his great brain

  78

  gave him the solution to his problem. He dropped his arms and opened his eyes.

  “I must get a paring knife now,” he said.

  To get the knife he had to walk around the sack of potatoes. He made certain it was obvious to both priests that he stubbed his toe on the sack of potatoes. He fell to the floor bracing his fall with his hands. He lay there quietly until the two priests turned him over on his back. Then he blinked his eyes several times.

  “What am I doing lying on the floor?” he asked. Then he took hold of his left wrist with his right hand and bit his lip as if in pain. “My wrist hurts. It feels as if I sprained it.”

  “Bless my soul,” Father Petrie said. “Self-hypnosis in a mere boy. I just can’t believe it, although you did tell
me that Thomas had what he called a great brain.”

  Both priests helped Tom to his feet and Father Rodriguez examined the wrist.

  “I don’t see any swelling,” Father Rodriguez said.

  “Maybe it is just a twisted muscle,” Tom said. “I twisted my ankle one time and it didn’t swell up. But I couldn’t step on it for hours.” Tom wasn’t lying about his ankle. It really had happened.

  “Come with me to the dispensary,” the superintendent said.

  Tom followed the priest up to the second floor. Father Rodriguez turned on the light in the dispensary. The room contained two beds, a table, and a cabinet holding gauze, bandages, scissors, cans of salves, and other medical supplies.

  The superintendent nodded toward a washbasin in the corner. “Let cold water run on your wrist,” he said.

  79

  Tom did as he was told while the priest opened the cabinet and removed a roll of gauze and a pair of scissors.

  “Dry your wrist now with a towel,” he said. “I’ll bandage it loosely. And if it starts to swell or your fingers start feeling numb, you come see me.”

  Tom pretended it was painful as he opened and shut his fingers. “I doubt if I could hold a potato in my left hand let alone peel it now,” he said.

  “I have no intention of forcing you to peel potatoes with a sprained wrist,” Father Rodriguez said. “You can return to bed as soon as I bandage it. Father Petrie and I will take care of the potatoes.”

  A few minutes later Tom entered the dormitory. It was too good a joke to wait until the six o’clock bell, so he awakened Jerry, Phil, and Tony and told them what had happened.

  “And right now,” he said as he finished, “Father Rodriguez and Father Petrie are peeling spuds in the kitchen.”

  They all had a good laugh and then went back to bed.