The Great Brain

by John D. Fitzgerald

  “But Sammy is older and bigger than Basil,” Papa said.

  “Sammy is older and bigger than me, but I can whip him,” Tom said.

  Papa just smiled as he picked up his book and resumed his reading.

  Tom and I were weeding the vegetable garden a couple of days later when Howard Kay came running into our backyard.

  “Sammy and his pals have got Basil down by the river and are scaring him to death!” Howard shouted.

  “Show me where,” Tom said as he jumped to his feet.

  We ran all the way to the river where Howard led us along a path through some bushes and into a clearing.

  Sammy, Danny Forester, Pete Hanson, and Jimmie Peterson were dressed in their Indian suits and had their faces painted with red crayons. They had Basil tied to a tree in the middle of the clearing. They had piled dead brush around Basil as if they were going to burn him at the stake. They were dancing around the tree, letting out Indian war cries as they waved homemade tomahawks in the air. Basil was screaming and looked as if his eyes would pop right out of his head.

  Tom ran across the clearing and grabbed Sammy. He knocked Basil’s tormenter down with one punch on the jaw. Sammy’s three friends started for Tom. I stepped in front of them.

  “You gang up on Tom and I’ll get Sweyn to knock your blocks off!” I threatened them.

  Howard and I ran to help Basil as the three backed down. We pulled the brush away and untied the Greek boy. Basil was crying hysterically. I couldn’t blame him. A Greek boy in a strange country must have thought for sure he was going to be burned at the stake. As soon as we got Basil untied he ran screaming toward town as if a real war party of Indians were chasing him.

  Sammy was now on his feet, watching. “Look at the cry baby,” he said. “Look at Mamma’s boy running crying home to Mamma.” Then he looked at Tom. “Are you going to protect that little sissy and do all his fighting for him the rest of your life?” he asked with a sneer on his face.

  I thought Tom would haul off and knock Sammy down again. Instead he began to nod his head slowly. “You are right, Sammy,” he said. “If Basil wants to be an American, he’s got to learn to do his own fighting.”

  Danny Forester stepped up close to Tom. “We weren’t going to hurt him,” he said. “We were just having a little fun.”

  “I know it,” Tom said, “and you know it. But Basil didn’t. But that doesn’t excuse him for being such a cry baby.”

  It was midafternoon before Tom and I finished weeding the vegetable garden. Sweyn had got out of the dirty job because he had to cut the grass. Mamma came out to inspect the garden. She was satisfied and said that we could go play. We went to the rear entrance of the Palace Cafe. We could see Basil’s face pressed against a window in the apartment above the cafe where the family lived. Tom marched into the kitchen, with me following him. Mr. Kokovinis was in the kitchen alone.

  “Can Basil come out to play?” Tom asked.

  Mr. Kokovinis’ tall chef’s hat wobbled as he shook his head. “That bad boy Sammy Leeds and those other bad boys hurt and scared my son,” he said. “Basil don’t play with them anymore.”

  “He can’t just stay upstairs with his mother,” Tom said. “If he does, what Sammy said is true.”

  “What did that bad boy say about my son?” Mr. Kokovinis asked.

  “He said Basil was a cry baby and a Mamma’s boy,” Tom said, “and in America there is nothing worse a kid can be.”

  “My son is no coward,” Mr. Kokovinis said. “But he doesn’t understand American ways. He stays home until he does.”

  “How can you make an American out of him if he stays home?” Tom asked. “He’s got to learn how to play the way American kids play. He s got to learn how to take it as well as dish it out. He’s got to learn to fight. He’s got to fight Sammy and keep on fighting until he can lick him.”

  “But this Sammy is older and bigger than my son,” Mr. Kokovinis protested.

  “He is older and bigger than me and I can lick him,” Tom said. “I kept on fighting Sammy until I could whip him.”

  Mr. Kokovinis looked surprised. “You mean you fought this boy when you knew you would lose?” he asked.

  “Yes,” Tom answered. “I knew the only way to make Sammy stop picking on me was to keep on fighting him until I could lick him. Now we are friends.”

  “This bully is your friend?” Mt Kokovinis asked.

  “Sammy is all right once you get to know him,” Tom said. “It isn’t his fault that his father hates foreigners.”

  “I have heard his big-winded father say many untrue things about immigrants,” Mr. Kokovinis said. “But I am no foreigner. I am an American citizen and have the papers to prove it. And that makes my wife and son American citizens.”

  “Just being an American citizen doesn’t make a boy a real American, Mr. Kokovinis,” Tom said. “Basil has got to prove he deserves to be an American, and the one sure way for him to do it is for him to whip Sammy Leeds.”

  “His mother will never permit it,” Mr. Kokovinis said.

  “Then Basil will be a cry baby and Mamma’s boy all his life, Tom said. “You can tell Basil for me that I’m through doing his fighting for him. I don’t care what Sammy and the other kids do to him from now on.”

  “Could you come back tomorrow?” Mr. Kokovinis asked.

  “Basil knows where I live,” Tom said. “If he is afraid to walk from here to my house on account of Sammy Leeds, I don’t want him for a friend.”

  I followed Tom into the alley. I had visions of Mr. Kokovinis coming after us with a big butcher knife, until we reached Main Street.

  “Gosh, T.D.,” I said, “if Papa knew you talked to a grown-up like that, he would raise Cain. I was expecting Mr. Kokovinis to slap you good and hard for the way you talked to him about his son.”

  “I had to do it, J.D.,” Tom said. “It was the only way to try and save Basil from being a cry baby and a Mamma’s boy.”

  We didn’t see Basil for a week. He came into our backyard as Tom was making me some tin-can stilts.

  “What you make, Tom?” he asked.

  Tom punched two holes on each aide of the cans with a nail and a rock.

  “What you make, Tom?” Basil asked again in his broken English.

  “We don’t talk to cry babies and Mamma’s boys,” Tom said.

  Tom turned the cans over. I stood on top of them. Tom ran a piece of baling wire through the holes near the top of the cans. He made a loop in the wire and measured it to fit my hands. Then he twisted the ends of the wire together.

  “Try them, J.D.,” he said.

  Pulling tight on the wire loops to hold the cans to the soles of my shoes, I began walking around the backyard. The tin-can stilts fit perfectly. All I had to do was wait for it to rain so I could use them.

  Basil finally spoke again: “Me no cry baby.”

  “Then prove it by fighting Sammy,” Tom said. Basil was game. “Me fight Sammy,” he said.

  I got off the stilts and called Tom to one side. “Sammy will murder him,” I whispered.

  “I know,” Tom said, “but Basil has got to learn to take it. Besides I’ve got to find out if he knows anything about fighting.”

  I went to get Sammy. Tom and Basil were waiting in the barn for us when I arrived with Sammy.

  “This is to be a fair and square fight,” Tom said.

  “Before I fight him,” Sammy said, “I want to know if you are going to fight me for beating up Basil.”

  “I’m through fighting for Basil,” Tom said.

  My brother picked up a chip of wood and placed it on Sammy’s shoulder. Basil had seen enough fights to know what to do. He knocked off the chip of wood and got a punch in the nose in return. Then Sammy began clobbering Basil, hitting the Greek boy almost at will.

  “Stop it,” I pleaded with Tom.

  “I’ve got to see if Basil can take it” Tom said.

  Basil’s nose was bleeding and one eye starting to swell up as Sammy ca
ught him with a haymaker on tile jaw that knocked the Greek boy down. Tom announced the fight was over and Sammy the winner. Sammy left to go brag to his friends about winning the fight. Tom helped Basil to the hydrant in our corral. He held his handkerchief soaked in water on the back of Basil’s neck until the Greek boy’s nose stopped bleeding. Basil had a lot of courage and could take it all right. He didn’t cry, although I knew his nose and eye must be hurting him like the devil.

  “You my friend now?” Basil asked.

  Tom held out his hand. “Friends,” he said.

  They shook hands.

  “You tell my papa we friends again?” Basil asked.

  “Sure,” Tom said.

  Tom and I didn’t know that Basil had sneaked out of the apartment without his mother and father knowing it until we entered the kitchen of the cafe. Mrs. Kokovinis was washing dishes. She took one look at Basil and let out a shriek. She didn’t even bother to wipe the soap and water from her hands as she ran to Basil and threw her arms around him.

  Tom ignored her. He looked steadily at Mr. Kokovinis.

  “Basil is no coward or cry baby,” he said. “He fought Sammy Leeds. He got whipped because he doesn’t know beans about fighting.”

  I thought Mr. Kokovinis would be angry. Instead he looked pleased. “I knew my son was no coward,” he said. “Now this Sammy Leeds, you told me you could beat him. Can you teach my son how to fight so he can beat this boy?”

  “I don’t know about that, Mr. Kokovinis,” Tom said. “It would take a lot of my time because Basil doesn’t know how to fight American style.”

  I thought Mr. Kokovinis was pretty dumb up to this moment, but he proved to me he had sized up my brother.

  “You teach my son how to fight American style,” he said, “and I will give you one whole dollar the day my son beats Sammy Leeds.”

  I couldn’t help feeling that my brother’s great brain had planned it this way when he got Basil to fight Sammy.

  “As I said,” Tom replied, “it will take a lot of my time and should be worth something. It’s a deal, Mr. Kokovinis.”

  At the end of a week of trying to teach Basil how to fight American style, it looked as if Tom would never get that dollar. We were in the barn. Tom was taking off the boxing gloves Papa had given him last Christmas. He was sitting on a bale of hay. He looked mighty dejected.

  “l don’t know if I can ever make a fighter out of you,” he said to Basil. “Why do you keep pushing instead of trying to hit me? You can’t hurt me with these boxing gloves on.”

  “Me try harder next time,” Basil promised.

  “You don’t even know how to stand like a fighter,” Tom said with disgust. “You keep acting as if you wanted to wrestle instead of fight.”

  Tom sat on the floor in the parlor after supper that night, staring into the empty fireplace. I knew he was putting his great brain to work to get that dollar from Mr. Kokovinis. He refused to play dominoes with me and just sat there saying nothing until it was almost our bedtime. Then he got up and walked over to where Papa was reading the mail edition of the New York World.

  “Why can’t Basil learn to use his fists, Papa?” he asked. “I’ve been trying to teach him how to fight for a week, but all he does is act as if he wanted to wrestle instead of fight.”

  Papa dropped his newspaper to his lap. “Perhaps it is a natural thing for Basil to want to wrestle,” he said. “The Greeks are known as the world’s greatest wrestlers. The majority of world champion wrestlers have been Greeks. I imagine that in Greece boys learn wrestling instead of fist-fighting.”

  “Thanks, Papa,” Tom said with a happy look on his face.

  The next afternoon Tom spread a horse blanket on the floor of our barn. He told Basil they would wrestle instead of box. I watched bug-eyed as Basil got a headlock on Tom and put my brother down.

  I thought Tom’s pride would be hurt because he was the champion wrestler for his age in town. Instead he was grinning as he got to his feet.

  “Let’s try it again,” he said.

  They sparred for positions, circling each other for a moment. They locked arms. Basil got a wristlock on my brother and before my astonished eyes threw Tom right over his shoulder with a flying mare. He fell on top of Tom and easily pinned my brother’s shoulders down.

  Tom was laughing as he got up. “Basil can whip Sammy,” he said to me.

  “Not in a fist fight,” I said.

  “I’m talking about a rough and tumble fight,” Tom said.

  Then he put on a pair of boxing gloves. “Now Basil,” he said, “I’ll fight and you wrestle.”

  Basil nodded as they squared off. Tom hit Basil a left and a right before they clinched. Then Basil got a headlock tm Tom and threw him down. They tried it several times, with Tom getting in a few punches before Basil clinched with him and wrestled him down. Then Tom showed Basil how, in a rough and tumble fight when you get a boy down, you put your knees on his arms to pin him down so you can clobber his face with your fists.

  The next morning Tom sent me to get Sammy while he went to get Basil. Sammy was playing One-O-Cat in the Smiths’ vacant lot with Danny Forester, Jimmie Peterson, and Pete Hanson. I told Sammy that Basil wanted to fight him again. Sammy did a lot of bragging to his friends on the way to our barn, about how he would clobber Basil again.

  Tom and Basil were waiting inside the barn.

  “This is going to be a rough and tumble fight,” Tom announced. “Anything goes, lumberjack style.”

  “Suits me,” Sammy said, grinning.

  Tom put a chip of wood on Sammy’s shoulder. Basil knocked it off and got pasted on the jaw in return. They began sparring around.

  “Look at him!” Sammy shouted, laughing. “He hasn’t even got his fists doubled up.”

  Sammy led with a left feint to the body and slammed a right cross to Basil’s eye. It worked so well that Sammy tried it again and this time threw a right cross to Basil’s nose which began to bleed. Then Sammy shot three straight left jabs on Basil’s nose making it bleed a lot more. Again Sammy tried a feint to the body and a right cross, but this time Basil clinched with him. Basil got a headlock on Sammy and threw the bigger boy down. Then Basil straddled Sammy as Tom had taught him to do in a rough and tumble fight. Sammy was at Basil’s mercy now.

  “Paste him!” Tom shouted. “Pay him back for that bloody nose and black eye! Let him have it!”

  Basil doubled up his right fist and raised his arm as we all waited breathlessly for him to whale the devil out of Sammy.

  “What are you waiting for?” Tom yelled. “This is a rough and tumble fight! Anything goes! Let him have it, Basil!”

  But Basil unclenched his fist and got to his feet.

  “He just got lucky,” Sammy said as he jumped to his feet.

  “Have another go at it,” Tom said. “I can’t declare anybody the winner if you stop now.”

  The two boys began circling each other. Sammy popped Basil on the nose. The punch made Basil’s nose bleed so much the blood was running all over Basil’s chin and down on his shirt. Sammy got in three more good punches before Basil could clinch with him. Basil got another headlock on Sammy and threw the bigger boy down. Again Basil straddled Sammy. Again Basil doubled up his right fist.

  “Paste him!” Tom shouted: “Let him have it!”

  Basil looked at his helpless victim as he slowly unclenched his fist. “Me no mad at you now, Sammy,” he said. “Next time you pick on me, I paste you good.”

  Basil got to his feet. Danny, Jimmie, Pete, and I all crowded around Basil to congratulate him. I guess because Sammy had whipped all three of them several times, it made Basil a sort of hero to them. And I guess Sammy thought it best now to have Basil for a friend instead of an enemy. He got up and held out his hand.

  “Friends?” Sammy asked.

  “Friends,” Basil said as they shook hands.

  Sammy must have guessed his defeat was the result of my brother’s great brain. “I’ll bet you could li
ck any kid in town in a rough and tumble fight,” he said to Basil, but the words were meant for my brother. “I’ll bet you could even whip Tom.”

  “You can’t get me to fight him rough and tumble,” Tom said, grinning.

  “Me only fight to show me no cry baby or Mamma’s boy,” Basil said, which was quite a mouthful of English for him.

  “Three cheers for Basil!” Tom shouted.

  We all joined in three hip hip hoorays for Basil. Then we accompanied him to the hydrant in the corral where Tom stopped the nosebleed with cold packs on Basil’s neck. The black eye Sammy had given Basil was almost swollen shut by this time.

  I went with Tom and Basil to the Palace Cafe. I was hoping Mrs. Kokovinis wouldn’t be in the kitchen, because Basil was a sight. I felt relieved as we entered the kitchen and saw only Mr. Kokovinis. He looked at Basil and shook his head.

  “Another one,” he said sadly.

  “He did it, Mr. Kokovinis!” Tom shouted as he pounded Basil on the back. “Basil whipped Sammy Leeds in a rough and tumble fight and whipped him good!”

  Basil was so excited that he began to jabber in Greek as he described the fight to his father. Mr. Kokovinis looked so proud as he listened that I thought he would burst right out of his chef’s uniform.

  “This is a proud and happy day for the Kokovinis family,” Mr. Kokovinis said as Basil finished describing the fight. Then he looked straight at Tom. “And we owe it all to you. Thank you.”

  Tom’s face dropped the distance between a thank you and a dollar. Basil knew my brother well enough by this time to sense what was the matter. He spoke to his father in Greek.

  “Of course,” Mr. Kokovinis said. “I was so happy I forgot.” He put his-hand into his pocket and took out a silver dollar which he handed to Tom. “I’ve been carrying this dollar in my pocket, hoping for the day I could give it to you,” he said. “It is very little for the happiness you have brought to me and my son.”

  “Thank you. Mr. Kokovinis,” Tom said as he pocketed the dollar. “And to show you my heart is in the right place, I am going to teach Basil all the English I can before school starts in the fall. And I’m going to be Basil’s best friend.”