Return of the Great Brain

by John D. Fitzgerald

  “Did you say something?” she asked.

  “No,” Greg answered. “Did you say something?”

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  “No,” Sally Anne said. “I thought you said something.”

  “No,” Greg said. “I didn’t say anything.”

  I sure as heck couldn’t understand why a boy and girl would want to sit on a front porch swing and ask each other if they said something when they knew darn well they didn’t. A few minutes passed and then Greg really did say something.

  “Know how to make one word out of a new door?” he asked.

  “No,” Sally Anne answered. “How do you make one word out of a new door?”

  “You take the first o from door,” Greg said, “and the n and e from new and what does that spell?”

  “One,” Sally Anne answered.

  “Then you take the w left in new,” Greg said, “and the o and r and d left in door. And what does that spell?”

  “Word,” Sally Anne said.

  “And that is how you make one word out of a new door,” Greg said.

  “That is clever,” Sally Anne said.

  I heard Tom grunt with disgust. I didn’t blame him. It just goes to prove how dumb girls are. I knew that riddle when I was Frankie’s age. Again there was no sound except for the creaking of the porch swing. Then a neighbor’s dog barked.

  “Did you say something?” Sally Anne asked.

  Again they went through that did you say something, no, I didn’t say anything, did you say something, business. And I couldn’t help thinking that only a girl would think a bark-ing dog sounded like a human being. Nothing but silence then for what seemed a long time. Finally Greg spoke.

  “Want to play a word game?” he asked.

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  “I’d love to,” Sally Anne said.

  “I learned it at school in Provo last year,” Greg said. “I’ll name a city or state in the United States. Then you have to name one that begins with the letter the one I name ends with. Ready? Arizona, a state.”

  “I see,” Sally Anne said. “Now I have to name one that begins with the letter A. Alabama, a state.”

  “Arkansas, a state,” Greg said. “Now you must start with the letter s.”

  “San Francisco, a city in California,” Sally Anne said.

  “Ends wfth an o,” Greg said- “Oregon, a state.”

  “Ends with an n,” Sally Anne said. “Let me think. Oh. Nevada, a state.”

  “Another a,” Greg said. “I think I’ll give you one back. Augusta, capital of Maine.”

  Sally Anne laughed. “And I’ll return the favor,” she said. “Atlanta, capital of Georgia.”

  “I’m running out of a’s,” Greg said. “No, wait a second. “Albany, capital of New York.”

  There was silence for a moment.

  “Give up?” Greg asked. “If you do that means you go down one point and can use the next letter of the alphabet which would be 2-And if you fail on z that puts you down two points and you go back to the beginning of the alphabet and use a.”

  “Begins with a y,” Sally said. “Wait just a minute. The Revolutionary War. Got it. Yorktown, Virginia.”

  “Begins with an n,” Greg said. “New Orleans, a city in Louisiana.”

  “Begins with an s,” Sally said. “Oh, Salt Lake City, the capital of Utah. Now let me see you find a city or state that begins with a y.”

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  I don’t know if Greg found one or not. Tom touched me on the shoulder. We crawled backwards to the side of the house and then stood up and stretched our aching muscles.

  “Boy, oh, boy,” I said when we reached the alley where we could talk. “Why would any boy rather sit on a front porch swing doing that instead of staying home and playing checkers or dominoes or some other good game?”

  “That, J-D.,” Tom said, “is something even my great brain can’t figure out.”

  “Then you didn’t get any kind of a clue that could help you break the spell?” I asked.

  “The only clue I got,” Tom said, “is that Greg might fail all other subjects in school but he ought to get an A in geography.”

  The next morning Danny, Parley, Seth, and some other fellows were waiting in front of our house when we left for school. They crowded around Tom wanting to know what he found out-

  “You won’t believe this fellows,” Tom said, “but it is the God’s truth and J.D. is my witness. We sneaked over to Sally Anne’s front porch last night to listen to her and Greg. First they kept asking each other if they said something when they knew darn well neither one of them had said anything.”

  Parley pushed his coonskin cap to the back of his head. “That’s silly,” he said.

  “It gets sillier,” Tom said. “Then Greg told a stale old riddle and Sally Anne didn’t know the answer. At least she pretended not to know. Then they began playing a word game to practice up on their geography. They were still playing it when we left.”

  I’d never seen such disappointed looks on the fellows’

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  faces. J guess they had been expecting to hear about holding hands, and hugging, and squeezing, and even kissing like I

  had.

  Danny asked, “Is that all?”

  “That is all,” Tom said. “The only conclusion my great brain can come to is that when a girl casts a spell on a fellow, it makes both of them plumb soft in the head. My father calls it puppy love. There is nothing my great brain can do to

  break the spell.”

  It was the first time Tom’s great brain had failed him, which only goes to prove how powerful the giggling of a girl can be. It not only hypnotizes a fellow but makes him a girl’s slave. Greg began carrying Sally Anne’s books home from school and followed her around like a little puppy dog follows his master. I guess that is why they call it puppy love. The only good thing was that Greg began getting good

  grades.

  I did learn one valuable lesson out of it all. Sweyn had

  been thirteen when Marie Vinson put a spell on him with her giggling. Greg was thirteen when Sally Anne put her spell on him with her giggling. When I became thirteen I would buy myself a pair of ear plugs. And every time I got near enough to a girl to hear her giggling I’d stick those ear plugs in my ears so I couldn’t hear. I’d show them I wasn’t hiding in the cellar when the brains were passed out. They would never get me under their spell with their giggling.

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  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The Wheel of Fortune

  TOM’S FAILURE TO BREAK the spell Sally had put on Greg gave the fellows an opportunity to start belittling his great brain. They never passed up a chance to rub salt in Tom’s wounds over it. I knew that if they kept it up Tom would put his great brain to work on how to get even with them. And sure enough on Saturday afternoon it happened. We were taking a rest after playing basketball in the alley behind our coal and wood shed.

  Danny Forester winked at some of the fellows so Tom couldn’t see him doing it.

  “I wonder what happened to Tom’s great brain,” he said. “He couldn’t break Sally Anne’s spell on poor Greg.”

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  Seth Smith nodded. “Maybe his great brain just shriv-eled up and died,” he said.

  Parley pushed his coonskin cap to the back of his head. “Could be,” he said. “But maybe he never had a great brain in the first place.”

  Tom was sitting right there listening. “All right, fellows,” he said. “That is enough.”

  Danny’s left eyelid flipped open. “Can’t blame us for being curious,” he said. “You’ve been bragging for years about your great brain. Then along comes a girl and makes a fool out of you and your great brain.”

  Seth snapped his fingers. “Which just goes to prove,” he said, “that if anybody in Adenville has a great brain it is Sally Anne Carver.”

  Tom stood up. “See you later,” he said. “I’m going up to my loft.”

  I watched Tom walk toward our barn. “Now you fellows have done it
,” I said. “Tom is going up to his loft to put his brain to work on how to get even with you with one of his swindles.”

  Danny shook his head. “No, he won’t,” he said, “because Tom knows if he pulls off just one crooked deal no kid in town will have anything to do with him.”

  We continued playing basketball until it was chore time. I called up to Tom to come down and help with the evening chores.

  “Did your great brain figure out how to get even with the fellows?” I asked.

  “Not yet,” he said. “But it will. They will rue the day they made fun of my great brain.”

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  Tom’s great brain didn’t come up with a plan until Monday afternoon after school I had to fix a tire puncture on my bike. After I finished I used the hand pump to pump up the tire. Then I figured as long as I had the bike upside down on the seat and handlebars I might as well oil it. 1 oiled the sprocket, the chain, and both wheels. Then I spun the wheels around to lubricate them. Tom and Frankie were sitting on the back porch steps watching me.

  “Got it!” Tom said as he suddenly jumped to his feet. “The wheel of fortune.”

  “What is that?” I asked.

  “Yeah, what?” Frankie said.

  “It is a wheel with numbers on it,” Tom said, “and each number wins a prize. You weren’t living with us then, Frankie, but J.D. remembers the year they let a carnival come here for the County Fair. One of the booths was the wheel of fortune.”

  “I remember,” I said. “I also remember so many people complained the games were crooked, the county commission-ers barred any more carnivals from the County Fairs. The only good thing about it was the merry-go-round.”

  “I’ll need a wheel,” Tom said as his face became thought-ful.

  I finished oiling my bike. “Maybe you could use an old bike wheel,” I said.

  “No,” Tom said. “It has to be made of wood.” He snapped his fingers. “Got it! Mamma never uses that old spinning wheel of Grandma’s in the attic.”

  I went into the house with him. Mamma was busy in the kitchen with Aunt Bertha.

  “Mamma,” Tom said, “can I have that old spinning wheel of Grandma’s in the attic?”

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  Mamma looked up from some biscuit dough she was kneading. “What in the world do you want it for?” she asked.

  “To make a wheel of fortune,” Tom said- “You know, like the wheel of fortune they had at the carnival that time.”

  “I also know,” Mamma said, “that your father, your uncle Mark, and the mayor decided all the games of chance at the carnival were fixed so nobody won any prizes most of the time, and when they did, it was something very cheap. That is why no carnival has been allowed here since.”

  “But my wheel of fortune will be different,” Tom said. “Somebody will win a prize every time and the prize will be wortrkmore than it costs to play.”

  Mamma wiped her hands on her apron and placed her hands on her hips. “Something tells me I should say no,” she said, “although I will never use the spinning wheel.”

  “Sometimes I just don’t understand grownups,” Tom said shaking his head. “I saw you and Papa playing the wheel ot fortune and other games at the carnival and having fun even knowing the games were crooked. Now I want to make an honest wheel of fortune that has a winner every time so the kids can have some fun and you don’t want to help me.”

  “I didn’t say you couldn’t have the spinning wheel,” Mamma said. “And I guess there is no harm in you and your friends playing carnival. You can have the spinning wheel. Just make certain somebody wins a prize every time and there isn’t any backsliding attached to it.”

  Tom and I got the spinning wheel from the attic and carried it to the barn with Frankie following us. Tom got some tools from the tool shed and took the spinning wheel apart. He told Frankie and me to throw everything but the wheel in the trash barrel.

  While Frankie and I carried the extra parts to our trash

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  barrel Tom went up to his loft. He had a cigar box with several thread spools in it when he came down the rope ladder. Mamma always gave us the wooden spools after using the thread on them. A fellow could make a lot of things with a wooden spool, like a peashooter. Tom picked out a spool. He put a sixteen-penny nail through the hole. Then he hammered the nail into a wall joist in back of the box he’d used for a table during his magic act.

  “The spool should hold the wheel far enough away from the two-by-four so it will spin,” he said.

  I watched him pick up the wheel and put the hub over the nail. He gave the wheel a spin and it went around and around.

  “Now I need one of Papa’s old celluloid collars,” he said. “J.D., go ask Mamma if she’s got one old and frayed enough to throw away.”

  Mamma said she was glad I’d reminded her because she had been meaning to buy some new celluloid collars for Papa. She picked out a worn one from the collar box and gave it to me.

  Tom had the wheel lying on the box table when I returned. He was using a ruler and a pencil to make ten dots around the wooden rim of the wheel. When he finished he drove ten small nails into the rim where he’d made the dots. He put the wheel on the sixteen-penny nail.

  Then he went to the coal and wood shed and picked out a stick about two inches wide and six inches long. Back in the barn he cut a strip of celluloid from the collar. He tacked one end of it to one end of the stick. This left about two inches of the celluloid below the stick. Tom placed the stick against the side of the wall joist above the wheel. The celluloid stuck out too far. He measured it with his eye and then

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  cut off a piece of the stick. It fit perfectly then so he nailed the stick to the side of the wall joist. The piece of celluloid hung about a quarter of an inch below the nails on the wheel. Tom gave the wheel a spin. The celluloid made a clicking sound as it hit the nails while the wheel was spinning around and around.

  “That is enough for today,” Tom said. “It is time to start doing the chores.”

  The next day after school Tom used a board a foot wide and about six feet long to make a shelf on the barn wall be-side the wheel.

  “What is that for?” I asked.

  “Yeah, what?” Frankie said.

  “To display the prizes you can win playing the wheel of fortune,” Tom said.

  He went up to his loft and rame back down with a calendar.

  “Go to the house,” he said to me, “and get a pair of scissors and some glue.”

  When I returned he took one month from the calendar and cut out the numbers one through ten. He glued them to the shelf about six inches apart. Then he cut out numbers one through ten from another month in the calendar. These he glued in the spaces between the nails on the wheel.

  “All I need now,” he said, “are some prizes and I’ll be in business.”

  “When are you going to open for business?” I asked.

  “Saturday morning at ten o’clock,” Tom said. “But wait until Friday. Then you tell all the kids at the common school they are invited to play the wheel of fortune in our barn

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  Saturday morning. And make sure you tell them if they want to play to bring some money with them. I’ll tell the fellows at the Academy.”

  Friday at noon Tom stopped at the bank on our way home for lunch. He exchanged three dollars for nickels.

  “I’ll need them to make change,” he told Frankie and me. “It is going to cost a nickel to play the wheel of fortune.”

  When school let out that afternoon we went home and had cookies and milk. Then we went up to the bedroom to change into our play clothes. Tom got his bank from the clothes closet and took some money from it.

  “I’m going to the Z.C.M.I. store to buy the prizes for the wheel of fortune,” he said.

  “Can I come?” I asked.

  “No,” Tom said. “I want you to do something. There are a lot of kids who graduated from the sixth grade who aren’t going to the Academy. You know them.
Take your bike and ride around and let them know about the wheel of

  fortune.”

  “It seems as if I’m doing a lot of work around here for nothing,” I said. “What do I get out of all of this?”

  “How about five cents?” Tom asked. “And that includes keeping the kids out of the barn tomorrow morning until I’m ready.”

  “Make it a dime,” I said.

  “All right,” he said handing me a dime.

  I was kicking myself as I rode around letting kids know about the wheel of fortune. Tom had given me the dime so quickly I knew I could have got a quarter just by asking. It

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  was time to start doing the chores when I returned. Tom and Frankie were waiting on the back porch steps.

  “It sure took you a long time,” Tom said as he stood up. “There are a heck of a lot of kids,” I said, “whose parents believe a sixth grade education is all they need. Can I see the prizes?”

  “You can see them tomorrow,” Tom said.

  The next morning we finished our chores in a hurry and just in time. The wheel of fortune wasn’t supposed to start until ten o’clock, but kids started coming into the corral at nine thirty. Tom went inside the barn after telling me not to let anybody in until he called out to me. The fellows kept asking me what the wheel of fortune was, but Tom had told me not to tell them.

  “You’li see for yourselves in a few minutes,” I answered. It seemed like more than half an hour before Tom called for me to open the barn doors. There were about twenty-five kids waiting by then. Tom was standing behind the box table by the wheel of fortune. He gave the wheel a spin.