“DING DONG, DING DONG!
“The wolf was ringing a big dinner bell.
“ ‘Come and get it,’ cried the wolf. ‘The water is boiling and I am very hungry. Hurry, hurry!’
“Rainbow did not move. Neither did Jimmy. He was waiting for Waldo to come closer so he could hit him with the baseball bat.
“ ‘Come on,’ snarled the wolf. ‘Get in here. Or must I come and drag you in?’
“ ‘I’m not quite finished with my breakfast.’
“ ‘Come on!’
“ ‘I’d like one more worm.’
“ ‘No!’
“ ‘One little bitsy half a worm?’
“ ‘NO!!’ thundered the wolf.
“ ‘Please?’
“The wolf shook his head.
“ ‘Pretty please?’
“ ‘I am ready to eat you right now!’ yelled the wolf. ‘So come on!’
“ ‘Give me till you count to twenty-five,’ said the hen.
“ ‘I will not! Quit stalling.’
“ ‘You don’t know how to count to twenty-five,’ said the hen.
“ ‘I certainly do,’ said the wolf.
“And now,” said Michael’s father, “here we are. This is where we leave the car, and we walk through that underpass to the beach.”
The boys could hear the roaring of the waves. They could taste the sea salt on their lips. They were so excited to be near the ocean that they forgot all about Rainbow and scampered off to the underpass, leaving Michael’s father to carry a blanket, a lunch basket, two sweaters, a kite, and one, two, three, four, five, six balls of string.
Chapter 7
ICHAEL and Stefan took off their shoes and socks and ran in the deep soft white sand of Jones Beach, stumbling, falling, laughing, getting sand in their ears and hair and down their necks and up their sleeves and in their pockets. It was autumn, a cool day, and the water was too chilly to swim in, but the boys raced along the damp sand at the water’s edge, and once in a while a wave would come up farther than the others and lick their heels with an icy tongue.
Meanwhile Michael’s father was sitting on a blanket assembling the big box kite. There were so many sticks to be fitted into so many other sticks. Michael’s father had his glasses on and seemed to be working hard. Presently he stood up and called to the boys. The kite was ready. It was as large as Michael.
“Now watch her fly,” said Michael’s father. He ran across the beach, holding the kite by its string. It just bumped along on the sand.
“Let me try it,” said Michael. He could hardly pull the big kite, but he ran across the beach with it. Still it wouldn’t fly. Then Stefan ran with it and still it wouldn’t fly.
“The wind blows it down instead of up,” said Michael’s father.
“Must be something wrong,” said Michael.
His father nodded.
“You can fix it, Daddy,” said Michael. “With courage and patience you can fix anything. Come on, Steffy. Let’s be cowboys.” And the boys galloped away.
Michael’s father studied the box kite very carefully and then he untied a string here and put it there, and untied a string there and put it here. The boys raced by on imaginary broncos, firing imaginary pistols into the real air. Michael’s father called to them.
“I’m going to try once more,” he said. “I am going to run from here to the edge of the water. If she doesn’t go up in the air by the time I get to the water, I am going to throw her in the ocean.”
“Yipe!” cried the boys. They didn’t know which would be more fun, to see the kite in the sky or in the ocean.
Michael’s father held the kite high in one hand. In the other hand he held a ball of string. He began to run. Suddenly the kite left his hand. It began to climb. Slowly but steadily ... up, up, up. Michael’s father was running hard, the boys were shouting. Michael’s father, looking up at the kite, tripped over a piece of driftwood and fell on his face in the sand, but he held onto the string.
Higher and higher went the kite. Michael’s father let the boys take turns holding the string. It was exciting because if you accidentally let the string go, the kite would come tumbling down out of the sky.
When lunchtime came they hauled the kite in and sat on the blanket and opened the basket. There were sandwiches and tomatoes and a thermos of milk and some oranges and cookies. The boys ate as much as they wanted, and then stretched out on the blanket in the warm sun.
“Think you could take a snooze?” said Michael’s father.
The boys said no.
“I could,” said Michael’s father.
“First some Rainbow,” said Michael.
“Will that make you sleepy?”
The boys said no.
“It will me!” said Michael’s father. “Well, where were we? Oh yes. Almost finished. The wolf said Rainbow had to come in this very minute and be eaten.
“ ‘If you want to eat me,’ shouted the proud little hen, ‘you’ll have to catch me first.’ And, turning, she scurried across the clearing toward the bush where Jimmy lay hiding.
“ ‘Ha, ha,’ cried the wolf. ‘I can catch you in two leaps.’ He squatted on his haunches with his big butcher-knife teeth glistening in the morning sunlight and made one great leap that carried him to the center of the clearing. And at that moment, five-year-old James Tractorwheel jumped out from behind the juniper bush, holding the baseball bat firmly in both hands.
“ ‘Halt!’ said Jimmy.
“ ‘Jimmy!’ cried the hen.
“ ‘YIPE!’ screamed the wolf.
“Rainbow was so overjoyed to see Jimmy that she flapped her wings and flew right to his shoulder and perched there.
“Jimmy put all of his muscle and all of his weight into one swing of the Louisville Slugger and brought it down on the wolf’s head. BONG! The wolf smiled foolishly and sank to his knees. Now what I want to know is this. Do you boys want Jimmy to hit the wolf again and kill him, or tie him up with some rope and drag him home and put him in a cage, or what? How do you want the story to end? Steffy, you’re company. You say first.”
Stefan smiled shyly and shrugged his shoulders.
“Ask Mike,” he said. “It’s his story.”
“Steffy, you are a very good, kind, polite boy, a credit to your mother and father,” said Michael’s father. Then he turned to his son and said, “Michael, you are also a very good, kind, polite boy, and, as Steffy says, it is your story. What shall we do with the wolf?”
“Make it that he gets up and runs away,” said Michael.
His father could hardly believe his ears.
“Let the wolf run away?”
“Yes,” said Michael. “As fast as his legs will carry him.”
“You don’t want him killed? Or even captured?”
Michael shook his head, no.
“This is the first time you’ve ever wanted a wolf to get away. What is this, be-kind-to-wolves week?”
Michael’s eyes were shining and he spoke in a loud whisper. “If the wolf gets away he will come back and steal Rainbow again!”
“Yea!” cried Stefan.
“You want that to happen?” cried Michael’s father.
Michael nodded his head, yes.
“Say! Whose side are you on, anyway?” said his father.
“You can kill the wolf at the very end, but this way we can have more story!” said Michael.
“Yea!” said Stefan.
“So go on,” said Michael.
And so Michael’s father made it that the wolf got up from his knees and staggered into the deep green forest and then the boys took a good rest on the blanket on the sand with the waves roaring agreeably in their ears.
Chapter 8
ichael and Stefan were lying on a blanket on the beach. Between them lay Michael’s father. It was the boys’ naptime, but, as usual, only Michael’s father was asleep.
The boys were lying with their eyes closed listening to the noise of the ocean: a soft ssswhishh followed
by a loud RRROARRR! Sssswishhh ... RRROARRR!
The ssswhishhh was made by weary old waves as they slipped out to sea after trying to climb clear up the beach and onto the blanket with Michael and Stefan. As each thin old wave slid down the sandy slope away from the beach it ran smack into a fat new wave coming toward the beach. The fat new wave would trip over the thin old wave, trip and stumble and tumble and flop right on its face with an angry RRROARRR. Ssswishhh ... RROARRR! Ssswishhh ... RRROARR!
Right beside the two boys, Michael’s father was making a similar noise, going aahhhh ... pooooooo! ... aahhh ... poooooo! Sometimes the noises would get mixed up and go Ssswishhh ... aahhh; RRROARRR ... pooooo. Or even RRROARRR ... aahhh; ssswishhh ... pooooo.
It would have put the boys to sleep if it had not been naptime.
Michael opened his eyes. He yawned. He scratched his knee where a fly had been sitting. He rubbed one eye and rubbed his nose and yawned again. “Ooooooh,” he yawned. Then he rolled over on his side and propped himself up on one elbow.
“Steffy,” he whispered.
Stefan opened one eye and whispered, “What?”
“You asleep?” said Michael.
Stefan opened the other eye, thought for a moment and said, “No.”
“Let’s play a game,” whispered Michael.
“Your father said to be quiet till rest is over,” whispered Stefan.
“But my father is asleep!” whispered Michael.
“I am not,” said his father, opening his eyes.
“Daddy! You were!” cried Michael.
“But I’m not now!”
“Good!” said Michael. “Then you can play a game too.”
“Oh, fine,” said Michael’s father.
“Goody, goody!” cried the boys.
“You were quiet while I took my nap. I’ll play a game with you. What shall we play? Tag? Hide-and-seek ...”
“Bunnies and the wolf!” cried both boys, dancing happily in the sand.
“Bunnies and the what?” said Michael’s father.
“The wolf!” cried the two boys.
Michael’s father shut his eyes.
“Please, please, please,” said Michael, crawling on top of his father. “The blanket will be your house and you will try to capture the bunnies and put them in prison in your house and eat them, only they get away. You leave the door unlocked a little.”
“Get your sandy foot out of my mouth,” said Michael’s father.
“Look out, he’s a wolf,” cried Stefan— and pulled Michael away.
“I am not,” said Michael’s father. “Anything else. Not a wolf.”
Soon they were playing bunnies and the fox. The bunnies, Michael and Stefan, would dance around the blanket singing, “ya, ya, ya, you can’t catch me,” until suddenly the fox, Michael’s father, would reach out and grab a bunny and drag him into the house and put him in the icebox, but as soon as the fox turned his back the bunny would escape, shouting, “Ya, ya, ya, you left the door unlocked!” After the bunnies had been caught about twenty times, Michael’s father said, “Well, boys, we’d better start home now.”
“No!” cried Michael. “Not so soon!”
Stefan didn’t say anything, but he looked very unhappy.
“You have been such good boys we can get ice cream or popcorn to eat on the way home,” said Michael’s father.
“Yea!” cried the boys, forgetting how much they hated to leave the beach and thinking only of ice cream and popcorn.
As they drove home, Michael’s father picked up the story where Waldo the wolf ran into the forest.
“Jimmy Tractorwheel carried Rainbow the hen all the way home on his shoulder,” said Michael’s father, “and when they arrived at the Tractorwheel farm, Jimmy’s mother and father and brothers were in the yard, and they all cheered ‘Hurrah, hurrah,’ and shouted, ‘Good boy, Jimmy!’ and ‘Welcome home, Rainbow.’
“Jimmy wanted to tell his brothers that he would rather have had their help in finding Rainbow than all this cheering afterward, but he said nothing. Jimmy loved his brothers and when you love people you do not go around finding fault with them. Or at least you shouldn’t.
“ ‘We have filled up that hole the wolf dug under the fence,’ said the farmer, Jimmy’s father, ‘so Rainbow will be safe in the chicken yard.’
“ ‘What did you fill it with?’ asked Jimmy.
“ ‘Dirt.’
“ ‘But if the wolf came again he could dig a tunnel in the dirt the same as he did before,’ said Jimmy.
“ ‘That’s true,’ said the farmer. ‘Yep. I never thought of that. What do you suggest, Jimmy?’
“ ‘I suggest that we dig a deep trench underneath the fence all the way around the chicken yard and fill it with concrete,’ said Jimmy. ‘Then we will cover it with dirt, and if a wolf tries to dig his way under the fence he will run into the concrete.’
“ ‘Say, that’s a good idea,’ said the farmer. ‘No wolf can dig through a concrete wall.’
“ ‘Not only that,’ said Jimmy, ‘but if he tries, he will stub his toenails and maybe he will yell Ouch and we will hear him and come running out of the house and take care of Mr. Wolf.’
“ ‘Good idea,’ said the farmer, and all of Jimmy’s brothers agreed that it was a good idea, but when it came to digging the trench that afternoon they were all busy somewhere else and Jimmy had to do it by himself. He didn’t mind, though. He knew it would strengthen his shoulder muscles for swimming and canoe-paddling.
“When the trench was dug he lined it with boards and poured in concrete. Next day when the concrete was very, very hard, Jimmy attached the bottom of the chicken yard fence to some hooks he had put in the concrete, and covered the concrete with dirt. The chicken yard now looked exactly as it had looked when Waldo the wolf came the first time, but it was certainly not the same, and if Waldo tried to dig into the chicken yard again, oh, brother, what a surprise he would get.”
Michael’s father paused here to eat a handful of Michael’s popcorn. He also ate one of the fruit drops that Stefan carried. Stefan had a slight cough and carried fruit drops to suck when his throat began to tickle. The boys could hardly wait to hear what happened when Waldo came to the chicken yard again. Of course they knew perfectly well he would come again.
“Make it that he comes again that very night!”
“First, I’d better make it that we get some gasoline,” said his father.
He drove into a filling station and the boys sat quietly eating popcorn while the filling-station man put in gasoline, checked the oil and washed the windshield.
Chapter 9
s they pulled out of the filling station Michael said, “Go on, Daddy. Make it that Waldo comes to steal Rainbow again that very night. Oh, Steffy, isn’t this scary?”
“I don’t want to make it too scary,” said Michael’s father.
“Yes!” cried the boys. “Make it too scary! Horribly, horribly scary.”
“Time out,” said Michael’s father. “My voice is tired.”
“Here,” said Stefan, and handed him a fruit drop.
“Well,” said Michael’s father when he had finished the fruit drop, “Waldo ran off into the forest, remember?” The boys nodded their heads, and Michael’s father continued.
“Waldo was very angry. ‘Who does that little Jimmy Tractorwheel think he is, anyway?’ the wolf said to himself. ‘Hitting me with a ball bat. And him only five years old.’
“Waldo was so angry he swore he would get even with Jimmy Tractorwheel. He would steal Rainbow the hen again and this time he would eat her at once, so that Jimmy could not save her. ‘I will do it tomorrow night,’ the wolf said to himself. ‘I would do it tonight only I have such a headache from being hit with the ball bat.’ It is a good thing he decided to wait, because that gave Jimmy’s concrete wall time to get hard.
“The next night was as dark as the inside of a black velvet pocketbook. No moon. No stars. The only light came from the tiny flashes of firefl
ies. ‘What a perfect night to steal a hen,’ said the wolf to himself as he came out of his den at midnight. ‘Boy, is it dark!’ he said. Just then he bumped into a tree. ‘A little too dark,’ he said. ‘I bruised my nose!’
“He went back into his den and got a glass fruit jar. He caught a lot of fireflies and put them in the fruit jar. When they all flashed at once he could see pretty well, and so he arrived at the farm without bumping into any more trees.
“ ‘Ah! Perfect!’ he said to himself as he looked around the farmyard. ‘Not a Tractorwheel in sight. Everybody in bed, including that little smarty-pants Jimmy. Will he be surprised when he comes out in the morning and finds another hole under his chicken yard fence and his pet hen Rainbow missing! I guess I’ll eat her right in the chicken yard and leave some of the feathers, so he’ll know I ate her. Heh, heh, heh.’
“Waldo crept toward the chicken yard. He held the jar of fireflies under his topcoat and let out just enough light to show him where he had dug a hole under the fence. It was filled up—but with very soft earth.
“ ‘This is too easy,’ he said to himself. ‘This is like stealing candy from a baby. In fact that Jimmy Tractorwheel is hardly more than a baby. Imagine him, a mere five-year-old boy, hitting me, Waldo the wolf, with a ball bat!’
“The memory of that sock on the head made Waldo so angry that he stripped off his topcoat, put the jar of fireflies on the ground and began to dig furiously. The soft earth was easy digging. His sharp toenails ripped it up and threw it back between his front legs, and it rattled against his empty belly, sounding like a drum and reminding him that he was mighty hungry. He had his nose right in the earth. And then all of a sudden his toenails hit the concrete wall. He was digging so fast that his nose banged against the rough concrete.
Wolf Story Page 3