by Iacopo Bruno
“The skitters are hanging on late this year,” Sam agreed while Amy and I scooted around the porch, plucking up marbles. “We need a frost to blast them all dead.” He bent to pick a marble up and I let him. “These don’t look like shooters. They look mighty special.”
“Sure do,” said Amy, who hadn’t seen them before.
They were right about the marbles being special. I hardly ever took them out all at once, but to see them that way was a wonder. Some had shapes and figures painted on them, tiny and real-looking. Trees and fishes and frogs and watermelons. One looked like a crystal ball. Others were pretty just for the sake that they were Jon’s. Sam helped me pick up the rest and we dropped them back in the sack. “Where’d you get these?”
I tied the leather strap tight and tucked the marbles away. “Belonged to my brother.”
“Oh? Where’s he been?” Sam asked. “Haven’t seen him around.”
“He died,” Tom said, then clapped a hand over his mouth. “At least that’s what I heard,” he mumbled, studying the porch floor.
I hated the thought of Tom Sawyer talking about my Jon, but I didn’t figure that particular instance counted as tattling. “Been dead about a year now, sir,” I told Sam.
His eyes got cloudy. “I’m sorry. I had two brothers and a sister die when I was young. And my brother Henry died two years ago on the river.” His lips formed a straight line, turning in on themselves and pressing hard. The pencil I gave him looked fit to break in the grip he was giving it.
I shifted my weight back and forth. Half of me wanted to leave. The other half wanted Amy and Tom to disappear so I could ask Sam if his mama had given up on life after her children died, and if she had given up on Sam along with it. “I’m real sorry for you, too.”
“So am I,” Amy Lawrence said.
“Me too,” Tom echoed. He eyed me nervously and wiggled like he was about to wet his pants. “Say, I got something to tell,” he said, a hopeful look lighting up his pasty face.
“I declare, Amy Lawrence, it’s an awful nice day,” I said, ignoring Tom. “I haven’t seen such a day for weeks. Makes a body want to find Sid Sawyer and go fishing, don’t it?”
“It’s about trouble,” Tom went on.
If Tom Sawyer figured I’d be interested in trouble, that was the same as him saying me and mishaps got along like bees and honey. Well, I’d be showing his tattling behind some trouble as soon as I got around to it. But seeing as I was in the company of a riverboat pilot, I stayed polite and just narrowed my eyes a little. “So?”
“Aunt Polly heard that some boys broke into the dry-goods store and stole candy and all the Reed’s tobacco they got,” Tom continued. “They guess it was boys, anyway. Who else would steal candy and tobacco?” He grinned at me.
“I might,” I said, just to shock the smile off his face. Worked, too.
His lips fell like someone who’d opened up a present and found a pile of cat poop. “I better get back inside. Aunt Polly wanted some help with . . .” He trailed off, looking miserable, kicked at an imaginary rock on the porch, and shuffled into the house.
“Good riddance,” I said under my breath.
“Mr. Clemens,” Amy said, “Becky told me you’re waiting on a part to come in. Is your steamboat gonna be in town much longer?”
“Another week at least. I don’t mind, though. I like this town.” He stared off the porch, taking in the view from the Sawyer place. “Here comes Sid.”
Far down the road, not more than an inch-high blob in the distance, I saw the easy sway of Sid Sawyer’s arms. I imagined he was whistling. How two brothers can be different as cookies and collards is beyond me. I grinned at Sam. “Well, you better write that thought down before it runs away.”
“Flies away. A single word can make a world of difference.”
What that was supposed to mean, I didn’t rightly know or care. “Right, sir. You go ahead and keep that pencil. Come on, Amy.” I reached for her hand.
We were halfway down the steps when he called to me. “Becky Thatcher?”
“Yes, sir?”
“I been hearing some talk about a certain boys’ bet, and I understand you’re taking part?” He jerked his head toward the Widow Douglas’s house.
Ooo, that Tom Sawyer must have opened his fat mouth. I slapped an innocent look on my face. “I don’t know what on earth you’re talking about.”
“She leaves her back windows unlocked and open. She likes the night air come autumn.”
Well, well. An open window was just the kind of thing that’s good to know for a stealing adventure. “How would you know, sir? Not that I care. Just curious.”
“I’ve had opportunity to talk with her a time or two, when she’s out gardening. Besides, I don’t mind talking to a witch.” He winked again.
Amy nudged me so hard in the ribs that I nearly gave her a shove back.
Did that wink mean he knew she was a witch, or that he thought for certain that she wasn’t a witch? Hard to say. I hated when adults spoke in riddles that only they knew the answers to. Plain rude, that’s what it was.
I cleared my throat. “So the Widow is a witch? That’s the truth?” When he didn’t speak, I pressed him with the Bible quote from Mrs. Sprague. Adults can’t resist a good Bible quote. “The truth will set you free, you know. John from the Bible said that.”
“That a fact?” Sam chuckled. “Well, the truth about the Widow Douglas is something you’d best figure out on your own.”
Amy made a whimpering noise beside me, like she didn’t want to figure much of anything out when it came to the Widow.
“All right, sir. We best get going.” I looked down the road, but Sid had disappeared. Darn it. We were down the last step, when Sam spoke again. “One more thing, girls.”
“Yes, sir?”
“Charlie likes bacon.”
“Who’s Charlie?” asked Amy.
“The Widow’s hound dog. Really it’s Charlemagne, but she calls him Charlie. That dog just loves a piece of bacon.”
I let out a snort. “I’ll bet that dog probably likes a whole pig even better.”
“Probably,” Sam acknowledged. “He’s a hunting dog, that’s for certain.” And with that, Sam Clemens tipped his hat at us and started scribbling his sentence.
Chapter Five
Scabs and strategy
I led us around the Sawyer house until we reached a nice patch of trees at the corner of the block. It was as good a place as any for a spitting lesson. I worried the fruit flesh off a cherry with my tongue, looked around to make sure Aunt Polly wasn’t in sight, then leaned back and spit the pit a good fifteen feet. It sailed right into their backyard.
Amy tried to spit too. She didn’t get but three feet, so I shared my opinions with her on the best way to go about it. We sat down and were halfway through the bag when a tap on my shoulder had me swallowing a pit. I coughed it into my hand and looked up at Sid Sawyer. “Where’d you come from?”
Sid laughed. “Made plans to meet Joe around here, but I didn’t want Tom following us, so I left and doubled back. I see you ladies are having a spitting contest. Mind if join you? I don’t even need a cherry.” He bowed gallantly and let loose with the biggest wad of phlegm I’ve seen in three states. It went clear over the fence.
I gave him a nod of approval. Then I chewed another cherry and sent my pit a foot farther.
“Pretty good,” he said. “Hey! Watch this.” He turned a neat cartwheel.
“I can do two in a row, but not in this,” I said, pulling on my dress.
Joe Harper rounded the corner humming to himself. He made his way over to where we three stood and slapped Sid on the back. With a sly glance at Amy and me, he chuckled and rubbed his hands together. “I’ve decided that since you have no chance of stealing from the Widow Witch, the Christian thing to do is to let you give it a try. Besides, extra losers means extra jingle in my pocket when Sid and I win. You ladies ready to pay up?”
“Just getting around
to it.” I dug into my satchel for the coins.
Joe snatched the money from my hand and began counting. He squinched up his eyes and counted out loud. Then he glared at me. “You’re cheating us.”
“What do you mean? It’s all there.”
He counted again and thrust a finger in my face. “It’s thirty cents per person.” He smiled real mean. “Pay up or she’s outta the bet,” he snapped at me, jerking his head toward Amy.
“Sid said we just had to pay thirty cents,” I argued back.
“If you’re both gonna be doing the stealing, then you both have to pay right now or you’re out. Didn’t want no girls doing it anyway. Y’all don’t have the grit for this kinda thing.” His lips curved up in a wicked smile. “But we’ll take this thirty cents as a payment toward whatever bet we do next. How’s that sound?”
“Sounds like this.” I shot him my best evil eye and spit near his feet. It was bad form to make us pay now or never and even worse form to keep the money we’d already paid. I looked at Amy, but she shook her head. She didn’t have five cents, let alone thirty. I was disappointed to see that she seemed to be relieved. Think, Becky. Think, think, think.
“Will you trade for it?” I asked.
Joe hesitated. “Got anything good? Skipping rocks or an arrowhead? Lost my best arrowhead to Davy Fry last week.”
“Not on me. And arrowheads are worth way more than thirty cents,” I added, which was a lie, but Jon always said to establish a high value on trading goods.
“Trade something else, then,” Joe demanded. “Whatcha got?”
I thought for a minute about my various treasures, then reached into my satchel. Inside an empty box of playing cards was a prize that might do the trick. I opened the box and tilted out a square of folded cloth. Unfolding the fabric, I presented him with the contents. “Got this daddy longlegs spider. Only had three legs to start with. Probably has powers of some sort.”
“That?” Joe leaned close and sniffed the spider. “It’s dead! Why, you plucked off the other legs and made it die. I’m no fool.”
I shrugged and offered him a spit cherry with my free hand. “Maybe I did and maybe I didn’t. All I know is that the murderous Pritchard brothers might be dropping into town any day now, and it’d be foolish to turn down an item of such protective power.” I shook my head to show what a shame it’d be. “I told Sid what my daddy said about those outlaws. Figured he would’ve warned you about the likes of them.” I frowned at the spider in my hand and folded the cloth back over it. “Come to think on it, maybe I don’t want to trade this after all.”
Amy managed to keep quiet despite her eyes nearly popping from their sockets to bop me on the head for keeping secrets from her. I hadn’t gotten a chance to tell her about the Pritchards yet, or about the rules of acceptable exaggeration when making a trade. I widened my own eyes to the point of popping to tell her to keep hushed up and let me finish our business first and explain things later.
“Hold on.” Joe took the cherry, popped it in his mouth, and snatched the daddy longlegs. After a brief examination, he put it in the bib of his overalls. “All right, that’s worth five, but you got to give more’n a spider to make up the rest. That’s twenty-five cents you owe.”
Twenty-five cents would mean trading a mighty big item. Not even a dead mouse would get me that. I thought and thought, and my stomach turned once the answer came to me. Before I could chicken out, I lifted my dress just enough to show my knee, revealing the huge scab from the day outside of Mrs. Sprague’s house. “I’ll let you pick this.”
Amy clutched my shoulder. “Becky, no!”
“Say, look at that!” Joe’s fingers twitched and he bent down for a closer look. “That’s a real nice one.” He frowned. “You won’t holler or nothing?”
I shook my head, trying to pretend Amy Lawrence hadn’t just made a gagging noise. “But you can’t do it now. You have to wait until after we do some chores for Miss Ada. I don’t want to walk around town with a bloody leg.” I also didn’t want to go cemetery-dirt-grabbing with a sore knee, but as Jon used to say, some things in life are worth sacrificing. He usually said that about school, but I reckoned knees counted too.
“Fine. That’ll do.” He looked at Sid. “Did you tell ’em the rules?”
“Nope.”
“Okay, look here. Rules are you got to do the stealing after eleven o’clock at night next Saturday. We’ll meet at the schoolhouse for dumping and showing at one o’clock, so that’s two hours for the stealing. If we happen to bump into each other at the Widow’s, there’ll be no pushing or shoving or shouting. And if we get caught, it’s each man for himself.” His cheeks got pinkish. “Or girl, I guess. You’re for yourselves too. If somebody gets in a tight spot with the witch, we ain’t gonna come save you. Got it?”
“Got it,” I said, answering for me and Amy. “If you get in a tight spot, we’ll just be saving ourselves, too. And if you die, we’ll promise to tell your mama that you weren’t stealing.”
Joe looked a little sweaty at my promise. “Okay. We’ll do the same.” He punched Sid’s shoulder. “Let’s go fishing before that brother of yours tries to follow us.” He pointed to the porch, where Tom was talking to Sam Clemens again.
Sid let out a real good belch. “Naw, he won’t follow us. He’s too busy spilling our secrets to Sam Clemens. What kind of writer would want to hear dumb stories about St. Petersburg?”
Amy and I headed into town, where we walked smack into the Pritchard poster from Daddy’s office. It had been copied and put up on the public notice board.
Amy pinched me lightly on the hip and got all quivery lipped. “Oh, Becky, why didn’t you tell me about them? You told Sid before me? I thought we were best friends.”
The betrayal tore me up good before I realized why I’d told Sid first. “I told him on the way to school, first day I came. You and me hadn’t even met yet, let alone made our pact. I was gonna tell real soon, swear to Heaven, I was.”
She matched my sigh of relief. “That’s all right, then. But shouldn’t we be awful worried about the Pritchards? Especially with you giving away that three-legged spider?”
Well, the honest truth was that I’d lied just a little about that spider having powers, but stretching the facts to make a trade go your way was a lesson for another day. “Don’t you worry, Amy. This town’s too boring to ever have marauders get close enough to do anything interesting.”
We stopped at Marley’s Dry Goods Emporium for a sack of sugar, then crossed to the riverside and whipped through bushes, playing explorer until we found a nice spot by the water to eat lunch.
Amy let out a heavy breath. “We’ll be okay tonight, won’t we?”
I nodded and passed her a baking powder biscuit with strawberry preserves. “Just remember what I said about dipping your toes in sugar before you put your shoes on. Jon always said to sweeten your feet before getting into night mischief. You got sugar?” I sorted the rest of the food, laying it on one of Jon’s handkerchiefs. Apples, cold ham, two slices of lemon ice-box cake, and a few more plain biscuits.
She licked red preserves from her fingers. “Yes. Sure you can sneak out again so soon after your daddy caught you?” she asked me, squirming a little. “We could always do it the Friday before the bet.”
“Nope. It’s best to have the dirt sit awhile to get real strong. And tonight’s a full moon, which’ll make the protection even more powerful. I’ll come to your place around eleven thirty and do a little cat meow.” I demonstrated. “Like that, only three of them. Then you do it back and we’ll know we’re both each other, and not something else.”
“It’s gotta be midnight when we get the dirt?”
I nodded, pulling apart two plain biscuits and sticking ham inside. “Jon got his information from all sorts of trusted folks who knew about spirits and such. The only thing that’ll weaken a witch is midnight dirt from a bad man’s grave under the moonlight. You know of any bad men who’re dead in the cemetery h
ere?” I handed her a ham biscuit.
“Thanks.” Her features scrunched together in thought. “I haven’t been to that cemetery much. Mama’s on the other side of the river with her folks. They have a family plot and Daddy said it’s what she would’ve wanted.” She sighed. “He won’t take us across to visit much.”
“We’ll make a raft just for visits,” I promised her.
“Oh, Becky, will we? That sounds awful nice. Let’s see, a bad man . . . Mama used to say that Old Robert Willis had about as many morals as a backwards-born mule.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Don’t know what it means.” She clucked her tongue a few times. “But Daddy once told me that Mr. Willis was the youngest of ten kids and never got anything to play with but dirt and chicken heads and that’s why he was always swiping silly things, even as a grown man. Couldn’t stay away from box puzzles and pop guns, but was too embarrassed to buy them.”
The topic of store stealing made me think of the break-in at Marley’s that Tom had mentioned, and how maybe it wasn’t a boy who’d broken in. “Mr. Robert Willis sounds like our man,” I told Amy.
She frowned. “Mrs. Willis knew about the stealing and always paid up, though.”
“He didn’t know she paid?”
“No, no.”
“Then his grave dirt will be just fine.” I searched my head for another way to help us out, since our chosen bad man’s badness wasn’t overly bad. “You don’t know where a dead cat is, do you?”
Her mouth dropped open, loosening a stuck crumb on the side of her mouth. “How’d you know? One of the kittens is awful sick. Keeps getting shoved away from the teat. Becky Thatcher, what are you thinking?”
Across the river, a ruckus was happening between two fishermen on a log raft. I gave my ear four tugs to keep the sick-kitten information inside my head. “Nothing for now. But a dead cat comes in mighty handy for keeping away spirits. I’d like to have one for the cemetery, but we’ll need it for sure at the Widow’s house, as she’ll have spirits around her. Maybe your kitten’ll die by the time we go to the Widow Witch’s?”