The Great Brain Is Back

by John D. Fitzgerald

  “This is probably the time of day he feeds the dogs,” Tom said.

  In a little while Mr. Bartell came out of the barn with a bucket. He went to the hand pump for the well and pumped a bucket full of water. He took it into the barn.

  “I was right,” Tom said. “He’s feeding and watering the dogs.”

  “Is that what we came here to find out?” I asked.

  “One of the reasons,” Tom said. “I want to know what he does next.”

  Mr. Bartell got a second bucket of water from the well. He went into the barn. When he came out again, he locked the padlock. Then he watered the team of horses. After that he went inside the farmhouse for a long time. When he came out, he began walking toward town.

  Tom and I ran back to our bikes the way we’d come. We could see Mr. Bartell from the apple orchard as he started down Main Street. “You take the bicycles home,” Tom said, “so I can follow him on foot, hiding behind trees. I don’t want him to find out he’s being watched.”

  Tom arrived home as I was washing my hands for lunch.

  “Mr. Bartell went to the Palace Cafe,” Tom told me. “I got Basil to watch him there for me.”

  When we’d finished our lunch, Tom and I went to the alley behind the cafe. Tom knocked on the kitchen door. Basil opened the door a crack to see who it was, then came out.

  “Where did Mr. Bartell go after he ate?” Tom asked.

  “To the Fairplay Saloon,” said Basil.

  Tom looked at me. “There’s nothing for Mr. Bartell to do at the farm,” he said. “I’ll bet he spends all afternoon in the saloon.”

  Basil nodded. “That’s what Mr. Bartell usually does,” he said. “Then he comes here to eat his supper.”

  “Let’s go, J.D.,” Tom said.

  We rode our bicycles to the meat market.

  “Why are we stopping here?” I asked.

  “To get meat scraps,” Tom answered.

  We had to wait for Mr. Thompson to finish taking care of a customer.

  “Your mother didn’t phone in an order,” he told us.

  “We aren’t here because of that,” Tom said. “What do you do with your meat scraps?”

  “Either give them to someone who wants them or throw them away at the end of the day,” Mr. Thompson said. “That fellow Bartell came around wanting me to save meat scraps for him. I told him I don’t hold with dogfighting, and if he wants meat for his animals, he’ll have to buy it. I do sell horse meat for dogs.”

  “Will you please give us the meat scraps every day?” Tom asked. “We’ll come for them right after lunch.”

  “Sure thing.” Mr. Thompson looked behind his counter. “Do you want what I have on hand now?”

  “Yes, please,” Tom said.

  Mr. Thompson got a piece of wrapping paper. He dumped the meat scraps from a box onto the paper. He rolled up the meat scraps and handed them to Tom.

  “Thank you very much,” Tom said.

  We left the meat market and went home. Tom got a hammer from the toolshed. Then we rode back out to the Kingston farm.

  We hid our bicycles in the long weeds so anyone passing on the road couldn’t see them, and walked to the rear of the barn. Tom pried a board loose with the hammer. Then he nailed it so it would swing back and forth. We entered the barn.

  There was enough light coming through the cracks to see pretty well. The first thing I noticed was the six cages along one side of the barn. Each cage held a barking dog.

  “That’s the pit,” Tom said, pointing.

  We walked over to look at it. The pit was about ten feet wide and twelve feet long. The boards around it were about four feet high. There was a sliding door on one side of the pit.

  “That’s where Mr. Bartell must put the dogs before the fight,” Tom said.

  I turned away from the pit and went to look at the dogs. One of them, a bulldog, had scars all over his face and body. There was a sign on his cage reading KILLER MCCOY. In the next cage was a dog that kept barking at us and showing his teeth. His name was Blue Devil. The other four looked like regular dogs, except they were barking and baring their teeth at us.

  “They sure look vicious,” I said.

  Tom walked to the front of Killer McCoy’s cage. He held his hand close to the bars for the dog to smell. “That’s a good boy,” he said. Then he fed Killer some meat scraps through the bars.

  Tom continued down the line of cages, letting each dog smell his hand to get his scent, then feeding it some of the meat scraps. When the meat was gone, Tom went to each cage and spoke to the dogs.

  “That’s a good boy,” he told each dog.

  A couple of the dogs still growled at Tom, but the others stopped barking and began to whine. All of them, even the dogs who growled, slowly wagged their tails as if they didn’t know what to think. As we left the barn, they began barking again.

  “What is your great brain’s plan?” I asked as we rode our bikes back to town.

  “You’ll see,” Tom said. “If it works.”

  • • •

  The next day Basil called right after we’d finished lunch. He told Tom over the telephone that Mr. Bartell had eaten lunch in the cafe and then went to the Fairplay Saloon.

  Tom and I immediately went to the meat market, where we picked up the meat scraps Mr. Thompson had saved for us. Then we rode our bikes out to the Kingston farm. We entered the barn through the board Tom had loosened.

  The dogs began barking as soon as they saw us, but they didn’t sound as vicious as they had the day before.

  Tom spoke to each dog and fed it a scrap of meat. Then he went to Killer McCoy’s cage. He talked to the dog for a while and fed it some more meat. By then Killer was wagging his tail.

  Still talking, Tom slowly unhooked the door. He patted the dog on the head and fed him another scrap of meat. Then he let Killer out of his cage.

  Although the dog no longer seemed dangerous, I became frightened. “What if we can’t get him back in the cage?” I asked.

  “Stop worrying,” Tom said. “Let me and my great brain handle this.”

  Tom played gently with Killer for a few minutes. Then he walked over to Blue Devil’s cage.

  I could see how that dog got its name. Its fur was almost blue in color. It was some kind of hound dog, with one ear completely chewed off. There were scars on its shoulders from dogfights.

  Tom spoke softly to Blue Devil, who looked at Tom and wagged his tail. Then Blue Devil saw Killer McCoy and bared his teeth.

  “Good boy,” Tom said, giving each dog some food.

  By that time Killer must have been pretty full, but he ate anyway. Blue Devil wolfed his scrap down and whined for more. Tom very slowly unhooked the cage door and opened it.

  Killer began to growl, and both dogs showed their teeth.

  “Stop that,” Tom said. “You fellows are going to be friends.”

  He fed each dog another scrap of meat. Then he walked to the end of the barn with both dogs following him. He laid down the paper with the rest of the scraps. After the dogs finished eating, he petted each one on the head and talked to them.

  Blue Devil began running around the inside of the barn and barking as if he were enjoying his freedom. Killer watched for a moment, and then he began running too.

  Tom let the dogs have fun for a few minutes. Then he grabbed Blue Devil by the fur of the neck and led the dog back to his cage. After that he locked up Killer.

  Before we left, Tom went by each cage, speaking to each dog and telling them they were good dogs. “That’s it for today,” he told me.

  • • •

  The next afternoon we again went to the Kingston farm. Tom fed Killer and Blue Devil some meat scraps, then let them out of their cages. The dogs began chasing each other as if they were old friends.

  While Killer and Blue D
evil played, Tom fed and talked to the other dogs. A dog by the name of Hornet had been watching Killer and Blue Devil play. He scratched at his door and whined to be let out of his cage.

  When Tom finally opened Hornet’s cage door, the dog made tracks straight to where Blue Devil and Killer were playing. In no time at all, there were three dogs chasing one another around the barn.

  By the end of the week, we were letting all the dogs out of their cages every afternoon to run. They would play tag around the barn floor and through the bales of hay, but there was not one fight among them.

  The dogs all seemed to be friends now, but Tom wanted to make sure. The afternoon before the day of the dogfights, he put Killer into the pit by himself. Then he put Blue Devil into the space behind the sliding door. He waited until he figured each dog knew where the other was, then slowly slid the door open.

  Blue Devil walked into the pit, looking as if he wasn’t certain what to do. When Killer came toward him, he growled and bared his teeth. Killer growled right back.

  “Easy,” Tom said. “Good dog.”

  Killer and Blue Devil each thought Tom was speaking to him. They both stopped growling and looked up at Tom.

  “Good dog,” Tom repeated. Then he climbed down into the pit with them.

  I’ll tell you, I held my breath, but Tom knew what he was up to. The dogs came up to him, then sniffed each other peacefully.

  “J.D.,” Tom said. “Get Hornet and put him in the pit.”

  It wasn’t long until all six dogs were playing in the pit together. The only problem we had was that a couple were having such a good time they didn’t want to go back to their cages. But of course The Great Brain had already prepared for that eventuality. He put some meat scraps in the cages and the dogs went in to eat.

  • • •

  The Saturday of the dogfights, Tom and I ate an early lunch. Then we once again stopped for meat scraps and rode out to the Kingston farm. We hid our bicycles in the orchard and sneaked through the weeds to the ridge.

  We waited until Mr. Bartell came out of the farmhouse and went to the barn. Then we hightailed it to the rear of the barn where the loose board was located.

  I could see Mr. Bartell through a crack between the boards. He had a bullwhip and was going from cage to cage, beating on the cages with the whip.

  “What is he doing that for?” I whispered.

  “To get the dogs excited,” Tom whispered back. “I’d bet he didn’t feed them either, to make them nervous.”

  The dogs were nervous and excited all right. They were barking and snarling like crazy.

  Mr. Bartell gave the dogs some water, then left the barn.

  “Let’s go,” Tom said as he moved the board aside.

  “Where?” I asked.

  “Inside the barn and up in the hayloft,” Tom said. “We can’t see from here.”

  I followed Tom into the barn. When the dogs smelled him, they quieted down and only barked as if in greeting.

  After Tom fed and talked to each dog, we climbed a ladder to the hayloft. There was very little hay in the loft. Tom lay down on the floor and tried looking through several cracks before he motioned for me to lie down beside him. By looking through the crack, I could see the pit and all around it.

  We lay there for what seemed like hours before Mr. Bartell returned to the barn and stationed himself near the door. Very soon the customers began to arrive. After Mr. Bartell had collected a dollar from each one, they walked around, looking at the pit and eyeing the dogs.

  “The fight will be between Killer McCoy and Blue Devil,” Mr. Bartell told them, “in case you men want to bet.”

  Right away several of the customers made bets with one another.

  When there were about fifty men in the barn, Mr. Bartell closed the door. The men crowded around the pit, laughing and talking and still placing bets.

  Mr. Bartell got Killer out of his cage and pushed the dog through the sliding door into the pit. Then he took Blue Devil and put him into the place behind the sliding door.

  “Last chance to bet!” Mr. Bartell yelled. Then he shoved the sliding door open.

  As he did that, noise filled the barn. Men shouted at one another and at the dogs. Those dogs still in their cages barked louder. Beside me in the loft, Tom changed position to look through a different crack.

  Blue Devil ran out from behind the door into the pit. He spotted Killer, and the two dogs just looked at each other. Then Killer sat down.

  “Fight, you worthless bags of bones!” Mr. Bartell shouted.

  When neither dog moved, Mr. Bartell picked up his bullwhip and began to beat them.

  All Killer and Blue Devil did was whine and run from one end of the pit to the other, trying to get away from the whip.

  “Fake!” a cowboy yelled.

  Then everybody took up the cry, “Fake!”

  Mr. Bartell put up his hands. “Hold on a minute!” he shouted. “There are times a dog just doesn’t feel like fighting. I’ll get two of my other dogs.”

  Mr. Bartell put Killer and Blue Devil back in their cages. Then he put Hornet and another dog into the pit together.

  Hornet and the other dog sniffed at each other. Then, I’ll be darned if those two dogs didn’t start playing together, not fighting at all, but sort of wrestling and playing chase.

  “Some dogfight!” somebody yelled.

  “I don’t know what’s gotten into these dogs,” Mr. Bartell said. “They are trained to fight immediately. Let me try my other two dogs.”

  But the last two dogs wouldn’t fight either, not even when Mr. Bartell went after them with his whip.

  “Sic ’em,” he yelled, lashing out at them.

  I closed my eyes tightly as the whip came down across the dogs’ backs. Then I eased them open again.

  One of the cowboys had grabbed the bullwhip from Mr. Bartell. “You and your phony dogfights!” he shouted. “I ought to take this whip to you.”

  “I want my money back!” somebody yelled.

  The way the men crowded around Mr. Bartell, I thought they were going to use the whip on him for sure.

  Mr. Bartell must have thought so too. “You can have your money!” he said, sounding scared. “No hard feelings!”

  A man with a black beard answered, “For you, maybe. We ought to string you up from one of those rafters.” Then he began tearing boards off the side of the pit, and several men joined him until the pit had been completely destroyed.

  The cowboy who’d grabbed the whip from Mr. Bartell got his dollar back, then opened the sliding door and whistled to the dogs still in the pit.

  They came running out and headed straight for the barn door. A man near the door opened it, and the dogs ran right outside.

  “Turn the rest of them loose!” the man with the black beard yelled. He grabbed Mr. Bartell by the collar.

  “We don’t take kindly to your type around here,” he said. “You have fifteen minutes to hitch up your team and clear the area. You take longer, and we’ll tar and feather you and ride you out of town on a rail.”

  It didn’t take Mr. Bartell fifteen minutes. He must have been gone in less than ten.

  As for the dogs, four of them were later picked up by ranchers for pets or watchdogs. But two of them, Killer McCoy and Blue Devil, were never seen again.

  To this very day, I don’t know what happened to those two dogs, but that Saturday afternoon in the Kingston barn I knew one thing for certain. The Great Brain had done it again.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Smoke

  THE MONDAY AFTER Tom put an end to the Adenville dogfights, Papa received an order to print a large number of pamphlets for the Mormons. So Papa put Tom back to work, and I hardly saw my brother at all for the next few weeks.

  It was while I was with the other fellows that I first saw a boy my age smoke
. That boy was Parley Benson. Parley had been talking about smoking for quite a while, but nobody paid any attention to him until that day.

  We’d all gone down to the swimming hole that afternoon. Most of us had our clothes off and were ready to go into the river when Parley stopped us.

  “I’m going to smoke a cigarette,” he said.

  Danny Forester wasn’t working that afternoon, so he was going swimming with us. His left eyelid flipped wide open, then went half closed again.

  “You got tobacco and everything?” he asked.

  “Who needs tobacco?” Parley said. He went and got some dried bark from a tree. He crushed it and rolled it in the palms of his hands. Then he took a piece of toilet paper from his pants pocket and put the bark in it. After a couple of tries, Parley had rolled a cigarette. He lit it with a match and then blew smoke out of his mouth.

  “Now watch this,” he said.

  And I’ll be a frog who can’t croak if Parley didn’t blow smoke out of his nose. It made him cough and sort of sneeze, but he did it.

  “I’ll pass it around,” he said as he handed the cigarette to Danny Forester.

  Danny took a puff and must have inhaled the smoke, because he began coughing like the devil and handed the cigarette to Herbie Sties.

  Herbie took a puff of smoke, held it, and let it out slowly. There was a very strange look on his face as he offered the cigarette to Seth Smith. Seth shook his head, and so did the rest of us. Herbie handed the cigarette back to Parley.

  Parley took a few more puffs, blowing the smoke through his nose, and then put the cigarette out in the sand. “You have to get used to it,” he told Danny and Herbie.

  “Not me,” Danny said.

  Herbie shook his head.

  “Afraid to smoke a little cigarette,” Parley teased.

  “All it did was make me cough,” Danny answered.

  Parley looked at Herbie.

  “It made me dizzy,

  It made me sick,

  I prefer sodas

  Or ice cream to lick,” Herbie said.