“Oh, Richard, you make it sound so bad. I’m so sorry.” A tear trickled down her cheek.
“Miss Simpson, I talked to Miss Emma down at the Randolph Hotel, and I think last year she and Daddy were doin’ what y’all are doin’ now. Anyway, Miss Emma told me my daddy couldn’t help it, and this thing with you would just pass ’cause he still loves my momma, and we should be patient.”
“You talked to one of the girls at the Randolph about me and your daddy?”
Miss Simpson was really upset now and this whole talk had me so nervous I could hardly stand still.
“Uh, uh, yes, ma’am, but I didn’t know what else to do, and then I thought ’bout these letters since y’all don’t want nobody to know what’s goin’ on.―Oh, me and Miss Emma are friends, and she won’t tell nobody what I told her.”
That made Miss Simpson feel a little better, and she looked at me and said, “Richard, I know I shouldn’t have gotten involved with your dad. It was a huge mistake, and I’m ready to quit, but Richard, you have to promise me, if we quit seeing each other, you won’t pass out those letters.”
“Okay, I won’t pass out the letters Miss Simpson, but me and John Clayton will know if Daddy comes back to see you, and if you tell Daddy I talked to you and have these letters, he’s gonna switch me, and I’m still gonna pass ’em out.”
“Richard, I promise you, he won’t get in my back door again.”
I wanted to smile, but I was too upset, so I just nodded my head and walked away.
I’d only been home a few minutes when Daddy came in and cleaned up from work. Me and Momma knew he’d be gone as soon as it was dark, so I went outside and picked up my frog gig and headlight, and told Momma I was gonna meet John Clayton and go frog gigging. I left ahead of Daddy so I’d be waiting behind Miss Simpson’s azaleas when he left Peg’s Pool Hall and walked down to Miss Simpson’s house. I didn’t have to wait but a few minutes for Daddy to show up, and just like before he went straight to the back door and rapped on it.
“Helen, it’s me, Jack.”
There was no answer, and Daddy called out again and again until finally Miss Simpson whispered to him through the locked door.
“Jack, it’s over, and don’t ever come back here again. Now, go on home.” Miss Simpson must have walked back away from the door into another part of the house.
Daddy couldn’t believe his ears, and he kept calling to Miss Simpson, but she didn’t answer. Finally, I looked through the azaleas, and saw Daddy shake his head as he walked away.
Shoot, I knew Daddy wasn’t gonna give up seeing Miss Simpson that easy, so the next afternoon I was waiting in some bushes across the road from Miss Simpson’s office. She walked out of the office right at four-thirty, and before she could get in her car Daddy walked up and started talking to her. She was shaking her head as she got in her car, and she drove away so fast that Daddy nearly got his foot run over.
That was it. Miss Simpson was true to her word and it wasn’t long until Daddy completely gave up. Things started to improve around our house, and then one evening I noticed Momma and Daddy sitting around the kitchen table talking, and every time I walked toward the kitchen they’d stop. They were still talking when I went to bed, but the next morning when I came back from delivering my papers they were joking and laughing just like before Miss Simpson. Our house was finally back to normal
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The Plan
The Saturday before school started on Monday, Momma took me to El Dorado, where she bought me a new pair of school shoes, a tablet, and a pencil. Course, I wouldn’t wear the shoes until about mid- September when we got the first cool front, but Momma wanted to have them in my closet just in case we got a cold, rainy day earlier. They were about two sizes too large, because Momma couldn’t stand for me to outgrow a pair of shoes before I wore them out.
I didn’t mind starting school because, if nothing else, it’d give me and John Clayton an alibi in case sorry Doctor Carl did anything and tried to blame us. One day, I talked with John Clayton at recess, and we decided to go talk with Peg after school was out. All the stuff we knew about Doctor Carl and Miss Tina had us so nervous we could hardly think about school, and since Miss Tina had said in so many words that they were gonna kill us, boy was we scared. When we got to Peg’s place he was standing outside chewing on an old cigar. We rushed up breathless.
“Peg, come over here away from the door. We gotta talk to you.”
“My god, boys, are y’all still upset ’bout Doctor Carl?”
“Yeah, Peg, and it’s gettin’ worse every day. Come here and let me tell you what Miss Tina said to us,” I said.
Peg walked over to where we were standing and I told him how Miss Tina had threatened to kill us, and for sure get us sent to reform school. When I finished, Peg shook his head and said, “Damn, Richard, y’all got them so riled up no tellin’ what they’re gonna do. Listen to me boys, just stay outta sight and I think you’ll be okay. Do you understand?”
“Yeah, Peg, we’re tryin’ to, but this is a little town and every time we look round Miss Tina or Doctor Carl is comin’ down the sidewalk.”
“Well, hunker down boys … Hell, some drunk is ’bout to start a fight. I gotta get back in the pool hall.”
Peg rushed back inside to break up a fight, and we walked down to the breadbox.
Shoot, we had just leaned back against the building and started to talk when I spied Miss Tina heading our way.
Last week Doctor Carl and Miss Tina had mailed out wedding invitations to just
about everybody in town, and on Friday afternoons Doctor Carl had started treating anybody who came by his office for free. You couldn’t go anywhere and not hear what a fine man he was. As usual, Miss Tina stopped and waited until we were by ourselves, and then she cussed us about the snakes again, looking at me as mean as she could. “Richard, you were lucky,” she said. “Next time maybe you won’t be. Oh, too bad about your dog,” she added as she smirked and then laughed.
“What?”
“Ha, ha, ha!”
“Miss Tina, you’re the worst person in the world. Why would you want to hurt little kids?”
“Little kids? You’re not little kids. You’re juvenile delinquents and this town will be better off when you’re gone. You could have killed Doctor Carl with those snakes. He’s almost had two heart attacks because of you two, and I still have nightmares from those roaches, hornets, and snakes. Get ready for reform school you little brats! You’ll be there next week or you’ll be dead, you worthless little bastards―and I’m glad Doctor Carl’s car hit your dog!”
John Clayton who’d been sitting there getting madder and madder finally stood up on the breadbox and blurted out: “You’re just a Yankee bitch! Go straight to hell, you sorry woman!”
“Yeah!” I shouted.
Well, Miss Tina was shocked, but not for long.
“What? You smart-mouthed little bastards.”
Then before John Clayton could move Miss Tina reached up and slapped him right across the mouth.
“Oh, oh!” moaned John Clayton.
She drew back again, but both of us jumped off the breadbox before she could swing.
“You’re mean, Miss Tina, and you’re gonna go straight to hell,” I yelled at her.
“Ha! Straight to hell? You dumb, little son-of-a-bitch! You think I believe in that garbage?”
Then she turned around and began prancing back across the street toward Doctor Carl’s office. I took one look at her behind in that tight-fitting dress, looked over at John Clayton, and said: “Get ready to run.” I pulled my slingshot out and slipped a big one-inch rock in the leather pouch.
Whap!
“Ahaaaa!” Miss Tina squealed like a stuck pig as the rock hit her behind.
“Take off, John Clayton! She’s probably gonna get Curly!”
Miss Tina let out a string of curse words, some I’ve never heard, but she didn’t go get Curly. I guess, since she slapped John Clayt
on, she didn’t want nobody to know about that. We tuned the corner laughing, with Miss Tina still cursing at the top of her lungs.
Boy, after that cursing, slapping, and slingshot hit we knew for sure we had to do something―and do it quick. But until we talked to Peg later that afternoon, I didn’t know how really bad we needed to do something. Peg waved us around back and we waited at his back door until he came out. Heck, I could tell he was upset just from looking at him.
“Boys, listen up! I just overheard Curly tell one of his worthless friends that they was gonna be a big arrest tomorrow, and I couldn’t hear everything, but he said something about Miss Tina being assaulted and then I heard, “John Clayton,” and the “reform school.”
“Oh, my gosh, Peg! Miss Tina turned us into Curly ’cause I shot her with my slingshot, and she didn’t tell him she hit John Clayton in the mouth before I shot her! This is it! They’re coming to get us!”
Gosh, John Clayton was so upset he couldn’t even talk. Heck, Peg had to go back in the pool hall before we could find out any more about what he’d heard, but we’d heard enough to know we had to do something before tomorrow or we was goners. We went over to the breadbox and talked about what to do almost non-stop until I came up with an idea.
“John Clayton let me tell you what we need. We need more evidence, you know, something solid we could get Peg to give the State Police.”
“Well, what ’bout the police report from Burlington?”
“Heck, we know it was ’bout Doctor Carl, but with a different name and as slow as that would be to get, we’d be long gone to Texarkana ’fore that report ever got to Norphlet.”
“Yeah, you’re right.”
“You know John Clayton if we get any more evidence, we’re gonna hafta find it.”
“But where? Miss Emma and that stuff from Burlington is all we have. There ain’t nothin’ else.”
“What ’bout in his office?”
“What do you mean? Go in his office and steal something?”
“Not exactly, but if there’s any evidence round, that’s where it is. Don’t you think he keeps a record of the girls and sellin’ stuff to the men?”
“Yeah, I guess he does.”
“Where do you think he keeps those records?”
“In his office?”
“Yep.”
“What are you thinking, Richard?”
“We gotta break in and get his record book. Then we can give it to the State Police, and they’ll have enough evidence to arrest them. That’s our only chance, and if we don’t do it tonight, we’re goners!—Goners!—Goners!” Shoot, I was just screaming I was so upset, but John Clayton had a look on his face like I’d told him we was gonna rob Fort Knox.
“Break in at night? Break into Doctor Carl’s office and steal his records?”
“That’s right, or do you just wanta sit round and wait till that old, sot Curly Sawyer arrests you tomorrow and has you hauled off to reform school? Heck, I can just see one of them mean guards beating you with a stick.”
“No, no; I don’t wanta go to reform school―Oh, my gosh, we’re gonna do it aren’t we?”
“Yep, we shor are.”
All afternoon we sat there on the breadbox talking about breaking in Doctor Carl’s office, and we were just about to leave when Miss Tina walked across the street to buy some cigarettes at Echols Grocery. She hadn’t missed threatening and glaring at us every time we were near, but this time she just smiled and smiled. Then, when she got right up to us she said, “Bye, bye, boys; I’m going to miss you.” And then she whispered, “Tomorrow’s the day.”
Heck, I just felt a shiver go up my back as I sat there breathing little quick short breaths. She was laughing like some hyena when she walked away.
“Oh, my god in heaven above!” I whispered to John Clayton. “If we don’t find something tonight, we’re outta here on that prison bus tomorrow!”
Well that settled it. We hopped off the breadbox, and spent the day checking out Doctor Carl’s office. Heck, that door was locked with a dead bolt that you had to use a key to get in, and unless we could pick the lock like a real burglar we weren’t gonna get in. We were just about to give up when I started looking at the big window fan that was installed in one of the back windows―the one that we had dumped the hornets in. I had an idea, and I yelled at John Clayton.
“John Clayton, come here and look at this.” I pointed to the fan. “I think, as skinny as I am, I can crawl through those fan blades. Heck, we know how easy it is to unscrew those screws and take the screen off, and they turn the fan off when nobody’s in the office.”
“Yeah, Richard, you’re so skinny I think you can. Then you can go round to the front door and let me in.”
So the plan was set.
We talked the rest of the day about the break-in and the more we talked about it the more worried I became. Late that afternoon I went by the dog pen to check on Sniffer and feed him. Wow, he was a lot better, and he was having one of them dog fits to get out, but Daddy had told me to keep him in there where he wouldn’t run and hurt himself. For the first time I smiled when I looked at him.
“Ain’t no sorry doctor gonna kill you, Sniffer!” I reached in a patted him until he calmed down.
Late that afternoon I went out on my front porch and sat in the swing and worried about what would happen if we were caught by Curly, or even worse, by Doctor Carl and Miss Tina. Finally, I thought of something, jumped up, and picked up my school tablet. I sat there in the porch swing and slowly printed out a letter. I figured if we disappeared after trying the break-in, maybe with this letter, they could blame it on Doctor Carl.
The letter said:
Tonight Richard Mason and John Clayton Reed are going to break in Doctor Carl Donaldson’s office to see if we can find any evidence that he has been selling dope to oil-field trash and having Randolph Hotel girls in to fool around.
If we don’t show up tomorrow you will know something has happened to us, and Doctor Carl killed us.
We have found out he has a really bad police record in Burlington, Vermont.
Richard Mason
I put the letter in an envelope, and when I went downtown later that afternoon, I stopped by the pool hall and gave it to Peg.
“Peg, here’s a letter that I want you to keep in your cash register, and if anything happens to me or John Clayton, give it to the State Police.”
“Richard, what on earth?”
“Peg, I can’t tell you, but promise me you won’t open the letter unless we turn up missing.”
“Richard, you’re gettin’ too worked up ’bout this Doctor Carl thing. I’ll bet the whole mess is just gonna blow over. Heck, I’ll bet that was just Curly popping off, and they’re not gonna arrest you.”
“Maybe Peg, but you know he almost ran me down the other mornin’, and he hit Sniffer and almost killed him.”
“Oh, Richard, that might have been just some old boy that was still asleep and didn’t see you.”
Course I knew better.
I left Peg’s and walked down to the breadbox where I met John Clayton, and we made our final plans.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
The Break-in
It seemed like supper took forever, but finally it was dark enough to convince my folks that we were going frog gigging, and off we went to downtown and the breadbox.
We sat there and planned the final part of our break-in.
“First, we’ll take the screen off the fan, and I’ll see if I can climb in. Then you go round to the front door, and I’ll open it from the inside, and we’ll go to Doctor Carl’s office and get the record book. Bring your frog-giggin’ light. We can’t risk turnin’ on the office lights,” I said.
So the plan was made and it sure sounded easy, and I told John Clayton we’d be in and out of there in fifteen minutes. Boy, was I wrong about that.
We slipped into the back alley, and I pulled out my screwdriver. The four screws came out real quick, and I started tryin
g to climb between the fan blades. Heck, I’m skinny, but trying to wiggle and squirm through fan blades was almost more than I could do. Finally, after about twenty minutes of squirming, I got in and sat there a minute to catch my breath. Then I ran into the front office and opened the door for John Clayton. He slipped inside, and we walked very softly back into Doctor Carl’s private office only to find the door shut and locked.
“Oh, my gosh, Richard. What are we gonna do now?”
“Well, dang, who would have ever thought he’d lock his office door … Wait a minute; look over the door … That transom window is cracked open … Bring that chair over here, and let’s see if we can push it open.”
I climbed up, shoved the window, and it swung open. “Hey, that was easy. It’s wide open. Here, give me a push, and I’ll climb through and open the door for you.”
It didn’t take but a few minutes until I had climbed through the transom window and dropped down to the floor.
“Come in, Mr. Reed,” I said as I opened Doctor Carl’s office door from the inside.
“Okay, John Clayton, start goin’ through everything on this desk and look in all the desk drawers.”
For the next half-hour we went through every scrap of paper and every file in his filing cabinets and on his desk.
“Dang, not one little thing,” I mumbled.
“Hey, Richard, this side drawer is locked.”
“Locked?”
“Yeah, there’s a little round lock where a key fits, and they ain’t no way to get it open if we don’t have a key. Shoot, something important must be in here. It’s gotta be where he keeps the records ’bout the Randolph Hotel girls and the oil-field trash.”
“Yeah, John Clayton, let me get this screwdriver after that lock.”
Well, I pried and worked everyway I could with that screwdriver, but I couldn’t get it open. The harder I worked the more we were convinced that the stuff we were looking for was in that drawer.
Lyin' Like a Dog, The Yankee Doctor, The Danged Swamp! 3-Volume set Page 34