There were confused looks all around, and Laura’s confidence wavered.
“Think about it,” Joby urged. “Damsels in distress don’t just show up whenever you need ’em! What if we need one, and we ain’t got it?” Laura had noticed long ago that boys always turned to bad grammar or foul language when they were nervous around other boys, and wondered if the others knew it too, but Joby pushed ahead. “This way we always got one handy, no matter what.”
When no one spoke, she decided she’d better say her speech. She stood, trying to look at them all as boldly as Joby had. “Good knights, and gentle,” she began. She didn’t know gentle what exactly, but Guinevere had said it in the book, and it sounded nice. “I would not intrude upon your noble council, except to offer some small service in thanks for your brave service.” The rest of what she’d memorized suddenly left her, so she went on in her own words, making them as fancy as she could.
“I have heard you are looking for good deeds to do in secret.” Some of the boys looked accusingly at Joby, as if they hadn’t told everyone themselves after last week’s meeting. “I can find out things which you might not hear about yourselves for you to do. No one even has to know I’m in, but you, good knights.” A few of them clearly liked the idea of a spy—as long as it wasn’t them being spied on, she supposed. “Of course, if this idea sounds unseemly,” she was proud of fitting that word in, “I would not wish to uglify this noble brotherhood with my presence.” She adjusted her sling again, then finished her speech with one last flourish gleaned from the book. “I thank you, brave and noble sirs, for hearing my petition with such courtesy.” She performed a grave bow, practiced exhaustively before her mirror at home, and sat down. Joby was staring as if he’d never seen her before. It had been easier than she’d feared. The fancy parts had seemed almost familiar in some weird way. In fact, she could hardly wait to talk like that some more.
To everyone’s astonishment, Duane jumped up across from her, brought his hand down flat on the table, and shouted, “I vote yes!”
Everyone looked back at Mrs. Escobedo’s office window, where, sure enough, the librarian was half out of her seat, scowling at them again. Duane made an apologetic gesture, and sat down. Happily, Mrs. Escobedo shook her head, and did the same.
“We ain’t votin’ on it yet, Duane,” Peter griped.
“Let’s vote then,” Joby said. “I vote yes too. If anyone says no, raise your hand.”
Laura adjusted her sling a third time. Johnny Mayhew looked pretty unhappy, but no hands were raised.
“Lady,” Benjamin said, surprising everyone, since he wasn’t usually quick to speak, “the knights are proud to have such a brave damsel in distress.” He looked defiantly around the table. “Aren’t we, guys.”
“Heck, yes!” said Duane, with a “told you so” look to Peter.
“No one’s s’posed to know you’re in. Right?” demanded Johnny Mayhew.
“I won’t tell anyone, if you guys can keep your mouths shut,” Laura replied.
“Well, all right then,” he grumbled. “Guess I’m glad you’re in too.”
She was in! She wasn’t a knight yet, but she’d gotten her foot in the door.
Joby burst into the house filled with good humor. He was still amazed at Laura’s speech. She could have been right out of his book! Even Benjamin had said it felt more like the real Roundtable now that she was in. Everything was going great!
“Joby?” his mother called from the kitchen. “Is that you, dear?”
“Yup!” he answered.
“You got a letter, honey. It’s on the table by the door.”
He went to pick it up and saw that there was no return address, but his name and address were very neatly written—definitely not from a kid. Who then? Joby didn’t get letters very often. He opened it and pulled out a two-page handwritten note on fancy beige paper bordered in green with the letters “J. C.” at the top.
Dear Joby,
I took the liberty of contacting Ben’s parents for your address. By now I imagine our second appointment has come and gone, and I must apologize with all my heart. I was called away quite suddenly, and in all the rush, I am sorry to say, I forgot all about it. I hope you will forgive me. I cannot begin to tell you how much I enjoyed meeting you, and I hope someday to hear how your efforts turn out. Sadly, I have been sent rather far away and doubt that we will meet again any time soon. Father Richter will be replacing me at the seminary. I know very little about him, but I hope he can be of help to you.
Being the old kibitzer I am, I have one last bit of advice to add to our last, very enjoyable, conversation. If you’re hoping to outsmart the devil, put as much effort as possible into pursuing the best things you can think of, and as little as possible into struggling against the bad. I am sure you will understand what I mean when and if you need to. I have great faith in you, Joby. Good-bye for now. God bless!
Remember! Love life!
John Crombie
Joby stared at the letter in confusion. Father Crombie couldn’t have forgotten about their appointment if he’d given that first letter to Father Richter, could he?
Just then the phone rang. Joby picked it up.
“Hello?”
“Joby! I got a letter from Father Crombie!” Ben’s voice exclaimed.
Joby frowned. “Me too.”
“You did?”
“Yeah. . . . Don’t you think it’s weird when he already wrote us?”
“Yeah,” Benjamin said. “Joby? You s’pose there’s something wrong with him?”
“Like what?”
“Well . . . before my grampa died, he got real confused. You know? You’d talk to him and then five minutes later, he didn’t remember you’d been there at all.”
“You think Father Crombie’s gonna die?” Joby asked.
“I don’t know,” Benjamin answered quietly. “But maybe that’s why he had to go away. Remember all that weird stuff he said about there bein’ no money?”
“Yeah, but . . . he didn’t seem like he was gonna die to me.”
“Me neither, but I got a feeling there’s something wrong.”
Williamson weathered this indignity as he had countless others: eyes glazed, countenance mute, stance straight but unchallenging. He’d known since long before his untimely death that swallowing all manner of crap with a smile and “thank you, sir” was just one of numerous unpleasant prerequisites to promotion.
“First Lindwald, then you! Can I rely on no one?” Lucifer raged. “That damn letter sat on that damn table all day! And what did we do about it? Nothing! Why? Because we didn’t know about it until it was in the candidate’s hands! I thought I sent you to watch, Williamson! It’s lucky for you they just think the old fart is demented and dying,” Lucifer growled. “So much the better. But I swear, if the more relevant discrepancies between our letter and his are ever noticed—by either of them—I promise to put an unbelievable crimp in your style. Do you understand me?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“And while we’re discussing style, Williamson, I had expected a great deal more from one of the most brilliant marketing strategists of your generation than these clumsy demographic travelogues you’ve been foisting on me. I’m not at all interested in your little ideas about wearing him down or beating him up. I want the Enemy’s hidden ace! To win this wager, he must turn willingly from the Creator to us! And I can hardly know how to arrange that until I’ve found the one utterly unexpected, completely impossible thing that makes this boy unique among all that other human vermin. Got it?”
“Yes, Sir.”
Lucifer gazed at him with disdain.
“Get out of here, you spineless toad, and try keeping your eyes open this time! I want the ace, Williamson! Not the king. Not the queen, or the jack. The ace!”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Out!”
Williamson went, struggling to bridle his resentment. Once, the world’s most powerful men had paid Williamson fortunes for the kin
d of analysis he’d been providing! Just bend over and play the game, he told himself. Find that ace, and he’ll have to acknowledge you.
5
( Aces )
Benjamin stared at the pew back in front of him, searching for imaginary faces in the wood grain. As he’d feared, church was no fun at all anymore without Father Crombie. This morning’s interminable sermon was about humility, which, as far as Ben could tell, meant you were supposed to be ashamed anytime you did something good—and to be more ashamed the better you did! How stupid was that? Joby’s company was all that made coming to church tolerable now.
Around Joby, the world just seemed to get wider and better all the time. Benjamin would never have thought of something like the Roundtable in a million years! He liked the secret missions even better than the stories Joby told them about King Arthur and his knights, or the games they all played at their tournament field.
Three weeks ago, Denis Wong had brought his model stegosaurus skeleton to school for show and tell. He’d put it together himself—every bone—and was very proud of it. But Lisa Herman’s sleeve had caught it just before lunch, and pulled it off his desk to smash in pieces on the floor. Denis had thrown it all in the garbage, and spent lunch in a bathroom stall, crying. But after school that day, Sir Bobby had gotten the pieces out of the wastebasket, then spent the evening with some of the other knights gluing it all back together. They’d snuck the model back onto Denis’s desk before class the next morning along with the Roundtable’s secret sign, a quarter-size disk of cardboard painted yellow with a red dragon drawn on it. That was how people knew the knights had done something, though no one would ever admit—outside their secret meetings, of course—exactly which knights had done it. Benjamin was sure nobody but Joby could ever have thought up such a cool idea.
Deanna Tepper’s lost jacket had reappeared mysteriously on Monday after Sir Kyle found it out behind the playground fence, where someone had probably thrown it. On Thursday, after Lindy Jacomella fell off the jungle gym and put a tooth halfway through her bottom lip, a whole stack of chocolate bars had shown up on her desk wrapped in red ribbon, attached to another little red and yellow disk. Lots of new boys wanted to join the knights now, and even the teachers had begun to talk about it. The tests to get in had gotten harder, and a boy had to do one secret good deed on his own before he could be knighted, but new members still kept coming.
Lady Laura had told them how badly Tony Esquivel wanted to be a knight, but that he wouldn’t say so because he knew the knights all had bicycles, and he was too poor to get one. Everyone liked Tony, and Sir Duane had gotten a new bike for his birthday, so he offered to donate his old one. They’d left the bike on Tony’s porch one morning before anyone was awake, and four days later he’d passed the tests and been knighted by Joby out at the tournament field amid the cheers of his new sword-brothers.
Laura was the first girl Benjamin had ever really been friends with. He’d known she was different the minute she stuck up for Joby after the dodge-ball accident. She didn’t do dumb girl things like playing horsies at lunch. She liked real adventures, and she sure got hurt as often as any boy, which he respected a lot. The supposed “secret” of her strange semi-membership in the Roundtable hadn’t lasted even days, but, as she had predicted, it was the guys themselves who’d let it slip. Now, of course, other girls wanted to be damsels in distress too, but the knights had told them all that they had to break an arm or leg to qualify, and that had kept them away pretty good so far.
Noticing the sudden quiet, Ben realized that Father Richter’s sermon was over at last, and, offering a silent prayer of thanks, stood with all the others to mouth the creed.
After church he and Joby raced to the car well ahead of Benjamin’s parents, then stood panting for breath.
“Do you think what Father Richter said is right, Benjamin?” Joby asked.
“What!” Benjamin rolled his eyes. “You mean humility? Nobody feels bad for doing something good, Joby. That’s crazy! Are you ashamed about the Roundtable?”
“No, but . . . what if the enemy wins ’cause I get too proud?” Joby looked away anxiously. “I’m not sure it’s good that we got everybody making fun of Lindwald.”
“Why not?” Benjamin protested. “He’s a jerk! We s’posed to thank him? Father Crombie said to laugh at the devil, right? Well, that’s what we’re doin’!”
“Yeah, but Father Crombie also said to fight our enemies with kindness. Maybe Lindwald doesn’t even want to work for the devil. Maybe he’s like a slave or something.”
“He wants to, all right! I never seen anybody who likes bein’ mean so much.”
“But Father Richter said—”
“I think you’re on drugs, Joby!” Ben cut him off. The very idea that Joby might take any of Richter’s nonsense about “humility” to heart made Benjamin furious. “And you know what? I think Father Richter’s talks are dumb, and he’s boring! I like the Roundtable! I like that Lindwald’s getting what he deserves, Joby, and I’m not gonna listen to anyone who says I’m s’posed to feel bad about any of it!”
“That’s not very respectful,” Joby murmured, looking down uncomfortably. “Father Crombie said Father Richter was a mentor, and . . . and I’m not sure we oughtta be makin’ fun of a priest when we’re fighting . . . you know—the enemy. He uses our mistakes, remember? Even little ones. Merlin said so.”
Hearing Joby sound so timid and girly made Benjamin’s anger so fierce that he wasn’t even sure anymore whether it was Richter or Joby himself he was angry at, and that scared him somehow.
“I’m your friend,” Benjamin growled, as if saying it might protect him from the things he was feeling. “I’m your friend. That’s all I’m gonna say.”
“You boys ready to go?” Benjamin’s parents had arrived at last.
Benjamin blew out a big breath of frustration, wishing they’d come sooner.
At recess the next morning, Lindwald sent Joby sprawling to the ground, and got sent to the principal’s office for his trouble, while Joby was congratulated by Mrs. Nelson in front of the whole class for not letting Lindwald “get his goat,” whatever that meant.
But at their meeting that afternoon, several knights complained that if Joby didn’t put Lindwald in his place pretty soon, people would be laughing at the knights instead of at Lindwald. Laura insisted that Joby’s refusal to fight was very grown-up, and a good example for the rest of them, which had done nothing to improve Joby’s position. Having promised to take care of it, Joby had left the meeting wondering how.
“Just fight him, Joby,” Benjamin said as they rode home together on their bikes. “That’s the only way to make him stop for good.”
“Don’t you remember what happened last time I fought him? That’s just what he wants. There must be some other way to get to him. What would stop you, Benjamin?”
“I don’t know. . . . My mom and dad, I guess. They can make me do anything.”
“That’s it! Benjamin, you’re a genius!”
“What?”
“His folks’ll make him stop! I should have thought of that weeks ago!”
“You’re gonna tattle to his folks?” Benjamin asked in dismay.
“I’m gonna beat him without falling for his trap,” Joby said. “That’s all. We gotta find out where he lives.”
“Tony knows,” Benjamin volunteered despondently. “I heard him tell Duane that Jamie lives one street over from him. . . . I still wish you’d just beat the crap out of him.”
After school the next day, they got on their bikes and headed for the address Tony had given them. It was not a pretty neighborhood. The few trees on Jamie’s street were small and sickly looking. Front yards were hemmed in by chain-link fence, and waist high in weeds, or carpeted in dead grass cropped so short that bare dirt showed through like bald spots on worn carpet. Driveways were cluttered with rusty, half-assembled hulks, as if some forgetful mechanic had wandered off years before in the middle of a major rebuild. The
paint was dingy and peeling on all but a few of the houses, and there were bars over most of the windows.
Jamie’s house was covered in ruined paint the color of old urine, and a woman sat on the porch, watching them come as if she’d been waiting. She was terribly thin, with stringy brown hair so greasy it looked wet. Her shapeless knee-length dress had been pink once, before someone had wiped a floor with it. She held a cigarette in front of her face, and smoke curled out of her half-open mouth, unstirred by any sign of breath. No one spoke. Her dark eyes were hard and flat, her closed face angry and sleepy all at once.
“Whadaya want?” she said at last, as if they were selling something distasteful.
“We’re . . .” Joby stumbled. “My name’s Joby. This is Benjamin.”
She looked away and took a long drag on her cigarette.
“You’re those little brats givin’ my Jamie such a hard time at school, ain’tcha.” She exhaled, then turned back to stare them down as if they were the worst kind of trash.
“Mrs. Lindwald—” Benjamin began.
“Spater!” she snapped. “Not Lindwald!” Then, more calmly, “I ain’t the little bastard’s mother. Just his stepmom.”
“Mrs. Spater,” Joby said. “If Jamie told you we’re giving him a hard time, he’s—”
“You callin’ Jamie a liar?” she demanded, then leaned back and took another lungful of smoke, as if they’d gone away.
“Yes,” Benjamin said, his fists clenched. “He’s been callin’ all of us names, and pushin’ us around, doin’ everything he can to make us fight. And Joby hasn’t touched him the whole time.”
The Book of Joby Page 11
