The Great Brain vs. Mamma
Mamma laid her embroidery on a table and stood up. She placed her hands on her hips and addressed Tom by his full name, which meant she was plenty angry.
“We will make a deal all right, Tom Dennis,” she said sternly. “Your father and I aren’t exactly stupid. We know you deceived us into getting you a bicycle for Christmas by pretending you’d reformed. The bicycle goes up into the attic immediately and stays there until Dotty Blake wants to get an education. Now put your great brain to work on that.”
Tom’s mouth fell open as if Mamma had just told him to pack his things and leave home and never come back. “But that isn’t fair,” he protested.
“It is just as fair as you pretending you’d reformed,” Mamma said. “And I’m sure your father will back me up.”
“I second the motion,” Papa said, nodding his head.
I sure felt sorry for my brother. For the first time in his life he looked as if he wished he hadn’t been born with a great brain.
Books about The Great Brain
The Great Brain
More Adventures of the Great Brain
Me and My Little Brain
The Great Brain at the Academy
The Great Brain Reforms
The Return of the Great Brain
The Great Brain Does It Again
The Great Brain Is Back
PUFFIN BOOKS
Published by Penguin Group
Penguin Young Readers Group,
345 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.
Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R ORL, England
Penguin Books Australia Ltd, 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia
Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 10 Alcorn Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4V 3B2
Penguin Books (N.Z.) Ltd, 182-190 Wairau Road, Auckland 10, New Zealand
Published in the United States of America by Dial Books for Young Readers, 1969
Published by Puffin Books, a division of Penguin Young Readers Group, 2004
Text copyright © John D. Fitzgerald, 1969
All rights reserved
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data available upon request
LC: 73-85547
Puffin Books ISBN 978-0-425-28998-3
Text set in Baskerville
Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
Version_1
For Brynn
Contents
CHAPTER 1
The Night the Monster Walked
CHAPTER 2
The Taming of Britches Dotty
CHAPTER 3
The Time Papa Got Lost
CHAPTER 4
Tom Scoops Papa’s Newspaper
CHAPTER 5
The Death of Old Butch
CHAPTER 6
The Ghost of Silverlode
CHAPTER ONE
The Night the Monster Walked
THERE WERE TWO GOOD REASONS for the people in Adenville to celebrate Christmas in 1896 besides the birth of Jesus Christ. It was the year that Utah became the forty-fifth state, and the year everybody in town believed my brother Tom had reformed. Papa went around with a happy look, believing he no longer had to worry about Tom making a fool out of him. Mamma was all smiles, believing no angry mother or father would be calling her on the telephone to complain my brother had swindled their son out of something. Aunt Bertha looked as if Tom had suddenly sprouted wings. Uncle Mark, who was the Marshal and Deputy Sheriff, thought all he had to deal with in the future would be lawbreakers. It was the first Christmas parents bought presents for their sons, believing my brother wouldn’t try to connive their kids out of them.
There was only one doubter in our midst, and that was my oldest brother, Sweyn, when he came home for the Christmas holidays from the Catholic Academy in Salt Lake City. Adenville only had a population of about twenty-five hundred people. About two thousand were Mormons, and the rest Catholics and Protestants. We had a one-room schoolhouse, where Mr. Standish taught the first through the sixth grades. Any parents who wanted their children to get more education had to send them to Salt Lake City. There were plenty of places in Salt Lake City where the Mormons could send their kids for a higher education, because The Saints, as they preferred to be called, outnumbered other religions by ten to one. And there was more than one Academy for Protestants in the state capitol. But only one Catholic Academy.
Sweyn was thirteen. He was named after my Danish grandfather on my mother’s side and had blonde hair like Mamma. I was now eight years old and would soon be nine. Tom was going on twelve. I had dark curly hair and brown eyes like Papa. Tom didn’t look like Mamma exactly, and he didn’t look like Papa. His hair wasn’t blonde, and it wasn’t dark. He was the only one in the family who had freckles.
“What has happened to the Great Brain?” Sweyn asked me two days after his arrival home, as we were stringing popcorn to help decorate our Christmas tree. “He hasn’t tried to connive me out of a single thing since I’ve been home.”
“T.D. has reformed,” I said. My brothers and I always called each other by the initials of our first and middle names, because that is how Papa addressed us. We all had the middle name of Dennis just like Papa, because it was a family tradition.
Sweyn held the darning needle threaded with string in one hand and a piece of popcorn in the other hand. He stared at me like I was plumb loco. “Bushwah!” he said. “That little conniver could no more reform than he could wash the freckles off his face.”
I had never heard the word “bushwah” before and assumed it was a city slang word that Sweyn had picked up at the Academy. But I knew what it meant just from the way he said it.
I told him how Tom’s great brain had helped Andy Anderson so he wasn’t useless anymore with his peg leg. And how Tom had refused to accept the erector set he had been promised as payment if he helped Andy learn to do his chores and play—peg leg and all. And I told Sweyn how Tom had given me back my genuine Indian beaded belt, which he had swindled me out of earlier in the year.
“T.D. hasn’t pulled a crooked stunt since,” I concluded.
Sweyn thought about what I’d told him for a moment. “Once a conniver always a conniver,” Sweyn said. “It doesn’t sound like T.D. at all.”
“Mr. and Mrs. Anderson both thanked Papa and Mamma for what Tom had done for their son,” I said. “And I told them about him giving me back my belt.”
Sweyn got a sly look on his face. “And what else did T.D. get you to tell Papa and Mamma?”
“Well,” I said, “he did ask me to tell them he had his heart set on getting a bicycle for Christmas. He even got me to tell them the one he wanted at the Z.C.M.I. store.” Zion’s Cooperative Mercantile Institute was the full name of the town’s big general store owned by the Mormon church. Some people called it the Z.C.M.I. store, and some called it the Coop.
“Ha, ha!” Sweyn exclaimed. “I knew it. T.D. with his cunning mind figured that a bicycle was worth more than an erector set or an old Indian beaded belt. This pretending to reform is all an act to get Papa and Mamma to give him a bike for Christmas.”
Sure enough, Tom got his bike for Christmas. I got a new wagon. Sweyn got a pocket watch and watch fob. I guess it was about the happiest Christmas of my life, because it was the first time I didn’t have to worry about Tom trying to swindle
me out of my present.
Sweyn still had his doubts and put them into words just before he left to return to the Academy in Salt Lake City.
“I’ll bet ten to one, J.D.,” he said, “that the Great Brain resumes his career as a confidence man now that he has his bike.”
My oldest brother was sure right. Tom started out the new year in his usual conniving style. It wouldn’t have been so bad if it had been just one of his usual swindles. But this one got so complicated that armed men patrolled the streets of Adenville, and women and children had to remain behind locked doors.
Papa, who was editor and publisher of the Adenville Weekly Advocate, was considered the smartest man in town because he was the only one who had ever gone to college. Uncle Mark was considered one of the smartest peace officers in Utah. By the time Tom got through with his first scheme of the year, Papa was ready to admit he was the dumbest man in town except for Uncle Mark.
It all started our first day back at school during morning recess. A new kid in town named Parley Benson was showing off a genuine Bowie knife his father had given him for Christmas. Parley was Tom’s age, had yellow hair, and he always wore a coon-skin cap.
I knew Tom’s great brain was working furiously to get that Bowie knife while he was riding me home on the handlebars of his new bike.
I was enjoying the ride as I looked at the trees planted by early Mormon pioneers that lined both sides of Main Street. Adenville was a typical small Mormon town but quite up to date. There were electric light poles all along Main Street, and we had telephones. There were wooden sidewalks in front of the stores. Straight ahead I could see the railroad tracks that separated the west side of town from the east side. Across the tracks on the east side were two saloons, the Sheepmen’s Hotel, a rooming house, and some stores.
“That is some Bowie knife that new kid got for Christmas,” Tom said.
I turned my head, and sure enough he had that old scheming look on his face.
“Sweyn was right,” I said. “You only pretended to reform to get this bike for Christmas.”
“You talk as though I were some kind of crook,” Tom said, pretending I’d hurt his feelings. “Just because my great brain makes me smarter than any kid in town, and a lot of grownups, doesn’t make me a crook. Papa always says that it’s brains that count in this world.”
“But Papa didn’t say you are supposed to use your great brain to go around swindling people,” I said.
“Who did I ever swindle?” Tom demanded.
“Me and every other kid in town,” I said without a moment’s hesitation.
“No two people can make a deal without both of them agreeing to it,” he said. “Right?”
“Right,” I said.
“And on all the deals we ever made, you agreed. Right, J.D.?”
I nodded my head.
“And no two people can make a bet without both of them believing they are going to win,” he said. “Right?”
“Right again,” I answered, wondering what he was leading up to.
“Then you’ve either got to admit that you are stupid and an easy mark or that I’ve never swindled you in my life,” Tom said.
I sure as heck wasn’t going to admit that I was stupid and an easy mark.
“I guess you are right,” I said. “I’m sorry I called you a crook.”
“But you did call me a crook,” Tom said. “And when I tell Papa and Mamma that you called your own brother a crook, it will break their hearts.”
“Please don’t tell them,” I pleaded.
“If I agree not to tell them,” Tom said, “I think you should be punished for daring to call me a crook.”
“I’ll do anything you want,” I said quickly.
Tom thought for a moment. “If you do my chores for a week, I just might not tell Papa and Mamma,” he finally said.
“It’s a deal,” I said, and how I wished I’d learn to keep my big mouth shut. I knew if I told Papa and Mamma that Tom was a crook, it would break their hearts. But I also knew if I told them I was stupid and an easy mark, that would break their hearts too. The more I thought about it, the more grateful I was to Tom for letting me off so easy.
After we’d changed clothes, I filled up all the woodboxes in our kitchen, dining room, and parlor. Then I began bringing in buckets filled with coal from our coal and wood shed.
Mamma and Aunt Bertha were kneading biscuit dough for supper. Mamma tilted her head piled high with long golden braids and looked at me.
“Why are you doing your brother’s chores?” she asked.
“It is all right, Mamma,” I said, as I put down a heavy bucket filled with coal beside our big kitchen range. “I’m perfectly satisfied with the deal.”
Aunt Bertha, who wasn’t really our aunt but had lived with us so long she was just like one of the family, looked down at me from her great height as she brushed a strand of gray hair from her forehead with the back of her hand. She had hands and feet as big as a man’s.
“Deal!” She said it as if it were a dirty word. “It was too good to be true. I knew it couldn’t last. Tom is at it again.”
Mamma looked concerned. “Is Tom D. taking advantage of you?” she asked.
“No, Mamma,” I said, because I thought Tom had let me off easy.
Tom sat on the corral fence while I fed and watered the chickens, milk cow, team of horses, and Sweyn’s mustang, Dusty. I was exhausted when I joined Tom on the corral fence.
“That new kid Parley Benson sure likes to brag,” Tom said.
“You mean how he bragged about his father being an animal bounty hunter for the ranchers?” I asked.
“Yes,” Tom answered. “And how brave his father is, and how brave he is.”
“I guess it does take a lot of courage to track down and kill mountain lions, wolves, coyotes, and other animals that kill livestock,” I said.
“Sure it does, but that doesn’t make Parley brave like his father,” Tom said. “If there is anything I can’t stand, it is a kid who boasts.”
I knew if Tom couldn’t stand it, he was going to put a stop to it. “Are you going to put your great brain to work to cure Parley of his bragging?” I asked. I couldn’t help feel excited.
Tom grinned. “And teach him a lesson at the same time,” he said.
“I’d hate to be in his shoes,” I said.
* * *
On the first Saturday after school had started in the new year, it was snowing in the mountains and raining in town. Tom went up to his loft in the barn to put his great brain to work on how to cure Parley Benson from bragging while I did all the chores.
It continued to rain after we’d eaten lunch. We went to the barn to wait for our friends, who always came there to play when the weather was bad. Tom and I were sitting on a bale of hay when Basil Kokovinis entered. He was a Greek boy, whose father owned the Palace Cafe. He was Tom’s age and had big dark eyes and black hair.
“It’s a pour down,” Basil said as he took off his cap and yellow rain slicker.
“Downpour,” Tom corrected Basil, who had trouble with the English language since he had been in this country less than a year.
Danny Forester, Sammy Leeds, and Parley Benson were the next to arrive. Parley and Danny were Tom’s age and Sammy one year older. Sammy had what Sweyn called a city-slicker look. I’d never seen a city slicker, but assumed my brother meant Sammy always had a sly, know-it-all look on his face. Danny’s left eyelid was half closed like it was most of the time—as if one half of him wanted to go to sleep and the other half to stay awake. Parley was wearing his coon-skin cap and had his Bowie knife in a scabbard on his belt.
Then Howard Kay and Jimmie Peterson, who were my age, came into the barn with rain dripping from their caps and slickers. Howard had a round face like a Halloween pumpkin. Jimmie’s mother always bought his clothes a size too large so they would last for two years, because she had no younger sons to wear Jimmie’s hand-me-downs. This was the year Jimmie’s clothes were too big
for him and hung on him like a scarecrow’s.
“What are we going to play?” Sammy asked.
“How about follow-the-leader?” Tom suggested. Then he looked at Parley. “And since Parley has been bragging all week about how brave he is, let’s make him the leader.”
“I can do things none of you kids can do,” Parley boasted, as he removed the Bowie knife from his scabbard and laid it on a bale of hay.
It didn’t take me long to believe it. Parley climbed up the rope ladder to Tom’s loft with us following. He went hand-over-hand across the rafters to the other side of the barn. We could all follow him. But on the way back Parley swung himself and only grabbed every other rafter. Howard, Jimmie, and I had to drop out. Then Parley went hand-over-hand to a rafter. I stood bug-eyed as he hung by his toes from the rafter. Then he let go with his toes, and I was sure he’d dash his brains out on the floor of the barn. But he turned a flip-flop in mid air and landed on his feet. That was the end of playing follow-the-leader because not even Tom or Basil could do a stunt like that.
Sammy patted Parley on the back. “What a stunt,” he said. “I guess that makes you the bravest kid in town all right.”
“I wouldn’t say that,” Tom said. “Would you say the circus acrobats are the bravest people in the world? What takes real courage is to do something nobody else has ever done. I know if Basil and I practice, we can learn to do that stunt. What takes real courage is an explorer going into a wild and strange country where no man has ever been.”
“My Pa goes places no man has ever been,” Parley boasted.
“We were talking about you and not your father,” Tom said. “Now if a boy had the courage to go someplace like the entrance chamber of Skeleton Cave at night, knowing there are monsters and big snakes in the cave, that would take real courage.”
“Baloney,” Sammy said. “Frank and Allan Jensen were lost in the cave before you and your Uncle Mark rescued them. If there are real monsters and big snakes in the cave, why didn’t they attack you?”
More Adventures of the Great Brain Page 1
