The Year Of Our Discontent

by Darrel Bird

late evening sun there by the river.

  When we woke up it was plumb dark.

  “I’m cold James Lee, could you sqwunch over next to me?”

  “We ain’t going to step on no frogs are we?” says I. The upshot of it was, when I scooted next to her, I stepped on a frog myself.

  We were laying there just nigh onto getting comfortable when I heard a noise downstream.

  “Did you hear that, Lindy Lou?”

  “I never heard nothing, James Lee.”

  “I know I heard something. You just lay quiet here; I aim to check it out!” I whispers.

  “You ain’t going to leave me here, James Lee. You promised!”

  “All right, but you be quiet and don’t you go to bawlin’ on me, you hear?”

  She put her hand to my lips and then to hers to seal the deal.

  We snuck through the cane breaks about a hundred yards and soon spotted a campfire. Two men were sitting there, jawing and tipping the bottle. I felt better about the sneaking because the men were hitting the booze. We were able to sneak up on the camp real close as it was dark as a dungeon in them canes and there was nothing but sandy loam underfoot.

  When we got close, I heard one of the men say, “When we get done robbin’ that Callville bank, we will have us lots of booze an’ women too.”

  When I heard that, I clamped my hand on Lindy Lou’s mouth hard. She went “Umumf,” so I cracked her across the head with my knuckles. She knew I meant business from that, and her eyes got big and scared looking. I let loose of her mouth and put my hand on her lips and then mine to seal the deal. She nodded, her curls bouncing.

  One of the men had a double-barreled shotgun lying next to him, but I didn’t see no evidence of horses so I figured they was afoot.

  I took Lindy Lou’s hand and we snuck back through the woods, only this time I went clear to the other side of the bridge.

  “Them men are up to no good. They are planning on robbing the Callville bank tomorrow, I reckon.”

  “What we going to do, James Lee?” says Lindy Lou. She was getting all teary eyed on me again.

  “Well, if we alert the sheriff he’ll want to know what we was doin’ down here and take us into custody. I reckon there ain’t much we can do.”

  We laid down again and slept scrunched close to each other to stay warm till morning. At daybreak I says, “Lindy Lou, I got to go get us something to eat. Will you stay here for me till I get back?”

  “You won’t leave me by myself?”

  “No. As soon as I get us something to eat, I’ll come right back.”

  “Promise on the Bible?”

  “Lindy Lou, we ain’t got no Bible and you know it!”

  “No, but if we had one?”

  “Yeah if we had one, is that like the frogs we didn’t step on?”

  “Just like them frogs,” says she.

  “Well, I reckon I’ll swear by it then.”

  “Now you stay right here, promise?”

  She shook her head and I headed for the bridge that crossed the river into Callville. I got across without anybody taking notice except a boy on the riverbank, getting some early morning fishing in.

  I walked easy like down the main street, then turned up a side street where they was houses. I had no more than got three houses down when I spotted a pie in a windowsill, and I swung by, grabbed it, and ran.

  Thank the Lord for old ladies that cook early, I thinks to myself, as I headed back across the bridge. The boy was still sitting there laid-back with his fishing pole propped up on a rock, he had his hat over his eyes and didn’t see me at all.

  I got back down to the riverbank to where I left Lindy Lou. When she seen me she ran up and smacked me on the mouth again. I figured she was froggin’ again.

  I told her to quit her foolishness and get to eating. It didn’t take us long to gobble the pie down. It was apple, my favorite pie, and I can put considerable away. It had sugar sprinkled on the top real thick just like I like it. After we ate the pie, we lain down again to let it settle.

  About nine we heard two gunshots and we peeked out at the Callville side of the river.

  There were two men hightailing it for the river.

  “Sure as shootin’ that’s them same two men we seen last night a high tailin’ it for the river!” says I.

  I figured we would be safe enough if we went back to our old camp; the one thing I didn’t figure on was those rascals swimming back to our side of the river.

  When we were going through the thick cane we run smack into them. They each grabbed one of us apiece and clamped their hand over our mouth, and I was looking square into Lindy Lou’s terrified eyes.

  “Now you youngins better be quiet or we will just slit your throat and let the buzzards have you!” He whacked me across the head hard with the palm of his hand to prove up on the point.

  Well… the upshot of that was that we heard men beating the bushes along the river all through the day while we lay there stifled, all thrust up close to the two stinkin-est buzzards what a man ever smelled.

  I finally got tired of the whole thing and I looked at Lindy Lou and then slid my eyes to a big rock laying beside her and then the one laying beside me then back at her and she got the message.

  She grabbed hers and I grabbed mine and we laid them suckers clean out cold with a rock apiece. We found some leather string in their pockets and thrust them up like a pig on a spit. I rumbled through the men’s pockets and got out the big wad of bill’s one of the men had on him and we lit out for the bridge to Callville.

  We just walked right into that sheriff’s office cool as you please, and there was the sheriff sitting at his desk. I handed him the money and told him where those two robbers were lying, all tied up. He gave us a stern look, but he wasn’t taking no chances, and sent some men to take a look-see.

  “You kids just stay put until my men get back,” says the sheriff.

  After about an hour they come hauling the robbers back to the sheriff’s office.

  “Sure ’nough, sheriff; we found them tied up just like they said and judging from the knots on their head the kids rocked’em all right!”

  “Well..I’ll be a monkey’s uncle!” says the sheriff, “Git them rascals locked up and I’ll return the money.” So they did.

  It turned out the robbers weren’t no more than two-bit thieves till they got up the nerve to rob the bank. The sheriff reckoned it was the liquor doing most the robbing. The only thing was, they shot the teller so they was going to get hung.

  I felt awful bad about the man they had killed and I knew I was indirectly responsible because I didn’t report it to the sheriff before the fact. The sheriff let us go if we promised to go straight home, and we promised we would.

  We were heading down the street toward the bridge when we passes a church. I told Lindy Lou that I felt plumb rotten, and she suggested we go in so I agrees to it. We got in there and I told the pastor what had happened with Lindy Lou chiming in ever once in a while.

  “My, my! Such a load for children to carry!” says he.

  “Do you want me to pray with you?” says he.

  “I reckon I do, but I ain’t got much words like yorn, mister,” says I.

  The pastor looks at me and says, “Son, it don’t necessarily take words for the Lord to hear, it just takes your heart and what words you got.”

  So we knelt down with him, one on each side, and he laid his hands on our noggins. I was just getting into being sorry about not doing my duty when I remembered to throw in the pie I stole for us to eat as an aside, just in case the Lord was in a good mood.

  “Do you think he forgived us, mister?”

  “I am just pretty certain of it, but I’ll check… yep he did,” says the preacher.

  We both went away feeling all squshy inside, I reckon there’s frogs of all kinds just laying around just waiting to be stepped on, only these kind don’t seem in a powerful hurry to get out of the way.

 
The upshot of the rest of this story is that we both went back without having to be drug back a’kicking. Lindy Lou went back to her house and I went back to the orphanage and stayed there eight more years, and you know what? Old Mr. Blumstock heard about the fracas over to Callville. He said I was a hero, and he never took a stick to me more than a few times after that. Mostly he was a nice man when you got to know him.

  The night we got back, old Mr. Blumstock took me up to the room. He patted me on the noggin and tucked the quilts up real good and it made me feel more to home. I got to noticing particularly that he would come around and give thisun’ a pat on the noggin and thatun’ a little tuck in and I found out he weren’t near as mean as I thought previously.

  Well now…me and Lindy Lou was never far apart after that. Her Ma said as how “It is just the Lord’s will that you two kids will be together!” She throwed up her hands, scooped us both up at once and hugs us both till we near smothered.

  ***

  “Grandpa, did you and Grandma really do all that? Catchin’ robbers, I mean?” says Lindy Sue.

  “Yes child, I reckon we did.”

  “I betcha Grandma rocked that old mean man hard, didn’t she, Grandpa?”

  “She sure did, James