The Adventures of Jack and Billy Joe

by A. Jeff Tisdale

  Jack didn’t know how to ask. His father solved that problem.

  “Where y’all off to this mornin’, Jack?” Jack’s father asked at the breakfast table.

  “We’re goin out to Bynum’s Bluff to sled on the pine needles,” he responded.

  “You mean down into that big gully with Tallahala Creek at its bottom?”

  “Yes, sir, but we just sled down to a stand of trees that block us from goin’ into the gully,” Jack explained.

  “That’s not good enough. I want something more positive than that to stop you. It’s a hundred fifty to two hundred feet straight down to the bottom of that gully, if I remember it right.”

  “Yes, sir, you do, but we plan to take some old two-by-fours with us to nail to the trees to make sure they stop us.”

  “How old are the two-by-fours and where did you get them?” his father asked.

  “The two-by-fours were old batter boards from layin’ the floor in the new girls’ dormitory at the college. When the concrete dried, they piled them all in a pile waitin’ to go to the trash dump. We asked Mr. Watkins, the superintendent, if we could have some. He said take them all but we ain’t got no use for all of ’em and no way to haul ’em if we did.”

  “Jack, don’t say ‘ain’t got no.’ You know better than that,” his mother said from the other side of the kitchen.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Jack dutifully replied.

  “So, how many two-by-fours you and Billy Joe takin out there?” his father asked, returning to the subject.

  “We figure we can haul four apiece on our bicycles,” Jack said.

  “Four apiece?” he asked, astounded. “How you gonna do that?”

  “We’re gonna tie them up close under the saddle and tie them to the steering column with two on each side. Then we can straddle them and be able to ride easy,” Jack explained.

  His father thought a minute and finally said, “Well, maybe you can. You boys are pretty good planners.”

  “Yes, sir, thank you,” Jack replied.

  “All right then, would you do me one big favor?”

  “Yes, sir, what’s that?” Jack promised.

  Take plenty of those ten-penny nails out in the garage and a good hammer and make sure all the two-by-fours are nailed solidly.”

  “Yes, sir,” Jack quickly responded.

  “That’s not all,” his father responded just as quickly. “When you have nailed them up as best you can, step back and say to yourself, ‘Would Daddy approve of this?’ If the answer is yes, go ahead and enjoy the slide. If not, either fix it or just don’t slide on it. That’s easy, isn’t it?”

  “Ah…yes, sir, I guess so, but that’s a pretty tough requirement for me to decide if you will like it before I can slide on it.”

  “I meant for it to be a tough decision for you to make,” his father said.

  “Yes, sir, I’ll do it,” Jack said solemnly, and his father knew he meant it.

  There was a knock at the back door and Jack rushed off to go with Billy Joe.

  Jack’s mother walked over to the table and looked down at her husband with a smile on her face. “You’re playing dirty pool with Jack this morning, aren’t you?”

  “How’s that?” he asked, already knowing what she meant.

  “Having him look at the trees and two-by-fours through your eyes,” she said.

  “That was the only way that I knew for sure that he would make sure it was safe as I would look at it. I can’t use that too often but to save his life, I can.”

  She kissed him on the forehead.

  Jack and Billy Joe rode their bikes the three blocks around to the new girls’ dormitory and to the scrap pile the workers had built. As they rounded the corner of the junior college building, Jack spotted a man who jumped behind an arborvitae bush to conceal himself. Jack could have sworn it was Lige Garner. He would have to be on the lookout for him.

  “Pick out the straightest ones that have the least concrete stickin’ to them,” Jack instructed as was his nature.

  “Yes, Daddy,” Billy Joe mocked.

  Jack showed Billy Joe how to tie the boards under the saddle and to the steering column post without getting the light rope or its knots into the wheel spokes.

  “You bring the hammer?” Billy Joe asked.

  “Yeah, it’s tied to my handlebar.” Jack pointed toward it. “And Daddy told me to bring this bag”—he patted his blue jean pocket—“of ten-penny nails.”

  “I got a hammer and a bag of ten-penny nails too,” Billy Joe announced.

  “You remember where you hid those RC Cola signs?” Jack asked.

  “Now how could I forget that?” Billy Joe scoffed. “It was just yesterday.”

  “Let’s go then,” Jack said as his bike started moving.

  The boys rode north on Court Street and turned right beside the courthouse, past the big Baptist Church, and the houses started getting further and further apart. At the bottom of the hill leading up to the Bynum house, the boys stopped.

  “You wanna try to pump your bike up the hill or are you gonna push it up?” Jack asked.

  “I think I wanna pump up the hill as far as I can without gettin’ too tired and then push it the rest of the way up,” Billy Joe decided out loud. “I may even pump all the way up.”

  “Let’s go,” Jack said, having heard that as a challenge. “If you can, I can.”

  They both pumped all the way to the crest of the hill, although their leg muscles were about to cramp up.

  Jack stopped on top and looked back down. Billy Joe stopped beside him and also looked back. Both acted as if it was no real challenge. Neither boy would have wanted to do it a second time.

  After a few moments, both boys pedaled on toward their destination, Bynum’s Bluff.

  About a half mile further on, the main road turned left. The road they wanted, however, went straight ahead through a well-hung gate.

  Jack opened the gate, allowed Billy Joe through, pushed his own bike through and closed and latched the gate.

  Within two minutes, the boys came out onto a rolling pasture. Actually, it was a Mississippi Power Company right-of-way with power lines running as far as you could see north and south. There were cattle grazing on it in both directions.

  The sun was shining brightly in an azure cloudless sky. There was a soft breeze blowing from the northwest. It was that ideal time of the year when it was most comfortable to be outside.

  “Let’s go get this show on the road,” Billy Joe pushed.

  “Take it easy,” Jack replied. “We have all day and I don’t see any reason to rush it. This can be dangerous if we are not careful.”

  “Your daddy talked to you, didn’t he?” Billy Joe guessed.

  “Yeah, yours too?” Jack asked back.

  “Uh-huh.”

  “What did you promise him?” Billy Joe asked.

  “That after we got the two-by-fours up, I’d stand back and look at it as if it were his eyes and decide if it was safe or not. How about you?”

  “More or less the same. Daddy said that all he asked was that I look at it and honestly decide if it was dangerous before we made the first slide.”

  “What we gonna do?” Jack asked.

  “I guess we’re gonna do what we told our daddies we would.”

  “All right,” Jack agreed, “let’s go through it step by step and figure out where our dangerous places are.”

  “Don’t we need to nail the two-by-fours on the trees at the bottom so we’ll know if that makes it less dangerous?” Billy Joe rightfully asked.

  “Yeah, I reckon we do,” Jack conceded.

  Billy Joe took the hammer from his bike and slid it into the hammer loop on his jeans and started to untie the two-by-fours to move them down the slide hill.

  Jack followed suit and did the same.

  At the bottom, the boys surveyed the situation to determine where to nail the two-by-four boards.

  “The way I see this is,” Jack began. “There is a flat p
lace at the top of the hill where we will push off from. Then goin’ down the hill, we will be able to control the sled some by pulling on the ropes on each front corner. The pine needles are pretty even all the way down so we should slide straight. At the bottom, the grade of the slide kinda tapers off some so we should slow down before we hit the trees. Is that about it or do you see any other problem?”

  “Naw, that sounds good to me,” Billy Joe agreed, but how are we gonna locate these boards on these trees to make sure we catch one every time?”

  “Sit down on the ground and let me see how high they need to be,” Jack asked of Billy Joe.

  Billy Joe sat down in front of the trees looking toward them and Jack looked the situation over closely.

  “I think,” Jack began, “that we need to put one board at about one foot off the ground all the way across. That will make it so that we can’t go under it. The top board should be placed at about two feet off the ground. That should catch us fine. Sittin’ down, we couldn’t get through there if we tried to.”

  “All right, lets do it then,” Billy Joe said, showing his impatience.

  Each boy piled his boards up at the base of the trees.

  Since Billy Joe was the best with a hammer, Jack agreed to place each board and hold it while Billy Joe nailed it to the tree. They agreed that each board should have two nails in each end at the trees that supported them. It didn’t take long. Billy Joe didn’t bend many nails so they moved right along.

  When they finished and surveyed their work, it looked better than they thought it would. There were four boards at two different levels. That was thirty-two feet of “backstop” to catch them at the bottom. How could they miss it?

  The boys looked at each other and nodded their satisfaction.

  “Where’d you hide the sleds?” Jack asked.

  “They ain’t sleds,” Billy Joe corrected him, “they’re RC Cola signs. Just pieces of tin.”

  “Now you know I know that,” Jack reminded him. “Don’t be so touchy.”

  “I ain’t touchy. I just don’t like to pretend they are fancy sleds like they have in the snow.”

  “Okay, where’s the tin then?” Jack stood corrected.

  “I stashed them just off the trail at the top,” Billy Joe said. “You check out the slide hill to make sure it has good pine needles from top to bottom. If we run onto a bare spot with no needles on it, the ‘sled’ will stop and we’ll go the rest of the way down without it. That won’t be fun.”

  “Naw, you are right,” Jack agreed and started up the hill looking at and feeling of every part of the slide area.

  Billy Joe climbed to the top, using the trees on each side to hold on to. At the top, he went off into the brush about ten feet, raked back some pine needles with his hand and pulled out four tin RC Cola and Nehi signs and moved them to the top of the slide hill. Each tin sign was curved up at the front to give less slide resistance and to somewhat resemble a real sled. The boys had made holes on either side at the front of the sleds and attached guide ropes. The theory was, when the sled was going down the hill with a boy on it, he could pull on the rope on one side and the sled would turn slightly the opposite way. That theory was untested but it should work.

  Billy Joe tested the ropes to make sure they were tied tightly and wouldn’t come off. The ropes also gave the boys some stability, something to hold onto, as they slid down the hill.

  “Are we ready to roll?” Jack asked as he climbed up the hill.

  “Yeah, far as I can tell,” Billy Joe assured him.

  “Who’s gonna be first?” Jack asked.

  Billy Joe picked up two pine needles and broke each off to different lengths and held them in his closed fist and said, “Okay, pull a straw and the other one will be mine. The shortest straw will be first.”

  That seemed fair to Jack so he pulled at straw and held it out to Billy Joe, who held his out too.

  “You got the shortest, I reckon,” Billy Joe conceded. “You go first.”

  Jack looked over the four sleds and picked one, which he set in place at the top of the hill.

  “Now don’t forget, you gotta guide it around those four trees that are in the middle of the slide area. If you don’t, you and the sled will take different paths to the bottom and you may get a knot on your head from the tree.” Billy Joe laughed.

  “Yeah, I think I figured out how to miss that first tree.” Jack grinned.

  “How’s that?” Billy Joe asked.

  “I’ll aim for it. There’s no way I can hit it if I try.” Jack laughed.

  “Uh-huh,” Billy Joe replied skeptically. “Well, let’s get on with it and we will see.”

  Jack placed his sled at the top of the hill, sighted down it to see if it was pointed the way he wanted it to be, walked around it and aimed it again.

  As he was about to do that again, Billy Joe said with impatience, “Jack, get on with it. I want a turn before it gets dark.”

  Jack nodded, sat on the sled, held the ropes tightly and pushed off with his heels.

  At first, the sled hesitated then, zip, it was gone. The speed of the descent surprised Jack and he was unable to steer as he had planned. He missed all the trees but not from the skill of his driving. It was pure luck. As the bottom flatter place came up, the sled slowed and turned sideways and Jack’s right shoulder came up against the boards. It was a soft bump so the first test seemed to be a success.

  “Come on down, Billy Joe,” Jack shouted.

  Billy Joe placed his sled the way he wanted it, sat on it, looked the slope over one more time and, as Jack had done, pushed off with his heels. He missed the first tree but dead centered the second, which stopped him. The bend in his knees had given him just enough springiness to offset the bump into the tree.

  He moved the sled a little to his left and continued on to the bottom.

  “I’ll do better next time,” he assured Jack. “You’ll see.”

  “Hey, good sled run, with boards to stop you and everything,” a voice said from the top of the hill.

  Jack and Billy Joe looked to see Larry Crawford and Charlie Conn looking down the sled run at them. Larry had been the one, as usual, to yell at them.

  Larry put his sled down, sat on it and pushed off. He hit the first tree, pushed off again, missed the second tree but hit the third one hard.

  When he got to the bottom, he came to rest up against the boards and said, “Boy, that second tree hurt,” rubbing the side of his head.

  Charlie Conn missed all the trees but came up against the boards really hard.

  “Uh,” was all he said, but Jack saw tears well up in his eyes. He pretended not to notice.

  “That’s a good sled run,” Larry complimented, “but y’all oughta dig out them trees.”

  “Those trees are pines,” Jack pointed out. “They are what makes the pine needles and besides, we need some obstacles in the run.”

  “I reckon so,” Larry conceded. “I’m just gonna have to learn how to guide around them. Let’s go do it again.”

  Jack and Billy Joe didn’t say anything but Charlie picked up his sled and started back for the top. He always did everything Larry told him to.

  Jack and Billy Joe followed along behind the other two, not wanting to disagree with Larry and start out with bad feelings.

  “I’ll go first,” Larry declared when they reached the top.

  He put his sled down and immediately pushed off. This time, he steered to the right around the first tree, which made him miss the second. However, that path headed him directly for the third tree. He pulled on the right side of the rope to try to miss the tree to the left. Instead, the sled turned sideways, dug into the pine needles and Larry went off to the right rolling uncontrollably. He had moved further and further to the right and was in danger of missing the boards altogether. He was moving down the hill very fast now and picking up bruises as he went. He reached for the end boards, touching them but not getting a grip on them. He went off the edge of the cliff.


  The three boys went down the slope as fast as they could, holding on to the trees on the side.

  Billy Joe picked up the rope he had brought with him before he went down.

  Before they got to the bottom, they heard Larry yelling, “Help me. Get me outta here. I can’t hold on much longer.”

  Jack looked down from the edge of the cliff and saw Larry hanging on to tree roots that were sticking out of the cliff face.

  “Hush, Larry. Yellin’ ain’t helpin’ none and it makes us all nervous,” Jack directed.

  “Well, get me outta here in a hurry and I won’t yell no more.”

  Billy Joe looked over the edge and said to Larry, “I’m gonna throw this rope over to you. Now you don’t get panicky and yank the rope out of our hands. Keep holdin’ onta them roots and lightly hold the rope until I tell you different. Do you understand me?”

  “Yeah, I understand, I ain’t no dummy.”

  Jack wanted to yell back, “What are you doin’ down there holdin’ onta them roots for then?” but he didn’t.

  Billy Joe tossed one end of the rope to Larry but held onto the other tightly. Just as he expected, Larry immediately yanked the rope. Luckily, he didn’t turn loose of the roots with his other hand.

  “Now Larry,” Billy Joe yelled down, “there’s a big knot in that rope about five or six feet from the end. You hold on to that knot and when we tell you, we’ll start pullin’ you up. Do you understand?”

  “Yeah, I understand.”

  “Jack, you and Charlie hold on to this rope with me and we’ll pull him up slowly but steadily. I’ll tell Larry what to do and when. Do you understand me?”

  “Yeah,” they both said.

  “Okay, hold on to that rope and here we go,” Jack said. “All right, Larry, hold on to that rope at the knot and put both hands on the rope NOW.”

  Larry grabbed the rope at the knot with both hands and it tightened up in their hands suddenly. Jack and Billy Joe held on tightly but Charlie let it slip a few inches before he grabbed it tightly.

  “Okay, Larry, hold on and we are gonna pull you up. Let us know when you get to the edge and you can climb over that yourself. We don’t want to mash your fingers and cause you to fall off.”