by Mike Befeler
I heard the boy crying. A good sign. I felt like crying too.
I kicked and one-arm-stroked.
The edge of the pond appeared almost within reach.
I went down for the third time and my feet struck bottom. I stood up, never so glad to feel something solid under me. Pushing the boy onto the grass lining the pond, I pulled my old body up next to him, scraping my hand in the process. Exhausted, I closed my eyes. So sleepy.
Then I remembered.
Don’t fall asleep you old coot, or you won’t have a clue what happened.
I opened my eyes.
A group of people had gathered.
I heard, “I’ve called 9-1-1.”
Another voice said, “Someone went to find the lifeguard from the swimming pool.”
I lay there gasping.
Shortly, a muscle-bound young man in skimpy swim trunks dashed up to me. He stared at me with a look on his face as if he’d been the one dragged from the pond. “You have blood all over your hand,” he said. Then he bent over and puked. So much for guarding my life.
I raised myself up on one elbow as the lifeguard continued to nourish the lawn with the contents of his breakfast. I noticed my minor scrape and rubbed the blood off my hand onto the grass.
The toddler sat on the ground, sniffling, but alive. Mr. Fisher had his arm around the boy.
A woman said, “Did you see that? The old man’s a hero. He saved the little boy’s life.”
Another woman said, “If he hadn’t been nearby, the boy would surely have drowned.”
The distant wail of a siren increased in volume, and, in moments, two men in white uniforms came running up to me.
“Check out the boy first to make sure he’s okay,” I said.
One medic attended to the child while the other bent down to wrap a blanket around me. That helped absorb some of the water from my T-shirt and Bermuda shorts, and I used it to wipe off the pond scum. I would have to put up with squishy tennis shoes for a while.
“Are you having trouble breathing, sir?” he asked.
“Not now. I caught my breath.”
“We can take you to the hospital.”
“That’s not necessary.”
I looked up to see Jennifer running toward me. “Grandpa, what happened?”
“I decided to go for a little swim.”
“But you hate the water.”
“I know. I still do.”
The emergency team tended to the lifeguard, the only one requiring treatment. They gave him oxygen from a portable unit and then, with a paramedic supporting him on either side, dragged him to their emergency vehicle.
I stood up and shook my arms and legs. “A little damp, but it’s a warm day. I wouldn’t want to have done that on a winter morning.”
“You should head home to change,” Jennifer said.
“I can walk back.”
“Okey dokey. I’m glad you’re fine. I need to go back to swim practice.” She raced off.
Mr. Fisher came up to me. “I can give you a lift to your house. I need to take Ralphie back to dry off.”
“Thank you,” I said. “I’ll take you up on that.”
He met my gaze directly. “And thank you for saving my grandson. I guess I misjudged you.”
I shrugged. “No problem, Mr. Fisher.”
“And please, use my first name. Nate.”
“And I’m Paul.”
We shook hands. Then he reached down to clasp Ralphie’s hand, and we headed toward the parking lot.
Ralphie seemed no worse for wear, and as a gaggle of geese flew overhead, he pointed and giggled. Ah, the resilience of youth.
“Let’s stop at my house first so I can get Ralphie changed into dry clothes.” His brow wrinkled. “My daughter-in-law will be by in half an hour to pick up Ralphie. Please don’t mention anything regarding the incident. If she finds out I fell asleep when I was supposed to be watching Ralphie, she’ll never entrust him to me again.”
“My lips are sealed.”
We pulled into his driveway. Nate extricated Ralphie from his car seat, then turned to me. “Come on in for awhile. I’ll fix you and Ralphie a snack after I change his clothes.”
I scanned the front lawn. Well-trimmed grass, no weeds, rosebushes in full bloom . . . partial row of fir trees with two stumps in the middle. No wonder he had been so pissed.
Inside, I waited while Nate and Ralphie disappeared down a hallway. Not wanting to dampen his furniture, I strolled around the living room inspecting an old, comfortable, blue flower-patterned couch and matching chairs. Pictures on the wall displayed a consistent theme: each a still life of a different flower. I felt like I had entered a plant nursery.
Everything appeared clean and neat. The only thing out of place in the otherwise immaculate room was a pile of cardboard boxes tucked away along the wall behind an end table supporting a lamp and yellow-flowered shade.
Nate reappeared with a dry and combed Ralphie. Nate puttered around the kitchen, opening and closing the refrigerator, banging dishes and making rapping sounds. I sauntered over to join him and studied him carefully. He must have been in his seventies, approximately my height, a small paunch, thinning white hair, but otherwise a healthy-looking young whipper-snapper.
“Anyone else live here with you, Nate?”
He visibly slumped. “No. My wife died a year ago. I’m on my own.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. I’m in the same boat. My wife Rhonda died some time ago. Any girlfriends?”
He shook his head. “I’ve kept to myself since Harriet died. Maybe one of these days . . .”
An idea occurred to me. “Say. I’m going over to the Centennial Community Center to see a movie tonight. You care to join me?”
His eyes lit up. “Sure. I haven’t been to a show in ages.”
I thought back to my conversation with Jennifer that morning. I had one too many girlfriends and Nate had none. What if . . . ?
“Here are some crackers and cheese for you.” Nate handed me a plate.
I sat down on a plastic-covered stool and munched away while I plotted. What if I fixed Nate up with Helen?
After we finished eating, Ralphie toddled off to play with a toy car on the living room rug.
The doorbell rang, and Nate shuffled over to open the door. A frazzled-looking woman with short brown hair stood there. Ralphie jumped up. “Mommy!” he shouted. The first word I’d heard him speak.
“I’m running late,” she said as she lifted up Ralphie. “Thanks for watching him.” Then she turned and disappeared.
Nate shook his head. “This generation. They’re always in such a hurry.”
“Good thing she didn’t ask why Ralphie had a different outfit on.”
“Yeah and I’m lucky that Ralpie’s only word is ‘Mommy’ so he won’t be able to tell her what happened.”
I surveyed the living room. “I was wondering. What do you have in all the boxes?”
“They’re a collection of Beanie Babies. Harriet collected them and after she died . . . well . . . I boxed them up. It’s a valuable collection, but I haven’t had the heart to do anything with it yet . . . Say, maybe your granddaughter would like some. I could let her pick out ones she likes.”
“Beanie Babies,” I said to myself, remembering what Jennifer and I had discussed on the way to the swimming pool that morning. “Tell you what, Nate. Rather than giving my granddaughter some Beanie Babies, could we borrow a box of them?”
“Borrow?” He looked at me quizzically.
“Yeah. We’re working on a project, and if we could use them for a day, it would really help. I promise to return them in pristine condition.”
He shrugged. “Well, I guess I owe you one.”
“One favor. Let me have a box that contains high-priced stuffed animals.”
He pointed toward the boxes. “The box on the top has the early ones. Harriet started collecting right when they first came out. Those should be worth the most.”
; I ambled over and picked up the bulky box. “Now if you’ll give me a ride down the street with this big box, I’ll get out of your hair.”
He coughed.
Damn. I guessed I shouldn’t have said that to a guy going bald.
* * * * *
Nate dropped me and the box of Beanie Babies off at the old homestead and said he’d pick me up at a quarter to seven for the movie at the Senior Center.
I waved goodbye as he drove away, glad that I had young friends who could still drive. What a change in his attitude toward me as a result of a little thing like saving the life of his grandson.
Jennifer had returned from swim practice and sat in the kitchen with her mom.
“I understand you’ve become the man of the hour,” Allison said.
“Just doing my civic duty.”
“Sounds like a lot more than that.”
“Some good news. Nate Fisher and I have become best buddies.”
“He told you his first name? Wow. That’s really something.”
“He’s basically a nice guy, but lonely.”
“He always seems so crotchety.”
“Losing a wife will do that to you.”
“What’s that?” Jennifer asked, eyeing the cardboard box.
“It’s a surprise,” I said. “Let’s go to your room, and I’ll show you.”
“What are you two up to?” Allison asked.
“We’re plotting and scheming,” I replied. “Now let’s get started.”
In Jennifer’s room, I opened the box.
“Cool.” She pulled out several stuffed animals. “These are expensive Beanie Babies.”
“You said this morning that you had a book that lists their value. Why don’t you calculate what we have here? This can be our hook to catch Benjamin Slade. We’ll dangle these in front of him and see if he retrieves cash from his stolen loot.”
“I get it. We don’t have to go to his shop pretending to sell Beanie Babies. We’ll take the box in and say we’re selling the whole caboodle.”
“Exactly. We’ll ask him to appraise them and give us an offer. We’ll say we want cash and will return the next day to complete the deal.”
Jennifer rubbed her hands together. “This will be so cool. We’ll nail him, Grandpa.” Then a serious expression returned to her face. “But you’ve been in his shop before. If he remembers you, he might start wondering what’s going on. If I take the box in on my own, he’s less apt to be suspicious.”
“I can wait for you outside. I’ll keep an eye on him from there so he doesn’t try anything fishy.”
Jennifer clenched her right hand into a fist. “Nobody’s going to mess with me.”
I stepped back in mock terror. “I wouldn’t want to be in Slade’s shoes if you go after him.”
Jennifer flicked her ponytail. “Now I want to find out the value of the Beanies.” She removed a book from her shelf, lined up all the Beanie Babies on her bed and retrieved a pad of paper and pencil. She licked the tip of the pencil, thumbed through a few pages and began jotting down numbers.
“You look like a serious entrepreneur,” I said.
“Absolutely. When I’m tired of being a lawyer, I’ll probably start my own business.”
“I wouldn’t put it past you. Or running the country.”
She grinned. “That might be later.”
When she had completed her research, she showed me the list and grabbed a calculator to tabulate the numbers.
“Okay, here’s the total.” She showed me the number.
“Wow! Almost ten thousand dollars.”
“These are all valuable first generation Beanies. The tags don’t open like a book, but are a single-layer heart shape. The more recent tags unfold.” She picked up her list and an alligator. “Here’s Ally, it’s worth three hundred dollars . . . And Spot the dog, over a thousand dollars . . . and here’s a neat one, Slither the snake. Twelve hundred and fifty dollars.”
I whistled. “People pay that much for these little critters?”
Jennifer shrugged. “That’s what the books shows. We have twenty-four first generation Beanies. That’s quite a collection.”
“It will be interesting to see what Slade offers for these—I’m sure a lot less since a dealer has to make margin, but I wonder how much he’ll try to cheat you.”
Jennifer smiled. “I’ll have to negotiate with him a little.”
I looked at my watch. “Let me change out of my damp clothes, and we can catch the bus downtown.”
“Okey dokey. I’m ready to catch this guy.”
* * * * *
As we boarded the bus, the mustached driver wrinkled his brow. Maybe he thought we had a bomb in the cardboard box.
“Let’s sit in the back, Grandpa.” Jennifer skipped down the aisle.
I followed her, noting the nearly empty bus—two young boys playing handheld video games and a shopping bag-toting woman who looked even older than me, if such a thing were possible.
After several stops where a teenager with earphones danced aboard and the old woman departed, we arrived at the end of the line. We strolled the short distance to Toys ’n Stuff.
“Okay, Grandpa. You wait here on this bench. You can see inside the shop through the glass door. Time for me to make a deal.” She pranced into the shop.
I heard a bell jangle and could see a man appear at the back counter. Jennifer placed the box down and began waving her hands. On one occasion she punched her right fist into her left hand. Then she began to extract the stuffed animals from the box and deposited them on the counter.
The man picked up each one, examined it and wrote something down. Then he turned his back for a few minutes. When he turned back he pointed to something on the counter.
Jennifer shook her head.
The man picked up a pen and scribbled for a few moments. He pointed again.
Jennifer threw her hands up in the air.
The man looked startled and jotted down something.
Jennifer put her hands on her hips and shook her head again.
The routine continued until, finally, Jennifer nodded her head. Then she returned all the Beanie Babies into the box, picked it up, turned and strolled out of the shop.
“Follow me, but don’t look like you’re with me,” she whispered as she loped past me.
I waited a moment and then traipsed after her until we were out of sight of the store.
“How’d it go?” I asked.
“Like you suspected, he tried to cheat me at first.”
“What did he offer?”
Jennifer laughed. “He said he’d give me ten dollars per Beanie.”
“That’s nothing. He must have thought you just got off the banana boat.”
“Exactly. And I told him so.”
“I can imagine you did.”
“I indicated I knew what they were worth and wanted a serious offer.”
“Did that work?”
She frowned. “Not the first time. He raised his offer to a thousand dollars.”
“But you kept after him.”
“Yes. He finally reached two thousand dollars and I figured that would be enough for him to have to resort to some of his stolen stash.”
“Didn’t he want to buy them right then?”
“Since I told him I’d only take cash, he said he’d have to bring in the money tomorrow. We know where that’s coming from.”
“What’s the next step?”
“I’m supposed to return at noon to finalize the deal.”
I smiled. “I’ll have to let my friend Detective Lavino know. Maybe he can waltz into the shop and check for marked money.”
“Then we’ll be able to clear your name, and you’ll owe me another Hawaiian stuffed animal.”
I sighed. “You lawyers always want your payment.”
“You bet, Grandpa.”
I looked at my watch. “It’s two o’clock, and I only had a snack at Nate’s house, but no lunch. You hungry?”
&n
bsp; “I’m always ready to dine with my grandfather.”
We stopped at a hamburger shop and ordered. The clerk filled up a large brown bag with cheeseburgers, fries and milk shakes and we headed out to find a bench to sit on.
“I like this town,” I said to Jennifer as we munched away. “Warm weather, but not too hot. And all kinds of strange characters to watch.” I pointed to a guy riding a unicycle who held a flag of Brazil in one hand while licking a chocolate ice cream cone.
After lunch I gathered all the wrappers, stuffed them in the brown paper sack, strolled over to a garbage can and dropped the bag inside.
Suddenly, a man in tattered jeans elbowed me aside and reached inside the trash container. He extracted a brown bag, looked from side to side with frantic eyes and started running. Before I could regain my composure, another man vaulted a bench and tackled him. They crashed to the ground, and a third man in a blue windbreaker jogged over and pulled out handcuffs.
Within seconds the guy who had pushed me wore cuffs.
The man in the blue windbreaker strode over to me and held out a police badge. “I need to speak with you.”
“Here I am.”
“No, I mean down at police headquarters.”
“Jennifer, come over here.”
Jennifer bopped over. “What’s happening, Grandpa?”
“This undercover cop wants to give us a ride down to police headquarters.”
“Cool.”
* * * * *
When we got there, Jennifer said, “I’ve seen the lobby before and now the inside of the police station, Grandpa.”
“You stick with me, and you’ll see all the exciting parts of the city.”
We were escorted to a small room, Jennifer carrying the box of Beanie Babies.
“I always wanted to see how they take videos during interrogations,” Jennifer said, as she jumped up and skipped over to inspect the camera in the corner of the room by the ceiling. She tilted her face up and stuck out her tongue.
Moments later a tall, skinny man in a suit strolled into the room.
“We meet again, Mr. Jacobson.”
“And who are you?”
“Detective Lavino.”
“Say. I want to talk to you. Here’s something important regarding the money from the bank robbery. When we last talked I told you I received the twenty-dollar bills as change from a toy store on the Pearl Street Mall.”
