“Bobby,” she said to me, “could I talk to you and Billy for a moment?”
CHAPTER 4
“TELL me what you saw,” Miss Delaney said.
“I didn’t see nothing,” Billy said.
“Bobby?” Miss Delaney said to me.
“You had an argument with a guy,” I said.
“Was it you who yelled?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you,” Miss Delaney said.
I nodded.
“Did you tell anybody what you saw?” Miss Delaney said.
Billy shook his head.
“We won’t tell nobody,” Billy said.
“Bobby?” Miss Delaney said.
“Mum’s the word,” I said.
“Good. It’s nothing, but it would be kind of embarrassing, I guess, if this got talked about.”
I felt uneasy. It was very strange to talk this way with Miss Delaney.
“Do you need any help?” I said.
“No, Bobby. That’s very sweet. But it’s just someone I used to know and we had a little argument.”
I didn’t like it. I wanted to know more. But I didn’t know how to ask.
“And you’re gonna be okay?” I said.
“Yes. As long as we keep it a secret,” Miss Delaney said, “I’ll be fine.”
We were all quiet for a moment, and then Miss Delaney leaned over and kissed Billy on the cheek and then me.
“Our secret,” she said, and got in her car and drove away down Church Street.
“You smell her?” Billy said. “She was wearing some kind of perfume. You smell how she smelled?”
“She smelled good,” I said.
“What’d she kiss us for?” Billy said
A gray Ford Tudor came around the corner from North Street and went down Church Street in the same direction as Miss Delaney. Billy and I watched it go until it was out of sight.
“You think that was him?” Billy said.
“I don’t know,” I said.
“You think she was telling us the truth?” Billy said.
“Not all of it,” I said.
“Why do you think it’s a secret?”
“I don’t know.”
“You think he was some kind of old boyfriend?” Billy said.
It was kind of exciting to think about Miss Delaney having a boyfriend. I didn’t exactly like it. But I didn’t not like it either.
“I don’t know, Billy. I don’t know who he was or what was going on except he grabbed her and she slapped him, and I yelled and she got away from him and came in the school.”
“And he didn’t follow her in?”
“No.”
“Was Mr. Welch here?” Billy said.
“He usually is,” I said.
Mr. Welch was the principal. The only man except the janitor in the school. He was a pretty big guy, and once when an older guy we were all scared of, Anthony Pimentel, had come in the school, Mr. Welch had taken him by the back of his collar, bum-rushed him down the stairs, and thrown him out the front door. None of us ever admitted it, but we were impressed as hell.
“You gonna tell anyone?” Billy said.
“We said we wouldn’t.”
“But maybe we should tell Mr. Welch,” Billy said.
“We said we wouldn’t.”
Billy nodded.
“I don’t want to get into trouble,” Billy said.
“You keep your mouth shut,” I said. “You almost never get into trouble.”
“Yeah. Okay,” Billy said. “Loose lips sink ships.”
“I think we should keep an eye on her, though.”
“An eye?” Billy said.
“Yeah, just stay ready, see what happens. Be alert, you know?”
“If we told the other guys, they could keep an eye on her too,” Billy said.
“Not yet,” I said. “We need help, we tell them. For now we just, like, stay alert.”
“So what do you think’s going on?” Billy said.
“I don’t know yet,” I said.
“Yet?”
I was quiet for a moment. Up behind us, the flag was still snapping in the breeze.
“I’ll figure it out,” I said.
I had a small brown GE radio in my bedroom and listened to it nearly every night. I listened to boxing from Madison Square Garden with Don Dunphy describing the fight. The ring announcer was Harry Ballough…The Fitch Band Wagon, with Dick Powell…“Don’t dispair, use your head, save your hair, use Fitch Shampoo.”…The Manhattan Merry Go Round, where I imagined myself actually going to the impossibly sophisticated clubs in Manhattan…Lux Radio Theater (Lux Presents Hollywood, with your host, Cecil B. DeMille)…And always the commercials: Get Wildwood Cream Oil, Charlie, start using it today…Ipana for the smile of beauty, Sal Hepatica for the smile of health…Serutan spelled backward in Nature’s…more doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette…On Boston radio there was a fifteen-minute show at noon that an announcer would introduce every day by saying, “Sit back, relax, and listen to Bing Sing.”…like everybody else, I loved Bing Crosby…On network there was The Jack Benny Program with Mary Livingston, Phil Harris, Dennis Day, Rochester, and “yours truly, Don Wilson.” It was originally sponsored by Jell-O ( J-E-L-L-O), and later by Lucky Strikes (LS/MFT). Jack had a pet polar bear named Carmichael, who he kept in the cellar…For adventure the afternoon programs were good—Jack Armstrong, Don Winslow of the Navy, Hop Harrigan…. Afternoons I would listen to ball games, the Red Sox and the Braves…When a team was out of town there would be telegraph re-creations with Jim Britt or Tom Hussy reading the play-by-play off a telegraph setup and simulating a real play-by-play…For more grown-up listeners Big Town was good, Steve Wilson of the illustrated press and his girlfriend Lorelei Kilbourn: “Freedom of the press,” Steve would say at the start of every program, “is a flaming sword, use it wisely, hold it high, guard it well.” And “Mister District Attorney,” “I Love a Mystery” Jack, Doc and Reggie always on some lost plateau somewhere.
CHAPTER 5
I had known Joanie Gibson all my life. We had met when we were three years old at somebody’s birthday party. We had been all through school together, and even though she was a girl, we were friends.
Joanie was one of the first girls in class to get boobs. They weren’t very big. But there they were. She had really nice eyes too. Very big eyes. Blue. The fact that she had boobs made her seem hot to us, but I also liked her. I wasn’t exactly sure where hot ended and like began, and I didn’t exactly know how to like a girl. On the other hand, I didn’t exactly know how to deal with hot either…Besides, we were friends.
Nick used to meet her after school sometimes, and buy her a Coke at the Village Shop, and maybe walk her home. So we kind of thought of her as his girlfriend. But she was still my friend.
In bad weather, especially when it was raining and windy, I used to like to go down to the empty bandstand and sit in it alone, protected by the pointed roof, and look at the way the rain and the wind made the harbor look. I was doing it on the Saturday afternoon after I saw Miss Delaney and the guy. Usually the harbor was dotted with sails. But the weather was too lousy, and all the boats were bucking and tossing at their moorings. Close in, there were a lot of Herreshoff 12s, and Beetle Cats. The wind made the empty gray surface of the harbor ripple in an odd crisscross pattern, sort of like the surface of a wood file. Farther out were bigger boats, of which I knew very little.
A girl’s voice said, “Are you thinking?”
I knew the voice.
“Sort of,” I said.
“You sure do a lot of that, Bobby,” Joanie Gibson said, and sat down beside me facing the water.
She had on saddle shoes and thick white socks and a camel’s hair coat.
“There’s a lot to think about,” I said.
“What are you thinking about now?” Joanie said.
“I don’t know.”
“I get like that sometimes,” Joanie said. “I mean, my mind is sort o
f out there moving around, but I don’t quite know what it’s doing.”
That was right. That was exactly how it was. Her too. I didn’t know what to say.
“It’s nice here,” she said. “Under the roof, out of the bad weather, warm coat. And out on the water it’s kind of rough and mean and cold, and we’re not on it.”
“I could be on it,” I said. “Sheet in one hand, tiller in the other, running before the wind. My hair blowing back like in the movies.”
“You have a crew cut.”
“So I’ll let it grow and then I’ll go out in a storm.”
“You’re embarrassed,” Joanie said. “Aren’t you?
“Huh?”
“You always try to be funny when you’re embarrassed.”
“What am I embarrassed about?” I said.
“Maybe embarrassed isn’t the right word,” Joanie said. “It’s more like you’re much smarter than anybody else, and you don’t want people to know it. So you always joke around.”
“So what am I supposed to do,” I said, “walk around, I’m smart, I’m smart all the time?”
“No, just don’t pretend you’re not.”
“It’s not good to be too smart,” I said.
“It’s not good to be too stupid either,” Joanie said.
I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t like that. I always knew what to say. Way out past the harbor mouth I could see a big schooner tacking back and forth across the wind, beating its way back into the harbor.
“I’m smart too,” Joanie said. “And I’ve known you all my life. I thought maybe we could talk.”
“About what?” I said.
“About why you like to sit in the rain and look at the water,” Joanie said.
I nodded.
“We could talk about that,” I said.
Joanie smiled at me.
“Good,” she said.
CHAPTER 6
THERE was a balcony above the Eastfield High School gym and I was sitting in it watching the high school varsity practice.
Coach threw the ball to one of the guards.
“Weave,” he said.
The five began to move. The man with the ball dribbled in one direction, a man without the ball came toward him. The dribbler went inside the other guy and left the ball for him and continued into the corner. The new dribbler went inside the next guy and left the ball for him and continued to the corner. They did this for a long time. Weaving past each other, and handing off so that the ball was always in the middle of the court and always in motion.
Then Coach said, “Sherm, take it to the hoop.”
Sherm was a blocky, muscular little guard. He came out of the corner, in the weave, and when he reached midcourt, he took the handoff and broke sharply for the basket right off the backside of the guy that just handed him the ball and went in and laid the ball up.
“Good,” Coach said. “Weave again.”
And they went back to it. Each guy took his turn driving for a layup off the weave.
After a time Coach said, “Okay Bart, start a roll.”
This time when Sherm came around and got the ball, Bart, the biggest guy on the team, turned and headed for the basket. Sherm passed it to him. And Bart took a layup.
“Lou,” Coach said.
And they ran that play over and over with different men taking the layup. I had a notebook and some pencils. But I didn’t use them. I just watched. Taking notes always kept me from learning stuff. I could write down things later if I had to.
“Okay,” Coach said. “Give and go. Out of the weave. Sherm, start it.”
So they went back to the weave, only this time as Sherm dribbled the ball toward midcourt and Bart approached him, Sherm stopped and passed the ball to Bart. Bart passed it right back to him and broke for the basket. They did this forever and when they finally stopped, all of them were puffing hard and shining with sweat.
“Okay, first unit,” Coach said. “Foul shots. Other end. Twenty each and I’ll be keeping an eye on you. Second unit come on in here and give me a weave.”
The starters went up the other end and began to shoot free throws. One guy shot. One guy retrieved, the other guys shot around. All of the guys but Sherm shot overhand. Sherm did the underhand free throw. And he was pretty good at it. I wasn’t much of a foul-shooter. But I’d rather miss than shoot underhand.
CHAPTER 7
WE were in the school yard and I was showing the Owls what I’d learned.
“You always go inside the guy you’re handing off to,” I said. “That’s what Coach says. Always inside.”
“Away from the defender,” Nick said.
“It work against a zone?” Russell asked.
“Don’t know. They haven’t run plays for a zone yet,” I said.
“You going back to watch more practice?” Manny said.
“Yeah.”
“Maybe they’ll say something about a zone,” Nick said.
Russell was holding the basketball.
“They’ll say throw it in to me,” he said. “For the pivot shot.”
He demonstrated the pivot shot.
“Kurland turns,” he announced, “shoots, scores.”
The ball clanked off the rim.
“But Russell doesn’t,” Nick said.
On North Street, across from the side of the school where we were practicing, a gray Ford Tudor was parked. It had a red stripe along the side of it. Billy saw me looking and looked too.
“That the one?” Billy said.
I shook my head at him, Don’t talk about it.
“The other one had a red stripe. I remember seeing it.”
“They probably all have a red stripe,” I said.
“What are you guys talking about?” Nick said.
“New Ford over there. You like it?”
“Sure,” Nick said. “After five years looking at the ’41s.”
“I’m gonna take a closer look,” I said.
“Hell,” Nick said. “Is it the first one you’ve seen?”
“I seen some go by,” I said, “but this is the first one I could look close at.”
I walked toward the car. There was someone in it. My stomach was scared. As I got closer, I looked at the license plate and repeated the number to myself, trying to remember it. A man got out of the car. It was him. He was wearing a trench coat today, and a tweed cap like longshoremen wear. But it was him.
He said, “What can I do for you, young man?”
“I was just looking at your car,” I said. “It’s nice.”
“Thanks. Anything else?”
I kept looking at him, trying to figure him out.
“It’s a ’46,” I said, “right?”
“It is.”
“They make a coupe?” I asked. “Or a convertible?”
“I am not a car salesman,” the man said.
“I was just asking,” I said.
“Fine,” he said. “Now you’ve seen it, run along.”
The other Owls had stopped practice and were watching us.
“I’m not doing anything,” I said.
“If you don’t run along,” the man said, “I’ll give you reason to.”
There was something in his voice, like a piece of broken glass. I nodded and turned, and walked back to the other guys.
CHAPTER 8
WHEN the bell rang, Miss Delaney said, “Bobby Murphy, could you stay a moment after class, please?”
“I think she’s hot for you,” Russell murmured as he stood up.
“Like hell,” Nick said. “It’s me she wants.”
When the classroom emptied, Miss Delaney came and sat down on the edge of my desk.
“I saw you yesterday,” she said. “Talking to the man in the gray Ford.”
I nodded. The way she was sitting pulled her dress tight over her thighs. I tried not to look. I imagined what she might look like with her clothes off. Then I felt sort of like I was bad to think about that.
“What did you
say?”
“I said I liked his new car, wanted to get a closer look at it.”
“Why did you go talk to him?”
“He’s the guy you had an argument with,” I said.
“So?”
“So I wanted a better look at him,” I said.
“Because?”
“Because if you’re in trouble, I want to be able to help.”
Miss Delaney looked at me without speaking for a moment. I thought about her thighs. I wondered if it was a sin to think about her with her clothes off. I hoped it was only a venial sin. I mean, guys thought about stuff like that.
“You will get me in trouble,” Miss Delaney said, “unless you simply forget anything you may have seen.”
“He seems kind of scary to me,” I said. “I’m just trying to figure him out.”
Miss Delaney smiled. It didn’t seem like a happy smile to me.
“You think you can figure anything out,” she said,
“don’t you?”
“Sooner or later,” I said.
“That’s because you’re fourteen,” Miss Delaney said.
“No it’s not,” I said. “It’s because I’m smart.”
She smiled again, the same smile with no happiness in it.
“You’re both,” she said. “But please, as a favor to me, please stay out of this. You can’t help. I doubt that you could even understand it. All you can do is cause trouble for me.”
“I don’t want to cause you any trouble,” I said.
“Then promise me,” she said. “To tell no one about any of this, and to leave me and that man alone.”
“Maybe you should tell Mr. Welch about it,” I suggested.
He had, after all, given the bum’s rush to Anthony Pimentel.
“Oh my God, no,” Miss Delaney said.
“He threw Anthony Pimentel out of the school once,” I said.
“Promise me,” she said, “that you’ll stay out of this.”
I nodded.
“And that you won’t tell anyone,” she said, “including Mr. Welch.”
I nodded.
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