by Alan Cook
“If you don’t like him, why wait until graduation?”
“Because…because I can’t leave him now. I don’t know what he’d do.”
If she was in physical danger from Joe, couldn’t she tell her parents? Probably not. And it would be uncool of me to suggest this.
“I’ve grown up since I went with Ralph. I’m ready for more. You’re Ralph’s cousin. I suspect you’re a lot like him. Maybe you and I could meet…”
“I’m going with…” I was going to say Sylvia, but that was supposed to be a secret now.
“Sylvia? Gary, that girl has no figure. She’s flat as an ironing board. And I’ll bet she never let you do this.”
She grabbed my hand and placed it on her breast. Suddenly I couldn’t breathe. This was a first for me. I felt a long dreamed-of softness with an unexpected hard tip under my touch. I couldn’t do anything for several seconds. As I was trying to get up enough backbone to remove my hand, I heard a noise below.
I jerked my hand away from Natalie’s sweatshirt and said, “Somebody’s coming up here.”
“Who do you think it is?” She sounded scared.
“Stay here. I’ll find out.”
I rotated forward on my knees and wiggled out through the space between the bales that served as an entrance to the fort. I stood up and looked down toward the hole in the floor of the hayloft where the trapdoor had just been raised. There, transitioning from the ladder to the hardwood floor was Ed Drucquer. He was facing the other way and didn’t see me. Yet.
I half climbed and half slid down the bales as quickly as possible, scratching my hands on the prickly stalks of hay in the process. I landed on the floor just as Ed turned around and saw me.
“Gary,” he said, obviously surprised. “I didn’t know you were up here. I didn’t see your car.”
I had parked the car in an outbuilding between the barn and the railroad tracks, anticipating rain during the night.
“What’s shakin’?” I said, feeling flustered. I had to get rid of Ed as quickly as possible.
Ed didn’t look like his usual unflappable self either. He said, “I…just came up here to look around and see if I could get a better idea of where the necklace might be.” He glanced up to the top of the bales where I had just come from and said, “What were you doing up there?”
That was none of his business, but I felt too guilty to tell him that. He started climbing up the bales.
“Wait,” I said and then stopped, unable to think of what to say next.
He continued to climb. I could grab him by the leg and pull him down, but that would start a fight and make him very suspicious. I followed him up, staying right on his heels to make sure he didn’t go into the fort. At the top, I stood in front of the entrance to the fort, as Ed looked at all the bales I had moved.
“What the hell have you been doing?” he exclaimed. “You’re trying to get the necklace for yourself. You bastard.”
I wanted to shush him. Natalie shouldn’t be hearing about the necklace. At that moment, Natalie burst out of the fort between my legs, knocking me over in the process. I landed in a heap, partially on top of her. Ed stared at Natalie, looking as if he had seen a vampire. Natalie lay panting, hay in her hair.
“I got claustrophobia in there,” she said, sitting up as we untangled. “And then you blocked off the light, and it was pitch black. I couldn’t stand it anymore.”
“Well, what have we here?” Ed said, recovering his poise. “Head cheerleader Natalie Porter and my cousin caught in flagrante delicto. How delicious. Perhaps a gossip item for the Carter Bulldog.”
“If you print or say one word about this, I’ll kill you,” Natalie said, standing up and approaching Ed in a menacing manner.
“My, my, the beautiful Natalie has a temper. I quake at her approach.”
“It’s okay, Nat,” I said taking her arm. “Let me handle it. You’d better go.”
“With this idiot on the loose? And why does he say he’s your cousin? How many cousins do you have? He doesn’t even look like you.”
“I’ll explain later. Go ahead. Everything’s going to be all right.”
Natalie looked at me and then at Ed. She said to him, “Remember what I said. I’ll make mincemeat out of you.”
She climbed down the bales. She reached the floor and went over to the opening. She climbed down the ladder and disappeared without looking at us again. A few seconds later, I heard the outside door to the barn slam. Now I had to calm Ed down.
“I wasn’t trying to cut anybody out of anything,” I said. “I was just trying to speed up the process of finding the necklace.” Or prove that there wasn’t a necklace. “But if you say anything about Nat and me, I will cut you out.”
“Don’t get a burr in your britches,” Ed said. “You know I can keep a secret. And we’ll work together on the necklace. But you’re going about it all wrong.”
“What do you mean, all wrong?”
Ed considered. “Well, maybe not all wrong. But you can’t move all those bales by yourself.”
“Do you want to help me?”
“No, it would still take us too long. I think the best thing to do is to wait until spring, when the hay is gone. The necklace has been missing for over a hundred years. A few more months won’t matter.”
“But what if the farm workers find it?”
“They won’t. It’s too well hidden for that.”
“How do you know? Let me see the document that Ralph wrote.”
Ed shook his head. “No, I can’t do that. You’ll just have to trust me on this.”
I was getting exasperated. “Ed, why exactly did you come here today?”
“To make sure you aren’t doing exactly what you’re doing. This necklace belongs to all of us. Not just to you yanks. Just because we’re not rich like you are doesn’t mean that we don’t deserve better.”
“If we were rich, instead of penny loafers, I’d wear quarter loafers. I was loading hay wagons during the summer for a buck an hour. And if you’re so intent on getting the necklace, why did you even tell me about it?”
Ed put out his hands, palms up. “Because I need your help. Because you have access to the barn at any time, and I don’t. In spite of what I said, I’m afraid that somebody will find the necklace and run off with it. You’re up here almost every day. You can keep an eye on what’s happening.”
“You’re sure you won’t say anything about Nat and me?”
“Of course not.” He grinned. “How is she in the hay? Pretty nice, eh?”
I pushed him over a bale.
CHAPTER 23
It was Wednesday, and I hadn’t seen Sylvia to really talk to since Sunday. I hadn’t kissed her or even held her hand. Natalie had heightened my sensibilities, and I needed to do those things.
This was an unsatisfactory way to conduct a relationship, especially since Sylvia was tantalizingly close to me at lunchtime. Close, but I couldn’t do more than trade a word or two with her as we turned in our trays and headed our separate ways to afternoon classes. At least a couple of girls were eating with her now, so she wasn’t alone, even when Barney and Ed strayed.
Natalie ate lunch with Joe. She didn’t look in my direction. It was just as well. She was trouble with a capital T. Ed joined me at lunch and seemed to be intent on staying on my good side. I assumed this was because of the necklace, but whatever the reason, if he wanted to be my friend, he wouldn’t be spreading gossip about Natalie and me.
We chatted about the newspaper business, since that was a common interest. Ed asked me to write articles for the Carter Bulldog. I told him I was prohibited from doing that by Dr. Graves. He said I could use a pseudonym. I declined, figuring that this was just another way to get into trouble.
“I’m doing a big article on Joe Hawkins,” Ed said, looking at me to get my reaction. “He’s being wooed by several universities, including Cornell.”
“Has he got the smarts to get into Cornell?” I asked.
&nb
sp; “Football players get special dispensation.”
I was about to make a remark about the poor girls at Cornell if Joe became their idol, but I bit my lip to keep myself from speaking.
“I’m watching the practices all this week and interviewing him, of course. I’d also like to get some comments from Natalie.”
He should have thought about that before he taunted her. But at least it was another reason for him not to say anything about Natalie and me. Sylvia got up from her table the same time I got up from mine. As we handed our trays in through the window to the kitchen, Sylvia whispered, “Can you come over after school?”
“I don’t know,” I whispered back. “I’ll let you know when school lets out.”
***
I had an idea based on the fact that Ed was going to be at football practice, which is why I told Sylvia I didn’t know whether I could go to her house after school. My idea needed Kate’s cooperation, which might be difficult to get. The first thing I had to do was to track her down, since we didn’t eat at the same lunch period or, of course, have any classes together.
The best time to talk to her would be right after school, when the majority of the students were boarding buses for the ride home. I found out from Ed which bus he and Kate rode and went outside to the parking lot where they loaded as soon as we were dismissed for the day.
The school owned many of the big yellow buses, because it was a rural district and the homes were spread out. They stood in a line with their doors open, looking to my jaundiced eye like yellow sharks, waiting with their mouths open to gobble up the unsuspecting students. Numbers were painted on them in black, so I had no trouble finding the correct one. I waited while the kids poured out of the school, talking, laughing, glad to be out of jail for the rest of the day.
I spotted Kate walking with two other girls, looking pretty in a plaid skirt and a light jacket. I hailed her as they approached the bus and said, “May I talk to you for a moment?”
She looked surprised. We hadn’t spoken for a week, not since I had been at her house. And then we hadn’t parted on the best of terms. I added, “I can drive you home.”
She hesitated. The other two girls were giving her knowing looks. That apparently did the trick, because she turned to me with a brilliant smile and said, “Okay.”
She waved to them as we walked away toward where my car was parked. It occurred to me that she had achieved some sort of status by being cut out of the pack by a senior, but it also worried me because it might get her expectations too high. So as soon as we got into the car and started moving, I started talking.
“I need your help,” I said. “Is your mother home this afternoon?”
“No, she’s working.”
“Good. Because what I want to do is to take a look at the sheet of paper Ed says he got from Ralph that supposedly tells where the necklace is hidden.”
“Why do you want to do that?”
“I guess just because he won’t show it to us. Don’t you think there’s something fishy about that?”
Kate shrugged her shoulders and said, “Eddie can be very secretive. He’s always keeping secrets from me.”
“Doesn’t that bother you?”
“I do the same with him.”
“But wouldn’t you like to know whether there really is a necklace? If there is, it could be worth a lot of money.”
“Eddie is obsessed with money. He’s always saying that you and the other cousins have a lot of money, but our family doesn’t.”
“You know that’s not true, don’t you? We’re not rich.”
“But at least you get new clothes once in a while. I have to keep mending mine. This morning, I had to fix the hem on this skirt before I could wear it.”
She lifted up the bottom of her skirt and showed it to me. Although the gesture barely exposed her knees, it distracted me enough so that I suddenly found the car drifting toward the side of the road. I had to jerk the wheel to straighten it.
To cover my discomfiture, I said, “Will you help me find the piece of paper?”
Her tone changed. She said, “Why should I help you?”
“Because you have a stake in this. Your family would get a share from selling the necklace.”
“Eddie says that if it’s found in the hayloft, you might try to cut us out, because your dad and Cousin Dorothy own the farm.”
“I promise that your family will get a third.” Big words, since I probably had no control over what happened if the necklace were found. Even if we were the ones to find it.
We had reached the small house where the Drucquers lived. It looked sad and uninviting. I could understand why Ed and Kate wanted something better. I stopped the car in front and said, “Well?”
“I’ll make you a deal. I’ll help you if you’ll take me to the autumn dance.”
I looked at her to see if she was serious. I could tell by the firm set of her mouth and the determined look in her green eyes that she was. The annual semiformal dance was a week from Saturday. I had already asked Sylvia to go with me. The problem was that I couldn’t be seen with Sylvia. We had discussed that on Sunday, when we had walked and talked together. We had concluded that we wouldn’t go at all, because it wasn’t a dance to which people went stag.
I was stuck for an answer to Kate. I couldn’t tell her I was going with somebody else, because that was no longer true. I couldn’t tell her that even though I wasn’t going with Sylvia, we were still together. Kate was a member of the family, and I couldn’t trust her to keep quiet about it. The seconds dragged into minutes. Kate sat with her hands folded in her lap. She wasn’t going to budge. I had to say something.
Just as I was about to give up my quest to see Ed’s necklace paper, an idea popped into my head. I cleared my throat and said, “Would you like to go to the autumn dance with me?”
Kate looked at me, clearly startled. She searched my face to see if I was putting her on. She must have liked what she saw, because she finally said, “Yes, I would like that.” Then she smiled. Her smile was her best feature.
My plan, still in the process of formation, was to get Barney to take Sylvia to the dance. Barney liked Sylvia, but I didn’t see him as a threat to me. Sylvia knew that Kate was my cousin, so she shouldn’t have a problem with me taking her. That way, we could both go to the dance. We could even dance together. Dr. Graves couldn’t ding me for doing that, could he? Besides, I doubted that Dr. Graves would be at the dance. I would be safe—unless he had people spying on me the way he had wanted me to spy on Sylvia.
We walked up the cracked concrete path to the house. Kate produced a key and let us in. She dumped her books on the coffee table in the living room and took off her jacket. She wore a pink sweater underneath that went well with her hair. I had seen her in that sweater before.
“Would you like something to drink?” Kate asked, playing hostess.
“I think we’d better get to work,” I said. Now that we were in the house, I was nervous. What if Mrs. Drucquer came home?
If Kate had qualms about going through Ed’s belongings, she didn’t let them show. She led the way into a small bedroom. In addition to an unmade single bed, it contained a desk piled high with papers. A big and black old Royal typewriter sat in the middle of the desk. Ed must use it to write articles for the school paper.
Every newspaper reporter had a typewriter. Mine was an Olympia portable. Recently, I had been using it only for schoolwork. But I had an idea. I grabbed a sheet of scrap paper from a waste basket and inserted it in the typewriter. Then I typed the first line of the mysterious limerick I had received.
“What are you doing?” Kate asked.
“Just checking to see how good a typewriter this is.” I quickly pulled out the paper, folded it, and stuffed it in my pocket.
Kate opened a drawer of the desk and said, “Eddie keeps his girlie magazines hidden here. She reached under some papers and pulled out a nudist magazine. She began leafing through it and said, “This is fun
ny. I see naked girls all the time in the locker room.”
I didn’t see naked girls in the locker room, and Ed didn’t either. To us, this was educational material. Sure it was. I casually glanced over her shoulder.
She said, “This girl would look good in a bathing suit.”
I thought the girl looked good without a bathing suit. I’d better not look any more. I turned my attention to the desk. The paper had been in a black, three-ring binder. A quick search told me that it wasn’t on the desk. I sat in Ed’s chair and went through several desk drawers, but I couldn’t find it.
“Maybe the binder is in that drawer,” I said, referring to the one from which Kate had extracted the magazine.
“I didn’t see it,” Kate said.
I quickly riffled the papers in the drawer and didn’t see it either.
“Maybe it’s under the magazines,” I said.
I lifted them, avoiding the temptation to open them, and looked underneath. Sure enough, there was the binder. I pulled it out and replaced the magazines. With nervous fingers, I opened the binder. There were a number of papers in it, which had once belonged to Ralph. School papers. Math homework, mostly. Signed and dated by him. With marks, many of which were A’s. He had been a good student.
The necklace sheet of paper had been in the middle of the binder. I started leafing through the papers, with Kate looking over my shoulder. I turned the pages slowly, being careful not to enlarge the holes where the paper went through the rings of the binder.
“This is it,” I said, turning over a page to reveal a sheet that looked familiar. It had to be. I felt a thrill, as if I were discovering a treasure map. In fact, there was a map and it was of the hayloft. It was drawn in pencil and referred to something with a capital N. That had to be the necklace. The first thing I noticed was that the handwriting looked the same as that on the other papers. Small and neat.
“Do you think this could have been written by Ed?” I asked.
“No way. Eddie’s handwriting is big and scrawly.”
Samples of Ed’s handwriting abounded on the papers on the desk. I also glanced at the other papers in the notebook, written by Ralph. I had to agree with Kate. This couldn’t have been written by Ed, but it could easily have been written by Ralph. The map was the genuine article.
