the wall. He always runs them that way,” he added as a final explanation. After a pause he said moodily, “I usually detour, but I guess today I was thinking about something else and forgot. Then all of a sudden zing!—and boy, I jumped about a thousand feet in the air, believe me! So anyway I went up the telephone pole like I said, because I figured he could probably outrun me even if he is a big slob, and then there wasn’t any way to get down except the same way and he was there with that old pump gun. I didn’t think he was ever going to leave.”
“Why didn’t you call for help?”
“Well, because if I did he’d of probably got sore at me and then I’d really’ve got fixed.”
Mrs. Bridge had become so confused that she could not even begin to understand this statement; she gazed at him in despair. “Well, don’t you know where this boy lives?”
Douglas shook his head.
“He must go to school somewhere, doesn’t he?”
Douglas didn’t know. “He’s one of those big high-school guys, except he’s probably too dumb. They probably expelled him.”
“But you must know something about him.”
“He’s a big fat slob!” Douglas said, flaring up. He was getting peeved with his mother for asking so many questions; he had been trapped on the garage, he had escaped, that was all there was to it. He hated Peters, but that was irrelevant. He wished his mother would drop the subject.
The case had begun to seem a little weaker to Mrs. Bridge. She was on the point of telephoning the Sixty-third Street police station, for she was certain Douglas was telling the truth and she knew perfectly well that a beebee gun could put out someone’s eye, and yet she could not very well call the police station to report a high-school boy with a beebee gun—just that and nothing more.
“But can’t you tell me anything about him? Anything at all?”
Douglas shook his head. He could have found out more about Peters, but there was no need to. He would avoid Pfeiffer’s from now on and that was all there was to it.
“I’m going to tell your father about that boy,” she said positively.
“Something ought to be done about him.”
“Okay by me,” Douglas assented. “Can I have some more potatoes and gravy?”
“May I?”
“Okay, may I?”
23 • ROCK FIGHT
Mr. Bridge did hear about the next adventure.
On his way home from the public school one afternoon shortly before the start of summer vacation, Douglas came across Tarquin seated beneath a chestnut tree. There was a book in his lap and he seemed to be innocently reading. Douglas was carrying a weed he had pulled up, and was using it to whip the horse on which he was making an escape from some Indians.
“Whoa!” said Douglas softly, reining to a stop. Then, conscious that Tarquin knew about the fictitious horse and was snickering at him, he abandoned the game and dropped the weed.
“Hello,” Tarquin said without moving.
After a pause Douglas said, “H’llo.” After another pause, during which he gazed up into the branches of the chestnut tree and industriously scratched first one ankle and then the other, he added, “What’re you doing here?”
“Haven’t I a right to be here?”
Douglas was thinking this over when Tarquin suddenly threw a rock at him. He had kept the rock hidden under the book. Douglas saw it coming and ducked, but even so it scraped the side of his head.
“Okay,” he said. “You asked for it,” and ran forward with his fists doubled up.
When he got home later that afternoon, after stopping by the high school to watch the track team at practice, and having searched the bleachers for valuables, he was disconcerted to find not only that his father was at home but that he had heard about the fight with Tarquin. Mrs. Leacock had telephoned Mr. Bridge at the office.
“Well, he started it,” said Douglas defensively, and when told to continue with his version of the fight he said, “Well, he sort of jumped up and took out across the streetcar tracks toward Wornall Road, so I took after him—and boy, I just about didn’t make it—and he kept yelling over his shoulder how I better not touch him because he knew how to fight with jiu-jitsu and—”
“What do you mean you just about didn’t make it? Didn’t make what?”
“Boy, that streetcar just about got me. But anyway, he—”
“Tell this to me again,” said Mr. Bridge. He had been standing up; now he seated himself and listened to the story with extreme attention. “Do you mean,” he asked, “that Tarquin threw the rock at you and led you across the tracks in front of a streetcar?”
Douglas nodded enthusiastically. He had, in fact, come very close to being hit.
“I see,” Mr. Bridge said. For a long time he was lost in thought, but finally he glanced up and said, “I understand you caught him.”
“Oh, sure. He runs like a girl. That’s because he’s knockkneed.”
“So then what transpired?”
Douglas gazed at his father doubtfully.
“What happened next?”
“Oh. Well, let’s see. I sort of punched him in the nose once or twice, I think.”
“You think?”
“I guess I did.”
“Was that the end of the fight?”
“Pretty much. I suppose you could actually say it was because he started to bawl like a little kid, so—uh—that’s about all.”
“Go on.”
Douglas groaned and made an agonized face. He was embarrassed about this next item because he knew he had not behaved very well. Unfortunately it was impossible to distract his father in the way he could usually distract his mother, so he did not even try to change the subject. Reluctantly he said, “I can’t stand cry-babies.”
“Go on.”
Douglas heaved a deep sigh. “Okay, okay. I hauled off and socked him one in the breadbasket.”
“While he was lying down?”
“He was up. I mean he was up when I let him have it in the breadbasket. Then he fell down again and wouldn’t get up any more even when I dared him to. He only lay there and screamed about how he was going to stab me to death.” Scarcely had he finished saying this when he became aware of a change in his father’s attitude; inquiringly he looked at his father, and next at his mother, who had been lingering in the hall.
With modest
