Читать книгу Pee-wee Harris: As Good As His Word - Percy Keese Fitzhugh - Страница 6

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Of course Googy knew that he could not go on leading this double life forever. He knew that he would stand in the box in the field at the end of Barrel Alley with all eyes upon him, blushing scarlet, trembling, but happy. Then the great big outer world would know. But he would not have to tell them.

“Come on up,” said Pee-wee; “gee whiz, you don’t have to go back to the Home yet, do you?”

“I don’t have to be back till five,” said Googy.

Rather hesitatingly, for he had never decorated the roof of a private garage before, he ascended by means of the window ledge and the top of the open door and crawled up to the peak where he sat side by side with Pee-wee. There before him in the spread-out paper were two articles.

One was a headliner and that was about the Grand Clean-up Drive featuring Mayor Rufstuff and several local officials, giving them vast credit for originality and public spirit for an enterprise which they had never dreamed of prior to the receipt of the program forwarded by some distant civic organization. That was the Evening Bugle all over.

Nestling unpretentiously down in a corner under a very modest heading was another article as follows:

HOME BOYS TO PLAY RIDGEDALE

The baseball team of the Martha Caldwell Home is to play the Ridgedale team on Temple’s Field on Saturday next. The Home team is as follows:

Halstead Tanner,	pitcher
George Battel,	catcher
Forrest Blythe,	1st base
Harry Davey,	2nd base
Charles McMann,	3rd base
Edwin Corry,	left field
Daniel Carter,	right field
John Wyne,	center field
William Jones,	short-stop

It was just one of those notices sent in by the Home and was certainly in no sense obtrusive in the paper. But Googy could see nothing but his own name at the top of the list. It glowed there as if it were written in fire. If it had been scrawled across the black heaven in shining stars it could not have been more conspicuous. Halstead Tanner, pitcher. At the top of the list—first. He—Googy!

In his glowing, secret pride he heard Pee-wee say, “Look at this big one with the big heading. I’m going to join it. Look where it says there’s going to be a banquet. Do you know what those are?”

Googy did not know what those were and he did not care. But he could afford to be generous and show an interest and listen while Pee-wee read, offering occasional original comments. The feature article, together with Pee-wee’s running commentary, are given intact:

MAYOR RUFSTUFF STARTS BIG CLEAN-UP DRIVE

Again Shows His Public Spirit and Initiative

by Big Campaign for Clean Streets

BOY SCOUTS TO SERVE

Mayor Rufstuff has decided on a Clean-up Drive. The Health Department is with him. Chief Bray [gee, I’ve got no use for him] is resolved that the town ordinances for maintaining clean streets shall be enforced.

Each boy scout in town [I’m one of ’em] is to be made a special officer for the enforcement of the laws relating to tidiness and cleanliness of the public places and thoroughfares.

Each scout is to be given a district and it will be his duty to see that the streets of his territory are kept clear of refuse. He will pick up papers, remonstrate with citizens who litter the streets and leave refuse uncovered and if necessary report them to the proper authorities.

He will go into candy stores and bakeries [gee whiz, lots of times I do that] and will ask proprietors to keep edibles under cover and free of insect pests. It will be his duty to visit fruit and peanut stands [that’s easy, I visited lots of ’em] and see that fruit and candy are covered, and it will be his especial care to see that ash and garbage utensils are properly covered when standing on the public streets.

At intervals during the campaign the neighborhood leaders are to meet at the armory to discuss progress, when speeches will be made and refreshments served [yum—yum—mmm, I’ll be there]. And the campaign is to open with a gala banquet to be given to the willing workers.

And so on and so on.

“Don’t you wish you were a scout,” said Pee-wee, “and could go round outside everywhere you want to? You bet I’m going to be a neighborhood leader.”

“I don’t care,” said Googy.

“You only say that because you can’t do it,” said Pee-wee. “I’ll have my name printed in the paper, you see.”

This was almost more than Googy could bear. “I don’t care,” he said. “I got things to be glad about.”

“What have you got?” Pee-wee asked incredulously. “Do you mean to tell me I won’t have more fun than you will going to banquets and everything and visiting candy stores and bakeries? Even, maybe, I’ll have a club; I have to be no respecter of persons.”

“You have to have respect,” said Googy.

“No, you don’t.”

“You do, too, you have to respect grown-up people.”

“That shows how much you know,” Pee-wee said; “the law hasn’t got any respect for anybody. Gee whiz, I had to write that a hundred times after school—I ought to know it.”

“Not even old ladies and—and lame people?” Googy inquired incredulously.

“Not even anybody, everybody’s the same; the law doesn’t have any respect for them.”

Googy pondered on this astonishing bit of information. Respect for one’s elders and teachers and parents was the rule of the Martha Caldwell Home. Respect for the law and the institution’s rules was emphasized to all the boys there. And here was this little oracle straddling the roof top telling him that the law itself was without this worthy quality. To him Pee-wee was almost as great as the law, so he did not contradict him, but he did not understand it.

“I’ll be the boss, maybe, of a whole block,” said Pee-wee. “Maybe I’ll have to stay out at night as late as midnight, maybe, except when I’m eating at banquets. I’m going to join in to-morrow, you can bet. I bet you wish you could join in that, I bet you do, and have all you want to eat and be the boss of people and even have your name in the papers.”

This was more than Googy could bear and he delivered his knock-out blow. He had intended to defend his lot in life by the reminder that he often had two desserts at the Home, but Pee-wee’s proud mention of newspaper publicity was too much for him.

“Do you see that top name in the baseball line?” he asked with nervous elation. “Do you see it?”

“Sure, I see it,” said Pee-wee.

“Do you—do you know who it is?”

“It’s that big feller that always goes first when you march to school.”

Googy could not speak and he would not tax Pee-wee’s credulity with a verbal announcement. He pulled out of his pocket a crumpled paper which he treasured. It was his pass giving him the privilege of absenting himself from the Home grounds each afternoon to go upon his route. It bore his own name—Halstead Tanner. He held, it up against the newspaper announcement with trembling hand as if inviting a comparison of colors.

“It’s—it’s me,” he said. “That’s my name. Nobody knows it, but it is. That’s my real, true name.”

Pee-wee nearly fell off the roof.