Part 8 (1/2)

”Let ME do it,” Poetry said beside me, puffing hard from the fast run we'd just had, and Dragonfly said, ”The ladder'd break with you on it,” trying to be funny and not being.

Little Jim piped up and said, ”All the snow's off the roof right next to the chimney.” I looked at him real quick, and he had a far-away look in his eyes, like he was not only looking at the dry roof all around the schoolhouse chimney, but was thinking something very important, which he'd heard in church that morning, but which I hadn't....

”Here goes,” I said, my heart beating wildly. ”You guys stay here, and watch,” and Little Jim piped up and said, ”We will--we'll watch and--and--” I knew what he was going to say even before he said it, and for some reason it seemed like it was all right for him to say it, and it didn't sound sissified for him to, either. While I was climbing over that rail fence and making a dive for the schoolhouse and the ladder, Little Jim's whole sentence was tumbling around in my mind, and it was, ”We will--we'll watch and--and _pray_.”

Little Jim was almost as good a friend of mine, as Tom Till was, I thought....

A jiffy later I reached my pop's new ladder and started to start up when I heard somebody running behind me and saying in a husky whisper, ”Hey, Bill! Stop. Wait! Let me hold the ladder.”

I looked around quick and it was Poetry behind me, and I knew he was right. My pop had taught me never to go up a ladder until I was sure the bottom of it was safely set so it _wouldn't_ slip, or unless somebody stayed at the bottom to hold it so it _couldn't_.

A jiffy later, I was on my way up, and another steenth of a jiffy I was at the eaves, and, being a very good climber, I scrambled up the other little ladder that was made out of nailed-on boards, to the red brick chimney. I had to be as quiet as I could, though, on account of not wanting Mr. Black to hear me on the roof. I also was going to have to be careful when I took the board off so the sound of it sliding off wouldn't go down the chimney through the stove.

In another jiffy I'd have had the board off, and have given it a toss far out where it wouldn't have hit Poetry, and then I'd have been on my way down again, but when I took hold of the wide, flat board, I couldn't any more get it off than anything. I gasped out-loud when I saw why I couldn't get it off, and that was that there was a nail driven into each end of it, and a piece of stove pipe wire was wrapped around the head of each nail and then the wire was twisted around and around the brick chimney, down where it was smaller, and that crazy old board wouldn't budge--an almost _new_ board, rather, and as soon as I saw it, I knew it was the board out of the swing which we have in the walnut tree at our house.... Why, the dirty crooks! I thought.

They wanted it to be _sure_ to look like Bill Collins put it up here.

I was holding onto the chimney, in fact I was sort of behind it, so I wouldn't slide down.... I could hear sounds down in the schoolhouse of somebody doing something to the stove, which must have been Mr. Black finis.h.i.+ng laying the fire, 'cause right that second I heard a sound like an iron door closing on the big round iron Poetry-shaped stove, and almost a second later, a puff of bluish smoke came bursting out through a crack where the board didn't quite cover the chimney on one side, and I knew that the fire was started. I knew that in a few jiffies that one-room school would be filled with smoke, and a mad teacher would come storming out to see what on earth was the matter with the chimney, and I'd be in for it.

”Hey!” I hissed down to Poetry, s.h.i.+elding my voice with my hand so the sound would go toward Poetry instead of down the chimney. Poetry heard me and dived out far enough from the schoolhouse to see me, and I hissed to him, ”It's too late. The fire's already started. What'll I do. I can't get it off. They've wired it on. If I had a pair of pliers, I could cut the wire.”

And Poetry yelled up to me and said, ”There's a pair in the schoolhouse.”

The awfulest sounds came up the chimney from down inside the schoolhouse, and I could just imagine what Mr. Black was thinking, and maybe was saying too. Smoke was pouring out of the chimney beside my face, but I knew the crack was too small for _all_ the smoke to get out, and the room down there would be filling up with smoke....

What on earth to do, was screaming at me in my mind.... Then Poetry had an idea and it was, ”Come on down quick, and let's run. Let's leave the ladder and everything!”

”But it's my pop's ladder, and it's our swing board, out of our walnut tree swing.”

”I say, let's _run_!” Poetry half yelled and half hissed up to me, and for some reason, knowing I couldn't get the board off the chimney, and guessing what might happen if I got caught, it seemed like Poetry's idea was as good as any, and so I turned and started to scoot my way down the board ladder on the roof to the ladder Poetry would be holding for me, and then--well, I don't know how it happened, but my boot slipped before I could get my feet on pop's ladder, and I felt all of me slipping toward the edge of the roof--slipping, slipping, slipping, and I knew I wouldn't be able to stop myself. In a jiffy, I'd be going slippety-sizzle over the edge of the eaves and land with a wham at Poetry's feet. I might even land on him and hurt him; and even while I was sliding, I heard a sickening sound in the schoolhouse somewhere, like a stove was falling down, or a chair was falling over or something, and then my feet were over the edge, and I was grasping and grasping with my bare hands at the slippery roof, and they couldn't find anything to hold onto, and then I heard another sound that was even more sickening than the one I'd heard in the schoolhouse and it was a ripping and tearing sound, and then felt a long sharp pain on me somewhere and I knew my trousers had caught on a nail or something....

R-r-r-r-r-r-ip!... R-r-r-r-r-r-ip! Tear-r-r-r-r-! And I knew that when I would hit the ground in a few half jiffies, there would be a big hole in my trousers which I'd have to explain to Mom when I got home, as well as a lot of other things to both Mom and Pop.

The next thing I knew I was off the edge and falling and the very next thing I learned awful quick, was I had landed ker-wham-thud in a snow drift at the foot of the ladder.

10

Even while I was falling and scared and feeling the long sharp pain running up and down my hip where I'd probably been scratched by a nail, I was wondering what would happen next--what Mr. Black would do, and what would happen when I got home, and also I was wondering how bad I would be hurt when I fell--and then I lit ker-fluffety-sizzle in that big snowdrift....

And there I was, Bill Collins, the one member of the Sugar Creek Gang who had made up his mind he wasn't going to have anything to do with smoking a teacher out of his schoolhouse, the one who was going to be what is called a gentleman, now lying upside down in a scrambled-up heap, with one of my trouser legs ripped maybe half way down, and myself all covered with snow and with my mind all tangled up and everything.

The fall didn't hurt much though, on account of the snowdrift being pretty deep, but we had to do something and do it quick.

Just that minute, I heard the schoolhouse door open around in front and while I was trying to scramble to my feet, I looked toward the front of the school and right that second Mr. Black came swis.h.i.+ng around on our side of the schoolhouse with a big pail in his hand and swooped with it down onto a snowdrift, scooped up a pailful of snow and without even looking in our direction dived back around the corner of the schoolhouse like he was half scared to death, and right that second Poetry yelled to Dragonfly and Little Jim who were still hiding behind the rail fence to ”Hurry up! I think the schoolhouse is on fire inside! Let's go help Mr. Black put it out.”

And so I, Bill Collins, an imaginary gentleman, but not looking like even a half a one, staggered out of my snowdrift, and the four of us made a dive for the front of the schoolhouse and around to the open door, which had smoke pouring out of it, to see if we could help Mr.

Black put out the fire, if there was one.

”I can't go in,” Dragonfly said, ”I'm allergic to smoke. It'll make me sneeze.”