Summer of the Monkeys (13 page)

I had just about decided to give up and go home when all at once I heard that hundred dollar monkey squall. I perked up like our old hens did when a chicken hawk came flying around.

“Did you hear that, Rowdy?” I whispered. “It was that hundred dollar monkey. We’re still in business.”

I raised up to where I could peek through the brush and started looking for monkeys. At first I couldn’t see a thing. Then I saw one. He was a little brown monkey and was sitting on a stump about thirty feet away.

I was keeping my eyes on him when that big monkey let out another squall. From down in the hole, I couldn’t tell where he was, but I knew that he was close by. Peering up through the brush, I saw him. He was sitting on a low limb of the bur oak tree, directly above my net, looking down at the apples.

I could tell by the big monkey’s actions that apples were just what he wanted for breakfast, but he couldn’t seem to convince himself that everything was all right.

He stood up on his short legs and started looking things over.
Once he looked straight at my hiding place, and I all but crawled down in my skin.

“Rowdy,” I whispered, “he’s looking for us but I think we’ve got him fooled this time.”

As if he had finally made up his mind, the big monkey squalled again and started moving backward and forward on the limb—all the time uttering those deep grunts.

“Rowdy,” I whispered, “he’s talking to those little monkeys. I know he is because he did the same thing before. I wonder what he’s saying to them this time.”

The big monkey must have been telling the little monkeys that everything looked all right to him because here they came. A whole passel of them dropped down from the branches and started grabbing apples.

I couldn’t see my net for monkeys. They were standing all over it. Very gently, I took hold of the handle with my left hand and caught hold of the blue ring with my right hand. Using the rim of the hole for leverage, I jerked down on the handle and yanked the blue ring.

Just as I pulled the ring, I heard the big monkey let out a warning cry, but it was too late. The net had already closed.

I couldn’t see too well through the brush but I could tell that I had caught something, for the handle of the net was jerking in my hand more than it did when I had Old Gandy wound up in it.

When the net flipped up out of the leaves and grass, it scared the monkeys half to death. Screeching and chattering, they scattered in all directions and disappeared in the timber.

Rowdy and I threw brush all over the bottoms when we came boiling up out of the hole. My eyes all but popped out of my head when I saw that I had caught two little monkeys in my net. I was so pleased I whooped like a possum hunter whooping to his dog.

“I’ve got them, Rowdy,” I shouted. “I got two of them. Look at ’em.”

Rowdy was just as pleased as I was. Wagging his long tail, he ran over and started barking and growling at the flouncing monkeys.

The monkeys were so cute and I was so happy that I had finally caught one, I couldn’t keep my hands off of them. I wanted to touch one. Working the handle back through my hands until the net was close to me, I poked a finger through the mesh and tickled one in the ribs.

I wouldn’t have been more surprised if I had stuck my finger in the firebox of Mama’s cook stove. The monkey squeaked and sank his teeth in my finger. I dropped the net and did a little squalling myself.

Slinging my hand and doing a jig-jig dance, I shouted, “You bit me. What did you do that for? I wasn’t going to hurt you.”

Rowdy had seen the monkey bite me and he really got mad. He darted in, grabbed one of the monkeys—net and all—in his mouth and started shaking it.

“No, Rowdy, no!” I yelled. “Don’t you hurt that monkey.”

I yelled too late. It seemed the monkey just turned over in his skin and sank his needle-sharp teeth right in the end of Rowdy’s nose.

Rowdy wouldn’t have turned loose of a bumblebee any faster than he did that monkey. He bawled and jumped back so fast he almost fell over backwards. Sitting down on his rear, he looked at me and started whimpering.

“Well, don’t look at me,” I said, “I can’t help you. I got bit, too.”

It was then that I realized I really had a problem. How was I going to get those monkeys out of the net and into my gunny sack.

“Rowdy,” I said, “for all the good this sack is doing us, we may as well have left it at home. I can’t get my hands close to those monkeys. They would eat me up.”

I decided that I’d just take monkeys, net, and all to the house and maybe Mama and Daisy could help me figure out something.

Holding the net out in front of me as if I were carrying a couple
of poison snakes, I started for home. I hadn’t gone a hundred yards when the unexpected happened. That hundred dollar monkey dropped down from a sycamore tree and landed smack in the center of the game trail I was walking on. Rowdy and I wouldn’t have stopped more suddenly if we had run face on into a white oak tree.

Standing on his short stubby legs and waving his long arms in the air, the big monkey started squalling. He lay down on the ground and rolled over and over. Every little while he would jump up and rush straight at me, showing his teeth, and uttering those deep grunts. He squalled and he screamed. Then he began picking up sticks and chunks and throwing them at me.

Usually when I got scared I could almost outrun my shadow, but I was beyond being scared, I was paralyzed. All I could do was stand there like I was in a trance, hold onto my net, and stare at that big monkey.

Rowdy was between the monkey and me. Every hair on his back was standing straight up. He was growling way down deep and showing his teeth to that squalling monkey.

A full minute went by before it dawned on me that I was still in one piece. When I realized this, I began noticing things. Every time the big monkey ran at me he only came a little way, then he would turn and shuffle back. He was bluffing. I was so sure of it that I got a little of my courage back, but not very much.

“Rowdy,” I said, in a croaking voice, “don’t jump on that monkey. I don’t think he means to harm us. I think he’s bluffing, or at least I hope he is.”

On hearing my voice, the big monkey went all to pieces. He squalled and here he came shuffling along the ground with his big mouth open and grunting. He came close enough this time to grab the metal loop of my net and start jerking on it.

Every time the big monkey jerked the net his way, I would jerk it back my way. We played tug of war for a few seconds, then he turned his end loose and ran back down the trail a little ways. He
lay down in the dirt and started squalling and screaming and cutting all kinds of capers. I thought he was having a fit.

All the time this was going on, I had the feeling that the big monkey was trying to tell me something. I tried hard to figure out what it was but I was so scared I couldn’t. Just then here he came again, scooting along on the game trail, screaming and making enough racket to scare a goblin to death. He grabbed my net and started jerking on it again.

It was the same thing all over. We had another jerking session. Again the big monkey turned his end of the net loose, ran back down the trail, lay down, and had another rolling, squalling fit. As I stood there holding onto my net and watching that monkey throw a tantrum, I figured out what it was that he was trying to tell me. He was telling me to turn the little monkeys loose.

“Rowdy,” I said, “I believe that silly monkey wants me to turn these little ones loose. But he can just keep on wanting. After all I’ve gone through to catch them, there’ll be whiskers on the moon before I let them go. Why, I’ll fight him all over these bottoms.”

All at once the big monkey stopped squalling and the bottoms got as still as a graveyard. In the silence, an uneasy feeling came over me. Great big drops of sweat popped out on me. I could almost taste the tension.

Never taking my eyes from that big monkey, I said in a low voice, “Rowdy, I don’t like this a bit. I have a feeling that something is going to happen.”

I had no more than gotten the words out of my mouth when something did happen. Another monkey dropped down out of nowhere and lit on the ground not over ten feet from me. Not making a sound, it just stood there staring at me.

I was having an eyeball fight with that monkey when another one came from somewhere and plopped himself down on the other side of me. The first thing I knew there was a complete circle of monkeys all around Rowdy and me. They started walking
around us stiff-legged, with their tails standing straight up, and looking at us sideways.

“Rowdy,” I said, “I believe these monkeys are up to something. You’ve been wanting to jump on them, and from the looks of things, I think you’re going to get the chance.”

Old Rowdy wasn’t scared. He kept looking at me and waiting for the “Get-um” sign.

I couldn’t stand it any longer. Something had to be done. I jerked off my old straw hat, threw it at one of the monkeys, and shouted, “You get away from here. Get now!”

I may as well have been telling Sally Gooden not to jump over the pasture fence. The monkeys didn’t even act like they had heard what I said. They just kept circling around and around and around. I could see that the circle was getting smaller and smaller.

I almost unscrewed my head from my neck following those circling monkeys with my eyes.

“Rowdy,” I said, “we’ve got to do something. We can’t just stand here and let these monkeys play ring-around-the-rosy with us.”

Just then that hundred dollar monkey started grunting that monkey talk again. The little monkeys must have understood what he was saying, for they stopped circling us. They just stood there on their spindly legs, staring straight at Rowdy and me with no expression at all on their silly little faces.

This was too much for me. Every nerve in my body was twanging like the “e” string on a fiddler’s fiddle. I was trying to figure out which way to run when it happened. A small monkey with a long skinny tail dropped down from a branch directly above me and landed right on top of my head. He grabbed a wad of my hair in all four of his tiny paws; then he leaned over and took hold of my right ear with his teeth. I dropped my net and squalled at the same time.

Shouting, “Get-um, Rowdy!” I reached up with both hands,
grabbed that monkey by the tail, and started pulling. It was like pulling on the rubbers of my beanshooter. The harder I pulled, the longer that monkey seemed to get. I learned something right then. The long skinny tail of a monkey is the best thing in the world to get a good hand hold on.

Closing my eyes and gritting my teeth, I gave a hard jerk on the monkey’s tail. Along with a lot of my hair and skin, he came loose.

I was never so mad in all my life.

I still had a good hold on the monkey’s tail, and before he could turn around and bite my hands, I started turning in a circle as fast as I could. About halfway in the middle of the third turn I let loose. He sailed out over the bottoms like a flying squirrel and lit in the top of a good-size bush.

The little monkey didn’t seem to be hurt at all. He let out a squeak and hopped down to the ground. For a second he stood on his hind legs and showed his needle-sharp teeth; then here he came again—straight at me—ready for some more fighting.

He hadn’t taken over three steps when all at once he fell over backwards. He got to his feet again, took a few more steps, and this time he fell flat on his face. He was so dizzy from that whirlwind I had put him through he couldn’t seem to do anything. This tickled me.

I yelled, “How do you like that, you little devil? If you jump on my head again, I’ll sling you clear into Arkansas.”

My fight with the monkey had taken only a few seconds. During that time, I had been so busy I had completely forgotten about Old Rowdy. On hearing a loud bellow from him, I turned to see how he was making out. Boy, did I ever get a surprise.

I saw right away that Rowdy had made a terrible mistake. He was having the fight of his life. He usually enjoyed a good fight, but from the looks and sounds of things, I didn’t think he was enjoying this fight very much. He didn’t seem to be making any headway at all.

Rowdy was built just right for good monkey biting and the monkeys had sure taken advantage of this. It looked like every square inch of his hide had a monkey glued to it. His long legs and tail were covered with monkeys. Two of the little devils were sitting right on the top of his head, holding on with all four paws. And they had their teeth clamped on his soft tender ears. More monkeys were lined up on his back like snowbirds on a fence; biting, clawing, and squealing. The hair was really flying.

The monkeys were so quick Rowdy couldn’t get ahold of them. Every time he snapped at one, he would wind up with a mouth full of air and no monkey.

I saw right away that if I didn’t do something the monkeys were surely going to have a hound dog for breakfast. Looking around for a good whipping stick, I spied one about ten feet away and darted over to get it. The monkeys must have realized what I intended to do, for just as I stooped over to get the stick, a little monkey flew in from somewhere and landed right in the middle of my back.

I forgot all about the stick and was trying to reach around behind me and get ahold of the monkey’s tail when another one darted in and latched onto my leg. I was trying to get ahold of that one when another one came squeaking in and bit me on the hand.

In a matter of seconds, I had monkeys all over me. They were biting, clawing, scratching, and squealing. I was hopping all over the place and making more racket than a tomcat with his tail caught in a mouse trap.

Just when things were looking really bad for Rowdy and me, from high in the bur oak tree, the big monkey let out a few grunts and a loud squall. He must have been telling the little monkeys not to eat us completely up—to save a little for the next time—because they turned us loose and disappeared in the underbrush.

Everything had happened so fast, it left Rowdy and me in a daze. I could hardly believe it. One minute we were fighting monkeys
all over the place, and the next minute there wasn’t a monkey in sight. We just stood there in the silence about twenty feet apart looking at each other.