Summer of the Monkeys (9 page)

“Maybe if we made some noise it would stir them up a little,” Papa said. “It’s worth a try anyway. You go over there and beat on that old hollow snag with your club, and I’ll do some whooping.”

I walked over to the snag, spit on my hands, and started whacking away with my club. It sounded like a war drum. Papa started whooping. Rowdy didn’t know what was going on, but figured that as long as we were making some noise, he might as well make some, too. He started bawling for all he was worth.

We made enough racket to scare the hoot owls out of the bottoms, but we sure didn’t stir up any monkeys. We listened and listened, but all we could hear was the droning tones of the noise we had made die away in the thick timber.

“Well,” Papa said, looking at me, “it sure looks like those monkeys have left the country. What are you going to do now?”

“There’s not but one thing I can do, Papa,” I said. “I’ll just have to go and have another talk with Grandpa. Maybe he can tell me what to do. I still believe those monkeys are around here somewhere.”

“That’s not a bad idea,” Papa said. “If I know your grandpa, he’s not going to let a bunch of monkeys get the best of him—not your grandpa.”

All the way back to Papa’s corn planter I was feeling terrible. What if those monkeys had left the country. There just wouldn’t be any pony or a .22, and that’s all there was to it.

Papa must have realized how I felt. “I wouldn’t feel too bad about this if I were you,” Papa said. “If you think those monkeys are still around here, I don’t think you have anything to worry about. I’m pretty sure that your grandpa will come up with something.”

“I sure hope he does, Papa,” I said. “It makes me sick to think how close I came to making all of that money and then to wind up without a nickel. If it hadn’t been for that smart-aleck monkey, I would probably be worth a million dollars by now.”

Papa laughed and said, “I’ll tell you what I’ll do. If you haven’t located those monkeys by the time I get this field planted, I’ll take a couple of days off and we’ll both look for them. I’d still like to see that smart monkey.”

When Papa said that, it was just like lighting the lamps in a dark room for me. I began to feel better and everything started looking good again.

Just as Papa unwrapped the check lines from the handles of the corn planter, he said, “As long as you’re going to the store, I think you should tell your mother where you’re going. She won’t worry so much if she knows you’re not down in the bottoms.”

“Yes, sir,” I said, and started for the house.

I didn’t think I’d have to do any explaining to Mama and Daisy about my monkey trouble, but I should have known better. After all, they were women folks.

They were both sitting out on the well curb, shelling early peas, when Rowdy and I came walking up. Mama looked at me, dropped the peas she had in her hand, and you would have
thought that it was the first time in her life that she had ever laid eyes on me.

“For heaven’s sake, Jay Berry!” Mama exclaimed. “What on earth happened? How did your clothes get torn like that?”

“Why nothing happened, Mama,” I said, trying to look as surprised as she was. “I was just running and got my clothes hung up in the bushes and tore them—that’s all.”

Before Mama could say anything else, Daisy had to put in her nickel’s worth. She giggled and said, “Jay Berry, you look just like my old rag doll did the time Rowdy got hold of her.”

It had been a terrible day for me. To have a monkey laugh at me was bad enough; but to have a girl laugh at me, even though it was my little sister, was a little too much.

“Mama,” I wailed, “you’d better make her stop giggling like that. It’s not funny.”

Mama was so interested in my torn clothes she ignored my plea altogether.

“Jay Berry, why were you running?” she asked. “Was something after you?”

I decided right then that if I could get out of it, I wouldn’t tell Mama everything that had happened down in the bottoms. I was afraid she might put a stop to my monkey hunting, and that was the last thing in the world I wanted.

“Aw, Mama,” I said, “what makes you think something was after me. You’re all the time thinking things like that. Every time I go to the bottoms you think something’s going to eat me up. You don’t see any blood on me, do you?”

The scared look vanished from Mama’s face, and everything would have been all right if it hadn’t been for Daisy. She just couldn’t leave well enough alone.

“Did you catch any monkeys, Jay Berry?” Daisy asked.

“No,” I growled, glaring at her. “I didn’t catch any monkeys. But I’m going to.”

“Where are your traps and gunny sack?” Daisy asked.

Boy! Boy! Boy! I loved my little sister very much, but she sure could ask some silly questions. I decided that I’d act like I didn’t even hear what she had asked me.

“Mama,” I said, “it looks like I can’t catch those monkeys with traps so I’m going back to the store and have another talk with Grandpa. Maybe he can tell me another way I can catch them. Do you need anything from the store?”

“No,” Mama said. “I don’t need anything today, but what did happen to your gunny sack and traps? Did you lose them?”

I never did lie to my mama, but right then I sure wanted to tell her one, but I didn’t.

“The monkeys got away with them,” I said as if it were something that didn’t amount to anything. “Well, I’d better be on my way to the store. I’d like to get back before dark.”

Daisy didn’t give me a chance to get started to the store. She popped up and said, “Did you say the monkeys got away with your traps and gunny sack, Jay Berry? How did they do that?”

“They stole them,” I said, almost shouting. “That’s how they did it. They stole everything I had. Now are you satisfied?”

Daisy laughed so loud it scared our old hens and they all started cackling. She grabbed up her crutch and headed for the house, squealing with laughter.

“Now, Mama,” I cried, “there she goes again, and you won’t say a word to her. You better make her stop. If I laughed at her, you’d jump all over me.”

“Jay Berry,” Mama said, looking at me real hard, “I think you’d better go on to the store before you get into it; but first you go in the house and change clothes. I wouldn’t want people to see you looking like that. They’d think we were starving to death.”

“Aw, Mama,” I said, “people aren’t going to think we’re starving to death just because I have a few holes in my britches. Every boy in the hills tears holes in his britches.”

“Now look, young man,” Mama said, “I’m in no mood for an
argument. If you want to go to the store, you’d better change your clothes, or you’re not going.”

Grumbling to myself, I went in the house and changed my clothes.

Grandpa was sitting on the porch of the store when Rowdy and I came walking up the road. He was just sitting there in his old rocking chair, with a fly swatter in his hand, looking off across the country.

As I walked up, Grandpa peered at me over the tops of his glasses and smiled. “You can take those monkeys out to the barn and put them in the corn crib,” he said. “They’ll be safe there.”

I grinned a little, but I didn’t want to.

“Aw, Grandpa,” I said, as I sat down beside him, “you know I don’t have any monkeys. I didn’t catch a one.”

“Didn’t catch any!” Grandpa said, trying to look surprised. “Why, I figured that you’d have a sack full of monkeys by now. What happened? Couldn’t you find them?”

“Oh, I found them all right,” I said. “It’s just like you figured it was. The bottoms are full of monkeys. All kinds of monkeys.”

“That’s fine,” Grandpa said. “That’s what I wanted to hear. Did you see that hundred dollar monkey?”

“See him!” I said. “I’ll say I saw him. I saw so much of that monkey I don’t care if I never lay eyes on him again. He’s the smartest thing that ever climbed a tree. I believe he’s smarter than the President.”

Grandpa laughed and said, “Oh, I don’t think he’s that smart, is he? For the good of the country, I hope he isn’t. What happened anyway?”

Taking a deep breath, I told Grandpa everything that had happened down in the bottoms. I didn’t leave out a thing.

Grandpa started fidgeting in his chair like something was biting him. He jerked out his old red handkerchief and made a big to-do about blowing his nose. I couldn’t see very much of his face for the
handkerchief, but what little I could see was as red as a busted watermelon. Grandpa was having a hard time holding back a good laugh. It always made me feel good to see my grandpa laugh because he laughed all over. But right then, I wouldn’t have enjoyed hearing Santa Claus laugh. I was miserable.

Grandpa finally got hold of himself and said, “I figured that monkey was smart, but I didn’t think he was that smart.”

“I didn’t either, Grandpa,” I said. “It’s a cinch that I’ll never catch him in a trap; and as long as he’s around, it doesn’t look like I’ll be able to catch any of the little monkeys either. I don’t know what to do now.”

Grandpa got that serious look in his eyes. “You know, it’s always a good idea to have more than one iron in the fire,” he said. “You watch the store for a few minutes. I’ll be right back.”

“Do you have another plan, Grandpa?” I asked.

“Sure, I have another plan,” Grandpa said. “That’s what grandpas are for, isn’t it? Don’t worry about catching those monkeys. Before you know it, we’ll have every one of them in the sack.”

Grandpa was the best boy perker-upper in the world. The way he was talking had me feeling like I was already sitting in the saddle and shooting at everything that moved. I watched Grandpa shuffle off toward the barn and disappear inside. He wasn’t gone long before I saw him coming back, carrying the oddest-looking outfit I’d ever laid eyes on. It was a long pole with a net on one end.

As Grandpa walked up, I said, “Grandpa, what in the world is that thing?”

Hefting the long pole in his hand, Grandpa chuckled and said, “To be truthful, I don’t know what it is. I don’t think it has a name. I guess right now is as good a time as any to give it a name. Let’s just call it a monkey-catching net.”

“A monkey-catching net!” I said, big-eyed. “Aw, Grandpa, you couldn’t catch a monkey with that thing, could you?”

“Well,” Grandpa said, still chuckling, “you’ll have to admit one thing, if you ever got a monkey in this outfit, he would sure be a caught monkey.”

On taking a closer look at the odd contraption, I could see that the pole part had eyes on it like the guides on a fishing rod, and two strings ran down from the loop of the net through the eyelets almost to the end of the pole. On the end of each string was a good-size celluloid ring—one was blue and the other was yellow.

“Grandpa,” I said, “what are all of those strings and rings for?”

“That’s what works the outfit,” Grandpa said. “Watch now.”

Poking the pole out in front of him, Grandpa pulled the yellow ring and the net opened. “Now let’s say there’s a monkey out there and you want to catch him,” he said, making a long swipe at an imaginary monkey. “Now he’s in the net. Watch closely. Here comes the good part.”

He pulled the blue ring and the net closed.

“See how it works,” he said. “What do you think of it?”

Once I had seen how the net worked, I was so pleased I couldn’t say a word. I just stood there staring at that wonderful monkey-catching net.

“Well,” Grandpa said, rather impatiently, “what do you think of it?”

“I think it’s a dandy, Grandpa,” I said. “That’s the slickest working thing I’ve ever seen. You’re right. If I ever get a monkey in it, he would sure be a caught monkey, wouldn’t he?”

“Do you think you could ever get close enough to a monkey to slap the net on him?” Grandpa asked.

I thought a minute and said, “I don’t think I could ever catch that hundred dollar monkey in it, Grandpa. He’s too smart to be caught that easy, but I might be able to catch the little ones. They’re not half as smart as that big monkey, and they don’t seem to be scary at all.”

“That’s all right,” Grandpa said. “You catch the little ones first,
and then we’ll figure out something for that hundred dollar monkey. We’re going to catch him, too, you know.”

Grandpa handed me the net, and just to get used to it, I made a few swipes with it. At first I had a little trouble with the ring-pulling part. I was closing when I should have been opening, but I finally got it and everything looked fine to me.

“Grandpa, I believe this is a better idea than those traps were,” I said. “All I have to do now is figure out how I’m going to get a monkey in this thing.”

Grandpa grunted, and taking the net from me, he laid it down on the ground. Motioning as he talked, he said, “I believe if I were you I’d work it this way. Right about where the end of the handle is, I’d dig a hole big enough for you and Rowdy to hide in. It might be a good idea to put some brush over the top of the hole so those monkeys can’t see you from the treetops. Then I’d take leaves and cover the handle and net until a monkey couldn’t see a thing.

“Be sure the net is open. Lay your apples in the center of the loop. Then crawl down in the hole and wait. When a monkey steps in to get an apple, just lift up on the handle, jerk the blue ring, and you’ll have one for sure.”

I saw right away that Grandpa’s idea was a jim-dandy, but there was one thing that was bothering me. “Grandpa,” I said, “that’s a good idea all right but I think we’re overlooking something—that hundred dollar monkey. He sits up in those sycamore trees and watches everything I do. If he sees me digging that hole and hiding that net, he won’t get in a mile of it. He won’t let any of those little monkeys get close to it either. How am I going to get around that?”

Grandpa frowned and started scratching his head. “Well, you could go down there tonight and dig that hole,” he said. “Monkeys don’t stir around at night. They go to sleep. Then in the morning you’d have to be there before they wake up. That way they wouldn’t know what went on.”

“By golly, Grandpa,” I said, “you sure think of everything, don’t you. That’s just what I’ll do. I’ll go down there tonight and dig the hole. Then in the morning all I’ll have to do is hide the net, put out my apples, and wait for those monkeys. I really believe we’ll out-fox them this time. I sure do. Don’t you?”