Shenanigans at Sugar Creek

ile Poetry and I made a lot of boy noise playing a tie-off game of pingpong, when we heard a door open at the head of the stai

ould make more noise and it wouldn't disturb any grown-up people's nerves, and would also be good for ours, it

p to Dragonfly to come on down and "play t

gic to something he'd smelled when he came in, or else it was

ng, pong-pong-pong-pong, sock, sock, sock.... Say, that little spindle-legged Dragonfly was good. He won the first game right off the bat. He really was a good athlete for such a thin little guy. "Hey, you guys!" h

d opened the door, and just as he did so, I heard a horse sneeze and a man's voice saying, "Whoa, there, Prince! Stand still!" and I knew

ce called. "An

he snow man we knew he'd seen yesterday, or the book, or anything. He was very nice, and a little later when he rode away on his great big beautiful prancing saddle horse, I thought maybe he was going to be a good teacher after all. The last thing he said to us just before he swung prancing Prince around and jogged up Poetry's lane to

beautiful brown saddle and Mr. Black's riding habit made me wish I had a big brown h

below zero.... Poetry went in the house and got his binoculars and we all climbed up on their chicken house which didn't have any snow on its roof, and started to look around Sugar Creek at different things. Little Jim grinned when he noticed there wasn't any snow on the r

th the binoculars focused in t

pping at Circus's house. Suppose maybe he's goi

and one of them was a real honest-to-goodness girl who wasn't afraid of mice or spiders, and sometimes I

ain toward Circus's house, the binoculars were focused, not on his house, but on our red brick schoolhouse farther across the field, and all of a sudden I let out a gasp and a yell, and felt a queer feeling inside of me, for right t

ht and easy to carry Pop's new ladder was, and remembering the story of The Hoosier Schoolmaster, and both of the boys not liking the Sugar Creek Gang, and Shorty Long especially not liking me terribly much, they had borrowed t

was looking through those binoculars, and was still standing on the roo

"'Smatter, Bill?" and Little Jim said in his mouse-like voice

r?" then he sneezed, which is what people sometimes do when all of a sudden they look

maybe." The ladder was on the side of the schoolhouse where I knew Mr. Black wouldn't see it when he got there. I whirled around, made a

was the matter and why was I in such a hurry, and how on earth could the schoolh

ould see in my mind's eye Pop's new ladder leaning up against the schoolhouse, and I knew that if Mr. Blac

seen, and why I was in a hurry. "We've got to get there first, and get that board off

ier Schoolmaster, there had

d he said, behind me between his short breath, "Those dirty bu

d him say that, yelled to us, and said, "

s pop's woods, we stopped and Poetry and I took a couple of quick looks through his binoculars tow

oodshed and he was taking their picture. I didn't see Circus there anywhere, and I wishe

of the guys with me, "we can m

far back. "I'm out of breath. I-can't

we can't make it. Look! There he goes now, right straight to

d I dropped down beside him. Dragonfly was still coming along not mo

to get to the schoolhouse first and he'd start the fire in the schoolhouse stove first, on account of he wouldn't se

tin can of kerosene which he kept in the corner, and in which he kept some neat little sticks standing. Those little sticks would be all soaked with kerosene from having stood there all night or longer, and he'd take them to the stov

himney, the smoke couldn't get out, and it'd have to come out of the stove somewhere, which it would, and the schoolhouse would be filled with smoke in a jiffy;

s already too late to get there before he went inside, without being seen. I knew that if I got there in time to hurry up that l

e was on the same side of the school the ladder was, and ab

make a bee-line for the schoolhouse, and zip up the ladder and take the board off. Then I'll climb back down, take the ladder and drag it around behind the schoolhous

leman I'd made up my mind I was going to try to be, would get a terrible licking, which

he fast run we'd just had, and Dragonfly said, "The ladder

and he had a far-away look in his eyes, like he was not only looking at the dry roof all around the schoolhouse c

y 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 t

ood a friend of mine, as T

rt up when I heard somebody running behind me and saying in a

d taught me never to go up a ladder until I was sure the bottom of it was safely set

r 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

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 cr

use 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

mney. Poetry heard me and dived out far enough from the schoolhouse to see me, and I hissed to him, "It's too late. The fir

me and said, "There's a

ack was thinking, and maybe was saying too. Smoke was pouring out of the chimney beside my face, but I knew th

Then Poetry had an idea and it was, "Come on down quic

and it's our swing board, o

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

ground in a few half jiffies, there would be a big hole in my trousers which I'd have t

the very next thing I learned awful quick, was I had land