The haunted hound; Read online

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  •aSCHOQU

  THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO BINGEY AND BARBIE

  THE HAUNTED HOUND

  CHAPTER ONE

  Jonathan Barrett put the report card and the note from his teacher between the pages of his arithmetic book. As he walked slowly through the schooKard he felt hopeless. And lonely. For a little while, as he walked across the school playground, he wondered what his father was going to say about the report card. But, as Jonathan turned and started down the avenue, he knew that his father wouldn't say much, if anything. He never did. He just looked for a long time at the red F's Jonathan made and then looked away.

  Last June, when he had failed the eighth grade, his father had asked him whether he thought he could pass by going to summer school. Now, with the long, hot das of summer school almost over, Jonathan was sorry that he had said he would pass. Slowing down, he opened the arithmetic book again and looked at the report card. The passing marks were in black ink, but the F's for failing were in red so that they stuck up like little stumps.

  Mr. Schreiker, his teacher, had told him that morning that his only chance of passing was to do well on the final

  exam Monday. ''You had better do some work over the week end/' Mr. Schreiker had advised him.

  It wouldn't do any good, Jonathan knew. He just couldn't understand arithmetic. He could study the stuff until his eyes fell out but it wouldn't make him understand it.

  Walking along, he wondered if other boys ever felt the way he did. He wondered if they hated to go home the way he did. And if they were ever lonely. Jonathan thought particularly of Tim Brent, a boy in the eighth grade who was just about his best friend. Tim never minded going home because there was always something to do around his house. For instance, Tim had a dog. It was only a little cur dog, a feist with a snipey face and a bad humor, but it was a dog. And in Tim's back yard Tim had a house of his own. It wasn't anything but a leanto shed, but it belonged to Tim, and no one could go in and bother his things. Tim always had somebody to play with, too, if it was only his sister Susie.

  What did he have? Jonathan asked himself. Nothing. He lived in an apartment so high above the ground that people down on the street looked like bugs. And if he wanted to do anything—like building something, or fixing his bicycle-Mrs. Johnson, who kept house for them, wouldn't let him. Whatever he did either made too much noise, or too much mess, or just generally got in Mrs. Johnson's way. She didn't even like the television shows that he liked. And when his father was home it was almost as bad. His father always had so much work to do and was so tired. Whenever his father

  was there, Mrs. Johnson went around on tiptoe saying *'Shhh'' every minute or so. '

  As Jonathan turned the corner into his street, he almost bumped into Tim Brent.

  ''Hi, Jon! Where vou been all summer?'' Tim asked.

  ''Oh, around,'' Jonathan said.

  "Around where? I haven't seen you at the lake or the movies or anywhere."

  "Just around," Jonathan said.

  Tim looked at him and then glanced down at the arithmetic book. "What's that ugly thing in your hand, Jon?" he asked.

  "A book."

  Suddenly Tim seemed embarrassed. "Oh, yeah," he said. "I remember."

  Jonathan nodded. "Summer school. I'm not right bright, you know."

  "You just had hard luck, Jonny. Anyway, it's about over, isn t it?

  "The exam's Monday. Then it'll be over."

  Tim smiled. "Why don't we get together Sunday night and relax a little? It'd do you good and help you, too. Take your mind off it so you'll be fresh for the exam."

  "All right," Jonathan said.

  "We'll just do that," Tim told him. "I gotta go now before my mama gets tired of waiting for me to bring the groceries. See you Sunday."

  Jonathan nodded and watched Tim walk away. He

  wished that he was hke Tim, with something to do all the time, even if it was just getting groceries for his mother.

  Jonathan began to wonder what it would have been like now if his mother hadn't died. He couldn't exactly tell, but he knew that it would have been a lot better. They would still be living out at the Farm, he knew that. And there wouldn't have been any Mrs. Johnson tiptoeing around. Maybe, if his mother hadn't died, his father wouldn't have had to work so hard, either. Maybe he could have gone on riding and hunting and fishing. Everything would have been different, Jonathan decided.

  Jonathan pushed open the solid glass doors of his apartment building and the elevator took him up to the two-story penthouse. Inside the apartment he didn't see or hear anyone, but he knew that Mrs. Johnson was there—he could feel that she was around.

  He wandered into the kitchen where Mamie, the colored cook, was sitting at the table reading the newspaper.

  ''Hi, Mamie," he said, going to the refrigerator. ''I flunked again."

  ''Land sakes!" Mamie said. "You going to break your dad's heart. If you were ignorant or something, it wouldn't be so bad, but you're about as smart as most people."

  "You saving this?" Jonathan asked, finding half a pie.

  "For you," she said, getting him a fork and a glass of milk.

  Jonathan sat down opposite her and began to cat.

  Mamie watched him for a little while, then she folded the

  newspaper and rested her elbows on it. ''What's the matter with you, boy?'' she asked. ''No reason in the world for you to flunk out of school all the time."

  "Mrs. J. home?" he asked, knowing that she was.

  "In her room," Mamie said. "Why don't you study a little harder, Jonathan? No reason in the world for you to be flunking in school all the time."

  Jonathan looked across the table at her. "I do, Mamie. But—all those problems. They just don't mean anything to me." He finished the pie, thanked her, and went back into the li'ing room.

  Mrs. Johnson was standing by the table, his arithmetic book in her hand. She was a tall, bony woman with a face so narrow that her eyes almost stuck out past the edges. She wore rimless glasses which would fall off whenever she talked. But they were tied to a thin black ribbon so just dangled until she took them, squinched up her nose, and pinched them back on again.

  His father had hired Mrs. Johnson to help the nurses when Jonathan's mother was so sick, and Mrs. Johnson had just stayed on after his mother died. Jonathan had nexer liked her, but he had gotten used to her.

  "Hello," he said, looking at his book. He didn't want her to see the report card before his father did.

  "Good afternoon. Jonathan, you know I've asked ou time after time not to leave your books lying around. Please take them into our room."

  Jonathan held out his hand for the book. Somehow, as

  the report card and the note fell out on the floor, he had known all along that they were going to. He stooped to pick them up, but she beat him to it.

  She turned the report card over. ''So. Another F.''

  ''That's right/' Jonathan said, holding out his hand for the card and the note.

  "What does this say?'' Mrs. Johnson asked, as she stuck her long, bony finger down into the unsealed envelope.

  Jonathan was suddenly furious. He started to grab the things out of her hands but stopped himself. "That isn't addressed to you," he told her. "It's for Dad."

  She didn't take her finger out, but she stopped moving it. "Jonathan, you seem to think that I'm not just as concerned over your failure in school as your father is."

  "Maybe you are," Jonathan admitted. "But if he wants you to know what's in there he'll show it to you. I don't think you have any right to open his mail/'

  "This isn't mail. It has no stamp on it/' she said, waving the note around.

  Jonathan
just kept on holding out his hand. At last she put the card and the note in it.

  "You be very sure you show that to your father, Jonathan."

  "You'd better ask him to make sure I do/' Jonathan said, knowing that she would. He put the things back into the book and returned to the kitchen.

  Mamie was standing so close to the swinging door it almost hit her.

  ''Jonathan, you ought to stop batthng with her," Mamie said in a low voice. ''Don't you know she goes right to your dad and tells on you? You just make things worse for yourself/^

  Jonathan smiled at her. "Dad doesn't believe all she tells him. He told me so.''

  Mamie sat down. "Things could be real peaceful around here—if," she said.

  "Yeah/' Jonathan said. "Is Dad home?"

  "Been home. He was packing up to go somewhere again but a man came. That Mr. Wilber."

  "Where's he going now?" Jonathan asked, wondering if his father would be in too much of a hurry to look at the report card.

  "Don't know. But there's no use your looking so glad. He's got to see that report card sometime. You just putting off."

  Jonathan nodded. "I'll go study," he told her.

  As he went back into the living room his father and Mr. Wilber came out of the den. "Hello, son," his father said. "You remember Mr. Wilber?"

  Jonathan shook hands with the man, and his father said, "Mr. Wilber's going to sell the Farm for us, Jonathan."

  "Is he?" Jonathan asked, thinking only about the report card and the letter from Mr. Schreiker.

  "He's going to try to."

  As the two men walked to the door, Mr. Wilber said, "Don't expect any miracles, Bill. The Farm's a big place and

  there aren't many people who can afford it. So it may take me a few months to sell it."

  ''That's all right. There's no hum."

  ''Fine." Then, at the door, Mr. Wilber stopped and laughed. "If I had a place like that, Bill, I certainly wouldn't live in a concrete dump like this. Especially an old fox hunter like you. Why don't you go back out there to live, Bill?"

  Jonathan's father's face got blank, and he said slowly, "Oh, well. Things have changed."

  Mr. Wilber stopped laughing. "Yes, they have, Bill." Then he went on out.

  Jonathan's father turned around and hurried up the stairs. Jonathan followed him slowly and, at the bedroom door, stopped as his father went on packing some shirts into a suitcase.

  Finally Jonathan held the arithmetic book out a little and said, "Dad."

  Without looking up his father said, "I wanted to talk to you about selling the Farm, but Jim Wilber dropped by and "

  Jonathan was thinking so hard about the red F that he hardly listened. "Dad, here's a letter and—"

  His father slammed the suitcase shut and lifted it off the bed. "Can it wait until I get back, son? Tve got about two minutes to catch a plane."

  "Sure," Jonathan said, feeling relieved all over.

  "Be back tomorrow or the next day," his father said,

  hurrying down the stairs. ''Don't give Mrs. J. any trouble, will you, Jon?" 1 won t.

  'Til let ou know when to cxpcet me and you can tell Mamie.''

  "All right.''

  At the door his father stopped and held out his hand. '* 'By, son. As soon as you get out of school, Til take you along on these junkets if you want to go."

  '' 'By, Dad. Have a good time."

  ''Lawyers never have a good time," his father said, and closed the door.

  For a moment, as he heard the faint hum of the elevator, Jonathan felt deserted and lonely. He almost wished that his father had had time enough to look at the report card. Even that would have been better than leaving him here with Mrs. Johnson.

  As he turned and walked slowly back toward his father's den he wondered when his father would come back. Lots of times he would go aw^ay expecting to come back the next day and then not return for three or four days.

  At his father's desk he opened the arithmetic book and started to study. In a little while, though, he was just sitting there watching the sun set beyond the misty green woods far away from the city.

  The apartment was quiet, and the light in the studv grew dimmer and dimmer as the sun went down.

  Slowly, without even realizing it, he stopped thinking

  about arithmetic, or his father, or his lonehness, and thought about the Farm instead. At first it wasn't even real thinking. He just remembered how the days always seemed to be warm with sunshine out there, and the nights were soft and dark and full of small sounds.

  After a while he began to remember things. The hound dogs his father had: big, sad-faeed Trombo foxhounds who sometimes barked at night. It was good to wake up and hear them baying the moon. But if they woke up his father he would stomp out on the upstairs sleeping porch and yell at them to be quiet. And the horses. Jonathan could remember back almost to when he first rode a horse all by himself. He must have been about four or five years old.

  He remembered the Big Pond and the Little Pond, and he could almost see again some of the fish he had caught.

  Why was it, he asked himself now, that when there were woods around you there was always something to do? Why wasn't he ever lonesome when he lived at the Farm? After all, it was a long way away from everything—movies and other people's houses and stores—but you weren't ever lonely. He could remember spending whole days, with a lunch Mamie fixed, without seeing a single human, and never being lonely.

  And he suddenly remembered the man who had bought the place next to theirs. His name was Mr. Worth, and he had a wife but no children. Soon after he came there he had asked Jonathan to go on a coon hunt with him. It ^^'as going to be on Friday night and Mr. Worth said he had some won-

  derful coon dogs. But that was the night his mother was thrown by the horse so he didn't go coon hunting.

  That was a bad night. Jonathan remembered how quiet everything in the house was; the doctors whispering to each other, his father sitting slumped in the big chair looking at the logs burning in the fireplace. Once, during that long night, Jonathan had heard, far, far away, the cry of the coon dogs.

  That was four years ago, when he was nine. Soon after that night they had left the Farm, so that his mother could be closer to hospitals and doctors and things.

  Jonathan remembered his mother's face and suddenly put his head down on the desk. She had never looked sad, or unhappy, or afraid. She had never given up hoping that someday she could walk again. But she never did, and when he was a little more than ten years old she couldn't bear to lie there any longer.

  Jonathan and his father went back to the Farm only once more. The day after his mother died they drove out there together and, without saying much, picked a lot of flowers from the garden his mother had planted. With them in the back seat of the car they had driven back to town. Jonathan didn't think that his father had ever gone to the Farm again, and neither had he.

  He wondered what the Farm looked like now. There wouldn't be much left of it, he guessed. The house and stables and barns would have fallen down by now, he decided. What had become of the hounds and horses? His

  father had never said anything about any of them to him. Probably sold them all, or given them away.

  The door of the den opened slowly, letting light flood in. Jonathan turned his head and saw Mamie in the doorvay.

  ''What's the matter, Jonathan?'' she asked, her voice low so Mrs. Johnson couldn't hear.

  ''Nothing, Mamie."

  "No lights and sitting here in the gloominess. WTiat's the matter, boy?"

  "Nothing. Really there isn't."

  "Just taking a nap?"

  "Yes," he said.

  "Well, come eat. Just me and you, because Mrs. J. she's gone to her sick sister's or something."

  As Jonathan followed Mamie toward the kitchen, he was glad that he wouldn't have to sit across the table from Mrs. Johnson. With Mamie it would be all right.

  "Jonathan," Mamie said, her back to him, "no use you thinking about
things like that."

  "Like what?"

  "You know what. You just breaking your heart to do it, Jonathan."

  "I couldn't help it, Mamie. It just slipped up on me."

  "You be careful then, or you'll end up just like your dad. Haunted all the time by things that are finished and gone. All he's got is a little handful of memories that he holds onto so tight he can't let anything else get in." She turned around and looked at him. "I watch your dad, Jonathan, and to see

  him makes something inside me ery just hke a Httle baby. He just killing himself w ith work and worry."

  ''He's just sort of sad, Mamie.''

  ''He got to get over that!" she said. "He gof to. What he better do is go back to the Farm to live. That what he ought to do."

  "He's going to sell the Farm. That man this afternoon is going to sell it."

  Mamie's eyes opened wide. "The Farm? He going to sell the Farm? Oh no, Jonathan. He mustn't do that. You got to stop him from doing that. He got to go baek out there to live. Him and me and you, we all got to go. You got to stop him."

  "What ean I do?" Jonathan asked.

  "Something! I don't eare what so long as it's something."

  Jonathan felt helpless. "There's nothing I ean do, Mamie," he said. "Nothing at all."

  CHAPTER TWO

  n the morning a shaft of sunhght streaming through the window woke him up. For a while he lay in bed watching specks of dust float in the strong light, then he got up and went to the window. The sky was blue for as far as he could see and with nothing in it except the sun. All outdoors looked warm and good to him. But then, when he looked down into the street far below, the height pressed against his lungs and he felt dizzy.

  Outside the door he could hear the vacuum cleaner starting and stopping, starting and stopping. Mrs. Johnson always made Mamie do it that way, because she was one of those people who go around turning off lights and saving electricity.

  It would be hard to study with that noise, Jonathan thought, as he got dressed and cleaned his teeth.