“You can’t either,” I said. “You’re a black man that doesn’t know anything about civilization and you don’t know how to read.”
So it was I who got to open the soiled brownish envelope, which I did with excited fingers, and then we all let out four disappointed groans, for would you believe it? there wasn’t a single thing written on the folded white paper on the inside—not one single thing. It was only a piece of typewriter paper.
Well that was that. We all sank down on the ground in different directions and felt like the bottom had dropped out of our new mystery world. I looked at Friday and he at me, and the fat goat started chewing his cud, while our acrobatic goat rolled over on his back, pulled his knees up to his chin, and groaned, then he rolled over on his side and, my Man Friday lying right there right then, got his side rolled onto, which started a scuffle, making my Man Friday angry. All of a sudden he remembered something about the story of Robinson Crusoe. He grunted and said, while he twisted and tried to get out from under the goat, “Listen, you—when Robinson Crusoe and his Man Friday got hungry, they killed and ate one of the goats, and if you don’t behave yourself like a good goat, we’ll—”
But Circus was as mischievous as anything and said, while he rolled himself back toward Dragonfly again and laid his head on his side, “Isn’t your name Friday?”
Dragonfly grunted and said, “Sure,” and Circus answered, “All right. I’m sleepy, and there’s nothing better than taking a nap on Friday,” which he pretended to do, shutting his eyes and started in snoring as loud as he could, which sounded like a goat with the asthma.
That reminded Poetry of something funny he’d read somewhere, and it was about two fleas who were supposed to have lived on the island with Robinson Crusoe and his Man Friday. Both of these fleas had been chewing away on Crusoe and were getting tired of him and wanted a change, so pretty soon one of them called to the other and said, “So long, kid, I’ll be seeing you on Friday.”
I just barely giggled at Poetry’s story ’cause my mind was working hard on the new mystery, thinking about the blank piece of paper and why it was blank, and why was the envelope sealed, and who had dropped it here, and when, and why?
So I stood up and walked like Robinson Crusoe might have walked, in a little circle around the tree, looking up at the limb where Circus had been perched, and then at the ground, and at Poetry, my fat goat, who right then unscrambled himself from the rest of the inhabitants of our imaginary island, and followed me around, sniffling at my hand, like a hungry goat that wanted to eat the letter I had.
Abruptly Poetry stopped and said to me, “Sh!” which means to keep still, which I did, and he said, “Look, here’s a sign of some kind.”
I looked, but didn’t see anything except a small twig about four or five feet tall that was broken off, and had been left with the top hanging.