That idea was even crazier, I thought—crazier than pumping the iron pitcher pump and waking up Pop, who, in turn, would start pumping his right arm up and down with a razor strap on either Poetry or me, or both.
But you might as well try to start a balky mule as to stop Leslie Thompson from doing what he has made up his stubborn mind he is going to do, so a jiffy later the two of us were hurrying past “Theodore Collins” on our mailbox—Theodore Collins being Pop’s name. A second later, we were across the gravel road and over the rail fence, following the path made by barefoot boys’ bare feet through the woods to the spring, Poetry using his flashlight every few seconds to light the way.
And that is where we ran into our mystery!
Zippety-zip-zip, swishety-swish-swish, clomp-clomp-clomp, dodge, swerve, gallop ... It’s nearly always one of the happiest times of my life when I am running down that little brown path to the spring, where the gang has nearly all its meetings and where so many interesting and exciting things have happened through the years. Generally, my barefoot gallop through the woods is in the daytime, and I feel like a frisky young colt turned out to pasture. But I had never run down that path in red-striped pajamas at night when I was sleepily disgruntled like I was right that minute for having to follow a dumpish barrel-shaped boy. So when we had passed the black widow stump and the linden tree and had dashed down the steep grade to the spring itself and found the dark green watermelon floating in the cement pool which Pop had built there as a reservoir for the water, it was as easy as anything for me to get fighting angry at most anything or anybody. A watermelon there could mean only one thing—especially when right beside it was a glass fruit jar with a pound of butter in it. It meant there were campers somewhere nearby—and campers in the Sugar Creek woods was something the Sugar Creek Gang would rather have most anything else than. It meant our peace and quiet would be interrupted; that we would have to wear bathing suits when we went in swimming, and we couldn’t yell and scream to each other like we liked to do.
Poetry, who was on his haunches beside the spring, surprised me by saying, “Look! It’s plugged! Let’s see how ripe it is!”
Before I could have stopped him even if I had thought of trying to do it, he was working the extra large rectangular plug out of the middle of the extra large melon’s long fat side.
It was one of the prettiest watermelons I had ever seen—in fact, it was as pretty as Ida Watermelon Collins, herself.
Poetry had the plug out in a jiffy and was holding it up for me to see.
Somebody had bitten off what red there had been on the end of the plug, I noticed. Then Poetry said, “Well, what do you know! The melon’s green. See, it’s all white inside!”
That didn’t make sense, ’cause this time of year even a watermelon that wasn’t more than half ripe would be at least pink inside. My eyes flashed off the rectangular plug and into the hole in the melon, and Poetry was right—it was white inside! Then his mind came to life and he said, “Look, there is something in it! There’s a ball of paper or something stuffed in it!”