The Pirate of Peppercorn Creek

It was the time of year that many in the Liars Bunch lived for. When the streets of the village of Jocobo were packed with strangers looking for a good time. They were searching for an answer and the Liars Bunch—a’settin’—on their bench, were there to give it to them.

Some of the boys even dressed up for the part although it was hard to figure out what part exactly they were playing. Joe “Peets” Moss might have looked the artistic type if it hadn’t been for the cheap all-sport shoes he was wearing. Zack Hardy affected the hog farmer style, with the bibs and the softball sized chaw tucked demurely in his cheek. The expensive watch on his wrist kinda gives his game away, though. Erv Roadapple looked like a bum, but it’s only because he’s not married and hates ironing his clothes. Harry Whelp, the one-eyed dentist, rarely bothers changing from his work “whites” with their splotches of dried blood arcing across his shirt and pants. Old Bart, however, is the very picture of a small town sage in his black slacks, white shirt, and thin black tie with a silver clasp. A cowboy hat wards off the hot sun and his silver belt buckle is cast in the shape of a lone American eagle, pouncing, with its wings flung high and talons extended.

A stuffed eagle sat in one corner of Calamine Pete’s cabin. It was a trophy he’d taken from an English “naturalist” right before he’d made him walk the plank. He hadn’t even bothered to pause and watch the lubber drown. “Let Nature take her course,” he chuckled.

Oh, yo ho ho
You dirty old dog,
Gonna cut you up
Like an ol’ fat hog!
Yo ho ho
And a bottle of beer . . .

“Jimmie!” He heard his mother calling him. “Jimmie!”

“All right,” he thought, “make that a bottle of root beer.” He got up from his favorite spot along the bank of Peppercorn Creek with a sigh, watching as the little reed boats he’d made that afternoon floated forever downstream. He wished he could go along, he thought, while starting home for supper. He could still hear the pirates singing their song.

Yo ho ho,
And a cask of scum
Effin’ you see us comin’
You better run . . .

Vinegarroon County was not the kind of place you’d expect to find a band of scurvy pirates but there they were, inside the head of the dreamy little boy sitting in the back row of the classroom. They were starting classes earlier every year it seemed. Why, summer wasn’t even close to over and here they were already learning geometry! He’d show them some geometry, by golly—the geometry of chasing Spanish treasure off Haiti and Jamaica! The geometry of a well-placed shot into ships’ rigging! The geometry of walking the plank! Ho ho ho!

“Um, could you repeat that question again, Mrs. Greech?”

Abby Greech shook her head with disdain. “Jimmie Bartholomew, you may want to stay after today’s class and clean the blackboards.”

“Aw.” Pa would have a fit if he wasn’t home in time to start his chores.

Later, with the room empty, as he stood beside her desk, Mrs. Greech said. “Jimmie, I told a little fib. I don’t want you to clean the blackboards.”

Jimmie looked up at her questioningly. Mrs. Greech was an old woman, at least 30, but she came from the city and had university training and so she was a little bit scary.

“I want you to write on the blackboard exactly what it is you’re daydreaming about during my class. You can go home as soon as you’ve finished.” She handed him a piece of chalk and walked out of the room.

“Gee whiz,” he thought, scratching his head. He stared at the board for quite some time before shrugging. “Why the heck not?”

He wrote down what was in his head until he’d filled up one blackboard and continued on to another. When he’d filled that one up he continued writing on the one in Mr. Grassgold’s room, then the room across the hall. Oh, Pa was mad that night and he’d gone to bed without supper and grounded for a month, but the growls his belly made were like the sweet groans of the mast as the sails shifted with the evening breeze.

Mrs. Greech had made him a writer. And he had had a wonderful career as the gadgets columnist in Popular Morbeau Magazine. Over six million readers worldwide and they even paid him, too, somewhat.

The warm breeze felt good to Old Bart as he snoozed on the Liars Bunch’s bench.

The fury of a storm just passing had left Calamine Pete and his scurvy crew helpless as a British frigate approached. The King Canute had no mercy for pirates. The battle was short and brutal as the Canute battered them from afar. Explosions ripped the deck and killed his men as Calamine Pete labored in vain to strike back. Finally the British ship of war approached deliberately, menacingly, grappling hooks pulling at what rigging was left. Calamine Pete and a few crewmen made it over the side and into a dinghy only moments before the bomb they’d set in the magazine took both ships in a towering gout of flame.

Old Jimmie Bartholomew sighed as he opened his eyes and gazed benignly out on the peaceful scene in downtown Jocobo on a warm summer’s evening.