The Mystery of the Canebrake Read online

  “Hurry, Richard, the train’s picking up speed. Run, faster!”

  I was sprinting as fast as I could possibly run, but I couldn’t get to the door. The boxcar with John Clayton in it was 20 yards in front of me now and getting farther away every second.

  I was just about to have a danged heart attack and since I’d already missed getting in the boxcar where John Clayton was, I grabbed a ladder on the end of the next car down and held on for dear life. The train had picked up speed now, and we were just roaring along as I started to pull myself up. I got a foot on the first rung of the ladder and climbed up between the two boxcars.

  Heck, John Clayton was two cars ahead of me and the train had picked up speed and we were just roaring along. I stood there for about 10 minutes trying to figure out what to do. I knew one thing for sure, I couldn’t ride between the two boxcars for very long, so I decided to climb up on top of the boxcar in front of me and walk down to where John Clayton was.

  Wow, when I got on top of the boxcar and started crawling along the top heading for the car where John Clayton was, it was unbelievably scary. Trains, especially freight trains don’t go real smooth. I guess you do some really stupid things at times like that, because walking on the top of a boxcar with the train going 50-miles-per-hour is just about the dumbest thing I’ve ever done. Heck, I nearly went flying off a bunch of times. Finally, I reached the car where John Clayton was, and I crawled over to the edge of the boxcar to the open door.

  “John Clayton, are you in there?”

  “Yes, where are you?”

  “I’m on top of the car. I think I can swing in if you can help me.”

  The next few minutes were the scariest of my whole, entire life, as I slowly eased down from the top of the jerking train, which threatened to sling me off in the ditch, until my feet were dangling in front of the open door.

  “Grab my feet and pull me in!” I screamed.

  “I can’t reach them! Slide down farther!”

  The next two feet of slipping down inch by inch, with the wind almost blowing me off, were terrifying. Finally, I was hanging by the top of the door swaying back and forth with the lurching train.

  “Grab me, John Clayton, I can’t hold on any longer!”

  “Hang on for just a second longer, until you swing back in the train!” he yelled.

  I dug my fingers into the steel rim of the boxcar door, holding on for dear life, and about that time we rounded a curve which kinda made me swing in toward the open door. Then I felt John Clayton grab my feet, and I turned loose as he pulled me back in the car. We fell in a heap right in front of the open door.

  “Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh! I thought I was a goner for sure!”

  “Dang, you, Richard, I thought you could run. Why didn’t you catch the train?”

  “Catch a train going 30-miles-an-hour? You took forever to get the door open, and then you were taking up all the room in the door, and I couldn’t jump in, you idiot!”

  “Okay, thank goodness we’re in here. We should be in Norphlet in ’bout four-hours. Let’s go lie down and rest.”

  “Well, we can’t rest very long. Remember what Sam from Tampa said ’bout that railroad man in Sheridan?”

  “Yeah, we gotta be ready. He said to slip out the other door when he comes by.”

  For the next hour the train rocked along, and soon we were slowing down as we entered the Sheridan freight yards. The train came to a halt, and we heard someone yell something, and then we could hear the boxcar doors being opened as the railroad man walked along checking them. We moved over to the opposite door and waited.

  “Get ready, he’s to our car,” I whispered. Then, I heard the lever slam back on our car.

  “Open the door and jump. He’s here.”

  We cleared the door just as the door on the other side opened and the railroad man flashed his flashlight in to see if anyone was there. All of a sudden, the train started moving and we started running for a car to get into. We yanked on door after door but they wouldn’t open.

  “John Clayton, grab that ladder and climb up on the back of that next car!” I screamed.

  Soon the car was by us and we grabbed for the little ladder on the side of the car, then pulled up, and climbed back to where we were between the two cars.

  “What are we gonna do now, Richard?”

  “Just hang on. We’ve gotta ride here until we get to Fordyce. We can just hold on till then. There ain’t no way on god’s green earth, I’m gonna get back on top of one of these cars.”

  We stood there holding on to the boxcar with the wind whipping for almost an hour until the train slowed down as it approached Fordyce. Our arms were so tired from holding on to a swinging and lurching train that we could hardly move them. Finally, the train clanked to a stop, we jumped off, and ran for the boxcar we’d left Little Rock in. Before the train pulled away, we had jumped in and were lying on our backs just inside the door, exhausted.

  “Oh, oh, oh, I can’t believe this. We could’ve been killed a dozen times, and you tell me everything was gonna go so easy. If I wasn’t so tired, I would pound you into the floor of this boxcar,” John Clayton said as he fell in a heap on the floor.

  “Heck, John Clayton, maybe we did have a few problems, but we managed to ride all the way to Little Rock and back without anybody finding out we were gone. Our folks will never know.”

  “Yeah, you’re right ’bout that. At least, the story ’bout staying in El Dorado with George and Edwin worked.”

  In a little over an hour, the freight train pulled into the Norphlet Refinery switching area, and we jumped off and started for home.

  “Shoot, I’m so tired and hungry I can’t wait to get home. I’ll see you tomorrow,” I yelled. In a few minutes, I had walked from the switching area to the highway and 15 minutes later I had made it to my house. As I walked up the driveway, I took the first look at my Sunday clothes. They were wrinkled and dirty and still a little wet from when we had been caught in the rainstorm. Oh, my gosh, I need to change before anybody sees me, crossed my mind, but it was too late. Daddy was standing on the front porch.

  “Richard, I thought Mr. Alderson was going to bring you home.”

  Heck, I just froze. “Un, well, he let both of us out in Norphlet,” I lied.

  “Son, he would have to drive right by our house. Why would he let you out in Norphlet?”

  Shoot, have you ever gotten yourself in a trap, and you were just waiting to get nailed?

  “Richard, why are your clothes so messed up? What have you boys been up to now?”

  ’Course, there wasn’t any chance on earth that I would really tell Daddy what we had done, but I had to come up with something.

  “Uh, Daddy, we went camping…” Daddy cut me off real quick.

  “You didn’t spend the night with the Aldersons did you? Tell me the truth, Richard. You know I can call Mr. Alderson and find out.”

  Wow, this was getting worse all the time, and I knew if I kept lying, I was gonna get deeper in trouble. I decided to tell the truth.

  “Daddy, we went campin’ down in Flat Creek Swamp.” Well, maybe that wasn’t the whole truth but I figured getting blamed for an unauthorized camping trip is a way bunch better than the god awful truth about what we really did.

  “I’m sorry and I won’t ever, ever, do it again. I promise.” I knew that wasn’t gonna be near enough to keep me from getting switched. In fact, I figured this might be the switching of my life.

  And then the chilling words rang out, “Richard, go cut me a switch!”

  “Oh, Daddy, please, I didn’t mean to cause any trouble. I promise I won’t ever do it again.” No answer from Daddy. There’d be no reprieve from this switching. I took that long walk over to the willow tree, cut a switch, and handed it to Daddy. “Well,” I mumbled, “I guess it’s worth a switchin’ to get Mr. Bill back to the circus.”

  “What did you say, son?”

  “Uh, well, Daddy, I just said it’s been a really long ni
ght.”

  Daddy looked at me curiously, knowing something had happened that he would never know about. Sniffer, who had crawled out from under the house let out a long howl and turned around to go back under as Daddy, shaking his head and mumbling, “Would I ever learn,” grabbed my wrist and we were at the starting gate.

  “Ow!”….

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

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