"I'LL bet you five bucks I can throw a pear fifty yards or more," Murray blurted. "You got any firecrackers?" Typical Murray. "Yea, I think I've got some at the house," I answered him, "but what has that got to do with throwing pears for record distances?" "Just came up with a good idea," Murray replied. Murray had a lot of ideas, though "good" didn't describe many of them. Come to think about it, I'm not sure that "good" ever described even one of them. "C'mon," Murray said excitedly, "let's get those firecrackers!" As we hurried towards my house, I found myself thinking about asking Murray a few more questions, but I knew that most likely I didn't really want to know the answers. One of the questions I thought about asking was why he was wearing a carpenter's apron.
It didn't take me long to locate the firecrackers that were left over from Independence Day or maybe from the day we caught the sunfish from the bridge at Wadeland Creek. "No", I thought, "we didn't have any firecrackers left over from the fishing trip." Wasn't particularly interested in recalling that day anyway. It was still difficult to look Goodall, the conservation officer, in the face. And I still plainly remember the only thing he said to us that day. "Hope you boys have satisfied your sadistic desires." And I still plainly remember Murray's answer, "I believe we have, Sir."
"I can only find eight firecrackers," I told Murray as I continued to dig through my dresser drawers. "That oughta be enough," he said with a smirk. I believe it was a smirk, though at the time I wasn't real sure what a smirk was. Just knew it was that same grin that was described in court on occasion as a smirk. We were still young and innocent at the time...well, we were still young at the time. Back then Murray was referred to as "a troublesome kid." Today he would probably be referred to as a terrorist. "I got at least that many pears off of old lady Tindel's tree," Murray continued. I still didn't want to ask.
Murray led the way into the garage at my house and we climbed the makeshift ladder up to the loft that we had built out of scrap lumber. Murray reached into the carpenter's apron he was wearing and pulled out a funny looking tool. "Look," Murray whispered, "I found this corkscrew in Pop's stuff." "Oh, neat," I whispered in response. Not only did I have no idea what we were doing in the loft with firecrackers and a corkscrew, I also had no idea why we were whispering. Then Murray pulled a pear out of the apron, took the corkscrew and drilled a hole in the pear, and stuck one of the firecrackers in the hole with only the fuse sticking out. "Watch this," Murray said, not whispering anymore. He opened the trap door that we had cut in the roof of the garage and we stood up with our upper torsos above the roof line. Murray reached into the apron again and pulled out a cigarette lighter, lit the fuse and hurled the pear into the alley behind the garage. A few seconds later there was a small explosion and the pear was smeared on our neighbor's garage door. "What do you think of that?", Murray asked, quite proudly I might add. Not wanting to disappont him at such a triumphant period in his life, I replied, "Quite a mess it made."
"I've got another good idea," Murray said, the smirk returning to his face. "Let's go over to the Antioch Baptist Church." It immediately came to me that maybe Murray did have a good idea for once, we certainly needed to repent. "Good idea," I answered. It was probably the only time I had ever said that with earnest and honesty. "Grab the firecrackers and the corkscrew," Murray said as he climbed back down the ladder, "I've got the pears and the lighter." "Maybe it would be best just to leave that stuff here," I said, startled that Murray would actually feel it necessary to provide evidence against ourselves.
"What do you reckon Pastor Willoughby will say?" I questioned as we headed towards the church which was less than a city block away. "He won't even know it was us," Murray answered. If we were going to confess, I was sure that Pastor Willoughby would recognize us. I realized that Murray didn't spend a lot of time at church and assumed that he imagined that the Baptist church was like the Catholic church down the street, with hidden confession booths, but I didn't bother explaining the difference.
We arrived at the intersection of Washinton Stret and Main Street, right across from the the church. The building was a landmark in the community, an impressive brick structure with a high pitched roof, topped by a steeple with a large cross. The congregation had outgrown the original building and a new addition was being added to the left side of it. The addition was nearly complete. Its design did not follow the design of the original structure. It was more modern, one story with a flat roof and it sat back about thirty feet further than the old structure. I noticed three workers on the roof of the addition, apparently spreading tar on the roof. "This is going to be fun," Murray said with that look that had become all too common. I was puzzled as to how confession could be fun, but I agreed with him anyway.
Murray and I crossed Washington Street and I started to climb the brick steps to the front door of the church. "Wrong way," Murray yelled. As I hadn't actually ever been to confession either, I wasn't sure where we should go. Maybe I had Murray figured all wrong. Just maybe he had visited Pastor Willoughby in the past and just didn't want to brag about it. Anyway, I followed him along the sidewalk on Main Street on the right side of the building. About half way along the building, he made an abrupt left through the grass and entered a small alcove built into the side of the structure. It was quite dark in the alcove. So the Baptist church did have a confession area that would keep us hidden. It suddenly occurred to me that Murray possibly had knowledge beyond his years. Then he stopped. The area was a dead end. Murray took seven pears out of the apron, drilled holes in them with the corkscrew, placed firecrackers in each of the holes and handed two of them to me. Then he gave me a book of matches. "Now, you go back around to the front of the building, walk down Washington Street slowly and if anyone does anything unusual, light these and throw them at them," was Murray's orders. I was totally confused. Did he think that Pastor Willoughby was going to really lose it today and chase us or something? I didn't ask. I took the pears, put them in my jacket pocket and started walking like Murray said. I figured that if Murray was going to take the rest of the firecracker-armed pears to the pastor, the least I could do was protect him if something went wrong. I walked slowly, like Murray had told me to do. I took a right at the corner and walked past the old building and into view of the new addition. Nobody paid me any attention so I stopped and stared at the men working on the roof. Suddenly, I saw a pear come over the steep roof of the old structure, bounce on the flat roof of the addition and roll up to the construction worker nearest me. He turned and leaned over towards the pear just as it exploded, showering him with shrapnel. The worker hit the deck face first, letting out an ear-piercing yell. In the meantime, more pears came over the roof. The other workers were running and yelling. I didn't know if this was what Murray meant by anything unusual or not, but I took the book of matches, lit one of the loaded pears and chucked it onto the roof. The worker who had dove face first jumped up. He was covered with black tar and looked terrified. He was such a sight that he startled me, so I attempted to light the second firecracker. But the fuse was soaked and wouldn't light, so in despair, I just threw the pear, no longer worrying about lighting it. Murray came running around the corner and yelled, "C'mon, Pougles, let's get out of here!" The construction workers had regained their composure and one of them picked up the last pear I had thrown.
"This whole ordeal might have been avoided," Murray confessed later that day. Murray looked at it a little different than I did. "You ain't really 'fessin anything if you're pressured into it," he said. Reckon he was referring to Pastor Willoughby's threat to call Officer Dilliard. But Murray repeated the confession to me after we finally got out of the church, this time he added a few words to it. "This whole ordeal might have been avoided," Murray murmurred, "if I had of come up with a way to waterproof those firecrackers. And," he added, "gotta fess that the strength and accuracy of that 'struction worker amazes me, though hittin' an eight-year old kid in the head with a pear aughta be illegal."
pougles
