The Fourth Stall - Chris Rylander [78]
“So what I’m saying is I forgive you if you forgive me for stealing money and lying to you,” Vince said.
“Well, before you go getting all sappy on me, I need to know one thing,” I said. “What was the deal with taking money from Staples?”
Vince actually chuckled. “That’s the thing, Mac. I had no idea that Barry Larsen was Staples. It still just blows me away. I grew up with that kid. He used to live just seven trailers down from me!”
“I know, it shocked me when I found out, too,” I said. “I remember playing football with him once or twice.”
“Deep down I think I kind of knew something was up when he stopped by that morning because I hadn’t talked to Barry in a while, but I was so desperate for money, I think I just switched off my common sense there for a second.”
“But why did he give it to you? Why did you miss school that day?”
“Barry’s been trying to get me to sell my bike to him for years,” Vince said. “This time he offered me three hundred and fifty bucks for it and I just couldn’t resist. I mean, that pays our electric bill for like three months. He paid me half and then said that he’d be by later that day sometime before three to pick it up and pay the other half. So I faked sick and stayed home. I know that whole scenario is so suspicious and I should have known better, but being in this kind of mess does things to you. I especially should have known better when he never came by to get it. I mean, what kid just forgets to collect the merchandise at that price? I can’t believe I was that stupid.”
Vince must have been really strapped for cash to be willing to sell his bike. It was his dad’s bike when he was a kid, a true vintage. For him to sell it for under a grand, or even sell it at all for any price, meant that things really were pretty bad for his family. It was basically the last part of his dad that Vince had left.
“Okay, deal. I forgive you if you forgive me,” I said.
“Cue the music,” Vince said as he started wiping at his eyes dramatically.
I laughed. “Whatever.”
“I still can’t believe you questioned my Cubs fandom. Especially after I’m about to finally beat you,” Vince said.
“Bring it on,” I said.
“What Hall-of-Fame Cub had the nickname Three Finger?”
That was a tough one. I tried to clear my head, which was difficult considering I still had to deal with the Staples issue. Though, really, now that I had Vince back on my side, I felt like we could take down anybody. I felt like if we were playing on the Cubs together as pitcher and catcher right then, we’d break a hundred-year-plus curse that even guys like Greg Maddux and Mark Grace and Aramis Ramirez and Carlos Zambrano and Ernie Banks hadn’t been able to break.
“Mordecai Brown,” I finally said.
Vince shook his head in defeat. “Well, then.”
I grinned at him. “All right, Vince. We still have to deal with Staples somehow. A lot has happened since I last talked to you.”
I proceeded to fill him in on the weekend’s events. We called over Joe and the bullies and filled them in as well. And then it was time to plan. We stayed up well past dark Sunday formulating the master plan for Monday.
So that’s everything that had happened since Saturday, and everything that had led me up to this point. What happened next would all depend upon how Staples reacted to my offer. He was either going to accept and we’d all go home, or he would decline and the cops would be called in. Then again, there was always option three: He’d ignore my offer and simply beat me to a bloody pulp.
Chapter 25
Staples stood next to the sink near the fourth stall from the high window and glared at me. I took the silence as a chance to ask something that had been bothering me ever since I’d found out that Fred was the snitch.
“I guess there’s still one thing I don’t get, though, and that’s why. Why would you send in Fred to reveal yourself when you could have just kept operating right under my nose?” I asked.
“You can’t figure it