That was still part of his job, though, crazy or not, and he began doing it that Sunday afternoon. Bobby walked around the block while his mom was napping, looking for either low men in yellow coats or signs of them. He saw a number of interesting things — over on Colony Street a woman arguing with her husband about something, the two of them standing nose-to-nose like Gorgeous George and Haystacks Calhoun before the start of a rassling match; a little kid on Asher Avenue bashing caps with a smoke-blackened rock; liplocked teenagers outside of Spicer’s Variety Store on the corner of Commonwealth and Broad; a panel truck with the interesting slogan YUMMY FOR THE TUMMY written on the side — but he saw no yellow coats or lost-pet announcements on phone poles; not a single kite tail hung from a single telephone wire.
He stopped in at Spicer’s for a penny gumball and gleeped the bulletin board, which was dominated by photos of this year’s Miss Rhenigold candidates. He saw two cards offering cars for sale by owner, but neither was upside down. There was another one that
Said MUST SELL MY BACK YARD POOL, GOOD SHAPE, YOUR KINDS WILL LOVE IT, and that one was crooked, but Bobby didn’t guess crooked counted.
On Asher Avenue he saw a whale of a Buick parked at a hydrant, but it was bottle-green, and Bobby didn’t think it qualified as loud and vulgar in spite of the portholes up the sides of the hood and the grille, which looked like the sneery mouth of a chrome catfish.
On Monday he continued looking for low men on his way to and from school. He saw nothing . . . but Carol Gerber, who was walking with him and S-J, saw him looking. His mother was right, Carol was really sharp.
‘Are the commie agents after the plans?’ she asked.
‘Huh?’
‘You keep staring everywhere. Even behind you.’
For a moment Bobby considered telling them what Ted had hired him to do, then decided it would be a bad idea. It might have been a good one if he believed there was really something to look for — three pairs of eyes instead of one, Carol’s sharp little peepers included — but he didn’t. Carol and Sully-John knew that he had a job reading Ted the paper every day, and that was all right. It was enough. If he told them about the low men, it would feel like making fun, somehow. A betrayal.
‘Commie agents?’ Sully asked, whirling around. ‘Yeah, I see em, I see em!’ He drew down his mouth and made the eh-eh-eh noise again (it was his favorite). Then he staggered, dropped his invisible tommygun, clutched his chest. ‘They got me! I’m hit bad! Go on without me! Give my love to Rose!’
‘I’ll give it to my aunt’s fat fanny,’ Carol said, and elbowed him.
‘I’m looking for guys from St Gabe’s, that’s all,’ Bobby said.
This was plausible; boys from St Gabriel the Steadfast Upper and Secondary were always harassing the Harwich Elementary kids as the Elementary kids walked to school — buzzing them on their bikes, shouting that the boys were sissies, that the girls ‘put out’ . . . which Bobby was pretty sure meant tongue-kissing and letting boys touch their titties.
‘Nah, those dinkberries don’t come along until later,’ Sully-John said. ‘Right now they’re all still home puttin on their crosses and combin their hair back like Bobby Rydell.’
‘Don’t swear,’ Carol said, and elbowed him again.
Sully-John looked wounded. ‘Who swore? I didn’t swear.’
‘Yes you did.’
‘I did not, Carol.’
‘Did.’
‘No sir, did not.’
‘Yes sir, did too, you said dinkberries.’
‘That’s not a swear! Dinkberries are berries!’ S-J looked at Bobby for help, but Bobby was looking up at Asher Avenue, where a Cadillac was cruising slowly by. It was big, and he supposed it was a little flashy, but wasn’t any Cadillac? This one was painted a conservative light brown and didn’t look low to him. Besides, the person at the wheel was a woman.
‘Yeah? Show me a picture of a dinkberry in the encyclopedia and maybe I’ll believe you.’