Page 96 of The Reformatory

“I can’t,” Robert said before he’d thought up a good reason. Boone’s grin vanished, replaced by glowering eyes. “I… need time. It’s too quick. Like… when a car is out of gas.”

Boone scowled, only halfway believing him. “How much time you need?”

Robert remembered Blue hovering over his bed like a vulture. Blue had said he would find him another haint to track, but when? “Maybe… only a day? A day in between. I think.”

Boone leaned over so his eyes were only an inch from Robert’s, as if he could see his lies. “You get one day,” he said. “Go wash dishes in the kitchen, then. But don’t you let down the warden after you got him all excited. He’ll skin you alive out in the Funhouse.”

Robert promised he wouldn’t, but he could barely look Boone in the eye or hide the way his stomach clamped at the idea of making Warden Haddock mad.

During band practice, Mrs. Hamilton announced that they would spend twenty minutes polishing and repairing instruments, so Robert volunteered to polish the brass instruments on the rack on the rear wall while Mrs. Hamilton tinkered with the piano strings to coax them back in tune. Mrs. Hamilton was strict during practice, but she allowed them to talk during chores, so the hum of conversation started right away. When someone sidled up to Robert, he said without looking up, “No more haint stuff today. Tell me tomorrow.”

“Missus H. said to put a few drops of oil on your trumpet keys so they’ll stop sticking.” To Robert’s surprise, Redbone was beside him offering him a small plastic bottle.

Robert hesitated before he took the bottle. “You still mad?”

Redbone shrugged. “Blue said you’re too dumb to know any better. So I guess not.” He said it quietly, just below the other boys’ playful chatter.

The mention of Blue’s name both electrified and angered Robert. Blue’s neck had stretched abnormally long, like an ostrich’s, and his teeth had seemed sharp at first glance. Maybe Blue had been playing tricks on him, changing how he looked.

“You shoulda told me,” Robert said. “I had to hear it from Haddock.”

Sickly alarm rose in Redbone’s face. “What you mean?”

“He showed me a picture of him from the fire. You shoulda told me he’s… like that.” He didn’t want to say dead.

“Did you tell on him?”

Robert shook his head no, and Redbone’s shoulders fell with relief.

Redbone glanced around, but the room was too noisy for eavesdropping. “You would’ve believed me?”

Robert couldn’t lie and say he would have, but he felt betrayed. He rubbed the tarnished bell of the old bugle he was polishing almost hard enough to dent it. The bugle was just like a trumpet but without any keys. Robert could play it as easily as a trumpet, his lips tripping across the notes, but Mrs. Hamilton said it was only good for playing reveille and at funerals. She said she didn’t like the sound of a bugle anymore.

“Blue said not to tell nobody,” Redbone said. “He’s the only one I see, mostly. He says he has to try real hard with me. And sometimes… I can’t see his face. It’s all blurry, a shadow. But with you, he said he doesn’t have to try at all.” Redbone ran his cloth listlessly across a trombone, and Robert wondered if he was envious over Blue.

“I wish I couldn’t see him,” Robert said. Should he say it? He felt he shouldn’t, but he couldn’t help himself. “You know what he wants me to do?”

Redbone nodded. “Shoot—I wouldn’t.”

Robert wondered if they were both thinking about the same thing, if Redbone knew about the photos Blue said the warden had hidden in his desk. “He asked you too?”

Redbone spoke from behind his teeth, nearly impossible to hear. “Oh, sure, he tried to make it sound so easy. But no way I could get close enough to get inside that desk. I told him only a fool would try it, and he said he found his fool. You let him put you in a trap.”

An explosive clattering on the floor made them both jump. Boys laughed as a cymbal rocked from side to side with a racket before it stilled. Mrs. Hamilton called out a reminder to be careful, but she didn’t sound angry. Band time was the only time they weren’t scared. Mrs. Hamilton would never send one of them to see Warden Haddock. She hadn’t said it, but they knew.

“You should’ve told me,” Robert said again, bitterly.

“How’d I know you was gonna start huntin’ haints?”

“HE made me,” Robert said, not speaking the warden’s name. “Why would I want to? Boone said I had a nose for it and told him and then HE said I had to.” Robert didn’t care that he was whining. He didn’t mention the warden’s early-release form, but what difference did it make? He’d never had a choice with a strap on the wall.

“You got all of ’em singing your name now—the Great Haint Catcher.”

“Shut up,” Robert said, ashamed, then softened his voice. “They just blame haints for every li’l thing.” Robert wanted to tell Redbone he’d missed him, but instead he said, “Why’d you get so sore at me?”

Redbone shoved one hand in his pocket and rocked back on his heels. “I thought… you would tell on Blue.”

“You already told me not to talk about him. Before.”