Crazy Jack

he sat in front of them not regally more of a slumping posture wearing a black Grateful Dead t-shirt covering grayish, dust-colored white skin a pronounced wattle and intense lime-green eyes when he spoke thunder roared from the antiquated throat and the five very young boys sat in rapt attention as he poured a black spider from a paper sack onto his arm with mouths gaping they watch the spider crawl up his liver-spotted arm until . . . WHAM! he grabbed that spider and bit its head off least that's what the boys swore they saw for years and years the old man had all the warmth of a Wyoming blizzard no social graces there was no finesse when he spoke as he read to the young lads from one of the many Zane Gray novels he seemed to pluck out of thin air sometimes he would stop reading look somewhere over the boys heads for the longest time and sometimes his head would droop a snore would awaken him he'd grin a snaggle-toothed grin reach behind him produce half a pint of vile-smelling whiskey take a small sip cap it and return it to its resting place and resume the tall tales of frontier west cowboys and rustlers pretty barmaids and long cattle drives outlaws and lawmen bawdy houses and girls of ill repute the old man told them those girls were ill with a common cold called repute the boys nodded giggled and looked at one another remembering what one of their big brothers told 'em about the girls after awhile much too soon a woman's voice would call out and the boys scampered up and took off running knowing they weren't supposed to be there been warned 'bout that old wild man called Crazy Jack as they ran home the old man's laugh followed them all the way but they'd be back to listen to him read sometime he read about somebody named Macbeth and witches or he might read to them a poem a poem so sad the boys fought back tears as he spoke about the raven and Lenore and so it was they did come back but the old man wasn't there rumor had it townspeople ran him off much to the sadness of the little boys