Button Down Read online

  For the grandparents —

  mine and yours

  Tractor Field

  Maybe This Time

  Feature That

  Yellow Brick Road

  Scrimmage

  Pool Hall

  The Weight of It

  Now What?

  Into the Night

  Something

  Rising

  Strategy

  Xs and Os

  Cutting Edge

  The Challenge

  Up in the Air

  The Situation

  Piles of Wolves

  Coach Button

  The Next Step

  Wheel Away

  Hawkeyes Versus Carroll

  Stood Up

  Gone

  Escape

  While It Lasted

  The Reward

  Iowa City Day

  The Game

  Back Home

  Hand-me-down

  Winnings Shelf

  Tractor Field

  The only thing Ned Button had caught in his life was the mumps, and even then he had fumbled, getting them only half as bad as the rest of his class, then out of quarantine and back to school before the others and unable to share in their tales of fevers and bumps when they returned. In fact, Ned may not actually have had the mumps so much as an ordinary case of roadside-ditch poison ivy.

  That’s how it was with Ned Button.

  Nevertheless, when Lester Ward let loose that perfect pigskin spiral across Tractor Field, Ned’s innards lurched high as the arching ball. Watching it hurtle toward him and the other scruffers, Ned hollered, “I’ve got it! I’ve got it!”

  Lester was leaving on the train to become Goodhue’s first University of Iowa Hawkeye, to play alongside the likes of Will Glassgow and Nanny Pape in a spanking-new stadium. All of Goodhue turned out for the occasion. Orion Ortner played “On Iowa” on his coronet. A student reporter from the university’s Daily Iowan took photographs. Like a bride tossing her bouquet, Lester was passing on his childhood football, worn and beautiful as anything Ned had ever seen.

  Tractor Field wasn’t more than a couple of mowed-over lots next to the train depot, but Ned saw stripes on the ground. He saw men like bulls pawing the earth around him. He saw the dust under their feet rise as they thundered ahead; heard a phantom crowd roar for him, Ned Button, to run, to raise up his stubby arms, to . . .

  And then Lester Ward’s football eclipsed the sun. It brushed Ned’s palms, smacked into his chest. Ned’s arms wrapped around the ball and . . .

  And then he was down, face in the dirt, air thumped from his lungs. But miraculously, spectacularly, there was leather under his fingers.

  He breathed into the dent in his chest, lifting himself off the ball and onto his knees, cradling the thing like a newborn kitten. Ned had clutched his father’s work boot once, pretending it was a real football, and it had smelled just like this, only ranker.

  Then, whoomp! He was knocked flat again, and the ball spurted out of his hands.

  There was Burton Ward, peacocking around his friends, holding the football aloft as if he had been the one to catch it.

  “Hey!” Ned gasped.

  Ralph Stump hauled Ned to his feet, shoving him into the swarm of boys. “Don’t let him get away with it!”

  Ned pawed his way through a mass of elbows and shoulders.

  “What are you looking at, runt?” Burton sneered at Ned.

  Every missed catch, every dropped ball, every past insult he’d taken from Burton Ward surged up in Ned, up through his belly, up into his head, filling it with red heat. Then that fury flew down his arm and out his fist, connecting with Burton’s gut but not making a dent.

  “It’s mine!” Ned yelled, reeling in his fist and cocking it for another swing.

  “Says who?” Burton grabbed Ned’s wrist with his free hand. “Fellows, is this Ned’s ball?”

  “Looks like your ball to me,” said Clyde. “You’re holding it.” Several of the boys nodded.

  “I don’t know,” squeaked Franklin. “Ned . . .”

  Burton spun around to look at him, still holding Ned’s arm.

  “What?”

  “It’s your ball, Burton!” Franklin amended. “Lester is your brother, after all!”

  “It’s my ball because I caught it, shrimp,” Burton said to Franklin. “Lester being my brother has nothing to do with it.” He let go of Ned and shoved him backward.

  Ralph caught Ned and pushed him toward Burton. “Take the ball, Ned. You caught it.”

  When Ned hesitated, Ralph stepped around him and took a swing at Burton himself.

  “Get him, Ralph!” Franklin said, scrambling out of Burton’s reach.

  Ned stepped forward but got between Burton’s fist and Ralph’s fist, and they both connected with Ned, knocking him to the ground.

  Burton dropped the ball and Ned reached out his hand to grab it.

  “Fight! Fight! Fight!” Franklin called from behind the relatively safe bulk of Luther Tingvold.

  But Burton scooped the ball from the ground, tucked it under his arm, and ran off toward the tracks, the herd of boys dispersing.

  Ned got up to go after him, but his little sister, Gladdy, was blocking his path. She’d been peering out at the goings-on from behind their cousin Tugs and her friend Aggie Millhouse.

  “Lester’s own brother can’t get it, can he? Doesn’t he already have a football?” Gladdy asked.

  “Some things don’t have rules,” said Aggie.

  “Well, they should,” said Tugs.

  “You did get it fair and square,” said Ralph. “I saw.”

  “They should have let girls try,” said Tugs. “Me and Aggie could have caught it, couldn’t we, Aggie? We wouldn’t have let Burton steal it.”

  “Yeah,” Gladdy echoed. “Tugs could have caught it. Or Aggie. Uh-oh, Ned. You’re getting a shiner.”

  “I did catch it, didn’t I?” said Ned. He had had the ball so briefly he was starting to doubt the fact. He touched his swelling face.

  “You let him take it from you,” said Tugs. “But it did look like you had it for a second.”

  “I didn’t let him!” said Ned.

  “We shouldn’t be squabbling,” said Gladdy primly. “Wait until Mother sees that shiner. You’re in trouble now!”

  Ned could feel the heft of that ball in his hands. He could see himself carrying it to school under his arm, hear the other boys begging him to pick up a game, to be on his team. Instead of “Ned” they’d call him Button, and they’d say it with the tone people used when talking to the Wards or the Millhouses, or even, lately, Tugs, thanks to her recent heroics. Ned would go to the university, like Lester. Wear a gold-and-black uniform. With that ball . . .

  “Uh-oh,” said Ralph. “I better scram. Here comes your ma.”

  “I knew it!” bellowed Mother as she elbowed her way through the crowd, a clump of Buttons trundling along in her wake. “That Stump boy scrubbed your opportunity again. Just look at your face.”

  “No!” said Ned as he watched Ralph hop across the tracks and out of sight. “Burton —”

  “Tugs and Aggie could have held on to the ball, Mama,” Gladdy interrupted before she was pushed aside by Granny, who was wagging her cane at Ned.

  “No surprise. No surprise atall. This one’s a Button all over again,” she said. “Not like our Tugs.”

  “But I did —” Ned started.

  “He —” Tugs tried to interject.

  “Football,” barked Father. “The u-ni-versity. It’s not right — hearty young men going off to college. Lester is well and able. Heaven knows a farmer could use his help if the Wards don’t need him down at their store. My brother’s place is going to seed. Don’t go getting any notions in your
head, young man.”

  “I thought there was going to be food,” said Granddaddy Ike. “Where’s the knockwurst?”

  “Notions? I caught the football!” Ned exclaimed. “I —”

  The whistle and rumble of the oncoming train distracted them then, and the Buttons started toward the depot.

  Tugs and Ralph were right. He had caught the ball fair and square. He should have gotten it back. Maybe it wasn’t too late.

  Ned lagged to the back of the clan and slipped off, working his way to the edge of the track and scanning the crowd until he spotted Lester. He couldn’t expect Lester to believe a Button over his own brother, but maybe if he threw the ball again, maybe this time . . .

  Ned approached Lester, who was swinging Winslow, the youngest Ward, up on his shoulder.

  “What do you want, Ned?” Burton spat, Lester’s football now lodged carelessly under his left foot.

  Ned watched Burton pick up the ball and twirl it around in front of his face. Ned blew out a deep breath, slowly inhaled, and, ignoring Burton, he faced Lester.

  “There was a scuffle,” he said in a voice weaker than he’d anticipated. “Maybe you should, you could, if you . . .”

  “Sure was a pileup,” said Lester, resting his elbow on Burton’s shoulder and leaning toward Ned with an affable grin. “I couldn’t make out what happened. You didn’t catch it, did you?”

  “I, well”— Ned looked from Lester to Burton and back again —“I did.”

  “Aw, Burton. What are Mom and Pop going to do without me here to keep you in line?” Lester said. He took the ball from Burton and handed it to Ned. “I’ll bet you’re a fine player, Ned. I was pretty squat at your age, too. And look at me now, off to U.I.”

  “Les-ter!” Burton whined, glaring at Ned and trying to edge his way into Lester’s line of vision.

  Ned stood his ground. He swelled with pride. This was the same Lester Ward who had rung up his bubble gum at the Ben Franklin. The same Lester who sledded down the Eighth Street hill like Ned did in winter and fished off Willow Creek Bridge like Ned did in summer. But today Lester was larger than all that. Larger than Goodhue. He was an Iowa Hawkeye football player. In a matter of weeks, Lester Ward from Goodhue, Iowa, would be facing down legendary Minnesota Gopher Bronko Nagurski. And not only was Ned acquainted with Lester, but he’d caught his pass. Lester knew his name and had called him a fine football player.

  Ned tucked the ball under an arm and stuck out his free hand. “Good luck at Iowa. I’ll be rooting for you.” Lester grabbed Ned’s hand and pumped it heartily. He ruffled Ned’s hair.

  “Thanks, pal. Come to Iowa City, why don’t you. Come see a game.”

  Then Lester was setting Winslow down. He was hugging his mother, slapping his father’s back, giving Burton a playful sock on the arm. He was tossing his duffel over his shoulder and hopping lithely aboard the train.

  “Good-bye! Good-bye, Lester!” Ned shouted. “I will come see a game! I’ll be there!” His arm shot up, and the hand that had shook Lester’s waved furiously.

  “Shoot,” said Burton, wiping his sleeve across his reddened face. “How will you get to a Hawkeye football game, Ned Button? Lucky Tugs going to take you?”

  “I . . .” said Ned. “I . . .” Burton had him there. Buttons didn’t believe in frivolous travel. Iowa City may well have been Zanzibar for all the chance he had of getting there; even Tugs couldn’t fix that.

  “I — I — I . . .” Burton mimicked.

  “I — I — I . . .” Winslow repeated, and laughed.

  “You,” said Burton, “have my football.” He snatched the ball from Ned and darted away with Winslow, leaving Ned empty-handed as the train rolled around the bend and out of sight.

  Ned hadn’t been there the day Tugs saved Goodhue from notorious con man Harvey Moore, aka Dapper Jack Door, but he’d heard the story enough times he could see the July crowd that had swarmed around to congratulate her. He could hear Miss Lucy, the librarian, declaring Tugs the town’s rabbit’s foot, or some such, and see the Rowdies (the Rowdies!) and Aggie Millhouse (of the Millhouse Bank and Trust Millhouses!) pat her on the back. The family had talked of nothing since — how their fortunes had changed!

  And if the stories were not enough, there was the framed newspaper clipping hanging on the kitchen wall, just over Gladdy’s shoulder, so that every time Ned looked up during a meal, Tugs grinned back at him.

  “The Chicago Tribune — now, that is something,” Mother was saying, as she did at nearly every supper, pointing her fork at the clipping, though, truth be told, Mina was loath to look at the thing, hanging it out of politeness to her sister-in-law Corrine, who had presented one to each Button household at great personal expense. It pained Mina that she’d sent Ned to the uncles’ farm that day, causing him to miss the opportunity to be in the newspaper with Tugs.

  Here Granddaddy Ike chimed in, as he did at nearly every meal, “Takes after me, does Tugs. You’ll recall I was featured in the Goodhue Gazette back when.”

  And, as they did at nearly every meal, the family nodded patiently without reminding Granddaddy that setting the town hall on fire had not done for the Button name what nabbing an infamous felon had.

  Usually they fell to companionable chewing at this point, being a clan more inclined toward private thoughts than convivial conversation, with children typically admonished that everyone’s digestion improves when children speak only when spoken to. But tonight Ned couldn’t help himself.

  He’d been holding in his mind that moment with Lester, spinning it around in his head like a prized marble, at once bursting to tell the tale and yet afraid that if he did speak the words out loud, the scene would disintegrate. Lester Ward had shaken his hand, looked him in the eye, placed his own football in Ned’s hands.

  “I caught Lester Ward’s football, and I’m going to get it back,” he declared, pounding his hand on the table. Granddaddy burped in the silence that followed.

  “Ooh, Ned, you’re in trouble!” said Gladdy.

  “Never mind,” said his mother, reaching across the table to pat his hand, then checking his forehead with the back of her hand. “You didn’t have a chance. Burton has height on you. Now, drink your milk.”

  “And girth,” added his father.

  “And there was that Stump boy, making trouble,” continued his mother, giving Granddaddy a poke in the arm. “Granddaddy, you’re making no progress at all. Look lively, now.”

  Ned lifted his glass, then set it down without taking a drink.

  “I did catch it. Gladdy saw me, didn’t you, Gladdy? Burton took it from me. And then when the train was leaving, Lester gave the ball back and Burton took it again. I’m going to get him.”

  “Don’t pull me into it!” Gladdy said. “No fighting, I said. Didn’t I say that, Ned? I said, ‘We shouldn’t be squabbling.’”

  Emboldened by his own outburst, Ned continued recklessly, “And I’m going to a game.”

  “A game,” said his father absently.

  “Gladdy, sit up straight, now, and eat your peas,” said Mother. “Let’s all get back to the business at hand.”

  “Milo Jackson says when Teddy Roosevelt went hunting in Africa after he lost to Taft, he caught himself a rhino. Can you feature that?” said Granddaddy Ike. “Now, that’s big game.”

  “I mean . . .” Ned fiddled with his fork. Had it really happened? Had Lester really asked him to come to a game? “I want to go to a Hawkeye football game in Iowa City. Lester Ward invited me.” There. He’d said it.

  Father stabbed a boiled potato out of the bowl and mashed it on his plate. “Costs,” he said. “End of story.”

  Mother sawed her beef into thin slivers with the household’s one sharp knife, then passed it on to Granddaddy. “You’re eleven, Ned. You’re not going to Iowa City for any reason. I know what all goes on there game days. Thievery. Rowdiness. Drinking. Gambling. Wild driving. No son of mine is going to a Hawkeye game. I don’t care if Hoover himself is playing
.”

  “President Hoover does not play football,” Gladdy added helpfully. “He is not athletically inclined. But then, neither is Ned. Maybe Ned will be president of the United States. He is from Iowa, like President Hoover. And they are both not athletic.”

  “You can be president, Gladdy. I’m going to a Hawkeye game. Lester will be expecting me.”

  “Girls can’t be president,” said Gladdy.

  “Too bad,” said Mother. “I’ve got plenty of ideas could shape this country up. Take a mother and put her in the White House and I’ll tell you what.” She pondered the window, then took in Gladdy and Ned with a single decisive look. “Finish your supper, both of you, and get these silly notions out of your head. President. Iowa City. Humph.”

  But Ned wasn’t hungry anymore.

  After supper Ned walked Granddaddy Ike to his one-room cottage next door and helped him get settled in his chair.

  “Read me a chapter, will you?” said Granddaddy, sitting back with his pipe.

  “You’ll fall asleep if I start reading.” Ned needed Granddaddy’s ear. Talking to him was like throwing a ball against the school wall. It’s not that Granddaddy said so much, but he listened in a way that sent Ned’s thoughts back to him with new bounce.

  “Never too tired for my friends Toto and Scarecrow.”

  “Can we read tomorrow?”

  “You’re what — ten, eleven?” said Granddaddy. “And you don’t have time to read an old man a story? You’ve got all the time in the world. It’s me who’s got more to get done than I got years.”

  “I’m eleven,” Ned muttered. “It’s not that.”

  “Book’s on the shelf. Go on, now.”

  Ned went to Granddaddy’s winnings shelf and slid The Wonderful Wizard of Oz out from between a pocketknife and a recording of “The Memphis Blues,” in a worn sleeve. Oz was Granddaddy’s one book. He’d won it in a checkers match with Mr. Jackson. The pocketknife was Ned’s favorite item on the shelf. A fellow could sure make use of a pocketknife.

  “I’m having a birthday over here,” said Granddaddy.

  Ned sat on the footstool and opened to the page held by the slim green marking ribbon. Last time they read, the Cowardly Lion had been saved from the poisonous flowers by a thousand mice, and though Ned and Granddaddy had read this book over and over, and though he would rather be sorting out his Burton and Iowa City problem, Ned was anxious despite himself to get Dorothy safely back to Kansas.