Salaaming frantically in front of the startled and embarrassed Ben Hanscom, Richie was speaking in what he called his Nigger Jim Voice.
'Lawks-a– mussy, it's be Haystack Calhoun!' Richie screamed. 'Don't fall on me, Mistuh Haystack, suh! You'se gwineter cream me if you do! Lawks-a-mussy, lawks-a-mussy! Three hunnert pounds of swaingin meat, eighty-eight inches from tit to tit, Haystack be smellin jest like a loader panther shit! I'se gwineter leadjer inter de raing, Mistuh Haystack, suh! I'se sho enuf gwineter leadjer! Jest don'tchoo be fallin on dis yere black boy!'
'D-Don't wuh-worry,' Bill said. 'It's j-j-just Ruh –Ruh-Richie. He's c-c-crazy.'
Richie bounced to his feet. 'I heard that, Denbrough. You better leave me alone or I'll sic Haystack here on you.'
'B-Be st p-p-part of you r-ran down your fuh-fuh –hather's l-l-leg,' Bill said.
'True,' Richie said, 'but look how much good stuff was left. How ya doin, Haystack? Richie Tozier is my name, doing Voices is my game.' He popped his hand out. Thoroughly confused, Ben reached for it. Richie pulled his hand back. Ben bunked. Relenting, Richie shook.
'My name's Ben Hanscom, in case you're interested,' Ben said.
'Seen you around school,' Richie said. He swept a hand at the spreading pool of water. 'This must have been your idea. These wet ends couldn't light a firecracker with a flamethrower.'
'Speak for yourself, Richie,' Eddie said.
'Oh — you mean it was your idea, Eds? Jesus, I'm sorry.' He fell down in front of Eddie and began salaaming wildly again.
'Get up, stop it, you're splattering mud on me!' Eddie cried.
Richie jumped to his feet a second time and pinched Eddie's cheek. 'Cute, cute, cute!' Richie exclaimed.
'Stop it, I hate that!'
'Fess up, Eds — who built the dam?'
'B-B-Ben sh-showed us,' Bill said.
'Good deal.' Richie turned and discovered Stanley Uris standing behind him, hands in his pockets, watching quietly as Richie put on his show. This here's Stan the Man Uris,' Richie told Ben. 'Stan's a Jew. Also, he killed Christ. At least that's what Victor Criss told me one day. I been after Stan ever since. I figure if he's that old, he ought to be able to buy us some beer. Right, Stan?'
'I think that must have been my father,' Stan said in a low, pleasant voice, and that broke them all up, Ben included. Eddie laughed until he was wheezing and tears were running down his face.
'A Good One!' Richie cried, striding around with his arms thrown up over his head like a football referee signalling that the extra point was good. 'Stan the Man Gets Off A Good One! Great Moments in History! Yowza-Yowza-YOWza!'
'Hi,' Stan said to Ben, seeming to take no notice of Richie at all.
'Hello,' Ben replied. 'We were in the same class in second grade. You were the kid who — '
' — never said anything,' Stan finished, smiling a little.
'Right.'
'Stan wouldn't say shit if he had a mouthful,' Richie said. 'Which he FREE –quently does — yowza-yowza-YOW — '
'Sh-Sh-Shut uh-up, Richie,' Bill said.
'Okay, but first I have to tell you one more thing, much as I hate to. I think you're losing your dam. Valley's gonna flood, pardners. Let's get the women and children out first.'
And without bothering to roll up his pants — or even to remove his sneakers — Richie jumped into the water and began to slam sods into place on the nearside wing of the dam, where the persistent current was pulling fill out in muddy streamers again. A piece of Red Cross adhesive tape was wrapped around one of the bows of his glasses, and the loose end flapped against his cheekbone as he worked. Bill caught Eddie's eye, smiled a Little, and shrugged. It was just Richie. He could drive you bugshit . . . but it was still sort of nice to have him around.
They worked on the dam for the next hour or so. Richie took Ben's commands — which had become rather tentative again, with two more kids to general — w i t h p e r f e c t w i l l i n g n e s s , and fulfilled them at a manic pace. When each mission was completed he reported back to Ben for further orders, executing a backhand British salute and snapping the soggy heels of his sneakers together. Every now and then he would begin to harangue the others in one of his Voices: the German Commandant, Toodles the English Butler, the Southern Senator (who sounded quite a bit like Foghorn Leghorn and who would, in the fullness of time, evolve into a character named Buford Kissdrivel), the MovieTone Newsreel Narrator.
The work did not just go forward; it sprinted forward. And now, shortly before five o'clock, as they sat resting on the bank, it seemed that what Richie had said was true: they had stopped the sucker cold. The car door, the piece of corrugated steel, and the old tires had become the second stage of the dam, and it was backstopped by a huge sloping hill of earth and stones. Bill, Ben, and Richie smoked; Stan was lying on his back. A stranger might have thought he was just looking at the sky, but Eddie knew better. Stan was looking into the trees on the other side of the stream, keeping an eye out for a bird or two he could write up in his bird notebook that night. Eddie himself just sat cross-legged, feeling pleasantly tired and rather mellow. At that moment the others seemed to him like the greatest bunch of guys to chum with a fellow could ever hope to have. They felt right together; they fitted neatly against each other's edges. He couldn't explain it to himself any better than that, and since it didn't really seem to need any explaining, he decided he ought to just let it be.
He looked over at Ben, who was holding his half-smoked cigarette clumsily and spitting frequently, as if he didn't like the taste of it much. As Eddie watched, Ben stubbed it out and covered the long butt with dirt.
Ben looked up, saw Eddie watching him, and looked away, embarrassed.
Eddie glanced at Bill and saw something on Bill's face that he didn't like. Bill was looking across the water and into the trees and bushes on the far side, his eyes gray and thoughtful. That brooding expression was back on his face. Eddie thought Bill looked almost haunted.
As if reading his thought, Bill looked around at him. Eddie smiled, but Bill didn't smile back. He put his cigarette out and looked around at the others. Even Richie had withdrawn into the silence of his own thoughts, an event which occurred about as seldom as a lunar eclipse.
Eddie knew that Bill rarely said anything important unless it was perfectly quiet, because it was so hard for him to speak. And he suddenly wished he had something to say, or that Richie would start in with one of his Voices. He was suddenly sure Bill was going to open his mouth and say something terrible, something which would change everything. Eddie reached automatically for his aspirator, pulled it out of his back pocket, and held it in his hand. He did this without even thinking about it.
'C-Can I tell you g-g-guys suh-homething?' Bill asked.
They all looked at him. Crack a joke, Richie! Eddie thought. Crack a joke, say something really outrageous, embarrass him, I don't care, just shut him up. Whatever it is, I don't want to hear it, I don't want things to change, I don't want to be scared.