Silent Came the Monster: A Novel of the 1916 Jersey Shore Shark Attacks by Amy Hill Hearth

Author:Amy Hill Hearth [Hearth, Amy Hill]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
Published: 2023-05-15T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 22

“I’m going to have that telephone removed from this house,” Margaret’s father complained.

“Should I answer it or let it ring?” asked Margaret. If she thought it was Stanley, she would have rushed to the telephone, but she knew he was playing baseball with his friends at the empty lot next to Petersen’s downtown.

“Let it ring,” said her father.

“But what if it’s important?” asked her mother.

“Oh, pshaw!” cried Margaret. “I can’t stand it! I shall answer it.”

It was Mrs. Yelverton, the mother of one of Margaret’s summer-school students, Lenny. A widow with three other children, Mrs. Yelverton worked at one of the local factories where they manufactured tiles made specifically for New York City subway stations.

Margaret asked if Mrs. Yelverton could call back later, but Mrs. Yelverton replied that she couldn’t. She was calling from a neighbor’s house where she had borrowed the phone.

“I really need to speak to you,” Mrs. Yelverton pleaded. “I’m taking Lenny out of school.”

“You mean summer school?”

“No,” Mrs. Yelverton said. “I’m taking him out of school altogether. He has gotten on my last good nerve, and I’m sending him to live with my brother in Texas. He has a ranch. Lenny will work on the ranch.”

“Mrs. Yelverton!” cried Margaret. “Lenny is only twelve!”

“I am certainly aware of that,” she said, “but you don’t have to live with him. I do. And I’m at my wit’s end.” She sniffled and cleared her throat.

“Oh, Mrs. Yelverton, please don’t cry. You must be exhausted. He is a very . . . spirited boy,” Margaret said, struggling for the right word to describe Lenny.

She thought about her most recent interaction with the child, which occurred in front of the butcher shop. He was holding court with a handful of younger children, telling them the temperature in Matawan was 141 degrees, the highest temperature in the USA, and that it was likely they would get heat sick in their sleep and die in their beds. “You won’t wake up in the morning,” he told them.

Margaret had overheard and reprimanded him. She tried to reassure the younger children, but she could see from their wide eyes that the idea was planted in their minds.

“Mrs. Yelverton,” Margaret said slowly, “I know he must be a very challenging child for you to handle at home. But what has he done this time that has gotten you so upset?”

“Well, he went too far with a prank,” she replied. “He was swimming with the other boys this afternoon down at the creek. And he leaped out of the water, claiming that something alive had brushed up against him. He started screaming to the other boys to get out. He said the thing that brushed up against him might be a shark!”

“Oh dear,” Margaret groaned. “He’s heard about the stories in the newspapers.”

“Yes, and that has put ideas in his head,” Mrs. Yelverton complained. “The others laughed at him, of course. A shark in Matawan Creek? The other boys said there was something in the water with them, but it was just an old log.

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