so he described them to us, and we spent the next days acting them out. He was very creative,
and always had good ideas. We eventually got tired of recreating Dracula and other stories.
That’s when Dill’s fascination with the Radley house began.
The Radley house had sagging shingles, and a drooping porch. The grass was too high
and the paint had turned gray and dingy. Even in the long, hot summer, the doors were shut up
tight. There was a rumor that it was haunted. People said “Boo” Radley went out at night and
peeped in people’s windows. That he breathed on flowers and they froze instantly. They said he
committed little crimes in the night but not one ever saw him.
The history of the story is that Arthur, “Boo”, got into a bad crowd in high school. They
swore, fought, and got into real trouble when they locked a court officer in the outhouse
(bathroom). Boo’s father was so strict that the judge let him take Boo home, and no one had
seen him since. Years later, the story goes, Boo was making a scrapbook out of articles from the
Maycomb Tribune when he stabbed his father with a pair of scissors, and kept right on cutting.
Mr. Radley was not a nice man. He went to town each day but never spoke to us even if
we said “Good Morning, Sir.”
When he died, Calpurnia said, “There goes the meanest man God ever blew breath into.”
The neighborhood thought maybe Boo would come out, but his older brother Nathan moved in
and he was just as mean. Atticus didn’t like us to talk about the Radleys much, but the more we
told Dill about the Radleys, the more he wanted to know. He would stand there hugging the light
pole.
“Wonder what he does in there,” he would murmur. “Wonder what he looks like?”
Jem said Boo was six and a half feet tall, ate squirrels and cats, his teeth were yellow, and
he drooled most of the time.
“Let’s try to make him come out,” said Dill. Dill bet Jem to go up and knock on the
door. Jem thought about it for three days.
“You’re scared,” Dill said.
“Ain’t scared, just trying to be respectful,” Jem said.
Three days later, after Dill had taunted him and called him scared repeatedly, Jem finally
gave in. He walked slowly to the Radley yard, threw open the gate, sped to the house, slapped it
with his hand, and sprinted back to us. When we were safe on our porch, we looked back at the
old, droopy house. We thought we saw a slight movement inside.
