Cheating Natty Bumppo and the Kit-Kat Barter

A big ol' fat cheater. That was me. It was only the once, and yes, I still feel the piercing pangs of guilt for it. But I had my reasons.

Natty Bumppo drove me to it.

That's right, I said Natty Bumppo. Also called "Leatherstocking." Or "Hawk-Eye." Or, probably, "Chuck." The main dude in James Fenimore Cooper's The Last of the Mohicans. In the world of literary names, I'd say Natty Bumppo perches on top. Right up there with Martin Chuzzlewit, Mr. Fezziwig and Thursday Next.

It's fun to say. Say it with me now: "Natty Bumppo..."

But as far as stories go, Last of the Mohicans, for me, was harder to get down than week-old bread-- and just about as flavorful.

Admittedly, I haven't revisited this classic since my impatient youth. But at the time, the mind boggled and then eventually just bogged in a chapter that seemed entirely devoted to describing a few trees. No matter how much I read, I was simply unable to get out of the woods.

I'd tug at the narrator's sleeve.... Mention it looked like rain.... Even point out how dark it seemed to be getting, and still, the narrator just kept running on about what the woods looked like.

I think the narrator might have been my grandfather.

Grandpa Keith was a stand-up fellow, a great cook, an avid sportsman with a deep love of nature- and a passion for detail. His tales of hunting, fishing and hiking could go on for hours, leaving no river, no tree, no stone undescribed.

Plus, his stories tended to be nested-- so just about the time he'd take us to the part where the 12-point buck walked into the scene, he'd backtrack...

And compare it to a previous 12-point buck moment...

Or a time he'd seen another autumn that had the same vibrant leaves...

Or segue into the life story of the buddy who was hunting with him...

Or a particularly good batch of venison.

Leaving the threads of the first story flapping in the breeze, to weave in the details of a second. A third. A flashback...

A flash sideways.

Reading Last of the Mohicans was like a long holiday weekend with just Grandpa and me.

The problem with getting tangled up in undergrowth of the forest, however, was our tenth grade English teacher still had this funny idea she wanted to test us on it.

So the morning of the test came, and there I was, sitting in my class with detailed knowledge of leaf and stone, and absolutely no idea what else happened in the book.

I turned to my friend Ken, with fear draining the color from my face. "Did you actually read this? What happened in it?" In sheer desperation I added, "If you tell me what happened, I'll give you two blocks of my Kit-Kat bar."

Well, any kid at the time knew, Kit-Kat bars were premium currency. An offer of even a few blocks was certainly worth information.

"Deal," said Ken. And he relayed to me a Ken's Notes version of what happened in the forest. He told me all about Natty Bumppo, and Uncas and the French and Indian War.

Well, as luck would have it, it was an essay question-- "Describe the character of Natty Bumppo."

I recalled Ken's words. I filled in the logical bits. I wiped sweat from my brow and used vague wording where necessary. Soon, the bell rang and we had to turn in our papers.

Oh, the guilt I experienced in the days between handing in my test, and getting the results. I was almost certain my teacher would take one look at that paper and see into the empty core of my soul.

My Natty Bumppo was a sham, bought for the price of a two-block candybar. Soon, this would filter down to my mother-- who had convinced me by about age five that she could read minds. There would be parent-teacher conferences, in-school suspension and, worst of all-- television privileges revoked until I graduated high school.

I got an "A" on the paper.

And the moral of the story? Well, it's not that cheater's win. I mean, I hadn't cheated before and I didn't do it again-- largely due to 40% too much conscience and 60% kid paranoia. But sometimes, those literary classics drive a hard bargain...

If Manhattan were bought for a few bucks in beads, in retrospect, two sticks of Kit-Kat doesn't seem too bad a value.

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Do you folks recall a classic book that you struggled with? I'd love to hear about it.

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