Written by Helen Miller in 1985.

Some neighborhoods have periodic prowler scares just as more rural others have panther sightings that necessitate gatherings of good old boys to go hunting with dogs, beer, whisky and pickup trucks. Our response to prowler possibility had certain relationships to a panther hunt.

On a hot 1956 summer afternoon, our neighbor telephoned the news:

“Helen, I don’t want to scare you. Maybe you shouldn’t tell the children, but I thought you should know. Please don’t be alarmed.”

“Good grief, Rommie, what are you trying to say?”

“Mrs. Lake says a prowler was seen on our block last night. I know you don’t always lock doors so I wanted you to know.”

She was right about that…some of those doors in that big old house didn’t have locks. Later in the afternoon, I decided that since Mack would not be returning from an out-of-town trip for the next two days and nights perhaps we should have a discussion about this rumored prowler.

Brian, Joan, Mike, and even Peter who was only four listened quietly…for once. It was not likely that this prowler would visit us, I told them, but if any of us were to awaken and see someone in the room who was a stranger, there was to be no screaming. Just moan and groan, “Oh, my stomach aches.” That would signal others to take action. Sneak downstairs and phone the police or something. Mike and Brian looked as if Christmas was about to come.

“We know we can’t lock the basement door so we’ll set a trap with a balanced board that will fall if the door is opened…dropping cans, bottles, whatever we can find to make noise. It’s simple to climb up to Joan’s balcony and open the door to her rooms so we’ve got to remember to put a chair under the doorknob.”

Joan reminded them of her groaning abilities by practicing, “Oh, my stomach aches.” Brian and Mike decided to forget about the chair under the doorknob. Her room was obviously the best place for the prowler if he didn’t enter through the basement.

By dinnertime, the trap had been set. The basement door had become a potentially noisy alarm system.

That night Peter complained of stomach aches that seemed either authentic or his contribution to the drama. The cure was a story read to him in his parents’ bed which was so effective that we both fell asleep with many lights on in that huge old house.

I awakened to chaos.

Mack’s hand on my shoulder, panicked voice, “What is going on? How can you be sleeping with these kids so sick?”

Sure enough, there was loud groaning and wailing about stomach aches, as Daddy had activated the prowler traps.

He went on barely able to get words past clenched teeth, “And what is that mess in the basement?”