Karen's Pumpkin Patch

  “Oh, honey, I don’t know.”

  “But the pumpkin-smashers have been making trouble. And anyway now it is warm because it is Indian summer. Please? Sleeping in the patch will be just like camping out…. Puh-lease?”

  Finally Daddy said I could sleep in the patch. But he said he would make me come inside if it got cold. I felt like Linus, who waited for the Great Pumpkin in the Peanuts cartoon.

  After dinner I went to Kong’s patch. I took a sleeping bag and a flashlight with me. I asked David Michael and Andrew and Kristy if they wanted to come with me, but they all said no. I hoped I would not be bored.

  I was not bored.

  There were an awful lot of sounds to listen to in that patch at night. I lay in my sleeping bag and stared up at the round yellow moon. Nearby, something rustled. Yikes! What was it? I held my breath, but nothing happened. I heard another rustle. Had the pumpkin-smasher come?

  Rustle, rustle.

  I decided the pumpkin patch was not a comfortable place for sleeping.

  “ ’Bye, Kong!” I called. (Kong was snug in his house.) “ ’Bye, Irv. ’Bye, Martha. See you guys tomorrow!”

  I fled into the big house. Everybody was still up.

  “I could not fall asleep on that bumpy ground,” I told my family.

  “Yeah, right,” said David Michael.

  “Well, I couldn’t.”

  So I slept in my bed that night. The next morning, I checked on Kong as soon as I woke up. He was still safe.

  The Snake Patch

  Halloween was coming soon. In school we wrote scary stories and talked about our costumes. At home, Hannie worked on designs for Martha’s face. I saved toilet paper (just in case). And of course I took care of Kong and my pumpkin patch. I decided it was time to start my sale.

  “Private sale! Private pumpkin sale!” I announced to the kids in Ms. Colman’s room. “Have first pick of the patch. Come on Wednesday before the best pumpkins are taken!”

  On Wednesday afternoon I rode home with Hannie. I ran across the street to the big house. David Michael was already home from his school.

  “Can you help me with the private sale?” I asked him.

  “Sure!” David Michael sounded pleased to be asked.

  “Stay in the patch with me this afternoon,” I said. “I am going to disguise Kong in his house. Do not let anyone look under the box. Try to make people look at Irv instead.”

  Before long my friends began to arrive. Mrs. Springer brought over Natalie and the twins. Mrs. Dawes brought over Nancy. Mr. Reubens brought over Hank and Ricky and Bobby. Hannie walked across the street by herself.

  “Hi,” said Natalie. “Nice pumpkin patch. Where is Kong?”

  “Kong is not for sale,” I told her.

  “I know, but I want to see him.”

  Guess what. So did everybody else.

  I sighed. I glanced at David Michael. He said, “Hey, everyone, come look at Irv instead. Karen made this scarecrow by herself.”

  A few kids wandered over to Irv. (His head had shrunk.) But Natalie saw Kong’s house. “Karen, what’s that?” she asked.

  “Oh, nothing. Just the house where my pet snake lives.”

  “Your pet snake?” Natalie backed away.

  Bobby leaned over the house and looked more closely. “That box is covering a pumpkin!” he exclaimed. “I can see the pumpkin stem.”

  My friends gathered around the box. “I bet that is Kong!” said Hank.

  “Well, don’t lift it up! Karen keeps her snake in there!” shrieked Natalie. “This is not a pumpkin patch. It’s a snake patch!”

  “Come on, you guys. Why don’t you pick out your pumpkins?” I said.

  Ricky left Kong’s house. He walked around the patch. “I like this pumpkin,” he said. “No, this one…. No, this one!” Ricky liked just about every pumpkin he saw.

  While Ricky was making up his mind, Pamela and her friends Jannie and Leslie arrived. Their noses were in the air. They are Gigundo Snobs.

  “These are not such great pumpkins,” said Pamela. “That one is lumpy. And I think that one has worms.”

  “Karen!” called Bobby. “I found the pumpkin I want!”

  “Goody!” I ran to him. “Okay. Which one?”

  “That one.” Bobby pointed to Kong. “I will pay you one hundred dollars for him.”

  “He is still not for sale…. Has anyone found a pumpkin yet?” I asked.

  “I found four,” said Ricky.

  “I am going to buy this teensy one,” said Pamela. “Maybe it will win the prize for puniest pumpkin.”

  I did not care why Pamela bought a pumpkin, as long as she bought one. So Pamela bought the baby pumpkin. Then Bobby chose a different pumpkin. Then Ricky bought a pumpkin for every person in his family. Natalie decided not to buy a pumpkin from a snake patch, but lots of other kids bought pumpkins. And Hannie took Martha home.

  I decided my private sale had been a success.

  The Pumpkin Zoo

  The next day, David Michael and I put up the pumpkin sale sign in the yard in front of the big house. My brother said he would stay in the yard and tell people how to get to the pumpkin patch. I would stay in the patch and be the salesperson. Also, I would guard Kong.

  As soon as the sign was up, someone stopped her car and called, “Where is King Kong’s Pumpkin Patch?” (I had not even had time to run to the backyard.)

  “It’s this way,” I said. “Follow me.”

  The woman parked her car. She and two children, a boy and a girl, climbed out. They followed me to the patch.

  “Come on in and walk around,” I said. “Pick your own pumpkins.”

  The boy and the girl leaped over the chicken-wire fence. They ran all over the place. They stepped on the vines. I waited for their mother to tell them to settle down, but she did not.

  “Be careful of the pumpkin babies,” I said to them.

  Then some more people came into the backyard.

  “Welcome to King Kong’s Pumpkin Patch,” I said politely. “Go right in.”

  Soon about eight people were walking around, looking at the pumpkins. A couple of them wanted to know about Kong’s house. When I told them it was the home of my garden snake they moved away fast.

  “Hi, Karen!” someone called. Sam was walking across the yard to the patch. “Need any help?” he asked.

  I looked at my customers. “Maybe,” I replied. “Can you make sure people do not step on the pumpkins?”

  “Sure.” Sam stood in the middle of the patch. He told people he was from the Pumpkin Police. Everyone listened to him.

  It pays to be tall.

  Finally a young man said to me, “Miss? I have found a pumpkin.”

  “Oh, good. Which one?”

  “That one.” He showed me a medium-sized pumpkin near the edge of the patch. “It is a beauty,” he added.

  Well, that was nice, but I realized I did not know a thing about this man who wanted to leave with one of my pumpkins. I had to make sure the pumpkin was going to a good home.

  Once, a stray cat gave birth to a litter of kittens in our toolshed. Daddy said I could find homes for the kittens. That was an important job. I knew I could not give the kittens to just anybody. I had to find the right home for each kitten.

  I figured it was the same with my pumpkins.

  “Do you like pumpkins, sir?” I asked the man.

  “Well, yes.”

  “What do you do for a living?”

  “A living? I repair cars.”

  “And where will you be keeping this pumpkin?”

  “Karen, what are you doing?” asked Sam.

  He was standing behind me. I guess he had been listening.

  “I have to make sure this guy is going to give the pumpkin a good home,” I whispered to Sam.

  “For heaven’s sake,” said Sam. “The point is to sell the pumpkins. If you do not get rid of them, they will rot.”

  I pouted. “Okay, then I will keep the pumpkins. I will put th
em in my room. I will start a pumpkin zoo.”

  “Karen!”

  “Sam, I cannot do this. I cannot sell my pumpkins to complete strangers.”

  In the end, I had to go inside. Sam sold the pumpkins for me. In return, I gave him some of the money. I gave David Michael some of the money, too. Boo. At least Kong was still safe in his house.

  Jack-o’-lanterns

  When Mischief Night arrived, I closed my pumpkin patch. The town Halloween party was going to be held the next day. I figured nobody would want to buy any more pumpkins. It was too late.

  Sam and David Michael had sold an awful lot of pumpkins for me. Only a few were left in the patch. I decided to leave them on the vines for awhile. I would figure out what to do with them later. Maybe we could use them for pumpkin pie or pumpkin soup.

  Not even the pumpkins for the people in my families were left in the patch. We had already brought them inside. But Kong was still in the patch and still growing. I did not think he weighed six-hundred-and-seventy-one pounds. But he sure was big. He was one of the biggest pumpkins I had ever seen. He was enormous. He deserved his name.

  On Friday, Mischief Night, Mommy drove Andrew and me to the big house earlier than usual. We wanted to carve our pumpkins in the afternoon. That way, they could glow in the windows at night.

  Daddy and Elizabeth were still at work. But everybody else gathered for pumpkin carving. Even Sam and Charlie.

  “Jack-o’-lantern time!” said Nannie.

  Nannie had spread newspapers on the table in the kitchen. Our pumpkins were lined up along the middle of the table. First we designed the faces we were going to carve. We practiced on paper. Then we drew the faces right on the pumpkins.

  Emily’s face was a scribble, like this:

  “How is she going to carve that?” asked Andrew. “She cannot carve a scribble. It is impossible.”

  “Shh, honey,” said Nannie. “I will help her.”

  I was carving a pumpkin I had found in the patch during the sale. I could not carve up Kong, of course. But I did not want to miss out on jack-o’-lanterns. I drew a cross face on my pumpkin.

  Everybody drew a different face.

  “Hannie is carving her pumpkin today, too,” I announced. “Her pumpkin, Martha. She is entering Martha in the jack-o’-lantern contest tomorrow.”

  “What kind of face is she going to carve?” asked Kristy.

  “A scary one, I think. We will find out tonight. Hannie is working on her pumpkin now. Then she will put Martha in her front window.”

  “Look,” said David Michael. “It is almost dark out.”

  When our pumpkins were finished, Nannie helped us put a candle in each one. We set our pumpkins in the windows in the living room. Sam lit the candles. I turned out the light. The room was dark except for the orange glow of our jack-o’-lanterns.

  “Let’s look at them from outside!” I cried.

  So we did. We saw a row of flickering faces.

  “That is creepy,” said Andrew.

  My family went back inside. Do you know what David Michael said then? He said, “Nannie, please can Karen and I go out tonight and make mischief? Please? Linny and Hannie are allowed to go. So are Bill and Melody Korman.”

  “Please, please, puh-lease?” I added.

  “Wait until your parents get home.”

  When Daddy and Elizabeth came back from work, David Michael and I told them we were the only seven-year-olds in the whole neighborhood who were not allowed to go out on Mischief Night. So they changed their minds.

  “You may go,” said Daddy, “but only for half an hour.”

  “And stay with your friends,” added Elizabeth.

  “And take flashlights,” said Nannie.

  “Thank you!” David Michael and I cried.

  Then David Michael stuck a bag in the bushes by the front door. We filled it secretly. We put in soap, shaving cream, two eggs, and the toilet paper.

  It was our secret stash.

  Making Mischief

  “Is it time? Is it time to go yet?” I asked. I was bouncing up and down in my place at the supper table.

  “Karen, please settle down,” said Daddy for about the one hundredth time.

  “But, Daddy, it’s Mischief Night!”

  David Michael was bouncing up and down, too.

  “All right. Go ahead,” said Daddy.

  David Michael and I put on our jackets. We ran for the front door just as the bell rang. “They’re here!” I cried.

  Hannie, Linny, Bill, and Melody were waiting outside. David Michael closed the door softly behind us. “We hid our stuff in the bushes,” he whispered loudly. “Here is our secret stash.” He found the bag.

  I grabbed Hannie’s hand. “Ooh, this is so exciting!” I squeaked.

  “Yeah! Our first Mischief Night.”

  “What should we do?” I asked my friends.

  For a moment we just stared at each other. Then Linny said, “Toilet paper. We will throw some toilet paper around.”

  “And let’s make noise!” I added. “Tonight is a good time to make noise. We can yell around in the darkness.”

  “I am not afraid of the darkness,” spoke up Melody.

  “Nope. Me neither,” said the rest of us.

  But I was glad the streetlights were on.

  We ran down our lawn to the sidewalk.

  “There is Martha!” exclaimed Hannie, pointing.

  “Let’s go look at her,” I said. “I want to see her face.”

  We looked both ways, crossed the street, and ran to Hannie and Linny’s front door. Martha was shining through a window in the hallway just next to the door.

  “Oh, Martha is a … what is she, Hannie?”

  “She’s a dragon. A scary dragon.”

  “Cool! I’m sure she will win a prize tomorrow. I bet nobody else carved a dragon jack-o’-lantern.”

  David Michael was unwrapping a roll of toilet paper.

  “Hey!” cried Linny. “What are you doing? You can’t make mischief in my yard. If you do, then I will mess up your yard.”

  “Sorry,” said David Michael. “Okay. Let’s get going.”

  We yelled and hollered. We ran into the next yard. David Michael tossed some toilet paper into a tree. Bill and Melody draped some over a hedge.

  “Where is the shaving cream?” I whispered. “I want to squirt shaving cream.”

  Linny and I squirted the shaving cream onto the sidewalk. We wrote HELLO.

  Then Hannie whispered to me, “Hey, where are the eggs?”

  We looked in the secret stash. There were our two eggs.

  The girls said the boys could throw them. They did not throw them at a window or anything. Eggs are a big mess to clean up. Instead, the boys threw them in the street. We watched them smash.

  Splat, splat!

  “What time is it?” I called a few minutes later.

  David Michael looked at his watch under a streetlight. “Time to go home,” he said.

  “Oh, well. Tomorrow is Halloween,” I replied. “The day of the contests.”

  We walked back to our houses. The neighborhood was quiet. Nobody had made any mischief in our yards.

  “Good night!” I called to Hannie. “Kong and I will see you and Martha tomorrow!”

  The Pumpkin-Smashers

  When I woke up on Halloween morning, the first thing I did was look out my window. I was hoping for sunny weather. I did not know what would happen to the Halloween party if it rained. The party, the contests, and the parade were going to be held outdoors.

  “Please, please be sunny,” I said as I pulled aside the curtain.

  I looked up at the sky. Perfectly blue!

  Then I looked down at our yard.

  Uh-oh.

  Our yard was a gigundo mess. So was Hannie’s and so was Melody’s. The entire neighborhood was a gigundo mess. The big kids must have made mischief after my friends and I had gone to sleep.

  This is what I saw. Daddy had climbed a ladder. H
e was pulling toilet paper streamers out of a tree. Charlie was hosing down the sidewalk. Kids had written on it with soap and crayon. There was a broken egg on the roof under my window. Shaving cream covered our front steps.

  Suddenly Mischief Night did not seem like so much fun. I decided that next year I would stay home on Mischief Night.

  Guess what I was going to wear that morning. My Halloween costume. (I was a witch again.) Hannie and I planned to walk in the parade together after the pumpkin contests. We could wear the blue ribbons we were going to win.

  I ate breakfast with a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle (David Michael) and a teddy bear (Emily Michelle). When I finished I said to them, “Guess what time it is now.” I tried to look very important.

  “Nine-thirty,” said David Michael.

  “No! I mean, guess what it is time to do now.” (David Michael shrugged his turtle shoulders.) “It is time to cut Kong from his vine. Then I will weigh him. I am pretty sure he does not weigh six-hundred-and-seventy-one pounds, but that is okay. He is huge and beautiful.”

  I left David Michael and Emily in the kitchen. I ran outside to my pumpkin. “Hello, Kong!” I called. “Happy Halloween! Today is your big — ” I stopped talking. Kong’s cardboard house had been turned over.

  Kong was gone. I gasped. “Kong! King Kong! Where are you?”

  I looked everywhere, but I did not see my pumpkin. Someone had cut him from his vine, and I thought I knew who.

  I ran back to the house. “Sam!” I yelled.

  “What?” Sam was in the kitchen. He was drinking milk straight out of the carton, which he is not allowed to do.

  “Where is Kong?” I demanded.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Yes, you do! You took him. You are mad because you had to sell the pumpkins for me. So you took Kong as a mean joke.”

  “I did not!” cried Sam.

  “Then Charlie did. He is still mad about that fence thing.”

  “Karen, Charlie did not take Kong, either.”

  “Someone did!” I shrieked. “Someone stole Kong!”

  “Karen, what on earth is going on?” asked Daddy. He ran into the kitchen.