Girls Rule!

  “Wh—who was that?” asked Caroline, almost afraid to know.

  “That was Mrs. Corby again. She simply said, ‘And we do not have termites!’ and hung up.”

  Fourteen

  A Worse Idea

  Wally crouched between the rake and the lawn mower and tried to see through the narrow crack in the door.

  “What’s he doing?” Jake asked. “Is he going over to Mrs. Corby’s yet?”

  “No. He’s coming around the side of our house,” said Wally. “I think he’s going to knock on the back door.”

  “Oh, man!” breathed Josh. “What if he comes out here? What’ll we say?”

  “How do you do, what else?” said Wally, wishing for the hundredth time that he hadn’t got mixed up in this. The huge termite on top of the white truck out by the curb seemed to have one eye on the Hatfords’ tool-shed at the back of the yard, and Wally could almost imagine it was watching him through the crack.

  Jake climbed over the wheelbarrow and nudged Wally aside so he could see out.

  “Oh, boy!” he whispered. “He is knocking. And now he’s looking all around the yard!"

  “Maybe he’s inspected the outside of our house for termites and he’ll inspect the shed next,” said Josh.

  “I’m hot!” Peter complained from his perch inside the wheelbarrow. “I can’t breathe in this shed!"

  “Shhhhh. Don’t talk so loud, Peter. Oh, no! He is starting back here!” Josh said.

  “What are we gonna do?” said Josh. “Suddenly burst out of the toolshed and yell ‘Surprise’?”

  Wally considered picking up a burlap sack and pulling it over his head.

  “Wait,” whispered Jake. “Now he’s stopped. Now he’s looking toward the house next door. Yay! He’s going around in front again. I think he’s going over to the Corbys’. He is going next door! All we need is for him to knock on Mrs. Corby’s door while the girls are over there.”

  This will never work, Wally thought. Things never turned out quite the way Jake planned them. Wally considered going around with a burlap sack over his head for the rest of his life.

  “I’m going to melt!” Peter warned.

  “Just a few more minutes, Peter, and then he’ll be gone,” said Jake.

  “I’m turning into butter!” Peter wailed.

  “There he goes, up on the Corbys’ front porch!” said Jake. “Hey! The girls are coming out! They’ve seen him! They almost bumped into him. Is this perfect, or is this perfect?”

  “I’m starting to ooze,” said Peter from the wheelbarrow.

  Josh took his place at the crack in the door. “Mrs. Corby’s talking to him now. She’s sending him away, and the girls are staring after him. You just know they’ll go home and tell their folks!"

  “Did he leave?” asked Wally.

  “Yep. He’s going back to his truck. And the girls are leaving too,” said Josh. “Wait one more minute, Peter, and we’ll get out of here.”

  The boys opened the door of the toolshed at last and stepped out into the fresh air. Their heads were wet with perspiration, and sweat trickled down their backs.

  “Saved!” yelled Jake, and they went into the house for some lemonade.

  Mr. Hatford wore shorts with his postal uniform now. He said that summer was his favorite season, and he loved going door-to-door in his shirtsleeves. When he came in that afternoon, he wanted a glass of lemonade too, and he sat out on the glider, swirling the ice around in his glass.

  “Have you guys collected any more money for the hospital?” he asked.

  “One more car wash should do it,” said Josh. “We told the Malloys we’d hold it over here this Saturday.”

  “Fair enough,” said his dad. “Put a sign at the corner so folks will know to turn this way.”

  This was the evening Mrs. Hatford came home for dinner, then went back to the hardware store to work until nine o’clock. On warm nights like this, she served her family a cold salad with hard-boiled eggs and corn muffins. Cold salad did not seem like real supper to Wally, however, and his dad must have felt the same way, because after Mr. Hatford had eaten the salad, he got up to get some ice cream.

  At that moment there was a knock at the front door, so he went to answer it instead.

  “Good evening,” Wally heard a man say. “I hope I’m not interrupting your dinner, but we received a call that someone here wanted a termite inspection. I came by earlier but no one was home.”

  Wally began a slow slide off his chair.

  “Termites?” said Mr. Hatford. And then, more loudly, “Ellen? Do we have termites?”

  “Termites!” cried Mrs. Hatford, scooting away from the table and heading for the front door. “Who said we have termites?”

  Wally’s chin had almost disappeared beneath the table, and Jake and Josh sat frozen, eyes unblinking.

  “All I know, ma’am, is that I got a call from our dispatcher asking me to check out this house and the one next door. Lady over there didn’t know anything about it.”

  “Well, for goodness’ sake, who could have called?” Mrs. Hatford said. “We’re right in the middle of dinner, but you can take a look if you like.”

  “I’ll take him down to the basement, Ellen,” Mr. Hatford said. “Josh, make sundaes for the rest of the family, would you?”

  Josh got out of his chair and walked to the counter like a robot. He put a scoopful of ice cream and a spoonful of syrup in six bowls and set them on the table, but no one was eating except Peter. When the exterminator came up from the basement at last and pronounced the home termite free, he left, and Mr. Hatford came back to the table.

  “Well, that’s good news, anyway,” Mr. Hatford said, sitting back down. “But who could have called? Does our house look like it has termites?”

  “Where were you boys this afternoon when he came by?” asked their mother.

  “I thought we weren’t supposed to open the door to strangers,” Jake answered.

  “Yeah!” said Peter. “We were hiding in the tool-shed.”

  Jake and Josh and Wally stared daggers at Peter, who quickly concentrated on his ice cream again. But Mr. and Mrs. Hatford studied each of their sons in turn.

  “Hiding? Why?” asked Wally’s father.

  And Peter, knowing he had goofed up before, tried to correct the matter. “Because we knew we didn’t have termites and didn’t want him to come in,” he said.

  “So why didn’t you just call out and tell him to come another time?” asked Mrs. Hatford.

  Jake shrugged.

  Mr. Hatford raised an eyebrow. “Let me get this straight: an exterminator knocks at our front door and you guys go hide in the toolshed? What did you think he was going to do? Exterminate you?”

  “We were scared of that big old bug on top of his truck,” said Peter, nodding emphatically.

  Mr. Hatford leaned back in his chair. “Wally, you’re about to slide under the table,” he said. “Do you want to tell me what this is all about?”

  “Not particularly,” said Wally. “Ask Jake.”

  Mr. Hatford turned to Jake.

  “We just thought…well, with the Corbys moving and everything, maybe they should have their house inspected for termites before they rented it. We were just trying to be helpful.”

  Mrs. Hatford put down her spoon. “Why would it even occur to you to do something like that? Who are you concerned might rent that house and find termites?” And then her face relaxed. “Aha! I think I get it!"

  “I think I do too,” said Mr. Hatford. “Were you boys by chance hoping the Corbys did have termites? Or that the Malloys would see the truck outside and change their minds about renting that house?”

  The phone rang, and Wally, glad for an excuse to leave the table, quickly jumped up and answered.

  “Hello?” he said.

  A woman’s voice came out so loudly that he had to hold the receiver away from his ear.

  “For your information,” Mrs. Corby said, “we do not have termites.” And she hun
g up.

  Fifteen

  After Dark

  It helped that the Hatford boys were in the doghouse too, the girls decided. On the way to school the next morning, Peter blurted out that termites were sure causing a lot of trouble these days, then added, “And Mrs. Corby’s really mad!"

  Caroline and her sisters looked at Wally, Jake, and Josh, and immediately understood.

  “Yeah, she called our place too,” said Eddie, “and Mom went ballistic that we’d been over to look at the bedrooms.”

  “Dad went ballistic that we called an exterminator,” said Jake. “I don’t know why Mrs. Corby was so mad about it, though. It’s not like we hurt anybody, and she could have had a free inspection.”

  “So where are you going to live if your dad takes another job in Buckman?” Josh asked.

  “I don’t know,” said Beth. “Nobody knows anything. And frankly, I’m not going to worry about it. I’m going to concentrate on enjoying the summer.”

  “Only two more days of school!” Peter sang out. “And then … all the strawberries I can eat!"

  “What time do you want to start the car wash on Saturday?” Eddie asked the boys. “Why don’t we make it early, and maybe we can earn enough to fill all our collection cans.”

  “Eight o’clock,” said Jake.

  “I’ll make some signs and put them up around the neighborhood,” said Josh.

  “And I’ll do the wheels!” said Peter happily.

  Now that the Hatfords and the Malloys were friends again, it could have been a cheerful day. The car wash arrangements were settled, the sun was shining, the birds were singing, and the bees and butterflies were out. When the seven kids walked by Mrs. Corby’s house, however, where she was reading on her front porch, she snatched up her newspaper and went inside, banging the screen behind her. And that, Caroline decided later, should have told her that the day wasn’t going to be so perfect after all.

  In Caroline’s classroom, as other people stood up to read their reports on where they had chosen to be shipwrecked or plane-wrecked, none of them, Caroline decided, was as good as her report was going to be. But she was practicing to be nice now, and after each report, when Miss Applebaum asked for comments, Caroline raised her hand and said that she thought the report was very good. Sometimes she said it was “very, very good.” The more complimentary she was to other people when they gave their reports, she figured, the nicer they would be to her.

  She was careful, however, not to use words like fantastic or stupendous, because once she said that about someone else’s performance, what words could anyone use to describe Caroline’s? All the good words would be taken!

  The morning went well. Lunch went well. Her mother had put strawberry jelly in her peanut butter sandwich, not grape, which Caroline hated—and the afternoon was okay too, even though a wasp got in the classroom and she imagined she could feel it crawling through her hair during math.

  She played on the rope swing with her sisters after school, enjoyed their dinner of shrimp and rice, and was thinking about going outside to swing again, even though it was growing dark.

  Just then she heard her father say, “Jean, do you hear that bird? I’ve been listening to it for the last couple of evenings. A mockingbird, I think. I’m going to get my binoculars.”

  Caroline finished brushing her teeth and decided she would look for the bird too while she was swinging. But then she heard her father call, “Does anyone know where my binoculars are? I always keep them on the closet shelf, and they’re not there.”

  And Caroline’s day began to crumble.

  The binoculars! Her head reeled. She could almost see herself walking into Mrs. Corby’s house with the binoculars in her hand. She remembered going up Mrs. Corby’s stairs holding those binoculars. And then, her heart sinking, she remembered setting her dad’s binoculars on a windowsill in one of Mrs. Corby’s bedrooms.

  Caroline felt sick to her stomach.

  “Eddie?” her dad was calling. “Have you seen my binoculars? Beth?”

  Caroline knew she was next, and before he could call out her name, she slipped out of the bathroom and down the stairs. Out the door she went, and down the hill toward the footbridge.

  There was nothing else to be done. She was going to have to knock on Mrs. Corby’s door and tell her she had left something in one of the bedrooms. Humiliation, that was what it was. She tried to console herself with the thought that if she ever had to play the part of a humiliated woman, she would know how it felt. The burning cheeks, the pounding heart, the dry throat, the thick tongue…

  Caroline took a deep breath as she neared the Corbys’ house, and then she saw Mrs. Corby out weeding her flower bed in the twilight.

  Luck was with her! Maybe Fate had decided she had suffered enough! Maybe because she was practicing being nice to people, God had decided to make it easy for her. Creeping up on the porch, she tried the screen door and, just as she expected, it was unlocked.

  There was a lamp burning in the living room, but Caroline tiptoed on by and softly, stealthily, like a panther, moved up the stairs. The hallway above was dark and lined with small tables and trunks. Caroline could barely see where she was going and stumbled once as she bumped into a chair.

  When she reached the first bedroom, she moved inside, feeling her way along and heading for the windows. Her hands slid over first one windowsill, then another. Nothing. Maybe Mrs. Corby had already found the binoculars and was keeping them for her own!

  Back to the hall again, and into the next bedroom. Caroline moved past a dresser, a bed, barely able to see them in the meager light from downstairs. And there, on the windowsill, were her father’s binoculars, just where she had left them. She gave a little murmur of thanks as she picked them up and turned around.

  And then she screamed. In the dark doorway stood the figure of a man with a shaggy head, holding a club in his hand.

  The light came on and an elderly man holding a rolled-up magazine stared at her quizzically.

  “Who the dickens are you?” he asked.

  “Wh…who are you?” Caroline responded.

  “The owner of this house, for one thing,” the man said, and Caroline remembered that there was a Mr. Corby. The man had a gray beard that stuck out an inch all around his face. “I happen to live here,” he said. “But unless you’re a long-lost granddaughter, I can’t say the same for you.”

  “I…I just came over to get something I left the other day,” Caroline said, wishing he would move a little to one side so that she could squeeze past him and run downstairs.

  “Those wouldn’t happen to be binoculars, would they?” Mr. Corby asked.

  “Yes,” said Caroline.

  “You wouldn’t have happened to be spying the other day, would you?”

  “N—not exactly,” said Caroline.

  “You didn’t happen to come over here with binoculars to spy on the boys next door, did you?” Mr. Corby asked, and Caroline wasn’t sure, but it looked as though he might be hiding a smile. Because she was too embarrassed to answer, he said, “Well, you’d better get on home, then. I’d say that between you and those Hatford boys, you’ve caused enough trouble already.” And as Caroline gratefully left the room and hurried down the stairs, he called after her, “And if you brought any termites over here, take them with you.”

  Caroline bolted from the house just as she heard the back screen door slam and Mrs. Corby call, “Harold, did you hear somebody scream a minute ago?” Caroline ran down the sidewalk and right smack into Wally Hatford.

  “I thought I heard somebody scream,” Wally said.

  “You did,” said Caroline, rubbing her forehead where they had collided and hurrying by to get out from under the streetlight.

  “What were you doing in the Corbys’ house with binoculars?” Wally asked, following her. And then, “I’ll bet you were trying to see us in our underwear or something.”

  Caroline had had just about enough for one day. She wheeled about and fac
ed him. “You’re right,” she said, “and you know what? Looking at Wally Hatford in his underwear would be about the most boring thing in the universe. We’re not going to rent that house and we’re not going to be in those bedrooms and we’re not going to watch you through binoculars, so relax.”

  “That’s good,” said Wally. “Because if I ever got plane-wrecked somewhere, being plane-wrecked with you would be about the most boring thing I could think of.”

  “Good!” said Caroline. “So we agree.”

  She went down the bank and on across the footbridge toward home. But Wally’s remark stung. That simply could not be true! She might be unpleasant at times. She might be self-centered, but Caroline Lenore Malloy was never boring! And if Wally Hatford didn’t believe that, he could just wait till she stood up in front of the class tomorrow and gave her report!

  Sixteen

  Turnaround

  The last day of school had come, and Wally was ready for it to be over. After he gave his stupid report in that stupid room in front of that stupid class, he wouldn’t have to think about school again till September. By that time, either the Malloys would have gone back to Ohio, or they would have moved to another house in Buckman. Either way, the Benson boys would be back, and that was something to look forward to.

  Actually, the plane-wreck project was probably the most interesting one the fourth grade had had all year, so maybe it wasn’t so stupid after all. Giving a report in front of the class, though, was something else. Wally had already decided that he would go first that day so he could stop worrying about it. But he was a second too late, because Caroline waved her hand in front of the teacher’s face, and Caroline got to go first.

  She opened her backpack and pulled out a safari hat. She pulled out a compass, a whistle, and a raincoat. Then she put on the hat and walked dramatically to the front of the room, where she propped up a painting she had done of her location in Australia. After that, she read a report that sounded to Wally like paragraphs from a girl’s diary: