Ivy and Bean No News Is Good News (4 page)

“I thought this was supposed to keep us off the streets,” Bean yelled at the door.

Her father didn’t answer. He didn’t open the door, either.

“Sheesh.” Bean and Ivy walked down the front path to the sidewalk. They looked in one direction. Trees and houses. They looked in the other direction. Trees and houses and a cat.

Ivy sighed and sat down on the sidewalk. “This could take days.”

“Months,” said Bean. “Years.”

The cat walked to the middle of Pancake Court and sat down.

“Cat in Danger?” suggested Ivy. “Is that a story?” She took out her notebook.

The cat licked its leg.

“Clean Cat in Danger,” said Bean. She took out her notebook, too.

The cat stood up, gave them an annoyed look, and crossed the street.

“Cat Saved?” said Ivy.

Bean shook her head. “Boring. This is going to be the worst newspaper in the world.”

“What if they ask for their money back?” Ivy said gloomily.

“I guess we could give them cheese,” said Bean, even more gloomily.

“But it’s ours!” said Ivy.

“Not until we write the ding-dang newspaper,” said Bean.

They sat some more. Mr. Columbi came out of his house, waved at Ivy and Bean, took a leaf off his car, and went back inside his house.

“Cleanest Car on the Court?” asked Ivy.

“That’s not news,” said Bean. “His car is always the cleanest.”

“Have you ever been in his house?” Ivy asked.

Bean shook her head.

“I wonder if it’s as clean as his car,” Ivy said.

“Bet it’s not,” said Bean. She imagined Mr. Columbi’s house. “I bet it’s really dirty and disgusting. With moldy sandwiches lying on the floor.”

“And rats in the sofa,” added Ivy.

“Eeeww!” Bean giggled. “He prob-ably eats food out of his shoes because all his plates are dirty.”

“There’s never a speck of dirt on his car,” said Ivy, “because he wants everyone to think he’s clean.”

“His dirty house is his secret,” Bean said.

“Mr. Columbi’s Dirty Secret,” said Ivy.

Bean looked at Ivy. “Now that’s news.”

Ivy smiled. “We’ll have to sneak.”

“Easy-peasy,” said Bean. “If we get caught, we’ll say my dad made us do it.”

+ + + + + +

Looking into Mr. Columbi’s house really was easy-peasy. It was Ivy who found the wheelbarrow in the backyard, and it was Bean who found the wooden box next to the garage. Put the box in the wheelbarrow, and ta-da! A perfect view into Mr. Columbi’s living room. Oh look, there was his kitchen, too.

“No rats in the sofa,” whispered Ivy, holding tight to the windowsill.

“Maybe they’re inside the pillows,” hissed Bean below.

“Well, he’s sleeping on the sofa,” Ivy hissed back. “He wouldn’t do that if there were rats, would he?”

“You never know,” said Bean. “What about moldy sandwiches?”

“There’s a sandwich,” said Ivy. “It could be moldy.”

“Is it on the floor or in a shoe?”

“It’s on a plate,” Ivy said. “But there are crumbs everywhere. And, yuck, there’s a lot of salami on the floor.”

“Salami?”

“That’s what it looks like.”

“What about the kitchen?” asked Bean.

“I see some plates in the sink,” Ivy reported. “And a jar without a lid. He left his oven door open. That’s kind of dirty, I think.”

“It’s dirty enough for me,” said Bean. “And he’s probably sleeping on the sofa because his bed is full of rats.” She wrote “Mr. Columbi’s Dirty Secret” in her notebook.

Ivy climbed down from the box and the wheelbarrow. Her eyes were shining. “So that’s how you get the story,” she said. “This is going to be fun!”

They figured that Mr. Columbi wouldn’t mind if they borrowed his box. After all, he was fast asleep. Why would he need a box? They carried it over to Dino and Crummy Matt’s house and set it against the wall where they thought the kitchen was. They wanted to see how much food Crummy Matt ate.

“Think how big he is,” Ivy said. “I bet he eats twenty pounds of food a day.”

“I bet their shelves are breaking,” said Bean.

“I bet they have two refrigerators.”

“Two refrigerators is news for sure,” said Bean, climbing onto the box. Luckily, the kitchen window wasn’t very far off the ground. Unluckily, the box fell over when she stood on it.

“Ow, ow, OW!” Bean yelled, rolling around in the dirt.

“Shh!” whispered Ivy. “They’ll hear us!” She sat on top of Bean and covered her mouth with her hand.

“MMMMMMM!” Bean yelled inside Ivy’s hand.

Suddenly Dino’s head poked out the kitchen window. “Whatcha doing?” he asked.

“Bean fell off the box,” Ivy explained.

“Look at my elbow!” yelled Bean. There was blood. Not much. But some.

Dino looked at the box. “Were you looking in our window?” he asked.

“Yes!” said Bean. She kicked the box.

Ivy nudged her warningly, but it was too late.

“Why were you looking in our window?” asked Dino.

Bean and Ivy glanced at each other. Should they lie? No, and Bean couldn’t think of one anyway. She sighed. “We’re making a newspaper.”

“We thought your kitchen would make a great story,” said Ivy.

Dino looked at her slitty-eyed. “Why?”

Ivy cleared her throat. How could she say this politely? “Because of Matt.”

“What about him?” said Dino suspiciously.

“Um. You know. How big he is.” Ivy made a circle with her arms.

“What?” Dino looked confused.

“We were going to write a story about how much food he eats,” said Bean. “We thought it might be interesting. That’s why we wanted to look in your kitchen.”

“It’s not interesting,” said Dino. “Matt’s big because he’s a mutant.”

“Bummer,” Ivy said.

“We thought he must eat a lot,” said Bean.

“Well, he doesn’t. He’s boring. He’s a boring mutant doofus.”

Ivy and Bean looked at each other and shook their heads. “No story.” They stood. “I guess we should try Sophie’s house,” said Bean. She was discouraged.

“Wait!” called Dino. They looked up at him. He was smiling. “I’ve got a great story for you.”

“What?”

“It’s a picture, really. Does your newspaper have pictures?”

Bean shrugged. “Sure. Pictures are good.” Anything that filled up paper was good.

Dino laughed. “I’ll go upstairs and get it. It’s on my mom’s dresser.”

+ + + + + +

“We can call it Guess the Naked Baby,” said Bean, looking at the picture.

Ivy started laughing. Again. “But everyone will already know it’s Crummy Matt. It looks just like him.”

“Except he’s
naked
!” Bean yelped. A laugh came out her nose. Again.

They were both laughing so hard they had to sit down on the curb to recover. They had already had to sit down on the curb three times. One time, Bean had laughed so hard she fell into the gutter.

“This newspaper is getting good,” gasped Ivy.