Kristy's Great Idea (7 page)

I shook my head dazedly.

Buffy and Pinky leaped around, galumphing after Miss Hargreaves as she put on her coat and went out to meet the cab that had come to pick her up.

Shaking, I let the dogs out in the backyard, remembering to bring their footballs. I tossed a
red football gingerly toward them as they ran ahead of me. I wasn't sure what they'd do with it. Louie usually runs halfheartedly after a football and then sort of forgets to fetch it.

Not those two. They dove for the ball, crashing into each other. One of them got it away from the other, but I couldn't tell which one. They looked identical.

I got down on my knees and clapped my hands. “Okay, boy, bring it here!” I called, not caring whether the dog was Pinky or Buffy.

Whichever one it was came barreling straight toward me. I knew that game all right. Louie likes it, too. He runs for you, then turns at the last second and veers around you. You can almost see him grinning.

But not this dog. He ran right over me. I was lost in a whirl of fur and claws and playful woofs. You really haven't lived until a dog has stepped on your face.

I sat up and rubbed my cheeks and eyes. Nothing seemed to be bleeding, so I stood up shakily. I looked around.

Oh, no. The dogs were gone! I thought Miss Hargreaves had said they would stay in the yard with me. Maybe they didn't stay with people they'd practically knocked unconscious.

“Pinky!” I shouted. “Buffy!”

Nothing.

“Pink-
eee
! Buff-
eee
!”

I ran to the front of the house. No dogs.

I looked up and down the street. No dogs.

I ran to the backyard and looked again. And there they were. Not in the McKeevers' yard but in the yard next door. They were racing toward me—heading for a clothesline.

“Pinky, Buffy,
no
!!”

Too late. They streaked through all the clothes and came to a screeching halt about two feet from me. One was wearing a small blanket draped over his (her?) tail. The other had a slip in his (her?) mouth.

“Bad dogs!” I cried. “Sit….
Sit!”

I took the blanket and the slip from them and glanced nervously at the house next door. It seemed pretty quiet. Maybe no one was home. Thank goodness the clothesline seemed okay except for the missing blanket and slip.

I wanted to return the things, but what about Pinky and Buffy? If I went into the other yard, would they follow me? Would they run away? I didn't know what to do. I almost didn't care. But just then a car pulled in the driveway of the house. Luckily, the driveway was on the other side of the
house from where I was, but I knew I'd better do something fast. Someone could come out at any moment to bring in the laundry.

“Okay, you guys,” I said to the dogs. “Look, here are your footballs.” I began walking slowly backward toward the clothesline. The dogs crept after me as if they were stalking the balls.

I reached the clothesline. The dogs were still following me.

“Come on,” I whispered tantalizingly. I held the balls under one arm, pinned the blanket and the slip crookedly to the line, and raced back to the McKeevers' yard at top speed.

The dogs ran after me. They liked that game.

Good for them. They could follow me all the way into the house, which was just what they did, and just where I wanted them.

We stayed inside for the rest of the afternoon, since I didn't trust the dogs outdoors anymore, even on their leashes. I watched TV. The dogs chewed on their footballs. Any time they started to get rowdy, I just held open the door to the laundry room and they calmed down. By the time Miss Hargreaves returned, I had decided something important. The members of the Baby-sitters Club should keep a notebook. Each time one of us finished a job, she should write it up in the
notebook and the others should read about it. That way, we could learn about each other's experiences. With a little luck, we wouldn't make any mistake more than once. For instance, no more dog-sitting.

I ran home, eager to start the notebook.

My first Baby-sitters Club job was over.

Claudia didn't have an easy time of it at the Newtons', that was for sure. She called me on Sunday to tell me all about it. I was almost glad
I hadn't gotten the job. What happened was that Mrs. Newton's sister, Mrs. Feldman, and her husband and their three kids were visiting, and the adults had gotten invitations to a show at an art gallery or something, so Mrs. Newton needed a baby-sitter for Jamie and his cousins. But somehow she forgot to mention that to Claudia, which wasn't at all like Mrs. Newton. It must have been because she's pregnant and thinking about the baby. Ordinarily, Mrs. Newton is honest and thoughtful. She always calls her baby-sitters if there are any changes in plans. Once she even called when Jamie had come down with a cold to ask whether I still wanted to come since I would risk catching it from him.

But things must have been slipping Mrs. Newton's mind, because when Claudia showed up that Saturday, four children were waiting for her. And there was a whole bunch of problems. Jamie and Rosie apparently didn't like each other, Brenda was cranky
(very
cranky) because she was getting over the chicken pox, and Rob hated girls, which included Rosie, Brenda, Jamie's mother, his own mother, and girl baby-sitters.

When Claudia stepped into the living room, Rob was sulking on one end of the couch, muttering things like, “Stupid girls,” and, “Why do we
have to have a dumb
girl
baby-sit for us?” Brenda was crying and clutching Mrs. Feldman around the legs, which made it hard for both of them to get around, and Rosie and Jamie were fighting.

Rosie was trying to yank something out of Jamie's hand.

“That's mine!” Jamie yelled indignantly.

“It is not. It's mine!” Rosie made off with her prize and charged up the stairs.

Jamie ran after her. “It is not! It's mine!”

“Mine!”

“Mine!!”
shouted Jamie at the top of his lungs. (Claudia said the house was practically shaking.) “Girls don't play with trucks. That's my moving van! Give it!”

“Nonononononono! “

Since the adults hadn't left yet, Claudia wasn't sure whether she was supposed to break up the fight or let one of the parents do it. Just as she was about to dash up the stairs, Mrs. Feldman managed to unwrap Brenda from around her legs and chase after Jamie and Rosie. She took each one by the hand and walked them downstairs, explaining patiently, “Jamie, sometimes girls
do
play with trucks. Rosie and Brenda do. But, Rosie, you don't have a moving van like this one. You must have gotten confused. That belongs to Jamie—”

“See,”
Jamie said, and stuck out his tongue. Rosie stuck hers out, too.

“—so we'll get your dump truck out of the goody bag,” continued Mrs. Feldman. “You brought three trucks with you, remember? Now maybe you and Jamie can play together nicely.”

Jamie and Rosie looked at each other suspiciously.

Brenda burst into tears again and grabbed hold of her mother. And that's just how things were by the time Jamie's parents and the Feldmans left, except that Brenda was hugging a ratty teddy bear instead of her mother's legs.

Claudia looked around the living room nervously.

Rob looked around in disgust. His eyes fell on Jamie, who turned his back on Rosie and was pushing an ambulance back and forth, making loud siren noises. “Hey, Jamie,” said Rob, “let's get away from all these
girls,
okay?” He glanced defiantly at Claudia.

“‘kay,” replied Jamie vaguely, busy with the ambulance.

“Where are you going?” asked Claudia.

“I'm not telling,” Rob said, and grabbed Jamie by the wrist.

Claudia dashed across the living room and
blocked the doorway. Rob pulled Jamie around and hauled him off in another direction, toward the entrance to the dining room. Claudia beat him to it.

“Where are you going?” she asked him again. “I'm the baby-sitter and I have to know. Just tell me where you're going.”

“Who's going to make me?”

“Nobody. But I won't let you leave until you do.”

Rob whirled around again. He let go of Jamie and grabbed his sister instead. Jamie sat down on the floor in surprise.

“Have we ever had a baby-sitter as mean as
her?”
Rob asked angrily.

“No!” said Rosie.

“No,” sniffled Brenda, who hadn't quite finished crying.

“Are we going to let her be mean?”

“No!” shouted his sisters. “Okay, let's do it!”

Claudia said that her stomach felt as if it were on a roller coaster. She had no idea what the Feldman kids were going to do. She found out immediately.

Rosie began running around and around the room, yelling at the top of her lungs. She wasn't yelling words; she was just making noise. Brenda
leaped onto the Newtons' couch and jumped up and down on it as if it were a trampoline. And Rob turned his fingers into guns and aimed them at Claudia.
“Pow! Pow! Pow-pow-pow!
You're a dead man! … I mean, a dead lady.” Jamie looked on dazedly.

At that point, Claudia almost panicked and called Stacey for help, but Jamie, sitting quietly on the floor, inspired her. She remembered that when she was little, and she or Janine misbehaved, her mother used to turn to her father and murmur, “I-g-n-o-r-e.” And they would do just that. Claudia decided to try it on the Feldmans. She sat on the floor next to Jamie, reached for a copy of
The Tale of Peter Rabbit
lying abandoned by an armchair, and began to read to him. Jamie rested his head against her shoulder.

Thump, thump, thump went Brenda.

“Aiieeee!”
shrieked Rosie, running by Claudia and stepping in her lap. Claudia didn't even look up.

“Pow!”
shouted Rob.
“Pow!
… Hey, baby-sitter, I'm killing you! … Okay? … Baby-sitter?”

“Not now,” said Claudia. “I'm busy.”

She kept reading, raising her voice when she got to the part where Mr. McGregor chased after Peter, waving a rake.

The thumping stopped. Brenda sat down a few feet away from Claudia and tried to listen without appearing
too
interested.

Rosie continued to run around the room, but she stopped yelling, and every time she ran by Claudia she slowed up long enough to look at the pictures in the book.

By the time the story was over, Jamie, Rosie, and Brenda were as quiet as mice. Claudia moved them to the couch. She found a copy of
Where the Wild Things Are,
opened it, and read about Max putting on his wolf suit and making mischief.

“As much mischief as me?” asked Rob from across the room, dropping his guns.

“Not quite,” replied Claudia. Rob looked satisfied. “If you come over here,” she went on, “you can find out what happened to him.”

Rob didn't say anything, but he perched on the arm of the couch and listened to the story. And to two more after that.

And that was Claudia's first Baby-sitters Club job (and the story of how she tamed the Feldmans).