One Day and One Amazing Morning on Orange Street (2 page)

Everything seemed normal, except you couldn't help noticing the Day-Glo orange cone sitting at the curb in front of the empty lot. (The mysterious stranger didn't arrive until later.)

The empty lot belonged to the kids who lived on that particular block of Orange Street. They didn't have the papers to prove they were the owners, of course, but the lot had been theirs to play in ever since they could remember, which, even if you subtracted those baby years when nothing really sank in, was more or less a decade.

The lot had no house on it, but it wasn't completely empty because of its orange tree. Years ago, the tree had shaded the backyard of a house that was later torn down and never rebuilt. And oh, what a tree it was, with its juicy fruit and big huggable trunk and dark canopy of leaves! It even had a little plastic swing hanging from a big branch. The tree was the last living member of the grove that had given the street its name, long ago. Everyone knew that the coolest spot on the street (temperature-wise and otherwise) was under the orange tree. That's where the Girls With Long Hair Club conducted its meetings.

Over the years, hundreds of things had been buried under the lot's hard clay surface, whether by accident or on purpose. The mysterious stranger himself had come to dig up some small things, as well as something big.

Nasturtiums and sage and lavender grew all over the lot. They looked so grateful to be planted in the sun, you knew
they would bloom forever. A huge, bushy bougainvillea vine climbed the lot's chain-link fence. Robert Green (302 Orange Street) liked to conduct his important, but lonely, missions behind that vine. He didn't pay attention to the orange cone because orange cones showed up on streets in Los Angeles all the time, and they usually meant street repair.

Bunny Perkins (308 Orange Street and a member of the GWLH Club) noticed the orange cone when she let her dog Ruff out, and went outdoors herself, to count snails. Summer always meant lots of fat snails—some could be found in the garden, others meandering across the sidewalks, leaving behind silvery, wet trails. Three snails on the front walk meant bad luck. Luckily, there were only two that day, an important point to note, especially on a morning when Bunny's mother was preparing to go on a trip by plane. Ruff ran to the lot next door and lifted his leg by the orange cone. Bunny phoned Leandra Jackson (301 Orange Street, another GWLH Club member) as soon as she could.

“What do you think that cone means?” Bunny asked.

“It's not the cone,” said Leandra grumpily. Lots of things made Leandra grumpy lately, especially changes out of the blue. Or in this case, orange. “It's the color orange.”

“Orange?”

“You heard me. In nature, orange means good things, like pumpkins, and juice, and autumn leaves, and sunsets. But when you paint something orange it usually means something not-so-good. Except, of course, if it's Halloween. And even Halloween is scary sometimes.”

“It's summer.”

“Exactly my point. So we're talking not-so-good. Like
danger
. Or
condemned
. And, of course,
keep out
.”

“Keep out! I can't do that!” cried Bunny, her heart pounding. Bunny had lots of dependable ways to keep her mother safe, and one secret way involved climbing the orange tree. It worked every time.

“I'll call Ali right away,” said Leandra. “I'll bet that cone means bad news. We're due for a club meeting anyway.”

But Ali Garcia (305 Orange Street) wasn't worried at all. “Maybe it means an important person will be driving by, like the mayor,” Ali said. “It could be something exciting. Maybe someone's going to make a movie about our street!” She and her little brother, Edgar, were sitting on the living room couch while they waited for Edgar's careperson to arrive. They lived right smack across the street from the lot and Ali had noticed the orange cone first thing that morning. “Actually, it looks just like a wizard's hat.”

Leandra laughed, still grumpy. “Oh, grow up,” she said. Leandra was five and a half months older than Ali, and often said that.

“Only kidding,” said Ali. “See you soon.”

It did look like a wizard's cap, thought Ali, staring at the cone across the street. When she had been younger, Ali had imagined the lot was a magical place, inhabited by witches, gnomes, fairies, goblins, wizards, etcetera, etcetera. Those creatures played tricks on ordinary mortals, terrified them, granted their hearts' desires, etcetera, etcetera, just as they did in all those great books she'd read.

The closest you got to real fairies in that lot were the tiny hummingbirds sipping nectar from flowers. Anyway, Ali was older now and considering a possible future career in science, probably paleontology, or archaeology. So she'd begun digging in the lot about two weeks ago, sort of as a summer hobby. She had always been curious about the true facts related to the property, which was sometimes provided by Ms. Snoops (303 Orange Street), the oldest living resident on the block.

Spread out on the coffee table were Ali's treasures from her most recent digs in the lot, not exactly the valuable treasures she'd discover on future digs in exotic places, but
a good start: a jar top, two iron nails, a woolen sock. Ali's favorite was a little blue stone, shaped like a heart. It could be a wishing stone, if she still believed in that stuff.

Ali had also made a recent gruesome discovery. Ruff, Bunny's dog, had been digging holes in the lot, as usual, and that's how Ali had found the ancient cookie tin. The gruesome discovery was inside that tin: a head! It was a doll's head, not a human one, but still . . . Its face was cracked all over, its hair and one eyeball were missing, but it was still smiling faintly, despite its bad luck.

Ali put a few fingers in its poor little skull, making it dance for Edgar like a puppet.

“Hey, kid! What's your name? Will you play with me?” Ali asked, in a squeaky voice.

But Edgar didn't answer Ali's questions like he used to. He didn't ask his own questions, either. It used to be “
Why? Why? Why?
” all day long. And he used to say his name, and he knew all the letters of the alphabet and the names of a whole rainbow of colors. Even turquoise! Even fuchsia! And words. Lots of words! “So smart, and only two and a half years old,” everyone used to say. Edgar himself would shout, “I'm
fart
!” And of course everyone would fall down laughing, Edgar laughing harder than everyone else. Just laughing and
laughing and laughing. But Edgar's words and Edgar's laugh had disappeared ever since he'd gone into the hospital two months ago, returning home silent and pale.

Ali put the doll's head down. She touched the blue heart shaped stone with the tip of her finger, then kissed her little brother.

“I wish for my heart's desire,” she whispered.

he kids called her Ms. Snoops because that's what she did. (Her real name was Ethel Finneymaker.)

That morning Ms. Snoops noticed the orange cone, too, when she went outdoors to deadhead her marigolds. She didn't like to disturb those hard-working 9-1-1 operators unless the situation was serious (especially so early in the day), but she knew that ominous orange cone could mean only one thing.

“Murder!” cried Ms. Snoops. She glanced around to make sure nobody had heard her, then hurried inside to make that early morning phone call.

On any other morning, if you happened to glance up at the
top corner window of 303 Orange Street, chances were you'd see Ms. Snoops looking at you as you strolled by. She'd give you an embarrassed wave, or a wink, or pretend to wipe some invisible dust specks from the windowpane. Then she'd go back to whatever she was doing before she started snooping.

The kids on Orange Street weren't exactly sure what that was.

Bunny worried that Ms. Snoops was a spy in disguise. (Well, a spy wearing a nightgown, or a shiny pink tracksuit.) She wondered if she should bring up that worry with her parents.

Leandra was positive that Ms. Snoops had committed a crime of some sort. Once she'd even seen a cop ringing Ms. Snoops's doorbell! She thought she'd glimpsed an electronic bracelet around Ms. Snoops's ankle on the day Ms. Snoops slipped on an avocado pit while taking a brisk stroll. The police were probably monitoring her activities.

Robert thought Ms. Snoops was a witch. He meant that in a good way. She had a thousand wrinkles that made her look wise, and she smelled of secret potions. Also, she'd recently lent him a book called
Incredible Magic Tricks for a Rainy Day
, which seemed to be the real deal, whatever the weather.

Ali knew Ms. Snoops the best, because she enjoyed
visiting her to discuss the history of Orange Street. But Ali kept changing her mind about Ms. Snoops.

Sometimes she thought

(1) Ms. Snoops, a retired schoolteacher, was amazingly smart, with one of those brains scientists liked to examine in their labs. Ms. Snoops was over eighty years old and had lived on Orange Street when it was part of a grove of trees. If Ali asked Ms. Snoops, “Who were all the people who've ever lived on Orange Street?” Ms. Snoops could reel off names, hobbies, what people liked to eat for breakfast—everything! Ms. Snoops also knew all the constellations, dog breeds, plant types, old movie stars, American presidents, and synonyms or antonyms for any word you threw at her.

On the other hand,

(2) sometimes Ali thought Ms. Snoops wasn't that smart. This was a surprising thought that occasionally flitted across her own brain and made her feel deeply ashamed.

But, then, she thought, maybe

(3) Ms. Snoops had a mysterious ailment which required rest, occasional exercise, and lots of vitamin C from orange juice.

Ms. Snoops did love her orange juice! She drank it at most meals, and sometimes, with a drop or two of sherry, just
before she went to bed at night: certified, organic orange juice from the health food store. But after the February blossoms had bloomed and then the sun and winter rains had done their magic, Ms. Snoops got the sweetest most orangey juice for
free
, stolen from the orange tree growing in the lot across the street, with the help of her trusty, rusty fruit-picker pole.

Actually, it wasn't
stealing
. Ms. Snoops felt she had the same rights to the tree's fruit as the squirrels did. Who else took the time to personally clean up the dog poop and gum wrappers and cigarette butts around its trunk? Who else fertilized its roots or gave it long, cool drinks from a watering can? Or risked a strained back lugging a ladder across the street to hang some wind chimes, as well as a snazzy birdhouse (free with her Chicken McNuggets at McDonald's)? Ms. Snoops had many “rules of life,” one of which was to help make her own neighborhood as nice as she could.

This included the prevention of murderous crimes. On this particular morning, she dialed 9-1-1.

“I'd like to report a murder,” Ms. Snoops said, when the dispatcher picked up.

That wasn't exactly true, Ms. Snoops realized.

“Actually, it's an attempted murder I'm reporting.”

That wasn't true, either.

“Well,” Ms. Snoops continued, “the murder hasn't been attempted yet, but trust me, it will be attempted very, very soon!”

There was a short silence at the other end of the phone line, punctuated by static crackles.

“Madam, I'm afraid we need more information. How can you be certain of this murder-to-be?” asked the dispatcher.

Now Ms. Snoops was very confused. “Well. I—”

But how
could
she be so certain? What had made her call 9-1-1 in the first place? Ms. Snoops racked her brain, but she couldn't remember.

“I really don't know why I called. I'm so terribly, terribly sorry for disturbing you,” said Ms. Snoops, and she hung up the phone.

“Mitzi, Mitzi,” she murmured sadly. “My memory is disappearing again.”

Ms. Snoops was talking to her cat, Mitzi, who was lounging on the windowsill. That was another of Ms. Snoops's rules of life: Always have a cat around to talk to. She figured if she didn't have a cat, she'd be talking to herself all day long, which would be unbearable. And all of her cats were named Mitzi, in honor of all the dear Mitzies who'd come before.