The Curious Adventures of Jimmy McGee (6 page)

Jimmy McGee took note of all this. He said to himself, "Suppose that tonight I should rescue Little Lydia as I am supposed to do according to the book? Would that make me a hero? Of course. Rescued by Jimmy McGee! Rescued from Monstrous! That would be the end of all of this hero-to-be business and could be labeled 'Business done!' Then I could forget it, put Little Lydia back on her couch, and I could get back to my nuts and bolts and my banging on pipes....

"Hey! But I'm way ahead of myself. Little Lydia is still somewhere in the ocean blue. Lucky she is made of rubber, except for her frizzy hair. I must be on the alert."

Jimmy McGee zoomied down to the beach. Now the tide was nearly high, the waves swelling and roiling way up on the beach, edging up to where he was standing. He backed off. Taking his stovepipe hat off his head, he emptied it of its nuts and bolts close to the dune, behind Little Lydia's castle.

Now, hat empty, Jimmy McGee went back to the nearest but safest edge of the incoming waves. He was not a seafaring little man. He was a landlubber interested in cellars and mainly in banging pipes. Still, he was brave and wanted to fulfill Amy's prediction about him, if possible ... and end that hero business.

What chance would a Little Lydia have in an ocean so vast and strong?

"Waves!" said Jimmy McGee. "Halt! Stop a minute. If one of you has a Little Lydia bobbing around on your chest, let her go! Please let her have a peaceful ride in, or..."

He could not finish. The next wave was tremendous, a giant wave! Monstrous! You would think it did not belong to the sea but had a life all its own and would rise higher and higher and even up and over the dune. That's how monstrous it was! Jimmy McGee backed up quickly. But he held his stovepipe hat straight out in front of him, like a beggar pleading for alms.

This monstrous wave seemed to stand still for a moment before hurling itself on shore. In that moment before it broke, Jimmy McGee saw a tiny object swirling and whirling in its frothy crest! Then it broke! As it did, it popped that tiny thing, whatever it was, right into Jimmy McGee's hat! Quick as a wink, he clapped his hat tightly on his head as the wave rolled back.

"Thank you," said Jimmy McGee. He retreated swiftly up to his headquarters, scooping up his nuts and bolts on the way, and sat down in the doorway. He took off his hat cautiously, held it upside down, and peered in. By the light of the moon he saw what he had captured, a tiny doll in a sopping-wet flowered summer dress and with frizzy golden hair!

"Ah!" said Jimmy McGee. "You are Lydia, Little. I recognize you because I have seen you in your sand castle, a little princess, and watched Amy and Clarissa making you a town around your castle. You are in the L's right ahead of me in Amy's book."

Naturally, Little Lydia did not reply. He looked at her, straight into her electric blue eyes. Naturally, too, she did not blink. Even if you squeezed her, she couldn't say anything or blink.

"That's all right," said Jimmy McGee. "Don't let it worry you—not saying anything but seeing plenty! I've seen you in your castle, so I know it's you. I've been wanting to run a little pipe in there to bang on in case of trouble. It would be like a fire alarm, and the whole family would come running, grab you up and keep you safe inside. No more trouble with Monstrous or who knows what other danger?

"But right now, I've got my other work to do, and you'll have to come with me on my rounds. Don't want to lose you or have some other Monstrous something catch hold of you. In the morning I'll lay you on your sand castle divan, and won't Amy be surprised?"

Before clapping his hat on—it was only a little wet—he took a long look at Little Lydia. He smiled. He liked her looks. She had a pretty smiling face; the paint had not washed off. Her hair was drying out and was all fluffed up like a movie star's. No wonder Amy had been sad losing such an odd little doll as this, a doll cut out for adventure.

Adventure! That's what she was going to have. Already had had Monstrous! Next, what?

He plunked her way up in his stovepipe hat, clamped it firmly on his head, and was about to take off when from far away he heard the rumble of distant thunder and saw the zigzags of lightning. That Lydia! She
had
taken his mind off his work. He had forgotten his precious little strong box, destined, he hoped, to have captured in it the tiny tip end of a streak of lightning and the faint last rumble of thunder. He lifted his stovepipe hat a fraction, shoved his little bolt box inside, and then clamped his hat back on very tightly.

Jimmy McGee had been so busy rescuing Little Lydia, maybe making himself into a hero, that he had not been paying enough attention to his real work. He had not estimated just exactly where this storm that he was tracking down was centered. He listened intently. Ah, another rumble! He loved the sound of distant thunder. He loved close-up thunder, too. Bang! Bang! Bang! Like a mighty man banging on a mighty pipe! Right in his line of work, though his was on a modest scale. Lightning, too, he liked. That's probably why he moved like lightning ... his zoomie-zoomies made him move with the speed of lightning. But, unlike lightning, his zoomie-zoomies never wore themselves out, nor hurt anything or anybody. They were magic. Even in Amy's
Who's Who Book
in the Z's it said, "Zoomie-zoomies: a magic that can make people who have it do curious things."

Well, now, on, he hoped, to the capture of the bolts!

Jimmy McGee, on his six-sixty way to track down a storm he figured was down Ipswich way, or farther down the coast, was beginning to have a strong feeling that this might,
might,
mind you, be the very storm in which he could catch his special thunder and lightning bolts. He was feeling somewhat elated, self-confident, filled with electricity! Maybe it was because he had rescued Little Lydia. But he was beginning to think less and less of Little Lydia and more and more about the important task he had set for himself.

After all, he was not cut out to be a doll-rescuer and doll-minder. He was a plumber pure and simple. Call him hero or don't call him hero—it didn't matter to him, not right now anyway as he heard the thunder and saw, not too far away, streaks of lightning!

He was certain now, from the sound of the thunder and the speed of the lightning, that this storm was down Ipswich way, and he zoomied through the telephone wires and was soon there. By now the storm was passing on. Here were simply the final rumblings of thunder and slight flashes of lightning, as afterthoughts, a kind of gentle ending to the storm! As if saying to Jimmy McGee, "Want some? Take some before it is too late!"

He reached in his hat for his special little bolt box. He was very careful not to let Little Lydia slip out. Then he really did forget all about her!

In a little town very near to Ipswich, about one hundred and fifty miles from his summer headquarters, Jimmy McGee zoomie-zoomied to the top of a pretty church on the green there. He knew about this church. In one of his scrolls he had a record of where and how many times every little church had been struck by lightning, and this church had had its steeple struck by lightning three times. Lightning must love it. So there he stood at the very tiptop, poised and balanced on its pointed spire. He opened his little bolt box and stretched it out in front of him.

"Come on, thunder! Come on, lightning!" he challenged, while balancing himself and urgently hoping. His hopes were rewarded.

What happened next was exactly what had happened earlier in the evening in the rescue of Little Lydia from Monstrous!

He did capture with a sizzling ping-ping the tiny frail tail of a flash of lightning and the final rumble of the thunderbolt, a comforting sound. Both quieted down right away when Jimmy McGee locked them inside his little bolt box. They couldn't get out. He pressed the box into his stovepipe hat.

It was only because of his magic powers that Jimmy McGee was able to capture them. No one else in the world could do it or should even try ... too dangerous!

He was elated. But he had completely forgotten the other occupant of his stovepipe hat, Little Lydia. At the moment all he thought about was what an awe-inspiring addition he had gotten to his rare collection of nuts and bolts, a large number of them odd ones from

many places and times. It was his intention never to let these new bolts loose until the absolutely right moment to do so came! What moment would that be? Some heroic moment?

Oh, my goodness!
Hero!
There was Little Lydia, sitting on a little box filled with thunder and lightning bolts on top of his head in his stovepipe hat! Or the box might be sitting on her! What must that seem like to Little Lydia?

He tried to reassure himself. "Remember," he said, "a do-nothing doll like Little Lydia wouldn't realize one thing about it."

Making sure that his hat was clamped down tightly, he zoomied back from the pretty church steeple to his summer headquarters. He did this in six-sixty time! He was as happy as he would have been had he captured a star!

He went inside and entered this adventure in one of his scrolls, the one labeled "Most Important Bolts," put it back in its pipe, put it in his library, and sat down in his doorway to think things over. Monstrous! And then thunder and lightning bolts! What a day!

But he did not have much time to relax, to think!

Strange sounds were coming from inside his stovepipe hat.

"Oh, my goodness!" Jimmy McGee exclaimed. "Little Lydia! Jogging around with thunder and lightning bolts, even though tiny, inside my stovepipe hat, plus whizzing through miles and miles of electric telephone wires have given her the zoomie-zoomies. She's not used to this! Just an ordinary do-nothing doll has become, and all because of me, a do-what? doll!"

Just how could he return a doll smitten with the zoomie-zoomies to Amy and to her family, who, unlike himself, were not accustomed to that curious magic? He was trapped in a delicate dilemma.

Tenderly he lifted Little Lydia out of his hat. Holding her tightly in his fist, he studied her with intense curiosity. He held her against his ear. He listened. Miniature rumblings of thunder were inside of her, thumping away, sounding like heartbeats, and even like do-re-mis! A musical doll. A do-nothing doll transformed into a musical doll! Boom! Boom! Boom! Just like the sound of the drum he could hear when he was working in the cellar of the Opera House, the practicing of the musicians above him on the stage.

What had he done? He realized he could not put Little Lydia back on her couch in her sand castle and surprise Amy in the morning as he had meant to do! He had to restore her to her old, perfect do-nothing condition, no questions asked.

Perhaps if he put her back in his hat, he could think better. First, he hid his magic bolt box back in its cubbyhole for his most out-of-the-way nuts and bolts. Then he put Little Lydia back in his stovepipe hat.

But up there her rumbles grew louder and louder and had begun to sound like words now, like a message in his own special bebop code.

"Little Lydia!" said Jimmy McGee. "Can you bebop a little louder? What did you say?"