The Girls' Revenge (6 page)

“Yikes!” said Beth. “Major, major embarrassment!”

“It was a stupid, stupid assignment, and Miss Applebaum wasn't fair!” Caroline sobbed. “How can I tell Dad and Mom I'm repeating fourth grade? What if we move back to Ohio and I have to tell all my friends, ‘Goodbye. I'm going back to fourth grade’?”

“You'll just have to talk to the teacher and ask what you can do for extra credit,” said Eddie. “Tell her how sorry you are.”

“But what if she wants me to apologize to Wally?”

“That's a tough one,” said Eddie.

The girls got to the swinging bridge, but as they started across, they saw that the bridge was already jiggling. The Hatford boys were just walking off the
other side, and going right up the hill toward the Malloys' backyard, heading for the garage.

“Oooh, they think they're
so
smart!” Caroline breathed, anger getting the best of her again. “They're just doing this to bother us.”

“What do you suppose they want the loft for?” said Beth. “It's not June, after all. It's December. It's
cold
in there.”

“There's only one way to find out,” said Eddie, smiling slightly.

Beth turned to her sister. “Spy on them?”

“Exactly.”

Caroline began to feel all warm inside again, though not, she knew, with the Christmas spirit. Eddie and Beth were back in her corner again, making plans, and that was right where she wanted them to be.

Eight
Peter on the Hot Seat

J
ake, Josh, Wally, and Peter trooped into the Bensons' old garage and over to the ladder. It was nailed to the wall and led up through the opening in the floor above.

“Ladder still squeaks,” Jake said as he put his foot on the dusty rung and started up, hand over hand.

One by one the boys emerged into the loft. Half the space held window screens and picture frames, and in the other Wally saw an empty box of fireworks, old soda cans, thumbtacks, a mitten, a candy-bar wrapper, string, wire, and a Chinese checkers game. There was not enough room to stand up, but it didn't matter.

“We used to have a lot of fun up here,” said Josh.

They looked around some more, crawling over to the loft window, which directly faced the girls' house.

“Remember the time we strung up that pulley between
the loft window and Tony Benson's room?” said Jake. “It worked too.”

“Yeah, we used to clip notes to the pulley and pass them back and forth.”

It was time, however, for the club meeting, and when Jake and Josh and Wally and Peter were sitting in a sort of circle on the floor, Jake said, “Peter, take the hot seat.”

Peter, who had been running a little red double-decker Matchbox bus along the floor, quickly looked up. “Why?” he said. And then he saw the sober looks on his brothers' faces. “
What?”
he said.

“Go ahead, take the hot seat,” said Wally.

Peter reluctantly crawled into the center of the circle and looked from one brother to the next.

“Okay, how did she get them?” asked Jake, who always seemed to take over.

“I don't
know
!” said Peter, examining the little bus in his hands. “I don't know how Caroline got his clothes.”

The boys looked at each other.

“Then how did you even know we were talking about Caroline?” asked Josh.

“How did you know we were talking about
clothes
?” Wally demanded.

Peter was confused. “Well, what
were
you talking about, then?”

“Caroline and my clothes!” said Wally angrily. “You gave them to her, didn't you?”

“Well, she
asked,
” said Peter.

“Whose side are you on, anyway?” Wally bellowed.
“If she'd asked you to cut off our heads, would you have done that too?”

“No,” Peter whispered.

“What did she pay you, Peter?” asked Josh.

Silence.

“C'mon, what did she give you to steal Wally's clothes?” Josh insisted.

“I didn't steal them, I borrowed them.”

“What did she pay you?” Wally yelled.

Wordlessly Peter held out his Matchbox bus.

“A Matchbox car,” said Wally disgustedly. “You betrayed one of your brothers for a Matchbox car?”

Peter nodded miserably. “It's a double-decker,” he said.

For a while Peter's brothers just sat there staring at him.

“Maybe he's too young to be in our club,” said Josh.

Peter's head dropped even lower.

“Either that, or he can't be trusted,” said Jake.

Peter's lips began to tremble, and even Wally couldn't stand to see Peter cry.

“Okay, Peter,” he said. “You either have to give back that bus or you have to get back every single thing you gave Caroline. I mean
everything.
”

“I
will
!” said Peter. “I
told
you she only borrowed them.”

There was the sound of voices outside, and the boys suddenly stopped talking and crawled over to peek out the loft window.

“How come they're just getting home from school
now?” Josh whispered. “What have they been doing all this time?”

“Nothing good, you can bet,” said Jake.

The four boys watched the girls go in the back door of their house.

“You think they know we're up here?” asked Wally.

“Who cares? Squatters' rights. We've got that official permit from the Bensons, and besides, Mr. Malloy said we could use the loft,” said Josh.

Josh took a Magic Marker from his pocket and a sheet of paper from his school notebook.
Explorers' Club: Members Only,
he printed in heavy black letters, and tacked it to the wall.

“Do you really think that will keep Caroline out?” asked Wally.

“Of course not. It will just bug them to death that we're up here,” Josh said, grinning.

“I'm hungry,” Wally said suddenly. “Let's go home and make a pizza or something.”

They climbed down from the loft and Jake said, “All except you, Peter.”

“Why?” asked Peter.

“Because you're going to walk out there and knock on the Malloys' door and get Wally's clothes back, that's why,” Jake told him. “We'll see you at home.”

The three older brothers headed out across the Malloys' backyard and down the hill toward the swinging bridge. Wally turned around once and saw Peter standing forlornly at the Malloys' back door, his head down, knocking with one tightly rolled-up fist.

Good
, he thought.
Let him be miserable for a while.
Peter had no right to take Wally's clothes and give
them to Caroline. Now Wally and Caroline were both in trouble. They'd both failed the December project, and he had no doubt that any day now his folks would receive a letter in the mail from Miss Applebaum, saying,
Dear Mr. and Mrs. Hatford, I very much regret to inform you that your son, Wallace Hatford, is failing the fourth grade
…

The water below had an icy look, and the wind whipped at their jackets as the boys moved along the bouncing footbridge. Ducks flew overhead in a V formation as though escorting winter in, and the snow was still coming down.

When they reached the other side, they climbed up the bank and crossed the road.

“What's that?” asked Josh, pointing.

Over on the Hatford steps sat something that looked like a big white ball. A lumpy ball. A ball with a face.

“What
is
it?” Jake wondered aloud, moving closer.

“Underpants!” Wally cried.

“With a face painted on them!” said Josh.

“
My
underpants!” said Wally.

He was right. Caroline had taken all the clothes Peter had given her—all the things she wore when she gave her report—and stuffed them into Wally's underpants until they bulged like a balloon. Then she had painted a smiling face on the seat of the pants.

Wally desperately pulled his baggy blue pants out of the bundle, then his socks and shoes, but he held the underpants up with two fingers. How could he ever put them on again when
Caroline
had been in them? Mom would want to know how the face got on
the pants, and if he said “Caroline,” she might think Caroline had drawn the picture with him still wearing them.

He'd get even with Caroline, don't think he wouldn't. Wally walked out in the kitchen, where Josh was sticking a pizza in the microwave. There was a note on the table:

Boys Don’t fill up on pizza, we’re having steak tonight and I want you to be hungry.

“We'll be hungry,” Josh said to nobody in particular, and waited for the bell to ding. “I want to finish that painting for Mom tonight. Then I've got to think of something for Dad.”

“It's you guys I have to shop for,” Jake said. “I've already got presents for the folks. Boy, I hope they remember how much I want a skateboard.”

As they were eating their second pizza Wally said, “I wonder where Peter is.”

“Trying to get your clothes back, when they were here all along,” said Jake. “They're probably giving him a hard time. Should we call over there and tell them to send him home? I'll bet he's standing in the hall crying, with Caroline telling him all kinds of lies. Like how she lost Wally's clothes or something, and she's making him look all over their house.”

“He'll think twice before he tries that again,” said Wally.

The phone rang. It was Mom.

“Everything okay?” she asked.

“Sure. Fine,” said Wally.

“You boys didn't eat pizza, did you?”

“It's okay. We're still starving.”

“Ask Peter if he turned in his lunch money like he was supposed to.”

“Uh… I'll ask him when he comes in,” said Wally.

“Where is he?”

“Over at the Malloys'.”

“The Malloys'? What's he doing there?”

“Uh… I'm not sure,” said Wally.

“Well, for heaven's sake! Do I have to do every thing myself?” Mother said, and hung up.

Wally looked at the others. “What does
that
mean? Maybe we'd better go get him.”

“Yeah? Not me,” said Jake.

“I don't want to go either,” said Josh.

“Listen, you guys. We're all in charge of Peter till Mom gets home, you know. It's not just me,” said Wally.

The phone rang again. It was Mom.

“He's baking cookies,” she said.

Nine
The Explorers' Club

B
eth opened the back door to see Peter Hatford

standing there, one hand in his pocket.

“What's this? A stickup?” she joked.

Peter didn't understand. He pulled the double-decker Matchbox bus out of his pocket and showed it to her.

“Nice truck,” Beth said. “What do you want, Peter?”

“I came for Wally's clothes,” he said.

Beth started to laugh. “Wally's
clothes
? Are we running a laundry service now? Hey, Eddie, Peter says he's here for Wally's clothes.”

Caroline, who had been pouring herself a glass of orange juice, said, “Come on in, Peter. Tell me what happened.”

Peter plunked his bus on the Malloys' kitchen table and sat on the edge of a chair. “Wally was mad.”

“Yeah, well, I'm mad too, 'cause we both failed the December project, and maybe the whole fourth grade,” she said.

“They said maybe I wasn't old enough to be in their club,” Peter said, his lip trembling just a little.

“Ha!
They're
not old enough to be in an Explorers' Club!” said Eddie. “If they're explorers, I'm a fruit fly.”

“So, what did they do, Peter? You guys were all up there in the loft. Did they tell you to get Wally's clothes, and then they went on home?” Beth asked.

“Yeah. I'm not supposed to come home without his clothes,” said Peter.

“Well, they'll turn up in a little while,” Caroline told him.

“Yeah,” said Beth. “We were going to bake some more Christmas cookies. Want to help?”

“Chocolate ones?” asked Peter, brightening.

“Chocolate cutouts, peanut butter bars, and shortbread cookies,” said Beth.

“Yeah!” said Peter.

“Wash your hands,” said Beth, and then to Caroline and Eddie, “This is a riot!”

Caroline rolled out one kind of dough and Beth another. Eddie gave Peter the Christmas-tree cutter and the bell and the Santa, and let him do the cutting. But they had barely got started when the phone rang. It was Mrs. Hatford wondering if Peter was there.