The Great Scavenger Hunt (23 page)

The Cranberry Boggers sheepishly looked at each other. “We hadn't exactly gotten that far,” Maeve confessed.

The futility of the Cranberry Boggers' non-plan was so completely ridiculous that pretty soon the entire group was in stitches. Betsy Fitzgerald tried to explain. “Technically, we did manage to learn the pirate history….” but she was shouted down. Fabiana laughed good-naturedly and shouted, “Three cheers for the Great Scavenger Hunt!”

When the noise died down, Mr. Moore presented the Salty Cods with their prize: a whole month of free treats from Montoya's Bakery and two free tickets each to the Movie House. Charlotte and Katani rejoiced, as Montoya's was far and away the most delicious bakery in all of Massachusetts.

“Oh, now I'm kind of jealous,” moaned Maeve. She might have loved movies more than anything in the world, but hot chocolate from Montoya's was a close second.

Katani leaned over to Charlotte and whispered something in her ear. “Well…if you say so!” Charlotte agreed. She turned to Avery, Isabel, and Maeve. “We've decided to share the prize with everyone. After all…what's the point of winning if you can't use your powers for good, right?” She looked at Patrice and winked.

How to Make an Entrance

T
hough looking fashion-savvy movie-star perfect certainly didn't come as naturally to Charlotte as it did to Katani or Maeve, she felt that she'd done a rather splendid job of pulling an outfit together. She'd picked out a silky, plum-colored dress (Katani's advice) to complement the lavender shades in her eyes, and borrowed Maeve's heating curlers. “They work on curly and straight hair,” Maeve had assured her after an hour-long Hair Care 101 session in the Tower. All the BSG had to look their best for the big occasion!

Charlotte strapped on her new black dress shoes with the tiny heels and examined her reflection in her closet mirror.
Okay—I'm ready to walk the red carpet…. I think.
She had a sudden vision of herself lying in a big klutzy purple heap while cameras flashed all around.

Thankfully, a loud
BEEP-BEEP
from the driveway interrupted those thoughts. Of course that was followed
by the overexcited yodeling of Marty and then her father shouting, “Charlotte! They're here!”

Excited, Charlotte quickly smeared on some light pink lip gloss and dashed down the stairs. “I'm off!” she declared while Marty eagerly danced and yipped around her.

“You look absolutely perfect!” Mr. Ramsey proclaimed, “Except…”

Charlotte frowned. “Except what?”

“Well, I don't think you want to bring this little accessory to the movie with you.” Mr. Ramsey extracted a solitary heating curler from the back of his daughter's head.

Charlotte laughed. “Thanks, Dad! Bye, Marty!” she called, slipping out the front door. But when she saw what was in her driveway she gasped—a white stretch limousine that looked big enough to tote around a blue whale! The tinted window in the back rolled down, and Maeve Kaplan-Taylor, shielded by oversize black plastic diamond-studded sunglasses, leaned out. “I told you we were going to show up in style! Hop in.”

Charlotte had been in a limousine before only once in her life for her aunt's wedding. And that limo had been black and—well—ordinary. Nothing like this lavish oversize white one.

Quicker than Charlotte could say “fabulicious,” to borrow Maeve's favorite word, a uniformed driver had the door open and she was greeted with a chorus of “Awesome”s and “Can you believe this?” from Isabel, Katani, Avery,
Maeve, and to her surprise, Chelsea, Ben, Patrice, Fabiana, Nick, and Riley!

“It was a surprise for most of us, too,” confessed Katani.

Isabel smiled, “After the way that weekend went, giving everyone a ride was the least we Cranberry Boggers could do to apologize for not doing the scavenger hunt.”

“You didn't have to do all this!” Charlotte pronounced as she snuggled in the only open seat, between Nick and Maeve.

“Ozmond did it, actually,” said a voice from up front. The glass slid open, and sitting next to the driver were Betsy and Danny! She almost didn't recognize them in their matching costumes circa 1717, the year of the movie.

“Well, it was Maeve's idea to get a limo,” Fabiana shared. “So she talked to Betsy, who called Ozmond, and he was ‘delighted' to arrange everything!” she explained, mimicking the director's crazy accent.

“I volunteered to sit up front,” Danny said. “Just in case we need to give directions.”

“And I got the costumes together,” Betsy informed Charlotte. “Maeve taught me how to make an entrance: arrive fashionably late, and wear something totally unforgettable!”

“I did say that!” Maeve held her hand to her heart and pretended to dab tears from her eyes. “My, my, they grow up so fast!”

Ever since their weekend in Cape Cod, Betsy and Danny had been practically glued together. The whole thing was
very weird—Danny would try to outsmart her, she would try to outsmart him…so on and so forth all day long. It was the strangest display of flirting that the BSG had ever witnessed, but for Danny and Betsy, it worked.

“Special guests and VIPs!” Maeve announced as she dramatically passed around cups of sparkling apple cider. “A toast! To one of my best friends in the world, and a brilliant writer, that great adventurer Charlotte Ramsey!” Maeve somehow managed to pour the cider into glasses while the limo pulled out of the driveway without spilling any on her lacy pink gown. “And to Nick Montoya, wilderness boy himself, and Chelsea Briggs, the world-renowned photographer! If it weren't for this amazing trio, none of us would be going to the East Coast premiere of my first big-budget film,
The Pirates of the Cape
! Thank you, Charlotte, Nick, and Chelsea!”

As the kids clinked their plastic cups, Maeve leaned forward on the divider between the driver and the back. “Yes, miss?” asked the driver.

“Mr. Limo Driver, when you go down Beacon Street…can you please drive as slowly as possible?” Maeve requested. “I want everyone to see our
unforgettable
entourage!” She smiled at Betsy, who beamed with pride.

Avery folded her arms. “Maeve, do you know how environmentally terrible this car is? Honestly when I think of the fossil fuels—”

Katani pulled off the handmade scarf that she had crafted for the occasion and wrapped it twice around Avery's mouth. “Avery…be quiet. We promise to reduce
our carbon footprint to make up for this five-minute ride!” The BSG shared a good-natured laugh, both proud of and amused by Avery's die-hard devotion to saving the world from global warming.

“We'll make it up by planting some trees in the park in honor of the movie, okay, Ave?” Isabel offered, and Avery nodded enthusiastically.

When the limo pulled up to the Movie House, Charlotte wasn't sure at first that they'd come to the right place.
Is this really the same tiny theater Maeve's dad owns and operates?
Charlotte wondered.
It looks like a slice of Hollywood!

A red carpet, velvet ropes, and even potted palm trees re-created a glamorous, old-Hollywood feel. As the limo pulled to a stop by the start of the red carpet, a swarm of local news teams flooded their doors.

“You guys, I think they think we're some kind of stars!” Charlotte remarked to her friends.

Maeve smiled at her and drawled, “Darling,
we are
some kind of stars.” With that, she popped open the door and stepped onto the carpet, blowing kisses to the throngs of people looking on from the other side of the velvet ropes.

“You gotta give Maeve credit,” commented a smiling Katani, as she watched Maeve making her way down the red carpet, signing autographs and posing for pictures. “She's really got her thing down.”

The rest of the kids piled out of the limo and followed Maeve as she sauntered past autographed, life-size, foam-core statues of Ontario Plume beside
The Whydah
, Lola
Lindstrom as the black-haired beauty Princess Polly, and Simon Blackstone dressed as his fierce pirate character.

Suddenly, someone in the crowd mistook Fabiana for Lola Lindstrom, who had just appeared on the cover of
Teen Beat
magazine in full costume with her black Princess Polly wig covering her red hair. Hundreds of girls followed along and shrieked at the top of their lungs when Fabiana exited the limo.

“Lola! Lola! I love you!” a weeping young fan proclaimed.

“Lola, I want to be you!” cried another young girl.

“I'm not Lola,” Fabiana sputtered, but no one could hear her over the chanting crowd. She dodged a hand thrusting pencil and paper in her face and grimaced at Maeve. “Maybe I'm not cut out to be a movie star. I can't handle the paparazzi!” Then she picked up the hem of her dress, waved politely, and ran as fast as she could into the theater.

“Should we explain that Lola
couldn't make it
to the premiere?” Isabel giggled to Maeve. They were sure Lola could have found a way in the midst of her busy career to fly out for the East Coast premiere, but the picky actress was still miffed that Ozmond cut all her lines at the last second, so she was a no show.

“They'll forget all about Lola when the special guests get here!” Maeve promised.

And she was right.

As the BSG and their friends joined Fabiana in the theater lobby, the crowd outside suddenly erupted in such an
uproar Maeve was sure a thousand pirates had just sailed down the street and attacked the Movie House. But then, out of the chaos, Maeve heard two names repeated over and over: “Simon! Ontario!”

Maeve strode back up the red carpet to the door of the Movie House and opened her arms wide. “Welcome!” she announced, “to Brookline.”

“It's my honor, milady,” Simon Blackwell said in his odd accent, and bowed.

“No, sir, 'tis
my
honor!” Ontario argued playfully, and lifted Maeve's left hand with his fingers,
just
as she'd seen him do in
Princess Daisy
. Of course, Lola Lindstrom played Princess Daisy, but Maeve brushed that aside to revel in the shining wonderfulness of Ontario's attention.

Simon and Ontario together escorted Maeve back into the lobby, and then the two Hollywood heartthrobs took turns walking every single girl to her seat in a special roped-off balcony in the theater!

“That color is smashing on you,” Simon complimented Katani's yellow dress. Then he turned to Betsy. “Love the costume.”

“You have the most lovely eyes,” Ontario told Chelsea. She nearly fainted right off the balcony!

Even Avery looked a little starstruck and let out an unusually girly giggle as she thanked the two polite pirates, who had their own private balcony across the theater.

“That…was the best moment…of my entire life,” Fabiana gushed, draping herself across her seat with one hand on her forehead.

“Just wait!” Maeve said, eyes glittering. “I think the best moment will come when you see Princess Polly up on that screen!”

Maeve looked around at the expectant faces of the entire crew of the AAJH scavenger hunt. Ben and the boys had managed to make their way through the crowd and were seated in the balcony. Even Kiki was down in front with her parents. The theater was so completely packed, Maeve could almost feel everyone breathing as the lights dimmed and the opening music began.

Maeve glanced over at Riley in the seat beside her. “That's your song!” she practically screamed, so proud and excited at once she thought she might start crying for real.

Riley, embarrassed, looked at his lap then at her. “Yup,” he said with a shrug. “Turns out Michele with one L wasn't lying. Her dad really is a music producer. Dude owns his own record label. I've been working on this song for the last few months, and Kiki's dad actually let me use his recording studio…so I guess the song actually made it into the movie, thanks to those crazy girls.”

Maeve swallowed, less enthused. “Oh, yeah?” she huffed.

Riley grinned. “Yeah. But they weren't the song's inspiration….”

Maeve listened to the next verse, which put a smile on her face that literally stretched from ear to ear. “Riley Lee, that is the most romantic thing I have ever heard in my life.” She boldly reached across the armrest and gave Riley's hand a little squeeze.

The first half of the movie passed in a whir of sword fights, village scenes, and close-ups of treasure troves.

“Those are the coins I told them to use!” Danny chirped excitedly.

“And I recommended that jacket the captain's wearing,” Betsy sang.

But Maeve wasn't even fazed by the constant chatter. She could hardly pay attention to anything except that verse of Riley's song playing over and over in her head:

Finally, the wedding scene opened with a shot of Riley the powder monkey whistling for his friend—Maeve the scullery maid turned flower girl—to come help him scrub the deck where they would dance a splendid jig!

Suddenly, Maeve's eyes were glued to the screen as Black Sam—a snarling pirate version of Simon Blackwell—burst through the wall and captured Princess Polly! In that
scene, Polly was Lola Lindstrom, but in the next—when she emerged from the cabin after the plot flipped around and everyone found out Sir Eric Bonewagon was
really
the brute, and Polly was in love with Yardley Howe, the young deck hand played by Ontario Plume—well, it was Fabiana's eyes that gazed up into Ontario's as the couple made their vows.

Maeve never would have known the difference if she weren't sitting next to the actress herself.

“Oh,” Fabiana said. Maeve put a hand on one of her shoulders and Nick took the other. “That's…that's…
me
?” Fabiana managed to stammer.

“You look beautiful!” Maeve assured her. “You'll get used to the stardom.”

Then the camera switched to Maeve, crying beneath the willow tree after Black Sam's tragic death when Sir Eric Bonewagon returned seeking vengeance. Thankfully, everyone's spirits were uplifted in the final, moving speech where Yardley Howe proclaimed that from now on, pirates and locals would live together in peace, and everyone took a vow to never betray the location of the sunken
Whydah
.

Before the credits even started rolling—with their special thanks to historical consultants Betsy Fitzgerald and Danny Pellegrino, and junior set designer Isabel Martinez—frantic clapping broke out from somewhere near the back of the theater. A few sheets of notebook paper fluttered up into the air, and Maeve knew there'd been
another
special guest tonight!