The Mysterious Benedict Society and the Prisoner's Dilemma

by Trenton Lee Stewart

  Mr. Benedict’s eyes twinkled (whether with amusement or anticipation it was impossible to say—perhaps it was both), and taking another deep breath he folded his hands together and said, “By all means, my dear. Let us try again.”

  They locked eyes as they had done before. This time, however, Constance’s face began to darken. She furrowed her brow, her lips pressed together, and her jaw began to clench and unclench. In moments her face was the exact hue of a pomegranate. She was visibly trembling now—she looked not just angry but furious. Indeed, had the others not known better, they would have thought she was ready to fly at Mr. Benedict and try to pull his hair out.

  And then, abruptly, she stopped scowling and fell back. “There!” she gasped. “That time I felt it.” Putting a hand to her head, she looked hopefully at Mr. Benedict. “Well?”

  Mr. Benedict nodded and smiled. He reached forward and squeezed her hand. “I am enormously proud of your courage and selflessness, Constance. Thank you, my dear—thank you from the bottom of my heart.”

  “I know you’re proud of me,” Constance said in an exasperated tone. “But?—” She shuddered. The color had begun to drain from her face. “Oh no… oh no, here it comes! Tell me quick, Mr. Benedict—did it work?”

  “I’m afraid I can’t say, Constance. Not yet. But we’ll know soon enough. Right now you should?—”

  “No! I want to know now! Reynie, give him the poem! Quick!”

  Reynie was already unfolding a sheet of paper. He thrust it at Mr. Benedict. “Constance wrote you a funny poem,” he explained. “She hoped you might use it as a sort of test.”

  Constance groaned, crossed her arms tightly, and sank over onto her side.

  Mr. Benedict gazed at her with concern. Then he looked at the poem and read the title aloud: “Why I Find Green Plaid So Annoying, And What I Intend to Do About It: An Explanation of My Heroic Actions.”

  Mr. Benedict’s lips jerked upward. He coughed into his hand, looked round at the older children (all of whom were grinning expectantly), and continued reading aloud from the first stanza:

  For one thing, plaid’s hideous, a pattern cooked up

  By dimwit designers who must have been mad.

  It’s also perfidious (a word I looked up—

  It means lots of different things, all of them bad).

  Mr. Benedict chuckled, then laughed outright. And as he went on reading the poem he laughed again, and then again, until finally he was laughing so hard his shoulders were shaking and he could hardly hold the paper still enough to read from it. The children began to giggle. Even normal laughter is contagious, and Mr. Benedict’s high-pitched, chattering squeals—so very much like dolphin speech—were not only contagious but funny in themselves. Even Constance, shivering and pale, managed to snicker through her moans.

  The giggles turned into laughter; and Mr. Benedict’s laughs turned into guffaws and strange, coyote-like yelps; and soon the laughter grew so uproarious it drew others to the study, so that eventually the room was packed with family and friends, with everyone laughing (though only a few knew why) and looking at everyone else with giddy, wondering expressions. Indeed, the laughter was so boisterous that it took awhile for the newcomers to notice that Constance was not only laughing but crying, too, and that in fact she looked terribly ill, and that despite this she kept gazing happily at Mr. Benedict, who had never laughed with such gusto for so long.

  The time had almost come. The bags were packed, the early morning sunlight was growing stronger, and the children were gathered in Constance’s room, eating doughnuts Kate had smuggled up from the kitchen. She had tapped on the boys’ door as she passed, and a minute later they had come trudging groggily down the hall in their pajamas and slippers. Constance hadn’t even risen but sat munching her jelly roll in bed, heedless of the crumbs and jelly dropping onto her covers. It was a bittersweet moment. Everyone was excited, yet never again would it be so easy to convene a meeting of the Mysterious Benedict Society.

  “I can’t quite get over it,” Kate was saying. “When I see Mr. Benedict walking around by himself, without Number Two or Rhonda hovering nearby—well, it’s strange, isn’t it? It’s as if he didn’t cast a shadow anymore.”

  “Number Two is having a hard time with it,” Reynie said. “Every time he stands up, she does too, then sits down again looking kind of disoriented.”

  “It isn’t just that,” said Sticky, licking his fingers. “When I saw him in that blue blazer yesterday, with his hair so neatly combed, I had to do a double take. I thought he was someone else.”

  “I don’t like any of this as much as I thought I would,” said Constance. “I really did hate that green plaid suit, but it’s weird seeing him in other clothes. And Sticky used to drive me crazy polishing his spectacles, but now I hate the way he’s always wincing and squinting and running to the mirror to fix his contact lenses. And I couldn’t wait for Kate to move out, but now that the day is here the whole thing makes me grumpy.” She frowned and wiped jelly from her chin with her pillow.

  “You’re a sweetheart, Constance,” said Kate, shaking her head.

  Reynie smiled and handed another doughnut to Sticky, who was glowering at Constance resentfully. “At least now we know what’s making her grumpy—I used to think it was just how she was.”

  “That isn’t all of it,” Constance whined. “I’m having writer’s block, too. I’ve been trying to write a poem about all of this—the whole adventure, I mean, from the moment we met up to the very end. But I can’t find the right words.”

  “I imagine it would be hard to come up with a rhyme for ‘Whisperer,’” Kate said absently. She was contemplating the empty space in her bucket. At the prison she had recovered only a few of her lost items, and since then she’d been considering what should be replaced and what should be bidden farewell. Now seemed like the right time. There was only so much room in the bucket, after all, and her needs might well be changing. Everything else was, wasn’t it?

  “Rhyming isn’t the problem,” Constance protested. “It’s the feeling. After all this time, after all we’ve been through and all we’ve accomplished—well, we should be thrilled, shouldn’t we? We should be on top of the world! Mr. Curtain isn’t a threat anymore, just a horrible old bore I may have to visit sometimes. And the Whisperer’s out of commission forever. It’s all incredibly important, and yet…”

  “And yet it isn’t that simple,” Sticky finished for her, and everyone nodded, because everyone understood.

  “I do wish things had worked out a bit differently,” Kate said. “When I think of all the good Mr. Benedict could have done with the Whisperer, all the people he might have helped if only there hadn’t been these other, nastier people trying to get their hands on it for their own greedy purposes?—”

  “But the Whisperer wouldn’t even have existed if not for a nasty person with greedy purposes,” Sticky pointed out. “It’s kind of disconcerting, isn’t it?”

  “Exactly!” Kate said. “I keep thinking about how every good thing in this whole business has been completely tangled up with some bad thing. I mean if not for Mr. Curtain and the Whisperer, we never would have met each other, much less become friends! And if not for Mr. Benedict, we might never have considered the good the Whisperer could do, so we wouldn’t have been the least bit troubled to see it go.”

  “It’s true,” Sticky said. “Everything has been bittersweet.”

  “Maybe we should acquire a taste for bittersweet,” said Reynie with a grin. “Then everything would feel wonderful.”

  “That’s stupid,” Constance snipped. “If it felt wonderful, then it wouldn’t be bittersweet, would it?”

  Reynie only shrugged. He wasn’t at all sure about that.

  Kate had wandered over to the window. “Uh-oh,” she said. “Looks like it’s starting.”

  Constance humphed and covered her head with her sheets, but the boys joined Kate looking out. The courtyard was filled with adults. Mrs. Washington in her w
heelchair was turning this way and that, directing traffic, and Mrs. Perumal was holding open the iron gate; everyone else toted bags, boxes, furniture, and odd-shaped bundles. Mr. Benedict, wearing an unfortunate, huge-collared shirt that Number Two had made for him, was carrying an ugly lamp that resembled a stork. Miss Perumal and Number Two were at opposite ends of a trunk, chatting and laughing, and behind them came Moocho Brazos carrying a desk, two suitcases, and a bookshelf. Rhonda and Mr. Washington were out at the curb, adjusting a makeshift ramp for Mrs. Washington’s wheelchair. And calling out encouragement from the bench beneath the elm tree was Milligan, both legs and one arm still in casts.

  Reynie’s gaze lingered on poor Milligan. Not for the first time, he reflected upon his role in the events that led to those injuries. It was Reynie, after all, who had suggested they go to the roof, and not long ago he would have felt terribly burdened by that. And yet, to his relief, he’d found that somehow his sympathy for Milligan was only that—sympathy, not guilt.

  You aren’t responsible for all of us, Kate had said in the prison. We’re all responsible for each other, right?

  Evidently her words had taken root in fertile soil, for despite the many problems that had remained to be dealt with—and despite his knowledge that new ones would always crop up—Reynie had never felt quite so light of step. It was an unexpected development, this new feeling, and remarkably pleasant. Indeed, he had felt so grateful for it that, on the day Milligan came home from the hospital, he’d drawn Kate aside to thank her.

  “Good grief!” Kate had cried. “Thank me? I just said the same stuff you’re always saying to us! You should thank yourself!” Then her expression had turned thoughtful. “But you know what? I’m glad you mentioned this, because I’ve been feeling guilty myself. I did sort of kick Milligan out of that elevator. He keeps reminding me that I was just trying to help him save Moocho and Ms. Plugg, but…”

  “We were all doing the best we could,” Reynie said. “It’s McCracken who should feel guilty—though I don’t suppose he knows how.”

  Instantly cheered (it never took much), Kate snorted. “Maybe in prison he’ll learn something about guilt and responsibility.”

  “Maybe,” Reynie said. He shrugged. “I did, I guess.”

  Kate looked at him askance, then leaned to whisper in his ear as if telling him a secret. “Yes, but you’re smarter than he is, Reynie. Also, you’re not evil.”

  They had both laughed—they’d been in high spirits that day, and any little thing had set them tittering—and now, gazing down upon the moving-day hubbub, Reynie smiled at the memory. How many times had they all laughed together? he wondered. Before Kate entered his life, before Sticky and Constance and Miss Perumal and all those people he loved down in the courtyard—before them, laughter had been in rather short supply. Reynie marveled to think of those days; they seemed so long ago now. He had had no idea what he was missing.

  “They’re really hustling out there, aren’t they?” Kate said.

  “It won’t take long at this rate,” Sticky sighed.

  “No,” Kate agreed. “I think it took much longer to coordinate than it will to actually move. Rhonda has it all laid out like clockwork.”

  “Has what laid out?” asked Constance from her bed.

  “The moving plan,” Reynie said. “First Sticky’s family goes; then Amma, Pati, and me; then Kate, Milligan, and Moocho.”

  “Don’t say goes,” Constance said, scowling. “I’m starting to get upset.”

  The others exchanged private looks. For days now Constance had been clamoring for the move, while the rest of them had spoken of it in more subdued tones. They were all pleased with the way things had developed, and yet they felt melancholy, too, for something they had grown used to was now changing forever. It came as no surprise that Constance had arrived at the same feeling rather late. Mr. Benedict had warned them it would happen that way—and had asked them to shore up their patience.

  “Fair enough,” Reynie said. “Instead of goes I’ll say relocates. After all, Kate and I are only moving downstairs.”

  “And I’m just moving across the street,” Sticky said, sounding as if he didn’t quite believe it. In fact he almost didn’t—he’d been in a perpetual state of surprise ever since the adults had announced this new arrangement. His friends had also been astonished.

  “Wait a minute,” Reynie had asked. “You really were working on a project in the house across the street? I thought that was a cover story for errand day!”

  “It was,” Mrs. Washington had said, “but it was also technically true. In addition to the errands, we were renovating the house.”

  “And Reynie and I are really staying, too?” Kate asked.

  “We’re remodeling the bottom two floors,” said Mr. Benedict. “If it suits everyone, the basement will be converted into apartments for you, Milligan, and Moocho, while the Perumals will continue to occupy their rooms on the first floor. Reynie will move down the hall from them. Mr. Washington has some excellent ideas for a common sitting room and?—”

  “Are you serious?” Sticky interrupted, gazing earnestly at his parents. “I mean, can we really?”

  “Really?” Kate and Reynie echoed. “We really, really can?”

  The answer had been yes, they really could. After all, Miss Perumal had explained, it was an unusually felicitous arrangement. The adults would all be involved with Mr. Benedict’s new projects, and to some extent so would the children—it would be part of their education. The only remaining question was whether the children themselves approved.

  “Although, we must confess it wasn’t much of a question,” Mr. Benedict had laughed as the children danced and shouted.

  The euphoria had lasted for days, and it still flashed upon all of them from time to time, though it had been tempered by the knowledge that the boys would no longer be roommates, that Kate would no longer be just down the hall, and that the regular meetings of the Society might never again feel so urgent or important as they had in the past. Certainly it was a relief, but it was also, strangely, a kind of loss, and they all understood what Constance was feeling now.

  “Look, Constance,” Sticky said in an effort to comfort her. “If you stand here at your window, and I stand at mine across the street, we can send each other Morse code messages.”

  “But I don’t even have a flashlight!” Constance exclaimed, and she began to cry.

  “You can have this one,” Kate said quickly, reaching into her bucket, which she had banged back into shape. “Okay, Connie girl? Don’t cry! You take this one and I’ll get a new one.”

  “Can we still have our meetings here?” Constance asked, sniffling. And she peeked over at them out of the corners of her eyes.

  The others looked at one another. They knew that within a day or two Constance’s bedroom would be a horrific mess; they also knew that Constance’s request was partly due to laziness. But no one cared to risk a tantrum right now.

  “We’ll rotate,” Reynie suggested. “Tonight’s meeting can be here, and next time we can meet in Kate’s new room, and so on.”

  “But what will we even have to talk about?” Constance wailed. “There aren’t any problems anymore!”

  “Oh, I’ll bet we can find something to talk about,” said Kate, grinning at the boys. “Don’t you?”

  “Like what? The stupid weather?” Constance grumbled. She was no longer truly upset, but simply complaining out of habit.

  “Why not?” Reynie said, and he chuckled to himself, for just then he was feeling as happy as he ever had. “It’s going to be a beautiful day, Constance. It’s springtime!”

  And indeed, out along Mr. Benedict’s fence, the roses were blooming.

 

 

  rchive.