Room One: A Mystery or Two

by Andrew Clements

  Chapter 26

  MAIN STREET

  It was four fifteen on a Thursday afternoon in May, but on Main Street in Plattsford, Nebraska, it looked like the Fourth of July. Except there were more people, close to three hundred. Because news of how this struggling little town was planning to welcome a fallen soldier’s family had fanned out across the prairie like a wildfire.

  At the start of Main Street near the county road, a canvas banner, forty feet long with letters two feet high, was stretched from side to side:

  WELCOME, THAYER FAMILY—OUR HOME IS YOUR HOME

  That had been one of Delmar Breslin’s ideas, one of about ten. As the town manager, he saw a huge opportunity in this event to develop some town spirit in a town that sorely needed some. It was also his idea to have the reporter for the county newspaper, the Weekly Observer, on hand to snap some pictures of him and the town council. And the brave army family, too, of course.

  And it had been the newspaper reporter’s idea to call his friend Annie Mason. She shot video footage for KETV in Omaha now and then. She drove the forty-five miles from Wheaton because it seemed like a natural human interest story.

  Annie Mason was so glad she’d made the effort. The banner, the people lining both sides of the street, the waving flags, the Wheaton High School Marching Band playing “The Stars and Stripes Forever,” she loved it all. As she walked around with her smallest digital camera—the one that didn’t make people feel self-conscious—she felt like she was capturing a wonderful slice of everything that was good about small-town America. And to see support for the troops expressed this way, as kindness for the family left behind, well, it was great documentary footage.

  She got this terrific image of the used-car salesman grinning from ear to ear as he held up his sign in front of a shiny red Dodge:

  A GENUINE AMERICAN CAR DONATED BY JACKSON’S QUALITY MOTORS FOR THE EXCLUSIVE USE OF THE THAYER FAMILY FOR AS LONG AS THEY NEED IT!

  Annie talked to Clara on the sidewalk in front of the diner with her name on it. Clara was selling—you guessed it—apple pie, at twenty-five cents a slice. Demand was high, and the woman laughed and joked with the customers lined up three deep around her table.

  The short interview with the schoolteacher and her students, that was Annie’s favorite bit so far. The kids had a message made of individual pieces of colored poster board, one or two letters per board, held end to end. When she finally got that one little boy to stand still, Annie got a good shot of the whole message held by all eight kids—the young ones squirming and grinning, the older kids looking like they’d rather be somewhere else:

  ROOM ONE WELCOMES YOU!

  Talking right into the camera, the teacher had said, “We’re a very small school—only one room now, just nine kids in all. It was one of our students, Ted Hammond, the only sixth grader in town. He’s the one who found the family staying in an empty farmhouse. And he took them food and supplies that he bought with his own money, and he’s the one who’s been trying to help them get their lives back on track. We’re all proud that Ted’s our friend.”

  Farther down Main Street, five veterans stood in a line in front of the American Legion Post wearing white shirts and blue caps with gold lettering. Annie got the camera in close on one man’s face, weathered and wrinkled, and then slowly scanned down to the row of medals pinned on his shirt. This was great stuff.

  When she heard a burst of applause from the far end of the street, Annie hurried to get her camera closer to the makeshift reviewing stand in front of the storefront with the sign that proclaimed PLATTSFORD TOWN HALL.

  A buzz ran through the crowd—“That’s them, that’s the Hammonds’ van.”

  A plain white Ford van had turned onto Main Street, the only vehicle in sight. And as it rolled along the street, the crowd whooped and cheered and clapped like mad.

  The van came to a stop in front of the town hall, and Annie worked her way around to the passenger side. This was the big payoff, the moment she was waiting for. It was the moment the whole town was waiting for.

  The passenger door opened, and a boy stood up on the running board, his head rising just a little above the roof of the van. The band stopped playing, the crowd hushed. Annie zoomed in for a tight shot of his face. She thought, This must be the sixth grader.

  The boy looked around, and with a shy smile he said, “This is really incredible—it’s … and thank you, all of you … and it’s … well, they left. I talked to them this morning, and we had planned to get them at four o’clock, but the family’s gone. So … I’m sorry. But really, thanks … thanks.” Annie pulled the zoom lever, and her shot widened as the boy sat back down in the van and heaved the door shut. The driver, a woman, did a slow three-point turn, the brake lights winking on and off. And as the van drove away, Annie swung her camera back to the teacher and the kids, there next to the reviewing stand. Annie took a slow step or two closer so she’d get better sound, and through her earphones she heard the teacher say, “I know it’s disappointing, but all this was still worth doing. When you try to do something kind, only good can come of it, no matter what. Now, I want you fourth graders to stay right here with me until your parents come. Kevin, come back here. Right here. No, here. Good.”

  Annie kept her camera running. The crowd started to break up, but she was surprised there wasn’t more grumbling. It was like everyone had given one big shrug and then started talking with their friends. The legionnaires walked across Main Street toward the diner, the used-car dealer looked like he’d found a high-school boy who was interested in the bright red Dodge, the town manager folded up his reviewing stand—a card table with red, white, and blue crepe paper wrapped around its legs—and the Wheaton High School band began putting their instruments away and moving toward the big yellow bus parked on C Street. The excitement was over, and if there could have been a little more to the event, sure, that would have been good. But life in Plattsford was just settling back to normal, and that was okay too.

  Annie couldn’t wait to get home. She wanted to do a quick digital edit, and then upload some of this footage to her contact at KETV. Because with the right voice-over, this could be a sweet little story. Might even make the ten o’clock news.

  But really, that didn’t matter to her so much. Annie was just glad she’d been on hand to see this. For herself.

  Chapter 27

  HOMECOMING

  The phone at the Hammond home had been ringing off the hook all evening.

  The most interesting call came from an intern at the TV station in Omaha. He had to check on the spelling and pronunciation of about ten names. And he told Mrs. Hammond that the family ought to watch the ten o’clock news on KETV.

  Most of the other calls had been from people around town, just wanting to have a word with Ted, wanting to thank him for trying to help that nice young family. After the tenth or twelfth call, Ted was pretty tired of hearing what a great job he’d done.

  It wasn’t the way he felt. First of all, April and her family had vanished. So how could that be good? And that giant scene on Main Street? Yes, he’d wanted the people in town to make the new family feel welcome, but he hadn’t wanted a three-ring circus. He could only imagine how all the hoopla might have upset Alexa. The only part of that he’d asked for was the little banner that Mrs. Mitchell and the other kids from school had made, something simple.

  By eight o’clock, Ted asked his mom to start telling people he had to do his homework. Which was true. But mostly, he needed to be alone.

  About eight thirty, the phone rang again, and a minute later his mom brought the portable handset into his bedroom. She said, “Sorry, but you’ve got to take this one.”

  Ted took the phone and his mom slipped out the door.

  “Hello?”

  “Ted? It’s me, April.”

  “April? Oh … well … hi.” Then he said, “Where are you? Sounds loud.”

  “I’m in the back of my aunt’s camper. We’re almost to Colorado. And it�
��s noisy because Artie’s got his dumb Game Boy plugged in again.”

  “Oh.” Ted didn’t know what to say.

  April said, “Sorry I didn’t call you before four o’clock, but my mom wouldn’t let me—still kind of skittery. I felt bad, because I knew you’d be on time. But it’s the best thing, I think, the way it happened. Artie and I told Mama about you and your mom comin’ to help, and that she had to take it. The help. And it was like that woke her up or somethin’. She said, ‘No, we’ve got relatives, and they’re close enough so’s we don’t have to bother the people around here.’ And that was it. We got out onto the highway round ten o’clock, and we got a ride to this truck stop about twenty miles west. Then Mama called her sister, and she hopped in her van to come get us. So we had to sit around that truck stop for five or six hours. But here we are. Aunt Rose is real nice. An’ she says we can stay with her long as we need to.”

  Ted said, “I’m glad to hear that.” And he was.

  The line went quiet except for the highway noise and the beeps and whistles of a computer game. And then April said, “Hey, listen. If you ever get out by that farm again, the last one? I left somethin’ there for you, under a board on the back steps. It’s not much. But I hope you like it.”

  “Great,” Ted said. “Thanks. I’ll get it soon as I can. Tomorrow, prob’ly.”

  “Well, like I said, it’s not much, not compared to what you did for us.”

  April tried to say something else, but there was static and skips in the signal.

  “What?” said Ted. “Couldn’t hear that.”

  “I said I’ve got to go—phone’s cuttin’ out.”

  Ted said, “Right—well, ’bye. And take care, okay? And come visit, if you want to.”

  “What?” April’s voice was faint. “I’ll …”

  The line went dead.

  On Friday morning Ted left enough time to swing past the Kosczinski farm before he delivered his papers. He rode into the drive, pedaled around to the back, and leaned his bike against the house.

  And like April had said on the phone, there was a board with something tucked under it. It was wrapped with the same plastic he had used to cover Little Women. And the gift Ted unwrapped was another book, a cheap paperback that had been read so much that the pages looked puckered and worn out.

  It was called The Best of Sherlock Holmes, and on the inside front cover was a message, freshly written in dark blue ink.

  For my friend

  Ted Hammond,

  from April Thayer

  P.S. This is one of

  my favorite books.

  Do you like mysteries?

  EPILOGUE

  * * * ANCHOR DESK NOTES * * *

  Thursday, May 27, Ten O’clock News, KETV, Omaha

  [cue camera 1: Anchor]

  We’ve all heard of foster families, people who open their homes to help others in their time of need. But here’s something new—a foster town, a whole town that was ready to reach out and adopt the bereaved family of a young soldier who died recently in Iraq.

  [still photo: Corporal Austin Thayer]

  Corporal Austin Thayer had been stationed outside of Baghdad to provide support for the recent elections, and he was killed when his armored unit came under attack.

  [video: Main Street, Plattsford, NE]

  This was the scene on Thursday afternoon as the whole town of Plattsford, Nebraska, turned out to welcome the wife and two children of a fallen First Cavalry soldier. A local boy had discovered the soldier’s family living in an abandoned farmhouse. Here’s what his teacher had to say today:

  [cue video and sound: teacher interview]

  “It was one of our students, Ted Hammond, the only sixth grader in town. He’s the one who found the family staying in an empty farmhouse. And he took them food and supplies that he bought with his own money, and he’s the one who’s been trying to help them get their lives back on track. We’re all proud that Ted’s our friend.”

  [cue video, background sound: marching band, red car, diner]

  People came from a fifty-mile radius today to show their support and love, serving up everything from automobiles … to fresh apple pie.

  There was only one hitch in the festivities—

  [cue video and sound: boy in van]

  “This is really incredible—it’s … and thank you, all of you … and it’s … well, they left. I talked to them this morning, and we had planned to get them at four o’clock, but the family’s gone. So … I’m sorry. But really, thanks … thanks.”

  [cue camera 1: Anchor]

  That’s right—the guests of honor, the soldier’s wife, daughter, and son, decided at the last minute that they needed to move on and stay with relatives in Colorado. Even so, it was a grand gesture, right from the heartland, and right from the heart of the good people of Plattsford, Nebraska.

  CASUALTY ASSISTANCE CENTERe

  FORT HOOD, TEXAS

  June 3

  Master Theodore Hammond

  175 Toronto Road

  Plattsford, NE

  Dear Ted:

  When the Casualty Assistance Center here at Fort Hood learned from the Kansas State Police that a car registered to Corporal Austin Thayer had been found abandoned at a rest stop, we investigated. And when military police at Fort Hood discovered that Corporal Thayer’s family had left town suddenly, you can imagine how concerned we became for their safety and well-being.

  We have now heard from Corporal Thayer’s wife, Alexa, who is staying with her sister in Colorado. We have also heard from her about the important part you played in helping her and her two children, April and Arthur, during their stay in your town.

  On behalf of everyone here at the home of the First Cavalry, and particularly on behalf of the Casualty Assistance Center, I want to thank you. The army makes every effort to care for our soldiers and their family members. We are grateful to know that citizens like you are standing by, ready to help these good people whenever we cannot.

  Again, thank you.

  Sincerely,

  Major Leonard Parsten

  Casualty Assistance Calls Officer

  FOSTER TOWN FOR MILITARY FAMILY

  June 6, Plattsford, Nebraska (Associated Press)

  THE PEOPLE OF PLATTSFORD, NEBRASKA, offered to become a foster town for the widow and children of a fallen soldier, and they made the offer out of the goodness of their hearts. Turns out they struck a chord in other hearts as well. Since the story first aired on May 27, the town offices report that inquiries and letters of thanks have been pouring in from across the country. The news has spread as far as Washington, D.C., where a broad coalition of congressional leaders plans to revisit the New Homestead Act, a law designed to encourage the repopulation of declining towns.

  The army’s Department of Casualty Assistance has also contacted the town of Plattsford to see if their offer holds good for other military families who might want to settle in a small town and start to rebuild their lives. And the answer is yes. The welcome mat is out for everyone.

  So far more than two dozen bereaved military families have asked about the possibility of moving to this peaceful town on the Great Plains, and three families have already begun to make plans to move there during the summer. While there are not a lot of job prospects in Plattsford at the moment, the cost of housing is low, the community spirit is alive and well, and the town’s one-room school is ready to grow, promising to provide an excellent education for children of all ages.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I want to thank Mrs. Kim Metz at the Angora Public School in Angora, Nebraska, who shared her insights about the joys and problems of teaching in a one-room school.

  Thanks also to Mr. Lee Price and the other kind people at the Casualty Assistance Center at Fort Hood, Texas, for helping me to be accurate and respectful in my brief portrayal of their difficult work.

  This is a work of fiction, and I have made some purposeful mistakes in my storytelling that I hope will not offen
d the good people of Nebraska. For example, I know that the Omaha Herald-Tribune is not available for home delivery in the part of the state where my story is set. More significantly, while I have tried to stay true to some of the real-life challenges facing small towns with small schools, I have portrayed the process of Class I school affiliation and redistricting in Nebraska as far less complicated—and far less democratic—than it is in practice. For complete and factual information about Class I schools, please consult the Nebraska Department of Education Web site, http://www.nde.state.ne.us/.

  HERE’S A LOOK AT

  THE NEXT GREAT SCHOOL STORY FROM ANDREW CLEMENTS

  CHAPTER 1

  ZIPPED

  Dave Packer was in the middle of his fourth hour of not talking. He was also in the middle of his social studies class on a Monday morning in the middle of November. And Laketon Elementary School was in the middle of a medium-size town in the middle of New Jersey.

  There was a reason Dave was in the middle of his fourth hour of not talking, but this isn’t the time to tell about that. This is the time to tell what he figured out in the middle of his social studies class.

  Dave figured out that not talking is extra hard at school. And the reason? Teachers. Because at 11:35 Mrs. Overby clapped her hands and said, “Class—class! Quiet down!” Then she looked at her list and said, “Dave and Lynsey, you’re next.”

  So Dave nodded at Lynsey and stood up. It was time to present their report about India.

  But giving this report would ruin his experiment. Because Dave was trying to keep his mouth shut all day. He wanted to keep his lips zipped right up to the very end of the day, to not say one single word until the last bell rang at ten after three. And the reason Dave had decided to clam up … but it still isn’t the time to tell about that. This is the time to tell what he did about the report.