The One Hundredth Thing About Caroline

by Lois Lowry

  "Poison book," wrote Caroline. "Evidence #2. It's way overdue at the library by now."

  "—and the last book was Yeats: The Complete Poems."

  "Was there a wastebasket?" Caroline asked. "Did you look through his trash?"

  J.P. opened his eyes. "Today was trash-collection day. All his wastebaskets were empty, except for the one in the kitchen. I'll get to that. I'm still in the main room."

  He closed his eyes again. "A television set. Black and white. On top of the TV was the latest copy of TV Guide—"

  "Open?"

  "Yeah. Open to last night's programs. Just some dumb comedies and 'Quincy.'"

  "'Quincy,'" wrote Caroline. "Crime show. Evidence #3."

  "Next, the bathroom," said J.P., with his eyes still closed. "Terry-cloth bathrobe hanging on a hook on the back of the door. Towel. Sponge. Toothbrush, Aim toothpaste. In the medicine cabinet, a razor—"

  "Wait," said Caroline. "Slow down. I want to write that. "Razor," she wrote. "Evidence #4."

  J.P. opened his eyes. "Why did you write that down?" He reached over and picked up a piece of chicken.

  "You can kill someone with a razor."

  "Not with that kind of razor," said J.P. with his mouth full. "It was a twenty-nine-cent Bic."

  "I bet you could if you tried real hard. What else was in the medicine cabinet?"

  J.P. licked his fingers and closed his eyes again. "Aspirin, mouthwash, and—here's something, Caroline. Powder. Write that down."

  "Powder? Why?"

  "I dumped some in the first envelope. It can be analyzed. The can just said Baby Powder, but that could be a fake. Arsenic is a white powder."

  Caroline wrote, "Arsnick. Powder. Evidence #5." She looked up. "How do you know that, J.P.?"

  He shrugged. "Everybody knows that," he said. He opened his eyes and took another piece of chicken. "Don't touch those envelopes. They could be lethal."

  Caroline glanced at the three white envelopes. Two were bulky and bulging, and the third—obviously the one that held the Baby Powder Arsenic—was flat. "Is that all for the bathroom?" she asked.

  Her brother nodded. "Now the kitchen." He closed his eyes again. "Refrigerator: two beers—"

  "Wait," said Caroline. "Alcoholism," she wrote. "Evidence #6."

  "—half of a pizza with pepperoni. A dozen eggs. Chunk of cheese with mold on it—"

  "Wait. Is mold poison?"

  "No. It just looks poisonous. Refrigerator, continued: half a pound of butter. Wilted lettuce. And some hamburger."

  "That's it?"

  "That's it for the refrigerator. Moving along now to the cupboards. Mostly bare. Just a few dishes and some canned soup. The wastebasket—"

  "Yeah, the wastebasket. That's important."

  "A crumpled paper towel and a crushed beer can."

  "Wait." Caroline moved her pencil back to #6 and added a word. "Severe Alcoholism," it said now. "Do you think I should put 'inhuman strength'? Because of the crushed beer can?"

  J.P. opened his eyes and gave her a disgusted look. "Anybody can crush a beer can, Caroline. A small baby could crush a beer can."

  Caroline shrugged. "What else? What's in those other two envelopes?"

  He closed his eyes once more. "Under the sink—write this down, Caroline: rubber gloves."

  Caroline sat there with her pencil poised. "What's wrong with rubber gloves?" she asked. "Mom has rubber gloves."

  "These are pink," said J.P., his eyes still closed.

  "So?"

  "So a man would never buy pink rubber gloves. No man in his right mind would buy pink rubber gloves—not unless he needed them for sinister reasons.

  That made sense to Caroline. "Oh," she said. "Fingerprint-proof gloves," she wrote. "Evidence #7."

  "I took one of the gloves," J.P. said. "It's in the second envelope."

  "What about the third?"

  J.P. grinned without opening his eyes. "We're still under the sink. Ivory Liquid. SOS pads. Ajax."

  "Ajax is a white powder. Could it be arsenic too?"

  J.P. shook his head. "It really smelled like Ajax. Anyway, there wouldn't be any way to get it into the can. You'd have to put it in through all the little holes."

  "What's in the third envelope, J.P.?"

  He paused dramatically. "The corpus," he said.

  "The what?"

  J.P. grinned again and opened his eyes. "You said we needed a corpus? So I found us a corpus. Dead mouse, still in the trap!"

  Caroline jumped up from her chair and looked at the third bulky envelope. "Yuck!" she said. "Did you have to bring it home?"

  "What good is evidence if you don't have it? And it's kind of cute. It has a pink nose."

  "Evidence #8, corpus," wrote Caroline, making a face.

  J.P. opened his eyes and reached for the last piece of chicken. "This chicken sucks," he said. "It's ice cold."

  ***

  After they had dumped the remains of the TV dinners in the trash and eaten some ice cream, Caroline looked again at the envelopes of evidence. "What are we going to do with this stuff, J.P.?"

  "Save it to show the police. They'll have to analyze it in their lab."

  "But where can we keep it? Tomorrow's cleaning day. I suppose I have some secret places in my room, but I don't want the corpus in my room—it'll smell."

  "How about the freezer?"

  "Mom would see it."

  "What about inside that big vase on the table by the front door?"

  Caroline eyed the vase and shook her head. "Every now and then she washes that. Maybe she'll decide to wash it tomorrow."

  "I could fit it inside the back of the TV, I think. But when the TV's on, it gets warm in there. We might end up with roasted corpus," said J.P.

  "Yuck. Wait," said Caroline. "I have an idea. Let me see if they're still there." She went to the closet by the front door and pushed through the winter coats. She shoved the vacuum cleaner aside. "Here they are! This'll be perfect!"

  She pulled them out and held them up triumphantly: two galoshes, huge, with flapping buckles.

  "Where did those come from?" asked J.P., looking at them with disdain.

  "That guy left them here. The one who was the Scrabble expert. Mom was going to give them to Goodwill, but she never did. Every time she gets out the vacuum cleaner, she says, 'I ought to get rid of those awful things.' But then she forgets about them again. Put the evidence in one of these and I'll stick them way back in the farthest corner of the closet."

  J.P. gave it some thought, nodded finally, and deposited the three envelopes in one of the galoshes. He buckled it all the way up, and Caroline carried it between two fingers back to the closet.

  "There," she said. "Arsenic, killer's glove, and a corpus with a pink nose. Safely stashed." She closed the closet door.

  "Nine o'clock," she said, looking at her watch. "I'm going to watch 'Movie of the Week'—it's a dinosaur picture. Hollywood makes such disgusting dinosaurs. They can't tell a Brachiosaurus from an Iguanodon, those jerks."

  "Oh, no, you're not," said J.P., leaping toward the television. "I'm watching a special on another channel. Mom promised me I could."

  "Liar! You never even asked her! I've been planning all week to watch that dinosaur movie!" Caroline tried to grab his hand away from the channel selector. But J.P. was stronger than she. He had his hand locked in place. "No fair, you beastly creep!"

  When Joanna Tate arrived home at ten, Caroline and J.P. were still locked in warfare. They had flicked the channels back and forth so often that the picture on the screen was just a maze of zigzag lines, and the sound was a staticky buzz. J.P.'s shirt was torn where Caroline had wrenched at his arm, and his sneakers were lying in separate corners of the living room; he had thrown them at her.

  "Well," said their mother, "it's another placid evening at the civilized Tate residence."

  "I brought you something," Mrs. Tate said, after she had taken off her jacket, "and you don't deserve it, either one of you, since you've wrec
ked the television once again—"

  "I can fix it, Mom," J.P. muttered angrily.

  "What did you bring us?" asked Caroline.

  "Actually it wasn't me. It was Fred. He felt bad that you guys were home all alone—he said we should have taken you with us for dinner. I didn't explain to him that you tend to behave like a couple of prehistoric beasts—"

  "Mom," warned Caroline, "watch what you say about prehistoric—"

  "Sorry, I lost my head. Anyway, just as we were leaving the restaurant, he said, 'Wait a minute,' and he went back and got you these. Here. You don't deserve them. But here they are anyway. Cannolis."

  She put a paper bag on the coffee table. Neither Caroline nor J.P. moved.

  "Well?" said their mother. "I know you love cannolis. Maybe some sweets will soothe your rotten tempers."

  Caroline opened the top of the bag, using her fingers fastidiously, like tweezers. Suspiciously she lifted out the two thick pastries dusted with sugar. She looked at her brother meaningfully. J.P. leaned over and sniffed the powdery coating.

  "Smells like sugar," he murmured.

  "Of course it smells like sugar," said Joanna Tate. "It is sugar. Your dental bills will be higher than usual. But what the heck; it was nice of him to think of you. Dig in."

  "Mom," asked Caroline, "did you say he went back in and got these? After you had already left the restaurant?"

  "Yes. Why?"

  "Well, ah, did you go back in with him? Or did you wait outside? Did you see the restaurant people putting these in the bag?"

  Her mother looked at her, puzzled. "I waited outside. I was reading the menu pasted on the window. I was wondering if I should have ordered the spaghetti with clam sauce. I liked the spaghetti with sausage and mushrooms, but the clam sauce looked so good. The people at the next table had it. Next time, I think— Why, Caroline? Why did you ask that?"

  "Oh," said Caroline vaguely, staring at the cannolis, "I was just thinking that it really isn't safe for a woman to stand around alone on the sidewalk in New York late at night. You should have gone back in with him."

  "Caroline, you're becoming downright paranoid. You call and ask if I have the door locked, and you—Why aren't you guys eating those cannolis?" Joanna Tate looked from Caroline to J.P. and back to Caroline again. "What's the matter?"

  "Nothing," said Caroline hastily. "They really look like great cannolis. I've never seen them with quite that much sugar on top before."

  "Yeah," said J.P. "All that sugar. Yum." He sniffed the cannolis again. He looked at Caroline and raised one eyebrow.

  "I'm going to go put my bathrobe on," said their mother. "After you eat those, maybe you could repair the television, J.P.? And we could watch the news?"

  She went into the bathroom and closed the door.

  "Quick," cried Caroline to her brother. "Get the other galosh."

  When their mother came out of the bathroom, wearing her blue quilted robe and with her make-up removed, J.P. was kneeling in front of the TV, working on the dials with a screwdriver. "Almost fixed," he announced.

  Caroline was sprawled on the couch, licking her lips ostentatiously. The coffee table was empty. "Those sure were great cannolis," she said.

  Inside the closet, behind the vacuum cleaner, both galoshes were buckled up tight and bulging with evidence.

  12

  "I wish we had a dining room," groaned Caroline early Sunday afternoon. "You should see the Baurichters' dining room. It has thick carpeting and a crystal chandelier and bouquets of fresh flowers everywhere. And silver candlesticks on the table." She looked at their own kitchen table, with its yellow Formica top. "Look at this table. Blecchhh. I wish we didn't have to eat in the kitchen when we have company."

  Joanna Tate turned from the sink, where she was washing lettuce, and surveyed the table and Caroline standing beside it, looking depressed. "Well," she suggested, "how about if we move the table into the living room? If we shove the blue wing chair over, it would fit there. Then we could cover it with a tablecloth. And I do have candles. I don't have silver candlesticks, but we can put the candles in—let me think. Here. We can put the candles in these two little juice glasses. How about that?"

  She handed Caroline two small glasses that had once had pineapples painted on them. The pineapples were mostly scrubbed away. Caroline stood two yellow candles in the glasses, and brightened. "Yeah," she said. "If I squish them down in hot wax, they'll stand up okay. Thanks. And yes—let's move the table into the living room. That's a neat idea."

  They each took an end and maneuvered the table legs around the kitchen door and into the living room. Caroline shoved the blue chair into a corner, and she and her mother dragged the table to its new spot.

  J.P. opened his bedroom door and peered out, frowning. "All that thumping and crashing is messing up my electronic work," he complained. He looked at the table. "What are you guys doing? You're not going to wax the kitchen floor again, are you? You waxed it last year."

  "Nope," said his mother. "We're going to dine graciously tonight. Here, Caroline: a tablecloth." She took a white embroidered cloth from a drawer and tossed it to Caroline. "Candlelight too, J.P. A real honest-to-goodness dinner party."

  J.P. leaned on his bedroom door and watched as Caroline straightened the cloth on the table. He made a face. "Can I eat in my room?"

  "Absolutely not. You're going to eat here, and you're going to use decent manners," said his mother. She stood back and admired the effect of the tablecloth. "I wish we had flowers," she said.

  "I hate everyone who's coming," announced J.P., swinging his bedroom door back and forth.

  "You don't even know Mr. Keretsky," Caroline said angrily. "Mr. Keretsky happens to be a world-renowned scientist."

  "Scientist ha," said J.P. "You call dinosaurs a science?"

  Caroline grabbed a candle and took aim. "Don't throw that," warned her mother. "It'll break, and I don't have any others."

  "And I hate Stacy Baurichter," J.P. continued, jumping up to grab the top of the door and dangle himself from it. "Stacy Baurichter is a big fake-o jerk."

  "Quit doing that to your door," said Joanna Tate. "You'll break the hinges."

  "Stacy Baurichter told me that she thinks you're cute," said Caroline sarcastically. "Cute cute cute." She began to fold napkins.

  "Liar," muttered J.P. He dangled for a moment and then let himself drop.

  "And I expect you both to be polite to Fred Fiske," Mrs. Tate said. "Don't forget to thank him for the cannolis."

  "BE POLITE TO WHOM?" asked Caroline, dropping a napkin on the floor.

  "Fred Fiske," said her mother. "I invited him to join us. There's plenty of food."

  "Oh, great," said J.P. "That's just great, Mom. Now I definitely want to eat in my room."

  "No way," said Joanna Tate in her don't-argue-with-me voice. "I'm going to finish washing the salad stuff. Caroline, you set the table. For six. That's S-I-X. Six." She went to the kitchen.

  Glumly Caroline began to put six napkins around the table. J.P. stood in his doorway, watching. "I'm going back to my electronic invention," he said finally. "Because I'm going to use it. Tonight."

  During the afternoon, after Caroline had set the table for dinner and dusted the living room once more, she helped her mother in the kitchen. Together they baked a chocolate cake and forced each other not to open the oven every five minutes to peek at it. Caroline removed the strings from what seemed fourteen million string beans; she sliced them into a saucepan. "A normal vegetable," she said. "About time."

  Her mother peeled potatoes. "Where's J.P.?" she asked. "What's he doing? He usually peels potatoes for me."

  "I'll check," said Caroline, and she slid down from the kitchen stool. She went to J.P.'s closed bedroom door and listened. Inside, she could hear mysterious buzzes and crackling noises. She knocked on the door.

  "Don't come in," said J.P.

  "It's only me," called Caroline softly. "Mom wants to know what you're doing."

 
J.P. opened the door, motioned her inside, and closed it behind her. On his desk she could see a tangle of wires and switches.

  "Look," whispered J.P. He gingerly picked up one green wire with an exposed copper end and touched it to the end of a red wire. Sparks flew, and a tiny column of smoke curled up into the air.

  "Zap," muttered J.P. "If you touched that, Caroline, you'd turn into a grilled cheese sandwich."

  "I have no intention of touching it," she replied, moving farther away from his desk. "What are you going to do with it?"

  "Show me which chair Fiske is going to sit in at dinner," he said. "I'm going to wire it. It'll be a do-it-yourself electric chair."

  Caroline backed away even farther. "Oh, no, you're not," she said. "No way. You're not going to kill anybody at my dinner party. Not even that Tyrannosaurus Frederick Fiske."

  J.P. looked at her impatiently. "Of course I'm not going to kill him, stupid; do you think I'm crazy? I don't have enough juice to kill him, anyway. I'm just going to stun him. Then, when he's stunned, sitting there helpless and stupefied, we'll confront him with all the evidence—in front of witnesses—and we'll call the police."

  "But, J.P., it's a dinner party! It's going to be gracious dining, with candles and everything! Couldn't you do it another time?"

  J.P.'s voice was determined. "How many chances do you think we'll get, Caroline? His deadline's the first of May—you know that."

  He opened his door and peeked out. "How long will Mom be in the kitchen?" he whispered.

  "A while. The cake's almost done, and then we have to make the frosting."

  "You keep her in there, okay? And show me which is his chair."

  Reluctantly Caroline pointed through the crack in the door. "The one at the end. Opposite Mom. You and Stacy will be on the side by the wall, and I'll sit with Mr. Keretsky on the other side."

  J.P. eyed the distance between his door and the chair where Frederick Fiske would sit. "Okay," he said. "Got it."

  "J.P.—"

  He interrupted her. "Make sure Mom stays in the kitchen while I wire the chair."