McMummy

by Betsy Byars

  “Come here, Pine Cone, come here, boy.”

  Pine Cone looked at Mozie as if he were trying to figure out who he was.

  “Come on, it’s me, Moze.”

  He scratched his nails against the steps, and Pine Cone came over.

  “Good Pine Cone!” he said. He began to scratch the cat behind the ears. “You know Pine, to this day nobody believes that you fell out of an airplane. And nobody except Batty and Valvoline believe me about the pod. And I don’t go around lying—that’s what I can’t understand. There is a pod. I listened to it.”

  Mozie put his hand on Pine Cone’s side and felt the purring deep inside.

  “I heard something in the pod too. I can still hear it in my head. And it reminds me of what’s going on inside you right now. Valvoline was the first one to hear it and she said it was like the purr of a tiger, but …”

  Pine Cone, suddenly tired of the conversation, turned and strolled into the bushes.

  Inside Valvoline said, “I have to turn around. It’s in the rules. See, I walk out like this … I turn … I stay like this till I count to ten—and ten is long enough for the judges to start wondering why I don’t have any sequins on my back.”

  “I could make a very small rose on the shoulder strap … here.”

  “Great! Only don’t make it too small, hear?”

  Mozie got up slowly and went into Crumb Castle #3.

  Batty

  THE PHONE RANG. MOZIE picked it up and a voice said, “What happened?”

  “Is this you, Batty?”

  “Yes, it’s the Bat. What happened at the greenhouse?”

  “I thought you were grounded, that you couldn’t use the phone.”

  “I am, only my mom and dad and sisters went to the mall. My mom said, ‘You are not to touch the telephone, do you understand me?’ So I put socks over my hands and I am not touching the phone.

  “The only thing that worries me is that I used dirty socks—I just took them off my feet and put them on my hands. And, Moze, my mom has a nose for socks. Like I’ll be at the table and I’ll slip my feet out of my shoes and my mom says, ‘I smell socks.’ So when she gets home, I’m hoping nobody will call, because if they do, she’ll say, ‘I smell socks on the telephone.’ Then she’ll—”

  “Batty.”

  “What?”

  “I know you did not call me to talk about socks.”

  “No, well, I want to know what happened, but first you need to know that I don’t think I’m going to be able to baby-sit with you Friday night.”

  “Batty!”

  “Don’t get on my case yet. I’ve got a plan that might work. I’m going to pick a time when my mom is on the phone and I walk by and say, ‘I’m off to baby-sit!’ And before she can react, I will be off.”

  “Batty, we were supposed to be in this baby-sitting fifty-fifty. I’m doing all the work.”

  Batty and he had had sheets of paper printed and put up around the neighborhood.

  Batty Batson and Mozie Mozer

  THE MACHO BABY-SITTERS CLUB

  Let us take care of your cares.

  Batty said, “Well, you’ll get to keep all the cash this time. So, what happened at the greenhouse? Talk fast because my family might come home.”

  “You wasted fifteen minutes on your dirty socks.”

  “So we can’t waste any more, right? Talk!”

  “Well, did your sister tell you that Valvoline went with me?”

  “Of course not. Who’s Valvoline? Isn’t that something for cars?”

  “She’s a girl that my mom’s designing a dress for. And it was very strange, Batty.”

  “I know it’s strange. We’re talking mummy pod. It don’t get any stranger than that.”

  “First I went in by myself, and I was sort of drawn forward—I didn’t want to go. I had to!”

  “Did Valvo-whatever-her-name-is go too?”

  “No, she was in the car, but the second time—”

  “You did this twice?”

  “Yes, and the second time, we got right in there and listened!”

  “To what?”

  “The pod.”

  “Let me get this straight. You and this girl got in there with Big Mac?”

  “Yes.”

  “And listened?”

  “Yes.”

  “You put your heads on this thing?”

  “Yes, Batty, we heard something. I’d never heard it hum before, but when Valvoline got in there with it, it hummed. Batty, there’s something in that pod.”

  “What kind of something?”

  “I don’t know—a being.”

  “A bean? You think it’s a bean? If that thing pops open and a bean walks out …”

  “No, a being—b-e-i-n-g.”

  “Oh, being.”

  “And then the sound of thunder came—you know, from that line of thunderstorms over the mountain. It was far away, but the humming in the pod stopped and it sort of quivered.”

  “Quivered? How—” Batty interrupted himself, “Moze!”

  “What?”

  “Remember that movie we saw on the late show—Frankenstein? Remember how that giant bolt of lightning brought the monster to life? Remember?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, maybe, just maybe, the same thing’s getting ready to happen here. There will be a clap of thunder that leaves everybody deaf and lightning that leaves everybody blind. WHAMMO!”

  Batty made the sound of a lightning strike so convincing that when it was over, there was a silence that made Mozie think the phone had gone dead.

  “Are you still there, Batty?” he asked.

  He heard Batty say, “Oh, hi, Mom, Dad. I didn’t hear you come in … These? These are socks. You told me not to touch the phone and I wanted to obey and so the phone rang and very quickly I slipped off my socks, put them on my hands, and answered.”

  There was a pause. Then, “I thought it might be one of Dad’s customers. I’ll hang up right away.”

  Into the phone he said, “I’m sorry, sir, but you have reached a wrong number. Good-bye.”

  “So long, Batty,” Mozie said.

  “Your father wants to talk to you,” Batty’s mother said.

  “About what?”

  “The recital.”

  “Oh, sure.”

  Batty hung up the phone, and he and Big Batty went into Batty’s room.

  Mozie went to his room alone.

  Professor Orloff

  “NO! NO!” MOZIE CRIED.

  The pod was opening and he had to keep it shut. He had to. There was something terrible and green inside.

  Mozie could not see exactly what it was—his struggles were too desperate—but he understood that his life depended upon keeping this monster inside the pod.

  The color of this monstrosity was a sick, unearthly, slimy green, and it kept oozing through the crack in the pod, trying to get out. Mozie had to get it back inside—he had to, but slime kept running down his arms and he—

  “No! No!”

  “Wake up, Mozie.”

  He felt his mother shake him and he opened his eyes. The dream had been so real that he was stunned to find he was in his bedroom. He held up his arms and marveled that they were slimeless.

  “Get up.”

  “Why? It’s night.”

  “Telephone.”

  “I’m not here,” he said truthfully.

  “It’s Professor Orloff.”

  “Who?”

  “Professor Orloff. Get up. It’s the overseas operator. He’s calling from the Congress on World Hunger.”

  Mrs. Mozer went back into her bedroom across the hall. Mozie heard her say, “He’s on the way, Operator.”

  Mozie put his feet on the floor and stood up. In his brain the pod was still opening, the slime still oozing. A humming sound droned in his ears.

  He crossed the hall so unsteadily he was reminded of the way Pinocchio walked before he became a real boy. His mother was waiting with the phone in her
hand. Silently, she urged him to take it.

  He took the phone, and his mother backed away to the dresser, giving him some privacy. She continued to watch him.

  His mother was wrapped in a worn bathrobe that made her look old, and the concern on her face heightened the illusion. Mozie saw his own face in the dresser mirror behind her, and even in this moment of confusion and alarm, he looked cheerful.

  “Is this Howard Mozer?” the operator asked. She spoke with such an accent that Mozie barely recognized his own name.

  “Yes. I think so.”

  “Your party is on the line,” the operator said. “Go ahead, sir.”

  “Allo, allo. Is dis Hovard?”

  “Yes, it’s me. Are you on your way home?”

  “No, I’m delayed. My presentation iss delayed. You understand? Und I must make de presentation. Did you get my vire?”

  “No, no, what’s a vire?”

  “A vire! A telegram!”

  “Oh, a telegram.”

  His mother put one hand to her face in alarm. Then she left the room.

  “De telegram telling you to discontinue de Witagrow.”

  “No, no, I didn’t. I’ve been giving the Witagrow.”

  “Den stop.”

  “I will, but when will you be getting home?”

  “I’ll haff to call you about that later. Iss ewerything all rrright?”

  “Well, there’s this pod—”

  “Vat? Vat? Dis connection iss bad. A pot?”

  “No, pod, POD!”

  “Oh, de pod, de being pod. De pod iss big, ya?”

  “Yes, I saw it by accident. I know I wasn’t supposed to go back there, but, anyway, did you just call it the being pod?”

  His mother returned with a telegram in one hand. She held it up, asking forgiveness with her expression.

  “How big?”

  “It’s as big as I am, and it hummed for Val—” he broke off.

  “Vat? Vat? I don’t hear you so goot.”

  “The pod hummed!” Mozie screamed in the phone.

  “Dat pod is my own special inwention. It has more protein dan a cow. Outside, it is like a bean. Inside, iss a …”

  “A what? I didn’t hear you.”

  “A wegetable, a wegetable such as the vorld hass never seen before, a wegetable that—”

  “Your three minutes are up,” the operator said.

  “Goot-bye, Hovard. Be a goot boy and follow instructions.”

  And he was gone.

  “I forgot about this,” his mother said, coming forward with the yellow telegram. She held it out with both hands like an offering. “It came right in the middle of Beth Ann Garner’s fitting and I put it on the table and immediately covered it with a piece of cloth. I hope it wasn’t important.”

  Mozie opened the telegram.

  PRESENTATION POSTPONED STOP RETURN DELAYED STOP DISCONTINUE FEEDING STOP KEEP WATERING STOP WILL TELEPHONE STOP

  PROFESSOR OTTO ORLOFF

  “Was it really important?” his mother asked.

  “I’m not sure.”

  “I just feel terrible that I forgot it.”

  Mozie started for his room. The sound of distant thunder made him pause in the doorway.

  “I better go downstairs and close the windows,” his mother said. “That storm has been threatening for three days now. As soon as I leave those windows open, it’ll rain on the pageant dresses.”

  Mozie went in his room and lay down. He heard the sound of windows being closed below him—hard, BAM, BAM—as if his mother was punishing the windows because she forgot the telegram.

  Then he heard again the rumble of distant thunder. His mind turned to the greenhouse, where the pod would be hearing the same sound and trembling.

  As he put his head on his pillow, he heard a faint humming noise in his ears.

  The Crack in the Pod

  … CREAK …

  Mozie pushed open the door and entered the greenhouse. He began to walk immediately—and on purpose this time—to the rear of the greenhouse, where the pod waited behind a screen of leaves.

  The vegetables seemed twice as big as they had yesterday. Tomatoes had rolled onto the path, crowded out by other tomatoes. Vines had grown together, and Mozie had to push his way through the thick leaves.

  It was like the jungle, and he longed for a machete to chop his way to the rear of the greenhouse. He did not stop struggling until he was directly in front of the plant.

  A little morning sunlight filtered through the leaves, giving the pod a luster, a sheen, which made it seem somehow even more important than it already was.

  Mozie glanced from the pod to the deep marks his sneakers and Valvoline’s wedgies had left in the soil. He bent and began to smooth them out with his hands. Professor Orloff knew he had seen the pod—he told him that on the phone last night—but Professor Orloff did not know Valvoline had been hugging the pod around the neck and making wishes on its head and wanting to plug it. That thought still caused him to shudder.

  When all traces of their scuffling were gone, Mozie sat down on the ledge and leaned back, resting on his elbow. He looked up through the leaves at the pod, squinting a little in the sunlight.

  “I’m early because I’m baby-sitting tonight. Batty—he’s the guy who usually comes with me—is supposed to babysit with me, but he’s grounded.”

  He paused as if giving the pod a chance to respond.

  “Oh, yes, Professor Orloff called last night,” he went on, speaking directly to the heavy, silent shape above him.

  “His presentation has been delayed. You just need to hang on till he gets here. It hasn’t helped, of course, that I didn’t get the telegram and have been pouring in the Vita Grow.”

  Mozie sighed and looked down at the dark earth. He smoothed it idly with one hand. The rich smell did bring visions of the Nile, of ancient tombs, of pyramids older than time, of—Mozie waited for another vision, but that was the extent of his Nile knowledge.

  “I guess you heard the thunder last night? I did, and I worried about you. It’s going to storm sometime, though, and there will be thunder and lightning … Try not to let it get to you.”

  Mozie got slowly to his feet and brushed off the seat of his pants. The scent of—whatever it was—was so strong, Mozie felt the need of fresh air.

  He said, “I’d better leave now.”

  He turned to go, but something held him in place. He didn’t feel that the pod was drawing him closer—it was his own interest. He wanted to lay his head on the pod, to listen to what was going on inside.

  Carefully he stepped up onto the ledge. He hesitated only a moment before he pushed the leaves aside and entered the pod’s space.

  The pod was taller than he was now, and it seemed so heavy Mozie wasn’t sure why it didn’t fall over. He took one step forward and pressed his ear against the pod in the exact place he had done so yesterday. He heard nothing.

  “Are you in there?” he asked. “Are you alive?”

  There was nothing.

  Mozie put his hands on the pod. His hands were trembling a little. There was no movement, no sound, and yet there was the feeling of energy within the pod. “I know you’re not dead,” he said. “I bet if Valvoline were here, you’d hum.”

  He listened again, hoping to hear even the faintest of hums, but there was nothing.

  “Well, I’ll let you alone.”

  He stepped back, and as he did, his fingers touched the seam in the pod. He stopped. He pulled back for a better look.

  The seam was deeper than it had been yesterday. Mozie remembered how it had looked then. And!

  He bent forward. There was a slight crack within the groove. The pod could be getting ready to open.

  “Please, please, don’t open till Professor Orloff gets back. Please!”

  Mozie stepped down from the ledge and started walking backward toward the door. Leaves brushed his back, vines caught at his arms like something in a Disney movie, he stumbled and sat on a baske
tball-sized tomato. He got up quickly and brushed off the seat of his pants.

  “I’ll be back tomorrow,” he shouted through the foliage. “And you stay closed.”

  He retreated to the door, turned on the sprinkler system, and left the greenhouse.

  Just Mozie

  MOZIE RANG THE BELL. It was one of those old-timey bells that had to be turned.

  “Tell my wife to hurry,” Mr. Hunter called from the car. “I want to be inside the theater when the storm hits.”

  Mozie nodded. He rang again.

  As the sound jangled in the house, Mozie glanced over his shoulder. The wind was whipping the dry branches of the old magnolia trees. In the distance was a lead wall of clouds, and a gray dome had shot up to thirty thousand feet. The dome turned golden with lightning.

  The storm would be here tonight.

  As he stood there, Mozie thought of McMummy in the greenhouse. He remembered the faint trembling he and Valvoline had felt as they stood there together with the rich dark smell almost overwhelming them. If she hadn’t felt it too, he would have thought it was his imagination, but she had, and he knew that for some reason McMummy feared storms. He wondered if mummies could predict—

  From inside the house Mozie heard, “You be a good boy now, Richie, and do what Batty and Mozie tell you.”

  That’ll be the day, Mozie thought. At least he didn’t have to bother getting a pleasant look on his face. He already had that, built in—the turned-up nose, turned-up mouth, turned-up eyes, a living, breathing elf.

  The heavy oaken door swung open and Mrs. Hunter’s face lit up at the sight of him. The only people in the world who were truly delighted to see him, Mozie thought, were Batty and the mothers of unpleasant children. And, so far, the parents with unpleasant children were the only customers for the Macho Baby-Sitters Club.

  “Hi, Mrs. Hunter,” he said.

  She peered out to check the porch. “Where’s Batty? I thought he was coming too.”

  “He’s grounded.”

  “Oh, my, well, at least we’ve got you.”

  Dutifully he stepped through the doorway and inhaled the old air of the hall. Years from now, Batty had once told him, scientists would discover that inhaling old air was as bad for your lungs as cigarette smoke.