Actually, Jancy—and William, too—had worried some about Trixie and her hiding places. About how it was somehow related to the way she used to try to keep herself hidden away when they were back at the Baggetts’ and Big Ed had made her watch while he beat William with his belt. But Aunt Fiona thought it was best just to let her alone and she’d probably grow out of it.
And now, here she was scooting out from under the table and asking, way too loudly, about the box. “What’s in the box, William?” she squealed. Of course, that did it. In less than a minute the rest of them were there too. So all three of them—Jancy and Buddy as well as Trixie—were crowding around and watching his every move, as he got out Aunt Fiona’s kitchen scissors and started cutting string; cutting lots of tough string. When the box was finally open, William reached in and took out a lot of wadded-up Crownfield Daily newspapers—several big handfuls. Lots of Dailys and then, finally, another smaller box wrapped in fancy “Happy Birthday” paper and tied with a blue ribbon.
“Oh look,” Trixie squealed. “It’s a present. What is it, William? Who gave it to you?”
Then Buddy asked the same thing. “Who gave it to you, Willum? Was it Santa Claus?”
“No, dummy,” Trixie said. “Santa Claus doesn’t give birthday presents. That’s a birthday present. See? It says so. Right there.” Actually, Trixie, who was just starting first grade, couldn’t read that much yet, but the wrapping paper had lots of pictures of cakes with candles on them. So you didn’t have to read all that well to figure out that the two fancy-looking words written under each cake were “Happy Birthday.”
And then Jancy, who hadn’t said anything before, gave William a sideways grin and said, “I bet I know who sent it.”
Ignoring her, William slipped the ribbon off and carefully unwrapped the box. He lifted the cover and discovered—a loose-leaf binder. Well, not an ordinary canvas-covered one. The cover of this binder was made of very expensive-looking leather, smooth and slick on each side with a panel of fancy bumps down the center that looked like the hide of an alligator or maybe a crocodile. An expensive-looking loose-leaf notebook that could be buckled shut so it was almost like a briefcase. The kind of briefcase that lawyers might carry around to hold stuff about all their courtroom cases. Lawyers like Clarice’s parents, for instance—a possibility that popped into his mind before it occurred to him that he’d rather not go in that direction.
But apparently Jancy already had. She was smiling at him, the kind of teasing grin she always used when she was about to say something about Clarice. So he didn’t give her the chance. Quickly picking up his fancy binder, he headed for his room without even stopping long enough to settle the loud argument—loud and getting louder—between Trixie and Buddy about which one of them was going to get to play with the great big box. Trixie wanted it for a dollhouse, and Buddy was yelling something about a hangar for his airplanes. William kept going. Jancy could settle it. She was better at that sort of thing than he was.
Safely in his room, he sat down on his bed for a while, thinking and running his fingers over the rich, bumpy surface of the mysterious gift and even holding it to his nose to breathe in its expensive, leathery smell. But what to do with it?
At first he did consider getting out the faded and slightly scruffy loose-leaf binder that he’d been using at school, taking out all his notes and math papers, and putting them into … But then he thought again.
Nobody else at Gold Beach Junior High had a fancy alligator leather binder that looked like a briefcase. Or if they did, he certainly hadn’t seen it. So there were going to be questions. And if he said it was a present, they might want to know who from—and even why. So William thought some more.
And that’s pretty much how he happened to decide that his mysterious gift was just the thing he needed—for a new secret journal! A new one, because the one he’d started in the seventh grade, and had written in almost every night for a while, had completely disappeared. Somewhere in all the spur-of-the-moment moves—from the Baggetts’ falling-down farmhouse, to the Ogdens’ cellar, to Aunt Fiona’s the first time, back to the Baggetts’, and finally back again to Aunt Fiona’s—the journal he’d been writing in for almost a year had turned up missing. Which was too bad, because there had been some pretty good stuff in it. The kind of stuff that, as Miss Scott suggested, told how you felt about the important things that happened to you, with sections where you put those happenings “on scene,” where you included dialogue—what you’d said to someone, and what they’d answered back. Or in William’s case, what he’d liked to have said if he’d had the nerve. Things like, “That’s my book, Andy, and if you throw it, someday you’re going to be very, very sorry.”
He could remember exactly when he’d written that one. It had been the day that Andy, one of the Baggett twins, had grabbed his new math book as he was going down the aisle in the school bus, and then all the way home kept threatening to throw it out of the window. And whenever William reached for it, Al, the other twin, punched him in the ribs or twisted his arm. Actually, Andy finally did throw the book, but by then they were nearly home and William had been able to find it lying there beside the road, only a little bit ragged and dirty. And that night, after he’d found the book, he went back and climbed up into his attic hideout and wrote a dialogue and recited it several times even before he did his math homework.
After the part about Andy being very, very sorry, he’d gone on to write more. It had gone something like, “You may be too dumb to realize it, but there are different ways to throw things, and someday I’m going to be the one who gets to do the throwing.”
After that he’d had Andy say something stupid like, “Duh! Whatcha talking about, kid?” He’d done a pretty good Andy Baggett imitation whenever he read that part. He’d always been good at impersonating movie stars like Jimmy Cagney and Edward G. Robinson, so Andy Baggett was a cinch.
It really was too bad that the old journal was gone. He’d like to read some of it again to remind himself how lucky he was, how lucky all four of them were, to be back at Aunt Fiona’s. But thinking ahead to next summer and the chance that he might be playing the part of Puck in an important production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, it really did seem like a good time to start another personal and very private journal where he would, once again, record every important and dramatic event that happened in his life.
So that was decided, and William found a good hiding place at the back of his closet and stashed his fancy new journal away until he could come up with an hour or two of absolute privacy.
CHAPTER
3
It took awhile. Privacy wasn’t too easy to come up with when you were part of a family that included a sister as good at mind reading as Jancy, and a brother as hard to get away from as Buddy. So it wasn’t until two or three days later that William was able to find a quiet moment to get started on his secret journal. In fact, it was rather late on a Friday night when he finally sat down at his desk and began:
I, William S. Hardison, am writing this on the first day of October, 1938, and as you can see, it’s only the first page. So nothing has happened to me before this date? Not likely, since I’ve been living for thirteen long years, and an awful lot has already happened to me.
He stopped writing for a moment—long enough to grin ruefully and underline the word “awful.”
But as for the present? Right now? Today? Well in a way, it’s a good time for starting over, because I am now a Hardison. A legal Hardison, after starting life as a Baggett. Which, let me tell you, is not a good way to start.
I don’t intend to say very much about that part of my life in this journal, because it’s over and done with. And because, where Baggetts are concerned—the less said, the better. Right?
He stopped again, holding his pen over the place where the next word would be written—considering whether that was all he needed to say about all those years as a Baggett. But then it occurred to him that someday, when that whole miser
able mess was a long way behind him—and he was, just maybe, a more or less important person—there might be some interest in what could be called his life story. That is, in finding out where he’d started, and how far he’d come. So the next paragraph began …
However, a few words might be a good idea, just to set the stage.
He rather liked that—the part about “setting the stage” particularly, since it was looking like the “stage” might turn out to be an important part of his life. He nodded approvingly and went on:
As I just said, I was born a Baggett, but my mother was Laura Hardison, Big Ed Baggett’s second wife. His first wife, Mabel, had had four kids, one after the other just about as fast as physically possible, and as if that wasn’t bad enough, two more at the same time—twins. I guess the twins must have been pretty scary even as newborns, because right after they arrived, Mabel gave up and ran away. No one seemed to know exactly what happened to her, but she never came back. So that was when my mother started taking care of the newborn twins, and for some reason she wound up getting married to Big Ed. So then I was born, and my sister Jancy, but by that time the other six Baggett kids were quite a bit older. And all six of them were way too big for their age. Not to mention, way too vicious.
Things weren’t too bad for the first few years, while our mother was still around. But then, when I was about six years old Trixie was born, and two years later Buddy, and that was when my mother died.
After that things went from bad to worse—a lot worse—until the day when Al and Andy convinced Buddy that a toilet was a good place to give a guinea pig a whirlpool bath. Jancy isn’t the type who flies off the handle, but having her only pet, Sweetie Pie, flushed down the toilet turned out to be the last straw. I was sort of surprised when she decided we were going to run away—not someday in the future, but right now! Like tomorrow! And of course we had to take Trixie and Buddy with us.
The escape wasn’t easy, and there were a couple of serious detours, but now we’re living with our aunt, Fiona Hardison, in the town of Gold Beach, and next summer I’m probably going to be playing a part in a Shakespeare play. Not a school one this time, but a big-time professional production. And in the meantime I’m in the eighth grade at Gold Beach Junior High, and everything at school is a lot different from what it was in Crownfield.
But enough about that, he told himself, as he put his secret journal back in its hiding place. Different, he was thinking. Yeah, in lots of ways. Not that he’d stop getting good grades. That had always been easy for him. But different from the kind of guy who was either ignored, or else teased and bullied, by all the other kids. Teased about being a teacher’s pet in Miss Scott’s classes, and made fun of for being the last one picked when teams were being chosen because he was so lousy at sports. But teased most of all about being a Baggett.
Most of that had already changed here at Gold Beach. The whole Baggett thing was behind him. There was no drama department, and no Miss Scott, which was too bad, but at least he wouldn’t have the “teacher’s pet” thing to worry about. There were still some problems, such as being small and scrawny for his age, and the fact that he was a total flop at sports.
Since getting enough healthy stuff to eat was a lot easier here at Aunt Fiona’s, he was probably going to start catching up as far as size was concerned. But that still left the no-good-at-sports thing. He was working on that, too.
CHAPTER
4
In the days that followed, the “lousy at sports” problem inspired a special page in the secret journal. On a page titled Things to Practice, William drew some columns where he planned to put down how much time he’d spent on practicing things such as throwing, catching, batting, and running. But the way it was turning out, the only column that grew very much was the running one. In the running column there were soon a lot of entries that said: 15 minutes running to school, or 16 minutes running home from school. But that was about it, since it turned out to be almost impossible to practice the other skills without someone to do it with.
He did manage to get in a little throwing practice by throwing a baseball at a spot on the trunk of the oak tree in Aunt Fiona’s backyard. But having to run after the ball every time slowed things up considerably. And as for catching and batting—no entries at all, even after he got desperate enough to try to get Buddy to help him practice. He should have known better. Like everything Buddy did, he threw amazingly hard and fast for a four-year-old, but usually not anywhere near what he was aiming at. So—lots more running practice, but not much of anything else. He tried Jancy next, but she hated doing it, and her aim wasn’t much better than Buddy’s.
But then Mr. Gregory, the gym teacher, started teaching gymnastics. Mr. Gregory had specialized in gymnastics when he was in school, and after he’d talked to the school board about how healthy it was for kids to be limber and well balanced, he was allowed to teach gymnastics to the kids at Gold Beach Junior High every Tuesday and Thursday. And it turned out that while William wasn’t anywhere near the strongest or toughest guy in his class, he was pretty close to being the most limber and acrobatic.
So William went from trying to practice throwing and catching, to working on some skills that seemed to come more naturally to him. He did things like cartwheels, backflips, rope shinnying, and handstands, not only in the gymnasium, but also in his own backyard. And before long in the old barn on the Bowens’ farm, with Charlie Bowen, who was in his gym class and was turning into a kind of best friend. At least the kind of friend who likes to practice with you when you’re doing some things you’re both really good at.
The month of October crept slowly by, and then it was Halloween—which turned out to be a brand-new experience, not only for Trixie and Buddy but for William and Jancy, too. Oh, they knew about the kinds of things people did on Halloween, or at least they thought they did. They’d certainly heard the older Baggett kids bragging about the things they’d tipped over and smashed to pieces, and the people they’d scared to death. But since Halloween seemed to make Baggetts even more vicious than usual, William and Jancy had known better than to try to do anything when October 31 rolled around—except keep out of sight. So things like dressing up in costumes and neighborhood trick-or-treating were as new to them as they were to Trixie and Buddy.
The year went slowly on. Christmas was a completely new and wonderful experience for all four of the ex-Baggetts. There were presents that everybody bought or made for one another. And, of course, a Christmas tree, and caroling with some other kids in the neighborhood. The Christmas tree, decorated with ornaments and tinsel, was a special treat for all of them, since the only time the Baggetts ever had a tree was one year when Rudy and Little Ed stole a real big one from the town square. It had lost most of its ornaments, so it didn’t look too good, but it did make the house smell a lot better than usual. But Big Ed knew the Baggetts were on the Crownfield police department’s “usual suspects” list when anything disappeared downtown, so he burned it up in the fireplace after only a few hours. Which was too bad, but at least the house was a little warmer for a while.
Then came Easter, with special days at Aunt Fiona’s church and lots of new clothes and egg hunts. All of which were things that, like Halloween and Christmas, were new experiences for the ex-Baggetts. Going to church at all was also different. William and Jancy might have gone more often, but with Aunt Fiona so awfully busy, and with Buddy making a pest of himself in Sunday school, they didn’t get to go very often.
School, for William, was okay in most ways. As usual, he had no trouble making good grades and getting along with teachers. He still wasn’t all that great at any sport that required a lot of height or big muscles, but he continued to be a natural at things like backflips and handstands and shinnying up ropes.
Later that spring it was Jancy who decided that Mother’s Day should be celebrated by giving Aunt Fiona presents. Mostly those consisted of thinking up new ways to help with all the extra work she had to do because of suddenly
having a houseful of kids. William and Jancy learned how to do laundry and ironing, and Buddy tried to get into the act—by digging all the holey socks out of Aunt Fiona’s sewing basket and mending them with glue from William’s model airplane kit. Another dumb kid disaster. Not quite as awful as flushing Sweetie Pie down the toilet, but nearly as bad. Aunt Fiona said Buddy meant well, even though about a dozen socks were pretty much goners. But then Aunt Fiona tended to think that way, where Buddy was concerned.
And of course, all year long there was A Midsummer Night’s Dream to look forward to—and practice for. It wasn’t long before his big Complete Works of William Shakespeare just naturally fell open to that particular play when he picked it up—pages 387 to 411—and he had all of Puck’s lines by heart. He’d memorized them so well that he could not only recite them silently in bed at night but also act them out now and then, for the rest of the family. Sometimes his audience was just Jancy and Pumpkin, her new guinea pig, but now and then he managed to get Trixie and Buddy to sit still for a scene or two.
On some days it seemed the year was flying by, but now and then it felt, to William at least, that time was standing still. He went on crossing out each day that passed with a big dark X on his private calendar, and writing down how many days were left until the middle of June 1939, when he would leave for Mannsville College, to be in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. But only on his own private calendar, because, for some reason, it upset Jancy when he used the one in the kitchen.
Sometimes he would get attacks of impatient frustration, in spite of the fact that in many ways it was the best year of his life. But when that happened he got through it by writing in his secret journal. Usually it was fairly late at night when he would get his new leather-covered binder from its secret hiding place at the back of his closet, climb into bed, and start writing. He would write things like:
William's Midsummer Dreams Page 2