Applewhites at Wit's End

by Stephanie S. Tolan

  “I meant at bookkeeping!”

  “Oh. Everybody I did temp work for wanted to hire me full-time. But I wanted to stay free to take whatever acting job came along. A lot of good that did me. I finally just gave up and came home. I figured even if Traybridge Little Theatre didn’t pay, I could at least get onstage there. When I went to audition, Mrs. Montrose offered me this job instead.”

  Randolph erupted in fury. “This job? It isn’t an acting job; it’s a criminal conspiracy! Call the police now! We can get that wretched woman on conspiracy to defraud! I knew all along she had to be behind this.”

  Jonathon Sandler, scratching his neck, grinned sheepishly. “She offered to pay really well!”

  When the whole story came out, it was pretty much what E.D. had suspected. When Mrs. Montrose couldn’t get the state interested in Eureka!, she’d decided to get revenge on the Applewhites as best she could.

  “It was to be a kind of terrorist action at first,” Sandler explained. “The intention was to inflict psychological trauma. So she had me deliver all those messages about the state regulations day after day. Then I was supposed to let myself get seen skulking around. She didn’t warn me about the goat! I wouldn’t have come back after that horrible day, but the goat tore the suit. It was from the costume shop at the Little Theatre, and she told me she’d take the cost of it out of my pay. I had to come back to earn the rest of it or I’d have ended up in debt!”

  “She intended to inflict psychological trauma?” Randolph said. “When the case comes to trial, she’ll discover that it didn’t work. Applewhites are made of stronger stuff!”

  Right, E.D. thought, remembering the look on her father’s face the morning she’d seen him with one of Mrs. Montrose’s threatening messages crumpled in his hand.

  “After the inspection she was planning to forge a ‘cease and desist’ order from the state—and send it by mail from Raleigh. She thought you’d shut yourselves down to avoid prosecution.”

  “Never!” Randolph insisted. “We would have fought the state to the last breath!”

  E.D. explained the policy of distraction and delay then, and told Jonathon Sandler she was sorry Wolfie had ruined the suit.

  Cordelia, who was sitting across the table from him, said, “I hope he didn’t hurt you!”

  Sandler smiled at her and shook his head. “He scared the devil out of me, though. The worst part wasn’t the goat.” He scratched at his neck. “It’s the poison ivy I got in the woods. It started on my neck, and it’s spread all down my back!” Cordelia patted his other hand comfortingly.

  Destiny looked up from his drawing pad. “Tell ’em about the Heffalump trap, E.D.!”

  She explained about her call to the department. “So we knew you couldn’t be a real inspector.”

  “You knew?” Randolph said. “You knew and didn’t tell your family? How sharper than a serpent’s tooth …”

  David pointed a finger at Sandler. “I suggested capture and torture. You’re lucky everybody else here is such a wimp.”

  “Then I had a Pooh and Piglet idea!” Destiny crowed. “The dock was a Heffalump trap, and I was the honeypot! And it worked! We caught you!”

  “Yeah. You caught me.” Sandler breathed a long, shuddery sigh. “And now I’ll never get the rest of my pay. I’m back to being a starving artist!”

  “You’re going to jail—that’s what’s going to happen to you! Don’t think for one minute that we won’t bring the full force of the law down on your head. And on the head of that vengeful, sadistic woman!” Randolph turned to Lucille. “You printed out those pictures, didn’t you? They’ll be all the evidence we need.”

  Lucille held up Harley’s photographs. “They’re evidence, all right. But we’re not going to turn them over to the authorities.”

  “What do you mean? Of course we are!” Randolph said.

  “There is a Higher Authority involved here, Randolph,” she said. “Take a look.” She spread the photos on the table. In almost every one of them, orbs could be seen clustered around Jonathon Sandler’s head. “There. You see? Orbs! Benevolent spirits, drawn to light and joy. They would not be in these photographs if this young man had come here with malicious intent. He is here for some higher purpose—a higher purpose than Mrs. Montrose could ever have imagined.”

  “And what,” Randolph asked with acid in his voice, “might that purpose be exactly?”

  “It will emerge in time,” Lucille said blithely. “You may be sure of that.”

  “It may have emerged already,” Zedediah said. “Zedediah Applewhite Handmade Wood Furniture is in serious need of a bookkeeper. I’ve been working overtime, and I can’t keep up with the books. For that matter, this whole family would benefit from having somebody around who knows how to keep track of money.”

  “Now there’s a good idea!” Sybil said.

  “I do have a degree in accounting,” Jonathon said. “Of course, I really prefer acting… .”

  “It’s possible,” Sybil said, “that there will be a place for you in one of Randolph’s productions from time to time.”

  “Are you kidding?” Randolph said. “After all he’s done …”

  “Well, the least you could do is let him audition, dear,” Sybil said. “As well as he played the part of Thomas Timmons, he could turn out to be a real asset!”

  Jonathon Sandler was smiling. E.D. noticed that Cordelia hadn’t moved her hand from his since she’d patted it.

  Sandler looked up at Randolph. “It would be an honor to be in a Randolph Applewhite production,” he said.

  “There now! All’s well that ends well,” Lucille said. “The whole point of Eureka! is to nourish creativity in these children, and look how creative they’ve been. Look how brilliantly they worked together to save the camp.”

  “It was never actually in danger,” Randolph pointed out.

  Zedediah stood up and swept his arm around the dining tent where the breakfast dishes were drawing flies and yellow jackets. “Who has KP for Community Service? The day is getting away from us. We still have a camp to run, after all!”

  Chapter Thirty-six

  “It seems to me,” Zedediah said at that night’s staff meeting, “that camp, like education, involves an adventurous quest. Kids learn not so much from what they’re taught as from what they do.”

  “Not just kids,” Sybil said. “The more I work on my children’s book, the better I get! Petunia Possum, P.I. It’s going to be a stunner.”

  “Don’t forget magic,” Lucille added. “The orbs are with us!”

  “Orbs!” Paulie muttered sleepily from his perch. “Orbs, orbs, orbs.”

  Zedediah rubbed his hands together. “All right, then. You all have another month to encourage these kids to do what they do best—”

  “Not just what they do best!” E.D. protested.

  Jake nodded. “If that’s all they do, how will they ever find out the rest of who they are?”

  Hal, who almost never spoke up at a staff meeting, cleared his throat. “Like me being a counselor. Doing the hard stuff’s what makes it an adventure.”

  “Focus, focus, focus!” Randolph said. “If we aren’t going to prosecute Mrs. Montrose, it’s time to get serious about an end-of-camp event that will show her and the whole of Traybridge, North Carolina, what real talent and creativity can do! Theater, dance, music, art. I say we sell tickets and rub her nose in our success!”

  “We already have a theme,” Lucille said. “The barn’s becoming a patchwork quilt. We could make it a whole day of family activities and call it the Patchwork Summer Festival of the Arts. Just imagine it: strolling singers—”

  “—storytelling for kids,” Sybil added.

  “Face painting!” Cordelia said. “And Q can teach people Step!”

  Hal nodded. “Art gallery in the barn …”

  Lucille clapped her hands. “Perfect! A gallery of sculpture and photographs. We can have a whole section just for orbs. We’ll have to have food, of course.
Barbecue, hot dogs, fried green tomatoes. I’ll see if I can get my guru, Govindaswami, to come and do a booth with Indian food… .”

  “If Cinnamon has really tamed Wolfie, we could have a petting zoo!” Sybil said.

  “And most important,” Randolph said, “a show to cap it all off. We’ll call it A Patchwork Evening of Scenes and Improv.”

  “Don’t forget New Fusion Movement—that’s what we’ve decided to call it—ballet, Step, tap, and modern dance,” Cordelia put in. “Jonathon told me he studied dance the whole time he was in New York. He could be in it too!”

  “Sybil and I will start organizing the publicity tomorrow!” Lucille said. “It’ll be a sellout.”

  Jake looked at E.D.; E.D. looked at Jake. Both of them sighed.

  Archie, who had offered to watch the campers during the staff meeting, had built a campfire and gathered them all for a marshmallow roast to celebrate Eureka!’s reprieve from the state. He sent Samantha to the Lodge to invite the staff to join them after the meeting.

  Jake and E.D. stood together, leaning on the porch rail, after the others had gone out to the campfire circle. Winston had settled next to them, chin on his paws.

  “They’re off again, aren’t they?” Jake asked.

  E.D. looked up at Jake’s face, lit by the full moon. When had he gotten so much taller, she wondered. And why hadn’t she noticed? His Mohawk had begun to tip over, softening his old delinquent look. The ring in his eyebrow glittered in the moonlight. “There’s nothing like the passion of the Applewhites,” she said.

  “You ought to know,” Jake said. “You are one.” He grinned. “That was some act you put on today.”

  Jake thought back to the first time he’d seen her—not even a whole year ago. She’d had scabby elbows and knees then, chopped-off hair, and a body like a ten-year-old boy. And she had clearly hated him. The feeling, he remembered, had been mutual.

  The sound of Archie’s guitar floated up to them from the campfire. After a moment Harley and Ginger began to sing Ginger’s latest song. “Moonlight on the water, mockingbird in the trees, come and join the laughter caught on the evening breeze… .” An owl hooted from the woods.

  They could never say later whether E.D. had kissed Jake or Jake had kissed E.D., but Winston’s tail thumped on the porch floor. Even the dog knew how much had changed.

  Acknowledgments

  Thanks to Larry Michael

  of the North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources for a delightful and very helpful conversation concerning camp regulations!

  Thanks to Katherine Paterson

  for coming up with the name Furniture of the Absurd for Archie’s work as we were writing the dramatic adaptation of Surviving the Applewhites. Archie is grateful, too.

  About the Author

  STEPHANIE S. TOLAN is the author of more than twenty-five books for young readers, including LISTEN, which won the Christopher Award and the Henry Bergh ASPCA Award. Her New York Times bestselling novel SURVIVING THE APPLEWHITES received a Newbery Honor and was named a Smithsonian Notable Children’s Book, a School Library Journal Best Book for Children, an ALA Booklist Editors’ Choice, an American Library Association Notable Children’s Book, and an American Library Association Best Book for Young Adults. Tolan lives on a little lake in a big woods in Charlotte, North Carolina, with her husband (Bob), two dogs (Coyote—the real dog from LISTEN!—and Samantha), one cat (Puck), two fish, and plenty of outdoor creatures. You can visit her online at www.stephanietolan.com.

  Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors and artists.

  Also by Stephanie S. Tolan

  SURVIVING THE APPLEWHITES

  LISTEN!

  WELCOME TO THE ARK

  FLIGHT OF THE RAVEN

  ORDINARY MIRACLES

  THE FACE IN THE MIRROR

  WHO’S THERE?

  SAVE HALLOWEEN!

  PLAGUE YEAR

  GOOD COURAGE

  Credits

  Cover art © 2012 by Brett Helquist

  Cover design by Erin Fitzsimmons

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  Copyright

  Applewhites at Wit’s End

  Copyright © 2012 by Stephanie S. Tolan

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

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  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Tolan, Stephanie S.

  Applewhites at Wit’s End / Stephanie S. Tolan. — 1st ed.

  p. cm.

  Summary: Great changes are in store for the highly creative and somewhat eccentric Applewhite family when money problems force them to open a summer camp for gifted children, who almost immediately begin to rebel, while a mysterious interloper watches from the woods.

  ISBN 978-0-06-057938-8 (trade bdg.) — ISBN 978-0-06-057939-5 (lib. bdg.)

  [1. Camps—Fiction. 2. Family life—North Carolina—Fiction. 3. Creative ability—Fiction. 4. Eccentrics and eccentricities—Fiction. 5. North Carolina—Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.T5735App 2012

  [Fic]—dc23

  CIP

  2011019388

  AC

  *

  12 13 14 15 16 CG/RRDH 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  FIRST EDITION

  EPub Edition © JUNE 2012 ISBN: 9780062213372

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