Mallory and the Mystery Diary

by Ann M. Martin

  “Would you really do that?” I exclaimed.

  “Of course,” Stacey’s mother replied. “I’d like to see an end to this mystery, too. After all, I don’t want any ghosts around here, either.”

  “Oh, Mom,” said Stacey, but I could tell she was pleased with what her mother was going to do.

  At that moment, I looked at my watch and saw that it was 6:05.

  “Oh, my gosh, Buddy!” I cried. “We’re late. I was supposed to have you home five minutes ago.” And at that moment, the phone rang. It was my mother saying that Mrs. Barrett had said that Mary Anne had said that Buddy and I were going to go to my house and where were we?

  I ran Buddy home. By the time we got there, Mary Anne had left, and Mrs. Barrett was looking pretty worried. So I had to tell Sophie’s story for the third time that day. I hoped it would be the last time, but I knew it wouldn’t be, because I still had to tell it to my family that night. I couldn’t not tell them.

  “And,” said Buddy when I’d finished, “I’m a detective and soon I’m going to be a magician.” He held out the box of magic tricks. “I found them in the attic and Stacey said I could have them. I bet I can read these instructions all by myself,” he added. Then he ran up to his room with his treasure.

  “Mallory,” said Mrs. Barrett with a huge smile, “you’ve worked wonders with Buddy. I’m not sure what you two have been up to, but Buddy seems much happier. We don’t have battles over going to school anymore, his work has been improving, and best of all, he doesn’t gag every time he hears the words ‘read’ or ‘book.’”

  I smiled back. “We tried some different things,” I told Mrs. Barrett. “I mean, some unusual things. When I realized that Buddy really didn’t like his workbook and reader and the flash cards, I sort of took a chance. We read comics and then we wrote our own. We read mysteries and tried to solve them. I figured it didn’t matter what Buddy was reading as long as he was reading and was enjoying it.

  “So when he said he wanted to read Sophie’s diary, I figured, Why not? It’s still reading. And you should have heard him. That diary is not easy to read — neither was the confession — but Buddy worked and worked because he wanted so badly to solve the mystery.”

  “Nothing like a little motivation,” said Mrs. Barrett.

  At that moment, Buddy came flying back down the stairs.

  “Look!” he exclaimed. “I already learned one trick!”

  “What, sweetie? Show us,” said Mrs. Barrett immediately.

  And I said, “Wait. Let’s get Suzi and Marnie. You can put on a real show.”

  “Great!” exclaimed Buddy.

  So Mrs. Barrett, Suzi, Marnie, and I squished ourselves onto the living room couch.

  Buddy stood before us.

  “I hold in my hand,” he began, “an ordinary silk handkerchief.” He waved a polka-dotted handkerchief around, I guess to prove how ordinary it was. “Now,” he went on, “if someone will say the magic words —”

  “I will! I will!” cried Suzi.

  “Okay,” replied Buddy. “Say ‘abracadabra.’”

  “Abracadabra,” said Suzi compliantly.

  Buddy pushed the handkerchief into his left hand, which he had made into a fist. When he opened his fist, the handkerchief was gone. In its place was an egg.

  “Cool!” exclaimed Suzi. “How did you do that?”

  “A magician,” said Buddy, “never reveals his secrets.”

  “Well, how did you learn it?” asked his mother.

  “Simple. I read the directions.”

  Mrs. Barrett and I smiled at each other over Suzi’s and Marnie’s heads.

  And then I had to hightail it home before my parents sent the police out looking for me.

  “Guess what, guess what, guess what!” cried Stacey. She dashed into BSC headquarters ten minutes before the beginning of a Friday meeting.

  “WHAT?” shouted Claudia. (Stacey had startled her. Claud was rummaging behind a chair in search of a box of Ring-Dings and hadn’t heard Stacey come up the stairs.)

  I was the only other club member present.

  “My mom got the painting back from the art restorer today, and it —”

  “Wait!” I said. “Don’t say any more. Kristy’ll kill us if we hear important news before she does. Can you hold off until the others arrive? Then you can tell us everything at once.”

  “All right,” Stacey agreed, “but if I explode before five-thirty, it’ll be your fault.”

  “I’ll try to live with that,” I said.

  Claudia finally found the Ring-Dings and settled herself on her bed with them. “There is nothing,” she said, “like a fresh, unopened package of junk food. Especially chocolate junk food. It’s like holding a really huge birthday present in your lap and savoring the moments until you can open it.”

  Stacey rolled her eyes. Claud did sound a little ridiculous, but I sometimes wonder if Stacey is jealous because she can’t eat things like Ring-Dings.

  Claud was beginning to open the box (in that slow, careful way that some people open presents), when Kristy and Jessi arrived.

  Kristy immediately plopped down in the director’s chair, put on her visor, and stuck a pencil over one ear. Jessi settled herself on the floor next to me, stretching out those l-o-o-o-o-n-g dancer’s legs of hers. We were talking about a social studies assignment we’d been given that day, when Dawn and Mary Anne arrived, grinning.

  The whole club was assembled, the digital clock read 5:30 on the nose, yet nobody, not even Kristy, could ignore those grins.

  “What?” said Claud excitedly. “What’s going on?”

  “It’s our parents,” said Dawn. “They called each of us this afternoon to announce that they’re going out tonight —”

  “That’s not unusual,” Kristy interrupted.

  “No,” agreed Mary Anne, “but it’s unusual for them to celebrate an anniversary.”

  “An anniversary!” I exclaimed. “What kind of anniversary?”

  “They’re celebrating because this is the twenty-fifth date they’ve been on,” replied Dawn. “I mean, as adults. Not including when they were in high school.”

  “We figure,” added Mary Anne, “that if they’re counting dates and celebrating anniversaries, they must really be getting serious.”

  “Wow,” said Jessi, impressed.

  “I’ve got some news, too,” spoke up Stacey.

  “Ahem.” Kristy tapped her pencil on Claudia’s clock, indicating that it now read 5:32.

  “Puh-lease?” said Stacey. “Remember, I said I’d burst if I don’t tell this news.”

  “Just one thing first,” replied Kristy. “Any club business?”

  Well, no one was going to raise an issue if Stacey was in danger of exploding. So we all just sat there. The phone didn’t ring. It wasn’t even dues day.

  At last Kristy said, “Okay, Stace, what’s your news?”

  “My mom got the painting back from the art restorer,” she said in a rush, “and it’s a portrait of a beautiful woman. It looks just the way Sophie described her mother’s portrait in the diary. So it’s got to be Old Hickory’s daughter…. It’s a lovely painting,” she added. And then she said, “You know something? Charlotte was right. Things aren’t always what they seem to be. I didn’t understand what she was trying to say before, but now I see.”

  “Do you think Charlotte knew the portrait had been painted over?” I asked incredulously.

  “Oh, no. Not at all. I think she just meant that sometimes you have to look beyond the obvious. Use your imagination, or a little ingenuity.”

  “Charlotte and Buddy ought to team up as detectives,” I said. “They could be the next Nancy Drew and Frank Hardy.”

  Ring, ring.

  “Ah,” sighed Kristy. “I just love the first call of a meeting.”

  Ring, ring.

  “Then answer the phone, for lord’s sake,” said Claud, and we all laughed.

  “Hello?” said Kristy. “Baby-sitters Club.
Children are our business.”

  (Honestly, you never know what will come out of Kristy’s mouth.)

  “Oh, hi, Mrs. Perkins…. Saturday morning? I’ll see who’s available and we’ll get right back to you.”

  Before Mary Anne could even look at Saturday in the appointment pages, the phone rang again. This time it was Mrs. Arnold, needing a sitter for her twins. Then Mr. Marshall called wanting to know who was free to sit for Nina and Eleanor.

  Needless to say, the next ten minutes or so were pretty busy. When things quieted down, Stacey said, “Isn’t anyone curious to know what Mom and I plan to do with the portrait?”

  “I am,” I said, and the others nodded.

  “Well, we thought and thought,” Stacey told us, “and finally we decided to hang it in our living room over the mantelpiece. I suppose the portrait really belongs at the old Hickman place, since it never hung in Sophie’s house, but Mom and I believe that Sophie’s mother belongs with the spirits of her husband and daughter … I mean, if there are such things, which I doubt, but you never know.”

  Stacey sounded so uncertain that the rest of us couldn’t help smiling.

  I said, “Whether there are spirits or not, I think it’s a nice idea.”

  “Meeee, toooo,” said Kristy in her séance voice, and the seven of us nearly became hysterical. Especially when Kristy couldn’t quit. “Thaaaank yoooou,” she added. “You saaaaved my sooooul.”

  The seven of us were literally rolling with laughter (Stacey fell off the bed) when the phone rang again. Jessi composed herself first and managed to answer it — and the next job call as well.

  When the appointments had been arranged, Claudia passed around the Ring-Dings. Only some of us took one. Claud did, of course, and I did because I was starving. Kristy took one, too, but Stacey and Dawn passed them up, and Jessi and Mary Anne split one. (Jessi watches her figure so she can stay in shape, and Mary Anne eats like a bird.)

  “You know what I still wonder,” said Kristy, after swallowing a huge mouthful of Ring-Ding.

  “What?” asked Dawn.

  “How Old Hickory’s trunk wound up in Sophie’s attic with Sophie’s things in it. Not to mention how the portrait got over there.”

  “Buddy and I have a theory,” I spoke up.

  “Oh, goody,” said Kristy. She wasn’t being sarcastic. She was truly interested.

  “Old Hickory had given Sophie’s house to his daughter, but he owned both of them — so we figured that the long-lost nephew probably inherited them both. But he only needed one house — and of course he wanted the bigger one — so maybe he started renting out the one Stacey’s living in now. But not until after he moved a lot of things in the big house that he didn’t want into the smaller house. I bet he just jumbled stuff up, throwing things from both places into boxes and half-empty trunks. And then maybe after awhile he sold the smaller house, forgetting about all the stuff in the attic.”

  “That makes sense,” said Mary Anne.

  “But I guess we’ll never know for sure,” I continued. “I mean, Buddy and I just made that up. The important thing is that we found the portrait and Jared’s name has been cleared, even if it is a little late.”

  “Yeah,” said Jessi thoughtfully. “It’s too bad his name wasn’t cleared while he was alive. Some things are so unfair.”

  Ring, ring.

  “Yikes!” said Kristy. “What a meeting!”

  Dawn answered the phone that time. Right away, she looked puzzled. Then she said, “Buddy? Is that you? … Sure, she’s here. Hold on.” Dawn handed the phone to me. “It’s Buddy Barrett,” she whispered, her hand over the mouthpiece. “He wants to talk to you.”

  “Does he sound upset?” I asked.

  Dawn shook her head slowly. “No … more like he’s excited.”

  I took the phone from her. “Hiya, detective,” I said.

  Buddy laughed. “Guess what.”

  “What?” I replied, wondering if Buddy was going to answer, “That’s what!” which is currently Claire’s favorite joke.

  Instead he said, sounding extremely proud and important, “Today I was moved from the Crows to the Robins.”

  “Excuse me?” I replied.

  “I was moved from the Crows to the Robins. The Crows are the lowest reading group in my class, and the Robins are the middle group.”

  “Oh, Buddy!” I exclaimed. “That is fabulous. It really is! And you deserve it. You worked very hard.” I cupped my hand over the receiver and relayed the news to the other BSC members.

  “I bet,” Buddy went on, “that I can make it into the Hawks before the school year is over. That’s the highest reading group.”

  “I bet you can, too.”

  “And you know what else?”

  “What?”

  “I just read a chapter book by myself. I read the whole thing. And I only needed a little help from my mom.”

  “Fantastic! What did you read?”

  “A Hardy Boys book. And I even solved the mystery before the end of the story.”

  Is there such a thing as too much good news? There might be. I felt a little overwhelmed after I’d hung up the phone. The portrait had been found and Buddy was becoming a reader.

  “Stacey?” I said. “Is the treasury in good shape?”

  “Yup,” she answered. “Why?”

  “Well, I was wondering. Can the treasury money pay for rewards?”

  “Rewards?” Stacey glanced at Kristy. Kristy glanced at me.

  “I want to reward Buddy for his hard work,” I said.

  “I think the treasury can handle that,” replied Kristy.

  “Great. There’s a book I want to buy him. Anyone who likes to read has to read about the naughtiest kids around. So Buddy’s just got to read GOOPS and How to Be Them.”

  Stacey opened the treasury envelope as carefully as if she were picking a lock. She handed me some money, grimacing.

  “Bring back the change,” she told me.

  And we all started laughing again.

  * * *

  Dear Reader,

  I have never been a diary or journal keeper, but when I was young — in fact, starting on the day I was born — my mother kept a diary for me. I love looking back through the diary to find out all sorts of things — what my first day of school was like, when I (finally) learned how to ride a two-wheeler, or simply what I did on June 10, 1958. I’m so glad my mother kept a diary for me, but I wish I had kept one for myself, too.

  A journal isn’t necessarily exciting or thrilling, but it’s interesting because it’s about you. It’s also a great source of story ideas. Lots of kids tell me that they love to write, but they don’t know what to write about. I tell them that the best things to write about are things that have actually happened. And what better place to keep track of things that have happened to you than in your very own journal? Remember, it’s the story of your life. And only you can tell it.

  Happy reading,

  * * *

  About the Author

  ANN MATTHEWS MARTIN was born on August 12, 1955. She grew up in Princeton, New Jersey, with her parents and her younger sister, Jane.

  There are currently over 176 million copies of The Baby-sitters Club in print. (If you stacked all of these books up, the pile would be 21,245 miles high.) In addition to The Baby-sitters Club, Ann is the author of two other series, Main Street and Family Tree. Her novels include Belle Teal, A Corner of the Universe (a Newbery Honor book), Here Today, A Dog’s Life, On Christmas Eve, Everything for a Dog, Ten Rules for Living with My Sister, and Ten Good and Bad Things About My Life (So Far). She is also the coauthor, with Laura Godwin, of the Doll People series.

  Ann lives in upstate New York with her dog and her cats.

  Copyright © 1989 by Ann M. Martin.

  Cover art by Hodges Soileau

  All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc. SCHOLASTIC, THE BABY-SITTERS CLUB, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc. />
  First edition, September 1997

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  e-ISBN 978-0-545-63081-8