The Penderwicks on Gardam Street

by Jeanne Birdsall

  Then it was the school week again. Batty took it upon herself to teach Ben more words, though after several afternoons at Iantha’s, she still hadn’t got him past “duck” and the occasional “pretty.” Jane finished writing Sisters and Sacrifice and took it to her Enchanted Rock for luck before giving it to Skye. Skye handed it in without reading even a page, then forgot all about it. Rosalind aced two pop Latin quizzes, and for a science project, she and Anna built a catapult that turned out to be the perfect thing for tossing dog treats to Hound. With so much going on, nearly the whole week went by without anyone mentioning dates or stepmothers. Rosalind’s fears drifted into the background. After all, she told herself, no one can worry constantly, and anyway, maybe she should learn to trust fate a little more.

  Humming cheerfully, Rosalind plucked ingredients from the kitchen shelves, measured them, mixed them, then dropped bars of dark chocolate into a saucepan for melting. She was making brownies, and she knew the recipe by heart.

  “By heart,” she said.

  It was because of her heart that she’d memorized the recipe. Cagney the gardener had professed a great fondness for brownies, and so that summer she’d baked brownies for him again and again and again, until she figured she could whip up a batch in her sleep. These brownies weren’t for Cagney, of course, as he was far away in Arundel. No, these were to be snacks for the eighth graders’ dance—the Autumn Extravaganza—coming up that weekend. It was traditional for the seventh graders to organize the Extravaganza, just as in the spring, the eighth graders would organize the Spring Spree for the seventh graders, and Anna and Rosalind had volunteered to be snack providers. Anna, after much deliberation, had decided on potato chips, since, as she said, Rosalind’s brownies would be luscious enough to cover for both of them.

  Stirring the chocolate, Rosalind wondered what the Spring Spree would be like. She pictured herself—in the blue sweater Aunt Claire had given her—walking into the decorated gym with Anna. And then they would dance, she supposed, though probably not with boys, since she couldn’t think of any seventhgrade boys she’d like to dance with. Briefly, she tried to imagine dancing with Cagney there in the gym, but the thought made her shudder. How juvenile it would all seem to him.

  Now the chocolate was melted and ready to be poured, but just as Rosalind lifted the saucepan, the phone rang. She plunked the pan back down and answered the phone.

  “Rosy, dear, it’s Aunt Claire.”

  Never in her life had she imagined that Aunt Claire’s voice on the phone would make her frown. But that’s what happened before she could stop herself. And by the time the conversation was over and she’d hung up the phone, she knew she’d been right to frown. Her week of rest—her week of insane denial!—was over, and danger was once again imminent.

  Hands shaking, Rosalind turned off the stove. The brownies would have to wait. There was work to do, and quickly, before Daddy got home. She looked at the clock. They had forty-five minutes. That was more than usual, because it was Parents’ Night at Wildwood Elementary, and her father was stopping there after work to meet with Mr. Geballe and Miss Bunda. But would even forty-five minutes be enough?

  Gather the troops, Rosalind told herself. She picked up the phone again, called Anna, and told her to come over as quickly as she could. And now her sisters. Skye and Jane were in the backyard doing soccer drills, and Batty—where was Batty? For a moment Rosalind panicked. And then—of course she knew where Batty was!

  Rosalind ran next door to Iantha’s. Loyal Hound, stretched out on the front step, did his best imitation of a neglected dog, but Rosalind knew he was perfectly happy waiting there for Batty. Besides, she saw Asimov sitting in a nearby window, positioned just right for keeping a wary eye on Hound, and vice versa, and she knew that Hound was beyond happiness and into ecstasy. For Batty had been right about that, at least—Hound did seem to love that cat. Now Rosalind noticed watchers at another window, too—Batty, wearing a pair of Jane’s old sunglasses, and Ben, wearing Batty’s old swimming goggles. She rang the doorbell, and the two heads disappeared from view.

  Iantha opened the door with what Jane called her among-the-stars look on her face, which meant she’d been wrenched away from her research by the doorbell. How she could concentrate on astrophysics with both Batty and Ben in the house was beyond understanding, but each time Rosalind asked her, she said the same thing—Batty makes Ben happy, and that’s what’s important.

  “I’m sorry to bother you, Iantha, but I need Batty right away.”

  Before Iantha could answer, Batty popped up beside her, with Ben in tow.

  “I can’t leave, Rosalind. Ben and I saw Bug Man drive by, and we have to stay on watch.”

  Batty had been reporting Bug Man sightings all week, and Rosalind was sick of him. She, Skye, and Jane had all had imaginary friends in their younger lives—Batty was the first to have an imaginary halfman-half-insect stalking Gardam Street.

  “Bug Man will do fine without you,” she said. “Come home now.”

  “But—”

  “Batty!” Rosalind rolled her eyes at Iantha, who smiled.

  “Batty believes that Gardam Street needs continual surveillance,” she said.

  “So does Ben,” said Batty, who had no idea what “surveillance” meant.

  “Well, it doesn’t,” Rosalind said in her end-of-discussion voice. “Now tell Iantha thank you for letting you visit.”

  “Thank you, Iantha.” Batty, defeated, kissed Ben good-bye and whispered something to him before she went quietly with Rosalind. Hound, after one last yearning look at Asimov, followed them.

  “What did you tell Ben?” Rosalind asked as they crossed over into their own yard.

  “I told him to keep his goggles on.”

  “Because—?”

  “Because if I wear sunglasses and he wears goggles, Bug Man will think we’re more like him and won’t try to hurt us.”

  Rosalind briefly considered a lecture about putting fears in small children’s heads. But then, Skye and Jane had played lots of Hide the Baby from the Monster when Batty was too little to defend herself, and Batty had turned out all right. Rosalind decided she’d worry about lectures later. Right now she had to get Skye and Jane in from the backyard, for in a minute or so Anna would arrive.

  Soon all five girls were settled in the kitchen.

  “Aunt Claire called,” Rosalind began. “She’s coming to visit tomorrow.”

  “Goody,” said Jane.

  “She’s going to check on the progress of Daddy’s dating, and if there’s been no progress, she has another possible blind date for him.”

  “Not goody,” said Skye.

  “Maybe this one will be as bad as the first blind date,” said Anna.

  “Except that Aunt Claire says she’s intelligent and funny and likes children. And”—Rosalind took a deep breath—“she’s a high school Latin teacher.”

  Groans went round the table.

  “What about dogs?” asked Batty.

  “She probably raises them,” said Skye bitterly.

  “Threatened by the specter of stepmother-dom, the sisters paled with horror.” And Jane did look a little pale.

  “Wait a minute,” said Anna. “You’re all giving up too soon. Possible blind date, Aunt Claire said, right? So it’s not set up yet. We’ll just have to find another awful date before she gets here. Your dad can’t go on two dates in one weekend, so you’ll be safe for a while.”

  “But where can we find another date?” cried Rosalind. “We thought and thought before, and all we came up with was your skating coach.”

  “Then we’ll think and think again.” Anna took a bag of pretzels from the cupboard and put it on the table. “Can’t think on empty stomachs.”

  So they thought and ate pretzels, and ate pretzels and thought, and no one came up with even one new idea for an awful date. Rosalind started to wonder if she should just give in. How terrible could it be, really, to have her father dating a nice woman he could talk L
atin to? And he’d have her over for dinner, and then she’d be cooking dinner, and then rearranging the kitchen, and then giving him advice on raising girls, and then—

  “Are you desperate enough to try my mother’s friend Valaria?” asked Anna finally. “You know, the one who used to be Mary Magdalene?”

  “Maybe,” sighed Rosalind.

  “No, we’re not,” said Skye.

  “It might be fun to meet Valaria,” said Jane. “She could tell us lots about history.”

  Skye looked pleadingly at Batty, but before Batty could vote for or against the much-lived Valaria, a sound came that froze everyone.

  “I’m home!” It was Mr. Penderwick, back too soon from Wildwood and the teachers’ conferences. He strolled into the kitchen. “A summit meeting?”

  “Not a meeting at all,” said Rosalind. “I mean, we were just talking.”

  “But not about you, Mr. Pen,” said Anna.

  “It never occurred to me that you were talking about me, Anna.”

  “Good.” Anna looked like she wished she could sink into the floor.

  He sat down between his two middle daughters. “Anyone interested in reports from their teachers?”

  Now Jane looked like she wished she could sink into the floor, for it was close to impossible that Miss Bunda would have said anything good about her. But no, her father reported that Miss Bunda was happy with Jane’s progress in math and even happier with the science essay that she’d written.

  “About antibiotics, I believe,” he finished up.

  “I think so,” said Jane. “I mean, of course, yes, it was about antibiotics.”

  “Skye, I saw Mr. Geballe, too. He’s quite impressed with a play you wrote about the Aztecs.”

  “What did he say about it?” Jane asked excitedly before Skye could stomp on her foot.

  “Apparently the play shows a great deal of imagination and flair, not what Mr. Geballe normally expects from you. He was particularly pleased because you’d resisted the project so strenuously. He’s so pleased, in fact, that he’s chosen it to be the play in this year’s Sixth Grade Performance Night.”

  “What?” Skye was appalled.

  “Wow!” Jane was thrilled. The Sixth Grade Performance Night was Wildwood’s gala event of the autumn. Usually they picked some moldy old play from a teachers’ guide. But this year it would be her play! Though, alas, no one would ever know it was hers.

  “They’ve never used a student’s play before,” said Skye. “Why this year of all years?”

  “Mr. Geballe thought you’d be pleased,” answered her father. “Aren’t you?”

  “It puts a lot of pressure on me.” So much pressure that Skye felt like blurting out that she hadn’t written the play at all. But if she admitted to this, she’d never again be able to swap homework with Jane, and then who would write her fiction assignments all the way through twelfth grade? After that, they could give up the charade and become honorable again, because in college Skye wouldn’t need any fiction written—she was going to stick to math and science. “But I can take it, I guess.”

  “Well, all right, then.” Mr. Penderwick pulled Batty onto his lap. “Why are you wearing sunglasses, sweetheart?”

  “For spying on Bug Man. Daddy, Iantha tried to make pudding for me and Ben, but she ruined it. She says she’s a terrible cook.”

  “Then it was particularly nice of her to try anyway, wasn’t it? How was your day, Rosy?”

  “Fine.” She gripped the table and looked to Anna for courage. “Daddy, Aunt Claire called. She’s coming to visit tomorrow.”

  “She called me, too. Did she mention the Latin teacher blind date? I told her not to bother.”

  “Not to bother?” echoed Rosalind, thinking she must have heard him wrong.

  “Because I already have a date this weekend.”

  “You—” Rosalind choked and could go no further.

  “—already have a date, yes. Tomorrow night, in fact.”

  His daughters would have been less shocked if he’d said he was going to become a circus clown. Anna asked what none of them could. “Who is she, Mr. Pen?”

  “A woman I met recently. I thought she was interesting and decided I’d like to spend some time with her. Nothing very dramatic. Now everybody go away and let me cook dinner.”

  No one went away. They couldn’t move. They could only sit there, unhappy and confused, wondering who or what had taken over their father.

  “What’s her name?” asked Jane finally.

  “Her name?”

  “Her name, Daddy.” This was Skye.

  “Nomen, nominis,” burst out Rosalind, close to tears.

  Mr. Penderwick looked round the circle of stunned faces. “Her name is Marianne.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Clues

  ALTHOUGH AUNT CLAIRE ARRIVED later than usual the next day—it was almost dinnertime—she found no freshly baked dessert, no flowers by her bed, no fresh towels. She didn’t even find Rosalind.

  “She’s at Anna’s,” said Skye, after all the hugging and distribution of dog biscuits and chocolate caramels. “She couldn’t stand the strain.”

  “What strain?” asked Aunt Claire.

  “The dreadful strain of the date with Marianne,” said Jane. “Even Rainbow fears that her courage may not be enough.”

  “Rainbow?”

  “My sister raves,” said Skye. Ever since the announcement that Sisters and Sacrifice was going to be staged, Jane had been blabbing about Rainbow as if she owned her, which of course she did, but no one could know that.

  “I might rave about some things,” said Jane. “But not about the strain, Aunt Claire. We’re all feeling it. And Daddy won’t tell us anything about this Marianne.”

  “He told me on the phone that he met her in a bookstore, but nothing else.”

  “Rosalind, Skye, and Jane are afraid Daddy’s going to marry her,” said Batty. “Did you bring any presents?”

  “Marry her! That’s a little premature.” Aunt Claire laughed at them. “And no, my pirate, I didn’t bring you presents this time.”

  “Truly, though, Daddy’s acting weird, and it would make anyone anxious.” Skye took Aunt Claire’s suitcase out of the car trunk. “See for yourself. He’s upstairs getting ready.”

  They all trooped inside and up the steps. When Aunt Claire knocked on her brother’s door, he came out into the hall. He was dressed in a very un-datelike manner.

  “You’re wearing that ancient sweater on your first date with this woman? What about that nice blue shirt I gave you last Christmas?” asked Aunt Claire.

  “Hello to you, too, Claire, and the shirt you gave me is flannel. Marianne doesn’t like flannel.”

  “Doesn’t like flannel.” Aunt Claire looked sideways at Skye, who made a we-told-you-he-was-acting-weird face. “So you do know something about her.”

  “Certainly I do.”

  “What’s her last name?”

  “Dashwood. Marianne Dashwood.”

  “An unusual name.”

  “Perhaps, but it suits her.” He headed down the steps, the flock of female Penderwicks trailing along behind him. Halfway down, he turned, pushed past everyone to get back to his room, then came out again, wearing a sports jacket.

  “Why are you taking that along?” Aunt Claire pointed to the orange book peeking out of the jacket’s pocket. “Are you going to read to her?”

  “No, of course not.”

  Skye was almost sure he blushed, but before she could look closely enough to be positive, he was running out of the house, calling over his shoulder about the soup and sandwiches he’d left for their dinner. His three daughters, who couldn’t remember the last time he’d gone away without hugs, stared forlornly at the door after it shut behind him.

  Aunt Claire stared a little forlornly, too, then shook herself and said brightly, “Come on, let’s do something fun while we eat. I know—it’s been a long time since we’ve played Clue. How about it?”

 
; Clue was a general favorite. While Jane helped Aunt Claire serve up the dinner, Skye dug the Clue box out of the hallway closet, where all the games were kept, and set up the board amidst the sandwiches. Then everyone had to switch chairs so they could be near their favorite characters. Jane chose Miss Scarlet because she secretly longed to wear a long, slinky gown like hers someday. Skye claimed Professor Plum, noticed that he had red hair, and decided he was a professor of astrophysics. Batty would be no one other than Mrs. Peacock, as only Mrs. Peacock was named for an animal. That left Aunt Claire, and since no one ever wanted to be Colonel Mustard because of his whip, and since Mrs. White was now represented by the top from a vitamin bottle—Hound had eaten the original long ago—she went for Mr. Green.

  “Highest throw starts,” said Skye when they were all settled. She picked up the dice—and the front doorbell rang.

  Jane ran to open the door. Was it Daddy home again already, so confused by love and romance that he’d lost his keys along with his heart? But it was Tommy.

  “Is Rosalind home?” he asked. “I need to talk to her.”

  “She’s fled her troubled abode, but come in anyway. Aunt Claire’s here and we’re playing Clue.” When he hesitated, Jane added, “And we have plenty of sandwiches.”

  The sandwiches pulled Tommy in, and soon he was Colonel Mustard—they all decided that a whip wasn’t so bad if it was just for show—with a stack of sandwiches in front of him. Everyone rolled the dice. Batty had the highest roll with ten, and Clue could begin.