Martin Ann M.

Baby-Sitters Club 027

BSC025 - Mary Anne and the Search for Tigger - Martin, Ann M.

Chapter 1.

"I just don't understand," Dawn Schafer said to me as we slowed down for a stop sign. "How can someone as small as Tigger knock his toys behind the refrigerator, so that you can't even get to them?" I shrugged. Then I checked the street. The coast was clear, so we pedaled across the intersection. "He just does, that's all," I said. "And thank you for calling Tigger a someone instead of a something." Dawn smiled. "I still don't get it, though." "All I know," I said, "is that his toys roll into that space between the wall and the side of the fridge, where I ought to be able to get them out. You know where I mean?" (Dawn nodded.) "Well, they roll in there and I never see them again." "Sort of a black hole for cat toys," said Dawn.

I giggled. "There's nothing underneath the fridge. I looked there with a flashlight. That leaves in back of the fridge. And I can't get there." "Which is why we're riding our bikes all the way downtown just to buy cat toys," said Dawn.

"Exactly," I replied.

In case you can't tell, Dawn Schafer is my friend. (I'm Mary Anne Spier.) Dawn is one of my best friends, in fact. And Tigger is my kitten. My one and only. He's a gray tiger cat with very pretty stripes. If I do say so, he's smart. Smart and pretty. And he can catch flies, which is difficult. I mean, when you only have paws.

Dawn and I were on our way to downtown Stoneybrook, Connecticut, to stock up on cat toys for Tigger, since he keeps losing them behind the fridge. His favorites are those plastic balls with a little bell inside. They come three in a pack, and he loses about three a week, so cat toys can be expensive to me. Thank goodness I earn lots of money baby-sitting.

Dawn and I stopped at a traffic light. We had reached Stoneybrook's main street (which is about as small as Stoneybrook is), and were only three blocks from the pet store.

"Hey, what did your dad say about the date last night?" asked Dawn.

We laughed. Dawn's mom and my dad go out sometimes. We really wish they would get married, but we can't help laughing. It's just so weird to see your own parents dating. Especially dating each other. They go out with other people, too, but when Dawn's mom has a date with my dad, she puts on all this makeup and checks her clothes twenty times and then asks Dawn to check her clothes again. And my dad puts on after-shave that smells like the dentist's office and gets nervous and can barely speak to me. Then they go somewhere together. What a pair.

By the way, the reason they can date is Dawn's parents are divorced and my mom died ages ago. I really don't even remember her.

"I think my dad had fun when they went out," I told Dawn. "What about your mom?" "Same," she replied. Then she announced, "Pet store," and stopped her bike. "Hey, I just thought of something." Dawn was grinning.

"What?" I asked.

"Well," she replied, "there's not much space behind your refrigerator, right?" "Right." We were chaining our bikes to a lamppost.

"Probably just enough space for the width of one toy, right?" "Right." "So Tigger's toys are probably behind the fridge in a line. And when the line reaches the wall, there won't be room for any more toys, right?" "Right," I replied as we entered the store.

"And then Tigger's toys can't get lost and you won't have to keep buying new ones." "Yeah!" Honestly, Dawn is so logical.

I headed for the cat toy department and picked up two packages of Tigger's toys. In one package, the balls were half pink and half green. In the other, they were half orange and half yellow. I like to give Tigger a little variety in his toys. Then I began looking over the cat treats. Maybe I should buy some fancy food for Tigger.

I was counting my money when Dawn tapped me on the arm. "We better go," she said. "Club meeting in forty-five minutes." "Okay. Just let me buy these." I held up the toys.

I stood in line at the counter, thinking about the Baby-sitters Club. My closest friends are all in the club: Kristy Thomas (she's my other best friend), Claudia Kishi, Jessi Ramsey, Mallory Pike, Dawn, and Logan Bruno (an associate member, who doesn't usually attend club meetings. I'll explain that later.) Logan is basically my boyfriend, and he is incredible in every way. He's incredible-looking and incredibly nice and incredibly thoughtful and, well, incredibly incredible.

(There is also one person who's in the club who is not a close friend, and one person who is a close friend who's not really in the club anymore. I'll tell you about them later.) The Baby-sitters Club is more a business than a club. My friends and I sit for families in our neighborhoods. We get a lot of jobs and earn a lot of money. And I spend a lot of my money right here in the pet store. The club was started by Kristy Thomas, our president. (I'm the secretary, by the way.) In some ways, Kristy is like me, but in more ways, she's my exact opposite. I think that's why she was my very first best friend. That and the fact that we lived next door to each other from the time we were born. Here are the things that are the same about us: We're small for our age and have brown hair and brown eyes. Here are the ways in which we're different: I'm shy and sort of held in; Kristy is outgoing and can be a loudmouth. I'm beginning to take an interest in what I wear; Kristy couldn't care less. She always wears jeans, a turtleneck, a sweater, and running shoes. (Well, not in the summer, of course, but you know what I mean.) Kristy has more ideas than anyone I know. She's always thinking of things to do, or finding ways to solve problems. You can almost see her brain at work. Lately, Kristy's life hasn't been too easy, though. It hasn't been bad, just not easy. For the longest time, she lived with her mom, her three brothers, and her collie, Louie, right next door to me. (Her parents had gotten a divorce.) Then her mom met this millionaire, Watson Brewer, and the next thing I knew, they'd decided to get married. After the wedding, Kristy's family moved across town into Watson's mansion. There was more room in the mansion, of course, but Kristy was upset. She had left her old neighborhood and her friends behind. And then Louie the collie died, which was terribly sad. On the other hand, Kristy gained a new little stepbrother and stepsister, whom she loves very much, and her family had gotten an adorable puppy. . . . And then they adopted a two-year-old girl! Kristy's life is never dull.

The vice-president of the Baby-sitters Club is Claudia Kishi. What a difference from Kristy and me. Claud, who lives across the street from Kristy's old house, is absolutely beautiful. Sophisticated, too. She's Japanese-American, and her eyes are dark and beautifully almond-shaped. Her hair is long and black and she wears it all different ways. And her complexion is perfect. It's her clothes that amaze me, though. (I think they amaze everyone.) Claud mixes and matches the weirdest stuff and comes up with the coolest outfits. Like a loose blouse with a fake coat of arms on it worn over a very short black skirt. Around her waist, a scarf. On her feet, short black boots. Dangling from her ears, dinosaurs. And her hair might be piled on top of her head and held in place with hairpins that look like seahorses. She combines all this stuff - and she looks fantastic.

Claud's hobbies are reading Nancy Drew mysteries, eating junk food, and especially working at her art. She's really talented and takes lots of classes. She's good at drawing, painting, pottery, you name it. Unfortunately, as far as her parents are concerned, Claud's art does not make up for the fact that she's smart but a poor student. After all, her older sister, Janine, is an actual genius. Luckily for Claudia, her grandmother Mimi lives with their family, and she and Claud are very close, even now when I can see that Mimi's mind is starting to wander and get sort of fuzzy.

Dawn is our club's treasurer, and you already know a little about her, but I'll fill you in on the rest. Dawn hasn't been living in Stoneybrook for long. She grew up in California with her parents and her younger brother, Jeff. But her parents split up, and Mrs. Schafer brought Dawn and Jeff to Stoneybrook to live, leaving Mr. Schafer three thousand miles behind. Dawn's mom chose Stoneybrook because she grew up here, and that's how she and my father know each other - they went to high school together years and years ago. Anyway, Dawn likes Connecticut okay, but Jeff never did. He always missed California and his dad. So after awhile he moved back. That was hard on Dawn. Now her family is split in half. But Dawn is very practical. She takes things as they come. She's not laid-back, exactly, she's just a real individual. Dawn solves her own problems and makes her own decisions in her own ways. And she practically runs the old farmhouse she and her mom live in. That's because her mom is totally scatterbrained. Nice, but living on some other planet. I wonder what kind of stepmother she would make.

Dawn has the longest, palest blonde hair you'll ever see, and bright blue eyes. She looks as Californian as all the health food she eats. (Dawn would never touch the junk food Claud loves.) I am so glad Dawn moved here because she's a great best friend. And if s neat that our parents are dating.

Jessi Ramsey and Mallory Pike are the junior officers of the Baby-sitters Club. That's because they're the youngest in the club. Jessi and Mal are eleven and in sixth grade at Stoneybrook Middle School, and the rest of us are thirteen and in eighth grade at SMS. Like Kristy and me, Jessi and Mal are best friends who are somewhat alike and somewhat different. Unlike Kristy and me, I think they're more alike than different. Let me describe the two of them for you, and you can make your own decision. I'll start with Jessi.

I might as well be straightforward (even though I hardly ever am), and say right out that Jessi's family is black. They moved to Stoneybrook near the beginning of the school year, and they're one of the few black families here. A lot of people gave them a hard time at first, but things have gotten better. Jessi is a ballet dancer, a good one (I've seen her perform), and she looks like a dancer. She pulls her hair back from her face into a knot above her neck, and she has lo-o-o-ong legs. Besides dancing, Jessi likes reading. (She has to wear glasses for that.) Jessi is very close to her family. She lives with her parents, her younger sister, Becca, her baby brother, Squirt, and a pet hamster. She feels like she doesn't quite fit in at school, and she thinks her parents sometimes treat her like a baby. But mostly she's happy, especially since she met Mallory.

Now Mallory may be white, and she may have seven brothers and sisters (plus two parents and a hamster), but she wears glasses, she loves to read, and also to write and draw (she might want to write books for children one day), and she also feels that she doesn't always fit in at school, and especially that her parents sometimes treat her like a baby. The Pikes and the Ramseys did give in a little while ago and let Mal and Jessi get their ears pierced, but both of them still wish for trendier clothes. You can see how much Mal and Jessi have in common.

I guess that's about it. Logan's in the club, too, but I've already told you about him. He's the incredibly incredible one, remember? Then there's Shannon Kilbourne, whom I don't know very well (she's another associate member, like Logan, who doesn't go to our meetings), and Stacey McGill, who used to be in the club, but who moved away. More about them and everyone else later. Honest.

"Here's your change, miss," said the man behind the counter of the pet store. He handed me seventy-three cents and the bag full of cat toys.

"Thanks," I replied. (I hate being called "miss.") Dawn and I headed out of the store. On the way, I passed the flea-and-tick products.

"Hmm," I said, stopping, "I wonder if Tigger needs a bottle of Doctor Herkie's Flea Tonic." "How bad are his fleas?" asked Dawn.

"He doesn't have any yet," I replied.

Dawn pulled me out of the store. We unchained our bikes and began to ride home.

"Dawn?" I said when we were about halfway there. (Actually I shouted it. She was riding in front of me and the wind was blowing against us.) "What?" "Can we go to my house before the meeting? I want to give Tigger his toys. We'll have time." I also wanted to get the mail. It is my absolute favorite thing to do. I don't know why. There's hardly ever anything for me.

"Sure," Dawn called back.

So we stopped at my mailbox. Sure enough, nothing for me. But some days there are surprises. You never know. We parked our bikes near the front walk and ran inside, where I opened Tigger's packages of toys for him. Then we ran back out and across the street to Claudia's house. It was time for the Wednesday afternoon meeting of the Baby-sitters Club.

Chapter 2.

Dawn and I were not the first to arrive at the meeting of the Baby-sitters Club, but we weren't the last, either. Kristy Thomas and Claudia Kishi were already there.

Kristy was sitting in her official presidential position - bolt upright in Claud's director's chair, wearing her visor, a pencil stuck over one ear. She was looking through our club notebook.

Claudia was doing something we've seen her do a thousand times before. She was lying on her stomach, half under the bed, rooting around in the stuff stored there. She was probably rooting for one of two things - art supplies or junk food. See, Claud's room is sort of a .... Well, I'm sorry, but "rat hole" is the best word I can come up with. Okay, it isn't that bad, but it is messy. Claudia needs all sorts of supplies for her projects, and there just isn't enough room for them on her shelves and in her closet. So she's stored boxes of stuff under her bed, in stacks against the wall, everywhere. She's also a junk-food addict, and she really has to hide her Fritos and Doritos and Heath Bars and M&Ms well. That's because her parents don't approve of her habit and told Claud, "No junk food," but she just couldn't give it up. It's hidden everywhere - in the boxes of art supplies, in drawers, even in her pillow.

So Dawn and I weren't too surprised to see Claudia half under the bed. I'm not supposed to eat right before dinner. Even so, I hoped she was searching for food, not art materials. I was pretty hungry.

"Hi, you guys," said Kristy with a smile, as Dawn and I entered Claud's room. "What's going on?" (We had all just seen each other at school, but that didn't matter. Every time we get together, it's as if we haven't spoken in a week.) "We rode downtown to buy toys for Tigger," I replied. "What's Claud doing?" "Looking for my Double Stuff Oreos," answered Claudia from under the bed, only it sounded as if she said, "Lummy fummy dummy fuff ooeey." "Oh, good!" exclaimed Kristy. "Double Stuff Oreos." "How on earth could you understand her?" Dawn asked Kristy as she and I settled ourselves gingerly on the bed. We didn't want to crush the vice-president beneath us.

Kristy shrugged. "Practice." Claudia emerged from her junk-food hiding place with an unopened package of Double Stuff Oreos in one hand.

"Oh, yum," said Kristy, looking as if she might faint from happiness.

While Claud was opening the cookies, Jessi and Mal arrived.

"Great. We're all here," announced Kristy. "Let's begin." Mal and Jessi took their usual places on the floor, Claudia passed the cookies around, and Kristy called our meeting to order. As president, that's one of her jobs.

Maybe 1 better tell you a little about the club and how it works. We hold meetings three times a week, every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday afternoon from five-thirty until six. Our clients call us during those times to say that they need sitters, and then we schedule the jobs for ourselves, depending on who's free.

How do parents know when to call us? Well, I'll go back to the beginning and tell you how the club started. Then you can find out for yourself.

Kristy is the one who thought up the Babysitters Club. (That's the main reason she's the president.) See, way back at the start of seventh grade, Kristy and her family were still living next door to me and across the street from Claud. Kristy's little brother, David Michael, was six then, and Kristy and her two older brothers, Sam and Charlie (they're in high school), were responsible for baby-sitting for him most of the time, since Mrs. Thomas (well, now she's Mrs. Brewer) has a full-time job. But the day came when Kristy's mom needed a sitter for one particular afternoon, and nobody - not Kristy, not Sam, not Charlie - was free. So she got on the phone and began making call after call, in search of a sitter. That was when Kristy got her great idea. What a waste of time, she thought, for her mom to have to make so many calls. Wouldn't it be easy if she could make one call and reach several sitters? Surely one of them would be free.

That was it! Kristy would get together with several of her friends, we would meet a few times a week, and when someone called, one of us was bound to be free for a job. So the caller was practically guaranteed a sitter. Kristy asked Claudia and me to be in her club. When we decided we needed one more member, Claud introduced us to Stacey McGill, a new friend of hers. Stacey and her parents had just moved to Stoneybrook from New York City. We liked Stacey right away and asked her to join. Then we did some advertising so people would know about our sitting service and how to reach us. And soon we were in business. Kristy, Claudia, Stacey, and I became the first president, vice-president, treasurer, and secretary of the Baby-sitters Club.

By the time Dawn moved here, we were doing so much business that we wanted her in the club, too, and when Stacey had to move back to New York, we replaced her with both Jessi and Mal. So our club has grown to six people. Actually, if s seven people as far as I'm concerned. Stacey isn't really gone; she's just the New York branch of the Baby-sitters Club! Kristy runs the club in a very businesslike manner. She insists that's the only way to do things. And so we keep a club record book and a club notebook. The record book is really important. It's full of information. As secretary, it's my job to keep track of our clients' names and addresses and stuff like that, and also to schedule all of our sitting jobs on the appointment pages. And Dawn, as treasurer, keeps track of our money in the record book, too.

The notebook is something that most of us don't like too much. In the notebook, we have to write up every single job we go on. Then we're responsible for reading the notebook once a week to see what's happened when our friends were sitting. I have to admit that finding out how other people handle sitting problems is helpful . . . but, boy, do we get tired of writing in that book.

It was one of Kristy's ideas, though, and that's another reason she's president. She's always coming up with new projects or ideas to keep the club fresh. For instance, Kristy dreamed up Kid-Kits. Kid-Kits are decorated boxes filled with games and toys and books - mostly our old things. Each of us has made a Kid-Kit. Whenever I take mine on a sitting job, the kids are thrilled. For some reason, another person's toys are always more interesting than your own. So the kids are happy and their parents are happy, and when parents are happy, they call our dub again! Kid-Kits are good for business.

As vice-president, Claud's job is ... well, she doesn't exactly have a job. She's the vice-president because she has her very own phone and private phone number, so her room is a good place for us to hold our meetings. We don't have to tie up anyone's line three times a week. Claud is really nice about letting us use her things and eat her junk food.

You already know what my job is about. I keep records and schedule sitting jobs. In order to do that, I have to know when Claud's art lessons are, Jessi's ballet classes, Mal's orthodontist appointments (she just got braces), and that sort of thing. Sometimes I complain about my job, but mostly I like it.

Dawn took over the office of treasurer when Stacey moved away. Her job is to collect dues money from us club members every Monday and to make sure we always have enough money in our treasury. We use the treasury money to buy new things for the Kid-Kits (crayons, coloring books, anything that gets used up), to pay Kristy's brother Charlie to drive her to and from meetings now that she lives on the other side of town, and to treat ourselves to a sleepover or a party every now and then.

Our junior officers, Jessi and Mallory, don't have actual jobs. "Junior" means that since they're younger than the rest of us, they aren't allowed to sit at night, unless they're sitting for their own brothers and sisters. They're a big help, though. They take a lot of the after- noon jobs, which frees us older club members to take the evening jobs.

Last but certainly not least, there are Logan and Shannon. Logan and Shannon are associate members. That means that they don't come to meetings, but we can call on them if a job comes up that none of the rest of us is free to take. Believe it or not/ this happens. And we'd hate to have to tell one of our clients that we couldn't provide her (or him) with a sitter. Shannon Kilbourne, by the way, is a friend of Kristy's. She lives across the street from her in Kristy's new neighborhood.

On the day I went toy-shopping for Tigger, Kristy had just barely called the meeting to order when the phone rang.

We looked at each other and smiled. A job call so early in a meeting must be a good sign.

Claudia reached for the phone, a plastic charm bracelet dangling from her wrist. "Hello, Baby-sitters Club," she said. There was a pause. Then she put her hand over the receiver. "Oh, Mary A-anne," she called to me in a singsong voice, "it's for you-ou." I took the phone, glancing at Kristy. She doesn't like us to get personal calls during meetings.

"Hello?" I said.

"Hi!" replied a cheerful voice.

Logan! I was really happy to hear from him. I just hoped he was calling about business.

"What's up?" I asked him.

"I need a sitter." Actually, he said, "Ah need a sittuh." (Logan's family moved here from Louisville, Kentucky, not long ago.) "For Kerry and Hunter?" I asked. Kerry is Logan's nine-year-old sister and Hunter is his five-year-old brother. None of us has baby-sat for them before, because Logan always does it.

"Yeah. It's for this Saturday afternoon. Mom and Dad have some tennis thing lined up with friends of theirs, and I'm going to baseball practice at school. I was supposed to sit, but then practice came up. Can one of you do it?" I was dying to do it, of course, but I had to treat this job like any other. "I'll check our schedules and call you back in just a few minutes, okay?" "Okay." This is how we handle club jobs. The person who gets the phone call or who answers the phone never just takes a job. It's open for everyone.

I told the others about the job as I looked at the appointment pages in the record book. "Well," I said, "Kristy, you and Mallory and I are free." My friends were very generous and let me take the job. I called Logan back. "What's all that sneezing I hear?" I asked, after I'd told him that I would be the sitter.

"Oh, it's my brother. It's allergy season." "Poor Hunter," I replied, remembering his bare, dust-free bedroom. "He - "I stopped. I had glanced at Kristy. Her eyeballs were practically falling out of her head in her effort to get me to end my personal conversation.

So I said good-bye quickly. Our meeting continued. When it was over, I dashed out the door, calling good-bye to Claudia's grandmother Mimi, who replied in confusion, "I will take six, please." Then I ran home to play with Tigger.

Chapter 3.

My dad used to be strict with me. Very strict. It wasn't so long ago that I had to fix my hair in braids and wear clothes he picked out, that I had to live in a little-girl room, wasn't allowed to ride my bicycle downtown, couldn't talk on the phone after dinner unless it was about homework, etc. I think my dad made up those rules because he was trying to be a good mother. That may sound funny, but I'm pretty sure it's true. He was nervous about raising a daughter by himself and he wanted me to turn out okay, so he decided he had to practically take over my life.

Luckily, he and I have both been changing lately. I've shown him that I'm more grown up and mature than he thought, and he realized that he doesn't have to live my life for me. So he let me take my hair out of braids and fix up my room so it isn't so babyish. Then came bigger changes. Now I can go places with my friends and talk on the phone after dinner. But Dad is still Dad. There's a ten-minute time limit on phone calls. And if Logan comes over when Dad isn't home, Logan has to stay outside. He is not allowed in.

Which is why the two of us were sitting outside one Friday afternoon that was so gray it was almost raining. But we had no choice. Well, I suppose we could have gone inside. How would Dad have known? But I just am not able to break one of his rules. I'm afraid he'll find out somehow. Magically, maybe. Anyway, a rule is a rule.

Besides, it wasn't raining, and it was fairly warm, so being outside wasn't actually unpleasant. How could it be unpleasant with Logan next to me, and Tigger playing at our feet?

Logan had untied one of his sneakers and was dangling the lace in front of Tigger. Tigger thought this was a great game. He batted at the lace. He tried to catch it. He stood on his hind legs and stretched out his round tummy, reaching as far as he could.

"Aw, look. He's so cute!" I said. (I say that, oh, sixty-five times a day.) Logan grinned. I had said it ten or twelve times just since he'd come over.

I changed the subject. "I'm glad today is Friday. I like school and everything, but . . ." "But there's nothing like two days off," supplied Logan.

"Right." "And think of it. This happens once a week. Boy, are we lucky. I'd like to thank whoever arranged things that way." Tigger got tired of playing with the lace then and darted away from us. He pounced on a bug. He ran after a seed pod that dropped from a tree.

"Aw, he's so cute," I said. Then I called, "Careful, Tigger!" Tigger has only been allowed outdoors for a couple of weeks now. Sometimes I even let him go out alone. He can stay happily in the yard for hours - playing and napping. I worry about him, being outside on his own. Then I remember how great it felt when Dad finally let go of me. I wonder - does Dad worry about me every day the way I worry about Tigger?

"You're sure quiet," said Logan suddenly.

I looked over at him. "I was thinking about how Dad treats me and how I treat Tigger and - " "Again?" said Logan sharply.

I paused. Logan hardly ever speaks like that. I decided to ignore it. "How's baseball practice going?" "Fine." "How's the coach? What's his name?" "Coach Blake." Conversational dead end. Okay. . . . Now what?

"Hi-hi!" called a little voice.

It could only belong to Jamie Newton. I glanced up and there he was, standing at the edge of our yard.

"Hi!" I called back.

Jamie's family lives nearby, so the members of the Baby-sitters Club, especially Claudia, sit for the Newtons all the time. Jamie is four and has a baby sister named Lucy.

Jamie ran across the lawn. "Oh, goody!" he exclaimed. "There's Tigger." Tigger looked like he might be tiring out. He was sitting in the grass - very neatly, with his tail curled around his front feet. But he wasn't doing anything. Nothing I knew about, anyway. Maybe he was doing some secret cat thing.

"Can I play with Tigger, Mary Anne? Please?" asked Jamie.

"Sure," I answered, "but carefully. I'm not sure he wants to play right now." Jamie lay on the ground near Tigger. He and Tigger looked at each other.

I glanced at Logan. Usually Logan and I would have turned to each other at a moment like that and smiled. But Logan was staring into the distance.

"Earth to Logan, Earth to Logan," I said, cupping my hands around my mouth. "Come in, Logan." "I am in, Mary Anne," he replied, without bothering to look at me.

I felt stung.

In the grass, Jamie inched closer to my kitten. "Tigger, Tigger, Tigger, Tigger, Tigger," he whispered. He swept one hand from side to side.

Tigger immediately fell into a crouch position. His head moved back and forth, following Jamie's hand. Suddenly - POUNCE! Tigger landed on Jamie's hand. (Luckily Tigger's little claws are only about as sharp as pine needles.) Jamie burst into giggles. "Tigger!" he squealed. He rolled onto his back and put Tigger on his tummy.

I glanced at Logan again. This time at least he was smiling. "Pretty cute," I commented.

"Boy," said Jamie, "I sure do wish I had a pet. I'd get a ... dog. No, a rabbit. No, a - a chicken. No, a cat. I mean, a kitten. That's it. I'd get a kitten just like Tigger. Gray and white. And pounsive." "Pounsive?" said Logan and I at the same time. I elbowed Logan as a way of telling him not to laugh. He didn't.

"Hi, Jamie!" "Hi, Jamie!" "Hi, Myriah! Hi, Gabbie! Hi-hi!" called Jamie. Standing in their yard next door were Myriah and Gabbie Perkins. The girls are good friends of Jamie's.

The Perkins family moved into Kristy's house when Kristy and her mom and brothers moved to Watson's. Considering I lost my best friend then, I feel lucky that such a nice family moved in. Us club members baby-sit at the Perkinses' a lot. Myriah is five and a half, Gabbie is two and a half, and their little sister Laura is an infant.

"Come on over!" Jamie called to the girls.

"Overrun with kids," I thought I heard Logan murmur, but I wasn't sure.

"No, come over here!" cried Gabbie. "Come on, Jamie. We have something to show you." "Okay." Jamie set Tigger on the ground. He called good-bye to us, and ran next door.

"Want something to drink?" I asked Logan.

"Sure," he replied.

I knew exactly what he wanted. That's how well we know each other. I didn't even need to ask him.

"Be right back," I said, as I got to my feet.

Logan didn't like having to wait outside (I could tell by the look on his face), but what could we do? I ran inside, opened two sodas, and ran back outside. I handed one to Logan as I sat down again.

"So," I said, as I settled myself on the stoop, "how are Kerry and Hunter?" "You mean, what are you getting yourself into when you sit tomorrow?" "No!" I said, even though I knew Logan was teasing me.

Logan smiled. "Well, Hunter's allergies are as bad as ever, and Kerry is going through a stage." "A stage?" "Yeah. She's been saying that we treat her like a baby. I think she wants to be, you know, more independent. She could also use a few friends. She hasn't really made any since we moved here." I nodded, staring down the street.

A few moments later I said, "I think we have more company." Charlotte Johanssen was headed our way. She's eight, another kid our club sits for. And she reminds me of myself - nice, but shy, trying hard to please people.

"Hi!" I called to Charlotte as she reached the end of our driveway. "Want to come see Tigger?" I turned to Logan and whispered, "It's all right with you, isn't it?" "Oh, sure." I couldn't tell what sort of tone was in Logan's voice, but I didn't worry about it. I watched Charlotte approach Tigger. Now he was a little livelier. He waited until Charlotte had almost reached him, then he jumped away.

Charlotte began to giggle. She sat down in the grass. She closed her eyes. "Oh, I can't see you, Mr. Tigger," she sang. "So come back to me. Come on back." Charlotte sat very still, peeking every now and then. Tigger crept toward her, right into her lap.

"Gotcha!" exclaimed Charlotte, opening her eyes and cupping him in her hands.

Logan laughed. So did Charlotte and I. ("Oh, he's so cute," I said.) Tigger looked at the three of us with surprised eyes. What had happened?

"Gosh," said Charlotte, as she turned Tigger onto his back, "if I could have three wishes, you know what I'd wish for?" "What?" Logan and I asked at the same time.

"Tigger," she replied. "A pet of my own." "And the other two wishes?" asked Logan.

"Tigger and Tigger." The three of us laughed - and I watched Logan and remembered something. I remembered one reason I had liked him so much when I was first getting to know him. Well, I have to admit, when I first saw him, I just thought he was gorgeous. But later I liked a lot of other things about him. For instance, he's good with kids. And he can laugh easily. (Obviously today was not one of his better days. But laughing just now had reminded me of that.) You know what I still can't figure out, though? I can't figure out why Logan likes me. Why would any boy like shy me better than sophisticated, outgoing Claudia? Or self-assured Dawn?

I didn't know then and I still don't know now. But Logan put his arm around me, and we watched Charlotte and Tigger for a long time. At that moment, it didn't seem to matter why Logan likes me.

At last Charlotte stood up. "I better go," she said.

Beside me, Logan stood up, too. "Same here." (I think he was getting cold. I was.) I sighed. "Okay." Charlotte ran off, and Logan jumped on his ten-speed and pedaled away.

I scooped up Tigger. "Come on, Bigger Tigger," I said. "Time to go inside. I have a meeting of the Baby-sitters Club and you've been outdoors long enough." But Tigger struggled and mewed. He did not want to leave the yard. So finally I let him stay outside. As I ran across the street to Claudia's house, I could see him pouncing on invisible things in the grass.

Chapter 4.

"Hi, Tigger, wherever you are!" I called. "Come see me!" Our meeting was over and I was at home again. It was time to start dinner. Dad and I like to eat pretty soon after he returns from work, and he returns between six and six-thirty most nights. So as soon as I'm home from club meetings, I get busy.

That night I set a huge pot of water on the stove. At breakfast that morning, Dad and I had decided we wanted spaghetti for dinner. And with that, I thought, a salad and some garlic bread. I'm not much of a cook, but I can throw a meal together.

I was busy getting vegetables out of the refrigerator when I realized something. Tigger wasn't running between my feet like he usually does at this hour of the day. I always feed him while I'm making dinner - and he knows it.

Where was he? He hadn't come when I'd called. I checked to make sure that his special cat door was open. Sure enough, it was. I was surprised that he hadn't come inside while I was at Claudia's. He knew it was getting to be dinnertime . . . didn't he?

Well, wait a second. Maybe he was inside. He has an awful lot of good hiding places.

"Tigger, Tigger, Tigger!" I called as I got his food out.

I chose a can of King Kat Liver 'n' Beef. I spooned a quarter of it into his bowl. Then I poured in a little milk and stirred it up. Can you believe it? Milk actually isn't very good for cats, especially male cats, but it isn't bad for kittens. And Tigger is so little that I need to mix the grown-up cat food with something to make it mushier.

I set his dish on his place mat, his special cat mat that says FOOD PLEASE. Then I called him again.

No Tigger.

"I know you're hiding," I said loudly. "Aren't you hungry?" No Tigger.

"All right. I'll just have to look for you." In our house are a million places where a kitten could hide. There are also several where a kitten could get stuck. Twice, Tigger has been snoozing in the laundry room when the doors somehow swung dosed on him. I marched to the laundry room. The doors were closed! Goody.

"Tigger!" I called.

I opened the door. No Tigger.

Sometimes he climbs onto a high place, such as the mantelpiece over the fireplace, and then can't get down. I checked the mantelpiece. No Tigger.

Okay. It was time for a room-by-room search. In a room-by-room search, I look through each room thoroughly. If I don't find Tigger in one room, I close the door to the room (if it has a door) and go on to the next one.

I began upstairs. I searched the bedrooms and the bathrooms. I didn't see Tigger, so I closed the door at the head of the stairs and ran down to the first floor.

I was on my hands and knees looking under a chair when I heard my father calling me.

"I'm here, Dad!" I replied. "In the living room." I backed away from the chair and stood up.

"What's going on?" asked my father. He crossed the room and gave me a kiss. "There's water on the stove but the burner isn't on, and there are vegetables all over the table. It looks as if you stopped in the middle of making dinner." "Sorry. I guess I did. I can't find Tigger. And I've looked everywhere for him. Well, everywhere inside. He's never missed dinner." "I guess we better search for him outside then," said Dad.

I gave Dad a grateful look. "Right now? That would be terrific." "I'll go get the torches." The torches are these gigantic flashlights we have. Each is bright enough to light up New York City.

I put a jacket on and Dad found the torches. He handed one to me and we went outside.

"Ti-i-i-igger! Ti-i-i-igger!" we called. We walked all around our yard. We shone the lights under bushes, up trees, in shrubbery. The longer we looked, the worse I felt. There was this awful feeling in the pit of my stomach, like I had swallowed a pebble and it had grown into a rock. Now it was growing into a boulder.

Dad must have seen me looking discouraged, because he said brightly, "I've got an idea," and ran inside. When he came out, he was carrying two of Tigger's toys. He gave me one, and we walked around the yard again, this time shaking the toys so that the balls jingled.

"Come play! Ti-i-i-igger, come play!" No Tigger. (The rock had just about reached boulder proportions.) "Dad!" I called, and he came running around the side of the house. "I don't think he's here. I really don't." My father put his arm around my shoulders. "Maybe not. Maybe he's off on an adventure. Anyway, I don't think there's any point in looking for him outside now. It's too dark. Besides, if he were around here, he would have come to us by now." I nodded. "I know." "So let's go in." Dad and I went into a house. A huge lump was forming in my throat. Maybe it was that boulder.

"I suggest we go on and make ourselves a nice dinner," my father said cheerfully. "If Tigger's off enjoying himself, then we might as well enjoy ourselves." I looked at Tigger's bowl. The food was starting to congeal and the milk was turning brown. Tigger probably wouldn't eat it tonight. How sad.

Dad saw me looking at the dish and said, "When I was growing up, our next-door neighbors had a cat who disappeared at least once a week. He just liked to take trips." "But Tigger is so little," I replied. I turned on the burner under the pot of water, while Dad began cutting up the tomatoes and cu- cumbers and celery and carrots for our salad. He didn't look worried. How come I felt so worried? Because I'm a worrywart, that's why.

We ate our dinner. Well, Dad ate his dinner. I tried to eat mine, but all I could get down were three mouthfuls of salad.

"Mary Anne," said my father, looking at my full plate, "what time is it?" "Seven-thirty?" I answered. (Why was he asking? He was wearing his watch.) "And when was the last time you saw Tigger?" "Just before five-thirty." "So he's only been missing for two hours," Dad pointed out. "He could be taking a nap somewhere, for all we know." "He did have a pretty exciting afternoon," I said slowly. "Lots of visitors. And he does sleep soundly." "I'll say," said Dad. "He could sleep through a tornado." I felt cheered up. I felt so cheered up that I called Dawn and said, "You'll never guess what. Tigger is off taking a nap, and he's hidden himself so well that Dad and I can't find him!" Dawn giggled. She likes Tigger stories. Then she said, "Okay, my turn. You'll never guess what. Our parents are going out again." "They are? Dad didn't say anything." "Well, it's no big deal. They're just going to a parents meeting at school together. But that's something, isn't it?" "Sure," I replied. "That's something." Dawn and I talked for the exact ten minutes that I'm allowed. Then we hung up. Then she called back. We talked for ten more minutes. That's one way of getting around Dad's telephone rule without actually breaking it.

After the second call, we hung up for good, though. I didn't want to press my luck. I watched some TV. I read two chapters in this really great book called A Swiftly Tilting Planet, by Madeleine L'Engle. I checked over my list of weekend homework assignments. And then I looked at my watch. Ten o'clock! Not only was it almost time to go to bed, but Tigger had been missing for four and a half hours.

I marched into my father's den, where he was doing some paperwork.

"Excuse me," I said, "but do you think Tigger has been taking a four-and-a-half hour nap?" "Hmm?" Dad looked bleary-eyed.

"If s ten o'clock. Do you know where Tigger is?" I said.

Dad didn't get the joke, but he did look vaguely surprised. "Still missing, is he? Mary Anne, he'll turn up. He's just gone off on a jaunt. Cats do that, you know." I wasn't convinced, but I went to bed anyway. I left my window open in case he turned up outside and began mewing. Then I lay down in bed. But I couldn't go to sleep. How could I sleep with Tigger missing? And he was missing, just like Dad had said.

He had disappeared.

At eleven-thirty, my father went to bed. I know because I was still awake. I knelt on my bed and looked out the window. I couldn't see anything, though. The sky was still overcast, so the clouds covered the moon.

I lay down again. At last I went to sleep. I woke up at one-thirty, thinking I heard mewing.

"Tigger? Tigger?" I called softly.

Nothing. I must have dreamed it.

The same thing happened at ten minutes past three, at 4:45, at 6:20, and at seven-thirty, when I finally decided to get up.

I ran down to the kitchen. "Is Tigger back?" I asked my father. He was sitting at the table with a cup of coffee and the newspaper.

This time he looked more worried than surprised. "No," said Dad. "He's not." I sank into my chair. Now what?

Dad had fixed pancakes for breakfast and I tried to eat them, but I couldn't. Instead, I excused myself from the table, went to my room, got dressed, then went out to search the yard. The clouds were gone and the day was sunny and bright, but I couldn't find Tigger. I was glad there were no bodies in the road or under high trees, but . . . where was he?

All morning, I watched for Tigger and worried. When afternoon came, I realized I would have to leave for Logan's to baby-sit. It was the last thing I wanted to do. But Dad would be home. He could watch for Tigger. And with any luck, by the time I got back, Tigger would be back, too.

Chapter 5.

"Ah-choo! Ah-choo! . . . AH-CHOO!" Sneezing was the first sound I heard when Kerry opened the door for me at the Brunos' house.

"Hi, Kerry," I said. I was trying as hard as I possibly could to act normal. "Is that Hunter I hear?" Kerry nodded. She closed the door behind me. "Poor Hunter. All he does is sneeze." "Where's Logan?" I asked. I was sort of hoping to be able to tell him about Tigger before he left for practice. Until now, I hadn't felt like talking about it with any of my friends.

"Oh, Logan's gone already. And, boy, was he in a grouchy mood," said Kerry, as she led me into the living room. "He hardly talked to any of us." "Yeah, he just growled," added a stuffy voice. "Like this. Grrr. Grrr." I smiled. "Hi, Hunter." "Hi," he replied.

I knew Kerry and Hunter pretty well even though I'd never baby-sat for them. I'd just spent a lot of time at their house. And I'd have been looking forward to sitting for them, but now because of Tigger, I was mostly just worrying.

Hunter dragged himself into the living room, sat down on the couch, and sneezed. Kerry handed him a tissue.

"Thack you," he said. "There bust be sub dust id here." I smiled. Kerry and Hunter are a neat brother and sister. They don't look a thing alike, but they get along great. Kerry looks like Logan. She has his eyes and nose, but unlike her big brother, her hair is very blonde, thick, and straight. Hunter, on the hand, has the same dark-blonde, curly hair as his brother - but his face is completely different. He looks more like his father, while Logan and Kerry look more like their mother.

I was thinking about that when Mr. and Mrs. Bruno came into the living room, wearing their tennis clothes.

"Hello, Mary Anne," they greeted me.

Mrs. Bruno bent down to look at Hunter. "Oh." She clucked her tongue. "Now your eyes look bad, too." "They're rudding," said Hunter pitifully. "They itch." Mrs. Bruno shook her head.

"Is there anything special I should do for Hunter?" I asked Logan's mother.

"Nope," she replied. "Just the usual. He better stay indoors today. His bedroom would be the best place for him, but I don't want to coop him up in there. Don't let him near Logan's room, though. It's a mess." "A dust factory," added Kerry.

"And he's got down pillows," finished up Mrs. Bruno.

"Is there anything I should give Hunter?" I asked. "Does he have allergy pills?" "Yes, but he just took them. He'll be all right, won't you, pumpkin?" said Mrs. Bruno, cupping Hunter's chin in her hands.

"Sure," he replied.

"And don't forget. I'll help," said Kerry. "I'll tell Mary Anne anything she needs to know. About Hunter or his allergies or - " "Dear," Logan's father interrupted, tapping Mrs. Bruno on the shoulder, "we're going to be late. We'd better go." "Oh, right," she agreed, and Kerry looked frustrated.

The Brunos left then, Mrs. Bruno calling instructions over her shoulder as they grabbed their tennis rackets and dashed out the back door.

I looked at Kerry and Hunter. I was just about to suggest that the three of us go to Hunter's room, when Hunter said, "Let's play hide-ad-seek. That's a good gabe. We cad all play." "Huntie, no!" exclaimed Kerry. "You can't go running and hiding all over the house. Think of it. The basement." "Oh, the basebet," said Hunter. "Ah-choo!" "And hiding behind curtains." "Curtids. Ah-choo!" "And lying on rugs and in back of couches." "Rugs. Couches. Ah-ah-ah-ah-CHOO!" "You'd be better off outside," said Kerry.

"Oh, doe. Dot outside. There's grass ad leaves ad - ad pollid." "Pollid?" I repeated.

"He's trying to say 'pollen,' " Kerry whispered.

"Hunter," I said. "Kerry. Let's go upstairs. We can play in Hunter's room. Hunter, you'll be more comfortable." Even though he had wanted to play hide-and-seek, Hunter looked relieved at the suggestion. Poor thing. It must be terrible to be so uncomfortable for so long. The thought reminded me of Tigger. Where was he? Was he uncomfortable? Was he stuck somewhere? Or was he off having the time of his life?

"Bary Adde?" We had reached the upstairs hallway, and Hunter was pulling at my shirt. "Look at our doors," he was saying. "At Logad's ad bide." I looked. They were closed.

"We have to keep theb closed," said Hunter thickly, because by roob is dust-free, and Logad's is - " "A pigsty," supplied Kerry. Then she added hastily, "I think I'll close mine, too. And keep it closed. My - my room doesn't get cleaned too often." She opened the door to Hunter's room. "You guys go on in," she said. "I'll be right there. I just have to do something in my room and then close the door." Kerry left. She certainly was being helpful. If all the kids I sit for were like her, my job would be a cinch.

Hunter and I went inside, closed his door - and I drew in my breath. I'd been in his room before, but I'd forgotten just how bare it is. Bare floor, bare walls, no curtains or bedspread or knickknacks. Hardly even any toys. Just a few in his closet. I'd go crazy in a room like his.

Hunter caught me looking around and said brightly, "I have bore toys, but we keep theb dowdstairs." "Oh, Hunter, I'm sure you have toys," I said, a bit too cheerfully.

Hunter plopped down on his bed. "Ah-choo!" "Bless you," I said.

"Thack you. Do you watt to doe what I'b allergic to?" "Sure." "Okay, here goes. Dust, bold, pollid, cats, dogs, horsies - well, iddy kide of fur or hair, except people hair. I'b dot allergic to byself." I smiled.

Kerry returned then. "What shall we do now?" she asked. "Is there anything I can help with?" You could tell me why you're being so helpful, I thought. This was a new Kerry. The old Kerry was perfectly nice, but this Kerry was . . . unnatural.

"Let's just choose something to do," I said.

"Chutes and Ladders?" suggested Hunter. "Cootie?" "How about Office?" said Kerry. "This could be your office, Huntie. No, wait. Vet. You're the vet and Mary Anne and I bring our sick pets to you." Oh, why did Kerry have to suggest that, of all things?

But Hunter said, "You bead I get to be the vet? Oh - ah-choo! - goody. This is a good gabe." "Mary Anne, you're first," said Kerry. "I'll be the assistant. Is that okay with you, Doctor Hunter?" Hunter nodded.

So I pretended to carry a cocker spaniel into Hunter's office. "This is Duffy," I said, giving Hunter a name he could pronounce. "I think he hurt his paw. He's been limping." Hunter held up an imaginary paw. "Huh," he said. "Just as I thought. Duffy broke his toes." "I wonder how that happened?" I couldn't help saying.

Hunter paused. "He - he bust have accidettally walked idto the side of the bathtub. That's how Daddy broke his toes." Kerry and Hunter looked at each other. They began to laugh. Even I laughed, worried as I was about Tigger.

"I'll go fix us a snack," Kerry volunteered.

"Well ... all right," I replied. Kerry could be trusted in the kitchen.

She dashed down the stairs. Suddenly I ran after her. "Hey, Kerry!" I called. "Does Hunter have any food allergies?" "Just wheat. And milk. And strawberries. And seafood." (Sheesh.) "But don't worry. I know what he can eat." A few minutes later, Kerry walked slowly into Hunter's room carrying a tray of snacks. We sat on the bare floor and ate. I tried to be extra neat. If Hunter was allergic to wheat and dust, would that make him allergic to cracker crumbs? I tried hard not to leave any around.

When we finished our snack, Kerry helpfully took the tray downstairs and tidied up the kitchen. She returned, and we continued the vet game and then played both Chutes and Ladders and Cootie. We had fun, even though Kerry kept interrupting the game to go do things in her room, but all I could think of was Tigger. Was he home yet? Was he eating from his bowl or curled up in Dad's lap?

Where was he?

Chapter 6.

As soon as Mr. and Mrs. Bruno had returned and paid me, I jumped on my bike and made a dash for my house. Logan and I don't exactly live in the same neighborhood, so the ride took awhile. I knew it was good exercise, but I was impatient. Was Tigger home or not?

I turned into our driveway, flew to the end of it, and tossed my bike down. Then I crashed through our back door, slamming it behind me.

"Dad! Dad!" "I'm in the den, Mary Anne." I ran to the den. "Dad, is he back?" I asked, panting.

All my father had to do was look at me and I knew what the answer was.

No.

"He's been missing for almost twenty-four hours now," I pointed out.

Dad nodded.

"It's time to do something," I said. I didn't wait to see what Dad's reaction to that would be. I just marched into the kitchen. I'm not always great in an emergency, but right now, I knew what to do.

I called Kristy Thomas. Not only is Kristy one of my two best friends, but she's full of ideas. Good ideas. Plus, she loves pets. She was the best person I could think of to talk to.

'"rigger's missing?" Kristy squeaked when I'd given her the bad news.

"For almost twenty-four hours." "Then there's only one thing to do. I'm calling an emergency meeting of the Babysitters Club. Can you be at Claudia's in an hour?" "Definitely." "Great. I'll see you there then." The members of the Baby-sitters Club gathered in Claud's room slightly less than an hour after I got off the phone with Kristy. I couldn't believe we'd all been able to make it.

We were a somber group. I think that was because most of the club members' families have at least one pet, so my friends were imagining how they'd feel if their pets were missing. I, of course, was thinking of Tigger.

And trying not to cry. I'm a champion crier. Ask anyone in the club.

Kristy got right down to business, and for once I was glad to see her acting in charge, even slightly bossy. "We have a problem," she said briskly. "It's not a baby-sitting problem, but it effects one of the members of our club. Tigger is missing, and we have to do something about it. Mary Anne, why don't you tell us what's happened so far?" "Well," I began. My voice quavered, so I started over again. "Well, when I came to our meeting yesterday, I left Tigger outside. He didn't want to go in. He's been outside alone a few times now, so I thought it would be okay. Only . . . only . . ." I had to stop. I couldn't go on. I looked at the faces surrounding me. Kristy was in her director's chair, but she wasn't wearing her visor, and the pencil that was usually stuck over her ear was resting on Claud's desk. Claudia and Dawn were seated solemnly on the bed, and Jessi and Mallory were on the floor. Their knees were drawn up to their chests, their hands clasped around them, and they were looking at me sympathetically. I was seated in Claud's desk chair, facing everyone.

I cleared my throat. "Only," I said again, "when I got back from the meeting, he wasn't around. Dad and I looked for him outside, but he didn't show up. And he didn't show up last night or today. I guess - I guess that's it." "Oh, Mary Anne," said Dawn. "I'm so sorry." "Me, too," murmured the other girls.

"So what are we going to do?" asked Kristy. When no one said anything, she answered her own question. "We're going to find him, that's what. We're going to pretend Tigger is a missing person." "We could put up posters!" said Mallory.

"With Tigger's picture on them!" exclaimed Claud. "I could draw Tigger." "Yeah, and the posters could say something like 'Lost or strayed. Gray kitten. Answers to the name of Tigger,' " added Jessi.

"We should say more about what he looks like," said Kristy. "A more complete description, I think. You know, how big he is, how old he is, his markings." "And we should put, 'Last seen on Friday afternoon,' " I spoke up.

"Then add something about if you've found him, call Mary Anne's phone number," said Mal.

Over in the director's chair, I could see Kristy getting another of her ideas. I'm not unusually perceptive. It's just that it's hard to miss Kristy getting excited. I could hear this big intake of breath, and then - I swear - she began wriggling around like a puppy.

Claudia saw, too, and said, "Kristy? Is there anything you'd like to tell us?" (Dawn, Jessi, and Mal tried to hide their giggles.) And Kristy exploded with, "Yes, I've got a great idea! We could offer a reward. Then we could add, Ten-dollar reward for the safe return of Tigger' to the poster. Or something like that." Well, we had to admit - it was a great idea.

"Except for one thing," said Dawn, our treasurer. "Where are we going to get the money?" "I've got four dollars," said Jessi.

"I've got three-fifty," said Claudia.

"Five-fifty," said Mal.

"Only two," said Dawn. "I just bought earrings. Sorry, Mary Anne." I shook my head, smiling. Who cared? I couldn't believe what my friends were doing.

"I've got five sixty-four," said Kristy. "I know exactly." "And I," I said softly, "have four seventy-five. I would spend my last penny to find Tigger. I wish I had four hundred seventy-five." Dawn was busy with a pencil and a pad of paper.

"Let's see here," she said. "Urn, all together we've got . . . twenty-five dollars and thirty-nine cents!" We gasped.

"Hold on, you guys," Dawn went on. "Let me check something." She reached for the club's treasury envelope and rooted around inside. At last she emerged with a fistful of bills and change.

"What are you doing?" asked Kristy.

"I just took four sixty-one from the treasury," Dawn replied. "If we add it to the money we're donating, our reward will be an even thirty bucks. Won't that look nice on the poster?" Five heads nodded. And I began to cry.

"Mary Anne? What's wrong?" asked Dawn. "Don't worry. There's still plenty of money in the treasury. I just took out enough to make thirty." "Oh, it's not that," I said, sniffling. (Claudia handed me a tissue.) "It's all of you. Donating the money you worked so hard for. I know you're saving for things. And now, you're giving up your money for Tigger." "And," added Dawn, "for you." Well, that started a fresh flood of tears. I was crying for me, for Tigger, but mostly because my friends were being so wonderful.

I cried until Dawn slid off of Claud's bed, crossed the room, and put her arms around me. Slowly, my tears subsided.

Just as I was getting under control again, I heard Mal say, " 'What shall we do about poor little Tigger?' " "Huh?" said Kristy.

"It's from The House at Pooh Corner," she replied. "Our family's been reading it aloud. That line is the beginning of one of Pooh's hums. You know, his poemy-songs. The rest of it is about getting Tigger the tiger to eat. But that first line makes me think of Mary Anne's Tigger." "Yeah," I said, nodding slowly. "What shall we do about poor little Tigger?" I almost started to cry again, but Kristy said, "Come on, we have work to do. If we can get a sample poster finished, my mom could go to her office tonight and run off copies. Then we - " "She'll go to the office on a Saturday night?" interrupted Claud.

"Maybe," replied Kristy. "For something this important. How many copies do you think I should ask her to make?" We decided on a number. Then we got to work on the poster. When we were finished, this is what the top part looked like: Underneath this information, Claud drew a picture of Tigger that really looked like him. She kept sending me home for photos of him so that she could work from them, but I didn't mind. I'd do anything that would help find him.

And at the bottom of the poster in huge letters we wrote: $30 Reward for the safe return of Tigger.

We laid the poster on the bed, and the six of us leaned over to look at it. Mimi came in at that moment. "What is picture?" she asked. (Mimi had a stroke last summer and it affected her speech.) "If s Tigger," Claudia told her grandmother. "He's missing, and we're going to help find him." Mimi looked puzzled. "Eggplants," was all she said. Then she left.

A moment of silence followed.

"I think the poster looks perfect," I said.

"I just hope it works," added Dawn.

"It will. It has to," Jessi said vehemently.

"Where will we put the posters?" asked Claud. I could tell she was trying not to think about Mimi. I hoped she knew the rest of us didn't mind the funny little things that happened.

"Oh, we'll put them on phone poles, in people's mailboxes. We'll go all over our neighborhood. I mean, your neighborhood," replied Kristy. "Well, I better call Charlie for a ride. Let's meet back here at noon tomorrow." We agreed to the plan and I ran home, hoping to find Tigger.

No Tigger.

I called Logan instead and gave him the news.

"Gee, that's too bad," he said vaguely.

That was it? Tigger was missing and Logan said, "Too bad"? Where was his brain?

"Logan, he's been missing for twenty-four hours." "I'm really sorry. . . . Oh! Darn. Now I see." "See what?" "What went wrong in practice today. I'm watching tapes of our games." I couldn't believe it. But I just calmly said good-bye and hung up.

Chapter 7.

I could tell, just from reading this notebook entry, how close Jessi and Becca and Squirt are. That is so nice. Boy, do I wish for a brother and sister. Or for just one of them.

Or for Tigger.

Anyway, as soon as Mr. and Mrs. Ramsey left, Becca said to her big sister, "Jessi, I'm hungry." "I know," replied Jessi. "Me, too. But I want to give Squirt his supper first. I think that'll be easier. Then you and I can eat together when he's finished." "Okay," said Becca reluctantly. She didn't want to wait - but she did want to eat dinner with Jessi.

Jessi fixed Squirt a cheese sandwich and some grapes. She cut the sandwich into small pieces, since Squirt is learning to feed himself. Then she put the food in Squirt's airplane dish, set the dish and a bottle of milk on the kitchen table, sat Squirt in his high chair, and placed his dinner in front of him.

Squirt smiled.

He picked up a piece of sandwich. He opened it. He put the cheese in his mouth and let the bread fall to the floor. Then he mashed a grape in his hands. And laughed.

"Der-bliss!" he cried.

He took another grape, tried to bite it in half, and sent it sailing across the room. More laughter.

Half an hour later, Squirt's bottle was empty. So was his airplane tray. But cheese was squished in his hair, his hands were covered with mashed grapes, and the kitchen was littered with bread, cheese, and grapes.

"You know what?" said Jessi to her sister. "I don't think he ate anything. He drank his milk. Well, he did eat that one piece of cheese, but everything else is somewhere in the kitchen." Becca giggled. "The best part was when he shot that grape at me. Right out of his mouth. And right at my nose. I know he did it on purpose." Becca helped Jessi clean the kitchen. Then Jessi cleaned up Squirt. And then she and her sister sat down to their own supper while Squirt watched them from his playpen.

"We get toasted cheese sandwiches," said Becca happily.

"Yes," replied Jessi, "because we're older and know how to eat. But if you spit anything across the table at me - I'll make you sit in the high chair." Becca giggled.

They began to eat.

"What shall we do about poor little Tigger?" murmured Jessi a few moments later.

"What do you mean?" asked Becca.

Jessi told her about Pooh's hum, and about the missing Tigger.

"Gosh, that's awful," said Becca. "You know who's going to be really upset? I mean, besides Mary Anne?" "Who?" "Charlotte. She loves Tigger. She wishes Tigger were hers." "I can understand that. Tigger's pretty cute. And Charlotte doesn't have a pet." "I'm sure glad Misty lives in his cage," said Becca. "He can't run away." Misty is the Ramseys' hamster. He's their first pet ever. Jessi and Becca think he's so adorable they could practically eat him up. He is cute. Because he's young, he's very small. Everything about him is tiny and adorable. (Kind of like Tigger). He's got itty-bitty feet with claws on them you can barely see. And by his nose, which is pink, are pale, pale whiskers. They're almost transparent. Misty is also pretty. His fur is patches of golden brown and white, and his eyes are shiny and black.

Guess how Jessi got Misty. She didn't go to a pet store and buy him. He came from some of her neighbors, the Mancusis. They were going away on vacation and needed a pet-sitter. So they called the Baby-sitters Club! Ordinarily, Kristy doesn't like for us club members to pet-sit, but Jessi had a free week, so she took the job - and found herself caring for cats, dogs, hamsters, rabbits, a disgusting snake that got loose one afternoon, some fish, and I don't remember what else. Anyway, while she was on the job, she discovered that one of the hamsters was going to have babies. Misty is one of those babies, of course, and the Mancusis were delighted to let Jessi have him. (By the way, Mal's family also took a hamster baby.) "I'm glad Misty lives in a cage, too," said Jessi. "Being cooped up might seem cruel, but at least it's safe." "Hey!" cried Becca. "I just got an idea. Maybe the Mancusis have a kitten they could give to Mary Anne. I mean, if Tigger doesn't come back." "Maybe . . ." Jessi replied slowly. "Two of their cats are going to have kittens." "One of the kittens might look like Tigger!" exclaimed Becca.

"Maybe," Jessi said again. Then, "I'm just wondering about one thing. Would Mary Anne want another kitten? I mean, let's say something happened to Misty - " "What would happen to Misty?" cried Becca.

"Nothing. I'm just saying if something happened - " "If what happened?" Becca had put her sandwich down on her plate. She looked worriedly at her sister.

Jessi sighed. "Nothing. But think of it this way: If you didn't have Misty, would you want a different hamster? Sort of as a replacement?" "No way!" "Okay. That's what I'm thinking about with Mary Anne and Tigger. I'm not sure she'd want a replacement kitten. Not right away." "But it's nice to know the Mancusis are here," said Becca.

"Yeah," agreed Jessi. "It's nice to know they're here." "Ah-choo! Ah-choo!" called Squirt from his playpen. He was standing up, his arms hanging over the sides, looking at his big sisters.

Jessi and Becca began to giggle. Squirt's newest trick is pretending to sneeze. Only his sneezes don't sound real. He just yells, "Ah-choo!" which sometimes comes out "Ah-shoo!" or even "Ah-too!" "Hey, Squirt," said Becca, "if you eat all your vegetables, will you get" (she lowered her voice dramatically) big. . .and. . .strong?" Squirt's face broke into a dimply smile. Then he squeezed his hands into fists, and posed his arms like a strongman.

Jessi and Becca were now giggling so hard they could barely eat. But they calmed down. As they finished their dinners, Becca said, "Jessi, can I help Squirt walk later?" "Sure," answered Jessi, wondering why her sister had even asked. Squirt was a new and unsteady walker, but Becca had helped him toddle around plenty of times.

"Oh, goody," replied Becca. She was quick to help Jessi with the dishes. Then she ran to Squirt's playpen and lifted him out.

Squirt squealed with happiness.

"Jessi, Jessi, come watch Squirt!" called Becca.

Jessi was sponging off the table. "Becca, I've seen him walk." "Well, you haven't seen this. Please come here." "Okay." Jessi abandoned the sponge and crossed the room to her brother and sister.

Becca had set Squirt on the carpeted floor of the rec room and he stood there unsteadily. She backed away. "Okay, Squirtles," she said. "Come here!" She held out her hands. "Come here!" Squirt lurched toward Becca. As he walked, he cheered himself on. "Yea! Yea! Yea!" So that was what Becca had wanted Jessi to see. Jessi began to laugh. "Who taught him that?" "He did. I kept cheering for him when he was walking. Now he cheers for himself." "Group hug!" announced Jessi. She and Becca and Squirt moved together for a three-person hug.

After that, it was Squirt's bedtime. Jessi read him some nursery rhymes before he went to sleep. Squirt is too little to understand them, but Jessi thinks reading is important at any age. Then she let Becca read to her from Baby Island, and finally, when Becca was asleep, too, Jessi brought her copy of Sounder downstairs and curled up with it on the living room couch. Sounder is about a dog, but Jessi found herself thinking of Tigger the cat, wondering the same things I was wondering. What had happened to him? Was he safe? Was he hurt? If he was hurt somewhere, would we find him? And . . . where was he?

Chapter 8.

"Mary Anne, Mary Anne! My mom did it!" "Did what?" It was Sunday morning and I hadn't been awake very long. My brain was barely working. All I knew was that Kristy was on the other end of the line and she was very excited.

"She copied the posters!" said Kristy. "I've got the whole stack right here in my lap. So I'm on my way over. We can paper the neighborhood." I wanted to find Tigger more than anyone else did. But it was only eight-thirty in the morning. I wasn't dressed. And I had a pretty good idea that Claudia and Dawn weren't even awake. All I said, though, was "Paper the neighborhood? What does that mean?" "You know, put up the posters. Distribute them. Cover the neighborhood with them." "Oh. . . . Wow, Kristy, it was awfully nice of your mom to go to her office last night. She had to go all the way into Stamford, just for the posters." "Well, Tigger is important." "Thank you," I said, "and listen, I can't wait to start, um, papering the neighborhood. But don't you think it's a little early in the day? I'm still in my nightgown. And . . . and . . . okay, I'm walking across Dad's room, now I'm looking out the window . . . Yup, Claud's shades are down. I'm sure she's still asleep. I bet Dawn is asleep, too. And I'd kind of like to call Logan. Maybe he'll come help us. Can we meet at noon?" "Noon?" repeated Kristy. She sounded slightly disappointed. "Well, okay. And how's this? I'll phone Jessi, Mal, and Claud, if you'll phone Dawn and Logan. Tell them to meet in your yard at twelve o'clock." "Deal." At noon that day, I was standing in my yard. Well, I wasn't just standing in it, I was calling for Tigger. It was impossible for me to be almost anywhere without calling or looking for him.

"Ti-i-i-igger! Here, Tiggy, Tiggy!" I called. I whistled. I shook his toys. I set out cat food. No Tigger.

So I was relieved when the Thomases' old station wagon pulled up in front of our house. Kristy hopped out and Charlie waved to me.

I waved back.

In Kristy's hands was a stack of papers.

"Oh, let me see," I cried, running to her. Kristy handed me the paper on the top of the stack. "Great. This is great, Kristy. How can I thank you?" "You're my best friend. We don't have to thank each other for things. But it would be nice if the posters brought Tigger back." "I'll say." As we stood looking at the LOST OR STRAYED heading, Claudia showed up. Then Dawn and Mallory. And soon, everyone was gathered in my yard.

Kristy, holding the posters, was in her element. She was in charge.

"Now," she began, "the idea is to paper the neighborhood. By tonight, there shouldn't be a single person in this area who doesn't know that Tigger is missing. I've got boxes of thumbtacks, and I want you to make sure you put a poster on every phone pole. Maybe two posters - front and back. Then stuff mailboxes. There are plenty of streets around here." The seven of us set out. Logan and I went as a team.

"Mary Anne?" said Logan, as we pushed thumbtacks into opposite sides of a phone pole. "I'm really sorry about Tigger." Well, that was a relief. "You are?" I asked.

"Sure." "I think," I said slowly, "that this is the worst thing that's ever happened to me." Logan smiled. "Oh, come on. Don't be so dramatic, Mary Anne. A lost kitten is sad, but aren't you overreacting a little?" I had nothing to say to that.

Across the street, Mallory stuck a poster in a mailbox, closed the box, ran to the next one, and expertly tossed another poster in.

"Hey!" I called. "Are you training for the Poster Olympics?" Mal grinned. "I just figure that the faster we get the posters out, the faster we'll find Tigger." She ran ahead.

Logan and I were putting posters in mailboxes when my dad drove by. He waved as he slowed to a stop..

"These are the posters, Dad!" I said, handing him one.

My father nodded. "Very profes - Thirty dollars reward! That's impressive. Where did the money come from?" "A little came from the club treasury, but most of it's our own. We chipped in." "It certainly ought to get people looking." "You think so? Great!" "I'm on my way to the grocery store," said Dad. "We ran out of a few things. How would you like me to take along some of the posters? I could put one on the bulletin board in the grocery store, and one on the board by the newsstand. Maybe some other stores will be open. They might let me tape a poster in their windows." I gaped. This was my father? He hates doing things like that - asking for favors and stuff. "That would be terrific, Dad," I said, "but are you sure you want to?" "For Tigger, anything." "Okay." I handed Dad a bunch of posters and thanked him six times. He drove off.

Logan and I continued. When we reached an intersection, he turned left and I turned right. I was on my own. I walked quickly, so quickly that after a couple of blocks, my legs ached. But it was worth it for Tigger.

Oh, Tiggy, where are you? I thought. That question had been worrying me since Friday. Where are you? But there was another question that was even worse. It had been worrying me since Friday, too. It was so bad, I could hardly bear to think of it. The question was, Tigger, are you alive? What if Tigger had wandered away? What if he'd been hit by a car? The driver wouldn't know whom Tigger belonged to. So he'd take my kitten to a vet and explain what had happened, and the vet would say, "I'm sorry, there's nothing we can do," and then they'd get rid of Tigger. They'd have to. He doesn't wear a collar with tags.

Dead, I said to myself as I walked along. Dead, dead, dead.

I stuck a poster in a mailbox.

Dead, dead, dead.

I came to a phone pole. Time for the thumbtacks. I pulled the box from my pocket and stuck a poster to the street side of the pole. I was putting one on the opposite side when a voice said, "Who's Tigger?" I jumped a mile. When I turned around, I found a boy who looked as if he were about ten years old. He was peering around me at the poster.

"Tigger's my kitten," I told him, trying to calm down.

The boy nodded seriously.

"Have you seen him?" I asked.

"Maybe. I guess you want him back pretty badly, don't you?" "Oh, yes," I said.

"Is there really a reward?" "Yup." "Well then, okay. Yester- um, no, let's see. The day before yesterday 1 saw a - a gray kitten with tiger stripes." "That's just like Tigger!" I cried.

"And he had short hair - I'm sure it was a he, not a she - and he was, oh, about fifteen inches long - I mean, including his tail. And, um, he answered to the name of Tigger." I looked suspiciously at the poster I'd just put up. "How did you know to call him Tigger?" I asked the boy.

"Because his name was on his collar?" he suggested.

I shook my head. "Sorry. He doesn't wear a collar." The boy didn't look a bit uncomfortable about having told a whopping lie. "What's the reward for?" he wanted to know. "For information leading to finding this cat or something?" "No," I replied crossly. "For finding him. For putting him in my hands." I stuffed the thumbtacks back in my pocket. Then I just walked off. Sheesh. What was wrong with people? Was money the only thing they could think of?

I walked and walked. I papered our neighborhood until I ran out of posters. Then I went home. I found Mal, Jessi, and Dawn sitting on my front lawn.

"We're done!" Jessi announced.

"I was done first," Mal added proudly.

I sat down with them, but as soon as I'd done so, Dawn jumped up.

"We shouldn't be just sitting here," she said. "We should be looking for Tigger." "But I've looked and looked." "Then we should look some more. He's just a baby. He's so little. Maybe he got stuck somewhere." The search for Tigger started out with just the four of us. We grew to seven as Logan, Claudia, and Kristy returned. Then Charlotte Johanssen came by and she joined us. Jamie, Myriah, and Gabbie were about to start a game of Superman Tag (whatever that is), and Nicky Pike was out for a bike ride with his friend Matt Braddock, but all of them stopped their fun and helped us look for Tigger. I was just telling Logan about the boy I'd met while I was putting up posters, when Jamie pulled on my sleeve.

"Mary Anne! Mary Anne!" he said urgently.

I stooped down to his level.

"What's up, Jamie?" "Nicky Pike said if you find Tigger you get thirty dollars." "That's true." "If 1 had thirty dollars, I'd buy eleven hundred racing cars." I sighed. Here we go again, I thought.

"But you know what?" Jamie went on. "I'd rather just have Tigger back." I gave Jamie a huge hug.

Chapter 9.

We did not find Tigger that afternoon. Somehow, I wasn't surprised.

But I was surprised the next afternoon when Jamie Newton said to me, "Let's look for Tigger some more." It was Monday. I was baby-sitting for Jamie and Lucy, and the weather was gorgeous. Being outdoors would feel wonderful. But it seemed to me as if we'd already looked everywhere for Tigger. Every possible place. At least around here, and I couldn't very well take the Newton kids to some other neighborhood in order to go kitten-hunting.

"Don't you want to find Tigger?" asked Jamie.

"Of course I do!" I said.

"Then let's look some more. We might have missed a place. Or maybe . . . maybe" (Jamie's eyes were widening at whatever this new thought was) "he's moved, and he's sitting right in some place we already checked! He might be, you know. We better look everywhere all over again." I smiled at Jamie. "Is this really what you want to do today?" "Yup. You can put Lucy in her stroller. And when we get to your house, we'll ask Myriah and Gabbie if they want to help us look, too." "Well," I said slowly. "All right." When Jamie had made his suggestion, he was sitting at the kitchen table drinking grape juice and eating crackers. And Lucy had just woken up from a nap. So there was a lot to do before we could go Tigger-hunting. I changed Lucy, cleaned her up, and put a new outfit on her. (The lavender overalls she'd worn in the morning were covered with milk, grape juice, and mashed banana.) Then I packed a bag to take on our walk. When you're watching a baby, you can't go anywhere without a bag. In it I put Baby Wipes, a bottle full of apple juice, a pacifier, a spare diaper, and a toy.

When Lucy was ready to go I started in on Jamie. He had a gigantic grape juice mustache, which we got rid of with some scrubbing. Then I found his jacket. "Do you have to go to the bathroom?" I asked him as I picked up Lucy and her bag.

"Nope," said Jamie.

"Okay." Lucy's stroller was in the garage. At the garage door, I stopped to put her sweater on. "Are you sure you don't have to go to the bathroom?" I asked Jamie again.

"I'm sure." We went into the garage. I settled Lucy in the stroller and hung her bag on the back. "Last chance for the bathroom," I said to Jamie.

"I'm fine," he replied.

We set off. We were halfway down the driveway when Jamie said, "Mary Anne? I have to go to the bathroom." I sighed. But what can you do? Back we went. Ten minutes later we were on our way again. When we reached the Perkinses' house, Jamie rang their bell.

"No woof-woof," he remarked.

"Chewbacca must be in the backyard," I told him. (Chewy is the Perkinses' big black Labrador retriever. He loves people and gets excited when the bell rings. Usually, you hear galloping feet and excited barks when you push the doorbell.) But very small footsteps approached this time. Then the door opened a crack and Gabbie peeked out. When she saw us, her face broke into a grin. She threw the door open.

"Hi!" she cried, blonde hair bouncing.

"Hi-hi!" Jamie replied excitedly. "Do you and Myriah want to look for Tigger again? Mary Anne's here. She'll help us." "Okay. Let me ask Myriah." The excitement over looking for Tigger was great, and in moments, Jamie and his pals were in my front yard.

"This is where you last saw Tigger, right, Mary Anne?" asked Myriah.

I nodded. "That's right." "Then we'll start here." Myriah, Jamie, Gabbie, and I began whistling and calling and looking in trees and under bushes. But when I pushed Lucy's stroller into the backyard and found myself looking in our toolshed, a place I was sure I had checked at least twelve times already, I began to feel discouraged - and sort of disgusted.

"Lucy-Goose," I said, and Lucy strained her neck back to see me. She answers to that name as well as to Lucy and Lucy Jane, which is her full name. "Lucy Goose, let's go get the mail. I'm tired of this." And I'm afraid, I thought. I'm afraid that someone will find Tigger - dead.

Getting the mail is the highlight of any day for me, and I felt I needed the highlight just then. So I wheeled Lucy around to the front of my house and down the driveway. I opened the box. I looked inside. Stuffed! I absolutely adore a stuffed mailbox. I listened to the cries and shouts of Jamie, Myriah, and Gabbie while I struggled to pull everything out of the box. Then I pushed Lucy up to our front stoop, where I sat down and dropped the mail into my lap. There was so much it overflowed and fell on the ground. Lucy laughed as I tried to pick it up.

At last it was stacked neatly next to me. I sorted it into piles: bills for Dad, letters for Dad, magazines, catalogues, stuff we could probably throw out, letter for me. . . . Wait a sec. A letter for me?! I hardly ever get letters.

I picked up the envelope. It must be from Stacey, I thought. But, no, the address wasn't in her handwriting. Ooh, very exciting. A mystery letter! "Now this," I told Lucy, "is why I like getting the mail. You never know what you might find. I can't wait to see who this letter's from." Lucy blew me a raspberry, then smiled angelically.

I opened the envelope.

What I found inside gave me goose bumps.

"On, no," I cried softly.

Written in big, messy writing was a short message: If yoo want to see your cat alive again leave $160 in an envelope on The biq rocK in Brenner Field this aftrnoon.

A picture of Tigger was taped to the bottom of the page. It had been cut from one of the posters we'd made.

I swallowed, feeling sick. So Tigger had been kidnapped? But why? Because someone needed a hundred dollars?

"This is curious," I said to Lucy. What I meant was that it was chilling, horrible, disgusting, and the meanest thing in the world - only I couldn't say that in front of a little baby.

But what was I doing? Tigger had been kidnapped, and I was sitting on my front steps, talking to Lucy. I jumped up, dumped the mail in our front hall, then found Jamie and the Perkins girls.

"Listen, I'm sorry," I said to Jamie, "but it's time to go home." "Good," he replied. "We're bored. And I have to go to the bathroom." "Again?" I said. "Then let's go." We walked Gabble and Myriah to their house, then returned to the Newtons'.

I felt shaky all over by that time. I had to do something, but what? What do you do when someone is asking for a whole lot of money in order to give back something you love - and you haven't got the money? My friends and I had just barely been able to scrape together thirty dollars. There was a little more money in the treasury, but nothing close to seventy dollars. Maybe I could use the thirty dollars reward money and borrow seventy dollars from Dad. He must have seventy dollars in the bank. I could pay him back later from money I earned baby-sitting.

Okay. There was the solution. I felt a little calmer.

I was standing in the kitchen next to the telephone. From there, I could see into the Newtons' family room, where Jamie was watching Sesame Street and Lucy was sitting in her playpen. I hated to leave them there, but I was going to have to, for a few minutes anyway.

I picked up the phone. I dialed Dad's office. First I got cut off. Then I got a busy signal - three calls in a row. When I finally reached my father's secretary, she said he was on an important call, dear, and would I please hold?

I told her that no, I wouldn't, thank you. As I hung up, I thought, my call was important, too.

But maybe this was better. Maybe telling Dad about Tigger's ransom note wasn't a good idea. Dad's a lawyer. He would probably freak out, and he certainly wouldn't allow me to go to Brenner Field the next day.

I made another call. This one was to Logan. Kerry answered the phone, sounding quite cheerful, and handed me over to her big brother, who was actually home, which I hadn't really expected. He plays so much ball these days that he's usually on the field at school.

"Hi," 1 said glumly.

"Hi," he replied, just as glumly.

"You'll never guess what happened. Tigger has been kidnapped." "What?" (That wasn't the "What?" I'd been hoping for. I'd been hoping for a "WHAT??/") "That's right," I went on. "They left a ransom note." I read it to Logan. Then, tearfully, I added, "Oh, Logan, what are we going to do?" "We?" "Well, you and I and the rest of the Babysitters Club." There was a pause. "I'll have to think," replied Logan.

"We have a club meeting today," I told him hopefully.

Another pause. "All right. I'll be there. I guess it would make sense to discuss the problem together." "Thanks, Logan," I said. "I'll call Kristy and tell her what's going on. She should have been the one to ask you to the meeting, but I think she'll understand about this. It's an emergency." (Kristy loves emergencies.) Logan and I got off the phone then so I could call Kristy. She was completely understanding. Certainly more so than Logan. I couldn't help thinking that he didn't seem concerned. And that hurt. But when I told Kristy about the ransom note, I got the "WHAT??!" I'd been waiting for.

"See you at five-thirty," said Kristy, as we were getting off the phone. "And don't worry. We're going to get Tigger back. The Babysitters Club can do anything." Chapter 10.

Mrs. Newton came home at 5:15 that afternoon, so I made it to Claudia's house just a few minutes before the beginning of our club meeting. I brought the ransom note with me, envelope and all. (Once, near Halloween, 1 had received a mysterious chain letter. The other girls were really upset with me for throwing away the envelope it had arrived in, so I was careful to keep the envelope from the ransom note.) When we had all gathered, even Logan, we sat in Claud's room sort of stiffly. This always happens when Logan comes to a meeting. It's because he's a boy. Even though we know him and like him (especially me!), he just makes a meeting different. We worry about things such as what if Logan sits on something lumpy and it turns out to be some of Claudia's underwear? Or what is someone says "bra" or starts to tell a story about a girl we know who might be going out with a friend of Logan's? Not that Kristy lets much of that go on during meetings, but it does happen from time to time.

Anyway, Kristy got the opening business over with fast. Then she said, "Today is going to be a combination regular club meeting and an emergency meeting. We'll take job calls, but in between, we'll try to figure out how to handle the ransom note." For some reason, that made me burst into tears. "Oh, that is so wonderful of you guys," I said. "You're the best friends in the world." I paused. "But where are we going to get seventy dollars?" Logan was sitting right next to me on the bed, which squished us next to Dawn and Claudia, but he didn't do anything when I started to cry. So Claudia, on the other side of me, patted my arm and then gave me a hug. I had the feeling she wanted to give Logan a dirty look while she was at it.

"Let's not worry about the money just yet," said Kristy as I was drying my eyes. "For starters, we should take a look at the ransom note." "Yeah," said the others.

But the phone rang then and we had to stop to schedule a job. When we were finished, I pulled the note out of my pocket.

"1 saved the envelope," I said pointedly.

My friends smiled. They knew what 1 was talking about.

I took the note out and laid it and the envelope side by side on the bed. Everyone crowded in for a look.

"It's those first words that scare me," I said. "They're so threatening. If you want to see your cat alive again . . .' It sounds like, well, if anything goes wrong, then Tigger will be . . . will be ... Oh, I can't say it. Or maybe he already is ... dead." My tears started to fall again and I glanced hopefully at Logan, but he was staring off into space.

"Well," said Jessi, "the handwriting on the envelope and on the note are the same." "But is this the real thing or some kind of trick?" asked Claudia, our mystery expert. "Any time there's a missing person, it seems as if about a million ransom notes suddenly turn up." "Yeah," agreed Mallory.

"It seems to me," Dawn spoke up, "that if the kidnapper wanted us to know he was the real one, he would have given us a better clue.

For instance, an actual photo of Tigger - you know, a Polaroid - to show he's alive now. Not just his picture cut from the poster we made. Anyone could do that." "Also," said Mallory, "the posters have been up for two days. If someone really was going to take advantage of them, he - or she - could have written the note Saturday afternoon and delivered it to Mary Anne yesterday morning. Why wait?" "Was that note mailed or just stuck in your box?" Logan asked me suddenly.

"Just stuck in the box," I replied. I handed him the envelope. "See? No stamp." He nodded.

The phone rang again. Dawn saw that I was still a wreck, so she took the club record book out of my lap and scheduled what might well be the one and only job she'd ever schedule.

While the others were busy with the call, Logan looked over at me and whispered, "Mary Anne, would you calm down? You are being so ... sensitive. You're acting like such a girl." For a moment, I just glared at him. "There's nothing wrong with being sensitive," I told him, "and besides, lam a girl." Claudia hung up the phone then, so Logan and I fell silent.

"The question is," said Kristy, "what are we going to do? I don't think we should worry about whether the note is a hoax. I think we should just follow up on it. It's our only lead." "Right!" agreed Logan. "We should go to Brenner Field and get this jerk who took Tigger. We'll beat him at his own game." "But how?" asked Dawn.

We stopped talking to think and to take two calls that came in.

Then, in a very small voice, and even though I had just been thinking the opposite an hour earlier, I said, "Maybe I should tell my dad about - " "No!" exclaimed Logan. "We're not involving any adults. No parents, no police." "Why not?" I asked.

"Because they'll just get in the way. A kid wrote that note. Don't you think so? Look at that big, babyish handwriting. And an adult would want more than a hundred dollars. Why would a grown-up go to all the trouble of stealing a kitten for three days, just to get a hundred dollars? It's not worth it." "That's true," the rest of us agreed.

"So?" said Kristy.

"Well," Logan went on slowly, "we don't know if that note is from an actual kidnapper, or just from someone trying to take advantage of Tigger's situation, but either way we should catch him - " "Or her," added Dawn.

" - or her. Don't you think?" I looked at my friends. We all nodded. This was getting sort of exciting.

"How are we going to catch the kidnapper?" wondered Jessi.

Logan frowned thoughtfully. He read the ransom note again. " 'In an envelope on the big rock in Brenner Field at four o'clock/ " he mused. "Do you know what the big rock is?" he asked the rest of us. "I don't even know where Brenner Field is." "It's right nearby," Claudia told him. "That's probably why you don't know it. It's not in our neighborhood. If s sort of behind Jamie Newton's backyard." "And do you know this big rock?" asked Logan.

"Oh, sure," I replied. "Everyone does. There's a boulder near one side of the field. We just call it the Trig rock.' " Logan nodded. "Listen, you guys," he said to the six of us girls, "I'm getting an idea, but I'm going to need the help of all of you - or most of you - tomorrow." "We'll be there," said Kristy, without even looking at the record book.

"But Kristy!" I cried. "We've probably got jobs - " "This is too important. We'll look at the record book in a minute. Then we'll reschedule whatever needs rescheduling." "Okay." (Why was I protesting? I was the one who wanted Tigger back so badly.) "Well," said Logan, "this is my idea. Mary Anne goes to the rock at four, just like the note says to do. She leaves an envelope full of money - " "What money?" I interrupted.

"Fake money. Monopoly money or something." "Well, as long as I'm not putting real money in the envelope, why do I have to bother with fake? Why can't I just stuff an envelope with newspaper or notebook paper?" "I don't know," said Logan irritably. "Fake money is what they always use on TV or in the movies. Maybe it looks more realistic from the outside. Don't ask me." "So go on," said Kristy. "Mary Anne stuffs an envelope with fake money - " "Not too much," I interrupted. "It's only a hundred dollars. Ten ten-dollar bills wouldn't look very fat. The envelope shouldn't be too stuffed." "Mary Anne!" cried Claudia in exasperation.

"Sorry," I said, "but we're talking about Tigger. I want this to go right." Kristy sighed. "Logan?" she said. "After Mary Anne fills the envelope?" "Then way before four, like pretty soon after we get home from school, the rest of us hide in Brenner Field, in places where we can see the big rock. Is that possible?" "To hide in the field or to find places you can see the rock from?" asked Mal.

"Both," replied Logan.

"Yes," said Mal.

"Great. Okay, so we hide. At four o'clock, Mary Anne leaves the envelope on the rock. Then, Mary Anne, you better pretend to go home, in case you're being watched. Actually, you should probably go all the way home. But then sneak back to the field. I think you'll want to see what happens next. I have a feeling the kitten-napper will turn up. And we can catch him." It was a thrilling plan. I was so proud of Logan! We were talking and thinking of hiding places in the field when Kristy remembered the record book. I was the one who'd been so worried about it - and then I'd forgotten.

"We have to find out what we're doing tomorrow," said Kristy. "If a lot of us are babysitting, then we have a problem, because we can't all cancel." As it turned out, only one of us was sitting and we got Shannon Kilbourne to go in her place. Some of the others had classes or lessons but decided not to go. We would all be at Brenner Field the next afternoon.

My heart began to beat a little faster. This was exciting! It was like something from a cop show on TV. We were going to trick the kidnapper. He had tried to get us, and now we were going to get him back. Tigger would be returned to us and we'd teach the kitten-napper a big fat lesson.

As we left the meeting, my excitement grew. But all of a sudden, I felt terrible. How could I feel excited? What was the matter with me? If Tigger were home, where he belonged, I'd have nothing to feel excited about. I'd just have Tigger, which is the way it should be. And I'd trade a little excitement for Tigger any day.

Chapter 11.

Dawn didn't say so, not in her notebook entry, but she was pretty spooked herself. It was just that kind of night. The Barrett kids were upset about pet-nappers, and then the storm came.

The Barrett kids are Buddy, Suzi, and Marnie. Buddy is seven, Suzi is four, and Mamie is only a year and a half. Dawn has sat for them for quite awhile; since not too long after she moved to Stoneybrook. She likes them a lot - even though at first they were the "impossible three." Boy, did they give Dawn a hard time. But now they're much better. Buddy, who is active and lively, likes to play with Pow, their dog. Suzi likes to play pretend games. And Marnie just tries to keep up with her older brother and sister. The best thing, though, is that their mother is more organized than she used to be. (Mr. and Mrs. Barrett are divorced.) Dawn's mother is pretty disorganized herself - she's apt to put the socks away in the bread drawer. But Mrs. Barrett used to do things like forget to clean the house, or give Dawn the wrong phone number for wherever she was going while Dawn was sitting. But now she's much better. She got a job she likes a lot, and she's been trying really hard ever since then.

"Hi, Dawn!" Suzi greeted Dawn happily at the door. "Mommy said I could let you in." Dawn entered the Barretts' house, closing the door behind her. "A storm is blowing in," she told Suzi. "It's all windy, and I can smell rain in the air." Suzi found this hysterical. "A storm is blowing in?" she repeated. "You can smell rain in the air?" "Yup," replied Dawn.

Marnie toddled in from the kitchen. She stared shyly at Dawn, even though Dawn has sat for her so many times.

"Where's your mom?" Dawn asked Suzi. "And where's your big brother?" "Mommy's upstairs and Buddy's downstairs. With Pow. He's guarding him." "Guarding him? A guard-human and his dog?" said Dawn.

"I guess so," replied Suzi, not understanding. "It's so Pow won't get bassett-napped. That's what Buddy said." Very curious, thought Dawn. Pow is a bassett hound, that much she knew. Everything else Suzi was talking about was a mystery to her.

At that moment, Mrs. Barrett came flying downstairs. (She's usually in a rush.) "Hi, Dawn!" she said breathlessly. "Suzi, wash Marnie's face, please." Suzi took Marnie into the kitchen and began to wash cookie crumbs off of her face.

"I'm just going to be at the office," Mrs. Barrett continued. "Special project. You've got my office number. I should be home by nine-thirty." "Perfect," said Dawn.

"The kids should go to bed as follows: Marnie, now; Suzi, eight o'clock; Buddy, nine o'clock. No more snacks for anybody, and Buddy is allowed to watch Dragon Warriors on TV tonight. He asked me about it earlier, and I couldn't make up my mind. You can give him the good news. It comes on at eight." "Okay," Dawn replied.

Mrs. Barrett left in a hurry, Marnie crying behind her. Dawn picked Marnie up and talked to her. "Your mommy's coming back. Your mommy's coming back," she kept telling her. "When you wake up tomorrow morning, guess who will be here - Mommy!" "Dawn, will you help me guard Pow?" asked Buddy. He had placed Pow in an elaborate-looking box on which he'd drawn gears and levers. He had also wrapped string around it, stuck things to it with tape, and labeled it "Basset-Napping-Proof." "I will as soon as I've put Marnie to bed," Dawn replied. "Is that okay? I'll be down in a little while." "Anything's okay as long as you're not a bassett-napper," said Buddy.

So Dawn took Marnie upstairs. She gave her a bath, since Marnie loves baths.

"Moy? Moy baff?" Marnie kept asking, as Dawn played with her. (That's Marnie-talk for, "More bath?") "A little more," replied Dawn. "Look. Here are Bert and Ernie. They're in their boat. They're sailing over to ... Big Bird!" Marnie laughed. Soon, though, Dawn was tired of boats and Big Bird, and Marnie's fingers were looking pruny, so Dawn lifted her out of the tub and dried her off.

"Okay, bedtime," she announced.

Marnie began to whimper. But when she'd been tucked into her crib with her animals and her blanket, she looked quite happy.

"Good night, Marnie-O," whispered Dawn. She turned out the light and tiptoed out of Marnie's room, leaving the door open a crack. At the head of the stairs, she stopped and listened.

Nothing. Good. Marnie would fall asleep quickly.

Two flights down in the family room, Dawn found Pow still in his box. "So what is this?" she asked Buddy and Suzi.

Buddy was sitting by the box, facing in one direction, Suzi was sitting by it facing in the other. Both kids looked scared yet determined.

"We're guarding," Buddy replied. "We're not going to let Pow get dog-napped the way Tigger got kitten-napped. We heard about the letter Mary Anne found in her mailbox. We know about the kitten-napping." Thank goodness they didn't know about Brenner Field or our plan.

"You heard?" exclaimed Dawn. "How? I mean, who did you hear it from?" "Matt Braddock signed it to me." (Matt is deaf. He communicates with sign language, which most of his friends know.) "Who did he get the news from?" Dawn asked. Maybe that would be a clue to the mystery.

Buddy frowned. "Nicky Pike. Nicky said Jamie Newton told him." "Oh," said Dawn. Darn. No clue there. "So you heard about the note," she continued.

"Yup," answered Buddy, and Suzi nodded her head vigorously.

"And you've protected Pow," Dawn went on.

"Mm-hmm. We built him this special nap-proof box. We don't want him to get napped, too," said Suzi.

"Bassett-napped," Buddy corrected her.

"Or Pow-napped," Dawn added.

"Right," agreed Buddy. "Anyway, you know what happens sometimes? Sometimes bad guys come into a neighborhood and start going around pet-napping. Mostly they take dogs and cats. They're easier because they're outdoors. And then they sell them to people who want nice pets, and the real owners of the animals never see them again." "Unless there's a good detective," said Suzi, "and he finds the bad guys." "Buddy, Suzi," Dawn said, "I really don't think you have to worry about this." "Yes, we do," said Buddy firmly. "Some- times there's a - a rash of pet-napping in a neighborhood." "I just don't think that's going to happen here." "It might." "How long are you going to keep Pow indoors in this box?" asked Dawn.

Buddy frowned. "I don't know." "How about a compromise?" Dawn suggested. "A compromise between you and Pow. Buddy, you agree that Pow doesn't have to stay in the box, and Pow will agree to go outside only when you take him - until tomorrow afternoon. After tomorrow we'll know if Tigger was really kitten-napped. If he was, there could be trouble. If he wasn't, then the note was just a joke and you won't have to worry." "How come you'll know that tomorrow?" asked Buddy.

"We just will. Trust me," said Dawn.

"Well . . . okay." Buddy lifted Pow out of the box and Pow took off, looking as if he'd been released from prison.

"Suzi-Q," Dawn began.

"Oh, no! Please! Just ten more minutes," begged Suzi, before Dawn even said the word "bedtime." "Sorry. It's too close to eight o'clock. We better start now. Say good night to Buddy and Pow. Then we'll go upstairs. I think we'll have time for a story." "Okay." Reluctantly, Suzi said good night to Buddy, then found Pow and kissed his floppy ears.

Once Dawn and Suzi were in Suzi's bedroom, everything was fine. Suzi changed into her nightgown and got ready for bed. Then she chose a book to read - Millions of Cats. They read it twice. At last Dawn stood up.

"Okay, Suzi-Q. Time to go to sleep." "No," said Suzi, but her eyes were already half closed.

"Sleep tight," whispered Dawn, as she turned out the light.

"Okay." Suzi's reply was so faint that Dawn could barely hear it.

Dawn dashed downstairs. The time was 8:05, and she'd just remembered something. "Buddy!" she called.

"Yeah?" Dawn found Buddy in the playroom. He was about to open up his junior chemistry set. Perfect timing, thought Dawn. "Guess what," she said. "I forgot to tell you. Your mom said it's okay to watch Dragon Warriors." "You forgot to tell me, and I forgot about the show!" Buddy laughed. "Thanks, Dawn." He abandoned his chemistry set, jumped up, turned on the TV, and was glued to it for the next half hour.

At eight-thirty, he went upstairs. Recently he has decided that he likes to get ready for bed on his own, and then put himself to bed. So he did just that. Dawn trusted him.

After he'd left, she sat in the playroom, the TV off, listening to the storm. The wind had picked up again and it howled around the house. Dawn could see lightning and hear great claps of thunder, but no rain was falling yet.

Dawn loves a good storm, but she was a little spooked - by the Tigger-napping, and by Buddy's stories of rashes of pet-nappings. Would a pet-napper, she wondered, try to break into a house to steal a dog? A bassett hound, for instance?

CRASH went the thunder! In a flash, Dawn had picked up the phone and called me. We talked until she felt better. We talked about my dad and her mom. (No dates planned.) Then we talked about Logan.

"Poor guy," said Dawn.

"Poor guy?" I exclaimed. "He's being impossible. He's unpredictable, and he certainly hasn't been very understanding or sympathetic lately." "He's having a hard time on the ballfield." "He is?" "Well... he did once, anyway. I happened to be watching practice, and he dropped a ball that he'd caught and had right in his mitt. The coach yelled at him, and his teammates teased him." "So he had a bad day." CRASH! CRASH! Lightning lit up the sky at the same time the thunder sounded.

"Dawn?" I said. "We better get off the phone. My time is up and I don't think you're supposed to use the phone during an electric storm." Dawn sighed. "Okay." We hung up, both of us wondering what the next afternoon would bring.

Chapter 12.

How I made it through school on Tuesday is beyond me. All I could think about was Tigger, and our plan for the afternoon. What had we gotten ourselves into? Were we in any danger? I didn't really think so, but you never know. Maybe we were fooling around with ex-cons or something. But Logan was right - the culprit was probably a kid. And I hoped he had taken Tigger, so I could have him back.

At lunch that day, Kristy, Claudia, Dawn, Logan, and I sat together at a table that was as far from the crowded ones as possible. (Jessi and Mal eat during a different lunch period.) We had decided not to discuss the Tigger-napping at school, just in case the wrong person should overhear something, but Logan wanted to go over the details of our plan once more.

"Mary Anne?" he said. "You fixed the envelope?" I nodded. "It's just a regular letter envelope. It looks like it's full of bills, though. I put in Monopoly money - fifteen tens, so it's not too stuffed." "Good. And you know what to do today?" "Every step of the plan." "Great. The rest of you - you have your hiding places picked out?" "Yup," replied Kristy. "And we'll meet up with you so I can show you your hiding place. Oh, and Mary Anne, you know where I'll be hiding, right?" "Yes. In the tall grass behind the sycamore tree." I needed to know Kristy's hiding place so I could hide with her after I returned from pretending to go home. That way, she could give me news, if there was any, about what had happened after I'd left the envelope. I could have hidden with Logan, but he wanted to be alone in case he had to rush out and do something daring. What he didn't realize was that if he did, I'd join him in a second, followed by all the other members of the Baby-sitters Club.

We stick together.

At any rate, our plans were set.

"And now," said Kristy, "we better not talk about this anymore. We should just be our regular Baby-sitters Club table having lunch.

So in that case, anyone care for some fish eyes and glue?" she asked, holding out her dish of tapioca pudding. I know my face turned green.

That afternoon, we all went home in whatever way we usually would, except for Kristy, who walked home with Claudia, pretending she was going over to her house for the afternoon. It was easier than going to her house and then having to come all the way back to our neighborhood.

When I reached my house, I let myself inside and pounced on the envelope I'd fixed up. I was so afraid it would be missing. (What was the big deal? I'd get another envelope and put some more Monopoly money in it.) I think I was just worried about what might happen in Brenner Field - and soon.

I looked at my watch. Three-thirty. My friends were probably already hidden.

Three forty-five. With trembling hands, I picked up the envelope. It was time to go. I had to be at the big rock by four o'clock.

I left my house, locking the door behind me, and got on my bicycle. Bicycling would be a quicker way to travel when I was pretending to come home later. Then I turned onto the street, rode past Jamie's house, stopped by a wooded area, and locked my bike to a tree. Clutching the envelope, I walked through the grove and entered Brenner Field. It was damp and muddy in places from the storm the night before. I couldn't see any of my friends. I knew they were there, but they must have been awfully well hidden.

I had to pretend I was alone, though, so I just walked through the field, heading straight for the rock. When I reached it, I looked around. Was Tigger's kidnapper somewhere nearby? Was Tigger nearby? I saw nothing.

I laid the envelope on the rock. I put a smaller rock on top of it to keep it from blowing away. Then I left. I walked right back through the field the way I'd come, unlocked my bike, rode home, and put the bike away.

I waited for five very long minutes. Then I dashed across the street, through Claudia's yard, through several other yards to Jamie's, and approached the field from a different direction.

Bending over to keep low, I ran to Kristy's hiding spot, a tree in the middle of the field. I sank down against the trunk and looked hopefully at Kristy.

"Good work," she whispered. "I think. I mean, everything went smoothly. Let's just hope no one saw you come back. But nothing happened while you were gone." "Darn," I replied.

Puff, puff, Pant, pant. I worked at getting my breath back.

Kristy and I peeked around the sides of the sycamore tree. We could just barely see the big rock. We stared at it. We stared and stared and stared.

Half an hour went by.

"1 guess it was a joke," I whispered at last. "Maybe someone thought we'd think the note was funny, or that we wouldn't believe it." "Maybe Sam did it," suggested Kristy glumly.

Just as she finished speaking, I saw a flash of red across the field.

"Look!" I cried softly, pointing.

Kristy's head snapped up.

The two of us jerked to attention. We watched as a boy stepped into Brenner Field. He looked from left to right several times, as if he expected to see something ... or someone. Then he shaded his eyes and stared toward the big rock.

"His hands are empty," I whispered to Kristy in disappointment. "He doesn't have Tigger with him." Kristy made a sad face but didn't say any- thing, since we were supposedly being as quiet as possible.

The boy crept through the field, looking from left to right and behind him.

Suddenly I gasped.

Kristy looked at me around the back of the tree.

"That's the kid I met when I was putting up posters," I whispered indignantly. "He's the one who pretended he'd seen Tigger." Kristy frowned. We returned to our watching.

The boy reached the big rock. He saw the white envelope with the stone on top, brushed the stone away, and pocketed the envelope. He didn't even look inside it. Then he began to walk off.

"Hold it!" someone shouted.

Logan leaped out of the hiding place Kristy had shown him. He ran for the boy, but the boy raced away.

In a flash, we were all after the kid. Logan caught up with him first and grabbed him. Then the rest of us - all six of us - surrounded him.

"Where's Tigger?" I demanded.

"Tigger?" the boy repeated.

"That's right." "I don't know what you're talking about." "You mean you can't remember those posters you watched me put up?" Kristy, standing next to me, was smiling. I could imagine her saying, "Way to go, Mary Anne." I don't usually stand up for myself.

"Oh, um," stammered the boy, "yeah, those posters. Now I remember. Tigger is a missing . . . skunk?" "Kitten," replied Logan through clenched teeth. "And where is he?" "Where is he?" "Yeah. You've got your envelope," said Logan fiercely. "Now give us Tigger." "After I see what's in the envelope." Logan moved as quickly as a striking rattlesnake. One second the envelope was in the boy's hand, the next second it was in Logan's. "Give us Tigger and I'll give your money back," he said.

I widened my eyes. All this for Tigger? (And maybe for me?) "Give me the money and I'll tell you where Tigger is," countered the boy.

"No way," said Kristy. "And remember, it's seven against one." "And we can wait around all afternoon. All night, if necessary," added Jessi.

The boy scowled. "Okay, okay," he said.

Ill Goody, I thought. Now comes the part where he tells us where Tigger is.

"I don't have your stupid cat," the boy went on. "I just said I did so I could earn some fast money." "You little - "I began, but Dawn put her hand on my arm. I knew she meant, Don't let him know he got to you. I changed course. "What a stupid thing to do!" I exclaimed. "It didn't work, did it? You got caught, and now you look like a fool!" "Whoa," said Kristy under her breath.

If the boy could have backed up then, I think he would have. But he turned round and saw Mallory blocking his path. No way out. He began to look scared.

"What's your name, kid?" asked Logan.

"I - I'm not telling. I mean, why do you want to know?" "Do you know that what you did is a felony?" I have no idea whether this is true, since Logan can make things up pretty easily, but it sure sounded good.

"It is?" "Yes. And in the state of Connecticut, it's punishable by twenty-five to fifty years in the slammer. Even for juvenile offenders." Now I knew Logan was just talking. He loves to use cop-show words like those.

"We could make a citizens' arrest," Logan went on. He looked around at us and we nodded as if to say, The seven of us are in agreement on eyen/thing.

"Are you going to?" asked the boy. "Arrest me, I mean?" Logan looked at us girls. Then just at me.

I shook my head. "Nope. He's not worth it." (The boy let out a breath he must have been holding for at least five minutes. That's how deep it sounded.) "So let go of him and show him the money," I said. "Let him see what he's missing." Logan grinned. "Sure thing." He opened the envelope and pulled out the Monopoly bills.

"That's all you'd have gotten away with anyway," I told the kid.

"That? Fake money?" he cried.

"Well, it just goes to show," spoke up Claudia. "Crime really doesn't pay." She grinned.

Everyone laughed except the boy, who looked disgusted. We moved aside and let him escape. He ran through the field the way he had come, and disappeared. The rest of us walked back to my neighborhood.

Our adventure was over. But where was Tigger?

Chapter 13.

That was a horrible thought, but Claudia certainly wasn't the only one to think it. I'd thought of it the very first night Tigger was gone, and it had been hanging over me like a dark cloud ever since. You can't help but wonder about the worst possibilities, yet you tell yourself all along that they could never happen. Anyway, Claudia's notebook entry didn't surprise or offend me.

It was Wednesday, the day after our rendezvous with the jerky kid in Brenner Field. My friends and I were trying to get back on normal schedules. I wanted to search for Tigger, but I had a feeling it would be pointless. I would just have to keep my eyes and ears open and let the posters do their work. So I was baby-sitting for Kerry and Hunter Bruno again, and Claudia was at the Perkinses'.

Myriah and Gabbie are really great kids. This is the truth. I knew it from the very first time I baby-sat for them. They adore Laura, their baby sister, they love to sing and dance, and they're very imaginative. Most kids just play house. You should see the games they invent. The afternoon that Claudia was there they played detective games.

When Claudia arrived, Mrs. Perkins re- minded her where the emergency numbers were posted. Then she gave Claud a few instructions, and she and Laura left. Claudia sat down at the kitchen table, where the girls were having a snack. Her first thought as she sat down was one I always have when I'm at the Perkinses': How weird to think that this used to be Kristy's house. It doesn't look the same from the inside, and it doesn't even feel the same. I guess that's good. It would be too weird if it looked and felt the same as ever.

Claudia watched Myriah and Gabbie, who were dunking Oreos in glasses of milk. "What do you want to do today, you guys?" she asked.

"Gosh," replied Myriah, "there are so many things." Claudia smiled. She wouldn't mind being five again. "Like what?" she asked.

"Like dancing or singing or making up a play." "Sounds like fun. Which do you want to do, Gabbers?" "Mm, let me think." Gabbie put down her glass of milk. "I would like to sing, Claudee Kishi," she replied. (Gabbie calls most people by their full names.) "I would like to sing Christmas songs." "Christmas songs!" exclaimed Claudia. "But Christmas is months away." "That doesn't matter," Myriah spoke up.

"I guess not," said Claudia.

Myriah and Gabbie jumped up from the table. "We know 'White Christmas,' " said Myriah. "And I'll Be Home for Christmas" Claudia was surprised. They did? What about the simple songs like "Jingle Bells" or "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer?" But the Per-kins girls know a lot of long, grown-up songs. And sure enough, they knew both of these, word for word. They performed them with hand motions and everything.

Claudia was impressed. "Hurray!" she cried, clapping her hands. "Hurray!" The girls took bows. "Thank you, thank you," they said.

"And now," Myriah went on, as if she and Gabbie were putting on a show, "we will perform that oldy but goody, 'Blue Suede Shoes,' by Mr. Elvis Presley." Claudia was even more impressed. Apparently, Myriah and Gabbie knew an entire rock and roll song - and she didn't. Furthermore, for years Claudia had thought the singer's name was Elbow Presley.

Gabbie and Myriah ran to their bedrooms.

They returned wearing black sunglasses and Hawaiian shirts. Then they bopped their way through the song.

"Hey!" exclaimed Myriah when they had finished, and Claudia had stopped clapping. "Gabbie, you know what we could play now?" "What?" "Hawaiian detectives. We're all dressed for it." "Hawaiian defectives? What are they?" "They're people who live in Hawaii and look for things." "What kinds of things?" "Missing things. Like Tigger." "Oh." Claudia had stood up. She was clearing the kitchen table. She put the dirty plates and cups in the dishwasher. Then she sponged off the counter and tabletop.

"Claudia?" asked Myriah suddenly. "Do real detectives look for pets?" Claudia had no idea, but she said, "Well, I don't see why not. They look for people all the time. So I'm sure they look for animals, too." "Oh, good." "Come on, Claudee Kishi," Gabbie said, as Myriah led her sister outdoors.

Claudia followed the girls. As the three of them stepped onto the back porch, they were greeted by joyous woofs. There was Chewbacca, ready to play. He looked as if he wanted to say, Okay, guys. Here I am. All ready. What do we do first?

Gabbie glanced at Myriah. "Is Chewy going to be a defective, too?" "Yes," replied Myriah. "He is. He will help us find R.C. I mean, Tigger." Claudia smiled. R.C. is the Perkinses' cat. Claudia had a feeling the girls were going on a fake Tigger hunt. She also thought it was pretty interesting that Myriah didn't even expect to find Tigger anymore. Only a Tigger stand-in.

"Now, Gabbie," Myriah began, as she sat on the lawn with Claudia, Chewy, and her sister, "we are playing a special Hawaiian detective game called 'private eyes.' " "Private eyes?" repeated Gabbie, puzzled.

"Don't worry about it. They're detectives. A lot of them live in Hawaii." "Why?" "I don't know. They just do. At least on TV. But it doesn't matter. Now, the first thing private eyes do when they've got a case is - " "Go on the swings!" cried Gabble. She jumped up, heading for the swing set.

"No!" exclaimed Myriah. "Don't you want to play, Gabbers?" And Chewy looked at Gabbie with eyes that said, Oh, please, please, please, please, please stay and play with me! "Okay," she replied and sat down again.

Claudia pulled her into her lap.

"All right. There's a missing cat," Myriah began. "I mean, kitten. His name is Tigger. It's our job to find him. Are you ready for that job, Private Eye Gabbie?" Gabbie was poking at a beetle in the grass.

"Private Eye?" Myriah asked again. "Private Eye?" "You're the private eye," Claudia whispered to Gabbie.

"Oh, yeah," she said.

Sometimes we forget that Gabbie is only two and a half.

"Hmm. Maybe we need one more private eye around here," said Myriah.

Claudia didn't really want to play detectives, and started to say so, but before she could open her mouth, Myriah said, "Can we see if Jamie can come over?" "Sure," replied Claudia, even though sometimes this is a good idea, and sometimes it isn't. Jamie, Myriah, and Gabbie are good friends, but every now and then they get just a tiny bit wild.

Claudia walked the girls and Chewbacca over to Jamie's house, spoke to Mrs. Newton, took Jamie by the hand, and then walked everyone back to the Perkinses'. Myriah assembled her team in the backyard. She stood in front of Jamie and Gabbie and said once more, "We have a missing kitten. His name is Tigger. It's our job to find him. Are you ready for that job, Private Eyes?" "Yes!" shouted Gabbie and Jamie.

"Then let's get going! Spread out, men!" The kids searched the Perkinses' backyard. R.C. was nowhere in sight. "Hey, Private Eye Myriah, can I look in the house?" asked Jamie.

"Sure," replied Myriah. "Good thinking!" Claudia stood around on the porch, where she could keep an eye on both Jamie and the girls. After a few minutes, Jamie returned triumphantly to the porch, lugging R.C.

"Good work!" shouted Myriah. "Where did you find him, Private Eye?" "In the bathroom! Napping!" "What are you going to do with him now?" Claudia asked the private eyes.

"Give him back to Mary Anne," said Myriah.

"Oh, okay. But Mary Anne isn't home now. She's baby-sitting." Myriah looked thoughtful. "If someone really found Tigger," she said slowly, "and Mary Anne wasn't home and neither was her daddy, what would happen?" "I think the person would just wait until someone came home. Don't you? I mean, if R.C. were Tigger - if you'd found Tigger - you'd wait until someone came home, right? You'd keeping calling the Spiers' house, or ringing their doorbell. And when someone finally answered, you'd give Tigger back." "Right," said Myriah. She and Jamie and Gabbie went back to their detective game.

Claudia sat on the porch and watched them. A funny feeling had washed over her. And that was due to the awful thought she was thinking. What if Tigger were dead? What if he were never coming back? What would I do? Claudia knew my mother had died when I was young. I don't remember her dying, but it had happened, and Claudia didn't want another death in my family. (Tigger definitely counts as family.) Claudia worried and worried. No one she was close to had died. Mimi had gotten very sick when she'd had her stroke, but then she'd recovered, even if she was a little confused now. But Tigger had been missing an awfully long time now, for a kitten. Five whole days.

Claudia had a bad feeling about things, overall. She wondered if it was too soon to ask me how I'd feel about getting another kitten, about getting a replacement for Tigger.

Chapter 14.

"Ah-choo! Ah-choo!" Guess where I was? Back at the Brunos'. Poor Hunter's allergies weren't any better than before. In fact, I thought he sounded worse.

"Thank you for coming on short notice, Mary Anne," Mrs. Bruno said to me. "Hunter was supposed to see the dentist today, too, but as you can hear, it probably wouldn't be a very good idea. He can have his teeth checked some other time." "Yeah, but us lucky ones still get to go today," said Logan, taking Kerry's hand. "Ah. I just love the dentist." Mrs. Bruno and I laughed, but Kerry shook her brother's hand away. "Mom," she said crossly, "do I have to go the dentist today? I'd rather stay at home." "Honey, you've barely left the house the last few days. Besides, we have an appointment, and there's no reason to miss it." "Hunter's missing it." "Hunter has a reason. He would probably sneeze and bite the dentist." Kerry managed a smile.

"Okay, Mary Anne, you're on your own," said Mrs. Bruno, heading for the door. "We should be back in a couple of hours." I smiled. "Don't worry about us. Hunter and I will be fine." "Yeah," said Hunter. "Just . . . fide. Ah-choo! Ah-CHOO!" Mrs. Bruno shook her head. Then she and Kerry and Logan left.

"Well," I said to Hunter, "what do you feel like doing this afternoon?" "Ridig by bike? Doe, that's probably dot - ah-choo! - a very good idea. Ub, we could go up to by roob ad play with by erector set. It's really deat. It has all this space stuff - a ludar bodule ad a bood-bobile." It took me a moment to figure those last two things out, but finally I said, "Oh, a lunar module and a moon-mobile!" "Right." Hunter nodded.

"Okay. Let's go." Hunter led me upstairs to his bare room. He pulled his erector set out of the closet. We began planning our space station, but right away, Hunter's sneezing grew worse.

Maybe he's sneezing because of my perfume, I thought. I hardly ever wear perfume, but at school that day, Claudia had dabbed some of hers onto my neck and wrists. I could still smell it. "Be right back," I said. I ran into the bathroom, ripped off a sheet of paper towel, wet it, and scrubbed at my wrists and neck. When I couldn't smell the perfume anymore, I went back to Hunter's room. But before I even entered it, I could hear him sneezing.

"Ah-choo! Ah-choo! Look, here's the door to the space statiod, Bary Adde," he said when he saw me.

"Hunter, that's great, but . . . just a sec." I was looking around his room. What could be making him sneeze so much? I closed his windows. Then I closed his door. I laid my sweat shirt against the crack at the bottom of the door to keep dust from coming in. Then it occurred to me that maybe Hunter was allergic to my sweat shirt, so I opened the door and tossed it into the hallway. I thought for a few moments, then took off my socks and shoes and tossed them into the hallway. That ought to do it.

"Ah-choo! Ah-choo!" Nope.

"Hunter," I said, "subthig, I mean something, is making you sneeze extra sneezes. I think maybe it's your erector set. You'd just gotten it out when you began sneezing. Maybe the pieces are dusty. Or maybe the box is dusty." "Doe," said Hunter, and he grabbed for a tissue. "Do't bother puttig it away. Ah-choo! It's dot the erector set. I doe what's bakig be sdeeze. Ah-choo! Cub od. I'll show you." Hunter led me into Kerry's room. What was he going to show me? A little dust bunny under her bed? No, he opened Kerry's closet. He motioned to me.

"Ah-ah-ah-ah-AH-AH-CHOOOO!" Hunter sneezed the biggest sneeze I've ever heard from a five-year-old. "Look id the box," he managed to say.

Then Hunter backed away and I stepped into the closet. On the floor was a large cardboard carton. I peered inside. Down at the bottom was . . . Tigger! I gasped. "Tigger!" I cried. "Oh, Tigger!" I lifted him out of the box gently, as if he would break, and cradled him in my arms. Then I held him up to my face and felt the start of his Tigger-purr against my cheek. "Have you been here all along?" I whispered to him. I turned to Hunter. "Has he been here all this time?" But before Hunter could say a word, I turned back to Tigger, "Oh, I missed you so much. I really did. I thought you were, um," (I glanced at Hunter) "I thought you were . . . hurt. But, oh, it doesn't matter. I missed you!" Tigger was nuzzling my arm, and I felt as if I never wanted to put him down, but then I noticed Hunter. He was sitting on Kerry's bed, sneezing practically nonstop, a raggedy tissue in his hands.

"Oops," I said. "Tigger, I really hate to do this, but I'm going to have to put you back in the box. Later this afternoon, though, you're going to come home with me." "Is he yours?" asked Hunter as we left Kerry's room.

"Yes," I replied. For good measure, I closed her door behind us. Then I went to the bathroom and washed my hands and arms and face. I couldn't believe that I was abandoning Tigger, even if it was only temporarily, but he looked fine, and Hunter came first. After all, I was baby-sitting.

As you might imagine, I had an awful lot of questions. So I decided to talk to Hunter. The two of us sat at the kitchen table. (I thought the kitchen was probably the most dust-free room on the first floor.) Hunter wasn't much help, though.

"How long have you known Tigger was here?" I asked him.

"Just sidce this bordig. I foud him by accidet. Kerry said dot to tell iddybody she has bib. She says they'll be bad because of by allergies. But I just had to tell subbody." "You did the right thing," I told Hunter. "Does anyone else know Tigger's here?" Hunter shrugged. "Do't doe." "How did Kerry get Tigger?" "Do't doe." "Did you know Tigger's my kitten?" I asked.

"Doe. Dot till you picked hib up ad every-thig." "Does Kerry know he's my kitten?" Hunter shrugged again.

"Well, Logan certainly knows he's my kitten," I said.

"But I do't doe if Logad dows he's here." "Oh. Right. . . . Hunter, you know I'll have to tell your mom about Tigger, don't you?" I added. "Even though Kerry might get in trouble." Hunter nodded. "I doe." He looked worried and relieved at the same time.

It seemed like hours, of course, before the Brunos came home. That always happens when you're waiting desperately for something. But at last they arrived. And they were in pretty good moods. Nobody, it turned out, had had a single cavity, so they were going to celebrate.

But they were waiting for a day when Hunter was feeling better, and when Mr. Bruno could join them.

"How did everything go, Mary Anne?" Mrs. Bruno finally asked.

I couldn't see anything to do but to come right out with the truth. Hunter and I glanced at each other nervously. He knew what was coming.

"Mrs. Bruno," I began, and suddenly I found that I couldn't look at Logan. If he had known about Tigger all this time, then . . . then we couldn't be friends anymore. We just couldn't. "Mrs. Bruno, today Hunter couldn't stop sneezing, so I went looking for whatever was making him sneeze so much and - and there's a kitten in Kerry's closet!" This wasn't a lie, but it didn't point the finger at poor Hunter. He'd been right to show me Tigger, and I didn't want Kerry calling him a tattletale.

"A kitten!" cried Mrs. Bruno.

I finally glanced at Logan. He looked surprised. But was he surprised that a kitten had been found in Kerry's closet, or just surprised that Kerry had been found out?

"Yes," I said, "a kitten. And - and he's my kitten. He's been missing for five days. We've been searching for him everywhere." "Tigger is in Kerry's closet?" Logan exclaimed.

All Mrs. Bruno could do was cry, "What?" and head for the stairs. Logan, Kerry, Hunter, and I followed her. When she reached Kerry's room, she flung open the door, raced for the closet, slid the box out, and exclaimed, "There is a kitten!" "And it is Tigger," added Logan.

As if he didn't know, I thought.

Hunter began sneezing again, so Mrs. Bruno told him to go downstairs. Then she looked at Kerry. "Well," she said, "I think we have a little talking to do." Kerry nodded miserably, her eyes on the ground. She sat on her bed and Mrs. Bruno sat next to her. Logan and I kind of stood around, unable to look at each other.

"How did you get Tigger?" Mrs. Bruno asked.

"I - I just found him," replied Kerry. "And I didn't know he was Tigger then. Honest. I was riding my bike home last Friday and it was getting dark. Remember? The weather wasn't very nice that day. And I was a few houses away from Mary Anne's and I thought I saw something shiny by the side of the road. So I stopped. And it was this kitten. Its eyes were shining. I thought, Poor kitty, no one's taking care of you. So I just put him in my bike basket and rode him home. I wanted to have a friend. And I wanted to show you and Daddy that I could care for a pet. I really am responsible enough to do that. Look how well I cared for Tigger." Kerry jumped up. She began pulling things out of the closet. "See? With my own money I bought this food and this toy and these dishes and I never once forgot to feed Tigger. Or change his water. He's my friend." Even I had to admit that Tigger looked well cared for.

"But honey," said Mrs. Bruno, "you know we can't have a cat, no matter how responsible you are. Hunter's just too allergic." Kerry put Tigger's things back in the closet. Then she faced us, biting at one of her nails. "Um, I was also hoping to prove that Hunter would be okay as long as the cat stayed in my room. But - but I guess it didn't work." Mrs. Bruno closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them, she said, "Kerry, I'm a little confused. Did you know the kitten belonged to Mary Anne?" "Not at first," said Kerry. "I really didn't. I thought he was lost or that somebody had dumped him by the side of the road. Then Logan told us about Tigger and I figured it out, only I thought, well, Mary Anne isn't taking very good care of him if she lets him wander away. I decided he'd be better off with me." Mrs. Bruno didn't agree with that, of course, so she and Kerry kept talking. My mind began to wander. I thought of how different Logan had seemed lately, of how he'd sounded kind of irritated that us baby-sitters wanted him to come to our meetings about Tigger, and how he'd jumped right in and been so helpful when I got the ransom note. He must have known all along that Kerry had Tigger, so he was trying to protect her. The ransom note was perfect. Kerry hadn't sent it. Logan could help with the Tigger-napping all he wanted, look like a hero, and keep Kerry's secret.

I couldn't stand it any longer. "I have to go," I said huskily. I grabbed Tigger and headed down the hallway.

"But I haven't paid you yet!" Mrs. Bruno called after me.

"I'll get it tomorrow!" I shouted back.

Logan was at my heels. "Mary Anne, what's wrong?" he cried as I barged through the front door.

"You know what's wrong," I answered icily. "You knew about Tigger all along - and you didn't tell me." I placed Tigger in the basket on my bicycle and sped down the Brunos' driveway, without giving Logan a chance to answer me.

Chapter 15.

Wednesday afternoon - late.

Things happened fast. Everyone found out about Tigger quickly. (Of course, I made a lot of phone calls, carefully leaving out the part about Logan.) Then, instead of holding a club meeting, Claudia and Mallory and I walked through the neighborhood and took down as many of the Tigger posters as we could find. Dawn gave back everyone's portion of the reward money and returned the remainder to the treasury envelope. Later, I spent as much time with Tigger as possible - talking to him, cuddling him, playing with him. That night, he slept with me.

I did not let Tigger outside.

Thursday.

I did not talk to Logan. In school, we avoided each other. He sat with his guy friends at lunchtime.

"Is anything wrong between you and Lo-gan?" Kristy asked me as we sat down in the cafeteria.

I nodded.

"But you don't want to talk about it?" said Dawn.

I shook my head. I didn't want to speak. I was afraid I'd cry. Logan and I had had fights before, but this one was different. I'd never accused him of anything so awful. And I'd never felt so unsure about us. If Logan could keep Tigger from me, what did that say about our relationship? By the end of the day, I just had to know.

I waited for Logan at his locker.

"Hi," he said shortly when he saw me.

"Hi," I replied. I stepped aside so he could work his combination lock.

When his locker was open, I said, "Can I talk to you?" "Not now. I've got baseball practice." "Later? I'm not baby-sitting this afternoon. I'll be at home." "Will we have to sit outside?" "Yup." (Logan knew that.) He sighed.

"Come on. It's a beautiful day," I told him. "And I really do want to talk." "Okay. I'll be there. See you later." Logan closed his locker, turned, and strode down the hall.

Well, I thought, this is better than nothing.

I walked home with Claudia. When I reached my house, the first thing I did was pick up Tigger. "Oh, it's so nice to find you here when I get home from school," I told him. I lifted him up so we were eye to eye.

"Mrow?" asked Tigger.

"I don't know," I answered. "Logan's coming over this afternoon. He'll explain everything then, I hope." I made sure that a bottle of Logan's favorite soda was in the refrigerator. I made sure we had ice cubes. Soda over ice in a glass is much nicer than warmish soda in a can.

At five o'clock, our bell rang. I ran to the front door and threw it open. Logan stood on our steps, mitt in one hand, books under one arm.

"Sit down," I told him. "I'll be right back. I'm getting you something to drink." Actually, I was getting more than that. By the time Logan rang the bell, I'd fixed up a tray. I'd put a plate of cookies in the middle and next to it a couple of napkins. Now I set the glasses on it, added the ice and soda, and carried the tray to the front door, which I managed to open as I rested the tray against the wall. When the tray and I were safely outside, Logan looked at us in surprise.

"What's all this?" he asked.

"Nothing," I replied. (What a dumb answer. It was cookies and soda. And I'd fixed them because I hoped to make up with Logan.) Logan took a soda and drank about half the glass in one gulp. How do boys do that? I mean, without exploding from the carbonation. Then he looked at me as if to say, "Well?" I breathed in deeply, then exhaled. "Logan," I began, "just answer one question for me, okay?" "Okay." "Did you know that Kerry was hiding Tigger in her room?" "No." "Really?" "That's two questions. And Mary Anne, I don't lie. To be honest, I'm really hurt that you could even think I'd do such a thing. Why would you think that, anyway?" "Because . . . because ..." Don't fall apart, I told myself. Sometimes when people accuse me of things, or sound like they're accusing me of things, I just crumple up and start to cry. So I took another deep breath (this is very relaxing, by the way) and said slowly, "Because of the way you've been acting lately. You snap at me, and you didn't seem to be very sympathetic when Tigger was missing. I know you helped with the search - the posters and everything - but it seemed like a huge chore for you. So I thought you knew about Kerry and Tigger and were just trying to protect Kerry. After all, she's your sister." "And you're my Mary Anne." Logan polished off the cookie he'd been eating, and put his arm around me. "I could never hurt you. Not on purpose. I couldn't lie to you. Don't you know that?" "I thought I did. But you have hurt me lately. You've changed." Logan looked down at the grass. "You might as well know," he said. "I'm about to get kicked off the baseball team." "You are? Why?" I couldn't believe it. Logan had been the star of his school team in Louisville.

"Coach doesn't like me. He expects more of me than of anyone else. And I start making stupid mistakes because of that." "Oh." I remembered what Dawn had told me, how she'd watched Logan drop a ball that was right in his mitt.

"So a little while ago, Coach said I'd be off the team if I didn't improve. And I've been trying to improve. I really have. But Coach yells at me all the time and just makes me so nervous. I'm thinking of quitting before I get kicked off." "Wow." "Yeah. But I guess I kind of took my baseball problem out on you. That wasn't fair." "It's okay. I should never have accused you of knowing about Tigger. That wasn't fair, either." "Kerry is a champion sneak," added Logan. "She could hide a whale in the house and we'd never notice him." "Not until you smelled him." Logan and I laughed.

Then Logan said seriously, "I bet Kerry would change one hundred per cent if she could just make some friends here." "Well, I can help with that. I'll try to get her together with Becca Ramsey or Charlotte Jo-hanssen." "Hey, that'd be great! Listen, Mary Anne, I'm sorry about the way I acted." "And I'm sorry about the things I said. . . . Is our fight over?" "Yes. . . . Are the neighbors watching us?" "Probably. That's the purpose of this outdoor arrangement." Logan made a face. "Then let's just promise that from now on, we'll be more honest with each other." "I promise," I said solemnly.

"Me, too," replied Logan.

Friday.

Club meeting day. At five-thirty we gathered in Claudia's room. Tigger was with me. He was curled up in my lap.

As soon as our opening business was taken care of, the phone rang.

"First job of the day!" said Kristy gaily, as she reached for the receiver. She picked it up. "Hello, Baby-sitters Club. . . . Oh, hi, Logan. Hold on. Here she is." Kristy handed me the phone, saying, "If it isn't a job offer, keep it short." Ms. Bossy.

"Hi, Logan," I said. "What's up? Oh . . ." I listened for quite awhile. When I'd hung up, I turned to the other girls. "It was a Kerry update," I said. "Logan thought you'd like to know what's happened, since you were all involved with the search for Tigger." Five heads nodded.

"Okay. Well, of course Mr. and Mrs. Bruno were not too happy about what Kerry had done, but they understood why she'd done it.

She's going to be punished lightly, like, she has to wash the Brunos' cars or something, for keeping Tigger when she knew he belonged to me, and for bringing an animal into the house, especially so near to Hunter's room. However, the Brunos also think Kerry proved she's responsible enough to care for a pet. So tomorrow she and her parents will go to the pet store and Kerry will get to choose a hairless animal, like a turtle or some fish. Plus, next Wednesday, she's going over to Charlotte's house. She needs a friend her age. And one who's human." "That's great!" cried Claud, and the others agreed.

The meeting continued. When the numbers on Claud's digital clock turned to 6:00, Kristy said, "Well, meeting's over." Everyone stood up, except me.

"Come on, Mary Anne," called Dawn.

"Can't," I said. "Tigger's asleep." Kristy groaned. "You are overprotecting that kitten." "Yeah. You're treating him, oh, kind of the way your dad used to treat you," said Claud.

I stuck my tongue out at her and everyone laughed. Then I said, "All I know is that Tigger will not be allowed to start dating until he's at least sixteen. And I will never, ever let him get his driver's license. Or have his ears pierced." "How about his nose?" asked Kristy, as I struggled to my feet.

I held the sleeping Tigger out toward her. "On this baby?" Tigger opened his eyes sleepily and yawned in Kristy's face.

"Mmm. Cat-food breath," she said.

The six of us began giggling again as we headed downstairs.

Cat-food breath or not, I was thrilled to have Tigger back - and Logan, too.

About the Author ANN M. MARTIN did a lot of baby-sitting when she was growing up in Princeton, New Jersey. Now her favorite baby-sitting charge is her cat, Mouse, who lives with her in her Manhattan apartment.

Ann Martin's Apple Paperbacks are Bummer Summer, Inside Out, Stage Fright, Me and Katie (the Pest), and all the other books in the Babysitters Club series.

She is a former editor of books for children, and was graduated from Smith College. She likes ice cream, the beach, and I Love Lucy; and she hates to cook.

BSC027 - Jessi and the Superbrat - Martin, Ann M.

Chapter 1.

"Mama! Daddy! Get in here?! Jessi, hurry! Come on!" That was my little sister, Becca, calling us from the living room. If you don't know Becca, you might've thought some major catastrophe had just happened, like: A. The house was on fire.

B. Enemy soldiers had trooped into our yard, aimed their guns through the front window, and opened fire.

C. A flying saucer had crashed through our roof, and Martians were streaming down the staircase to capture us and take us off to Spacecreatureland.

So what was it? Fortunately, the answer was: None of the Above. The truth was, Becca was only calling us because of a TV show. The show had just come on and she wanted us to watch it with her.

Mama, Daddy, Squirt, and I were in the kitchen, cleaning up after dinner. Well, Squirt wasn't exactly cleaning up. He was still strapped in his high chair, gnawing on a teething biscuit, and he had as much food caked on his face as we had just washed off the dishes.

Maybe 1 should introduce myself and my family before I start the story. My full name is Jessica Davis Ramsey, but everybody calls me Jessi. I'm eleven years old and in sixth grade. I'm black, and just to give you an idea of how few black families live here in Stoneybrook, Connecticut, I'll tell you that I'm the only black kid in my entire grade at Stoneybrook Middle School. I keep my hair long because I take ballet class two times a week and ballerinas are supposed to be able to pull their hair back. Probably my best feature is my legs. They're long, long, long, which is great for dancing. My grandma always says they're graceful, too. And Mama says I move like a cat. I take that as a compliment.

You can tell I have a nice family. I live with my parents, eight-year-old sister Becca (that's short for Rebecca) and my baby brother Squirt. No, his real name's not Squirt, it's John Philip Ramsey, Jr. But when he was born, he was the tiniest baby in the hospital, so the nurses gave him a special nickname.

As I said, my family and I live in Stoneybrook, Connecticut, but we used to live in Oakley, New Jersey, and that was great because my grandparents lived on the same street as we did and so did a lot of my aunts and uncles and cousins. One of my cousins, Keisha, was my very best friend. She and I have the exact same birthday, and Keisha always seemed to know what I was feeling about things.

I'd lived in Oakley since I was a baby, but then Daddy's company transferred him to Stamford, Connecticut, so we found this house in Stoneybrook, nearby. I'll tell you honestly, sometimes I still miss Oakley. It was a little easier to be myself there. And I especially miss Keisha. I mean, how many best friends have known each other since they were one day old?

Well, Stoneybrook doesn't have Keisha. And it doesn't have my wonderful grandparents or my aunts and uncles. But it does offer a lot of other things. Since we moved here, I enrolled in a very good ballet school in Stamford. To get in, I had to audition. And then Daddy built me my very own ballet barre and practice area in our basement. I also found myself another best friend. Her name is Mallory Pike. And because of Mallory, I now belong to one of the greatest clubs in the world - the Baby-sitters Club. Maybe that's been the best thing about moving to Stoneybrook.

The club was the great idea of Kristy Thomas. She's an eighth-grader who goes to my school. Last year, when she was in seventh grade, she got together with a bunch of friends who love to baby-sit and they formed a club. They sent out fliers to all the families in the neighborhood - very professional - and pretty soon they had a booming business. Leave it to Kristy. She's a take-charge type of person. The club meets three afternoons a week - Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 5:30 until 6:00 - and families who need a baby-sitter know to call us up during club hours. The great thing is that one of us is bound to be free. So our clients are sure of getting a sitter and, meanwhile, we get plenty of jobs. Everybody's happy! All the club members are eighth-graders except for Mallory and me. Mallory got in because all the Baby-sitters knew her. See, the girls had sat a lot for Mallory's family, the Pikes. Oh, 1 guess 1 forgot to tell you. Mallory is from a big family, and I'm talking big. Believe it or not, there are eight kids in the Pike family. Mallory's the oldest. Mrs. Pike used to hire sitters from the club and Mallory would always help them out. Of course, being the oldest of eight, Mallory was always great with the kids. So when there was an opening in the club, Kristy decided to let her in. Lucky me, she decided to let me in at the same time! How did I get started on all this? Wasn't I telling you about Becca and the TV show? Well, to get back to the beginning of the story, there I was in the kitchen with Mama, Daddy, and Squirt. And there was Becca in the living room, bellowing at us with the full power of her lungs. Mama looked at Daddy.

"Do you think someone wants our attention?" she said, and laughed.

"You guys!" Becca was now standing in the kitchen doorway. Her arms were crossed over her chest and she had this expression on her face that said, I can't believe you guys are just standing there when the best show on TV has come on.

"ABADA!" said Squirt. (He loves to be in on any conversation.) "Okay, everybody!" Becca said. "If you hurry, you won't miss anything." Mama lifted Squirt out of his high chair and wiped his face clean with the washcloth we keep in the kitchen for that purpose.

"So what is this five-star show we're missing?" Daddy asked.

"P.S. 162," I explained. "Becca says all the kids in her class watch it every Friday night. I think Becca has a crush on one of the kids in it." "I do not!" Becca cried. She was already back in the living room and settled in her seat. Mama followed her and set Squirt on the carpet. Then she and Daddy squeezed onto the couch next to Becca. I laid down on the floor on my back and lifted one of my legs toward me to stretch it out. Sometimes when 1 watch TV, I use the time to do stretching exercises. I've got my family trained. They're completely used to seeing me sprawled all over the floor like a contortionist. Becca's the only one who ever complains, and that's only if I block her view of the screen.

"Where's the popcorn?" Daddy joked, as we all settled down for the show.

"Shh!" Becca said. Her eyes were glued to the TV, even though all that was on was a commercial for toothpaste.

I'd seen this show, P.S. 162, a couple of times before, and I'd liked it okay. But until that day I'd never thought it was anything special. It's about an inner city elementary school, and the class includes all different kinds of kids. The character Becca has a crush on is named Lamont. He's black, and in the show he's the most popular kid in the class. For good reason, too - Lamont is smart, funny, and good-looking. In the class, there're also Latin kids, Asian kids, and white kids. One of the white characters is named Waldo, and I've got to admit, he always makes me laugh. He's got weird, spiky hair and he wears this pair of thick black glasses and he's an incredible science whiz. You know, one of those kids who lives and breathes science, but put him in the real world and he can barely tie his shoes. When he talks to the other kids, he always uses big, science-y words like "zygotes" and "ecosystem," and of course the other kids don't have a clue what he's talking about.

That night, finally - after what seemed like about a hundred commercials - the show came on. In the opening scene, as a joke, one of the kids swiped Lament's homework and Lamont was looking for it everywhere. Class was about to begin. The teacher rapped on her desk to get everyone's attention and then asked for a volunteer to write the homework on the board. She stared at Lamont. He slunk low in his desk chair, trying to avoid her gaze.

"Lamont," the teacher said.

From her seat on the couch, Becca let out a long, low wail. "Oh, no!" she cried. You would've thought Becca was the one caught without her homework.

Daddy started to laugh.

"I take it Lamont is the boy Becca's got a crush on," he teased.

"Shhh!" Becca said.

Just then in the show Waldo raised his hand.

"Miss Pedagogue," he said, very seriously. "I've got the correct answer. Allow me." He strode up to the board and wrote the word "fission" in big block letters. The teacher groaned and buried her head in her hands.

"Waldo," she said, "1 hate to break it to you, but this is history class. After history comes English. And then, after English, comes science. How about if you just hang onto your answer for a couple more periods? Believe me, when it's science, I'll let you know." Waldo got flustered and dropped the magnifying glass that he keeps in his pocket onto the floor. All the other kids in the class laughed. So did the voices on the laugh track.

When that scene was over, P.S. 162 faded off for a commercial break and an ad for some gasoline company came on.

Becca stared dreamily at the screen.

"Isn't Lamont the cutest guy in the world?" she said with a sigh.

"He's pretty nice, all right," Mama agreed.

"I think Waldo's funnier," I said.

"You like Waldo?" Becca said. "So does everyone in my class. Charlotte Johanssen said that the kid who plays him used to go to Stoneybrook Elementary School." (Charlotte Johanssen is Becca's best friend. She's lived in Stoneybrook a lot longer than we have.) "Is that true?" asked Mama.

"Cross my heart," said Becca. She traced an X on her chest over her heart. Then she spit on her finger and raised her hand in a sort of oath. I still didn't know whether to believe her. "Charlotte said he always used to get his picture in the paper here. But now he lives in L.P." "L.A." I corrected her. "Los Angeles - in California." Hmm. Well, maybe Becca was telling the truth. She certainly seemed to have enough details.

"The kids in my class only like the show because of Waldo," Becca went on. "But not me," she said, pouting. "I wish Lamont was the one who'd gone to Stoneybrook Elementary." I was curious to find out more about this Waldo business, but it was too late to ask Becca any more questions. The commercials had finished up and the show had come back on. Lament was back on screen, cornering the kid who had swiped his homework.

"Quiet!" Becca said.

Squirt toddled over and crawled onto my stomach. I picked him up, sat up, and plunked my little brother onto my lap. I stared at the screen and waited for Waldo to come back on. This new information made the show a lot more interesting. I tried to picture Waldo playing baseball with the kids in the schoolyard here. Or shopping for school clothes at Washington Mall. Maybe he got those weird glasses of his at the same place Mallory got her glasses.

When the show was over I ran to the telephone to call Mallory. I figured if there was any family that would know about this Waldo business, it would have to be the Pikes. I mean, out of eight kids, somebody's got to know something. That's one advantage to having a best friend from such a large family. It's like calling Information Central.

When Mallory came to the phone, she confirmed everything Becca had said.

Yes, it was true. Waldo and his family did live in Stoneybrook, only not full-time anymore. She said that Waldo's real name is Derek Masters, and she told me that now that he had to be out in California for a chunk of the year, his family had moved with him to L.A. They would be back when he had finished taping P.S. 162.

"How do you know all this?" I asked.

"A star from Stoneybrook! Are you kidding? It's big news. Everybody knows it," said Mallory. "Anyway, Derek used to be in Nicky's class." Nicky is one of Mallory's younger brothers. He's eight years old and in the third grade.

"In Nicky's class!?" I practically shrieked. Uh-oh. I was getting star struck, and by the time this whole mess was over, I was not going to be the only one. "Put Nicky on the phone, will you?" I asked.

When Nicky got on, he told me all about Derek. He told me that Derek had been a local child model, that he'd been in a lot of magazine ads and even on one TV commercial here. Somehow, that had all led to the job on P.S. 162.

"Wow!" I said. I couldn't believe that no one had told me any of this before. This was hot news, and I wanted a chance to talk about it with my friends. I couldn't wait for the next meeting of the Baby-sitters Club.

Chapter 2.

By the time I skidded into the meeting on Monday, everybody else was already there. Kristy Thomas (remember, I told you she's the one who started the club) was sitting in her director's chair, wearing her visor, as usual. As I walked in that day, she was chewing on the tip of a pencil, waiting for Claudia's digital clock to turn to 5:30 so she could start the meeting. When I caught sight of her, I almost giggled. To me, it kind of looked like she was gnawing on a cigar. The way Kristy sits in that room and takes over, you'd think it was her house, her bedroom and her director's chair. That's because she's the club president, but actually we hold the meetings in Claudia Kishi's house. Claudia is our vice-president. She has her own bedroom with her own phone and private phone number, and she's nice enough to let us use them for the club. I should probably tell you a little bit about the club members so you know who we are. There're six of us all together. I'll start right at the top.

Kristy? Well, she's . . . Kristy. Sometimes people think she's a little bossy, but she certainly does know how to take charge of the club, and I really admire her for that. Kristy's a tomboy type. She's short for her age and she's got brown hair and brown eyes. She always wears jeans, a turtleneck, a sweater, and sneakers. I think I'd faint if I ever saw her in a dress.

Kristy lives with her mom and Nannie (her grandmother), her three brothers, her stepfather (Watson) and her newly adopted little sister, Emily Michelle. Watson has two other kids from when he was married before, and sometimes they come to stay at the house, too. I call it a house, but I'll tell you what it really is - a mansion. No kidding. See, Watson is a millionaire. And when Kristy's mom married him last year, Kristy and her brothers moved over to the ritzy side of town. Kristy still goes to our school, but she does live a little far away from the rest of us. So we pay her brother Charlie to give her a ride to Claudia's house every time we have a meeting.

Claudia is about as different from Kristy as you can get. I'm talking sun and moon. Claudia is Japanese-American and she's got long, sleek, black hair that she has fixed a different way every time I see her. You wouldn't think there could be so many ways to fix hair. That Monday, for instance, she had two French braids pulled back and wound into one. She's also a wild dresser. At that meeting she was wearing a bright pink T-shirt, a short red flouncy skirt, and underneath the skirt she had on black footless tights that she had rolled up to mid-calf.

Claudia has a little bit of trouble in school, but what she's really good at is art. That's probably why she gets such interesting ideas for putting wild and colorful clothes together. She loves to paint and sculpt and make collages, and her room is cluttered with the boxes she keeps all her materials in. She's got boxes of paints, boxes of brushes, and boxes of fabric scraps, interesting bits of paper, ribbon, wood pieces, everything. You name it, Claudia can turn it into art.

The only boxes in her room that aren't filled with art supplies are the ones stuffed with junk food. You might not think someone so into art would be into Cheez Doodles and Tastee Cakes, but Claudia is. She keeps a stash in her room and passes it around at all our meetings.

The secretary of our club is Mary Anne Spier. Mary Anne is short, like Kristy, and also has brown hair and brown eyes. Sometimes Mary Anne can be on the quiet side, and she's very sensitive (also romantic), but she's extremely organized, and that's exactly what makes her perfect to be club secretary. Mary Anne's job is to schedule all the baby-sitting appointments as they come in. She has to keep track of everyone's schedule, so she always knows who's free when, and believe me, that's a lot to juggle. Take me, for instance. I probably have the busiest schedule of anyone in the club, what with my ballet classes and a semiregular sitting job. Keeping track of me alone is practically a full-time job.

Mary Anne's mother died when she was a baby, so she lives alone with her father. Mr. Spier can be kind of strict, but in the past year he's loosened up a lot. Now Mary Anne even has a boyfriend! His name is Logan Bruno and he's very nice. Can you believe it? The shyest girl is the one who gets the steady boyfriend? And to top it off, she's the only club member who has one! The last important officer is our treasurer, and that's Dawn Schafer. Dawn has long, white-blonde hair and she's a real California girl. Her whole family used to live in southern California, but then her parents got divorced. Now her father lives there with her brother, and Dawn lives here with her mother in an old, restored farmhouse.

Dawn's an independent type. She has her own opinions and she does what she likes. For instance, she won't have anything to do with Claudia's junk food. Dawn's strictly a natural-foods girl. Her idea of a good sandwich is tofu, sprouts, and tahini on whole wheat pita bread. Try offering that to Claudia.

Those four are the eighth-grade members of the club. Then there's Mallory and me, the lowly sixth-graders. We are the junior officers. We came into the club when one of the other girls, Stacey McGill, moved back to New York City. (My family moved right into her old house!) Since we're younger, we mostly take jobs in the afternoons or weekends. The only night jobs we're allowed to take are with our own families.

You know pretty much about me already, and you know that Mallory is one of eight Pike kids, so I'll just add that Mallory loves to read and that sometimes she even writes and illustrates her own stories. She has glasses and braces (which she hates), and pierced ears (which she loves), and she's just about the best friend I could have hoped for when I moved to Stoneybrook.

I think that's all you need to know about the dub members. Oh, yeah. I almost forgot. We also have two associate members, Shannon Kilbourne and Logan Bruno. (Logan's not just Mary Anne's boyfriend. He's also a great baby-sitter.) We call our associates to help us out if we get too many jobs to handle ourselves. Logan and Shannon don't come to the meetings or anything. They're kind of like our standby crew.

Anyway, I was telling you about that Monday's meeting, wasn't I? When I slipped into Claudia's room that afternoon, I found a place on the floor next to Mallory. Kristy waved that pencil of hers through the air like a baton.

"This meeting will now come to order," she said.

I always sit up straighter when Kristy starts a meeting.

"Any business?" she asked.

"Dues are due." Dawn smiled.

We all groaned. Really, none of us minds paying dues. The money goes for things we need, like Kid-Kits, which are these neat boxes of toys and games we sometimes bring on jobs with us. I think we just like to groan every week because it's fun.

"All right, all right," Kristy cut us off. "Any other club business?" she asked, after Dawn had collected our money.

"Anyone want M & M's?" Claudia asked. She fished a bag of candy out from under her bed and passed it around.

Kristy heaved a loud sigh. She doesn't consider Claudia's snacks to be "club business." (But I notice that she always takes something when the bag comes around.) Of course, I was dying to bring up the matter of Waldo, but I knew that if Kristy didn't consider snacks to be official enough business, she'd hardly approve of my bringing up Waldo. I knew that I'd have to wait until the end of the meeting for that.

Kristy flipped through the club notebook. We use the notebook to write down all the important things that happen on our jobs - things about the kids, the families, anything the other sitters should know. Then, once a week, we're supposed to read what everyone else wrote. That's Kristy's way of keeping us all informed.

I was still thinking about Waldo when the first couple of calls came in. Mary Anne scheduled some sitters. The phone rang a third time. Kristy took the call.

"Oh, hello, Mrs. Masters," she said. "Yes, I've heard of your family. . . . You're back in town? . . . Sure. . . . Sure. . . . We'd be delighted to sit for your boys." Mallory nudged me and grinned. I shot her a questioning look. I hadn't recognized the name.

Kristy hung up and gave us the news. Someone named Mrs. Masters was looking for an afternoon sitter for her two boys, Derek and Todd.

"Derek!" Now I got it. "Derek! You mean Waldo? Are you saying that that was Waldo's mother calling us for a baby-sitter?" Kristy shot me a look that said, Calm down, Jessi, this is a baby-sitting job, not a meeting of the Derek Masters Fan Club.

Mary Anne checked the appointment book.

"Someone for Wednesday?" she asked. "Well, it looks like the only one who's free is Jessi." Often on Wednesdays I sit for a family called the Braddocks, but the other club members had started to take over some of those jobs. That had left me with a little more free time.

"Me?" I squeaked. "You want to send me to baby-sit for Waldo?" "Derek," Kristy corrected me. "Derek and his four-year-old brother, Todd. Anyway, that would work out well, Jessi. The Masterses live only two blocks away from you." "They do?" I cried. How come I didn't know anything about that? I guess 1 thought the house should have a big neon star on top of it. Or Waldo's handprints pressed into the sidewalk outside, like at that famous Hollywood theater.

Well, this was more than I had bargained for. When I came to the meeting, I had only wanted to talk about Waldo. Now it turned out I was going to be baby-sitting for him.

Kristy called back Mrs. Masters and told her to expect me on Wednesday afternoon.

As you can see, things were already going awfully fast. That's what happens when you get involved with show biz.

Chapter 3.

The thing about my life is that my schedule is so crazy, I don't have time to dwell on any one thing for very long. After the meeting that day I rushed back to my house to dinner and homework. Then, the next day, right after school, I had dance class. . . . Or, as Mme Noelle would say, "donce closs." Mme Noelle is my ballet teacher and she's perfect for the role. I can't imagine her doing anything else. She's an older woman, and she teaches class in a leotard and a long rehearsal skirt. Instead of wearing ballet slippers she wears dance shoes with heels on them. Apparently, she was quite a beautiful ballerina in her time. You can still see it in the graceful way she moves her arms, and in her carriage in general. (I love that word "carriage." And I don't mean the horse-drawn kind. I mean the way she walks and moves and carries herself.) "Modemoiselle Romsey, point thot toe." That was Mme Noelle. Did I forget to tell you that she's a stern taskmaster? Well, she is. When you're there in class doing the exercises, she watches your every move.

"Modemoiselle Romsey, turn out the stonding thigh, if you please. Lead with your heel, and drop thot hip." There's no escaping the watchful eye of Mme Noelle. Now, the crazy thing about dance class is that part of you doesn't want a teacher to be scrutinizing you and giving you a zillion corrections, but then again, part of you does. When a teacher pays attention to you, it means she thinks your work in class is worth paying attention to. And, of course, the only way you get better is to find out what you're doing wrong.

"Modemoiselle Romsey, drop that hip!" (I know what I just said, but when I'm in class, sometimes it's hard to remember why it is I like corrections.) That day in class it seemed to take forever for my body to warm up and start to move the way it should. We started class with exercises at the barre and I just felt a little off. Then we moved into the room for what we call center work. We always start off slowly and work up to big leaps and things like that, Usually I like to stand in the front of class so I can correct myself from what I see in the mirror. But that day, Mme Noelle had already bombarded me with so many corrections that I decided to stay toward the back. It didn't matter, though. Mme Noelle saw me anyway.

"Modemoiselle Romsey! How many times do I have to say? Straighten thot back leg!" Oh, my head was swimming. In ballet, sometimes there're just too many things to remember at once.

I was starting to feel a little discouraged toward the end of class, but then, when we lined up in the corner to do the final leaps across the floor, the man who accompanies us on the piano struck up a really different and wonderful piece of music. Usually he plays a lot of classical themes, which I do enjoy, but all of a sudden he switched to a lively waltz from an old Broadway show. I looked at Katie Beth, one of my friends in the class, and we both grinned.

Mme Noelle .walked us through a series of steps and then we did them to the music. Something about that music gave me energy. The footwork Madame had given us was fast, and when it was my turn my feet practically flew and I felt myself soar into the air. I caught a quick glimpse of my reflection in the mirror while I was at the height of my leap. Good grief! I looked like . . . like a ballerina! I mean, I know that's what I'm supposed to be, but it really feels super when all the hard work comes together.

This may sound corny, but every once in awhile in class my overwhelming love for ballet just comes flooding into me. Nothing else gives me so much pleasure. And no other art form seems as beautiful or as moving.

When the class ended we all applauded Mme Noelle. She bowed her head graciously as she always does and then held up one hand to get our attention. She had an announcement to make.

"Mes petites," she said. (That's what she calls us. It's French for "my little girls.") "I want to advise you thot the Stoneybrook Civic Center will be holding aw-di-see-ons for Swan Lake." (Did you get that? She meant auditions.) "The aw-di-see-ons, as I understond it, are Soturday next. Those girls who feel ready might be brave to try out." Auditions for Swan Lake! At the Stoneybrook Civic Center! That was really something. Swan Lake is a ballet about an enchanted swan, and it's one of the most beautiful ballets ever choreographed. And now it was going to be performed at the Stoneybrook Civic Center, which is a wonderful theater. The theater's not in New York City, but it's so good that it might as well be. A lot of famous stars you would have heard of are always performing there.

I sat down on the floor to unlace my toe shoes. I was thinking that someday I'll be good enough to audition for a ballet like that. Maybe a few years from now. Three years, two . . . if I were lucky. Who could tell? Maybe even next year. I picked up my dance bag and started to head for the dressing room.

"Modemoiselle Romsey." Mme Noelle caught me just as I was almost out the door. Oh, no. My heart sank. Was she going to give me one last correction? Just when I had been able to end the class on such a good note. I braced myself to hear what she had to say.

"Ma petite, do you think you might aw-di-see-on for Swan Lake?" she asked.

"Me?" My voice came out in a high-pitched squeak. "Well, I don't think this year. Maybe I'll be ready next year. I mean - " "You're a gifted doncer," Madame cut me off. "This production will be quite professional. It would be a wonderful experience for you. Broadening. I do hope you consider, dear." She handed me a flier with the information. Then Madame smiled at me and gestured for me to go ahead of her out the door.

"Thank you, Madame," I managed to sputter.

I glanced at the flier. It said that there would be three audition calls altogether, with eliminations after each one. As 1 walked to the dressing room, my thoughts were flying. Mme Noelle had singled me out to encourage me to audition. Maybe I actually should try out.

In the dressing room the other girls were all talking about Madame's news.

"The Stoneybrook Civic Center!" said one. "You know, the productions in that theater get reviewed by the papers in New York City." "I bet a lot of dancers from New York will come out for the auditions," said another. "I bet the competition will be really stiff." "Yeah, like A Chorus Line." "Oh, no!" groaned Katie Beth.

Katie Beth was still wearing her toe shoes. She leaped to the center of the dressing room floor and began turning pirouettes as fast as she could.

"Do I get the part? Do I get the part?" she called out.

After her last pirouette, she struck a pose from the ballet, nuzzling her cheek against her shoulder as a swan might do to preen its feathers.

We all applauded.

"Encore!" we shouted. "Encore!" Katie Beth collapsed on the floor, breathless and panting.

"No way," she said, laughing. "I guess I'm no enchanted swan. All I am is a tired ballet student." After I had changed, I stuffed my sweaty tights and leotard into my bag. Then I slung the bag over my shoulders and waved to my friends.

"Do you think you'll try out?" asked Katie Beth, as we left school.

"Maybe," I said. "I don't know." That was true. I didn't.

Outside the school, Mama was waiting for me in the car. Becca and Squirt were with her. I slid into the backseat next to Squirt. He grabbed my cheek and gave me a spitty kiss.

"How was class?" Mama asked.

"Good," I said. I told her about the auditions for Swan Lake. I told her that Mme Noelle had drawn me aside at the end of class to encourage me to try out.

"That's wonderful, honey," Mama said. I could see her smiling in the rearview mirror.

"It is," I replied with a sigh, "but I don't know. Maybe it's too professional for me right now. I mean, how can I compete with dancers from New York? I mean, do I even want to?" "It's up to you," Mama said. "It does sound like an opportunity. You might want to go ahead and go to the audition even if it is scary. But that's your decision, Jessi. You just let me know." Parents. Doesn't it seem backwards that they always want to make decisions for you when you don't want them to? Like, "No, you can't stay out past 9 PM," or "No, you can't get your ears pierced." But when you actually might want them to go ahead and tell you what to do, what do they say? "It's up to you. You just let me know." Mom pulled the car into traffic and turned on the radio.

I stared out the window. I pictured myself onstage in a swan costume. I couldn't be Odette, of course. Odette is the queen of the swans and the star of the ballet. But maybe I could be one of the swan maidens who dance in the corps. In my fantasy I did quick turns across the stage. I was a graceful, mysterious swan escaping from hunters.

Okay. The fantasy did it. I was hooked. Yes, I did want to be in Swan Lake. More than anything, in fact. Right then and there I decided to try out. Yes, I'd go to the audition, all right. I would do it.

Chapter 4.

Before I knew it, it was Wednesday afternoon, and time for me to baby-sit for DEREK MASTERS! and his little brother, Todd. If you think I was excited, you should've seen Becca. When I was getting ready to leave, she followed me to our front door, firing questions at me all the way.

"Ask him if he knows Lament. I mean, of course he knows Lament. Ask him if Lamont's as nice as he is on TV. Ask him what kind of games Lamont likes to play. Ask him . . . ask him what Lamont likes to eat for breakfast." Honestly.

"Becca, I'm baby-sitting for Waldo, not for Lamont." I heaved a big sigh. "Look. Now you've got me all confused. I mean, I'm babysitting for Derek. Anyway, I thought you said you didn't have a crush on Lamont." "I don't!" Becca said hotly. "I'm just curious, that's all." "Sounds like a pretty serious crush to me," I said.

Becca whirled around in a huff and stomped off to her room. I grabbed my sweater and was out the door.

Well, Becca may have been a bit over the edge about Lamont, but to tell you the truth, I was not much calmer about Derek. As I walked down the street to the Masterses' house, my heart started racing. I was going to meet a real TV star! Every week people all over the country watched P.S. 162 and every week they laughed at Waldo and his silly science. Hmm. It suddenly occurred to me that maybe Derek would be able to help me with my science homework. (I had been having a little bit of trouble with it lately.) At any rate, this would be a good opportunity to get his autograph. If I wanted to be clever, I could even get him to autograph my science book! I stood at the front door of the Masterses' and brought my finger up to the doorbell. I took a deep breath and swallowed hard. This was as bad as an audition. I certainly had as many butterflies in my stomach.

"Go on," I said to myself. Sometimes I have to take myself in hand and tell myself what to do. "Just go ahead. Ring that bell." B-R-R-R-R-I-M-I-N-G/ I jumped at the sound of the bell. The door opened and a nice-looking woman stood there smiling. Behind her were two boys.

I looked past them into the house. I was looking for Derek, for a boy wearing thick, horn-rimmed glasses.

"Hello," the woman said cheerfully. She extended her hand to shake mine. "You must be Jessi. I'm Mrs. Masters, and, come here, boys." She beckoned to the two children behind her. "This is Todd," she said, putting her hand on the little one's shoulder. "And this is Derek." "Derek?" I don't think I hid my surprise. The boy she introduced as Derek was just a regular-looking kid. Where were the glasses? And what about his spiky hair?

"I look different from on the show, huh?" Derek said. I guess my mouth was still hanging open.

"No glasses," I managed to say. , "Waldo wears the glasses," said Derek. "I have 20-20 vision." Mrs. Masters ushered me into the house and started showing me around. Well, the famous Derek Masters was not only regular-looking himself, he also lived in a perfectly regular house. In fact, it was kind of messy. There were newspapers all over the floor in the living room and dishes piled up high in the kitchen sink. What had I expected? A Hollywood set?

Mrs. Masters showed me where she kept the emergency numbers and then she set out a snack for the boys and me in the kitchen. She was just going to be gone a couple of hours, so she said good-bye to Todd and Derek and left me there in charge.

"Well," I said to the boys. They looked up at me over their glasses of juice. "Tell me about L.A. What's the TV business like, Derek?" "Yuk," Derek said. "Work. Actually, I like it okay, but I'm glad we're on a break." "P.S. 162 feels like work?" I said. "Gee, it looks like so much fun on TV." "It can be fun," Derek said, "but it's long hours." "Then when do you go to school?" I asked.

"I have a private tutor there," said Derek. "He works with me on breaks between tapings, whenever we can fit it in." Derek stuffed a whole fig cookie into his mouth. "I'm starting school here again next Monday," he grinned. The words were all garbled with cookie. Derek was a regular kid, all right.

I wished I had taped our conversation that afternoon. It probably sounded pretty comical. For awhile, I didn't give up trying to ask Derek questions about the show - what it was like being a TV star and all. But, every chance he could, Derek changed the subject and asked me things about Stoneybrook. Did I know anything about Stoneybrook Elementary School? he wanted to know. Were the same teachers still there? Did I know if any of the same kids would be in his class?

Of course, I know plenty about Stoneybrook Elementary. Becca goes there and so do just about all the kids I baby-sit for.

"Do you know Nicky Pike?" I asked.

Derek's face lit up. "Nicky's a great guy." As Derek talked on, the light bulb finally flashed in my brain. Derek wasn't interested in talking about show biz. Here was a kid who'd been away from his class for almost a year, and he was just worried about how he would fit in when he went back.

"I hope the kids don't think I've changed," he said, "or treat me differently. Some people act pretty strange about this star stuff." "Really?" I gulped. I was glad Derek didn't know how silly I had gotten.

After the boys had finished their snack, Derek brought me up to his room. He pulled an old, battered box out from one of his drawers. It was a game of Candy Land.

"Landy Cand!" he said to Todd. "You want to play Landy Cand?" Then he explained to me, "That's what Todd used to call it when he was two." See, not only was Derek a regular kid, he was also a regular, everyday brother.

The three of us settled on Derek's floor for a game. And another. And another. Whenever Todd got a card with candy on it, he brought it up to his mouth and pretended to eat it with loud munching sounds. Derek let Todd win every other game.

When we were about Candy Land-ed out, Derek folded up the board and put the game away. I spotted another box in the drawer. On the top was a large photo of Derek.

"What's this?" I asked curiously. I picked up the photo. It was of Derek's face, but it was blown up and it looked like some kind of fancy movie star photo. His hair looked kind of windswept, but in a perfectly styled kind of way. His smile was big and toothpaste-y. At the bottom of the photo his name was printed in big letters. Derek looked embarrassed that I had found it.

"There's more," I said. The whole box was filled with copies of the photo.

"It's my head shot," Derek said shyly.

"Your what?" I asked.

"Head shot," Derek repeated. "If you're an actor, you get a fancy picture taken of you like this and then you send it around to all the people who might give you work." "Really?" I said. It seemed so ... so, I don't know. ... So professional.

"Yeah," said Derek. "You take them to auditions with you and stuff." "Auditions," I mumbled, I wondered if dancers were supposed to have photos, too.

"I'm going on an audition soon," I told Derek. Even as I said the word, my stomach started knotting up. I may have decided to go ahead with the audition, but I was obviously still more than a little scared.

"Really?" said Derek. Now it was his turn to be surprised. "What kind of audition? An acting thing?" "Sort of," I said. "For a ballet." I explained to Derek about my dance classes and about this Stoneybook Civic Center production of Swan Lake. I told him that Mme Noelle had encouraged me to try out.

"Great!" said Derek. "I know all about auditions. I'll be your coach. I'll tell you exactly how to land this job." Derek didn't have time to do any coaching that day, though. Downstairs, the front door banged open.

"I'm home!" Mrs. Masters called.

Derek came downstairs with me. "Thanks for all the news about Stoneybrook Elementary," he said.

"Sure," I replied. "And don't worry. You'll do fine. Hey, especially in science," I suggested, trying to be helpful. "You could make friends just by doing everybody's science homework." "Science!" Derek shook his head as if he were going crazy. "I hate science!" he exclaimed. "I get F's!" "You do?" I said. I couldn't help laughing.

Derek narrowed his eyes, pretending to be mad.

"I know, I know. I'm confusing you with Waldo. I'm going to have to start a list. On one side I'll put all the things Waldo does. On the other side I'll put the things Derek does." Mrs. Masters paid me and I said good-bye to the boys. I hurried down the street and headed for my afternoon Baby-sitters Club meeting at Claudia's house. I couldn't wait to tell my friends all about Derek and what a nice kid he was. And wait'll Becca hears, I thought.

Uh-oh. I stopped short. Becca! I'd completely forgotten to ask Derek anything about Lamont! Oh, well. I sighed as I thought of how mad Becca would get. I ran the rest of the way to the meeting.

Chapter 5.

You can tell from what Mallory wrote in the club notebook that she had caught DEREK MASTERS! fever. That's the way it seemed to go. Just when one person would be getting over it, another person would catch it. It was contagious.

Anyway, that Saturday, things did get a little strained. Who knows, maybe it was all my fault. Maybe I shouldn't have tried to get everybody together in the first place. But Becca started it. And Mallory pushed it. And then the triplets made it worse.

Come to think of it, Derek didn't help the situation any himself.

See, this is how it started. I was still home, getting ready to go over to the Masterses' house for another afternoon baby-sitting job. Becca followed me to the door while I was putting on my jacket. She was begging, I mean absolutely begging me to take her along.

"Please, please, please, please, please," she said.

"Becca," I said, "you know I can't take you with me on a job." "But Derek is probably lonely," she whined. "He probably doesn't have any kids here to play with yet. In L.P. he probably gets to play with Lamont all the time." I rolled my eyes. This time I didn't even bother to correct Becca. She hurried on.

"Does Derek ever say anything about Lamont?" she asked. "I mean, did he ever maybe say anything about how Lament really loves rock collections?" What a question. That's my sister, though. You can guess who has her very own rock collection. Miss Rebecca Ramsey, herself.

"Please," Becca started up again.

Okay, Becca was being a little bit of a pest. But as she was talking, I started thinking. It was true, Derek had seemed a little lonely. Practically all he'd talked to me about was whether he was going to be able to make friends at school again. And it just so happened that he and Becca were the same age. I decided that I would ask Derek and his mom if they'd mind if Becca came over to play for awhile. Of course, I wasn't about to tell that to Becca. I figured I'd wait and see what they said first.

"That would be fine with me." Mrs. Masters smiled when I asked her the question. "Derek, what do you think?" Derek squinted his eyes.

"How old did you say your sister is?" he asked.

"Eight," I said.

Derek's face brightened.

"Eight?" he repeated. "Yeah, sure. Call her up. Tell her to come over." You should've heard Becca squeal on the other end of the phone. I had to hold the receiver about a mile away from my ear.

Mrs. Masters left us sandwich fixings for lunch, and since it was a nice day, the boys and I decided to have a picnic in the backyard. By the time Becca arrived, Derek was munching on an apple and Todd was trying to spread a big glob of peanut butter onto his bread. I introduced Becca to the boys.

I noticed Becca staring hard at Derek. I had warned her ahead of time that in real life he doesn't have spiky hair and glasses, but I think it still came as a shock.

"Hi," Derek said. "Want an apple?" Phew, I thought, this is going to go just fine.

Derek asked Becca all kinds of questions about what had been happening in the third grade. Becca, of course, knew lots more than I had been able to tell him. She knew all of the kid stuff, like how one boy had thrown a spitball and been sent to the principal's office, and how a bird had flown through an open auditorium window during the last assembly.

"Really?" said Derek. "Cool." There was a lull in the conversation. I could see Becca gearing up to ask her question.

"So, Derek," she said. "What's it like to work with stars?" "It's okay," said Derek. Suddenly, all the life had drained out of his voice.

"Well, what's it like to work with Lament? What's he like?" "He's okay," Derek replied flatly.

"Is he as funny as he is on TV?" "Yeah, he's funny." "Is he smart?" "Pretty smart." "Do you think he likes rock collections?" Derek kneeled on the picnic bench. He took a napkin and wadded it up into a ball. "Can we change the subject please?" he said.

That was my first clue that talk about the show was going to make Derek a little testy.

"Hey," I said quickly, "why don't you guys go climb on the jungle gym? But carefully, since you just ate." Derek hopped off the bench and started for the jungle gym. Becca tagged after him, still firing questions.

As I cleaned up the lunch things I had an idea. Maybe it would be better to get Derek together with a boy. I decided to call Mallory and see if maybe I could bring my kids over to visit hers. I knew that Mallory was at home baby-sitting for Nicky and the triplets (her mother had taken the three younger girls shopping). After all, Derek already knew Nicky, and the two of them were even going to be in the same class. I got Mallory on the phone and asked her what she thought.

"DEREK MASTERS!" she screeched. I was beginning to understand how Derek felt. I mean, Mallory is my best friend and all, but she was getting as carried away as everyone else. I reminded Mal that Derek was just a kid.

"Right," she said, calming down. "I remember what you said at the meeting. He's worried the kids won't like him." "So how about it? Can I bring Derek and Todd and Becca over?" I asked.

Mallory thought it was a super idea. I wrote Mrs. Masters a note telling her where we would be in case she should come home early. Then I rounded up my gang.

"Field trip!" I called. "What would you think about going over to the Pikes' to play?" "All right!" the kids exclaimed.

When we got to their house, Nicky opened the door. He looked a little shy when he saw Derek. He shifted his feet and smiled a sheepish grin. Derek looked kind of shy himself.

"Ask them in. Ask them in." Mallory hurried up behind Nicky and swung the door open wide.

"Hello," she said, smiling right at Derek. She stuck out her hand to shake his. "I'm Mallory Pike." She was standing at attention and pronouncing her words strangely, a little too precisely. "And you must be Derek. I'm so pleased that you could come visit us in our home today." Why was she talking like that? What did she think she was doing? Greeting the Queen of England?

"Mal," I said, trying to cut her off.

"Yes, yes," she went on. "We are very pleased to extend our hospitality, aren't we, Nicky? Do come in." Nicky smiled another one of his embarrassed smiles.

"Hi, Derek. Uh, how's Hollywood?" he asked.

"It's okay." Derek shrugged.

"Tsk, tsk, tsk," Mallory shook her head and clicked her tongue. "Now, Nicky. I'm sure Derek is tired to death of talking about Hollywood and show business." Mallory gave me a little wink, like she was in the know.

I'd never seen Mallory act quite like this. And where was she getting this voice of hers?

She sounded like she was about to recite Shakespeare.

"The other children are out back," she said. Other children? Who was she talking about, the triplets or some precious little boys in sailor suits? "Everyone is so looking forward to meeting you." "Mallory," I whispered as we cut through the house to the back door. "This isn't high tea. Why are you talking like this?" "Am I talking funny?" she whispered back.

"Just a little," I said.

"I guess I'm just nervous. I figured Derek would think we're a bunch of nobodies." When Nicky opened the back door, Derek spotted the badminton net.

"Badminton!" he said. A big smile stretched across his face. "Great! I love badminton!" "See," I mouthed to Mallory. "He's a kid." "Right," Mallory mouthed back. "Derek," she said. "Would you care to join the others in a game of - " I shot Mallory another look. Her face relaxed.

"I mean, do you want to play badminton with the guys?" she asked.

"Sure!" said Derek. "Let's go!" The triplets, Nicky's brothers, were already at the net. Their names are Adam, Byron, and Jordan and they're ten years old, two years older than Nicky. Sometimes, because they're older, they can go a little too far with their teasing. They like to lord it over Nicky, and I really don't think they liked the idea of a TV star who was younger than they were. So they took one side of the net and Nicky, Derek, Becca, and Todd positioned themselves on the other.

"We're gonna cream you squirts," said Byron.

Jordan and Adam slammed a high five.

But when Adam served the birdie, Derek jumped to hit it and slammed it right back.

"Whoa," Adam said, taken by surprise. "Think you're cool, huh?" Well, the game went on like that. Any birdie the triplets served up, Derek managed to hit right back over the net. Derek and his team were winning, and the triplets weren't used to being beaten. Especially not by "squirts." "Do they teach you that on P.S. 162?" Byron jeered.

Oh, no. I couldn't believe this was happening. Why couldn't anyone just act normal around Derek? Becca had been hounding him for information, Mal had treated him like royalty, and now the triplets were going to be jealous and nasty about the show. Each person seemed to have a different way of acting creepy, but acting creepy was the general theme.

"Is that what they teach you in star school?" Jordan joined in.

Suddenly, Derek's face turned bright red.

"Forget it," he said. "Just forget it. Who cares about your crummy old game." He threw down his racket and turned to face the triplets. "Anvil Head!" he shouted. "Cactus Brain! Pizza Breath!" Pizza Breath??? Before I had time to step in and referee, Derek had stomped out of the yard and was calling me after him.

"Come on, Jessi," he said. "I'm going home!" I grabbed Todd by one hand and Becca by the other.

"Mallory," I said quickly, "I'll talk to you later, I guess." Chapter 6.

Did you ever notice that things often get worse before they get better? When we got back to the Masterses' house after the badminton game, I spent a lot of time trying to calm Derek down. But Derek didn't feel like being calmed.

"It'll be worse when I get to school," he complained.

"No, it won't." I tried to shrug the whole thing off. "It was just the game." Derek's face slid into an even deeper sulk. Suddenly, I had a silly thought.

"Hey," I said. "Why do you think they call it badminton?" Derek cracked a smile. We both started to laugh. It was a giddy laugh, though. That tense kind of laugh that means things really aren't fixed at all.

And believe me, they weren't.

That Monday I had another job at Derek's house after school. Monday was his first day at Stoneybrook Elementary. Mrs. Masters had had to run off to take care of some legal something or other (handling Derek's career was practically a full-time job for her), and I was waiting at the house with Todd when Derek got home from school.

I was hoping that Derek and I would have time to talk about my upcoming audition. I was still feeling pretty nervous about it, and I thought Derek might be able to give me some tips on how to relax. We never did get a chance to talk about auditions that afternoon, though. What we talked about was Stoneybrook Elementary. When Derek got home, he threw his book bag down on the couch and walked right past me without even saying hello.

"Hi, Derek," I said.

"It was terrible," was his answer.

I got out the snack Mrs. Masters had left and settled the boys around the kitchen table. After a couple of bites of cookie, Derek poured out the whole miserable story.

When he first got to his classroom that morning, he said, the girls circled around him, cooing and mooing like they were sick cows.

"They wouldn't let me through the door," he said. "They all thought they were in love with me." I nodded my head. I knew what he meant.

"Like Becca," I said.

"Worse than Becca," said Derek. "Becca follows me around, but at least she isn't in love with me. I thought those girls might rip my jacket off. You know, so they could keep the pieces for souvenirs." Derek stuffed another oatmeal cookie in his mouth.

"So I was trying to push my way past them into the class," he said, "but then all of a sudden this flash went off and practically blinded me. Some photographer had shown up at the school, some guy from the Stoneybrook News. A reporter was with him. The reporter pushed the girls aside, stuck this stupid tape recorder microphone into my face, and started firing questions at me." Derek laid his head in his hands.

"The worst part was," he said, "after the reporter was finished, he pushed his notebook into my hands and asked for my autograph." The reporter asked for his autograph?

Derek heaved a big sigh.

"What did Mr. Rossi do during all this?" I asked. Mr. Rossi was Derek's teacher. "Didn't he break it up?" "Break it up?" said Derek. "He made it worse. When the bell rang, he got the reporter out and everybody in their seats. So I thought, Oh good, he's gonna ask us to get out our readers or something like that. But no. The first thing he does is introduce me to the class. He says, It's a great honor to welcome back our returning student, that fine boy and wonderful actor, Derek Masters.' " I couldn't help it. I knew Derek was upset, but I had to giggle. The teacher sounded like some talk show host introducing his next guest.

"It's not funny," Derek said with a groan. "After he introduced me, you know what he made me do?" "What?" I asked.

"He made me come up to the front of the room and he asked me to give a little talk on my career. 'Tell the class what it's like to work on P.S. 162,' he said. 'I'm sure we'd all be interested in hearing how a television show gets produced.' So I had to stand up there and say dopey things, and then I had to answer all the questions the kids had." I shook my head. It did sound like an awful lot for a first day back.

"One girl asked me if I have to wear makeup on the set and I do, so I said yes. But I should have lied. I should've just said no. You should've heard the boys hooting after that.

The boys don't like me, Jessi. They won't talk to me. They wouldn't play with me on the playground. I knew this was going to happen." "Just because you said you wear makeup on the set?" "No, that's not just it. When the girls crowded around, the boys called me 'lover boy.' They called me 'spoiled brat.' " "Brat?" Todd piped in. Poor little Todd sounded horrified. I guess, to a four-year-old, "brat" is about the worst name a person could ever be called.

"Derek, you're not the brat," I said. I shook my head. How come kids can be so mean? Derek just wanted to be one of the guys, but I could see how the boys would be sort of jealous of him. It's not easy to like a kid and think he's a regular guy when reporters are running after him and the girls in the class are practically tearing at his clothes.

"What about Nicky?" I said. "Was Nicky friendly?" "Oh, yeah," said Derek. "Nicky's real nice. But all of the other boys hate me." Believe it or not, there was more to the story. As the school day had worn on, the boys had gotten nastier and nastier. One of them had knocked Derek's pencil off his desk when Mr.

Rossi had turned his back. Another boy had squirted him when he walked by the drinking fountain.

"What'd you do then?" I asked.

Derek looked uncomfortable.

"What do you think I should've done?" he asked.

"Well ..." I paused, "you could just tell them to knock it off." "I did," said Derek. 1 "And did they?" \ "No, they got worse. What do you think I should do?" * I sat there for a moment, trying to think of a solution to this mess.

"Jessi?" Derek said.

"Yeah?" "What if I try fighting back? What if I play tricks right back on them?" "No," I said carefully, "I don't think that's a good idea. No use stooping to their level. That never helps." "You don't think so?" Derek asked.

I shook my head.

"Jessi," Derek said slowly, "there's one boy in the class who's worse than the rest." I looked at Derek's face. It was all twisted, like he was about to cry. "This kid is really mean to me." "What's his name?" I asked.

"John," Derek said quickly. "John. When lunch came around, he took my lunch bag and threw it out the window." "You didn't have lunch?" I cried. No wonder Derek was stuffing cookies into his mouth.

"And during gym, when I wasn't looking, he tied my sneakers together. When I got up, I tripped. Everybody laughed." "You're kidding!" I exploded. "What a brat! Derek, these kids are calling you a brat and they are the biggest brats around. John is ... is ..." I couldn't even find the words. "This kid John is a ... Superbrat!" By this time, I was practically shouting. "I never heard of such a thing. When a new person comes into your class you're supposed to welcome him, not tie his shoes together in gym and throw his lunch out the window." Derek's face was brightening. Now that I had gotten angry, I think it made him feel better, like somebody finally understood what he'd been going through.

"Yeah," he said. "These kids are mean." Not much later, Derek's mom returned. I stuck around while Derek told her what a horrible day he'd had. Mrs. Masters gathered Todd up and sat him in her lap while Derek went through the story a second time.

I wanted to stay long enough to see if we could put our heads together and come up with some kind of solution. But it was already 5:15. Almost time for the Monday meeting of the Baby-sitters Club. I'd have to hurry to get to Claudia's house on time. On my way there, I noticed that I was walking through the streets much faster than usual. All that anger was really giving me a push. I even got to the meeting a few minutes ahead of time, which for me is really unusual. Everybody was surprised to see me.

"Jessi!" Kristy looked shocked. She checked her watch to make sure she had the right time. "Did my watch slow down? Is it five-thirty already?" As usual, I plopped onto the floor next to Mallory.

"No," I replied. I was still catching my breath. "But you won't believe what happened to Derek in school today." My friends were all ears.

"There's a kid in his class," I explained, "a kid who's a real brat. The boy's name is John. But I call him Superbrat!" Chapter 7.

Kristy's afternoon sounded like quite a production. That Saturday she had a job sitting at her own house. Her parents and Nannie were out visiting friends, and her two older brothers were out doing whatever it is that high school brothers do. Karen and Andrew, Kristy's stepsister and stepbrother, were at the house for the weekend, so that left Kristy with Karen, who's six, Andrew, who's four, Kristy's own little brother, David Michael, who's seven, and Emily Michelle, who's two. (She's the little girl who was adopted into Kristy's family.) When Kristy's parents left, David Michael and Andrew were quietly playing a game of cards and Emily Michelle was taking her afternoon nap. But Karen . . . well, Karen is Karen. That little girl has a wild imagination and more energy than a month-old puppy. You know how puppies just can't help chewing on slippers and shoes and socks and anything else they can get their teeth on? Well, Karen's sort of like that. Only it's not slippers she chews on. It's more like . . . life.

Kristy told me that Karen had started getting a little wild the night before, when the family had sat down together to watch P.S. 162. (I guess a lot of families in Stoneybrook had taken to watching the show.) While they were watching, Kristy happened to mention that the actor who played Derek was back in town and that the Baby-sitters Club had lined up a few jobs at his house. Well, that was enough to set Karen's mind spinning. Kristy said that Karen sat there wide-eyed, staring at the TV, amazed that this character on the screen was really a little boy named Derek who actually lived in Stoneybrook.

"You mean he's from here?" she sputtered. "But then, but then how did he ever get to be on TV?" Kristy explained as best she could about actors and how they get jobs.

"Does that mean 7 could be on TV?" This was a whole new revelation for Karen. She jumped up and started reciting all the lines after the actors on TV.

By the time the show was over, Karen's eyes were glazed over. She'd gotten the bug, all right.

"You know, I could do that," she said. "I could be an actor, too. I know how to do what they were doing. It's not so hard. I could be on TV." That night, Kristy thought the whole thing might blow over. She figured Karen would go to bed and wake up the next morning having forgotten all about this acting business. Well, obviously, Kristy had forgotten who she was dealing with. This, after all, was Karen Brewer, the same Karen who for months and months has sworn that the older woman who lives next door to them is really a witch named Morbidda Destiny. Now, mind you, Karen's had plenty of evidence to the contrary. But will she give up her idea? Not on your life. And she wasn't about to give up this acting idea, either. So she'd had a good night's sleep. So what? That Saturday morning, when Karen woke up, she was ready and eager to start her career. At the breakfast table she made her first move. She asked if Kristy could introduce her to Derek.

Kristy sighed.

"Karen," she said, "Derek is having a very hard time adjusting to being back in Stoneybrook. The last thing he needs right now is people calling him up and asking him favors." "But he could get me on TV," Karen protested. "I'm sure he could get me on P.S. 162." "The answer," said Kristy, "is no." Karen kept pestering Kristy all morning and into the afternoon, and finally Kristy suggested that if Karen wanted to be an actress so badly, maybe she should think of some way to do it herself.

"Okay!" said Karen.

Karen dashed up to the playroom and dug into a big trunk she has there. The trunk is filled with old dress-up clothes. Karen pulled out a big straw hat with a bunch of fake violets on the brim, a pair of long black silken gloves (the kind that go all the way up to your elbows), high-heeled shoes, and a yellow flouncy dress that looks like it had been somebody's prom outfit. She put this odd costume on and walked back down the steps in her tippy shoes.

"Kristy," she called. "I have an idea. Can I call Hannie and Amanda to come over and help me?" Hannie Papadakis and Amanda Delaney are two little girls who live on Kristy's street. Both of them are good friends with Karen, though the two of them don't get along quite as well.

Kristy took a look at Karen's getup. She felt the edges of her mouth start to twitch into a smile, but she knew she couldn't laugh. That it would hurt Karen's feelings.

"Sure," she said. "Call 'em up." Kristy's used to having a lot of kids around. For her, the more the merrier.

By the time Hannie and Amanda arrived, Karen had already rearranged the living room so it worked better as a stage. She pushed the chairs around so that there was a big empty space at one end of the room, and the chairs became the seats for the audience.

"There!" Karen said, eyeing her work.

Hannie and Amanda stood crammed behind the chairs.

"What are we playing?" asked Hannie.

"Playing!" cried Karen. "This isn't play! This is work!" Karen adjusted the straw hat on her head and hiked up her long yellow gown. "I'm an actress," she announced, as if that explained everything, "and Hannie, you and Amanda can be actresses, too. Of course, I'm the star, though," she added.

"I want to be a star, too," said Amanda.

"Well," Karen paused, "okay." "If she's a star, I want to be a star," said Hannie.

"Everybody can't be stars," Karen protested.

Kristy poked her head in through the door. She'd been listening all along.

"Why not?" she asked.

"Because," said Karen. It was as simple as that. "And anyway, Kristy," Karen went on, "you can't come in here yet. We're going to put on a play, but we have to practice it first. You and David Michael and Andrew and Emily Michelle are going to be the audience. The audience isn't supposed to see the practice part." Just then, Kristy heard Emily Michelle stirring upstairs. She had woken up from her nap. Kristy left the girls alone and went upstairs to tend to her new little sister. Karen shut the door to the living room behind her.

Over the course of the next hour or so, Kristy could hear all sorts of commotion coming from Karen's rehearsal.

"No!" she heard Karen shout. "Hannie, you're not supposed to stand here. You're supposed to stand there." "But Amanda's standing over there," Hannie said.

"Amanda, weren't you listening? I told you to do a dance with a little twirl and end up on this side of the room," Karen directed.

It's always difficult being a director.

When the rehearsal was almost finished, Karen brought her friends up to the playroom and rummaged through the trunk with them, looking for their costumes. Amanda found a black lace dress she wanted to wear.

"No," said Karen. She gave her a red cotton one instead. I think Karen didn't want anyone to be more dressed up than she was. She was, you remember, the star.

The girls ran up and down the stairs several more times, then closed themselves back up in the living room. Kristy could hear Karen's orders and Hannie and Amanda's giggles. Finally, Karen swung open the living room door.

"Come on, everybody!" she cried. "Come on, audience!" It was time for Karen's production.

Kristy hiked Emily up on her hip and brought David Michael and Andrew into the living room. The "audience" settled themselves into their seats. Karen walked to the center of the stage area and held up her hands for attention.

"Quiet, everybody," she said, though no one was saying a word. "We have a play today and the name of it is - " Before she could finish, Hannie tiptoed over to Karen and whispered a question in her ear. "No, no." Karen said firmly. "You come on after." Karen turned back to the audience. "Like I was saying," she continued, "the name of our play today is Getting to Be Stars. I will be the biggest star, and Hannie and Amanda are two other stars. Okay," she said. I think she wasn't sure how to make the transition from her opening speech to the actual play. She walked to the back of the stage, turned around, and walked back again. "Now if s the play," she said simply.

Suddenly, Karen struck a melodramatic pose, her hand across her forehead.

"Oh, dear," she wailed in a high, false voice. "I want to be a star. In fact, I know I'm a star. But the question is, how do I get on TV?" There was a long pause. Something was obviously supposed to happen, but someone was missing her cue.

"Hannie!" Karen prompted loudly.

"Oh!" Hannie started. She tottered over in her too-big dress-up shoes to deliver her (late) line.

"Did you think of calling up that Darrel boy?" Hannie asked loudly.

"Derek," hissed Karen. "Derek." "Oh, yeah." Hannie tried again. "Did you think of calling that Derek boy? Maybe he could get you on TV." "Kristy says no," wailed Karen. She looked directly at Kristy, to make sure the line was having some effect. Then she broke into loud, fake sobs and cried into her arm. She was an actress, all right.

"So what are you going to do?" cried Amanda.

"I'll do the only thing I can do," said Karen. Now she was holding her arms grandly up to the sky. "I'll go to Hollywood and be discovered and I'll get lots of costumes and my own dressing room." Well, you can imagine the rest of the play. Karen did go to Hollywood. She knocked on door after door, but (sob, sob), she couldn't get a job. After many tries, she started thinking that maybe she should go home - crawl back defeated, with her tail between her legs.

"Well," she said dramatically. "I'll just try one more door." She knocked. Amanda answered.

"Who are you?" asked Karen.

"I'm the director," said Amanda. "We've got a show to do here, but my main actress just got sick. I need someone else to step in and be a star." "I'm a star!" cried Karen.

"Then you're hired!" said the director.

In the last scene of the play, two reporters (Hannie and Amanda) crowded around Karen to interview her. They held up their microphones (which were really a spatula and a soup spoon) for her to speak into.

"What is the secret of your success?" asked Hannie.

"Well," Karen said, smiling, "all along I knew I was a star. It would've been very easy if I could've met Derek, but I knew, I just knew, I had to get on TV." Hannie and Amanda dropped their microphones and applauded loudly. Karen took a long, low bow. She was some kind of star, all right. Kristy and the rest of the audience joined in the applause.

Later, when Kristy told me about the play, I felt the knot in my stomach again. Oh, I found myself thinking, if only stardom were as easy as that.

Chapter 8.

On that Saturday when Kristy and her crowd were "getting to be stars" in the safety of their house, I was out in the big, wide world trying to do the same thing. That's because Saturday was my first Swan Lake audition.

I can't tell you how crazy I was that morning. You know how usually, when you wake up, it takes awhile to shake the sleep off? Well, that morning, when I opened my eyes, my heart was already racing and adrenalin was already pumping through my veins. One word was pounding in my head: AUDITION! I hopped out of bed and began my morning's work . . . driving my family nuts.

Mama was in the kitchen making coffee. I joined her and started pacing around.

" 'Morning, Jessi," Mama said. She smiled an amused sort of smile. I could tell that she recognized this nervousness of mine. My whole family is used to it. This is the way I always get before an audition or a performance.

The rest of my family drifted into the kitchen and we all sat down for breakfast. At least, they sat down. I kept jumping up from my place. I had to check on the toast, I had to get another spoon, I had to fill my glass with orange juice, and, of course, I had to change my mind and switch to grapefruit.

I caught Daddy throwing Mama his own little amused smile. When breakfast was done, I jumped up from the table.

"I'll do the dishes," I said.

"I have a better idea," said Daddy. "Why don't you go downstairs to your practice room and do some warming up. To tell you the truth, I'm not sure you could hold a plate steady in those hands of yours this morning. Better for you to grab onto something stable, like the barre." "Right," I said quickly. "Good idea." Going down to the basement and working at the barre did calm me down some. At least it gave me something to think about. My feet, for instance. I had to work through all the muscles in my toes and up through my ankles. Then, of course, I had to worry about my legs. I stretched my calves and my hamstrings and did some strengthening work. Finally I was ready to put on my toe shoes and work on my balance.

It was a lot of work. But it did keep me occupied until it was time to get ready to leave.

The sheet of instructions Mme Noelle had given me said that I should bring a picture and resume to the audition. Mama had typed me a short resume with information about the ballet schools I had gone to and about the few performances I had been in. We stapled a little snapshot of me on top.

I looked it over. I panicked.

"Mama!" I called frantically. "We forgot to put my telephone number on the resume!" "No we didn't, honey." Her voice was soft and soothing. "There it is, right there." She pointed to the top of the page. She was right. There it was.

"But the resume doesn't say anything about Coppelia," I rushed on. Coppelia was the last performance I had been in.

Mama pointed down the resume. There, indeed, was Coppelia. Mama had included a whole paragraph about it.

"Oh," I said sheepishly. I decided it was time to fix my hair.

I went into the bathroom, brushed my hair back off my face, and pulled it up tightly with an elastic band. I looked at myself in the mirror. It didn't look right. I pulled the elastic band out and tried it again. No good. I must have done this about ten more times when I looked up in the mirror and noticed Daddy standing behind me, watching the whole thing.

"Having trouble?" he asked.

"I can't get all my hair to stay in the elastic, Daddy," I said sullenly. I think I was sort of pouting.

"Did you try glueing it?" Daddy smiled. Of course, he was just trying to tease me out of my mood, but I wouldn't be comforted. Daddy put his arms around me. That felt a little better.

"So why don't we shave your hair all off?" he asked. "I could go get my razor right now. A little off the sides, off the top . . ." All of a sudden, the whole thing did seem kind of funny. I guess I had been getting a little carried away. I took a look at my hair in the mirror. To tell the truth, it looked just fine. I gave Daddy a kiss, changed into my leotard, and was ready to hit the road.

The audition itself was bigger, scarier, and even more professional than I had imagined. The girls in my ballet class were right. A lot of New York dancers had shown up to try out. They were all long and lean and wore beautiful practice clothes - shiny leotards that showed off every muscle, matching leg warmers, and gauzy ballet skirts with crisp satin ties.

All these ballerinas had their pictures and resumes in hand. Of course, their pictures weren't little snapshots like mine. They were the same kind of fancy head shots that Derek had. Somehow, being at this audition reminded me of my very first ballet class. I remembered the feeling. Mama hadn't had time to buy me ballet slippers, so I had had to take my first class barefoot. But once the class had started, it hadn't mattered. I got right into concentrating on the work.

I looked around me at the audition. Everyone was stretching out and pounding their toe shoes on the floor to soften them up. These are things that ballerinas always do before they go onstage.

"I know how to do all that," I thought confidently.

So I took a deep breath and joined right in.

The audition itself was actually kind of fun. They broke us up into groups and taught us some combinations of steps, some slow ones in which you had to try to be steady and graceful, and some fast ones in which you traveled across the whole stage. I wasn't sure how I did, but I thought I did okay. After my group took its turn, I waited in the back of the theater and watched the others. There was a tight, clique-y group of ballerinas standing near me. They were watching the other groups, too. And they were making nasty comments about everyone onstage.

"Look at her," one of them said. "She has no balance. And look at her leg. It's just flopping there." I couldn't help but look at the girl they pointed out. It was true, she lost her balance at one point, and it was also true that her leg wasn't as stretched as it could be. But to tell you the truth, she was a beautiful dancer. I thought she was the best onstage.

I moved away from the gossippers. The thing about ballet is that sometimes you come across girls who are sharks - girls who circle around, watching and waiting for someone else to fail. I guess it's because ballet can be so competitive.

"Jessica Ramsey." What was that? Someone was calling my name. It was the stage manager. She was reading off a list of names, and the girls whose names were called were gathering at the front of the theater. I joined the group.

"Me?" I asked the stage manager. "Did you call Jessica Ramsey?" The stage manager nodded.

Now this you won't believe. At least, I couldn't. The names they were calling were the ones that had made it through the first audition, the dancers they wanted to see a second time.

Me, Jessica Ramsey! They had called my name! "Come back next Saturday. Same time," said the stage manager.

You bet I'd be there! Daddy was waiting outside for me. I hopped in the car. I was talking a mile a minute.

"Daddy, Daddy, I got a callback! They broke us into groups, and of course there were some gossipy ballerinas there, but Daddy, they called me back!" I don't know if Daddy understood all of what I said, but he did manage to get the gist.

When we got home, I raced to the phone to call Mallory and tell her my news.

"That's great!" she squealed.

But by this time, other, shakier thoughts had started to seep into my head.

"Oh, but Mallory, what if I'm not good enough?" I said. "And this audition business is so scary. I'm not sure I can go through it another time." Mallory is my friend for a good reason. She said all the right things then. She told me all 1 could do was try. And she said I shouldn't let my fears stop me from doing what I wanted in life. I knew she was right. I'd just never been this nervous about anything before.

After Mal had calmed me down, she also told me something that Nicky said about Derek, something about how he was doing in school.

"What?" I said. "Is it John again?" Mallory said Nicky told her that Derek had gotten into a fight. "Nicky said Derek threw his food all over a kid in the cafeteria." "Nicky must've got it wrong," I said. "That's probably what the Superbrat did to Derek." "No," Mallory insisted. "Nicky says Derek was the one who threw the food." This information did not sound good.

"The Superbrat pushed Derek too far," I said decisively.

Poor Derek. Things did not sound like they were getting better at all.

Chapter 9.

As you can see, I wasn't the only one in the Baby-sitters Club involved in the Derek business. When Claudia took an afternoon job sitting for Derek and Todd, she jumped right into the soup. Is that what the expression is, soup? Maybe I mean stew. Now Claudia's got me making mistakes. Well, whatever the mess was, Claudia got involved.

When she reached the Masterses' house, the boys had just gotten home from school. Claudia noticed that Derek looked kind of jittery. He kept chewing on his nails and, when she gave them their snack, Derek shredded his napkin into a hundred little pieces.

"How was school today?" Claudia asked.

Derek started in on another napkin.

Luckily, it happened to be a beautiful, sunny afternoon. It was one of those blue-sky days, the kind that only happens a couple of times a year and when it does, you think, This is heaven. Every day should be like this. It was much too pretty to spend the whole afternoon cooped up inside, so Claudia suggested a trip to the school playground.

"Yeah!" cried Todd. No question what his vote was.

Derek wasn't as enthusiastic. He scuffed his shoes around on the kitchen floor before he agreed, and Claudia noticed that when they got to the playground, Derek's eyes darted around, taking a quick survey of the other kids who were there. Most of the kids at the playground were younger, and Derek seemed to relax a little. He straddled the seat of a swing while Claudia pushed Todd.

"During school, I hate this playground," Derek said sullenly.

"You do? Why?" asked Claudia.

" 'Cause out here, anything can happen. The teachers aren't really in charge and the kids can pretty much do anything they want." "That's exactly what I always liked about the playground," said Claudia.

"Yeah, but that means they can do anything they want to me." "Oh. Right." Claudia remembered. How could she have even forgotten?

Derek looked around again to make sure he didn't see anybody he knew.

"What do the kids do to you?" Claudia asked.

"Well . . ." Derek sighed. "Like the other day, I was on the monkey bars over there and I was just playing, I was hanging upside down, when this guy John came over and pushed my legs off the bar." "Really?" Claudia gasped. "That's terrible!" "I landed right on my head," said Derek. He pushed his hair back to show her where. "Do you see a bump?" "Not really." Claudia squinted. She parted his hair and combed her fingers over his scalp.

"It must've healed," said Derek.

"Still," said Claudia. "That's horrible." Derek heaved another big sigh.

"Yeah, and then another time, when I was on my way into the school in the morning, John grabbed my book bag, dumped all my stuff onto the ground, and stole my math homework." "He stole your homework!" Claudia was aghast. Probably because Claudia isn't the best student in the world and she appreciates how hard it is to do homework in the first place. "Well, what did you do?" she asked.

"What could I do?" asked Derek. "When Mr. Rossi asked us to pass in our homework, I didn't have any to turn in. I told him I forgot it at home." Claudia shook her head. She could relate.

"Did the teacher call your parents?" she asked. That would be Claudia's worst nightmare.

"No," said Derek. "I just had to bring it in the next day." "Well, do the kids ever let you play with them?" asked Claudia.

"Once," said Derek. "They were playing catch. I asked if I could play, too, and they said yes. John tossed me the ball, and I couldn't believe it. I thought, 'This is great.' But when I caught the ball, something sticky got on my fingers. John had stuck ABC gum all over the ball." "Ick," Claudia said. "Already-been-chewed." "Right," Derek answered.

Claudia gave Todd another big push.

"Oh, no!" Derek said suddenly. He turned backwards on the swing and tucked his chin down to hide his face.

"What is it?" asked Claudia.

Derek shushed her.

Claudia looked in the direction Derek had turned from. Four boys on bicycles had just ridden onto the playground. They looked like they were about Derek's age. They circled the monkey bars and reared the fronts of their bikes up as if they were cowboys riding wild horses. They headed for the swing set.

"Oh, no," Derek said again.

"From your class?" asked Claudia.

"Yeah." "Don't worry," she said. "They're not going to bother you while I'm here." When the boys reached the swing set, they hopped off their bikes. Derek turned back around. He sat up straighter.

"Hi," he said cautiously.

"Hi," the boys replied.

Then nobody said anything. The boys stared at Derek. He stared at the ground. Claudia knew that it's usually best to let kids try to work things out for themselves, but after awhile, when everybody was still standing there not saying anything, she just had to jump in. That's when she got her great idea.

"Would you like to join us?" she asked the boys. "I'm Claudia, the baby-sitter, and this is Todd. We were just about to head back to Derek's house. Do you want to come over?" Derek stared at Claudia, dumbfounded. Each of the boys looked at another.

"Yeah," one said finally. "Sure." Claudia smiled. That boy was obviously the ringleader. She figured he was probably the infamous John.

Claudia's idea to invite the boys over was a smart one. She had a hunch that it would be good for them to see where Derek lived. They'd see that he was just a regular kid living in a regular house in Stoneybrook.

On the way to the Masterses' house, the boys walked their bikes alongside Derek. Claudia held Todd's hand and walked a little ways away. She kept her ears open, though. The boys still didn't say much of anything.

One sort of muttered, "This the way?" Another commented briefly, "Hey, I know somebody on this block." Well, at least what they did say seemed friendly enough.

When they got to Derek's house, Claudia turned into the front walk.

"This is where you live?" asked one of the boys. His mouth was hanging open like he'd just seen a blue elephant.

"Yeah," said Derek.

"I thought you lived in a Disneyland castle or something," the boy said.

Claudia had to stop herself from laughing out loud.

She let the boys inside. They were all eyes. When she described their reaction to me, it sort of reminded me of the first time I went to Derek's house. (I wonder if the boys noticed all the old newspapers and the pile of dirty dishes.) The boys looked around at this regular house in total surprise.

"Wow!" one said. "A house." Derek invited the kids up to his room to play. Claudia decided it would be best if she stayed out of the way a little while. So she and Todd settled into a chair in the living room with a couple of picture books. That would be good for Todd anyway, she figured. Derek gets so much of the attention so often, Todd could use some cozy one-to-one time.

As she turned the pages of Todd's books, she could hear laughter drifting down from Derek's room. It wasn't mean laughter, either. She could hear that boy laughing, the one she figured was John, and she could hear Derek joining right in. As she sat there, Claudia congratulated herself. She figured she'd solved the Superbrat problem once and for all.

After awhile the boys trooped down the stairs.

"Hey, Derek, that was fun," one said.

"Yeah, I never played that game before," said another.

"I got it in California," said Derek.

"Wow. Cool. See you in school tomorrow, okay?" The boys had obviously had a good time. They waved a quick good-bye to Claudia and ran outside to their bicycles. Derek stood at the doorway, waving, as his new friends coasted down the driveway and skidded out onto the sidewalk. When he closed the door, he was all smiles.

"Hey," said Claudia, "not bad, huh?" "Yeah," Derek said. He looked truly amazed. "They liked me. We had fun." "So which one was John?" Claudia asked. She could hardly wait to get the information.

"John?" Derek looked puzzled. "Oh. John. None of them," he said. "John isn't friends with them." Derek wandered back up to his room. He looked a little dazed from the events of the afternoon. Dazed, but happy.

Well, Claudia thought, she hadn't exactly solved the Superbrat problem, but she had helped some of the boys to be friends with Derek, and that was a good start.

"See you tomorrow in school," they had said.

Not bad for one afternoon of baby-sitting.

Chapter 10.

The next Saturday was the day of my second audition. I also had another job scheduled at the Masterses'. Mrs. Masters had offered to pick me up after the audition and bring me straight to their house. You can bet my parents went for that idea in a big way. They end up carting me around so much for my classes that I think they sometimes feel like a ballet chauffeur service.

I told Mrs. Masters where the theater was and what time to come, and sure enough, when I came down from the stage after my audition, I spotted her and Derek standing at the back of the theater. I waved to them and they waved back.

"Jessica Ramsey." It was the stage manager again, calling my name from the front row of seats. She was sitting next to the choreographer, who was leaning over her, writing something on her pad. For a moment, I felt pretty scared.

It was time to take myself in hand and give myself another little talk.

Come on, I said to myself. They're not going to wait all day while you stand here trying to find your legs.

"Yes?" I asked when I reached them. My voice cracked as the word came out.

"Miss Ramsey," said the stage manager. "Congratulations. You've survived another round. We'd like to see you again next Saturday for the final audition." "Really?" I squeaked. "I mean, thank you. I mean, I'll see you next week. Thank you very much." I backed away, all smiles. Then I grabbed my bag, slipped my pants on over my tights, and ran to the back of the theater, where Derek and his mother were waiting.

"You made the cut?" Derek asked. "They asked you back?" I guess he could tell by the big smile that had taken over my face.

"Yup," I said. "Just one more audition to go." Mrs. Masters gave me a hug of congratulations and Derek slapped me five. As we walked out of the theater to the car, Derek nudged me and pointed to the clique-y group of girls who were again standing at the back of the theater, huddled and whispering.

"Those girls are cutthroat, huh?" Derek said.

"We were standing next to them for awhile," Mrs. Masters added. "They didn't have a nice word to say about anyone." I shrugged.

"They're a certain type you find around ballet," I said. "But most ballerinas aren't like that." When we got tojhe car, Derek pulled a small notepad out of his pocket.

"I took a few notes on your performance," he said.

"You did?" I asked, surprised.

"I hope you don't mind. It really was super. Even I could tell that. But there were a few things that you could just clean up, and since you do have one last audition to go through, I figured I might as well give you some tips." "Sure," I said. "Shoot." Though, to tell the truth, I was wondering what kind of corrections Derek could really give me about ballet. It's a pretty exacting art, and you sort of have to know a lot about it to be able to notice what's right and what's wrong.

Derek opened his notepad.

"Well," he said. "To start, during the piqué turns, you weren't attaching your foot to the back of your knee." I stared at Derek dumbfounded. How did he know about piqué turns? How did he know where your foot was supposed to be?

"And another note," said Derek. "During the tour jetes your spot wandered." Tour jetes? Spot? Where was Derek getting this technical language? These were the kinds of things Mme Noelle was always hounding me about.

I looked at Derek. He was grinning. I grabbed the notebook out of his hands.

"Give me that," I said.

I looked over the page. It was filled with lots more notes that were just as technical. The only thing he had wrong was the spelling of the words. For instance, he had spelled "tour jete" the way it is pronounced - "toor jetay." "All right," I said. "How did you come up with these notes?" "Certain cutthroat types can be very helpful without knowing it." "You mean . . . ?" "We were standing by those girls for an awfully long time," Mrs. Masters explained. "We heard them tearing apart everyone's performance, so Derek got the idea to see what they had to say about yours. They have trained eyes and were very specific in what they saw. Derek just happened to get it all down on paper." I looked over the notes. They were actually very helpful. I recognized a lot of the mistakes they had caught. They were things I often did wrong. Well, now I had the whole week to work on them.

"Gee, I don't know who I should thank," I said. "You or the cutthroats." "You can thank me," Derek grinned. "I accept all donations of money, all presents, all major credit cards . . ." I cuffed Derek playfully on the head.

"All bops on the head," he continued, "all punches on the arm ..." "All punches in the nose," I said, laughing.

"All kicks in the shins." I have to admit, we were getting pretty silly. Suddenly, I remembered that I was supposed to be the baby-sitter. I glanced at Mrs. Masters to see if she seemed bothered. Mrs. Masters smiled.

"All knocks to the noggin," she joined in.

Pretty soon we were all laughing. For me it was a way of letting out some of that giddiness that was left over from the audition.

"You know, those notes are all fine and good," Mrs. Masters said, "but we did catch your performance and I just want to say that it was beautiful." "Really?" I said.

"Breathtaking," she went on. "There's just something about ballet, isn't there? And you looked like such a natural ballerina up on that stage." "Except for the pique turns and the tour jetes," Derek teased.

"I think those girls were picking on you because you were so good," said Mrs. Masters.

Boy, I sure wished I could let myself believe that. I still wasn't sure I had the stuff to make it into the production. Now that I had only one more audition to go, I started to get really scared. I was in the big league now. Deep down, I was afraid of blowing it.

By this time Mrs. Masters was pulling the car into the driveway. When she shut off the ignition, she turned to face Derek.

"Well," she said, "are you going to tell Jessi your news?" Derek blushed.

"Shhh," he said.

"News?" My ears pricked up. "What news?" "I'll tell you later," Derek said.

The front door of the house banged open. Todd had heard the car and was running out to greet us. He jumped right into my arms.

"Jessi!" he cried.

I set him down and followed him into the house. Mr. Masters was putting on his jacket to join his wife, who was waiting for him in the car. A few moments later, I was alone with the kids. My curiosity was getting stronger and stronger.

"So," I said. "What's this news all about, anyway?" "Nothing." Derek shrugged.

Todd grabbed my arm and started jumping up and down.

"We're going back to L. A.! We're going back to L.A.!" he said.

"What!?" I shrieked.

Derek stared at the floor. ."Derek, are you really?" I asked.

He glanced up quickly, then nodded his head.

"Why?" I asked. "You just got here." "Derek's gonna be on TV again," Todd said. "He's gonna be on another show." "A TV movie," Derek explained. "They start shooting real soon, so we have to leave in a couple of weeks." "A couple of weeks?" I said. I couldn't believe it. This had all happened so fast.

"I'm gonna go back to my old school," said Todd. He was still hanging on my arm and tugging hard.

"Just when I started to make friends," said Derek. "I'll miss my new friends and I'll miss you. . . . Oh, no, Jessi," he cried. "I just realized. I won't get to see you in Swan Lake." Derek's eyes started to glaze over. You could tell his mind was wandering off somewhere. "Hey," he said suddenly. "Jessi, why don't you come out to L.A., too? There're lots of dancers out there. You could pick up some modeling work. I'm sure you could get some commercials." "I can't go out to L.A.," I protested.

"Why not?" said Derek. "I did." "Anyway, I couldn't get work on commercials." "Sure you could." Derek grabbed my free hand and started tugging at me, too.

"Come to L.A.," he started chanting. "Come to L.A." Todd joined in.

With Derek tugging on one hand and Todd tugging on the other, I felt a little bit like a giant piece of taffy. Just then, the doorbell rang.

"Saved by the bell!" I said with a laugh.

Todd ran to the window to see who was there.

"It's your friends," he called to Derek.

Derek looked at me quickly.

"Don't say anything about L.A.," he said. "I'll tell them. Soon, but not yet." He ran to the door. Four boys trooped in, I guess they were the same boys Claudia had invited over. Derek introduced me to them, but none of them was named John.

Oh, well. I sighed to myself. Derek had been in Stoneybrook such a short time. It had been long enough for him to make a few friends, but not long enough to win over the Super-brat. I took Todd's hand and brought him out to play in the backyard. There sure were big changes here. And something Derek had said was echoing in my brain. That I could get modeling jobs and work on commercials.

"Come on, Todd," I said.

Modeling. Commercials. That might be a relief after all this ballet anxiety. I had a lot to think about.

Chapter 11.

When Monday rolled around, I almost missed the meeting of the Baby-sitters Club. I had two projects in mind, and both of them had something to do with Derek. At 5:10, I was still sitting in my room, working on Project #1. I had the Stamford phone book in my lap. I opened it to the yellow pages and was copying down names and phone numbers of certain kinds of businesses. I had closed the door because I didn't want anyone to know what I was doing ... at least not yet. It was my secret. I bet I have you curious about what I was up to. Well, I'll give you this hint: the project had something to do with Derek's idea about me going into acting and modeling. I hadn't been able to stop thinking about the possibility, ever since Derek had brought it up. I glanced at the clock. Uh-oh! Only a few minutes to meeting time. Time to put aside Project #1 and get started on Project #2.

(You'll see what that one was in a minute.) I hid the list of phone numbers under my pillow and took off for Claudia's.

No one was surprised, of course, when I slid into the meeting at the very last minute. I guess at this point, they almost expect that. Kristy was already rapping on the arm of her director's chair to call the club members to attention.

"The Baby-sitters Club will now come to order," she said.

I sat up as tall as I could. I don't usually talk a lot at the meetings, being a junior officer and all, but like I said, I had to start organizing this second project I had in mind. And that would mean getting all the club members involved.

"Anybody have any club business?" Kristy asked.

I shot up my hand even though Kristy had said at my first club meeting that I didn't have to do that.

Kristy looked a little surprised and so did everyone else. I hadn't even told Mallory my idea yet.

"Jessi," Kristy called on me.

"Yes. Well," I began. "Well, all of you know by now that Derek and his family are moving back to L.A. in a couple of weeks. So my idea is ... My idea is ..." I swallowed hard. "My idea is that we give him a surprise good-bye party before he leaves. We could invite all the new friends he's made. That way everybody will get a chance to say good-bye." For a moment nobody said anything. Then Kristy's face broke into a big smile.

"Great idea!" she said.

"Yeah!" Mallory echoed.

"I could make invitations," said Claudia.

Everybody started talking at once.

"We could invite some of the kids we babysit for." "And all the kids in Derek's class." "All the kids?" I asked. That sounded like a big crowd. "I was thinking of having the party at my house. I don't know if everyone would fit." "Well, we could have it at my house," Kristy offered. Kristy's house, remember, is a mansion.

"Really?" I said. "You wouldn't mind?" "It would sure make Karen happy," Kristy said, laughing. "She still hasn't given up the idea of meeting Derek and asking him to make her a star." A phone call came in and then another one, so we did have to do some of our usual meeting stuff, but we spent most of the time planning the party. Kristy, who loves to be in charge, had quickly taken over.

The first problem we ran into was the question of when to hold the party. There wasn't much time left before Derek would be moving again and we were all pretty tightly scheduled with jobs and all. Mary Anne paged through the appointment pages of the record book.

"Hmm," she said. "Looks like the only time might be Saturday afternoon." "No, we can't do it then," said Dawn. "Remember, I just took that job at the Newtons'." That was the last call that had come in. In all the excitement, Mary Anne had forgotten to write it down.

"Anyway, Saturday afternoon's no good because that's when Jessi has her final Swan Lake audition," Mallory piped up.

Oh, no. I shot Mallory a withering glance. Why did she have to tell the whole club about that?

"You do?" Mary Anne asked, all excited. "You mean you got through the other auditions? Why didn't you tell us?" Suddenly, everyone surrounded me, giving me their congratulations and asking me questions. I didn't know why, but I felt very uncomfortable. This was a new feeling that had taken over. After Saturday and the initial rush of making the cut, I didn't want to talk about Swan Lake. I didn't even want to think about it. All I wanted was to get the last audition over with.

Lucky thing the phone rang then. Another job call came in. Everyone settled back into their places and left me alone.

Mallory was watching me. She could see I looked kind of squirmy.

"Why didn't you want everyone to know?" she whispered.

"I don't know." I shrugged.

After the phone call, Kristy rapped again on the arm of her chair.

"So when are we going to have this party?" she said. "It looks like the only time available would be some night at midnight." Mary Anne looked over the pages of the appointment book.

"That's not the only time," she said thoughtfully. "If we can't have it Saturday afternoon, how about Saturday morning? Hey, I have an idea! It could be a breakfast party. We could have it from nine until twelve." "Great idea," cried Kristy. "We could have a table with a whole assortment of cereals." "And juices," said Dawn.

"A breakfast party?" said Claudia. She didn't sound at all sure about the idea.

"Yeah," said Mallory. "A breakfast party. "It's so unusual. It's a great idea." "But if it's breakfast, we can't serve cake," said Claudia. "Or ice cream. Or cookies. Well," she said with a sigh. You could see the wheels turning in her head. "I guess we could have doughnuts." All the rest of us laughed.

"Doughnuts, cereal, and juice." Mary Anne wrote all the suggestions down.

"And fruit slices," Dawn added.

Claudia crinkled her nose.

We decided that we would each be responsible for bringing two boxes of cereal, and we divided up the rest of the food equally. (Guess who got doughnuts.) Kristy put Mallory in charge of getting the names of all of Derek's classmates, since her brother Nicky was in the same class. That brought up one last issue for discussion.

"Are you going to invite John?" Mallory asked.

"John?" Kristy looked puzzled.

"The Superbrat," Claudia explained.

Everyone looked to me for the answer.

"I think we should invite him," I said. "If we're inviting the whole class, we have to. Anyway, this may be Derek's last chance to win the kid over." "And I want to meet John finally," said Claudia. "I'm dying to know who the Superbrat is." That settled that.

When the meeting broke up, I headed home for dinner. Becca was already setting the table, but I slipped upstairs to my room and fished out the phone list from under my pillow. Time to get back to Project #1. I went back down to the kitchen, helped Mama put the food onto plates, and waited until everyone was seated and Daddy was helping himself to butter for his mashed potatoes.

I cleared my throat.

"Mama, Daddy?" I said.

"Yes?" Daddy answered.

I had rehearsed a whole speech, thinking of just the way I wanted to present my idea, but suddenly I couldn't remember what I had planned to say.

"I was talking to Derek," I said.

Becca dropped her fork. I think she figured she was about to get more information about Lamont. Sorry, Becca, no such luck.

"Well," I stumbled on, "Derek suggested that I move out to L.A." "Move to L.A.?" Now it was Mama's turn to drop her fork.

"I mean, I don't want to go to L.A.," I said quickly. "But Derek suggested I come to L.A. so I could do some modeling or get on commercials. Anyway, that made me think. I might be able to do that here, the way Derek did before he got on TV. There are some modeling and talent agencies in Stamford, and I think they do local commercials and some newspaper and magazine ads." I pulled out the list of numbers I had taken down and passed it to Mama.

"I was thinking of calling them," I said, "to see if they might be interested in me, but, of course, I wanted to check with you first." Mama looked at Daddy. He was already looking at her. Squirt smashed his spoon into his mashed potatoes.

"Po-po!" he cried.

Mama handed the list over to Daddy and he looked it over, too. For the longest time, I thought no one was going to say anything.

"Why do you think you want to do this?" Daddy asked.

I wasn't prepared for that question.

"I don't know," I said. "I just do." "You've got quite a full schedule already with ballet class and the Baby-sitters Club," Mama said.

"And who knows, you may have a full Swan Lake rehearsal schedule coming up," Daddy added.

"I'm probably not going to get into that," I mumbled.

Daddy shot a look at Mama. "Are you nervous about Swan Lake?" he asked.

"I'm not nervous," I said. "I just don't care anymore." "Mmm-hmm," Daddy said. He didn't sound like he believed me.

"Well," I said, "maybe I do care, but I'll tell you, this audition process is driving me crazy. And after I go through all this, I'm probably not going to make it anyway. So it seems to me that I might as well branch out, get some other kinds of work. Modeling can't be as nerve-racking as ballet. I mean, all you have to do is stand there and smile, right?" Mama wiped mashed potatoes off of Squirt's cheeks and chin.

"Well, if you want to look into this," she said, "I don't see why you shouldn't. Why don't you go ahead and make some phone calls. You can find out some more information, and then we'll talk again." "As long as it's limited to Stamford," Daddy added.

"Right," Mama agreed. "That's as far as this chauffeur service goes." "Really?" I jumped up from the table. "I can call?" "Well, not right now," said Daddy, laughing. "I think agencies are closed this time of night, and besides, you've got a plateful of dinner to eat." "Oh. Right," I said.

I sat back down at the table and poked at the food on my plate. Becca was still staring at me. Her mouth was gaping and she hadn't yet picked up her fork.

"You mean you're going to be a TV star, too?" she said.

"Tee-vee!" Squirt cried.

Daddy, Mama, and I just laughed.

Chapter 12.

By midweek, party plans were in full swing. I had made a couple of secret calls to Mrs. Masters to clear the date with her and make sure that she could get Derek and Todd to the party on time. Of course, Mr. and Mrs. Masters thought that the party was a great idea.

"We're very touched that you girls have spent so much time helping Derek readjust," she said. "I don't know how he would have done it without you." I was practically beaming on the other end of the phone. It's true, I thought. The Babysitters Club is special that way.

That Wednesday I was scheduled for another sitting job at the Masterses'. Before Mrs. Masters left to go out that day, she wanted to offer some last-minute help with the party. Of course, that was not the easiest thing to do with Derek standing right there, but she managed to get the information across anyway.

It was a funny exchange. First she winked at me. "Tell your mother I have those bowls she wanted," she said. She emphasized the word "bowls" as if it had great significance.

"Bowls?" I asked blankly. I didn't get what she was talking about.

Mrs. Masters winked again, this time more obviously.

"You know what I'm talking about. Those disposable picnic bowls and those plastic spoons?" she said. "Your mother had called me up and asked me where to get them. Well, I happened to go to the store myself and bought plenty. More than enough. So tell your mother I'll give them to her." "Oh," I caught on. "Bowls." Derek gave us an odd look. I guess it was obvious something was going on.

"And do you think your mother would like, maybe, some bagels and cream cheese?" Mrs. Masters asked. "I could bring over some of those, too." "Bagels and cream cheese?" I considered that. "I think my mother would love bagels and cream cheese. That's a great idea. She could have them Saturday morning with her breakfast." "And does she need milk?" asked Mrs. Masters.

Derek looked from his mother to me.

"Is your mother sick or something?" he asked.

"Who? My mother?" I said guiltily. "No, she's fine. Why?" "Oh," Derek looked puzzled. "It just sounds like she can't get to the store by herself or something." "Oh, you know how mothers are," Mrs. Masters said airily. "Sometimes they like to have milk with their bagels." It wasn't quite an answer and it didn't make much sense, but Mrs. Masters gave me a last wink and breezed out the door.

"You two sound cuckoo," said Derek.

"Cuckoo," Todd echoed. "Let's play cuckoo bird." Since neither Derek nor I knew any game called "cuckoo bird," and the truth was Todd probably didn't, either, we decided to play Chinese checkers instead.

While we were setting up the board, Derek asked me about Swan Lake.

"Are you excited about the last audition?" he asked.

"Not really," I answered. "I'm not thinking about it much." "Why not?" asked Derek.

"I'm just not," I said. I wanted to change the subject. "But I am thinking about starting modeling like you suggested. And I do want to ask you some questions about how you got started here in Stamford." "Okay," Derek said.

I had plenty of questions and Derek had plenty of answers. He told me the names of some people I might call and what to expect if I went in to talk with them.

"The agents'll take you through it step by step," he said. "They'll tell you what kind of work you'd be good for, and they'll even set you up with a photographer if you want." "A photographer?" I asked.

"For head shots and things like that.5" "Is that expensive?" "Yeah, but you make the money back on your first job." "Right," I said. This was sounding a little complicated, but Derek didn't think so. He was just getting started.

"First they'll probably get you newspaper work and then magazines and then commercials. And then you'll probably land a TV series, just like me." "Right." I laughed.

"That'll be great!" Derek was serious. "Then you'll have to move out to L.A. You could stay at my house as long as you want. I'm sure Mom won't care. You could be sort of like a sister." "Then you could baby-sit for us all the time!" Todd cried out.

"She might not have time to baby-sit," Derek said seriously. "Once she's got the TV series, she'll be taping all day." Todd's face fell.

"Couldn't you baby-sit just sometimes?" he asked.

I gave him a hug.

"Sure," I said. "But don't count on my coming out to L.A. any time soon. Maybe when I'm older and out of school or something. Right now I think I'll just try to get some work in Stamford." Derek jumped one of his Chinese-checker marbles over three of mine.

"Gotcha!" he said.

I guess I hadn't been paying much attention to the game. My head had been spinning with all these new show biz plans. Forget ballet, I was thinking. Being famous and on a TV series was starting to sound like a lot more fun.

I stretched my legs out on either side of me on the floor.

"Oh, yeah. Don't forget to tell these agents that you're a ballerina," Derek reminded me. "That's a real plus." "A ballerina," I said vaguely. "Yeah." After the sitting job (Derek creamed me three times at Chinese checkers and even Todd beat me once), I did my usual sprint over to Claudia's house for the Wednesday meeting, which again turned into mpre of a planning session for the party.

Claudia had the invitations she had made spread out all over the floor. Everybody was crowded around them, ooh-ing and ah-ing. The invitations were very clever. Claudia had cut the cards into the shape of TV sets and she had drawn a picture of a cereal commercial on the screens.

"Start your day the party way," she had written on the inside. And then she listed all the necessary information. Since there was still work to be done on the invitations, Mary Anne and Dawn helped Claudia write out the in-sides, and Kristy and Mallory got busy copying onto envelopes names and addresses from the class list Mallory had brought.

I looked over Mallory's shoulder and scanned down the list of names. "Ricky, Betsy, Amy, Tommy," it read. I looked down the names again. There was no one named John.

"Hey," I said, picking up the list. "How come the Superbrat isn't on here?" "Oh, yeah," said Mallory. "I tried to call you. When I asked Nicky about John, he looked completely confused. He said there's no kid by that name in the class." "No John?" I said. "There's gotta be." "I told him it was the kid who was the Superbrat. I mean, I didn't use that word, but I said the kid who was really bothering Derek." "Well, what'd Nicky say?" "He didn't know what I was talking about. He said all the boys had been bothering Derek for awhile, but that had pretty much stopped and that Derek has a lot of friends now." "Hmm," I said. I tried to think back on what Derek had told me. "Maybe he never actually said that John was in his class. Maybe John is from a different class or even from an older grade." "That could be it," said Mallory.

Since my friends had grabbed up all the invitations and there was nothing much for me to do, I stationed myself by the phone and took calls. In between calls, I placed my leg up on Claudia's bed to stretch it out. Without knowing I was doing it, I started humming the music from Swan Lake.

Mallory looked over and smiled.

"Practicing to be a swan?" she asked.

"Hmm?" She jolted me away from my thoughts. "Me? No," I said. "Actually, I was thinking of some calls I have to make. Derek gave me a lot of new tips." Around me, my friends worked away on the invitations, and though I half listened to their conversation, I wasn't fully in the room. In my mind, I was somewhere in Stamford, in a. fancy agent's office. A box of glossy head shots was at my side and the agent was handing me a contract.

"I'll make you a star, kid," he was saying. He lit a cigar and slapped me on the back. "You've got the face. We'll plaster your picture in every magazine across the country." My face. In every magazine across the country. I heaved a big sigh. I probably wouldn't even have time to be in Swan Lake.

Chapter 13.

Party day! Saturday arrived quickly. Well, "quickly" might be putting it mildly. Actually, it arrived like a runaway train. There were lots of last-minute plans to get straight, and everybody in the club was calling everybody else.

Mallory called Kristy about the guest list.

"Nicky says that most of the kids are going to be able to come. Do you think we need another few cartons of juice?" Kristy called Mary Anne about the benches.

"We'll push the picnic tables together and borrow some more from the neighbors, but we're short five chairs. Can you bring some of those folding ones?" Even as late as Saturday morning, the phone calls were still going strong. On her way to the party, Claudia called Kristy from the doughnut shop.

"Do you think kids like chocolate doughnuts better than coconut?" she asked.

"Who cares, Claudia?" Kristy snapped. I guess Kristy had plenty to think about already. "Get them all. Get an assortment!" For my part, I had set my alarm for very early that morning. The day was going to be a big one for me. I not only had the party in the morning, I had my final audition (yipes!) right after. I slipped down to my barre in the basement to wake up my sleepy and very tight muscles. Mmmmm. It always feels so good to get stretched out.

That morning I would've liked to have had a long time at the barre, but I did have to get to the party early, and that left time pretty scrunched up. Mama had promised to pick me up after the party and get me to the audition early so I could do a real warm-up there. (Thank you, Mama.) That morning I had just enough time to throw my toe shoes, leg warmers, and leotard into my dance bag and gather up all the party supplies I had promised to bring. I called Becca (of course, she was invited to the party, too) and hoisted my bags into my arms. Mr. Spier pulled into the driveway with Mary Anne to give us a ride to the party. I hurried out to the car and dropped my bags onto the backseat.

"Did you remember to bring your - ?" Mary Anne didn't even have to finish the sentence.

"Oh, no!" I cried. "Just a minute, okay?" I raced back into the house, up to my room, and grabbed my bathrobe off its hook.

That's right. My bathrobe. This was a goofy idea Kristy had had, and it seemed so silly, we all thought it was great. Her idea was that since it was a breakfast party, all the members of the club should wear bathrobes over their clothes. Since we'd be keeping our eye on so many kids, and since we didn't know a lot of them to begin with, the bathrobes would be kind of like a uniform, and the kids would at least know who was in charge. Kristy had wanted us to go even further with the joke and have us all wear curlers in our hair, too, but Mary Anne and Claudia vetoed that idea right away. I think neither of them wanted to be seen in curlers in public, and the truth was, neither did I.

"Bathrobes are funny enough," Claudia had said.

"How about if we just wear curler caps, then?" Kristy had suggested.

Maybe the party plans had started to get to her.

"Kristy," Claudia said firmly, "this is a good-bye party, not a Halloween party." "Right," Kristy had said.

By the time Mary Anne, Becca, and I arrived at Kristy's house that morning, all the other club members were there. They were throwing paper tablecloths over the picnic tables and setting the places with plates, bowls, and cups.

Mallory was busy farther back in the yard, setting up the one game we had planned. To fit in with the "Good Morning" theme, we had come up with a funny idea for a relay race. The teams of kids would line up and, to start the race, we were going to set off an alarm clock. Each runner had to put on a pair of pants, drink a cup of imaginary juice (we thought it might be dangerous to use real juice since someone might choke), run a comb through his or her hair, grab a book bag, and run to pass the book bag to a teammate across the yard.

Not to sound conceited, but the whole idea for the relay was mine. That's exactly how I feel every morning, like getting ready for school is a relay race. But I can't take all the credit. Mallory was the one who had the idea for the prizes. She had spent the whole morn- ing fishing those little prize packages out of all our cereal boxes. Every kid on the winning team would get one.

Soon the kids began arriving. Of course, we had told them to get there ahead of time so that when Derek arrived, everyone would be gathered for the surprise. The yard started filling up. We club members scattered ourselves around to talk to the kids and keep some kind of general order. The back door opened and Kristy's sister Karen came out to join us. Oh no. She was wearing her "Getting to Be Stars" costume - high heels, gloves, hat, and all. Kristy rolled her eyes good-naturedly.

"You're going to wear that for the relay race?" she asked.

"I have to wear it so Derek'll notice me," Karen answered. "It shows I'm a star." She started across the yard to the picnic tables, her heels sinking into the sod with each step.

I'll tell you, maybe Claudia was wrong. Between Karen in her getup and all of us babysitters in our bathrobes, that party might as well have been for Halloween.

Inside, the kitchen phone rang. Kristy's mom answered it and came to the door to call me.

"Jessi," she said, "it's Mrs. Masters." Everyone in the yard let out a little gasp. We were all getting excited. The surprise is always the most fun part.

Mrs. Masters was ready to bring Derek and Todd over and was calling to warn us. She and her husband had told the boys that they were going shopping to buy clothes before the move back to California.

"Coast clear?" Mrs. Masters asked.

"Bring them over," I said. "We're ready and waiting." The time between the phone call and their arrival seemed like ten years. The kids started to get really giddy. To tell the truth, so did I. Finally, we heard a car pull into the front drive. Everyone started shushing everyone else. The back door opened again. I heard Mrs. Masters talking to Kristy's mom. Then Mrs. Masters called Derek and Todd.

"Come on, boys," she said. "I promise, we'll head out for the mall in a minute. But before we go I just want to show you something." Derek stepped out of the house and into the yard.

"Surprise!" we all yelled.

He stood there, frozen to the spot. But he didn't have time to be shocked for long, because in a few seconds we were all crowded around him, laughing and talking.

"Were you surprised?" "Your whole class is here." "Did you suspect anything?" "Okay, let's break out the cereal!" That last cry was from Kristy. She rounded up all the kids and herded them to the tables. The rest of us busied ourselves passing around food.

The kid next to me put three doughnuts on his plate and nothing else - no bagels, no Cheerios, and certainly no fruit slices.

"Hey, Claudia!" I yelled across the tables. "You've got a friend over here!" We were all laughing and joking and having a good time.

Derek was sitting at the table with me. Across from him were his mom, his dad, and Todd, and next to him were Nicky and some of the other boys. It was great for me to watch him just sitting and talking like a regular kid with his new friends. It was a happy ending, all right. Or, who knows, maybe some kind of beginning, too. I was still curious about John and what had happened with that, but I knew I'd have to wait until sometime when Derek and I were alone to ask him about it. It was clear I wasn't going to get him alone at this party.

After the kids finished eating, we let them hang out for awhile before we started the relay race. (We didn't want breakfast to come back up all over the lawn.) When it was time for the race, Karen had still not changed out of her "star" outfit, and she was hanging around Derek like a fly around honey. The funny thing was, after all her scheming, she was too afraid to open her mouth and actually say anything to him. Finally, Kristy took Karen's hand.

"Derek, did you meet my sister?" Kristy asked. "This is Karen. She's really been wanting to meet you." Derek had a funny look on his face, like he didn't quite know what to make of Karen's outfit, Karen pulled up her gloves and steadied her hat.

"Hi," she said.

Suddenly, Becca was right behind her.

"Derek!" Becca broke in. "Since you're going back to L.P., do you think you could get me Lamont's autograph?" Well, okay. So, even as he was leaving, Derek still had to deal with two stage-struck little girls. But two kids out of a whole yardful didn't seem so bad.

"Hey, Derek!" cried one of his classmates. "Come on! Join our team!" By this time Claudia had organized all the kids into groups for the relay. They were lined up and ready to run.

"On your mark . . . get set ... wake up!" she cried as the alarm clock sounded.

It was funny to watch the kids struggle with the pants and cheer each other on. All in all, it was a great party. Though Derek would be leaving in a week, we were sending him off with a very nice good-bye.

"Jessi." I spun around. Mama had arrived to pick me up and take me to the audition.

"Is it already time?" I asked.

"Now or never," she said with a smile.

Becca and I called good-bye and followed Mom to the car.

"Break a leg, Jess!" Derek yelled after me. That's show biz talk. What he really meant was "good luck." So. One event down and one to go.

The final audition. I took a deep breath.

Well, I thought to myself, this is it.

Chapter 14.

When we reached the theater, I changed into my dance clothes, found myself a quiet corner, and began the extensive warm-up I had planned. The warm-up really helped to calm me down. My head was still full of partying and relay races. I had to shift to ballet.

As I was stretching, I looked around me. Actually the place didn't seem quite so scary anymore. The stage manager and choreographer were talking in the front seats, and the piano accompanist was also warming up, playing scales and snatches of Swan Lake themes. I didn't see any of the clique-y "gossip girls" - I guess they'd all been cut - but all around me other ballerinas were going up to their toes, testing their balance. Those of us who were left had all staked out little bits of territory for ourselves. In a funny way, the place was almost beginning to feel like home.

Suddenly, I could really imagine coming here and performing. It'd be like this every night, I thought, and that'd be great. There is something magical about all the backstage goings-on in a theater - all the performers getting ready and then going out, transformed, before an audience. For a moment I let a picture of myself onstage slip into my thoughts. I was one of the swan maidens and I was costumed in a beautiful white, feathery tutu. It made me so happy just to think of myself up there.

Well, I thought quickly, I'll know when I leave today whether or not I got into the production. And if I don't make it, I'll just pursue modeling. That would keep me busy. It'd be something new and different. And it couldn't possibly be as difficult - or as nerve-racking - as ballet.

The stage manager clapped her hands to call together all us ballerinas.

"We look like a flock of migrating birds," I heard one joke.

"Swans," another one answered. "We want to be swans." I closed my eyes for a moment. Suddenly, Mme Noelle's words ran through my head. "You're a gifted dancer," she'd said. Well, we would see. I took a deep breath.

The choreographer taught us a long, difficult dance variation, but this time, it was pretty easy to pick up. It was really not much different from the ones we'd learned before. Then he divided us into groups. Oh, no. I was in the first one. That meant I wouldn't even get to watch another group and have time to run the variation through my head. Oh, well, I thought. It'll just be like plunging into a pool.

Actually, I think I danced very well. The choreographer had stuck me front row center onstage, which usually makes me nervous. But this time the music was really in my body. When I lifted my arms up, I could feel my whole torso stretch with them. When I extended a leg, I let it suspend there for a moment before I snapped it down. This is exactly what I love about ballet. Once you've got the technique, you can really express yourself.

In the last couple of steps, I did make a small goof. I rushed a step and then had to slow down to get back on count. I didn't know if the choreographer caught it, or if he did, how much it would count against me. Well, I'm human, I thought. What could I do?

After my group had finished, I found a seat in the audience to watch the others. No doubt about it, the competition was stiff. There were some ballerinas I liked better than others, but, the truth was, we were all good. I couldn't imagine how they would choose among us.

Finally, the last group finished and the girls trickled offstage. I wandered up to stand by the stage manager and wait for the news. The stage manager and choreographer had their heads together, bent over their notes. The stage manager glanced up quickly.

"Okay, everybody," she called. "Thank you very much. We'll talk to you in a few days." A few days? What did she mean? All the other ballerinas had picked up their things and were drifting out the door.

"Excuse me," I said. "Did you say a few days?" "That's right," she smiled. "You can call the office on Wednesday." "You mean we're not going to find out today? I have to wait until Wednesday?" "Yes. That information was on the audition notice," she told me.

Now, how had I missed that?

"Don't worry," she said. I guess I looked pretty upset. "Wednesday will be here before you know it." "Well, thanks," I managed to reply as I started walking toward the door.

"By the way," the stage manager called after me. "Nice audition." "Thanks," I called back, this time a little brighter.

But till Wednesday? I had to wait until Wednesday?

Right after I got home that day, the phone rang. It was Mallory, wanting to know if I'd made it or not.

"I don't know," I wailed. "I have to wait four more days!" "That doesn't seem fair," Mallory said.

"Mallory," I said patiently, "nothing's fair in love or ballet." On Monday, Mallory came home from school with me to keep me company. Poor Mallory. I think I was pretty jittery. I'd told her a little bit about my modeling plans, and I asked her if she minded if I made a few phone calls. Mallory nodded half-heartedly. She stretched out on our couch and began her homework. I got out the index cards I had started. On the top of each card I had written an agent's name and phone number. When I called and got through, I wrote the information he or she gave me onto the card. Information like, "Head shot necessary" or "Print work only." That afternoon I was on the phone for at least fifteen minutes with one agent. I could see Mallory peek up from her books every now and again to watch me. While I was still on that call, Daddy got home from work. He was early. It wasn't even time to leave for our club meeting. He dropped his briefcase on a chair, listened in on my conversation, and smiled at Mallory. Mallory had started to look a little nervous. Probably because I sounded so businesslike, and that's not the usual me.

"Hi, you two," Daddy said when I hung up. Then, "How's the research going?" he asked me.

"Okay." I sighed. "But for work that's supposed to be so arty, there's an awful lot of business involved." "Do you think you're gonna move to L.A.?" Mallory asked abruptly.

I could see that Daddy was going to listen closely to my answer, too.

"Oh, I don't think so," I said. "I think I'll just get as much work in Stamford as I can." "What happens if you become really famous?" asked Mallory.

"Well," I said, "you never know. I mean, there's a chance I could land a TV series - " "Any word from the Swan Lake folks yet?" Daddy cut in.

"Da-a-ad-dy," I whined. "You know that's not till Wednesday." "Tough wait?" he asked.

"I hate waiting!" I practically spit that out. I was surprised at how vehement I sounded.

"I hear you." Daddy smiled. He picked up his briefcase and gave Mallory a reassuring smile.

Then I got on the phone to dial another agent's number. Mallory followed Daddy into the kitchen.

"Do you think she's really going to get on a TV series?" I heard Mallory ask. "I mean, Jessi's my best friend. I'll just die if she moves away." "I think what she really wants," Daddy said carefully, "is to dance in Swan Lake." "I do not," I called after them as I dialed the last digits. "I mean, I don't care one way or the other. Anyway, I'm probably not going to get in. So it doesn't matter." Mallory wandered back into the room and settled back into her place on the couch. I started in on another phone call. Mallory watched me anxiously as I pulled out another index card and started to scribble notes.

Chapter 15.

Well, finally, Wednesday arrived. I hurried home from school, called the theater, asked the question I was dying to ask, and sucked in my breath as I waited for the answer.

The woman on the other end of the phone took about an hour to find the list of people who had made it into the audition and another hour to search for my name on the list. Okay, it might not have been an hour each. Maybe it was more like five minutes. But those five minutes were long. To me, each one could've been a century.

"Ramsey, Ramsey," the woman muttered, as she looked down the list. "What did you say your first name was?" "Jessi," I said. "Well, I'm probably listed as Jessica." "Yes, here you are," said the woman. "Jessica Ramsey." "But what does that mean?" I asked anxiously. "Is my name on the list of cuts or did I get into the show?" "You're in," she said simply. "Congratulations." "All right!" 1 yelled. I knew that that was not the most delicate thing to do, but I couldn't help it. "Thank you very much," 1 babbled. "Thank you very, very much." I hung up the phone and stood there beaming.

Mama had heard my screech and came into the room.

"You made it?" she asked.

I couldn't even answer. I just nodded.

"Oh, honey, congratulations!" Mama gave me a warm hug.

"So what part did you get?" she asked me. "Are you one of the swan maidens?" "Oh, my gosh!" I laughed. "I forgot to ask. I guess I'll have to call the theater back. Now that woman'll really think I'm nuts." Mama stayed by my side while I dialed again and asked the question.

"I wondered if you were going to call back." The woman chuckled. "Yes, you're in the corps. You're one of the swan maidens." "Ask for the rehearsal schedule," Mama prompted.

"Oh, right." At that moment I would've had trouble remembering my own name. "And when do rehearsals start?" The woman gave me all the necessary information. I repeated it and Mama wrote it down.

Of course, as soon as I hung up, I called Mallory right away.

"I'm a swan!" I cried into the phone.

"I knew it all along," she said. I could practically hear her grinning into the receiver.

Shortly after I got off the phone with Mallory, Daddy came home from work, early again.

"I hear we've got a ballerina in the house," he said, smiling.

I ran to his arms and he caught me up.

"I'm so happy, Daddy," I said. "I wanted this so badly." "You think I didn't know that?" He smiled. "All that modeling and agent business didn't fool me for a moment. You were going so far in the other direction, I knew Swan Lake must've meant a lot. " So much that you couldn't even admit it to yourself." "Oh, yeah. The modeling stuff," I mused. As soon as I'd heard that I'd gotten into the show, I'd forgotten about those calls to the agents in Stamford. That whole world had just fled my mind.

Daddy went on. "I think sometimes if we want something too badly, we have to play tricks on ourselves so that we won't think it matters so much," he said.

"Is that what I was doing?" I asked. How did parents know these things?

"Well, thaf s what it looked like to me," Daddy said.

Hmm. All those index cards. Suddenly, I didn't have any use for them at all. I was right back where I started from - ballet. And suddenly I knew it was exactly where I belonged, sort of like my true home. I did a couple of quick little jumps and ran down to work at my barre until the club meeting.

It wasn't until later that week that I got to tell Derek that I had made Swan Lake after all. I decided not to call him up, that it would be better if I went over and told him in person. That way I'd also get to say my goodbyes.

One afternoon after school, I stopped by the Masterses' house. It was kind of sad to go there and see that they were really moving out again. Of course, since they were going to keep the house, they were leaving all their furniture and everything, but there were lots of boxes and suitcases scattered around, and Mrs. Masters had put sheets over the chairs in the living room. The place looked kind of ghostlike.

"Derek will be so glad to see you," Mrs. Masters said as she let me in. "Derek!" she called upstairs. "You've got a visitor!" Derek came bounding down the steps.

"Jessi!" he cried. "I was hoping you'd come over." Derek grabbed me by the hand and dragged me up to his room, which looked every bit as strange as the living room had. Derek's clothes were all over the bed, and beside them was an open suitcase.

"I'm packing," he said.

"I can see. When are you leaving?" "Tomorrow morning," said Derek.

"Gee, it seems like you just got here." "Well, maybe you'll be coming out to L.A. soon yourself," Derek said hopefully.

"I wouldn't count on that," I said. I tried to sound as gentle as I could.

"Who knows, though?" Derek went on. "The agents in Stamford sent me to L.A." How was I going to tell him?

"I don't think I'll be working with those agents," I started to explain.

"What?" Derek said. "But you told me you'd made a million phone calls." "That's true. I did," I said with a sigh. "But then something happened. I made Swan Lake." "You did!" Derek cried. "Great, Jessi! I knew you'd make it! Ever since I heard those other ballerinas tearing you apart." "It is great." I smiled. "But once I got in, 1 realized that ballet is the thing I really love. I want to be a ballerina, not a model or an actress. I've already put so much time and work into dance." Derek's face fell.

"So now you won't ever come to L.A.," he said. He looked so forlorn, that I laughed all of a sudden.

"Never say never," I said. "And besides, you'll be coming back to Stoneybrook sometimes. And now when you come you've got friends, and you know the kids in school. . . ." "Yeah," Derek agreed. "Thanks to the Babysitters Club." He was starting to cheer up. "Thanks again for the party, Jessi. It was great. No one ever threw me a surprise party before." I thought back to that morning and how nice it had been to watch Derek with his friends. That reminded me.

"Oh, yeah, Derek," I said. "Listen, I've been meaning to ask you. I thought you said that John Superbrat was in your class. But there was no John on your class list. What ever hap- pened with that kid? Did he stop bullying you?" "John?" Derek said quickly. His eyes shifted away from mine.

"Yeah. John. Is he in another grade?" "No, he's the same grade," Derek said slowly.

"A different class then?" Derek gulped and started fiddling with a string hanging from his bedspread.

"No, he's even in the same class," he answered.

"Well, why wasn't he on the list?" I persisted. "You mean, we gave all the kids invitations except him?" "Sort of," Derek said vaguely. "But he was at the .party anyway." "He was at the party?" I cried. "John? The Superbrat? He was there?" "Jessi, let's go downstairs," Derek said quickly. "Maybe Todd wants to say goodbye." "Wait a minute, Derek," I said. "Why are you trying to change the subject? Did something awful happen with John? You have to tell me now." Derek sat there a long time before he opened his mouth again.

"It was kind of awful," he said. "John's an awful kind of kid." "What did he do?" I pressed. "And how could he have been at the party?" "Jessi," Derek said. He lowered his voice to almost a whisper. "I hate to tell you this. It's really embarrassing. I was John. And all those things I said John did? Well, I did them." "What?" What in the world was Derek talking about? I didn't get it at all.

Derek went on.

"See, what happened," he said, "was that the kids were bothering me so much that I had to get back at them. So whenever they did something mean to me, I started doing mean things back to them." "Well, why'd you say it was John?" I asked.

"I don't know." Derek shook his head. "When I told you, it was like I had to tell somebody what I'd been doing, but I didn't really know how to tell. And then once the boys started actually being friends with me, I didn't have to do those things anymore. So John just kind of disappeared." "You tied a kid's shoes together in gym?" I was still incredulous. "You dumped someone's books all over the playground?" Derek nodded sheepishly. "Only because I wanted to make friends so badly," he said.

Suddenly I started to giggle. The idea of trying to make friends by dumping over someone's book bag was just too silly. Before I knew it, I was laughing pretty hard. It was contagious. Derek started laughing, too.

"Hey," I teased, "I'll be your best friend if you tie my shoes together." Derek doubled over. After awhile, when we both quieted down, Derek's face grew thoughtful.

"It was horrible," he admitted. "I didn't want to do those things. I guess you make more friends by being nice to people, don't you?" "That's usually how it's done," I said, and smiled.

"Well, now I know," said Derek. "I guess I'll only be that mean again if somebody writes it into a script for me." "Good idea," I said, laughing.

It looked like it was time to go. I was dreading our good-byes.

"So, Derek," I said. "Good luck out there. Break a leg and everything. Send me a postcard if you get a chance." "Oh, I almost forgot!" Derek jumped up. He opened his dresser drawer and pulled out a large envelope. He handed it to me.

"Open it up," he said proudly.

Inside the envelope was one of Derek's head shots. His smiling face was staring right out at me. In the bottom corner, he had inscribed the photo: GOOD LUCK! YOUR FRIEND, Derek Masters. I gave Derek a big hug good-bye and hurried out of the house. I already felt kind of choked up and I didn't want to start crying.

When I got halfway down the street I stopped and pulled the photo out to look at it again.

"Your friend forever," it said.

Well, who could tell? Maybe that would end up being true. Anyway, it had sure been fun being friends with Derek so far. I slipped the photo back into its envelope and started to run home. After all, I had a lot of index cards to throw out. . . .

And, hey, I thought as I leaped over the curb, I had Swan Lake to learn, too! About the Author ANN M. MARTIN did a lot of baby-sitting when she was growing up in Princeton, New Jersey. Now her favorite baby-sitting charge is her cat, Mouse, who lives with her in her Manhattan apartment.

Ann Martin's Apple Paperbacks are Bummer Summer, Inside Out, Stage Fright, Me and Katie (the Pest), and all the other books in the Babysitters Club series.

She is a former editor of books for children, and was graduated from Smith College. She likes ice cream, the beach, and I Love Lucy; and she hates to cook.

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