Wrestling with Tom Sawyer Read online

  or Setting Up the Basic Problem to Keep the Reader Turning Pages

  Well! If you do not deem this chapter’s title a dandy of a humdinger (first-rate statement of remarkable excellence), then I, Bartholomew Inkster, LF (literary fussbudget, self-taught) cannot help you. I’m so proud of it, I believe I should treat myself to a triple espresso with white mocha at the coffee bar on the hipster block of Kingscross. Then again, not desiring to mortgage my house in order to afford such an indulgence, I shall instead procure a cup of java from the department lounge. The professors hate it when I do that, due to the obvious fact that the janitor is more well-read than they are and possesses finer literary tastes (if some of today’s assigned readings are any indication).

  If you do not like that, feel free to take it up with the university’s administration. Thank you.

  Aunt Portia, with a ruby tiara resting atop her frizzy, apricot-colored hair, set a sizeable red platter on the kitchen table. When she’d read someplace that the elements of a meal should all coordinate, it failed to occur to her that the flavors should harmonize. In other words, who wants a plate of sweet pickles, tapioca pudding, and red beans? Instead, she took “coordinate” to mean that foods must go together by category or color.

  That evening’s meal displayed its theme loudly: the color purple. She artfully arranged eggplant rounds fried crisp, blueberry pancakes, blackberries, and grape-flavored fruit leather to resemble a gathering of carnival rides. If it hadn’t been for the obvious color theme and the rectangular fruit leather, one might have thought she’d chosen a theme of circles.

  As the platter was passed from twin to twin to twin to twin, each selecting items from the dusky assortment, Aunt Portia reported on her day. “I don’t know what happened, but four of my rarest first editions are nowhere to be found!”

  The family lived on the second and third floors above Portia’s bookstore on Rickshaw Street. Seven Hills Better Books (hardbacks only, collectible first editions, and antiquarian volumes) kept Aunt Portia busy. Internet marketing, a new LED sign, and a coffee machine were her latest attempts at attracting new business.

  Naturally, Seven Hills is my favorite shop in Kingscross, despite the coffee and the mess those cups make.

  “Did you misplace them?” asked Uncle Augustus, looking smart in a quilted smoking jacket in a glistening shade of garnet. (Garnet is a dark red semiprecious stone.)

  “I haven’t ruled that out. But I’ve looked everywhere I can think to look. Nobody has reshelved books but me, and I can’t remember anybody looking at them recently.”

  And why would they? Who would want to pay that much for Victor Hugo when you can purchase an entire collection of his works on the Internet for $19.99 plus tax and $3.99 for shipping? It doesn’t smell like mildewed socks, either.

  Augustus cut a slice of eggplant with the side of his fork. “It’s a mystery, then.”

  “Hopefully one that’s soon solved.” Aunt Portia plucked the yellow damask napkin from beside her plate and laid it on her lap.

  Uncle Augustus swallowed his bite, sipped some water, and then said, “On a happier note, the party plans are coming along swimmingly.” He turned to Linus and Ophelia. “I’m going to need you to tidy up the yard after school tomorrow, Linus. And Ophelia, all of the windows as well as the baseboards need to be cleaned.”

  The twins’ groans had no effect on their uncle who believed that hard physical labor hurt no one. In other words, Linus and Ophelia have chores just like you do.

  Augustus threw a soiree (pronounced swah-rey) on the eleventh day of every month. And the theme of this month’s party was Along the Mississippi River—A Night with Mark Twain. Augustus, once a concert musician with the Boston Philharmonic, was readying himself to play the part of one of America’s most memorable and much beloved man of letters, Mark Twain (born Samuel Clemens in 1835).

  Ophelia had readied her Becky Thatcher costume, and Linus, going for comfort, had chosen to emulate (imitate) Huckleberry Finn. Walter found a suit from Uncle Augustus’s extensive costume collection that made him look like a riverboat captain.

  “Our costumes are all set,” Ophelia informed her uncle. “We’re using The Adventures of Tom Sawyer as inspiration.”

  “Thank you, my dear.”

  After the twins cleared the table and washed the dishes, they decided to spend their last hour of daylight at Paris Park. Walter planned to join them in the attic after lights out by using the secret passage between a cleaning supply closet in The Pierce School and the third-floor bathroom of Linus and Ophelia’s home. Having been in the States for only a few days, Walter had discovered it when midnight boredom set him to poking around the school. He is the type of person, as the old saying goes, who doesn’t let grass grow under his feet. In other words, he’s most likely never muttered the words “I’m bored” without making plans to rectify the situation.

  Linus joined his girlfriend, Clarice Yardly-Poutsmouth, on the tennis court. He wasn’t a bit concerned that she would thrash him at her favorite game. Clarice was the only student at The Pierce School whose family was old and yet still had heaps of money (although she wasn’t all that impressed by it).

  Ophelia read her paperback copy of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer while sitting on a bench near the Bard River that flowed beside the park and ran parallel with Rickshaw Street. She had almost finished the book—laughing at Tom’s brash, boyish antics, admiring his pluck, and appreciating his sheer good luck—when a movement from further down the walking path beside the river caught her eye.

  “Kyle!” She waved to the boy she’d met earlier that summer at the camp just upriver. The Bard River Camp for Kids gave children with special needs a fantastic summer to remember.

  The outgoing lad waved back with his left hand, while his right piloted the joystick that steered his wheelchair—or what he likes to call his “spiffy black set of wheels.” He zoomed up the path, halting next to her on the bench. “Hi, Ophelia!”

  “How do you like The Pierce School so far?” she asked.

  It was Kyle’s first year at the school. The gang had been delighted when they’d seen the sixth grader at orientation. Though a tad young for a sixth grader, his math skills had earned him a scholarship from a foundation that paid for an exceptional education for physically challenged children like Kyle.

  His blue eyes dropped, revealing a crescent of blond lashes. “Okay, I guess.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I don’t know. I guess I don’t like being the littlest kid there. And then there’s this thing.” He bumped the arm of the wheelchair with his hand.

  Ophelia’s heart twisted. “It’s been only a week, bud. These things take time even for us older kids. You know that boy Lassiter Plum? I’ve never done one thing to him, and yet he snickers at me every time I walk by.”

  “I don’t like him.”

  “Me either. But the point is, there will always be people like Lassiter Plum wherever we go. And you know what? We should feel sorry for them! Imagine having a mean heart like that.”

  “I’d hate that.”

  She took his hand. “Exactly. Hey! My aunt and uncle are having a party tomorrow evening. Want to come help us set up?”

  His eyes cleared. “Do I?” He pumped a fist in the air. “Definitely!”

  Ophelia checked her watch. “Well, good. Ten minutes to quiet hours. Do you mind if I walk back with you?”

  Once across the street, Kyle and Ophelia cut through the garden at the side of The Pierce School. They eyed the construction site as they walked past.

  “Too bad there’s no swimming pool down there,” Kyle said.

  “Exactly what I was thinking.”

  Perhaps you should try the local YMCA, Ophelia.

  Linus sat at his lab table in the attic, pondering a worthy project topic for the upcoming school science fair. Plenty of inspiration was available. You see, the attic laboratory—the entire building, actually—once belonged to Cato Grubbs, mad scientist and ge
neral troublemaker at large (on the loose). Nobody realized the wonders lingering in the uppermost reaches of the house until Linus and Ophelia discovered the hidden room soon after they moved in.

  The lab table and the dark blue sofa with gold fringe were the most formidable of all the furnishings. But don’t assume that the other tables and shelves stacked with volumes written in German, Italian, and a mysterious language (using an alphabet Linus had never seen before) didn’t possess a decrepit (in this case, old and mildly battered) grandeur all their own. These shelves and tables also held cans containing everyday items such as bolts, hairpins, and river stones; bottles filled with brightly colored liquids that caught the sunlight when it shone through the trefoil window under the eaves; jars of powders; and tins of organic items such as aardvark toenails and mud from the Rhine River.

  Considering its wide variety of contents, the attic might have won the award for Most Interesting Place in Town—if there was such a thing, that is.

  Linus pondered three jars labeled A, B, and C. It must have taken the genius who thought up those names all of three seconds to do so. He pulled down a binder of detailed notes from his experiments, then opened Cato Grubbs’s journal, checked and double-checked a formula, and pursed his lips. Something wasn’t quite right with his current experiment. And despite his extraordinary efforts (you try staying up three days in a row and checking the barometric pressure every ten minutes), he kept hitting a wall.

  The rainbow beaker, as Linus called it, held the key. He was sure of it. (By the way, he called it the “rainbow beaker” because it was filled with a liquid that retained its composition according to the light spectrum—ROY G BIV, don’t you know—no matter how one tipped it.) He just couldn’t find a way to use it to unlock the door to the secrets of the enchanted circle.

  This problem, however, had nothing to do with his science project. As it turns out, he wouldn’t need any chemistry lab equipment for that. A wind tunnel would have been helpful, though, as Linus had decided he would design an airplane that would revolutionize the aeronautics industry.

  Or so he hoped. Aim high, dream big, and live large, I always say!

  three

  Party On, Auggie! Party On, Portia!

  or Introducing Side Characters You’ve Come to Know and Love

  (or in the Case of Professor Birdwistell, Wish You Hadn’t Come to Know at All)

  Ronda, part-time hair stylist, part-time caterer and coffee bar owner (her most recent venture), worked on the food preparation for Uncle Auggie’s party. As it usually did, Ronda’s presence brought anyone of the male gender who currently occupied the house on Rickshaw Street flocking to the kitchen. Even Kyle sat in rapt attention as the most beautiful woman on the planet rolled out pastry for homemade apple dumplings. (If you go blabbing that I said such, you will be proclaimed a liar of the first degree—never mind the fact that it’s written right here in black and white.) And Father Lou (the motorcycle riding, ponytailed priest at All Souls Episcopal Church across the street) cored apples that he and Ronda had picked during their date the previous afternoon.

  Uncle Augustus pretended to rummage through the junk drawer for a tape measure he didn’t need. And Walter sliced a ham while stealing surreptitious (furtive, secretive, going for unseen, really) glances at Ronda. Linus sat at the kitchen table eating a PB&J while flipping through one of his favorite periodicals, Glider Planes Today. He liked the sound of her voice.

  Ronda chattered with her customary conviviality (friendly manner). Unlike some women with such powerful pulchritude (beauty), she failed to realize the matchless magnitude of her consummate comeliness (complete beauty).

  I just employed a device called alliteration. Alliteration employs words that begin with the same letter or sound. Annoying, isn’t it?

  “I heard Clark’s Antiques was burgled the other night,” Ronda said, swiping her forearm across her glistening forehead.

  Father Lou’s eyebrows arched. “Did you actually use the word ‘burgle,’ Ronda?”

  She giggled. “I did!”

  “I like it!” he said with a laugh.

  Oh dear me. Somebody fetch me a sleeve of Saltines to stave off my sudden onset nausea. Burgle it if you must.

  Ophelia was listening in while she ironed the linen napkins in the dining room. “What happened?” she asked.

  “Jonas told me that when he went to open the shop, the back door was ajar.” (Slightly open.)

  Clark’s Antiques sits two doors down from Ronda’s beauty salon and four doors down from Seven Hills bookshop, right next to Professor Birdwistell’s house.

  “Were the thieves still about?” asked Walter.

  “Thankfully, no. But a French sideboard from the 1700s and two figurines were taken. And, if you can believe this, a brooch belonging to Marie Antoinette.”

  Ophelia set down the iron and rushed into the kitchen. “The Marie Antoinette?”

  “None other.” Ronda began filling the cored Pink Lady apples with a mixture of cinnamon, nutmeg, and brown sugar. Beautiful and a wonderful cook, too. Father Lou’s no dummy, as they say.

  Linus met Ophelia’s glance. Could Cato Grubbs be broadening the scope of his thievery? You see, the mad scientist who founded the lab in the attic, was, to use a time-honored saying, a man with sticky fingers. They were even stickier, in fact, than Ronda’s fingers were now as she sprinkled coarse sugar over the pastry.

  “It’s getting to be a problem.” Father Lou finished stuffing the last apple. “Three people from our congregation have had valuable antiques taken from their homes.”

  Linus wondered if a similar thread ran through the fabric of all the crimes.

  “Is there any connection between them?” asked Ophelia. “Other than antiques?”

  “I don’t know. But that’s something to consider,” said Father Lou. “Good thinking, Ophelia.”

  Linus frowned. She had gotten the thought from him, right?

  Kyle finished slicing the block of Swiss cheese Ronda had given to him. “What else can I do?”

  Ronda took a block of Muenster cheese out of the refrigerator. “How about more slicing?”

  “I love slicing,” said Kyle. “I help my mom in the kitchen all the time.”

  Uncle Augustus slammed the junk drawer shut. “So much for the tape measure. I’m heading up to my room to get into character.”

  He’d been cultivating a great mustache since the previous party, which also happened to be the last time the enchanted circle in the attic had glowed like a sunbeam through crystal and sparked like a fountain of light.

  Ninety minutes later, Birdwistell, Professor Kelvin Birdwistell, made his appearance as the first guest. Of course he did because the trio, and Ronda too, wished he would arrive last—or better yet, not at all.

  Dressed in a high-lapelled woolen suit indicative of the mid-1800s, a stiff-collared shirt, and a black tie, the philosophy professor (specializing in the French philosopher Alain Touraine, for you brainy types) trundled his roly-poly avian (from the Latin avis, meaning “bird”) body into the kitchen. Imagine a sweet, fat little ruffly sparrow. Now make it human, only not at all sweet and extra fat, and you’re in all likelihood picturing Birdwistell.

  Most party guests are polite enough not to make a nuisance of themselves with the kitchen crew. After all, punch must be concocted, hors d’oeuvres arranged, and food of all sorts tasted on the off chance that an enemy snuck in with poison. (I’m always available for that task. Not that anyone takes advantage of my services.) Birdwistell, however, cares little for such niceties.

  He sniffed his beaky little nose, wrinkling it in what appeared to be disgust. It reminded Walter of the look on his Auntie Max’s face after she ingested an entire box of coconut macaroons.

  Ronda reappeared in the kitchen. She was now dressed to serve wearing a black cocktail dress, and her warm brown curls were fashioned in a fancy updo. (Marie Antoinette would have been moss green with envy.) Pointing to the kitchen door, she said, “Back w
here you came from, Birdwistell. We have plenty of vegetarian options, so go on your way.”

  Birdwistell’s eyes glittered. “Young lady—”

  “I’m not one of your students. Go!”

  At the last party, the rude professor had overstepped his bounds with Ronda for the final time.

  Father Lou expelled a low whistle (not a bird whistle, mind you) as the professor quickly exited the kitchen. “Well done, Ronda.”

  She pointed her knife at the priest. “You’re only saying that because we’re going out. I was hardly turning the other cheek, Reverend.”

  The priest laughed and then tightened his silver ponytail. “You got me. Anything else you need me to do?”

  “It’s all under control. Thank you, Lou.”

  “I’m out, then. There’s a vestry (church committee) meeting tonight.”

  “Can I stay for the party?” asked Kyle, after Father Lou had gone.

  “Will you be my kitchen helper?” Ronda asked. “I could use an expert slicer like you at the ready.”

  “Yeah!” he said, ready for the next task.

  Now dressed in their costumes, Walter, Linus, and Ophelia lifted their silver serving trays and pressed forward, first serving the guests gathered in the bookstore, and then those sitting around the back garden. Aunt Portia wafted among them, not giving a fig, as usual, for her brother’s costume requirements. While she wore a lime green, floor-length dress of the time period—the waist nipped and the sleeves tight around her arms—she had raided her costume jewelry collection and loaded up her arms with bracelets, her neck and bosom with glittering pendants and strings of pearls and jewels of all colors, not to mention the largest and maybe even the most sparkly pair of dangle earrings Ophelia had ever seen. She looked like a nineteenth-century disco ball as she circled the room to greet her guests. Ophelia wondered if she’d ever be as magnificent as Ronda and Aunt Portia.

  After most of the food had been devoured, Uncle Augustus, wearing a white linen suit and a black bow tie, rose to give his monologue. Finished with their serving work, the trio of teenagers gratefully retreated to the attic. Watching a relative perform a monologue was embarrassing and awkward at best, unquestionably excruciating at worst.