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With all of that to deal with, a rec center sounded like a really great idea.

Of course she couldn't talk about that much at home, because her mother got that look on her face, and Maggie ended up feeling like a traitor.

But if she were running Felicity, a recreation center for teens would already be on the drawing board and the old courthouse would be ... well... history.

Conscious of passing time, Maggie tapped her fingers impatiently on the steering wheel and glanced sideways at the old courthouse one more time. And shuddered. She couldn't help it. Maybe it had been beautiful once, when there was a happy family living there, but now it just looked like somebody's bad memory, and if you asked her, it should be torn down.

The light turned green. Maggie pressed down on the gas, glad to get away from the building, with its tall, narrow windows staring back at her as if daring her to come inside. She shuddered again, realizing that she would have to do just that when the

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peer jury began assisting in the transfer of supplies from the old building to the new. That bright idea had come from the principal, Gail Marsh. Something about "taking responsibility in your community as well as here at Otis Bransom High." Whatever. Maggie was foreperson of the peer jury. No way could she opt out of the chore.

Glancing in her side mirror as she rounded the corner, she noticed only one car behind her, a navy-blue sedan so nondescript she immediately dismissed it. No one she knew would drive such a boring car, so there was no need to wave to the driver, whoever it might be. She pulled into the high school parking lot with one minute to spare before the peer jury hearings were scheduled to begin.

In her rush, she never noticed that the blue car had pulled into a space near her.

In spite of her anxiety about being late, she took the time to stuff into her backpack the roll of plans her mother had given her. Then she jumped out of the van and rushed into the gray stone building.

If she hadn't done that... if she had instead left the plans in the van and locked the doors, that Friday would have been no different from any other Friday.

But she took the plans with her.

After a brief interval, the driver's door of the blue sedan opened, and, a moment later, closed again. Footsteps followed Maggie into the high school.

any other way to keep her busy (meaning, Maggie knew, keep her out of trouble).

"What are we going to do with you, Magdalene?" the slim, dark-haired teacher had said in her office at the end of first semester last year. She had sounded exasperated. "You tried drama, and hated it. Then you worked on the school paper with Scout for what, all of six weeks? And quit. He said you were bored. Big surprise. The same thing happened with chorus. It's a good thing you like sports, but sporting events are not enough to keep your mind occupied. We need something else. Frankly, Maggie," the teacher added, "the only thing left for you to try is the peer jury."

"Oh, lovely." Maggie, slumped in a leather chair opposite Ms. Gross's desk, her long, jeaned legs stretched out in front of her, had made a face. "Like I really want to be one of those geeky people who smacks a classmate's hand when he's been naughty. Now there's a super way to make friends!"

"You already have plenty of friends," the teacher had responded sharply. "And if you were interested in collecting more of them, you'd have stayed in drama or on the newspaper or campaigned for an office. What gets me is, your peers don't seem to mind your inability to stick to anything for very long."

"That's because they know I'm a loyal and faithful and true friend," Maggie joked, realizing she was straining the counselor's patience. She liked Ms. Gross. But the woman had deliberately returned to Felicity after college and taken a job

here, when she could have moved to a big city to teach. Which meant she didn't mind being bored, so how could she possibly understand why Maggie hated it?

And Maggie did hate it. Very much. She still faced two and a half long, dreary years in Felicity, where nothing much ever happened. They stretched out ahead of her like a jail term. Then she was out of here! On her way to college somewhere far, far away, then to a job in a huge, exciting city. She'd come home on holidays, of course, because it wasn't as if she didn't like her family. Her dad had a great sense of humor and was very generous with allowances, and her mother, when she wasn't so busy reshaping Felicity, was a lot of fun. Dog-face would come home from college, too, and maybe he'd have been magically transformed into a real human being by then.

But it would take a holiday to drag her back to Felicity.

'There are ten members of the jury, not twelve," Ms. Gross had continued, apparently unaware that Maggie wasn't really listening. "Sessions are held as often as necessary. They take place either in the morning before classes begin, or after school, whichever time is most convenient for jury members, and last anywhere from an hour to two hours, depending upon the problems presented."

Maggie lifted her head. "You mean, depending upon the crimes presented. Horrendous offenses like stealing a candy bar from the vending machine or putting feet up on a desk or mouthing off to a

teacher." She twirled an index finger in the air. "I don't know if I can stand the excitement, Ms. Gross."

Ignoring the gesture, the counselor continued, "I must caution you, you'll be dealing with some students who are repeat offenders. They don't like being disciplined, and they especially don't like being disciplined by their peers. If anyone gives you any trouble, you must report it to this office or the principal."

"This office"? Maggie hid a smile. Ms. Gross thought of herself as "this office"? That's what came of settling in Felicity. The woman didn't even see herself as a person anymore.

"Many of the students who get into trouble are simply, like yourself, bored." The counselor's tone deepened, became stern. "I wouldn't want to see that happen to you, Maggie."

"It won't," Maggie answered confidently. It wouldn't. Not because she was afraid of breaking the rules. She wasn't. But getting out of Felicity required going to college and going to college required a relatively unblemished transcript, no matter how screamingly, achingly bored she got. She wasn't taking any chances with that transcript. "Okay, so I'll take a shot at this peer jury thing. Might be fun."

"It isn't supposed to be fun." Ms. Gross frowned as she stood up. "I hope I'm not making a mistake here. The majority of the other nine members are straight-A students, which you could be, too, if you'd apply yourself. I've seen your PSATs. And most of your fellow jurors hold office. Two of them are cheerleaders."

"Oh, wow," Maggie breathed with what she hoped was the appropriate degree of awe. The teacher missed the sarcasm. Maggie knew the two girls, "Bennie" Sawyer and Tanya Frye, and liked them. But Ms. Gross couldn't possibly be including Bennie and Tanya in that "majority" of straight-A students. Fortunately for the two girls, good grades weren't essential for cheerleading duties at Bransom High.

"I expect you to take this seriously, Maggie," were Ms. Gross's parting words as Maggie left the office.

Maggie had done just that. She hadn't exactly planned to. She had thought of it more as a lark than anything else, something to pass the time. Four of her closest friends were already on the ten-member jury, so it wasn't as if she'd be walking into a group of strangers.

Helen, her hazel eyes wide, had cried, "No kidding? You?"

Alex threw an arm around her shoulders and cried, "Hey, great! I'd already decided we were going to hang out more together this year, now that I'm driving and can hang out in town more. It's like Ms. Gross read my mind."

Lane smiled and said, "Cool. We'll have our very own little club."

Scout gave Maggie an affectionate but cynical grin and said, "Yeah, well, we won't print your name on the roster in permanent ink until we see how long you last."

When she did last, Maggie had probably been

more surprised than Scout. Her enthusiasm for the business of debating first innocence and guilt, and then the appropriate disciplinary measures to be taken, had grown rapidly. She had actually begun toying with the idea of going into law someday. The dedication she began bringing to peer jury hearings earned the respect and admiration of her fellow jurors, and at the beginning of this year, she had been selected as foreperson for the first semester. She knew Scout had wanted it, and had expected him to be angry. But the next day he'd given her the antique gavel and told her to use it "in good health." He had sounded sincere.

When she was seated in the first row of folding chairs in the center of the gym, she pulled her gavel from her backpack, dropped the pack on the floor, and glanced around. "Everybody here?"

"Robert's not," Helen volunteered. Tall and broad-shouldered, with a wide, strong face completely devoid of makeup, and light brown hair cut short and straight, Helen looked very much like the athlete that she was. A champion soccer player, the keystone of the girls' basketball team, and a blue-ribbon swimmer, Helen had long since earned the respect of her classmates at Bransom High. With clear eyes, thickly lashed, and a full, upturned mouth, she could have been very pretty with very little effort. But she was adamant in her refusals of Maggie's offers to do a "makeover."

"I couldn't stand having all that goo on my face," Helen always demurred, "and I need to keep my hair short like this for sports."

Lane had told Maggie knowingly, "Helen's afraid of boys. Anyone can see that. She must have been deeply hurt by one, before we met her."

Maggie, who knew Helen better than Lane did, wasn't sure she agreed with Lane. Since when did a lack of makeup signify a fear of the opposite sex? And Helen had confided in her once that she hadn't had many friends, growing up out in the country. "My social skills," she had said, laughing lightly, "are practically nonexistent." But she got along fine with everyone on the peer jury.

"So?" Maggie glanced around the table. "Where is Robert?" Now that she was in place herself, she felt impatient with anyone who wasn't seated on time. They had three hearings scheduled for this morning. The "judge" and the "accused" and their "lawyers" would be here soon. The jury should be in place.

"Robert isn't coming," a deep, unfamiliar voice said from the doorway.

All heads turned.

The boy in the doorway, leaning against the frame as if he'd built it himself, was tall, with long legs in jeans, and wide shoulders in a navy-blue suede jacket over a white T-shirt.

"Oh, wow," Helen breathed, and Lane declared, "Omigod, it's John F. Kennedy, Junior! What's he doing here?" The two cheerleaders sat up very straight, their hands automatically flying to their hair.

He's a swimmer, Maggie thought, assessing the span of the newcomer's shoulders. She glanced Hel---

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en's way to see if there was recognition on her face. There wasn't, so the guy didn't swim at Bransom. Of course not. If he did, Maggie would have seen him when she went to Helen's meets. And if she'd seen him, she'd remember him, because that was definitely not a forgettable face. Nice bones. Nice skin, still tanned, although it was too late in the year to be swimming outside. Tennis, too, maybe? He had the shoulders for it. Nice eyes. Bright. Keen, as if they could see things ordinary eyes couldn't. Were they brown or hazel? His hair was brown, a little wavy around the edges, and recently combed, Maggie thought. Maybe right before he entered the gym? What was he smiling at? No one had said anything funny. No one had said anything at all. But he was smiling. Like he knew something they didn't.

Well, he did. He knew that Robert wasn't coming. And why.

"Okay, I'll bite," Maggie said coolly. Lane was wrong. This guy didn't look that much like John F. Kennedy, Jr. His hair was lighter. "Why isn't Robert coming?"

The boy didn't move. Four people arrived and passed him in the doorway, but he stayed where he was. Maggie recognized the quartet. It included Susan Blair, this semester's "judge." Behind her, his usual sullen expression present, walked James Keith, a sophomore; his girlfriend, Connie Fox; and James's student "lawyer," Ralph Santini, who looked like he would rather be taking a pop math quiz blindfolded.

This was James Keith's third appearance before the peer jury this semester, and it was only early October. He had the personality of a badger, the manners of a hyena, and was as sly and stealthy as a snake. We should just sentence him to the zoo, Maggie thought, feeling James's hostile glare. He was focusing it only on her. One of the prices she paid for being foreperson.

Susan took her seat behind the judge's desk, and the other three sat in front of her on folding chairs. James, short and dark and barrel-chested, stared at her arrogantly. Ralph looked far less confident than he usually did. He knew his "client" well. Everyone at Bransom did. No wonder Ralph looked nervous. Connie, a small, pretty girl, wore a bored expression on her face.

"Your friend Robert," the boy in the doorway said in answer to Maggie's question, 'Is waging a tough battle in calculus. He decided his time would be better spent by hitting the books than by meting out justice. He asked me if I'd be interested in taking his place, since I'd mentioned to him that I might be going into law someday. I thought about this jury thing, and it seemed like a good idea. So here I am. That my chair?" he finished, pointing to the empty chair on Maggie's left.

"You can't just take someone's place," Scout protested. "You have to talk to Mrs. Marsh, our principal, or one of the counselors. You have to be picked."

Maggie and Helen exchanged an amused look that said silently, Boys! Scout Redfern, who was alu

most as tall as the boy in the doorway and almost, but not quite, as good-looking, was used to being in charge of things. He obviously wasn't thrilled by the arrival of another great-looking guy in his territory. Bad enough that a girl had been selected as foreperson. Now, in the doorway, stood yet another threat to Scout's heretofore peaceful, unchallenged reign at Bransom.

Helen smiled and Maggie shrugged. He'll get over it, she signaled with her eyes.