Boys Against Girls (15 page)

      W
ally watched the Malloys coming up the driveway for Thanksgiving. Coach Malloy came first, holding a low open box with three pies in it, from what Wally could see.

Caroline's mother was next, holding a large covered dish. Then Eddie, who seemed to have been talked into wearing a skirt under her baseball jacket, and was carrying still another dish; Beth, who was holding a paper bag in one hand and a book stuck out in front of her with the other; and finally Caroline, with some kind of an acorn, pine-cone, ribbon creation in her hands, the ugliest thing Wally had ever seen.

The Whomper, the Weirdo, and the Crazie, that's what he and his brothers had nicknamed the girls— Whomper, because Eddie could whomp a baseball farther than any other girl he'd ever seen; Weirdo,
because Beth was always reading about dragons and vampires and trolls; and Crazie, because you never knew what Caroline was going to try next, but whatever it was, it would be off the wall.

This was the first time the Bensons and Hatfords had not been together for Thanksgiving. The Benson brothers were probably sitting around a table in Georgia this very minute, their mouths full of thirty different kinds of desserts.

Well, let the Malloys come¡ Wally was ready for them. He fingered something in his right pants pocket, and a smile spread slowly across his face.

One minute his house was fairly quiet—the sound of a video game going in the living room, Mom in the kitchen listening to her favorite radio station, the snap of the fire in the fireplace—and the next, the hallway was filled with Malloys, with Coach Malloy's deep voice and Mrs. Malloy's high one, with the sound of hangers clunking and scraping as coats were hung in the closet.

“Happy Thanksgiving, and welcome to our home.”

“How nice of you to invite us.”

“A real November sky out there.”

“My, those pies smell so good.”

Just like it was when the Bensons used to come, there was so much food, it didn't all fit on the table. Mr. Hatford carved half the twenty-pound turkey
and set the rest on the back porch, but things still didn't seem the same as when the Bensons were there.

When they sat down around the big table, with Peter's place cards at every plate, Wally sat right beside Caroline. Jake had switched his place card so he did not have to sit beside Eddie, and Josh had switched his so he did not have to sit beside Beth, but Wally had made sure that he was right beside Caroline.

He hoped that the Malloys did not insist on holding hands around the table during grace, or singing “Come Ye Thankful People, Come” or something, and was glad when his father bowed his head and said that he hoped the food before them would “nourish our good.” Which was another way of saying that they should put their energies, toward something useful. Finally the meal began.

The three Malloy girls didn't look any more comfortable than he did, Wally decided, but the worst was yet to come. And again he patted his pocket.

The plates were all stacked in front of Dad at the end of the table. Because the turkey platter was so heavy, it was the tradition in the Hatford family for Dad to put a little dark and a little white meat on each plate and pass it down one side of the table until it reached the person at the end. Then the next plate. When all the people on one side of the table
had been served, Dad would pass plates down the other, one at a time.

Wally watched as the first plate went down the table and ended up in front of Mom. Then the next and the next. People began talking as the plates were passed, but Wally had his eye on the turkey. When all the people on the other side of the table had been served, Dad started the plates down Wally's side. Past Mrs. Malloy, then Peter, who handed the plate to Wally. As Wally took the plate, he carefully pulled his other hand from out of his pocket and deposited a worm—a small green worm he had found in the apples stored in the basement—along the edge of the plate. Then he gave it to Caroline, who set it down in front of her.

Nobody else seemed to notice. Out of the corner of his eye Wally saw Caroline glance at the turkey slices and then her eyes grew huge. Wally could not stop the smile that was taking over his face, and tucked his chin down in his shirt collar. When he looked sideways again, Caroline was staring right at him, and Wally knew that she knew. Strangely enough, she looked as though she also was trying not to laugh.

Wally could not figure it out. He thought she would shriek and pretend she was poisoned or something, but instead she just sat there calmly like
the Queen of Sheba, while the worm slowly inched along the rim of her plate.

And soon Wally found out why. Because as soon as everyone had a plate of turkey, the other dishes were passed around. And as a casserole of green beans and corn came to Caroline, Wally stared as she put a little on her plate, and then, with the edge of the serving spoon, scooped up the worm and put it inside the dish, passing it on.

Mother took the dish from Caroline and put a spoonful of beans and corn on her plate and passed it to Jake, sitting across the table from Caroline. Jake took a spoonful, and there was the worm again, crawling around Jake's plate. He started to pick up his fork, then startled, and glanced over to where Wally and Caroline were grinning. Then Jake, too, smiled a little. When the sweet potatoes came around next, in went the worm and out it came again on Coach Malloy's plate.

By now Josh and Eddie could see that something was going on, and all eyes were on Coach Malloy as the worm crawled under his fork, then over his fork. Caroline's father lifted a bite to his mouth, then lowered it again as he asked a question, the worm dangling like a sky diver.

Down went the fork as Coach Malloy and Mrs. Hatford talked about the best kind of paint to use on
cement, and the worm wriggled under a leaf of lettuce. By now Beth was in on the joke.

Finally Coach Malloy stabbed at his lettuce, brought the fork to his mouth, worm and all, and in it went. The three Malloy girls and Wally, Josh, and Jake stared in horror as Coach Malloy's lips closed over the hapless worm, and the big jaws began moving up and down.

Beth covered her mouth with her napkin. Jake and Wally looked wide eyed at each other. But Coach Malloy swallowed, and the worm was gone.

A grin traveled around the table, leap-frogging over the parents, who went right on talking. Wally almost felt like laughing out loud.

Maybe it wouldn't be as bad as he thought, having the girls here in Buckman. Maybe between the seven of them, they could all think up enough to do until the Bensons came back.
If
they came back. And if they didn't?

Well, when had the Benson brothers ever passed a worm from plate to plate at Thanksgiving? When had they ever thrown one of Mom's cakes in the river, probably the most awesome sight Wally had ever seen? If the Malloys weren't around, what
would
Wally and his brothers be doing? Being bored half out of their minds, that's what¡

He blinked as he heard the word
abaguchie
again,
and paid attention. His parents were talking about it now with Mr. and Mrs. Malloy.

“Fellow over at the college says he thinks it's a bobcat’ said the coach. “Sometimes they come close in to town when food is scarce, he says, and that's probably what people have been seeing.”

Wally's dad helped himself to bread and then the butter. “Even a possum or raccoon can seem bigger at night than if you glimpse it by day,” he put in.

“Frankly,” said Mother, “I think it's an overactive imagination.”

“I agree, Ellen,” said Mrs. Malloy. “You get a rumor going about strange creatures and loud squalls in the night, and suddenly everybody's seeing and hearing things.”

That wasn't what Wally wanted to hear at all. He wanted to know that it was a weird animal no one had ever seen before—some prehistoric creature that only came out every twenty years or so in West Virginia. He wanted to think that if things ever slowed down between the Hatfords and the Malloys, he'd have abaguchie stories for entertainment.

At that precise moment there was a crash, then a thud on the back porch.

Wally looked over at Jake and Josh; Caroline was staring at her sisters.

Mrs. Hatford pushed her chair away from the table. “Now, what was
that?”

Instantly Wally was on his feet, and suddenly everyone was hurrying through the kitchen and crowding through the doorway to the back porch.

There was the roasting pan upside down on the floor, the turkey carcass nowhere in sight. And just as Wally and his brothers, and Caroline and her sisters, lifted their eyes to the yard beyond, they saw a tail, a tawny tail, dart swiftly into the trees behind the shed and, just as quickly, disappear.

“Well, for heaven's sake!” gasped Mother.

“There goes our dinner,” said Dad. “I hope everyone had enough turkey, because I'm not going after that one.”

“Did you get a good look?” asked Mrs. Malloy.

“It looked bigger than a bobcat to me,” said the coach. “I'm no expert on these things, but I don't think that was a dog or a bobcat, either one. Maybe the abaguchie creature isn't so imaginary after all.”

Mrs. Hatford sighed. “Something
else
to worry about!”

Worry? Wally looked around at his brothers. Then he looked at Caroline, Beth, and Eddie. They didn't look worried. There wasn't a worried face among them. Caroline's eyes almost snapped with excitement, and Jake and Josh looked as though they could hardly wait for dinner to be over so they could
start tracking the animal. Just telling about this at school would be half the fun.

A d even as Wally went back to the table and saw that the turkey platter was empty, there was a grin that inched wormlike across his face.

The Boys Start the War

Just when the Hatford brothers are expecting three boys to move into the house across the river where their best friends used to live, the Malloy girls arrive instead. Wally and his brothers decide to make Caroline and her sisters so miserable that they’ll want to go back to Ohio, but they haven’t counted on the ingenuity of the girls. From dead fish to dead bodies, floating cakes to floating heads, the pranks continue—first by the boys, then by the girls— until someone is taken prisoner¡

The Girls Get Even

Still smarting from the boys’ latest trick, the girls are determined to get even. Caroline is thrilled to play the part of Goblin Queen in the school play, especially since Wally Hatford has to be her footman. The boys, however, have a creepy plan for Halloween night. They’re certain the girls will walk right into their trap. Little do the boys know what the Malloy sisters have in store.

Boys Against Girls

Abaguchie mania¡ Caroline Malloy shivers happily when her on-again, off-again enemy Wally Hatford tells her that the remains of a strange animal known as the abaguchie have been spotted in their area. Wally swears Caroline to secrecy and warns her not to search by herself. But Caroline will do anything to find the secret of the bones and finds out the hard way that she should have listened.

The Girls’ Revenge

Christmas is coming, but Caroline Malloy and Wally Hatford aren’t singing carols around the tree. Instead, these sworn enemies must interview each other for the dreaded December class project. Caroline, as usual, has a trick up her sleeve that’s sure to shock Wally. In the meantime, Wally and his brothers find a way to spy on the Malloy girls at home. The girls vow to get revenge on those sneaky Hatfords with a trap the boys won’t soon forget.

A Traitor Among the Boys

The Hatford boys make a New Year’s resolution to treat the Malloy girls like sisters. But who says you can’t play tricks on sisters? The girls will need to stay one step ahead of the boys and are willing to pay big-time for advance information. Homemade cookies should be all it takes to make a traitor spill the beans. In the meantime, Caroline is delighted with her role in the town play. Don’t ask how Beth, Josh, and Wally get roped into it—just wait until showtime, when Caroline pulls her wildest stunt yet¡

A Spy Among the Girls

Valentine’s Day is coming up, and love is in the air for Beth Malloy and Josh Hatford. When they’re spotted holding hands, Josh tells his teasing brothers that he’s simply spying on the girls to see what they’re plotting next. At the same time, Caroline Malloy, the family actress, decides she must know what it’s like to fall in love. Poor Wally Hatford is in for it when she chooses him as the object of her affection¡

The Boys Return

It’s spring break, and the only assignment Wally Hatford and Caroline Malloy have is to do something they’ve never done before. Wally’s sure that will be a cinch, because the mighty Benson brothers are coming. It will be nonstop action all the way. For starters, the nine Benson and Hatford boys plan to scare the three Malloy sisters silly by convincing them that their house is haunted. Meanwhile, everyone in town has heard that there’s a hungry cougar on the prowl. When the kids decide to take a break from their tricks and join forces to catch the cougar, guess who gets stuck with the scariest job?