Death by Eggplant

Susan Heyboer O'Keefe

Roaring Brook Press

NEW YORK

 

An Imprint of Macmillan

 

DEATH BY EGGPLANT. Copyright © 2004 by Susan Heyboer O'Keefe.

All rights reserved. Distributed in Canada by H.B. Fenn and Company Ltd.

Printed in December 2009 in the United States of America by R. R. Donnelley & Sons Company, Harrisonburg, Virginia. For information, address Square Fish, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

 

Square Fish and the Square Fish logo are trademarks of Macmillan and are used by Roaring Brook Press under license from Macmillan.

 

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
O'Keefe, Susan Heyboer
Death By Eggplant / Susan Heyboer O'Keefe
p.    cm.

Summary: Eighth-grader Bertie Hooks has to keep his dream of becoming a world-class chef a secret, especially from his mortal enemy, Nick Dekker, and when they both get “flour-sack babies” to take care of for a week, things become even more complicated for Bertie.
[1. Babies–Fiction. 2. Schools–Fiction. 3. Cookery–Fiction. 4. Bullies–Fiction]
I. Title.
PZ7.O41445De 2004
[Fic]–cd22  2003017846

 

ISBN: 978-0-312-60241-3

 

Originally published in the United States by Deborah Brodie Books,
an imprint of Roaring Brook Press
Square Fish logo designed by Filomena Tuosto
Book design by Jennifer Browne
First Square Fish Edition: 2010

10    9    8    7    6    5    4    3    2    1

www.squarefishbooks.com

 

 

 

 

 

More thanks than I can say go to my agent, Steven Chudney,
and my editor, Deborah Brodie.

 

I also thank everyone who read
Death by Eggplant
while it was still unreadable and who gave me invaluable help
in bringing the book to life.

 

Special thanks to Bonny Becker, Susan Taylor Brown, and
Laura Purdie Salas for giving me Bertie's heart.

 

And the biggest thanks of all to Laura Spinella,
who so generously gave me Cleo.

 

 

 

For Laura
,
who'll always be Laura Catherine to me

“And for his extraordinary culinary skills, the world's first-ever Nobel Prize in Cooking goes to— Bertram Hooks!”

It was last-period math, with summer vacation close enough to touch. My daydream was just getting to the part where the cute cooking groupies show me around Stockholm after the awards dinner. Then Mrs. Menendez's voice went up a notch, and the groupies vanished. Algebra could scare anyone away.

The incredible chef Jacques Pépin was only thirteen, my age, when he began his cooking apprenticeship, but that was France. They knew what was important over there. Over here, they believe in stupid things like taking algebra, graduating from junior high, and then enduring four more years of physical, mental, and emotional torture.

“I said, ‘Mr. Hooks?'” Mrs. Menendez repeated.

Without opening my eyes, I guessed.

“
X
equals 42?”

“Mr. Hooks.”

Mrs. M. was holding a brown paper bag. It was bigger than a lunch bag, unless you were a jock who ate multiple hoagies and a first grader every noon.

“What is it?” I asked. I didn't remember any math problems involving brown paper bags, but it might have been a trick question.

Mrs. Menendez smiled her very special I'm-so-pleased-with-myself smile. That usually meant I was in big trouble. The expression made a creepy combination with her everyday uniform of navy skirt, navy jacket, white shirt, and navy tie. Before coming here, she must have worked in a prison. And she must have smiled that same smile at the prisoners.

“Why, it's your baby, Mr. Hooks. I believe it's a girl. Please come and take her.”

“Oooooh, Aunt Bertha has a baaaa-by!” Nicholas Dekker cooed.

Nick Dekker and I were what you would call mortal enemies. Had been ever since kindergarten. Once, he had mouthed off so badly, the teacher had taken away his job of clapping erasers and given it to “that nice polite boy, Bertie Hooks.” That was when Dekker decided he hated me. I had done my best to ignore him over the years. Then he twisted my name from Bertie to Bertha.

Now he cooed again. “Ooooh, Aunt Bertha and her bay-yay-by.”

“That's enough, Mr. Dekker,” Mrs. Menendez warned. She held the bag out toward me.

“Mr. Hooks?” she said impatiently.

“There's a baby in the bag?” I asked.

She didn't answer. She only smiled and waited.

From my seat in the last desk of the last row, the walk to the front of the room seemed longer than usual.

“Very good, Mr. Hooks,” she said, when I was at her side. “Here she is.”

She opened the bag and carefully tilted the contents into my hands. Out fell a squarish white package, soft, much heavier than I expected, and powdery to the touch.

“Is this a joke?” I asked. “It's a five-pound sack of flour.”

“This is not a joke,” Mrs. Menendez said. “It is your brand-new baby girl. Now then, Mr. Hooks, today is Wednesday. Your little bundle here will be in your care for the next ten days, till the end of the final marking period.”

Mrs. Menendez gently stroked the top of the flour sack.

“In that time,” she continued, “you are not to let her out of your sight—ever. When I take attendance, I'll be taking
her
attendance, too. If
she's
not here, I won't consider you here. When I see you outside of school, I'd better see her. And when the assignment is over, she must be returned in perfect condition. Do you understand me?”

This was like a bad sitcom. Heck, there are even books about flour-sack babies. Why couldn't I just read one of those books and write a report on it?

Mrs. Menendez sat back at her desk and began to thumb through her math text, ready to move on. I started to panic.

“This is all because I let Harry escape last week, isn't it?”

Harry was Miss Rogers's newt. Miss Rogers used to teach second grade, then was promoted this year to junior high. She thought it would be cute to have a class pet for science. Last week I had taken Harry out of his bowl to teach him little newt tricks, like how to roll over and beg. I guess I forgot to put the lid back on, and Harry ended up learning how to play dead. I wondered if Miss Rogers had asked to be transferred back yet.

“Poor Harry,” Mrs. Menendez murmured. “Yes, it's about Harry, and it's about the Spanish vocabulary words you should have memorized this weekend but didn't—”

“But—” I had been practicing my pastries.

“—and it's about the biography of Enrico Fermi you were assigned to write for English class, but which you changed on your own to Santa Claus so you could make it all up—yes, I heard about that—”

“But—” I wanted to protest that Santa was a major force in American culture. Somehow I didn't think she would buy it.

“—and it's about the math work you promised to bring Indra Sahir in January when she broke her leg, but which you forgot to—”

“But—” I felt myself turn neon pink.
Forget
to go to Indra's? It would be easier to forget how to breathe. Three separate times this winter, I trudged nine and a half blocks, past countless leafless trees, past snow-covered houses on wide snow-covered lawns, past collies and shepherds and Rottweilers, all out on their own for a quick icy wee, and stood outside Indra's house, shivering, and not just from the cold. All the years we were in school together, I had never really talked to her. What if she invited me in now? What if she didn't invite me in? What if she said, “Who are
you
?” after I had silently worshiped her for so long?

“—and it's about the extra credit you nagged and nagged and
nagged
me for,” Mrs. M. went on, “then ended up not even trying, and it's about the—”

“All right,” I said. “I think I see a pattern here.”