Raymie Nightingale (18 page)

But Raymie didn’t want to go home. She wanted to be where Louisiana was. So Ruthie brought a cot into Louisiana’s room, and Raymie lay down on it. She fell asleep right away.

And when she woke up, Louisiana was still sleeping and Louisiana’s grandmother was still wearing her fur coat. She was still holding Louisiana’s hand, and she was asleep, too. The hallway outside of the room was lit up, shining with afternoon light, just like the common room at the Golden Glen.

Raymie got up and stood in the doorway of the room and looked at the bright and shining path.

A cat was walking toward her.

Raymie stood and stared. The cat came closer and closer. Raymie recognized him from her dream. She recognized him from Mrs. Borkowski’s suitcase.

It was Archie.

The cat brushed past her. He came into the room and leaped up on Louisiana’s bed and curled himself into a tight ball.

Raymie went and lay back down on her cot. She fell asleep again. When she woke up, it was dusk and Archie was still curled up at Louisiana’s feet. He was purring so loudly that the hospital bed was shaking.

Archie, King of the Cats. He had returned.

Louisiana’s fever broke that night. She sat up in bed and said, “Oh, my goodness. I’m hungry.” Her voice was scratchy.

And then she looked down at her feet and saw the cat.

“Archie,” she said, as if she wasn’t surprised at all. She bent forward and pulled him into her arms. She looked around the room. She said, “And there’s Granny.” She looked at her grandmother, who was sleeping in the chair beside the bed. And then Louisiana looked at Raymie and said, “Raymie Nightingale. There you are, too.”

“Here I am,” said Raymie.

“Where’s Beverly?”

“She’s at home. Taking care of Bunny.”

“Bunny,” said Louisiana in a voice of wonder. “We saved Bunny. Remember how we saved him?”

Ruthie came into the room and said, “How did that cat get in here?”

“He found me,” said Louisiana. “I lost him. He lost me. We went looking for him, and he found me.”

Raymie closed her eyes and saw Mrs. Borkowski opening the suitcase and pulling Archie out of it. “It’s kind of a miracle,” she said.

“Ain’t no miracle,” said Ruthie. “It’s just a cat. That’s how they do.”

The other thing that happened in the hospital was that the phone rang at the nurses’ station and it was for Raymie.

Ruthie came into the room and said, “Somebody on the phone for you, Raymie Clarke.”

Raymie went out into the hallway, to the phone. She still had on Ruthie’s sweater. It came down to her knees.

“Hello?” said Raymie.

Ruthie was standing right beside Raymie. She put her hand on Raymie’s shoulder.

“Raymie?” said the voice on the other end.

“Dad,” said Raymie.

“I saw your picture. It was in the paper and . . . I wanted to check on you and make sure . . .”

Raymie couldn’t think of what to say to him. She stood and held the phone up to her ear. There was nothing but a great silence. It was like listening for the ocean in a seashell and not ever hearing it.

It was like that.

After a while, Ruthie took the phone out of Raymie’s hand and spoke into it. She said, “This child is tired. She has saved somebody from drowning. Do you understand what I’m saying? She saved somebody’s
life.
”

And then Ruthie hung up the phone.

“He is a skunk,” she said to Raymie. “And that’s all there is to it.” She put her hands on Raymie’s shoulders. She guided her back to Louisiana’s room. Raymie got on her cot and fell back asleep.

When she woke up, she wondered if she had dreamed the whole thing.

Mostly what she remembered was holding the phone for that long silence — the silence of her father not saying anything, and her not saying anything back.

And then, too, she remembered Ruthie’s hands on her shoulders, guiding her back to the room, where Louisiana was alive and breathing and a cat was curled up at her feet, sleeping.

Louisiana competed in the Little Miss Central Florida Tire contest.

She wore her lucky bunny barrettes and a blue dress spangled with silver sequins. She did not twirl a baton. She sang “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head.”

The contest was in the Finch Auditorium. Louisiana’s grandmother was there, and Beverly was there and Beverly’s mother and Raymie’s mother. And Raymie.

Ida Nee was there, but she did not look happy. Ruthie came from the hospital. And Mrs. Sylvester came from Jim Clarke Family Insurance. They all sat together.

Raymie’s father was not there.

Raymie was not surprised — she was only happy — when Louisiana won the contest and was crowned Little Miss Central Florida Tire.

Later, after Louisiana was presented with a check for one thousand nine hundred and seventy-five dollars, and also with a sash that said
LITTLE MISS CENTRAL FLORIDA TIRE 1975
, Beverly Tapinski and Raymie Clarke and Louisiana Elefante went to the top of the Belknap Tower, even though Louisiana was afraid of heights.

“I’m afraid of heights,” said Louisiana, who was still wearing her crown and her sash. She kept her eyes closed and lay on the floor of the observation deck.

But Raymie and Beverly stood at the railing and looked out.

“See?” said Beverly to Raymie.

“Yes,” said Raymie.

“Tell me what you are seeing,” said Louisiana, who was facedown on the floor and refused to stand up.

“Everything,” said Raymie.

“Describe it,” said Louisiana.

Raymie said, “I can see Swip Pond and the swans and Lake Clara and the hospital. I can see the Golden Glen and Jim Clarke Family Insurance. I can see Ida Nee’s house and the Tag and Bag Grocery. I can see Building Ten.”

“What else?” said Louisiana.

“I can see Ida Nee’s moose head, and I can see the candy-corn jar on Mrs. Sylvester’s desk. I can see the ghost of Clara Wingtip. I can see the yellow bird from the Golden Glen.”

“Is he flying?” said Louisiana.

“Yes,” said Raymie.

“What else?” said Louisiana.

“I can see Ida Nee twirling her baton. I can see Ruthie. She’s waving at us. And there is Archie. And Bunny.”

“Don’t call him ‘Bunny,’” said Beverly, who had renamed the dog Buddy.

After a while, Beverly went and picked Louisiana up and brought her to the railing.

“Open your eyes,” said Beverly, “and look for yourself.”

Louisiana opened her eyes. “Oh, my goodness,” she said. “We’re up so high.”

“Don’t worry,” said Beverly. “I’m holding on to you.”

Raymie took hold of Louisiana’s hand. She said, “I’ve got you, too.”

The three of them stood like that for a long time, looking out at the world.

is the beloved author of many books for young readers, including two Newbery Medal winners:
The Tale of Despereaux
and
Flora & Ulysses: The Illuminated Adventures
. She grew up in Florida and moved to Minnesota in her twenties, where homesickness and a bitter winter led her to write her first published novel,
Because of Winn-Dixie
. It was named a Newbery Honor Book, and she followed it with many other award-winning novels, among them
The Tiger Rising, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane,
and
The Magician’s Elephant.

In addition to her novels, Kate DiCamillo has written a luminous holiday picture book,
Great Joy,
illustrated by Bagram Ibatoulline, and three early-chapter-book series. The Mercy Watson and Tales from Deckawoo Drive series are both illustrated by Chris Van Dusen and feature a “porcine wonder” with a love for buttered toast and a cast of quirky characters from her neighborhood. The Bink & Gollie series, co-written with Alison McGhee and illustrated by Tony Fucile, centers on two characters who embody the tall and short of a marvelous friendship. The first book in that series,
Bink & Gollie,
received the Theodor Seuss Geisel Award for beginning readers.

Kate DiCamillo was selected to be the National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature for 2014–2015. Of that mission, and on the power of stories, she says, “When we read together, we connect. Together, we see the world. Together, we see one another.”

Born in Philadelphia, Kate DiCamillo lives in Minneapolis, where she faithfully writes two pages a day, five days a week.

For discussion guides and other resources for Kate DiCamillo’s books, please visit
KateDiCamilloStoriesConnectUs.com
.

Follow Kate DiCamillo on Facebook
at
Facebook.com/KateDiCamillo
.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or, if real, are used fictitiously.

Copyright © 2016 by Kate DiCamillo
Cover illustration copyright © 2016 by Lucy Davey

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in an information retrieval system in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, taping, and recording, without prior written permission from the publisher.

First electronic edition 2016

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 2015954528

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