Boys Against Girls by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor Read Free Book Online

Peter screeched, stopping there on the sidewalk, fists clenched, eyes scrunched up in fury.
    “Okay, but not one word to anybody!” Wally warned. “I'll bet my last nickel that as soon asschool is out, Caroline is going to Oldakers’ bookstore and go down in that cellar when no one's looking.”
    “Why?” asked Jake.
    “Because she asked me about the abaguchie today. She said if there were abaguchies around Buck-man, somebody should have found some bones. And then it came to me—this idea, sort of.” He grinned just a little.
    “Well?” said Jake.
    “I told her there were some bones—that nobody knew what they belonged to—and that they were down in the cellar of Oldakers’ bookstore. I just know she's going to go there today and sneak down in that cellar.”
    “So?” said Jake.
    “Then what?” asked Josh.
    So? Then what? After all his brilliant work luring Caroline to the cellar, his brothers didn't know what to do?
    “What do you mean, then what?” squawked Wally. And he suddenly realized he didn't know either. He put his imagination on fast-forward. “Then we'll—we'll all go in and stand on top of the trapdoor so she can't get out.”
    “That's it!” said Jake. “That's perfect¡ You're a genius, Wally.”
    But Peter looked worried. “Not ever?”
    “Don't be stupid, Peter. Of course we'll let her out sometime. Just not right away, that's all,” Josh told him.
    “So we can't let her out of sight for a minute,” said Wally. He pointed. “There she is, going over the bridge with her sisters. Maybe they'll all go down into Oldakers’ cellar.”
    “If they see us following them, though, they won't,” warned Jake. “What we've got to do is go stand inside the drugstore where we can watch the door of Oldakers'.”
    “And, Peter, if you blab, you can't come with us,” Josh told him.
    “I won't blab¡ I just think we ought to put some food down there or something.”
    “Food?” said Wally.
    “In case they get hungry.”
    “Peter, we're talking about fifteen or twenty minutes. Anybody can go without food for fifteen or twenty minutes.”
    Peter looked much relieved. “Okay, then,” he said.
    As soon as the boys put their schoolbooks on the table and grabbed a handful of cheese crackers, they were off again, heading toward the business district. A quick glance inside Oldakers’ told them the girls weren't there yet, so they crowded into Larkin's Pharmacy and went over to the window.
    Mr. Larkin, the pharmacist, looked up from his pills and bottles. “How ya doin', boys?”
    “Okay’ said Wally.
    They took positions just far enough back so they couldn't be easily seen, but close enough to the window so that Caroline and her sisters could not get into the bookstore unnoticed.
    Four o'clock became four-thirty. The cashier glanced over at them. “Anything I can do for you?” she asked.
    “Uh … no, thanks,” said Wally.
    “I'll bet she doesn't come,” Jake whispered. “Maybe she had a piano lesson or something.”
    “Yeah, who says that even if she comes, it'll be today?” said Josh.
    Wally was getting a little peeved. “Well, just go on home, then,” he said hotly. “Just go on home and miss her if she does come. Oldakers’ closes at six. If she's not here by then, we'll leave.”
    “What are we supposed to tell Mr. Larkin?” whispered Jake. “He keeps looking over at us. So does the cashier.”
    Wally looked around. The magazines were at the back of the store beside the prescription counter. The games were over by the soda fountain along one wall, one of the last soda fountains left in the state of West Virginia. Up here beneath the front windowwas a rack of women's socks and underwear. To his left was a shelf of Ace bandages.
    Mr. Larkin was walking toward the front of the store.
    “You boys waiting for somebody?” he asked.
    “No, uh … we're trying to decide what to buy,” Wally said, because neither Jake nor Josh said a word, and Peter had wandered off to look