Ann Martin - Little Miss Stoneybrook...and Dawn

"Boo," replied Margo unhappily, but she headed for the kitchen anyway.

Everyone followed her. They all wanted to watch.

Margo stood in front of the refrigerator. She popped a piece of banana in her mouth and chewed it thoroughly.

Just as she was about to begin reciting, Adam

jumped in with, "This is the mouse the cat killed. This is the fly that landed on the mouse the cat killed. This is the spider that ate the fly that landed on the mouse the cat killed."

"Adam!" Margo cried. "Mallory, Jessi, those aren't the right words! Make him stop!"

"Adam," said Mallory warningly.

"Mallory?" Adam replied.

Mallory hid a smile. She thought Adam's poem was sort of funny. And she thought all the pageant business was ridiculous. But as a baby-sitter, it was her job to try to keep the peace. She frowned at Adam. He frowned back, but remained quiet.

"Thish ish the housh that Jack" (swallow) "built," said Margo.

"This is the fly that landed on the mouse the cat killed," Adam continued for her.

"Adam!" screamed Claire and Margo.

"Why don't you go rehearse in your room?" Jessi suggested to the two hopeful beauty queens.

"No!" they shrieked. "Make Adam be quiet."

"Adam - " Jessi began.

"Never mind," he said hastily. "Come on, you guys," he added, and as he left the kitchen he was followed byJordan , Byron, Nicky, and Vanessa.

Mallory and Jessi looked at each other and

shrugged. Then they left/ too. Claire and Margo were alone in the kitchen.

"Good," said Margo with satisfaction. "Now we can really rehearse."

"Right," agreed Claire. "Only it's my turn to 'hearse."

"No, mine! I'm not finished."

"It's mine! I haven't even started."

"Mine!"

"MINE!"

"Okay, break it up in there!" shouted Mallory from the living room. "Either take turns or rehearse in separate rooms."

Margo and Claire looked at each other. Margo had finished her banana. "Separate rooms," she said, glaring at her sister.

"Good," said Claire angrily.

As Margo marched out of the kitchen she called over her shoulder, "I'm going to win, you know. Because my talent is better than yours."

"Is not!" Claire began singing at the top of her lungs, "I'm Popeye the sailor man. I live in a garbage can."

"Claire, hold it down just a little," said Jessi, poking her head into the kitchen.

Claire ignored her. "I eat all the wor-orms and spit out the ger-erms. I'm Popeye the sailor man!"

From the rec room, Margo began an even

louder rendition of her poem, starting with the long last verse: "THIS IS THE FARMER WHO SOWED THE CORN, THAT FED THE COCK THAT CROWED IN THE MORN, THAT WAKED THE PRIEST ALL SHAVEN AND - "

"STOP!"

Utter silence reigned in the Pike house.

Jessi, who had never raised her voice in front of the Pikes, had had enough. "If you two can't rehearse quietly, then go outside," she said firmly.

"Better yet, don't rehearse," added Mallory, coming to Jessi's side. They were standing at the entrance to the kitchen. Mallory was looking in at Claire. Jessi was looking down the steps at Margo in the rec room.

"We'll be quiet," said Margo contritely.

"Yeah," agreed Claire.

For half an hour, the girls did rehearse quietly. And separately. Then Margo tiptoed up the steps to the kitchen, carrying her copy of The House That Jack Built. "Claire?" she said sweetly. "Let's work together, okay? There are a few things I could show you. Like how to shake hands and stuff."

"I know how to shake hands," Claire replied. Still, she looked pleased that her sister wanted to help her.

"Do you know the special Judges' Handshake?" asked Margo.

"Judges' Handshake?" Claire repeated. "No. I thought Dawn said we would curtsy for the judges."

"Well, we'll probably have to shake their hands, too, and you better know how to do it. Here, hold out your left hand."

"But I thought - " Claire began.

"Right hand for regular people, left hand for judges," Margo interrupted importantly.

"Margo! Cut that out!" called Mallory. "You're making that up!"

"Are you?" asked Claire, sounding wounded.

"Yeah," Margo admitted.

"Then you go back downstairs and 'hearse alone," said Claire. "Oh, but first would you get me a glass of milk, please? Since you were so mean to me?"

"Oh, all right."

Margo poured out a glass of milk and handed it to her sister. "Hey, where's my book?" she asked, looking around for The House That Jack Built.

Claire gazed at Margo with wide, innocent eyes. She blinked. "I don't know."

"You do too. You hid it!"

"Did not!"

"Did so!"

Jessi had to step in to break up the latest fight. When the girls had settled down and Claire had returned Margo's book (which she had hidden), Jessi marched them into the living room, where Mallory and the rest of the Pikes were involved in a hot Monopoly game.

Mallory tried to find something quiet for Claire and Margo to do. "I hate to suggest this," she said, "but why don't you girls practice your poise or something. Practice walking like . . . walking like . . . Oh, I can't even say it."

"I can," spoke upJordan . "Practice walking like gorillas."

"Jordan!" shouted Claire and Margo.

"How about walking like, um, females?" suggested Jessi.

"We could try the books again," Claire said to Margo.

"Use encyclopedias," said Nicky.

The girls ignored him. They each found a small paperback and began sashaying around the living room with the books on their heads.

"Oh, that is pathetic," said Mallory to Jessi. "Look at them. They're going to think the only thing that matters in their lives is beauty and poise. They'll grow up believing they can only be pretty faces, not doctors or lawyers or authors."

"I am so glad Becca has stage fright," said Jessi.

At that moment, Adam got to his feet. He followed his sisters around the room, wiggling his hips and singing in a high voice, "Here she comes - Miss A-meeeer-i-ca!"

Claire and Margo didn't utter a word. They just threw down their books and stomped out of the living room. Claire went to the kitchen, Margo to the rec room. A few moments later, the Pikes and Jessi heard, "I'm Popeye the sailor man ..." all mixed up with, "This is the farmer who sowed the corn ..."

"I have a headache," commented Mallory.

"Me too," said Jessi, Adam,Byron,Jordan , Vanessa, and Nicky.

They moved their Monopoly game upstairs and waited for the afternoon to end.

Chapter 10.

This is the house that Jack built. This is the malt that lay in the house that Jack built. This is the rat -

Stop! Stop! Stop!

I was having a stupid conversation inside my head. I couldn't get that darn poem out of my mind. It was with me all the time.

This is the farmer who sowed the corn, that fed the cock . . .

Claire's song was with me, too.

7 eat all the wor-orms and spit out the ger-erms I'm Popeye the . . .

Ew, ew, ew.

"Dawn, would you pay attention, please?"

I jumped. Thank goodness I wasn't in school, just at a meeting of the Baby-sitters Club. Even so, Kristy looked about as peeved as a teacher who's caught a kid drifting around in outer space.

"Sorry," I said. "It's that poem that Margo's going to recite in the Little Miss Stoneybrook pageant. It's driving me crazy."

"Tell me about it," said Mallory. She looked a little wild.

And Jessi immediately added, "This is the farmer who sowed the corn, that fed the cock that crowed in the morn, that waked the priest all shaven and shorn ..."

Mallory and I joined in with, "That married the man all tattered and torn - "

The phone rang then and Kristy reached for it, saying, "Amazing," and giving us a look that might have meant she thought we were totally demented, or might have meant she was really, really impressed with us. It was hard to tell.