Isabelle Shows Her Stuff: The Isabelle Series, Book Two (11 page)

“So I said, ‘That's Guy!' and my father says, ‘Unh huh,' the way he does when he's not really listening. When I got to school I told Mrs. Esposito and she said I could run down to Guy's room and check. His teacher said he'd be in later, that his mother called and she was taking him to the doctor. You don't think there could be two eight-year-old boys both named Guy Gibbs living on Hot Water Street, do you?” Isabelle said.

“I doubt it,” Jane Malone answered. “Probably his mother had to take him to the doctor because he lost a lot of blood.”

“Guy lost a lot of blood? My gosh, I can't believe it. That little weasel. Why wasn't I along? If I was there, I could've pinned their ears back. I could've helped Guy. I miss all the good things. Boy, they'll never call him a goody-goody again.” Isabelle's eyes widened and she clutched Jane's arm. “You don't think Guy's gonna die or anything, do you?”

“Of course not,” Jane said in her practical way. “I like that word ‘hoodlum.' Hoodlum. It sounds just like what it is. Hoodlum.” Jane was getting carried away by the word. Jane was a word person, always trying out new words.

“Isabelle,” Jane said, “can you come—”

But Isabelle was distracted by the sight of Herbie, staggering under a load of books and papers. “Hey, Herb!” she hollered. Jane flinched and stuck a finger in each ear. “You hear about Guy getting rescued by the cops yesterday?”

“Guy?” Herbie said vaguely. As if he'd never heard of Guy. “What happened? Did they have a shoot-out?”

Isabelle stopped moving. Hands, eyes, legs, arms, feet, all came to a dead halt. “A shoot-out?” she said. “My gosh, maybe they did. Maybe that's why Guy lost so much blood.”

“He lost blood?” Now she had Herbie's full attention. “Maybe we oughta go down to the hospital and offer to give him blood. You know what your blood type is? Maybe it won't match Guy's. Maybe mine will.”

Herbie screwed up his face. “I never gave blood. I'm scared it might hurt. How much blood did Guy lose?”

“Hey, slow down, Herb,” Isabelle urged. “He's gonna be all right. He's at the doctor's now, but he'll be in school later on. You wanna fight at my house today?”

“I can't,” Herbie said. “Got too much to do. My assistant editor is coming over after school. We gotta make plans. He—”

“Your assistant editor!” Isabelle's voice rang out. People turned to stare. “Your assistant editor!” she screeched. “I thought
I
was your assistant editor! What goes on?”

Herbie looked embarrassed. “Well, Chauncey called up and said he would be my assistant editor on account of he voted me into the job in the first place. So I said okay. So Chauncey's my assistant editor.” Herbie looked at the floor, not willing to meet Isabelle's indignant gaze.

“Well, all right for you. That's the last time I offer to help you, Herbie. Fine pal you are. I said I'd be your right-hand man. All right for you, Herb.”

Chauncey came chugging up to Herbie. “Meet me outside right after the bell goes,” Chauncey directed, looking at his watch. “We have a tight schedule. I'm trying to line up a photographer. It's not gonna be easy, though. Remember”—again Chauncey checked his watch—“right after the bell rings. Outside.” Chauncey chugged away.

“Boy, you got your work cut out for you, Herb. I'll say that. I bet you'll wind up in the booby hatch with that guy on your side.”

“You're just jealous, Isabelle,” Herbie said with dignity. “You're jealous because you're not the assistant editor.”

“That's what you think!” Isabelle cried. “Next time you want somebody to fight with, try fighting with your assistant editor. That oughta be a barrel of laughs. Don't forget who your friends were before you were somebody. That's all I've got to say. Just don't forget who your friends were before you turned famous.”

“Isabelle, can you come—” Jane Malone said. And stopped talking.

“Can I come where?” Isabelle demanded.

Jane looked around. “Are you listening to me?” she asked.

“Sure,” said Isabelle.

“Well, my mother said I could ask a friend to come to stay at my house for dinner and the night on Saturday,” Jane said. “And I picked you. My father might take us to the movies and to McDonald's after. Can you?”

Isabelle was stunned. Never before had she been asked to Jane's house. “Can I!” she cried. “I would very much love to come to your house, Jane.”

“That's good.” Jane smiled. “Ask your mother when you go home today, all right? Then call me up and tell me.”

“Sure.” Isabelle punched Jane gently on the arm. “Sure,” she said again, smiling at Jane.

I didn't even know she liked me that much, Isabelle thought. Jane is my best friend.

The thought warmed her.

Chapter Twenty-two

“Tell me what happened right from the beginning,” Isabelle directed.

“Well, first, I went to Mrs. Stern's house and she wasn't home, so I hid in the bushes and watched when Philip delivered the paper and then—”

“I don't mean that beginning,” Isabelle said impatiently. “I mean when the hoodlums got you. Start there.”

So Guy told her about picking the violets and about the one saying “Hello, dere” to him and not letting go of him. About
MONSTER
and the other two. About the cigarette and the smell of burning and the tin can tied to the dog's tail.

“Then they said they were gonna tie me up while they planned how much money they wanted for the dog,” Guy said. “And I thought about you and what you'd do, and so I started swinging the big stick, which was the only weapon I could find, and then they knocked me out.”

“Why didn't you wait for me?” Isabelle wailed. “Oh, why didn't you!” She had missed the biggest excitement she might ever know.

“I did,” Guy said simply. “You said you were real busy when I asked you if you'd thought of anything. But I waited anyway. When you didn't come, I decided to go to Mrs. Stern's by myself. To ask her about the paint.”

He was right. She had said that.

“Guy,” she said. “You know what?”

“No. What?”

“You did it yourself,” she said. “You kept asking and asking if I'd think of a way to make them stop teasing you, calling you all those names and everything. And you did it all by yourself. Don't you see?”

A smile broke across Guy's face slowly. “You're right,” he said. “I did.”

“Excellent. Excellent,” Isabelle told him, holding up the index finger on each hand and jitterbugging around him in a complete circle.

“Hi, Guy. You wanna come over my house after school? My cat had two more kittens. You can come see 'em if you want.”

“Hello, Bernie. She did! Neat-o. Sure, I'll come.”

“What's that on the back of your head?” Bernie asked. “You cut yourself?”

Guy looked at Isabelle. “I was in an accident,” he said.

“That's my friend Bernie,” Guy said. “He's in my class. His cat had kittens while he was eating a piece of toast in the kitchen.”

“Jane Malone asked me to come stay overnight Saturday. We're going to the movies and to McDonald's after,” Isabelle said.

“What're you gonna have at McDonald's?” Guy asked.

“I don't know.”

“I always plan what I'm gonna have ahead of time,” Guy confided. “If I don't, I get too confused when the girl asks me and I always pick something I don't like. So I write down what I want on a little piece of paper, and that way I know exactly what I'm gonna get.”

“That's not a bad idea,” Isabelle said.

“They said I could keep the dog,” Guy told Isabelle. “He doesn't have a license or anything. They said if nobody owned it, I could keep it.”

“Terrific. What're you gonna call it?” Isabelle said.

“Jake,” said Guy, looking at her, eyes glistening. ‘I'm calling it Jake.”

“What if it's a girl?”

“If it's a girl,” Guy said slowly, “I'm calling it Isabelle. I already decided.”

“Isabelle?”

“Sure. It even sort of looks like you,” Guy said.

“Cool,” said Isabelle, without enthusiasm.

“Sure. It's got brown eyes and brown hair, like you.”

“Yeah, but you hafta think about when it's out at night and you're trying to get it to come in. So you're out there, calling, ‘Here, Isabelle! Come on in, Isabelle!' I don't think that sounds too hot.” She'd been told she looked like lots of things, but never, not even by Philip, had she been told she looked like a dog.

“Besides, if you call it Isabelle,” Isabelle said, trying to talk Guy out of it, “it'd sound silly. ‘Here, Isabelle'”—she imitated Guy calling his dog—“‘Good boy, Isabelle! Supper's ready! Come inside, Isabelle, before your tootsies get all wet.'

“How would that sound?” Isabelle asked indignantly.

“So? I don't think there's anything bad about that,” Guy said.

“What's bad is, you would sound exactly like my mother. That's what's bad.”

“So what if I sound like your mother.” There was something he'd forgotten, something important he'd left out.

“I know!” Guy remembered what it was. “You know how I got home? After they bonked me on the head?”

“No. How'd you get home?”

“In a police car,” Guy said, in hushed tones.

Isabelle narrowed her eyes at him and scratched herself, knowing what was coming, pretending she didn't care.

“With the lights flashing?” she said, leaning down to pull up her socks so he couldn't see her face.

“Yup.”

“How about the siren?” she asked, inspecting a hole in the toe of her Adidas.

Guy only nodded.

“I can't stand it,” Isabelle said, clapping a hand to her head. “I cannot stand it!”

“I know.” Guy couldn't help grinning. “And you know something else?”

She shook her head.

“I'm gonna be on the six o'clock news. Tonight.”

Mary Eliza Shook came hurtling by at that moment.

“How's your little brudder?” she said sarcastically. Mary Eliza was always the last to get the word.

“Watch the six o'clock news tonight and find out,” Isabelle said.

No actress ever had a better exit line. Mary Eliza stood there gawking at them.

“The six o'clock news?” she finally squeaked.

“Yeah, you can't miss it,” Isabelle said, smiling sweetly. “It comes on at six o'clock.” There were so many good things about Guy's adventure and its aftermath that Isabelle couldn't pick her favorite. But certainly one of her favorites was telling Philip about Guy being on the six o'clock news.

“You're putting me on,” he said scornfully when she told him. “Not that little squirt. I don't believe you.”

She shrugged, knowing that for once she had the upper hand. “Okay, don't,” she said. “See if I care.”

And, although the rule was no television on school nights, Isabelle's mother made an exception.

At two minutes to six, the family gathered in front of the TV set. “It's Channel Eight,” Isabelle said. Philip just looked at her. He was the official dial twirler.

“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Channel Eight here.” The anchorman had a silly face, Isabelle thought. He laughed too much, too. The first story was about a suspicious fire set in a downtown hotel. The second story was about a group of concerned citizens picketing a proposed motel in the next town.

“If he's gonna be on, why don't they put him on?” Philip groused.

“If you don't wanta watch, don't.” Isabelle sat on the floor and waited.

“Now for the last story, last but certainly not least,” the anchorman said. “An eight-year-old boy became a hero yesterday when he stood off the attacks of three hoodlums who captured him and held him hostage against the release of a stray dog the hoodlums offered to sell to the boy for a thousand dollars.”

The camera zoomed in and Guy stood there in his own front yard. He didn't smile but looked straight at the camera.

“Guy Gibbs,” the person holding the microphone said, “how did you have the courage to do what you did?” The microphone waited for Guy to speak.

He opened his mouth, then closed it.

“The kid's lost his voice,” Philip said.

Isabelle clutched herself around the middle with both arms, rocking back and forth, willing Guy to speak.

He cleared his throat as the camera ground away.

“It was Isabelle,” he said, in a loud, clear voice. “My friend Isabelle.”

“Isabelle?” the interviewer asked animatedly.

“She's my friend and she learned me, I mean, taught me how to stand up to things. So when they came at me, I tried to figure what Isabelle would do. And I did it.” Guy's mouth clamped shut.

Isabelle's mother laid a hand on her arm, gently. Philip said, “Sheesh!” but that was all.

The camera zoomed in on a shot of Guy holding his dog.

“Just thirty seconds left now,” the anchorman said jovially. “Tell us what your dog's name is, Guy Gibbs.”

“Isabelle,” said Guy. “I was going to call it Jake, but we found out he was a girl. So I'm calling it Isabelle.”

A commercial about breakfast cereal came on. In Isabelle's living room there was silence.

“Well, that certainly is quite a testimonial,” Isabelle's mother said at last, in a little choked-up voice.

“Not too many guys I know have a sister who gets a dog named after her,” Philip said. The telephone rang. Isabelle ran to answer it. It was Aunt Maude.

“The strangest thing just happened,” Aunt Maude said. “I was watching the six o'clock news and a little boy who looked familiar was on. He was getting some sort of award, don't you know, and he said his dog was named Isabelle. Was that the little boy who comes over every Sunday to fight or was that the little boy who said I looked like his uncle? It was one or the other. The strangest coincidence, isn't it? There he was on the television. He looked a little peaked, too. I really think his mother should've kept him in bed.”