Tree Musketeers

by Norma Charles

  I nod. It was fun with all my friends.

  “Anyway, next time, please phone if you’re going to be late. Vancouver’s a big city, you know. We’re not in Sandberg any more.”

  “Don’t remind me. In Sandberg, everyone knows everyone. When you were working at Dr. Rosier’s office, it was only a block from home so I could check in after school every day.”

  “Oh, Jeanie. I’m sure we’ll both get used to living in the city.” Mom sighs and shuts the telephone book she’d been looking through. “Guess I’ll get supper started.”

  “That sure is a thick phone book.” I pour myself more tea from Mom’s pot. “Were you trying to phone someone?”

  “I found the phone book in a drawer in the living room bureau. It’s pretty old, but it’s got a good Yellow Pages section. I was checking doctors and dentists to see if anyone needs a new receptionist. But nothing yet. Maybe I’ll have better luck tomorrow.”

  “If we’d stayed in Sandberg, you could still be working for Dr. Rosier.”

  “But you know how your father’s always dreamed of having his own construction company. And his brother offering to take him on as a partner is his chance to do exactly that. There just isn’t enough work for a self-employed carpenter around Sandberg any more.”

  “Any chance Uncle Berny will be dropping by tonight?”

  “I don’t think so. Did you want to see him about something special?”

  I shrug. “Maybe I can talk to Dad instead.”

  * * *

  That night, while we’re eating a supper of cheeseburgers and tomato soup, I ask Dad if he knows anything about the house next door to the school.

  “Small white house with green trim?” he asks, cleaning his glasses on his napkin.

  “Used to be. They knocked it down today.”

  “Good. That means we can get started building the new house soon. It’s the first big construction project for your Uncle Berny and me. It’s going to be a big family house, four bedrooms and four bathrooms, plus a media room and a two-car garage.”

  It’s all because of my dad’s new job with my Uncle Berny’s construction company that we had to move to Vancouver when we really belong on the Prairies. All our friends are there, and most of my cousins and aunts and uncles. We had a large comfortable house in Sandberg with a yard for Mom’s flower garden, and I had a spacious bedroom with a pullout couch for sleepovers with my friends. But we can’t ever move back because my parents had to sell the house.

  “You know that big tree that hangs over into the school grounds?” I ask my dad.

  “The evergreen? Yes. I’ve noticed it.”

  “The kids at school are really worried it’ll get chopped down. Everyone just loves that tree.”

  Dad shrugs. “Don’t know what I can do about it.”

  “The man who was driving the excavator said that it was coming down. But you can’t chop it down, Dad. You just can’t. It’s way too big and beautiful. The kids all love that tree. Could you talk to Uncle Berny about it?”

  “I could try to talk to him. But if the tree’s in the way of our new construction, it’ll have to come down.”

  My stomach takes a dive. All the kids at school are so going to hate me. Especially Isabelle. I stare at my soup.

  “What’s the matter, sweetie?” Mom pats my arm. “Not hungry?”

  “Guess not,” I mumble. “Awfully tired. Maybe I’ll just go and read for a while.”

  I push past the heavy furniture in the murky basement to my bedroom. It’s so small I have to shuffle sideways to get between the dresser and the bed. The only thing that’s really mine in here is a green frog-shaped cushion Gran made me for my tenth birthday last March. When I hug it, it still smells like my old bedroom in Sandberg, like sweet hay and sage. Way nicer than the damp musty smell of this basement suite.

  I glare at the ugly brown bedspread before pulling it over my head.

  Chapter 6

  THE NEXT MORNING, I wait for Isabelle under the big old evergreen. She comes soon.

  “So what happened?” she asks. “Did you talk to your uncle about the tree?”

  “No. He didn’t come over after all.”

  “But you said you would. You promised.”

  “I asked my dad to talk to him.”

  “He’d better. Or else.” Isabelle narrows her eyes and glares at me. Then she sprints off to the gym. I trail behind.

  So maybe she’s not going to be my friend after all.

  In the gym, Mr. Grady outlines the plot for the winter musical. An absent-minded Santa sets out for a jog early one foggy morning with his good friend, Ms. Biggy-Big-Ears. She’s sort of a cross between the Easter Bunny and Bigfoot with these gigantic ears. But Santa gets lost in an unusually thick fog and he ends up in a strange world called Mish-Mash Land.

  The Mish-Mash folks, who are mostly monsters of one sort or another, try desperately to help Santa find his way back to the North Pole before Christmas Eve so he can make his deliveries. He’s finally led back home by Ms. Biggy-Big-Ears, whose keen hearing detects the excited holiday preparations at the North Pole.

  Isabelle doesn’t look at me once during the whole practice. Man! She sure is mad. Just because I didn’t talk to my uncle about the tree.

  I try not to care that she’s ignoring me and stand beside Trudy on stage with the rest of the chorus, about twentyfive girls and boys. I’m nervous at first, but Trudy knows all the words and actions for the songs, so when we sing along with the main characters, I can follow her. It ends up being pretty easy. I remember Mrs. Fan’s instructions about opening your mouth wide and singing out to a spot at the back of the gym.

  At one point, I’m standing near the edge of the stage, singing out as loud as I can. Mr. Grady notices me and nods like he’s liking what he’s hearing.

  Then we do “Merry Monsters’ Hand Jive.” It has such a good beat, my feet start moving on their own. When we finish it, I’m grinning like mad.

  I whisper to Trudy, “Hey, this is fun.”

  She grins back. At least she’s not mad at me.

  The bell rings and ends our practice. It’s back to boring classes. Except for reading period. Mr. Grady is reading The Three Musketeers to us. He makes the story really exciting by acting out the parts using different voices. He’s so dramatic. You can tell his favourite character is the young man, d’Artagnan. He’s always getting into trouble trying to save maidens in distress, and the Three Musketeers have to keep rescuing him from being arrested. Then they all clash swords and shout, “All for one and one for all!”

  Just when Mr. Grady gets to a really exciting part where the guards are about to capture d’Artagnan and drag him away to prison, he shuts the book. “That’s it for today, folks. Time for math.”

  I groan along with the rest of the class. It’s way more fun to listen to Mr. Grady read than do boring old math.

  “Plenty to cover today, so let’s get down to it, everyone. Take out your math textbooks. Page 67. Review of mixed fractions.”

  Mixed fractions. I sigh and screw up my nose.

  He sees me and frowns. “You’ll find a math text in your desk, Jeanie,” he tells me.

  Everyone gawks at me, the new kid. My heart bounces. So many faces!

  I duck behind my desk and take a long time sorting through my textbooks. But I’m really trying to avoid the staring eyes. Eventually I peek out. By then, everyone’s lost interest.

  I pull out my books and write the questions from the math text into my exercise book. Mega boring!

  At my old school in Sandberg, we did most of our math at work stations with job cards and fun activities. We cut up pies for fractions and weighed stuff on scales. Math was fun there.

  Through the window next to my desk, I notice a truck pulling up at the property next door. Two men get out. One of them takes out a measuring tape and starts measuring. It’s my dad! I wonder if he’s had time to talk to Uncle Berny about the tree. Sure hope so.

  “Jeanie.” Mr. Grady
’s voice yanks me back. “Your answer to number 3, please?”

  “I . . . um . . . I didn’t get that far yet,” I mumble.

  His caterpillar eyebrows frown. “At this school, we pay attention.”

  “I got 13½,” Trudy says, coming to my rescue.

  “Correct, Trudy. Tony, number 4?”

  The teacher drones on and on.

  Finally the recess bell rings and he dismisses us with a flick of his hand and a “You may go now.”

  I grab my parka and sprint down the hall and outside, hoping Dad’s still there. I dash through the rain and duck under the big evergreen tree. But now, no one’s at the building site. Just piles of rain-soaked debris. I missed him. Rats. Now what?

  I scan the playground where kids are running around, chasing soccer balls in the rain. If I try talking to anyone, they’ll probably just stare at me and think tree killer. Then walk away.

  Well, I’m not a tree killer. I love trees. Especially big beautiful ones like this one.

  It’s dry here, under the tree’s thick branches. And it smells sweet. I lean against the shaggy trunk. It’s so huge it’d take at least three kids with their arms outstretched to go around it.

  There’s nothing even half this big back home in Saskatchewan. Even the tallest poplar trees they planted more than a hundred years ago in front of the cathedral aren’t this big.

  I walked past those poplars practically every day with my best friend, Josie Fournier. Everyone called us “Double J.” Like when we went skating behind the school, kids would yell, “Hey, hey, hey. Here comes Double J.”

  I wonder if Josie’s missing me as much as I’m missing her. Probably not. Bet she’s already got a new best friend.

  The tree’s bark feels almost warm against my shoulders. At least the tree doesn’t mind me standing beside it.

  A rope dangles from a low branch. I catch it and wrap my legs around the lumpy knot. I swing away from the tree’s shelter, out into the rain. Then back under the tree again. Back and forth. Back and forth.

  The tree’s sweet smell reminds me of my grandmother’s cedar chest at the farm. The chest where she keeps extra blankets for when I stay overnight. I hum an old French lullaby my gran used to sing when I was small. “Fais dodo, Colas, mon p’tit frère . . .”

  As I swing higher, I sort of forget where I am. I sing louder and louder, in time with the swing, until I’m singing full out. “Fais dodo . . .”

  “Hey! Who’s that howling?” Mojo yells from below.

  I shut my mouth up tight and think, Please go away.

  He doesn’t.

  The boy’s friend laughs. “New kid thinks she’s a fancy opera star.”

  Clasping their hands over their hearts and fluttering their eyelids, the two boys wail like a couple of coyotes. “O sole mio . . .”

  I leap off the rope and dash past them onto the wet playing field. A mucky ball bounces against my legs. A dozen feet pound toward me.

  “Hey, kid! Get off the field!” Someone yells. “Can’t you see we’re playing soccer here?”

  I’ve run into the middle of a game! My face flushes hot and prickly. I scuttle off the field, feeling two centimetres tall.

  The bell rings, ending recess.

  I slink back up to the classroom and into my desk, thinking, Loser, loser, loser.

  Chapter 7

  AFTER RECESS, WE HAVE a free reading period, while at the back of the classroom Mr. Grady rehearses raps from the musical with Mojo.

  I flip through my novel, A Great Dane Called Big Morgan, and glance out at the evergreen. It waves long fringed branches like a green-fingered giant. It seems be pleading. Begging me to save it from being destroyed and made into firewood or lumber. Or whatever they do when they chop down big trees.

  Are kids its last hope?

  Just before lunch, a white van with black letters on its side drives up. LECLARE BROTHERS CONSTRUCTION. Uncle Berny!

  I nudge Isabelle and whisper, “My uncle’s out there.”

  “Good. We’ll talk to him,” Isabelle hisses back. “Just hope he doesn’t take off before we can get to him.”

  “Stay there, Uncle Berny,” I mutter, staring at the van. “Please don’t leave.”

  But the lunch bell doesn’t ring. The classroom’s silent now. Even Mojo’s back at his desk, flipping through his novel.

  Should I ask to go to the washroom then sneak out to talk to Uncle Berny? Maybe not, since his van is in full view of the classroom windows and Mr. Grady would see me.

  Hurry and ring, bell! I pray. Hurry, hurry, hurry.

  Finally, my prayer is answered and the lunch bell rings. But before Mr. Grady dismisses the class, Isabelle and I slam our novels shut and start racing for the door. Isabelle trips over Mojo’s foot that’s somehow “accidentally” in the aisle.

  “Ooof!” she grunts as she crashes down to her knees.

  I trip over her, thumping my elbow on a desk. Tears sting my eyes.

  “Oops.” Mojo hides a grin behind his hand. “Sorry.”

  “Excuse me, girls. Isabelle and Jeanie.” Mr. Grady’s deep voice rises above everyone’s clatter. “If you don’t mind, wait until you’re dismissed. Go back and sit down, you two. The rest of you may leave.”

  While the other kids funnel out of the classroom with their lunch packs, we drag ourselves back to our seats. I hold my sore elbow and my cheeks burn with frustration. We have to get out there to catch my uncle before he leaves!

  Still grinning, Mojo waves at us as he scampers out the door with George. He can be so annoying. I want to stick out my tongue at him but don’t.

  “Now, girls.” Mr. Grady folds his arms and stares down at us over his glasses. “What’s the rush? You have a whole hour for lunch. Surely that’s long enough for anyone?”

  “Yes, Mr. G.” Isabelle ducks, her red hair hiding her face.

  Should I explain about my uncle? That we have to catch him before he leaves? No. That would delay us even more. I grit my teeth and nod. I just hope and hope with all my might that when we get outside, he’s still there.

  The teacher drones on. “Now, girls. This is a prime example of ‘haste makes waste.’”

  We both nod again like those bobblehead dolls they put on dashboards.

  “Now,” he says. “I want you to quietly, slowly, carefully, get your lunches and quietly, slowly, carefully, walk out of this classroom. Then quietly, slowly, carefully, walk down to the lunchroom. Is that clear?”

  “Yes, Mr. G.,” Isabelle says.

  “Yes, Mr. Grady,” I say.

  I follow Isabelle as we quietly, slowly, carefully get our lunches.

  We quietly, slowly, carefully walk to the classroom door.

  We quietly, slowly, carefully go out the door.

  Then we race down the hall, gallop down the steps, crash open the outside door, and shoot across the schoolyard . . .

  . . . Just as Uncle Berny’s van pulls away.

  “Uncle Berny!” I yell, waving my arms like a maniac. “Uncle Berny!”

  Isabelle is panting right behind me.

  Oh no! We’ve missed him. I wave harder.

  The van turns the corner. Then it screeches to a stop. It backs up and Uncle Berny opens the door. He’s as big and burly as ever, wearing dusty jeans and a plaid work shirt with a black padded vest.

  “Jeanie! I thought that was you.” A wide grin creases his face. “So how do you like living in the big city?”

  “Oh, Uncle Berny!” I skid to a stop. Isabelle crashes into my back.

  “Easy now.” My uncle catches me before I fall over. “So what’s happening, kiddo? I got a call from one of my men and he says there’s some kind of problem here . . .”

  “It’s the tree, Uncle!” I gasp, trying to catch my breath. “You can’t cut it down. You just can’t!”

  “The tree?” His brow wrinkles and he looks where I point.

  “You can’t let anything happen to our cedar tree!” Isabelle pipes up.

  “Why not
? What’s so special about it? It’s just a tree.”

  “There . . . there’s a nest up there,” she tells him. “A woodpecker’s nest!”

  I pull in a deep breath. “Besides, all the kids climb it. They built a tree fort. And they have a rope swing. It’s sort of like the main thing to play with around here. And . . . and it’s a beautiful old tree, Uncle Berny. You can’t just go and cut it down. Think about the environment!”

  “Well . . .” he says, scratching his head. “I guess I could talk to Mr. Johnston, who owns the property. The tree does belong to him, you know. It’s on his property, so it depends on what he wants to do. But if it’s in the way of his building, it’ll have to come down. That’s what the city bylaws allow. Not much we can do one way or another.”

  “But you’ll talk to the owner, Uncle? For sure?”

  “Sure. But no guarantees. See you later, kiddo.”

  As he drives away, Isabelle pulls my sleeve. “I don’t understand, Jeanie. What does your uncle mean?”

  “You heard him, didn’t you? He says it’s up to the owner.”

  “So they can really cut down our tree? Like, really?”

  “Guess so,” I mumble.

  “We’ve got to think of some way to stop them.” Isabelle pounds her fist into her hand. “We’ve got to make them want to keep that tree. And a woodpecker’s nest just won’t cut it.”

  “Look. It’s not my fault if they chop down that tree.”

  “Yeah, sure. But those darn developers are your uncle and your dad.”

  I kick at a rock. “Don’t worry. I’ll think of something.”

  “Hunh!” Isabelle says. “You better. Or else!”

  Chapter 8

  THAT NIGHT AT SUPPER, I can’t wait to ask Dad about the tree again.

  When I do, he shakes his head. “We talked about it and Berny said it all depends on the owner. If a tree’s on someone’s land, it’s his tree. If it’s in the way of the new house, it’ll have to come down. Nothing we can do about it.”

  “But . . . but it’s such a big beautiful old tree, Dad. Isabelle says it’s a cedar! And it’s been growing there for years and years. Centuries, even. I bet it was there even before the school was built.”