by Betsy Haynes
My mind kept jumping back to Taffy. Why couldn't she be the thief? She was so horrible and snotty that she deserved to get in trouble, and I had dreamed of getting even with her practically forever. Mona Vaughn would never blackmail anyone. She was nice. She couldn't help it that she wasn't pretty and couldn't afford to wear nice clothes.
It made me furious to think that Taffy Sinclair was the reason Mona stole the money out of Wiggins's wallet and the dollar bills out of the lunch money box. Or as Katie would say, Taffy was her motive. She was trying to look nice so that Taffy would pay attention to her. Poor Mona! She was miserable enough. What would she do if I got her in trouble? On the other hand, I was the only one who knew about Mona. I could go ahead and frame Taffy Sinclair and nobody would ever know the difference.
Mom hadn't said any more about my father since her talk the day before. She's pretty good about not driving a subject into the ground. Usually. But the closer it got to Saturday night and her date with Pink, the more nervous I got about what he would say when he came to pick her up. I couldn't help wondering what he was thinking. Was he jealous of my father? Was that why Pink was looking for a different place for him to stay?
When the doorbell rang at a quarter to six, I raced to open the door. There was Pink, tall and blond, with his usual grin spread across his face. If he was worried about my father, it didn't show.
"Hi, Jana," he said, pushing a pizza box toward me. "Here's your bribe for letting me take your gorgeous mother bowling tonight."
Pink is an absolute bowling nut, and they go bowling almost every Saturday night. I took the pizza, sniffed the delicious aroma, and said thanks. It would be deep-dish pepperoni, green pepper and mushroom. That was my favorite, and he brought me one practically every time they went out.
I took my pizza to the kitchen and dug right in while it was still hot. I was so absorbed in eating that I forgot all about what Pink thought about my father until I heard him say three words: "Alcoholism treatment center."
I put down my pizza slice and listened. "I've called every one in the area," he was saying to my mother. "They're all booked up for at least a month, and a couple of them have long waiting lists."
Then Mom said something about talking about it on the way to the bowling alley, called good-bye to me, and they left. I sat there staring at the door and thinking about what Pink had said. He had been trying to get my father into an alcoholism treatment center. That was like a hospital. I had seen them advertised on TV. I wanted to think that Pink was trying to get rid of him, but down deep I knew that he was really trying to help. Still, he had said that they were all full. I couldn't help being glad. There would be plenty of time for my father to go to the hospital if he had to after we were a real family again.
My pizza was getting cold, so I started eating it and thinking about the predicament I was in. Why did everything have to happen at once? My father coming. Taffy blackmailing me. And now, finding out that Mona Vaughn was the real thief. I couldn't tell on Mona. I just couldn't. If only there were more time. Then maybe she would confess, or quit stealing, or at the very worst, someone else would find out and tell on her. Then I wouldn't have to. But there wasn't more time. My life was going to end on Monday when the police came to Mark Twain Elementary and later, at six o'clock in the evening, when my father's bus pulled into Bridgeport.
When Monday morning finally came, I checked for the hundredth time to be sure the fake note was in my knapsack. There was only one thing I could do, and I would do it all by myself so that if it backfired no one would get in trouble except me.
I got to school earlier than usual. There were a few kids from the lower grades milling around the front door, but nobody from my class was anywhere in sight. I had planned it that way. I tugged on the front door. It was open. I pulled it some more, stuck my head through the opening, and looked in. The coast was clear. My scalp was tingling with excitement. All I had to do was go inside, plant that note beside Wiggins's desk, and I was home free.
"Hi, Jana. What are you doing here so early?"
I jumped so hard that I nearly caught my neck in the door. It was Curtis Trowbridge, and he had come up behind me.
"I just felt like coming to school early," I lied. I certainly couldn't tell him the truth, and I couldn't think of anything else to say. "What about you?"
The grin that had been on Curtis's face changed to an expression of concern. "I'm still working on the case," he said. "And there are a couple of kids I couldn't reach on the phone. Joel Murphy's house didn't answer all weekend, and I got a recorded message saying that Mona Vaughn's phone had been disconnected. I thought maybe I could talk to them before the bell. I hope one of them can give me some clues. Nobody else knows anything."
"I hope so, too, Curtis. See you around." I ducked into the building and away from Curtis as fast as I could. I knew why Mona Vaughn's phone had been disconnected. Her family couldn't afford it, which meant she could never afford to buy that sweater, either—unless she stole the money. If I ever had any doubts that she was the thief, they were all gone now. Not only that, but she might tell Curtis about seeing me in the hall. I only had one chance to get out of this mess. I had to sneak into the classroom and plant that note.
I tiptoed up the hall and stopped in front of the door. The room was dark, which meant that Wiggins wasn't there yet. My hands were shaking as I pulled that note out of my knapsack and folded it up. Then I pitched it underhand and smiled as it landed right beside Wiggins's desk. So what if Taffy Sinclair wasn't the real thief? It was still the right thing to do.
I sneaked back outside, confident that nobody had seen me go inside the building. More kids had arrived on the school ground, but it was such a beautiful morning that everyone was staying outside.
"Hey, Jana."
It was Christie. She and Beth and Melanie were just coming onto the playground. I waved and hurried toward them. Just then Katie came up. All my friends were there and I was bursting to let them in on my secret.
"Come over by the fence," I said. "Have I got something to tell you!"
I explained about seeing Mona buying the sweater and realizing that she had a motive, but that she was too nice to rat on. "I decided to frame Taffy anyway," I said confidently. "She deserves it. I just planted the note beside Wiggins's desk."
Everybody just stared at me for a moment, and then they started giggling. "Morgan, I'm proud of you!" shouted Beth, slapping me on the back.
"I think you're doing the right thing," said Melanie. "Taffy Sinclair treats Mona badly, too. Sometimes she's friendly to her and lets her follow her around, and sometimes she just acts snotty and snubs her."
"Yeah," said Christie. "You're really doing Mona a favor."
Katie didn't say anything. I could tell she was thinking it over.
"Would you rather that I got in trouble instead?" I demanded.
"Of course not, " said Katie. "It's just that it would be better if Taffy really were the thief."
Leave it to Katie to put a damper on things. I wasn't feeling nearly so confident about what I had done when the bell rang. I forgot about my doubts when I got to my locker, though. There was Mona Vaughn at her locker across the hall from mine. She was taking off a corduroy jacket that was so old and worn out that the elbows were shiny. Underneath it was the beautiful blue sweater with the pearl design on the front.
She hung up her jacket and then she started rearranging the books and papers and things in her locker. I knew what she was doing. She was killing time. She was waiting for Taffy Sinclair to come by so that she could show off her new sweater. I would be willing to bet on it. Poor Mona.
I started rearranging things in my locker, too. I had to be sure. I didn't have long to wait. A couple of minutes later Taffy Sinclair came prancing up the hall on her way to the classroom.
"Hi, Taffy," Mona called out. Then she turned and sort of puffed out her chest so that Taffy couldn't help but see her new sweater.
Taffy gave her a bored look and did
n't even slow down. "Hi, Mona," she said barely above a whisper. Then she went sailing on by.
I thought I could see tears in Mona's eyes. That Taffy Sinclair was the worst fink in the world.
"Hi, Mona," I called as cheerfully as I could. "I thought the math homework was hard this time. Did you have trouble with problem seven?" I don't know why I said that. The math homework was easy, and I didn't even remember what problem seven was. The truth was, I wanted to say something to Mona. Anything to make her forget about Taffy Sinclair.
Mona gave me a surprised look. Then she smiled shyly and said, "I didn't have much trouble with the homework. You can look at my problem seven if you want to."
I said thanks and walked with her to the room. Mona looked around proudly when we walked in together. I knew she wanted everybody to see that she had a friend. My heart was just about breaking for her. The Fabulous Five would have to be nicer to her from now on.
Wiggins was already seated at her desk, shuffling through some papers. I ducked into my own seat. This was it. The big day. I glanced toward the spot where I had put the fake note. It was gone! Wiggins had found it. Taffy Sinclair's doom was sealed at last. She would never blackmail anyone again. My friends had noticed it, too, and Beth turned around and gave me a thumbs-up victory sign.
Now all I had to do was wait for Wiggins to announce that the thief had been caught. Or for Mrs. Winchell to come into the room with the police. I was so excited I couldn't sit still.
Wiggins made all the announcements and collected the lunch money without saying a thing. I couldn't believe it. Could somebody else have found the note? I thought about that for a while. Wiggins was always the first one in the room in the morning. And I had left it right beside her desk where she couldn't miss it.
That was the longest morning of my life. Wiggins conducted class as if nothing had happened. We went through a boring social studies lesson and forty-two spelling words before recess. I kept waiting for her to say something, but she didn't.
Then the recess bell rang. Wiggins held up her hand and got slowly to her feet. "I'd like to see Taffy Sinclair in the room during recess," she said calmly.
This was it! Wiggins had found the note, after all. Taffy's eyes were wide and she had a puzzled look on her face. I stuck my nose in the air when I walked past her. I had done it. I had gotten my revenge on Taffy Sinclair. It was the most wonderful moment of my life.
I felt just about nine feet tall as I went out for recess. I couldn't even feel the ground beneath my feet. I would never have to worry about what anyone thought of me again. I could look Randy straight in the eye. I wasn't guilty of anything bad, and what was more, no one could convince him that I was.
I thought about my father, too, and I breathed a huge sigh of relief. Now he could be proud of me, and if he and Mom decided to get married again, I'd be the best daughter anyone could ever be.
When I got to the playground my friends were all clustering around me. "You did it!" shouted Christie. We started jumping up and down and laughing.
Suddenly I stopped. "I wonder what Wiggins is doing to Taffy Sinclair right now?" I couldn't forget about her for even one second.
"Probably giving her a lecture about stealing," said Christie.
"And Taffy is crying and sobbing and carrying on," Melanie said gleefully.
"And Wiggins is holding the fake note under her nose and ordering her to confess that she's the thief!" I cried.
"What fake note?"
My friends and I all froze on the spot. In our excitement we hadn't noticed Mona Vaughn standing close by. She must have thought that I was her new friend and had followed me out of the room. Now she was standing about three feet from us, and she was looking at us as if she couldn't believe what she had just heard.
"I SAID, what fake note?" she demanded. "I heard you. You said something about a fake note and about Wiggins ordering Taffy to confess that she's the thief. What have you done to Taffy? How could you be so cruel?"
"You . . . you must have misunderstood." I fumbled for words. "I didn't say FAKE note. I just said note. I saw it on Wiggins's desk as I came out for recess. I read it. It was from Taffy and it said she was the thief." I knew I was talking too fast, but I couldn't slow down. The words were tumbling out before I could stop them. I couldn't let Mona know what had really happened. She wouldn't understand—even though I had partly done it for her.
"What do you care?" snapped Beth. "She treats you awful most of the time. Do you think we can't see that? Everybody notices. Taffy treats you like dirt."
Tears were streaming down Mona's face. "How can you say that? She isn't perfect, but Taffy is my friend," she insisted. Then she turned and looked at me with poison-dart eves. "How could you do such a thing, Jana Morgan, when Taffy was trying to be your friend, too?" Her words hit me like a bucket of cold water. I wanted to scream at her and say that if Taffy wanted to be my friend she certainly had a funny way of showing it. But I didn't. I couldn't help remembering all the times I had thought that Taffy Sinclair didn't know the first thing about making friends. Still, I couldn't stand to think that she really wanted to be friends with me.
Mona wiped the tears off her face with the back of her hand as she turned and started to walk away. After a few steps she stopped and looked at me again. "Just because you hate Taffy Sinclair, that doesn't make what you did right. I'm the one who took the money from Wiggins's wallet and from the lunch money box. I have to tell Wiggins the truth now. I can't let Taffy take the blame for something she didn't do."
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
My friends and I watched Mona head toward the school, scuffing up little clouds of dust with every step. As hard as I tried to shut them out, her angry words kept ringing in my ears. JUST BECAUSE YOU HATE TAFFY SINCLAIR, THAT DOESN'T MAKE WHAT YOU DID RIGHT.
Part of me wanted to shout after Mona and tell her that she was wrong. Taffy Sinclair deserved to be framed. She had been blackmailing me, hadn't she? And she was snotty and stuck-up, and she wanted to take Randy Kirwan away from me. Still, another part of me knew that what Mona said really was true. My framing Taffy was no more right than her blackmailing me. In fact, it made me just as mean and spiteful as she was. I remembered all the times I had heard people say that two wrongs don't make a right, but I had never totally understood what that meant until now.
"She's really mad," said Christie.
"I guess framing Taffy Sinclair wasn't such a good idea after all," I admitted.
My friends all nodded. I could see by the guilty expressions on their faces that they had been thinking the same thing I had.
For the millionth time in my life, I tried to figure out Taffy Sinclair. Was Mona right about her, too? Did Taffy really want to be friends? She certainly wanted people to think that we were. I thought about how she made me sit with her in the cafeteria and how she paraded me around on the playground at noon. There were plenty of other things that she could have blackmailed me into doing that wouldn't have made it look as if we were friends. It didn't make sense. Why couldn't she see that she already had a super friend in Mona?
When the bell rang and my friends and I were walking back toward the door, a terrible thought occurred to me that made me forget all about my guilty conscience and trying to figure Taffy out. "What if Mona tells Wiggins that we wrote that fake note?" I cried.
"Mona may not tell Wiggins, but she'll certainly tell Taffy. And you can bet that Taffy will tell," said Katie. "She'd die before she'd let Wiggins think she did anything wrong."
Melanie gasped. "Oh, my gosh! Then we'll be in more trouble than Taffy."
"Take it easy, Edwards," said Beth. "We'll think of something."
But we didn't because there wasn't time. We had to go back into class. I felt like a zombie as I marched to my seat. Wiggins was sitting at her desk thumbing through the reading book as if nothing had happened. I wasn't fooled. Mona's eyes were red from crying, and I didn't dare look at Taffy Sinclair. I didn't look at Randy, either, even though I knew he
was watching me. I had thought my troubles with him would be over once I fixed things so that Taffy couldn't blackmail me anymore. I was wrong. I had not only made things worse by framing Taffy, but now I was going to get caught. The way things were going, I might never be able to look Randy in the eye again.
All morning long, I waited for Wiggins to call my friends and me up to her desk, but she didn't. I knew she wouldn't make any announcements about the thief confessing. She wouldn't want anyone to figure out that it was Mona. Wiggins was nice about things like that. But she would never let anyone get away with something so horrible as framing another person. It was just a matter of time until she got us.
I kept remembering that it was just one week ago today that my troubles had started. That was the day I found Wiggins's wallet in the girls' bathroom. If only I had just turned it in when I found it. Then none of this would have ever happened.
A couple of times I thought I caught Wiggins looking at me. Was she thinking about what a horrible person I was? Maybe she was trying to figure out how to punish my friends and me so that we would never do something so terrible again.
I held my breath when the lunch bell rang. Still Wiggins didn't call us to her desk.
"What's she waiting for?" I cried as my friends and I headed into the cafeteria.
"Maybe she just wants to watch us squirm," offered Christie as she picked up a carton of milk.
"Or maybe she's going to call our parents to come in for a conference after school and talk to us then," said Katie.
"Oh, no!" said Melanie. "I'll die if my parents find out about this."
Suddenly I stopped dead in my tracks. "Look who's waiting for us at our table," I whispered. I couldn't believe my eyes. It was Mona Vaughn and Taffy Sinclair.
Mona's eyes weren't red anymore and she was looking adoringly at Taffy, but Taffy wasn't paying the least bit of attention to her. She was looking at me and smiling her nasty smile.
