Sharra fluffed her hair and looked away.
“We’re all friends in this classroom,” said Mrs. Hopwell. “Now, I want you to apologize to Sharra, Jennifer. And I’ll see you after school.”
“Sorry, Sharra,” muttered Jennifer.
“Oh, that’s all right,” said Sharra sweetly.
Jennifer wanted to throw up.
Jennifer found Ellen waiting for her when she left the school building after receiving her lecture from Mrs. Hopwell.
“Traitor,” she hissed.
“I’m sorry!” cried Ellen. “I didn’t mean to get you in trouble. It’s just that I was so proud of you I had to tell someone!”
Jennifer wanted to stay mad, and she didn’t like the fact that Ellen’s explanation made her feel better.
“So you told Annette,” she said, trying to maintain her anger. “Annette told Maya. And Maya told Sharra. It’s an old story. Haven’t you figured it out yet?”
“I promise I’ll never let out a secret again. Ever!”
Jennifer could feel herself beginning to relent.
“Besides,” said Ellen, “if you hadn’t been trying to get Sharra in trouble, it never would have happened.”
“Me!” exclaimed Jennifer. “I wasn’t trying—”
A warning thump sounded from inside the box.
“Oh, forget it,” said Jennifer. “It wasn’t your fault, anyway.” She gave the shoe box a shake and listened with satisfaction to the squawk that came from inside. “Come on, let’s go home.”
The two girls walked in silence until they came to the Moncrieffe house, where they found Sharra sitting on the front porch. She was holding Ponko, stroking his long white fur.
“I hate that cat,” whispered Jennifer, when she noticed Ponko glaring at her.
Sharra put the cat down. “Hey, Murdley,” she said. “Where’d you learn that ventriloquism thing?”
“From a friend,” said Jennifer, barely slowing down.
“Wait a minute!” said Sharra, getting up from the porch. “I’m talking to you.” She walked toward Jennifer and Ellen. “Gimme the box. I want to take another look at that toad.”
“He’s sleeping,” said Jennifer nervously.
“So what? Beauty rest isn’t going to do a toad any good.”
THUMP.
“See?” said Sharra. “He’s awake. Let me see him.”
She grabbed for the box. Jennifer clung to it for a moment, but Sharra was tugging at it, and Jennifer was afraid it was going to break and spill Bufo onto the ground. “All right,” she said grudgingly. “Take a look. But be careful.”
“Oh, it’s only a toad,” said Sharra. “You can get another one anytime you want.” Lifting the lid, she looked inside. “Just what I thought,” she said triumphantly. “He looks just like you. A toad for a toad. You make a good pair.”
Before Jennifer could recover from the sting of Sharra’s words, Bufo leapt from the box and planted a great, warty kiss on Sharra’s lips.
“Yuck!” cried Sharra. Dropping the box, she began to rub at her mouth, gagging and spitting. At the same time the sky went dark. A great bang shook the air, followed by a flash of light and a puff of smoke.
Jennifer and Ellen began to cough. They waved their hands in front of their faces to clear away the smoke.
When the smoke cleared, it was Jennifer’s turn to scream.
Sharra Moncrieffe was gone.
On the spot where she had been standing crouched a small, bewildered-looking toad.
FIVE
Step into My Parlor
Jennifer blinked in horror. “Bufo!” she shouted. “What have you done?”
“Jennifer, what’s going on?” cried Ellen. “Where’s Sharra?”
“She’s right there,” said Bufo, waving his front leg toward the new toad. “Cute little thing, ain’t she?”
“That toad talked!” whispered Ellen, just before she fainted.
Jennifer couldn’t decide whether she should try to deal with Sharra and Ellen or just run as far and as fast as she could, with the vague hope of ending up someplace where she might never be found.
Before she could give the question much thought, Ponko decided to pounce. Fortunately for the toads, Jennifer spotted the cat and caught him just as he was about to launch himself. Frustrated, Ponko turned and hissed at her.
“Cool it, fuzz brain!” snapped Jennifer, slapping him on the nose.
Bufo, suddenly aware of what was happening, squawked and jumped back into his box, which still lay where Sharra had dropped it. “Take that thing away!” he commanded, trying to pull the lid into place.
“You cool it, too!” shouted Jennifer. “I’ve got enough to worry about with this cat . . .”
Before she could finish the sentence, Ponko squirmed out of her grasp and dropped to the ground, landing face to face with Sharra. His hunting stance made it clear this was to be a temporary situation: soon he and Sharra would be face to stomach.
Jennifer was terrified. It was one thing to turn an enemy into a toad. It was something completely different to have her eaten by her own cat!
Fortunately, Sharra knew how to deal with her pet. “Bad Ponko!” she scolded. “Bad cat! Go away!”
The effect on Ponko of hearing Sharra’s voice come out of something he was about to eat was remarkable. He hissed and fluffed his tail, then started to back away nervously. Jennifer would have sworn his eyes began to cross.
“Scat!” yelled Sharra.
Ponko yowled and took off like his tail was on fire.
For a moment no one said anything. The only sound was a soft groan from the unconscious Ellen, who was lying on the grass next to the sidewalk. Then Sharra began to scream.
“Murdley!” she screeched. “Look what you’ve done to me! Look what you’ve done!”
“Shhhh!” hissed Jennifer. “Someone will hear you!”
“I don’t care!” wailed Sharra. “Let them hear me!”
“Spunky little thing, ain’t she?” said Bufo approvingly. He was standing at the edge of his box, leaning over it like a neighbor at a back fence. “I think she looks better this way, don’t you?”
“You shut up!” said Jennifer savagely. “You, too,” she added, pointing to Sharra. “If you don’t, someone’s bound to come over to find out what’s wrong. Do you want anyone to see you like this?”
“No!” cried Sharra, her voice filled with panic. “No! No! No! I can’t let anyone see me this way!”
“Then be quiet and let me think.” Plopping down on the grass, Jennifer noticed Ellen. “Wake up!” she said, giving her a nudge.
Ellen groaned, opened her eyes, took one look at Sharra, and immediately passed out again.
“Great,” said Jennifer. Linking her hands around her knees to stop them from trembling, she tried to think. But her insides were churning so fast she felt like a human blender. The only thought that came to mind was, I wonder if they can put you in jail for turning a kid into a toad?
Sharra had begun to weep, which only made Jennifer feel worse. Much as she disliked Sharra, she didn’t want her to have to spend the rest of her life as a toad.
Six months, maybe. But not the rest of her life.
Then the obvious struck her, and she wondered why she hadn’t thought of it at once. “Bufo,” she said. “Turn her back.”
“I can’t.”
“What do you mean, you can’t? You did it, you fix it!”
“I didn’t know it was going to happen,” said the toad, without the slightest touch of remorse. “She was saying rotten things, so I thought I would gross her out. I never kissed a human before. I had no idea I possessed such a powerful pucker!”
“You’re a powerful fool,” hissed Sharra.
“Be quiet—both of you!” yelled Jennifer.
At the sound of her shout, a man crossing at the corner paused and glanced in their direction.
Great, thought Jennifer. Just what we need. An audience. Scooping Sharra into her hand, she whispe
red, “Come on, we have to get out of here. This place is too public.” But when she moved her hand toward the shoe box, Sharra jumped away, screaming, “Not in there! Not with him!”
“Oh, grow up,” said Bufo. “Give the girl a chance to spend some time with quality and what does she do? Snub it! Well, all right for you, missy.” He reached up and pulled the shoe box lid the rest of the way into place. “See if I care,” he said from inside.
“You’re gonna fry for this, Murdley,” hissed Sharra.
“Be quiet while I think, or I’ll go get Ponko.”
Sharra was quiet. Jennifer thought. “Okay, look,” she said at last, “we have to find someplace where we can discuss this in peace. I vote we head back to my place.”
“I second the motion,” shouted Bufo from inside the box.
“This is a dream,” said Sharra. “I know it’s a dream. It has to be a dream. Someone pinch me.”
Jennifer picked her up again instead. “You can ride in the pouch in my sweatshirt,” she said.
“Sure,” murmured Sharra. “Why not? After all, it’s only a dream. Let’s go.”
“First we have to wake up Ellen,” said Jennifer, bending to give her friend a shake.
As it turned out, waking Ellen wasn’t nearly as difficult as getting her to believe what had just happened. By the time she had managed to convince Ellen that the second toad really was Sharra Moncrieffe, Jennifer realized there was one more thing they had to try before heading for home.
“Come on,” she said, when they reached the corner of Oak and Beech. “We’re going this way.”
“What are you doing that for?” asked Ellen, as she followed Jennifer onto Beech. “This won’t take us home.”
“I don’t want to go home right away. I want to find the place where I bought Bufo.”
“Someone sold you that thing?” asked Ellen in surprise.
“I’m not a thing!” bellowed Bufo. “I’m a toad. A practically perfect toad, when you come right down to it.”
“If you were perfect, Sharra would still be a kid,” said Jennifer, giving the box a shake.
“Don’t do that!”
“Then behave,” said Jennifer. Turning back to Ellen, she added, “I got him from this old man who runs a magic shop. His name is Mr. Elives.”
“I’ve lived in Smokey Hollow all my life,” muttered Sharra from inside the pouch of Jennifer’s sweatshirt. “There is no magic shop in this town.”
“Maybe there didn’t used to be,” replied Jennifer. “But there is now.”
“Maybe, maybe not,” said Bufo.
Jennifer stopped and lifted the lid of the shoe box. “What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked.
Bufo shrugged his warty shoulders. “You don’t think that shop stays in one place, do you?”
“Of course it stays in one place,” said Jennifer, wishing that she really believed it.
Bufo sighed. “Look, you yourself said it’s a magic shop . . .”
“I meant that it sold magician’s supplies—you know, like it says on the window.”
“Well, it does. But it is a magic shop. It doesn’t stay in one place. It goes wherever the old man wants it to go.” He paused, then added, “Or maybe where he’s told to take it. I was never too clear on that part.”
“Are you serious?” whispered Jennifer.
“Of course I’m serious,” replied Bufo, using the president’s voice for emphasis. “I don’t mean you should stop looking. Just don’t be surprised if you don’t find it.”
“But what are we going to do? We can’t leave Sharra as a toad.”
“What’s wrong with being a toad? I’ve been one all my life, and it suits me just fine.”
Jennifer apologized, but Bufo refused to say anything else to her. She wondered if he were really mad or actually feeling guilty about turning Sharra into a toad. Maybe he had just run out of rude comments.
Despite Bufo’s warning, they spent two hours looking for Mr. Elives’ shop. As Jennifer tried to retrace her path for the fourth time, Sharra began to complain.
“Listen,” said Jennifer harshly. “If your all-girl goon squad hadn’t been chasing me, I never would have come this way. And if I hadn’t come this way, I wouldn’t have found the magic shop. Which means I wouldn’t have bought Bufo. Which means you would still be your own repulsive blond self, instead of just a ball of warts,”
“Hey!” said Bufo.
Sharra began to whimper, which made Jennifer feel guilty for having lost her temper. It also made her realize that with Sharra so easily squishable, she was going to have to keep herself under control. The thought of what might happen if she got really angry was too horrible to contemplate.
She set her mind back to finding the magic shop. If she could only find that pair of mountain ash trees, she felt the rest would be easy. But she had been in such a blind rush to escape Sharra’s gang that she couldn’t remember any other markers.
“Come on, Jennifer,” said Ellen. “We’re not going to find anything here. We’d better go to your house—or maybe over to Sharra’s.”
“Not my house!” shrieked Sharra. “I can’t let my parents see me like this.”
“Well, we’ve got to tell someone,” said Ellen reasonably.
“No! No one! This is enough.”
Jennifer was a little worried. She knew they ought to get some help—not that she really thought any of their parents would know what to do about a kid who had been turned into a toad. But it also seemed that Sharra ought to have some say in the whole situation.
It was at that moment that she found a spot that looked familiar. “I think we’re on the right track,” she whispered. “Come on!”
“Jennifer, I don’t like this,” said Ellen. “I’ve never seen this street before.”
“That’s a good sign,” said Jennifer. “I told you there was something weird about this place.”
“Weirder than I want to deal with,” said Ellen nervously.
But though they seemed to be on the right street, there was no sign of the magic shop. In fact, the only building they saw that wasn’t a private home was a small place with a sign that said Beauty Parlor hanging over the door.
“Let’s ask here,” said Jennifer, leading the way to the door. A small bell tinkled as she stepped into the parlor. The first thing Jennifer noticed about the place was that it was lined with mirrors. She tried to turn away from her reflection, but it seemed that no matter where she looked, she saw herself.
I can’t wait to get out of here, she thought.
The shop was deserted except for a woman sitting at a desk near the front. She was applying dark red polish to her long nails and appeared to be so intent on the task that she hadn’t noticed them entering. But when Jennifer cleared her throat, the woman looked up in such a slow, deliberate way that it seemed she had been aware of their presence all along.
Indeed, it was Jennifer who was surprised, for the woman was the most beautiful person she had ever seen. Her jet black hair, parted in the middle, fell about her shoulders in thick curls. Two thin black brows divided her high, pale forehead from a pair of almond-shaped eyes that seemed first green, then gold, depending on how the woman moved her head. Her smile left Jennifer sick with jealousy and wondering if this beauty parlor had any secrets that could work on her own dumpy face.
“Can I help you, girls?” asked the woman, in a voice that was like bells ringing and waves kissing the shore and children laughing.
Can you make me look like you? Jennifer wondered. Out loud she said, “Do you know if there’s a magic shop on this street? I thought I saw one around here the other day.”
“Are you sure it wasn’t this place?” asked the woman.
Jennifer wrinkled her brow. “What do you mean?”
The woman laughed, a wonderful laugh. “Is anything more magical than beauty?”
Probably not, thought Jennifer bitterly. But aloud she said, “No, it was a little shop where you could buy magic stuff. I want
to find it again.”
“Tell me a little more about it,” said the woman. Her voice was light, but it was forced lightness.
Jennifer shrugged, starting to feel uneasy. “It was a neat place,” she said, falling back on vagueness. “I liked it, sort of.”
“Did you buy anything there?” asked the woman.
This time not even the lightness of her tone could mask the hunger beneath her words. The green-gold eyes had changed again. Now they were gray, the color of cold steel.
Jennifer’s skin grew cold, too. She suddenly knew that she was in big trouble, though exactly what kind she couldn’t tell.
SIX
Skippy Gets Hoppy
“Jennifer, I think we should go,” said Ellen, plucking at her arm.
Jennifer agreed, but she wasn’t sure she could get her feet to move. They felt as if they had been embedded in cement. The woman’s eyes, shifting now to an icy blue, seemed to be burrowing into her soul. Smiling, a summer sun beneath the arctic ice of her glare, the woman said, “I asked if you bought anything.” Glancing significantly at the box, she raised one elegant eyebrow and added, “Anything . . . interesting?”
Jennifer knew she shouldn’t speak of Bufo—and not only because Mr. Elives had specifically forbidden it. Something deeper, instinctual, told her not to mention him to this woman. But the woman’s gaze was so compelling, the silk and steel of her voice so frightening and comforting all at once, that Jennifer could feel her control over her tongue beginning to loosen.
“I . . . I bought a toad,” she murmured, her face burning with shame at the weakness that let the words be pulled from her lips.
The woman’s eyes glowed with triumph, making her at once more beautiful and more frightening. “And where is that toad now?” she asked, the tip of her tongue gliding across the top of her lip in a way that made it clear she already knew the answer.
Suddenly Ellen grabbed Jennifer by the elbow and spun her around. “Run!” she cried.
Free of the woman’s gaze, it took no more than a heartbeat for Jennifer to recover her senses. Racing toward the door, she burst out of the beauty parlor and into the afternoon sunlight. From behind them she heard a chilling cry of rage and anger. But the moment the door swung shut, the cry was cut off, almost as if the door formed some barrier between the inside of the shop and the rest of the world.
Jennifer Murdley's Toad Page 4
