Henry and the Paper Route

by Beverly Cleary

  Beverly Cleary

  Henry and the Paper Route

  Illustrated by Tracy Dockray

  Contents

  1. Henry’s Bargain

  2. Henry and the Premiums

  3. Henry’s Advertisements

  4. The Paper Drive

  5. Henry’s New Neighbor

  6. Ramona Takes Over

  About the Author

  Other Books by Beverly Cleary

  Credits

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  1

  Henry’s Bargain

  One Friday afternoon Henry Huggins sat on the front steps of his white house on Klickitat Street, with his dog Ribsy at his feet. He was busy trying to pick the cover off an old golf ball to see what was inside. It was not very interesting work, but it was keeping him busy until he could think of something better to do. What he really wanted, he decided, was to do something different; but how he wanted that something to be different, he did not know.

  “Hi, Henry,” a girl’s voice called, as Henry picked away at the tough covering of the golf ball. It was Beatrice, or Beezus, as everyone called her. As usual, she was followed by her little sister Ramona, who was hopping and skipping along the sidewalk. When Ramona came to a tree, she stepped into its shadow and then jumped out suddenly.

  “Hi, Beezus,” Henry called hopefully. For a girl, Beezus was pretty good at thinking up interesting things to do. “What are you doing?” he asked, when the girls reached his house. He could see that Beezus had a ball of red yarn in her hands.

  “Going to the store for Mother,” answered Beezus, as her fingers worked at the yarn.

  “I mean what’s that in your hands?” Henry asked.

  “I’m knitting on a spool,” Beezus explained. “You take a spool and drive four nails in one end, and you take some yarn and a crochet hook—like this. See?” Deftly she lifted loops of yarn over the nails in the spool to show Henry what she was doing.

  “But what does it make?” Henry asked.

  “A long piece of knitting.” Beezus held up her work to show Henry a tail of knitted red yarn that came out of the hole in the center of the spool.

  “But what’s it good for?” Henry asked.

  “I don’t know,” admitted Beezus, her fingers and the crochet hook flying. “But it’s fun to do.”

  Ramona squeezed herself into the shadow of a telephone pole. Then she jumped out and looked quickly over her shoulder.

  “What does she keep doing that for?” Henry asked curiously, as he picked off a large piece of the golf ball cover. He was getting closer to the inside now.

  “She’s trying to get rid of her shadow,” Beezus explained. “I keep telling her she can’t, but she keeps trying, anyway. Mother read her that poem: ‘I have a little shadow that goes in and out with me, and what can be the use of him is more than I can see.’ She decided she didn’t want a shadow tagging around after her.” Beezus turned to her sister. “Come on, Ramona. Mother said not to dawdle.”

  “Oh, for Pete’s sake,” muttered Henry, as the girls left. Knitting a long red tail that wasn’t good for anything, and trying to get rid of a shadow—the dumb things girls did! They didn’t make sense. Then he looked at the battered golf ball in his hands and the thought came to him that what he was doing didn’t make much sense, either. In disgust he tossed the golf ball onto the lawn.

  Ribsy uncurled himself from the foot of the steps and got up to examine the golf ball. He picked it up in his teeth and trotted to the top of the driveway, where he dropped it and watched it roll down the slope to the sidewalk. Just before it rolled on into the street, he raced down and caught the ball in his mouth. Then he trotted back up the driveway and dropped the ball again.

  Henry watched Ribsy play with the golf ball, and he decided that this afternoon everyone—even his dog—was busy doing something that made no sense at all. What he wanted to do was something that made sense, something important. Something like…something…Well, he couldn’t think exactly what, but something important.

  “Hi there, Henry!” A folded newspaper landed with a thump on the grass in front of Henry.

  “Oh, hi, Scooter,” answered Henry, glad of an excuse to talk to someone, even if it was Scooter McCarthy.

  Scooter was in the seventh grade at Glenwood School, while Henry was only in the fifth. Naturally, Scooter felt pretty superior when Henry was around. Henry looked at Scooter sitting on his bicycle, with one foot against the curb and his canvas bag of Journals over his shoulders. He thought it must be fun to ride down the street tossing papers to the right and to the left, and getting paid for it.

  “Say, Henry,” said Scooter. “Mr. Capper—he’s in charge of all the Journal boys around here—he’s looking for somebody to take a route. You don’t happen to know anybody around here who would like to deliver papers, do you?”

  “Sure,” answered Henry eagerly. “Me.” Talk about opportunity knocking! It was practically pounding on his door. A paper route was important, and Henry knew that delivering the Journal was exactly what he wanted to do. It made sense.

  Scooter looked thoughtfully at Henry, who waited for him to scoff, the way he usually did at almost anything Henry said. But this time Scooter surprised Henry. He did not scoff. Instead, he said seriously, “No, I don’t believe you could do it.”

  Henry would have felt better if Scooter had said, “You deliver papers? Ha! Big joke,” or something like that. Then Henry would have known that Scooter was just talking. But to have Scooter say, “No, I don’t believe you could do it….” Well, Henry knew Scooter really meant it.

  “What’s wrong with me delivering papers?” Henry demanded. “I can throw just as good as you can.”

  “Well, for one thing, you’re not old enough,” Scooter explained. “You have to be eleven to have a paper route.”

  “I’m practically eleven,” said Henry. “I have a birthday in a couple of months. Less than that, really. I feel eleven, and if you can deliver papers, I guess I could, too.”

  “Yes, but you aren’t eleven,” Scooter pointed out, as he pulled another Journal out of his bag and pedaled on down the street.

  Henry watched Scooter toss a Journal, with an experienced flip of his wrist, onto the front steps of a house farther down the block. So Scooter really didn’t think he could handle a paper route. And he wasn’t just joking, either.

  Henry began to think. He’d show Scooter; that’s what he’d do. Maybe Scooter was older and did have a paper route, but he would catch up with him somehow. He’d go to Mr. Capper’s house on Knott Street—the house with the horse-chestnut trees in front, where the boys had chestnut fights every fall—and he would ask Mr. Capper for the paper route. He would act so grown-up and so businesslike that Mr. Capper wouldn’t think to ask his age, and even if he did, Henry could say he was practically eleven. After all, if Mr. Capper was asking around for a boy to deliver papers he must be pretty hard up for someone to work for him. Why, the job was as good as Henry’s already. And with a paper route and a birthday, he would be as good as caught up with Scooter.

  Then it occurred to Henry that Mr. Capper might have asked other paperboys besides Scooter if they knew someone who would like to deliver papers. It might be a good idea to go over to Mr. Capper’s house as fast as he could, before some other boy beat him to it. Henry ran into the house and washed his hands as far up as the wrists. He ran a comb through his hair and pulled on his jacket, which he snatched off his bedpost. He was glad his mother was out shopping, so he did not have to stop and persuade her to let him have a paper route. He could do that after the route was his.

  After removing the unbusinesslike raccoon tail from the handlebars, Henry wheeled his
bicycle out of the garage and was coasting down the driveway when Ribsy suddenly appeared and started to follow him.

  “Go home!” Henry ordered.

  Ribsy sat down on the sidewalk. He thumped his tail on the cement and looked hopefully at Henry.

  “Good dog,” said Henry, and started to pedal down Klickitat Street. Ribsy galloped after him.

  Hearing Ribsy’s license tag jingle, Henry looked over his shoulder. “I told you to go home,” he said.

  Ribsy looked hurt. He was used to following Henry wherever he went, and he could not understand why he could not go this time. Henry sighed. “I’m sorry, fellow,” he said, and pedaled back to his house. There he got off his bicycle and led Ribsy, by his collar, up the front steps. “I’d like to take you with me, but this is important. I can’t have a dog tagging along when I ask for a job.” He shoved Ribsy through the front door and hurried down the steps. He did not look back, because he knew that Ribsy, his paws on the windowsill, would be watching him.

  Henry zipped up his jacket so it would look neater, and ran his hand over his hair to make sure it was combed. A boy had to look his best when he asked for a job, even though he was practically sure the job was his—if he got there in time.

  Henry practiced being grown-up as he pedaled toward Mr. Capper’s house. He steered his bicycle with one hand and jingled the nickels and dimes in his pocket with the other hand. He sat up very straight to make himself look taller. He tried to think what to say to Mr. Capper.

  “How do you do?” he said politely to a telephone pole. “I’m Henry Huggins. I heard you were looking for a paperboy.” No, that wasn’t quite right. He got off his bicycle to address a mailbox. “Good afternoon,” he said. “My name is Henry Huggins. I understand you are looking for a boy to deliver papers.” That was better.

  Then Henry spoke to an imaginary bunch of boys. “Sorry,” he said, in a brief and businesslike way. “Can’t play ball with you now. I have to start my route.” Yes, that was what he would be saying after his visit to Mr. Capper. “My route,” he said to himself again, and just speaking the words made him feel good.

  As he rode through the business district, Henry glanced at his reflection in the windows of the Rose City Barber Shop and the Payless Drug Store and was pleased with what he saw. Businesslike—that was Henry Huggins. Why, he probably wouldn’t even have to tell Mr. Capper why he was calling. Mr. Capper would look at him, and right away he would see that here was a boy who could handle a paper route.

  “Young man, do you want a job?” he would ask Henry, as soon as he opened the door. Maybe Mr. Capper would be so busy talking him into taking the paper route that all Henry needed to say would be, “Yes, sir, I’ll be glad to take the job.” Already he could see himself pedaling down the street, throwing papers to the right and to the left with a perfect aim. He would never have to get off his bicycle and poke around in someone’s shrubbery for a paper that had missed the porch. Not Henry Huggins.

  And the things he could buy with the money he earned! Stamps for his collection. A flashlight. Two flashlights—one for his bicycle and one to keep in his room. He could even buy a real sleeping bag that he had admired in the sporting goods store. Then he could ask his friend Robert to come over and spend the night, and sleep out in the backyard. It would be lots more fun to sleep in a real sleeping bag with a zipper, instead of some old blankets his mother pinned together with safety pins.

  Just then Henry came to the rummage sale in the vacant lot. Now a rummage sale was something Henry knew all about, because his mother had helped with such a sale only last year. A lot of ladies who belonged to a club gathered up all the old junk they could find in their closets and basements and attics and garages, and had a couple of men with trucks haul it all to a vacant lot, where they spread it all out on boards set on sawhorses. They sold the junk—or rummage, as they called it—for very low prices, and used the money to buy a television set which they gave to a hospital.

  Since Henry liked old junk, he had enjoyed his mother’s part in the rummage sale and had been sorry to see the old dishes and lampshades and baby buggies hauled away to be sold. He had been especially sorry to see a pair of old laundry tubs taken away, because he was sure they would come in handy someday for something—he didn’t quite know what. But his mother had said firmly that he could not keep old laundry tubs in his room or in the garage either, for that matter.

  Naturally, even though Henry was in a hurry, he had to stop to see how all the junk in this vacant lot compared to his mother’s collection of rummage. He leaned his bicycle against a telephone pole and joined the crowd.

  Racks of old clothes hung in the corner of the lot under a couple of billboards. Nearby was the furniture department: old-fashioned iceboxes, chairs with three legs, sofas with the springs popping out. All sorts of odds and ends were heaped on the board tables. Henry decided it was pretty good junk. He paused in front of an old electric fan. There were lots of things a boy could do with an electric fan, especially if it worked. Just what, Henry could not decide at the moment, but he was sure there must be lots.

  “How much is the fan?” Henry asked the lady behind the table.

  “Twenty-five cents,” was the answer.

  The trouble was that Henry could not very well carry an old electric fan when he went to ask Mr. Capper for a job. It wouldn’t look businesslike.

  “If I pay for the fan now, could you hold it for me until I come back in about half an hour?” Henry asked.

  “I’m sorry, but the sale ends at five-thirty,” the lady told him. “A junk man will come and buy up everything that is left over.”

  “Oh.” Henry was disappointed. Oh, well, a job delivering papers was more important than an old electric fan. Besides, when he got his route, he could buy a new fan if he wanted one.

  As Henry started to leave, he glanced into a carton and what he saw was a great surprise. Four kittens, one black-and-white, one gray with white paws, and two yellow-and-white-striped, lay sleeping in a corner of the box. They looked tiny and helpless, poor little things. But there must be some mistake. Kittens were not junk.

  “These kittens aren’t for sale, are they?” Henry asked a lady who was standing nearby.

  “Yes, they are,” answered the lady cheerfully. “Fifteen cents apiece. They’re very nice kittens. Their grandmother was a long-haired cat.”

  Henry did not like the idea at all. People shouldn’t go around selling kittens for rummage, as if they were old teakettles or something. “If nobody buys them by five-thirty, will the junk man take them?” Henry asked anxiously. Henry was so upset about the kittens that he forgot he was in a hurry. For a minute he even forgot that he wanted a paper route.

  “Oh, no,” answered the lady. “I suppose someone will take them to the pound.” She spoke as if kittens were not very important.

  The black-and-white kitten stirred and blinked its gray eyes. Henry could not keep from touching the soft furry head. The kitten yawned and showed its tiny pink tongue. Then it climbed on top of the other three kittens, curled itself into a ball, and went to sleep again.

  This was too much for Henry. “I don’t think you should let them go to the pound,” he said.

  “I don’t, either,” agreed the lady. “I’ll tell you what I’ll do. Since the sale is just about over, I’ll mark them down for you from fifteen cents to five cents apiece.”

  A nickel for a kitten! That was a real bargain. Henry gently stroked the black-and-white kitten with one finger and thought it over. If he bought the four tiny kittens he would be saving them from the pound, and that was even more important than getting a bargain. Of course his mother wouldn’t let him keep all of them, but it should be easy to find good homes for the others.

  Then Henry remembered the paper route. He could not carry a box of kittens with him when he went to ask Mr. Capper for a job. That would be even less businesslike than carrying an electric fan. And nothing was going to keep him from getting that paper route, not even kit
tens.

  “Well…no, I guess not,” Henry said to the lady. “They’re awfully nice kittens, though.”

  The black-and-white kitten snuggled deeper into the fur of the other three kittens. No, Henry told himself, I’m not going to do it. I’m not going to buy them even if they are only a nickel apiece. My route comes first.

  A yellow kitten mewed in its sleep. “It’s sort of squashed,” Henry remarked to the lady, as he carefully pulled the little bundle of fur out from under the other kittens. Every minute made it more difficult for Henry to leave. Henry fingered the money in his pocket. Maybe he could leave the kittens someplace along the way and pick them up after he had talked to Mr. Capper. No, that wouldn’t work. A dog might get them. They were too little to know how to climb trees. And yet there must be some way to save them.

  Henry thought hard. His jacket! It was just the thing. It was roomy, it had a tight knitted band around the waist, and it was a cloth jacket, so air could get through it. He could tuck four tiny sleeping kittens inside, zip it up, and no one would know the difference.

  “I’ll take all four,” said Henry, and quickly produced two dimes from his pocket. Gently he lifted the kittens, one by one, and slipped them inside his jacket. Then he pulled up the zipper. Maybe he looked a little plump around the middle, but no one would ever guess that he was hiding four kittens.

  It was late, Henry realized, as he got on his bicycle and tried to ride without joggling his kittens. He had spent too much time at the rummage sale. When he reached the district manager’s house he leaned his bicycle against the chestnut tree, ran his hand over his hair, stood up straight, and tried to feel eleven years old. All at once his mouth felt dry. “Good afternoon, Mr. Capper,” he whispered to himself. “My name is Henry Huggins.” He walked up the steps and rang the doorbell. While he waited he could feel his heart pounding.