The Brat asked why she had a delivery truck.
“To make deliveries!” she said. “It’s for the family . . . business.”
We huddled to talk it over.
“What’s to talk?” the Brat said. “What choice do we have?”
“But c-c-can we trust her?” the Know-It-All said.
“What’s to trust?” the Brat said. “There’s seven of us and only one of her!”
The tramp-girl was so eager to help, she even dragged the Brat’s trunk out of the station and into the freezing cold—all by herself!
I do have to say I got a little nervous as we walked into the alley behind the station. It was dark and dodgy.
“How come you speak such g-g-good English?” the Know-It-All asked as we walked.
“Because I’m not from Quebec,” she said. “How come a bunch of American kids are up here all alone?”
“We’re traveling circus performers,” I said.
I’d always wanted to be a traveling circus performer.
“There it is,” she said.
On the side of the truck was a faded sign that read
MUMMY RUMMY’S HOME-BAKED YUMMIES
“Is your family in the baking business?” Goody-Two-Shoes asked.
“What?” she said. “Oh yeah. That’s what we are. In the baking business.”
The Brat asked how much it was going to cost, and the tramp-girl asked which hotel she was taking us to.
“The Ritz?” she said. “The circus pays well!” The tramp-girl smiled and rubbed her chin. “The ride there will cost . . . let’s say . . . five American dollars?”
“Five dollars!” the Brat said. “That’s robbery!”
“Hey, it costs extra for the all of you!”
“Why does it cost extra?” the Brat said. “It’s the same size truck!”
Once again, we didn’t have much choice.
The tramp-girl opened the back of the truck for us to get in. There were no windows and it reeked of something rotten. I wasn’t sure what, but it made me cough.
“Nothing to be afraid of!” she said.
It felt like we were being kidnapped. The Know-It-All was getting his barf-of-terror look, and I didn’t have such a good feeling about it, either.
“You poor kids can all sit in the back,” the Brat said. “I’m riding up front.”
“That’s not fair!” we all said, and the Brat reminded us yet again that he was the one who was paying.
The tramp-girl shrugged. “I do what the guy with the money says.”
Thinking fast, I mentioned that I suffered from terminal claustrophobia. “It means I can die by being locked in a small space,” I said, and hopped out of the back.
“Hey! I got that too! Thermal cost-a-whatsis!” the Rude said as the tramp-girl shut the doors on them and locked the back.
I breathed a sigh of relief as I settled into the middle seat up front.
“My name is Pearl,” the tramp-girl said, getting in. “What’s the name of your circus troupe?”
“The No-Good Nine,” I said.
“The No-Good Nine?” she said. “But there are only seven of you!”
* * *
• • •
As the tramp-girl drove her rickety truck over the bumpy cobblestones that passed for streets in this town, my teeth chattered like a rattle from all the vibrating. It was sweet relief when the ride finally ended.
Pearl pulled right up to the entrance of the Ritz and went around back to let the others out.
The Rude whistled. “Woo-wee! Ain’t this the fanciest joint I ever seen!”
“It looks like a palace,” Goody-Two-Shoes said.
“Merci beaucoup!” the tramp-girl said as the Brat counted out dollar bills. “That means thank you very much.”
“That much French I know,” he grumbled.
The tramp-girl helped us inside with the Brat’s trunk, and stayed with the others while the Brat, the Know-It-All, and I went to the front desk.
The Brat asked for two rooms.
“I am so sorry, monsieur, but the hotel is booked,” the man at the desk said.
“What?” the Brat said.
The clerk explained how there were no rooms, but the Brat wouldn’t accept it.
“Do you have any idea who my father is?” he said. “Why, I could have him buy this rathole and fire you!” It didn’t help.
“Full is full,” the clerk said.
Then the tantrum thing happened, with the Brat’s face turning as red as the cherry on top of a sundae.
That didn’t help, either.
“Maybe you could tell us where another hotel is?” I asked.
“What other hotel, monsieur? It is New Year’s Day!” The clerk threw up his hands. “All the hotels are filled with Americans who want to drink champagne without worrying about getting arrested!”
I said we didn’t need anything fancy—just a flophouse with a few beds—but the clerk said he was sure he wouldn’t know of such a place.
Did I mention he was real snooty?
The Know-It-All asked if there might be rooms to rent near the docks. “We have to take the 9:35 a.m. boat in the m-m-morning.”
The clerk raised an eyebrow.
“The docks?” he said. “The docks are closed for the winter.”
“What do you mean?” the Know-It-All said. “I have the b-b-b-boat schedule right here!”
The manager looked at it and pointed to the words été seulement.
“That means ‘summer only,’” he said. “The river is frozen until May.”
The Know-It-All had his worst case of barf-face yet when we went back to where the others were waiting.
“How did that go for you?” the tramp-girl said.
The Know-It-All went from green to greener.
“He screwed it all up, that’s how it went!” the Brat said. “There aren’t any ships until JUNE!”
“June?” the Cruel said.
“Some Know-It-All you turned out to be!” the Rude said.
“What are we gonna do now?” the Hooligan said. “We’ll never get to Santa’s!”
“To Santa’s?” the tramp-girl said. “You are performing the circus for Santa?”
“There’s nothing we can do about it tonight,” Goody-Two-Shoes said, picking up her bag. “So where’s our room?”
The Brat, the Know-It-All, and I looked at each other and shrugged.
The Cruel let out a Puh! of disgust. “You three really are a bunch of ignoramuses.”
“Wait, there’s no room?” the Rude said. “Where are we gonna sleep?”
“I know where you can go,” the tramp-girl said smiling. “And it won’t even cost you a dime!”
* * *
• • •
Meanwhile . . .
The Truant Officer and the Vainglorious—remember those two? When last we saw them, they were on that train platform back in Pittsburgh.
Now, I can’t tell you what happened to them for sure, because I wasn’t there. However, I do have in my possession further journals of my archenemy, who—let’s face it—is way more accurate about reporting stuff than I am.
From his diary of that night, as translated by someone who knows Russian a heckuva lot better than me:
The boy that I captured has been able to provide information that is helping me piece together something about the plans and whereabouts of the child conspirators, a.k.a. “the No-Good Nine.” This boy is, however, problematic.
For one thing, he seems to be of below-average intelligence.
As an example, he believes that his being left by the others was some sort of mistake.
BOY: “The No-Good Nine are my best friends, so they couldn’t have meant for me to get left behind! They must be really worried ab
out me.”
The child seems unable to understand that they tricked him.
He tells me that the No-Good Nine are headed to Quebec City, but will not divulge where they will be staying or where they are going afterward unless I take him with me.
I tell him that this is impossible, that I need to get him to his parents, but he refuses to reveal his name. He insists that I call him “Glorious,” like all of his friends do.
I fear he is mentally unstable.
A decision must be made: I can take him to the police station, or bring him with me in search of the No-Good Nine.
Now, you might be asking yourself, would a truant officer really take a child out of the country? Since that might be considered, y’know, kidnapping.
For any normal catcher of school-skipping kids the answer would be NO. But my nemesis was no normal anything.
Ivan Ivanovich, former secret agent of the tsar, had a dream. He wanted to become a real police officer, and in his mind, breaking up a criminal gang of children bent on ruining Christmas would be just the thing to get him the job.
So he took the Vainglorious with him to Quebec. In fact, they were coming on the next train.
“NEXT STOP! ROCHESTER!” the conductor calls.
15. MUMMY RUMMY
Rattle-rumble-bump the truck barreled through the narrow, winding streets, and it was hard to keep my teeth from knocking into each other, and my butt on the seat. So I was thankful when the tramp-girl slowed down the truck and pulled over behind another truck. It was the same model and also had Mummy Rummy’s Home-Baked Yummies written across the side.
“Is that who we’re going to stay with?” I said. “Mummy Rummy?”
The tramp-girl nodded yes.
“Her name is Rummy Renée, but everyone calls her Mummy.”
It had to be past midnight by now, and the sky was a swirling stew of clouds and moon and stars. It all felt a little threatening as we followed the tramp-girl down a set of half-broken stairs that led from the street to a seedy area by the port.
“Are we sure this is a good idea?” the Know-It-All whispered to me and the Brat.
“Don’t be such a chicken all the time!” the Brat said.
From up ahead, the tramp-girl pointed. “There it is,” she said. “Home.”
“Home” was a shack that leaned all the more with each gust of wind. A light flickered in the window, and smoke ran out of a tin pipe that poked out of the roof like a little top hat.
“At least it’s heated,” the Hooligan said, rubbing his hands together.
We followed the tramp-girl inside, where we found three people playing cards at a table, a pile of funny-looking coins in the middle. The two facing us were teenagers, the one on the left all skinny with an Adam’s apple like a rooster’s wattle. The other one was more of a bruiser and had a single black eyebrow that went straight across his forehead.
The third one was a lady. A BIG lady. She had her back to us, and boy, was it a lot of back—like a mountain.
The two teenagers silently looked up at us from their cards but kept on playing.
Meanwhile, the tramp-girl went to the lady and said something. It was in French, so who knows what the heck it was. The lady said something back in a voice as loud as a sawmill.
Then she turned around.
The thick cigar was unusual enough—I’d never seen a woman smoke a stogie before—but what really surprised me was that when she smiled, you could see that she had a gold tooth.
I had a moment of fear—the kind of fear where you want to run away but your whole body freezes. Then the gold-toothed lady let out a big, hearty laugh and got up to give us all hugs.
My momma was so thin and bony, it hurt when she hugged you, but with this lady, it was like a mattress wrapping around you.
“Bienvenue! Well-come! Well-come!” she said in a thick accent. “I am Rummy Renée, but call me Mummy! Everyone does—isn’t that right, sonny-boys?”
The other two poker players nodded their heads, and both said, “Oui, Mummy.”
“They don’t speak English,” the tramp-girl said.
She told us they were her brothers, which was weird, since neither of them looked anything like her, or each other. The other weird thing was that they were both named Jack. The skinny brother was Rooster Jack and the thug-looking one was Black Jack.
“My daughter says you are stuck on this freezing-cold night with nowhere to stay. Well, you are in luck, because my ’ome is your ’ome!!” Mummy said. “Make yourselves comfortable! And tell your Mummy—why is it you ’ave come to Quebec?”
“We’re going to Labrador,” the Brat said. “There’s a magical lighthouse there that—”
“No! No we’re n-n-n-not,” the Know-It-All said, cutting him off.
The Brat looked annoyed at the Know-It-All, who obviously didn’t trust Mummy. But how could you trust someone named Mummy Rummy? (Not to mention a pair of brothers named Jack.)
“What he means is we are going to a lighthouse,” I said, “and that it’s like magic. Because aren’t all lighthouses like magic?”
“And why are you going to this magic-not-magic light’ouse?” Mummy said.
“We’re orphan circus performers,” I said. “And we’re doing a tour of the coast to give lonely lighthouse keepers a little entertainment.”
“Wait,” the Hooligan said. “We’re gonna have to perform?”
The Rude elbowed him in the gut.
“I am sure I can ’elp you get to this light’ouse,” Mummy said. “I am in the transportation business, after all. You know, for my . . . products.”
“How much will you charge?” the Brat asked suspiciously.
Mummy exhaled a cloud of cigar smoke like she was blowing away the very idea.
“Ah, I would not dream of profiting a penny. I love to ’elp the orphans! Isn’t that right, Pearl?” She looked at the tramp-girl.
“Can I ask you a question, Mummy?” Goody-Two-Shoes said.
“Certainly, ma chérie!”
“Why are you called Mummy Rummy?”
Mummy laughed her explosive laugh. “Why else? I am a rumrunner!”
That gave us all a reason to think twice.
“W-w-why do your trucks say you’re a baker?” the Know-It-All asked.
“Ah, but I am a baker,” she said. “’Ere, try one.” She opened a tin of biscuits and held it out for us to try.
“Me first!” the Rude said. “I’m starvin’!” But as soon as he took a bite, he looked like he regretted it.
I took a nibble of one and it tasted absolutely
“Terrible, yes?”
Mummy snapped the tin shut, shaking her head. “No one ever buys them, so I ’ad to try a different line of work,” she said. “And it winds up that selling booze is much more profitable than selling biscuits!”
“Are you really a bootlegger?” the Rude said. “That’s so jake!”
I thought it was swell too—a real rumrunner!—but I could tell Goody-Two-Shoes was horrified. And so was the Know-It-All.
“I never heard of a woman rumrunner before,” the Brat said skeptically.
The happy eyes of Mummy suddenly narrowed to slits. She blew a cloud of smoke into the Brat’s face.
“Yes,” she said. “It is not usual to find a woman in such a man’s line of work. Not easy, either! There is much to overcome. I tell little Pearl all the time—we are women, we have to be twice as tough as the men. Isn’t that right, Pearlie?”
“Yes, Mummy.”
“And twice as mean,” the Cruel muttered.
“Good girl!” Mummy said, smiling at the Cruel.
“Instead of being twice as tough and mean, maybe we should be twice as gentle and kind,” Goody-Two-Shoes said.
“Ah-ah!” Mummy tossed her head back to guffaw. “The only
thing men understand is this.”
She tapped on her gold tooth.
“And this.”
She pulled a knife out from under the table.
Which was a pretty neat trick, if not a little terrifying. For the Know-It-All especially.
“So you’re a c-c-c-c . . .”
He had trouble spitting out the word.
“. . . criminal?”
“A criminal! No!” Mummy placed her big ham hands on his shoulders. “Rum and liquor—they are not illegal ’ere in Quebec! Even children drink them! You must try some! Let us toast in the ’appy New Year!”
One of the Brothers Jack smiled, making me wonder if they didn’t know a little more English than they let on.
Mummy grabbed a bottle off a shelf and pulled out its cork. The liquid inside was foggy, and she poured a glass for each Naughty Lister. That bottle empty, she pulled out another and poured glasses for herself and her three children.
“To new friends!” Mummy said, raising her glass. She then tossed it back in one go, as did the tramp-girl and the Brothers Jack.
I looked into my glass, then to the other No-Good Ninesters.
“Try it!” Mummy said, pouring herself another.
“What are you?” the tramp-girl said, turning to the Brat. “Afraid?”
The Brat repeated the word afraid like it was absurd, and took a big gulp of whatever was in the glass.
He spit it right back out.
Everyone laughed.
The Hooligan, the Rude, and the Cruel all tried it too—or pretended to, like I did. I’d been around plenty of alcohol (my uncle Peppe made grappa in his bathtub back home), but it didn’t look—or smell—anything like this. One whiff made me go all queasy.
The Know-It-All, on the other hand, wasn’t even pretending. He treated his glass like it was liquid dynamite.
“It may not be illegal to have l-l-l-liquor here,” he said. “But it is illegal to bring it into the US.”
“Ah, right you are!” Mummy said. “You are not a customs officer, are you? Please don’t shoot!” She held up both hands with a frightened look on her face, then burst into laughter again.
She downed another glass in one gulp, wiped her mouth on her sleeve, and said, “Now ’oo wants to play poker?”
The No-Good Nine Page 7
