The Marvelous Inventions of Alvin Fernald

by Clifford B. Hicks

  Alvin almost fell out of the tree. Thousands of dollars! Thousands of dollars!

  Second voice: “We could look through every room in the house again. But we’ve already been through every room twice. Wish she wasn’t so stubborn, and there was some way we could make her tell. I’m about ready to give up.”

  First voice: “You want to turn your back on all that money?”

  A pause. Second voice: “No. But do you have any new ideas?”

  First voice. “No. But we sure don’t have time to go through the whole house again. I’m surprised those kids haven’t been back already with their parents.”

  Alvin held tighter to the tree.

  Second voice: “I have a hunch they won’t be back. They’d have shown up before this if they’d squealed. I’ll bet we scared ’em so bad they slept with the covers over their heads.”

  How right he is, thought Alvin.

  First voice: “Well, this isn’t finding the loot. Let’s look over this room once more.”

  There was a rustle in the earphone.

  First voice: “What’s that thing over there?”

  Second voice: “What thing?”

  First voice: “Right there.”

  Long pause.

  Second voice: “Why, uh, why — why, that’s just an old — vase.”

  Alvin thought there was a strange note in his voice, a mighty strange note.

  First voice (speaking in a rush): “We’ll search every room of the house again. Yeah, that’s what we’ll do. We’ll start with the basement. This time we’ll even look inside the furnace and up the chimney. Then we’ll work our way up. We’ll look in every room on this floor. We’ll take apart the piano. When we’ve finished here, we’ll go upstairs and even search the towers.”

  Alvin though it was odd that only one man was talking now. Not a peep from the other one.

  First voice, droning on: “We’ll even look on the roof. Then, when we’re through inside the house, we’ll start outside. We’ll —”

  Too late, Alvin suddenly realized what had happened. They’d spotted the funnel! There was only one man inside the room, and he was talking to himself!

  At that instant, a bright beam of light flashed up into the tree from below. They’d been found!

  “Got you!” said Second Voice from behind the blinding light. “Followed that hose right to your little nest. Got you this time!”

  Daphne whimpered, but was too scared to make much noise.

  “Come on out,” the man shouted toward the house. “I’ve caught them in a tree. Come on out, and we’ll show them what we do to spying kids.”

  For a moment Alvin was paralyzed. Then suddenly his brain went into action. He whispered to Shoie, “When I shout, jump right into that flashlight with your feet.”

  Alvin waited a moment until he heard the front door slam. An instant later he jerked the hose just as hard as he could, and shouted, “Now!”

  Shoie dropped down out of the tree, and at that moment Alvin felt a satisfying ripple along the hose. There was a loud thud from the direction of the house. He’d tripped the man on the front steps with the hose.

  Another thud came from below, and then the flashlight was spinning off into the grass.

  “Yow!” shouted the man beneath him, and Alvin knew that Shoie had dropped out of the tree right onto the man’s arm. The Mighty Athlete had come through.

  Alvin dropped to the ground. The Pest landed beside him. It was dark under the tree and he could hear the man groaning in the bushes. He and the Pest raced after Shoie, who was heading for the fence.

  Alvin could hear stumbling steps behind him, then the pound of running feet. Once more he was atop the fence, with Shoie and the Pest already racing down the street.

  Just before Alvin jumped off the fence, he glanced back at the old house. There was a flickering light in the window of one of the towers. Did he imagine it, or was there a head silhouetted against the window?

  He jumped off the fence, but he was too late. An arm reached between the bars and grabbed his jacket. No matter how hard Alvin squirmed, he couldn’t wriggle loose until he simply slid out of the jacket, leaving it in the man’s hand, and ran off down the street.

  He had trouble going to sleep that night. His inventive mind had earned a long rest, but an hour passed before it relaxed into a troubled sleep.

  Chapter 7

  THE ONE-JERK BED MAKER

  After breakfast Alvin headed for his room to make his bed. It was a job he didn’t like one bit, a job for girls. Long ago, though, he had learned not to argue about it or forget to do it. When he complained that only girls should make beds, his mother made him put on an apron and wipe the dishes. When he forgot to do it, she ordered him to make all the other beds in the house. Consequently, he had learned to make his bed first thing after breakfast.

  He was pulling up the sheet and blanket when a sudden thought struck him. A glassy look came across his eyes, and he sat down on the edge of the bed. For five minutes he stared off into space. Suddenly he leaped to his feet, raced downstairs, and returned with two of his mother’s spring-action clothespins.

  Rummaging through the boxes on his inventing bench, he found a ball of strong cord and two small pulleys. He tied the pulleys to the head of the bed, one on each side of the pillow. He cut two long pieces of cord. One end of each cord he tied to one of the clothespins. The other ends he ran through the pulleys. He brought the cords down under the bed, leaving plenty of slack on the floor, then tied the two cords to the footboard. He squeezed open two clothespins and fastened one to the sheet and blanket on each side of the bed.

  Alvin was about to try another great invention. He climbed into bed, pulled up the covers, closed his eyes and tossed about as though he were asleep. A couple of minutes of hard sleep and the bed was a mess, but the sheet and blanket were still tucked in at the foot. Alvin rolled out of bed and walked around to the footboard. He stood there a moment, holding the two cords, almost afraid to try the invention.

  He pulled slowly on the cords. The blanket and sheet slid neatly into place, as though pulled by two invisible hands.

  Alvin Fernald, Great Inventor, had done it again.

  Ten minutes later he was showing Shoie and the Pest his One-Jerk Bed Maker. They were so impressed they wanted to try the idea immediately on their own beds. Instead, Alvin insisted that they stay in his room for a very important conference.

  He locked the door and turned on the Foolproof Burglar Alarm. After their latest adventure, he wanted no one to hear what they were discussing. They were about to make a big decision.

  Alvin threw himself down on his pillow. The Pest and Shoie flopped down on the bed, too.

  It was the first time, really, that his sister had been willingly included in the plans of the two boys. Somehow, it seemed natural to include her now. She was lying on top of his blanket on her stomach, her chin propped between her hands. Only once before had Alvin seen such a serious look on her face. That was the time she had climbed to the very top of the telephone pole out by Gilligan’s pasture. Perched there, she had made the mistake of looking down. She’d grabbed the pole with both arms, but they’d had to call the ladder truck from the fire department to get her down. She’d been pretty serious after that episode, too.

  It was no wonder she was so serious. All three of them were, for they were faced with a big decision. What should they do about old Mrs. Huntley?

  “Do you suppose she’s still alive?” asked Shoie for the fourth time.

  “I think she is,” said Alvin. “I have a hunch she’s still all right. Last night, when I was listening on the Eavesdropper, one of those men said, ‘She’s pretty smart.’ I’ll bet he was talking about Mrs. Huntley. The reason I think she’s still alive is that ‘she is’ is present tense.”

  “Present tents?” asked the Pest. “Present tents? Who’s giving away tents, and what’s that got to do with Mrs. Huntley?”

  Alvin groaned. “Not present tents. Present tens
e. You wouldn’t know anything about tense because you haven’t been in Miss Riggs’ room in school yet.”

  “Does she give away tents?” asked the Pest.

  “Pretend I never mentioned it.”

  “I learned how to do timeses in school,” offered the Pest.

  “What do you mean — timeses?”

  “You know — two times two is four, four times four is eight.”

  “What’s that got to do with Mrs. Huntley? Besides, four times four is sixteen, not eight.”

  “So’s two times eight.”

  “Who said it wasn’t?”

  “You did.”

  “Did not.”

  “Did so.”

  “Quit fighting, you two,” said Shoie. “We’ve got to decide what we’re going to do.”

  “Right, old bean. That’s exactly what we have to do. Let’s get down to business.”

  “If she’s still alive,” asked Shoie, “where is she? And is she in any danger?”

  “I think I know where she is. I think she’s in one of the towers of that old house. When I was on top of that fence last night I happened to look up at the tower on the left corner. There was a candle in the window.”

  “That’s a spook,” said the Pest. “Everybody knows that’s the ghost of the old Huntley place.”

  “No. This wasn’t a spook or a ghost. I saw somebody silhouetted at the window. I couldn’t make out who it was, but I’ll bet my next invention it was Mrs. Huntley.”

  The room was quiet for a moment. Shoie rolled over on his back, put his feet in the air, and started pedaling an imaginary bicycle upside down. The Mighty Athlete did this frequently to keep his legs in shape. Finally, he plopped them back down on the bed.

  “Maybe we ought to tell Daddy,” suggested the Pest for the third time.

  “Maybe we ought,” repeated Shoie.

  “Maybe,” said Alvin. “Then again, maybe not. Do we know anything is wrong over there? Do we know old Mrs. Huntley is in danger? Maybe those men are relatives. Maybe she invited them to visit her.”

  “Mommy told me once that she only has one living relative,” said the Pest.

  “Right. Her only relative is a nephew named Herbert. Maybe he’s one of the men over there. And maybe he brought one of his friends along. Maybe they’re just visiting, and nothing at all is wrong.”

  “If we told Daddy, he could arrest the men and find out who they are. He’s the best policeman in the whole world.”

  “That’s all the more reason why I don’t want to tell Dad,” said Alvin. “Do you remember last winter when Dad got in all that trouble? It wasn’t his fault at all. Somebody broke into Mr. Peabody’s store. Mr. Peabody said he’d seen who it was — Mr. Riggs, who lives down by the tracks. Dad took Mr. Riggs down to the jail where he found out they’d already caught the real burglar. It wasn’t Mr. Riggs at all, and was he hopping mad! He was going to sue Dad for ten thousand dollars for false arrest, or whatever they call it. Anyway, the Chief finally talked the man out of it. But you can’t just go around arresting people. Even a policeman can’t arrest people unless he knows they did something wrong, or at least it looks like they committed a crime.” Alvin paused for a minute. “Nope. I don’t think we ought to tell Dad just yet. He might go over and arrest those men and get sued for a lot of money.”

  “I don’t know,” said Shoie doubtfully. “Maybe we ought to tell.”

  Alvin brought up his strongest argument. “If we tell,” he said slowly. “Mom and Dad — and your parents too, Shoie — will know we’ve been sneaking around that old house. We’ll really catch it then.”

  The other two thought about the consequences.

  “Well, what are we going to do then?” asked Shoie.

  “I’ll tell you what we’re going to do. We’re going to find Mrs. Huntley and talk to her.”

  “We can’t do that, Alvin,” said the Pest. “We wouldn’t dare sneak inside that old house.”

  “Count me out, and when you start counting, count me first,” said Shoie.

  “I think I know how we can talk to her without ever getting into the house.”

  Shoie and the Pest were astonished.

  “What do you mean?” said Shoie. “Even Alvin Fernald isn’t crazy enough to go over there and shout at her. At least I hope you aren’t.”

  “Nope,” said Alvin. He enjoyed mystifying them. “But I’ll bet I can find out what’s going on in there without those men knowing a thing about it.”

  “Bet you can’t,” said the Pest.

  “How much will you bet?”

  “Ten million dollars.”

  “How much do you have in your bank?”

  “Eleven cents.”

  “Then,” said Alvin, doing a little rapid calculating, “you’re short only nine million, nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine dollars and eighty-nine cents.”

  “I’ll bet it anyway.”

  “You can’t bet unless you have the money. Besides, the folks told us never to bet.”

  “I’ll still bet you, Alvin. How could you do it?”

  “With an invention.”

  “Watch it!” warned Shoie. “Your eyes are getting glassy again. You always go out of your head when you’re thinking up a new invention.”

  It was true that Alvin was thinking furiously. Finally he said, “Will you try once more with me? Will you go over to that house right now if I promise that those men won’t see you?”

  “How can you promise that?” asked Shoie.

  “I’ve invented an Invisible Powder,” said Alvin. “You shake a little of it on you and you turn absolutely invisible. Just as though you aren’t there.”

  The Pest’s jaw dropped. “Alvin! Did you really?”

  Alvin grinned at Shoie. “Yep. And any time you don’t behave, Pest, I’ll just sprinkle a little of it on you. Poof! You’re gone!”

  “Please don’t do it, Alvin. I’ll behave!”

  Alvin smiled. “You’d believe anything, wouldn’t you? No, I haven’t really invented Invisible Powder. But if I promise that you won’t be seen, will you go over to the old house with me?”

  “I guess so,” said the Pest.

  Shoie couldn’t stand for a girl to be braver than he was. He finally agreed to go along. “But you have to promise one thing, Alvin. If we find out something is wrong over there, or if we don’t see Mrs. Huntley, then we go straight to your dad and tell him everything.”

  “It’s a bargain.” Alvin thought for a minute. “Now we have to get the parts for the Jet-Powered Message Carrier. Shoie, it’s a good thing you were the best bow and arrow shooter in our grade last year. I want you to get your bow and arrows, and meet us at the corner. Pest, you get a pencil, some pieces of paper and Dad’s fishing reel. Don’t let Mom see you take the reel. Bring along a paper sack. I’ll get the other stuff myself.”

  “Here we go again,” groaned Shoie. “Okay. I’ll meet you at the corner in five minutes.”

  Chapter 8

  THE JET-POWERED MESSAGE CARRIER

  “Hi, Robin Hood,” said Alvin with a grin as Shoie showed up, the bow slung across his shoulder, a quiver full of arrows on his back.

  “All set,” said Shoie.

  Alvin was carrying a paper sack. He handed it to the Pest. “Here, you’re the carrier. Hang this around your neck and pretend you’re a St. Bernard.”

  The Pest looked puzzled. “What’s a St. Bernard, Alvin?”

  “It’s a big dog that carries medicine and stuff to people lost in the mountains. As long as you’re the St. Bernard, let’s hear you bark.”

  She didn’t know whether he was kidding or not. “Rowf!” she said. “Rowf! Rowf!”

  Alvin and Shoie kept straight faces.

  “That’s pretty good,” said Alvin, “but you really should bark louder if you’re going to be the St. Bernard on this expedition. Try it again.”

  “Rowf! Rowf!”

  “That’s better. Okay, you can come along. But don’
t bark unless I tell you to.”

  “How do I hang this sack around my neck?”

  Alvin and Shoie looked at each other and started to laugh. Finally Alvin reached out and mussed up her hair. It was the only way he had ever found to show her that he liked her. For as long as he could remember she had been tagging after him, always getting in the way. So, once in a while when he did want to say something nice to her, he didn’t know how. Whenever he wanted to show that he really liked her, he mussed up her hair. He knew she liked it, even though she pretended she didn’t.

  “We were only kidding. You make a wonderful St. Bernard, but don’t work too hard at it. Just carry the sack for us. I hope I haven’t forgotten anything.”

  This time Alvin led them clear over to Hickory Street, then circled around so they could come up on the old Huntley place from the rear. The back end of the lot was covered with even more trees and bushes than the front. Standing beside the iron fence, they couldn’t even see the house except for one of the towers, so they knew they couldn’t be seen either.

  They climbed the fence and dropped inside. Alvin put a finger to his lips and sneaked off through the weeds like the jungle fighters in the movies. The others were following. He moved from bush to bush and tree to tree, always keeping something between himself and the house. At last he stopped behind a clump of bushes. Through the branches they could see the corner of the house with the tower rising high into the air.

  The three sank down to the soft ground.

  “That’s the tower where I saw the candle,” whispered Alvin. “And I’ll bet old Mrs. Huntley is up there.”

  “Look,” said Shoie. “The window’s open. But I don’t see anything of her.”

  “Don’t see her,” echoed the Pest.

  “Well, that doesn’t mean she isn’t there.”

  “How are you going to talk to her without letting those bad men know about it?” asked the Pest.

  “A lot of it will be up to you, Shoie,” said Alvin. “Now we’ve got to get ready. Give me your bow.”