Tabloidology (5 page)

Trixi had to smile. She'd been so busy with the dog and the toilet seat last night, she never got around to studying for her geography review test. The next time she saw Mr. Pen, she'd have to thank him.

Trixi left the office and headed to her classroom. But halfway down the hall, she noticed something almost as strange as Merlin Pen's photocopier. Water was seeping from under the doors of the library and running into the hallway. Trixi tried to open the doors, but they were locked. The library was only open in the afternoons.

Trixi sprinted back down the hall to the office and ran past Mrs. Sledge, saying, “It's an emergency!” Without knocking, she threw open the principal's office door and shouted, “Ms. Baumgartner! There's water! Lots of it! And it's coming out of the library!”

Ms. Baumgartner was just hanging up the phone, when her head snapped toward Trixi. “There's what coming out of where?”

“Water! H-two-O! Clear liquid that comes out of pipes! And it's coming out of the library!”

“Water? Coming out of the library?” Ms. Baumgartner shot out of her chair and began a wobbly sprint on her high heels down the hall toward the library. By now, the water had spread all the way across the hall and was flowing toward the back doors. Ms. Baumgartner pulled a ring of keys from her pocket and undid the lock. She pushed both doors open, unleashing a wave of water that rushed past them into the hall.

Trixi looked up and saw the sprinkler heads in the ceiling showering water into every corner of the library. Every book, magazine, poster, kit and manual was turning into a pulpy mushy mess. A computer crackled and sparked before dying in a puff of smoke, and a wooden model of the Ugly Duckling bobbed in the story corner.

“Why are the sprinklers on?” Trixi said.

Ms. Baumgartner grabbed the
C
volume of the encyclopedia, held it over her head and began to wade across the library. “There must have been a fire for the sprinklers to come on!”

“If there was a fire, I think it's probably out,” Trixi said.

But Ms. Baumgartner had already disappeared out the fire door.

The school was evacuated until the maintenance department could be called in to turn off the sprinklers and the water in the hall could be vacuumed and mopped up. Fortunately, most of the water had run straight down the hall and out the back door, leaving the classrooms dry. Unfortunately, every book, magazine, encyclopedia and computer in the library was waterlogged and useless.

That afternoon, the entire school was called down to the gym for an emergency assembly. Trixi sat obediently in a row with the rest of her classmates. Some were leaning forward and looking her way, while others were pointing. “What?” she whispered. “It wasn't me! I had nothing to do with it!”

Trixi knew she had a reputation for pulling some pretty amazing pranks in the school, but they couldn't blame her for this one. None of her pranks ever caused damage to school property. And they certainly never came close to the chaos caused by the sprinklers in the library. At least, they'd better not blame it on me! she thought.

Trixi noticed Ms. Baumgartner's hair was still wet and tangled from her shower in the library that morning, and she was wearing an old pair of gumboots she'd borrowed from the custodian.

“I just want to reassure everyone in the school that the unfortunate flood in our library was a complete accident. I have heard some nasty rumors circulating about this being a prank, but I can assure you it was caused by faulty sprinkler heads. The bad news is that the contents of the library have been ruined by the water.”

There were gasps from various parts of the gym. Hands shot up.

“Excuse me, Ms. Baumgartner,” Greg Olson said. “Don't tell me all the Tintin books are gone!”

“I'm afraid so, Greg.”

“How about Tom and Liz Austin? And Anne? And the Hardy Boys? And Nancy Drew?” Ella Brown called from the back. “Did they survive?”

“Sadly, no, Ella. Pretty well every single book was damaged beyond repair,” Ms. Baumgartner said. “Unfortunately, our insurance will only cover damage to the building. It does not cover the replacement of our books, computers and other materials. This means we're going to have to do some fundraising to restock our library. Not only that, we'll have to take money normally used for other school activities to buy replacement books. To save money, I'm afraid some of our field trips, sports events and other special activities will have to be cut back.”

Ms. Baumgartner blinked as a light flashed in front of her. Martin was crouched in the front row, taking a picture for the school newspaper.

FIVE

T
he next Thursday at recess, Martin sat in the hall at his table with yet another stack of unsold copies of the
Upland Green Examiner
. Once again, the only one to stop at his table was Trixi Wilder.

“So, Marty, with all the excitement of the flood in the library, I bet you wrote one humdinger of an article, giving all the gruesome details. People love reading about disasters. You might actually sell a few copies for a change.”

“As with every edition of the
Upland Green
Examiner
, I have stuck to the facts—the cold hard facts,” he replied.

Trixi snatched up a copy of the paper, but this time Martin didn't even bother asking her to pay.

“
Library Experiences Increase in Water Content.
That's it?” Trixi said. “That's your great headline about the biggest disaster in the history of this school?”

“Before judging the article, I suggest you read it,” Martin said, his hands clenched into fists.

Trixi held up the paper and read the article out loud in her best tv news-anchor voice. “
Last Friday, due to some
faulty plumbing, a leak occurred in the overhead sprinkler
system in the library. The water caused extensive damage to
much of the library's collection. The library will be closed until
further notice
. That's it?”

“Those are the plain facts. The facts and nothing but the facts,” Martin said, his arms now folded tightly across his chest.

Trixi flipped through the rest of the paper. “Mrs. Brown's class going on a field trip to the fire station, Mr. Eastman's class making mobiles out of recycled coat hangers, a day in the life of a school custodian and the weather forecast.” Trixi shook her head and slammed the newspaper back on the pile. “Oh, well. At least you didn't leave out anything great I did this week. Although, next week, I'm sure I'll have something spectacular for you to write about. Good luck with sales. I'll let you know if anyone needs to line the bottom of a birdcage.”

Moments after Trixi had loped off down the hall, Ms. Baumgartner came by. Without a word to Martin, she snatched up a copy of his newspaper. After a quick read, she shook her head. “Couldn't you make the front-page article just a little more exciting, Martin? You've described the flood as an ‘increase in water content.' Don't you think you should jazz your writing up a little?”

“Absolutely not, Ms. Baumgartner!” Martin said, jumping up from his chair. “I reported the flood in a responsible, factual manner. There's no room for sensationalism in my paper!”

“Obviously not,” Ms. Baumgartner said. She slapped the paper down on the stack of unsold papers and walked off without a word—not one mention about his fine spelling or his grammar, and not even a hint of her usual smile. Not only that, she didn't even buy a copy. This was not a good sign. Martin could sense something was in the air. He didn't know what, but something at Upland Green School was about to change.

That night, Razor's band practiced in the living room until 2:25 am when the neighbors finally phoned the police.

At 2:55 am, three fire trucks answered a call, roaring out of the fire station with their sirens wailing.

At 4:42 am, Sissy's dogs got loose, ran upstairs and jumped up on Martin's bed.

At 4:55 am, two fire trucks answered another call.

At 5:15 am, the freight train rumbled past Martin's house, and the engineer blew the whistle three times.

At 5:45 am, Martin's mother arrived home from working the night shift and tripped over the cat in the front hall.

At 5:55 am, three fire trucks answered another call.

At 7:30 am, Martin dragged himself out of bed to take a shower, but there was no water. All he could find for breakfast was a can of sardines, a box of stale crackers and a jar of pickles.

He took the last bruised apple and the rest of the crackers for his lunch and headed for school.

Trixi woke up to find a note stuck to the outside of her bedroom door.

I forgot to tell you last night that your father and I had to
leave for New York a day earlier than planned. If you behave
yourself while we're gone, we'll pick up something special for you
at Saks Fifth Avenue.

Be Good,
Mom