I have to get those chocolate-covered cherries into her gullet before the bells at St. Kate’s start clanging to let her and everyone else in the neighborhood know that it’s high noon.
Wait just a cotton-pickin’ minute.
What’s wrong with me?
I just remembered 12:00 is when Mr. McGinty told us that Mrs. Peterman decided to hold her husband’s funeral so the workers he bossed around at the Feelin’ Good factory could attend on their lunch break, which is the worst possible timing that could put the Finley sisters in grave danger—no joke—because the box of Stover candy that Mrs. Melman leaves on Mr. Lindley’s final resting spot is not too far away from Mr. Peterman’s new hole that most of our neighbors will be gathered around. If we’re sneaky, we should be okay, but only if Birdie doesn’t give us away. I so wish I had a gag on me like the sock I keep in the Radio Flyer wagon, because—
Clang . . . clang . . . clang . . .
Anybody who came to say their final good-bye to Mr. Peterman is about to be treated to a concert of hideously loud starvation squawking when those bells reach twelve. And, of course, one of them is bound to call our mother at the Clark station to tell her about the ruckus one of the Finley ghouls caused in Holy Cross during the funeral.
“Se?orita Birdie!” I turn to tell her in my sure-to-please Zorro voice. “Vamanos to those chocolate-covereds!”
Clang . . . clang . . . clang . . .
Unfortunately, she wants those runny cherries in her tummy even more than I thought she did. Before I have the chance to get a good grip on her hand, she vamanos-es down the side of the hill yelling . . . yelling . . . I have no idea what the hell she’s yelling. I caught the words, “sister” and “run” and “tree,” but she might’ve yelled, “mister” and “fun” and “free,” for all I know . . . no . . . no . . . no . . . no!
For some unknown reason, is unpredictable Birdie listening to her big heart instead of her big stomach? Could she be yelling at me, her sister, that she feels so bad about not seeing Charlie earlier, the way I wanted her to, that she’s going to run down to the weeping willow tree to check for him in person? That wouldn’t be great, but it wouldn’t be the end of the world, either, because I keep a stash of emergency candy in a hole in the willow along with our Mutual Admiration treasury money.
But what if Birdie is listening to another part of her weird brain and she’s yelling on her hustle down the hill that she’s going to look for Mister McGinty at his shack because she thinks it’d be fun to play a game of gin rummy with him? And because she doesn’t know any better, when she’s done eating her free windmill cookies and drinking her free root beer, she’s so proud of the clue she found that she just might brag to him when she’s shuffling the “52” that she dug his St. Christopher medal out of a leaf pile behind the mausoleum where a murder was committed last night. And that right there? That could be a life-ending decision. The poor kid doesn’t understand what could happen if she told already very jittery Mr. McGinty that we got proof that he was at the scene of the crime. Our armed-to-his-beautiful-teeth friend, who I’m now 95% sure murdered our principal, really, really, really, really wouldn’t like that Gotcha!
Clang . . . clang . . . clang.
13
WHY . . . WHY . . . WHY . . . WHY?
From hanging out at Lonnigan’s Bar with the best bartender in the neighborhood since I only came up to his knees, I have a bigger vocabulary than most kids, especially when it comes to cuss words, and I’m using every single one of them while I’m running after my sister down the side of the cemetery hill. Cussing and chasing after Birdie, I swear, if I could get paid for them, we’d be rolling in more dough than Meuer’s Bakery. (No joke.)
“Don’t run to the willow tree and don’t run to Mister McGinty’s shack. Go to the chocolate-covered cherries!” I’m shrieking between the clanging church bells that are telling my sister that it’s feeding time. “Turn right at the bottom of the hill! Right! That’s . . . that’s the hand you deal cards with!”
Birdie doesn’t slow down, turn around, and give me an A-okay sign, but she must’ve heard me, because just after St. Kate’s bells finish sounding noon, she makes a sharp turn toward Mr. Lindley’s grave, thank God.