Otherwise Known as Sheila the Great (7 page)

   
"No, no. Washington Irving invented him."

   
"But he lived around here, didn't he?"

   
"Yes, but so what?"

   
"Well," I said, "suppose he really saw this Headless Horseman and thought nobody would believe him, so instead he wrote a story about him. You see?"

   
"No, I don't see," Daddy said. "It's all made up. I'll bring you a book of his stories and you can read them. Then you'll understand."

   
"No!" I shouted. "I don't want to read about any Headless Horseman."

   
After that, whenever I heard noises at night, I knew it was the Headless Horseman haunting Tarrytown. I wished it was September and we could go back to the city where there isn't room for any kind of horseman to go haunting at night.

   
ONE gray, cloudy Saturday afternoon Mrs. Ellis said she had to do some shopping. Mouse didn't want to go so her mother said she could stay at our house. Mouse gave me yo-yo lessons for half an hour, and all that time I wished there was something I could do better than Mouse and the other kids in Tarrytown. If only they had to live in the city for a month, I thought. Then I'd show them plenty! Probably not one of them could take a crosstown bus without getting lost!

   
When we got tired of yo-yoing Mouse said, "Let's call the twins and see if they can come over."

   
The twins are Sondra and Jane Van Arden. They swim at the pool too. They don't look anything alike. Sondra is very shy and quiet and she always looks at your feet when you talk to her. They are both pretty good swimmers, but I have never seen Sondra dunk anyone. That's why I like her better than Jane.

   
When Mouse called them they said they would be right over because if they stayed home their mother was going to make them clean out their closets.

   
When they got to my house we had a snack of Oreos and milk. Sondra and Jane open their cookies and eat all the icing first. I used to do that but Libby said I was disgusting. When we were finished with our snack Mouse said, "Want to play indoor hide-and-seek?"

   
"Hey, yeah," Jane said. "At your house, Mouse!"

   
"But we can't," I said. "Her mother isn't home."

   
Mouse and Jane laughed then and Sondra said, "There's a special way to get into the Mouse House when her mother isn't home."

   
"And just wait till you see it!" Jane said.

   
So we walked down the road to Mouse's and when we got there the girls showed me the milk door. It's a small door on the side of the house, near the kitchen. Mouse unlatched it and said, "See, this is where the milkman puts our stuff. My mother never has to go outside to get it. Isn't that neat?"

   
"Yeah," I said. "It's really neat. It's kind of a built-in milk box!"

   
"Right!" Jane said. "Only it's not a box, because it leads right into the house."

   
Mouse boosted Jane up and Jane crawled through the milk door. Then Sondra boosted Mouse and she crawled through. I gave Sondra a boost and was wondering who would boost me when Sondra cried, "Help . . . I'm stuck!"

   
"You can't be," Mouse said.

   
"I am!" Sondra yelled. "I really am!"

   
"You need to go on a diet!" Jane called from inside.

   
"Please do something!" Sondra begged.

   
Since I was the only one left on the outside I pulled Sondra's legs, trying to get her to back out. When that didn't work, Jane and Mouse pulled from the inside, hoping to get her through the milk door. But nothing happened.

   
Sondra cried, "I'm doomed! I'll be here forever."

   
Jane said we should call the Fire Department and let them chop her out, but Mouse said her mother might get mad about that.

   
I could see that unless I took charge of the situation nothing would get done. So I said, "Mouse, you and Jane open the regular door and help me on the outside."

   
"I never thought of that," Mouse said.

   
"You should have," I told her. "Because if you had been the only one to crawl through the milk door in the first place, none of this would have happened. You could have unlocked the back door and we would have walked in like any other human beings."

   
Mouse didn't answer me, but she and Jane did what I told them to and joined me on the outside. "Okay," I said, "now pull Sondra by the legs."

   
All three of us pulled as hard as we could, but she still wouldn't budge. "We need rope. Do you have any?" I asked Mouse.

   
"I think so," she said. "In the garage."

   
"Well. . . don't just stand there. Go get it!"

   
Mouse ran to the garage and came back with the rope. I tied it onto Sondra's ankles and we all pulled and pulled until we got her out. By that time she was crying for real and her ankles were full of rope burns.

   
"We've got to carry her inside now," I said. "I'll take her arms. Mouse, you take her legs and Jane, you grab her middle."

   
As we were carrying her into the house Sondra kept screaming, "Put me down! Put me down!" Some people don't know when other people are trying to help them!

   
We got her into the kitchen and put her down on the floor. Mouse said, "Her legs are a mess. The bandages are upstairs. We better get her up there too."

   
"That's crazy," I said. "You go get the bandages and some first-aid cream and we'll fix her up down here."

   
So Mouse ran upstairs and came back with a million little tubes and bottles and bandages and we all played doctor, fixing Sondra up. Of course I was the only one who knew just which medicine to put on each of Sondra's wounds. So I was really the main doctor and the others were my assistants.

   
We must have done a good job because Sondra stopped crying and said her legs felt much better. She even managed to walk up the stairs so we could start our game of hide-and-seek.

   
Mouse told Sondra she didn't have to be It because she had already suffered enough. The only rules to indoor hide-and-seek were, we had to stay upstairs and the attic was off limits. Home Base was the sink in the hail bathroom.

   
We did once-twice-three shoot to see who would be It first. I lost. I hate to be It, especially in a strange place. I always get this creepy feeling. And I've never played hide-and-seek inside before, except with Daddy, and that's not the same at all because nobody's going to pop out from under something and scare me.

   
But I closed my eyes and counted to seventy-five before I hollered, "Ready or not . . . here I come!" I was supposed to count to one hundred, but I'm sure nobody noticed. If they did I would just tell them I am a very fast counter.

   
The house was quiet, except for some squeaks now and then. I wanted to find the others in a hurry so I wouldn't be all alone. I walked from bedroom to bedroom but I didn't search under the beds or in the closets. I was afraid of what I might find. Suppose Washington Irving left something behind when he slept here a hundred years ago? I wonder if the Headless Horseman ever comes inside houses. If he does, I know he would choose this one, because it's so old he would feel at home. I went into Betsy's room. Ootch was on her bed. I made a lot of noise, hoping one of the others would hear me and laugh. But no one did. Just as I was coming out of Betsy's room Jane made a mad dash for the hall bathroom and yelled, "Home-free-all!"

   
Now at least I had some company. I was glad she came out, even though I didn't catch her. I had to concentrate on finding Mouse or Sondra. If they all got Home Free I would wind up as It again. Jane walked around with me and we found Sondra sitting in the bathroom in Mr. and Mrs. Ellis' bathroom. Now allwe needed was Mouse. We looked and looked but we couldn't find her.

   
Finally Jane said, "Do you suppose she's in the laundry chute again?"

   
"No," Sondra said. "She got in awful trouble the last time. Remember

   
"What laundry chute?" I asked.

   
"Oh, it's this hole in the wall where Mrs. Ellis drops the dirty clothes. They fall down to the basement, where she does the wash. Come on, let's look," Jane said.

   
We walked down the long hallway to the attic door. Next to it was a smaller door that looked like an oven. Jane pulled it open and looked inside. "No Mouse," she said.

   
"How did she hide in there? Didn't she fall down to the basement?" I asked.

   
"Oh. . . she can really hang on," Jane said.

   
"But the last time her mother caught her and she got it good!" Sondra told me.

   
"Where do you suppose she is?" I asked.

   
"Who knows?" Jane said.

   
Just then we all heard a scary noise.

   
Whooo whooo whooo

   
All three of us grabbed hold of each other and Sondra started laughing like crazy. Then Jane started. So I laughed as loud as they did. Even louder, to show I thought it was funny too.

   
Whooo whooo whooo

   
Jane pulled away and flung open the attic door.

   
Mouse shouted, "
BOO!
" and jumped out at us. "Ha ha. . . I really scared you!"

   
"Scared who?" I asked. "You think a little noise like that could scare us?"

   
"Yeah," Sondra said, "we all knew it was you."

   
"And besides that," I told Mouse, "you broke the rules. The attic is supposed to be off limits! You said so yourself."

   
"Yeah," Sondra and Jane said together.

   
I didn't want to play any more hide-and-seek after that, but Mouse promised not to scare us again. She said she'd even be It just to show what a good sport she was. So Sondra, Jane, and me hid while Mouse stood at the sink and counted up to one hundred-no cheating allowed.

   
I ran to Mrs. Ellis' room and hid inside her closet. My heart was thumping so loud I thought it might explode and that would be the end of me. I crouched in the corner and waited. I never know when to run for Home Base. Other kids get Home Free. Why don't I? I sat still for a long time. Why didn't Mouse come? Should I try for Home Base? I heard footsteps. So, she was finally going to have a look in her mother's room, I thought. It's about time.

   
The footsteps came closer and closer. I hid behind a long bathrobe. Maybe she wouldn't find me after all, and as soon as she was gone I could run for Home Base.

   
The closet door opened. I peeked out from behind the robe. All I saw were feet. They didn't belong to Mouse. They were much too big.

   
Whoever it was started moving the clothes around.