Free The Penderwicks on Gardam Street by Jeanne Birdsall Page A

down. “And I’m truly interested in writing a science essay about—what’s it supposed to be about?”
    “How Science Has Changed Our Lives.”
    “I could write one of those. I could write a dozen of them without blinking. But can you write a play without any tra-las or ha-has?”
    “Of course.”
    “Then, have at it.” Skye dumped her Aztec books on Jane’s desk. “Oh, and no Sabrina Starr.”
    “Of course not.” Jane opened the first book, eyes shining.
    A half hour later, Skye tossed aside her pen triumphantly. Her essay—
Antibiotics as the Ultimate Warriors
—was a winner, well written, with just the right amount of science thrown in. She was dying to show it off, but Jane was still writing feverishly, happily lost in Aztec land. Skye would leave her to it. She grabbed her binoculars and slipped out onto the roof.
    Lights were shining in the houses up and down Gardam Street. It took great strength of will not to point the binoculars at one of the lit windows, and Skye actually did—but just for a second—point them at the Geigers’ house, but Nick happened at that very moment to be looking out his window, and she knew if he caught her spying he’d kill her, so that was the end of that. Instead, she looked up into the sky, clear now, for the earlier clouds had blown away, and searched for geometrical patterns formed by the stars. She particularly wanted to find a rhombus, which was her latest favorite shape. A square askew. What could be more interesting than that?
    Then there was a thump, and Skye was no longer alone on the roof. She lowered her binoculars and saw a large orange cat several feet away. He must have come up the tree just like Tommy had.
    “Go away,” said Skye, sick of interlopers.
    The cat turned his head slowly toward her. He had large yellow eyes and a look almost intelligent, if you believed that cats could be. Skye didn’t. She had as much use for cats as she did for babies.
    “You can’t stay here,” said Skye. “Go away or I’ll make you.”
    The cat, without taking his eyes off her, calmly sat down and began to wash his left paw. So make me, he was saying. Skye couldn’t ignore such a clear challenge, especially from a cat. Carefully she slid along the roof—closer—closer—but just as she was about to grab the intruder, he jumped lightly into her lap.
    “Idiot,” she said, but she put her arms around him and was surprised at how nice he felt there.
    Now she saw that he was wearing a collar with a tag that read MY NAME IS ASIMOV AARONSON. So Iantha did have a cat, after all. Batty had said so, but she was always making up stuff. Well, thought Skye, Asimov was going to have to get off her roof, even if he did belong to an astrophysicist. But before she could decide how much force was needed to move such a big cat, he’d settled in her lap as though he meant to stay awhile. And when he started purring, Skye went back to looking for rhombuses through her binoculars, and time passed pleasantly until the lights of the stars were outshone by the lights of her father’s car returning home.
    “Now you really do have to leave, Asimov,” said Skye.
    Asimov, who seemed determined to impress Skye with his brain power, obediently climbed off her lap, lightly leapt from the roof to the tree, and disappeared into the night.
    “And don’t come back!” Skye called after him, just as determined not to be impressed, then crawled back through the window into her bedroom. Jane, surrounded by piles of crumpled paper, was still scribbling furiously.
    “They’re home from the rink,” said Skye.
    “I’ve got the first few pages of the play already. The title is
Sisters and Sacrifice,
and here’s how it starts:
Long ago in the land of the Aztecs, there was great worry. The rain had not come for many months, and without the rain, the maize didn’t grow, and without the maize, the people starved.
”
    “That’s nice. We should go downstairs now.”
    “Nice? That’s all you