Free The Tunnel of Hugsy Goode by Eleanor Estes Page A

spilling out of the fork of the tree.
    Tornid came out, said (he speaks in a monotone, no ups and downs), said Sasha had eaten his tunnel supplies he'd saved from dinner on the ledge under the dining-room table, part of a pork chop—it was tough—and part of a baked potato, mostly peel.
    "The best part," I said. "Where are the
grils?
" I asked.
    "I dunno," he said. "Maybe over at Jane Ives's," he said.
    "Don't you think it's strange," I said, "that the
grils
haven't caught on to our work in the hidey hole? In and out of your house a dozen times a day while we are chipping and chiseling? How in the name of Sam Hill..."
    "Who's he?" asked Tornid.
    "A friend of John Ives," I said. "But I'll tell you why they haven't conned our top secret T. business. It's because they haven't opened the trap doors that seal their minds and let in the meaning of what's going on right under their noses. They have clues ... like, where we are all the time ... and they don't even know they have a clue. Yes. Some people are like that. Now, you and me, Tornid, we know a clue when we read, hear, see, or guess one. We may even see more clues than there really are. But that is better than not seeing any.... Sh-sh," I said. "
Grils
approaching."
    We lay down on our stomachs on the floor of the tree house and watched Tornid's two sister
grils
saunter to the Fabians' gate with Connie Ives, home from college for a few days. They stopped under Miss Alderman's tree, second only to Billy Maloon's in size, and they looked up at the drooping nest. Tornid and me watched them and we listened.
    "Are you home for the summer?" C.
gril
Beatrice asked.
    "Not yet," said Connie. "I will be on Decoration Day."
    Can you beat that? I tell you. That's one reason I'm aiming to go there—to college. You get to go late in September, and you get to come home the end of May. Neat. Tornid and me listened for clues, like Black-Eyes saying, for instance, "We know what Timmy and Nicky do with all their spare time ... they're..." And then she'd reveal the secret of the tunnel, if she knows it. But there were no clues. All the
grils
did was, they brought Connie up to date on Alley news, like about the white-bellied squirrel, the cross-eyed cat named King, and the visitor raccoon. Yechh! We had wanted to tell Connie about all those neat things.
    Then the talk veered off onto sounds in the Alley houses. Me and Tornid pricked up our ears. Blue-Eyes said, "Sometimes in the nighttime I hear strange sounds, Connie, funny little noises. Mommy says they may be mice, or sparrows in the ivy talking in their sleep.... But I wish they wouldn't do it."
    "Yez," said black-eyed
gril.
"And Mommy zayz maybe it'z juzt the oldnezz of the houzez ... and they creak. Zazha hearz the zoundz, too, and zee getz zcared and zee crawlz into bed with Mommy and zhakez. Izzy and I, we keep our door clozed and the door into the attic clozed zo nothing can get out at uz. I zleep on the zide of the bed that iz farthezt from the attic. That'z fair becauze Izzy iz one year older. That iz fair, izn't it, Connie?"
    "Zoundz fair," said Connie.
    Yechh. Now she's got Connie, a girl in college, contaminated into using a "z" where an "s" belongs. Next thing everybody'll be doing it—these things are catching.
    Then LLIB came along. He'd heard part of the talk. "And, yeah," he said. "But I know who really makes all those sounds ... it's a guy named Jimmy Mannikin ... lives down below.... Sometimes you hear him chipping on his work ... banging pipes, banging walls..."
    We didn't hear the rest of LLIB's theories because everyone sauntered away. "Come on, Tornid," I said. "If LLIB can hear us chipping, soon someone else will. No time to lose."
    We slid out of the tree house and hopped in the hidey hole and located our word TRATS. NO one had erased it or added their two cents. Above, in the kitchen, Tornid's mom was ironing. She had the television on. Her television is in the living room in plain view from almost every