Free On the Road to Mr. Mineo's by Barbara O'Connor

supposed to catch him?
    â€¢ And what would they do with him if they did catch him?
    So many problems that Stella hadn’t thought of.
    Stella wasn’t nearly as good at thinking of problems as Gerald was.
    Now she was running home to get her bike.
    Gerald was supposed to get his bike and meet her out front. He wished he hadn’t eaten that dough ball. He clutched his stomach and plodded over to where his bike was propped against the fence along the driveway.
    He couldn’t stop himself from looking at those pale pink words.
    W ORMY L IVES H ERE
    The dough ball felt like a cannonball in his stomach.
    He pushed his bike up the driveway toward the road, one heavy step at a time.
    Clomp
    Clomp
    Clomp
    Stella was waiting out front, sitting on her dented bike, her curls standing up like springs on top of her head. She grinned at him.
    â€œLet’s go!” she hollered as she pedaled up Waxhaw Lane.
    Gerald glanced over his shoulder at the garage behind his house.
    How he longed to go back up there and sit in the lawn chair and play cards all day.
    Instead, he climbed onto his bike and pedaled slowly after Stella.

 
    CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
    Little Brown Dog
    Ethel ignored the car honking behind her. She was not going to speed up. She was looking for the little brown dog, scanning the roadsides and fields and yards.
    Every once in a while, she asked Amos, “See anything?”
    He would utter a grumbly “No.”
    She stuck her arm out the window and motioned for the car behind her to go around. The car roared by, sending up a swirl of dust.
    Ethel made a hmmph sound.
    Amos mumbled a cuss word.
    â€œKeep your eye out for that pigeon, too,” Ethel said. “If we see the pigeon, that dog is liable to be nearby.”
    They drove through neighborhoods and up dirt lanes and down bumpy gravel roads. They drove behind gas stations and circled parking lots and wove through trailer parks.
    But they didn’t see the little brown dog.
    Or the one-legged pigeon.
    Amos kept asking Ethel what she was going to do if she found the dog, and Ethel kept saying, “Don’t worry about it.” Actually, she wasn’t really sure what she would do if she found the dog. She just wanted to make sure he was okay.
    â€œLet’s go drive around the lake,” she said, turning down the road to Mr. Mineo’s.
    When she got to the run-down bait shop, she pulled into the parking lot.
    â€œGo see if it’s open,” she said to Amos. “Maybe Mr. Mineo has seen something.”
    â€œAw, that old guy ain’t never here,” Amos said. “Anybody that wants to fish is better off digging their own dang worms.”
    But he got out and shuffled across the parking lot to the bait shop.
    He tried the door.
    Locked.
    He knocked on the window.
    Nothing.
    He climbed back into the car, grumbling something about wanting to go home.
    But Ethel wanted to find the little brown dog.

 
    CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
    Edsel’s Hunk of Junk (Again)
    On the road to Mr. Mineo’s, Luther and Edsel heard a familiar noise coming from under the hood of Edsel’s white delivery van.
    Sort of a whirrrrrr-clunk-clunk noise.
    Then swirls of dark gray smoke twisted into the air like little tornadoes on each side of the hood.
    â€œGol-dern criminy cripes,” Edsel muttered. “I’m ready to push this hunk of junk right into the lake and call it a day.”
    Luther didn’t say anything. He knew Edsel well. When that vein on the side of his neck started pulsing like that, it was better to keep quiet.
    The van putt, putt, putted to a stop.
    There was a slow sssssss , two puffs of gray smoke, and then nothing but the still summer air.
    The buzz of a fly.
    Luther clearing his throat.
    Edsel pounding the steering wheel.
    â€œThis gol-dern hunk of junk.”
    Luther and Edsel got out of the van. Edsel opened the hood. The loud squeak of metal echoed across the field of wildflowers on the other side