June Jam Read online

  “Grab some straw,” Lucy said. “We’ll make him look fat!”

  They each brought an armful of straw and began filling the shirt and jeans.

  “Give him a big chest,” Brian said. “He’ll look like a giant!”

  Bradley found some rope, and they tied it around the scarecrow’s waist for a belt. They tied more around his wrists and ankles so the straw wouldn’t fall out. When they were done, the scarecrow looked almost real.

  “He’s cool!” Nate said. “Except for one thing. He needs a head.”

  “Wait a sec,” Bradley said. He ran into Polly’s stall. His pony was munching from her pail of oats. He patted her neck, then took the empty oats bag. It said OATS on one side, but the bag would make a perfect scarecrow head.

  He ran back to the others. “How’s this?” he asked.

  “Great,” Lucy said. “Stuff it with straw.”

  After the head was filled with straw, the kids tied it onto the frame with more rope.

  “It’s not very scary,” Brian said. “But I know how to fix that!” He raced out of the barn toward the house.

  “We could draw a scary face with Magic Markers,” Bradley suggested.

  “Let’s splash his face with red paint that looks like blood!” Nate said.

  Brian ran back into the barn. He showed the other kids a Halloween mask. The face had warts, snaggly teeth, a big scar, and one eyeball hanging out of its socket.

  “What do you think?” Brian asked.

  “Awesome!” Nate said.

  Bradley laughed. “Cool, Brian. Not even Dad will go in the garden when he sees this!”

  Brian tugged the mask over the stuffed oats bag.

  “Okay, let’s bring him outside,” Lucy said.

  The kids each took an arm or a leg, and they lugged the scarecrow into the garden. Josh, Dink, and Ruth Rose stared as the younger kids and the scarecrow moved through the barn.

  They used rope to tie the scarecrow to the fence.

  “That is so amazingly awesome!” Nate said.

  “It looks like someone I know,” Brian said. He closed his eyes, pretending to think. “Oh yeah! It looks like you, Bradley.”

  Bradley grinned. “Well, if it looks like me, then it looks like you, twin brother!”

  5

  Grandma’s Recipe

  The kids stood back and admired their scarecrow.

  “It would sure scare me if I was eating your garden!” Nate said.

  “Me too,” Lucy said. “The one we made in California looked a lot friendlier than this one does.”

  “I hope it keeps the mystery creature out of the garden,” Bradley said.

  “When do we get the ice cream?” Nate asked.

  “Later,” Bradley said. “But I’m really thirsty. Let’s go get a drink.”

  The kids trooped into the kitchen. The room smelled like spaghetti sauce. A pot was simmering on the stove. Pal was still asleep.

  Brian took a pitcher of lemonade from the fridge. Bradley found some cookies. They sat around the kitchen table for their snack. Pal woke up and waited for cookie crumbs to fall.

  “Maybe we could make Dad some cookies for Father’s Day,” Brian suggested as he munched. “He likes cookies.”

  Bradley shook his head. “He likes his mom’s strawberry jam better,” he said.

  Bradley saw the recipe box on the counter. On top of the box was the recipe for Grandma Pinto’s spaghetti sauce. He opened the box and flipped through the cards. “Here it is!” he said. He showed the card to the other kids as he read the directions out loud:

  “Uh-oh,” Brian said. “We’ve got a problem.”

  “What problem?” Nate asked.

  “We can’t use the stove,” Brian said.

  “Why not?” Lucy asked.

  “We’re not allowed to cook without a grown-up,” Bradley said.

  “So what’re we going to do?” asked Nate. “The recipe says to cook for ten minutes.”

  Bradley read the recipe again. “I say we leave that part out,” he said. “We do everything else, but no cooking.”

  “That should be okay,” Lucy said. “It’s not like strawberries have to be cooked, right?”

  Bradley slipped the card back into the box. “We probably won’t be able to make it anyway,” he said glumly. “Even if we do catch the mystery creature, we’ll never get enough strawberries!”

  “We could always give Dad an empty jar,” Brian said. “We could put a note inside that says, WE REALLY WANTED TO MAKE YOU SOME JAM, BUT SOMETHING ATE ALL THE BERRIES.”

  Bradley tossed a cookie crumb at his brother. “Brilliant, Brian,” he said. “Then when it’s our birthday, Dad will give us an empty box with a note inside.”

  They all laughed.

  Just then Josh, Dink, and Ruth Rose burst into the kitchen. They were dusty and sweaty from head to toe.

  “I hope you left us some lemonade and cookies,” Josh said.

  “There’s plenty left,” Bradley said. The younger kids gave up their seats and walked outside.

  “Look how the breeze makes the scarecrow seem like it’s alive,” Lucy said.

  They walked over to the garden. Bradley went inside the fence. He bent down near the strawberry patch. Then he screamed.

  “AHHHHH!”

  6

  Bradley’s Monster Trap

  “What’s wrong?” Brian, Nate, and Lucy shouted. They all ran into the garden.

  “LOOK!” Bradley said. He held up a strawberry. Something had taken a chunk out of it. “I know this one was perfect when we went in the house. I picked all the ones that had been bitten!”

  “I guess the mystery creature was snacking on this while we were snacking on cookies,” Brian said.

  “Mr. Scarecrow isn’t scary enough,” Lucy said.

  “What do we do now?” Nate asked.

  “We get smart!” Bradley said. He ran into the house and came back with the J encyclopedia book. He turned to the jungle section and flipped pages.

  “Um, what are you doing, bro?” Brian asked.

  “We need to set a trap!” Bradley said. He showed them a picture of some people digging a hole in the ground. Another picture showed them covering the hole with branches and big leaves. A third picture showed a large animal falling into the hole while the people hid and watched. The last picture showed the people cooking the animal over a fire.

  “We’re gonna catch a water buffalo and eat him?” Nate asked.

  “No, silly, we’ll dig a smaller hole,” Bradley said. “When we catch the creature, we’ll take him out to the woods and let him go.”

  Lucy looked at the fence around the garden. “I still don’t know how it got in here,” she said.

  “Maybe it’s invisible!” Nate whispered. “He could be standing next to us right now, licking his lips! His fangs are long and shiny, his claws are sharp, and he’s watching us!”

  “And you’re watching too much TV,” Lucy said. “Bradley, we need a shovel.”

  “I’ll get one,” Brian said, and ran toward the barn door.

  “Nate, can you find some thin branches or weeds to cover the hole?” Bradley asked.

  “Back in a flash!” Nate said as he took off.

  “Where should we dig the trap?” Brian asked when he returned with the shovel.

  “Near the strawberries,” Bradley said. “I’ll dig first.”

  They all took turns digging in the soft garden soil. Soon the hole was round and deep.

  Nate brought back a bunch of thin branches and weed stalks. The kids placed them across the hole carefully. Then Bradley sprinkled some garden mulch over the branches.

  “It looks just like the rest of the ground,” Lucy said.

  “I wonder what we’ll catch,” Nate said.

  “Whatever is eating the strawberries will never know there’s a deep hole under there,” Bradley said.

  “Mom and Dad won’t know there’s a hole, either,” Brian said. “If they step in it, they won’t be ve
ry happy.”

  “You’re right,” Bradley said. “So we’ll leave a note. Humans will know it’s a trap, but …”

  “THE MYSTERY CREATURE CAN’T READ!” the other kids yelled. They all did a quadruple high five in the garden.

  Bradley wrote a note and left it on a stick next to the trap. The note said: DANGER! ANIMAL TRAP. DO NOT WALK HERE! He set a fat, ripe strawberry in the middle of the trap.

  “Let’s wait in the barn,” Brian said.

  The air in the barn was much cooler than outside in the sun. The floor was swept clean, and the workbench was neat. Bradley set his encyclopedia on the bench.

  Polly the pony let out a loud whinny from her stall.

  “She looks lonely,” Lucy said. She ran over to pet the pony.

  “And dirty!” Nate said. “Look at her coat!”

  “It got real dusty in here when Josh and the guys were sweeping,” Bradley said. “The dust blew all over poor Polly!”

  “Let’s wash her,” Brian said. He went to the barn wall and turned on the spigot. Bradley picked up the hose and sprayed Polly’s coat.

  “There’s some pony shampoo and brushes on the shelf,” Brian told Nate and Lucy.

  Soon Polly’s coat was covered with shampoo suds. The kids washed her whole body, even her tail and mane and hooves. Then Bradley rinsed her off. “Let’s take her out in the sun,” he said.

  Bradley led Polly out of the barn. She shook her head, wetting them all with water flying off her mane.

  Brian brought a stack of old towels, and the kids wiped Polly until her coat gleamed.

  While Bradley was drying Polly’s back legs, he glanced into the garden. He looked at his trap, but nothing seemed disturbed. Then he looked again.

  “Oh no!” Bradley cried.

  “What’s wrong?” Lucy asked.

  “The mystery creature struck again!” Bradley said.

  7

  The Long Neck

  “What do you mean?” Nate asked. “The trap is just the way we left it. Nothing fell in, Bradley.”

  “It’s not the way we left it,” Bradley said. He opened the gate and ran into the garden. “I left a big strawberry right in the middle of it. Now look!”

  He held up what was left of the strawberry. A bite had been taken out of it.

  “I don’t believe it!” Brian said. He moved the branches aside and peered down into the hole. “Nothing’s down there.”

  “Something bit the berry without falling in!” Lucy said.

  “It has to be some kind of bird,” Nate announced. “It just flew in here, took a bite, then flew away again.”

  “I don’t think so,” Lucy said. “When birds peck at something, their beaks leave tiny holes.” She pointed at the strawberry Bradley was holding. “See, half the berry is gone, but there are no beak holes. Some creature took a real bite!”

  “Maybe it was something with a long neck,” Brian said. “It could reach its neck out and take a bite without stepping on the trap!”

  “Like what?” Bradley scoffed. “A giraffe?”

  Nate laughed. “No, a python!”

  “In Connecticut?” Brian asked.

  Lucy giggled. “Maybe it was an octopus.”

  “They don’t have necks,” Bradley said.

  “But they do have all those long arms!” Lucy answered. She waved her arms in the air.

  Bradley threw the damaged strawberry into the field behind the barn.

  He kicked a rock into the fence.

  “Now what do we do?” Nate asked again.

  “Now we get mad!” Bradley said.

  Just then Josh yelled from the house, “Lunch in five minutes, you guys! You too, Nate and Lucy!”

  “Great, I’m starving!” Nate said.

  “First we have to do something,” Bradley said. “Come with me.”

  He ran into the barn and over to the workbench. “Help me get this down,” he said.

  “What?” Brian asked.

  “Dad’s seine,” Bradley said.

  “What’s a seine?” Nate asked.

  “A big fishing net,” Bradley said. “It’s that rolled-up thing.”

  The kids tugged the net off the bench. It plopped down on the barn floor.

  “Our dad showed us how to catch minnows with this thing in the river,” Brian said. “It’s huge when it’s opened.”

  The kids unrolled the net onto the floor. It was a big square, ten feet by ten feet.

  “What’re we going to do with it?” Nate asked.

  “Cover the strawberries,” Bradley said. “Come on, let’s drag it outside.”

  The kids lugged the net through the door, through the gate, and into the garden.

  “First, let’s make sure there are no more bitten berries,” Bradley said.

  They found a few that had been bitten and threw them into the field.

  Then they each took a corner of the net and dropped it over the strawberry patch. Through the holes in the net, they could see several ripe strawberries.

  “Something could still crawl under the net,” Lucy said.

  “Not when we’re done,” Bradley said. “Get those bricks.”

  There was a pile of bricks in the corner of the garden. The kids each grabbed some, and they laid them on the edges of the net, all around.

  “Nothing is getting under there!” Brian said, wiping his hands on his shorts.

  “I hope you’re right,” Bradley said. “Let’s go eat!”

  Bradley, Brian, Nate, and Lucy ran across the yard and into the kitchen. Josh, Dink, and Ruth Rose were eating tuna sandwiches at the table. Pal was in his favorite spot, next to Josh’s feet.

  Four plates holding sandwiches sat on the counter. Near each plate were a napkin, a glass of milk, and two cookies.

  “Where are Mom and Dad?” Bradley asked Josh.

  “Dad went to get a haircut for Father’s Day,” Josh said. “And Mom is on a secret mission.”

  “Secret?” Brian said. “Cool, tell us!”

  “She didn’t even tell me,” Josh said. “Wash your hands, please.”

  “They’re clean,” Brian said. “We just washed Polly and our hands at the same time.”

  Josh inspected his little brothers’ hands. “Wash again now, please. Use a brush on those fingernails.”

  The four younger kids lined up at the sink and washed.

  “What’re you kids doing in the garden?” Dink asked.

  The four kids took turns explaining how some creature was biting and ruining the strawberries and some of the other stuff.

  “We built a scarecrow, but that didn’t work,” Lucy said.

  “Then we dug a hole in the ground and made a trap, but nothing fell in,” Nate said.

  “No matter what we try, the creature is still eating strawberries,” Bradley said.

  “What kind of creature?” Ruth Rose asked.

  “It has a big mouth,” Lucy said.

  “And a real long neck,” Nate said.

  “It’s real sneaky,” Brian added.

  “Sounds like Josh is your creature,” Dink said.

  Everyone laughed.

  After lunch, Bradley, Brian, Nate, and Lucy went back to the garden.

  They removed the bricks. They pulled the net off the strawberry patch.

  “I don’t believe it,” Bradley said. He fell onto his knees.

  Before lunch, at least ten strawberries had been perfect. Now five were bitten in half.

  8

  The Monster Is Smart, but Lucy Is Smarter

  “This is creeping me out,” Nate said. “No matter what we do, this … this … THING outsmarts us.”

  Lucy picked one of the chewed berries off the plant. “It seems like the creature waits till we’re gone before he gets the berries,” she said. “It could be watching us, waiting for us to leave.”

  “Yeah, but where is it?” Brian asked. “And how does it get inside the fence?”

  “Maybe it’s already inside the fence,” Bradley said.
He looked at the tomato plants, the zucchini plants, and the other stuff his parents had planted. “Maybe it’s hiding!”

  “Then we’ll find it!” Brian said. “Let’s check everything inside the fence.”

  The kids searched the garden, turning over every leaf on every plant. The only creatures they found were tiny bugs and one little toad.

  “Toads are good in gardens,” Lucy said. “They eat insects.”

  Nate held the small toad in his hand. “Could this be our monster?” he asked.

  “No, his mouth is way too small,” Lucy said.

  “We might as well give up,” Brian said.

  “You can if you want,” Bradley said. “But I’m not stopping till I find this berry-biting monster. I’ll stay here forever if I have to!”

  “Till you’re old and gray?” Nate asked.

  “Yep,” Bradley said.

  “Even when it snows in December?” Brian teased.

  “Yeah, I’ll build an igloo and sit in it all winter!” Bradley said, trying not to smile.

  “I have an idea,” Lucy said.

  The three boys looked at her.

  “If this creature is watching us, maybe we can play a trick on him!” she said.

  “How do we do that?” Brian asked.

  “We pretend to leave the garden,” Lucy said. “But we don’t really go away, we just hide. Maybe we’ll catch him in the act!”

  “But if we can see the creature, the creature can see us,” Bradley said. “There’s no place in this garden to hide.”

  “We can make something,” Lucy said. She picked up one end of the net. “In your encyclopedia you showed us those men who dug a deep hole for the buffalo. Remember the picture that showed the men hiding in some bushes and tall weeds? We can do the same thing!”

  “Um, there are no tall weeds,” Nate said. “We pulled them all up, remember? And we never got our ice cream, either.”

  “Watch,” Lucy said. She grabbed some of the weeds from the pile they’d made. She wove the weed stems through the holes in the net. She added more weeds, weaving them in and out.

  “I see what you’re doing!” Bradley said. “It’s camouflage, like army guys use when they’re hiding!”

  “When we’re done, we can hide behind it,” Lucy said. “The creature won’t be able to see us.”