Although he hadn't slept well at all, Alan rose from his bed the moment he awoke. His parents were sitting in the dining room, a newspaper laid flat on the table between them. Their bleary eyes and morose expressions, and the strong smell of coffee, suggested that they had remained awake all night.

He took a glance at the paper, as if expecting to see a story about the break-in at Ballford Prep, but found nothing. It was too soon for the local newspaper to have picked up such a story, but there might be a late-breaking news flash on the Elwood Times Internet site.

He turned on the computer and browsed the site, but the information he found was succinct and no more helpful than what his parents had told him. "An intruder broke into Ballford Preparatory School on Friday night. The unknown person or persons succeeded in breaching the main entrance before being detected by a sensor that alerted the police. No suspects were taken into custody. Nothing of value was removed." That was the essence of it.

How could it have been Mansch? Alan asked himself. The man was far too smart to be thwarted so easily. Unless Mansch was indeed the culprit, and had enjoyed greater success than the school administrators were willing to divulge.

He was staring at the computer screen, deep in thought, when he noticed an old gray head peeping into the room. It was Mrs. McGrady, long-time cafeteria employee and good friend of the Powers family. He hadn't sensed her arrival.

"Good morning, Alan," she said sweetly. "How's my little cakeface?"

He hated it when she called him that. Apparently she had watched him try to eat cake as a toddler, and the image had never left her mind.

"I've been better," said Alan wearily.

He soon learned that Mrs. McGrady's business was not to his liking. "We're going to Ballford Prep to check on Tegan," his father told him. "You'll stay with Sarah while we're gone."

"Lovely," was Alan's sarcastic response.

"We'll have so much fun," gushed Mrs. McGrady, pinching Alan's cheek. "You can help me work on my new quilt."

"Mom, Dad," inquired Alan, "why are you going to see Tegan? Dr. Payne said she was all right."

"She may be frightened because of what happened last night," replied his mother. "We just want to lend a little support."

Alan's suspicions grew. He had been inside of Tegan's mind several times, and was sure that something as mild as a break-in wouldn't scare her.

Too tired to put up any resistance, he allowed Mrs. McGrady to take him away in her rusted old Chevy. "The kids don't visit me much anymore," she babbled. "The last one was Fern. She just showed up and asked if she could stay the night. I guess she was hiding from someone. I was lonely, so I let her stay."

"Uh-huh," Alan mumbled.

"The kids think I'm crazy, don't they?"

"Uh-huh."

The old woman's face drooped. "Oh, well. I've heard it said--who's crazier, the crazy person, or the crazy person who thinks the crazy person's crazy?"

Shortly Alan entered Mrs. McGrady's house, a compulsively tidy place of residence with blues posters adorning the walls and books about various philosophies and religions on the shelves. "Help yourself to whatever's in the refrigerator," she told him. "If you want to watch TV, I have a nice selection of children's DVDs."

He opened the refrigerator door and looked inside. Aside from the usual butter, eggs, and bread, he saw several plastic containers holding unrecognizable and unappetizing substances in various shades of red and brown. "So this is where mystery meat comes from," he realized.

Closing the refrigerator, he told Mrs. McGrady, "I'm not hungry. I think I'll go to Arthur's and hang out."

"Your parents told me not to let you out until they get back," said the lunch lady.

Alan was stunned. "Why not?"

"They didn't say."

Things were making less and less sense. Were his parents trying to protect him from someone? Did they think the thieves who had taken "nothing of value" from Ballford Prep would come after him?

With a sigh, Alan turned to the rack of children's movies next to the TV. He soon settled on an educational DVD which bore the tag line, "You think your piano teacher's tough--I've got Beethoven!"

----

The small auditorium was packed, and many students had to stand in the aisles. On the stage, Arthur and Mickie had taken up microphones in preparation for the historic debate that might decide who would lead the Lakewood Elementary student body. Principal Haney acted as moderator.

"The candidates will now answer questions from the audience," he announced.

Many hands went up, and Mr. Haney pointed at Molly. "As president, what would you do to make it easier for students to get to school?" asked the rabbit girl.

Mickie made a gesture with her hand, and the back wall of the stage split apart, revealing the presence of a shiny new PT Cruiser.

"Everybody gets a CAR!" she shouted to the cheering audience.

In reality, the debate was four days away, but Arthur was consumed with worries about what might go wrong.

"Let's pretend that D.W. is Mickie, and I'm the audience, and you're...er, Arthur," said Beat, who was coaching the boy through a debate simulation.

"Can I be the audience, too?" came a tired-sounding voice. Grandpa Dave had emerged from the guest bedroom, propelling himself on a walker.

"Sure, Grandpa," said Arthur, helping the old man to seat himself on the couch.

"Question number one," Beat began. "As president, what would you do about the cracks in the stairs leading to the school entrance? Mickie? Er, Mickie?"

"Oh, that's me," said D.W., snapping to attention. "Uh, I would invite Justin Timberlake to sing at a concert, and with the money from the tickets I would pay for the stairs to be fixed."

"Thank you, Mickie. Arthur?"

The aardvark boy cleared his throat. "I would round up some volunteers, and go door to door raising funds to patch up the stairway."

"Thank you, Arthur."

"I have a question," said Grandpa Dave. "What would you do about those women who show their belly buttons on TV?"

Arthur, D.W., and Beat stared blankly at him. Kate toddled through the room, with Pal nipping at her heels.

"Well, something's got to be done about it," the old aardvark man continued. "All this revealing clothing on women is taking the nation down the wrong path."

"Right," said Beat in an annoyed tone. "Next question. Do you think hall monitors should be introduced at Lakewood? Mickie?"

"The moral fabric of our great country is unraveling," Grandpa Dave interrupted. "I can see it right in front of me. Little girls are developing faster than they should. They don't want to wait until they're thirteen anymore."

"I didn't choose to be this way, you old coot," said Beat sharply.

Grandpa didn't seem to hear. "And those women on TV with their belly buttons," he rambled on. "It's revolting, I tell you."

"Let's go to your place," Arthur suggested to Beat.

----

"My wife died of a congenital heart defect," Mr. Haney recounted. "We knew when we were married that she might not have long for this world, but we hoped and prayed for the best. Sadly, we didn't get it."

At the Muffin Man cafe, the principal had met over coffee with Zoe Belnap, mother of triplets and new resident of the old Tibble house. It was a sunny, cloudless Saturday afternoon.

"I'm terribly sorry about your misfortune," said Zoe comfortingly. "It's painful to lose someone you love so much."

"I don't mean to pry," said Haney after a sip of coffee, "but you haven't told me about the circumstances of your husband's death."

Zoe hesitated, choosing her words carefully. "He died of a terminal illness."

"So it was a similar situation," Haney mused.

"The girls were fifteen months old," Zoe went on. "They never knew him."

"It must have been hard, raising them by yourself."

"It was. Money wasn't a problem. Work wasn't a problem. But the loneliness...oh, the loneliness."

Smitten with compassion, Mr. Haney put forth a hand and covered Zoe's fingers with it. The cat woman smiled wistfully.

----

Saturday afternoon continued to be sunny and cloudless. It was a perfect day for riding a bike or taking a dip in the pool, but Alan could do neither. His parents hadn't returned from their trip to Ballford Prep, and Mrs. McGrady forbade him to leave her house.

Desperate for something to distract him from thoughts of Prunella and Tegan, he took up the lunch lady's offer to teach him quilting. After a few stitches, however, his nose started to run--it appeared he was allergic to duck down. "Don't you have any cotton?" he asked.

"I'm allergic to the stuff," Mrs. McGrady replied.

It was almost dark, and he had endured almost unimaginable boredom, when his parents finally came to retrieve him.

"Thanks for watching our little boy, Sarah," said Mrs. Powers as she left the house with Alan in tow. It was something he hadn't heard her say to a babysitter for at least four years.

They drove away, but not in the direction of their house. "Tegan says hello," his father uttered glibly.

"Hello?" was Alan's incredulous response. "She'll never see me again, and all she has to say is hello?"

Mr. Powers answered nothing, but continued to drive. Within minutes they were on the entrance ramp to the highway.

"Where are we going?" Alan inquired.

"Oh, I guess I didn't tell you," his mother replied. "Aunt Frieda and uncle Larry called us yesterday for the first time in three months. They invited us to visit."

"But that's two hundred miles away," the bear boy pointed out.

"They said we can spend the night," said Mrs. Powers.

Alan began to wonder if he would ever see home again...

----

to be continued