Read Online A Traitor Among the Boys by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor - Free Book Online

together and didn't reply. She didn't want her family so disgusted with her that they wouldn't even come to the performance. Down in her heart of hearts, however, she knew that she was perhaps the most precocious child in Buckman and that some day, when she was a famous actress, people would be standing in line for her autograph.
    She dressed for school and tried not to say anything else that would upset Beth. Eddie seemed restless, however. Plays did not interest her very much. Shelonged to be doing something more active, and baseball season still seemed a long way off.
    But all that restraint on Caroline's part was a little too much, and when she slid into her seat behind Wally, she could not resist poking him a little with her ruler and saying, “Good morning, Clyde! Are you going to send me flowers?”
    “Huh?” said Wally, turning around.
    “Flowers! For being in the play.”
    “Why would I send you flowers?” said Wally, and faced forward again.
    Poke, poke. This time she poked him with her pencil.
    “What?” Wally snapped, turning again.
    “Do you suppose we'll still be in plays together when we're in high school?”
    “You mean you'll still be around when we're in high school?” Wally asked in despair.
    “I don't know. I just mean if we are.”
    “No,” said Wally. “I don't ever plan to be in a play again the rest of my entire life. And I will never, ever send you flowers.”
    “Oh,” said Caroline.
    ▪
    It was cold at recess and Caroline's throat felt a little scratchy, so she stayed in the shelter of the door and didn't venture out into the yard. Actresses had to be careful of so many things. It was amazing all the things you had to think about when you became an actress.
    “Class,” said Miss Applebaum. “I hope you are all planning to go to the grand birthday celebration ofour town tomorrow. Sometimes we think about history only in terms of our country—the leaders who made it great—and we forget that even little towns like ours have a history—somebody, sometime, had to start the ball rolling and think about what our community might become. Everyone who attends one of the festivities this weekend will get an extra ten points for the unit. And that includes the play, The Birth of Buckman, in which two members of our class will star—Wally Hatford and Caroline Malloy.”
    What does she mean, mentioning Wally! Why, he doesn't even have any lines! Caroline thought. She started to stand up and take a bow, and then remembered what her mother had said about humility and decided she'd better stay seated.
    ▪
    Everyone was excited at rehearsal that night, because it was the final rehearsal before the performance and the players came in costume. Caroline wore a silver brooch at the collar of her high-necked blouse, and Mrs. Malloy piled Caroline's dark hair on top of her head and fastened it with a tortoiseshell comb.
    Beth, however, looked even more beautiful in a long, soft blue dress with lace on the sleeves. A little spray of blue artificial flowers was tucked into her blond hair.
    It was almost enough, Eddie declared, to make her want to be in the play so that she could look beautiful, but not enough to make her go onstage and act stupid.
    Caroline was very quiet as Mr. Malloy drove them to the old theater that evening. What she was feelingwas tired. All the excitement and stress of the past two weeks, all the evening rehearsals, were beginning to show, and she didn't have her usual spunk. But when she got up on the stage and saw Tracy Lee watching from the seats below, just waiting to spring onstage and take over if anything happened to Caroline, she performed with every ounce of energy she had, and the director told her it was one of her finest performances.
    “Just do that well tomorrow night,” she told her, “and you will never have done better.”
    The set was finished, the paint was dry, the old-time furniture collected and placed onstage, and as all the players left the theater