Abby and the Mystery Baby Read online

  The event started on time, as Vanessa stepped onto the stage, picked up the microphone, and greeted the audience (mostly made up of parents and friends of the writers) with a rendition of a couple of her favorite poems, which she’d memorized. She talked for a minute about various forms of poetry and prose and then went on to introduce the first “act,” which was the Pike triplets.

  They’d written a rap about — what else? — boogers and puke. But you know what? It was pretty good, actually. Or at least memorable. I noticed several audience members, Gram Elsie included, looking a little green at first. But by the end of the performance, everyone was laughing.

  The triplets were a tough act to follow, but David Michael did a terrific job reading his story about Prince Eli. After that, Melody Korman read her poem, and Maria Kilbourne told her fairy tale. I glanced at Miriam and saw that she knew the stories were about Daniel. She looked pleased and proud. Daniel, on the other hand, was sleeping soundly.

  Afterward, everyone agreed that the high point of the show was the play put on by Charlotte, Becca, Marilyn, and Carolyn. It was funny, well written, and even educational, and the acting was excellent. The best part was when Becca, dressed as a tree, sang a song about chlorophyll. I think Mary Anne even cried a little at that point. They received a standing ovation, three “curtain calls,” and first prize in the contest.

  Vanessa wrapped up the party by inviting everyone to stay for refreshments. Amazingly, by that time I was hungry (I thought I’d never eat again, after that brunch), and I joined my BSC friends by the food some parents had provided. Then we moved off to a corner to talk — about BSC Writing Month and how it was going to have to be an annual event; about Daniel and Miriam and how cool it was that Anna and I had discovered a new branch of our family tree; and about how happy we were that the mystery had finally been solved. There were only a few loose ends to be tied up. Erin, for one.

  “What about that nanny?” asked Stacey. “If she wasn’t connected with the mystery, why was she acting so weird?”

  I laughed, and so did Anna.

  “We figured that out,” I said. “On her last day, she explained everything. It turned out that even though she’d done a lot of child care — her references weren’t made up — this was her first real job as a nanny, and she was terrified. That’s why she always seemed so nervous.”

  “And by the way, she really did have a nephew named E. J.,” Anna chimed in. “She showed me pictures, and he does look an awful lot like Daniel.”

  “What about that lady in your writing class?” Kristy asked, turning to Jessi and Mal.

  Mal blushed, and Jessi looked down at her feet. “Well, it’s kind of embarrassing,” she said.

  “The thing is,” said Mal, “even though we should know by now that truth and fiction are two different things —”

  “We forgot for a little while,” said Jessi, finishing Mal’s sentence. “In fact, that woman never even had a baby to begin with. What she told the dry cleaner was true — she doesn’t have any children. The kid in her story was entirely made up.”

  We all laughed. “Wouldn’t you know it?” asked Mary Anne. “Here was one time when the real story was even wilder than anyone could have imagined. And on top of it all, there was a happy ending.”

  I gazed across the room at Miriam, who was holding Daniel close as she stood in the middle of a half circle made up of my mom and my grandparents. How lucky it was that we had all come together again! Mary Anne was right. This story really did have a happy ending.

  The author gratefully acknowledges

  Ellen Miles

  for her help in

  preparing this manuscript.

  About the Author

  ANN MATTHEWS MARTIN was born on August 12, 1955. She grew up in Princeton, New Jersey, with her parents and her younger sister, Jane.

  There are currently over 176 million copies of The Baby-sitters Club in print. (If you stacked all of these books up, the pile would be 21,245 miles high.) In addition to The Baby-sitters Club, Ann is the author of two other series, Main Street and Family Tree. Her novels include Belle Teal, A Corner of the Universe (a Newbery Honor book), Here Today, A Dog’s Life, On Christmas Eve, Everything for a Dog, Ten Rules for Living with My Sister, and Ten Good and Bad Things About My Life (So Far). She is also the coauthor, with Laura Godwin, of the Doll People series.

  Ann lives in upstate New York with her dog and her cats.

  Copyright © 1997 by Ann M. Martin

  Cover art by Hodges Soileau

  All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc. SCHOLASTIC, THE BABY-SITTERS CLUB, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.

  The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 557 Broadway, New York, NY 10012.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  First edition, February 1997

  e-ISBN 978-0-545-79313-1