Romeo Blue Read Online Free Page A

pajamas, Fliss.” Ever since he had entered eighth grade, Derek loved slang. And I did too. I was awfully curious about the cat’s pajamas . I pictured a cat wearing flannels covered with cowgirl hats and stars. I hoped it was a good thing to be the cat’s pajamas .
    I was thinking about that when the phone rang, which was a rarity at the Bathburn house. I knew Gideon used to ring up Washington when we were out. The whole family knew all about Gideon’s work — not his work at school as a teacher but his secret work with Mr. Donovan in Washington. It was the same kind of work Winnie and Danny did. Every time the phone rang I thought of them, because they were missing and lost and we hadn’t heard from them in months. How I longed for Winnie andDanny still. How my longing followed me about the way the wind seemed to follow me sometimes.
    Usually I had to race with Miami to answer the phone on the landing but she was in the gymnasium upstairs arguing with Uncle Gideon while he stood on his head. “Well,” Uncle Gideon was saying, “Henley should pop the question now so we can have the wedding before Christmas, when I have to go overseas.”
    I would have rushed to the phone but now I stood frozen in the hall, frozen hearing those words, when I have to go overseas . I was frozen, suddenly thinking of Captain Bathburn’s ship in 1855, which finally came home, finally sailed over the horizon and into port. It was pure white, they said, frozen solid. The masts and sails all covered in ice. It was like a ghost ship, arriving eight weeks late in the middle of winter. But it had made it, with Captain A. E. Bathburn and half of his crew still alive and on board.
    Two things were happening at once now. Gideon was going overseas at Christmastime? At Christmas ? And the phone was ringing.
    I finally picked up the receiver. “Hello,” I said.
    “Oh, Flossie, it’s Brie. Derek’s cousin Brie,” the voice said.
    “Well, actually, I’m your cousin too,” I said. “And my name is Flissy, not Flossie.”
    “Oh, I never thought of you that way. I mean as a cousin. I guess because of your accent and you being soforeign and everything. Flossie is cute, don’t you think? Is Derek there? I’m inviting him to the autumn dance.”
    I held the receiver in my hand. It was very heavy and instead of answering Brie, I kind of dropped it on the small table and went off to find Derek.
    I passed Aunt Miami on the stairs as she rushed by, her silky chiffon skirt fluttering past me in a whirlwind. “Gideon will be going overseas right before Christmas. Mother! Where’s The Gram?” she said and she seemed to swirl and dissolve in soft silk and tears.
    “And Brie’s inviting Derek to the dance. She’s just rung up,” I called.
    Aunt Miami didn’t answer. She seemed to lift up and disappear down the hall, past moving curtains and fluted shadows, past paintings of Captain A. E. Bathburn’s staring daughters. Then I heard her crying in the kitchen and The Gram too.
    I went on up to fetch Derek from his room. He was studying a map of Europe in there, looking at France. I opened the door. “Gideon’s going to Europe before Christmas,” he said without turning round.
    “But that’s where the war is,” I said. “Why would he go there now? I’ve been in the midst of that, Derek. It’s dreadful. Everyone at school thinks we’re not very safe here in Maine either, because of the coast. We don’t even know what’s lurking in the waters. The Bagley family moved back to Illinois because they thought the coast was too dangerous. Oh, Derek, everything is changing. Idon’t want Uncle Gideon to go. Must he? And I don’t want you to go away with your father either or even talk to him. None of the others want you to answer him.”
    “I don’t know what they’re worried about,” he said. “But whatever I decide, it’s up to me now. I don’t want them to know any more about it. Okay?”
    “Brie is on the phone, Derek. She wants to