"At night?" exclaimed Nicky. "No way."

"I didn't think so." I tried not to start shivering again. Who had been moaning and creaking around the pa.s.sage during the night-time thunderstorms?

"I'm sorry I scared you," said Nicky.

"It's okay. Really. Let's go back to your house. Your mom's going to be home soon."

"All right." Nicky looked as if I were going to lead him into a pit of vipers.

We left my house and headed back to the Pikes'. "Another thing/' I added as we walked along. "I don't know how safe the pa.s.sage is. Those stairs are old. So's the trapdoor." Nicky nodded glumly.

"Last thing," I said. "When your mother made up the two-block rule for you, I don't think she meant for you to go someplace where no one could find you. Thaf s just not a good idea. Okay?"

"Okay."

I took Nicky's hand. "Hey," I said. "Look at that. Your mom beat us home. Let's go tell her about your adventure."

Mrs. Pike had been surprised, to say the least, when she had come back and found that I wasn't there, but I explained the whole story to her, including the triplets' pranks. Mallory, luckily, had done just fine with her brothers. While I was chasing after Nicky, she had gotten them to clean up lunch and then had settled them into a game of Monopoly. They were extremely quiet and well-behaved when I returned. I was really impressed with Mallory.

Mrs. Pike and Nicky and I had a talk before I went home.

"I need a hideout," Nicky said, sounding the way people do when they talk about very important things, like food or money.

"I understand that, sweetie," said Mrs. Pike.

"Well," I spoke up, "I'll have to check with my mom, but it's all right with me if Nicky comes back to our pa.s.sage."

"It's all right with me, too," said Mrs. Pike after a moment, "as long as you tell an adult where you're going first, Nicky. And maybe someone should check the condition of the pa.s.sage."

"Yippee!" cried Nicky. "I just hope the triplets don't start going there."

"Believe me, they won't," said his mother.

"How do you know?" asked Nicky.

"Because I'm about to have a little talk with them."

Nicky turned to me, all smiles. "You," he said, "are my favorite baby-sitter in the whole wide world."

Chapter 15.

"So what movie do you guys want to watch?" I asked.

"Ghostbusters," said Kristy.

"Star Wars," said Claudia.

"Mary Poppins," said Stacey.

"Sixteen Candles," said Mary Anne.

"And I want to watch The Parent Trap," I said, looking woefully at the VCR.

It was Sat.u.r.day night. The members of the Baby-sitters Club were crowded into my living room. We were having a slumber party. Upstairs, sleeping bags were spread over every inch of the floor of my bedroom. The bathroom was a disaster area. It looked like a makeup tornado had ripped through it. (But our faces looked great. Stacey and Claudia had practiced on all of us.) We had finished supper, and now we were settling in for a long night in front of the VCR.

"Maybe we could watch all of them/' suggested Claudia.

"Well," I said, "let's see. If each one is about two hours long - "

"Mary Poppins is longer, I think," said Stacey.

"But Sixteen Candles is shorter," Mary Anne pointed out.

"An average," I said. "Just an average. What I was going to say is that that comes to about ten hours of movies. It's nine o'clock now. That would take us right up to seven in the morning."

We laughed.

"Let's pick two," I said. "We'll vote on them."

Everyone voted for the movie she had suggested plus one other. We ended up with a five-way tie. In the end, Kristy drew two of the movies out of a hat. (After all, she's the club president.) The winners were Sixteen Candles and Ghostbusters.

Mary Anne was jubilant. She'd brought two copies of Sixteen magazine with her, and there was an article about Cam Geary, the love of her life, in it. Cam Geary and Sixteen Candles created a really prime evening for Mary Anne.

We watched Ghostbusters first. Much as I like The Parent Trap, I have to admit that Ghostbusters is pretty funny. My favorite part is when that giant marshmallow guy bursts. I think it's Kristy's favorite part, too. As soon as he exploded, she said, "I'm starving! Let's toast marshrnallows, Dawn. Or make s'mores."

"Kristy, we don't have stuff like that at my house. It's junk food."

Kristy and Claudia glanced at each other. "Be right back," they said, and ran upstairs.

They returned holding a bag of marshrnallows, some candy bars, a box of graham crackers, a bag of potato chips, a supply of M&M's and some crackers.

"Pig-out time!" said Kristy. "I hope you don't mind, Dawn. We can't have a slumber party without this stuff. It isn't normal." She tossed the crackers to me. "Those are for you and Stacey," she said.

Stacey and I looked at each other. We made faces. But then we couldn't help laughing. It was kind of funny.

"Where'd you get all that?" I asked.

"Mary Anne and Claudia and I bought it this afternoon," said Kristy. "We thought it might be a good idea to come prepared. Don't worry, we paid for it ourselves, not out of the club treasury."

Kristy pressed the pause b.u.t.ton on the VCR and Bill Murray froze in action. "Quick! Let's make the s'mores before the movie comes back on!" she cried.

Kristy grabbed the marshmallows.

Mary Anne grabbed the graham crackers.

Claudia grabbed the Hershey's bars.

The three of them tore off, leaving Stacey and me behind in a trail of dust (so to speak).

"Boy," I said, "Just because we don't eat that junk of theirs."

"Really," agreed Stacey. "I feel like a leper."

"I feel like a nerd."

"We shouldn't, though," said Stacey. "They're the ones who're going to end up with pimples/'

I giggled. "Let's get them."

"Pimples?"

"No! I mean, I have a plan. We'll get back at Kristy and the others. Remember our search for a secret pa.s.sage?"

Stacey nodded.

"Well, I found one."

"No."

"Yup."

"Honest?"

"Cross my heart. So here's what I think we should do."

I leaned over and began to whisper to Stacey. We had just finished planning, when Kristy and Claudia and Mary Anne came back. They were eating these gooey concoctions and had chocolate all over their fingers. Every time they took a bite of their s'mores, the melted marsh-mallow would string out between their mouths and hands.

Stacey and I had a hard time keeping straight faces. Somehow, though, we made it through the rest of Ghostbusters without giving anything away.

As soon as the movie was over, Mary Anne dove for the rewind b.u.t.ton. "Time for Sixteen Candles/' she said.

"Why don't we watch it later?" I suggested casually. "Wouldn't it be fun to watch it at, like, one or two this morning?"

"Yeah!" said Kristy enthusiastically. (I knew I could count on her. She loves to stay up late.) Mary Anne looked disappointed, but she didn't want to argue with the rest of us.

"Let's go up to my room for awhile," I said. "You know Cam Geary's girlfriend, Mary Anne?"

"Come Lalique?" she replied immediately.

"Yeah. I bet with a little more make-up I could make you look just like her."

"Really? Oh, hey, great!"

Mary Anne was the first one upstairs. The rest of us followed. After we'd worked on her for awhile, I said, "Boy, am I thirsty."

"Oh, me, too," chimed in Stacey.

"So am I," said the others at once. (It figured, after all that sugar.) "I'll go get some sodas," I said. "Come with me, Stace. Okay?"

"You have soda?" asked Claudia skeptically. "Or do you mean Perrier or sparkling, saltless mineral water from an artesian well or something?"

I tried not to sound sarcastic. "Yes, we have soda. Real soda. Mom bought it for the party. One hundred percent sugar."

"Good," said Claudia, not cracking a smile.

"Come on, Stace."

We ran downstairs. It was time to put our plan into action.

"What's your mom going to say?" asked Stacey nervously.

"Nothing," I replied. "I warned her when we went upstairs before. And Jeff's already in bed, so we don't have to worry about him. Unless the screaming gets too loud."

Stacey laughed. She and I stopped in the kitchen for flashlights. We turned them on, aimed the beams out the back door, and crept outside as quietly as possible. I led Stacey into the barn, shoved aside the bale of hay, and showed her the trapdoor. We lowered ourselves down the ladder.

"I don't believe it," whispered Stacey slowly. "This is awesome."

"Are you scared?" I asked. I hadn't told her about Jared Mullray.

"Not really. I'm not wild about the dark, but . . . let's go!"

When we'd climbed the flight of stairs and turned the corner, we paused to listen. Very faintly we could hear the voices of Mary Anne, Claudia, and Kristy.

"Now?" whispered Stacey.

"Now," I replied. "And when they've had enough, just follow me."

"Okay."

Stacey rapped lightly on a wall of the pa.s.sage. I scratched on another.

We paused. The girls were still talking.

"Louder," I whispered.

We rapped and scratched more loudly. The talking stopped, then started again.

"Closer," I suggested.

We crept down the pa.s.sage. Our friends' voices grew louder.

Rap, rap. Rap, rap, rap.