Hidden in the Haunted School by Gertrude Chandler Warner

Author:Gertrude Chandler Warner
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Albert Whitman & Company
Published: 2016-03-23T04:00:00+00:00

That evening, Grandfather made his famous spaghetti. He had spent an hour standing over the bubbling pot of sauce before he left it to simmer on the stove. Each time one of the children entered the kitchen to offer their help, he shooed them away. “It’s a secret recipe!” he would say.

After dinner they made tapioca pudding for dessert. Benny had given Mrs. McGregor the idea after the Aldens returned from Hawthorne School. Benny told her all about the old menu. When he mentioned tapioca pudding, Mrs. McGregor took out a cookbook and showed him a picture of what looked like vanilla pudding filled with tiny, round blobs. Benny thought the pudding looked really funny, but he wanted to try it.

Now Mrs. McGregor set out the ingredients so the children could help make it. She showed them the package of tapioca, which looked like little white beads.

“Tapioca comes from the root of a South American plant called cassava,” she explained.

“I think I’ve had tapioca before,” Jessie said. “I had some bubble tea at the mall once, and there were little round pieces in it! They were soft, like jelly. It was weird but good!”

“Wow!” Benny said. Mrs. McGregor let him pour the beads into a measuring cup while she heated the milk for the pudding in a saucepan. Jessie cracked two eggs into a bowl and whisked them together.

“Violet,” Mrs. McGregor said, “will you get the sugar, vanilla, and salt?”

After a few minutes, Mrs. McGregor added the rest of the ingredients to the milk. Each of the Aldens took turns slowly stirring the mixture.

“Is it done?” Benny asked. He looked at the creamy pudding. It was now thick and filled with little translucent globes of tapioca.

“I think so,” Mrs. McGregor told him. She poured the pudding into a bowl and covered it with wax paper. Benny opened the refrigerator door, and Mrs. McGregor set the sweet pudding inside.

While they waited for the pudding to cool, Mrs. McGregor finished cleaning the kitchen and Grandfather went to read in the next room. Benny, Jessie, and Violet gathered around Henry while he showed them what he’d found online.

“I wanted to know more about Martha’s antique business,” he said. “So I went to the website listed on her business card.”

Benny pointed to a photo on the screen. “Those look like desks from Hawthorne School.”

“They sure do,” Henry said. “‘Original antiques from a historic Silver City building,’” he read aloud. “‘Will be in stock soon. No other dealer in town has these unique desks!’”

“Hmm,” Violet said. “‘No other dealer in town.’ Do you think Martha has been making the school seem haunted so that nobody else would find out about those old desks?”

“It’s a good theory,” Jessie agreed. “She didn’t want anyone to know she was interested in the desks. And she definitely didn’t want other antique dealers to know about the school.”

“That must be why she didn’t want anyone to call the newspaper when we found the lesson on the old chalkboard,” Henry added. “I’m sure she doesn’t want the others to know about the furniture in the school.

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