Bookworm Buddies Read Online Free PDF

a book. It was Tracy’s lost book! How in the world did she get it? wondered Molly.
    “Tracy, this book was turned in to the library by Mrs. Swenson, who lives in the neighborhood. She found it on the lawn. I believe it was taken out on your card.”
    Tracy turned bright red. But she was smiling. She might have been careless, but she had her book back! She didn’t have to sell any more Halloween costumes!
    Tracy thanked Mrs. Peters and put the book into her new book bag. Mrs. Peters talked about carelessness.
    Rat’s knees, thought Molly. One down and two to go. It was not likely that Mrs. Swenson would come up with her book or Tim’s. They were probably gone forever.

CHAPTER 9
Time Is
Running Out
    “ W ell, that’s a relief,” said Mary Beth on the way home. “Tracy was lucky.”
    Molly could not keep the bad news inside any longer. “Skippy ate my book!” she said. “Now I have to pay for it.”
    Mary Beth stopped walking. “How could he eat a book?” she asked. “Dogs don’t eat paper.”
    “He did,” said Molly. It didn’t matter how or why.
    “Well, we’re back where we started,” said Mary Beth. “I’ll go home and think of what we can do.”
    When Molly got home she went up to her room and sat at her desk. She started to doodle in her notebook. She wrote more rhymes because it made her feel better. She wrote a poem about spring, and one about school. Then—because Skippy was on her mind—she wrote one about pets. She was so busy finding a word to rhyme with
terrier
that she forgot all about the book. It was fun to rhyme! The pet poem turned out the best, and Molly liked it. She drew a fancy frame around it with her crayon.
    All week Molly read books and wrote reports. And all week she worried about how to earn money to pay the librarian.
    “I have an idea!” said Mary Beth, on the phone on Monday. “Let’s have a garage sale!”

    “You need a lot of stuff for a garage sale,” said Molly. “A garageful of stuff. Or people won’t come.”
    “I suppose so,” said Mary Beth. “All I’ve got is that Halloween stuff. Maybe we should look for jobs. Most people earn money from their jobs. We could look at the want ads and go to work.”
    “We aren’t old enough,” said Molly sensibly.
    “We could use makeup and wear my sister’s high heels,” said her friend.
    “We still wouldn’t look like sixteen!” said Molly. “And they would probably want a note from our parents. Our mothers wouldn’t lie.”
    “We may just have to tell Mrs. Nelson, and take out a loan or something,” said Mary Beth.
    Molly didn’t like that idea at all. Still, timewas running out. The ruined books would be due soon at the library, and then what?
    “I saw a book at the library called
101 Ways to Earn Money in Your Spare Time
,” said Molly. “I’m going to check it out.”
    But when Molly asked Mrs. Nelson for the book, she said it was out.
    “It’s a very popular book,” said the librarian. “All the Pee Wees have been asking for it. I’ll call you when it comes in.”
    When it came in, Mrs. Nelson did call her, and Molly checked it out. Molly read it from cover to cover. Why did everyone want it? she wondered. All that was in it were instructions for making pots and dishes out of clay. There wasn’t time for that.
    Just when Molly thought earning money for the books was hopeless, the phone rang. It was Tim.
    “Guess what?” he said. He didn’t giveMolly time to guess. He said, “We’ve got this great big apple tree in our yard.” He paused. Then he said, “A-p-p-l-e. Apple.”
    Tim could spell
apple
! It was longer than
stop
! That was good news!
    “The tree has a million apples on it,” he went on. “Big red ones. R-e-d. Red.”
    Molly sighed. This was not solving her problem.
    “My mom made all these pies and stuff and gave lots of the apples to the neighbors and my aunt, but there are still zillions. My uncle picked them and put them in grocery sacks.”
    Molly was getting