Otis Spofford Read Online Free PDF Page B

Otis. “I don’t see why we can’t have hot dogs and ice cream every day.” He gloomily handed the cashier his money. Twenty perfectly good cents wasted, he thought, as he carried his tray to a table. Scalloped potatoes and Swiss chard! Otis carefully picked the meat out of his potatoes and ate that first.
    “I’m sure glad I brought my lunch,” said Tommy, who was sitting across from Otis, eating the centers out of his sandwiches.
    “You’re lucky,” agreed Otis, poking at his Swiss chard. “I don’t see why this stuff would even be good for a rat.”
    Hey, wait a minute, Otis suddenly thought. He was about to have an idea. He could feel it coming on. This might be very good food for a rat. If he gave Mutt good food, without anybody’s seeing him, Mutt might outgrow Pinky. That would really fix the experiment, because everybody would think it was white bread and soda pop that had made Mutt grow. He could just see Mrs. Gitler’s face. And boy, oh, boy, the cafeteria would have to start serving soda pop! That was the best part of all. Soda pop in the cafeteria!
    Otis was so pleased with his inspiration that he ate his beets and Swiss chard without even thinking about them. It was a perfect idea. Difficult, of course, but worth it. Already he could see cases of orange and pink and green soda pop stacked in the cafeteria. Now all he had to do was figure out what to feed Mutt and how to slip the food to him without being seen.
    That evening Otis went into the kitchen, where his mother was preparing dinner. She was in a hurry, because she had got home late from the Spofford School of the Dance. Otis watched her drop a slab of frozen peas into boiling water and put two frozen cubed steaks into a frying pan. “I’m hungry,” he said. “We had an awful lunch at school today.”
    The peas boiled over onto the stove. “Run along, dear, and don’t bother me,” said Mrs. Spofford, wiping up the stove. “Mother has been teaching tap dancing all afternoon and she’s tired.”
    Otis leaned against the refrigerator. “Say, Mom, isn’t there something that’s better for people to eat than scalloped potatoes?”
    Mrs. Spofford forked two potatoes baking in the oven. “Why, almost anything, I suppose. Milk and cheese and—oh, I don’t know. Lots of things.”
    Cheese! Of course! Rats liked cheese. He should have thought of that himself. Otis helped himself to a piece of cheese from the refrigerator. Then he noticed a bottle of vitamin pills on the drain board. “Say, Mom, can I have some vitamins?” he asked.
    “Yes, dear. Now please run along,” said Mrs. Spofford, as she turned the flame down under the meat.
    Otis added a handful of vitamin pills to the piece of cheese in his pocket. Cheese and vitamins. They ought to make Mutt grow. Now all he had to do was to find a way to slip them into Mutt’s cage without being seen. That was the hardest part of his plan.
    When Otis arrived at school early the next morning, he found the door of Room Eleven locked. In a few minutes Mrs. Gitler appeared with the key in her hand. “Good morning, Otis,” she said. “My, aren’t you bright and early?”
    “I…uh…thought I’d come early and study my spelling,” Otis explained. If only Mrs. Gitler would unlock the door and go away.
    “Splendid,” said Mrs. Gitler, giving Otis a surprised look. Or was it a suspicious look? Otis couldn’t tell.

    When Mrs. Gitler was busy writing some arithmetic problems on the blackboard, Otis left his desk and went to the rats’ cages. Mutt was huddled miserably in a corner. Otis put his hand in his pocket and broke off a piece of cheese.
    “Otis,” said Mrs. Gitler, without even turning around to look at him, “if you aren’t going to study your spelling, you must go out on the playground until the bell rings.”
    Otis took his seat. He had said he had come early to study spelling, so he supposed he had to sit there with a book in front of him.
    All morning Otis waited for a