The Facts and Fictions of Minna Pratt Read Online Free PDF Page A

tadpoles.
    â€œA frog,” said Minna, smiling. “You want to come back as a frog.” She thought of the first time she had seen Lucas, the frog he had saved from biology lab hidden in his pocket.
    Lucas nodded.
    â€œSee,” he said softly. “You didn’t laugh.”
    â€œNo,” said Minna.
    â€œYou know what I’d really like to be someday?” Lucas went on before Minna could speak. “A biologist, or a naturalist.”
    â€œNot a musician?” asked Minna, surprised. “Not a violist?”
    â€œNo.” He turned his head to look at her. “I’ve never told anyone this before. Never ever. My parents don’t even know about the frogs.”
    â€œWhy not?” whispered Minna.
    Lucas shrugged his shoulders. “They never come up here. They say that children need room and space to grow in. Room and space of their own.”
    â€œWell,” said Minna, “there is space for all of us to grow here.”
    She walked to the windows. Lucas’s world here. His all alone. My parents spill out and tumble all over my house . She turned.
    â€œBut you play so well.”
    â€œSo do you,” said Lucas. “Do you want to be a professional musician?”
    Minna was silent. For a moment she thought mean thoughts. Traitorous thoughts. What a waste of a vibrato . Or was it? Her father had once told Minna that nothing was a waste. She doubted it. She looked out the window over the buildings across the street, to the park and the pond where they had walked to free Lucas’s frog. She could see the peaked roof of the conservatory in the distance, the familiar gargoyles lurking underneath the eaves. It was like living above the world here, looking down at everything in its proper place; the “eternal fitness of things,” her father called it. For the first time in Minna’s life she knew what he meant.
    She took a deep breath.
    â€œLucas?”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œI want to be a ferret.”
    She turned around just in time to see his smile.
    There was a silence, the only sounds in the room the splashes of frogs in the water, a steady hum of the fish tank. At last Lucas took her hand.
    â€œCome on,” he said.
    Lucas pulled her out the door, down the forty-four steps not counting the landings, past the solarium, through the entry way, and through double-swinging doors with brass edges into the kitchen. The room was huge and clean and white. A girl stood at the sink washing lettuce. She was dressed all in white with white stockings and shoes, like a nurse.
    â€œTwig,” said Lucas, breathless, still holding Minna’s hand. “This is Minna.”
    The girl looked at Minna. She turned off the water and shook the lettuce in the sink.
    â€œYou can tell Twig,” said Lucas.
    Minna, confused, looked at Lucas.
    â€œYou mean about being a ferret?” she asked.
    â€œAh,” said Twig thoughtfully, “a good choice, ferret. I myself devoutly wish to be a penguin.”
    A penguin, a ferret, a frog. Minna was seized by verse.
    A penguin, a ferret, a frog, tra-la ,
    Sing sweet happy songs in a bog, tra-la .
    Minna stared at Twig, who looked less like a penguin than anyone Minna had ever seen. She was tall and thin with pale straight hair and large eyes. She looked more like a fish on its feet than a penguin.
    â€œTwig is our housekeeper,” said Lucas.
    â€œA housekeeper? I’ve never known a housekeeper,” said Minna.
    Twig moved silently about the kitchen from refrigerator to countertop to sink.
    â€œAnd now you do,” she said in a soft voice.
    â€œYour new soft-soled shoes really work,” said Lucas admiringly.
    Twig nodded.
    â€œQuiet, you know. To sneak up on thieves and killers and kids,” she confided to Minna. She waved her hand. “And other lowlifes as well. You never know who or what will hover about.” Twig pronounced the word “hoover.” Minna