For once, Mr. Sheperton didn’t correct the boy. He sat there and let Rolf hold him. His tail even wagged once or twice. Sounding rather embarrassed, he said at last, “Well, harumph… I suppose we’d better get away from here before those rascals work up the nerve to come back.”
On the way back to the Hollow, Baneen kept talking about O’Rigami’s space kite and how wonderful it would be to return to Gremla.
“And the most wonderful part of it all,” the gremlin said, dancing lightly over the sand, “is that yourself will be in complete charge of the entire launching of the great, powerful rocket. The most important man of all, that’ll be you, Rolf me bucko. Er…once you’ve attached the kite to the rocket properly, of course.”
Rolf nodded. But inwardly he was wondering how he could possibly get to his father’s rocket and attach the kite, even if O’Rigami made it invisible. Gremlin magic wasn’t going to be enough for that job.
Mr. Sheperton stayed strangely quiet as they approached the Hollow. Rolf could see gremlins scurrying about, busy with a thousand unguessable tasks. Lugh stood in the middle, as usual, in a small mound of sand, pointing here, shouting there, his tiny bulldog’s face red with scowling, his chin whiskers bristling.
Rolf picked up his bike and said farewell to Baneen. The gremlin, jigging happily, reminded him:
“Don’t be forgetting tomorrow, now. Tomorrow O’Rigami will have the grand kite finished, and tomorrow night you’ll be helping us to attach it properly to the rocket. Ah, Gremla, land of me youth! Soon we’ll be back enjoying your dusty delights.”
“Sure,” Rolf said as he got on the bike. “Tomorrow.”
He pedaled up and away from the Gremlin Hollow and got back on the road that led to the highway. But when he thought of the men with the boat and his own promise not to report them, he was conscious of an ugly, hollow feeling inside him.
Rolf’s father wasn’t home for dinner again that night. After helping his mother clean up the kitchen, Rolf went outside for a walk. The sun was low in the southwest, the breeze already had a bite of evening’s coolness.
Mr. Sheperton came padding up to him, but Rolf said. “No, Shep. Stay. I want to think, not argue.”
The dog muttered something about calling people by their proper names, as he trotted stiffly back toward the house.
Rolf walked out on the narrow sidewalk that fronted the lawn, and headed down the street slowly. “How deep am I getting myself into this?” he whispered to himself. “It all seems so crazy. For one thing, suppose something goes wrong when I’m helping the gremlins and I get caught?”
There was only one tree in this part of town worth climbing, a sturdy old live oak that had been growing for maybe fifty years before the houses had been built and the streets put in. Miraculously, it had escaped the bulldozers and builder, probably because it looked too big and tough to knock over easily.
The tree happened to be right next to the Amaros’ old two-story house, close to Rita’s window. Rolf hesitated in the dark at the foot of the tree, remembering all the times he had climbed up there for secret talks with her, back when they both had been real young kids. But now he needed to talk to her again, and the tree looked as climbable as ever.
He climbed up easily, but found that he’d gotten too big to crawl out on the limb that practically brushed her window. And the window was closed, because the house had recently been air conditioned.
Can’t use our old signal, Rolf knew, remembering the way he’d whistle like a bobolink. How can I call her?
While he sat there hunched up on the big branch near the tree trunk, Rita opened the window. Over her shoulder she called, “Okay, Momma. I’ve got my window open. Tell me when the air conditioner is working again, and I’ll shut it.”
Rolf thought he could hear Baneen giggling in the shadows of the tree.
“Hey, Rita!” he whispered.
She jerked back a little in surprise. “Rolf? What are you doing there?”
“I wanted to talk with you.”
She smiled, and it looked better than moonlight to Rolf. “Just the way we used to,” she said. “Wait a minute.”
She ducked inside for a moment, then crawled out on the window ledge.
“Hey, no… the branch can’t hold…”
But Rita already had one bluejeaned leg on the branch. “I’m not as heavy as you are.”
Or as careful, Rolf thought. But she crawled out on the branch. It dipped and swayed under her weight, but Rita calmly shinnied up until she was sitting safely next to Rolf.
“We haven’t done this in ages,” she said happily.
“Yeah,” Rolf nodded. It was fun. Almost, it took him back two years, to before he had started going out to the Preserve, alone.
More seriously, Rita said, “I was beginning to think you didn’t like me anymore. You’ve stayed away so much lately… I’m sorry I said you were weird.”
Rolf had forgotten that. “Oh, that’s okay.”
“You really have been acting strange. You know?”
“I guess so…” He didn’t know where to begin, how to tell her.
For a moment they just sat there, bare feet dangling in the cool evening air.
“Rita?” Rolf said. “Listen. There is uh… something I need your help for.”
“Sure Rolf. What is it?”
“Your father’s still on the night shift, isn’t he?”
“Yes.” Then she added proudly, “He’s been promoted to sergeant. He’s got a whole shift of guards under him now.”
“But he’s still working right at the launch pad, isn’t he?”
“Yes.”
Hesitating for a moment more, Rolf finally decided to take the plunge. “Look… I need to get up close to the rocket. Up onto the top platform of the checkout tower. Tomorrow night.”
“Tomorrow night?” Rita’s voice sounded shocked. In the darkness it was difficult to make out the expression on her face. “But that’s the night before the launch! Nobody’s allowed…”
Slowly, and as carefully as he could, Rolf explained to Rita about the gremlins and how they wanted to use the Mars rocket to help the return to Gremla.
He was earnestly explaining about O’Rigami and the space kite when Rita began laughing. He stared at her, and she laughed so hard he had to put out a hand to keep her from falling off the branch. Her shoulders were pumping up and down, and she put a hand over her mouth to keep from making so much noise that her parents would catch them. “Mmpff, mmppfff,” came the sound from behind her hand.
“Hey, it’s not funny,” Rolf said.
“Oh, Rolf,” she gasped. “When you want to put somebody on, you sure can do it…” She started giggling again.
“’Tis no joke, me lovely maid.” It was Baneen’s voice, coming from right behind Rolf’s ear.
Rolf turned his head slightly and saw that the gremlin was perched on his shoulder. Strangely, he felt no weight on the shoulder at all. Then, looking back at Rita, he could see that her eyes had gone white and round. Her laughter was stopped. Her mouth was open, and her eyes were enormous.
“Allow me the grand pleasure of being introduced to this charming young lady,” Baneen said.
Still holding Rita by one arm, Rolf said, “This is Baneen—one of the gremlins. Baneen, this is Rita Amaro.”
“Charmed, I’m certain,” said Baneen, and he took his little green cap off, making a low sweeping bow to the girl.
Rita recovered her voice. “You… you’re real!”
“As real as your beautiful brown eyes, Rita me girl. And as happy as your darling laughter. But all the gremlins on this vast dreary world would be sadder than a mud toad’s croak if it weren’t for this fine, brave lad here.”
“Aw, come on, Baneen,” Rolf said.