"I got some things figured out-" Bobby began. "Write that down," John ignored him.
"Then what about feeding her?" Cindy said. "Yeah, that's something, too."
20
"I think we ought to put her on bread and water once a day," Paul said quite seriously.
"You know, like a diet."
"Why?" Cindy said. "She's not fat."
"To make her weaker. Bobby says she's strong, so make her weak. Our mother diets.
She doesn't eat anything at all during the day, except for carrots and celery and
skimmed milk and junk like that, and she's always weak and tired out. Besides," he
said, "we can do anything we want with a prisoner."
"Does your mother really eat that stuff?"
"All grown-ups do. They're afraid of getting fat and dying."
"Aw, you only get that from smoking and cancer," Cindy said. "Don't you watch TV?"
"Shut up, Cindy," John said, but kindly enough.
"OK, how're we going to feed her? What happens if we take off the gag and she starts
doing a lot of yelling?"
"We've still got the chloroform from Bobby's father," Paul said. "We can tell her if she
screams, we'll put her to sleep and not feed her at all."
"There's enough stuff in the rag still." Bobby thought and had to agree. "I put it back in
a tight jar."
"No one could hear her way down here anyway," Dianne said coolly.
"I know! We'll tum up the TV like they do on ·TV," Cindy's redundance was unconscious.
"That way, anybody'll think it's that."
"Well, at least we all ought to be here whenever we take off her gag," John said. "Five
are better than two. Write that down, Dianne."
"Another thing," Dianne spoke while she wrote.
"Bobby and Cindy are supposed to have a baby-sitter to do all the housework and keep
them clean," she looked up at Cindy. "If the house isn't neat and the yard's a mess and
the trash piles up, anybody stopping by'll want to come in and find out what's wrong."
"I'm not dirty," Cindy said.
"You ought to wash your face and brush your hair”
21
"Aw, I thought we were going to be free after her-"
"We are free, stupid," Bobby said, "but that doesn't mean you can do everything you
want."
"It specially doesn't mean you can do what you want," John said. "We've got to be extra
careful from here on. We have to do the things they usually do." They meant adults,
clearly the other team (and the children all understood this).
"Right. First of all, we have to stay neat. Don't / make a mess. Second, we all have to
chip in and help clean things up," Dianne said. "Well, we have to," she added to the
silence with which she was heard.
"I liked it better the other way-when she did all the work,'' Cindy said. "At least, she was
our friend and played with us."
"Friend," John scoffed. "She was plain bossy. HI was your age, I wouldn't want her to sit
for me."
"Besides, grow up," Bobby said. "We're too old to play all the time. Even you."
"What'd'ya mean?" Cindy sat up with the beginning of a tantrum in her voice. Whatever
brother-sister love they had shown earlier was erased just now.
"Leave her alone," John said. "Now what else?" "Phone calls," Dianne said.
"Yeah, we got to be careful about them-"
"And food," she said. "You've both got to eat for a week. We have to shop .... "
"That's easy," Bobby said. "We have a charge account at Tillman's. That's closest, and
he delivers. Somebody can phone in an order, and he'll bring it up on the porch and
leave it. He does all the time-"
"Arid he has Pop-Ups!" Cindy said.
Dianne looked at her with a frown. "And you
have to cook .... "
._
"We'll barbecue things on the grill like Daddy
does!'' Cindy was slowly rekindling some enthusiasm.
"And vegetables, too." "You're not my mother."
"Do what she says,'' Bobby said. "Eating has to
22
be just the same as always. Just as if nothing was wrong."
"Then why're we doing all of this?" Cindy's smile sort of stopped.
"You want to go swimming anytime you want to?" Bobby said. "You want to stay up late
and watch the movies on TV you're not allowed to see? You want to try some of Dad's
Scotch?"
"Well .... "
"It's just that there have to be rules." "Yeah, but that takes the fun out of it."
"No, it won't," Paul said with a tic. "C'mon, Just wait."
Cindy sighed and flounced up and went to the kitchen. She went as if she felt she
carried some immense veto power over the older kids. She let them wait. Then from
the kitchen-slam of the refrigerator door-she grudgingly acquiesced. "OK."
John snorted, but not without mild amusement.
"Well, OK. What're the rules so far?''
Dianne handed him the pad. On it, she had written in a neat, tiny hand:
1. Watch her.
2. All be here-move her.
3. All-gag out.
4. Be neat, clean up.
5. Watch telephone calls.
6. Eat-shop.
7. Cindy's hair.
"Yeah, what about the telephone?" John passed the pad to Paul. Bobby leaned down
over his shoulder and read with him.
"Tell everyone she's taking a bath," Dianne said. "Or she's down at the beach with the
rest of us,"
Paul said.
"Or she took Cindy up to Bryce," Bobby said. "OK." John was convinced. "Anything
else?" "Read your own rules," Dianne said. "First, let's
23
clean up what needs it, and then we can find out if she needs anything."
"I'll do the kitchen," Cindy said from the doorway.
"You wash your face and hands and put on a clean dress and brush your hair," Dianne
said.
"It hurts."
"All right, I'll brush it for you." "Still hurts-"
"Not if I do it."
"Cindy!" Bobby looked at her. He was the stronger.
"Aw-w-w-"
"Anyhow I'll do the kitchen with somebody. I know where everything's kept," Bobby
said. "Afterward we can get Barbara up."
"Cool," Paul said. "That's neat."
Barbara had guessed in advance who the rest of Freedom Five would be. She had taken
the same five children swimming the afternoon before-Sunday helping the boys with
their flailing Australian crawls, herding Cindy back from the part of the river where the
current was strongest, and getting in some workout herself. (Dianne had only waded
around a little and then withdrawn to sit on the bank and watch.)
Freedom Five was simply a community of kids well, call them children, Barbara thought-
stuck down in the country with no one else to play with except one with the other. And,
just as Barbara had characterized Bobby as manly and reliable and Cindy. as spoiled
and funny, so had she formed rapid, friendly opinions of the others.
John was quite big and strong for his age, which she took to be about sixteen. He was a
good-looking boy; his voice had settled down toward what would be its steady, mature
tone: he was mannerly and thoughtful toward the others even though-except for Di-
anne-they were younger, possibly irritatingly younger. Still, there was an air about him
which had to be called 24
vague, lost. Even in the short hours they had all been together at the small river beach
north of the Adams house, be had seemed now and then to drift away, to be thinking about
something else or, more accurately perhaps, to be trying to think of something beyond his
experience or present ability. Not to make too much of too little-particularly in the young-
Barbara assumed that since he was no longer one of the children and yet not an adult (as