Puppet Pandemonium (2 page)

The woman took the tote bag from me. “Just so we don't get any more big surprises,” she said.

I grabbed it back. In the commotion, Chicken Licken fell on the steps. The guard accidentally stepped on the puppet's head. Chicken Licken's paper tongue flew out of her beak and she squawked for dear life.

“Squawk! Squawk! Squawk!”

I picked up Chicken Licken and stuffed her back in the tote. The puppet theater might close down forever because of me. I felt sweat running down my neck. My hands grew clammy. My head throbbed. Our summer puppet shows flashed before my eyes.

Gram's show was a serial. The kids returned every Saturday to find out if Ricky Raccoon was going to be saved from the scrape he had gotten himself into the week before. Now the escalator had turned out to be
the biggest scrape of all. I didn't see how Ricky was going to get out of this mess in one piece.

“Please,” I begged the security guard, tugging on his sleeve. “Let me help you.”

“Outta the way, I told you. You've caused enough trouble already.” He gave one last jerk. Ricky's tail came out of the steps. “Here, Mr. Director. Is this what you're looking for?”

Ricky's shredded tail dangled from his limp body. I was horrified. The escalator started again and the alarm stopped screaming.

Everyone began to move at once, pushing, shoving, and elbowing their way up the steps. My stomach did double flips. What was I going to tell Gram? I saw her coming toward me, smiling as usual.

“Did you hear the siren go off?” she said. “There must have been a fire somewhere.”

“It was the escalator,” I said, looking down at the floor. “Ricky's tail got stuck in it.” I held Ricky up. His tail looked like shredded lasagna noodles.

For a moment Gram was silent. Then she started laughing. She fingered the tail's remaining strands of hair.

“He looks like he's been run through a meat grinder, all right. I'll just doctor him up when we get to the theater. I have my trusty glue gun in here,” she said, giving her suitcase a pat. “It works miracles.”

I looked down the mall corridor, but I didn't see Sam anywhere. I couldn't imagine why he was late. He knew it was my last show with Gram. Maybe he got stuck on an escalator too. I checked my watch.

We needed a miracle.

It was showtime.

W
hen we reached the Wonderful World of Puppets, I rubbed my hands across one of the theater's red velvet seats. “Just think, Gram, soon all these seats will be filled with screaming kids.”

“I hope so,” she said. “More kids, more fun.” We walked down the center aisle toward the large stage. I liked seeing the pictures of the famous puppet characters on the wall. The most famous ones were Punch and Judy. Gram said those puppet characters had been around for over four hundred years. Their shows were still going strong in Europe. Unbelievable.

“He's a colorful old rascal, isn't he?” Gram said. “Mr. Punch doesn't put up with any nonsense, that's for sure.”

“I could have used Punch today on the escalator,” I said, pointing to the picture of beaky-nosed Punch as we walked by. “He would have smacked that security guard in the nose with his bat.” I was still mad about the escalator incident. The guard hadn't needed to pull so hard on Ricky's tail. And that glitter-glassed woman hadn't helped matters either.

Gram climbed the stairs to go backstage. I lifted her suitcase onto the stage and unzipped it. Then I handed her Ricky.

“Let it go, Baker. We've got more important things to worry about now.” She slipped between the red velvet curtains, carrying poor wounded Ricky. I opened the puppet house and hung Gram's puppets on their hooks behind the side panels.

Fifteen puppeteers entertained in the theater every week with hand puppets, marionettes, shadow puppets, rod puppets, box puppets, small stick puppets, and giant puppets. Then there were Mr. Brady and Leo. After Ricky Raccoon, I liked watching them best. Mr. Brady was a ventriloquist and Leo was his dummy pal. Leo kept us all on our toes.

All the puppeteers had become friends of mine. They were super-fun to watch. I had learned tons of
stuff about directing a puppet show from them, but Mr. Brady and Leo had helped me the most. At first, I couldn't keep the spotlight on Gram's puppets because they moved so fast. But it didn't take long to catch on to their actions, and by the end of the summer, I had become really good with the spot. That was what Mr. Brady and Leo told me.

I took a deep breath and smelled the freshly waxed wooden arms of the theater seats. The smell reminded me of Gram's dining room table. Someone had flipped the house lights on, and I glanced at the ceiling. It was decorated with golden lights, and in the center was a crystal chandelier that sent rainbow colors around the auditorium when a special spotlight shined on it. It was awesome.

“Hey, Baker, what's with breaking the escalator?” I looked up. Sam came down the center aisle wearing glasses with eyeballs bouncing around inside the frames. They were attached to a spring, and when he walked the eyeballs danced.

“You should be more careful,” he said. “I heard there was a puppet problem and knew it had to be you. Lots of people are really mad at you. You may need a police escort to get out of this place.”

“Where were you when I needed help?” I asked. “Some friend you turned out to be.”

“Standing in line for these,” he said, twirling his glasses over his head. “They're giving them away today.”
He handed me a pair. “You never know when you might need an extra set of eyes.” He put them back on and the eyeballs started springing again.

“Will you stop goofing around and help me? This is my last show and I want it to be perfect.”

“That's why I'm here,” he said. He pulled himself up onto the stage. “What can I do?”

“Check this over,” I said, giving him the schedule. After a few minutes, Gram came out and handed me Ricky and a new tail. It was black with a white stripe down its center.

“I borrowed it from Sandy Skunk,” Gram said. She clicked a pair of sewing scissors under my nose. “Snip. Snip. Snip.”

“Ouch!” I cried. “That doesn't sound like borrowing to me.” I made a sour face. “Gram,” I said, “you remind me of a Boy Scout. You're always prepared!”

“In this business you have to be,” she said. “Sometimes it can be a surprise a minute.”

I hadn't really thought about it much, but it was true. Gram could patch up any disaster. She carried supplies in her suitcase for any emergency. Once, Wendell-the-Wizard's eyes fell off before it was his time to tell a story. So Gram hot-glued two buttons from her sweater onto Wendell. The show went on as scheduled and no one was the wiser. Wendell-the-Wizard charmed the audience, button eyes and all.

“Baker, fasten the skunk's tail to Ricky and it will be
fine.” She gave me a handful of safety pins and I performed the necessary surgery. I didn't think anyone in the audience would ever believe a raccoon with a skunk's tail, but there wasn't time to question it. We were off to a bad start and I didn't want to make it worse. Sam and I went to work setting up the puppets in the order of their appearance. Ricky Raccoon came first.

“Who's next?” I asked Sam.

He checked Gram's notes. “Carole Cow.”

“Then who?”

“Rita Rooster.” I reached for Rita and shook out her feathers so she'd look fresh and fluffy.

“Next?” I said.

“Wendell-the-Wizard. And Greta Gorilla brings up the rear today” Sam said.
“Grrrr,”
he growled, pretending to eat a banana. He pitched the gorilla at me.

Ricky always appeared again at the end of the show and told one final funny story. The other puppet characters stayed on the floor by Gram's feet so she could reach them if she decided to use them at the last minute. There was also a monster puppet, Miss Mona. Gram used her occasionally. I put her on the floor beside the rest of the puppets, just in case Gram found a part for Mona unexpectedly.

“One never knows when one might need a monster,” Gram had told me the day she brought Mona home.

“Wonder why Ella Pearl isn't in the show today?” Sam asked.

“She causes so much trouble when she shows up that the audience goes wild. She can't be in the show every time. But I'll put her backstage anyway,” I said, even though I figured Gram had decided we'd had enough excitement for one day.

Ella Pearl was dressed in her long fluffy bride's dress. She gave the impression that she was the most beautiful crocodile in the whole world.

“Testing, testing,” I said into the mike. My voice boomed out loud and clear.

“Sounds good,” Gram said. “Are we ready to go?”

I nodded. “I'll set the spotlight now,” I told her. We could hear the audience talking, their feet shuffling in the theater. Sam and I hurried to the control booth. The theater was packed tighter than a box of crayons. The magic was about to begin. I crossed my fingers, hoping everything would go according to plan. I dimmed the house lights and Sam started Ricky's special music. His song, “Hey, Hey, It's a Happy Day,” blared out. I flipped on the spotlight and Gram came out in front of her puppet house.

“Let's just hope no one in the audience smells a skunk,” Sam whispered in my ear. We held our noses and grinned at each other.

G
ram started her shows the same way every week. She played finger poems with the audience at the beginning. It was her trick to get them to listen. When she went behind her puppet house, the only way she could control the audience was with her voice. The kids repeated after Gram and did all the things with their hands and fingers that she told them to do. She worked with the kids until she had them exactly where she wanted them, and then she asked questions. It seemed as if she was talking to each kid one-on-one.

“What are puppets?” she asked. Every weekend she
got different responses. She wrote down the funniest answers.

One kid spoke up. “Puppets are a hole you put your hand through.”

“Puppets make you giggle and wiggle,” said a boy from the back of the theater.

“Puppets can scare you if you're not brave,” another little boy called out. That was when Gram assured the children that puppets never harmed anyone.

“What do puppets talk about?” she asked. “I'd like to know that.”

“Ricky says, ‘Don't talk to strangers,’” someone said.” ‘It could be dangerous.’ “

“They don't want you to run around the swimming pool,” a boy told Gram. “You might fall and break your arm.”

One little girl stood on her chair. “Puppets are my friends.”

“Good for you,” Gram said, her face crinkling into a smile. “You'll never have to worry about not having a friend if you know some puppets.”

After a couple more finger poems, the audience was getting fidgety. So Gram told them that her friend Ricky Raccoon wanted to come and tell them a story. I was amazed how she could do all those things with the kids and hold their attention, especially before
Ricky had even made an appearance. I dimmed the house lights.

“Shhhhh,” Gram whispered to the audience. “I'm going to see if Ricky is here.” You could have heard a pin drop. The inside of the theater was as silent as a floating cloud. Gram disappeared behind her puppet house and I felt the excitement in the air like everyone else. No one moved. We waited patiently for Ricky to come out onto the stage. I shined the spotlight on the curtain and Ricky Raccoon popped out. I moved the spotlight to his face, and his eyes sparkled with mischief. He wiggled his nose and looked at the kids and then yelled in his loudest raccoon voice:

“Who's ready to have a Ricky Raccoon day? Who's ready to see a Ricky Raccoon play?”

All the kids in the auditorium started stomping their feet and clapping. It was puppet time, and they were ready. Ricky told riddles and made up rhymes for the audience.

Then Ricky said, “Carole Cow and Rita Rooster are going to tell you a story today. Pay attention.”

Wendell-the-Wizard came to Carole and Rita's farmyard and scared the chickens into laying colored eggs. He stole the eggs and sold them for piles of money. The kids got so excited that some of them stood in the aisle calling out advice to Carole Cow and Rita Rooster.