The Penderwicks in Spring Read Free

childhoods of the original set of sisters. But since then, she and her husband, Turron, had produced twin boys, Marty and Enam, whose energy and enthusiasm for life seemed to have rattled Aunt Claire’s common sense. The crown wasn’t theonly thing. Tutus also arrived at irregular intervals. Mr. Penderwick had been heard threatening to retaliate with drum sets for Marty and Enam, but Iantha always calmed him down.
    Still, a crown and tutus do not a princess mania make, so Aunt Claire couldn’t be assigned all the blame. While Batty was certain that princesses couldn’t ruin a life, as the senior member of the younger Penderwick siblings, she felt responsible for the honor and dignity of all three. Ben had many talents and not just with rocks, and Batty planned to become a professional pianist, but who could tell with Lydia? So far she was dragging down the team.
    “La-la-la-la-la-la kiss, kiss,” sang Lydia.
    “Also no kissing,” said Batty. “Where are your shoes?”
    Lydia found her shoes in the corner, buried under one of the tutus, and brought them to Batty.
    “Outside?” she asked, lifting one foot at a time to receive its shoe.
    “Yes, outside. Let’s go look for signs of spring.”

H OLDING HANDS , Batty and Lydia went out into the spring sunshine. Across their street—Gardam Street—Mrs. Geiger’s first daffodil glowed proudly among a smattering of purple hyacinths and white crocuses. But what Lydia noticed first was the family car parked in the driveway and, in the driver’s seat, the third-oldest Penderwick sister. This was sixteen-year-old Jane, and she was reading a book propped up on the steering wheel.
    Lydia broke into a run, clutching at her crown to keep it from tumbling off.
    “Snow White is dead!” she shouted to Jane.
    “The prince will kiss her awake!” Jane threw open the car door and swung Lydia up onto her lap, covering her with kisses.
    “You know we agreed not to encourage her,” said Batty when she caught up.
    “Sorry,” answered Jane, but she snuck in a few more princely kisses anyway.
    On the passenger’s seat of the car was a stack of books—the one that Jane had been reading, plus a dozen others. This was typical for Jane, who wanted to be a published author someday and believed that the only way to learn how to write was to read, read, read. So she was always in the middle of at least one book and felt safe only if she had several more on standby. Tucked into her stack was also a blue notebook, the kind Jane used for writing down ideas that came to her, bits and pieces of conversations she’d heard, anything she thought she might write about one day. Batty figured that by now Jane had filled dozens of these blue notebooks—most of them kept in boxes under her bed.
    Lydia pointed at the book on top of the pile. “Lydia wants story.”
    “That one’s in French,” said Jane. “You wouldn’t understand. Even I can’t understand it without looking up most of the words.”
    “Oui.”
Lydia had picked up a few words from Jane, and was proud of herself for it.
    “All right, but just a little bit. This is by a man named Dumas, who wrote about hopeless passion and bitter revenge—” Jane paused. “You’re probably too young for the details. Just listen.
‘Une belle jeune
fille aux cheveux noirs comme le jais, aux yeux veloutés comme ceux de la gazelle—’
 ”
    Batty let the words wash over her, understanding nothing. Life would have been easier, she thought, if Skye and Jane had followed Rosalind and their dad into Latin. Skye had started on that path, taking Latin in seventh grade, but she soon tired of being compared unfavorably to Rosalind—Mr. Smith’s favorite Latin student ever—and switched to Spanish. After that, Jane didn’t even attempt Latin, instead studying French, because it was “romantic.” Lydia was able to pick up words from all three languages, but the polyglot confusion had the opposite effect on Batty. She hoped to avoid studying