The Wish Giver Read Free Page B

stay away from me, do you hear? Stay away!”
    Off went Agatha, leaving Polly red-eyed and almost crying. She just wanted to be friends with Agatha…and now the thing seemed spoiled beyond repair.
    Polly moped about the house all day, and her mother wondered if she was coming down with some illness. Evening came and Polly trudged up to her room to do her homework. Outside, down by Spider Crick, the frogs began their shrill chirping and peeping.
    Chirp-a-chirp! Chirp-a-chirp!
    To Polly it sounded like: Ag-a-tha! Ag-a-tha!
    And then a deep bullfrog’s croak, like the string of a bass fiddle being plucked.
    JUG-A-RUM!
    Suddenly Polly got up from her chair. She walked to the little table near the window. There, just as she’d left it after the Church Social, was the card with the red circle on it.
    In the twilight, Polly turned the card over and over in her hands. Oh, it was foolish of course. Yet she’d paid her fifty cents. Thaddeus Blinn had told her that whatever she asked for wouldbe hers. What was the harm in trying?
    Carefully she placed her right thumb over the red circle. “I want ever so badly to be liked,” she said softly. “And not just by Leland and Lenora, either. I want people to greet me and not walk on the other side of the street whenever they set eyes on me. And especially I want Agatha Benthorn to invite me to her house for tea.
    “So that’s what I’m wishing for, Mr. Wish Giver. I’m wishing that people will pay attention to me. And smile when they see me. And I wish that someday soon, Agatha will ask me to come to her house. I know I’m a fool for believing Thaddeus Blinn is anything but a fake, but…”
    Suddenly Polly dropped the card. That was funny. The red spot felt warm—almost hot—against her thumb. She looked down at the floor, and a little gasp escaped from her throat.
    The card had fallen under the bed, away from the light of the tiny lamp. In the darkness the spot on the card glowed like a burning coal.
    Outside her window the sound of the frogs could still be heard.
    Chirp-a-chirp! Chirp-a-chirp!
    Ag-a-tha! Ag-a-tha!
    JUG-A-RUM!

 
    P olly tossed and turned in her bed until late that night. She couldn’t get her mind off Agatha and the torn dress. The frogs down by Spider Crick kept up their chirping and croaking. Finally in the small hours of the morning, Polly nodded off.
    She woke up just shy of eight o’clock. She was still tired, and her eyes felt like they had sand in them. Polly washed herself, combed her hair, and got dressed, feeling meaner than a snapping turtle on account of not sleeping well. She trudged downstairs and into the kitchen.
    Mrs. Kemp sighed and shook her head when she saw the mood Polly was in and hoped her daughter would hold off any complaining until she got to school. But Polly took one look at her toast and eggs and started in.
    “Mother, the toast is just horrid. It’s all burned and—
    “ JUG-A-RUM! ”
    How on earth could a bullfrog have gotten into the house? Mrs. Kemp wondered. Why, it sounded like it was right in the kitchen.
    “ JUG-A-RUM! ”
    Mrs. Kemp’s eyes lit on Polly. The girl was sitting bolt upright with one hand at her throat. She looked like she was about to scream, but the sound that came out was:
    “ JUG-A-RUM! ”
    Polly’s mother shook her head in exasperation. “You can stop that right now, young lady,” she said. “Making frog sounds isn’t going to get you out of school today. You’ve told me you were sick too many other times, and then—”
    “ JUG-A-RUM! JUG-A-RUM! ”
    “That’s enough, Polly!”
    “ JUG-A-RUM! ”
    “All right, be a frog if you want to. But get that breakfast into you and be off.”
    Before she knew it, Polly was standing on the front steps with her coat on and her schoolbooks under her arm. Her mother slammed the door behind her.
    Polly shuffled down the road to school, scared to death by the croaks that come from her mouth when she tried to speak. Once or twice she tried talking