Baby-Sitting Is a Dangerous Job by Willo Davis Roberts Page B

burglar, poking at his little sisters, instructing Melissa to be the intruder while he was the officer who pursued her. She got into the spirit of the thing, being about half really afraid, screaming as she ran to get away from him.
    Shana didn’t understand what was going on, but she ran and shrieked, too. After Melissa knocked over a lamp, I told them they’d better go out in the backyard. Luckily the lamp landed on the couch and it didn’t break, but it looked expensive, and I didn’t want to lose allmy wages for the entire baby-sitting job over one lamp.
    Jeremy was just as wild outside, but there was less to damage. I let him run and yell, as long as he didn’t get too rough with his sisters.
    After half an hour or so, though, I was getting tired of burglar alarm imitations and screaming, and Melissa fell and hurt her knee.
    â€œOkay, that’s enough,” I said. “Come on, Melissa, we’d better wash that off and put disinfectant on it, and maybe a Band-aid.”
    Most little kids like Band-aids, and sure enough, she decided not to cry as I led her inside.
    I found the medicine cabinet and was proud of the good job I did, getting the dirt off the scraped place, putting a Snoopy patch over it.
    â€œNow maybe you can talk Jeremy into playing something quieter,” I suggested.
    There was an odd sound, then, and it took me a moment to identify it. The garage door opening? I’d heard it when Mrs. Murphy left; she had one of those devices you carry to open and close the garage doors without getting out of your car.
    Was she back already? I was torn between relief that someone else could take on the job of calming Jeremy down and regret that my pay would be smaller if I went home early. The housekeeper was only scheduled for three more appointments after today, so I wasn’t going to earn a whole lot anyway, I decided.
    Just at that moment I heard a bellow of rage—or what sounded like rage—from somewhere else in the house. I sighed. Jeremy would have to be distracted by something else, I thought, and wondered what would work best. He had every game I’d ever heard of in his room, but he never seemed much interested in playing any of them except video games. I didn’t dare play them with him because I had to watch the girls, too. Maybe I could think up something that just used his imagination, like the games my little brothers played all the time.
    Melissa trotted off ahead of me with an exaggerated limp to make sure everyone knew she’d been injured. I lingered to wipe up the dirty fingermarks she’d made on the edge of the sink, then dropped the washcloth into the hamper.
    I wondered how Diana was doing, up there in the tree house with only that old tattered book about child abuse to occupy her time. Maybe when I got home I’d go and talk to her, try to persuade her to confide in my folks. Kids can’t do much about that kind of situation, but surely adults could. I didn’t know if it was even legal for her to go and live with her brother or her aunt, but there must be some way to keep her from going back home where she was mistreated. My mom is usually pretty good about finding solutions to problems, even serious ones, and if Diana would talk to her . . .
    I had walked back to the front hall, where I could see down the bedroom corridor and into the big living room. The house was so quiet now that I stopped, listening. Mom always said that the time she got most concerned was when she couldn’t hear the kids making any noise, and I hoped the Fosters weren’t into anything horrible or destructive.
    Had Mrs. Murphy returned, or not? I didn’t think I’d have noticed the neighbors operating a garage door opener, but maybe I’dmistaken the source of the sounds I’d heard. A new and alarming idea formed. What if it had been Jeremy doing something, not Mrs. Murphy at all?
    Was there a control where he could get at it?