The Old Willis Place by Mary Downing Hahn Page A

Persnickety old thing—what did I care? Soon I'd have a new friend, a real friend, a girl to talk to and laugh with.
    I squinted at the sun. It was past noon. Had Lissa found her diary? Read what I'd written? Did she plan to meet me at the terrace? Would she really and truly be my friend?
    I ran across the field and into the woods, eager to see what she was doing. Near the trailer, I heard Mr. Morrison's voice. I dropped to my knees and crawled noiselessly through the underbrush until I was close enough to see and hear. Lissa sat at the picnic table, surrounded by books, her diary among them. Her father sat across from her, drilling her with math problems. MacDuff lay at his feet, dozing peacefully in the sunlight.
    "Come on, Liss," Mr. Morrison said patiently. "You're not concentrating."
    Lissa frowned at the page in front of her. "I don't care whether car A or car B gets to Chicago first. Its a boring problem."
    Mr. Morrison sighed and pulled a pipe out of his shirt pocket. I watched him light it. The scent of tobacco drifted across the grass and I breathed it in, reminded of my father. He'd often smelled of the same sort of tobacco, aromatic, a little strong, but, unlike cigarette smoke, pleasant.
    I wished I could go closer, join Lissa and her father at the picnic table, sit between them as if I were part of a family again. Filled with longing, I wiped tears from my eyes with the back of my hand. Wish all you want, I told myself, it won't happen.
    "You'll never finish the problems at this rate," Mr. Morrison said. "And you've still got science, history, and French to go.
    Lissa grimaced and bent her head over the paper. Mr. Morrison leaned on his elbows and smoked, gazing at the fields and woods as if they were his own personal estate. For a moment, he looked right at me. I ducked lower, ready to run, but apparently he was too absorbed in his own thoughts to realize I was just a few feet away.
    After a while, Mr. Morrison stretched his long skinny arms and stood up. "Can I trust you to sit here and work on those problems while I go inside and write?"
    "Sure." Lissa watched him return to the trailer. The moment the door banged shut behind him, she opened her diary. She read what I'd written, I was certain of it, and then looked right at my hiding place.
    "You're there, aren't you?" she said. "Diana, that's your name, and you want to be my friend."
    I didn't answer. We were too close to the trailer. Her father might step outside for some reason and hear me.
    "I must be crazy, but I'll meet you on the terrace," she said. "I'll have MacDuff with me—for protection. You'd better be telling the truth and you'd better be alone. Don't try anything funny, either."
    At the sound of his name, MacDuff raised his head hopefully and watched Lissa run inside. In a few seconds she was back with his leash. While she fastened it to his collar, I took off through the woods, planning to get to the terrace before she did.
    I made a wide circle around the house, afraid now of the front windows. The plywood covering them was cracked. Perhaps Miss Lilian was peering out from the dark, watching me go by dressed in her clothes, loathing me even more than before.
    Cautiously I approached the terrace and climbed its broad steps. No sign of the old woman. No sound. Hoping she didn't know I was near, I perched on the edge of the lion bench. Intensely aware of the silent house behind me, I waited for Lissa.
    A breeze ruffled the weeds growing tall on the lawn, turning brown now, their seed pods emptying into the air. Above, the sky burned a deep pure October blue. The trees had turned red, gold, brown. Their leaves littered the terrace, blown into piles in the corners.
    Despite the sun's warmth, I shivered in the house's gloomy shadow. I pictured Miss Lilian creeping about in the dark rooms the way she used to, her mind racing with crazy thoughts, her heart full of hatred for Georgie and me.
    A trickle of sweat ran down my spine. "Please come soon,