Chapter 6

Chapter 6 Shortly after sunset, Sugar, Dirt, Poppy, and Sweetie peeked out the rear window of the station wagon. All eyes were on the decoy sitting in the birdcage just a few feet away, the secret second bag of jelly beans lying beside it. "How is this going to work again?" asked Poppy. Dirt rolled out her diagram. "We have the fishing line hooked up to the door of the birdcage. When Bepizzle tries to—" "Befrizzle!" snapped Sugar. "Fine," continued Dirt. "When Befrizzle tries to grab the jelly beans out of the cage, we pull back on the fishing pole and BLAM—we've got him in the cage. We won't let him out until he tells us where the shoe is."

"This is taking too long," said Sugar. "I'm going outside." "What are you going to do? You'll blow our cover!" asked Dirt. "I'm going to secure the perimeter," answered Sugar. "Secure the what?" asked Poppy. "The perimeter," answered Sugar. "What's a perimeter?" asked Sweetie. "Listen, kid." Sugar chuckled. "Perimeter is a very complicated term that would take about

six hours to properly explain. We simply don't have the time right—" "A perimeter is the distance around something," interrupted Dirt. "If you drew a rectangle around the car, that would be the perimeter." "I'd estimate the perimeter to be around one mile," said Sugar. "I'll be back in an hour." "I don't think that's right," said Dirt. "It's just an estimate, kid," explained Sugar. "It doesn't need to be exact!" "It should actually be kind of close," explained Dirt. "We just need to add." She took out some crayons and drew a rectangle. "The

car is about ten feet long and five feet wide. So..." "There is a time and a place for everything!" cautioned Sugar. "And the dark of night is no time for math!" "To find the perimeter, we just add up all the sides. So 10+5+10+5," continued Dirt. Poppy and Sweetie watched as Dirt set up her equation. "This is scary!" said Poppy. "What if we get it wrong?" "It's okay to get things wrong," said Dirt. "I get things wrong all the time."

"You got that right," mumbled Sugar. "Let's start with your packing—" "Okay, so 10+10=20," continued Dirt, ignoring Sugar's remark. "And 5+5=10." "Don't come crying to me when your night math doesn't turn out the way you expect it to!" warned Sugar. "And 20+10=30," finished Dirt. "It's approximately thirty feet around the car. So I'm

going to estimate that it will take you just about a minute to secure the perimeter." "Nice work, kid," said Sugar. "I'm proud of you. It takes nerves of steel to do math in the dark. I didn't think it could be done." "Thanks, Sug—" "Shhhh," said Sugar, her wing to her beak. She pressed her face against the window. "Something's out there...." Dirt took her position at the fishing pole and gripped it as tightly as she could. Sugar motioned for Poppy and Sweetie to take cover under the front seat.