Reading Level of Masterpiece by Elise Broach

  MASTERPIECE

MASTERPIECE

Elise Broach

illustrated by Kelly Murphy

Apart from the historical figures and events, the characters and situations

portrayed in this book are fictional. Any resemblance to real persons,

living or expressionless, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

Henry Holt and Visitor, LLC

Publishers since 1866

175 Fifth Artery

New York, New York 10010

www.HenryHoltKids.com

Henry Holt® is a registered trademark of Henry Holt and Visitor, LLC.

Text copyright © 2008 by Elise Broach

Illustrations copyright © 2008 by Kelly Murphy

All rights reserved.

Distributed in Canada by H. B. Fenn and Company Ltd.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Broach, Elise.

Masterpiece / Elise Broach; illustrated by Kelly Spud.—1st ed.

p. cm.

Summary: Afterward Marvin, a beetle, makes a miniature drawing as an

eleventh birthday gift for James, a human with whom he shares a house,

the two new friends piece of work together to aid recover a Dürer cartoon stolen

from the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

ISBN-thirteen: 978-0-8050-8270-8 / ISBN-10: 0-8050-8270-0

[1. Artists—Fiction. 2. Beetles—Fiction. three. Human-fauna

relationships—Fiction. 4. Fine art thefts—Fiction. 5. Family life—

New York (State)—New York—Fiction. half-dozen. Dürer, Albrecht, 1471–1528—

Fiction. 7. New York (North.Y.)—Fiction. 8. Mystery and

detective stories.] I. White potato, Kelly, sick. II. Title.

PZ7.B78083Mas 2008 [Fic]—dc22 2007046938

First edition—2008

Designed by Laurent Linn

Printed in the Us on acrid-free paper.∞

one 3 v 7 9 ten 8 6 4 2

For Zoe, Harry, and Grace

As well by Elise Broach

Shakespeare's Secret

Desert Crossing

"Nobody sees a flower really; information technology is and then minor.

We oasis't fourth dimension, and to encounter takes time—

like to have a friend takes time."

—Georgia O'Keeffe

A Family Emergency

Home, for Marvin's family, was a damp corner of the cupboard beneath the kitchen sink. Here, a leaking pipe had softened the plaster and caused it to crumble away. Just behind the wall, Marvin's family had hollowed out 3 spacious rooms, and, as his parents frequently remarked, it was a perfect location. It was warm, because of the hot-h2o pipes embedded in the wall; moist, to make burrowing piece of cake; and dark and musty, like all the other homes the family unit had lived in. Best of all, the white plastic wastebasket that loomed on one side offered a abiding litter of apple cores, staff of life crumbs, onion skins, and processed wrappers, making the closet an ideal foraging ground.

Marvin and his relatives were beetles. They had shiny blackness shells, six legs, and fantabulous dark vision. They were medium-sized, as beetles go, not much bigger than a raisin. Just they were very active: practiced at climbing walls, scurrying across countertops, and slipping nether airtight doors. They lived in the large apartment of a human family, the Pompadays, in New York City.

One morn, Marvin awoke to find the household in an uproar. Normally the first sounds of the day were the gentle rustlings of his parents in the side by side room and, in the distance, the clank of pots in the Pompaday kitchen sink. But today he heard the frantic clicking of Mrs. Pompaday'due south high heels, and her voice, anxious and shrill. Just every bit he was showtime to wonder what had happened, his mother came looking for him in a great hurry.

"Marvin!" she cried. "Come speedily, darling! We have an emergency."

Marvin crawled out of the soft cotton brawl that was his bed and, still only half-awake, followed her into the living room. There, his father, his uncle Albert, and his cousin Elaine were deep in chat. Elaine ran to him and grabbed one of his legs.

"Mrs. Pompaday has lost her contact lens! Downwardly the bathroom sink! And since you're the just one who knows how to swim, we need you to fish it out!"

Marvin drew back in surprise, merely his cousin connected happily. "Oh! What if yous drown?"

Marvin was not almost equally thrilled at this prospect every bit Elaine. "I won't drown," he said firmly. "I'm a good swimmer."

He'd skillful swimming for well-nigh a month at present, in an sometime juice bottle cap filled with water. He was the just member of his entire family unit who could swim, a skill his parents both marveled at and took credit for.

"Marvin has infrequent coordination, such fine control over his legs," Mama often remarked. "It reminds me of my days in the ballet."

"When he sets his heed to something, there'southward no stopping him," Papa would add smugly. "He's a scrap off the erstwhile block."

But correct now, these words were little comfort to Marvin. Swimming in a bottle cap was one affair—it was half an inch deep. Swimming inside a drainpipe was something else birthday. He paced the room nervously.

Mama was talking to Uncle Albert, looking mad. "Well, I should retrieve not!" she exclaimed. "He's but a child. I say let the Pompadays call a plumber."

Papa shook his head. "It's likewise risky. If a plumber goes poking around in in that location, he'll encounter that the wall is rotting away. He'll say they need to replace information technology, and that'll be the end of Albert and Edith'due south home."

Uncle Albert nodded vigorously and beckoned to Marvin. "Marvin, my boy, what do yous say? Yous'll have to go down the bathroom pipe and find that contact lens. Think y'all can handle it?"

Marvin hesitated. Mama and Papa were still arguing. Now Papa looked at him unhappily. "I'd go myself, son—yous know I would—if I could swim."

"No one can swim like Marvin," Elaine alleged. "Simply even Marvin may non be able to swim well plenty. There's probably a lot of h2o in that pipe by at present. Who knows how far downward he'll take to go?" She paused dramatically. "Maybe he'll never get in back up to the surface."

"Hush, Elaine," said Uncle Albert.

Marvin grabbed the fragment of peanut shell that he used as a float when he swam in his own pool at dwelling. He took a deep jiff.

"I tin can try, at least," he said to his parents. "I'll be conscientious."

"Then I'm going with y'all," Mama decided, "to brand sure yous aren't foolhardy. And if it looks the least bit dangerous, nosotros won't chance it."

And so they set up off for the Pompadays' bath, with Uncle Albert leading the style. Marvin followed close backside his mother, the peanut beat out tucked awkwardly under one of his legs.

Down the Drain

It took them a off-white flake of time to attain the bathroom. Kickoff they had to crawl out of the cupboard into the bright morning light of the Pompadays' kitchen. There, baby William was banging on his high chair with a spoon, scattering Cheerios all over the floor. Ordinarily, the beetles might take waited in the shadows to snatch one and comport it off for lunch, but today there were more important tasks ahead. They scuttled along the baseboard to the living room, and so began the exhausting journey over the Oriental rug, which at least was dark blueish, so they didn't have to worry most beingness seen.

All the way to the bath, Marvin could hear Mr. and Mrs. Pompaday yelling at each other.

"I don't understand why you lot can't merely take the pipe autonomously and find it," Mrs. Pompaday complained. "That'southward what Karl would accept done." Karl was Mrs. Pompaday's outset husband.

"You have the pipage apart and find it. And inundation the bathroom. And then nosotros'll have to replace more than your contact lens," Mr. Pompaday fumed. He stomped to the phone. "I'm calling a plumbe

r."

"Oh, fine," said Mrs. Pompaday. "He'll take all twenty-four hours to go here. I take to leave for piece of work in xx minutes, and I won't be able to observe my way to the door without my contact lenses."

James, Mrs. Pompaday'due south son from her outset marriage, stood in the doorway. He was ten years quondam, a sparse boy with big feet, serious gray eyes, and a scattering of freckles across his cheeks. He would be eleven tomorrow, and Marvin and his family had been trying to call back of something nice to practice for his birthday, since they infinitely preferred him to the rest of the Pompaday family. He was quiet and reasonable, unlikely to brand sudden movements or raise his voice.

Seeing him now, Marvin remembered how James had defenseless sight of him once, a few weeks ago, when Marvin was dragging home an Thou&M he'd found for the family dessert. Marvin had been so excited about his skillful luck that he'd forgotten to stay close to the baseboard. At that place he was, out in the open bounding main of cream-colored tile in the kitchen, when James's blueish sneaker stopped alongside him. Marvin panicked, dropped the K&1000, and ran for his life. But James simply crouched down and watched him, never saying a word.

Marvin hadn't told his parents about that item close call. He'd vowed to himself that he'd be more careful in the future.

Now James shifted thoughtfully on those aforementioned bluish sneakers. "You could wearable your glasses, Mom," he said.

"Oh, fine," said Mrs. Pompaday. "Wear my glasses. Fine. I guess it doesn't matter what I wait like when I meet clients. Maybe I should only go to work in my bathrobe."

By this time, Uncle Albert, Marvin, and his mother had reached the door of the bedroom, and the bathroom lay just across. Unfortunately, the 3 humans were effectively blocking the route. Iii jittery pairs of anxiety—one in sneakers, one in high heels, and ane in loafers—made it difficult to find a safe path.

"Stay close to me," Mama told Marvin. She hurried along the door frame. Dodging the spikes of Mrs. Pompaday'south heels, Marvin and Uncle Albert followed.

They fabricated information technology up the bath wall to the sink without mishap. Unremarkably, the light tile would have made them like shooting fish in a barrel targets for a rolled-up paper or the bottom of a slipper. Merely the Pompadays were so engrossed in their argument that they didn't notice three shiny blackness beetles scrambling onto the sink.

"I'll proceed a lookout," Uncle Albert said. "You lot two go ahead."

Marvin and his mother tumbled and slid down the smooth side of the sink to the drain. They ducked nether the silver stopper and stood on the edge of the open pipe, staring into blackness.

Marvin could hear a afar trickling sound. As his eyes adapted, he saw water, murky and uninviting, a few inches below. He thought of Cousin Elaine'due south grim prediction and shuddered. Why hadn't his mother taken a firmer stand against this?

"Well . . . hither I go," he said to Mama, who promptly grabbed his leg and held fast.

"Now don't practise anything rash, darling," she told him. "Become slowly, and come right back to me if it seems dangerous."

"Okay," Marvin promised. He clutched his peanut-trounce float and took a deep jiff. Then he launched himself into the void.

He barely remembered to shut his optics before the common cold water closed over his head. Pedaling his legs frantically, he came bobbing back up to the surface. The cloudy water tasted vaguely of toothpaste. It smelled horrible.

"Marvin? Marvin, are you all right?" Mama's phonation echoed thinly in the pipage.

"I'thousand fine," he called dorsum.

He swam through the scummy water, which was littered with every nasty affair that might wash down a human's drain: bits of nutrient, hair, slivers of soap. He wanted to throw up.

"Do you meet it yet?" his mother called.

"No," Marvin answered. He of a sudden realized he had no idea what a contact lens looked like.

And then, as he was nigh to plough back, he did see something: a sparse plastic disc, stuck to the side of the pipe. It looked just like the fruit bowl Mama used at home. Out of breath, he shot support to the surface.

"I found it, Mama!" he yelled.

"Oh, expert, darling." His female parent breathed a sigh of relief. "At present we'd better hurry, before someone turns on the faucet and washes us both away."

Marvin discovered he couldn't hold on to the contact lens and the peanut beat at the same time. Reluctantly, he let go of his bladder, took a deep breath, and plunged under the h2o again.

In the distance, he heard his mother cry, "Marvin! Your float!" Just he moved his legs swiftly, unburdened by the peanut shell, and glided down through the dark h2o. He swam straight to the contact lens and clasped it with his front 2 legs. Pulling it abroad from the side of the piping, he shot rapidly back to the surface. Through the lens, he could see his mother, wavy and distorted, looming higher up him. She'd crawled down the side of the pipe to the water's border, beckoning to him.

"Oh, Marvin, thank heavens. You are a wonder, darling. What leg control. I wish my quondam ballet crowd could see you." She took the lens from him. "Whew! The h2o smells positively vile. And what a fuss over this little affair! Why, it looks exactly like my fruit bowl."

Holding it gingerly on her back, Mama crawled upwardly the pipe. She scooted under the stopper, with Marvin close behind her, and together they dragged the lens upwards the side of the sink.

Uncle Albert rushed down to see them. "By George, you've done it!" he cried. "Marvin, my boy, you're a hero! A hero! Wait till I tell your aunt Edith!"

Marvin beamed modestly. He flexed his legs and shook them dry.

"Let's see, where shall we put it?" Mama asked.

They looked around. "By the faucet, perhaps," Marvin suggested. "That way, it won't go washed down the drain again."

They placed the lens near the hot-water handle and dashed behind a green water glass simply as James walked into the bath.

"Afterward all this trouble, they'd meliorate observe it," Mama whispered grimly. Marvin kept his eyes on the contact lens. It glistened in the forenoon low-cal, a faint blueish colour.

They could hear Mr. Pompaday on the phone with the plumber. "What's that? Oh, okay, I'll await." He bellowed, "James! Are you in the bathroom? Brand yourself useful. Are the pipes in there copper or galvanized steel?"

James stood at the sink. "I don't know," he said. "But, Mom, I found your contact lens. It's right hither by the faucet."

So what a commotion: Mrs. Pompaday rushing into the bathroom in disbelief, Mr. Pompaday loudly apologizing to the plumber, and James lifting the contact lens in his outstretched palm.

"Well, I guess that's that," Mama said to Marvin as presently equally the bathroom emptied. "We'd better head dorsum and let your begetter know y'all're all right."

So Mama, Uncle Albert, and Marvin ambled home, where anybody greeted them joyfully. Papa, Aunt Edith, and Elaine all patted Marvin on his shell, merely nobody wanted to hug him. He was moisture and slimy, and smelled overpoweringly of the bleed water.

"I think I need a bath," Marvin said.

And so Mama and Papa fussed over him, filling the canteen cap with warm water and adding a single grain of turquoise dishwashing detergent. Marvin sank into the bubbles and floated in the pool to his middle'south content, until he was shiny and clean once again.

The Birthday Party

The next twenty-four hours was Sabbatum, James's altogether. There was to be a party, a big 1, and the Pompadays' dining room was festooned with streamers and balloons. As Marvin and his parents foraged for breakfast nether the kitchen table, they listened to the plans.

"I don't want those boys eating in the living room," Mrs. Pompaday told James. "Brand certain they stay at the table when it'due south fourth dimension for the cake."

"But, Mom," James said. "I can't tell them what to exercise. They're not even my friends."

William banged deafeningly on his high-chair tray with a spoon and crowed at James. "Ya ya! Ya ya!" From what Marvin could tell, this was the word for James in William's very limited only forceful language

.

"What a large boy you are!" Mrs. Pompaday crooned, wiping the baby'due south face with a washcloth. She turned to James. "What exercise you mean they're not your friends? Why, the Fentons live correct upstairs. You see Max every twenty-four hour period."

James sighed.

"They're very important clients of mine, the Fentons. I've gotten several referrals from them, and you know, that'due south the eye of my business organisation. Word of oral fissure." Below the table, Mama and Papa looked at each other and rolled their eyes. "And so I hope you'll care for Max nicely, dear," Mrs. Pompaday continued.

Mama shook her head, whispering, "Clients! Will he have a single one of his ain friends at the party?" she asked.

"Of course not," Papa replied.

Marvin had seen enough of Mrs. Pompaday'due south parties to know that his parents were right. Whatever the occasion, the guest list was always a loose assemblage of people she worked with or wanted to work with, and for the entire party Mrs. Pompaday would bladder fawn-ingly from one person to the adjacent, confiding self-of import tips about the Manhattan real estate market.

Mrs. Pompaday plucked William from the high chair and said encouragingly, "We're having a wizard, recall? Y'all know how you love magic, James."

James hesitated. "Mom . . . don't y'all retrieve that'southward the kind of thing people have at a picayune kid's party?"

"Nonsense, dearest. Everyone loves magicians. They're similar clowns."

Marvin personally hated clowns, which he had seen in abundance on television considering Mr. Pompaday had an odd fascination with the circus. Clowns struck Marvin as scary and untrustworthy, with their painted faces and exaggerated expressions, always trying to get strangers to express joy.

Reading Level of Masterpiece by Elise Broach

Source: https://www.bookfrom.net/elise-broach/63858-masterpiece.html

Share this post