“You can’t use Jackie,” Max said. He folded his arms. “Dr. Cassel made me promise to take good care of him.”
“But nothing will happen to Jackie. I disappeared and nothing happened to me.”
“How did he do that?” Diane asked Donna. Donna shook her head. She didn’t know.
“I’ll cut two flaps in a large cardboard box,” Gary told Max. “I’ll lift one flap and put Jackie in the box. Then, while I talk to the audience, someone will take Jackie out of the other flap.”
“Well,” Max said as he unfolded his arms, “that doesn’t sound dangerous. You’ll have to let me see the box. And I’ll have to be at the show to make sure nothing happens to Jackie.”
For the next two weeks Diane and Kevin practiced juggling.
Donna borrowed joke books from the library and read them. She wrote the best jokes on small white cards. And as Donna walked home from school, she kept saying, “We are proud to present.” Then she pointed to someone nearby. Most people walked quickly ahead. But one woman bowed and did a little dance.
Gary worked on his disappearing box.
Someone in the apartment building had bought a new television set. Gary found the box outside near the trash cans. He taped the box closed. Then he cut two large flaps. Gary painted the box red. And he painted black bars on the box, to make it look like a cage.
Gary and Kevin practiced the disappearing trick in their kitchen. Gary draped a large cloth over a table. Kevin hid under the cloth. Then Gary put his “disappearing box” on the table.
Gary held a teddy bear in his arms. He opened the front flap. “Say good-bye to everyone,” Gary said to the bear. Then he put the bear inside the box and let the flap drop down. As soon as the front flap was closed, Kevin opened the back flap and took the bear out.
Later Gary showed the box to Max. Max watched as Gary and Kevin practiced the trick with Jackie.
On the Monday evening of the talent show, people came to the school theater early. Half an hour before the show was to begin, people were already sitting in their seats and waiting. The curtains on the stage were closed. Behind the curtains fifth graders were getting ready.
A boy was singing, “My shoes are worn.” In front of him Diane and Kevin were juggling plastic bowling pins. A girl danced in circles with a broom. Children were reading poetry, telling jokes, and one boy was playing a harmonica. And Jackie was in his cage talking to them all.
Ms. Benson, one of the fifth grade teachers, stood on a box. She clapped her hands together and said, “It’s time for the show to begin. You’ll have to clear the stage. And you’ll have to be quiet.”
Ms. Benson got off the box. Donna walked in front of the curtains to the center of the stage. She waited. A few people in the audience saw Donna and told the others to be quiet.
“Welcome to the fifth grade talent show,” Donna said. “Before our first act I want to tell you what my parents gave me for my birthday. It was an electric toothbrush. Next year they’re giving me electric teeth.”
Donna waited. No one laughed.
“And now,” she said, “we present a great singer, Brian Baker.”
The curtains opened. Brian walked forward, holding a microphone. He sang, “My shoes are worn. My shoes are torn.”
Jackie was in his cage in the offstage area, where the audience couldn’t see him. Max and Gary stood next to the cage and waited. Kevin and Diane waited in another area off the stage.
The audience cheered when Brian finished singing his “Torn Shoes Blues.” Brian bowed a few times. Then Donna introduced the next act.
Kevin looked through the curtain along the side of the stage. “Susie Hannah is dancing with a broom,” Kevin whispered to Diane. “We won’t be on for a while. Let’s go somewhere and practice.”
Kevin and Diane walked into the hall. They practiced their juggling act. Then they sat on the floor and rested.
“Donna shouldn’t tell those jokes,” Diane said. “No one thinks they’re funny.”
Diane and Kevin talked for a while. Then Kevin jumped up. “I have to get onto the stage,” he said.
“Why? We’re not on yet.”
“Not to juggle. When Gary is on, I have to take Jackie out of the disappearing box. I stand behind the curtain,” Kevin told Diane. “Then as soon as Gary puts Jackie into the box, I take him out. I wait for him to show everyone that the box is empty. Then I put Jackie back in the box and Gary shows everyone that Jackie is back.”
Diane followed Kevin. They looked at the stage from one of the side doors. Gary was doing his act in front of the closed curtain.
“He’s doing the disappearing act,” Kevin said. “I’ve got to get Jackie out of that box.”
Kevin ran to the back part of the stage. He reached through the break in the curtain and opened the flap in the disappearing box. He reached for Jackie. But Jackie was gone.