"Uh-oh," I whispered.

"What?" asked Jessi.

"Look." I pointed to our parents. They had gathered in a pack under the sign that read: NEW YORK-BOUND TRAINS. I "Ooh," breathed Jessi. "That doesn't look good. You don't think they'll suddenly decide not to let us go, do you?" "They might," Mal replied darkly.

"I'll take care of them," announced Stacey. She marched over to the parents. The rest of us followed her uncertainly.

When the grown-ups saw us coming, they stopped talking — which only proved that they had been talking about us.

"So," said Stacey, "my dad's apartment is ready for us. Well, for some of us." (Mr. McGill's apartment isn't big enough to be overtaken by seven extra people for two weeks, so only Stacey and two others were going to stay with him. The rest of us would stay on the other side of town with Laine Cummings and her family. Laine is an old friend of Stacey's, and she and her parents live in a huge apartment.) "Dad even had the apartment professionally cleaned," Stacey went on. "Exterminated, too." "Exterminated?" repeated Mrs. Ramsey. "You mean it has roaches?" She looked as if she were about to cry.

"No, giant sewer rats," I whispered, but Dawn poked me in the ribs.

"Well, yes," Stacey said to Mrs. Ramsey. "But, see, the important thing is that now they're gone." "Besides," spoke up Mrs. McGill, who was the only sane-looking adult on the platform, "almost every apartment in New York has roaches. They're like flies or ants in most — " "They carry disease," murmured Nannie, shuddering.

Stacey and her mom exchanged a Look.

The loudspeaker was turned on then, and a tinny voice announced, "The train bound for New York is approaching the station. Two minutes to boarding time." My mother burst into tears.

Dawn's mother said, "I hope all the dishes and pots and pans were washed after those exterminators sprayed their poison around." Mrs. Ramsey hugged Jessi protectively.