Chapter 25

Miss Nogard stared at her a long moment then said, "Will you please bring me the dictionary?"

The smile dropped off Maurecia's face and crashed on the floor.

The dictionary lay on top of the bookcase. Maurecia numbly went after it. How could she know? she wondered. It's impossible! Maybe she just wants to look up a word.

She carried the heavy book back to Miss Nogard.

"Thank you, Maurecia," said Miss Nogard, flipping through the pages. "I need to look up 'journey.'"

Maurecia couldn't take it any longer. "I ripped it!" she cried out. "I tore the dictionary. I'm sorry. I don't even know how it happened. I was just turning the page, really! Maybe pages only have a certain amount of turns in them. Like, nine hundred and ninety-nine. Then when you turn the page for the thousandth time, it will rip, no matter who turns it."