Then There Were Five

Book excerpt: With Father in Washington and Cuffy, their housekeeper, away visiting a sick cousin, almost anything might happen to the Melendy kids left behind at the Four-Story Mistake. In the Melendy family, adventures are inevitable: Mr. Titus and the catfish; the villainy of the DeLacey brothers; Rush's composition of Opus 3; Mona's first rhubarb pie and all the canning; Randy's arrowhead; the auction and fair for the Red Cross. But best of all is the friendship with Mark Herron, which begins with a scrap-collection mission and comes to a grand climax on Oliver's birthday. Here is Elizabeth Enright's classic story of a long and glorious summer in the country with the resourceful, endearing Melendy bunch. Then There Were Five is the third installment of Enright's Melendy Quartet, an engaging and warm series about the close-knit Melendy family and their surprising adventures.