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distance vision was not great. The world out there was generally fuzzy, despite his six eyes. But he could see these headlines all too well! Big black block letters seemed to roar:
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    INFESTATION OF DEADLY SPIDERS
    IN PHILHARMONIC HALL
    Conductor Found Collapsed!
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    Oh, no! Felix silently groaned. There seemed to be a drawing of a brown recluse on the front page. Beneath it were the words “If you see this spider, contact pest control immediately. Call 1-800-EEK-PEST.”
    â€œI’m wanted!” Felix muttered. He strained to see, but he couldn’t read anything else from the windowsill. It was profoundly frustrating. Did the conductor live or die?
    Felix returned to the captain’s quarters of the USS Constitution . His family was still asleep, but try as he might, Felix couldn’t join them.
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    Over the next few days, Edith and her children became accustomed to the endless blathering of Oliphant Uxbridge and the pace of life in the antique store. Countless times a day, Felix announced that a molt was coming on. But Edith knew it would be a while and cautioned him to be patient.
    Then one morning a week after their arrival, she heard a scuttling in the rigging. Felix swung in on a silk thread through a porthole. “Ta-da!” he announced.
    â€œWhat’s all the ta-da-ing about?” Jo Bell asked as she trussed up a carpenter ant.
    Edith looked hard at her son. She took a tiny step closer and focused all of her eyes. Her minuscule heart skipped a beat. “Felix! Your leg! You have a new leg!”

C ould you keep it down!” The merry little spider family froze. They were gathered around a large cockroach, celebrating Felix’s new leg. Through small puncture wounds made by her fangs, Edith had delivered the first stunning doses of her venom. The cockroach was barely stirring now. Each member of Edith’s family was preparing to vomit a bit of their own digestive fluids in through the puncture wounds so the guts of the cockroach would liquefy and could be sucked out.
    â€œYou know what would taste great with this? Ketchup!”
    â€œJulep, stop already!” Jo Bell rolled her eyes.
    Oliphant Uxbridge’s complaint cut through the little party. “I say, you’ve been carousing about this molt and your son’s newly grown leg for hours now. I believe our egg sac is showing signs of hatching. I would appreciate it if our spiderlings could hatch into a more refined environment.”
    â€œJust wait until one of them loses a leg. You’d be celebrating, too!” Felix blurted out.
    â€œFelix!” Edith hissed.
    â€œWell, it’s true, Mom,” he muttered.
    They heard a painful wail from Mrs. Uxbridge. “Oliphant, that family is so vulgar. Don’t even speak to them. You know nothing ever good happens when brown recluses move into the neighborhood. Why, I heard sirens out there the very night they arrived. I bet anything it was something to do with them . Brown recluses — they give us all a bad name!”
    Fear coursed through Edith. Mrs. Uxbridge had made the connection between Edith’s family and the sirens. A sense of defeat engulfed her. Fat Cat, however, had heard enough. Arching his back in anger, he sprang across the shop to where the Uxbridges’ web hung in all its spiraling delicacy.
    â€œHow dare you speak that way to my dear friend! ‘Vulgar,’ you call her! My dear madame, you wouldn’t know vulgar if it smacked you in the face.” Fat Cat was in full voice now. Edith and her children clambered up the USS Constitution ’s rigging to watch Fat Cat’s performance. Scores of other spiders in the shop began creeping out from their webs. A leucauge family appeared from a dented globe. Another black widow emerged from a chronometer. A pholcid descended from a shelf of compasses for a better view. Fatty was thrilled with his arachnid audience and puffed up to deliver his