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tumbling after them. Charles gave Lizzie a questioning look, and Lizzie shook her head sadly. Charles was right: Mary was not going to adopt Jack. After Lizzie hung up, she waited to hear Charles say “I told you so.” But he just shrugged and gave her a superior little smile, which was even more annoying.
    Lizzie sat on the kitchen floor and pulled Jack close for a hug. “You’ve been a good boy,” she said,“even though I know it’s only because we have been watching you every minute. And we can’t do that forever. I just know the perfect home is out there, waiting for you.” She kissed his adorable wrinkly forehead. “Mary said her house is in a state,” she informed Charles. “Whatever that means. Like what, the Green Mountain State?” She remembered what Kit Smithers had written.
    “Vermont!” Charles said.
    “Vermont?” Lizzie stared at him. “What do you mean, Vermont? The Green Mountain State has got to be Texas. That’s where Kit Smithers lives.” Lizzie tried to remember what she’d learned about the states last year. How could Charles possibly know more than she did when he was only in second grade?
    Charles shook his head. “I saw it on a sign when we went to Vermont last winter. ‘Welcome to Vermont, the Green Mountain State.’”
    “Charles is absolutely right,” said Dad, who had come into the kitchen from the garage, where hewas cindent the oil in his pickup truck. He wiped his hands on a rag. “The name Vermont comes from the French words for green,
vert,
and mountain,
mont.
Vermont was the fourteenth state to join the Union, and —”
    Dad had a habit of sometimes telling you more than you wanted to know. But Lizzie had stopped listening. She gave Jack one more kiss on the head, moved him off her lap, and pounded up the stairs. She had to write to Kit Smithers right away.
    But when Lizzie checked her e-mail, she got a big surprise. There was a note waiting for her!
    Dear Lizzie,
    I’m glad to hear that you may have found Jack a home — but to tell you the truth, I’m sorry, too. I was just about to ask you if I could adopt him! I think Jack would fit in perfectly with my country life. (I don’t live in Texas anymore, by the way. I moved to Vermont last year.) But the important thing is that he has found a good home. Pleaselet me know if anything changes. Good luck with your puppy fostering!
    Your friend,
    Kit Smithers
    Underneath her name, Kit Smithers had put her phone number. Lizzie’s hands flew as she typed a quick answer and wrote down the phone number on a scrap of paper. Then she ran downstairs and out into the garage. “Dad! Dad! Can we go to Vermont? Maybe today?”
    Dad stared at her from under the open hood of his truck. “What?”
    Lizzie gave him the scrap of paper with Kit Smithers’s phone number on it. “Kit Smithers wants to adopt Jack. Will you call her and find out how long it would take to get to where she lives? Please? Please?”
    Dad frowned down at the number. “It seems crazy,” he said. “But we do need to find Jack a home before he eats our whole house. Andyour mom could definitely use some peace and quiet so she can finish up her article.” He wiped his hands on a rag and slammed the hood. Lizzie followed him into the kitchen and stuck right by him while he called the number on the paper and started talking. She couldn’t believe that her dad was actually speaking to
the
Kit Smithers!
    Finally, he hung up and turned to Lizzie with a big grin. “Okay, we’re on! She still wants Jack and it’ll only take a couple of hours to get there. We can pile everybody in the van right after lunch.”
    “Pile everybody in the van? Where are you going?” Mom bounced into the kitchen, looking much more cheerful than she had in days. “Guess what?” she asked without waiting for an answer to her first question. “It turns out Jack brought me some good luck. Since I couldn’t read those notes he chewed, I finally had to call the builder again. We