55 WAVERLY STREET

In this arch and oddly phrased allegory, a child joins other neighborhood children slipping through gaps in a hedge around the yard of a mysterious old house ``to do what they do, do, do''—in his case fix plants, by repotting them. He forgets about the house as he grows, until years later, a weary old man, he takes a hand held out to him through the hedge and finds himself a child again. In Chambers's drawings he is accompanied by a bouncy dog (which he ignores, and ultimately abandons) and a small wagon, full of planting supplies when he's young and bags of money later. In the end, remembering a companion of his youth, he leaves that idyllic place—ostensibly momentarily—to fetch her. Since the symbolism isn't exactly clear or compelling, children may identify more with the dog, always an outsider looking in, than the boy. (Picture book. 7-9)