Theresa Moss is a 14 year old girl who lives on Mount Licorice in a country called Virithia. Virithia is a very interesting country. It is divided into mountains and valleys. In the valleys live people called Valenites, and in the mountains live people called Mononites. The majority of the Valenites are farmers, and most of the Mononites are hunters. They trade with each other in the meeting places where the mountains and valleys join. The temperature in the valleys is extremely high, and the mountains are just as cold as the valleys are hot. The Mononites lived in tunnels in the ground, while they Valenites live in cottages on the side of the valley wall.

Despite all these differences, the Mononites and Valenites are at peace with each other. They can't visit each other, so they communicate by means of passenger pigeons. Virithia is ruled by a wise king who lived on flat land in the middle of the country. Each mountain and valley elects its own mayor.

Theresa Moss lives on Granite Avenue, a prominent street on Mount Licorice. All streets on the mountains are made of ice. The people are able to rub a special lotion on their feet and glide down the street instead of walking. Many families live on Granite Avenue. Like most other streets on Mount Licorice, it has a playground, church, school, town hall, and a big barn, which is a gathering place for the men. The church and the barn are the only building above ground. All of the homes are comfortable tunnels.

Theresa and her family live at the end of Granite Avenue. Mr. and Mrs. Moss and Grandma Moss (Mr. Moss's mother) are the adults of the family. Mr. Moss is the craftsmen for Granite Avenue, but when the work is light, he goes on hunting trips with the rest of the men. Mrs. Moss is a wonderful mother, who takes good care of the family. Grandma Moss may be old, but she oversees things quite well. She loves the children very much, and she spoils them with treats. Theresa is the oldest girl. Her older brother's name is John. The younger siblings are Steven, Bridget, Patrick, and Timmy.

The Moss's large family is quite crowded in their tunnel, which is not especially large. But it is nice and comfortable inside. Theresa helps Mrs. Moss keep it clean. The Moss family owns a passenger pigeon, and all of the Moss children have pen pals among the Valenites. But their pigeon is old, and sometimes takes a while to deliver letters. Although the Moss family is not rich, they have quite a few ice sculptures in the front yard next to their pigeon box. This is because John is studying sculpting and is quite good.

Theresa is interested in becoming a trader with the Valenites when she graduates from secondary school. At the present, she attends school fives days out of the week. She does many things to help her mother, among them, the hated chore of washing clothes. Her hobbies are playing the piano, and working on her snowflake collection.

Theresa wanted to do something exciting. She had been thinking about going to visit the Valenites for a long time, because nothing exciting ever happened on Licorice Mountain. Theresa was very interested in the Valenites. She spent a lot of time at the bottom of the mountain, and asked the Valenites who came to trade many questions. Men did all the trading, however, and she couldn't learn much from them because they answered her questions in monosyllables. She had a pen pal among the Valenites, as did most Mononite children. She didn't get letters very often, however, because the Moss family's passenger pigeon was so old. Besides, reading about a place wasn't the same as seeing it.

So one day Theresa decided that tomorrow she would go and visit Gumdrop Valley, the valley directly below their mountain. She knew that the villages elders said that no Mononite could survive the hot climate of the valleys, but she decided to risk it. She decided not to tell her parents where she was going, as they might forbid her to go. Since it was a Saturday, they wouldn't care where she went, as long as she was back before dark. She got some things together and went to bed right after family prayers. The next morning she awoke early and set off on her great adventure.

Theresa walked down Granite Avenue in high spirits. It was a beautiful winter day, and she was excited about going to see the Valenites. She figured that she would be back before night, and no one would worry about her. She turned on to the familiar path, and had soon reached the trading store. There was no snow on the ground down here, and the air temperature was about fifty degrees - too warm for the taste of most Mononites. But Theresa was used to it since she spent a lot of time down here.

She tried to sneak past Charlie, the Mononite trader. She didn't want to have to answer awkward questions. But Charlie, sitting on a chair behind the table piled with goods, was on the look-out. He spotted her quickly.

"Why, it's little Theresa," he exclaimed. Theresa had started coming down here when she was seven years old, and Charlie had called her little Theresa ever since.

"Hi Charlie," Theresa replied.

"Sit right down. You don't come down here much anymore," Charlie said, pulling out a chair for her.

Theresa was thinking, "That's because the Valenite men don't tell me what I really want to know," but to Charlie she only said, "I know, I've been pretty busy. In fact, I only came to see you for a minute. I've got lots of things to do today."

"Oh, are you going to go skating with your friends?" Charlie asked.

"I'm not sure yet," Theresa answered, trying to sound casual. She had decided that it would be best if no one knew about her plans to visit the Valenites, not even Charlie. "But maybe I'll go see Tom first," she told Charlie, as if the idea had just occurred to her. Tom was the Valenite trader, and he worked was just a little farther up the road.

"You won't get much out of him," Charlie warned. "You'd probably be best off staying here and talking to the Valenites who come to trade." Charlie knew of her wish to learn more about the Valenites.

"I'll be all right," Theresa said. "I've dealt with Tom before."

"Okay, bye, little Theresa," Charlie said.

As soon as she was out of Charlie's sight, she left the path and walked behind some tall rocks. She didn't want to see Tom, and give him a chance to yell at her. Although she usually sat with Charlie and questioned the Valenite men, once she had gone down to question the Valenite trader. Tom hadn't even given her a chance to ask questions, but had yelled for her to get out of his sight.

She had soon reached Tom's table of vegetables which the Mononites traded for. Getting down on her hands and knees, she crept behind the table, trying to keep out of Tom's sight. She had soon passed the table, but she didn't dare to look back or stand up until she was well beyond the trading center.

When she looked around, she was on a small path. She took a deep breath and started walking down the road. The road did not go straight down into the valley, but seemed to spiral down. After a few minutes of walking, Theresa turned a corner and came upon a tall man. She didn't have time to hide, and she only hoped that he would take her for a Valenite girl.

"Good morning," he said.

"Good morning," Theresa responded, breathing a sigh of relief as he passed by her.

"You'd better go see your mother and put some more clothes on," he said, turning back to look at her. "You'll catch your death of cold."

Theresa wondered what the man was talking about by catching her death of cold. It had to be seventy-five degrees! She considered turning around because of the extreme heat, but then decided not to. She hadn't even come to a village yet. She could bear the heat as long as it got no worse.

A few minutes later, it had gotten worse. Theresa felt like she was in an oven. She was used to freezing temperatures, and felt as if she would die in what felt like a ninety degree heat. She had just decided to turn around and go home when she saw a group of Valenites coming up the road. She stepped off the road to hide behind a rock, but lost her footing and fell down the steep side of the valley. Down, down, down!

When Theresa finally stopped rolling, she was in the middle of a plain, with no road in sight. The heat, at 120 degrees, was worse than Theresa had ever thought she could stand. She stood up with difficulty, and started wandering aimlessly about, trying to find a sign of civilization. Her head was swimming. She caught a glimpse of a block of ice, and shouted for joy. But after she had reached it, she found that there was nothing there.

"It must be a mirage," Theresa said to herself. After she had walked what seemed like miles, she fell on the ground, almost dead with the effects of the heat and exhaustion.

Suddenly, she thought she heard a bell. "Help!" she called. "Can anyone hear me?" She waited what seemed like an eternity. "No, it can't be," she murmured. "I must be hearing things as well as seeing them."

But Theresa was not one to give up hope. "Help!" she called again. No one answered. The sun beat down relentlessly. Eventually, Theresa's eyes closed, and she knew no more.

When Theresa regained consciousness, she realized that she hadn't died, and that she was being carried. Through a haze, she saw some houses and realized that someone had brought her to the village. She was dimly conscious that they were going inside one of the houses. She was put to her feet and a girl helped her walk over to a tall rectangular box.

"Step in," the girl said. "It will make you feel better." Theresa didn't know who this girl was, but she had to trust her. Anything would be better than how she felt now. She stepped in, and the door closed behind her. It was cool inside the small compartment, and Theresa breathed deeply. After a few minutes, she stepped back out, feeling like herself again.

"Do you feel better?" asked the girl.

"Oh, yes," Theresa replied.

"My name is Joan," the girl told her. "Joan Muir. What's yours?"

"Theresa Moss," Theresa told her. "Thank you so much for saving my life. I thought for sure that I would die."

"I came upon you laying there when I was taking a walk. I knew at a glance that you were a Mononite, and I figured that you had fainted from the heat. I called my brother over from where he was hoeing the fields, and he carried you here. He's gone back to the fields now."

Joan showed Theresa around the house. She lived there with her parents and her four brothers.

"They're all working in the fields right now," Joan said.

"Do you always work on Saturdays?" Theresa inquired.

"No, not usually. But right now is harvest time, and everyone has to work longer in the fields."

Theresa asked Joan millions of questions about how she and her family lived. For instance, she had always wanted to know what kind of clothes the Valenites wore. Joan told her that they always wore sweat pants and sweat shirts, and overcoats, even inside. Joan showed her closet, and told her that all the women wore fur coats to church, over velvet dresses.

"That's why we need the pelts that we trade for with Mononites," Joan commented.

"It's amazing to me that you never get hot," Theresa said to Joan.

"It's incredible to me that you never get cold," Joan said, looking at Theresa's shorts and sleeveless top. Then both girls laughed!

"I guess that's just the way God made both of us," Joan said.

"Oh, by the way, Joan," Theresa said. "Can you show me how to make a fire?"

"You mean you've never made a fire before?" Joan asked.

"Except for the one at Tom the trader's place, I've never even seen one before." Theresa said honestly.

"We make one every night!" Joan told her. Theresa was amazed! It was wonderful finding out everything she had always wanted to know about the Valenites!

"Well, thanks for showing me around and answering my questions," Theresa said, after the girls had chatted for about an hour.

"I was glad to," Joan replied. "And thanks for the information about you Mononites."

"I'll probably start for home soon," Theresa went on. "It was great coming down here, but my parents will be getting worried if I don't get home soon."

"How are you planning on getting home?" Joan asked. Theresa was silent. She hadn't thought about that. She knew that she couldn't go through another ordeal like the one she had had on the way down.

"I don't know," Theresa said to Joan, with a worried tone in her voice. "Isn't there some way for Mononites to keep cool here?"

"Well, you've been in that cool box," Joan answered. "My uncle invented that. He calls it a refrigerator. My mother didn't think it had any use, because no one ever gets too hot here. But now it has practically saved your life."

"Yes," Theresa said. "It's a wonderful invention. But I certainly can't travel home in it."

"No," Joan agreed. "That wouldn't work. But as far as I know, there's nothing down here to keep things cold."

Theresa tried to swallow the big lump in her throat. Would she ever see her parents again?

"Wait, I know," Joan said suddenly. "Uncle Roger can help us!"

"You think he has something that would keep my cool?" Theresa asked.

"Well, I don't think he has something, but I'm sure he would try and make something. He's sort of an oddball. He's an inventor, and he's been exempted from working in the fields. He just sits in his workshop all day and fiddles around. In fact, we can go visit him right now!"

"That's wonderful!" Theresa said. Joan opened the front door, and the girls started to go out, but the hot air started making Theresa feel light-headed before they had even stepped outside.

"I don't think I can go out there," Theresa said.

"Maybe we'd better wait until tonight," Joan said. "It's cooler when the sun goes down." Theresa felt bad when she thought about how worried her parents were going to be when she didn't returned home that night, but she agreed with Joan. There was nothing else to do. The girls spent the rest of the afternoon playing games.

Around five o'clock, Mr. and Mrs. Muir, along with Joan's brothers, arrived home. They listened to Theresa's story with interest. Theresa was glad that she had found such kind people. For dinner, they had hot soup. "What a novelty!" Theresa said, when Mrs. Muir served everyone. "We always have cold soup at home." She waited until hers had cooled off, and then ate it, finding it very good.

Theresa and Joan left the house around eight o'clock. They walked down the street, passing a lot of crooked houses like the Muirs' house. Joan was right, it was much cooler at night, but Theresa was still quite hot when they finally stopped. The shop in front of them read, "Roger Muir, Inventor." Joan opened the door, and the girls walked in.

They were in a big room, crowded with all sorts of junk. Sitting at a table in the back of the room was a man wearing thick glasses. "Why, hello, Joan," the man said, putting down some pieces of pipe that he had been fitting together, and giving his niece a hug. "How nice to see you!"

"Hi, Uncle Roger," Joan said. "This is Theresa Moss. She is a Mononite. I found her unconscious near the fields, and brought her home. I put her in that refrigerator of yours to cool her down."

"Oh, really?" Uncle Roger said. "So one of my inventions was actually good for something, eh?" He grinned at the girls. "Nobody seems to like most of the things I make. But you say that the refrigerator actually did help you?"

"Yes, it was wonderful," Joan said quickly. "But, Uncle Roger, Theresa needs your help. She needs to get home to her family, and she needs to have something to keep her cool on the way back. Couldn't you make something?"

Uncle Roger's face puckered up a little. "I don't know, Joan," he said. "That was very hard to do. I don't even have the right supplies on hand."

"Please, sir," Theresa said. "I will be so grateful to you if you would just try."

"Well, seeing that you need to get back to your family, I can certainly try," Uncle Roger said. "It will probably take me a few days, though." Theresa's face fell. Her family was going to be so worried about her!

"What will my family think?" she asked Joan when they had thanked Uncle Roger and returned to her house. "No one knows where I've gone."

"We can send them a pigeon with a message," was Joan's bright idea. "That way they'll know you're in good hands." The girls went outside to the shed where the Muirs' family pigeon was kept. Theresa wrote a loving note to her parents, telling them what had happened, and not to worry about her. Then Joan let the pigeon out, and they gave it the folded piece of paper. Theresa watched the bird fly away, knowing it was on its way to her family and to home!

Joan poked her head around the corner of the room that Theresa was using during her stay at the Muir's house.

"Theresa," she said excitedly. "Uncle Roger said he has finished the machine. You can go home once it's dark tonight."

"Oh, that's wonderful," Theresa said. She had not received any message from her parents, even though it had been five long days since she had sent the message to them. So she didn't know whether or not they had received hers.

Early that evening, after they had finished dinner, the Muir family walked Theresa over to Uncle Roger's shop. As they walked, Theresa reflected that it was a good thing she was not going to be walking home. She got quite hot just walking the five minutes to Uncle Roger's.

Uncle Roger answered their knock right away. "The machine is out back," Uncle Roger said. "Follow me." Theresa wondered what this machine was going to look like. Joan had hinted that her uncle sometimes had pretty odd ideas.

In the back yard, there was a shed. Uncle Roger opened the door and disappeared inside. Then he came back out, pushing a big piece of equipment which was covered by a cloth. Then he uncovered it with a flourish. Theresa's mouth hung open. She didn't know what to say. The machine was nothing like she had imagined it. It looked like a bunch of rusty pieces of metal glued together. Inside, there was just enough room to squeeze one person.

"You expect to get her home in that thing, Roger?" Mrs. Muir asked in disbelief.

"Hmm? Oh, yes of course. Get in, my dear." Theresa looked at Mr. and Mrs. Muir for direction.

"Uncle Roger," Joan finally said. "Are you sure it's safe?"

"Of course it's safe," Uncle Roger said in a hurt tone of voice. "I wouldn't expect the child to do anything that wasn't safe. It's a combination automobile and rocket." Everyone looked at him blankly. "Some foreign ideas I've read about," he explained hastily.

"Well, I guess if he says it's safe, it's safe," Mrs. Muir said to Theresa. "Do you want to risk it?"

"Yes," Theresa decided quickly. "It's the only way I can get home again."

Mr. Muir helped Uncle Roger push the machine out to the road. "Well, goodbye then, Theresa," Mrs. Muir said. "We've enjoyed having you with us."

"Thank you for your hospitality, Mrs. Muir," Theresa said politely. "Goodbye, Mr. Muir." She then said goodbye to all of Joan's brothers.

"Goodbye, Joan," Theresa said, giving her friend a hug. "Thanks for everything! Come and visit me sometime."

"Oh, I will," Joan said. "Goodbye, Theresa."

Theresa climbed into the cockpit. "When you're ready to start," Uncle Roger said. "All you have to do is pull this lever down. Then, step on the gas pedal, and steer with this wheel."

"Will I get home soon?" Theresa ventured to ask.

"Oh, yes, in about five minutes," Uncle Roger answered. "It goes one hundred miles an hour, you know." Theresa was very nervous, but she managed to thank Uncle Roger for all his work.

"No problem at all," Uncle Roger said. "Now step back, everyone. Those rockets can be dangerous." With shaky hands, Theresa pulled the lever. It seemed to Theresa that the whole contraption exploded. She looked back and saw flames shooting out the back. Under the din of the rockets, she could just hear everyone shouting, "Goodbye! Goodbye!" She waved goodbye. Then she stepped down on the pedal and shot away.

Theresa had never come close to such dizzying speeds in her life! She managed to remember to steer with the wheel, but there wasn't much more she could do except hang on for dear life.

In what seemed like no time at all, Theresa realized that she was nearing the top of the valley. A second later, she had passed both trading booths, and she was back on her beloved mountain!

She stopped in front of her very own house. It seemed like ages since she had left, and at that very moment she resolved that it would be ages before she ever left again!