The Hockey Rink Hunt

by Mike Lupica

  But Mike “Boston” Gordon had just said the magic word for her:

  Mystery.

  And considering the stakes—Game 7 of the Stanley Cup finals—it might be the biggest mystery the Walker twins ever had to solve.

  THREE

  Zach always admired Zoe for her confidence, whether in school, in sports, or especially in mysteries. He could see that confidence now, even standing in front of a famous athlete’s locker. Zach loved solving mysteries as much as Zoe, but Zoe always took her excitement to the next level.

  Zoe stepped back in front of Mike Gordon.

  “Maybe we can help,” she said.

  Mike grinned as if he couldn’t help himself. Maybe he was seeing the same confidence Zach had always seen in his sister. She did appear pretty fearless the way she’d stepped up and offered to help.

  “You think you can find my lucky necklace the way you found your brother’s silver dollar?” he asked, sounding hopeful.

  Zach smiled and reached into his pocket. He pulled out the silver dollar to show Mike.

  “Still got it,” he said. “Maybe it will help bring us luck to find your necklace.”

  “When it comes to solving mysteries,” Danny Walker said to Mike, “my kids are the all-stars.”

  Then Zoe said to Mike, “Do you have time to answer a couple more questions?”

  “If it will help find my necklace,” Mike said, “I’ll be even happier to answer your questions than I was your dad’s.”

  “Could you go through everything you did once practice was over?” Zoe said. She didn’t have a notebook to write everything down, but her memory worked just as well.

  Mike looked over at Danny Walker.

  “Your daughter sounds as if she might have a job like yours someday,” he said.

  “Maybe by the time she’s ten,” Danny replied with a grin.

  Mike turned back to Zoe then. “You really think this will help?”

  Zoe shrugged and smiled. “How much time was left in Game 6 when you scored that goal?” she said.

  “Twenty seconds,” said Mike.

  “You didn’t give up, and neither will we,” Zach said.

  Mike told them that once practice ended, he came straight to his locker. Then he got out of his gear and took a shower, and that’s when he realized the necklace was gone. He said he even went back and checked the shower room and the area next to it with sinks and mirrors for the players.

  “Is that all?” Zoe said. “Is it possible you may have forgotten something you did?”

  “Honestly?” Mike said. “It’s definitely possible. All I’d been thinking about was Game 7, at least until I realized my necklace had gone missing.”

  “Could you have taken it off without realizing it?” Zach asked.

  Mike shook his head.

  “Never,” he said. “That I would remember.”

  “You do have an awful lot on your mind today,” Zoe said.

  “My brain is filled with a million thoughts about Game 7. I want to win it so badly for my teammates, for Boston, for myself,” he said.

  “And you said you already checked around your locker, right?” Zach said.

  “I did,” he said. “It’s not here. I went through my jersey and T-shirt, even looked inside my skates.” He shook his head again, his face sad. “Somehow I’ve lost my own lucky charm before I play for the biggest prize in hockey.”

  “We’re going to find it for you,” Zoe Walker said, determined.

  “You did something nice for us by letting us meet you today,” Zach said. “It’s only right we do something nice for you.”

  “Wow,” Mike said. “I know I’m feeling the pressure of Game 7 tomorrow night. But it sounds like you’re the ones putting pressure on yourselves now.”

  “They sort of thrive on it,” Danny Walker said. “Even at eight years old.”

  Some Bruins players were still in front of their lockers. A few were out on the ice for some last minute practice before the big game. Mike took Zach and Zoe into the middle of the room and introduced them as his brand-new friends.

  “These are the world’s youngest detectives! They’re on the case, looking for my missing necklace,” he said.

  “You’ve got to find it,” said Joe Craig, the right winger on Mike’s line. “He wasn’t even this upset when he accidentally broke his stick in the middle of Game 3!”

  The locker to the right of Mike’s was empty by now. Zach asked if it was all right for him and his sister to check around in there, even though Mike said he already had.

  Mike said it was fine with him. The twins checked around, thoroughly. The necklace wasn’t there.

  Alex Mozov, the left winger on Mike’s line, happened to have the locker to Mike’s left. Alex gave a thorough search of his own locker, but also came up empty.

  “It has to be here somewhere,” Mike said.

  “And my brother and I are going to find out where,” Zoe said with certainty.

  “It’s not going to be easy,” said Mike.

  Zoe smiled at him. “But it’s like one of the announcers said after you scored that goal in Game 6. If what you did against the Sharks was easy, everybody would do it.”

  “We’re not trying to win Game 7 for you,” Zach said. “Only you and your teammates can do that. But we are sort of trying to get an assist.”

  FOUR

  The last few Bruins who stayed on the ice finally came inside the locker room.

  “They’re like us when we’re playing outside and don’t want to come in for dinner,” Zoe remarked. “They know their season is over tomorrow night, but don’t want to stop playing.”

  “I’ve learned so much just by being here,” Zach said.

  “Including how star athletes are just as superstitious as anybody else,” Zoe said.

  “It’s more than that,” her brother said. “Even though these players are some of the best in the world, they still love sports the same way we do.”

  Their dad came over then, having overheard their conversation. “It’s just like Grandpa Richie says: the boy in him never really left,” he said.

  Danny still had one more player to interview before the head coach: the Bruins goalie, Jeff Costello, who had just made his way into the locker room. He walked over to Jeff’s locker, and Uncle Marty handed him his microphone before turning on the camera light. Danny asked Jeff a few questions about Game 7, and before long it was time for Jeff to hit the showers. So Danny, Uncle Marty, Zach, and Zoe had to leave the locker room, at least for the time being.

  Danny headed to the coach’s office for his final interview. The coach had called a meeting with the assistant coaches after practice ended, and it was just letting out. The twins couldn’t believe how much was still going on, even though practice was over. They could only imagine what it was like for everybody on a game day.

  Their dad told Zach and Zoe to head toward the rink and he’d meet them there once his interview was over. Zach and Zoe walked up to the ice and noticed the man who drove the Zamboni getting ready to start it up. The Zamboni drove up and down the rink to resurface and smooth the ice. In an hour, people would be skating around on the same ice the Bruins had just used.

  “That Zamboni reminds me of a giant lawn mower,” said Zach. “Only instead of cutting grass, it smooths the ice on a hockey rink.”

  His sister barely heard him.

  She was staring at the Zamboni.

  “Wait a second,” she said.

  Zach turned and saw an expression on her face he recognized. It was one he’d seen plenty of times before. Right away he knew she’d noticed something, or had an idea she thought might help them find Mike Gordon’s missing necklace.

  “Go ask Dad if we can ride along on the Zamboni,” Zoe said. “I’m going to ask the driver the same thing. If Mike’s necklace somehow fe
ll off during practice, we don’t want the machine to run over it.”

  “On it,” her brother said, and took off down the hallway at full speed for the coach’s office. Zoe ran over to the glass near the ice and waved to get the Zamboni driver’s attention. When he saw her, he smiled and got down from behind the wheel. Slowly, he walked over to where Zoe was standing, careful not to slip on the ice.

  “You’re one of Danny Walker’s kids, right?” the man said, introducing himself as Mr. Doherty.

  “Yes sir,” she said. “I’m Zoe. My brother Zach just went to ask our dad if we could ride along with you . . . if that’s okay.”

  “And why would you want to do that?” Mr. Doherty asked.

  As quickly as she could, she explained about Mike Gordon’s missing necklace, and how important it was to him. “He’s never played a game without it,” she said, “and definitely not one as big as Game 7.”

  While she was doing her best to convince Mr. Doherty to let them ride along, she saw Zach running back down the hallway. He was giving her a thumbs-up, which meant he’d gotten permission from their dad.

  “I’d do anything for Mike,” Mr. Doherty said after Zoe introduced him to Zach. “He’s an even better person than he is a hockey player, which is saying something.”

  “So we can ride along?” Zoe asked, hopeful.

  “What are we waiting for?” Mr. Doherty said with a smile.

  They went over to the Bruins bench and hopped over the boards, just the way the players did. Then Mr. Doherty took them both by the arms so they wouldn’t slip on the ice, and helped them into the seat next to him.

  “I usually go pretty slow in this thing,” he said. “But I’m thinking we should go even slower today. I feel as if we might be looking for a needle in a haystack.”

  “I think my sister could even spot one of those,” Zach said.

  As Mr. Doherty drove the Zamboni, he leaned out from behind the wheel so he could study the ice in front of him more closely. Zach and Zoe did the same from where they were sitting. It wasn’t just Zoe who had great vision. Zach prided himself on his own vision, too, especially when it came to sports.

  But none of them spotted the necklace on the ice. By the time Mr. Doherty had gone up and back across the rink, they were convinced Mike hadn’t dropped his necklace on the ice after all.

  It was somewhere in this arena, it just had to be. But it wasn’t out here in the rink.

  “We’ve got to find that necklace,” Zoe said, sounding more determined than ever. “Mike is our friend now, and he needs that necklace for the game tomorrow.”

  “Which means he needs us,” Zach said.

  They thanked Mr. Doherty for the ride, and he wished them luck. Then they stepped off the Zamboni and walked off the ice. Their dad would be finished working soon, but it seemed their own work was just beginning.

  Mike’s big game was tomorrow night at the Garden. But Zach and Zoe’s was right here, right now.

  FIVE

  Zach and Zoe waited near the ice for their dad, who was just finishing his interview with the Bruins coach. Now he and Uncle Marty were heading toward the rink, ready to set up the camera near the ice.

  The twins knew this was where their dad would speak directly into the camera and put what he called a “tag” on his piece.

  “The tag,” Danny Walker had explained to them once, “is like what you do when you sum up a paper you’ve written for school.”

  It was what viewers at home would watch after Danny’s interviews with the players had aired on TV. Kind of like a roundup.

  He told the twins that he wouldn’t be long, and he’d meet them back at the locker room door in twenty minutes. Zach and Zoe took another walk back down the hallway, passing an open door where they heard a man talking on the telephone.

  The door read SECURITY, so Zach and Zoe were careful not to intrude. On their way to the practice that morning, their dad explained that it wasn’t just the Bruins who used the Warrior Ice Arena. Sometimes the youth hockey teams played their games there, too. Many also came for skating lessons, or just to have a free skate on the smooth ice Mr. Doherty’s Zamboni machine made.

  They stopped outside the office as they heard the man inside say, “Well, I can’t make any promises about your son’s sweater, ma’am. But I’ll certainly check the Lost and Found for you.”

  Zoe turned to Zach. He could see the excitement on her face.

  “Why didn’t we think of that?” she said, slapping a palm to her forehead. “Somebody might already have found the necklace and put it in the Lost and Found! They wouldn’t have known it was Mike’s.”

  They waited patiently for the man to finish his phone call. When he did, they knocked on the open door, and the security guard invited them in. Zach and Zoe introduced themselves quickly, but were eager to explain about the missing necklace.

  “How can I help you kids today?” the security guard said. His nametag read MR. AMARO and he wore a big, friendly smile on his face.

  “Mike Gordon lost his lucky necklace and we’re trying to help him find it,” Zach began. “My sister and I overheard you on the phone saying something about a Lost and F—”

  Mr. Amaro chuckled, and jumped up from behind his desk and grabbed his keys before Zach could even finish his sentence.

  “C’mon!” he said, waving a hand at Zach and Zoe to follow him. “I’ll do anything to help the Bruins. They’ve been my favorite team since I was your age.”

  Mr. Amaro said he had to get back to work soon. But he offered to walk them down to the Lost and Found and then find their dad to let him know where they were.

  “But I’ve got to warn you,” he said. “There’s a lot of stuff in that room. You can’t believe the things people leave behind in this place.”

  “We’re not afraid of hard work,” Zach said.

  Mr. Amaro grinned. “I could tell that as soon as the two of you came through my door,” he said. “Looks as if the whole Walker family is working here today.”

  He hadn’t been kidding about the amount of stuff in the Lost and Found. The twins were surprised it all fit into one room.

  “We’ll never be able to go through all of this before we have to leave,” Zach said.

  “So we’ll do as much as we can until we have to meet Dad,” Zoe said.

  “I feel like Mike must have felt at the end of Game 6 with the clock winding down,” Zach said as he scanned the room.

  “But he found what he needed that night,” Zoe reminded him. “The winning goal!”

  They got to work. Zach took one side of the room, Zoe took the other. There were so many articles of clothing lying around: sweaters and T-shirts and windbreakers and a few pairs of sneakers. They even found a parka that must have been there since last winter. There were umbrellas and old hockey pucks and sticks and skate guards.

  There was pretty much everything except a gold necklace with a locket attached to it.

  “Hey,” Zach said from his side of the room. “Look at this!”

  He held up a shoe for his sister to see. It must have belonged to a grown-up, because it was too big to be a kid’s size. “Someone lost one shoe! How is that even possible?”

  Zach giggled thinking about how it would look if someone were leaving the arena with only one shoe on. Zoe looked up at the shoe Zach was holding and immediately stopped what she was doing.

  “Look what’s inside!” she said.

  Zach turned the shoe around so the opening was facing him.“Somebody’s sock must have come off with their shoe,” Zach said to his sister. “I’ve done that plenty of times.”

  “I don’t know why,” Zoe said, “but somehow I think it’s important.”

  Zach scrunched up his face. “A sock?” he said.

  Zoe frowned. Maybe she was wrong. But something inside her said it had to do with the mystery. She did
n’t get to respond to her brother, because at that moment, Mr. Amaro poked his head in the door. He told them their dad was waiting for them outside the Bruins locker room.

  Zach shrugged. “Out of time.”

  “Not yet,” Zoe said. “This is just the end of regulation time. Remember, if Mike hadn’t scored that goal at the end of Game 6, the Bruins and Sharks would have gone into overtime.”

  “So now we’re in overtime?” Zach asked.

  “Totally,” said Zoe. “If Mike could find the net when he absolutely had to, we can find that necklace.”

  SIX

  When they met their dad, Zach and Zoe asked him if there was any chance they could take one last look around the locker room. They would have to leave the arena soon, and the Bruins managers were due back from their coffee break any minute. Then they’d get to work on laundry and sharpening skates and making sure everything and everybody was ready for Game 7.

  “If we can’t find the necklace, maybe we can at least find a clue,” Zoe said to her dad.

  “I’ll ask,” he said. “But I just want you both to remember that this is a very big room, and the necklace is a very small item.”

  “But, Dad,” Zach said. “Don’t you and mom always tell us to dream big?”

  “All the time,” he replied.

  “And,” Zoe said, “we’re built a lot closer to the ground than the managers or anybody else. We might still be able to spot something they can’t.”

  Danny Walker smiled.

  “Every time I think I know how big your hearts are, you prove to me they’ve gotten even bigger,” he said.

  His friend from the Bruins, Mr. Greenberg, was still in the locker room. Mr. Greenberg said it was perfectly all right if the twins made one last search of the Bruins locker room before the managers got back.

  Just as they had in the Lost and Found, Zach took one side of the room. Zoe took the other. They scanned the space almost the same way the Zamboni drove over the ice, walking up and down the room so as not to miss a thing. They went from locker to locker, thinking Mike might have walked over to one of his teammates after practice and forgot to mention it. Sometimes they got down on their hands and knees to look underneath the bench in front of the lockers. Then they’d switch sides, just on the chance that one of them had missed something, even though they hardly ever did.