by Dave Keane
“How’d you figure that out?” she asks.
“Well, it just never made sense that an art thief would need to steal a hook. I should have thought more about the missing hook when we first got to the museum. He must have broken the window with his boot, too, so everyone would think the painting was gone. Pretty clever.”
“So our mayor’s a thief?” Hailey asks, shocked by the idea.
“Well, he is a politician,” I observe. “Of course, he claims that the artist, McGuffin, actually gave that painting to him, not to Mrs. Bagby. They argued about it at the time, and it eventually led to their breakup. I guess this was his opportunity to get back what he thought was always his.”
“I can’t even picture the two of them in the same room.”
“It was a long time ago,” I conclude with a shrug. “I guess hard feelings last a lifetime. He says he eventually would have split the money with her, but I doubt it.”
“So we’re just letting him go?”
“Not exactly. I agreed not to tell my whole story to the Baskerville Daily News on the condition that he did three things.”
Hailey waits. “Do you want me to start guessing?”
I start down the steps for Officer Lestrade’s cruiser. “The mayor is going to pass an emergency funding bill next week. The Baskerville police department will soon have plenty of money for new equipment, the cameras in the museum will finally get hooked up, and the science lab at our school will soon have thirty new microscopes.”
“Not bad, Sherlock,” Hailey says, clearly impressed. “Now let’s go celebrate with some flat-rabbit stew.”
Now that Mrs. Bagby has gobs of money for a fabulous retirement, and since the mayor has promised to stick to the terms of our agreement, I plan to honor my end of the deal and keep the details of this case quiet. I do, however, plan to use the index cards in my pocket to persuade Jessie to help me write a new oral report on a famous artist named Arthur McGuffin. I bet it makes Miss Piffle’s eyebrow dance a jig.
About the Author
DAVE KEANE has been an avid Sherlock Holmes fan since he was a kid. He even insisted on going to the Sherlock Holmes Museum while on his honeymoon in London, England. Today he lives in Northern California with his wife, Christine, and their three junior detectives. He now solves everyday mysteries like “Where are my car keys?” and “Who left the garage door open?” The Joe Sherlock series is his debut in children’s books.
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Copyright
JOE SHERLOCK, KID DETECTIVE, CASE #000005: THE ART TEACHER’S VANISHING MASTERPIECE. Copyright © 2007 by David J. Keane. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub © Edition JANUARY 2009 ISBN: 9780061973994
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