Mabel Opal Pear and the Rules for Spying

by Amanda Hosch

  “Your parents are international fugitives, and your aunt Gertrude is behind bars.” Montgomery clicked his pen. “You’re fortunate Mr. and Mrs. Baies agreed to be responsible for you. Otherwise, you’d be a ward of the state.”

  Fortunate? I’d much rather take my chances with total strangers. Or a maybe a rabid raccoon or a hibernating black bear.

  Keep cool, Sunflower. “Lucky. Sure. Today is my lucky day,” I said. “If I had any more luck, a big black hole would pop up in the living room, suck me in, and crush me until my eyeballs exploded and my bones turned to gelatinous goo.”

  “That is a disgusting image, child.” Montgomery frowned at my outburst.

  “When you’re done, Mabel, clean up in here.” Stella turned to Montgomery. “She’s all yours, Al.”

  Al? They know each other?

  Victoria was right. My parents and Aunt Gertie had been set up. I was living behind enemy lines. This situation wasn’t going to resolve itself. Time to go into super spy mode, Sunflower.

  I was going to have to use the Rules for real. When my parents went into hostile situations, they relied on each other. I needed backup — help from someone I trusted. Victoria had insider information, but I couldn’t completely trust her. Frank and Stella were the source of my problems, after all.

  Montgomery looked like he was itching to arrest someone — namely me. I’d bet my measly savings account Frankenstella had fed him a whole pack of lies about my family. Would he believe me if I told him my suspicions?

  Get your head in the game, Sunflower. I met the inspector’s eyes and held his gaze. I wasn’t the three-time class champion of the annual Bluewater-Silverton Unified School District Staring Contest for nothing.

  “Mabel, you’re a smart girl,” he finally said. “This can be easy or hard.” He cracked the knuckles on his left hand. “Your choice.” Then he cracked his right-hand knuckles. “Choose wisely.”

  I wanted to say that Montgomery had been misled, that Gertie and my parents were innocent and had been framed by Frankenstella. But I remembered Rule Number 22: He who talks first loses. Besides, I had no proof. Only my instincts.

  Montgomery’s eyes swept over me, as if trying to memorize my every feature. I tried to do the same, but his clothing was boring: black shoes, blue suit, white shirt, blue tie. Even his face was bland: medium-sized nose, brown eyes, brown hair cut short, no scars or birthmarks. He appeared older than my parents, maybe even older than Aunt Gertie and Principal Baker. He looked like a typical television detective — totally forgettable.

  “Well, Mabel Opal Pear?”

  He talked first. A point for Sunflower! “I’m not sure what you mean.”

  Shaking his head, Montgomery imitated me in a squeaky, high-pitched voice. “I’m not sure what you mean.” He smirked, just like at the Star’s Tale. “Think of my questions as a point system.”

  “For prizes?”

  “As in, if you don’t do it right, I’ll point it out to you.” He double-clicked his pen. “Where are your parents?”

  “I have no idea.” At least I could answer the first question honestly.

  “Before the October trip, when was the last time they went out of town?”

  Be helpful, but vague. “It must have been a couple of months ago.”

  “Summertime?” he asked.

  “Sure. That sounds right.”

  “And where did they go?”

  I squinted as if I was thinking deeply. “To an antique silverware convention, just like I said in Principal Baker’s office.”

  “Where?”

  “Somewhere in the south. Mom complained about the heat. Arkansas, I think.” I bit my lip, pretending to be lost in thought. “Or was it Alabama?”

  “The southern United States.” He wrote something down and then tapped his notebook. “Have your parents ever been to…” Montgomery raised his left eyebrow. “Anau?”

  I scrunched up my face to cover my shock. How on earth did he know they had gone to Turkmenistan (fourteenth petal, light indigo or thirteenth sunflower)? Play it cool, Sunflower. “Uh. A new what?”

  “Anau, Turkmenistan.” Montgomery twisted his lips to better pronounce the city’s Persian name. “Next to Iran and Afghanistan.”

  Deny. Deny. Deny. “Aren’t those countries, like, far away?” I asked, knowing full well that my parents had been there to clean up some huge diplomatic mess just a few months ago. “Like on another continent or something?”

  “Have you seen this?” He handed me a photograph.

  And there it was — the old-fashioned red suitcase. This had to be the one Frank would not stop going on about during his explosive June visit. This was the picture of the thing, along with Frank’s outrageous reaction, that had made my father’s spy sense tingle.

  “Well, have you?” Montgomery leaned toward me.

  “Nope.” Another honest answer. Then I asked, “What does that have to do with Turkey?” Turkey, thirteenth or light indigo sunflower, thirteenth petal.

  “Turkmenistan.” He cracked his knuckles again. “I’m asking the questions, remember?”

  “Yes, I remember.” But meanwhile, I was wondering: How had someone who worked for the Washington State Border Patrol gotten intel on my parents?

  “How many gold-handled spoons does the museum have?”

  Talk about changing the topic. “A hundred or so.” Factual information, available to all on our awesome website. Most were gold-plated. The ones with solid gold handles were kept in a locked case. Only Mom could polish them because too much pressure would bend the gold, which I’d learned the hard way.

  “Any have the initials TJ on them?”

  My head hurt. His questioning made no sense. Was this how Mom and Dad got enemy agents to talk — by dazing and perplexing them? “Not a clue.”

  “So, it’s possible.”

  “Look, Inspector, some of the spoons are used. People put their initials on them. Legend has it that even a pirate like Jean Lafitte found the time to get his soup spoon engraved.”

  “Think, Miss Pear. Any gold spoons with TJ on them?”

  “I. Don’t. Know.” My tone was a lot sharper than I meant for it to be. “What does TJ stand for, anyway?” I thought of my favorite store in Seattle. Trader Joe’s? No. That wasn’t right. “I can’t think of anyone with the initials of TJ. I mean if it was JTK, that could have been James Tiberius Kirk, one of my dad’s favorite TV characters.”

  By this time, the inspector was shooting me annoyed looks, but I couldn’t stop babbling. This was the first interrogation I’d experienced, so who could blame me for being a bit nervous? “That can’t be right, either. I don’t remember them using gold spoons in the future on the starship Enterprise. Because if they did, that is one spoon my parents would definitely buy.”

  “I’m going to ask you one more time, Miss Pear.” He tapped the picture of the red suitcase. “Have you ever seen this?”

  Again, an honest answer. “No.”

  “If it was in the museum, would you have had the opportunity to see it?”

  “I would have noticed an old piece of luggage lying around.” Mom was tidy. And we had searched every square and round corner of the place with a radar gun that penetrated the wooden walls, ceiling, and floor.

  “For your sake, you’d better be telling the truth.”

  Or what? I wanted to ask, but I swallowed the question before it popped out on its own. For all I knew, Stella would ask him to haul me off to jail.

  TJ… I kept repeating the letters in my mind, trying to figure out what they could stand for.

  Just then, an unfamiliar ring sounded. Montgomery took a cell phone out of the inside pocket of his jacket. “This better not be another excuse, Madison.” He wasn’t happy with the caller named Madison, but that might’ve just been his normal sour disposition. “Seriously? You and Jac
kson should be able to figure out if he found the key.” He closed his eyes and scratched his head. “Now? OK.” He hung up.

  “Thomas Jefferson,” I blurted out.

  “What did you say?” Montgomery’s neck muscles tensed, making it look as if he was dry swallowing a big pill and having problems getting it down.

  “TJ. Thomas Jefferson, the president. He would have used gold spoons. People did that back then — kept their wealth in silver and gold. Right?”

  Montgomery rose up on his tiptoes. He leaned even closer to me. “You’ve seen the spoons?”

  “No.” If we had gold spoons that belonged to an actual president, those would be in their own display case, front and center. They’d be locked up, but on display for all the visitors to see. Spoons like those would give serious credence to the museum. “What other famous person has the initials TJ?”

  “I couldn’t think of anyone else either.”

  “Jefferson didn’t have a middle name,” I added. “So the TJ fits.”

  “Good reasoning on your part, Miss Pear.” Montgomery’s eyes darted around the room. For a second, I wanted to confide in him, tell him that Frank and Stella were interested in the red suitcase too. But I couldn’t. Because when Stella called the inspector Al, it made me feel uncomfortable, like when a bug crawls over your skin. I guess that’s what Dad says is the tingly spy sense.

  Montgomery snapped his flipbook closed. “One more thing, Miss Pear. What were you doing in your room?”

  Think, Sunflower. Deny. “I tried calling Aunt Gertie’s house, just in case she’d been let out of jail.” I stared at the brown carpet, afraid that Montgomery would see I was lying. I needed to deflect his attention, so I asked, “Why were you at the Star and the Spoon on Saturday?”

  “A good agent always makes sure he has the right person in sight.”

  I couldn’t argue with that. “Inspector, what’s inside the red suitcase?”

  “No more questions, Moppet.”

  12

  Act natural. Be consistent in your cover story. Simple, true statements work best. Don’t get fancy.

  — Rule Number 7 from Rules for a Successful Life as an Undercover Secret Agent

  It took me more than three hours to get the living room back to normal, minus two handmade, lopsided bowls. I discovered the rest of the red bowl crushed under a pile of my parents’ home and garden books. The blue shards I found under a stack of cookbooks left no hope for my father’s bowl, either. I’d made those for my parents’ Christmas presents several years ago.

  What type of person destroys a kid’s art projects? The type that stuffs her face with my leftovers (pepperoni and red pepper pizza from Mai’s) while I cleaned up her mess — that’s who. Still, I doubted that Stella would have ripped apart this room just to be malicious. She must have been searching for something specific. But even if she thought Mom had Frank’s suitcase somewhere, it wouldn’t have been squeezed in between books.

  Stella popped into the living room every ten minutes to screech that I wasn’t cleaning fast enough. When I suggested she help me since, you know, she made the mess, Stella used “driving” words — words Mom says I’m not allowed to use until I’m at least sixteen, have my driver’s license, and can buy my own car.

  Since then, Stella left me alone to think. Unfortunately, my brain doesn’t work on an empty stomach. There was nothing in the Rules about what to do when the enemy was camped out in your own kitchen.

  My plan from this morning — bust Aunt Gertie out of jail and get rid of Frankenstella — seemed stupid now that my parents were probably missing. Roy said he trusted my parents’ instincts and that my parents trusted me. Was Roy trying to send me a message about trusting my instincts too?

  I took out the museum printouts. The circled “$14,500” stood out on the page. A terrible idea hit me. Frankenstella were planning on selling spoons. That’s what Frank meant by calling the museum a gold mine. He should have called it a silver mine. This time, I noticed “10130” written next to it. I couldn’t figure out what that number meant. Maybe it was a secret code. Suddenly everyone thinks they’re a secret agent, I thought.

  Stella was on the phone in the kitchen as I re-shelved the last book, The Definitive Northern Italian Cookbook. Knowing she wouldn’t come out to growl for a few minutes, I tortured myself by flipping through the pictures of gnocchi, tortellini, and farfalle.

  Farfalle — the Italian name for bow tie pasta! Suddenly it dawned on me — Aunt Gertie’s handler’s name was Ms. Bow Tie. Oh! My aunt was trying to tell me to contact her Agency handler.

  All I needed now was Ms. Bow Tie’s phone number, Aunt Gertie’s password, and her spy phone. But how was I going to talk with Gertie when she was in jail? Before I could think of a good plan, my least favorite cousin walked in through the front door, smiling like she’d won a million dollars. “Mabel, you missed so much today.”

  “What happened?”

  “Nothing.” Victoria rolled her eyes. “You are gullible.” She grabbed my wrist, pulling me close to her, and whispered directly into my ear, “Are they here?”

  “Your mother is in the kitchen,” I answered in the same low voice. “Your father’s been gone all day. And I’m hungry.”

  “She didn’t let you eat.” It was a statement. “Go to your room. I’ll be there in a few.”

  I sighed, sick and tired of being bossed around in my own home.

  “Mo-o-om!” Victoria’s wail grated my nerves, so I beat a hasty retreat upstairs.

  In my room, I stared out the window, wondering where on earth my parents might be. Gusty winds blew scattered clouds across the deep blue sky. The leaves of the apple tree glimmered in the late afternoon sun. I tripled-checked the sunflower cipher for clues but came up with the same random smattering of bent petals, which meant nothing since it could be any one of those places — or none of them.

  Victoria walked in with two glasses of milk and two bags of chips, one bag tucked under each arm. I took a milk and a bag from her. She pulled a peach out of her pocket and gave it to me with her free hand. Then she sat on the floor, nibbling her fingernails. “Are you ready now?”

  “For what?” I asked through a bite of peach.

  Victoria rolled her eyes again, but at least she smiled this time. “To help me, silly.” She popped open her chips and crunched one.

  “I have a few problems of my own right now.”

  “Helping me helps you.”

  “How?” I asked.

  “Once the producers of Exploring Locked Places see my entry, they’ll know I’m a natural star. Last year’s winner got an endorsement deal for shampoo and styling gel, and her own web series.”

  “Oh,” I said, trying to sound impressed. “I didn’t know.” Of course, I hadn’t heard of Exploring Locked Places, either, so that was probably why.

  “And if Mom and Dad think there’s more money to be made in Hollywood, we’ll be out of here like that.” Victoria snapped her fingers.

  The whole scheme seemed so far-fetched that I was sure Victoria had better odds of being struck by lightning while Hula-Hooping and singing the national anthem at a Seahawks game. “What if your video doesn’t get picked?”

  “Why are you so negative?”

  “I’m not. It’s called worst-case scenario planning.”

  “Sounds more like planning to lose. You wouldn’t recognize big dreams if they slapped you with a wet rag, would you, Mabel?”

  It wasn’t true, but I didn’t have the luxury of arguing with Victoria. I had real problems to deal with.

  “So are you going to help me?” Victoria asked.

  “I’ll think about it,” I said, stalling.

  “Is that the pumpkin the girls made for you?” she asked, pointing to my glittery pumpkin.

  “Obviously.”

  “It’s cute. One of the Hannahs
said I could make one with them this weekend.”

  “You’re making plans for the weekend?” I said, hating the squeak of my voice.

  “Yeah. Why? Is that a problem for you?”

  If Victoria was still here this weekend, it would mean my parents weren’t, and that meant that they’d be missing my birthday. I shrugged like it didn’t matter, but I don’t think I fooled her.

  “Face it, Moppet. You’re stuck with us.” She smirked. “Unless you want to help me with my dream.” She rummaged around in her backpack until she pulled out a big beige envelope with my name printed on it. “Ms. Drysdale said to give you this.”

  “Thanks.” I guess Principal Baker was serious about making sure I didn’t miss any homework assignments.

  “Are you failing your classes?”

  “No,” I snapped. Not that it was any of her business.

  “You sure? She seemed real concerned that you do your history homework, but she only gave the class ten pages of reading for a quiz tomorrow.”

  “Teachers. Who can figure them out?” I found it weird that Ms. Drysdale and Mr. Baker had both fixated on history of all subjects. I’d made perfect scores on all the tests and assignments so far.

  Ding! Ding! Suddenly my spy sense kicked in. What if they were trying to tell me something? I had to get rid of Victoria quickly.

  “Would you like to borrow a book?” I asked. “I have the new Fulton Sisters’ Adventure.”

  “Number Eighty-Seven? It’s so awesome when April and Samantha find out the waitress is a ninja who —”

  “No. Stop with the spoilers.” I covered my ears. “Do you want to watch television?”

  “Do you guys have cable?” Victoria opened the door to the hallway.

  “Dad installed satellite dishes. We get a couple hundred channels.”

  “Excellent. I have some serious catching up to do on my favorite shows.” A smile spread across her face. “Coming, Moppet?”