by Ron Roy
Dink turned and walked down the hall into Josh’s room, with Josh and Ruth Rose right behind him.
The twins were sitting on Josh’s bed with mouths full of cookies. The plate sat on the bed between them. It was empty.
“Dudes, you ate them all?” Josh yelled. “Three were for us!”
“You didn’t say we couldn’t!” Brian wailed.
Dink found the page that described the three-million-dollar nickel. “Okay, we were all at the counter,” he said to Josh and Ruth Rose. “Mr. Paskey told Amanda she could wash up in the bathroom. I think that’s when I saw the shadowy reflection in the mirror. It was moving between some bookshelves.”
“So it couldn’t have been Amanda,” Ruth Rose said. “She was in the bathroom.”
“That’s when Mr. Paskey showed us the picture of this nickel in the book,” Josh added.
“No, wait a minute,” Dink said. “Amanda left the Book Nook before Mr. Paskey gave you the book. I remember him locking the door behind her.”
“Dink’s right,” Ruth Rose said. “Amanda left, then Mr. Paskey gave you the book and showed us his coin box.”
Dink nodded. “So I think that woman with the backpack was standing in the shadows, listening,” he said. “She probably heard Mr. Paskey when he told us the nickel was worth three million dollars.”
“That’s when she decided to steal it!” Ruth Rose exclaimed.
“Guys, Mr. Paskey was only showing us a picture of that nickel in the book,” Josh said. “There was no real nickel.”
“But the woman didn’t know that,” Dink said. “She couldn’t see this book from where she was behind the bookshelves. When she heard Mr. Paskey say This nickel is worth three million dollars, she thought he was talking about a real nickel. She probably thought he had it right there, in his collection!”
“Which is why she stole the box!” Josh said.
“I’ll bet she was hiding somewhere until Mr. Paskey went home,” Ruth Rose added. “That’s why we don’t remember seeing her once we got inside the store.”
“I’ve been thinking about that,” Dink said. “She could’ve snuck down into the basement, waited for Mr. Paskey to leave, then come back up to steal the coins.”
“This all makes sense now!” Josh said. “She smashed the case, grabbed the box, then climbed onto the toilet and hopped out through the bathroom window. Leaving wet footprints!”
“And disappeared,” Ruth Rose said. “She could be anywhere.”
“Don’t be so sure,” Dink said. Grinning at Josh, he tapped his forehead. “I have a brilliant idea!”
“What is it?” Josh asked.
“Mr. Paskey collects old and rare coins because he loves it,” Dink said. “It’s his hobby.”
“Yeah, because he’s a noo-MIZ-muh-tist,” Josh said.
Dink nodded at Josh. “But whoever stole his coin collection is probably just after the money the coins are worth,” he continued.
Josh pulled the flyer about the Numismatic Society meeting from his pocket. “Maybe the crook plans to sell Mr. Paskey’s coins at this meeting!” he said.
“That’s what I was thinking,” Ruth Rose said. She leaned closer and read the print. “It’s today.”
Dink closed his eyes. He pictured the woman in the backpack walking into the Book Nook. “She had to go right past the counter,” he said. “She could’ve seen the flyers and picked one up, just like we did!”
Josh looked at the flyer again. “The meeting is on all day,” he said. Then he grinned. “And they serve free refreshments!”
“It’s at the library in West Hartford,” Dink said, reading from the flyer. “On Main Street.”
“West Hartford isn’t very far from Green Lawn,” Ruth Rose said. “About a twenty-minute bus ride.”
Dink, Josh, and Ruth Rose looked at each other.
“Let’s do it!” Ruth Rose said.
“I’ll tell my dad we’re going,” Josh said. He raced out of the room.
“I’ll text my mom and ask her to call yours, Dink,” Ruth Rose said. She whipped out her cell phone and keyed in her message.
“I told her we’d be back in a few hours,” she told Dink.
“Come on, you guys!” Josh yelled from downstairs.
Dink and Ruth Rose hurried down the stairs and into the kitchen. Josh was eating a lion-shaped cookie.
“Grab some for yourselves,” he said to his friends.
Dink and Ruth Rose each took a critter cookie, and they headed out the door. The closest bus stop was in front of the Green Lawn Savings Bank, so they hiked down Main Street.
The rain and wind had stopped. Dink saw patches of blue sky over the bank. The clock out front said one o’clock.
“So when does this West Hartford bus come along?” Josh asked.
“I don’t know,” Ruth Rose said. “But I can find out.”
She ran over to the elderly housing building and dashed up the front steps.
“What will we do if we find this woman?” Josh asked Dink. “I mean, we don’t know if she really did steal Mr. Paskey’s coins. The thief could still be Amanda or that guy sitting behind us in Ellie’s yesterday.”
“Or it could be none of them,” Dink said. “But we have to try, for Mr. Paskey. Besides, don’t you want to see all the money at this meeting?”
Josh grinned. “Yeah, especially now that I’m a noo-MIZ-muh-tist dude!”
Ruth Rose came back to them. “Every half hour,” she said. “It’ll say WEST HARTFORD CENTER on the front of the bus. It goes up Farmington Avenue and drops us near the library.”
Fifteen minutes later, the bus came along. The kids clambered aboard.
“Oops, I forgot about money,” Dink said. “I spent all mine on our hot chocolates.”
“I have money,” Ruth Rose said.
“Me too,” Josh said. “I’ll take care of you, Dink—like always!”
Josh and Ruth Rose dropped money into the coin box, and the kids found seats.
“How will we recognize this woman?” Ruth Rose whispered.
“Why are you whispering?” Josh asked.
“Because if she’s also going to this Numismatic Society meeting,” Ruth Rose said, “she could be on this bus!”
The kids looked around. They saw five men, two women, and four teenage boys.
One of the women was too large to fit in Mr. Paskey’s tiny bathroom window.
The other one had white hair, and a cane was propped next to her.
“I don’t think it was either of those women,” Dink said. “The one we saw yesterday was thin. I think she was tall. That’s all I remember.”
“She had a black backpack,” Ruth Rose said.
“She was chewing flavored gum,” Josh said.
Dink looked at him. “How do you know that?” he asked.
“I smelled it,” Josh said. “Wild cherry, I think.”
“Do you guys remember anything about her hair?” Ruth Rose asked.
“I’m pretty sure she had hair,” said Josh.
Ruth Rose poked him. “I mean what color, short or long, straight or curly,” she said.
“She might have been wearing a hat,” Dink said. “It was about to rain, remember?”
Twenty minutes later, the driver called out, “West Hartford Center!”
The kids walked to the front of the bus. “Can you tell us where the library is?” Dink asked him.
The man pointed out the window. “Walk past the church, and it’s the next building,” he said. “Can’t miss it. There’s a statue of Noah Webster in front of the place.”
They climbed down and started walking. “Who’s Noah Webster?” Josh asked.
“He wrote a spelling book a long time ago,” Dink said.
“Plus, he helped write the Merriam-Webster dictionary,” Ruth Rose added. “You probably have one on your desk, Josh.”
“So why’d they name this library after him?” Josh asked as they approached a large brick church on the left.
&nb
sp; “I think he lived in West Hartford,” Dink said. “I’ll bet we could find his house around here someplace.”
“I see Noah Webster!” Ruth Rose said.
About a hundred feet ahead of them stood a statue. It was around fifteen feet tall, and the white marble gleamed when the sun shone through the clouds. Noah Webster wore a long robe and a serious expression on his face.
“He looks like he had a headache the day the sculptor carved this,” Josh said. “Probably from memorizing all those words in his dictionary.”
“You’re so funny,” Dink said. “Come on, let’s go find the noo-MIZ-muh-tist meeting!”
The kids shoved open a thick door and entered the library. Straight ahead was a long counter where two men and a woman sorted and checked out books. Behind them was a computer room where a bunch of people sat at keyboards.
Dink looked to see if the woman they were after was in there. No one seemed familiar.
One of the men behind the counter smiled at the kids. “The children’s room is downstairs,” he said, pointing toward a set of stairs.
“We’re looking for the numismatic meeting,” Ruth Rose said.
“That’s down there, too,” the man said. “Take a left at the bottom of the stairs. They’re in the Nutmeg Room.”
Dink, Josh, and Ruth Rose headed for the stairs. “What’s nutmeg?” Josh asked as they walked down.
“I think it’s a kind of spice,” Ruth Rose said. “My grandmother puts it in her Christmas pudding.”
“You get it from a nut,” Dink added.
Josh giggled.
They turned left at the bottom of the stairs. The first thing Dink saw was a policeman. He had wide shoulders and was a lot taller than Officer Fallon and Officer Keene. His name tag said SGT. O. RICH.
Dink walked over and asked Officer Rich if he knew where the Nutmeg Room was.
“Right here,” the officer said. He stepped aside, revealing a door. Taped to it was a flyer like the one in Josh’s pocket.
“Can we go in?” Ruth Rose asked.
“Sure,” the officer said. He opened the door and held it as the kids walked into the room. “Have fun, but no touching the money!”
The Nutmeg Room was huge, and filled with people. Along three walls, Dink could see tables draped with green cloths. Most of the tables held glass cases where coins and bills were displayed. The people standing behind the tables wore tags around their necks on lanyards. The tags had each person’s name, then NUMISMATIC SOCIETY.
“Welcome!” a cheery voice said.
Just inside the door was a smaller table. A man and woman sat there to greet people as they came in. A microphone stood on the table, next to a laptop. The woman was smiling at the three kids.
“Would you like a map of the room?” she asked. “This will help you find the dealers.”
“Thank you,” Dink said, taking a sheet that showed the room’s layout. The tables were numbered. “Can you tell us which dealer buys old coins?”
The woman laughed. “They all do, dear,” she said. “All the dealers come here to buy and sell.”
Some new people came through the door, so the kids moved out of the way.
“I don’t see any free food,” Josh said, standing on tiptoes. “Just a jillion people looking at coins.”
Dink showed Josh the sheet of paper. “The food is on table seventeen,” he said.
“Does anyone see that woman from yesterday?” Ruth Rose asked.
“If she’s in this room, we’ll never find her,” Josh said. “There are a lot of women here. She could be any one of them, if she’s here at all. She might not have picked up a flyer.”
“If she’s not here, at least we tried,” Ruth Rose said. “But even if she didn’t get a flyer, she was reading the one taped to Mr. Paskey’s window when we saw her at the Book Nook.”
“But we don’t know if she is the thief,” Josh said.
“Let’s split up,” Dink suggested. “Keep your eye out for someone skinny enough to crawl through Mr. Paskey’s bathroom window.”
“Wouldn’t it be great if she was here and she was carrying Mr. Paskey’s wooden box?” Ruth Rose whispered.
“I don’t think she’d want to be seen with it,” Dink said. “She might have gotten rid of the box and just brought the coins with her.”
“If she’s even here,” Josh repeated.
“I know,” Dink said. “But we are here, so let’s look around.” He pointed at a table where a plump man stood next to a sign saying CHUCK’S RARE COINS. It was table number one. “Let’s look around and meet back at this table in about ten minutes.”
Suddenly they heard a cheery voice over a hidden speaker: “Ladies and gentlemen, just a few reminders: We close our door at four o’clock today. Smoking is not allowed in this building. And please stop at our food table for a free snack and beverage!”
Dink turned around. The voice came from the woman who had greeted them.
“Now we’re talking!” Josh said. “See you guys in ten minutes.”
Dink said to Ruth Rose, “Okay, why don’t we each check out one side of the room? The food is in the back, so Josh will look around there.”
“I wish I knew what she looked like,” Ruth Rose said. “Yesterday we only saw her from behind.”
Dink and Ruth Rose went their separate ways. Dink strolled past several green-topped tables, hoping to spot a skinny woman who looked familiar. He noticed one thin woman standing at a table. When he got closer, Dink realized it was really a thin man. He kept walking.
Dink bumped into Josh at the end of the room. Josh was munching something and wiping his fingers on a paper napkin.
“Did you see her?” Dink asked his friend. “Or were your eyes closed while you enjoyed your treat?”
Josh laughed. “I kept both eyes open, but I didn’t see anyone who looked like the woman we saw yesterday,” he said. “There are just too many people!”
“Come on, let’s keep moving,” Dink said. “Ruth Rose is on the other side of the room. Maybe she’ll have better luck.”
But when the three kids met at the Chuck’s Rare Coins table, no one had spotted their quarry.
Just then another announcement came over the loudspeaker: “Hello again, folks. I have a gentleman here who has misplaced his little boy. Oliver Sidney, if you can hear my voice, please come to the front. Your daddy is waiting for you!”
Everyone looked toward the front. The woman on the microphone was standing next to a worried-looking man. That was when Dink saw a tall, thin woman enter the room. She picked up a floor plan from the table and began studying it. The strap of a backpack was slung over the woman’s shoulder.
“I think I see her!” Dink whispered to Josh and Ruth Rose.
Just then a small boy came running out of the crowd. “I’m Oliver!” he cried. “Hi, Daddy!”
Everyone began clapping as the boy leaped into his father’s arms.
When Dink tried to spot the woman again, she was gone.
“You saw her?” Josh asked. “Where was she?”
Dink pointed. “She came in the door when that little kid ran up to his father,” he said. “I took my eyes off her for two seconds, and she had disappeared!”
“Do you think she recognized us and left the room?” Ruth Rose asked.
“I doubt it,” Dink said. “Too many tall people standing between us.”
Josh glanced around the room. “So she must be in here somewhere,” he whispered. “What was she wearing?”
“She had that black backpack,” Dink said. “And jeans, I think. Oh, and a light-blue jacket with a hood.”
“Did you see her hair?” Ruth Rose asked.
Dink grinned at Ruth Rose. “She had hair,” he said.
“Okay, here’s the plan,” Josh said, taking charge. “We move toward the front together. Dink, you check everyone on the right. Ruth Rose, keep your eyes on the left. I’ll be front man.”
“But what if she sees us before we see her?” Ruth
Rose asked. “If she recognized us from the Book Nook, she’d take off!”
“We don’t have a choice,” Dink said. “Besides, she’ll be checking out the coins. Plus, she doesn’t know that anyone is looking for her.”
The kids moved slowly toward the front of the room. Their eyes fell on every woman, looking for a backpack and a blue jacket.
“Dude, there are a lot of women in blue jackets,” Josh muttered.
“This was light blue,” Dink said. “Sky blue.”
Five minutes later, Ruth Rose put out her hands and stopped the boys from walking any farther. “There she is,” she whispered.
“That’s the woman I saw come in,” Dink said quietly.
The woman was fifteen feet in front of them. She was leaning over a table where coins were on display. She had tied her jacket sleeves around her waist.
“Are you sure it’s the woman from yesterday?” Josh asked Dink.
“Positive,” Dink said. “Look at the straps on her backpack. One of them has a yellow smiley face attached to it.”
“I remember that!” Ruth Rose said.
They inched closer, keeping other people between them and the woman. The smiley face was clearly visible. Dink knew this was the woman who had entered the Book Nook yesterday. But did she steal Mr. Paskey’s coin collection?
“I’d give anything to know what’s in her backpack,” Ruth Rose said.
“Me too,” Dink said. He glanced at Josh. “Where’s Shadow Man when we need him?”
“Shadow Man is on vacation,” Josh said. “But his friend Invisible Man is taking his place.” He pulled his hood up over his red hair. “She’ll never see me!”
“What are you going to do?” Dink asked.
“Watch,” Josh said. Then he walked away and crept up behind the woman. He stood next to her, pretending to be looking at the coins on the table.
Dink and Ruth Rose watched Josh place his hand on the woman’s backpack. They watched his fingers give it a squeeze.
“I’m going to faint,” Dink whispered.
“Me first,” Ruth Rose said.
Josh headed back toward Dink and Ruth Rose. He held two thumbs in the air.
