“Where?”
Cam started to explain, but then she saw something that made her stop.
“Look at that,” she said, and pointed across the playground. “Now I know where the baseball is.”
Chapter Five
Cam was pointing to the two children playing catch. One of them had thrown the ball too far. The boy in the green jacket was picking it up.
“Did you see that?” Cam asked.
“See what?”
“He picked up their baseball. Now I bet he’ll switch baseballs. He’ll throw back the one he has in his pocket.”
The boy in the green jacket turned around. As he turned, he took the baseball out of his pocket and threw it over his head to the two children. Then he started to walk away.
“Come on, Eric. Let’s follow him.”
“Why? What’s the difference if he did switch baseballs? Those children couldn’t have the Babe Ruth ball. They were outside when it was stolen.”
The boy in the green jacket walked quickly away from the playground. He didn’t even look as he crossed the street. Horns honked. Two cars stopped short to avoid hitting him. But the boy didn’t even turn around.
Cam ran through the playground and out the exit. Eric followed her. They waited at the corner and then crossed the street when they were sure no cars were coming. The boy was almost a full block ahead of them.
“Let’s be careful,” Cam told Eric. “I don’t want that boy to know we’re following him.”
Cam and Eric stayed about half a block behind the boy. They walked past a row of stores. At the corner the boy turned around. He looked straight at Cam and Eric.
“Quick!” Cam said. “Let’s go into one of these stores.”
It was Sunday. The only place open was a small food store. Cam opened the door, and Eric quickly followed her inside.
“Can I help you?” a man behind the counter asked.
“No. We don’t need anything,” Cam told him.
“Of course you do. Now try to remember what your mother sent you to get. Was it milk? We have regular milk, ninety-nine-percent-fat-free milk, skim milk, and buttermilk.”
“We don’t need milk,” Eric said.
“Maybe you came for bread or canned vegetables. We have peas, spinach, corn, carrots, and lima beans.”
Cam opened the door and looked outside. Then she told Eric, “Let’s go before we lose him.”
“Maybe you need juice,” the man called as Cam and Eric were leaving. “We have orange juice, apple juice, tomato juice, grapefruit juice, and lemon juice.”
When Cam and Eric stepped outside the store, they looked for the boy. He was gone. They ran to the corner. They looked ahead and down both side streets.
“There he is,” Eric said.
The boy was walking down one of the side streets. Cam and Eric were careful not to get too close. There were a few stores along the first half of the block. The rest of the block was lined with apartment buildings. They saw the boy walk into one of the buildings.
Cam and Eric ran to the building. They peeked into the lobby. The boy was standing there waiting for the elevator. He got into the elevator, and the doors closed behind him.
Cam and Eric ran into the building. They watched the numbers over the elevator door light up. Number five stayed lit for a long time.
“He got off on the fifth floor,” Cam told Eric. “Now we know where he lives. I’ll stay here and watch to make sure he doesn’t leave. You go get the police.”
“No!”
“No?”
“You still haven’t told me why we followed him. What will I tell the police?”
Cam sat on one of the chairs in the lobby. Eric sat next to her.
“While we were sitting in the playground, I looked at the pictures I have stored in my head. That boy didn’t have a ball in his pocket when we first saw him at the exhibit. But he did have one when we saw him later.”
“But it wasn’t the Babe Ruth baseball.”
“I know it wasn’t. At first that confused me. Then I saw a ball get away from those two children playing catch. When the boy picked it up, I knew what had happened.”
“What?”
“That boy took the Babe Ruth ball from the exhibit. He saw us speaking to the guard so he ran. But then he had a better idea. The ball the two children were playing with must have landed near him. That was the first time he switched the baseballs. The two children didn’t know it, but they were playing catch with a very valuable baseball.”
Eric stood up and said, “Then, while we were watching, he switched the baseballs again. Now he has the Babe Ruth ball.”
Eric walked toward the door. As he was leaving the building, he said to Cam, “You wait right here. I’ll go and get the police.”
“And tell my parents where I am,” Cam said.
Cam waited, until she was sure that Eric was gone. Then she walked over and pushed the button for the elevator. When it came, she got on and pressed the button for the fifth floor.
Chapter Six
The elevator stopped on the third floor. A woman was standing there reading a flier about the items on sale at the local supermarket. She got into the elevator and asked, “Are you going down?”
“No. I’m going up,” Cam answered.
The woman smiled and said, “That’s all right. I’ll come along for the ride.”
The doors closed and the elevator started to move.
The elevator stopped on the fifth floor and Cam got off. The hall was lined with doors. What will I tell the police? Cam wondered. How will they know which is the boy’s apartment?
Cam looked at the names on each of the doors: Benson, Jackson, Goldwin, Cruz, Washington, Hamada, Grant, and Keller.
Maybe his name is Benson, Cam thought. He looked like a Benson. Or maybe he’s a Keller.
A door opened. It was the door to the Goldwin apartment. As the door opened, a paper fell to the floor. It was a flier just like the one the woman in the elevator had had. Cam looked at a few of the other apartment doors. Each one had a folded flier pressed into the frame of the door.
A tall woman with red hair just like Cam’s came out of the Goldwin apartment. Two children were with her. One of the children, a small boy with curly blond hair, picked up the flier. As they walked to the elevator, the woman smiled at Cam.
Cam waited until they were in the elevator. Then she walked from one apartment door to the next. Two of them, the Goldwins’ and the Grants‘, did not have fliers.
His name is Grant, Cam said to herself. He must have taken the flier when he went inside.
Cam was just about to knock on the door when she heard some people get off the elevator. It was Cam’s parents and Eric, with a policeman and a policewoman.
“Why didn’t you wait for us downstairs?” Eric asked.
“His name is Grant,” Cam told them. “This is his apartment.”
“What were you about to do?” Cam’s father asked.
“I hope you weren’t going to knock on the door,” Cam’s mother said. “Chasing and catching a thief isn’t something children should do. It’s a job for the police.”
The policeman knocked on the door.
“Who is it?” a voice called from inside the apartment.
“It’s the police. We’d like to ask a few questions.”
The door was opened by a boy wearing jeans.
“Is this the boy you think took the baseball?” the policeman asked.
“Yes,” Cam told him.
“No!” the boy shouted. “You’re wasting your time. This is the second time these two kids have said I stole that baseball. I had one with me when I left the exhibit, but it wasn’t the Babe Ruth ball. I showed it to them the last time.”
“Would you please show it to us?” the policewoman asked.
“Just a minute.”
The boy opened a closet near the front door of the apartment. Then he held out a baseball.
Cam looked at the ball. She closed her
eyes and said, “Click.”
“This isn’t the same one you showed us in the park,” Cam said when she opened her eyes.
“Is this the Babe Ruth baseball?” the policewoman asked.
“No.”
“Then let’s go.”
The boy was just closing the apartment door when something green caught Cam’s eye. The boy’s jacket was hanging over the back of a kitchen chair. And there was something on the kitchen table.
“Wait,” Cam said. “Don’t close the door.”
Chapter Seven
Cam’s father held the door open.
“What is it now?” the policewoman asked Cam.
“I saw the baseball. It’s on the kitchen table.”
“Are you sure?”
“I think I’m sure.”
The policewoman looked inside the apartment. “Oh, there is a baseball on the table,” she said. “Bring it here,” she told the boy.
The boy walked slowly to the kitchen. He took the baseball off the table and brought it to the policewoman.
“It sure is old,” the policewoman said as she looked at the ball. “And it says here ‘To Henry Baker, from The Babe.’ ”
“Maybe it’s mine,” the boy said.
“Is it?” the policewoman asked.
“Well, no,” the boy said softly. “I took it from the old man. I’m sorry.”
“You’ll have to come to the police station with us. We’ll call your parents,” the policewoman said as she led the boy to the elevator.
“But first we’ll stop at the exhibit,” the policeman said. “We’ll return the baseball to Mr. Baker.”
They all squeezed into the police car. The boy just stared quietly out of the car window. But the police officers and Cam’s parents weren’t quiet at all. They talked all during the ride to the exhibit hall.
“I’m too young to remember the great Babe Ruth,” the policewoman said. “But my father told me lots of stories about him.
“His favorite story was about the time Babe Ruth hit a home run in the 1932 World Series. The score was tied. There were two strikes. The Babe pointed to the centerfield fence. Then ...” She paused.
“And then what happened?” asked Cam’s mother.
“That’s where he hit the very next pitch, right over the centerfield fence.”
“And on the next pitch,” the policeman said, “Lou Gehrig hit a home run.”
“He was a pretty good ballplayer, too,” Cam’s father said.
When they reached the exhibit hall, Cam, her parents, Eric, and the policewoman went inside. Cam held the baseball with both hands.
Mr. Baker was sitting in the Babe Ruth corner of the exhibit. His head was down. Eric tapped him on the shoulder. Then Cam gave him the baseball.
“You found it! You found it!” Mr. Baker yelled. He hugged Cam, Cam’s father, Eric, the policewoman, and a man who just happened to be walking past.
“Look, they found my baseball!” Mr. Baker told his wife when she came from the other side of the exhibit.
“I’m not putting this back on display,” Mr. Baker said as he put the baseball in his pocket. “Someone else might take it.”
“I want you to come to the station house and sign a complaint against the boy who took it,” the policewoman said. “Come as soon as the exhibit closes.”
The policewoman started to leave.
“Wait,” Mr. Baker said. He took a handful of baseball cards from the box. “Take this,” he said as he handed the policewoman a card. “It’s Hank Aaron. He’s the greatest home run hitter of all time. And here’s George Brett and Yogi Berra and Willie Mays and Pete Rose.”
The policewoman held up her hands and said, “Oh, thank you, but don’t give them to me. Give them to these two children. They’re the ones who found your baseball.”
Mr. Baker gave the cards to Cam and Eric.
“Can you stay a little longer?” he asked Cam. “My wife would like to see you and your amazing mental camera at work.”
“Sure.”
“Good. Wait right here. I want everyone to see what a great memory you have.”
Chapter Eight
“May I have your attention, please,” a woman’s voice called out over the loudspeaker. “First, I want to thank you for coming to our hobby show. And I want to invite all of you to go to Henry Baker’s baseball exhibit. An amazing memory show will be given there in just a few minutes.”
A small crowd gathered around Mr. Baker’s exhibit. Cam’s parents stood right near the front. Both of them were tall and thin. Cam’s father had red hair just like Cam. Cam’s mother’s hair was brown and curly.
Mr. Baker and Cam were standing on chairs. Mr. Baker quietly asked Cam a few questions. Then he announced, “The girl standing next to me is Jennifer Jansen. She is in the fifth grade, and she has a remarkable memory.”
Mr. Baker picked up a box and said, “I’m going to pick a few cards from this box. Jennifer will take a quick look at the cards. Then I’ll let you test her memory.”
Mr. Baker picked out some cards and handed them to Cam. Cam said, “Click,” as she looked at each card. Then she gave the cards to Eric and closed her eyes.
Eric gave the cards to people in the crowd. “Ask her anything you want,” Eric told them.
“I’m holding a Dave Winfield card,” someone called out. “What’s his middle name?”
“Mark.”
“What’s Eddie Murray’s hobby?”
“Basketball.”
A woman standing next to Cam’s parents said, “She sure has an amazing memory.”
Cam’s mother told the woman, “She’s our daughter. We’re very proud of her.”
“And not just because of her memory,” Cam’s father said. “We were proud of her even before she said her first ‘Click.’ ”
The Mystery of Babe Ruth Baseball Page 2
