by Penny Warner
PENNY WARNER’S first book in the Code Busters Club series, The Secret of the Skeleton Key, was nominated for the Agatha Award for Best Children’s/Young Adult novel, and the follow-up, The Haunted Lighthouse, won the award the next year. She has also won both the Agatha Award and Anthony Award for her novel The Mystery of the Haunted Caves. Her books have received excellent reviews and have been printed in fourteen countries throughout the world.
Warner lives in Danville, California. You may visit her online at www.pennywarner.com, and brush up on your sleuthing skills at www.CodeBustersClub.com.
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: Treasure Hunt
Message:
In darkness yon,
A shrouded night covers island mists.
Those hallowed, sunken, tired souls,
Lively ghosts hope you’ll see …
Alone a local treasure.
—Z
Luke and Quinn sat up to see the computer screen. M.E. rolled over to view it. Cody read the message aloud and then turned to them. “Did one of you guys write this?”
THE CODE BUSTERS CLUB
CASE #1:
The Secret of the Skeleton Key
CASE #3:
The Mystery of the Pirate’s Treasure
EGMONT
We bring stories to life
First published by Egmont USA, 2012
This paperback edition published by Egmont USA, 2013
443 Park Avenue South, Suite 806
New York, New York 10016
Text copyright © Penny Warner, 2012
All Rights Reserved
www.egmontusa.com
www.pennywarner.com
www.CodeBustersClub.com
THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS HAS CATALOGED
THE HARDCOVER EDITION AS FOLLOWS:
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Warner, Penny.
The haunted lighthouse / Penny Warner.
p. cm. — (The Code Busters Club; case #2)
Summary: “An enigmatic message leads the Code Busters on a treasure hunt on creepy Alcatraz Island, where they must use their problem-solving skills to unravel the mystery.”
eISBN: 978-1-60684-362-8
[1. Cryptography—Fiction. 2. Ciphers—Fiction. 3. Alcatraz Island (Calif.)—Fiction. 4. Mystery and detective stories.] I. Title.
PZ7.W2458Hau 2012
[Fic]—dc23
2012003787
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher and copyright owner.
v3.1
To all the Code Busters Club Members,
especially Bradley, Luke, Stephanie, and Lyla.
And special thanks to Connor Brien!
READER
To see keys and solutions to the puzzles inside, go to the Code Buster’s Key Book & Solutions on this page.
To see complete Code Busters Club Rules and Dossiers, and solve more puzzles and mysteries, go to
www.CodeBustersClub.com
CODE BUSTERS CLUB RULES
Motto
To solve puzzles, codes, and mysteries and keep the Code Busters Club secret!
Secret Sign
Interlocking index fingers (American Sign Language sign for “friend”)
Secret Password
Day of the week, said backward
Secret Meeting Place
Code Busters Club Clubhouse
Code Busters Club Dossiers
IDENTITY: Quinn Kee
Code Name: “Lock&Key”
Description
Hair: Black, spiky
Eyes: Brown
Other: Sunglasses
Special Skill: Video games, Computers, Guitar
Message Center: Doghouse
Career Plan: CIA cryptographer or Game designer
Code Specialties: Military code, Computer codes
IDENTITY: MariaElena—M.E.—Esperanto
Code Name: “Em-me”
Description
Hair: Long, brown
Eyes: Brown
Other: Fab clothes
Special Skill: Handwriting analysis, Fashionista
Message Center: Flower box
Career Plan: FBI handwriting analyst or Veterinarian
Code Specialties: Spanish, I.M., Text messaging
IDENTITY: Luke LaVeau
Code Name: “Kuel-Dude”
Description
Hair: Black, curly
Eyes: Dark brown
Other: Saints cap
Special Skill: Extreme sports, Skateboard, Crosswords
Message Center: Under step
Career Plan: Pro skater, Stuntman, Race car driver
Code Specialties: Word puzzles, Skater slang
IDENTITY: Dakota—Cody—Jones
Code Name: “CodeRed”
Description
Hair: Red, curly
Eyes: Green
Other: Freckles
Special Skill: Languages, Reading faces and body language
Message Center: Tree knothole
Career Plan: Interpreter for UN or deaf people
Code Specialties: Sign language, Braille, Morse code, Police codes
CONTENTS*
Cover
About the Author
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Code Buster’s Key Book & Solutions
Excerpt from “Code Buster’s Club, Case #3: The Mystery of the Pirate’s Treasure”
*To crack the chapter title code, check out the CODE BUSTER’S Key Book & Solutions on this page and this page.
Guys … look at this!” Cody Jones said to her fellow Code Buster Club members, who were spread out in her upstairs bedroom doing homework.
Quinn Kee, the self-appointed leader of the club and math whiz, lay on the floor composing a sudoku puzzle for the others to solve. His ever-present aviator sunglasses rested on top of his spiky black hair.
Code Buster’s Solution found on this page.
Luke LaVeau lay sprawled across the bed on his stomach, studying his spelling words. MariaElena Esperanto—M.E. for short—took up her usual spot in Cody’s red beanbag chair, writing a poem. Sitting at her desk, Cody pointed to her computer screen. The cryptic message she’d just received had caused the back of her neck to tingle.
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: Treasure Hunt
Message:
In darkness yon,
A shrouded night covers island mists.
Those hallowed, sunken, tired souls,
Lively ghosts hope you’ll see …
Alone a local treasure.
—Z
Luke and Quinn sat up to see the computer screen. M.E. rolled over to view it. Cody read the message aloud and then turned to them. “Did one of you guys write this?” she asked, raising a suspicious eyebrow. The Code Busters were known for writing and sending coded messages to each other. That’s why they’d formed their club. They had recently solved a real crime involving Cody’s former neighbor, Mr. Skelton—the man they used to call “Skeleton Man.”
“I didn’t,” M.E. said, her dark
eyes wide. She glanced at the two boys.
“Me, either,” Luke added, leaning back, his tall, lanky body melting into the comforter.
“Don’t look at me!” Quinn said, when Cody turned her attention to him. He scrunched up his face and studied the message again.
“You’re sure none of you wrote this?” Cody stared at each one of her friends, her red-haired ponytail swishing behind her as she moved her head.
“Uh-uh,” Luke said.
“No way.” M.E. shook her head.
“Quinn?” Cody asked again when he didn’t respond.
“No, I’m telling you! I didn’t write it or send it,” Quinn said, standing up to get a closer look. “Read it out loud again.”
Cody turned back to the screen and read the message once more.
“In darkness yon,
A shrouded night covers island mists.
Those hallowed, sunken, tired souls,
Lively ghosts hope you’ll see …
Alone a local treasure.
Z”
“Sounds like a poem,” M.E. said. She was somewhat of a poet herself, always making up riddles in rhyme. She’d memorized “The Raven” by Edgar Allan Poe—and loved reciting it when they had sleepovers, hoping to scare Cody, but she always ended up just scaring herself.
“Dude, if it’s a poem, it doesn’t make a lot of sense,” Luke said, putting aside his study sheet. Cody glanced at his homework and saw a list of unfamiliar words:
ushoe
holocs
knomey
grande
grifen
grooft
pliglens
macres
Code Buster’s Solution found on this page.
Even though the list looked as if it was written in a foreign language, she knew they were anagrams. Luke’s grandmother always made a game of his spelling words by scrambling them up. Luke had to unscramble the letters, which helped him remember how to spell the word correctly.
Luke saw Cody checking out the list and said, “I’m stuck on the last one.”
It took her only seconds to figure it out, but instead of blurting out the answer, she gave him a hint. “Try starting with the last letter and ending with the first letter.”
“Got it!” he said. “Thanks!”
“Great, now can we get back to this weird message on my computer?”
She read it aloud again. “ ‘A shrouded night covers island mists … Lively ghosts hope you’ll see … Alone a local treasure.’ ”
“So who’s this Z dude—the Shadow, or whatever he calls himself?” Luke asked.
“I don’t know, but it sounds old-fashioned,” M.E. said, wiggling her knee-sock-covered feet. Today her socks had Hello Kitty designs that in no way matched her tie-dyed shirt and denim skirt. Who knew what she’d be wearing tomorrow. “Cody and I are studying poetry in class. That was the way they spoke back in the day.”
“We are, too, but not gibberish,” Luke argued.
Quinn laughed. “My dad thinks I speak gibberish. Half the time he doesn’t know what I’m saying when I speak pig Latin.”
M.E. nodded. “Y-may arents-pay o-day, oo-tay!” she said.
Code Buster’s Key and Solution found on this page, this page.
“I have a feeling we’re missing the point here,” Cody said.
The others looked at her, waiting for an explanation.
“I think it’s a code. After all, someone sent it to us at CodeBustersClub.com, so they obviously know we’re into deciphering codes and puzzles.”
“So let’s decipher it,” Quinn said. “M.E., you’re good at poetry. What does, ‘In darkness yon, / A shrouded night covers island mists,’ mean?”
M.E. frowned. “Uh … there’s an island in the dark or the fog?”
Quinn nodded, then continued. “What about, ‘Those hallowed, sunken, tired souls, / Lively ghosts hope you’ll see’ …?”
“I don’t know,” M.E. said, shrugging. “I’m not an expert.”
“Sounds like dead people,” Cody offered. “Souls, ghosts …”
“And a treasure,” Luke added, noting the last line, “Alone a local treasure.”
“Maybe,” Cody said. “But what about those letters in bold?”
“Yeah,” Quinn said, leaning toward the screen. “What’s up with that?”
“Let me try something.” Cody highlighted the message and copied it to a new document. She deleted all the letters that weren’t in bold. When she was done, she tried to read the message aloud, but it came out in one long word:
“IdareyoutovisitThehauntedLighthouseonalcatraZ.”
She tried again, reading it more slowly.
Code Buster’s Solution found on this page.
“Alcatraz?” Luke asked, with a hint of his Louisiana accent. “That’s weird. Our class is going there tomorrow on a field trip.”
“We all are,” Cody said. All four Code Busters were in the sixth grade, but the girls were in a different class from the boys. The whole sixth grade was heading for the prison island the next day on a class trip.
Cody stared at the translated message and was caught by the words haunted lighthouse. She knew there was a lighthouse on Alcatraz. Her teacher, Ms. Stadelhofer, had spent a class on the island once known as “the Rock,” which had held many notorious prisoners but was now one of the most popular attractions in the Bay Area. She’d never been there, but she’d heard many stories about the prison, including that it was haunted by prisoners who had died there. Although she didn’t believe in ghosts, Cody shivered at the thought. If there was such a thing as spirits returning to haunt a scary place, Alcatraz, with its violent history, would be perfect. But she was sure these were legends, told to attract more tourists to “the Rock.”
So who had sent them an e-mail about the lighthouse being haunted? What was behind this mysterious message? And who was Z, aka The Shadow?
“I say we keep an eye out tomorrow for this mysterious ‘Shadow’ and see what’s up.”
“I agree!” M.E. said. “This is going to be fun! I can’t wait for tomorrow. Maybe we’ll see the ghost of Al Capone.”
“Who’s Al Capone?” Luke asked.
“He was a big gangster in Chicago,” M.E. said. “They called him Scarface. He was a bootlegger back when there was Prohibition.”
“What’s a bootlegger?” Luke asked.
“Someone who sold alcohol when it was illegal,” M.E. answered.
Cody’s younger sister, Tana, who was deaf, appeared at the door and finger-spelled to Cody:
Cody nodded at her sister.
“What did she say?” Luke asked, watching Tana.
Cody showed her friends the signs.
Code Buster’s Key and Solution found on this page, this page.
The kids copied each of the signs with her.
“Thanks, Tana,” Cody said, and finger-spelled that to her sister.
Cody turned to her friends. “Well, I’ll see you guys tomorrow.” Quinn packed up his IRONMAN backpack. M.E. gathered her things into her I’M A PRINCESS backpack. Luke stuffed his spelling words into his sports bag and picked up his skateboard before pushing himself up from the bed. They followed Cody down the stairs and said a polite good night to her mother. Cody knew her friends were a little intimidated by her mom, who happened to be a Berkeley police officer. But they also knew Mrs. Jones would be there for them if they ever needed her. She had recently helped them solve the mystery involving Mr. Skelton.
After the others left, Cody kissed her mother good night and took Tana back upstairs to sign her a bedtime story. When she was finished tucking her sister in, Cody returned to her bedroom, pulled out her collection of lighthouse postcards, and crawled under her heart-covered comforter. She flipped through them and sighed contentedly. She’d been collecting the postcards since she’d seen her first one, when she’d lived in the California Gold Country. She’d been attracted to lighthouses because they seemed to symbolize strength and hope during rough tim
es. And she’d been through some rough times, what with her parents getting a divorce, their moving to a new city, and her having to make new friends.
Cody returned the album of postcards to the spot under her bed and turned off the light. But the semidarkness did nothing to help her get to sleep. She stared at the shaft of moonlight on her ceiling, wide awake, puzzling over the cryptic message that had mysteriously appeared in her e-mail box.
When she finally fell asleep, she dreamed about a ghost wearing prison-striped pajamas, flying in and out of a lonely, abandoned lighthouse.
Morning, sweetheart,” Mrs. Jones said as Cody entered the kitchen, dressed for school. Winter weather had come early to Berkeley and the rest of the San Francisco Bay Area, stripping the trees of their colorful leaves and laying early morning frost on the lawns and rooftops. Cody had dressed in layers, because her teacher had warned her class that Alcatraz Island would be cold and windy. Cody had never been to “the Rock,” so she made sure she was prepared, wearing her warmest jeans, two long-sleeved T-shirts, Ugg boots, her red hoodie, and a black muffler.
“Ready to go to prison?” Mrs. Jones asked, pouring some orange juice for Cody and Tana.
“You mean school?” Cody asked, grinning at her mom’s play on words. “They’re the same thing, right?”
Mrs. Jones shook her head at her daughter’s joke. “Very funny. You love school, and you know it.”
“I don’t love it,” Cody tried to argue. “I just don’t hate it.”
“That’s because you’re good at so many subjects. You inherited your brains from me, of course.” Mrs. Jones handed Cody a bag lunch and some money to buy souvenirs and to use in case of an emergency.
