The Diamond Mistake Mystery

by Sylvia McNicoll

  “Hi, Mrs. Klein!” I wave. She was my favourite custodian at our school, the only one who I thought really liked kids, and I miss her.

  “Do you clean for the Lebels?” Renée calls.

  Mrs. Klein stops. “Shh! Not supposed to talk about our clients. Tom already asked me that.”

  “So you and Mr. Rupert still a thing?” Renée asks.

  I’m curious, too. Mr. Rupert and Mrs. Klein dated for a while but seemed to have broken up. Not surprised. That seemed like another yeti and princess duo. Yet, now she’s talking about him again.

  Still. Kids can’t ask adults about their dating. Renée always does, though, and strangely, adults answer her.

  “Well, we’re co-parenting Bandit,” Mrs. Klein says. “No one else can handle that ol’ cat except us.”

  I ask Renée’s first question a different way. “So you don’t clean for the Lebels?”

  “Didn’t say that. I just gave the house a thorough once-over yesterday. I was so worried about Mr. Lebel’s coughing, I called the ambulance.”

  “Is he okay?” I ask.

  “He’s going to be fine. You can’t be too careful, though.”

  “The Lebels sure have an interesting book collection, eh?” Renée asks.

  “Oh, I was told not to touch their bookshelf. They’re very particular about that.”

  Renée turns to me. This time, only one eyebrow lifts. She turns back to Mrs. Klein. “Do you ever sift through your vacuum cleaner? You know, say, in case you suck up a special toy or ring?”

  “Never. We do a visual check and pickup first. Don’t want to wreck the equipment.” She continues into the house.

  Mr. Rupert steps out of the house now, eyes narrowed, arms folded across his chest, his yellow hair glued to attention.

  “What do you two know?” he barks at us.

  “I’m sorry?” I say.

  “Don’t play stupid with me. I saw the cops at the Lebels’ house.” He pulls out his phone from his pocket and taps it. “I also have a video of that drywall guy crawling in the bathroom window. And you two were there.”

  “He wasn’t breaking in. He was helping us.”

  “Aiding and abetting is what the law calls it,” Mr. Rupert says. “You’ll all go to jail.”

  “No, no! You’ve got the wrong idea,” Renée insists. “Pearl Lebel locked us out by accident. Mr. Diamond helped us get her. She was all alone.”

  “Then why were the cops there?”

  “Someone broke in through the basement window.”

  “Aha!”

  Renée turns a guilty shade of pink. “Much later, though.”

  “What did they take? Money? Jewellery?”

  “For your information, nothing!” I answer. Renée turns to me. Her eyebrows reach for the sky.

  Mr. Rupert has tricked us into giving him important information. He smiles. “So, the robbery was interrupted in progress.”

  “Maybe,” I answer. I see Renée’s eyebrows still reaching. “I don’t know!”

  He nods and turns to Renée. “So tell me. How is that criminal brother of yours?”

  Oh boy. Here we go again.

  DAY TWO, MISTAKE TWO

  “Attila didn’t break into anybody’s house, if that’s what you’re saying,” Renée says. Her face looks tomato-soup angry. “He’s an artist, not a thief.”

  “Well, now, that’s up for discussion.” Mr. Rupert lowers his chin to his chest and smiles. “If he needed something for his art, wouldn’t he just take it?”

  He makes a very good point. Attila grabs things for his art installations. Without even asking. What if he just needed money to make art? Wouldn’t he grab that, too?

  Mr. Rupert aims his glare at me. “You going to walk the hounds now?”

  “Yes,” Renée answers. “So, we’re in kind of a hurry.”

  “Do you need bags?”

  I pat my pocket. “No, sir.”

  “On your way, then.”

  We move away quickly past the tombstones and plastic limbs and spiders on Mrs. Whittingham’s lawn. She waves hello to us as some of her daycare kids arrive. “Nice day for a walk,” she calls.

  I nod and smile.

  “What kind of accent does Mrs. Whittingham have?” Renée asks me as we cross the street. “I can’t place it.”

  “Accent, really? Never noticed.” So many people in this neighbourhood say words differently — pencakes instead of pancakes — almost like they add the colour from their home countries. Only their kids talk in blank.

  “British, no, South African maybe.” She snaps her fingers. “Australian. That’s it.”

  “Well, you would know.” ’Cause Renée knows everything. We arrive at the Bennetts’ and the dogs wag from the window. I swear Ping barks, “Walk, walk, walk,” as I key in the code. When the door swings open, the dogs swarm us. It always feels like there are more than two. Pong, though silent, muscles his way to attention, pushing Ping out of the way. I have to bribe them with liver bites to sit still so we can snap on the leashes.

  “Should we walk them down to the park?” Renée asks.

  “You’re still hoping we find the diamond,” I say.

  “For Pearl’s sake. How would you like to tell her dad you lost a valuable diamond?”

  “I wouldn’t.” I shake my head. “So we’ll go to the park.” We head up Cavendish, and at the corner of Duncaster, we hang a left. The dogs begin to pull hard. They love Brant Hills. The big green field, the skateboarders, the raccoons, the other dogs!

  We check over the sidewalk near that crack with the ant colony. The ants have crawled off somewhere else.

  A whole new batch of pop tabs and shiny bits of garbage trick me into brushing my hands around the grass. Ping and Pong nose along, too. I wish the diamond would appear. It would be nice to be a hero for Pearl. But we don’t find it.

  Instead, we begin to jog through the football field. Even Pong gets excited and jumps from side to side, bowing and wagging. Ping practically does flips. Then suddenly, their mood changes, their ears point, and they race each other as they sniff.

  “They’re on the trail of something!” Renée says.

  From the corner of my eye, I spot movement. Something round and brown ducking into the large, green garbage bin at the side of the community centre. Both Ping and Pong bark and strain at the leash.

  “Leave it,” I command Pong, and Renée and I pull them away, hard. We once lost Pong for days when he went after a raccoon.

  We jog in the opposite direction, toward the school, which is a whole baseball field and a half away. When we reach the path leading to the front door, Ping stops, digs his paws in, and puts on his donkey face, looking up at Renée, big-eyed with slivers of white showing.

  “No wonder Ping’s anxious. The Animal Control truck is parked over there.” Renée points to the white truck in the school parking lot.

  “Can’t blame him.” I see Janet Lacey, the Animal Control officer, carrying a long metal rod with a loop on the end toward Mr. Rogers. He’s standing, legs wide, like the captain of a pirate ship. His hands hang down at the end of long gorilla arms.

  With no jacket on, Ms. Lacey’s arm muscles bulge against her shirt sleeves; you can tell she has great biceps. She’s also got intense eyes and yellow hair; today it’s straw-straight. She’s pretty in a female wrestler way.

  We drag the dogs closer. “She’s not wearing her diamond ring!” Renée says. Ms. Lacey bought the ring from Harry when he and his fiancée broke up. Crazy thing is she was engaged to herself. Planning a big solo wedding and everything.

  “Maybe she had a fight and broke off the engagement with herself.” Both Renée and I chuckle.

  Mr. Rogers and Ms. Lacey sound like they’re arguing. We can hear them as we get closer.

  “You said he was injured,” Ms. Lacey says.

  “I said he was acting strange. Like he was sick or something.”

  “He sure moved quick.” Ms. Lacey crosses her arms in front of her chest,
the pole snug under one armpit.

  “I’m worried he’ll bite one of the kids,” Mr. Rogers says.

  “Well, I’ll check around the park,” she answers. “But you’re probably going to have to hire Wildlife Removal.”

  He shakes his head at her and then swaggers back into the school.

  She turns toward the parking lot.

  Renée waves.

  “Hey, if it isn’t Mouse-girl and Dog-boy!” — Renée adopted our mice from Burlington Animal Control, so Ms. Lacey knows them and us — “With the dogs. Hey, doggies!”

  We drift close, and Ms. Lacey reaches down to give Ping and Pong a pat. Only, both pull away. Ping’s tail drops between his legs and he huddles beside Renée. He’s peeling his lips back. I hear a rumble. He never growls at anyone!

  Mrs. Bennett did adopt him from the animal shelter. Perhaps he has bad smell memories.

  But Pong leans against me, too, eyeballing Ms. Lacey’s pole, his long nose sniffing in her direction.

  She pulls back her hand and pretends not to notice. “So how are Mickey and Minnie?”

  “They’re doing great. I’ve trained Mickey to do some tricks. Minnie, well Minnie’s grown lots.” It sounds like she’s making an excuse for the mouse who’s too scared to come out of her paper towel roll.

  Ms. Lacey nods. “She’s eating well, that’s good. Mickey’s always been kind of a whiz mouse.”

  Renée looks down, chews her lip. I almost think she’s not going to ask, but in the end, she can’t resist. “What happened to your diamond?”

  And because Renée is that in-your-face smart girl, of course Ms. Lacey answers. In detail. “Ah, Harry’s ex, Salma, wanted it back. Frankly, I think she wants him back, too, even though he hates her pet snake.” She shakes her head. “How can you trust a person like that? Anyway, I sold the ring back to him. Cost him a bit extra, though. I was really fond of that diamond.” She frowns.

  “So the wedding’s off?” I ask, probably because I’m spending so much time with Renée, and her snoopiness is catching.

  “No, no. I’m shopping for another one. I’ll go to the Brilliant Diamond Show on Saturday. I heard there’s going to be a pink diamond door prize. Maybe I’ll get lucky.”

  At the word pink, I could swear Pong’s and Ping’s ears lift. They’re suspicious of Ms. Lacey.

  “Say, do you know if that new guy is married?” Ms. Lacey asks.

  “Mr. Rogers?”

  She nods.

  “Not sure,” I say.

  “He’s sort of a buffer version of Jack Sparrow,” she says, as though she’s thinking out loud.

  “The Pirates of the Caribbean dude?” I ask.

  “Yeah, a younger version. Do you know if he has a girlfriend?”

  “Haven’t seen him with anyone,” Renée answers.

  And when would we, anyway? We don’t even know if he’s married. Still Ms. Lacey grins over Renée’s answer.

  “What did he want you at the school for? Was there a snake in the toilet?” I ask.

  “Ha ha. No. He said a raccoon was roaming close to the school, behaving weird.”

  “What is weird for a raccoon?” Renée asks.

  “The fact that he’s up and about.” Ms. Lacey waves a finger. “They’re nocturnal, you know.”

  “Not always. Not in an urban environment,” Renée says.

  “Mostly.” Ms. Lacey squints at Renée. “What animal wants to be up when a whole bunch of pesky kids are about?”

  I jump in. “We saw a raccoon in a garbage can near the community centre.”

  “Thanks. I’ll go check it out.”

  “Yeah. I bet Mr. Rogers would like that,” Renée says. “If you catch the raccoon.”

  Ms. Lacey winks at Renée. “Maybe I’ll ask him to the Brilliant Diamond Show. You kids should go, it’s pretty interesting. You meet the strangest people there.”

  Renée’s eyes pop. Strangest person we’ve ever met has to be Ms. Lacey.

  “That’s a great idea,” I tell Ms. Lacey. “But we promised a little girl we’d take her to a Halloween party at the library.” No way can we survive taking Pearl to both events. At least not an adult jewellery show where she would have to behave.

  Mistake number two of the day was agreeing to take Pearl to that party, even though technically the promise occurred yesterday. It seemed like a nice thing to do then, but maybe looking after her will stop us from finding her missing pink diamond.

  DAY TWO, MISTAKE THREE

  Time for us to take the dogs back and pick up Pearl for school. Past time. Ping and Pong don’t seem to mind running toward home today, as long as it’s away from our city dog catcher. We dash up their walk and neither dog stops. Then they stand, tails at half-mast as I try to open the door.

  In a hurry, I key in the Bennetts’ code wrong twice, and I have to stop and take a breath. Finally, on the third try, I hear the magic whir that says it’s unlocking and we’re able to hustle them into the house. “I’ll do water. You do kibble,” I tell Renée. Teamwork makes everything go faster. We set the bowls down. We’re done, ready to dash.

  Then Ping brings me his chewed-up mini Jack Russell. I throw the stuffie for him, high, intending to get away as he chases it, but instead, he makes a spectacular jump. His jaws clamp on mid-air. Then he lands and spits it at my feet.

  “Wow!” Renée says. She scoops it and throws it up the stairs. We scoot for the door.

  Pong blocks my way — the dogs use teamwork, too — and it takes both of us to move him. We can hear toenails scrabbling on the floor behind him. Ping tears toward us with his toy.

  Last second, I end up shutting the door in his furry face. “Sorry, guys,” I call through the door. “Be back after school!”

  We’re later than I want to be for the drawn-out kindergarten walk, so I don’t even touch down at home. Dad will still be with Bailey and Tiger, anyway, and even if Mom calls, I have no time to talk.

  But at least we won’t have to deal with Mr. Lebel this morning, and I’m sure Mrs. Lebel won’t be as crabby about us being late.

  We zip over to the Lebels’ house and I ring the doorbell. Mr. Lebel answers. Bah! I’m wrong again. He’s wearing a grey sweatsuit today, no body hair showing, and his eyes look bleary.

  Now is the time to tell him about the pink diamond. Dad said we should wait till he’s out of the hospital, and he’s out.

  “Pearl. Come on. Kids are here!” he growls. The growl changes into a cough and he bends his head toward his elbow.

  “How are you?” Renée asks. “We heard you went into the hospital.”

  “Aah. That busybody cleaning lady made me. I’ll be fine.” He coughs again.

  When he stops coughing, I’ll tell him about Pearl taking the diamond for show and tell.

  He lifts his head from his elbow and I open my mouth to start … but then, from nowhere, Pearl curls around his leg like a cat, big eyes looking up, thumb in her mouth.

  Instead, I end up asking whether we can take her to the library Halloween party.

  “Oui. That would be fun. We will be busy setting up the gem show, anyway. You can drop her off after.”

  Aha! Mistake two of the day corrected. We can drop Pearl off and perhaps still solve the mystery of the missing diamond.

  Today, the yeti helps Pearl into her Wonder Woman jacket before she slides her shoulders into her backpack straps. Makes things go a little quicker. “You’ve got your lunch. Your letter and reading booklet? Your ‘double you’?”

  “Double you. Whuh, whuh, whuh, whuh, watch,” she answers.

  “Whuh, whuh, whuh, whale,” Renée adds.

  I join in. “Whuh, whuh, whuh, wagon.” Sounding out letters is reading-buddy stuff; we’re supposed to encourage it.

  “Whuh, whuh, whuh, whatever!” Mr. Lebel gives me annoyed eyes, but I think I see his lips twitch upwards. Whatever. That may have been a yeti joke. Mr. Lebel taps Pearl’s backpack. “They’re in your zippie, right?”

  She nods, and Mr. Lebel
kisses the top of her head. Then he pushes her forward. “Get going, you’re late!”

  So, I never tell him about the missing ring. Dad didn’t want me to bother him when he was sick, and while Mr. Lebel may be out of the hospital, he’s coughing just as much as yesterday.

  “We have to hurry. No looking at ants, okay?” I tell Pearl as I take her hand and tug her along. She doesn’t pull away or call out that I’m hurting her. It’s a good day. Renée takes her other hand and we move pretty quickly.

  We turn right on Duncaster as usual and wave to Mrs. Filipowicz.

  “Good morning, keeds.” She holds up her stop sign and crosses the street to meet Mrs. Whittingham and her parade. She’s pushing a four-seater stroller full of toddlers with a conga line of kindergarteners attached, August among them. He’s wearing his Batman jacket today.

  “So many children.” Renée shakes her head. “She sure must need the money.”

  “Are you kidding me? She loves looking after kids.” I don’t want Renée to be right. I like Mrs. Whittingham. She makes crazy mistakes and I help her out sometimes, like when she left her diaper bag on top of the van and started to drive off. Some people get super huffy when you point out their errors, but she’s always super nice.

  We hurry ahead into the kindergarten play area so we’re not stuck behind her parade, and we make it before the first bell. Yay!

  “Did you find your diamond?” Aswan asks Pearl. He sounds like he really just wants to know.

  “Yeah, did you find your diamond?” another kids repeats. This one sounds like he doesn’t believe there is one.

  “Dia-mond, dia-mond, dia-mond,” a chant picks up. Not sure if they’re being mean or just goofballs.

  Pearl ignores them. But instead of dropping her stuff and playing, she stands by herself in line, twisting her hair around her finger.

  Renée squints at me and I shrug my shoulders. Doesn’t she have any friends? I wonder. I mean she’s kind of a brat but so are they.

  She doesn’t have long to wait for school to start. The bell rings and all the other kids rush to line up behind her.