Mrs. Pringle and Ms. Thorsen turned in surprise. Robyn’s face turned pink. “We were just coming in and heard what you said,” she explained as Nick and I followed her in.
Robyn continued. “We could raise the money,” she said. “It wouldn’t be hard. The school always has fundraisers.”
“Well, it’s a great idea, Robyn, but that’s just the problem. We do have a lot of fundraisers, and our parent council does most of them. I’m not sure we could get the support for another one.”
“Why couldn’t we do it ourselves?” Robyn persisted. “Trevor, Nick and I could do most of the organizing if you’re too busy.”
“We could?” Nick looked startled.
Robyn elbowed him hard in the ribs. “Yes, we could. I bet we could get other students to help. It would be fun.”
“Yeah, loads,” Nick muttered, just loud enough for me to hear.
Mrs. Pringle hesitated. “I don’t know, Robyn. It would be a lot of work to get it organized for this school year, and I’m not sure I’ll be here next year. It might be better to wait until September.”
“But we need books now. You said so,” Robyn pointed out. “What if we held a literacy fair? The whole school could help!” Her eyes lit up. “We could have a used book sale. We could sell all the donated books that the library can’t use!”
“That’s a great idea, Robyn!” Ms. Thorsen said enthusiastically.
“It would solve the problem of getting rid of these discards.” Mrs. Pringle glanced at the boxes full of books. “But there’s still a lot of books no one will buy—old textbooks and things.”
“That’s easy. We can donate those to charity.” Robyn gave an airy wave of her hand, then stopped. “But wait a minute, Mrs. Pringle. What do you mean, you won’t be here next year?”
Mrs. Pringle frowned. “I shouldn’t have said that. It slipped out before I thought. I don’t really know for sure. But with more students coming in for fall, there may not be room in the budget for a librarian.”
“That’s terrible!” Robyn cried.
Mrs. Pringle smiled, but her eyes looked worried. “That’s the way it is, honey. There’s only so much money, and teachers are necessities. The school can manage without a librarian.”
“I can’t!” Robyn burst out. Anger made her swell up like a toad. “Librarians are important!”
Mr. Kowalski, his curly brown hair more disheveled than usual, strode through the library door with the students. “Sorry, kids,” he said to us. “I had a phone call. The rest of the class had to wait. Have they been any trouble?” he asked Mrs. Pringle.
“Not at all.” She smiled. “Quite the opposite. While we were waiting, Robyn, Nick and Trevor volunteered to spearhead a literacy fair to raise money for the library.”
Mr. Kowalski took a sip from his coffee cup and wiped his bushy mustache. “Really? That’s sounds great. Let’s see if they can put the same resourcefulness toward their social studies project.” He faced the class. “Find a computer, kids, and get started. We only have twenty minutes left before lunch.”
I sat down at the nearest computer station and logged on. I only had time to type in my outline before Mr. Kowalski interrupted us.
“Everybody, stop and save, please. We have to pack up. It’s almost time for lunch.” He glanced at the clock. “Sorry this session was so short. I’ll see if I can book some extra time on the computers this afternoon with Mrs. Pringle.”
The bell sounded. Nick slammed his binder shut. “Let’s go! I’m starving.”
Robyn caught up to us in the hall, just as we passed the school office. Her gaze fastened on a grade seven boy who was standing near the office door. He was shifting uneasily from foot to foot and hiding something behind his back.
“Look!” Robyn whispered. She gestured toward the boy.
I looked. “So?”
“So, he’s up to something!” she hissed. “Can’t you see what he’s hiding?”
I stared. It was a lunch box—a pink lunch box with sparkly stars. The boy caught me looking, and his face turned red.
“He could be the lunch thief,” Robyn insisted. “Look at how he’s acting. He’s very nervous. That’s suspicious, if you ask me.”
“Yeah, but...” I started to object, but Robyn took off like a shot.
She strode up to the boy and demanded, “Where did you get that?”
The boy gulped. “Get what?”
“That lunch box.”
“What lunch box?”
“The one behind your back!”
The hall was crowded with students, and people turned to see what was going on. “I...um—” The boy started to sweat. He looked around wildly, as if searching for escape.
Robyn glared at him. “You stole it, didn’t you? You’re the thief who’s been ripping off lunches, aren’t you?”
His face went blank. “I have no clue what you’re talking about, but I didn’t steal anything, so mind your own business!”
At that moment, a small, curly-haired girl wearing a pink denim jumper came up.
“Thanks, Connor,” she said, taking the lunch box from him.
“The next time you forget your lunch, get Mom to bring it. Okay, Holly?” The boy said through clenched teeth.
“Okay,” the girl chirped. She skipped back to her class.
Connor gave Robyn a baleful glance and took off down the hall. Robyn turned back to us, completely crestfallen.
“Don’t worry, Robyn,” I said, fighting back laughter. “Even the best detectives make mistakes.” Nick kept his face turned carefully away and was making weird snuffling noises in an effort to control his own urge to laugh.
“Stop it, you morons,” Robyn scowled at us.
“You’re calling us morons?” Nick sputtered, finally giving in to a fit of laughter. It was contagious, and I couldn’t hold it in any longer. Loud guffaws erupted from both of us. The madder Robyn looked, the funnier it seemed. Nick doubled over and had to lean one arm on the wall for support.
She glared at us, her hands on her hips. “So tell me, brainiacs. Why was he hiding the lunch box, if it belonged to his sister?”
Nick snorted. “Think about it, Robyn. No guy wants to stand in the hall holding a pink lunch box. That’s like holding a sign that says, ‘I’m a dweeb.’”
“Oh.” Robyn paused. “I never thought of that.”
I managed to stop laughing. “You’re a girl. Pink lunch boxes aren’t a big deal to you.”
“Okay, so I was wrong.” Robyn shrugged. “I still think it’s Cray, anyway, but a good detective has to investigate every possibility,” she said in a pompous voice. “Come on, let’s go eat.”
chapter four
“What’s the next move, Sherlock?” I asked Robyn.
“Stick it up your nose, Trev,” she answered. We were back in the library working on our research project. “The guy with the pink lunch box looked suspicious, so I investigated. Which is better than you—sitting on your butt doing nothing. It’s your lunch issue that I’m trying to solve, you know.”
“I’m not doing nothing,” I retorted.
“Yeah, you are,” Robyn said. “I’m doing all the work, and no one’s swiping my lunch.”
“That’s because it’s disgusting,” Nick interrupted. “And the next move is for someone to explain to me why I can’t get this dumb Internet to work.”
“Need some help?” A grade nine boy from Ms. Thorsen’s class stopped, his arms full of books. Their class was organizing the new books for Mrs. Pringle.
“Sure.” Nick gestured to the screen. “I can’t get the search engine to work.”
“No problem.” The boy set down the books. Some old detective novels were on top of the pile. I have a weakness for high-action mystery-thrillers, even fifty-year-old ultra-cheesy ones. This one was titled, Mac Dougall and the Case of the Monster From Mars. I opened the cover, but the boy looked up. “Hey, don’t mess with those.”
Surprised, I stopped. “I was just looking at it.
”
“Sorry, but I just finished sorting them. I don’t want them to get mixed up.”
I raised one eyebrow and caught Robyn’s eye. She shrugged.
He turned back to Nick.
“Anyway, I think you’re putting in the wrong keywords. Try something like this.” The boy typed rapidly for a moment.
“Blake, what are you doing?” Ms. Thorsen asked.
“Just helping this guy for a second on the Internet.”
Mrs. Pringle came over to see. “What’s the problem?”
“Nothing,” Blake answered. “I fixed it.” He explained to Nick what he’d done.
“This is majorly cool,” Nick enthused. He scrolled through several pages. “Look at how much stuff came up.”
Mrs. Pringle shook her head. “I can’t keep up with all the technology.”
“That’s what happens when you were born in the Dark Ages,” Blake said, grinning. “Right, Mom?”
Mrs. Pringle gave him a teasing frown. “Get back to class.” She moved away to finish packing a box of discards. Blake scooped up his books and went over to help Ms. Thorsen.
“That’s Mrs. Pringle’s son,” Robyn hissed.
“Brilliant deduction, Holmes,” Nick said, typing intently.
Robyn shot him a withering stare. “I just never knew that.”
“Me neither,” I said. “I wonder...,” I paused as Ms. Thorsen stopped at our table.
“Less talking, more working. Trevor, I think you need to be at a different computer station. Come with me.”
Reluctantly, I stood up and followed Ms. Thorsen. She wove around a table stacked with books in the far corner and turned on the computer stationed behind it.
“There you go,” she said.
Annoyed, I plunked myself into the chair and waited to log on. I was surrounded by a fortress of books that cut me off from Nick and Robyn. Some of the books were part of the series of Mac Dougall detective novels that Blake had been sorting. They were really ancient—the kind without a book jacket, just an illustrated hardcover. I picked one up and flipped through the yellowed pages. A slip of paper fell out. It was a note covered with pencil-jotted numbers, but before I had a chance to look at them too closely, Mrs. Pringle appeared over one of the book towers.
“Trevor,” she said, “could you help me lift this box onto the trolley? It’s too heavy for one person.”
“Sure.” I shoved the note into my jean pocket and heaved one end of the box. It was filled to the brim with books. We staggered under the weight and placed it carefully on the trolley.
“Thanks,” Mrs. Pringle said, brushing the dust from her hands. “I think I over-packed that one.”
She noticed the detective novel I’d been looking at and smiled. “I used to like that series. Mac Dougall and his friends always got themselves into terrible trouble. I’d have to read under the covers with a flashlight, because I couldn’t wait to find out how they got out of it. It’s a shame I have to discard them.”
“Why do you have to?” I asked.
“Well, the books are getting too old to be lent out—they’d start falling apart. I don’t think many kids would be interested in them, anyway.”
“Do you...” I hesitated. “Do you think I could have one, then? If you’re getting rid of them?”
Mrs. Pringle paused, then grinned. “Sure. But don’t tell anyone, okay? If Robyn gets her way, these books will go into the used book sale. If everyone decides they want one, we won’t have anything left to sell!”
“Okay.” I tucked the book—Mac Dougall and the Secret of the Underwater Spy—inside my binder.
“Now, you’d better get to work before class is over.” Mrs. Pringle took two stacks of books and walked away to pack them, leaving a hole in my wall of books. I could see Nick still typing at his computer, his eyes glued to the screen. Robyn was flipping the pages of a magazine.
I sighed and entered my password. Research projects were not my favorite thing to do. Searching the Internet is fun, but writing up the report afterward is harder. I plugged a few keywords into the search engine and waited while the computer looked them up.
Ms. Thorsen was rummaging through stuff on the trolley, where Mrs. Pringle and I had loaded the heavy box of books. When I heard her gasp, I peeked around a book stack to see what the problem was.
She had her square glasses propped up on top of her head, and she was chewing on her bottom lip. “What’s the matter?” Mrs. Pringle asked, coming over.
“The hockey book—the one with Gretzky’s signature—it was here on the cart.”
“I know. I was going to put it in my office after I showed it to your class,” Mrs. Pringle said.
“It’s gone!” Ms. Thorsen whispered.
“Gone!” Mrs. Pringle stared at her, wide-eyed. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, it’s not here. Look.”
Mrs. Pringle rifled through the books on the cart. “Oh, no!” She looked at Ms. Thorsen in dismay. “What are we going to do?”
Ms. Thorsen rubbed her forehead. “We start looking,” she said grimly.
chapter five
“Hey!” Ms. Thorsen yelped. I dodged her at the last second.
The heavy box she was carrying teetered in her arms. I grabbed for it, but I must have done the wrong thing because the cardboard bottom collapsed and a cascade of books spilled onto the floor.
“No running in the halls, Trevor,” Ms. Thorsen said crossly, picking up scattered books.
“Sorry, Ms. Thorsen,” I said. I reassembled the box and began stuffing books inside. I caught a glimpse of a hockey picture before Ms. Thorsen scooped up several books and pulled the box farther away from me.
She straightened her Oilers ball cap. She was dressed in running tights and a T-shirt, to exercise during the lunch hour.
“Oilers fan?” I said.
Ms. Thorsen grinned at the disapproval in my voice. “Is that a problem?”
“The Flames are way better,” I said.
Ms. Thorsen didn’t argue. She just picked up the box. “Thanks for helping clean up.” The noon bell rang, and she headed for the door to the parking lot.
A stream of kids poured into the hall. I went to my locker to grab my lunch, trying to ignore the smell of putrid sneakers that burst out as I opened the door. Rachel Gibbons shared this locker with me, and her feet were brutal. Everything in this locker came out smelling horrible.
Our locker would not normally win awards for neatness, but today it might have qualified as the world’s messiest. I rummaged through the piles of crumpled worksheets, textbooks, gym clothes, gloves, and mountains of Rachel’s stuff, but my lunch was nowhere to be found. Meanwhile, I nearly passed out from the fumes.
“Trevor! You are such a slob.” Rachel stomped up behind me. “Look at this mess! I came early this morning and cleaned this locker, and now look at it. It’s disgusting! And it stinks too. The Board of Health is going to close the school because your gym clothes are contaminating the air.”
“Oh, yeah? I don’t think so. You should check your feet,” I retorted. “Your sneakers smell like toxic waste!”
Rachel put her hands on her hips, but before she could say anything else, I butted in. “Did you just say you cleaned the locker this morning?”
“Yes.” She eyed me coldly. “It took me twenty minutes before the bell just to shovel out all your junk,” she said.
“But, Rach,” I shook my head, “it was like this when I opened it.”
“Give me a break.”
“No, I’m serious.”
“Well, it was organized when I left it,” Rachel answered.
“That means,” I said slowly, “that someone’s been in here. Did you lock it?”
Rachel looked a little shamefaced. “Well, I never do, actually. I just close the lock. I don’t click it shut.”
“What!” I felt my eyes bug out. “Why not?”
“Because I can never get the lock open when I’m in a hurry. It always jams,” R
achel said defensively.
“Rachel, are you brain-dead?” I demanded. “That explains why my lunch is always missing, even when I leave it in my locker. And that explains this mess. But what I don’t get is why? What were they looking for?”
“I don’t know, but this means our locker has to be cleaned out all over again, and I’m not doing it this time.” Rachel elbowed past me, grabbed her lunch out of her backpack inside the locker and flounced off.
“What’s going on?” Nick tapped my shoulder. Robyn was just behind him.
“Someone trashed my locker,” I said. “Rachel said she just cleaned it this morning, so someone’s definitely been into it.”
Nick peered into the mess. “Anything missing?”
“Besides my lunch, I don’t know yet.”
“My lunch is gone too. Someone swiped my pickle sandwich,” Robyn fumed. “I just know it’s Cray. We’d better catch that bozo before the entire school starves. I bet he took that hockey book too. Mrs. Pringle told me it’s still missing.”
“Come on, Robyn,” I said. “Just because you don’t like the guy doesn’t mean he’s a thief.”
“Look at the facts, Trevor,” Robyn retorted. “He starts a food fight after he stockpiles lunches, he’s totally into hockey, and when Mrs. Pringle showed us that book about Gretzky, he thought it was majorly cool. What more do you want?”
“Evidence, maybe?” Nick said.
“I don’t understand why you guys don’t believe me.” Robyn frowned. “He thinks it’s fun to pick on other kids. He’s probably laughing every time one of us is stuck at lunch with nothing to eat.”
“I don’t know, Robyn,” I said. “He’s not really that bad.”
“Hah.” Robyn snorted. “That’s what you think.”
“Robyn, you have to come up with facts, not opinions,” said Nick.
“Okay. It’s a fact that Cray Simmons is a jerk. What more do you want?” Robyn answered.
Nick groaned.
“Shh.” I nudged Robyn. I’d spotted Cray coming down the hall.
“Hey, Trev,” he said. He noticed Nick and Robyn watching him. “What are you staring at?”
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