Cam Jansen & Mystery of the Dinosaur Bon

by Adler, David/Natti, Suzanna

  Cam and Eric heard the door on the other side of the truck open and someone get inside, but they couldn’t see who it was. Then the truck backed up. As the truck passed them, Cam read the sign again.

  “There’s something else that’s strange about that truck,” Cam said. She closed her eyes and said, “Click.”

  “The museum doesn’t use Beth’s milk. It uses Edna’s. That’s what it said on the milk container you bought in the cafeteria.”

  Cam got on her bicycle. She turned to Eric and said, “That man wasn’t picking up sour milk. He was picking up something else. Come on, let’s follow the truck.”

  Chapter Six

  The streets were crowded with cars. It was after four o‘clock, and many people were driving home from work. Cam stayed on the right-hand side of the street. Eric rode behind her. The milk truck was already a block ahead. Cam and Eric pedaled hard to catch up.

  As Cam pedaled, her bicycle made a loud “clicking” sound. The kickstand was loose, and one of the pedals hit it as it went around.

  The milk truck made a right turn onto a side street, but before Cam and Eric could reach the corner, Cam had to stop. The loose kickstand was in the way. It was impossible for Cam to pedal.

  Eric got off his bicycle, too. He pushed the kickstand on Cam’s bicycle back into place.

  Cam said, “Thank you.”

  “You really need a new one,” Eric told her.

  Cam and Eric got on their bicycles again. When they reached the corner, they signaled and turned.

  Cam looked ahead. A big brown dog was running along the sidewalk. A few cars were parked along the side of the street. But Cam couldn’t see the milk truck. She stopped and waited for Eric.

  “We’ve lost it,” Cam said.

  “Maybe not. I think I see a truck parked in the driveway of one of the houses on the next block. Maybe it’s the milk truck.”

  Eric led Cam to a small brick house with a white wooden fence around it. The milk truck was parked in the driveway. No one was sitting inside the truck.

  “They must have gone into the house,” Cam said. She leaned her bicycle against the fence. “You stay here and watch for them,” she told Eric. “I’ll look around in the back.”

  There was a high window on the side of the garage. As Cam walked past the window, she heard voices. She looked for something to stand on so she could see inside.

  Someone tapped her on the back. It was Eric.

  “I locked the bicycles to the fence,” he said. “I didn’t want to wait out there alone.”

  Cam found an empty wooden milk box behind the house. She put the box right under the window, climbed up, and looked through.

  There was a large table inside the garage. A few small bones and some larger ones were on the table. The milk box with the brown bag that they had seen the man put in the truck was there, too. A bag of plaster of Paris was on the floor near some boxes, and metal tubs and a wheelbarrow with a pickax and shovel in it.

  “Get down,” Eric whispered. “Someone will see you.”

  “There’s no one there,” Cam said. “But there is an open door. Maybe it leads into the house. I’ll bet that’s where they went.”

  Eric climbed up on the box.

  “Look!” Eric said. “The three missing bones are on that table!”

  Eric got off the box. He pulled on Cam’s sleeve. “Get down,” he said. “Let’s go back now.”

  Cam didn’t move. She kept looking through the window.

  “We can call the museum,” Eric said. “We can tell them we found their missing dinosaur bones.”

  “Someone is coming through the door,” Cam said. “It’s the Milkman.”

  Eric quickly climbed onto the box. Cam and Eric watched the Milkman take the brown bag out of the box. The bag was tied with string. The Milkman tried to untie the knot. He couldn’t.

  “Why did you tie it so tight?” he called into the house.

  “Use the scissors,” a woman’s voice answered.

  The Milkman reached into one of the boxes. He took out a pair of scissors and cut the string.

  “I wonder what could be in there,” Eric whispered.

  “It can’t be a bone from the Coelophysis,” Cam said quietly. “It’s too big.”

  The Milkman tore open the side of the bag. There was something large and white inside. He took it out and carefully placed it on the table.

  “Wow!” Eric said. “Look at the size of that bone.”

  “It must be from the Brachiosaurus,” Cam said, “the one they were fixing in the museum.”

  The Milkman took out a ruler and measured the bone. He took a pad and pencil from his pocket and wrote on the pad. Then he looked at the bag of plaster of Paris.

  “We need more plaster,” he called into the house.

  “Then let’s go get it,” the woman said.

  The Milkman walked through the open door and into the house.

  “They’ll probably use the plaster of Paris to make a copy of the bone,” Cam said. “They’ll take the copy to the museum to morrow and leave it there in place of the real one.”

  “But how do they get in and out of the museum?” Eric asked.

  “And why do they want the bones?” Cam added.

  Cam and Eric stopped talking. They heard the front door of the house open and then slam shut.

  After a few minutes Cam whispered, “I didn’t hear the truck drive away, but they should be gone by now. Let’s take a look.”

  Cam walked quietly. Eric followed her. Cam peeked out past the edge of the garage wall. She saw that the truck was still in the driveway. And she saw something else.

  “Our bicycles,” Cam said. “What if they see them!”

  Chapter Seven

  “We sure did see your bicycles,” a man said.

  Cam turned. It was the Milkman. He was standing behind Eric.

  “Janet!” the Milkman called.

  A woman came out. She was wearing a purple dress. It was Janet Tyler, the museum guide.

  “Well, well,” she said. “Look who we have here. It’s the Click, Click Girl and her friend.”

  The Milkman put a key into a lock at the side of the garage door. The lock was electric. He turned the key and the door opened.

  The Milkman led Cam and Eric into the garage. He pressed a button on the wall. The garage door closed.

  Janet Tyler and the Milkman started to argue. She pointed to the dinosaur bones on the table.

  “It’s all over. We’ll have to give these back. And it’s your fault. You should have made copies of the three small bones last night. Then these kids wouldn’t have followed us.”

  “I’m not giving anything back. Not yet,” the Milkman said. “We’ll do just as we planned. We’ll take the bones along on our dinosaur hunt. We’ll bury them and then dig them up. Then we’ll give the bones back to the museum.”

  Janet closed her eyes and said, “I can just see the newspaper headline: ‘Janet Tyler discovers buried dinosaur bones and gives them to the museum.’ I’ll be famous. I’ll speak to science groups all over the coun try. I’ll make a fortune.”

  Cam pulled on Eric’s sleeve and whispered, “This is our chance. Janet’s eyes are closed. Take out the whistles you bought.”

  Eric reached into his pocket. He took out the two dog whistles shaped like dinosaurs. Cam took one of them.

  “When I tell you to, blow the whistle,” Cam whispered. “Blow it as hard as you can.”

  “Stop whispering,” the Milkman said.

  Janet opened her eyes. She seemed surprised to be in the garage with Cam, Eric, and the Milkman.

  Then the Milkman told Cam and Eric, “Either you agree not to tell anyone about our plan, or we’ll call the museum director. We’ll put the bones in your bicycle baskets and tell the director you took them and we caught you.”

  Cam turned to whisper to Eric.

  Janet Tyler smiled. “That’s right,” she said. “You talk it over with your friend.”

>   “Quietly count to three,” Cam whispered. “Then blow the whistle.”

  “One...”

  Cam quickly turned around. She pressed the garage door button.

  “Two...”

  The garage door opened.

  “Three.”

  Cam and Eric blew the whistles hard. Janet could hardly hear the sounds the whistles made. But she knew what kind of whistles they were.

  “Get the bones!” Janet yelled. “Get the bones before some dog comes and runs off with them.”

  She opened the door to the house. The Milkman picked up as many of the bones as he could carry.

  “Quick, Eric!” Cam said. “Crawl under the table.”

  Chapter Eight

  Cam and Eric crawled under the table and ran out of the garage. A big brown dog and two smaller dogs ran past them toward the garage.

  Cam and Eric ran around the milk truck to the bicycles. Eric tried to open the lock. He turned the dial a few times.

  “Hurry!” Cam said.

  “I can’t remember the combination.”

  Cam closed her eyes. She said, “Click.” Then she thought for a moment.

  Inside the house there was a noise. Someone was coming out.

  “It’s four, eighteen, thirty-six,” Cam said.

  Eric turned the knob. The lock opened. Cam and Eric got on their bicycles just as the Milkman ran out of the house.

  “Stop!” he yelled.

  “Let’s go!” Cam said to Eric.

  Cam looked both ways. No cars were coming. She quickly rode across the street. Eric followed her.

  Just as they got across the street, they heard the door of the milk truck open and shut. The engine started.

  Cam pedaled hard. As she pedaled, her bicycle made a loud clicking sound. She tried to keep pedaling, but she couldn’t. The kickstand was in the way.

  Cam got off her bicycle. Eric stopped, too. He came over to help.

  “Hurry. The truck’s coming,” Cam said.

  Eric pushed the kickstand back into place. They both got back on their bicycles.

  Cam started pedaling again. The bicycle made a clicking sound, but not as loud as before.

  Cam turned quickly and looked behind her. Eric was pedaling hard. And the milk truck was right behind Eric.

  Cam pedaled as hard as she could. The clicking sound became louder again, but Cam kept pedaling. She signaled and turned the corner. Eric followed her.

  “Screech!”

  “Honk! Honk!”

  Cam stopped pedaling and turned to see what was happening. A car had turned the corner right in front of the milk truck. Both the driver of the car and the Milkman had slammed on their brakes.

  “This is our chance,” Cam told Eric.

  Cam and Eric were riding on a busy street now. There were stores on both sides of the street.

  Cam saw a narrow path on the side of a candy store. She rode down the path to the back of the store. Eric followed her.

  “Good thinking,” Eric said once they had stopped their bicycles. “When the Milkman turns the corner, he won’t be able to find us.”

  Cam got off her bicycle. Then she told Eric, “You stay here and watch the bikes. I’m going inside to call the museum.”

  There was only one telephone in the store. A large man was using it. Cam opened the telephone book and looked for the museum’s number.

  “Do you have any shirts on sale?” the man was saying into the telephone. “Yes ... Extra-large... I want a sky-blue shirt. But not a rainy day sky-blue. It should be a sunny day sky-blue.”

  Cam found the museum’s number. She looked at it and said, “Click.” Then she took a coin from her pocket and waited to use the phone.

  “... and I need a green shirt,” the man said into the telephone. “But not grass-green. It should be more like a traffic-light green ...”

  Eric came into the store. “I saw the milk truck. It rode right past me. The Milkman and Janet Tyler looked angry, but they didn’t see me or the bicycles.”

  The man said, “Thank you very much.” He hung up and left the booth.

  Cam said, “Click,” to help her remember the museum’s number. Then she dialed.

  “Hello,” Cam said into the telephone. “I’d like to speak to the director.”

  She waited.

  “This is Jennifer Jansen,” Cam said. “I’m the girl who was found hiding in the dinosaur room after the museum closed.”

  Cam told the director about the Milkman, Janet Tyler, and the dinosaur bones. She also told him the name and address of the candy store. “Yes, we’ll wait here for you,” Cam said, and then she hung up.

  “The museum director is coming,” Cam told Eric. “He said that after we left, he went to the dinosaur room. He looked at the skeletons and saw that some bones were missing. He said we should wait in front of the store with our bicycles. When he gets here, he’ll follow us to the house.”

  Chapter Nine

  Cam and Eric went behind the store to get their bicycles. Eric started turning the dial on the lock.

  “Do you remember the combination?” Cam asked.

  “Sure, I only forgot the last time because we were in such a hurry.”

  As Eric was turning the dial, Cam laughed and said, “You know, I don’t think any dog would really be interested in those dinosaur bones. They’re too old.”

  Cam and Eric walked their bicycles to the front of the candy store. They waited for the museum director.

  Soon a car drove up and stopped in front of the store. The car was just like the museum exhibits—very old. The director was at the wheel. He waved to Cam and Eric. They got on their bicycles. The director followed them in his car to the small brick house with the white wooden fence. The milk truck was in the driveway again.

  “This is it,” Cam told the director.

  “You don’t have to worry about the bones,” the director said. “Since I know Janet stole them, she can’t bury the bones and pretend to discover them. The bones are no good to her any more, so I’m sure she’ll give them back without any trouble.”

  The museum director got out of his car. “Of course, she’ll lose her job and I’ll have to report her and her friend to the police. But they should have known that could happen when they took the bones.”

  The museum director shook hands with Cam and Eric. “I want to thank both of you for all your help,” he said. “Before you go, you must tell me how you knew that some bones were missing. I pass those skeletons all the time, and I didn’t notice anything.”

  Cam explained, “The last time I was at the museum, I took a picture of the dinosaur skeleton. When I looked at the picture, I knew some bones were missing.”

  “But our guards don’t let anyone take photographs in the museum.”

  “Cam’s camera is different,” said Eric. “She doesn’t need film or a flash. Cam’s camera is her memory.”

  The director smiled. “Well, we certainly won’t stop your memory from taking photographs.” He buttoned his jacket, and then he asked, “Can you take one of me?”

  Cam laughed. Then she looked straight at the museum director and said, “Click.”