Amanda Lester and the Orange Crystal Crisis

by Paula Berinstein

  “I’m using a program with a cool user interface,” she said. “It’s pretty easy. You just drag and drop stuff.”

  “Yeah,” he said, “but it’s so tiny.”

  “Not that tiny. You can squodge it so the image gets bigger.”

  “You people with good vision,” he said.

  Amanda felt a pang of sympathy and decided a change of subject was in order. “Say, do you have any idea what’s bothering Editta? She hasn’t been the same since term break.”

  “Yeah” he said, slurping another Coke. “She’s even weirder than usual.”

  “That isn’t nice,” said Amanda.

  “She’s wacko,” said Simon. He bit into his hamburger. Another piece of tomato fell out. “Nuts.”

  “To you she’s wacko,” said Amanda. “Maybe to her you’re wacko. Those tomatoes just don’t like you, Simon.”

  “I don’t care what she thinks,” he said. “Anyway, I don’t know what’s wrong with her. Probably some dumb superstition thing. I wouldn’t worry about it.”

  “I don’t think that’s it. She was late coming to school this term. You’re not suggesting she thought the date of the first day of class was unlucky?”

  “She was?” He unwrapped the burger a little more. Some sauce oozed out and down his finger. “Nuts and lentils.”

  “What, you didn’t notice? Where is your head all the time?”

  “For one thing, I was busy watching you make stupid remarks,” he said.

  “For heaven’s sake. Can we forget about that? So I think Scapulus is a jerk. Big deal.”

  “How could he have been a jerk just by walking into class?” said Simon. He’d got sauce all over his face now.

  Point to Simon. She wasn’t going to win this one. Maybe yet another change of subject was in order.

  “I want to text Amphora and find out what’s going on with that key,” she said.

  “It’s not a house key,” he said.

  “How do you know? Can I have a sip?”

  “Wrong shape.” He passed her the Coke. It dripped on the sweater she didn’t like.

  “Okay. I don’t know anything about keys. I take your word for it. Let me just write this.” She switched to her message screen and dashed off a quick text to Amphora: “Key?” She turned back to Simon. “So what kind of key is it?”

  “Dunno.” He took a bite of his sandwich. This time he was holding a napkin underneath it and he caught the tomato bits before they could fall onto his lap.

  “Could it be a key for a desk drawer or something?” she said.

  “It’s possible,” he said, slurping his drink. “Or maybe a suitcase. Hm, not enough ice.”

  “You want more ice? I can get some.” He shook his head. “So not a door?” she said, sticking her hand under his sandwich to catch a piece of lettuce.

  “You don’t have to do that,” he said. “I got it.” She pulled her hand back. Now she was stuck with a piece of lettuce. She grabbed a napkin from Simon’s stash and stuck the lettuce in it, then wiped her hand. “It looks kind of small to be for a door. Maybe a cage?” He took another bite. This time nothing dripped out of the sandwich, but he did lick some sauce to keep it from falling.

  “Ugh,” she said. “I don’t like to think of animals being in cages.” Should she get up and throw the napkin away or wait till later?

  “Could be one of those fighting cages,” he said. “Extreme sports.”

  “Are you kidding? That’s just as bad.” She paused and thought for a moment. “Do you think you could tell if he did that from the skeleton? Extreme sports, I mean.” She grabbed a plastic evidence bag from her pack and put the napkin in it, then stashed it under the seat. It would be okay there till the next time she got up.

  “Don’t think so,” he said, finishing the drink and looking for a place to put the cup. “Well, maybe. But Professor Hoxby didn’t say anything about that. Maybe it’s from one of those flight cases? Like the kind they use for rock concerts.”

  “You think the dead guy was a musician?” she said.

  “No way of telling,” he said, sticking the cup under the seat. “If the body weren’t in such bad shape there might be signs that he played this or that instrument, but it’s too far gone.”

  “You mean like callouses or certain muscles that are more developed than normal?” she said. “Here, give me that.” She snatched the detritus of the sandwich out of his hand, bagged it, and put it with the other trash.

  “Yeah. Like that.” He looked under the seat. “Uh, thanks.”

  Bing! A text from Amphora had arrived: “Nothing.”

  This was not encouraging. Apparently the key was still a mystery. Amanda texted back: “What about shape?”

  Amphora texted back: “Ivy says not house key.”

  “Tell her great minds think alike,” said Simon, reading the text.

  Amanda gave him a disgusted look. “She knows how smart you are,” she said.

  “I’m not bragging,” he said. “I’m letting her know we already thought of that.”

  “Oh, okay,” said Amanda, still not convinced of his modesty. She texted, “We know.”

  “Hey,” said Simon, looking over her shoulder. “That’s not what I said.”

  “It’ll do,” said Amanda. Score one for her. Now they were even.

  27

  London

  Fortunately Amanda and Simon were able to take the tube directly from Euston to Bank Station without having to go through the zoo that was King’s Cross. Unfortunately, before they left Euston they split up and went to the toilets and lost each other. Amanda kept calling and texting Simon but got no answer. That was weird. Why wasn’t he responding? Had something happened to him? Maybe those tough guys had followed them and beaten him up.

  After what seemed like forever she became so worried that she called Ivy and Amphora to see if they could get hold of him. After about ten minutes they called her back and said that they couldn’t reach him, so she tried Clive, who told her he couldn’t get hold of Simon either. Now she was getting so frantic that she wondered if she should call Holmes, although what he could do from a distance she couldn’t imagine. After another five minutes of pacing she gave in and phoned him.

  When he answered, he seemed incredulous. “Amanda?”

  “Yes, it’s me,” she said. It’s me? We’re not “it’s me” friends. Why did I say that? “I’m sorry to bother you, but I have a huge problem.”

  “Go on then,” he said.

  “It seems I’ve lost Simon and he isn’t answering calls or texts.” She looked around frantically. Still no Simon.

  “Where are you?” he said. “I can go look for him.”

  “Uh, thanks, but that isn’t going to help,” she said.

  “Why not? I’m quick. I can cover the whole school really fast.”

  “There’s a teensy problem about that,” she said, pacing.

  “What, you don’t think I can?” he said. “Why don’t you ever think I can do anything?”

  “I think you can do a lot of stuff, Scapulus,” she said. “But I know you can’t do this.”

  “Thanks a lot,” he said. “I don’t see why I should help you if you’re going to take that attitude.”

  “We’re in London,” she said rather loudly. “Oops.” She’d almost run into a woman with a walker. The woman, who was about a hundred years old, glared at her and edged forward ever so slowly.

  “What?” he said. “You can’t be.”

  “We can and we are. I’ll explain later. All I can say right now is that this is really important and I’ve got to find Simon.”

  “Where are you?” he said.

  “Tube station,” she said, not wanting to be specific.

  “Well, then, why don’t you page him?” said Holmes.

  Slap to head. Why hadn’t she thought of that? Now what was she going to say? He obviously thought she was the biggest idiot on the planet. Why she cared she didn’t know, but for some dumb reason she felt e
mbarrassed.

  “That’s a good idea,” she managed to squeak out. “I’ll try that.” She felt she needed to acknowledge what had just happened but had no idea what to say. Maybe she should just keep her mouth shut, but the silence on the other end was getting to her. “Thank you, Scapulus. I, uh, I think you’re good at a lot of things.”

  “Thanks, Amanda, but I get it,” he said.

  This was not the result she’d been hoping for, but she just said “Sorry” and hung up.

  She found the information booth and asked for the attendant to page Simon Binkle. Before she could say another word, the woman had picked up a microphone and bellowed, “Mr. Simon Binkle. Please come to the information desk. Mr. Simon Binkle.” It was really loud. Amanda felt even more embarrassed. The woman sat back and stared at her as if she were a space alien.

  “Uh, thanks,” said Amanda.

  Within about thirty seconds Simon came bounding up. “What happened?” he said.

  “I don’t know,” said Amanda. “Where have you been?”

  “When I came out of the gents’ I couldn’t find you, so I waited but you didn’t show up. I went to text you, but I forgot my phone when I went back for the clothes, and then when I found a pay phone I couldn’t remember your number. It’s in my phone but I don’t know it by heart.”

  “I don’t understand,” she said. “I was right there, just where we said to meet.”

  “Well, I didn’t see you.”

  “I didn’t see you either.”

  He seemed to take her paging him for granted because he didn’t mention it. All he said was, “Let’s board this tube and get to the factory. We’ve lost a lot of time.”

  When they got off the tube the neighborhood was deserted, as you’d expect on a Saturday. It was now around noon and they had a lot of ground to cover, so they got onto their boards and skated the rest of the way

  When they arrived at the wreckage Amanda burst into tears. Despite the fact that she was still furious with him, she couldn’t bear to look at the place where Nick had died. Yes, he had lied to her, led her on, and done terrible things, and yes, it was probably the fictional person she really missed. But they’d been so good together. Not that she’d ever forgive him. Not in a million years. She still wished she could scream at him. In fact if Simon hadn’t been there she’d have done just that.

  “Go on,” said Simon, watching her face. “Do it.”

  She sniffled but didn’t look at him. “What do you mean?”

  “Yell at him,” he said. “It’ll feel good.” He motioned toward the wreckage with his chin. How did he know?

  “You don’t think—” she said.

  He shook his head. “Do it.”

  Amanda faced the wreckage, took a deep breath, and screamed, “How could you leave me, Nick Muffet?” That was weird. She hadn’t meant to say that. She’d meant to take him to task for lying to her, kidnapping her father, and almost killing him. For laughing at her.

  She was breathing hard and her heart was pounding. She turned to Simon. “I’m done,” she said. “Let’s look for the crystals.”

  The place was still sticky from the sugar meltdown and there were dead ants all over the place. There was also a huge amount of charred wood and Amanda could still smell a faint burning odor. It was going to be rough searching for the crystals in that mess. She wished she’d thought of a way to keep her shoes from sticking. Then she remembered the evidence bags. They might just fit over them. But when she slipped a bag onto her right shoe, she found that it was too small. If only they’d thought to collect some plastic shopping bags. Oh well. They’d have to clean their shoes later.

  They started picking through the mess with Amanda videoing as they went. She opened a channel and streamed the signal back to Clive so he could make comments. He was chuffed and kept asking her to direct the camera here and there. The work was tedious, and at the rate they were going it would take them hours to comb through the rubble, but they couldn’t think of a way to make the search go faster.

  “Maybe the crystals we brought will sense their countrymen,” said Simon, giggling.

  “You know,” said Amanda, “that’s not such a bad idea. Think they’d be able to spot them?”

  “It’s worth a try,” said Simon. “Are you getting this, Clive?” Amanda checked her screen and nodded. He extracted a crystal from his backpack and held it out. Nothing. “That doesn’t mean anything,” he said. “Maybe it will blink when we get close, assuming there are crystals here in the first place.”

  She removed a crystal from her stash and held it out, with the same result. “Tell you what,” she said. “For the next ten minutes, I’ll look on the ground and you hold out the crystal. It’s pretty hard to do both at the same time.”

  “I’ve got a better idea,” said Simon. “I’ll attach the crystal to my shoe so I can see it when I look down.” He put the crystal in an evidence bag and threaded a shoelace through it, making sure the cord was short enough that the crystal didn’t flop around. “What do you think?”

  “Looks good to me,” said Amanda. “Clive, did you hear Simon? We’re relocating the scout crystal to his shoe. Let’s roll.”

  “Cool,” said Clive.

  They sifted and lifted and dug until their backs were sore, but they didn’t find anything. Then, after quite a while spent in this futile activity, Simon stopped abruptly and said, “It’s working.”

  “What’s working?” said Amanda, searching a particularly dense bit of wood and plaster rubble.

  “It’s blinking.”

  “What?” she cried. “Let me see.” Sure enough, the crystal attached to Simon’s shoe was blinking its apricot color off and on. “Do you think there are crystals near here? Maybe it’s just trying to say that it likes you or something.”

  “Getting hot,” said Clive.

  “Dunno,” said Simon. He moved the crystal around until it blinked faster. “There!” he said, stepping into some mud. “I can see something.”

  He grabbed the small trowel he’d stowed in his backpack and dug gently. The crystal on his shoe blinked so fast it looked like a strobe. The color deepened slightly as the crystal got more excited. Amanda thought it looked really cool with Simon’s purple nose. She made sure to get a good shot of the two of them. She wanted to try that combination in disguise class.

  “Nice camerawork,” said Clive.

  “Thanks,” she said.

  Soon Simon had unearthed two perfect crystals. The one on his shoe had settled down and reverted to its normal state, but when he put them close together the scout crystal went back to blinking. Whether because that was the way it communicated with the other crystals or to show its happiness Amanda didn’t know.

  “Is that amazing or what?” she said. She bent close to Simon’s hand to look carefully with both eyes and camera. “They’re like their own Geiger counters.”

  “Yes and no,” said Simon. “Obviously they don’t blink just because they’re near each other. I suspect this one did because it knew we were looking for the others and wanted to let us know we were close.”

  “They’re like dogs,” said Amanda. “The blinking is their wagging tail.”

  “They’re pretty amazing,” said Simon. He bagged the crystals and put them in his pack. “You do realize what this means, though?”

  “What?”

  “Professor Pole’s theory is correct. The force of an explosion does create the crystals, but only if the virus-treated sugar has been there.”

  “It’s surprising they’re not pink,” said Clive. “I’ll look into it.”

  “You’re right,” she said. “But what this also means is that Moriarty might have found them. We have no way of knowing how many crystals are still here, or might have been. And yes, Clive, I thought of that too.”

  “You’re probably right,” said Simon. “But let’s keep looking. Maybe we’ll discover something else. I mean besides more crystals.”

  A couple of times Simon’s war
ning crystal blinked but they didn’t find anything. “Do you suppose there were crystals here and they know it?” he said.

  “If they can sense that, they’re even more amazing than we thought,” said Amanda. “But how are we supposed to be able to tell? They don’t leave a residue, do they?”

  “I don’t know,” said Simon. “It doesn’t seem likely. We can try swabbing and analyzing what we find in the lab. But it’s hard to know where to take a sample.”

  “I can tell from the video,” said Clive. “Hold still.”

  What was Clive talking about? “Can you zoom in with the sensor crystal and see if it blinks really hard?” she said.

  “Let me see,” said Simon. He swept the crystal slowly over the place he suspected it was pointing to. “The speed of the blinking is changing. See? Here it goes faster.” He positioned the crystal over a place where it looked like the soil had been worked. The crystal blinked frantically. He moved it near another spot that looked undisturbed. The crystal slowed down. “And here it doesn’t go so fast. If I didn’t know better, I’d say there were some crystals here at one time.”

  “Okay, let’s swab that,” said Amanda. “But isn’t that weird?”

  “I’ll say,” said Simon. “Of course we have no proof of what’s causing the changes in speed. It might be something we haven’t thought of. But we should know more when we get these samples into the lab.”

  “I really think there were crystals here,” said Amanda. “There was a ton of the pink sugar—way more than at Legatum. You can’t tell me that the explosion didn’t turn all that residue into crystals.”

  “You’ve got a point,” said Simon. “It does seem odd that we haven’t found more.”