It Happened on a Train

by Mac Barnett

  Steve yanked The Masterless Apprentice from his chum’s hands and put it in front of his face. He peered over the book’s top as the man walked past them.

  “Look,” Steve whispered to Dana. “The birthmark.”

  On the man’s neck was a coffee-colored spot.

  And then the man was gone, out on the platform.

  “Did you see that?” Steve said. “Did you see the triceratops?”

  “I saw an eagle,” Dana said.

  Steve ignored his chum. “This is the proof! Cy’s in cahoots with the car thieves!” said Steve. “They’re probably going to make an attempt on the Phoebus.”

  “Should we tell the police?”

  Steve shook his head. “Of course not. They won’t know what to do—plus if they catch this thief, Cy will deny everything and get away. I’ve got a better idea—we’ll catch the thieves red-handed and figure out where the gang is stashing the rest of the Vanderdraaks’ cars.” And prove to Claire that she was wrong, Steve thought.

  Dana looked dismayed.

  Steve looked at Rick. He was walking around in circles, talking on his cell.

  “Have you heard of the Wooden Horse?” Steve asked.

  “The what?”

  “The Wooden Horse.”

  “Is that like the Trojan horse?”

  “No, the Wooden Horse. It’s a classic sleuthing technique. In The Clue of the Vanishing Tire Tracks, Shawn and Kevin are trying to track down a bunch of car thieves. But all the crooks are these really ace drivers, and when the Bailey Brothers chase them, the cars keep disappearing after this blind curve in the road. So Shawn and Kevin use the Wooden Horse: They hide themselves in the trunk of a hot rod and park it where all the cars keep getting stolen. And then the baddies steal the car, and they take it back to their hideout—which is in a sea cave—and Shawn and Kevin bust out, take the gang by surprise, and recover all the cars.”

  “That is the Trojan horse,” Dana said.

  “Whatever. The Bailey Brothers call it the Wooden Horse.”

  “I’ve never heard it called that anywhere else.”

  “You’re missing the point. The point is we can be heroes and break this case wide open.”

  Dana took his book back. “I don’t know,” he said. “It sounds dangerous.”

  “Of course it is!” Steve said. “Danger is how sleuths know they’re on the right track.”

  Dana thought for a second. “Pass,” he said.

  “What?”

  “Pass. I pass. No thanks.”

  “But the Wooden Horse!”

  “I don’t care about the Wooden Horse,” Dana said. “I don’t care about the Trojan horse. I just want to go to the hotel, meet up with everybody, and give my speech about cod tomorrow.”

  Steve couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Cod? Cod?” Steve shook his head. “Fine. That’s fine. You chose her over me.”

  “What?” Dana said.

  “Other Dana. You’d rather hang out with her than go on this adventure with me.”

  “That is not what this is about,” Dana said.

  “I knew this would happen.”

  “Steve—,” Dana said, but Steve wasn’t listening. Rick was off the phone and writing something down at the information desk. It was time to act.

  “Good luck with the cod,” Steve said. “I’m off to ride a horse.”

  Dana looked puzzled. The line had sounded better in Steve’s head.

  Steve ran off down the platform, leaving his best friend and his good suitcase behind him.

  CHAPTER L

  THE WOODEN HORSE

  STEVE BRIXTON SAT IN THE TRUNK of a 1932 Packard Twin Six Sport Phoebus. It was dark and cramped, and it smelled like boot polish.

  But the plan was going perfectly. Steve had told the station agent that he’d left a book on the train; then he’d boarded on the DEATH VALLEY car, run back, and opened the secret panel. Luckily—and good luck, like danger, was a sleuth’s signpost—the Vanderdraaks had been in their drawing room (Steve heard them talking as he walked by). O’Rourke had been in the kitchen, but he was doing the dishes, and his back was to Steve. Chuy was nowhere to be found. Steve had opened the trunk and climbed on in.

  The only thing that could have made this case better was a chum. And another six inches of legroom. Although, given the legroom situation, Steve wasn’t sure there was room for a chum in here anyway. How had Shawn and Kevin both fit inside the trunk of a car? The illustration had made it look like there had been so much room.

  Now the only thing to do was wait.

  Steve waited.

  CHAPTER LI

  STOLEN

  IT WAS HARD TO SAY exactly how long Steve waited. Time passes strangely in absolute darkness. Plus Steve fell asleep for a while. But he woke up to the sound of two men talking outside. The men’s words were muffled, but their voices were tense and urgent.

  There was the high-pitched whine of metal on metal, and then the car was moving. Steve was thrown against the inner wall of the trunk.

  The car was going down the ramp. The Phoebus was being stolen!

  The Phoebus’s engine rumbled. The trunk rattled. Steve plugged his ears. The car was in motion, driving fast. Steve slammed against the other wall. They were going uphill now. Steve wished he could see what was going on. Then: silence.

  The car stopped.

  They couldn’t have driven very far. The car had been on for no more than ten seconds. And then there was the sound of another engine roaring, not the Phoebus’s but one very close by. And now the Phoebus was moving again. The thieves must have driven the car into a truck that was carrying it away. Of course! You couldn’t just drive off down the highway in one of the world’s rarest cars. People would notice.

  Steve’s legs were stiff, and the trunk was stuffy, but he was too excited to care much. Steve started counting the seconds so he could estimate how far from San Diego they were traveling. When he got to thirty minutes he figured they’d gone about twenty-five miles. By the time Steve got to forty-five minutes, he was asleep again.

  CHAPTER LII

  IN THE LAIR

  WHEN STEVE WOKE UP, everything was still and quiet. His heart beat fast. The Wooden Horse had worked: The Phoebus was parked in the thieves’ den. Steve smiled in the darkness.

  Quickly he outlined his next moves. The criminals wouldn’t be expecting him, so that was good. Still, there were probably two or three guys, and Cy had a revolver, so Steve didn’t like his chances in a fight. He would burst out from the Phoebus and put these crooks under citizen’s arrest; if they didn’t comply, Steve would use his magnifying glass—nestled in the pocket of his cargo shorts—to scratch or even dent the Phoebus. Then their prize would be worthless. Maybe the baddies wouldn’t even be around. They could be out drag racing in a local warehouse district or blowing off steam in some basement gambling operation. In that case Steve would sneak out and notify the police—now that he’d done the cops’ work for them—and they could lay an ambush outside the hideout.

  Well, there was no point waiting any longer. Steve stretched, flexed his fingers, and took a deep breath.

  Go!

  Steve realized there was no way to open a trunk from the inside.

  CHAPTER LIII

  A BOLD PLAN

  HE WAS STUCK.

  This was a pretty big problem with the whole Wooden Horse concept.

  Steve tried to remember how the Bailey Brothers had done it. He was pretty sure they’d just raised the lid and climbed out. Maybe their hot rod was built differently? Steve pressed firmly but quietly against the top of the trunk. He felt around the latch for some sort of release. There wasn’t one.

  This was not good.

  Steve started breathing faster.

  Suddenly Steve became conscious of how stale the air was inside the trunk. Couldn’t you run out of oxygen trapped in a car like this? Then again, Steve had lasted this long, so the trunk must not be airtight. Unless the fact that he had been in here a lon
g time was a bad thing, and meant that he wouldn’t have much time left.

  Every breath felt bad in Steve’s lungs. Unsatisfying. Poisonous, even. Was he imagining this? He tried to calm down, to inhale and exhale slowly, but his breaths just became shallow and fast.

  Steve’s head moved back and forth like he was searching for something around him, but there was no light. His hand groped around on the floor of the trunk. It was empty.

  Assuming that there was air, how long could Steve last in here? A couple days without water. Someone would have to come rescue him in the next couple days. And nobody knew where he was.

  Dana. Dana knew. Dana would tell Rick, and Rick and the police would have to track down the Phoebus.

  Steve didn’t like those odds. He would have to think of a new plan.

  Steve drummed his fingers on the top of his head, thinking.

  He stopped.

  There was really nothing else he could do.

  Steve started banging on the lid of the trunk. The clanging reverberated around him.

  “Hello, criminals!” he shouted. “My name is Steve Brixton, I am a detective, and I am in the trunk of this car. I have infiltrated your hideout and witnessed the commission of a crime. I am placing you under citizen’s arrest. Please open the trunk and then put your hands up.”

  After four minutes of banging he heard someone fiddling with the latch.

  Steve balled up his left fist and grabbed his magnifying glass with his right. Would it be Cy, or the bald guy? Steve hoped it was the bald guy—Cy knew a lot of good holds.

  The lid lifted, and light poured in.

  “Hey, guey.”

  CHAPTER LIV

  THE MAN UNMASKED

  CHUY STOOD LOOKING DOWN at Steve, who was poking out from the back of the car like a hatchling turtle from an egg. He blinked big slow blinks and looked around him.

  He was in a large room or small warehouse, brightly lit by industrial lamps that hung high overhead. The floor was polished cement that reflected the lamplight in spectacular patterns. Arrayed neatly around the Phoebus were six beautiful old cars, including one Steve recognized from countless Bailey Brothers illustrations: a Tucker ’48 sedan. In the pictures Shawn and Kevin’s souped-up auto, the Jalopy, was usually teetering off a picturesque cliff or swerving to avoid road hazards like rusty nails and bicycle messengers. And although this Tucker Torpedo was freshly waxed and shone like a supermarket apple, the car didn’t look right parked in the middle of a windowless room.

  “Come on out,” Chuy said.

  Steve’s eyes had started adjusting to the light, and he saw that Chuy was smiling warmly, but also holding a lead pipe in his left hand.

  So Chuy was a southpaw.

  Steve felt like staying in the trunk. Part of his reluctance to move was due to the sluggish disappointment that detectives always feel when one of their pet theories proves wrong. Mostly it was because of the lead pipe.

  But if Steve was going to get out of the mess he now found himself in, the first thing he’d need to do was to get out of the trunk. Steve lowered himself onto the warehouse floor.

  “Careful,” Chuy said.

  Steve stretched. Steve was sore, and the stretching hurt.

  “So that was you on top of the train,” Steve said, nodding toward the pipe.

  “Sure,” Chuy said.

  “But then how did you get back inside the train to rescue us?”

  “When we went through the tunnel,” Chuy said. “In the dark I ran back past you and got in the train.”

  “That’s crazy,” Steve said.

  “Sure, crazy.” Chuy was grinning. “My father, he worked for the railroad. My first job was on the railroad too. He taught me”—Chuy used the middle and index fingers of his right hand to mimic running. “I’m good on trains. You? Not so good on trains.” Chuy laughed. Steve didn’t.

  “Well, I guess I should thank you for saving me up there, except you were also trying to hit me on the head with a pipe.”

  “No. I was trying not to hit you, guey. Just scare you.”

  “Yeah, well, it worked,” Steve said. He rubbed his arms to get his circulation working. “So you’re the one who’s been stealing Mr. Vanderdraak’s cars,” Steve said.

  “Sure,” Chuy said.

  “Well, that solves this case, then.” Steve tried to make his voice sound deeper—if this next bit was going to work, he’d need to sound confident. “Like I said before, Chuy, I’m placing you under citizen’s arrest.”

  Chuy looked confused.

  “So drop your lead pipe.”

  Chuy didn’t.

  “Because you’re under arrest right now.”

  Chuy smiled. “I don’t get it. How can you arrest me? You’re not a policeman. You’re a kid.”

  “Yeah, I’m also a detective, but that doesn’t matter. It’s a citizen’s arrest. As a citizen who witnessed a crime, I can arrest you. So right now, legally, you are under arrest and you have to do what I say.”

  Chuy looked like Steve was telling him a joke. “Sorry, guey, but you can’t do a citizen’s arrest.”

  “Wrong, Chuy,” Steve said. “You’re wrong. I have the full backing of the laws of the state of California and the United States of America.”

  “Sure, guey, but you’re not a citizen. Right now you’re in Mexico.”

  CHAPTER LV

  KIDNAPPED

  MEXICO. Steve had never been to Mexico. Steve had never even been out of the country, so the news that he had just unintentionally traveled abroad would have been exciting, if he hadn’t also unintentionally gotten himself kidnapped.

  Although maybe he wasn’t kidnapped. After all, Chuy hadn’t said he was kidnapped, and he wasn’t tied up in ropes or anything.

  “Mexico!” Steve said. “I’m supposed to be in San Diego. It’s very important that I return as soon as possible. I’m giving a talk tomorrow at the Model UN on cod fishing rights in Iceland. I better get back up to the U.S.”

  Chuy shook his head. “Sorry, guey. You can’t leave.”

  “Chuy. Just let me go. I’ll find my way back home. And I promise I won’t even tell the cops in California.” Steve would tell the cops in Mexico, though, who he was pretty sure were called federales.

  “You gotta stay,” Chuy said.

  “But that’s kidnapping,” Steve said. “That has to be illegal here, too.”

  Chuy did not react.

  “So what are you going to do with me?” Steve asked.

  Chuy shrugged. “I don’t know. That’s up to her.” He nodded over Steve’s shoulder.

  “Who?” Steve said, turning around.

  Standing a few feet in front of the Packard, with an amused smile on her maybe beautiful face, was Alice Vanderdraak.

  CHAPTER LVI

  A LOVE STORY

  “WAIT, WHAT?” said Steve.

  “Hello, Steven,” said Mrs. Vanderdraak.

  “Steve,” said Steve. “You’re stealing the cars?”

  Still, that smile.

  “But,” said Steve, “they’re your cars. You own them with Mr. Vanderdraak.”

  The smile disappeared. “Please. You heard the way J. Nicholas talks. On and on about ‘his collection.’ Imagine twenty-five years of hearing about his collection.” She paused. “It wasn’t as bad when we first married, mind you. J. Nicholas was fun then. Even the cars were fun. He’d take me out driving down the coast, from his pied-à-terre in San Francisco down here to his Baja estate. He drove quite fast. And back then he’d let me drive. But back then I always felt like he was paying more attention to me than the cars. That changed.”

  Steve didn’t know what to say or even how to arrange his face during this story. He looked at Chuy, who was looking at the Phoebus.

  “You probably think I’m ridiculous,” Mrs. Vander- draak said. “A woman jealous of machines. But you wouldn’t understand what it’s like to be in a marriage like mine. How old are you?”

  “Twelve.”

  “Twel
ve. You probably haven’t even had a girlfriend yet.”

  “So?” Steve said. What did that have to do with anything? Steve didn’t think he’d ever understand a marriage like this.

  “Well,” said Mrs. Vanderdraak, “you stop feeling like you even exist. I didn’t grow up with money, and as a girl I dreamed of being fabulously rich. But being fabulously rich can be fabulously lonely. When J. talks about cars, I feel like I’m not even in the room. And nowadays he does nothing but talk about cars.”

  “So why steal them?” Steve asked. “Why not just tell him what’s bothering you?”

  Mrs. Vanderdraak laughed. “Talk to me when you’ve been married for twenty-five years.”

  Steve hated when people said things like that.

  “When he got the Shelby,” Mrs. Vanderdraak said, “that’s when things got bad. He loved that car—spent all day with it, then talked about it all through dinner. It grew tiresome, then infuriating. If he loved the car so much, why didn’t he marry it?”

  Steve hadn’t heard that joke since second grade.

  “I fantasized about the car getting rear-ended at a traffic stop. Or better yet stolen. And then I realized: I could just steal it myself. At first just the idea was enough to give me pleasure and get me through another dinner. But then I began thinking about how I could actually do it. And so I paid Chuy—”

  Chuy nodded bashfully.

  “—to take it one night. Chuy had full access to J.’s garage, and J. trusted him completely. It was too easy, right, Chuy?”

  “Sure,” Chuy said.

  “J. was morose! Every day he moped around the estate I was secretly jubilant. Then he bought the 2CV. And he fell in love with a car all over again.”

  “So you stole it,” Steve said.

  “Yes,” said Mrs. Vanderdraak. “And now here’s the sixth car I’ve stolen. The Packard Phoebus blah blah. If J. only knew they were still right here on our estate.”