The Spy Catchers of Maple Hill

by Megan Frazer Blakemore

  Hazel coasted on her bike up alongside Connie and jumped off in her patented, graceful move. Connie did not say anything. In fact, Connie did not even look up. Hazel thought that maybe Connie was just embarrassed. So the two walked side by side in silence for a while. Maple seeds fell from the trees and spun down like little kamikaze helicopters. The girls’ feet crunched over fallen leaves.

  Finally Hazel could stand it no longer. “I’m sorry about what happened in school today,” she said.

  Connie looked up, but didn’t say anything.

  “I wasn’t ignoring you with everyone else. We just never talk, you know. But I noticed how everyone was being mean to you, and I thought that was pretty low.”

  A maple seed fell right down on Hazel’s shoulder and she brushed it off. They were going uphill now. For a waddler, Connie could move pretty quickly, and Hazel had to huff along after her with her bicycle.

  “What I’m trying to say is that I know how it feels not to have any friends, and I don’t think it’s your fault your dad is a spy, so if you want to be friends with me and Samuel, we decided that would be okay.”

  Connie stopped walking. She turned and faced Hazel, her cheeks red and tear stained. “I know you were trying to help today, but don’t you know, Hazel, when someone like you tries to help, it only makes things worse?”

  “I was only pointing out that just because your father is a spy doesn’t mean you’re a Red, too.”

  “Don’t ever talk about my father,” she said, her voice tight. “In fact, don’t ever talk to me again.”

  With a sharp turn, she went waddling off on her way home, leaving Hazel standing dumbfounded on the sidewalk. A maple seed fell, twirling faster and faster in front of her eyes before spinning to a stop on the ground. Even though she should have known what to expect from Connie, she couldn’t help but be disappointed.

  29

  The Light in the Graveyard

  Hazel opened the door to the mailbox hoping for a letter from Becky. There was nothing. She closed it. Then she opened it again, just in case she had missed something. Sometimes the letters got pushed way into the back. She squinted, but still saw nothing. Every once in a while spiders built their webs back there, and once a paper wasp had constructed a small nest. Still, Hazel steeled her jaw and reached her hand in to feel around.

  Nothing. Nada. Zilch.

  It wasn’t like Becky to not write. She prided herself on her conscientiousness. Maybe some terrible fate had befallen her. Maybe she had been kidnapped or had gone for a walk in the desert and been ripped apart by coyotes. Before Becky had left, Hazel had provided her with carefully researched information on all the poisonous snakes of the region, including illustrations. Maybe Becky hadn’t had a chance to read it and a Western diamond rattlesnake had sunk its fangs into her ankle.

  Hazel couldn’t help but think it would serve her right.

  She had written Becky several letters detailing the investigation, but so far had only received one reply that had barely mentioned the mystery: a cheery Good luck! Instead the letter had been full of tales of the kids she had met in Tucson, the parties she was going to, and she even hinted at liking a boy, Ronnie O’Ryan. Becky and Hazel were not party people. They were not the type to get crushes on boys. Why, it was called a crush. Who would want a boy to smush her down so small there wasn’t even a bit of her real self left? She wondered what could have possibly gotten into Becky to make her change so much. It was like she’d been taken over by some sort of alien being.

  She clomped inside the house and dropped her knapsack with a dull thud on the floor. Her mother happened to be coming out of the office into the hallway and said, “My, aren’t you in a sour mood. What’s troubling you?”

  Hazel couldn’t believe her mother was standing there smiling like nothing in the world was amiss. “What did you say at that meeting?” she demanded.

  The smile faltered on her mother’s lips. “That’s a grown-up matter, Hazel. You don’t need to worry about that.”

  “Did you say we needed to lay off the Communists? Is that what you said?”

  Her mother sighed and rearranged her scarf on her head. “Not exactly, Hazel. I said that we were making things worse by getting all riled up. That if we really were concerned mothers, we wouldn’t dwell on what was going on at the factory, because that’s scary for you kids, but instead we should try to come together as a town.”

  Hazel looked at her mother agog. “Do you realize what you’ve done? Now everyone thinks we’re in on it!”

  “Hazel, I’m sorry if it came back to you like that, but—”

  “Why did you choose this moment to be a concerned mother?” Hazel yelled, her voice echoing up the stairs.

  “Hazel—”

  “You should have just stayed out of it like you always do!”

  “Sometimes you have to step up and say the difficult thing, Hazel, even if it’s unpopular.”

  “That’s easy for you to say. You don’t have to go to school and have every kid think your mom loves the Reds. Did you ever even think of me?”

  She didn’t wait for an answer. She flew up the stairs, and her mother didn’t follow.

  It was time for Hazel to take matters into her own hands. She changed into her play clothes, found a set of pliers, a hammer, and a screwdriver in her father’s toolbox, and headed out to the garden shed. Hazel couldn’t recall if Nancy Drew had ever needed to pick a lock. In the comics, the detectives would hold their ears up to the locks and listen for clicks, but this wasn’t a combination lock, it was a padlock, and anyway Hazel didn’t know how to do that, so she would need to use brute force. She jammed the screwdriver into the keyhole, then hit it with the hammer. It made a huge clanging noise, but nothing else happened. She looked over her shoulder. She had made sure that Mr. Jones’s truck was gone, but the noise seemed loud enough to alert her parents. When the back door of her house didn’t open, she hit the screwdriver again and again and again. She hit it—bang!—because she was angry with Becky for not writing back, and—slam!—frustrated with Samuel, and—crash!—disappointed in her whole town. Bang! Slam! Crash! But most of all she was mad at her mother, who didn’t seem to understand the way the world worked. Bang! Who didn’t understand that now the whole town was looking at them. Slam! And if Hazel didn’t find the proof she needed soon—crash!—then the next people being investigated by Senator McCarthy might be the Kaplanskys. Bang! Slam! Crash! Until the whole lock smashed apart.

  She pulled open the door.

  Hedge trimmers. Push lawn mower. Four shovels. Three rakes. Grass seed.

  Hazel’s heart sank.

  But then in the back she saw something stacked in a corner under a tarp. Hiding things under a tarp was more or less a confession. She crept over and pulled the tarp back to reveal six Switzer safes.

  She tried to open one, but of course it was locked. She tried the rest, with the same outcome. This was it, though. She knew it. There were secrets in those safes. Secrets she needed to get out. She just needed a plan. Or a trustworthy locksmith.

  She was still thinking about it that night in her bedroom, trying to come up with a way to open the safes, when she was supposed to be doing her homework. She wondered how long it took to learn how to crack a safe, and if they had books on it in the library. She was filling a paper bag with cans so she could bring it out to the mausoleum the next day.

  She was working on beans. She had baked beans aplenty, but she wanted to make sure she had kidney beans, too. Finding none in her stash, she decided to go downstairs to get a can or two, depending on how many her mother had in the pantry.

  When she got down to the kitchen she glanced out the window toward the cemetery. Off in the distance she saw a faint, glimmering light. She threw her hands up in the air. “Unbelievable,” she muttered. Maryann and her new crowd were out in the cemetery trying another séance. On a school night, no less!

  Hazel pumped her arms as she strode into the cemetery. She was going to put an en
d to this once and for all. It was bad enough that she had to deal with those girls at school, but for them to come to her house—her home—at night and disturb her there, it was all too much. Striding across the grass, she composed in her mind what she would say to them.

  Just who do you think you are to come to this place and disturb it? It’s their final resting place. As in resting. As in do not disturb. All for your silly little crushes on boys who can barely hold the cymbals properly!

  There were two of them leaning together, crouched over a grave in Pauper’s Field. They were so close they seemed to move and shift as one.

  Do you even know where you are? she went on in her head. These people have been dead for decades and you’re lighting candles and saying spooky words and I can’t believe you would even think that would work in the first place. Just how few brain cells do you have?

  Her fists were clenched and her jaw squeezed tight. She felt as angry as she had the day she pushed Maryann, but instead of a sudden eruption of rage, this was a simmering pot of spaghetti sauce about to boil over and splatter the walls. She ought to have called the police. That would have shown them. But there was another part of her that needed to take care of this herself, to tell them once and for all what she really thought. She threw open the gate, spread her legs wide into an Old West gunfight stance, and called out, “Hey!”

  When they stood up, she realized it was not a “they” at all, but a “he.” Mr. Jones. The Comrade. He looked at her with icy eyes. He held a lantern that flickered on his skin. Her knees shook, but she stood her ground.

  “It’s awfully late for you to be out here all by yourself,” he said, his voice calm and steady.

  She swallowed hard.

  “Your parents know you’re out here?”

  She shook her head, but then said, “Yes,” her voice cracking.

  “Well, which is it?” There was a hint of a smile at the edge of his lips.

  “Yes,” she said again, more firmly this time. “Yes, they know I’m here. As a matter of fact, they’re on the phone with the FBI right now, so don’t you try anything, Mr. Jones. Or whatever your name really is.”

  “The FBI?” He was a good actor. He honestly looked confused. But of course he was a good actor: he was a spy.

  She took a few steps back. “Don’t act all innocent with me. I had you figured from day one.”

  “I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “I know what you are. I know about Alice. I figured it all out. Me!”

  He took a step toward her, lifting his hand again. Something metallic flashed in the moonlight. A knife! She was sure of it. She turned to run but tangled her feet together and fell with an oof. She heard him moving toward her, and so she did the only thing she could think of, though it wasn’t dignified or heroic. She screamed. “Mom! Dad! Help!”

  The lights flashed on in the house. Mr. Jones looked at the house and then back at her with the most curious expression on his face, as if he were already imagining her as a brainwashed automaton back in Russia. He leaned toward her, the knife hand extended. She scrambled back away from him, nearly crashing into her father’s legs.

  “What’s going on out here?” her mom demanded.

  “Call the police,” Hazel gasped. “Call the FBI.”

  Mr. Kaplansky looked from Hazel to Mr. Jones, then back to Hazel again. He crouched down and put his arm around her. “Hazel, what happened?”

  “He’s not who you think he is. He has a knife. He’s not—”

  “I think you should go,” Mrs. Kaplansky said. She placed herself between Hazel and Mr. Jones.

  Mr. Jones hesitated for a moment, but he didn’t protest. “Yes, ma’am.”

  He backed away from them slowly, then turned and walked away. Mrs. Kaplansky collapsed down beside Hazel and gathered her daughter into her arms. “What did he do to you, Hazel? What happened?”

  “He’s been coming out here, and Samuel and I were watching him and—”

  “Did he hurt you?”

  “He’s a spy,” she said. “He’s the Russian spy, the one all the spies at the Switzer plant are reporting to. Connie’s father and all the rest of them.”

  Hazel felt her mother stiffen and then she let Hazel go. The night air was still and cold between them. When her mother finally spoke, her voice sounded as if it were coming from far away. “You march yourself right inside and straight to your room.”

  “Are you going to call the FBI?”

  Her father coughed. “Hazel, I suggest you get inside and make yourself invisible.”

  Hazel stared at her parents. They didn’t believe her. She stood up and dusted herself off. “It’s true. I found this Russian doll he left behind and he stole an American flag and the garden shed is full of Switzer safes and—”

  “Hazel!” her mom barked.

  Hazel knew this fight could not be won. She slunk back into her house and then collapsed onto her bed, staring at the ceiling. If her parents weren’t going to help, then she would have to call the FBI herself.

  30

  Canned

  “Hazel Elizabeth Kaplansky!”

  Hazel had not yet finished brushing her teeth when her mother’s voice yelled from her bedroom. She spit out the toothpaste and rinsed her mouth with water.

  “Hazel!” her mother yelled again.

  “Coming,” Hazel replied, trying to sound cheery, like the good girls on TV. She had never seen her parents so angry and now it seemed her mom was even angrier. They would change their tune, though, when the truth came out.

  Hazel walked lightly down the hall and into her room. When she saw her mother holding the brown shopping bag full of canned beans, her stomach dropped. “Explain this,” her mom ordered.

  Hazel knew she was doing the right thing setting up the mausoleum as a bomb shelter, just like she was sure about Mr. Jones. In both cases, though, she knew her parents would not see it her way. “I plead the Fifth,” she said.

  “You what?” her mother demanded.

  “I plead the Fifth. I choose not to incriminate myself.” Hazel had always considered this a silly strategy—if you were afraid of incriminating yourself, surely it meant you had something to hide. Now, though, faced with the ire of her mother, and lacking a suitable explanation, this seemed her best option.

  “This is not a court of law. You have no rights. Tell me why there are canned goods in your closet.”

  Hazel sighed and sat down on her bed. “You’re not going to like it,” she said.

  “I already suspected as much.”

  “You know we live under constant threat of atomic annihilation, right? Mrs. Cornflower told me that if the Russians ever came they would put us in a sausage grinder feet first unless we declared allegiance to the Communist Party.”

  Hazel’s mom shook her head. “Becky’s mother was being overwrought.”

  “I know,” Hazel said. Or at least she thought she did. She wasn’t entirely sure what “overwrought” meant. She would have to look it up in the dictionary later, if her mom ever stopped yelling at her. “The real threat is the atomic bomb. If they drop one of those we need a place to hide. Why, the Shorts have a fallout shelter, and if anyone knows the plans of the Commies, it’s Mr. Short.”

  “Hazel, you’re talking in circles.”

  “I was making us a fallout shelter, Mom. I’m gathering canned goods for us to live on. Flashlights, too. I’ve been trying to get some sleeping bags, but that’s harder.”

  “In your closet? You’re building a bomb shelter in your closet?”

  “Of course not,” Hazel said. “That wouldn’t protect us at all. It will be in one of the mausoleums.”

  Hazel’s mom pinched her lips together and puffed out her cheeks so she looked like a balloon ready to pop. Then she let the air out, slow as could be. She took another deep breath before she spoke. “Hazel, do you realize what you’ve done?”

  Hazel knew exactly what she’d done. She’d set them on the pat
h to safety. But she also knew that her mother did not want to hear that. So she kept quiet.

  “The mausoleums, those aren’t places for you to play.”

  “I wasn’t playing, I was—”

  “What do you think would happen if the family of a person interred in the mausoleum knew you were hiding canned goods there?”

  Hazel supposed it depended on the person. Some people would probably be upset, but others would admire her practicality, she felt sure of it. “I had to protect our family. No one else was.”

  “If someone had found that—” Hazel’s mother shook her head. “Hazel, you could have put us out of business.”

  Hazel bit her lip.

  “Tomorrow, first thing after school, you will come home, and you will remove anything you put in that mausoleum.”

  “But, Mom—”

  “You will clean it out so that no one, and I mean no one, will be able to tell that anyone has been inside.”

  “Mom, if there’s a—”

  “All the cans will be back in the pantry.”

  Hazel wanted to stay silent and strong, calm like Sherlock Holmes. But she didn’t. “You don’t understand anything, do you? This is all because of you!”

  “Me?”

  “You weren’t keeping us safe, so I was. You’re so busy trying to prove there are no spies that you can’t even see one under your nose—”

  “Hazel, Mr. Jones is not a spy. You need to stop telling that story. And if you see Mr. Jones, you’d better not say anything to him other than ‘sorry.’ That is, if we can get him to come back to work after the stunt you pulled. What were you even doing out in the graveyard?”