Samantha Spinner and the Perplexing Pants

by Russell Ginns

  Samantha nodded. This cavern was like one big treasure room…of fake treasures. It looked like a long journey to the other end of the place. She waved her brother forward.

  “Come on,” she said. “Let’s see where this goes.”

  “Hang on,” said Nipper. “I’m thinking.”

  Nipper began moving his finger along a smooth section of cavern wall, drawing in the dust.

  Samantha watched, realizing it was some sort of geometric shape.

  A diamond.

  He kept drawing, adding more shapes on the wall.

  It was a baseball diamond.

  Samantha whipped out her umbrella again. Clang! Clang! Clang! She banged the tip of her umbrella against a metal bin. The sound reverberated through the cavern.

  “Maximum time limit exceeded!” she shouted, exasperated.

  Nipper looked back at his sister.

  “You have a one-track mind,” Samantha continued.

  “Fine, Sam,” said Nipper. “But…”

  “But what?” she pressed.

  Nipper looked around, then back to her.

  “But you’re wrong,” he said. “This isn’t a one-track mine.”

  “Did you say mind?” Samantha asked. “Or did you say…”

  “Mine,” said Nipper. “As in ‘Hey, Sam, you’re banging your umbrella on a mine cart.’ ”

  She took a closer look at the big metal bin. It was connected to a second bin, and each one had four wheels. The wheels rested on a track that ran into a wide tunnel.

  Her brother was right. It was a little train.

  “I call front,” said Nipper as he climbed over the side of the little metal hopper. A cloud of salty dust rose when his shoes hit the bottom of the bin. Samantha pulled herself up and over the side of the rear cart. She tried to be more careful than her brother, but it didn’t matter. White dust streaked her shirt and pants. That was just how it was going to be.

  “All aboard?” asked Nipper.

  She could see he had his hand on a lever that stuck out of the floor on the left side of the cart.

  “Go for it,” said Samantha.

  Nipper smiled and shoved the lever forward.

  Chugga-chugga-chugga-ga-ga…

  A motor somewhere under their carts started to shake. The cart began moving forward. Slowly it picked up speed.

  Samantha smiled. She had no idea where they were going, but super-secret travel was the way she was going to find Uncle Paul.

  As she sped along in the cart behind her brother, Samantha watched his hair flapping in the breeze.

  Nipper looked back at her. He took a deep breath, and his mood seemed to lighten a bit.

  “Okay, Sam,” he said. “I guess I have been moping about my Yankees a little too much.”

  Samantha nodded and watched the walls of the mine pass by.

  They rolled on through the wide, dusty tunnel. Lights flashed as they passed beneath them. Every hundred feet or so, they rolled past a statue. Samantha recognized a full-sized copy of Michelangelo’s David, and another statue that looked like George Washington. She saw Chinese warriors, horses and lions, and many other figures that didn’t look familiar at all.

  Samantha glanced at Nipper. He had his hand open and seemed to be staring at one of his fingers. In front of him, something had been rubbed into the dusty surface along the rim of the front panel of the mine cart.

  “It would be great if you could keep yourself from touching everything for a while,” said Samantha. “There’s a layer of dust, dirt, and salt everywhere in this mine, and we both know you’re not going to wash your hands anytime soon.”

  “I didn’t touch anything, Sam,” said Nipper. “I’m just looking at my ring finger.”

  In front of him, she could see there were letters scrawled on the dusty cart.

  “Is that so?” she asked him. “Then who wrote those words on the cart right where you are—”

  Samantha stopped herself. She squinted at the letters more closely. Six words appeared in the dust:

  “Do you think Uncle Paul wrote this?” Nipper asked.

  “I think so,” said Samantha. “What could it possibly mean?”

  “I haven’t the foggiest idea,” said Nipper.

  “The pattern is in the plaid,” she read.

  At last, she had a clue…but she had no idea what it meant.

  The tunnel had become broader. They rolled on, passing sculpture after sculpture.

  Two more versions of Michelangelo’s David went by, then a huge copy of the Lincoln Memorial. Between the sculptures, Samantha could see that there were many other lines of tracks leading to who knows where.

  The cart began to slow.

  “End of the line,” Nipper called.

  The cart bumped a metal post and came to a stop. They climbed out of the train and stepped into a narrow, dusty space.

  Samantha looked back at the long, statue-lined tunnel. Now, at the end of the line, there was only one way to go. A metal staircase rose one flight to a small landing. Samantha and Nipper headed up the steps and stopped at the landing. There stood a door with three letters on it:

  D I A

  “DIA?” asked Nipper.

  Samantha shrugged.

  The door looked heavy, made of speckled stone. Maybe it was granite. A brass pole ran up and down along one side, forming a handle.

  “The pattern is in the plaid,” Samantha repeated.

  “Come on, Sam. Help me with this,” said Nipper, tugging on the door handle. It wouldn’t budge.

  She put her hands on the handle beside his. Together they pushed open the door.

  Scra-a-a-a-pe!

  The heavy door swung away from them. The Spinners stepped out into sunlight.

  Samantha took a deep breath and let it out slowly. It was good to be out of the dusty mine and back in the fresh air. She shook herself off and stomped her feet to try to get rid of the dust.

  She looked back. They had just emerged from the stone base of a huge statue. A man made of bronze towered above them. He sat on a rock, with his chin resting on one hand. The figure stared forward, as if he were deep in thought.

  “The Thinker,” said Samantha.

  Uncle Paul had told her about this sculpture many times. It was by the French artist Rodin, and there were dozens of copies of it around the world. She pictured her uncle, imitating the sculpture as he sat on the steps to his apartment. She remembered how he’d had trouble keeping his chin on his fist as he spoke. Uncle Paul was the kind of storyteller who waved his hands in the air a lot.

  “DIA,” said Nipper, pointing up in the other direction.

  Stretching out ahead of them, a wide staircase led up to a majestic building. Stone arches framed an entrance with ornate metal doors. Words carved into the stone above the arches read:

  The Detroit Institute of Arts

  “The DIA,” said Nipper.

  Samantha nodded at him. Then the two of them stood at the bottom of the steps and gazed up at the museum.

  Several dozen people were lined up single file, waiting to enter the building. Samantha and Nipper joined them.

  As she stood there, Samantha puzzled over the message from their uncle again.

  “The pattern is in the plaid?” she asked Nipper.

  He shrugged and turned to the line ahead of them. He scrunched up his forehead. He began tapping his fingers on the sides of his legs.

  Samantha knew that face and that tapping. He was getting impatient.

  “Ugh,” said Nipper. “I don’t think this line’s moving at all.”

  Samantha was used to hearing that from her brother also. From amusement parks, to movie theaters, to all-you-can-eat restaurants—any place you had to wait in line—Nipper complained that lines didn’t move fast eno
ugh. And yet…this time he was right. The line to get into this museum was definitely not moving.

  She looked back. A dozen people now stood in line behind them. She leaned out and looked up at the entrance again. A security guard stood blocking the doors. A sign beside him was taped to the top of an orange plastic cone. In handwritten letters, it said:

  MUSEUM CLOSED DUE TO BAD WEATHER

  She pointed to the sign and rolled her eyes.

  “Bad weather?” asked Nipper, looking around. “It’s a beautiful day.”

  “Exactly,” she replied. “There isn’t a cloud in the sky.”

  Nipper looked up.

  “You’re right, Sam,” he said. “And why would an indoor museum close for bad weather anyway?”

  Samantha looked back and forth at all the people in the line with her. They talked among themselves. They used their phones. None of them seemed to be taking a closer look at things.

  “Come on,” she said. “Let’s investigate.”

  She stepped out of the line and waved for Nipper to join her. Then they marched up the stairs.

  “Sorry, kids,” said the guard as they reached the top. “We’re not open.”

  In one white-gloved hand, the guard held a tally counter, a metal clicker to count visitors. His other hand was out, stopping the Spinners from touching the doors.

  “There’s been a blizzard today,” he said. “A terrible ice storm. Hail the size of baseballs. Museum’s closed.”

  “Really? Since when?” Nipper asked.

  The guard scowled.

  “Since we got all the alerts,” he answered.

  Samantha looked up at the sky, and then all around the steps of the museum. There wasn’t any ice. There was no baseball-sized hail. It was a sunny summer’s day.

  “Who alerted you?” she asked.

  “We got a phone call and a dozen messages from the SNOM,” said the guard. “The Storm Network of Ohio and Michigan. Half our museum staff is out buying shovels and de-icer.”

  “Waitaminute,” said Samantha, trying to sound calm and helpful. “Do you see any ice or snow?”

  The guard looked around the steps.

  “Nah,” he replied.

  “Do you feel any cold air?”

  “No…,” said the guard carefully.

  “Maybe this was a test,” she said.

  “A test?” asked the guard.

  “Yeah,” said Samantha. “The museum could be testing you to see if you have what it takes. You know, the power of observation. Maybe they want to invite you to join STARCH.”

  “STARCH?” asked the guard.

  “The Stolen Treasures and Artwork Recovery Convention and Hoedown,” said Samantha.

  The guard nodded, just a little. He seemed to be thinking this over.

  “Okay,” he said. “I guess you can go in.”

  He smiled and clicked his tally counter twice.

  “Next time, you should take a closer look at things,” said Nipper.

  “What?” the guard asked. He stopped smiling.

  “STARCH doesn’t like it when their members stand around blocking doors,” Nipper said.

  The guard began to look irritated.

  “They have a lot of great snacks and cookies at STARCH parties, and they might not want you to—”

  “Don’t annoy him,” Samantha whispered, tugging Nipper’s shoulder. “He’s letting us in.”

  She pulled her brother through the doors of the museum.

  As they walked through a foyer and into the main lobby, Samantha marveled at Nipper’s special talent for annoying people in mere seconds.

  Samantha and her brother walked to the center of the museum’s lobby and gazed up a grand marble staircase leading to a grand hallway.

  “Let’s head to the landing up there and have a look around,” she said, using her umbrella to point up to the second floor. “It’s as good a place as any to get started.”

  They climbed the steps to the top, where a broad hallway stretched out ahead of them. On each side, doorways led to the museum galleries, and far ahead there was a huge two-story entrance to somewhere beyond.

  “Good night!” said Nipper.

  “What?” Samantha asked.

  Samantha glanced around to see what her brother was talking about.

  “I meant knights,” he said. “You know, with a K.”

  He smiled at her and pointed sideways.

  Between the entrances, tall glass cases lined the hall. Inside each one, a shiny silver knight stood at attention. They weren’t actually people. They were empty suits of armor. A knight who wore one would be covered from head to toe in metal. A few small slits would have let the wearer see and breathe, but that was it.

  “I wonder what these guys did when they had to go to the bathroom,” said Nipper.

  Samantha smiled. Normally her brother’s comments were ridiculous. But she had been wondering the same thing.

  “I guess they went very carefully,” she giggled.

  Cra-tack!

  Something sailed past Samantha’s head, hit the closest display case, and bounced away. Startled, she looked around quickly and spotted a shiny object on the floor. She bent and picked it up. It was a metal half circle with numbers along each side.

  “A protractor?” asked Samantha, holding it out for Nipper to see.

  She and her brother had had a lot of things thrown at them over the past few months. And it never meant anything good. She looked around the hallway, trying to spot where the protractor could have come from.

  Cra-tack!

  Something else bounced off the glass display case and dropped to the floor. More quickly than before, Samantha picked it up, too. The V-shaped object had a pencil on one end and a sharp metal needle on the other.

  “A compass,” said Samantha.

  Cra-tack!

  “A ruler,” said Samantha, glancing at the floor again.

  “Somebody really hates these knights in shining armor,” said Nipper.

  “Very funny,” said Samantha, looking around. “But who’s throwing these things at us?” Visitors had begun filtering into the museum. Men, women, and kids milled about the hall.

  One couple in particular caught her eye. A man and a woman stood out from the rest of the crowd. They wore long white coats and bright white sneakers. They looked exactly like the people Nipper had told her about—the ones who’d taken away Uncle Paul!

  “Look,” she said to Nipper, pointing at the couple.

  “It’s the math police!” her brother shouted.

  Samantha watched them carefully. They stood facing her across the hall. She could just make out that the man had numbers on the front of his coat:

  1+1=2

  And on the woman’s coat, she could see, there was an equation:

  2+2=4

  “I’ve already told you,” she reminded her brother as she stared at the couple. “There’s no such thing as the math police. They’re the SNOW.”

  Abruptly the man and woman turned and began to run away.

  “Don’t let them get away,” Samantha told Nipper, pointing her closed umbrella at them. “We need to ask them about—”

  Thunk!

  Another geometry compass flew past Samantha. The deadly sharp needle missed her face by inches and drove deep into the wooden handle of her umbrella.

  She didn’t care. This was her chance to find Uncle Paul. She took off toward the two figures in lab coats, chasing them down the grand hall.

  “I’m right behind you, Sam,” Nipper called.

  Samantha was closing the distance between her and the SNOW when a line of people crossed in front of her, stopping her in her tracks. A dozen teenagers wearing matching yellow T-shirts meandered among the galleries. Their shirts said To
urs du Jour on the front.

  Samantha pushed her way through the line, trying to keep an eye on the man and woman.

  “Excusez-moi,” a teenage girl said to Samantha as she passed.

  Samantha glanced at the girl. She looked familiar, but there wasn’t time to stop and talk.

  Samantha sprinted after the SNOW agents, but the hall had become crowded. Now that the guard had agreed to let visitors into the museum, hundreds of people moved in every direction.

  Samantha hopped up and down to peek over the crowd and get a better view. She spotted the two white coats flashing through the crowd.

  And then they were gone.

  She searched the hall, but it was as if they’d disappeared.

  “Don’t stop, Sam,” Nipper said. “I saw them go in there!” He was pointing straight ahead, toward the two-story marble entrance they’d glimpsed earlier.

  “Are you sure?” she asked.

  He nodded.

  She was going to have to trust that Nipper was actually paying attention to things this time. She nodded back, and together they sped toward the entrance.

  Samantha and Nipper charged through the entranceway, and they both stopped at the same time.

  “Whoa, Nelly,” said Nipper.

  A vast indoor courtyard stretched out before them.

  “The Detroit Industry Murals,” Samantha said. “Uncle Paul told us about this last year.”

  “He did?” asked Nipper.

  Samantha sighed.

  “You were right there with me,” she replied. “Uncle Paul told us all about this place…and The Thinker by Rodin…and…”

  Her brother wasn’t listening. He was staring at the walls of the courtyard.

  Samantha guessed that the room was one hundred feet long and at least forty feet high. And almost every inch of the four huge walls was covered with paintings, dozens of them. Most of the scenes showed men at work, building and operating machines, but others featured women and babies, fish and birds. Some paintings featured giant hands, rising from the ground, holding crystals. There were paintings of airplanes, doctors, and nurses, and a huge panel with a baby in a womb.