Missy lifted her hand and stared at the ring on her finger. She smiled as she watched the green scorpion blink. Then she pulled it off and dropped it onto the floor.
Crunch!
She stepped on it.
“What in blue blazes did you do that for?” asked the pirate, looking up from his knitting. “That bauble looked priceless.”
“That bauble was a cheap plastic ring with a battery inside,” said Missy.
“Aye…sea,” said Nathaniel.
He went back to his knitting.
Missy closed her eyes and listened to the clicking sounds of the pirate’s needles for a while. When she opened her eyes, she squinted through the screen wall of the porch. She studied the apartment above the Spinners’ garage…and grinned.
“Put down the knitting needles,” she said, turning to face Nathaniel again. “I’ve got an important new assignment for you.”
The pirate stopped knitting. He tilted his head down and looked at Missy over the top of his thick lenses.
“I need you to travel somewhere for me,” she told him.
“Arrrrr-gentina?” asked Nathaniel. “Aye-celand? Myan-marrrrr?”
“No,” said Missy. “Michigan.”
“Michigan,” Nathaniel repeated. “Are you sending me to Port Huron? Bay City? Ann Arrrrrrr-bor?”
Missy shook her head. She held up her hand so Nathaniel could see the mitten shape of Michigan.
“Go to Detroit,” she said.
She pointed to a spot at the base of her thumb.
“Stay hidden until you find Paul Spinner.”
Section 2, Detail th4sp1nn3rd0
Camouflage
Many animals have fur or skin with a combination of patterns and colors to help them hide or impersonate other things. This is called camouflage.
A leopard’s spots help it disappear into the grass and trees. A saturniid moth imitates the face of an owl to scare other animals away.
People use camouflage, too. Soldiers wear camouflage uniforms to avoid being seen. Navies have even painted wild patterns on their battleships to make them difficult to identify. A chameleon can alter its skin color to blend in with its surroundings.
* * *
• • •
The WIND is highly skilled in the art of camouflage, and they do it—with yarn!
Their pirate ship is covered with knitted blankets, so it looks like a garage in someone’s backyard. The entrance to their secret underground headquarters is disguised as a big grandfather clock in someone’s living room. Members of the organization can even camouflage themselves by wearing knitted clothing that blends in around statues, paintings, and other works of art.
Watch out for the camouflage, so you can watch out for the WIND!
“Pretty sneaky, Sam,” said Nipper, inspecting the scorpion ring.
Samantha walked ahead of her brother as they crossed through their backyard. She wore a satisfied smile on her face.
“I’m going to destroy this thing,” said Nipper. “I’m going to put an end to this evil curse.”
Samantha stopped walking and turned around. Nipper was holding the ring right over his ring finger. He seemed to be trying really hard to stop himself from putting it on.
“Come on, Nipper,” she said. “You know evil magical curses aren’t real, don’t you?”
“No…I mean, yes. I don’t…,” he answered. “I mean no, I do, Sam.”
She shook her head. “I’m getting tired of saying it,” she told him. “But you’re ridiculous…and annoying…and there’s no such thing as a magical cursed ring.”
“Oh yeah?” asked Nipper. “Then how do you explain the fact that it blinks?”
He held out his open palm with the scorpion ring in the center. She studied it for a second.
“Watch,” she answered, taking it from him.
She held up the ring and slowly tilted it. The scorpion blinked. Then she rotated her hand slightly. The ring caught the light again and it flashed green once more.
“See?” she told him. “It just reflects light at different angles.”
Nipper watched as she kept turning her hand. The ring flashed a few more times.
“Okay, Sam,” he said. “Then how do you explain all the bumps and trips and stumbles that happened to me when I wore it?”
“Are your shoelaces tied?” she asked.
“Well…no,” he replied, glancing down at his feet.
“Do you ever watch where you’re going?” she asked. “Or look at what you’re about to step on?”
“Not really,” Nipper answered.
“Do you pay attention to your surroundings?” she continued. “Do you take a closer look at things before you touch or tap or poke or taste—”
“Okay, okay,” he said, snatching the ring back from her. “Just forget about it.”
They had reached the side of their house. Samantha stopped on the porch. She didn’t open the door.
“I’m not forgetting everything,” she said.
“What do you mean?” asked Nipper.
“I’m not forgetting what you promised,” she said. “You said that if I helped you, you’d tell me the secret of the plaid.”
“Oh yeah. You’re right,” said Nipper. “I almost forgot.”
He shoved the ring into his pocket.
“Come with me,” he said. “It’ll bring back some memories.”
Samantha followed her brother into the house and up to his bedroom, where she had a lot of good memories….And some others she would gladly forget.
Samantha sat down on the edge of Nipper’s bed. Her brother stood next to his desk. He looked very excited to tell her something.
“All right,” she said. “This had better be good.”
Nipper took a deep breath.
“Do you remember last year, Sam?” he asked.
“Most of it,” she answered.
“No, no,” said Nipper, shaking his head. “Listen.”
He took another deep breath.
“Do you remember when we all went to Pacific Pandemonium last year?” he asked.
“How could I forget?” Samantha replied.
Last year, the whole Spinner family, including Uncle Paul, had visited Pacific Pandemonium Amusement Park, near Spokane, Washington. Her brother had ridden the Holy Cow-a-Bunga roller coaster thirteen times, until he’d thrown up and they’d all had to leave the amusement park early. Samantha wasn’t going to forget about it for a long, long time.
“I remember how gross it was,” she said. “And I remember having to leave before I got to ride It’s a Big Little World, which is my favorite ride.”
“That’s really more of a musical theater show than a ride,” said Nipper. “And it’s for babies.”
“So what?” Samantha snapped. “And why are we talking about this anyway?”
“Waitaminute, waitaminute, waitaminute,” said Nipper. “Do you remember the last thing we did before we got into the car to go home?”
Samantha tried to remember. The whole experience had been exceptionally gross. What special detail could her brother be talking about?
“Okay, I’ll tell you,” said Nipper.
He reached over to the top of his desk, grabbed something, and held it behind his back.
“We got inside a photo booth together,” said Nipper. “You, me, and Uncle Paul.”
Samantha thought about it for a moment. She remembered that photo booth.
“Yes, we did!” she answered, slowly getting excited, too.
The hair on the back of her neck stood up. Could it be?
“Yes!” Nipper shouted. “And we paid eight dollars and ninety-nine cents…for this!”
He held out a glossy strip with four square black-and-white photos.
Samantha leaned forward and stared.
The top photo showed the three of them—Samantha, Nipper, and Uncle Paul—squeezed together on a bench inside a photo booth. In the photo, her brother and her uncle were smiling, but she looked mad. Samantha remembered being mad because they were leaving the park before she could go on the It’s a Big Little World ride.
In the second photo, Nipper looked queasy. Samantha and Uncle Paul were watching him, worried that he was going to be sick again.
In the third photo, Nipper’s eyes were closed, and he was covering his mouth with both hands. Samantha and her uncle were only half in the picture. They were scrambling to get up and out of the photo booth very, very quickly.
In the bottom photo, the camera had gone off just as Uncle Paul had left the booth. His rear end must have been right in front of the camera. The picture was a rectangle…of plaid!
“Thanks!” Samantha shouted, snatching the photo strip from Nipper.
She raced out of her brother’s room, across the hall, and straight into her bedroom. Her purple glasses sat on her desk, ready for her to inspect the pattern in the plaid.
Samantha sat down at her desk. Then she put on the purple glasses, held up the photo strip, and stared at the plaid rectangle at the bottom.
Nothing.
She took them off, rubbed the glasses against her sleeve to clean the lenses, and put them on again.
She stared. And stared. And…nothing.
“Ugh,” she said. “Of course.”
Of course it didn’t work. Uncle Paul hadn’t left a message in super-secret ink on Nipper’s souvenir photo. It was just a picture…taken by accident…of his butt.
Samantha felt dumb…and frustrated…and was staring at a butt.
This was a total waste of time….Again.
She took the glasses back off and let out a heavy sigh. She set down the photo and glasses and leaned forward.
Thump.
She let her head hit the top of her desk.
“Everything okay?” Mr. Spinner asked.
Samantha lifted her head and turned to see her father in the doorway. He looked worried.
“No, Dad,” she told him. “Everything is not okay.”
She held up the photo strip.
“The pattern is in the plaid,” she said quietly. “And I’m…lost.”
“Wait,” he said, stepping into the room. “One minute.”
He took the photo strip from her and stared at it.
Samantha could tell he was looking at each photo, one by one, starting at the top.
She knew when he reached the third photo, because he chuckled. He was definitely looking at Nipper.
Then her father reached the photo at the bottom, and he squinted.
His lips moved silently. Then, still squinting at the picture, he said, “One, one, two, three…”
Her father was counting. Samantha started getting excited. Had he found a clue?
“Five, eight…,” he continued.
Samantha held her breath.
“It’s the Fibonacci sequence,” said Mr. Spinner.
“The Fib-o-what?” she asked.
“It’s a famous math pattern,” he answered. “It’s hidden in the pattern in this photo.”
Her father put the photo strip on the desk in front of her and tapped one of the squares in the plaid.
“If you count the groups of stripes that run up and down, you get one, one, two, three,” said Mr. Spinner.
Samantha nodded at him, then went back to looking at the photo.
“Now count the groups of stripes that go from side to side,” he told her.
Samantha studied the square carefully.
“Five…eight,” she replied.
“Exactly,” said her father. “That’s the Fibonacci sequence. Every number is the sum of the two numbers before it. You start with two ones to make the number two. Then you add two and—”
“Wait,” said Samantha, standing up quickly.
She pushed her chair back under her desk.
“Come with me and explain it. I want to write it all in my journal.”
He smiled and nodded, and together they headed downstairs to the kitchen.
“It’s pronounced ‘fih-buh-nah-chee,’ ” Mr. Spinner told Samantha as they entered the kitchen. “It’s one of the most famous number patterns in the world.”
He took a pencil and a sheet of paper from a drawer. Then he sat down at the table. He waved for Samantha to join him.
“Each number is the sum of the two numbers right before it,” he said, as he wrote on the paper:
1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21…
“One plus one is two. One plus two is three. Two plus three is five,” he said. “Get it?”
“I think so,” said Samantha.
She opened her journal to the page where she had started copying the number grid from the secret wall in the Detroit Institute of Arts.
“Here’s a wall with buttons,” she said. “Do you think that I can use the Fibonacci sequence to open it and find the SNOW?”
“The who?” Mr. Spinner replied.
“The mathematicians,” said Samantha. “You know, the ones that you gave Uncle Paul away to, the moment I turned my back for two minutes. Thanks a lot.”
“It was Paul’s idea to go with them, Samantha,” her father said. “He did it to save Nipper, by going in his place.”
He watched her think about it for a moment.
“Or…maybe he planned it all,” said Mr. Spinner. “So you would follow him to someplace special.”
Samantha was already busy circling all the numbers on the grid that fit the sequence.
“Nipper and I took the kogelbaan to Detroit, and I found a hidden entrance to a salt mine filled with treasures,” she said. “We popped out of a secret door under a statue, but then they lost us in the museum using some kind of mysterious—”
She stopped circling and looked up.
Samantha had completely forgotten that her father didn’t know all of Uncle Paul’s secrets…or any of her super secrets!
What had she just done?
She looked at him nervously. He smiled, just as he normally did. He didn’t seem very surprised to hear any of this.
“I know that you and your uncle travel around using secret transportation systems, Samantha,” he said.
“You do?” she asked, surprised.
Her father nodded.
“When we went searching for your brother, Paul showed me the magtrain,” he said.
He looked back down at the drawing.
“And the slidewalk,” he added.
He started circling some of the numbers with his pencil.
“I know you wanted some of this to be secret,” he said. “And I could tell you wanted to have something special, just between you and Uncle Paul.”
“What about Mom?” Samantha asked.
“I think…your mother’s the only one left in this family who doesn’t know about the super secrets,” he said.
Mr. Spinner glanced through the doorway toward the living room, where Dr. Spinner sat on the sofa. He watched her thoughtfully.
“There’s a high probability that that’s not going to last much longer,” he said. “Eighty-nine…”
Samantha watched him finish circling the numbers.
“One hundred forty-four,” he said, and put down his pencil.
“Are you guys talking about my Yankees?” Nipper asked, appearing in the kitchen doorway. “There’s only two games left until they lose one hundred forty-seven and—”
“Your time limit is exceeded,” said Samantha. “And we’re not talking about baseball. We’re figuring out how to get to the SNOW.”
Nipper walked over to the table and stared
down at their work.
“I’m teaching your sister about the Fibonacci sequence,” said Mr. Spinner.
Nipper eyed the sketch. He frowned.
“This is like a foreign language lesson with Uncle Paul,” said Samantha.
“No,” said Nipper, backing away from the table. “This is a math lesson.”
Her brother moved to the far side of the kitchen and sat down on the floor next to Dennis. The pug started licking his fingers.
“Math class is tough,” said Nipper. “Math class is tough.”
“What put that notion into your head, Son?” asked Mr. Spinner.
“Uncle Paul gave me a talking doll once,” he answered. “I listened to it a lot…until a raccoon snatched it and ran away.”
Samantha watched Dennis again. He had finished with Nipper’s fingers and was licking furiously at her brother’s wrist.
Samantha shook her head. The pug was licking salt.
“You haven’t washed at all since we’ve been back?” she asked. “I took a shower the minute we got home. You are exceptionally—”
“Math class is tough,” Nipper repeated.
“Okay, Samantha,” said Mr. Spinner.
He tapped on the sketch to get her attention.
“These are all the numbers. Is this what you wanted to find?”
She hoped it was! She closed her journal and stood up from the table.
“I wonder what other math challenges these SNOW people have created,” he added.
Samantha could tell that her father was hoping to come with her, but she wasn’t so sure he’d be a good traveling companion. She didn’t think he cared about her nearly half as much as he cared about lightbulbs.
Then she looked at Nipper again. Dennis was licking under his sleeve. Nipper had a goofy this-tickles-and-I’m-trying-not-to-giggle expression. It was gross.
“If there are more puzzles like this, I could help you with the math,” said Mr. Spinner. “And, of course, I’m good with lightbulb emergencies, too.”
“I know, Dad,” she replied. “But I’m not really expecting any lightbulb—”
Samantha Spinner and the Perplexing Pants Page 9
