Edgar Allan's Official Crime Investigation Notebook (2 page)

“Good problem-solving, Patrick!” Ms. Herschel said. “Now, I'll put four new problems up on the board and set the timer. See if you can get all four done before the timer rings.”

Patrick is smart. I'm afraid he's going to solve the crime before me. It'll be like the science fair all over
again. Patrick brought that recycling robot that crushed empty cans and lit up. All I brought was a rock.


Okay it was a very nice smooth rock and my question was what makes some rocks smooth? But still it was just a rock.


The room was silent, except for the scratching of pencils on paper and the sound of Kip's leg jiggling against his desk. Everyone was working on the math problems, except Taz, who was playing with a keychain.

Edgar had a sudden urge to blow his nose. As he walked up to get a tissue, he stopped by Maia's desk and whispered, “What kind of goldfish was Slurpy?”

She looked up from her math work and whispered back. “He was an ordinary goldfish, Edgar.”

“How do you know?” he asked.

“My mom is the manager of Pet Place,” she whispered.

“I got my iguana at Pet Place!” Sammy said.

“Edgar,” Ms. Herschel called out. “You're wasting time and distracting others.”

Disappointed, he took a tissue and blew his nose. On his way back to his seat, he glanced at the Pet Corner, which was in the back, by the sink. The empty tank on the counter, where Slurpy had been, looked as sad as a box of chocolates after all the chocolates are gone. In a cage next to it, Mister Furball, the hamster, popped out of a toilet paper roll and began sniffing around. Edgar tried to lock eyes with Mister Furball, but Ms. Herschel told him to sit down and get to work.

There is one person who I'm sure witnessed the crime and could tell me the name of the criminal! Unfortunately that person is a hamster.


He tried working on math, but a new theory was gnawing away at his mind. What if the thief was interested in stealing all kinds of pets, not just fish? He might return to the scene of the crime and steal poor Mister Furball! Maybe the thief was still here, hiding somewhere in the school—in a closet—and he was planning the next theft at this moment.

Realizing that his pencil needed sharpening, Edgar raced to the sharpener, which happened to be near the Pet Corner. While sharpening, he looked at Mister Furball's cage. Perhaps he could build a trap that would catch the thief and save Mister Furball. Certainly no one else in the room had thought of this. Edgar glanced at himself in the mirror that was over the sink, to see if he looked as distinguished as he felt. Unfortunately, he hadn't grown any taller, and he had slept on his thick brown hair so it was sticking up in the back, but his big brown eyes looked full of daring and his feathery eyebrows could do wonderful things on command.

Fired up, he bolted to Ms. Herschel's desk and whispered, “May I be excused from doing math so I can immediately build a hamster protection device?”

“No, Edgar. You have to do the math like everyone else.”

Only temporarily discouraged, an even more brilliant thought popped into his head. “If you bring in one of your puppies, I'll train it as a classroom guard dog!”

“I don't have any puppies, Edgar. That was just a word problem.”

Crushed, Edgar sat back down. Mister Furball was standing on his hind legs with his little paws on the bars, looking right at him.

Never fear, Mister Furball! I will ask Mr. Crew to let me skip language arts to do a complete search of the school. Unlike Ms. Herschel, Mr. Crew has a heart.


Edgar wasn't positive, but he thought he saw Mister Furball smile.

On the way from Ms. Herschel's room to Mr. Crew's room, where Edgar had language arts, there was a janitorial supply closet big enough to hide a thief and his loot. Edgar walked toward it quickly. There was no guarantee the thief would be hiding inside, but Edgar was not about to pass by a possible hideout and leave it unchecked. The secret was to stay one step ahead of Patrick.

Kip was already at Mr. Crew's door, but his other classmates were behind Edgar, which would mean they would witness how smart he was to think of investigating the closet. He reached the door, turned the knob, and opened it, ready to duck if the thief had a weapon.

A push from behind sent Edgar stumbling into the little room. The door slammed shut, plunging him into total darkness. He reeled around, yelling and groping for the door. “Help!” He banged on the door. “Help!”

The door flew open, and Clarice Stolnup was standing there, laughing her head off. Clarice was a small blond girl in the other class who had a large mouth, mean eyes,
and a passion for making other people miserable. Edgar avoided her whenever possible.

“What were you looking for?” Clarice said. “Toilet paper?”

“That wasn't funny, Clarice,” Destiny said, but Edgar was sure he heard some other people laughing.

Embarrassed, he hurried on to Mr. Crew's room. By the time he walked in, Patrick was already standing at the teacher's desk, showing him the thief's message on the viewing screen of his camera.

“This is fascinating, Patrick!” Mr. Crew was exclaiming, his eyes dancing like candle flames on a chocolate birthday cake. Their language arts teacher was genuinely fascinated about most things, which was why his students loved him. “This message is like a poem. The thief is using the image of a cat to describe himself or herself.”

“Maia said that!” Gabriela exclaimed.

“Good job, Maia,” Mr. Crew stepped over to Maia's desk for a high five. “That's called a metaphor. How lucky! I was going to start our unit on poetry today, and now I can use this as a springboard. We can start with metaphor.”

“I know who the criminal is,” Patrick said.

“Really?” Mr. Crew stroked his black mustache. “Well, make sure you have solid evidence before you go pointing a finger, Patrick.”

Patrick showed Mr. Crew his crime investigation notebook. “I'm already working on that.”

Edgar sat down, disappointed.

I can't even ask Mr. Crew about leaving his room to search the
school because Patrick is hogging all the space up there. I will wait until everybody is working and Mr. Crew is alone at his desk. Then I'll make my move.


“Okay, everybody!” Mr. Crew pulled his chair over to the board and hopped up on it. “Kip, will you hand me that paintbrush and that can of paint?”

“What for?”

“Watch!” He took the paintbrush from Kip, dipped it in the paint, and wrote in big letters on the wall above the board.

A POEM IS A GIFT.

“I'd rather have candy,” Kip said.

“I'd rather have a new soccer ball,” Sammy said.

“I'd rather have Slurpy back,” Maia said.

Edgar had always wanted a dog, but now that the idea of a guard dog had leaped into his mind, he wanted one more than ever.

Mr. Crew gave the paintbrush back to Kip and hopped down from his stool. “I hope by the end of this unit, you'll all come to enjoy poetry. Who thinks they know what I mean by saying a poem is a gift?”

Maia raised her hand. “The writer of the poem is giving it to the world like a beautiful gift.”

“What if it's an ugly poem?” Taz said and laughed.

“I don't think every poem has to be beautiful,” Destiny
said. “You can write a sad poem. If you write a poem to express yourself, then it's a gift to yourself.”

“That's a terrific way to put it.” Mr. Crew smiled, and his mustache smiled, too.

“Mr. Crew, I got a question,” Taz said. “Why didn't you just write it on the board like a normal teacher?”

Mr. Crew laughed. “I'm writing it on the wall because I don't want it to get erased. I want you to remember it. A poem is a gift.”

Taz put one hand over his heart and sang,

Happy birthday to me
.

Don't give me a flea

all covered with chocolate
 . . .

or I'll stick you in a tree
.

Mr. Crew laughed again. “See? Taz made us laugh with his poem. That was a gift.”

Patrick scribbled something down in his crime notebook. Edgar noticed and couldn't help wondering what it was.

“Hey, Mr. Crew,” Taz said. “How come you can write on the wall, but if we do we get in trouble?”

Mr. Crew laughed. “I got permission from the principal. Try that next time. Now, back to metaphor.” Mr. Crew pulled his chair to his desk. “Who remembers what that means?”

“A metaphor is when you use one thing to describe another, like the thief is a cat,” Maia said.

“Or happiness is a flower,” Gabriela suggested.

“Yes!”

“I don't get it,” Kip said.

“Think of candy,” Destiny suggested, and Kip's eyes lit up. “Then think of something else that's really fun, like a party. Then squash the two things together: Candy is a party in my mouth. That's a metaphor.”

“Nice one, Destiny,” Mr. Crew said. “So here's what we're going to do. We're each going to think of a subject that we want to write about, then come up with a metaphor to use, like the thief is a cat, and write a poem.”

“Can we work with a partner?” Maia asked.

“Sure, but before you start, I'm going to make you sit for two minutes in absolute silence to let your ideas and thoughts come out. Think of your imagination as a seed; silence is the water that helps it to grow.”

The moment the room grew quiet, Edgar walked up to Mr. Crew's desk.

“Edgar, it's time to sit and think,” Mr. Crew whispered.

Edgar lowered his voice as far as it would go. “But I really need to search the school. I have reason to believe the thief might strike again.”

Mr. Crew nodded. “I see. But if I let you go, then I'd have to agree to let everyone go. And if everyone went, we wouldn't get any poetry writing done.”

“I can live with that,” Edgar whispered.

“Tell you what. Write a poem. Maybe if we have a minute or two left at the end, and if you have a specific place you'd like to search, I'll consider it.”

Edgar walked back to his seat.

Big problem. I don't have any ideas. I don't even like poetry. These teachers who expect us to
concentrate when there's a thief running loose are crazy.


Sometimes when I look at a blank piece of paper, my stomach hurts.


Mr. Crew just said if we don't get a poem finished in class he wants us to do it tonight. The pressures are piling up.


“Would anyone like to share a poem before we get dismissed for lunch?” Mr. Crew asked.

Maia raised her hand. She and Gabriela read the poem they had written together.

Goldfish

Underneath dark water

A fish is dancing light
.

When the light goes out

The day becomes night
.

“That was terrific, girls!” Mr. Crew exclaimed. “Light is a metaphor for a goldfish! And what do you think they mean by ‘When the light goes out the day becomes night?' ”

“They're saying it's sad when the fish disappears,” Patrick offered.

“Yes! Beautiful! Who wants to go next?”

Kip was practically jumping out of his seat. “I wrote one about my skateboard,” he said.

My Skateboard

My board is a bird

and I ride on its back
.

We fly out of half pipes

and get lots of air
.

When I do a 360

and grab the nose
,

then my bird

is my flying chair
.

“Fantastic! Love it! Two metaphors—your board is a bird and a chair! Bravo!” Mr. Crew looked like he was going to explode with happiness. “Who's next?”

Taz raised his hand. Edgar was amazed. Was he the only one who was having trouble concentrating?

“Mine is about my dog,” Taz said with a grin.

Dog Breath

A monster lives inside my dog

Its smell is worse than death
.

It comes out when he kisses me

Its name is Big Bad Breath
.

While the class was laughing and Mr. Crew was giving Taz a standing ovation, Patrick wrote another entry in his crime notebook. Edgar watched him nervously.

I didn't get anything done in this stupid class. No good observations. No poem. I am a failure. I am giving up.