The Odds of Getting Even (23 page)

Grandmother Miss Lacy took her tea upstairs, hoping for one last wink of sleep. We settled around the kitchen table with cereal.

“Okay,” I said to Dale as he dug in. “You told Starr you had a plan. What is it?”

“I don't have one,” he said, milk running down his chin. “I just said I did. I learned that from you. I see how it works now. Very nice.”

“Great,” Harm muttered. “Thirty-six hours and no plan.”

“Thirty-five hours,” I corrected. “Well, I can get us started,” I said, hopping up. I scurried to the darkroom and grabbed my enlargement of Flick's car. “While you were sleeping, I figured out who took the patrol car from the courthouse.” I tossed the photo in the center of the table. “See this? A torn skull-and-crossbones air freshener.”

“Like the patrol car,” they said together.

“I think Flick tore them both when he opened the pack.”

Harm sighed. “Two-fers. Flick never was that bright. He's not smart enough to have done it all, though. He
needs a boss. Besides, Starr was keeping an eye on him—part of the time, anyway.”

“Then who?” Dale asked, his voice soft. “We got a thread from the church windowsill, a photo of an extra set of tire tracks heading away from my house the day it was robbed, a torn air freshener, and a bunch of stupid letters we can't read.”

He eyed us like a general surveying his troops. I waited, fighting back an urge to tell him he'd buttoned his pajama top wrong.

“We need Sal,” he said. “The clock is ticking down.”

And the Clock Ticks Down

At school that morning, we caught a double break: First, Sal was well enough to make it back to class, putting our decoding operation on Go. Second, Miss Retzyl sent us to the school library to scrounge up books for book reports.

I found Sal at a reading table.

“This is fascinating,” she said, closing her book.
The Enigma Machine
—
How Math Shaped World War II.
She gasped. “You look terrible, Mo. What happened?”

“The usual,” I said, very cool. “Dale and me saved Lavender from a burning building and got in a fight and I've had maybe two hours sleep,” I told her, opening my messenger bag. “I got something to show you.”

I slid my file of letters to her. “Coded messages—like the one we showed you earlier—from Capers's trash. I tried the 2-6 code, where you start with the second word and read every sixth word, but . . .”

She flipped through the letters. “Each one probably has a different key. But the keys are all torn off the corner
of the papers,” she said, her voice thoughtful. “Probably to keep trash thieves like you from decoding them.”

Sal picked up the last page—the page of numbers I found in the parking lot the day Capers came to town—tan numbers and letters over a letter written in blue ink. She held the page to the light as Harm and Dale slid into seats across from us. “Is this the only one like this?”

I slid the second file to her.

Jimmy drifted by. “Lemon juice,” he said, glancing at the paper. “You got to heat it to make it look old. You still won't get extra credit, not even for the Pilgrims' Thanksgiving menu.”

Lemon juice?

“Really?” Harm said. “What's it like before you heat it?”

“Nothing,” Jimmy replied.

“Invisible?” Harm murmured. “Brilliant.” He laughed. “That's why Capers wanted an iron. She didn't want to iron her clothes. She wanted to iron out her messages.” He turned to Sal. “Can you decode these?”

The bell rang. “Maybe. I'll review them during class,” she said.

“Excellent,” Dale told her. He slid one Lemon Juice Message to me. “My detail division will help you, Sal. But hurry.”

I glanced at the clock. “It's ten a.m.,” I said. “Time's flying by.”

I pretended to listen to Miss Retzyl and stared at my Lemon Juice Message, trying to find a pattern. Sal peered at hers and worked a calculator beneath her desk.

Nothing.

I refocused just in time to hear Attila say, “It's just that I'm so sagacious.”

Dale, who had his head on his desk, opened his eyes. “She's
what,
Mo?”

“Mo? Dale? Question?” Miss Retzyl asked.

“No, ma'am,” I said. “We were just thinking there's maybe a less show-offy word that would work there. I'm guessing
obnoxious,
but I'm not sure.”

“Try the dictionary,” she said, nodding to the faded book on our shelf. Miss Retzyl is old-school. Blue dictionaries, white chalk, black-and-white composition books.

She likes technology, but she wants us smart if our batteries die.

Dale and I dragged ourselves over and I plopped the dictionary on the windowsill. Dale yawned and thumbed through the pages . . . “I'm too sleepy for this,” he muttered. “Emergency, mushy, saddle . . . Here,” he said. “Page 541.”

I ran my finger down the column of words. “
Saddler, safe, saffron
 . . . Here it is,
sagacious.
Second column, fourth word.
‘Quick and shrewd . . . '”

I gasped. “
What
did I just say?”

“Quick and shrewd,” he whispered. “I don't think it sounds right either.”

“Not that, the other: Page 541. Second column. Fourth word . . . That's it!” I shouted, snapping the dictionary closed. The class rustled behind me. “I mean, thank you, Miss Retzyl. May I take the dictionary to my seat for further reading pleasure?”

“You may not. Please sit down.”

I lowered my voice. “Dale, I think I just cracked the Lemon Juice Code. What's the best way to get out of here?”

Dale practices school exit strategies like Houdini practiced rope tricks. He recited: “Forge a note, set off an alarm, fake a throw-up . . .”

I clamped my hand over his mouth. His nostrils flared. “Stand back!” I shouted.

“Mmfff,” Dale said, struggling against my hand.

“Dale's sick! Sal, where's his medicine? We need your help!” Sal grabbed her things and mine. The class leaned away from us, clearing a path to the door.

“They're faking!” Attila cried, jumping to her feet.

I looked at Miss Retzyl. “Dale could go projectile any minute. Your call.”

Miss Retzyl froze, caught between the probability of a bald-faced lie and the possibility of projectile vomiting. “Go!” she commanded.

Harm jumped up. “I'll help,” he said. “Everybody stay calm.”

We led Dale into the schoolyard.

“My place,” I said, wiping Dale's breath off my hand. “I think I broke the Lemon Juice Code. Hurry.” Sal hopped on Dale's handlebars. We took off like a fleet of bats, dumping our bikes in the café parking lot and sprinting for my flat.

I opened my dictionary—a dead ringer for Capers's. “First blob of numbers, any message,” I said.

“420A25,” Sal read.

I ferreted out the word: “Page 420.
A
means first column. 25 means the twenty-fifth word. Doubt.”

We went through the message word by word. Finally I read it out: “Doubt clears your debt to me. The odds of getting even are in our favor. Shell.”

“Brilliant,” Harm murmured.

True. I tried to look modest.

“No, it was mostly dumb luck from trying to use a dictionary while sleepy,” Dale said. “Usually we don't have to pay much attention to finding words.”

My glory moment keeled over dead.

“Who's Shell?” he asked.

“Shell. Short for Shelly?” Harm guessed. “Michelle? But whoever Shell is, why would she write in code?”

Dale frowned. “Capers interviewed Slate and Deputy
Marla. They're in prison. Maybe Shell is too. Letters get guard-read going in and out. I know because of . . .”

“Family reunions,” Harm guessed, and Dale nodded.

Sal studied her fingernails. “Dale, if you'd like my help with the rest of these letters, I'd trade my fee for a consulting credit on this case. That would free you up to handle other clues. But if there's any
reward money
 . . .”

“An even split. A fourth is yours,” Dale said.

Now
he learns fractions?

“Deal,” she said. “Don't worry, Desperados. Sal's on the case.”

“Where to?” Dale asked as we grabbed our bikes.

The café door swung open. “Message for you, sugar,” Miss Lana shouted, holding up a note. “From Thes. He has a clue. He wants a meeting at four thirty, at the church.” She winked at Dale. “Glad you're feeling better, Dale,” she said.

I plucked the message from her fingertips. At least
Thes
has a clue, I thought. “Thanks,” I said, glancing through the window. “Is Capers in there?”

“She'll be back tomorrow morning. Why?”

I pictured that last note sitting on her desk. “I still have the Colonel's skeleton key. We'll pick up her trash for you,” I said, and we zoomed away.

As we crossed Fool's Bridge, my chain slipped and my pedals went into free spin.

“Not again,” I muttered, coasting over to the old store. I hopped off and bulldogged the bike to the ground.

“I got the back,” Harm said.

I fed the chain around the big sprocket, and rocked the pedal. The chain clunked on. “Come on, Dale,” I called, wiping grease on my jeans.

“No,” Dale replied.

He stood by the door, his fingers thick with webs. “Smell these. I thought they smelled bad when I got them in my hair the day we lost the patrol car. They're fake.”

Fake cobwebs?

He pointed to a faint trail in the dirt. “Bicycle tire tracks.”

Harm knelt. “Perfect tread,” he muttered, studying the track.

My heart jumped. Only Attila possesses perfect tread. The rest of us ride on the slick memory of new tires. “Attila's show bike,” I said. “From the break-in.”

We followed the tracks around the building to a small, lop-sided back door. A hammock of webs covered its lock. Dale sniffed. “Also fake,” he said.

Harm went up on his toes, ran his fingers along the top of the casing, and flashed a tiny key. “Score.”

The lock clicked and the door scraped open . . . Slowly my eyes adjusted to the dim light. “Nobody's here,” I said. We stepped inside. In the corner sat a pile of pale shadows. “What's that?”

The door slammed and the room went dark.

The lock clicked shut behind us.

“Not good,” Dale whispered.

“Hey!” I shouted, wheeling to the door. “Let us out right this minute!”

Footsteps pounded around the side of the building. Please, I thought, don't let me smell smoke. “We got to get out.”

I stumbled to a crooked door outlined in light and rattled the knob.

“We need a plan, now,” Dale said, his voice tinged in panic.

“I got one. Move,” Harm gasped. He lowered his shoulder and charged the door. “Jeez,” he said, ricocheting into Dale and then into me. “That hurt more than it looks like on television.”

He backed up and charged again. The door splintered and he tumbled out, Dale and me on his heels. Tires screamed against the blacktop.

“Fast car,” Dale murmured, listening.

I knew we were all thinking the same thing: Flick.

Dale plucked something from the grass at his feet. “Attila's turkey earring,” he said. “It's ugly, but they wouldn't throw it on the ground, not on purpose. Somebody's moving the loot. Another rookie move.”

“They know Lavender's coming to look at the building,” I said.

He hopped on his bike. “We need to talk to Lavender. Now.”