Mystery of the 19th Hole (Taylor Kelsey, Mystery 1) (8 page)

             
After the service ended, Taylor grabbed Susan by the arm and led the way to Chad.  He was sixteen just like Taylor and Susan, okay looking, and a nerd.  Taylor wondered how he would look if he didn’t wear prescription glasses that looked like goggles, and if he spiked his hair rather than comb it formally to the side.

             
“Hello, Chad,” said Taylor.

             
“Hey, Taylor.  Susan.”  He smiled.

             
“What school do you go to, again?” asked Susan.

             
Chad sighed.  “You ask me the same question every week.  I go to Formstaw Christian Academy.  The same school you go to.  In fact, I’m even in the same grade.”

             
“Oh, yeah.”

             
Taylor cut in before Susan went off on tangents.  “We need your help, Chad.”

             
Chad’s nose twitched, and his glasses slipped down a little.  He pushed them back up to the bridge of his nose, answered, “Really.  I’ll be happy to help.  What do you need help with?”

             
“We’re trying to solve a string of robberies and a murder.  There’s reward money, and we’ll give you a cut—”

             
“No money necessary.  I can do it just to help,” he said, looking into Taylor’s eyes.

             
“It’s okay.  We’ll give you a cut, anyway.”

             
“What’s wrong with you?” Susan asked Taylor sharply.  “If the boy doesn’t want a cut, he doesn’t need a cut.”

             
“You’ll get a cut of the money,” Taylor assured Chad while elbowing Susan in reprimand.  “We need you because, for one, it will be safer.  There’s a long story we don’t need to get into.  And we need you, for two, because you’re smart and have those gadget-things.”

             
A corner of Chad’s mouth turned up in a smile.  “Yes.  Yes I do.”

             
Seconds later they were in the parking lot standing behind the trunk of a white convertible.  The sun was bright and hot, creating sharp glares on all the cars.

             
Susan spoke, “Is this your car?”

             
Chad pressed a button on the car’s electronic key and the trunk opened with a pop.  “No, it’s my mom’s.  I don’t have my own… yet.  My dad lets me drive his car in the meantime.”

             
Chad’s hand nervously twitched at his side, Susan noticed.  And as Taylor stepped beside him to look into the trunk, his twitch worsened.  Susan stifled a laugh as she stepped to the other side of him.

             
Pulling out a make-up mirror, Chad explained, “This looks like a mirror, but it’s a video camera.  It was one of the first things I made, but it’s not much use to me as I’m not a girl and have no need of a make-up mirror.”  He handed it to Taylor.  “It can record up to ten minutes of video.  There’s a memory chip inside.”

             
As she fiddled and examined it, he pulled out a pair of sunglasses.  It had a symbol on the side that had the letters, in a stylish font, TK.  He handed it to Susan, explaining, “This also has a camera in it.  Up to ten minutes of video just like the mirror.”

             
Susan donned them.  “Stylish,” she muttered.  “How do I look?”

             
Chad and Taylor looked at her and both said, “Nice.”

             
Then Chad held up an mp3 player.  “This will explode on impact—all you have to do is drop it or throw it.  It’s just a small explosion, but it could be used as a distraction.”  Susan snatched it.  “Just make sure you use it in emergencies only.  It cost a lot.”

             
Nodding, Susan asked, “Would being attacked by large nice-looking-but-evil robots  count as an emergency?”

             
“Sure,” Chad replied awkwardly.

             
Susan sorted through things in the trunk until finding a batch of hand watches.  “What are these, like walkie-talkies?”

             
“Not yet.  I’m still working on them.  I’ve only got the GPS system installed in them so far.”

             
“Can I have one?”

             
“Uh…  Sure.”

             
Susan grabbed an extra one for Taylor, holding it before Chad.  He nodded.  Taylor and Susan slipped the expensive GPS watches onto their wrists.

             
“So,” asked Taylor, sounding disappointed, “is that all?”

             
Again, Chad smiled.  “Not at all.  I have a lot more at my house.”

             
“Then let’s go.”

             
They all piled into Taylor’s car, and Chad directed the way to his house, which turned out to be down a dirt road and into the backcountry.  Once there, Chad took them behind the house to a large oak tree.

             
“Let me guess” said Susan, peering up through the boughs, “there’s a tree fort up there.”

             
“I wish.”  He took five long steps to the right of the tree and stopped, reached down, grabbed a latch, and flung open a trapdoor.  Dirt and weeds fell backward off the door.

             
“After you.”

             
“It doesn’t look like you’ve been down there in a while.”

             
“I go in everyday,” he responded, “I cover the hatch with dirt afterward.”

             
Susan was first to enter.  Looking into the dark hole, she couldn’t see the means of descent.  It turned out to be a ladder.  Taylor and Chad were in just after her.  Chad shut the trapdoor behind him, which cut off the outside light.

             
Dropping to the carpeted floor with a soft thud, Susan could see hundreds of colorful flickering lights everywhere in the small room.  None of it made sense until Chad turned on the overhead lights.  When he did, Taylor and Susan could see dozens of computer monitors lining all the walls, some on desks and some mounted higher up near the roof.  In fact, some of them were mounted on the roof.

             
The room was just a little larger than Taylor’s bedroom and on the back wall was a small sofa.  Above it, a large plasma TV mounted on the wall.  There were also two grandfather armchairs at the end of the room with the ladder.  The roof had a fan.  The floor was carpeted.  It didn’t seem anything at all like an underground room accessed by a trap door.

             
Chad observed the girls’ stunned faces.  “It’s my lab.  Like it?”

             
“Love it,” said Taylor.  “This is fantastic.”

             
Susan was staring at the plasma TV and tears were welling in her eyes.  “Does that TV get cable?”

             
“Yeah.”  Chad found the remote on a desk.  Susan gratefully took the remote, reclined in a chair, and started watching TV.

             
Chad gave Taylor a tour of the room, walking about and pointing out things, like the previously unnoticed desk with the test tubes and chemicals, and another desk with chords, batteries, lenses, and other electronics.

             
He explained that the house was built a long time ago, and this underground room was built as a bomb shelter.  It was his idea to make the room into a lab, and his dad and several uncles in construction helped bring the dream to life.

             
“I never thought of using it for detective work, but I have always thought of it as a base of sorts.  Before we converted it to this, me and my siblings would pretend it was a lab or a secret base to conduct operations.”  He laughed.  “But we can definitely use it for forensics, and I can build technology when we need it.”

             
“That’s spectacular.  It’s going to work out great,” said Taylor.  Then she leaned in close to him and kissed him on the cheek.  Withdrawing she said, “Thank you.”

             
“Oh—y—y—yeah—I—it’s no pro—problem.”

             
“I think we have a good chance at solving these cases.  Even more so now.”  She put her hands on her hips and looked at the television as she said, “Tomorrow, we go back to the circus.”

             
After school on Monday, Taylor, Susan, and now Chad went to the circus to snoop, ask questions, and hopefully find some kind of evidence that could help them solve the elephant robbery, which would help them solve all the other high-profile robberies.  That is, according to Taylor’s logic.

             
They started by surveying the area where the truck had been that had harbored the stolen elephant.  They examined the tent and the asphalt but found nothing other than dirt, skid marks, and dead bugs. 

             
When they had finished there, Taylor talked to Jason about the other day.  He had told his parents at dinner that he’d saved some girls, but that was all.  Just as she’d guessed.  She also asked him if he recognized the kidnappers.  He said they were wearing masks when he’d fought them.

             
Susan, meanwhile, interviewed clowns and mimes.  Whether they actually talked and, if they did, what they talked about, no one, Taylor and Chad suspected, would ever know.

             
During this, Chad went from vendor to vendor and asked if they’d seen the robbers, the truck, or the elephant.  Some had seen the elephant.  None had seen the robbers.  Of course.

             
Finally, they got candy apples and rendezvoused at a table, discussing their progress in between bites.  The cool day’s air was as refreshing as the warm sun’s rays.

             
“I think I’m going to become a mime when I grow up,” surmised Susan.  “But what kind of degree do you have to have?”

             
Taylor and Chad laughed but ignored her question. 

“I got nothing,” said Chad.

             
“Me neither.  On a good note, Jason hasn’t told anyone about what happened on Saturday.”

             
“What happened on Saturday?” asked Chad.

             
Taylor relayed the whole story about being captured and nearly killed.  She also told him that she’d counted how many things the man on the phone had taken down.  Eighteen.  Susan pressed the fact that they’d passed a golf course.  Taylor said that was a non-issue and that they’d passed many things.  Still, Susan insisted on the importance of the golf course.

             
Chad sided with Taylor.

             
Then, after some silence and thinking, Susan accidentally dropped her candy apple onto her lap, which was bad since she was wearing her school uniform.  She only had five of them, and her mom would kill her if she ruined one.  “Can you get me some napkins?” she asked Chad.

             
“Oh, sure.”

             
When Chad walked away, Susan scooted next to Taylor.  “Chad likes you.”

             
“I know.”

             
“What about you?  Do you like him?” asked Susan.

             
“No.”  Taylor smiled.  “No, he’s too much of a nerd.”

             
“And here I thought you liked nerds.”

             
“No, Susan,
you
like nerds.  Which is weird considering your personality?”  Taylor poked Susan in the side.  “You like him, don’t you?  Admit it.  You like him.”

             
“No.  Well, maybe if he lost the goggle glasses.”  Susan thought about it.  “Actually, no, I don’t like him.  Couldn’t.  I’m going to have way too much fun making fun of him.  Thus, it would be impossible to like him.  Understand?”

             
“I don’t.  But I’m sure you do, and that’s all that matters.”

             
Chad returned with the napkins, and Susan noticeably scooted away from Taylor.  “Here you are,” he said, handing over the napkins.

             
“What are they for?” asked Susan, actually being serious.

             
“You dropped your candy apple on your lap,” Chad said awkwardly.  “You already forgot?”

             
She looked down at her skirt.  “So I did.”

             
Chad laughed.  He was wearing his school uniform as well—sweater over a button-up shirt and black slacks—for they’d all come straight from school in Taylor’s car.  “So,” he said, “what next?”

             
Taylor was wiping her sticky fingers with a napkin.  “Let’s talk to security.”

             
After some searching, Susan spotted a lone security guard standing near some public telephones.  She nudged the others and all three of them approached the man.  “Excuse me, Sir,” began Susan, “I’d like to report a missing person.”