Sammy Keyes and the Dead Giveaway (19 page)

“That doesn't mean the Stones dug him a hole and removed his collar!” she whispered. “Besides, they were at the council meeting!”

“But Marty left early! And how do you
know
they were there? You didn't actually see Teri until it was all over, right?”

She held my cheeks gently and smiled at me. “Oh, lamb. Not everyone is as devious as Coralee Lyon—don't let her cast a shadow on the entire flock! Teri's our ally, remember? And no, she doesn't like Captain Patch digging into her yard, but she's a long ways from purposefully releasing him.”

“But what about Marty?”

She frowned. “Marty? Dig a
hole
?”

“Yeah! He knew you were at the meeting,” I whispered.
“And don't tell me he has a bad back. He mows their yard, he works in their garden, and he chased me with a hoe! If you ask me, he's just using his back as a way to get paid for not working!”

“Shhh!” she warned. Then she frowned again and whispered, “He
was
injured on the job, and if his back has improved, well, it's not my place to meddle. Besides, he does have cancer now—”

“But don't they just take the cancer spots off and make you stay out of the sun? It doesn't stop you from digging a hole!”

“Skin cancer can spread to other parts of the body, Samantha. It can kill you!”

“Annie?” Mrs. Stone said, coming into the kitchen. “I gotta get going.”

“Oh!” Mrs. Willawago said, fluttering a little. “Why don't I wrap up a scone or two for Marty?”

Mrs. Stone smiled. “That'd be nice.”

Then Grams came into the kitchen and said, “We should be going, too. It's getting quite late.” She turned to me and said, “Samantha? I think we should give you a lift home,” pretending like I didn't live with her.

So I said, “Sure,” and we got out of there in a wave of polite thank-yous. But once I was inside Hudson's car, I let my frump show in a big way. “I am so sick of people not believing me!”

“What
now
?” Grams asked. “People seemed to believe you just fine at the council meeting…!”

So I told them about the hole and the shovel and how I was pretty sure Marty Stone had dug the hole. And just
like Mrs. Willawago, Grams tried to come up with reasons why he
hadn't
done it.

“See?” I said. “
I
think the hole was man-made, so you think I'm wrong. If it was someone with a Ph.D. in hole digging telling you the same thing, you'd think it was the gospel, but it's
me
, so you think it's my imagination.”

“But someone with a Ph.D. in hole digging would know about holes,” Grams said.

“Someone with a Ph.D. in hole digging should be put in the nuthouse! It's a
hole
. All you do is apply a little common sense to the surrounding dirt and the walls of the hole. I don't need to write a dissertation on holes to know when one's dug by a dog and one's dug by a shovel!”

“Well,” Grams said, patting her hair. “Teri Stone
is
a little odd, I'll give you that.”

Silly me, I thought I was getting somewhere. But when I asked, “What do you mean?” she said, “Well, for one thing, she should bathe more. And socks and Birken-stocks? Goodness.”

See? That's what talking to Grams is like. You're discussing the science of hole digging and she turns it into a criticism of someone's personal hygiene and fashion choices.

But then Hudson looked at me in his rearview mirror and said, “Her socks were quite dirty. Perhaps
she
dug the hole.”

Good ol' Hudson.

“Hmmm.” But then I shook my head. “Her feet always look like that.”

“She always wears those sandals?” Hudson asked.

I nodded.

“Well, that hippie look is very unattractive if you ask me,” Grams said. “But to each his own.”

I felt like saying, Who cares about fashion? I want to know who dug the
hole.
But I kept my mouth shut, and when we finally got home, I took a quick shower and went straight to bed. I was beat!

The next morning I actually watched the news 'cause I was on it. Actually read the paper 'cause Mrs. Ambler brought in a copy and I was
in
it. And I actually had an outside-the-classroom conversation with Mr. Holgartner on my trek between classes.

“Sammy!” he called from the admin building as I walked by.

Now you have to understand—Mr. Holgartner is not exactly Most Popular Teacher or anything. He's more like Most
Un
popular Teacher. He's boring, sarcastic, snide, and gives really confusing multiple-choice tests. And talk about needing to bathe more—pee-yew! He always smells like he's sweating garlic.

So having a teacher like this call your name with such enthusiasm across the campus makes you want to:

• Hide
  

• Pretend you didn't hear
  

• RUN
  

• Die of embarrassment
  The correct answer?
  

• All of the above
  

I did go for option (b) for a second, but he called my name again, “Sammy! Samantha!”

“Uh, yes, Mr. Holgartner?”

He came up to me quick and stood a little too close. “Since when have you been interested in politics?”

“Uh … I'm not really.”

“That was
my
impression,” he laughed, oozing garlic.

“Ha-ha,” I said back.

“No, seriously! I saw the news, read the paper…I was proud to see you taking a stand on the matter.” Then he said, “We discussed eminent domain earlier in the year…?”

Now, it's funny—it was like he was trying to take credit for my involvement. And maybe it would have been nice of me to say, Oh yeah. You totally inspired me to fight city hall, sir. But I wasn't in the mood to lie.

Too bad he hadn't talked to me the week before!

Instead, I looked right at him and said, “Actually, I got interested because of Mrs. Willawago's Train House and because I found out how the mall got built by the city kicking people out of their houses.”

He nodded like he knew all about that.

Well, you know what? That really irritated me. So I kind of squinted at him and said, “Why didn't you tell us about that when you covered eminent domain?”

He shrugged. “We only have so much time to spend on each subject.”

“But … but it would have made it
interesting.
You know,
relevant.
”

He just stood there, blinking garlic fumes at me.

His face had totally fallen, and I felt kinda bad. Plus we were standing with this awkward silence between us. So I said, “Next year. Teach 'em about it next year.” I gave him a little smile. “Kids might actually listen.”

After my encounter with Mr. Holgartner, the rest of the day was very normal. Except for my little circle of friends, only teachers seemed to know anything about what had happened at the city council meeting, which made total sense. I mean, what junior high kid in their right mind gets up and watches the news or reads the paper? We're too busy rushing around from oversleeping to care about anything but not being tardy.

And for the rest of the week school was sort of a happy place. The teachers seemed to be in good moods, the kids were all buzzing about summer plans, there was hardly any homework … it was real
enjoyable
.

'Course, Heather was still lurking around, still making snide remarks, still plotting and conniving and pretending to be popular, but you could tell she was also counting the hours to Friday night, when she just
knew
she'd be ordained Friendliest
and
Most Stylish Seventh Grader. Maybe even Most Popular.

She couldn't wait.

And neither could we!

Hee-hee!

Things over on Hopper Street were also pretty mellow. Well, except for Captain Patch. He had a new collar and tags but was spending more time inside, which made our walks real athletic adventures. I tried to get him to heel like Marissa had, but he wouldn't listen.

And the whole thing with the Stones? I decided, Forget it! As long as Patch wasn't getting out and running the risk of being hit by a car, what did I care?

But Wednesday I asked Mrs. Willawago, “Hey, have you gotten any more threats since that letter?”

“No, thank God! And Teri hasn't gotten any, either.”

Now, that should have been good, but something about it seemed strange to me. I mean, if the person who'd sent the letters and thrown the rocks was trying to make the rec center project go through, you'd think they'd be madder than ever after what had happened on Monday night, right?

But whatever. According to my number one news source, Hudson Graham, the rec center project was in limbo because there was now proof that Coralee Lyon owned Earl Clooney Management Systems, and instead of talking about batting cages and a sports café, people were talking about recalling ol' Blue Butt from the city council.

I played with the idea of sending her some suggestions for a new personalized plate. She could switch to CNCLCRK
.
O
R
LYNLYON
.
Or maybe just RECALME
.

Anyway, Wednesday I also told Mrs. Willawago that I couldn't keep walking her dog forever and that Thursday would have to be my last day for a while. I mean, I like Mrs. Willawago and all, and I like Captain Patch, but c'mon, I'd been doing this every day for a month. My heaven insurance was more than paid up.

Besides, I'd promised Marissa that on Friday I'd go straight to her house after school.

Mrs. Willawago was very nice about it, actually. She said, “You've been an angel of mercy, lamb, and I will always be so grateful for your help.” Then she told me that her physical therapist had been urging her to exercise her foot more and that she'd heard of a special harness you could put on dogs to make them easy to handle.

Now
she tells me.

But anyway, Thursday after school Mr. Pence and his science club were selling supersour suckers to raise money for some Rocket Wars Camp they're attending this summer. And since I
love
supersour suckers, I broke down and let Marissa buy me one. Normally, I don't let her spend money on me, even though she always offers. I guess you'd say it goes against my philosophy of friendship.

But they had supersour apple, so I couldn't resist. And since these are big, square, chunky suckers, there was plenty of pucker power left to my sucker by the time I got to Mrs. Willawago's.

It was trash collection day, so I dragged her empty trash can into her garage, then waited for the mailman, 'cause he was whistling his way up the street.

When he reached me, he handed over Mrs. Willawago's mail and motioned over to Appliance Andy's. “Do you know if the folks next door are on vacation? Their mail's piling up.”

I shrugged. “They're probably still in jail.”

His eyes popped. “Jail?” Then he put up a hand and said, “Never mind—I don't want to know,” and continued toward the Stones', whistling his merry little tune.

It did seem strange, though, that the Hairy Bowling Pins would still be in jail. Unless they hadn't been able to make bail or something. So I asked Mrs. Willawago about it when I went inside.

“Oh, lamb,” she said. “I found out this morning that Andy is a swindler! He's wanted in thirteen states for insurance
fraud! He's one of those deplorable people you hear about that preys on old people's fears. And imagine—him living right next door! I wonder if he ever phoned me. I get calls like that, you know. They were supposed to put an end to it, but I still get them!”

So. Appliance Andy was out of the picture. The threats had stopped. Maybe Mrs. Stone was right that it had been Andy making the threats. Maybe he wanted to sell his house and skip town.

Made sense.

I guess.

Mrs. Willawago squinted at me. “Why are your lips all green?”

I showed her my sucker, which I'd been holding politely by my side. “I'm supporting the science club,” I said with a grin, then popped it back in my mouth.

She laughed. “I'm going to miss you, you know that?”

All of a sudden I felt bad. I'd probably miss her, too.

Just not tomorrow.

Or over the weekend.

Or— “I know you have your own life to live … but maybe you can still come over once in a while?”

“Sure,” I said. “I'll have lots of time this summer.” Then I got the leash, and Captain Patch and I started our last adventure around the big block.

We went the way Patch always wants to go—west. Only this time he practically killed me, yanking me around the Stones' trash can. “Patch!” I shouted. “Patch, heel!”

“Yip-yap-arf! Yip-yap-arf!”
he barked, wagging and
wiggling. Then he smelled something delicious on the sidewalk, and off he went again, following one scent until it led to another, to another, all the way around the block.

Like always, he lunged for Leland Hawking, Esquire's sign, but this time I let him add a posting while I grinned about the orange CLOSED sign in the front window. It had been there since Tuesday. And as we rounded the corner, it occurred to me just how many secrets had come out in the past week. Mine, Coralee's, Appliance Andy's, Leland Hawking's …

And then I giggled with the thought that there was one more secret that was coming out of the closet on Friday.

Heather's!

So I took a delicious chomp and shattered what was left of my sucker, thinking how nice it was not to be sweating anything out. And as I passed by Appliance Andy's house, it hit me that confessing to Mrs. Ambler might have been one of the hardest things I'd ever done, but it was probably the
best
thing I'd ever done. I'm not talking goody-two-shoes stuff. I'm talking the best thing I'd ever done for my
self
.

Anyway, by the time I made it back to Mrs. Willawago's, all that remained of my supersour sucker was a well-chomped, soggy stick.

It was pretty gross, let me tell you. And since the Stones' trash can was still at the curb, real near where I'd go in the side gate to put Patch away, I went over, opened the lid, and tossed the stick inside.

Only as I was closing the lid, my eye caught on something. Something stuck to the inside wall of the can.

I opened the can again. The inside was wet from trash ooze, which was working like glue on scraps of garbage. And near the rim, one of those scraps was a full sheet of paper.