The Case of the Barfy Birthday (6 page)
“They’re in Oklahoma, attending the Poultry Producers’ Prancing Promenade. My grandma’s the only one here. And she can’t lift Dolly.”
“Fire department?” asked Drake.
“I already tried them. They said they’d be right over, ’cause they ain’t had a pork barbecue for about a week now and they was starved. ’Course I told them thank you kindly, but never mind. Don’t you see? You just
gotta
save Dolly.”
“Well,” said Drake. “Looks like it’s up to us.”
“But what can we do?” asked Nell. “We can’t just lasso her and pull her up. She must weigh one hundred eighty pounds.”
“Two hundred,” corrected Jessie.
Both Drake and Nell gasped. Drake crunched a few numbers with his calculator. Meanwhile, Nell glanced around, searching for something to help them. There were a few things—a shovel, a tarp, an old rusty swing set—but not much.
“We must return to the lab,” said Drake.
“Agreed,” said Nell.
“We’ll be back in an hour,” said Drake.
“Please hurry,” said Jessie, wiping away a tear. “My heart’s about broke.”
So off they rode, with Dr. Livingston racing ahead.
A
s Jessie watched Drake and Nell ride away, the little lump in her throat became a big lump.
“Don’t you worry none, Dolly,” cried Jessie into the pit. “Doyle and Fossey, Science Detectives, are gonna save you . . . at least I think they are.” She suddenly realized she didn’t know much about Doyle and Fossey. Maybe they could save Dolly, but maybe they
couldn’t
. Maybe . . . maybe . . .
Jessie dug in her pocket and pulled out another business card. “Frisco,” the card read. She’d been warned that his prices were steep and that he wasn’t nearly so polite as Doyle and Fossey. But if he could save Dolly . . .
Jessie ran into the house to make a quick phone call.
• • •
Meanwhile, back at the lab, Drake and Nell had already read the section in their handy reference book titled: “Porker Problems: What to Do When a Big Fat Pig Has Fallen into a Pit and Can’t Get Out.”
“We need to formulate a plan,” said Drake, pushing his glasses up.
“A foolproof plan.” Nell took a quick gulp of decaf. “Because if it fails . . . well, the possibilities are just too horrible to imagine.”
“Here’s what I think we should do,” said Drake, and they put their heads together and formulated a foolproof plan.
After gathering all the necessary equipment, they set out again, pedaling like mad. (With Nell’s decaf in a to-go mug.) But when they arrived in Jessie’s backyard, what they saw was shocking beyond words.
They saw Frisco and Baloney tugging on a rope that led out of the pit.
“Ugh!”
“Grunt!”
OINK!
Now, in case you didn’t know, Baloney was Frisco’s best friend and easily the biggest kid at Seaview Elementary School. If anyone could pull one big fat pig from a pit, it was Baloney. Drake knew from experience just how big Baloney was, as he often sat on Drake if Drake came too close or if Baloney just happened to feel like sitting on something. (Having Baloney sit on you was rather like having a refrigerator sit on you, or a rhinoceros.)
Drake was so shocked that he dropped his armload of equipment with a clatter. “Great Scott!”
Nell dropped her decaf. “Oh my gosh!”
Woof!
said Dr. Livingston.
“Hey, look who’s here,” said Baloney, stopping for a breather. “It’s those other guys.”
Nell put her hands on her hips. “Better known as Doyle and Fossey, Science Detectives.”
Frisco frowned. “What’re
you
doing here?”
“We were hired by Ms. Simmons to handle this most difficult case,” said Drake.
“Oh yeah?” said Frisco. “Well, so was I. And I was here first, so beat it, brainiacs.”
Jessie broke in between them. “Y’all, please. It’s my fault, I reckon. You see, I hired all y’all. I—I just want someone to save Dolly. It don’t matter who. Please don’t make a fuss. Please save her.
Please
.”
Frisco snorted. “Well, so long as they stay out of our way and let us men do our job.” And he and Baloney went back to pulling on their rope.
“Ugh!”
“Grunt!”
OINK!
Nell murmured to Drake. “Jessie must have lassoed Dolly for them. At this rate, not only will it take them all day, but Dolly will still be in the pit by the end of it and very sore, besides.”
“Agreed,” said Drake. “They’re going about it all wrong.”
“Shall we?” asked Nell.
“Indeed,” replied Drake. “Let’s get to work.”
And so they did.
With Jessie’s help, they moved the old rusty swing set into position. They suspended ropes. They hung pulleys. They tied knots. They scratched Dr. Livingston behind his ears.
Finally, Jessie climbed a rope ladder down into the pit and attached a harness to Dolly. Then Jessie climbed back up. (But not before she gave Dolly a few hugs and whispered some sweet nothin’s.) “Ready,” she said.
“All systems go!” cried Drake.
“Stand back, Frisco and Baloney,” cried Nell, “and let the
real
scientists do their work!”
And with some gentle tugging, Drake and Nell drew in the rope a foot at a time, while the pulleys turned. It was easy work, really. They scarcely broke a sweat. And Dolly rose up out of the pit, lickety-split.
Oink!
“Hey!” cried Frisco and Baloney. “No fair!”
Then, with a quick lasso from Jessie, Dolly was hauled to the side and released. “Oh, Dolly!” Jessie wrapped her arms around Dolly.
Oink!
oinked Dolly, wagging her little piggy tail.
It was quite a tender moment, really. (Drake dabbed his eyes with a hankie.)
Jessie said, “You done saved my little pig’s life, Drake and Nell. How were you able to do it when Frisco and Baloney couldn’t?”
“Simple,” said Frisco, scowling. “They were cheating.”
Drake adjusted his glasses. “Frisco is right. It was simple. But it wasn’t cheating. Allow Scientist Nell to explain.”
“Thank you, Detective Doyle. To begin with, moving a pig out of a pit requires a lot of work.”
“Tell me about it,” mumbled Baloney.
“However, simple machines help make work simple,” said Nell.
“Hence the name ‘simple machines,’” added Drake.
Nell continued, “With the help of simple machines—pulleys in this case—Detective Doyle and I were able to do the work using less force. You see, pulleys are like miniature wheels.”
“Quite handy, really,” said Drake.
“The first thing pulleys can do for us is change the direction of the force.” Nell drew a quick sketch in her notebook. “Instead of having to pull a load
upward
, one pulley and a rope can let you pull
downward
.”
“Which,” mentioned Drake, “makes the work easier.”
“Blah, blah,” said Frisco. “Easier, schmeasier.”
“The second thing pulleys do for us,” said Drake, “is divide the load, again making the work easier. Scientist Nell?”
“Thank you, Detective Doyle. You see,
work
is defined as the
force,
or weight of an object, multiplied by the
distance
to be moved. In our case, we had to lift a two-hundred-pound pig out of a twenty-foot pit.”
“But by using a multiple pulley system—” said Drake.
“Dolly’s weight, or force, was divided between each of the pulleys.” Nell drew another sketch. “Now, let’s say, instead of pulling a rope with a force of two hundred pounds, we pull a rope with a force of, say, fifty pounds, or twenty. It just depends on how many pulleys we use.”
“All we have to do is pull more rope,” added Drake.
“Again, far easier. Force is traded for distance,” said Nell. “It takes more rope and a little more time to set up, but it’s not nearly so hard.”
“Simple, if I do say so myself,” remarked Drake.
“I just can’t thank y’all enough,” said Jessie. “Doyle and Fossey, you’re everything everyone said you’d be.”
“Hey, what about me?” asked Frisco.
Jessie scuffed the dirt with her cowgirl boot. “Well, you’re everything everyone said you’d be, too, I reckon.”
Nell handed her their business card. “Call us. Anytime.”
Back in the lab once again, Drake wrote in his lab notebook:
For a hard day’s work, it was a snap.
Jessie and Dolly reunited at last.
Received free lasso lessons.
Paid in full.
Contents
Brainteasers for Bacteria Busters:
Epidemiology
Be a Bird Buddy: Wildlife Habitats
Dry-Ice Blaster: Phases of Matter
Trouble in the Tree House:
Simple Machines
