The Ghostwriter Secret (8 page)

Dana glared. He'd gotten kidnapped on Steve's last adventure, and apparently it was still a sore subject with him. “I don't want to be a Bailey Brother or an Ernest Plumly. I want to be a Dana Villalon, and I want to have a bowl of cereal and then go to sleep.”

“So an Ernest Plumly, then,” Steve said under his breath. Then he added, “Dana, the people I'm looking for are dangerous. I'll need a friend out there.”

Dana shook Steve's hand.

Steve smiled. “Welcome to the Brixton Brothers Detective Agency, chum!”

T
HE
B
AILEY
B
ROTHERS
' D
ETECTIVE
H
ANDBOOK
tells gumshoes how to start an investigation off right:

You can't fight crime on an empty stomach! If Shawn and Kevin are heading out to do fieldwork, their mom always packs them a nourishing picnic lunch! (And she always packs extra for the Baileys' chubby chum, Ernest Plumly.) Their basket's packed with turkey sandwiches, coleslaw, two pies (one apple, one banana cream), a batch of cookies, a few generous
slices of chocolate cake, and a Thermos full of fresh lemonade. You know, brain food!

Steve's mom had stopped packing his lunch in the fifth grade, and anyway, this morning she was still asleep, so Steve dumped a whole box of Fruit Roll-Ups and four pudding cups into his backpack.

He ran up to his room and grabbed his notebook, magnifying glass, flashlight, and the
Guinness Book of World Records
. Right now the secret compartment held a bunch of secret stuff, including one thousand dollars cash, a fifth of the money Fairview had given him on Sunday. (The rest was in a business savings account at the Ocean Park Credit Union.) He put everything in his backpack. Then he took a black permanent marker and crossed out the name his mom had written on the green fabric—he couldn't have “Steve Brixton” written on his stuff if he was going undercover. He put on his pack and tightened the straps.

Steve was ready to start sleuthing.

Dana knocked on the front door at seven forty-five. “Where do we start?” he asked.

“The Bailey Brothers always say, ‘Start with a little spadework.'”

“I have no idea what that means.”

“You know, digging up everything we can about the missing person. Friends, enemies, connections with criminal gangs or foreign countries unfriendly to the United States.”

“But we don't know anyone who even knows MacArthur Bart.”

“That's why we have to break into MacArthur Bart's hotel room,” Steve said. “Come inside. We need to put on our disguises.”

T
HE
B
AILEY
B
ROTHERS'
D
ETECTIVE
H
ANDBOOK
says:

The key to sneaking around where you don't belong is to act like you actually belong there. Think of developing a convincing backstory! For instance, in Bailey Brothers #13: The Secret Behind the Fun House Mirror, when Shawn Bailey goes undercover as a carnie, he makes up an appropriate nickname (Rock Salt) and invents a story about why he wears a beard (to cover a scar from a
tragic bumper car accident). When he tells his tale to gangs at the state fair, they accept him as one of their own!

“Keep it natural,” Steve whispered to Dana as he pushed the door open at the Sea Spray Waterfront Hotel. Steve and Dana were dressed as resort guests: They were wearing Hawaiian shirts and brightly colored board shorts. Steve had a camera around his neck (the camera didn't work, but nobody needed to know that). Dana had a straw hat on his head and a beach ball under his arm. “I'll take the lead,” Steve whispered. The two boys sauntered up to the front desk. Steve wanted to whistle a carefree tune but settled for humming instead.

The woman working today had a bright pink face and a brass name tag that said
LINDA, MANAGER
.

“Good morning,” she said pleasantly.

“Good morning, Linda,” said Steve. “I'm Sam and this is Otis. We're brothers, out here on a trip with our dad. We checked in yesterday, with Lewis, I believe.”

“Okay …,” said Linda.

“Boy, we're sure enjoying this California weather,” said Steve. “It's a different world in Ohio, where we're from.”

The manager nodded slowly.

“Tell me,” Steve said. “Do you guys have a doorman working at the hotel?”

“No,” said Linda. “Why?”

Just like he'd suspected! But there was no time to celebrate his discovery—he had to keep up his identity. “Just curious,” said Steve. “When our dad took us on another vacation to Hawaii we stayed at a hotel with a doorman.”

“Oh,” said Linda. “All right.”

Dana spoke up. “When we went to Hawaii, we visited Maui.” Nice! Dana was deep undercover.

“Well,” said Steve, “we'd better get to our room. Our dad's waiting for us. He's an engineer on the railroad, so he expects everyone to be punctual.”

“Sounds good,” said the manager.

Steve and Dana walked past the desk and turned the corner into a long hallway lined with doors.

“That was perfect!” said Steve. “Our story was airtight.”

Steve and Dana high-fived.

Just then, a pale old couple wearing huge wraparound sunglasses came walking in the opposite direction. Steve and Dana smiled and kept walking.

“How will we know which room is Bart's?” Dana asked.

“I've thought of that,” said Steve. “Yesterday the
guy at the front told me that MacArthur Bart has been ordering caviar, salmon, and cheese for every meal. But since he's been kidnapped, the food's been sitting outside his room.”

Steve stopped next to a silver plate, covered with a silver dome, that was sitting on the carpet in the hall. “All we have to do is find the plate that has Bart's meal, and we've got it. Voilà!” He bent down and whisked the shiny cover off the plate. Underneath were a few nibbled pizza crusts, a bowl of soggy lettuce, two dirty champagne flutes, and an empty green bottle.

“That's disgusting,” Dana said.

“Yeah.”

Steve and Dana strolled down the hotel's nearly endless corridors, peeking under covers at the platters underneath. They found half a croissant; a piece of French toast, soggy with syrup; the bones of some sort of fish (which made Steve gag violently); a glass smeared red with cocktail sauce and holding two white shrimp; pieces of eggshell and a tiny silver pedestal; a single asparagus shoot that looked like a fat-knuckled finger in brown sauce; a vegetal mash that smelled like gorgonzola cheese; a bunch of grapes and a sausage patty; and a plate of six Kobe beef sliders, cold but untouched. They climbed a flight of concrete stairs up to the second floor, walked nonchalantly past a maid
and her cart, and continued down another a hallway. There, on the only tray in the corridor, they discovered a bowl of glistening black caviar, a pink fillet of salmon, and a plate of pale and fragrant cheeses.

“We're here!” said Steve.

Dana popped a piece of cheese into his mouth. “That's good,” he said, chewing. “How are we going to get inside?”

T
HE
B
AILEY BROTHERS'
D
ETECTIVE
H
ANDBOOK
has a useful chapter called “Picking Locks”:

Picking locks is a breeze! It's also sometimes against the law! But if your heart is good and your intentions are noble, like Shawn and Kevin's, you've got nothing to worry about. Just:

1. take a credit card

2. insert it here

3. wiggle it around

4. and you're in!

Steve took out his Velcro wallet, opened it as quietly as he could (which was not very quietly), and took out his detective's license. It was a little bit flimsy.

“Do you have a credit card?” Steve asked Dana.

“Seriously?” asked Dana.

“Wait here,” said Steve.

He sprinted softly back down the hall, his footsteps muffled by the carpet's deep pile. When he got to the end, he froze, got down on the ground, and peered around the corner (it's always best to be above or below eye level when you're sneaking around).

There, twenty feet down the hallway, was the maid's cart, parked outside a room. Maybe there was something flat and thin on there. He tiptoed down the hall and ducked behind the cart. The door to the room was propped open, and Steve could hear the sound of flapping sheets as the maid made the bed.

Steve rummaged around the cart, looking for
something he could pick a lock with. A toothbrush handle would be too thick. The needle from a sewing kit wouldn't be thick enough. He put a bottle of lavender bubble bath in his pocket, but not because it would help him break into Bart's room—it was a gift for his mom.

From inside the room came the soft thudding of pillows being fluffed. Steve didn't have much time. He snuck around to the front of the cart, where, next to a set of keys and a half-full bottle of Diet Coke, sat a white plastic card with “Sea Spray Waterfront Hotel” written on it in cursive. Steve couldn't believe his luck. He slipped the card in his pocket—just as the maid walked out of the room with an armful of bed linens. She stopped suddenly and eyed Steve suspiciously.

“Can I help you?” she asked.

“Oh, I, uh, was looking for an extra washcloth.”

The maid smiled, but not warmly, and took a washcloth off her cart. “Here,” she said, her hand outstretched. “Next time just ask. Things go missing off these carts.”

Steve nodded quickly and hurried down the hall.

When he turned the corner, Dana was lifting a spoonful of caviar to his mouth.

“How is it?” Steve asked.

“Salty,” said Dana. “But good.”

“You know those are fish eggs, right?”

“Delicious fish eggs.”

Steve shook his head. “Look what I found.” He reached into his pocket, removed the card, and flashed it in front of Dana's face.