The Great Shelby Holmes (4 page)

3

B
efore
M
om
and
I
moved
,
D
ad
sat
me
down
for
a
talk
about
living
in
the
“
real
world
” (
aka
not
on
an army post). One thing he told me was that I shouldn't go looking for trouble, especially where the police were involved.

Apparently, Shelby's dad never had that talk with her, since she handed me Sir Arthur's leash and marched up to the police officers. “Hello, officers. What's going on?”

“Shelby!” An older white guy wearing an apron that matched his white hair emerged from the deli. “Look at what they did to my storefront!”

The metal security gate that was drawn over one side of the deli had A
GHRA
spray-painted across it in big red letters.

“Tell me everything that happened, Kristos,” Shelby insisted.

The deli's name was Kristos, so I deduced he was the owner.

(See, Shelby wasn't the only person who could figure out things without being told!

So there.

John Watson: one. Shelby Holmes: a gazillion.)

Before Kristos could tell his story, a woman with a badge on her belt appeared from inside the deli. She groaned upon seeing Shelby. “Leave this to the police, Holmes. We can handle this without your interference.”

“I'm sure you can, Detective Lestrade.” Shelby smiled sweetly at her. It was the first time I'd seen her smile, and it looked really unnatural on her.

“It's a basic case of vandalism, end of story.”

“Then you shouldn't mind if I take a teensy look around?” she asked the detective, her tone innocent. Shelby then turned toward Kristos. “Would you get me a Fudgsicle? I'm going to need
a lot
of sugar for this.”

Kristos obediently ran into the deli.

“Holmes,” the detective scolded. “I told you, we've got this.”

“Just like you had the guy who robbed Sal's last month?”

Lestrade narrowed her eyes. “That was pure luck, kid.”

Ah!
The free pizza finally made sense. (Shelby turning down said free pizza was still a mystery.)

“Just a quick glance.” Shelby reached into her backpack and took out a measuring tape. She began to measure the graffiti from every angle. She took a few steps back and then paced some more, talking to herself the entire time, until Kristos handed her the Fudgsicle.

Sir Arthur was lying on the ground, his legs stretched out. He knew we were going to be a while.

While Shelby studied the graffiti, I tried to think of what A
GHRA
could stand for.

This was what I came up with: absolutely nothing.

It was five letters. That wasn't a lot of evidence.

For a regular person.

Shelby approached the detective, who was talking to a fellow officer. “I assume you've been able to deduce that the vandal was Irish, about six foot one, with a rotator cuff injury on their right arm? Most likely a baseball pitcher. I doubt there are a great many people in the area who fit that description.”

“Is that true?” the police officer asked Lestrade. “How does she know that?”

“It's quite simple,” Shelby began to explain. “Generally, people write at eye level, and this graffiti is fairly high up on the gate, which explains the vandal's height. Also, handwriting tends to slope upward. This gradually slopes downward. That leads me to presume that the person's shoulder
has limited range.
A ghrá
is Irish for ‘my love.' The apartment building across the street is known as Little Dublin since the majority of residents are Irish students attending Columbia. This appears to be an act of love.” Her nose twitched as if she smelled something gross.

“That's incredible,” the officer remarked with his mouth slightly agape. His eyes lit up. “You're that girl? I've heard about you!” Lestrade quickly waved him off.

“New guy,” Lestrade muttered. “While it's always a pleasure to watch you work”—Lestrade said it in a way that let you know she felt
exactly
the opposite—“there's no need to blow this out of proportion. Vandalism happens every day. We're not going on a wild-goose chase for some guy solely because of your hunches. Seriously, Holmes, what do you expect us to do?”

Shelby stood up tall to the detective, although she was still two feet shorter than her. “How about your job?”

Uh-oh.

I might've been new to the neighborhood, but I was pretty sure getting sassy with a police officer was never a wise move. For anybody. I took a few steps back, wondering if I would draw suspicion if I ran as far away from Shelby as I could. Although I realized that not only did I have no idea where I was, we were definitely farther away than ten
blocks. First day on my own and I already broke one of Mom's rules.

“I don't have time for this, Holmes.” Lestrade turned toward Kristos. “Call if you discover anything missing,” she said before walking away.

The deli owner stood there, looking helpless.

“Don't worry, Kristos.” Shelby crossed her arms defiantly. “I'll get someone to clean up this mess until it's as good as new. I have a few people who owe me a favor or two.”

The short, stout man patted her on the head, a move that did not make Shelby extremely happy. “You take such good care of me. Do you want some more chocolate?”

“Like you need me to answer that.”

“What about your friend?”

Shelby seemed surprised I was still there. “Oh, Watson? He's diabetic, so he should probably have something else, like a piece of fruit or nuts.”

“How did—” I stopped myself. Of course Shelby knew I was diabetic. Was there anything she
didn't
know?

I declined Kristos's kind offer, since I was still craving pizza. We began walking home, mostly in silence. Shelby enjoyed her candy bar while I kept trying to figure her out. I went with John Watson's Foolproof Way to Make New Friends: ask questions and let the person talk until you find
some sort of common ground. It was something that I'd perfected over the years (and many moves).

“What type of music do you like?” I asked.

“Classical.”

“Favorite class?”

“Science.”

“Oh, yeah?”

No response.

I continued, “What kind of things do you do with your friends?”

Shelby replied by licking her fingers, which were caked in melted chocolate.

So much for that foolproof plan (since now I felt like a fool). Shelby was a tough code to crack.

I slowed down as we approached our brownstone, wondering if I should invite her to our apartment. We didn't have cable or Internet set up yet, but I could find the box with our
DVD
player. Maybe we could watch a movie. Or maybe she'd want to go to a park and toss a ball around. Something. Anything.

It wasn't like I thought she and I could be friends, but she was the only person I'd met close to my age. My options were limited. I didn't want to spend the afternoon alone, surrounded by boxes. While I was used to the moving, I didn't think I'd ever get used to being in this huge city, especially without Dad.

Shelby continued her rapid pace and took the stairs leading to the front door, with Sir Arthur trailing behind her. “Good-bye, Watson.” She didn't even look at me before the front door slammed shut.

I found myself standing outside our building, unnerved by how quiet our block was in the middle of the afternoon.

Now what was I supposed to do?

CHAPTER

4

“W
hat
'
d
you
do
today
?”
M
om
asked
as
she
washed
some
strawberries
in
the
sink
.

It was a normal question, but I wasn't sure how to respond. I couldn't make sense of Shelby. At first, she seemed like a really weird girl. Okay, she
still
seemed like a bit of a weirdo, but I couldn't help but be impressed by everything she could do.

“Um, I walked around the neighborhood a bit with Shelby.”

Mom paused. “The girl from upstairs?”

“That would be the one.” It wasn't like either of us knew anybody else in this place besides Mrs. Hudson.

“That sounds like fun. What did you see?”

I debated how much to tell Mom. She had some sort of lie detector in her brain and she could always, and I mean
always
, tell when I wasn't being truthful. She was also pretty understanding, but to a point.

“We just walked around. I saw this pizza place that looks good. And, um, we may have gone more than ten blocks.” I started talking really fast, hoping she would hear me out before she got mad. “But everybody knows Shelby and she's lived in the neighborhood her entire life and I didn't think it was a big deal. Plus, she has this dog and knows jujitsu and at no point did I feel threatened or unsafe.” (Well, except for Shelby threatening my self-esteem, but that was an entirely different matter.)

Mom dried off her hands. “Well, I'm sure she does, but I want you to be careful. This is a very different place from anywhere we've lived before.”

Oh, how true that was. We were pretty contained on the posts. There was only so much trouble you could find. But I had a feeling that New York City was the kind of place where it could find you. As I thought about Shelby, I wondered if trouble had already met me.

“When you're alone, I only want you going ten blocks,” Mom reminded me while she kept opening the kitchen cabinets. This always happened in each new home, trying to remember where we'd put everything. For people who moved a lot, we sure did have a ton of stuff. “Did you unpack the bowls today?”

I looked around at the boxes that still littered the kitchen and living room. “No.”

Mom sighed, not the annoyed sigh that Shelby had perfected, but the sigh of someone really tired. “I asked you to unpack more boxes.”

“Sorry.” I took the scissors off the island and began opening the boxes marked
KITCHEN
to find our dishes.

Mom placed her hands on my shoulders. “You know, John, we're staying here for good. There's no need to keep anything in boxes anymore.
This
is our home now.”

Home
. It was something I'd wanted for so long, but I still couldn't picture us here long-term. I still couldn't picture a life without Dad.

“Listen”—she leaned down so we were eye-to-eye, although she didn't have to bend down as much as she used to, since I'd grown a few inches this summer—“I know you're used to being in a new place, but this is different. Do you want to talk about it?”