"I didn't know you were friends with the DiSilvios," I said.
"I met Richard when I interviewed him about Mrs. Donaldson." Nina speared another shrimp and ate it. "Since he was the park's accountant, I wondered if he thought she embezzled the money."
Interested in spite of myself, I asked, "What did he say?"
"He's convinced she took the money, but it pained him to admit it." Nina sighed. "Richard trusted Myrtle Donaldson. He thought she was a loyal employee. A nice woman, a good person."
"What about her murder?"
"In Richard's opinion, she was murdered by someone who believed she'd hidden the stolen money in her house." Nina shrugged. "That's what the police think, too."
I gripped my soda can and looked her in the eye. "It's not what Arthur's grandmother thinks. She—"
"Oh, for heaven's sakes, Logan. You can't take that woman seriously. She has an opinion about everything. And not one of them has any basis in fact."
"I'd take her word over yours any day." I was mad now. "She'd never tell lies to my mother. She'd never sneak around with Billy and Silas. She'd never come to a party like this with all these phony people. She'd never talk about you behind your back!"
"You really are angry with me, aren't you?"
"Yes," I almost shouted. "I don't like you, and I don't trust you. And I'd never tell you anything Arthur and I know!"
Nina seized my shoulders and shoved her face so close to mine I could smell the shrimp she'd just eaten. "Listen to me, Logan. You're a nice kid and I don't want—" She broke off suddenly and veered in a different direction. "Leave crime solving to the police. Forget about Mrs. Donaldson. Stay away from the Magic Forest. You and Arthur both. Those ruins are in bad shape. You could get hurt playing there."
She bit into a small sandwich. "Take Richard's advice. Join a soccer team, make friends when school starts."
"I hate sports," I shouted. "And I had a friend until you ruined everything."
Nina waved her hand impatiently. "Well, join something else, then. A book club, a science club, a chess team. Just stop meddling. Stay away from—" She broke off when Rhoda appeared at her side.
"Nina, I've been looking everywhere for you," Rhoda said. "I want you to meet someone." Without a word or even a look at me, she swept Nina away.
Left alone, I wandered around the party looking for my parents. The guests certainly seemed to be enjoying themselves, drinking, eating, laughing, talking. I caught a glimpse of Johnny leaning across the bar, chatting with some guests. On the lawn, just beyond the reach of lights, Anthony and his friends were playing a rough game of soccer. The girls had gathered on the sidelines to cheer them on. Nina, Mr. DiSilvio, and Rhoda were surrounded by important-looking people.
I finally found my mother talking to a stylish woman about paint. "Try Ralph Lauren's earth tones," she told Mom. "They're fabulous."
Tugging Mom s arm to get her attention, I whined, "My stomach hurts. Can we go home?"
"Drink a soda fast, honey," the woman said. "It's the best cure I know for an upset stomach."
If Dad hadn't joined us, I would have been stuck at the party for hours. "Let's get out of here," he said. "I'm tired of socializing."
I slipped an arm around Dad's waist and leaned my head against his chest. "Me, too."
Mom and the woman parted with a hug and a promise to meet for lunch soon. We found Rhoda and said our goodbyes and our thank-yous.
As we headed toward our car, Nina called after me, "Behave yourself, Logan."
Mom laughed. "I'll see that he does," she promised.
At last we got into the only car in the neighborhood more than a year old and worth less than fifty thousand dollars. And drove away.
"Don't ever drag me to something like that again," Dad muttered to Mom. "Bores and Philistines and conservatives of the worst kind."
Mom sighed. "I thought it was a lovely party."
"I'm with Dad." I patted his shoulder. "That was absolutely the worst party I've ever gone to."
"Except for the food," Dad said. "Too bad we couldn't have ordered take-away."
To Mom's annoyance, we both laughed. It was a guy moment, a bonding thing, and I was happy when Dad reached back to tousle my hair.
17
Late that night, when I was sure Mom and Dad were asleep, I aimed my flashlight at Arthur's window. It took a lot of probing, beaming the light here and there, making it flit through the dark like a demented firefly, but I had to see him.
Finally, Arthur came to the window and stared across the space between us. "What do you want?" he asked in a grumpy voice.
"We've got to talk. Can you sneak outside and meet me?"
He nodded and disappeared. As quietly as possible, I crept downstairs and slipped out into the summer night. It was still hot. Thunder rumbled far away, and reddish heat lightning flickered across the dark sky. It was like looking at a battle being fought just over the horizon, the sky lit with rockets and the ground reverberating with artillery fire.
Arthur was waiting for me under a tree, arms folded across his skinny chest. Bear sat beside him, scratching fleas. "What do we have to talk about?" Arthur asked sarcastically. "Now that you're friends with Anthony?"
"I hate Anthony. Blame Mom, blame Nina, but don't blame me."
"What's Nina got to do with it?"
"Plenty." I told him about her phone call to Mom, leaving out what she'd said about his being an unsuitable friend. I let my mother take the blame for that.
"But how did Nina know what happened in the library?" Arthur asked.
"Silas," I said. "Silas told her. That's why he didn't follow us to the graveyard. He stopped to talk to her." For once I was ahead of Arthur.
"How would they know each other?" he asked, his face puzzled.
"Maybe she interviewed him about the murder," I said. "After all, he was a suspect for a while."
Arthur nodded. "She knows Billy and Johnny—why not
Silas, too?"
"Listen," I said, "there's more. Mom made Dad and me go to this disgusting party at the DiSilvios' house. Nina was there. She started talking to me, being all friendly and stuff. Then Mr. DiSilvio came over and joined in. He actually told me I should join a soccer team."
When Arthur laughed, I knew everything was all right and we were friends again.
"All of a sudden," I went on, "Mr. DiSilvio dropped the chummy act and told me to stay away from the Magic Forest—he owns the land, it's private property, it's dangerous, etc., etc., etc. He kept grinning, but I swear he was threatening me."
"Nina, Silas, Billy, Johnny, and now Mr. DiSilvio," Arthur said. "How does he fit in?"
I'd been asking myself the same question, but I shook my head, just as mystified as Arthur.
We sat under the tree for a while and listened to the thunder mutter a long way away. All around us, hidden in the dark leaves, the cicadas buzzed their monotonous serenade.
"Did you know Danny's living with Silas?" Arthur asked after a while.
"I wondered why I hadn't seen him."
Arthur picked up a stone and tossed it at our garbage can. He missed by a mile. "He wanted to take Bear, but Silas wouldn't let him."
The dog heard his name and wagged his tail. I reached out and patted his head. "Good dog," I whispered. "You're too smart to go with Danny."
"You'd think Violet would be glad to be rid of him," Arthur continued, "but she mopes around all day and cries all night. Then May cries. It's driving me nuts."
"Have you talked to Violet about the finding game?" I asked.
"I haven't had a chance, what with Danny going off with Silas, and her being all sad and weepy."
Arthur picked up another stone and aimed again at the garbage can. This time he actually hit it with a loud clang. Bear started barking. Dad came to the window and shouted, "Shut up, Bear!"
Arthur and I froze in the shadows under the tree. Bear snorted and lay back down. Without seeing us, Dad went back to bed.
"It's
better when you miss," I told him.
"I didn't think it would make so much noise." Arthur yawned and stood up. "I got to go, but let's talk to Violet tomorrow."
Glad the darkness hid my face, I said, "This is really embarrassing, but Mom won't let me go to your house anymore—thanks to Nina and her lies."
"That Nina." Arthur scowled. "How about meeting at the library around ten? If Mrs. Jones lets us in, that is."
"Mom made me give back the map and apologize to Mrs. Bailey and Mrs. Jones," I said. "They didn't act mad or anything."
With a sigh, Arthur walked off into the darkness. Bear lumbered after him, his tags jingling.
All alone, I slipped silently into the murder house.
The next morning, I hopped on my bike and sped away before Mom had a chance to stop me. When I got to the library, I saw Arthur's old Raleigh lying on the sidewalk. I locked mine to the bike rack and went inside. A new poster caught my eye. In great big letters it said: PROTEST THE DESTRUCTION OF THE MAGIC FOREST! And below that, in slightly smaller print, was this: "Bulldozers go into action at 8 A.M. Tuesday August 25. Help us stop them!" Near the bottom of the poster it said: "Come as your favorite nursery rhyme characters. Be There at Sunrise!"
A young woman standing nearby gave me a big smile. "I'm going dressed as Mama Bear," she said. "My husband's Papa Bear, and our little boy is Baby Bear. I made the costumes for Halloween last year."
"Great," I said. "That's really great." A little weird, I thought, but definitely interesting.
"Meet us in the park tomorrow. My family will be there at four A.M., but most people won't arrive until six or seven." She smiled. "Bring all your friends—the more we have, the better."
I nodded, and she walked off with an armload of books. I didn't tell her that bringing all my friends meant exactly one person.
Arthur sat at a table in the children's room. Violet was with him. May sat between them, playing with the plastic gingerbread men. The copy of the note and one of the Magic Forest maps lay beside Violet's elbow.
"She knows what the note means," Arthur whispered. "She figured it out last night."
Violet glanced around the library. Not far away, Mrs. Bunions browsed through a rack of romance paperbacks. Near her, a man sat in the reference area, his face hidden behind a newspaper. Several other adults wandered among the shelves, looking for books.
"When I was little," Violet said in a low voice, "Mom used to take me to the Magic Forest while she worked. She let me play anywhere I liked, but I never went near the Witch's Hut—I was really scared of her."
Arthur turned to me to explain. "The witch was life-size. She had a green face and a long nose, and she was really ugly. Hideous, in fact. Every ten minutes or so, she'd pop out of the hut door, wave her arms, and cackle. I thought she was a real live crazy woman. You wouldn't believe the nightmares I had about her escaping from the hut and chasing me."
Violet shuddered. "I thought the same thing." She picked up one of the little plastic gingerbread men. "There was a fence made of twelve wooden gingerbread men like these. They stood in a row, holding hands along the path leading to the witch's door. They were kind of cute and kind of scary at the same time. But they didn't frighten me the way the witch did."
She smiled at May. "When I was around your age," she went on, "Mom decided I was too big to be scared of a silly old fake witch. One day, she told me she'd thought of a game to play. To make me brave."
May looked up at Violet. "I'm not very brave. I'm scared of spiders and spooky things in the dark and witches under my bed and wolves in my closet."
I felt like saying I wasn't very brave, either, but I kept my mouth shut and waited for Violet to go on with her story.
"At lunchtime," Violet said, "Mom and I ate our sandwiches on a bench near the path to the Witch's Hut. One day after we d eaten, she showed me a little plastic gingerbread man."
"Like these?" May toyed with the little men. She'd put them in a circle, so each one had a hand to hold.
Violet nodded. "Mom walked over to the first gingerbread man, the one farthest from the hut. She hid the plastic figure in the grass near it. If I could find it, she said I could keep it—a prize for being brave."
May leaned against her mother's side. "That sounds easy."
"It was," Violet said. "All I had to do was poke around in the grass at the feet of the first gingerbread man and find my prize. I was nowhere near the hut, so I wasn't scared."
"What color was it?" May asked. "Red? Green? Yellow?" She held up the little men one at a time.
Violet smiled at May. "I think it was red."
May slid a red man across the table to her mother. "There's your prize, Mommy."
Violet swept the little man into the palm of her hand. "The next day," she went on, "Mom hid a blue man near the second gingerbread man. The day after that, she hid a green one near the third gingerbread man."
"Your mommy was mean to make you go closer and closer to the hut," May said.
Violet shook her head. "No, honey, she was trying to show me there was nothing to be scared of."
Turning to Arthur and me, she went on, "Some days, I didn't win a prize because I was too scared. I'd have to try again the next day."
While Violet talked, May had counted the gingerbread men. "Eleven!" she said. "Did you get them all?"
Violet shook her head. "Mom hid the twelfth one in front of the last gingerbread man—right next to the witch's doorstep. Just as I got close, the hut door flew open and out came the witch, waving her arms and cackling. As much as I wanted the last little man, I ran to Mom, bawling my head off. I never went near the hut again."
She paused to smooth May's hair out of her eyes. "After a while, I got too old for the Magic Forest. I forgot about the finding game and the witch."
"Maybe he's still there," May said. "We could go and look for him."
"It's too late now," Violet said. "I'd never find him. The whole park is a jungle of weeds and kudzu vines. I wouldn't know where to look."
"The hut is right here." Arthur stabbed the map with his finger. "I know we can find it!"
Violet stared at him. "Find what, Arthur? A tumbledown shack, a little plastic man?"
"The briefcase!" Arthur was so excited he almost shouted. Mrs. Bunions turned, her finger to her mouth to shush us, but the man with the paper kept on reading as if he hadn't heard a thing.
"Don't you see?" He lowered his voice. "It has to be buried near the Witch s Hut."
"Do you really think it's still there?" Violet whispered.
"Yes, but not for much longer," Arthur said. "Once the bulldozers destroy the place, the briefcase, the money, and the evidence will be gone forever, and we'll never know who killed your mother."
"Suppose Silas already has it," I said. "He's got the note, he's got the map."
"Yes, but Violet s the only one who knows about the finding game. And she hasn't told Silas." He swung toward Violet. "Right?"
Violet nodded. "He might have the note, but he'll never figure it out."
Arthur jumped to his feet, earning another sharp look from Mrs. Bunions. "We've got to go to the Magic Forest right now!" He headed toward the door, expecting us all to rush after him.
"But, Arthur," Violet said, "I have to be at work in an hour."
"Can't you call in sick or something?"
"If I lose any more time, they'll fire me. And I can't afford—"
"When do you get off work?" Arthur interrupted.
"About ten thirty tonight, but—"
"We'll meet you at Wal-Mart," Arthur said. "And you can drive us to the park."
Violet hesitated. "Do we have to go there in the dark? Can't we wait until my day off or something?"
"The bulldozers are coming to demolish the place tomorrow," Arthur said. "It's tonight ... or never."
The disgustingly wimpy part of me wanted to say, "Never. Let it be never." But instead I said, "You don't have to come with us, Violet. We can find it without you. "
/> "I want to be there," she said in a low voice. "I owe it to my mother."
"Can I come, too?" May asked.
Violet hugged her. "Absolutely not. Your bedtime is seven thirty."
When May started to protest, Violet stacked up a pile of picture books. "Mrs. Jenkins can read these to you tonight."
"All of them?" May asked.
"That's up to Mrs. Jenkins." Violet gave her another hug and kissed her forehead. "Be a good girl tonight, and I'll treat you to ice cream tomorrow."
After Violet checked out her books, Arthur and I followed her and May out of the library and into the blazing heat of the August morning. As they drove away, I found myself wishing I could go to bed with a stack of books instead of traipsing around the Magic Forest looking for something we'd probably never find. And maybe running into someone we didn't want to meet in a dark place.
"I sure could use a nice cold soda," Arthur said. "Do you have any money?"
I had enough to buy one can of root beer at the rundown gas station on Laurel Avenue. In the park across the street, I drank half and passed the can to Arthur. Pigeons ambled around in circles, cooing to themselves in sad voices, and sparrows hopped here and there, picking crumbs out of cracks in the pavement.
With my head tipped back, I gazed across the dusty crab-grass at a granite pedestal topped by a life-size bronze statue of the town's founder, Robert Arthur Beale, 1841-1913. Shoulders splattered with bird droppings, he stood tall and gazed into the distance, most likely envisioning a city of the future, a place of real significance—not a little backwater town like Bealesville.
On a bench across from ours, two old men slumped side by side, just like Arthur and me. If we stayed in Bealesville long enough, we'd be sitting here when we were old, complaining about the heat and the cost of living, just like them.
Suddenly, a shadow slanted across my feet. I looked up to see Mr. DiSilvio standing in front of me, his back to the sun. "Well, hello, Logan," he said, flashing his white teeth in a big Hollywood smile.
"Oh—um—hi," I stammered, going from relaxed to tense in about one second. That was how the man affected me. Desperate for something to say, I asked, "Have you met Arthur Jenkins?"