Finders Keepers (7 page)

I slipped out of the conversation because I couldn't stop thinking.

Secret money.

Hideouts.

Basements.

Tunnels.

I looked at Matt, wondering what else he knew. Then Matt looked at me, like he was wondering what else I knew. While my parents cleaned up, Matt and I stared at each other. I didn't trust him, and his eyes said he didn't trust me, either.

 

THE ATV AND THE ARGUMENT

Alex Clark was the luckiest kid in the world and the entire universe, probably. First he got to live in Hayward, and second his family knew gangsters, and third his grandpa went to a yard sale and bought a used ATV.

“ATV” means all-terrain vehicle. An ATV is like a supersized tricycle only with an engine. It's fast. Tornado fast. You need gas, a helmet, and parental authority to ride it. All I'd wanted was to ask Grumpa about the loot, but then he brought the ATV out of the shed. After that I couldn't think of anything except racing that ATV through the ditches.

All afternoon Grumpa taught Alex how to drive the ATV. And he taught me how to sit behind Alex and not pester him about driving it, too.

“Can we take it on gravel roads?” I asked.

“Maybe.”

“Do we have to wear helmets?” The helmet trapped sweat in my hair and made my head itch. “It's so hot.”

“Hell's bells, Minnow. I'm surprised your parents don't make you wear a helmet in the shower.”

Grumpa, Alex, and I left the ATV by the shed and walked to the porch for something to drink. Wisconsin summers drenched everything with a warm mist. Humidity. The air was sweating, basically. Grumpa drank water, but Alex and I downed cold orange sodas.

Alex let out a refreshing orange-soda burp and said, “Now that I know how to drive an ATV, can I drive the speedboat?”

“One thing at a time.”

“Grumpa, why can't I drive the ATV and have Alex ride behind me?”

Grumpa took off his fishing hat and wiped the sweat from his forehead. He didn't have much hair. Why didn't he let the wind blow the little strands around? “Minnow, you have an unmagic touch. I don't need you driving an ATV through my shed.”

“I won't! I'll be careful. Very, very careful.”

“Let's review history. Four summers ago, you put a baseball through my kitchen window. Three summers ago, you tried to set the lawn on fire with a magnifying glass. Two summers ago, you—”

“None of those accidents involved an all-terrain vehicle!”

Alex dropped to the grass and rolled around laughing. He had a stupid laugh. He hee-haw laughed like a sick mule. “Set the grass on fire? Oh my God! Hilarious!”

“Okay, kids, enough. I've got fish on ice in the shed. They ain't going to clean themselves,” Grumpa said. “Go find something to do.”

CHASING AL CAPONE'S GANG THROUGH THE STREETS OF CHICAGO

The Adventure:
Motorcycle police trying to arrest Capone and his crooks

The Place:
The busiest street in Chicago (Grumpa's driveway)

The Characters:
Chase Truegood (me) and Buck Punch (Alex)

The Wardrobe/Props:
Motorcycle (the not-moving, not-running ATV), police badges (pickle jar covers with duct tape), handcuffs (Amelia's headbands), police guns (squirt guns), helmets (helmets), and rope (rope)

Chase Truegood and Buck Punch have survived many adventures, but trying to arrest Al Capone and his gang might be their last.

Sheriff Duncan assigned the team to the Capone case. Capone escaped the long arm of the law whenever Sheriff Duncan tried to arrest him. It was up to Chase and Buck to get Capone once and for all.

Chase and Buck parked their motorcycle outside a bar where Capone was selling his illegal booze.

“This stakeout might be our most dangerous,” Buck said. “I think Capone knows we're undercover.”

“Me, too. But Sheriff Duncan will fire us if we don't stay on the case. I can't afford to lose this job. I'd have to sell the orphanage, and all the kids would be homeless.”

“Chase! Look! It's Capone leaving the bar.”

“And his assistants, too!”

Capone strutted down the sidewalk with his assistants Matt Fat-Cat and Mr. Walt Miller. Capone got in the backseat of his limousine while Mr. Walt Miller loaded cases of booze in the trunk. The driver rolled down the window, and that driver was Chase's sister Jade.

“Jade lied.” Chase pointed at the limo. “She didn't leave us to explore the Amazon. She's actually working for Capone!”

“I knew it!” Buck said.

“I knew it first!” Chase said.

“I learned how to detect liars back in Arizona,” Buck shouted. “But I don't have time to explain it to you. They're driving away. We have to go!”

The team raced down a busy Chicago street in hot pursuit of Capone. Their motorcycle weaved in and out of traffic, barely missing a semitruck carrying dynamite. Buck steered onto the sidewalk to avoid hitting a school bus.

“Time to let me drive,” Chase shouted. “We might have to jump a ramp. That's my special skill.”

“We'll lose sight of Capone if I stop. We gotta keep moving!”

“Look!” Chase pointed. “Capone is stopping for gas. Pull over!”

“I'll circle the gas station.”

“No!” Chase shouted. “I have to drive. Only I understand where Jade might drive the limo. We must change places!”

Buck got off the motorcycle and switched spots with Chase. She straddled the bike and clenched the handlebars. Then off they zoomed! Soon they were inches from Capone's bumper. Buck pulled out his gun and fired, trying to hit the tires of the limo.

“You hit a bump!” Buck shrieked as he fell off the cycle and rolled in the dirt.

The motorcycle tipped as Chase slammed the brakes. It slid on its side, nearly taking off Chase's head as it skidded under a semi. She leaped off the cycle and emerged unhurt on the other side of the truck.

“Buck?” Chase dropped to her knees to check on her partner.

He sputtered and coughed. “I knew you were a bad driver … but … didn't wanna say … didn't wanna make you mad.”

“What's going on?”

Standing a few feet away was Neil, his face screwed into the maddest of mad expressions. We hadn't noticed our parents' cars pulling into the driveway.

“Nothing.” Alex stood up and brushed the dirt off his shorts. Neil just stared until Alex said, “Dad, it's just an ATV.”

“I know what it is. Where in the world did it come from?”

“Grandpa,” Alex said. “Grandpa gave it to me.”

While Neil yelled, and Grumpa yelled back, Mom took me by the hand and led me into the cabin for dinner.

Neil shouted that there's no way Alex would be allowed to drive that thing, even if he's slow and careful, because he could get killed. Then Grumpa said parents should stop treating kids like fine china and let them have some fun. Then Neil said kids' safety is more important than fun. Then Grumpa said if Alex hadn't been living in Ari
stona
all this time he could've been spoiling the kid a long time ago. Then Neil yelled at Grumpa about being forced to work when he was a kid and never having a real childhood. Then Grumpa said they'd fished together sometimes on Sundays and wasn't that fun, dammit?

Mom shut the windows, and I couldn't hear the rest.

 

THE LOOT AND THE SECRET

We had Grumpa cornered, basically. He was watching TV in his recliner, away from the distraction of broken pipes and the canoe rescue and the ATV. So we pounced.

“Tell us about the loot! Pleeeeeeease! Tell us!” Alex begged.

“Go find something to do. I want my nap.”

Grumpa slept every afternoon in the recliner. He napped with his gray fishing hat on his head, his hands folded on his chest, and the remote control on his lap. Before his nap, he had a cheese sandwich, potato chips, and an orange soda. He ate on paper towels so he didn't make dirty dishes. Every day, it was the same lunch, served on paper towels, followed by a nap. I liked this about Grumpa. He didn't need to change things all the time.

“Go on. Out.” Grumpa waved his arm at us.

Alex looked at me and shrugged. I couldn't believe he was going to give up so easily. I cleared my throat and said, “Why'd your mom use the words ‘blood money'?”

“Hell's bells. The past is the past.”

“But it's history!” I said. “History is important.”

“Family history's real important,” Alex added. “I lived in Arizona too long. Nobody told me about the money. Does Dad know?”

Grumpa turned down the volume on the TV. “History my rear end. You kids can't resist a secret, and these days you don't have to. You just type on that Internet, and the computer tells you everything whether it ought to or not. You ever heard of skeletons in the closet?”

We shook our heads.

“We used to call family secrets ‘skeletons in the closet,' and we kept our mouths shut and the skeletons stayed put. I sure as heck didn't tell your dad, Alex. We were busy earning a living, and I didn't need my boy running around town looking for trouble.”

“Okay. Just wondering,” Alex said. He turned and walked past the recliner. I grabbed his arm before he could leave the room.

“I think Alex is saying he doesn't know anything about his family. He's counting on you to tell him.”

“I'm just wondering is all,” Alex said. “Just wondering.”

Grumpa sighed all big. Finally he turned off the television, and we sat on the old shag carpet, ready for the story. He pointed at a picture on the wall behind the sofa. It was an old wedding photo, from the time when pictures were black and white and people wore funny hats. The people weren't smiling, and their eyes looked hard, so I knew right away they had to be Grumpa's parents.

“Those are my parents, Ernie and Hillary. You heard the phrase about a person working hard as a horse? Well, my mother worked harder than a hundred horses. She was like my wife, Ginny. They both believed honest work made a good life. They were kind and smart and good to the core. My mother always said, ‘What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his soul'?”

“That sounds like Dr. Phil,” Alex said. “Mom watches him on TV.”

“It's from the Bible!” Grumpa grumped. “Don't they teach you anything at school? It means money ain't everything.”

Grumpa put the recliner's footrest down and dropped his feet to the floor. Alex looked at me and cleared his throat. I reached into my back pocket and pulled out a piece of history—a wrapped candy anise ball.

I had a few of those disgusting balls in the back of a drawer. Last year at the candy store, Dad had told me anise balls were popular in the olden days, so I decided to try a few. And what I learned was kids in the olden days did not have taste buds, because anise balls tasted like cough syrup.

I held the anise ball in front of Grumpa's face. Not a bribe, Alex had said, but a gift from two nice kids. Kids who cared.

“Now what in the world is that?”

“We got it for you, Grumpa. An anise ball. Candy from the olden days.” I held it under his nose, the way you tease a dog with a meatball you don't want to eat because Mom cooked it in mushroom gravy.

Sure enough, Grumpa reached out his hand and took the candy. He peeled off the wrapper and popped it in his mouth. Either he smiled a little or the anise ball forced his mouth muscles to move. His eyes seemed to soften and lose focus. I wondered if the anise balls were bringing him back to the olden days. Then he said, “What I'm about to tell you kids has never been spoken. I guess it don't matter much anymore. Everyone who knew anything is dead.”

A
L
C
APONE AND THE
C
LARK
F
AMILY
L
OOT

Years ago, people drank a lot of alcohol. They drank like stray cats in front of bowls of milk. Some of them drank so much they became mean and stupid. Those drunks weren't taking care of their families. My mother, Hillary Clark, believed if drinking was against the law, then people wouldn't do it. Lots of people saw it her way. So the government banned alcohol, but the whole plan backfired.

Nobody likes to be told what to do. When you can't have something, you want it even more. And if people want something and they got money to buy it, someone will find a way to make and sell it. Don't matter what the law says. So people kept drinking. Since they couldn't buy alcohol in stores or bars, they bought it from crooks.

Let me tell you, it was a good time for crooks. There was a fortune to be made selling booze. They called it bootlegging. Al Capone was king of the bootleggers. He was tough and mean, and he'd do anything to earn a buck. Capone didn't work alone, of course. He needed helpers. He needed guns and fists and booze and secret bars and ways to deliver booze to those secret bars.

In the Northwoods, two of his helpers were my father and grandfather.

My family ran a nice restaurant in the same spot as Clarks Pizza. You would have needed to go to Duluth to find anything nicer. We served sirloin steaks—never fillets—because sirloins have the most flavor. Pops cooked them in bacon grease. Capone said our sirloins were better than any restaurant's in Chicago.

We never quit selling booze, even when it was illegal. We moved the bar into the basement. My mother thought alcohol ruined lives, but Pops loved it. He couldn't get enough. He liked drinking it even more than he liked selling it.