The Chocolate Fudge Mystery (2 page)

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Authors: David A. Adler

BOOK: The Chocolate Fudge Mystery
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Chapter Two
“
Y
ou can’t just follow people,” Eric said. “There must be some law against doing that. And anyway, we came here to sell candy, not to play detective.”
“I’m not playing. I
am
a detective and you know it. I’ve already caught a few criminals. You helped me. Now are you coming with me or not?”
Cam started to follow the woman. Eric grabbed the shopping bag and joined her.
Crinkle! Crinkle!
“Shh,” Cam said.
Crinkle! Crinkle!
“Shh!” she said again.
Eric whispered, “I can’t help it. It’s the rice cakes. They make noise when they move around in the bag.”
Brooom! Brooom!
A gardener was mowing a lawn across the street.
Cam and Eric saw the woman stop in front of a blue house, right next to two garbage cans. She looked quickly to the right and then to the left. Then she lifted the lid of a garbage can and dropped the plastic bag in.
Cam and Eric watched as she crossed the street. She walked quickly past the gardener and into a large white house.
When the door closed, Cam said, “Let’s see what’s in that bag.”
“We have no right to look in there. It’s not our garbage,” Eric told her.
“It’s garbage,” Cam said. “She threw it away. Now it belongs to anyone who wants it. There might be evidence of some terrible crime in there. That’s why she crossed the street to throw it away. Maybe she robbed a bank and the bag is filled with those small paper bands they put around the money.”
“And maybe the woman had a party last night,” Eric said. “She’s wearing dark glasses because her eyes hurt. She’s wearing a long coat because underneath it, she has on a nightgown. This morning, she was too tired to get completely dressed. And there was so much trash from her party that she couldn’t fit it all in her own garbage can.”
When Eric finished talking he smiled and folded his arms.
“Maybe you’re right,” Cam said. “Let’s find out.”
Cam walked ahead and Eric followed her. They had reached the blue house. Cam was about to lift the lid of the garbage can.
“Stop!” Eric said. “Don’t lift that lid.”
“Why not?”
“It’s not your garbage,” Eric said.
“Oh, that’s silly.”
Cam began to lift the lid again.
“Stop!” Eric told her. “There may be a bomb in there.”
Chapter Three
C
am very gently put the lid down.
Eric said, “You know, we were told in safety class not to go near strange packages.”
Cam stepped away from the garbage can. She closed her eyes and said,
“Click.”
“What are you trying to remember?” Eric asked.
Cam
“clicked”
again. Then she said, “I was looking at the pictures I had in my head of that woman carrying the bag. She wasn’t holding it like she was afraid it would explode. And she just dropped it in the garbage can. She wouldn’t have done that if there was a bomb inside.”
Cam lifted the lid again. She opened the bag and looked inside,
“What do you see? What’s in there?” Eric asked.
“Lots of apple peels.”
Cam shook the bag.
“There’s an empty skim milk carton under the peels and an empty box of oat bran,” Cam said.
Eric leaned closer.
“Yuck,” he said. “It stinks.”
Then he looked in and said, “Maybe the paper money bands are at the bottom.”
Cam rolled up her sleeves and dug into the bag.
“What’s in there?” Eric asked.
“More garbage.”
Cam pulled out a few soda cans, some paper plates, an orange juice carton, and a cereal box.
“Super Sweet Wheats!” Eric said. “And the box top is still attached.”
He tore the top off the cereal box. “I can send this in and get a Super Sweet Wheats watch,” he said. He put the box top in his pocket.
Cam shook the bag again. She reached in and took out a large envelope. It was empty.
“Nothing but garbage,” she said. Then she put it all back in the bag.
Cam put the lid on the can. She was about to roll down her sleeves, when she smelled her hands.
“Yuck! Now my hands stink! If I roll down my sleeves, my shirt will stink, too.”
Cam stretched her hands out. She told Eric she was keeping her smelly hands away from the rest of her. Then Cam said, “I just don’t understand it. That woman looked so guilty and mysterious.”
“Oh, everything is a mystery to you,” Eric said as they walked past the Miller house. Eric kicked two rolled up newspapers out of the way as he and Cam walked up the front path of the yellow house next door.
Eric rang the front doorbell. He waited. Then he rang it again. He knocked on the door, but there was no answer.
“There’s probably no one at home,” he said.
Cam nodded. “Look at these newspapers. It looks like no one has been here for a while.”
They each picked one up and looked at it. Eric read the headline, “Ding, Dong! Four-Alarm Fire Blazes On.”
“Mine says that, too,” Cam said. “These newspapers are from last week.”
She dropped the paper and walked toward the back of the house. Eric ran after her and asked, “What are you doing now?”
“I still think that woman with the dark glasses was up to something and I want to find out what it was. We first saw her walking along the side of this house. Maybe there’s a shortcut back here or maybe some secret hideaway.”
“Oh, stop talking about that woman,” Eric said, but he followed Cam.
All the windows of the yellow house were closed and the shades were down. Cam lifted the lids of the two garbage cans that were along the side of the house. Both were empty.
Cam walked ahead. Then she stopped. She held out her hand and Eric stopped, too. She put her finger in front of her mouth so that he would be quiet. They listened.
They heard the sounds of coins and keys jingling. Someone was walking behind them and was getting closer.
Jingle.
Jingle.
“What should we do?” Eric asked.
Cam looked across the backyard. It was surrounded by a metal fence.
Jingle.
Cam whispered, “Let’s run around the back of the house to the other side and then out.”
Jingle.
Cam and Eric started to run. Whoever was following them started to run, too.
“Stop! Stop running right now!” someone called out.
Chapter Four
C
am and Eric stopped running. Cam held Eric’s hand and they slowly turned around.
“What are you doing here? I told you that I had to be able to see you from my car at all times.”
It was Cam’s father.
“You’re standing on someone’s private property,” he said. “You’re not supposed to be here.”
“Did you see that woman with the dark glasses?” Cam asked. “She looked mysterious to me. She was walking back here. I just wanted to find out what she was up to. She may have been involved in a crime.”
Mr. Jansen was holding a book. He showed it to Cam. “Do you see this? If you want to solve crimes, do what I do. Read a mystery. It’s safer. Now let’s get out of here.”
Tinkle.
Tinkle.
Someone or something was moving nearby.
“Watch out!” Eric called.
He jumped to get out of the way of a black-and-white cat. A small bell was tied around its neck. The cat leaped onto the back porch and poked its head into a cardboard box.
“Let’s go,” Cam’s father said.
The cat pulled on the box and tipped it over. Containers of milk and juice, a box of Super Sweet Wheats, and a wrapped loaf of bread fell out. The cat bit into the plastic wrapping around the bread. It ran with the loaf to the far end of the yard, right in front of the metal fence.
Mr. Jansen started to walk toward the front of the house. He called to Cam and Eric, “I expect both of you to be following me.”
Cam caught up with her father and asked him, “If there’s no one at home, why is there food on the back porch?”
“Maybe there’s a homebound person living in that house, someone too sick to go shopping,” he answered, “and he has his groceries delivered.”
“And too sick to come to the door to buy chocolate or rice cakes,” Eric added.
Cam, Eric, and Cam’s father had walked to the front sidewalk. Mr. Jansen stopped.
“Something stinks,” he said. He checked the bottoms of his shoes.
“It’s my hands,” Cam said. “I was looking through some garbage.”
“What!”
Just then a letter carrier turned the corner.
“Make sure you wash your hands,” Mr. Jansen told Cam.
Mr. Jansen looked at the letter carrier walking toward them. Then he said, “There’s a mailbox next to the front door and it’s empty. Either someone is in this house and is taking in the mail, or the people who live here are on vacation and have stopped their mail delivery. We’ll see in a minute.”
The letter carrier went up the Millers’ front walk. He put some letters and a magazine in their box. Then he walked toward the yellow house.
Mr. Jansen smiled.
“Good afternoon,” the letter carrier said, as he walked past.
He didn’t deliver anything to the yellow house.
“Well, no one is home,” Eric said. He picked up the bag of candy and rice cakes. “Now let’s raise some money for Ride and Read.”
Cain stared at the yellow house. “You say no one is home, but there’s a box of food on the back porch.”
Cam looked at the front windows and at the closed curtains hanging inside. She looked at the outdoor furniture that was neatly stacked on the front porch, and the many newspapers on the front lawn.

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