“What’s with the clipboard?” Nipper asked Samantha as they walked across their backyard.
“It’s a prop,” she answered. “I borrowed it from Mom. Now let me have your hand lens.”
“Where’s your umbrella?” he asked.
“I left it at home,” said Samantha. “We won’t need it.”
Samantha hoped that was true. It had saved her life on more than one occasion. Finding secret passageways, fighting ninjas. But right now she just wanted to help her brother get his silly ring and then get back to finding her uncle.
Nipper took the magnifier from his pocket and handed it to her.
“Good,” she said. “Let’s go.”
Together they hopped over the bushes and landed on the Snoddgrass driveway.
“See?” her brother told her. “It’s a lot easier to get here this way, isn’t it?”
“We went this way because we don’t want anyone on the porch to see us,” Samantha replied. “Just do as I say, and you’ll get the ring.”
“Sure, sure,” said Nipper. “But that was a perfectly acceptable way to go between houses, am I right?”
Samantha didn’t answer. She led him across the driveway. When they reached the side of the Snoddgrass house, just past the front porch, they crouched out of sight…and waited.
“If nobody touches my things…then nobody’s bones will get broken!”
It was Missy, shouting back into the house as she stepped onto the front porch. The horrible little girl slammed the door behind her and marched down the steps. This was good. Samantha would be able to help her brother without having to worry about another Missy-versus-Nipper adventure.
They watched as Missy reached the sidewalk, turned, and disappeared in the direction of downtown Capitol Hill.
“You’ve memorized your script, right?” Samantha asked her brother.
“Yes,” Nipper said. “Word for word.”
“Fine,” Samantha said. “Don’t change anything, and I’ll get us inside.”
Nipper gave her a thumbs-up.
They walked around the front porch and up the steps. Nipper leaned flat against the house to the right of the door and out of sight.
Samantha rang the doorbell.
“Do you really think this will work, Sam?” Nipper whispered.
“Shhhh,” she replied. “Just stick to the script.”
The heavy door opened. A man and a woman stood behind the screen door, smiling.
Samantha was pretty sure they were Missy’s parents. She’d encountered them the last time she’d gone to Missy’s house. Of course, every time she went to this house, things were kind of strange. There always seemed to be something going on in this place that she couldn’t quite figure out.
The man wore a chef’s hat and a sparkling clean apron with the words BOSS-LEVEL GRILLER on it. In one hand, he held a long pair of metal tongs. A roasted hot dog dangled from them.
The woman wore a frilly apron. She cradled a blueberry pie. A toothpick stuck into the crust held a small blue ribbon with the words FIRST PRIZE. NATIONAL BAKING COMPETITION. The woman also had a blue ribbon pinned to her frock. That ribbon said AWARD-WINNING BAKER OF NATIONAL BAKING COMPETITION. FIRST-PLACE WINNER.
Yep, thought Samantha. Kind of strange.
Samantha could see Nipper out of the corner of her eye. He was leaning against the wall, with his eyes closed, sucking in long, deep breaths of the hot dog and blueberry pie scents wafting out of the home.
“Stick to the script,” she whispered.
He opened his eyes and nodded.
Samantha cleared her throat and leaned in to speak to the adults through the screen door.
“Cookie delivery,” said Samantha.
“Cookies?” asked the man.
He pushed open the screen door and stepped forward. Nipper stood pinned between the door and the wall.
“Tell us about these cookies,” he said.
The screen was pressed against Nipper’s face, and the man waved his barbecue tongs in the air, dangling a hot dog two inches from Nipper’s nose.
Samantha pretended to review information on the clipboard.
“It says…here,” she said, “Missy ordered ten thousand boxes of cookies to help send me to detective train camp.”
“Detective train camp?” asked the man.
“Ten…thousand…cookies?” asked the woman, stepping out of the house.
She looked past Samantha, out to the sidewalk, then up and down the street.
“Where?” she asked.
“I’m just the advance cookie delivery scout, ma’am,” said Samantha politely. “Before the trucks can unload, I have to make sure the porch is safe.”
“Safe?” the man and woman both asked at the same time.
“It has to support the weight of all the boxes,” said Samantha.
She knelt down and pretended to inspect the floorboards through Nipper’s hand lens.
“Take a close look at this porch,” she said, gesturing with the clipboard for them to come join her.
The man let go of the door, and he and the woman both knelt down to peek at the wood through the lens of the magnifying glass. While they stared, Samantha waved to Nipper. He crept from behind the door and tiptoed into the house.
As soon as Nipper was out of sight, Samantha stood up.
“Excellent carpentry,” she announced.
“That’s good news,” said the man.
Both of the strange adults got to their feet.
“And the cookies?” asked the woman.
“The truck should be here in five business days,” said Samantha, pretending to read from the clipboard again. “Sometime between five a.m. and midnight.”
The man and woman smiled, nodded, and walked back into the house.
Samantha watched the door swing shut behind them.
She hoped her brother would stick to the script.