Leading the boys into the auditorium, Odelia finds that it is indeed packed.
Not only are there no seats down front, but she doesn’t see three together. Spotting two, she points them out to Max and Jiffy.
‘Go sit over there,’ she says, ‘and don’t move. I’ll watch from back here.’
‘That’s OK, Odelia. You can sit with Max,’ Jiffy tells her.
‘How come you don’t want to sit with me?’ Max asks.
‘I’m being a gentleman.’
‘You’re hardly ever a gentleman.’
‘I know, but right now, I’m being one.’ Jiffy looks up at Odelia and gives a courtly gesture at the aisle.
Odelia narrows her eyes at him.
‘I’ll stand back here with Jiffy and be a gentleman, too,’ Max decides, and imitates the courtly gesture. ‘You can go sit, Odelia.’
‘No, thank you. Is there any reason you’d prefer to be back here, Jiffy?’
‘I told, you, I’m being—’
‘Other than being a gentleman?’
‘Nope.’
But he flashes a glance at the exit, right behind her.
‘All right, then go sit.’
‘Hey,’ Max says, grabbing Jiffy’s arm and pointing. ‘Look who’s there! Isn’t that—’
‘Shh!’ Jiffy elbows him, and Max clamps his mouth shut.
Following his gaze, Odelia sees a couple of boys their age seated in the row behind the two empty seats.
‘Why, is that Kevin Beamer?’ she asks, putting two and two together.
Max turns to her, wide-eyed. ‘You know him?’
‘Of course. I’ll walk you to your seats and say hello. Come on.’
She puts a firm hand on each boy’s shoulder and steers them down the aisle.
‘Sit down,’ she tells them, and turns to the boy in the row behind.
He’s noticed Max and Jiffy and is snickering to his friend behind a cupped hand.
‘Kevin?’ she calls sweetly, and he turns, startled. She waves as if they’re old pals. ‘Hello, there!’
‘Uh, hi.’ He turns back to his friend.
Max and Jiffy slink down in their seats as if hoping to make themselves invisible.
‘Kevin!’ Odelia calls again. ‘Come here! I have to tell you something!’
He looks at her, suspicious. ‘About what?’
‘About …’ She points at the stage, where Tommy and Candace are setting up equipment. ‘It’s about the Specter Inspectors. Come here.’
‘What about them?’
‘Kevin, if you’re going to lallygag, I’ll just tell Candace and Tommy to choose some other kid to help them with the demonstration.’
‘I’ll do it!’ Jiffy says, sitting up straight.
Max does, too, saying, ‘I’ll do it, too!’
‘They only need one kid,’ Jiffy tells him. ‘And I said it first.’
‘Maybe they need two.’
‘They need one,’ Odelia says. ‘Sorry, boys, but they’ve asked for Kevin.’
He stands, gloating, steps out into the aisle, and starts for the stage.
Odelia stops him with a firm hand on his arm. ‘Not that way. I have to take you backstage.’
‘Oh! Right.’
‘Max, Jiffy, stay right where you are. I’ll be back in a few minutes.’
She leads Kevin up the aisle to the exit.
‘Wait, isn’t this the wrong way?’ he asks, hanging back, and she experiences a flash of guilt. Then she thinks of Jiffy, and she says, ‘No, we have to use the VIP entrance. Come on.’
Spotting Peter and Walter sitting in the last row, she asks them to keep an eye on Max and Jiffy.
Then she steps outside with Kevin.
The rain has stopped. The Dale has been washed clean, and everything is dripping.
‘First, things first. I need to get a picture of you for the newspaper article,’ she says, pulling out her cell phone.
‘What newspaper article?’
‘The one about the Specter Inspectors.’
‘Oh. Right.’
She opens the camera on her phone. ‘Stand right here and smile nice and big. Say Cheese.’
‘Cheese!’ he says around a toothy grin, and she hates herself for doing this.
He’s a kid.
But a kid who has some tough lessons to learn, and she’s determined to set him straight.
‘Nice,’ she says, pressing a button on her phone and then lowering it, holding it at her side as she leads him around the side of the auditorium. Glancing across the park, she sees that Lieutenant Grange’s car is still parked in front of Misty’s house, and that the white Chevy no longer occupies a guest spot at Valley View.
‘OK, Kevin, let’s stop and go over a few things before we go backstage, OK?’
‘I guess.’
‘First things first. It’s never, ever a good idea to let a stranger talk you into going somewhere with them. You do know that, don’t you?’
‘Yep.’
‘But you just left the auditorium with me.’
‘You’re not a stranger.’
‘Do you know who I am?’
‘You’re Odelia Lauder.’
‘That’s right. I live right over there.’ She points.
He glances over, nods, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. ‘Are we going backstage?’
‘In a minute. We’re talking.’
‘I’m not really talking. You are.’
‘Let me talk, Kevin. Listen up. You may know who I am, but that doesn’t mean you should have left the auditorium with me. Got it?’
‘Huh?’
‘I’m trying to help you. Be smart. Be careful. The world is full of bad guys, you know?’
‘Uh, I guess.’ He takes a wary step back from her.
‘Not me,’ she says quickly. ‘I’m just the friendly medium who lives next door to Jiffy Arden. You know him, right?’
‘Yeah.’
‘I hear you’re the one who talked him into breaking into the Slayton house.’
Wide-eyed, he just looks at her.
She goes on, ‘You got him to steal the necklace, and then—’
‘I didn’t even know about the necklace until he told me about it! And all I did was dare him to take it, because he was going on and on about finding some stupid pirate treasure so that he can be rich. I didn’t make him steal it.’
‘Oh. Glad we straightened that out.’
‘Yeah.’
‘But you were with him? When he broke into the Slayton house?’
‘Yeah, but it’s not like we smashed in the door or something. The basement window was already broken. Everyone in the Dale knows about that.’
‘I didn’t know about that.’
‘I mean all the kids. Can we go backstage?’
‘We’re almost through. I’m just wondering what you stole that night?’
‘Nothing!’
‘So he stole the necklace, and that’s it? Why would he do that?’
‘He thinks he’s going to sell it somewhere and get all this money for it.’ He grins. ‘Dumb kid.’
‘Detective Grange is trying to pin this thing on him. He’s over at Jiffy’s house right now, investigating.’
Kevin follows her gaze and lifts an eyebrow when he sees Grange’s car parked in front of the Ardens’.
‘He said there’s a huge reward for anyone who comes forward with any kind of evidence that Jiffy is behind it. Pictures, or a video.’
‘Wait, I’ve got evidence! I got the whole thing on my phone.’
That makes two of us, Odelia thinks, looking down to make sure hers is still recording.
‘Wow, that’s genius,’ she tells Kevin. ‘Can I see?’
‘Sure.’ He takes out his phone, scrolls through the files, and opens a video. He tilts the screen, and she sees a dark blur.
‘What am I looking at?’
‘I took this when he was crawling through the window. It’s kind of dark, so you can’t really see him, but you can hear him. Shh, listen.’
She hears a voice that doesn’t sound like Jiffy’s at all. It sounds small and scared, saying, ‘Are you sure? What if we get caught?’
‘We won’t. And you said you need the money bad, don’t you?’
‘I need it really bad. It’s kind of an emergency, by the way.’
‘Then get in there. I’m right behind you.’
Odelia carefully slides her own phone into her pocket and reaches for Kevin’s. ‘Can I take a closer look? I couldn’t tell that was him.’
‘It is.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yeah, see?’ He presses Play and hands her the phone.
‘I need more light,’ she says, and steps into a patch of sun just starting to peek through the clouds. ‘That’s better.’
Holding the phone close to her face as if she’s watching it intently, she swiftly highlights the video and deletes it.
‘Wow,’ she says, as if marveling at Kevin’s prowess. ‘You must be really smart to set a clever trap like this.’
‘I guess.’ He can’t hide his smug smile. ‘Everyone’s always saying Jiffy’s the smartest kid in the class, but I’m way smarter.’
‘Are you guys enemies, then?’
‘Not really.’ He holds out his hand. ‘Can I have my phone back?’
She hands it to him, and he shoves it back into his pocket without looking at it.
‘I’m sure you were trying to do the right thing, Kevin. Theft is a serious crime, you know?’
‘Yeah.’
‘You would never steal, right?’
‘Me? No.’
‘So you didn’t steal Jiffy’s Playbox, and his cell phone, and his other things?’
‘Huh?’ He blinks. ‘He gave me all that stuff.’
‘Why?’
‘I guess he didn’t want it anymore.’
Applause fills the auditorium on the other side of the wall, and a voice booms over the speakers, ‘Ladies and gentlemen …’
‘I’d better get back to my gentlemen,’ Odelia says. ‘The show is starting.’
‘But … what about backstage? I’m the demonstrator.’
Odelia presses a button on her phone to stop the recording and waves it as if she’d just gotten a text. ‘Oh, they’re saying that they no longer require your services.’
‘Huh?’
‘Sorry, Kev. Go back to your seat, now. You and I can talk more about this later. Should I let Detective Grange know you might have some evidence to show him? For the reward?’
He grins. ‘Yep. Thanks, Odelia.’
‘No problem.’