“Is there an empty room we can use?” one of the officers asked the Scotts. “We need a place to bring all the suspects.”
“You can use the library.”
Across from the elevator were two large doors. Mrs. Scott opened them.
The walls of the room were lined with bookcases. One bookcase had glass doors. There were several large chairs in the room.
“Please come in here,” one of the officers told Cam and Mrs. Jansen.
Cam and her mother went into the library. Eric and Mrs. Shelton went in, too.
“I’m Officer Jack Kaplan. I need you to empty your pockets.”
Mrs. Jansen whispered to Cam, “We’re suspects. He thinks we might have taken the necklace.”
Cam took a pen and a small notepad from her pockets.
“That’s all I have,” Cam said.
She pulled out the inside of her pockets and showed Officer Kaplan that they were empty.
Mrs. Jansen emptied her pockets. She took paperclips, cough drops, coins, keys, coupons, a shopping list, and small bits of thread from her pockets. She opened her handbag and Officer Kaplan looked through it.
The other officer was standing by the door to the library. “Come with me,” she told Mrs. Scott. “We have to find the other people who were on the elevator.”
“Let’s take Cam with us,” Mrs. Scott told the officer. “I don’t remember everyone who was with us, but she does.”
“Let’s go,” the officer told Cam.
They walked toward the many large windows overlooking the city.
“I’m Officer Sally Phillips. Whoever took the necklace must have it in his or her pocket or handbag, so we’ll have to check them all.”
The party guests had gathered by the windows.
“That’s where I work,” a woman said as she looked out over the city.
Cam pointed to a woman in a tight flowered dress. “She was on the elevator,” Cam whispered. “She was holding a plate of cake.”
“She’s eating more of that cake now,” Mrs. Scott whispered. “She must really like it.”
Officer Phillips spoke with the woman. Then they walked together to the library.
“There are Jane and Joe Levy,” Cam said.
Mrs. Scott spoke to her friends. She told them to go to the library.
Officer Phillips was back. “We still have a few more people to find,” she said to Cam and Mrs. Scott.
“Four more,” Cam said.
Cam walked slowly past the many people standing by the windows.
“I can see my house,” someone said, and pointed.
“I can see my store,” someone else said.
“Officer Phillips,” Cam whispered. “That woman in the green dress was on the elevator. She got on right after we did. And that man with the cane was with us.”
Officer Phillips spoke to both of them. She walked with them to the library.
“Wasn’t that man in the uniform also on the elevator?” Mrs. Scott asked.
Cam looked at the man. She closed her eyes and said, “Click!”
“Yes,” Cam said.
Mrs. Scott asked the man to follow her to the library.
One more, Cam thought. There was one more person on the elevator.
Cam said, “Click!” again. She looked at the pictures she had in her head of the people on the elevator.
Officer Phillips and Mrs. Scott had returned from the library.
“Is that it?” Officer Phillips asked.
Cam opened her eyes.
“There’s one more,” Cam said. “He was wearing a dark blue jacket and tie. I looked at everyone standing by the windows and I didn’t find him.”
“Are there any other rooms up here?”
“There are two bedrooms,” Mrs. Scott told Officer Phillips, “but the doors to those rooms are closed.”
“Let’s check.”
Mrs. Scott led them to two doors, one on either side of a wide hallway. Officer Sally Phillips checked both doors. They were locked.
“Maybe he went downstairs,” Mrs. Scott said. “Maybe he wanted more fish and salad, and that’s served only downstairs.”
Cam, Mrs. Scott, and Officer Phillips walked toward the elevator. Just then a door in the hall was opened. It was the door to the bathroom. A man wearing a dark blue jacket walked out.
“That’s him,” Cam told Officer Phillips. “He was on the elevator with us.”
