Max walked quickly into the classroom. Gary, Kevin, and Diane followed him. There was an older man in the room. He was bent over, picking up something.
“Where’s Jackie?” Max asked.
The man in the yellow sweater stood up. He was holding a piece of paper. “All the children are in the theater,” he said, and dropped the paper into the box.
Diane looked in the box and said, “It’s full of trash.”
“Sure it’s full of trash,” the man said. “I’m cleaning the school. That’s my job.”
“We’re looking for a large gray bird,” Kevin told the man.
“I just fed all the birds, and the fish, too. And I put the food back in my closet.”
Gary told the man, “This bird was part of a magic act in the talent show, and he’s missing.”
“Oh. There are some birds and fish in the kindergarten rooms. But I don’t think they’re part of any magic act.”
“We’re looking for a large gray bird that talks,” Max said. “If you see him, please let us know.”
The man began to sweep as Max, Gary, Kevin, and Diane left the room. “A talking bird,” the old man said as he swept. “I wonder what it says.”
There was a chair in the hall outside the principal’s office. Max sat on it, rubbed his forehead, and said, “No one has seen Jackie leave, so he must be in the building. But where?”
“Maybe he’s flying around the building,” Gary said.
Kevin said, “Or maybe someone found him or took him out of the disappearing box and hid him. Then, when everyone leaves, he’ll leave, too. But he’ll have Jackie.”
“The sixth graders have lockers,” Diane said. “Maybe someone put Jackie in one. They have air vents. After the show he’ll open the locker and take Jackie home.”
Max rubbed his forehead again. Then he told Kevin and Diane, “You check the theater. See if someone there is hiding Jackie. Gary and I will check the lockers and the rest of the building.”
Max looked into the stairwell.
Gary walked down the hall to a row of lockers built into the wall. The lockers were tall enough for a coat to hang inside. Gary tapped on one locker and asked, “Are you in there, Jackie?” Gary put his ear against the locker and listened. Then he tapped on the next locker and talked to it.
Kevin and Diane walked into the theater. People were cheering. A boy bowed and the curtains closed. Then Donna walked onto the stage. She held up her hands and asked, “Do you know why ducks don’t fly upside down? If they did, they’d quack up.”
No one in the audience laughed.
“That’s a terrible joke,” Diane whispered to Kevin.
“Sh,” Kevin whispered back. “Just look for someone with a large bag or box.”
Kevin went quietly to the aisle on one side of the theater. Diane went to the aisle on the other side.
A boy walked onto the stage. He smiled and said, “My first poem is called ‘How I Make My Lunch.’”
The boy took a paper from his pocket and read:
“‘Put the peanuts in my shoe.’
That’s what I told my mother.
Then when I walk to school,
I’ll make some peanut butter.”
Kevin saw a woman sitting in the middle of the back row. There was a large bag on her lap.
“What’s in there?” Kevin asked her.
The woman began pulling things out of the bag. “Spinach,” she said as she held it up. “Potato chips, carrots, tomatoes, jelly.”
“Sh,” the people sitting near her said.
“Thank you,” Kevin whispered.
“My next poem is called ‘I Have a Cold,’” the boy standing on the stage said. He turned over the paper he was holding and read:
“When I’m in class
and about to sneeze,
I run outside
and water the trees.”
Diane walked quietly from row to row. She saw her parents sitting with her brothers, Eric and Howie. Eric’s friend Cam Jan-sen was there, too. Some people sitting in the theater were holding raincoats. But Diane didn’t see any large boxes or bags. Then she heard someone say, “Take two aspirin.”
Diane waved to Kevin. They both ran to the back of the theater.
“I think I heard Jackie,” Diane told Kevin. “Come with me and I’ll show you where he is.”