Chapter 4

Cody and M.E. arrived at school just in time for the first bell. By the second bell—the “late bell”—Cody was in her seat behind Matt the Brat, studying the stick figure sketches she’d copied into her Case Files Codebook earlier that morning. The first figure held its right arm out to the side, the left across its chest and down at a forty-five-degree angle. The second figure held its right arm straight down, the left up and out. The third’s right arm was pointing down at an angle, and the left pointed up at the opposite angle. The fourth one held a right hand straight out and the left one straight up.

What did the figures mean? Was Skeleton Man sending some sort of message? Why had someone tried to wipe them off the windowpane?

And what was up with those two creepy people?

“Dakota Jones?”

Ms. Stadelhofer’s husky voice startled Cody from her thoughts. Her teacher’s bushy brown hair bounced as she shook her head in irritation. Stad was a pretty cool teacher most of the time, even though she always wore a ridiculous themed vest with her outfits. Today’s vest featured apples, rulers, and miniature blackboards—the classic schoolteacher theme.

“Uh, here!” Cody said a little too loudly as her hand shot into the air. Everyone in class turned to her and giggled. She felt her face flush, certain she was lit up like a freckled fireball.

She scrunched down in her seat and looked out the window, her swinging ponytail tickling her back. As the teacher finished calling roll, Cody returned to her daydream about the stick figures, mulling over the positions of their arms, but when Stad’s vocab lesson began, Cody tuned back in to the classwork.

Cody didn’t mind school. That’s because she viewed each subject as a puzzle to solve. To her, spelling was just coded letters, and math was coded numbers. Even social studies was full of mysteries to be solved—puzzling sphinxes, lost civilizations, and mysterious dinosaur disappearances. But she’d never let the other kids know she liked school. Not cool.

“Hey, dipwad,” said Matt the Brat, twisting around in his chair. Matt was a wannabe skater and wore the outfits to match. Trouble was, he didn’t know how to skateboard. Today he had on a skull T-shirt, baggy jeans, and ginormous, multicolored athletic shoes, worn without laces. His breath reeked of peanut butter—he was always eating the stuff straight from a jar he kept in his backpack. He would have had nice eyes if he wasn’t always using them to spy on people.

When Cody didn’t answer, Matt looked down at her vocab paper. “Writing another one of your secret messages?” he asked.

Cody had quickly learned that Matt was a bully. He liked to pick on the new kids at school. He had been held back a year, making him bigger than the other seventh graders. Sometimes she caught him staring out the window, and she wondered where he’d gone in his mind. She felt sorry for him, knowing how hard it must have been for him to see his friends move on. But he was always in her face—with that peanut-butter breath. And always snooping around the Code Busters Clubhouse and making fun of them. Her mom had said his behavior had to do with his home life, but since he sat in front of Cody in class, thanks to their last names—Jeffreys and Jones—Cody had to deal with his school life.

Before she could pull her paper away, Matt scribbled an ugly monster over her vocab words. He wasn’t half bad when it came to drawing monsters, but she didn’t appreciate it when he defaced her work. She jerked the paper away, tearing a hole in the middle of it in the process. Great, she thought. Now I’ll have to recopy the whole paper. Matt laugh-snorted, leaned sideways in his chair, and lifted one leg.

Oh no, no, no. The Silent but Deadly.

The smell nearly knocked her out of her seat. She tried to fan it away. She held her breath to concentrate on rewriting her vocab list, but it was nearly impossible. The school day had barely started, and already she felt as if it would never end.

Halfway through first period, Lyla, the girl who sat behind Cody, tapped her on the back. When she turned, Lyla handed her a folded note. Slipping her arm across her chest and her hand behind her back, she took the folded message, then tucked it under her math homework.

“Dakota Jones! Is that a note?” Cody looked up to see Stad frowning at her.

She froze.

Busted!

“No, Sta— Uh, Ms. Stadelhofer. I…was just going over my math homework. See?” Cody held up the homework sheet with one hand, covering the note with her other hand.

“Well, put it away. It’s not math time yet,” Ms. Stadelhofer said before continuing her lecture. Matt the Brat turned around, smirking.

“Matthew Jeffreys, turn around or it’s the principal’s office for you,” Ms. Stadelhofer threatened.

Matt stuck his tongue out of the side of his mouth

to Cody before turning back.

Cody let out a breath.

Close one.

When she was sure Stad was no longer watching, she quietly unfolded the note. It was written in Caesar’s cipher, decipherable only if you had the corresponding decoder wheel.

3-2-12-8 21-2-9-22-4-8 8-2 15-4-4-8 15-4 16-8 8-19-4 21-13-16-22-23-2-13-4 16-21-8-4-9 7-1-192-2-13

15.4.

She checked the clock again. Only a few seconds to decipher the note before the bell rang. Pulling out her decoder wheel from another compartment of her backpack, she slid the dial around to each of the numbers and jotted down the corresponding letters underneath.

It took only seconds to translate the code.

Code Buster’s Key and Solution found on pp. 203, 205.

The bell rang.

“Yooou got in trou-ble,” said Matt the Brat in a singsong voice as he grinned broadly. He stood up, blocking her way down the aisle with his bulk.

“No, I didn’t.” Cody hoisted on her backpack, then swung around, bumping Matt out of the way.

Ms. Stad looked up from the pile of spelling papers on her desk. She eyed Cody. Before Cody could escape, the room filled with the familiar sound of static on the loudspeaker. It was the deep gravelly voice of Principal Grunt.

“Attention, students! This is Principal Grant speaking. I don’t want to alarm you, but we’ve received a notice from the Berkeley Police Department that a mountain lion has been sighted in the hills near the campus.”

Several students gasped.

“There’s no need to panic, but stay alert, and away from the hills until further notice. Thank you, and have a pleasant afternoon. Go Eagles.”

Cody rolled her eyes. That’s all I need, she thought. First a fire. Then Matt the Brat. And now a mountain lion on the loose.

Could it get any worse?

The rest of the day passed as slowly as first period had. When the final bell rang at the end of school, Cody raced to join M.E. at the flagpole, their usual meeting place. Her friend looked as sparkly and as radiant as she had that morning.

“I thought this day would never end,” Cody said to M.E. as she scanned the mass of kids pouring from the school building. There was no sign of Matt the Brat, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t nearby. Probably spying on her and planning his next prank.

“Totally,” M.E. said.

Cody glanced around. “Careful. I might have been followed,” she whispered as they headed off campus.

M.E.’s dark eyes flashed. “Matt the Brat?”

Cody nodded.

“He likes you, you know. That’s why he’s always bugging you.” M.E. glanced sideways at her.

“How do you know?” Cody scrunched up her face in disgust.

“I saw it on a TV show. This guy was always teasing this girl, and she couldn’t stand him. But then she found out he really liked her and so she started being nicer to him, and he quit bugging her… ”

Cody half listened as she glanced around for a glimpse of Matt’s X-Men cap or skull-emblazoned T-shirt. There was no way Matt liked her—not the way he acted. At least, Cody hoped not.

“So maybe you should ask him out!” M.E. said, giggling.

“Shut up!” Cody gave her a death look, then checked her watch. “Come on. Let’s get to the clubhouse before he follows us.”

The two girls sprinted to the end of the block. Just as they started up the hill toward the eucalyptus forest, M.E. suddenly stopped and grabbed Cody’s arm.

“What about the mountain lion?” she asked, her eyes wide. “Grunt said it was in these hills.”

“Don’t worry,” Cody said. “There were tons of mountain lions where I used to live. They usually hunt at night, not daytime. My teacher told us if you see one, don’t run. Just make some noise. And try to look bigger.”

M.E. stared up at Cody, who towered over her by at least six inches. “Oh yeah? How am I supposed to look bigger?”

Cody grinned, then flapped her arms up and down. “Wave your arms like this. Come on. We’ll be safe in the clubhouse.”

As soon as the words were out of her mouth, Cody heard a crunchy noise coming from a nearby bush.

She looked at M.E. to see if she’d heard the sound, too.

M.E. stood like a statue, her eyes as wide as her open mouth. “What was that?” she whispered.

“I don’t know, but let’s get out of here!”

In spite of everything they’d been told, they

ran.