Touchdown Tony Crowne and the Mystery of the Missing Cheerleader (6 page)

Tony had exited Mrs. Hardacre’s English class, was halfway to his locker when he heard Judd’s excited voice, turned and looked down the hallway to see where he was. It wasn’t hard to pick Judd out of the crowd; he was mowing kids down like a runaway freight train. Trying hard not to plow directly into them, he would angle his body to get around them but end up clipping their book-holding arms, sending their notebooks and papers flying into the air. Then he would spin around, say he was sorry with a please-forgive-me look and wallop the next kid from behind as he was back pedaling which, in turn, caused more books and papers to fly up into the air.

“Excuse me, pardon me, comin’ through, gangway!”

OOMPH! “Hey!”

“Sorry about that, I—”

THUD! “Hey, watch where you’re going, you big oaf!”

“Whoa, I am so sorry, I’ll pick that up for—”

THWACK! “Do you mind?”

“Oh, look at all those papers; I’ll be right back as soon as I talk to my buddy.”

Judd, out of the corner of his eye, spied Miss Dingledine coming out of her office area, he slowed to a fast walk and as he passed her, he grinned, nodded and said, “Hello, Miss Dinadingle, have a nice weekend.” Judd, stopped, stiffened his back, scrunched his eyes and said, “I mean, Miss Dorisdine… er, Miss Dingledoris…um, Miss Dingdong…ah, Miss Dimeadognight—”

“Master Judson, the name is MISS DINGLEDINE!” She pronounced slowly and with theatrical effect.

Judd, thinking about the safety of his ears, immediately pivoted, bowed to Miss Dingledine several times and replied, “Yes, ma’am
(bowed).
Sorry, ma'am
(bowed).
I forgot ma’am
(bowed).
I’ll never do it again, ma’am
(bowed).
May I go now, ma’am
(bowed)
?”

Miss Dingledine harrumphed and with a wave of her arm dismissed Judd, “Oh, yes, yes, yes. Go, go, go. Off with you.” She turned smartly, saw some other kids who were misbehaving down the hallway and clickety-clacked her way toward them while at the same time wondering why so many students were bent over picking up their books and school papers.

Tony, still chuckling at Judd’s encounter with Miss Dingledine, waited for him to catch up and said, “Hi Judd, what are you so excited about?”

Judd grabbed Tony’s arm, walked him to a nearby alcove away from the throng of students heading home, craned his neck from side to side and whispered, “Tony, I just overheard Felicity talkin’ to her toadies about how she’s out to
get
Ash for takin’ the last cheerleader spot and—”

“Aw, Felicity is all talk and no action.” Tony waved his arm in a disgusted manner. “I wouldn’t worry too much about her.”

“Yeah, but she was really, really mad. Her face was all red and puckered up.” Judd tried to make his face all red and puckered up, but he couldn’t do it and talk at the same time so he gave up and added, “She was a pointin’ that bony finger—”

“She’s
always
pointing her finger at something.”

“Yeah, but she pointed her finger at those two other girls.”

“You mean Mel and Josie?”

“Yeah, yeah. She pointed at them and real serious like…” Judd lowered his voice and leaned close to Tony, “I mean,
real serious like
, threatened the toadies with cutting them off from her friendship, if they didn’t help her do something to Ash.”

Tony voiced a
pfft, thwud!
sound, grabbed his chest like he had been shot with an imaginary arrow, took a few stumbling steps, fell down upon his knees, looked up to the ceiling and wailed in his best toady voice, “No, no, Felicity! Anything but that!” Tony made another
pfft, thwud!
noise, threw his chest out and reached behind him with both arms as if he had taken an arrow in the back and wailed again, “Oh, Felicity, what did we ever do to deserve this!” Tony rolled his eyes, coughed twice, fell onto the tiled floor, kicked his legs up and down and finally drew his last imaginary breath.

Tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap.

Tony lay on the floor with his eyes shut, hoping that tapping sound wasn’t coming from Miss Dingledine’s shoe. He gingerly opened his right eye into a tiny slit and could only see Judd’s shadowy frame through his eyelashes. Judd had his arms folded, his right foot tapping the floor, an arched eyebrow and a very serious expression on his face.

He exhaled heavily and thought, Whew! I’m out of danger now—. “Ack! Gak! Argh!”

Judd had reached down with one arm, grasped Tony’s neck like a suitcase handle and lifted him back up on his feet.

“Sorry buddy, but this is not the time to be playin’. We have to help Ash!”

“Cough…cough, okay, cough…cough, okay. Well, cough… did they say exactly what, cough… they were planning to do?”

“That’s just it. I don’t know what they’re planning. Their voices got real low and they started whispering. One of those toads raised her voice a little and said, ‘After school?’ But they shushed her and I couldn’t hear anything else. Then I came a searchin’ for you.”

Rubbing his chin, Tony thought a bit about the situation and replied, “I know Ash is in a meeting with Miss Brady right now, talking about cheerleading, I suppose. If Felicity’s gonna do anything, it’ll probably be on Ash’s way home. We need to reconnoiter—”

“Do what? Recon—, reconnoi—, huh?”

“Scout. You know, scout the route Ash takes home to see if those loony tunes are out there waiting for her.”

“Ah, gotcha, now I know what you mean. Well, I can do the reconooterin’, you can wait for Ash to come out of her meeting and then when I get back, we can both walk her home.” Judd, with his mind made up, began backing away from Tony in a hop-skip type of way like he was running onto a football field and a coach was talking to him.

Tony was impressed with Judd’s new take-charge attitude. It must be the football player in him, he thought. When the game is on the line good players make good decisions. Tony cupped his hands to his mouth, leaned forward and yelled, “Excellent plan. Do you remember how to get to her house and all the possible routes?”

Judd was halfway down hallway, heard Tony’s question, stopped running and hollered back, “Nope, don’t have to!” Judd raised his arm in a wave and burst through the school doors.

“WHAT! Wait a minute! Where are you going?” Tony pleaded with a shocked face and outstretched arms as he ran a few tentative steps in Judd’s direction, realized he was too far away and pulled up. Tony ran his hands through his hair a couple of times, looked up to the ceiling and sighed, "Judd, what are you doing?"

Chapter 9- The School Mission

Ew, this is creepy, Tony thought as he crept down the dimly lit, deserted main hallway toward the school office. The last bell of the day had rung over an hour ago and, being a Friday, all of the students as well as the teachers had scurried away as fast as possible. Tony knew Miss Dingledine and Tom Pasquinel, the janitor/maintenance man, were usually the last to leave and lock up. He hadn’t seen Tom all day, but that didn’t mean anything. Tom kept a low profile unless someone threw up or a light bulb needed changing.

As he approached the open door, he stopped a few feet away and began to tip toe. All he wanted to do was confirm that Ash was still in a meeting and hadn’t somehow gotten past him. He could hear papers being shuffled and little harrumphs resonating from inside the office. Miss Dingledine was definitely still there and the last thing he wanted was to have a conversation with her about what he was doing in the school after hours. He could feel his heart beating hard. His breathing getting shallow and that funny feeling you get in your stomach when you’re nervous as he inched toward the door.

One more step, Tony estimated, ought to be enough to give me a good view into the office area.

SQUEAK!

Tony hadn’t kept his foot high enough on the last tip toe to prevent a sneaker squeak from escaping his shoe. The squeak was more impressive than normal because the empty hallway amplified the sound.

Tony grimaced and called himself stupid. Miss Dingledine must have heard that for sure! Tony stood as still as possible and tried not to breathe so he could hear if she was getting up to investigate the noise.

Options? Options? What are my options? Tony’s mind was racing at 100 mph. His gaze darted up the corridor and down the corridor. The school office sat exactly in the middle of a long annex that connected the front of the school with the classrooms located in the rear of the building.

Hide somewhere? There was absolutely nothing that could give me cover and hide me from Miss Dingledine’s eyes. Option one? Disregard, he thought.

He couldn’t bolt past the open door; she would see me for sure and probably tackle me harder than she tackled Judd. Option two? No way!

I could just walk in to the office area and face Miss Dingledine—Option three? NO! NO! NO!

Okay, okay, what about running toward the front door and veering off into the side hallway? The side hallway dead ends into the school cafeteria and at this time of the day the cafeteria doors were locked and the lights were turned out to conserve energy. That will give me cover! I can make it, I can make it. I know I can. Just don’t make any more noise! Option four? Do it!

At the sound of the squeak, Miss Dingledine stopped shuffling her papers, cocked her head to one side and listened for a moment. She harrumphed, sighed, rolled her eyes and wondered out loud, “Oh, who could that be at this hour?” and pushed her chair away from the desk.

When Tony heard her chair sliding out from her desk, he knew it was time to go. He figured it would take her at least three clickety-clacks to go from her desk to poking her head out of the door. He’ll need all those clickety-clacks to make it to that hallway, he thought.

Clickety-clack
! Tony’s legs felt like rubber as he tried to run fast
and
not make any noise. This is not an easy thing to do, he thought. I’m not running fast enough this way! Forget it, he reasoned, just run faster!

Clickety-clack
! Tony had a horrifying thought as the side hallway came closer and closer: how am I going to make that ninety-degree turn running full speed? I won’t be able to stop my momentum enough to avoid plowing into those metal student lockers!

Clickety-clack
! At the beginning of the third clack, the shiny, tiled floor gave him an idea. About eight feet from the corner, Tony kicked his right leg out in front of him, tucked his left leg underneath and performed a baseball hook slide on the slick surface. As he slid on his left thigh and calf, Tony reached out with his arms and caught the joint of the wall with both hands enough to swing his body around the side of the corner.

His momentum caused his body to spin wildly after swinging around the corner; he saw the lockers looming toward him and dug his fingers and toes into the floor in an effort to slow himself down. His feet barely missed the lockers and as the rest of his body whipped around in the spin, he jammed his fingers harder into the floor and braked to within an inch of ramming his head into a steel door. He lay on his stomach, panting heavily, with his arms and legs outstretched like someone had played a game of tug of war with him and he was the rope. He lifted his head up, quieted his breathing and listened.

Miss Dingledine stuck her head into the hallway, looking left and then right. Not seeing anyone, she called out in her modulated voice, “Hello, who is there?” She took a few tentative steps to her left, a few to her right, peering down each darkened hallway. Still not seeing anyone and thinking she had merely heard a random sound like the building settling, she shrugged her shoulders, harrumphed and turned to enter the office area.

Yes! I did it! She must not have seen me! Tony silently celebrated his little victory by raising his left fist in a triumphant pump.

BAM!

In his excitement, he didn’t realize how close his arm was to the locker until he fist pumped it by mistake. Tony covered his head with his arms in anguish. He scrunched his face as if he was in severe pain and rolled onto his back, shaking his head and staring at the ceiling. He wondered how long it would take Miss Dingledine to swoop down the hallway and pick him up by his ear.

At the sound of the bam, Miss Dingledine stopped in her tracks, pivoted quickly and strode back into the hallway. She placed her hands on her hips and thundered, “I heard you that time! Come out now! Do not make me come after you! I would be extremely unhappy if I had to do that!”

Tony sighed, got up onto his feet, hung his head in a shameful manner and came within a step of the corner when he heard two bams in rapid succession: BAM! BAM!

And again two bams: BAM! BAM! Then three quick ones: BAM! BAM! BAM!

Tony flattened himself against the wall and peeked around the corner slowly so as not to draw any attention. He saw Miss Dingledine with her back to him, her hands on her hips and a shadowy figure advancing toward her. Who is that? What’s going on here? She’s not afraid of him, of course, she’s not afraid of anything, so she must know him.

The shadowy figure finally came into a ray of light in the hallway and Tony could make out that it was old Tom, carrying a rubber mallet.