Watson's Case (9 page)

Rollie squeezed and scooted around the barricade. He recognized Holmes' large tin bin full of souvenirs from his cases such as the Musgrave Ritual. When his eyes spotted a painting of a young woman, he knew it was Professor Moriarty's artwork by Jean-Baptiste Greuze.

Beyond all the storage, Rollie came upon another door. He spun the last combination he had memorized: 8-left, 1-right, 16-left, and entered through it. He hurried up to the fourth floor tunnel. He soon came to a dead-end where he leaned against the corner, and was relieved it opened. He scrambled out, watched the corner close, and tiptoed to his dorm room. He got into bed. Before closing his eyes, he glanced at his roommates. Eliot sprawled on his back, his arm hanging over the side of the bed, his mouth open. And Rupert—

Where was Rupert?

Panic gripped Rollie.

He recounted his trek through the secret passage. Had he heard any noises? Had he sighted any shadows? He had been so enthralled with his exploration that he had not bothered to watch for the mole. He wanted to kick himself for being so careless. Some detective!

Even if Rupert had not discovered Rollie and the secret passage, he must have noticed Rollie gone. He would be sure to tell on Rollie for breaking school rules. Rollie vowed not to sneak out of bed again . . . unless absolutely necessary.

An opening door cut into Rollie's blistering thoughts. He squeezed his eyes shut, waited, and peeked. Rupert shuffle out of the bathroom and stumble back to bed. With a grunt, he rolled over.

Whew!

Maybe Rupert had not noticed Rollie's absence. He appeared to be half-asleep. Either way, Rollie made a second vow to himself to be more watchful, especially of his suspicious roommate.

Auntie Ei's War
ning

Rollie woke with a start, and blinked around his room. Weak sunlight filtered through the window, and his roommates' beds were empty—Eliot's was nicely made and Rupert's was an untidy heap of wrinkled bedding. Rollie sprang up and checked the clock on the desk.

“I'm late!”

He madly rummaged around in his suitcase for some clothes, got dressed, and raced down to the second floor. When he reached Ms. Yardsly's closed classroom door, he paused to catch his breath. Trying hard to make no disturbance, he slipped inside and into his seat. Cecily raised her eyebrows in surprise, Eliot shook his head, and Ms. Yardsly immediately marched up to him. She looked as crisp as ever in a black skirt suit and orange tie. Her brown hair was pulled tightly into a bun at the back of her head. She stood stiffly and inspected him with her icy gaze.

“You are tardy by seven minutes,” she told him, tapping her wrist watch. “I've already handed out today's quiz. Unfortunately it's too late for you to take it.” She spun on her heel and marched back to her desk.

Rollie held his head in his hands, thinking how this missed quiz would raise the headmaster's attention about his poor studies yet again. He could not believe he had slept through the alarm, slept through his roommates waking, and slept in clear past nine o'clock. He knew the reason he had been so tired was his midnight escapade through the secret passage. Well, he had not been caught, but he had not entirely gotten away without consequences. He hoped Yardsly wouldn't take him off the mole case.

“Time's up, please pass your quizzes forward,” Ms. Yardsly barked. “We will continue with another Dancing Men message to decipher,” she drilled, tapping the blackboard. “You have one minute. Go!”

Dancing Men!

Rollie had almost forgotten the code in the
Daily Telegraph
. It was Monday, which according to Miss Gram meant keeping up on current events. He could not wait to get to her class and check if another code hid in the newspaper. Last time it had been one word:
TUNNEL.
Not much of a message, but—

Rollie gasped.

“Rollin E. Wilson, did you decode it?”

Rollie gulped.

“Rollin E. Wilson, answer me!”

“Sorry, Ms. Yardsly, I, uh, thought—”

“Did you decode it or not?”

“No, sorry.”

“Then return to your work and stop distracting others with oral outbursts.” Ms. Yardsly's stern voice rang with authority, yet her expression softened as she noticed his furrowed brow and flushed cheeks. She marched over to him, bent down slightly, and whispered, “What's troubling you, Rollin?”

“I just thought of something important. I'll get back to work.”

“Good lad.” For a split second she squeezed his shoulder reassuringly, then turned on her heel and strode to the blackboard. “Time's up, pair and share!”

Rollie barely heard another word spoken in class.
The tunnel
! He had not just stumbled upon someone's silly doodling in a newspaper—he had stumbled upon an intentional message to someone in the school.

That someone had to be the mole. Because of the tightened security, the newspaper was perhaps the only method of getting a secret message into the school. If the message was for the mole, then it had to be an order from Herr Zilch himself. He was telling the mole to search for the
tunnel
, or secret passage as Rollie called it. What would Herr Zilch's message be this week?

During recess, Rollie caught up with Cecily about the weekend.

“It was a good thing I stayed.” Rollie told her all about the secret passage and the map hidden in the newspaper Auntie Ei had given him. Then he flipped open his notepad and read his list of clues to her.

• Herr Zilch's mole is looking for the secret passage
  
• He is looking by pounding holes in the walls
  
• He is using Miss Gram's missing tools to pound holes
  
• He wants something in the secret passage
  
• What does Herr Zilch want? Something in the locked boxes?
  

Cecily listened, her green eyes sparkling. “You said
he
. You think the mole's Rupert, don't you?” She glanced around the recess area to be sure Rupert was not lurking somewhere nearby.

“I
think
he is, but I can't find any evidence. It's really frustrating!”

“You
want
him to be the mole.”

“I wouldn't say I
want
him to be, but . . . it would make sense, and—”

“Be honest.”

“I
am
being honest with you! I think he could very likely—”

“No, Rollie,” Cecily stopped him. “Be honest with yourself.”

He furrowed his brow. “He's mean, shifty—”

“Shh! Not so loud.”

Rollie sighed. “Sorry, I don't know what's wrong with me. I'm following my instincts about Rupert, but I can't find any evidence! Auntie Ei always tells me to trust my instincts. My instincts tell me he's no good—I don't like him.”

“Sounds like you're going off of your feelings more than instincts. Your feelings could be wrong. Just because you don't like someone doesn't make him a criminal, you know.”

Rollie stared at her. “You're right. Then who is the mole?”

“I'm not saying Rupert isn't,” Cecily countered. “He could be. I'm just saying you need to suspect him for the right reasons. Not because you can't stand him, but because the evidence points to him.”

“Good point.” Rollie smiled at her. “You've got a lot of good points this morning.”

Cecily giggled. “I wish I could take credit for all that, but they're not my words—they're Auntie Ei's. She got home this weekend.”

“What! Did you tell her about our case?”

“I talked to her mainly about you and Rupert. She gave me the advice I just told you.” Cecily wiggled out of her coat.

“We need evidence,” Rollie reiterated.

Cecily patted his shoulder. “We'll get it on whoever it is, but right now we better get to class.”

“You look different.” Rollie eyed her. “You're wearing a dress!” He pointed at her mustard yellow dress with green buttons.

Cecily blushed slightly. “I didn't have any clean trousers.”

“That's not the reason,” laughed Rollie. “I deduce that the Lady Gram club is the reason.”

“I think I'm gonna quit the club,” said Cecily, smoothing her skirt. “All we do is practice curtsies and other boring lady-things. Plus I don't like Rosemary Wood.”

Wesley jogged up to them, raising a high-five to Rollie and nodding a greeting at Cecily.

“I thought you were going to join us for rugby drills this morning,” he said, tossing his rugby ball in the air.

“Do we still have time for another scrum?” asked Rollie.

In response, the bell rang.

“Apparently not,” chuckled Wesley. “Which classes do you two have next?”

“Miss Hertz's class, then Miss Gram's etiquette class,” replied Cecily, following the boys across the roof.

“Miss Gram's alright, huh?” said Wesley. “I mean, she's no Professor Enches. He was really great, wasn't he? He was always my favorite.”

“He was?” Cecily wrinkled her nose.

“Sure. He sort of took me under his wing.”

“You shouldn't talk about him anymore, Wesley,” Rollie said solemnly.

“Why not?”

“Because.” Rollie wished he could be honest with his friend. He felt it did more harm than good to keep some secrets. “Never mind. See you at lunch.”

In Miss Hertz's class, Rollie wondered what Herr Zilch's new message would be in the
Daily Telegraph
. He hoped it would give a clue about who the mole was.

“Footprints contain an entire story to someone's identity,” Miss Hertz twittered. “Sherlock could discover the height of a person by measuring the length of his or her stride. To figure this, one can divide the length of the footprint by 0.16—that will be the height. Sherlock could also identify the type of shoe, which always offered a helpful clue. Do you remember what I always say? Footprints are the best tattle-tales!”

Her words went in one ear and out the other. Not until she announced, “Class dismissed!” did Rollie fully hear her. He bolted to Spy Etiquette and Interrogation class. The door was locked, but he heard hammering from inside the classroom. No doubt Miss Gram was adding a new touch.

“You left in a hurry.” Cecily joined him by the closed door.

“I have to get the business section of the
Daily Telegraph
again.”

“Alright. If I get that section I'll trade with you. Do you think there will be more Dancing Men?”

“I hope so.”

“Fa-la-la, boys and girls!” Miss Gram sang as she opened the door for them. She looked whimsical in an orange-and-black polka-dot dress. “Monday morning means current events! Cecily, I adore your dress—simply darling.”

Cecily beamed with delight.

As Rollie sat down at his desk, he scanned the room for new decorations. He did not notice anything new, although now there were so many decorations that it would have been hard to spot anything small. Suddenly he spied something new in the pretend parlor scene . . .

A hole.

Rollie squinted hard at it and noted its similar size to the other holes. Had Miss Gram just hammered out that hole minutes before? Was she the—

“Boys and girls, I spy with my little eye a new decoration!”

The students swiveled their heads and eyes around the busy room.

Cecily was the first to observe the addition, and she shot her hand up.

“Cecily, dear!”

“You hung a window!” She pointed to a window frame dressed with curtains hanging on the wall in the pretend parlor.

“Wonderful! I thought our parlor needed to look a little more realistic for the ambiance.”

Rollie glanced at the faux window frame. Now he was puzzled. Which had she hammered—the hole or a nail for the faux window? Or both?

Miss Gram
clip-clopped
between the desks and passed out newspaper pages. She handed Rollie a page from the
Times
with a cartoon. He frowned with dismay. Quickly he searched his classmates nearby, trying to see which pages they got. He noticed Eliot looking glum.

“Chum, what did you get?”

“The business section of the
Daily Telegraph
,” Eliot grumbled.

“I got a cartoon. Do you want to trade?”

“Yes!” Eliot leaned over to make the trade, but paused. “Wait a minute. Why do you want the business section?”

“I know you want the cartoons. I'll trade. You need to get more ideas for your cartoon.”

“That's truth.”

They exchanged pages.

Rollie breathed out a sigh of relief. When he raced his eyes down the page, he spotted a Dancing Man next to a pie chart. As he found more Dancing Men, he copied them down in his composition book. He whipped out his pocket notepad, flipped to the Dancing Men alphabet Eliot had made for him earlier, and decoded Herr Zilch's message. He gaped at the two words that made more sense to him than any other clue had so far: