Karen's Softball Mystery Read online

  While I was untying the laces, I saw something interesting. There was an old baseball card wrapped in plastic on the ground. As soon as Kristy came over to help with Jake, I slipped the card into my pocket.

  I waved to Hannie and Nancy. It was time for another meeting.

  “I do not understand how those bats fell down all at once,” said Nancy. “I leaned them up against the wall just as carefully as I always do it. The bats should never have fallen down.”

  “Unless someone gave them a push,” said Hannie.

  “Look what I found,” I said. I pulled the baseball card out of my pocket. We studied it together. It was a four-year-old card in excellent condition.

  “It is probably part of a private collection,” said Nancy.

  “The criminal’s private collection!” said Hannie.

  “I bet he or she dropped it after pushing the bats down,” I said.

  “That was so mean,” said Hannie. “It is one thing to put Elmer’s glue on a ball or in a glove. That cannot hurt anyone. But it is another thing to make a kid fall over all those bats.”

  “You are right,” I said. “But now we will catch that criminal for sure. We have another excellent clue to add to our list. We can be pretty sure that the criminal has a baseball card collection.”

  This was a very good day’s work for the Three Musketeers Detective Agency.

  Jake Kuhn’s mom came to take him home. (Thank goodness he was not hurt too badly.) Natalie decided to sit out the practice. The rest of us played ball. But we did not play very well. It is hard to play ball with a criminal on the loose.

  Kristy’s Idea

  Kristy plopped down on the grass after the game. She looked beat. We all fell down around her. We felt the same way.

  “I think we need a break from practicing,” she said. “I am giving everyone the weekend off. The next practice will be on Monday.”

  This was good news. But Kristy had more good news to tell us.

  “I have been thinking about the state of our equipment,” she said. “Most of it is either missing or in terrible shape. We need new equipment for our team.”

  “That will cost a lot of money,” said Ricky. (My pretend husband is very practical.)

  “I know that,” replied Kristy. “And I have an idea about how we can raise the money we need. The Krushers will hold a toy sale.”

  “Cool!” I said. A toy sale would be fun.

  “Kids can donate their used toys to me,” continued Kristy. “The sale will be at my house a week from Saturday. I can advertise during the week. That way lots of kids will come and all the money will go toward buying new equipment for the Krushers.”

  Everyone liked Kristy’s idea. Haley and Charlotte and Vanessa jumped up and led us in a cheer.

  “Two, four, six, eight, who do we appreciate? Kristy! Kristy! Hooray!”

  “Thanks, team,” replied Kristy. “See you Monday. And remember, gather up those old toys. We need all we can get.”

  Mrs. Dawes came to pick up Nancy, Andrew, and me. When we got to the little house, we burst through the door and told Mommy our news about the sale.

  “That is great,” Mommy replied. “I will help you clean out your closets and playroom tomorrow.”

  Yikes. Kristy had not said anything about cleaning.

  “I think I have some old toys lying around my room,” I said. “We do not really have to go through the closets, do we?”

  “You want to donate as many toys as you can, don’t you?” asked Mommy.

  “Well, yes. But isn’t there another way? Besides cleaning up, I mean,” I said.

  Mommy shook her head.

  “Tomorrow, bright and early,” she said.

  Good-bye, Toys

  There was one thing I had to do on Saturday morning before going through my toys. I took out the telephone book and found a listing for “Baseball Cards — Sales.” There was a shop in Stoneybrook called Stan’s Souvenirs. I dialed the number and spoke to Stan himself.

  “Um, I found a baseball card yesterday,” I said. “I was wondering if it came from your shop.”

  I described the card. Stan did not remember it.

  “Are you sure?” I asked. “It is part of an important criminal investigation.”

  Stan still did not remember it. I thanked him and hung up. I did not feel too bad. Maybe Stan did not remember the card. But it could still turn out to be a good clue.

  I had breakfast with Mommy, Seth, and Andrew. I ate a bowl and a half of Krispy Krunchy cereal with blueberries on top. (I had the half a bowl for extra energy. I had the feeling getting rid of toys was going to be hard work.)

  Seth went to his workshop. (He is a gigundoly good carpenter.) Andrew and I helped with the breakfast dishes.

  Then Mommy said, “Karen, will you please get some rags? I will fill a bucket with soapy water. The last time I looked that playroom was pretty grimy.”

  Rags? Buckets? This sounded more like cleaning than I thought. I carried up a bag of rags and we got started.

  Mommy held up a building set Andrew and I used to play with all the time.

  “How about this toy? Can we sell it?” asked Mommy.

  “I want to keep it,” I said.

  “Do you play with it?” asked Mommy.

  “No,” Andrew replied. “I forgot we had it.”

  “Karen, why do you want to keep it if you do not play with it anymore?” asked Mommy.

  “I just like it,” I said.

  “Well, all right,” sighed Mommy. She dusted it off and put it back on the shelf.

  “How about this?” she asked. She held up an old cow puppet I had given Andrew for his birthday one year.

  “It’s Minnie-Moo!” said Andrew. “She used to moo when you squeezed her. But her mooer broke.”

  “Can we give her away?” asked Mommy.

  Andrew nodded.

  “Wait! We have to keep her,” I said.

  “She is Andrew’s puppet,” Mommy replied.

  “But I gave Minnie-Moo to him. She might not like going to a new home. She might get upset,” I said.

  “We have to give toys to Kristy,” said Andrew. “She needs money to buy equipent.”

  “That’s equipment,” I said. “And I am sure she will get plenty of other toys.”

  “How about this old tea set, Karen? Grandma Packett gave you a beautiful new one,” said Mommy.

  “The new set is very nice. But I do not want to give away my old set,” I replied.

  “Please tell me why,” said Mommy. “You never use it.”

  “It was my very first tea set. It has sentimetal value,” I replied.

  “That’s sentimental,” said Mommy. “And I think it is time to say good-bye to it. It is just collecting dust.”

  “I will dust it, then,” I said.

  I grabbed a rag and wiped every cup and saucer.

  “I give up, Karen,” said Mommy. She turned to Andrew.

  “Andrew, how about this wind-up bear?” she asked.

  “It does not wind up anymore,” said Andrew.

  “And this?” asked Mommy. She held up a jigsaw puzzle with great big pieces.

  “It is for babies,” said Andrew.

  She held up one toy after another. Andrew was good about giving away his toys. I was having trouble parting with all but a few of mine. If they left it to me, Kristy would not even have enough money to buy a softball!

  Just the Facts

  Sunday morning is a day off for most people. But not for the members of the Three Musketeers Detective Agency. We could not rest. We had work to do.

  Kristy was having her toy sale to buy new equipment for the Krushers next Saturday. If we did not solve the softball mystery, there would be no softball team to use the new equipment.

  I called Nancy.

  “Can you come over right away?” I asked.

  Nancy said yes. She called Hannie. Before I knew it we were all up in my room. I closed the door for privacy.

  I took out my mag
nifying glass in case we needed to use it. I handed out the detective’s hats I had made the night before. I had written the initials T.M.D.A. on each one.

  “The first thing we need to do is make a list of crimes committed against the Krushers,” I said.

  “I hope you have a lot of paper,” said Hannie. “We have a long list of crimes to write down.”

  Here is the list we came up with:

  “We are dealing with a dangerous criminal here,” I said.

  “Now let’s write down all the clues we have,” said Nancy.

  I took out a second sheet of paper and started writing:

  “Now we need a list of suspects,” said Nancy.

  I hated to say what I was thinking. But a good detective needs to be ruthless.

  “I think my brother, David Michael, is a suspect,” I said. “He has not been allowed to come to some practices and he is very angry at Kristy for not taking his side.”

  “How about that Jack Darvin?” said Hannie. “He does not seem to like Kristy at all. He is always bossing her around.”

  “Mr. Benson will do anything to see that Marty does well on the team,” said Nancy. “Marty’s left-handed, by the way.”

  “Julian Spencer is left-handed, too. And his sister, Barbie, is pretty pushy,” I said.

  We talked about a few other kids, but found good reasons for ruling each one out. We were left with four main suspects. I wrote down their names:

  “We forgot to mention two other suspects,” said Hannie. “Didn’t you say that a couple of Bashers were spying on us?”

  “You are right. I forgot about Jerry and Joanna,” I said.

  I added their names to the list. That made six suspects. Watch out, criminal, here we come!

  Kristy’s Toy Sale

  We were back at practice on Monday. The criminal was back at work, too. There were several more reports of missing equipment. But the Three Musketeers did not uncover any other important clues. By the end of practice on Friday, we were stumped.

  “See you tomorrow at the toy sale,” called Hannie. She headed home with her brother, Linny.

  On Saturday, I was up bright and early. My family had breakfast together. Mommy said she would drive Andrew and me to the big house for the toy sale when we finished.

  “You hardly donated any toys, Karen,” said Mommy. “Are you sure you do not want to give up the tea set? It would bring a good price to help buy equipment for your team.”

  I wanted to help the Krushers. But I wanted to keep my tea set more.

  “I will think about it,” I said.

  I thought about it for two seconds and decided to keep my tea set. When it was time to go, though, I saw Mommy carrying it out to the car.

  “No! No! You can take Minnie-Moo instead,” I said.

  “The tea set will get a better price. It is old. You do not use it. It is time to say good-bye,” said Mommy.

  “What if I want to have lots of friends over for tea? I might need it then,” I said.

  “I will give you my real tea cups if that happens,” said Mommy.

  I could see Mommy was not going to take no for an answer. I said good-bye to the pot first. Then to each cup. (There were six.) Then each saucer. (Six again.) Then I sang and acted out, “I’m a Little Teapot” until it was time to get in the car.

  We arrived at the big house while Kristy was setting up for the sale. A few of her friends were helping out. Mommy and Andrew carried our carton of toys to one of the tables. I carried my tea set by itself. (I thought about hiding it, but I knew Mommy would notice it was missing.)

  Kristy’s friend Abby Stevenson came over to help us arrange and price our donations.

  “This tea set is great,” she said. “We will put a high price on it.”

  She made a tag and hung it on the teapot. She put the set at the center of the table. When the table was ready, Mommy took Andrew home, and I went to find Hannie and Nancy.

  “Let’s go check out the toys,” said Nancy. “I haven’t decided whether to buy a few little ones, or one big one.”

  We circled the yard once. New kids kept arriving with more toys. So we went around again. Every so often I turned to see if my tea set was still on the table. It was.

  While I was checking out my tea set, Barbie and Julian Spencer arrived. Barbie was wearing another cool outfit. Julian was tagging along behind, as usual. They showed Kristy their toys. I watched Barbie take an album from their carton. At first I thought it was a photograph album. Then I saw that it was an album that held cards. Baseball cards! I took a closer look.

  “Hey, can I see that album?” I asked.

  “Sure,” replied Julian.

  The baseball cards were arranged in alphabetical order by the players’ names and also by year. There was one empty space in the book. It was the exact place where the mystery baseball card would go. Hmm.

  “Thanks for bringing this great carton of stuff,” said Kristy. “If you give me your phone number, I will call you to pick up any toys we do not sell.”

  Barbie took a pencil out of her pocket. It had a dark charcoal point and a pink eraser! I noticed that she wrote with her right hand, not her left. But I already knew the reason for that.

  Eureka! I had found our criminal!

  Case Closed

  “Explain this!” I said.

  I reached into my pocket and pulled out the baseball card I had picked up on the field.

  Barbie stood there with her mouth hanging open. Hannie and Nancy ran to see what was going on. Since Barbie was not saying anything, I decided to do the talking for her.

  “The Three Musketeers Detective Agency has been hot on your trail,” I said. “We know the changes in Kristy’s book were made with that pencil you are holding in your hand!”

  I pointed to the pencil.

  “The stolen equipment was for right-handed players only. Not for left-handed players like that player next to you!” I said. I pointed to Julian.

  “You were committing all the crimes against the Krushers for Julian’s sake, weren’t you?” I said.

  “Huh?” said Julian.

  He looked up at his sister and she poured out her story.

  “Karen is right. I admit everything,” she said. “I wanted my brother to look extra good on the softball field. I thought if I messed things up for the good players, Julian would look better. I thought that would help him fit in and make new friends more quickly.”

  “So that was why you stole right-hand equipment. And it is why you put glue in the catcher’s mitts,” said Nancy.

  “And that is why you lowered the statistics in the player book. And why you tripped Jake,” said Hannie. “You are lucky he did not get hurt badly.”

  “I am sorry,” said Barbie. “I never wanted to hurt anyone. I just wanted to help my brother.”

  “This was not the way to do it,” said Kristy.

  We left Kristy to deal with Barbie. The Three Musketeers had done their job. Our case was closed.

  It was time to celebrate. It was time to buy some toys! I looked over at Abby’s table.

  “I wonder if Mommy would be mad at me if I bought back my tea set,” I said.

  Hannie and Nancy looked at each other.

  “I would not do that if I were you,” said Hannie.

  “Hey, Karen. I think I hear Ricky calling you. He probably wants to hear about the case,” said Nancy.

  “Where is he? I did not hear him calling,” I replied.

  “He is over there,” said Hannie, pointing toward the house. “You better go find him. We will wait here for you.”

  I went to look for Ricky. I did not find him. When I came back Hannie and Nancy were each holding one handle of a shopping bag.

  “What did you buy?” I asked.

  “A tea set,” said Hannie.

  “Your tea set,” said Nancy. “Hannie and I chipped in and bought it together. I will keep it at my house. That way it will always be next door to the little house. You can play with it whenever
you want.”

  “Thank you. You are the greatest!” I said.

  “One for all and all for one!” the Three Musketeers said together.

  We got busy buying toys. I bought lots of good things for myself. And I bought a toy for Hannie and one for Nancy, too. I even bought a toy for David Michael. (I felt bad about calling him a prime suspect.)

  By the time Mommy came to pick me up, my money was gone and my arms were full.

  “Look what I got, Mommy. More toys!” I said.

  Mommy groaned. A big grin spread across my face.

  Welcome Back, Ms. Colman

  Sunday was a happy day. And a busy one! I was happy because the mystery was solved. But that was not the only reason. Ms. Colman was coming back to school on Monday. For real this time.

  That is why I was busy. Mommy and I were making cupcakes again for the party. (I had saved the cards I made before.)

  Before I knew it, Sunday was gone and it was Monday — party day! Nancy and I raced to Mr. Berger’s room to drop off our party things. Then we headed for our room.

  We were the first ones there. Except for Ms. Colman. She was sitting at her desk as if she had never been gone. Nancy and I burst through the door.

  “Welcome back, Ms. Colman!” I shouted.

  (Ms. Colman usually reminds me to use my indoor voice when I shout in class. But she did not say anything this time. She knew it was a special occasion.)

  Ms. Colman put one arm around Nancy and one around me.

  “Thank you for that welcome, girls,” she said. “I am happy to be back. I missed you.”

  “We missed you, too,” I replied.

  “Even though Mrs. Hoffman was nice,” added Nancy.

  “Mrs. Hoffman told me she enjoyed being your teacher very much,” said Ms. Colman.

  I was glad to hear that. I was glad we were giving both our teachers a surprise party.

  The other kids were coming in. It was time to start the day. Guess who got to take attendance. Me! Not one kid was absent.

  We told Ms. Colman about the things we had been doing with Mrs. Hoffman. She told us all about Jane. She even passed around baby pictures. Jane was gigundoly cute. And in one picture she was lying on the blanket I had made! I felt very proud.