Mary Anne and the Library Mystery Read online

  “So was I,” piped up Rosie, from behind me. “And I agree with Nicky. What are we doing sitting around here, when there are leads we could be following?”

  Shannon, Claudia, and I exchanged amused glances. “What about your reading?” Shannon asked Rosie. “I thought you wanted to win that prize.”

  Rosie shrugged. “I’d rather solve this mystery,” she said. “So, what do we do first?”

  “Well, we can’t just walk up to Miss Ellway and ask her for all her relatives’ names and addresses,” I said, thinking out loud.

  “What if we could find an obituary for old Mr. Ellway?” asked Shannon. “They usually list the relatives in those.”

  “You’re right!” said Claudia. “And I bet we can find the obituary with the microfiche, upstairs. My mom showed me how to use it. It has all the newspapers on it, going way back.”

  And that was the last I saw of Claudia, Shannon, Nicky, and Rosie that day. They headed upstairs, but I had to stay in the children’s room and work. It wasn’t until later that evening, when Shannon called me, that I found out what they had done for the rest of the afternoon.

  The obituary was easy to find. It was in the Stoneybrook News of November 13, 1943, along with a longer article about Mr. Ellway’s life. Theodore Ellway, the four of them discovered, had been a big shot in Stoneybrook. He had made a fortune building houses, and he had died a very rich man. He had given a lot of money and land to the town, but many of his gifts had strings attached. For example, he had donated a little park, which would only belong to the town for as long as the people in the town agreed to feed the ducks that visited a pond in the park. “That’s dumb,” said Nicky, when he read that part of the obituary.

  “I think it’s neat,” said Rosie. “It just means he cared about the ducks and didn’t want them to starve.”

  “What about his children and grandchildren, though?” asked Claudia. “He didn’t seem to care if they starved.”

  “It’s true that he didn’t leave them much,” said Shannon. “He seems to have thought it was important for them to be independent. See, here’s a quote from him.” She pointed to a paragraph in the article.

  “ ‘I worked hard for every penny I earned,’ said Ellway,’ ” Claudia read out loud. “Then here, he said, ‘I believe that hard work builds character.’ I think he was worried about what would happen to his descendants if money was just handed to them.”

  “So, who are his descendants?” asked Nicky.

  “Well,” said Claudia. “I only see one name: His son, Theodore Ellway the second. Then it mentions a granddaughter and a grandson. There is also a great-granddaughter and a great-grandson, infant children of Theodore Ellway the third.”

  Nicky scribbled away. “Boy, they like that name Theodore,” he said. “How do you spell that, anyway?”

  “Forget about Theodore the second,” called Shannon, who had been working at another microfiche machine. “I guess he was Miss Ellway’s father, and he died in 1974. But it gives his kids’ names in his obituary, and his grandkids’ names. His kids are Miriam — that’s our Miss Ellway — and Theodore Ellway the third. And I guess Theodore the third has two kids named Rosa and — surprise! — Theodore the fourth.”

  “Wow,” said Claudia. “This is pretty confusing.” She thought for a moment. “I guess Theodore the third would be middle-aged by now, right?”

  “At least middle-aged,” said Shannon. “He’s Miss Ellway’s brother, and she’s no spring chicken.”

  “Isn’t her brother the one who owns the hardware store?” asked Rosie. “I bet that’s the one my dad goes to. I go with him sometimes. It’s called Ted’s Tools. Ted is short for Theodore, right? There’s a nice man there, and a nice lady, too. I bet that’s his wife.”

  “Okay!” said Claudia. “So, we know where our first stop will be. But how do we find the other Ellways — his son and daughter?”

  “Can’t we just check the phone book for their addresses?” asked Shannon.

  Claudia snapped her fingers. “Right!” she said. “Okay, we’re all set. Ready, everybody?”

  They left the library and headed downtown to the hardware store. It’s open on Sunday for homeowners who are working on weekend do-it-yourself projects, and lots of people were there. Claudia pretended to be interested in some light fixtures, and she held a long conversation with Ted Ellway. (She knew he was Ted Ellway, because he was wearing a nametag.) Meanwhile, Shannon, Rosie, and Nicky browsed around the store. It’s a neat place, an old-fashioned hardware store with a million different things on the shelves: nuts and bolts and nails and glue and fishing line and every kind of tool you can imagine. The aisles are narrow, so customers have to squeeze by one another as they hunt for spare parts for their lawnmowers or new reflectors for their bicycles.

  Shannon told me later that Mrs. Ellway (her name tag said “Dottie”) was a good-natured woman who appeared to be at home behind the cash register. She joked with every customer, and seemed to know them all by name. Claudia found that Ted Ellway was really nice, too. Instead of treating her like a kid, he took her seriously and spent a long time helping her find the right kind of light fixture. She said later that she felt rotten when she told him he really didn’t have what she wanted. “I couldn’t help it, though,” she said. “I didn’t have any money with me, and besides, I didn’t really need the thing anyway.”

  The four of them left Ted’s Tools, Rosie and Nicky clutching lollipops that Dottie had handed them. “Didn’t I tell you? They’re really nice in there,” said Rosie, eyeing her purple lollipop.

  “I’m going back tomorrow,” said Nicky, taking a lick at his green one.

  Claudia looked at Shannon and shrugged. “They sure don’t seem like people who would burn down a library,” she said. “But maybe their son and daughter will turn out to be terrible people. Let’s check the phone book and find out where they live.”

  It only took a few minutes at a nearby phone booth to find the addresses for Ted the Fourth and Rosa Ellway. Ted the Fourth lived in a ritzy area of town, not Kristy and Shannon’s neighborhood but an even fancier one. And Rosa lived near the vet’s office.

  They headed to Rosa’s place, first, since it was nearer. It turned out that she ran Ellway’s Kennel, where people could leave their dogs and cats while they were on vacation. When Shannon and the others arrived, they found a cheerful red-haired woman in the yard, playing fetch with a black-and-white puppy. Shannon pretended to be looking for a place to board her dog, Astrid. After just one short conversation about dogs and puppies she realized Rosa was just as nice as her parents.

  As for Ted the Fourth, he turned out to be a great guy, too. Not that they met him. They found that out from the gardener, who was trimming the long, long hedge that ran along the long, long driveway to Ted’s huge mansion.

  “Mr. Ellway? He’s the greatest boss a man could have,” said the gardener. “His wife is terrific, too. She’s the one with all the money, but she’s just a regular gal. Usually she’s right out here with me, hauling brush.”

  Claudia threw up her hands as they walked away from the Ellway mansion. “We did all that work,” she said, with a laugh, “and all we ended up with is the news that the Ellways are wonderful people!”

  “And we were hoping for arsonists and murderers and thieves,” said Shannon, giggling. “What a shame.”

  Nicky and Rosie started giggling, too, though Shannon wasn’t sure they understood the joke. Their investigation hadn’t led them anywhere, but at least, as Shannon said later, they’d had fun trying.

  I laughed when Shannon told me about her adventures with Rosie, Nicky, and Claudia, but I felt glum after we hung up.

  Our investigation was going nowhere. Oh, sure, we had a few leads, but none of them was panning out. The mystery was confusing and scary, and it worried me.

  I had been having bad dreams lately. Dreams about fires burning out of control. In one of the dreams, the burning library was a big house where all my favorite childr
en’s-book characters lived. Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle had to jump out of a high window, while the Runaway Bunny squirmed out of a low one and Ramona Quimby stood on the lawn, wearing her pajamas and crying. It was horrible.

  I was losing sleep because of the dreams, which meant that I was feeling foggy during school. I was still finishing my homework and passing quizzes, but during class time I often felt as if my head were wrapped in cotton gauze.

  I was feeling that way on Monday during math class. We were supposed to be working on a problem about a man who was selling apples at $3.25 a pound and another man who wanted to buy two and a quarter pounds of them, and none of it was making any sense to me. I sat chewing on my eraser, hoping the teacher would call on somebody else.

  And then the fire alarm went off. “Fire drill!” yelled Alan Gray, this obnoxious boy who happens to be in my math class. “Don’t panic, boys and girls. Just line up and walk this way.” He stood up and started doing this silly walk toward the front of the class.

  My teacher, Ms. Frost, glared at him. “Please sit down, Alan,” she said. “Fire drills are not a joking matter. Class, you know the procedure. Please line up and get ready to leave the classroom — quietly.”

  I gave a huge sigh and closed my notebook. A fire drill was the last thing I needed that day. For one thing, it was just plain boring. We would all line up and file out of the school, stand outside in the freezing cold for a few minutes, and then file back in. Some kids would clown around, and the rest of us would try to ignore them.

  For another thing, I was beginning to feel that my life had been one big fire alarm lately.

  I lined up with the others and followed Ms. Frost out the door and down the hall. The hall was packed with kids shuffling along, jostling one another and giggling.

  “Can I stop at my locker, Ms. Frost?” asked a girl named Tiffany.

  “I’m afraid not,” said Ms. Frost. “We’re supposed to head straight for the main parking lot.”

  “What if somebody needs to — you know, use the facilities?” asked Alan Gray, with a wicked grin.

  “Alan, are you trying to tell me that you need to go to the bathroom?” asked Ms. Frost, loudly enough so all the kids in the area could hear her. There was a lot of snickering, and Alan actually blushed.

  “Um, no,” he mumbled. “It was just a hypothetical question.”

  “Well, from now on, I’ll ask you to hold the hypothetical questions until we’re safely out of the building,” said Ms. Frost. She sounded firm, but she was smiling a little.

  I spotted Kristy emerging from her social studies classroom, and I called to her and waved. “Meet you by the fence!” she called back, and I knew exactly where she meant. My friends and I have a spot where we meet sometimes, before or after school. I knew I’d probably find the other members of the BSC there once we were safely outside.

  My class made its way through the crowded hallway. At one point, Alan Gray and some other boys started to make mooing noises, as if we were a herd of cows. “Git along, little dogie,” said Alan, smacking another boy on the rear. That led to a short shoving match, and someone trampled on my toes, which made me squeal.

  “Mr. Gray!” said Ms. Frost. “This is your last warning. Do I need to report you to Mr. Kingbridge?”

  Mr. Kingbridge is the assistant principal, and being sent to him is worse than being sent to the principal, whose name is Mr. Taylor. Mr. Kingbridge is in charge of discipline, and he has the power to suspend kids who get into trouble.

  Alan and the other boys stopped mooing, and the hall was quieter until we reached the doors. Then the boys started shoving again, and fooling around. Alan held the door open for another boy. “After you,” he said politely. When the boy tried to walk through the door, Alan stopped holding it and tried to squeeze through at the same time.

  “Boys, boys,” said Mr. Fiske, one of the English teachers. “I know this seems like an opportunity to make fools of yourselves, but that’s actually not the point of the exercise. What we’re trying to do here is get everyone out of the building as quickly and as quietly as we can.”

  Alan was blushing again. Mr. Fiske held the door for him, and he stepped out without a word. The rest of us followed. It was wonderful to be out of that hot, crowded hall. I knew I was going to start freezing soon, without my coat, but for a second the cold air felt great. The parking lot was full of kids who seemed to be milling about aimlessly. We’re supposed to stay with our classes during a fire drill, but nobody ever does. I headed for the fence, and found Kristy, Claudia, and Stacey waiting there already. “Hey, Mary Anne,” said Kristy. “We have almost enough people for a BSC meeting!”

  “Here come Jessi and Mal,” said Stacey. “They look upset.”

  “Isn’t this awful?” said Jessi, as she and Mal neared us.

  “What, having a fire drill in the middle of social studies?” asked Kristy. “I can think of worse things.”

  “Kristy, it’s not just a fire drill,” said Mal.

  “What do you mean?”

  At that moment, I heard the sound of sirens, and my stomach did a flip-flop.

  “It’s a real fire,” said Mal, as three fire engines pulled into the parking lot.

  “Oh, my lord!” exclaimed Claudia. She began to search in her pocketbook, found a kind of mushy-looking bar, and offered it around, but nobody wanted any. We were too busy staring at the fire fighters. Several of them leapt off the trucks and started uncoiling hoses. Others grabbed axes from the toolboxes on the trucks and dashed into the school.

  “This is for real,” I said to nobody in particular. “It’s not a fire drill, and I’m pretty sure it’s not a dream.” I stopped to pinch myself on the arms. Maybe it was just a dream. But no, the pinch hurt enough to make my eyes water. What was going on? Why were there fires in every building I spent time in lately?

  “I smell smoke,” said Kristy, sniffing the air.

  “I do, too,” said Claudia, taking a bite of her chocolate bar. “Are you guys sure you don’t want any of this? I think I have some Twizzlers, too.” She started to root around in her bag again.

  Another fire truck pulled up, and more fire fighters jumped out and ran into the building. “Whoa, this is serious,” said Stacey.

  Just then, Mr. Taylor climbed up onto one of the fire trucks, holding the fire chief’s bullhorn. “Attention,” he said. “May I have your attention?”

  The noise level in the parking lot, which had been very high, dropped off. I noticed that even Alan Gray and his friends turned to listen to Mr. Taylor.

  “There is a fire in the school,” began Mr. Taylor.

  “Duh,” said Kristy, under her breath. I turned to her and frowned. Then I turned back to Mr. Taylor.

  “On the advice of the fire department, I am canceling classes for the rest of the day.”

  A huge cheer went up, led by Alan Gray. Mr. Taylor gestured for silence. “Our emergency evacuation plan specifies that you will be escorted to the high school, to wait in the gym until your parents can be alerted to the circumstances. A bulletin will go out over the radio, local businesses will be called, and the phones in the high school will be available for use.”

  “This is exciting,” Mal whispered.

  I knew what she meant. It was kind of exciting. But it was upsetting, too. I can’t deny that being let out of school early was fun, but not if it meant that the school was going to burn down. I may not love everything about SMS, but I wouldn’t want the place to be destroyed.

  “Girls and boys,” finished Mr. Taylor, “I hope I can trust you to behave like mature young adults. Please follow your teachers’ instructions, and make your way to the high school in an orderly fashion.”

  “What about our coats?” asked Kristy.

  “And our notebooks and stuff?” asked Mal.

  “I guess we have to leave them here,” said Claudia. “Come on, let’s go. After we talk to our parents, maybe we can go to my house and make some popcorn.”

  We followed the cro
wd to the high school. When we arrived, the gym was already a mob scene. There were long lines at the phones by the school office, too. But eventually my friends and I got in touch with our parents and told them we would be at Claud’s — except for Mal, who was told to come home.

  By the time we left the high school, we had heard lots of rumors and a few facts about the fire. The rumors, which were probably started by Alan Gray and his friends, were wild: that the school had blown up right after we had left, and that we would all receive passing grades for middle school without attending any further classes.

  The facts, which we heard from Ms. Frost, were that the fire had started in a classroom near the school library. The library had suffered smoke and water damage, and the classroom would be out of use for at least a month.

  Later, at Claudia’s, we munched popcorn and discussed the afternoon’s events. We wondered if the fire was related to the fires at the library, and whether the book banners could be responsible after all. The school fire certainly didn’t seem to have anything to do with the Ellways, and there was no way Nicky Pike could have started it, which let him off the hook once and for all. Not that any of us still thought he might be guilty.

  After awhile, we stopped talking about the mystery and concentrated on our popcorn and some magazines Claudia passed around. I guess we needed a break from thinking about the mystery. But the break didn’t last long. At five-fifteen, Shannon showed up for our BSC meeting, and Kristy announced that that day’s meeting would be focused on the mystery of the fires. “No more fooling around,” she said. “It’s time to solve this case.”

  “I hereby call this meeting to order,” said Kristy solemnly. She was sitting up straight in the director’s chair, and she looked very serious and very official. “And I hereby declare this meeting an emergency meeting.”

  Claudia, who was rummaging around underneath her bed, looked up. “Does that mean we can’t eat the chocolate-covered pretzels I got for today?” she asked. “They’re right here.” She pulled out a long, flat box marked “Kaligrufy pens.” “I have some jelly beans, too. And some plain pretzels for you, Stace.” She smiled at Stacey.