The Case of the Clever Secret Code Read online

  Bogey grinned again. “Bingo, kid.”

  “Wow . . .” I just sort of breathed.

  A whole new case for the BBCDA. And probably our toughest case ever. Because, to solve this case, we had to crack a secret code that had been around for a long, long time. Then we had to figure out what it led to. And, we might even have to figure out who owned what it led to.

  Holy Catnip! That was quite a trail to follow!

  Now the question was, were we smart enough to figure out that secret code? People had come from all over the place, for decades and decades, trying to figure out what those letters meant. But they had failed. So how were Bogey and I ever going to figure it out?

  In any case, one thing was for sure — we could use one of Bogey’s hunches right about now. Or better yet, it sure would be nice if I got a hunch for a change.

  Bogey pointed at the floor. “Let’s chew on this while we run our rounds, kid. We’re already late.”

  “Aye, aye,” I told him. I tried to salute him, but I only poked myself in the ear.

  Thankfully, he’d already jumped off our Mom’s desk and was headed for the hallway. So I jumped off the desk and joined him. Then together we zoomed out of the room and into the dark house. We trotted side by side as we ran our first surveillance rounds of the night. We started on the first floor and checked out doors and windows to make sure everything was secure.

  After we finished the downstairs, we headed upstairs. Along the way, I told Bogey what I’d learned from the Wise One.

  Bogey shook his head. “Gracie’s getting a raw deal on this contest, kid. Especially since the other kids will probably be mad at her. You can bet they don’t think it was a fair contest, either.

  I followed Bogey as we turned a corner. “So Gracie ends up looking like the bad guy. And she didn’t even do anything wrong.”

  Bogey sniffed at a window. “I hear ya, kid.”

  I looked out a second-floor window and noticed the moon was big and shiny tonight. “But what can Gracie do?”

  Bogey shrugged. “Wish I knew, kid. But I don’t have a clue. Maybe the Princess or Lil will have some ideas.”

  Maybe they would. In fact, maybe a family meeting was in order the next day. Just to see if we could figure something out.

  I suggested the idea to both Lil and the Princess when we saw them on our second surveillance run. They were both more than happy to help. Then we made plans to meet around lunchtime the next day. I only hoped we could come up with some good ideas to help Gracie.

  After we finished our second rounds, we stopped back at our Mom’s office. Bogey did some more work on the computer while I took a nice, long nap.

  Later, we finished our final rounds just before our Dad got out of bed. He was half asleep when he picked up the morning paper from the front porch.

  I could see the picture on the front of the paper from halfway across the room. There was Gracie, looking so sad and standing next to Steele Bronson. He had a big smile on his face, and his teeth were blinding even in the photo.

  I sort of choked and then my chin practically hit the floor. What happened to Gracie last night was bad enough. But now she was going to have to live it all over again. And again and again. Every time she looked at that picture! If I thought she was upset before, well, I could only imagine how upset she would be now.

  I glanced over at Bogey. He was shaking his head and I knew that he’d seen it, too. Now it was more important than ever for us cats figure out a way to help Gracie.

  Except that brought up another question in my mind. Something the Wise One had said. She talked about how we had to earn things and how we would feel bad if someone just handed something to us. And that’s where things got tricky. We had to help Gracie, but not fix things for her. That meant we had to help her to help herself.

  And let me tell you, that wasn’t going to be easy. I could sure see how it would be a whole lot easier just to take care of things for someone. And be done with it.

  It seemed like I had so many things to think about. Steele Bronson. Secret codes. And helping Gracie. It was almost more than a guy like me could handle.

  I flopped down in my cat bed in the family room. My eyes were barely starting to close when our Mom came down for breakfast. That’s when our Dad pointed to the picture in the paper.

  “What can we do about this?” our Mom sighed.

  “I don’t know,” our Dad told her. “It doesn’t sound like any of it was fair. For any of those kids. And if Gracie stays the winner, she won’t feel right.”

  Our Mom got some coffee started. “And if Gracie doesn’t go through with reading her essay on Saturday night, she’s going to look like she’s not being responsible. Or grateful for winning. She would look completely selfish if she quit now. And Gracie is very responsible and she’s not a selfish girl.”

  Boy, our Mom could sure say that again! Gracie was one of the nicest girls around.

  Finally, Gracie herself came downstairs and plopped into one of the kitchen chairs. She was still wearing her pajamas and she was wrapped up in her bed comforter. She coughed a couple of times, but I could tell it wasn’t a very bad cough.

  Then she started to talk in a whisper. “Mom, Dad. You’ll have to call Mrs. Peebles. I’m really, really sick. I took my temperature and it’s a hundred and twenty-five degrees. I’ve got the worst sore throat ever and a really bad cough. I won’t be able to read my essay on Saturday night.”

  Our Dad shook his head. “Wow, a hundred and twenty-five, huh? That’s quite a temperature. I guess we’d better take you to the Emergency Room then.”

  He looked at our Mom. “Don’t you think so, Abby? But she probably won’t like all the shots they’ll give her.”

  Now our Mom nodded. “You’re right, Mike. But since she has a fever of one hundred and twenty-five, we don’t have much choice.”

  Gracie’s eyes went wide and she gulped. “The Emergency Room? Really? I have to go there?”

  I glanced at my brother. “Oh no! Gracie is really sick. She has to go to the hospital. Maybe our Mom should call an ambulance to come pick her up.”

  I suddenly started to shake in my paws. I didn’t know what I’d do if something ever happened to Gracie! I loved her so much! But we had to do something. Funny, but I no longer cared about helping her to help herself. I just wanted to make sure Gracie was okay!

  Holy Catnip!

  CHAPTER 11

  Holy Mackerel!

  I turned to my brother. “Oh no! Gracie must be really, really sick!”

  Bogey glanced up at her sideways. “Something’s wrong, all right, kid. But I don’t think she’s sick.”

  How could he say that? Not when she’d just told us she had a fever of a hundred and twenty-five. And our Mom and Dad were about to take her to the Emergency Room. So how could Bogey be so calm about it all?

  “I’m going to go give her a hug,” I told him.

  He nodded. “Knock yourself out, kid. That’s probably what she really needs, anyway.”

  I jumped up and ran over to Gracie. I was so worried about her. I rubbed around her legs and then I stretched up her side so she would pick me up.

  She grabbed me and pulled me up to her. Right away I wrapped my arms around her neck and gave her a kiss on the nose. Funny, but she didn’t feel like she had a really bad fever.

  Gracie coughed a few more times. “Um, Mom and Dad, I probably don’t really need to go the Emergency Room. I’m sure it’s just some kind of flu or something. I’ll probably be better by Sunday. Maybe if you could just tell Mrs. Peebles that I won’t be able to make it, then I can go to bed.”

  “Maybe we should talk about this first,” our Mom said.

  Gracie leaned her head onto my head. I kept my arms around her neck and she kept her arms around me.

  “I don’t think you really have a fever quite that high,” our Dad said softly.

  Gracie turned to him. “You don’t?”

  Our Dad shook his head and smiled. “You pro
bably wouldn’t be sitting there if you did. Anything over one hundred and five is usually fatal for a person.”

  “Oh,” Gracie said. Then she tucked her face into my long, fuzzy fur.

  Our Mom put her hand on Gracie’s arm. “I’m guessing you’re not really sick. I think you’re mostly just shook up about the way the contest went last night. I am right?”

  Gracie nodded her head yes. Then I could feel her hot tears falling into my fur.

  “I don’t blame you for being upset,” our Dad said. “It sounds like a rotten situation. But I’m still very proud of you for entering that contest.”

  Now tears flowed freely down Gracie’s face and I licked them off just as fast as I could.

  All of a sudden, words just started pouring out of her. “It was all so horrible and now I don’t know what to do! I got so distracted yesterday when Steele Bronson showed up. It was like I was dizzy and couldn’t even think straight or anything. Then that writer made all those changes on my essay. I know I should have practiced reading it, and I’m not sure why I didn’t.”

  Her tears flowed as fast as her words. “I guess I just couldn’t stop being excited about Steele Bronson. Then when I got on that stage, I couldn’t even read what that writer had written on my pages. And he marked out some of the sentences and words I already had on my essay, so I couldn’t even read those, either. I was so embarrassed I wanted to die. I just wanted to finish my essay and get off that stage and out of there. Then Steele Bronson showed up again, and he was being so nice and he made me the winner.”

  She paused and hiccupped a couple of times. “But I sure didn’t feel like a winner. Instead I just felt like a big, giant loser. Because I didn’t really win that contest. I knew it and all the other kids knew it, too. So did everyone in the audience. Except, for some reason, they all listened to what Steele Bronson said. But that wasn’t right, because Dylan’s essay was way better than mine.”

  Now she hugged me extra tight. “I don’t know how I’m going to face all those kids. They probably think I cheated. And I don’t know how I’m going to read that essay on Saturday night. It’s going to be so embarrassing. I just want to crawl under a rock.”

  Our Dad put his hand on her head. “I understand what you’re saying, honey. But here’s the thing, together we will face this. One way or another.”

  And that’s when Gracie saw her picture on the front page of the paper. She squealed and I almost jumped to the ceiling. Then she started to cry even harder.

  Finally she said, “I just don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to make this right. And I didn’t even do anything wrong. All those kids are going to hate me.”

  So I gave her a kiss on the nose, to let her know that I didn’t hate her.

  Our Mom stroked Gracie’s long, dark hair. “I know this looks awful right now. But together we’ll figure this out somehow. We’ll just have to think about it, and then we’ll come up with the best solution.”

  “I only want to do what’s right,” Gracie sobbed. “But I’m not even sure what that is.”

  Our Dad shook his head. “I know, honey. This is very complicated. But first we have to pull ourselves together. We can’t think up any ideas if we don’t have clear heads.”

  Our Mom smiled. “That’s right. We need to have some faith that we’ll come up with an answer. But let’s give it a little time so we can calm down. Then our brains will work better.”

  With those words, I gave Gracie another kiss on the nose. This time she giggled.

  “And it looks like Buckley wants to help, too,” our Dad said with a smile.

  Boy, he sure had that right. Little did he know, but us cats had a family meeting planned for later. To come up with some ideas to help Gracie.

  To help Gracie to help herself, that was.

  “Why don’t you go have a shower,” our Mom suggested. “It’ll make you feel better.”

  Gracie stood up with me. “Okay, Mom.”

  Then she leaned over and kissed our Mom on the forehead. She did the same thing to our Dad, too. Each time she did, I put my paw on their cheeks.

  She put me back on the floor before she grabbed her comforter and raced off.

  I glanced over at my brother.

  “We’d better get some shut-eye, kid,” he told me. “So we’ll have clear heads, too.”

  Well, let me tell you, he didn’t have to tell me twice. I ran over to my bed that was right next to his. I flopped down and suddenly my eyes felt like they weighed about a thousand pounds each. I barely remember our Dad leaving for work. And then later, our Mom and Gracie left, too. Gracie leaned over and kissed us both good-bye.

  “You won’t be coming to work with us today, Buckley and Bogey,” she whispered. “But we’ll be home early. Since Steele Bronson is coming for dinner.”

  I had forgotten all about him coming to dinner tonight. Funny, but Gracie didn’t sound too excited about it, and she sure didn’t sound excited when she said his name this time. Not like she had yesterday. In fact, she almost sounded sort of hesitant.

  “I love you, boys,” she said. “Thanks so much for all the hugs, Buckley.”

  I really wanted to tell her that I loved her, too. But for some reason, my eyes wouldn’t open and my mouth wouldn’t work.

  The next thing I knew, Bogey was shaking my shoulder. “Look alive, kid. Time for our family meeting.”

  It took me a minute or two, and lots of yawning, but I finally managed to drag my big, furry body out of bed. I stopped at our food dish for a quick bite before I made a beeline for the living room. Lil and the Princess were already there, sitting up nice and straight. And Bogey was leaning over with one arm reaching into the base of the exercise wheel. He pulled out a bag of cat treats and brought it over to our group.

  He raised his brows. “I suggest we skip the small talk and get right to the point.”

  I nodded. “We need to figure out a way to help Gracie. And the hard part is, we have to help Gracie to help herself.”

  The Princess smiled. “It sounds like you learned a lot from the Wise One last night. Didn’t you, Buckley?”

  “Uh-huh . . .” I managed to say, right before I made the mistake of looking into the Princess’ big, green eyes. That’s when the room started to spin. And then I couldn’t remember what I wanted to say next.

  Bogey tugged the treat bag open and passed me a treat right away. “Here you go, kid,” he murmured to me just under his breath. “Eat this. It’ll get you going again.”

  I ate my treat while he passed out treats for everyone else.

  A few seconds later, I remembered exactly what I wanted to say. “We have to be careful that we don’t just fix the problem for Gracie. Otherwise she might end up feeling bad all over again. So . . . does anybody have any ideas?”

  Lil put a paw to her head and thought for a moment. “Maybe we could send a secret email to the St. Gertrude Times. We could tell them the whole story. The real story. And maybe they would print an article about it.”

  Bogey put his paw to his chin. “Hmmm . . . It’s a good idea, all right. One we could probably pull off. But I wonder if the paper would print it. Not after they made such a big fuss with the picture of Gracie and Bronson. They might not be willing to change their tune. And print the truth.”

  “Very true,” Lil said with a nod.

  That’s when an idea hit me. I tried to put my paw to my forehead, but I only ended up sticking it right straight into my ear. I noticed Lil didn’t have any problem getting her paw to go where she wanted it to go. Neither did Bogey. Why did I have that trouble?

  Lil glanced at Bogey and then back to me. “You’ll grow into those paws someday, Detective Buckley. It just takes some time.”

  I shook my head. “It seems like every time I grow into them they just grow some more.”

  Bogey kept on grinning. “Don’t sweat it, kid. We’ve all been there.”

  I’m sure my eyes went pretty wide. “You have?”

  “You’d better
believe it,” Lil laughed. “I went through a very rough stage when I was growing up. I was all legs and arms and ears.”

  “Ditto to that, kid,” Bogey added. “But I grew out of it.”

  Well, I sure was looking forward to the day when I grew out of it, too. If that day would ever come.

  The Princess leaned her little head onto my shoulder. “I think you have very nice paws, Buckley. Now what did you want to tell us?”

  This time I just kept my paws on the floor. “Maybe we could send out announcements that say the Fourth of July celebration has been called off. Maybe because of mosquitoes. Everyone hates mosquitoes. Or maybe we could say a bad storm is on the way.”

  “Interesting idea,” Bogey said and passed out another round of treats.

  “It is interesting,” Lil added. “But I’m afraid it won’t work. Fourth of July is too big of a celebration. It’s the birthday party for our country. Nobody will want to call it off. Rain or shine.”

  Then we all sat silently chewing our treats for a moment.

  All of a sudden, the Princess smiled and waved her paw in the air. “I know! I know!”

  This time I was careful not to look into her big, green eyes. “Yes, Princess? Do you have an idea?”

  She smiled bigger than I’ve ever seen her smile. “Gracie should have a party.”

  The rest of us crinkled up our brows and said, “A party?”

  She nodded her little head up and down really fast. “Yes. A party!”

  “Um . . . okay,” I said. “But how will that help her solve her problem?”

  The Princess stood up and began to prance around like a ballerina. “It’s easy. Gracie can host a party and invite all the kids who were in the contest. She can make cupcakes and hang decorations. It’ll all be so pretty.”

  “That sounds nice,” Lil told her. “But I’m not sure it will help her situation.”

  “Sure it will,” the Princess said and flicked her fluffy white tail. “She can invite the judges, too. Then she can have a little award ceremony and hand off her trophy to the boy who really should have won.”