The Case of the Jumping Frogs (5 page)

“What toys are being sold today at the auction?” Sally asked.

“Toys the kids are tired of,” Sol replied, “or toys that have flopped. If the kids don’t like a new toy, it doesn’t get into stores.”

“Is that good business?” objected Sally. “I mean, five little kids forcing their tastes on the whole country.”

“The Best Buy Toy Company doesn’t let that happen,” Sol answered. “The testers change. A new group of little kids enrolls every two weeks.”

He pointed to a large mirror.

“It’s a one-way mirror,” he said. “Company officers sit behind the mirror. They can see the kids but the kids can’t see them.”

“The kids have no idea they’re testing the toys?” Sally said.

“Correct,” Sol said. “The officers and the teachers make careful notes about which new toys are liked or disliked.”

“That’s neat,” said Encyclopedia. “The kids don’t have to give answers they feel the company wants to hear.”

The teacher who had been reading to the class closed the book. “Free play time,” she announced.

The young toy-testers immediately went to work. Some chose toys and played quietly and happily.

Others weren’t happy. They had chosen one or another
of the newer toys. When it failed to please, it was shaken, sat on, or cast aside.

Sol’s sister Birdie was busily banging a red car on the floor. A wheel flew off.

Birdie wailed.

“That car will go back to the drawing board,” Sol said.

The auction was going to start soon. The small toys were displayed on a long table. Bigger toys were on the floor. An electric locomotive caught Encyclopedia’s eye.

“Do kids this little really play with electric trains?” he asked.

“Hardly,” Sol said. “The locomotive belongs to one of the men in bookkeeping. It’s pretty beat up, but he hopes it will sell. I want it. If the bidding goes past five dollars and twenty cents, though, I’m sunk. Five dollars and twenty cents is all I have.”

The nursery was filling up with parents. Just before the bidding began, Sledge O’Hara, Bugs Meany’s eleven-year-old cousin, came in.

Sledge’s right arm was in a sling. He had hurt his shoulder badly in a card game trying to catch a joker. It had fallen out of his sleeve.

The auction began. The prices were a bargain hunter’s dream. Everyone was having fun except Sol.

His bid for the locomotive fell eighty cents short. Sledge bought it for six dollars.

“What happens if the locomotive doesn’t work?” Sledge
demanded of Mr. Wilmott, the auctioneer and a vice president of the Best Buy Toy Company.

“Return it, and the company will let you pick another toy free of charge,” said Mr. Wilmott. He put the locomotive in a gift bag.

Sledge slipped his left arm through the handles and slung the bag over his left shoulder. He strutted from the nursery, grinning slyly.

Ten minutes later he was back, empty-handed.

“Two big teenagers stole my locomotive!” he howled.

He had left by the revolving door in the rear of the factory, he said. A big teenager got in the slot ahead of him and dropped a package. It jammed the door.

“I was stuck, trapped like a rat!” Sledge cried.

Another big teenager, he went on, snatched the bag with the locomotive. Both thieves got clean away.

“I was robbed in your building,” Sledge said to Mr. Wilmott. “You’re responsible. You owe me for my pain and suffering. But I’m not pushy. I’ll take another toy.”

“Sledge is such a liar and a cheat,” Sol muttered. “I’d go over Niagara Falls on a banana peel before I’d believe him.”

“Did anyone see the thieves?” Mr. Wilmott asked calmly.

“No, the theft is just another chapter in my life of toil and hardship,” Sledge moaned.

“Why did you leave by the back door?” Mr. Wilmott inquired.

“Because my bus home stops behind the building,” Sledge answered. “The streets are so unsafe these days, I wanted to get to the bus as quickly as possible. An honest lad like me doesn’t stand a chance alone. We’re in a crime wave! Bad guys are everywhere!”

Mr. Wilmott hesitated, and then said, “Well … all right. Pick another toy.”

Sledge grinned and tapped a music box. “This will do,” he sang.

“Encyclopedia!” Sally exclaimed. “Sledge will walk off with both the locomotive and the music box for six dollars! You can prove he wasn’t robbed, can’t you?”

The detective smiled his knowing smile. “Of course.”

E
ncyclopedia and Sally were biking in town when they saw Scott Burlow in an alley. Scott was dancing like a chicken on a hot stove.

The fingers of his left hand, which were next to his shoulder, slid up and down, twitching like crazy. His right hand seemed to be scratching his hip, and he was shaking his head so fast that it looked like it might snap right off his neck.

“Oh, dear,” said Sally. “I hope he doesn’t get whiplash.”

“Maybe he just ate his first raw oyster,” Encyclopedia offered hopefully.

Scott saw the detectives and stopped dancing and twitching and scratching and shaking.

“Scott! What itches?” Sally inquired anxiously.

Scott laughed. “Nothing. I’m tuning up is all. Today is the day.”

“For what?” Encyclopedia was almost afraid to ask.

“You’re detectives,” Scott said. “I’ll give you a clue. Check out my hair.”

“It’s long,” Sally said.

“I grew it an extra five inches for the air guitar contest,” Scott said. “You have to look like a musician if you want to catch the eye of the judges.”

Encyclopedia had heard of air guitar contests, in which the performers pretended to play a guitar. The guitar couldn’t be seen or heard because it didn’t exist.

“I finished third last year,” Scott said. “I’m not resting on my laurels. A win today and I’m in the state finals.”

Sally said, “We were on our way to the early movie. But we’d rather see you play air guitar.”

“Come on. The contest starts at eleven-thirty at the dance school on Third Street,” Scott said.

The detectives went with Scott to the dance school. The main room had some two dozen folding chairs in front of a stage.

The stage was empty except for a piano.

“I’ll show you around,” Scott said.

He led the detectives backstage, where the equipment was stored.

He pointed toward a door. “That leads to the office.”

“There’s someone in there,” Sally whispered. “Listen.”

Two boys were speaking in low voices.

“
Make sure it’s his and not one of ours
.”

“
It’s his. Let’s go. It’s nearly twenty minutes past eleven.
”

“
You’re fast. It’s only eleven-eighteen—oops, eleven-nineteen.
”

“Who’s in there?” Scott called.

Encyclopedia opened the door as the other door in the office slammed shut. He crossed the office and opened the other door. It led to the street.

“We’re too late,” Encyclopedia said.

Whoever had been in the office had turned the corner and was out of sight.

“I don’t like this,” Scott muttered.

They went back into the main room and took seats. Friends and relatives of the air guitar players were filing in.

Mrs. Watson, the elementary school music teacher, sat down at the piano. She placed several sets of sheet music on the rack above the keyboard.

“Each person performs to the music he’s chosen,” Scott explained.

At eleven-thirty, Mr. Jurgens, one of the two judges, announced the six contestants.

Scott and the other five performers took off their wrist-watches and laid them on the piano.

“Each kid has exactly one minute to perform,” Scott explained upon returning to his seat beside the detectives. “You lose points if you stop playing more than ten seconds before or after the music ends.”

“So no one can cheat by checking his watch?” said Sally.

“That’s the idea,” Scott said. “The judges look for artistic style, ability to stay with the music, and airiness.”

First up was Adam Lang. He wore a red wig and played his invisible guitar to “Rowdy Rob Robin.”

He flung himself this way and that. Alas, he became dizzy, lost his footing, and knocked himself out in twenty-two seconds.

Scott, Harold Johnson, Phil Twining, and Manny Foster had their turns. Each strummed the air wildly, hopping and flopping as though hooked to a live wire.

“It’s going to be a tough call,” Scott remarked. “We all cracked down without cracking up.”

Herb Carter was last to perform. “Herb won last year,” Scott said. “He really rattles his bones. He’s going to be hard to beat.”

Herb swaggered onto the stage, grinning confidently. He spread his feet, ready to do his thing the moment Mrs. Watson started playing.

She didn’t play. She fumbled through the stack of music she had on the piano.

“I can’t find Herb’s piece!” she exclaimed. “I’m sure I had it in the office with the other music for safekeeping.”

“Those two boys who were talking in the office stole Herb’s music!” Sally whispered. “It has to be! But which two?”

“Couldn’t you tell by their voices who the thieves are, Scott?” Encyclopedia asked.

Scott shook his head. “They were speaking too quietly,”
he answered. “Without his own music, Herb doesn’t stand a chance.”

Herb performed bravely, but clearly not well enough to win.

The judges counted up the scores.

Encyclopedia used the break to stroll onto the stage and over to the piano. Sally followed him.

The boy detective studied the watches.

Five of the watches had a minute hand and an hour hand. The sixth watch had no hands—it showed the time digitally.

“
Hmm,
” Encyclopedia said.

“What does
‘hmm’
mean?” Sally demanded.

“It means I know who one of the thieves is,” Encyclopedia answered. “From him, we’ll learn the name of the other.”