The Case of the Jumping Frogs (3 page)

“What’s on your mind?” Encyclopedia asked.

“My tuba,” Nemo announced. “I know what you’re thinking. The tuba is for Tubby Tuba, the fat kid in the back row of the school orchestra.”

“Anyone who calls you Tubby Tuba should have his valves ground off,” Sally said.

“How may we be of help?” Encyclopedia inquired.

“Find out who played a dirty trick on me and my tuba,” said Nemo.

He went over the details of the case for the detectives.

That afternoon the summer youth orchestra had given a performance of Suchalicki’s “March of the Frosty Flowers”
in the school auditorium. Nemo was delayed at the dentist’s office and arrived at the school late.

Grabbing his tuba from the music room, he had raced to his seat in the rear of the orchestra. Mr. Downing, the conductor, had just raised his baton.

“Boy,” said Nemo, “did he give me a look. It curled my shoelaces. Lucky for me I didn’t have to play for a while.”

“Is it true that in many pieces the tuba doesn’t play a single note?” Sally asked.

“Yep,” replied Nemo. “In ‘March of the Frosty Flowers’ the tuba plays only one note. I sweated out forty-two measures before I played it, a high E. If I hit it, I was a hero. If I missed, I was a bum.”

Sally cried, “Tell us!”

“I was a bum.”

“Oh, dear.”

“Someone switched the valves on my tuba,” Nemo said. “The valves are what you push down to make the sounds. They should be in order, one, two, three. Someone switched them to three, one, two. You can’t tell just by looking if they’re in the right order or not. You have to blow.”

“Who could have switched them?” Sally asked.

“Anyone,” Nemo said. “The instruments belong to the school and are kept in the music room. Kids can practice there or take the instruments home.”

“Lugging a tuba home will flatten your feet flatter than a flatiron,” Sally warned.

“You’re so right,” replied Nemo. “That’s why the school doesn’t allow students to take home the two bass fiddles or the tuba. I practiced the tuba yesterday until the janitor locked the music room for the night.”

“Do you suspect anyone?” Sally asked.

“Alma Higgens,” Nemo said instantly. “The instruments were handed out in the fall. I got the tuba. Big Alma had wanted it so she could show that a girl is strong enough to carry it. But I was there a minute before her. She had to settle for a trumpet.”

“That shouldn’t have made her mad enough to pull such a dirty trick on you,” Sally said.

“There’s more,” Nemo said. “This morning I was throwing a baseball with Mitch Jennings on his front lawn. Alma rode by on her bike. I threw wide. The ball whacked her on the foot and she fell off her bike. Oh, boy, was she mad.”

“It isn’t a good idea to make Alma mad,” Sally said. “She’s hotheaded.”

“The throw was an accident,” Nemo said. “But the fall hurt her. Her lip was cut and bleeding a bit, and she was limping. I was sorry and tried to apologize. You should have heard what she said to me!”

“Alma could have sneaked into school before the performance of ‘March of the Frosty Flowers’ and switched the valves on your tuba,” Sally said. “Limping or not.”

“I believe it’s time to question Alma,” Encyclopedia said.

On the way to Alma’s house, he stopped at the school to speak with Mr. Downing, the conductor.

When Encyclopedia came out, he said, “Mr. Downing told me Alma telephoned him before the concert. She said she hurt herself falling off her bike this morning. She was staying home to rest and practice the trumpet.”

At Alma’s house, Sally rang the doorbell. Alma opened the door.

“What’s the squawk?” she demanded, glaring at Nemo.

“I just remembered,” Nemo whispered to Encyclopedia. “I don’t want to be here.”

Sally stepped fearlessly up to the big girl. “We think you switched the valves on Nemo’s tuba. You wanted him to miss his one big note, a high E.”

“So Mr. Downing would think I wasn’t good enough and kick me out of the orchestra,” Nemo put in, his courage up. “Then you’d take over the tuba.”

“Think again, mousehead,” Alma snarled. “I wasn’t near the school today.”

“Where were you?” Sally demanded.

“After I telephoned Mr. Downing to tell him I couldn’t make it today because I hurt my foot, I went to my room. I read and practiced the trumpet.”

“How come we didn’t hear you playing?” Sally demanded.

“I quit practicing a few minutes ago,” Alma said. “Besides, I use a mute. I can barely be heard in the next
room. I’m the kind who respects the ears of others. Now bye-bye, you sand fleas.”

She shut the front door with a bang.

“I sure hope she’s guilty,” declared Nemo. “If she isn’t, she’s going to make me pay for saying she is. Maybe I ought to give her the tuba and take up barrel jumping.”

“Don’t,” Encyclopedia said. “Alma switched the valves.”

H
ector Heywood was nearly in tears when he came into the Brown Detective Agency.

“Bugs Meany, that no-good bully!” he wailed.

“Oh, not Bugs again!” exclaimed Sally.

Bugs was the leader of a gang of tough older boys. When Encyclopedia and Sally weren’t around, they bullied the little kids of the neighborhood.

The boys called themselves the Tigers, but they should have called themselves the Spurs. They always arrived on the heels of trouble.

Sally often said Bugs was quite accomplished for a boy with the IQ of a refrigerator door.

“What’s Bugs done now?” Encyclopedia asked Hector.

“He stole Mrs. van Colling’s diamond ring from me,” Hector replied.

He explained. He had been at the beach the day before. He’d found a ring in the sand. The ring hadn’t looked valuable, but he had taken it home.

“This morning the
Idaville Gazette
had a story about the ring,” Hector said. “It’s worth a lot of money, and there’s a reward for finding it. The newspaper said the ring belonged to Mrs. van Colling.”

“I read the story,” Encyclopedia said. “Mrs. van Colling thought she had lost it while scuba diving at Warren Reef. She hired two divers to search for the ring. They didn’t find it.”

“That’s because she lost it on the beach,” Hector said. “I was returning the ring when Bugs and three of his Tigers stopped me a block from her house. They asked where I was going, and like a dummy I told them. They turned me upside down. They shook me until the ring fell out of my pocket.”

Hector laid a quarter on the gas can. “Get the ring back. I found it. I should get the reward, not Bugs.”

Encyclopedia agreed. “We’ll go see Bugs.”

“You go,” said Hector. “I’m about to do what any red-blooded coward would do—go home. Bugs is too rough for kids our age.”

“Except one,” Encyclopedia said. “Sally has straightened him out before.”

It was true. The last time Sally and Bugs had fought, the toughest Tiger had taken a right to the nose. His eyes had
rolled up far enough to see his brains. For a full minute he had staggered around as if looking for the rest of himself.

“Okay, I’ll go with you to see Bugs,” Hector said. “But you’d better have an escape plan.”

The Tigers’ clubhouse was an unused toolshed behind Sweeney’s auto body shop. Bugs was sitting on a crate out front.

He had a deck of cards and was practicing dealing himself all the aces.

When he spied the detectives and Hector, he growled, “Well, well, the little goody-goods.” His lips curved in a sneer. “Go adopt an egg!”

“Don’t get your dandruff up, Bugs,” Sally said. “Hector told us he found Mrs. van Colling’s ring on the beach yesterday. He says you took it from him.”

“What is this?” Bugs growled. “You dare accuse Bugs Meany, the idol of America’s youth, of being a common thief? I found the ring! I’m waiting until I think Mrs. van Colling has had her breakfast before I return it. I’m a gentleman.”

He took a step toward Hector, his teeth bared.

“I don’t think he wants to be friends,” Hector whispered to Encyclopedia. “I have what I believe is a very good idea: Run for your life!”

Encyclopedia grabbed his arm and held him.

“Stay calm,” the detective said. “Trust Sally.”

“Where did you find the ring, Bugs?” Sally demanded.

“I often dive at dawn,” Bugs purred. “The reef is so beautiful then! The pursuit of beauty is my life. I don’t get along on good looks alone.”

“Where did you find the ring?” Sally repeated.

“If you must know, I was swimming by the reef when my foot struck something lying on the bottom,” Bugs said. “It was a bright yellow fish, dead. I moved it with my foot. I saw what had been lying under it. A ring!”

“Aw, c’mon, Bugs,” Sally said. “That’s the biggest fish story I ever heard.”

“You doubt the word of Bugs Meany?” Bugs said, his voice rising. “Nobody gets away with calling me a liar!”

He took aim and threw his Sunday punch. Sally sidestepped and cracked him one on the side of the jaw.
Zowie!

Bugs spun like a propeller. Encyclopedia thought he saw Bugs’s face and the back of his head at the same time.

Bugs slowed, wobbled, and fell flat. He lifted his head and moaned, “I hate it when she does that.”

Sally suddenly looked concerned. “Oh, no. Maybe he’s telling the truth!”

“He isn’t,” Encyclopedia said.

E
ncyclopedia and Sally arrived at the county lawn mower racing championships at five minutes to nine on Saturday morning.

Engines roared. Billows of dust and smoke rose from the track, a nine-acre pasture on Josh Woodly’s farm. Rows of spotlights and bales of hay outlined the course.

Souped-up, bladeless riding mowers bounced over ruts and bumps at speeds of more than forty miles an hour. The riders were finishing the last few laps of the twelve-hour endurance race, which had begun at nine o’clock the night before.