Digging For Trouble

by Linda Fairstein

  “That’s a good thing,” Sam said, looking at me. “I’m off-duty for the weekend. You need to give your brain a rest, Dev. Just enjoy Katie’s party.”

  “Will do.”

  I actually liked it best when my brain was on overdrive. Sleuthing could keep me going 24/7, if my mom didn’t put a lid on it.

  She had called Sheriff Brackley’s office and left him a message. Apparently, the top dog in every police department didn’t have a Sergeant Tapply by his side to take care of business when he was away from his desk.

  Booker held up his hand to me in a wave. “Tomorrow, Dev. See you on the way to the party.”

  “Bye, guys,” I said.

  “I’ve got some homework to do,” my mother said, turning to me after she closed the door. “Are you going to read, or watch TV?”

  “Read, probably,” I said, kissing her on the cheek and heading back to my room.

  I washed up and got into bed, checking my laptop for e-mails. It was only an hour later in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where Liza de Lucena lived, than it was in New York. Maybe she’d be up to Skyping with me.

  I popped her a text. “Miss you,” I said, which was true. “Can you talk?”

  Liza replied right away. “Yes! Want to Skype?”

  “You bet. I’ll start it up.”

  I hadn’t spoken to Liza since I’d gone to Montana with Katie. She lived with her family in Buenos Aires, where both of her parents were schoolteachers, and she had won a scholarship for the Ditchley summer program. Liza lived at our home and we had instantly hit it off together during our first investigation.

  “Hey, Liza. It’s so good to see you.”

  She was smiling widely, still sporting her braces.

  “Como esta?” I asked her. “I’m practicing my Spanish so I can come visit you someday.”

  “That would be so cool,” Liza said. “How’s your mom? And Natasha?”

  “They’re good. But the house is too quiet without you, and even Asta keeps sniffing around your bed, trying to find your scent.”

  “Gracias, Dev,” she said. “And how is Booker?”

  “He’s fine.” I didn’t dare tell her he had just left the apartment, and that I hadn’t thought to include him on the Skype.

  These girls and their crushes were just something I didn’t entirely understand. I needed to get my mother settled into a relationship. Then maybe I could turn my attention to boys.

  “How was Montana?”

  “It was amazing,” I said, launching into my description of Big Sky Country and the Badlands—and of course, the dino dig and all the curious events surrounding it.

  “I think adventure finds you, Dev. You’re like a magnet for mystery,” Liza said.

  “Sam will like that turn of phrase.”

  “Maybe when I come back to New York, your force field will draw me into some excitement.”

  “You know, Liza, you don’t even have to wait that long,” I said, getting right to the point. “Have you ever been to Patagonia?”

  “No. Why?”

  “Well, have you ever heard of a dinosaur called the Titanosaur?”

  “Of course I have! Those fossils were found in La Flecha, which is like our desert.”

  “You’ve got to see this creature, Liza. He’s on display now at the Museum of Natural History. You have to come back here.”

  “I hope my parents can travel with me next time. You know my mother teaches science at the high school,” Liza said. “That’s all her students could talk about when Il Titanosaur was found.”

  “Actually,” I said, “I was hoping that your mom might know someone who worked on the dig.”

  “She would have told me if she did, Dev.”

  “Oh, that’s too bad.” I tried to hide the disappointment in my voice, but I suspect Liza saw my expression.

  “But I know she has friends at the museum here, where those fossils were on display before they moved to New York,” Liza said. “At the Museo Paleontológico in Patagonia.”

  “That’s exactly what I need, Liza,” I said. “A connection to a paleontologist in your country.”

  “What for?”

  “Well, how did your mom feel about our investigation last month? Does she know how brave you are?”

  Liza hesitated before she answered. “She’s very proud of me for getting the award from the mayor, but she really didn’t want my father to know all the details.”

  I grimaced.

  “I think she was just being protective of me, Dev. Not disapproving.”

  “Do you think she would help me?”

  “I’m sure she would,” Liza said. “What do you want her to do?”

  “I’d like her to talk to one of the paleontologists—you know, just a phone call,” I said. “I’d like her to ask around about an American named Steve Paulson, who might have been part of the team that dug up the Titan-osaur.”

  Liza was slow to answer. “It’s not dangerous or anything like that for my mother to get involved?”

  “I’d never ask her to do anything that would put her in harm’s way, Liza.”

  My mother faced down the city’s worst criminals every day that she was on the job, but not everybody could be this way.

  “What then?”

  “Just to find out whether Steve was involved, and if so, exactly what his job was,” I said. “And why he was terminated.”

  “What will you do with the information? If my mother can get any,” Liza asked.

  “My mom might talk it over with the sheriff in Montana, if yours gets any interesting news,” I said. “Or President Sutton, the head of our museum, might want to know about it.”

  “Do you think this Steve Paulson is a bad guy?” Liza asked.

  “My opinion counts for very little in all this,” I said, calling up words my mother had spoken often over the years. “I’m looking for facts, Liza. Nothing but the facts.”

  22

  “Could you all cut down on the giggles?” Booker asked.

  It was almost six o’clock on Saturday evening. Mrs. Cion had hired a van to pick each of the kids up, and the last would be Katie.

  Booker and three of our friends—Tanya, Amy, and Rachel—were already on board when the van stopped for Natasha and me. We had all been instructed to bring sleeping bags to place on top of the cots provided by the museum, and our pajamas and toothbrushes.

  Natasha had baked three dozen chocolate cupcakes this morning—a dozen for Tapp—and I had frosted them. Then I squiggled Katie’s name in pink and turquoise letters on top, drawing bones and dino eggs—and on one, a tiny heart for Kyle Lowry.

  “How’s this going to be a surprise anyway?” Rachel asked.

  “When we get to Katie’s building,” Natasha said, “Mrs. Cion is going to blindfold her and bring her down to the van. That way, she won’t know where she’s going till we get in the door of the museum.”

  The squealing started again.

  Booker was in the back row of seats. “Amy, you’re going to shatter the glass in every window of this thing with that voice of yours.”

  “She’s been this way since pre-K,” Tanya said. “You know that. You started out with us in the same school.”

  “Is there time for me to rethink spending Saturday night with all of you?” Booker asked.

  “No chance,” I said.

  Katie was in the lobby of her building, and I could see Mrs. Cion had tied a red and black bandanna around her head. Then they walked out to the van and Natasha helped Katie step up, while the driver threw her sleeping bag in the rear.

  “Have a great time, kids,” Mrs. Cion called out, waving us off. “I can’t believe you’re officially twelve!”

  It only took ten minutes to get to the museum entrance on West Seventy-Seventh Street.

  There was a gua
rd on the door, who laughed along with us as we guided Katie down the ramp and through the doors.

  “Any idea where you are?” Rachel asked.

  “No way,” Katie said. “I’m stumped.”

  She was probably hoping she was on the ground floor of a fancy jewelry store, free to roam around and pick out some trinkets. But the most interesting museum in the world would have to do.

  “Ready?” Booker asked. “I’m going to take off your blindfold.”

  Katie could hardly stand still. Her feet were dancing in place and her fists were pumping up and down. Booker stood behind her and untied the knot in the bandanna.

  Katie blinked her eyes and looked up. “I don’t believe it! It’s the Great Canoe,” she said, standing right below the carved killer whale on its prow. “We’re in the museum. My party’s in the museum!”

  “Are you okay with that, Katie?” I asked. I felt a little bit guilty having steered Mrs. Cion to this location, mostly because I wanted to be here myself. I had hoped Katie’s colossal find in Montana had fueled the spirit of adventure in her.

  “Totally! This is so cool, Dev!”

  “Okay, kids,” a twenty-something-year-old African American woman tried to get our attention. “My name is Keisha, and I’m going to be your guide for the night.”

  All of us stopped chattering and listened up.

  “First thing I do is give each one of you an ID card to keep around your neck on this lanyard,” she said, passing out long yellow cords with the museum’s logo on them. “Then you each get a mini-flashlight, because the museum is closed to everyone but you all tonight, and some of these hallways get pretty dark.”

  There were a few ohs and ahs from our pals.

  Then Keisha addressed Katie directly. “You’re the birthday girl, right?”

  Katie bounced a bit. “I am.”

  “Well, your friends have picked out a special place for you to spend the night,” Keisha said. “Any idea where that might be?”

  Katie pointed her finger, first at me and then at Booker, laughing as she did. “I didn’t believe for a minute that you were going to the Statue of Liberty yesterday!”

  “Fiblet, Katie,” I said, crossing my heart. “But in a really good cause.”

  “Somewhere in the museum that has something to do with dinosaurs, right?” Katie said.

  “You’ll be sleeping next to the biggest one ever,” Keisha answered. “So if you all pick up your bags and things, we’ll take the elevator to the fourth floor, and I’ll introduce you to the Titanosaur. He’ll be your bedtime companion tonight.”

  We piled into the elevator and took it up to four. The first thing Katie saw, from the end of the building that was our approach, was the elongated neck of the giant creature snaking out of the exhibition room and into the hallway.

  “He’s looking for me, you guys!” she shouted.

  It was as though the ancient animal was craning his neck to find a friend in the quiet corridor, trying to escape from the space where he was penned in.

  On both sides of his enormous body, cots had been set up for our group.

  “Here’s what you do,” Keisha said. “Pick your place and plop down your sleeping bags. We’re going to go to the food court, where you’ll have your dinner. Then I’ll give you a flashlight walking tour of the museum before I say good night.”

  “I want to be in the middle of all of you,” Katie said, throwing her bag on a cot right beside the belly of the beast.

  “I need to be outside of squeal-central,” Booker said, choosing one of the first two cots that was halfway out in the corridor, beneath the dino’s neck.

  “I’ll be opposite Booker,” I said.

  “You’ve got to be closer to me, Dev,” Katie said.

  “Hey, I had you all to myself in Montana,” I said. “Don’t you want one of the other girls to have a turn?”

  “Good idea,” Katie said.

  Booker looked at me and nodded.

  Natasha took her stuff—and a thick book to read—and went to the farthest end, near the Titanosaur’s tail. We all threw our things down and followed Keisha to the closest food court.

  Dinner was hot dogs and chips, and when it came time for dessert, Natasha surprised Katie with the platter of cupcakes, all aglow with lighted candles. We sang “Happy Birthday” and Katie beamed with delight.

  “Whose idea was this?” she leaned over and whispered to me.

  “It was a combination of me and your mom,” I said. “She talked to me about it when we were at the rodeo our last night in Montana, and because of the dig, I thought it would be extra special. It’s kind of perfect, isn’t it? Katie squeezed my hand. “This is just a really cool place to celebrate. Especially since I got permission to keep the bones I dug up.”

  Lulu had a phrase for my modesty in this kind of situation. Something Latin that meant don’t hog all the cred when it isn’t necessary.

  Each of us had a gift for our friend—a wallet, some hair accessories, books, and a diary from Natasha.

  I had gone shopping with my mother earlier in the day and gave Katie a small box. “It’s not real gold, Katie,” I said, “but it’s something you wanted.”

  She ripped off the paper and opened the lid. In it was a locket on a chain—which would have to do until her parents sprung for something better—since I had distracted them from the gift Katie wanted most. I had downloaded and cut up a photo of Kyle in his rodeo gear to put inside the locket.

  “I love you, Dev,” she said, putting the chain around her neck before she reached over and hugged me tight. “Best birthday ever.”

  “Most excellent,” Booker said. He got up and walked out of the food court. I could tell he was ready to get on with our business.

  I walked out to catch up to him. “Just be patient a little longer,” I said. “You’ve got to admit it’s a really special opportunity to have this whole place to ourselves.”

  “I’m more interested in whether the sheriff got back to your mom about Chip Donner.”

  “Nope,” I said. “She called again today but the outgoing voice mail in his office said he won’t be back until Monday. I guess there isn’t a lot of crime in Big Timber.”

  “How about Liza?” he asked.

  “You should Skype with her yourself, Booker. She likes you a lot.”

  He put his hands in his pockets and shrugged. “Yeah. You’re not kidding about that. Did her mother make the call to the museum people in Patagonia about Steve?”

  “Not yet, so far as I can tell. But it’s not so urgent,” I said. “We’ve got our own work to do.”

  “Maybe we should just let sleeping bones lie, Dev,” Booker said.

  “That’s sleeping dogs, you mean, Booker. Not dinos,” I said. “We’ll see if these bones can tell tales.”

  23

  “This is called the rotunda,” Keisha said as we all gathered around her in the entrance hall of the museum. “You probably know that this area and the halls beyond are a memorial to Theodore Roosevelt.”

  I looked up at the painted canvas murals on the walls—covered with zebras, lions, antelopes, and other exotic animals. There were vibrant paintings of Genghis Khan and other explorers, panels filled with early surveying equipment and with scientists conducting research experiments. And always back to Teddy Roosevelt—here, posed with the long guns he used to hunt wildlife in Africa in 1909, and there his role in the digging of the Panama Canal.

  “Not only was TR a statesman and scholar, a great conservationist and historian,” Keisha said, “but this museum was really in his blood. Teddy’s father was one of our founding trustees, and the museum’s charter was signed in his father’s home in 1869.”

  Keisha was moving us along, through the Hall of African Mammals and down the stairs to the Hall of Ocean Life. As we walked, she explained the history of the coll
ection and answered all our questions, no matter what they were about.

  I had other plans for the night, but I had to admit to myself that this was a pretty amazing way to see the museum. Keisha was a wonderful storyteller and it was easy to be sucked in by her tales. So much had changed in the way people all over the world lived their lives and took care of the natural world.

  Other than the backlighting in the dioramas and exhibition cases, the only glow in each hallway came from the flashlights that the eight of us were holding.

  “I’d like you all to point your beams up at the whale,” Keisha said. “He’s a giant blue whale—which over the centuries has been hunted almost to extinction—but is still the largest animal alive today.

  “This one is ninety-four feet long,” Keisha said. “It was found off the coast of South America in 1925.”

  I’d seen this one so many times I could recite the numbers myself.

  “What are you going to do about Natasha?” Booker was standing behind me, talking into my right ear.

  “Not to worry,” I said. “I asked Natasha for help with my summer math project last night.”

  “That’s no joke, Dev. You really need it.”

  “No kidding,” I said. “We didn’t get started until after you and Sam left, and I kept her at it till eleven o’clock. That’s when she went out to meet with her friends.”

  “Did she have a late night?”

  “Let me just say that Natasha’s cupcake moves were a little slow today,” I said. “She told me she was out till after two this morning.”

  “She must have been really tired, Dev. You let her sleep late, right?”

  “Not a chance, Booker. I was on her at dawn about baking for Katie.”

  Amy turned her head and told us to be quiet. Really, Amy? What is it about this old blue whale that every schoolkid in New York doesn’t know?

  “So if you want to see how the whale gets his bubble bath once every year,” Keisha said, pointing up at the giant sea creature suspended overhead, “we live stream it, complete with soap suds, rubber gloves, ladders, and the longest-handled brooms you’ve ever seen.”