He ducked and it sailed over his head.
Samantha leaped from the car onto the platform. Without looking back, she raced to the main chamber. She stopped and waited. She listened to the ninjas climb out of the magtrain.
“There she is!” shouted Crumb-Gum.
Samantha bolted up the stairs and into daylight. She dashed toward her house. When she was halfway down Thirteenth Avenue, she stopped again and looked behind her.
The four ninjas emerged from the chamber beneath the raised mailbox. One of them pointed at her. Another pointed in the opposite direction. Samantha looked to see what he was pointing at.
The remaining twenty members of the Royal Academy of International Ninjas were marching into Volunteer Park.
Nipper was furious at Samantha for making him leave all that treasure behind in the tomb. He couldn’t buy his Yankees or any other baseball team, and he was really, really mad. For a while.
Nipper wasn’t the kind of person who could stay 100 percent angry with anyone forever.
By the time he reached the center of the park, he was bored with being mad at his sister. He looked up at the art museum. The doors were propped open, and there was a noisy crowd inside. Some kind of event was under way.
Nipper reached into his pocket and took out the big blue gem. He tossed it in the air happily and caught it. Then he skipped up the museum steps, excited to show it off to anyone willing to take a look.
His foot slipped and he stumbled as he neared the entrance, but he caught the handrail and kept his balance. He patted the shape in his front pocket and kept going.
The lobby was packed from wall to wall with adults.
A group of men and women were playing banjos and accordions. All of them had oversized fake mustaches and wore badges that said Nasjonalmuseet. Whatever that meant.
He noticed the words Police du Louvre on the lapels of two women in gray business suits.
Many people were dressed like famous works of art. Someone walked by inside a giant soup can. Another person wore a clown costume.
Nipper saw a huge banner draped above the windows on the back wall.
STARCH
STOLEN TREASURES AND ARTWORK RECOVERY
CONVENTION AND HOEDOWN
A pack of men and women wearing bowler hats and green T-shirts with pictures of llamas pushed past him on their way to the door. Nipper turned and saw the words Seguridad de Machu Picchu on their backs.
Then he spotted a trio of men in togas standing around a huge punch bowl. They were handing out drinks and frosted cookies shaped like statues.
As he headed to the snacks, Nipper passed a man and a woman talking. He glanced at their attendee badges. The man was from Wahoo, Nebraska. The woman was from Wagga Wagga, Australia.
“If there were cows in here, this would be a MOO-seum,” said the man.
“Don’t arrest that painting. It’s been framed,” said the woman.
Nipper scratched his head and thought about the jokes. He remembered seeing the two names on the arches in the magtrain station. It turned out neither Wagga Wagga nor Wahoo was particularly funny.
Then he looked down at his empty hands. He looked down at his feet and at the floor around him.
The big blue diamond was gone!
Olivia Turtle stood in the lobby of the art museum, beaming with pride. It was the second day of STARCH. She loved meeting professionals from other countries and catching up on the latest gossip. It didn’t bother her at all that her team came in a miserable last place in the trivia-quiz challenge. The art museum in Volunteer Park was her home turf, and she felt like royalty.
She noticed Pajama Paul’s nephew moving anxiously through the crowd. He was darting around the lobby, looking under tables and chairs.
“What’s the matter, soiled young man?” asked Olivia, tapping him on the shoulder.
“I had a diamond,” he told her. “It was about this big.” He held up his hand and gestured with his thumb and index finger. “It was bright blue…and I lost it!”
Olivia didn’t waste time wondering why a kid would have a gem that sounded a lot like the Hope Diamond. She reached for the bullhorn she kept stashed in the lobby’s information kiosk.
“Attention, STARCH attendees,” she barked. “This is a code nine situation. Repeat. A code nine situation.”
Everyone in the lobby froze. The banjo players stopped strumming. Seconds later, the accordion players stopped squeezing. Dutifully, they all turned and listened to Olivia.
“A large gem has gone missing. It is a huge blue diamond the size of a walnut. This is not a test. Fan out, remain unobtrusive, and observe!”
Samantha hid behind a tree at the edge of Volunteer Park and watched the two dozen members of the RAIN as they huddled together.
She also noticed a woman in a bowler hat and a green T-shirt sitting on a park bench a few yards away, sniffing the air and eying them carefully.
Crumb-Gum addressed the group.
“First, we’ll go in and take the diamond back,” he said, pointing to the museum.
One of the ninjas was holding an electronic device with an antenna. He gave everyone in the group a thumbs-up.
“While we’re there, check to see if there are any paintings worth stealing.”
He made eye contact with several of the other ninjas and patted the rectangular shape on his back.
“There might be one or two guards inside,” he added. “So chop first, ask questions…never.”
They all drew their swords and tiptoed off to the museum.
Samantha waited until they’d disappeared through the front door. She figured Nipper would have lost the big blue gem by now. She headed after the RAIN, up the stairs and into the lobby.
Just as she had hoped, the museum was full of security guards. As soon as she stepped into the crowded lobby, she spotted Nipper. He was standing by the information kiosk with Olivia Turtle and two women in gray business suits. He was waving his arms and talking excitedly about something.
“That sounds very much like the Hope Diamond,” Samantha heard one woman say in a thick French accent.
The other woman started to speak, but stopped suddenly. She sniffed and looked around.
The smell of stale cheese, rotten hot dogs, oil paint, ashtrays, and two hundred baby-changing tables filled the lobby.
The two women glanced at each other quickly.
“Les Bandits Putrides!” they both shouted.
“Watch out for the RAIN!” shouted Nipper.
Samantha smiled.
She had lured the twenty-four members of the Royal Academy of International Ninjas into a room with two hundred of the world’s most dedicated security guards.
The battle was over before it had really begun.
Most of the ninjas decided they were hopelessly outnumbered and dropped their swords. One got clobbered with a banjo.
As she watched a ninja banging his sword uselessly against the side of a guard’s giant soup-can costume, Samantha thought about the entry in the Encyclopedia Missilium. Without the Plans, the RAIN was truly a mediocre outlaw gang!
Samantha heard a howl. She turned and saw the shortest ninja scampering around the room. He ripped off his ninja slippers and started leaping from statue to statue and swinging from light fixtures.
No one was able to catch the monkey until he stopped at the table with the frosted cookies. He picked up one that looked like Michelangelo’s David. Then he dropped it and picked up one shaped like the Fountain of Neptune. He licked it three times, took a bite, and then put it back on the table. He used a foot to pick up another cookie, shaped liked The Thinker by Rodin, and began to rub it between two of his hairy toes.
Six security guards from Machu Picchu tackled him.
Crumb-Gum didn’t give up. Samanth
a saw him slashing his samurai sword back and forth wildly. People began to panic. A crowd stampeded across the lobby, pushing Samantha backward toward the exit.
She peered over someone’s shoulder and watched Crumb-Gum stop as he spotted Nipper.
“I’ll make it easy for you to be on both sides of the Atlantic at the same time,” he said, and charged. With both hands, he swung his sword down at Nipper’s head.
Samantha pushed forward and burst from the crowd. She grabbed the ninja’s sleeve, stopping the silver blade inches from Nipper’s forehead. Then she pulled as hard as she could and yanked the ninja away from her brother.
Crumb-Gum’s smelly black shirt came untucked and the heavy object hiding on his back came loose. A wood panel stuck out.
He jerked free and spun around, sending the board sailing through air. It arced up—and then down toward the punch bowl.
Olivia Turtle lunged forward. She pushed the clown out of the way, reached up, and snatched the tumbling object just before it splashed into the foamy red beverage.
She held it out before her, showing a full view of the painting. It was a portrait of a smiling woman.
“Whoa, Nelly!” shouted a visitor who was dressed like The Scream by Edvard Munch. “It’s the Mona Lisa!”
Olivia cradled the painting gently in her arms, as if it were a newborn Italian baby from the 1500s.
Crumb-Gum whirled back around, looking for an escape route.
Samantha stood between him and the lobby exit. Hands at her sides, she blocked his path.
“Stop right there…please,” she said. “That’s English for s’il vous plaît.”
She raised her left hand, holding up a red umbrella.
“What?” the ninja screamed. “How?”
The umbrella in her hand was old and worn, and unlike her parents’ black-handled umbrella—now lying crushed in the magtrain tunnel—it had a wooden handle.
It was the Super-Secret Plans.
“When? Who? Where?” asked the ninja.
“I’ve learned something very important,” Samantha said. “I’ve learned to take a closer look at things.”
The stink-bandit stepped toward her.
“And to watch out for stale bread, too!” she shouted, and swung at him with her other arm.
In her right hand she clutched a long, hard, three-day-old baguette she’d purchased outside the Louvre for fifty cents. She used it to smack him on the side of the head so hard that it dislodged several clumps of dried gum from his forehead. He fell to the floor, knocked out cold.
Nipper ran to his sister. For a second, she thought he was going to give her a hug. Then he stopped. He smiled and put one hand on her shoulder lightly.
“Shukraan,” he said in perfect Arabic.
“You’re welcome,” said Samantha.
A few people congratulated a Norwegian woman in a big fake mustache for using her banjo as such an effective weapon. Many more people gathered around Olivia Turtle. They congratulated her for moving so quickly and saving the Mona Lisa.
“It’s a good thing I recognized that famous painting right away,” she announced. “I was able to do that because I heard so much about it from Pajama—”
She looked at Samantha and stopped herself.
“From Paul Spinner,” Olivia finished.
Samantha stood with Nipper in the doorway and watched the STARCH conventioneers march the stink-bandits out of the museum and through the park. They continued down the street toward downtown Seattle.
Samantha knew that when they went back to school, Morgan Bogan Bogden-Loople would tell everyone that he’d seen the world’s strangest parade. More than two hundred people walked down Thirteenth Avenue. Some were dressed like ninjas. Others were dressed like police officers. A few were dressed like famous works of art. A monkey screeched at everybody and swung from lamp to lamp all the way through the neighborhood. A woman in a uniform carried the Mona Lisa.
She was sure nobody would believe him.
Samantha and Nipper walked around the water tower, out of the park, and past the mailbox. They were one house away from home when Nipper stopped suddenly. He put out his arm and blocked his sister.
“Ugh,” she said as his arm whacked her in the belly. “What now?”
Nipper stood on tiptoe and peered down the Snoddgrass driveway.
“Wait right here,” he said. “I really want you to see something.”
Giggling, he skipped down the driveway.
He hopped over a hula hoop and continued toward Missy’s house. He stepped on a strand of yarn lying on the ground and nearly wiped out, but he steadied himself and kept going.
Before Nipper could reach the side porch, Missy pushed open the screen door.
“So, it’s you here again,” she said, stepping outside.
Nipper stopped. He kept smiling as he looked up at her.
“Decent people always use the front steps,” she told him. “This won’t look good on your record.”
He ignored this and cheerfully held out his hand. The black-and-green ring rested in his open palm.
“We went to London Bridge and I got you this present,” he told her.
Missy looked at him suspiciously. Then she walked down three steps, letting the screen door slam behind her.
“Wait. What’s that hole in your shirt?” she asked, pointing at his collar. “It looks like somebody else tried to stab you.”
Nipper waited.
Missy looked down at the scorpion and gazed into its emerald eyes.
She grinned, exposing the large black space where one of her teeth was missing.
Slowly, she took the ring from Nipper and slid it onto the index finger of her left hand.
“Thanks. Now get out of here,” she said briskly, and turned away.
Nipper took one careful step backward. He didn’t slip or trip!
Quickly he spun around and dashed back to the sidewalk. He grabbed Samantha’s arm and pulled her off the sidewalk and down into a bush.
“Ouch,” she said. “What are you—”
“Shhhh,” he whispered. “This is going to be great.”
They crouched in the bush and waited.
Missy marched up the steps.
She didn’t stumble.
She didn’t fall backward down the stairs and land in poop.
She didn’t accidentally bash her face against the house.
Missy grasped the handle of the screen door and paused. She looked back over her shoulder and shot a menacing glance in the general direction of Samantha and Nipper. They didn’t think she could see them, but they both ducked a little closer to the ground.
“Jeremy Bernard Spinner,” she called out. “I know you’re hiding in that bush.”
Then she turned back to the house and opened the screen door.
“Can we go home now?” whispered Samantha.
“Hold on,” said Nipper. “Keep watching.”
Missy didn’t trip on her own shoelaces. An airsick owl didn’t fall from the sky and smack her on the top of the head. A cement mixer didn’t make a wrong turn down the driveway and accidentally pour cement all over her.
She disappeared into the house and the door swung shut behind her.
“This makes no sense at all!” Nipper wailed.
“She’s Double-Triple-Super Evil,” Samantha reminded him. “Maybe a cursed ring doesn’t have any effect.”
She could sense her brother’s deep disappointment. He looked as if his head were going to explode.
“Don’t worry,” said Samantha. “I’m pretty sure we can figure out how all this crazy, mixed-up stuff fits together.”
“You’re starting to sound like Mom,” said Nipper.
Samantha looped the umbrella strap over her shoulder. Then she held out he
r hand to help him up.
“Let’s go home.”
SECTION 08, DETAIL TZIMBABWEN
The Great Wall of China
The Great Wall of China is a series of walls, trenches, and fortifications along the northern border of historical China.
It was originally constructed between 250 and 200 BCE, incorporating many fortifications that were built hundreds of years earlier. It has been rebuilt many times over the centuries.
It is made of wood, dirt, bricks, and limestone. Some of the sections are massive constructions with towers and wide paved roads along the top. From end to end, the Great Wall is more than five thousand miles long.
The wall was built to protect Chinese empires from invasion. Today, it is a celebrated landmark. Almost everyone who visits northern China takes a trip to see the Great Wall.
* * *
• • •
Look for a section of the wall near Jinshanling, about eighty miles northeast of Beijing. You’ll know that you’re close to a secret entrance when you see a red trash can with a lid shaped like one of the Great Wall’s towers.
Place your open hand against the wall on the huge gray stone that is a different color from all the others. Then withdraw your hand and wait until you hear the sound of a gong. (It will come from a speaker hidden in the trash can.)
If you lean against the stone, you’ll be able to push it into the wall. Do not be startled by the sudden hissing sound of rushing air.
There is a secret staircase. As you walk down, the stone will slowly slide back into place behind you. You will find that it’s impossible to exit the way you entered.
At the bottom of the stairs is a paved hallway that runs directly underneath the Great Wall. Rocket-powered bicycles have been stationed in plastic compartments every fifty miles along the path.
There are secret signs and markers hidden along the walls of this subterranean roadway. Be sure to bring a pair of invisible-ink-detecting glasses with you on your journey.
Samantha Spinner and the Super-Secret Plans Page 12