“Inscription,” Pascal repeated. “I thought that was when the government forced people to become soldiers.”
“I think you mean conscription,” Merrilee corrected.
“Isn’t that what a doctor fills out on a pad of paper so that you can get medicine at the drugstore?”
“That’s a prescription,” she said, pushing her glasses up and looking away.
One thing about Pascal. He could be counted on to keep my mind off things.
“Moving on,” Creelman said, paying no heed to Pascal with remarkable persistence. “The flat stones that look like tables usually cover an underground family vault, or tomb. Some have chests sitting on the tabletops, but it is a mistake to think that people are placed inside those chests. The chests only mark the site of the tomb below, where everyone’s buried in the ground.”
Pascal walked over to a nearby tabletop for closer inspection.
“Some people think that the horizontal stones were used before we had public cemeteries. You would bury a family member in a field, then place a large stone on top to keep the animals away,” Creelman explained. “They were called wolf stones.”
I looked around again. There were fewer of those than of the door-shaped grave markers, and they all had more than one name on them, just like Creelman said.
“Pop quiz,” Creelman announced. “Who is entombed inside this chest?”
He just told us that no one was, that everyone was buried below in the family vault, but I knew Pascal would steer us in the wrong direction.
Sure enough, Pascal was about to read the names out loud when I cut in.
“No one,” I answered boldly. “They’re buried below.”
Creelman nodded grudgingly, perhaps annoyed that I had rescued Pascal from his latest trap.
“Lastly, the obelisks.” Creelman pointed to the tall pointy columns in the distance. “These were popular in the nineteenth century, when people became fascinated with ancient pharaohs discovered in tombs in Egypt.”
It looked to me as if the obelisks were for those who liked to show off their wealth like the pharaohs did.
“Okay, the last part of today’s lesson is how to read a map,” Creelman said.
On cue, Wooster advanced with his clipboards and handed one to each of us. The clipboards had a map and a second sheet of paper with a list of numbers and blanks to fill out.
“When you record information about the gravestone you are working on, you need to be sure you know where it is located on the map. There can be no mistakes,” Creelman warned, wagging his finger at us.
I studied my map. It marked the boundaries of the cemetery and where the iron gate was located. It showed all the stone walls and paths and major groves of trees. Some sections of the map were marked with area names: Garden of Angels, Garden of Memories, Children’s Garden, Serenity Lookout, Veterans’ Hill and Potter’s Meadow. There was a compass drawn in the corner, pointing which way was north. And the map was filled with clusters of tiny boxes, each box numbered. Every once in a while, there was a box with a pointy top marking an obelisk.
“Turn to the second page,” Creelman ordered. It was the sheet filled with numbers and blanks beside them. “You will spend the rest of the afternoon locating the grave marker for each number. When you find the grave marker, write down the name of the person buried, the year they died, the type of stone and the style of grave marker. Got it?”
Pascal rotated his map around and around, bending his head this way and that. “Which way do I point this map?” he finally asked.
“Here are two facts you can count on,” Creelman said. “Moss always grows on the north side of trees, and gravestones always face west.”
“Always?” Pascal repeated in awe.
Creelman heaved a sigh.
“No. But they mostly face west, and bodies are laid behind the stones, with their heads to the west and their feet to the east. Ministers and priests like to be buried the opposite way, to face their flock.”
“Flock? As in birds?” Pascal asked, turning to me.
I decided to pull a Creelman and ignore Pascal by asking my own question.
“I understand why ministers and priests would want to face members of their church, but why do church members want to face east?” I asked.
“What rises in the east?” Creelman asked, waving his hand toward the eastern part of the cemetery.
From where I stood, I thought the obvious answer was “ghosts,” but I knew enough not to say that out loud.
“Here’s a hint. It’s the only star in our galaxy,” Creelman added.
“Oh,” I said with relief, “the sun!”
“Correct,” Creelman said. “The dawn of a new day.” Then he hesitated. “Are you interested in astronomy?”
“The moon and the stars? Sure,” I said.
I wished I had been wearing last week’s t-shirt, the one about footprints on the moon. Instead, I glanced down and was horrified to see what I had selected. I’d turn back if I were you.
“Have you ever been to a planetarium?” he asked.
“No,” I admitted, somehow feeling as if this was my fault.
Creelman’s face fell as quickly as it had risen. He turned his attention to his cronies, and they nodded toward the iron gate.
I looked at my list. There must have been twenty-five numbers. This was going to take an eternity. Then I wondered how Merrilee was going to get out of it.
The Brigade marched out the gate without a backward glance.
“Well, boys,” Merrilee said brightly. “I believe I have a secret code to solve.”
With that she parked herself beside a nearby obelisk and opened To Catch a Bicycle Thief to a page where she pulled out her Queen of Spades bookmark.
Merrilee annoyed me, but I couldn’t tell if it was because as sure as the sun rises in the east, she would somehow manage to get out of today’s quiz, or that she was already chapters ahead in her book and seemed dead set on solving the mystery novel code before me or Pascal.
I looked at my list again. Maybe if I could cut my work in half, I could catch up to Merrilee in the reading. After all, I was a pretty fast reader myself. And lately, I had plenty of time to kill in the dead of night.
“Hey, Pascal. How about I do the first half of the list, and you do the second half. Then we’ll share answers.”
“Deal,” Pascal said with relief, and off he went.
I gave Merrilee a smug look, but she was already lost in her book.
I spent the rest of the afternoon traipsing back and forth between the rows of gravestones and filling in the blanks. It was tedious and never-ending.
But thankfully, I did not come across the gravestone with the lamb.
The Brigade returned just before quitting time.
“Let’s see your answers,” Creelman demanded.
Pascal and I handed over our clipboards to Wooster and Preeble. I kept an eye on Merrilee to see what she would do, having spent the entire afternoon reading and dead to the world.
Merrilee boldly handed over her clipboard to Creelman.
Then, amazingly, all three members of the Brigade began to mark our answers, Merrilee’s included!
How had she done it? I was certain that she hadn’t moved from that obelisk all afternoon!
Merrilee gave me a small smile as the Brigade handed back our tests.
Pascal and I each got four wrong, three of them from Pascal’s section I might add.
Merrilee got a perfect score.
“Not bad,” Creelman said gruffly to her.
As soon as the Brigade left through the iron gate for the day and was out of earshot, I pounced on Merrilee.
“How’d you do it?” I demanded.
“Simple,” she said. “When I was in the library signing out copies of To Catch a Bicycle Thief, I fo
und the answer sheet in the photocopy room. Creelman must have made copies for Wooster and Preeble, and he left the master list behind.”
“So all you had to do was copy out the answers,” Pascal said. “Awesome.”
“It’s not awesome!” I snapped. “We’re killing ourselves out here, and she keeps getting away with murder.”
“Come on,” Pascal said, looking at his quiz. “It beats getting four wrong. If I had seen that master list, I would have done the same thing.”
“Really?” I said with sarcasm. “Is that your motto?”
“What do you mean?” Pascal asked.
“If I made you a t-shirt, would it read, I’d have done the same thing?”
Pascal grinned. “I’d love that!”
“And if you made a t-shirt for me, what would it say?” Merrilee asked.
I ignored her question. I was still mad at how she had gotten away with cheating.
“You know,” I warned. “You’re not going to have a clue when it comes time to fixing gravestones.”
“Maybe not. But I’ve already solved the first clue in To Catch a Bicycle Thief.”
She dug out her copy and flipped it open.
“Check it out,” she said.
Pascal and I leaned in and read the word she was pointing to.
“The first word in this book’s secret code is ‘tortoise.’” She slid her finger to the word that followed “tortoise.”
Pascal read that word out loud. “‘Trevor.’”
“Not many books would start with the name Trevor,” I said. “Why not do a quick library search on titles with Trevor in them. Then you could cheat the code, too.”
“Already tried it,” Merrilee said, ignoring my attempt at insulting her.
I looked at Merrilee with astonishment.
She shrugged. “When I ducked out to return the master list to the library, I did a quick search.”
I couldn’t believe that I had not seen her leave the cemetery, especially in that red plastic bunnies-and-carrots jacket of hers! Had I just been too busy with the exercise to notice?
No. A more likely explanation was that I was too tired to see things clearly. I hadn’t gotten a good night’s sleep in ages on account of my nightmares.
“So, this code is not going to lead to another mystery book like the last ones?” Pascal asked.
“No,” Merrilee said.“This one’s different.”
Four
_____
Cleaning Stones
I AM SITTING ON the front steps eating a popsicle. There’s a scab on my knee. The cement is warm beneath me, and the grass smells sweet. My dad is rolling his mower to the backyard. A screen door squeaks, and it is my neighbor, Dennis. I wave. He has an orange rubber ball.
I scarf down the rest of my popsicle and put the stick in my pocket. I am saving sticks to make a cowboy corral. I already have the plastic horses.
Dennis cuts across the newly mown grass. He kicks the ball to me. I try to kick it back, but I miss. He laughs. I laugh, too, as I scramble to get the ball. I kick it to him. He misses. We laugh. We go back and forth, back and forth. The sun is warm. The grass is sweet. The orange ball is tricky.
Back and forth, back and forth. We miss most of the kicks, and we are laughing. I can hear the lawnmower in the backyard. It is loud.
We are the only ones playing outside on our little street, with the young trees just planted and the houses brand-new. It is too hot for most people, and there is no shade. They stay indoors where it is cool and they can make ice cubes. We are the only ones outside, except for my dad, who is cutting the lawn in the backyard, and the car that is driving down our street.
I can hear my dad’s lawnmower, but I do not hear the car. Dennis does not hear the car, either.
I kick the ball. Hard. Dennis misses. He chases after the orange ball. It bounces across the lawn and onto the street.
No! I slammed the garage door shut, but not before I sat bolt upright in my bed with my heart pounding and my sheets soaked in sweat.
I could hear my ragged breathing through my tight throat and chest. Deep breaths, I told myself. In, out. In, out.
I turned on my bed lamp. My alarm clock said it was 2:07 in the morning. I was wide awake. To Catch a Bicycle Thief was on my night table. I opened it to where I last left off. I was looking for the next word in the code. By 2:46 I had found it in chapter 9.
First word: Trevor.
Second word: Tower.
Trevor Tower.
Who was Trevor Tower?
I flipped to the end of my book. Only three more chapters to go. I turned my back to my alarm clock and forged ahead. I don’t remember what time I finally got to sleep that night, but in the morning when I woke up, the first thing I did was put the sheet of paper where I had written the solved code into my knapsack.
For once, I couldn’t wait for cemetery duty that afternoon so that I could share my results with Pascal and Merrilee.
“Hey,” I said as soon I got to the iron gate.
Pascal and Merrilee had already arrived.
“I solved the code,” I boasted.
“We did, too,” Merrilee said. “Trevor Tower keeps secrets, twenty-eight, thirty-four, eighteen.”
“Oh,” I said, a bit deflated.
“So what do you think it means?” Pascal asked. “We already know it’s not the title of another mystery book.”
“The other codes. Did they have numbers?” I asked Merrilee.
“No,” she said. “They didn’t.”
“And you don’t know who Trevor Tower is?” I asked.
“No idea,” Merrilee said. “But he’s not an author. I checked that out at the library, too. So this is definitely the last code to solve.”
“Trevor Tower keeps secrets,” I repeated. “Twenty-eight, thirty-four, eighteen.”
“Here comes the Brigade,” Merrilee reported.
We all turned to watch the trio navigate the crosswalk and plow through the gate. They carried clipboards and, for the first time, buckets.
“What do you think we’ll be doing today?” Pascal asked dryly. “Surely not cleaning gravestones, even though that’s what I thought we had signed up to do.”
“Good afternoon,” Creelman said when the Brigade had assembled in front of us. “Today’s lesson: cleaning gravestones.”
“Really? That’s great!” Pascal exclaimed. “But before we begin, do you know Trevor Tower?”
Creelman frowned. He set down his bucket and flipped through sheets of paper on his clipboard. Preeble and Wooster did the same.
“No,” Creelman said. “He’s not listed as buried here. Why are you asking about Trevor Tower?” Creelman inquired reluctantly.
Merrilee shot Pascal a warning look.
“No reason,” Pascal said, but the way he kept bouncing from foot to foot told the entire Brigade otherwise.
Creelman scowled while he worked out whether to pursue his line of questions, move on to the lesson of the day or go for a cigarette.
“As I was saying,” Creelman finally continued, “today we’re cleaning gravestones.”
Pascal and Merrilee fell into a silent line beside me.
“The first thing you must figure out is what type of material you need to clean off the gravestone.”
Creelman held up his hand and began to count down on his fingers.
“There are five common materials that plague markers. Soot. Dirt. Organics such as lichens and moss. Stains caused by metal or oil. And salt.”
Creelman picked up his bucket.
“Most of our cleaning will be to remove organics.”
This time, I dared to ask a question.
“Why are lichens and moss a problem for stone?”
“Moss stains, and its root system pries stone apart. Lichens ho
ld water on the stone, delaying evaporation. This makes the stone prey to frost damage.”
I nodded. I had no idea moss and lichen could be so evil.
“In this cemetery, we use the least aggressive cleaning method along with good clear water. And we always clean from the bottom up. This avoids stains from streaking down on the area you’ve just cleaned. Now, grab your buckets.”
The Brigade handed the buckets to us.
“Each bucket has a set of rubber gloves, a sponge and a soft bristle brush. Put the gloves on and go fill your buckets from that spigot,” Creelman said, pointing his cane to a nearby tap that the groundskeepers used for water. “Then select a gravestone from these three rows. We’ll come by with a cleaner, depending on the type of material you’ll need to remove.”
We went to fill our buckets, then wandered among the rows to pick a gravestone. I chose a slate one that belonged to a man who died over two hundred years ago. He had a double grave marker for him and his wife, with two sets of angel heads and wings carved at the top. His name and dates were filled in on one side, but curiously, the other half remained blank.
When Creelman came by with my cleaner, I asked, “What do you think happened here?”
I pointed to the blank side of the stone.
“I guess his wife was dead set against being buried next to him,” Creelman said.
I started to laugh until I saw that Creelman continued to scowl, as if he hadn’t said anything funny at all.
I sobered up pretty quickly.
“What’s the cleaner you’ve added to my water?” I asked, getting back to business.
“You’ve got some organic growth there, so you’ll be using a cleaner we like that is biodegradable, has no salt, no bleaches and only a touch of ammonia.”
I put on my gloves and picked up my sponge.
“Go easy on the stone. Remember to start at the bottom.”
“Right,” I said.
I got to work. And believe me, I started at the bottom.
As I cleaned the stone, I wondered about the man buried below. The grave marker told me very little. His name was Enoch Pettypiece. He lived to be 33 years, 5 months and 8 days old. His stone also read, He was an affectionate husband, tender parent, lived respected and died lamented.
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