After a big breakfast, we checked on the cabin. Watson made arrangements with Mitch for some repairs and improvements (including locks on the windows). Then we set out for home.
Once we were off the back roads, the main roads were amazingly clear. We arrived home before lunch.
* * *
Did we hold the regular meeting of the BSC that afternoon? We did. Neither rain nor snow nor sleet nor criminals can stop the BSC. Logan and Shannon came, too, to hear our adventures, mostly.
“No charges are going to be filed against Noah Seger, Sergeant Johnson told me,” Mary Anne reported as we all groaned and handed over our weekly dues to Stacey. “I called the police station and he said Noah is going to go to family counseling with his father. His friend is going for counseling, too.”
“And Woodrow Tate has made a full confession,” said Stacey. She tucked the envelope with our dues away and said, “Isn’t that what Detective Renn said, Kristy?”
I nodded. Naturally I’d called the detective the moment we’d arrived home. “I can’t believe we thought it was her, even for a second.”
“I can,” said Stacey. “She was acting oddly. And she did have a gun.”
“What about the guy with the eyepatch?” Abby reminded us.
We laughed about that. We’d found out at the lodge the night before that he had been coming there for years — and complaining for years. This year, at least one of his complaints had been legitimate. He’d lost his ski bag (which later turned up in the lost and found).
“I was right,” said Claudia. “I did see Karl Tate. His son walks just like him.” She stuck her nose in the air. “It’s the artist’s superior eye for detail.”
Jessi whacked her with a pillow, and Claudia laughed.
“What I want to know,” said Logan, changing the subject, “is who’s been writing those notes to Mary Anne and me? It wasn’t Woodrow Tate, that much we know.”
Shannon said, “You should put them in the mystery notebook. Looks like we still have a mystery for the BSC.”
“Speaking of notebooks, Mal, you did an awesome job,” Jessi said.
We all agreed, and Mal ducked her head, looking pleased.
Then the phone rang, and it was business as usual.
When we’d taken care of the call, Claudia sighed happily and bit into a Dove chocolate bar. “It was an awesome vacation,” she said.
“Yeah,” said Abby, trying hard to keep a straight face. “Interesting. Diverting. Entertaining. Awesome. But listen, if we’re going to keep up this mystery business, can I ask a favor? No pictures in the paper. Please!”
The author gratefully acknowledges
Nola Thacker
for her help in
preparing this manuscript.
About the Author
ANN MATTHEWS MARTIN was born on August 12, 1955. She grew up in Princeton, New Jersey, with her parents and her younger sister, Jane.
There are currently over 176 million copies of The Baby-sitters Club in print. (If you stacked all of these books up, the pile would be 21,245 miles high.)In addition to The Baby-sitters Club, Ann is the author of two other series, Main Street and Family Tree. Her novels include Belle Teal, A Corner of the Universe (a Newbery Honor book), Here Today, A Dog’s Life, On Christmas Eve, Everything for a Dog, Ten Rules for Living with My Sister, and Ten Good and Bad Things About My Life (So Far). She is also the coauthor, with Laura Godwin, of the Doll People series.
Ann lives in upstate New York with her dog and her cats.
Copyright © 1995 by Ann M. Martin.
All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc. SCHOLASTIC, THE BABY-SITTERS CLUB, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.
First edition, December 1995
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 557 Broadway, New York, NY 10012.
e-ISBN 978-0-545-76867-2
Baby-Sitters Beware Page 13