The Ghostwriter Secret

by Mac Barnett

STEVE PULLED OUT the bottle of lavender bubble bath, uncapped it quickly, and aimed it at the goon’s eyes. He squeezed. Time slowed.

  Steve watched the purple fluid flying from the bottle toward the goon’s stubbly face; the liquid’s arc dropping sharply, way too early; the bubble bath hitting the goon’s white shirt with a lavender splatter; the goon’s mouth twisting as he laughed a laugh both angry and amused; the plastic bottle falling from Steve’s hand and clattering weakly on the bathroom floor.

  The man stepped forward, wiggled his fingers, and closed them into a fist. “So you wanna fight dirty,” he said, grinning. “That’s fine with me.”

  The man lunged forward. Steve took a quick step back. And then, out of nowhere, Dana was stepping forward, as in toward their attacker, and Steve noticed that Dana was holding the white ceramic lid from the back of the toilet. He swung the toilet’s ceramic lid hard and fast into the man’s right knee. The big man doubled over and collapsed onto the floor, holding his leg in both hands. Dana dropped the lid, which crashed on the tile, breaking into three or four large pieces and a puff of white powder.

  “Ace!” said Steve. Dana smiled, breathless, and ran out of the bathroom with Steve following right behind him.

  They probably shouldn’t have been surprised to see the second baddie standing there waiting for them. “I’m a little tougher than Henry,” he said, smiling mirthlessly.

  Steve glared at him, about to spit out a smart retort that he hadn’t quite yet thought of, when he suddenly recognized the man before him.

  “You’re the doorman!”

  Steve looked him up and down carefully: He wore his greasy hair pulled back in a ponytail that glistened in the light from the window. The sleeves of his shirt were pulled low and covered his tattoo.

  “Good to see you again, Steve Brixton. Who’s your friend?”

  “This is my associate, Dana.”

  “I’m not really his associate,” said Dana.

  “Dana,” said the man. “Cute name. I guess you must be the Brixton Sister.”

  And with that Dana went rushing toward the doorman.

  The Shawn Bailey Flying Tackle, deployed with equal enthusiasm against rival schools’ quarterbacks and the underworld’s burliest creeps, looks like this:

  Dana’s bum-rush of the doorman looked more like a remote-control car running at high speed into a wall. Dana bounced off the man, who picked him up and held him, wriggling, in a full nelson.

  Steve, determined to rescue his best friend and really wishing he had looked up “solar plexus” in his mom’s anatomy book this morning, charged forward. He hadn’t taken more than two steps when something hit the back of his foot and he went sprawling onto the carpet. Before he could get up, someone pinned his arms behind his back.

  “Nice job, Henry,” said the doorman.

  Steve craned his neck around and saw that Henry had indeed recovered and was holding both Steve’s wrists in one meaty hand. Steve kicked his legs wildly and wriggled his wrists, but the struggle was fruitless.

  “All right, grab the rope,” said the doorman. “Let’s tie these two up.”

  Henry froze, looking sheepish.

  “What is it?”

  “Um, I think I left the rope in the car.”

  The doorman gave Henry the kind of irritated look that probably would have been accompanied by an exasperated gesture were he not using both hands to subdue Dana. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  “Wait!” said Henry. “I’ve got an idea.” He pulled Steve up to his feet and passed him over to the doorman, who now held Steve in one arm and Dana in the other. Henry disappeared into the bathroom and re-emerged moments later with an armful of fluffy white towels. “These’ll work,” he said cheerfully, and dropped all but a hand towel on the floor.

  Henry unfolded the towel and, taking an end in each hand, ripped it into two thin strips. Steve was impressed. Henry then took one of the strips and tied Steve’s wrists together behind his back. Steve was still wearing his backpack, so it was extra uncomfortable. When he was finished, Henry quickly bound up Dana’s wrists too.

  “Works pretty good,” he said. Steve had to admit he was right.

  “Are you taking us to where you’re holding MacArthur Bart?” Steve asked, trying to keep the note of hope out of his voice. He was sure that if they were held in the same place as Bart, the three of them could engineer an escape.

  The doorman raised his eyebrows gleefully. “Look at the detective!” he said. “Think you’ve got everything figured out, do you? Well, I’ve got some bad news for you both: You’re never, ever going to see MacArthur Bart.” The doorman’s smile disappeared. “Henry, gag ’em.”

  A pair of washcloths made excellent gags.

  “All right,” said the doorman. “It’s time to get rid of these detectives once and for all.”

  CHAPTER XXIII

  CAPTURED!

  JUST THEN there was a knock at the door.

  “Mr. Snuffley? This is Linda, the manager? Um, we’re a little worried about you in there, seeing as you haven’t eaten any of your food or anything? Are you in there, Mr. Snuffley?”

  Henry and the doorman looked at each other, panicked. Steve and Dana tried to shout out for help, but the washcloths muffled their cries.

  The doorman called out, “Um, hello, Linda! This is Mr. Snuffley! I’m fine.”

  “Oh, okay, happy to hear it,” said Linda. “Have a good day, sir.”

  Henry and the doorman exhaled simultaneously, relieved.

  Steve’s hopes plummeted.

  But then there was another knock. “Hi, Mr. Snuffley? Sorry to bother you again. I’m just wondering if you mind if I come in for a moment?”

  “Why?” said the doorman tersely.

  “Well, a maid’s key has gone missing on this floor, and we need to recode the lock on your door.”

  The doorman cursed quietly and whispered to Henry, “Take these two out on the balcony and make sure they don’t do anything unwise.” Then, louder: “Just a minute, Linda. Let me throw on some clothes.”

  Henry opened the sliding glass door that led to the balcony and pushed Steve and Dana outside. The doorman pulled the curtain closed.

  It was a little cramped out there for three people. Henry was distracted, looking nervously back at the room even though they couldn’t hear any of what was going on in there. Soundproof windows: That had to be another sign of a nice hotel room. Steve looked around, hoping some other guests would be on their balconies and see them, but the place was dead quiet. Below them, the pool sparkled—it looked blue and inviting and, from up here at least, close enough to jump into.

  The next few things seemed to happen all at once.

  Steve looked at Dana, who looked at Steve, who kicked Henry hard in the kneecap. Henry shrieked, and Dana, hands still tied, climbed backward onto the balcony’s ledge. He stood up, wobbled, and jumped. And then Steve did the same thing.

  CHAPTER XXIV

  UNDERWATER CHAOS

  ACCORDING TO THE BAILEY BROTHERS’ DETECTIVE HANDBOOK:

  Shawn and Kevin consider themselves experts on jumping out of tall buildings. And do you know their favorite place to land? Not a barge full of soft garbage (Bailey Brothers #7: The Great Landfill Caper), or a hay cart (#16: Danger Flies the Coop) or even a truck full of pillows (#21: The Message in the Factory Whistle). That’s right! It’s water! Whether they’re taking swan dives off abandoned lighthouses on Benson Bay or the rocky cliffs of Acapulco (in Mexico!), when it comes to a safe and splashy landing, there’s no better surface than good old H2O!

  Steve Brixton also considered himself an expert on jumping out of buildings, although he typically ended up injuring himself in the process. But he fell now with confidence, anticipating the cool, chlorinated cushion of pool water below him. He entered the water feet first (Steve couldn’t do a swan dive even when his hands weren’t tied behind his back), plummeted downward, and came down mightily on the bottom of the pool.

  Wat
er may be soft, but a pool’s floor is not.

  Steve’s hands were smashed between his butt and the concrete, and a sharp pain shot from his wrists to his nail beds. Bubbles streamed from his nose.

  Air. Steve pressed his legs hard against the bottom and shot upward, bursting from the surface of the water like a breaching whale. He saw Dana a few feet away, doing some awkward kicking stroke with his hands behind his back.

  Steve took a deep breath in through his nose, at the same time sucking in water from the towel in his mouth. The key was not to panic. The water stung his throat. Just stay calm and don’t panic. He sank back down in the water.

  Again to the bottom and back to the top. This time Steve turned and looked up at the balcony from which he’d just jumped. It was empty. A breath and back downward. When Steve sank, he sank fast. Any kind of swimming would be impossible with this backpack. Steve pushed off from the bottom, breathed in deeply, and disappeared underwater again. Up and down, up and down, like he would do when he was a little kid, when he didn’t know how to swim and got stranded in the deep end. Slowly, with every trip to the surface, Steve moved closer to the steps on the other side of the pool. Ten feet. Eight feet. At five feet the water was just an inch or two above his head. By four feet he was walking, coughing against the towel in his mouth. He dragged himself out of the pool. Dana was out already, lying flat on his back.

  Soaked, fatigued, with hand towels in their mouths, the two boys lay in the sun, the warm cement radiating pleasantly on their backs.

  But not for long.

  There was a loud crack that Steve instantly recognized as a gun firing. He turned his head and looked at Dana (Steve’s heart now beating loud and fast) and saw that Dana was all right—wide-eyed but all right. And now Steve looked up at the block of rooms that lined the pool, and, sure enough, there was the doorman on the balcony with what had to be a pistol in his hand. There was another shot, and Steve heard it ricochet off a metal deck chair. He turned back to his best friend, and the two of them knew what they had to do. They scrambled to their feet, took a running start, and jumped back into the pool.

  CHAPTER XXV

  DANGER FROM ABOVE

  THREE MINUTES AGO, in this very same pool, Steve had been desperate to get his head above water. Now all he wanted to do was get to the bottom and stay there. He blew all the air in his lungs out through his nose and drifted down to the pool’s smooth floor. Eyes open and burning, he watched Dana come to rest on a spot nearby. They wriggled their way across the pool’s bottom to the edge closest to the building, for cover.

  When he was a little kid and taking swim lessons, Steve didn’t have a great breaststroke or butterfly, but he was able to stay underwater longer than any kid in the class. Although it was a lot harder to stay submerged when you were already exhausted and a man was shooting from somewhere twenty feet above your head. It had only been a few seconds, and already Steve wanted air.

  One terrible thing about being shot at underwater is being able to see the bullets travel toward you. They came screaming through the pool, swirling streams of little white bubbles trailing behind them. These bullets were coming close. A shot—two feet away, maximum. Steve’s ears popped, and his chest heaved. A shot, this one even closer. Steve’s lungs felt like they were turning inside out. Nearby, Dana sat with his back against the edge of the pool, his black hair swaying to and fro like seaweed. Another shot. Steve’s eyeballs felt ready to burst.

  And then nothing. Silence. Stillness. Steve’s first thought was that it was a trap. His second was that, trap or not, he needed air. He unfurled his legs, kicked off from the bottom, and, as carefully as he could, poked the top half of his head above water. Air rushed through his nostrils and filled his chest. There were no gunshots. There was a police siren, loud and getting louder. The cops must have scared those crooks away. Dana came up next to him. They made their way out of the pool once again. The siren was close. The police would be here any second.

  A path ran from the pool past a wing of the hotel and down to the beach. Steve immediately took off toward the sea. Dana didn’t follow. Steve stopped and turned around.

  Dana gave Steve a look that meant, What are you doing?

  Steve gave Dana a look that meant, What are you doing?

  Dana stomped his right foot, which meant, I’m staying here.

  Steve nodded his head toward the beach and gave Dana a look that meant, Come on, man, you need to trust me here. We’ll lose hours explaining to Chief Clumber why a man was shooting at us. And then lose more time explaining to our parents why we aren’t in San Diego at a debate tournament. We can’t afford that time, not when MacArthur Bart is being held by those guys, who are obviously homicidal maniacs. Now hurry up.

  Steve wasn’t sure all that got through, but when Dana rolled his eyes, he knew his chum had gotten the gist of it. Steve started running. Dana ran too. They sprinted past a sign that read NO HOTEL TOWELS ALLOWED AT THE BEACH and onto a vast stretch of golden sand.

  CHAPTER XXVI

  THE BEE SYNDICATE

  AFTER A LIFEGUARD untied their towels (Steve invented a cover story about a game of cops and robbers, but the lifeguard didn’t seem interested), Steve and Dana walked for miles along the beach. They stopped near a rock jetty that jutted into the ocean. Nearby, a teenage couple sometimes looked seaward and sometimes looked at each other but never once looked at Dana and Steve.

  Steve and Dana hadn’t spoken while they were walking, but now Dana turned to his friend and shouted, “We could have died!”

  (Even now, the couple did not look over.)

  Steve nodded gravely. “I knew this would get dangerous. But I didn’t know how dangerous. Dana, this is big. MacArthur Bart has been kidnapped by the Bee Syndicate.”

  Dana, who was flushed and angry, paused. “What’s the Bee Syndicate?” he asked.

  Steve took out The Bailey Brothers’ Detective Handbook. It was soggy, and the pages turned in chunks. Steve found the entry he was looking for and laid the book down on the sand. “Look,” he said to Dana, pointing to the handbook.

  Dana crouched down to read a section called “Crime Syndicates—the Methodical Mayhem of Organized Crime.”

  Shawn and Kevin always say, “One no-goodnik is bad enough, but a gang of them is positively rotten!” Crime syndicates are groups of criminals who have banded together to break as many laws as possible. Syndicates usually have lots of cash (which they often call dough) and tons of burly rascals eager to get in fistfights with detectives. Shawn and Kevin have spent a lot of time busting up crime syndicates, so they know a thing or two about them.

  Three Fun Facts about Dangerous Crime Syndicates:

  —They’re usually headquartered in run-down warehouses, ramshackle cabins, or secret rooms off the back of ethnic restaurants.

  —Their favorite crimes include smuggling, counterfeiting, automobile theft, blackmail, kidnapping, and stealing gold from honest miners’ claims.

  —They always name themselves after a fierce and dangerous animal, like the Rattlesnake Posse, the Hyena Gang, or the Chupacabra Cartel.

  “You can stop there,” said Steve.

  “So we’re up against the Bee Syndicate?” asked Dana.

  Steve nodded. “That’s right.”

  “That’s not the fiercest animal name.”

  “What are you talking about?” said Steve. “Bees sting people.”

  “Right, but a bee sting just hurts a little bit.”

  “Not if you have allergies.”

  Dana shrugged. “I guess.”

  Steve knew Dana knew Steve was right.

  “I wonder what MacArthur Bart did to make these guys angry,” said Dana.

  “Maybe,” said Steve, “they’re holding him for ransom.”

  “But then wouldn’t there be a ransom note?”

  “There probably is one, but we don’t know about it.” Steve started walking. “We don’t know who Bart’s family or friends are. The only thing we know about him is t
hat he called someone in San Francisco.”

  Steve was now pacing a figure eight. “Maybe,” he said, “MacArthur Bart stumbled upon the Bee Syndicate and was going to bring them to justice.”

  “MacArthur Bart writes detective stories. That doesn’t mean he’s a real detective.”

  “And so that’s why he came to me!” Steve made another loop. “He wanted me to bring this gang down.”

  “Maybe,” Dana said.

  “Well, the important thing is that a vicious crime syndicate is holding MacArthur Bart, and we need to find their headquarters before it’s too late.”

  “So what do we do next?”

  Steve paced faster.

  “Look,” said Dana, “before you come up with some crazy plan, I just want to say for the record that I don’t really want to get shot at, or even run into those guys, ever again.”

  Steve said nothing. He just kept moving.

  “And so,” Dana continued, “even though I know you’ll disagree, I really think we should just go to the police.”

  Steve stopped. “You’re right,” he said.

  “I am?”

  “Yes. We will go to the police.” Steve smiled. “The San Francisco police.”

  “What?” Dana asked.

  Steve had a feeling, a glowing, tennis ball–size orb of certainty right in his gut. And Steve had read enough Bailey Brothers novels to know what this feeling was: It was a hunch.

  “Dana,” said Steve. “I have a hunch.”

  “Oh, no,” said Dana.

  “The last number MacArthur Bart called had a 415 area code. I have a feeling the solution to this case lies in San Francisco.”

  “But he could have been calling anybody,” Dana said.

  “No!” said Steve. “I had to rub that notepad with a pencil to get that number. That means it’s a clue.”

  “That’s not enough evidence!”

  Dana didn’t understand. A hunch didn’t need evidence to be true. A hunch was like a two-legged stool that somehow still managed to support a fat man’s weight. A hunch was remarkable, even magical.