The Fabled Fifth Graders of Aesop Elementary School

by Candace Fleming

  “That’s one way to skin a cat,” quipped Lenny. He looked at Bruce for a response.

  Nothing.

  “Cat got your tongue?” asked Lenny.

  Bruce grinned.

  For the next thirty minutes, the students filled their papers with blue tails, blue paws, and blue whiskers.

  Mr. Pickles continued to snore and drool and twitch in his sleep.

  The guinea pigs kept watching.

  Then Ms. Bozzetto clapped her hands. “We’ve only a few minutes left, so let’s begin finishing up,” she said.

  But the fifth graders never got a chance to finish. At that moment, the school bell began clanging hysterically.

  “Fire alarm,” Mr. Jupiter said calmly from the back table, where he’d been grading the students’ macroeconomics papers. He stood. “You know the drill.”

  Just as they had practiced dozens of times before, the fifth graders lined up quickly.

  Ms. Bozzetto hurriedly checked to make sure the windows were closed, wiping blue paint on her smock as she went.

  Mr. Jupiter picked up the guinea pig cage and flipped off the lights. Then he led the students and the art teacher down the hallway and out the nearest exit.

  The fifth graders burst out the door and onto the blacktop.

  Theatrically, Lenny and Bruce fell into each other’s arms, gasping and panting.

  “We’re alive!” Lenny fake-wheezed.

  “Fresh air!” Bruce fake-coughed. He pounded on his chest.

  “Knock it off, you two,” said Mr. Jupiter. “Fire drills are serious business.” He began counting heads. “Is everyone here?”

  Rachel shook her head. “Pffft. Pffft.”

  “What’d you say?” asked Ham.

  “Pfcat,” repeated Rachel. “Pfcat.”

  “Did you say ‘cat’?” asked Ham.

  “Cat!” shrieked Ms. Bozzetto. “We forgot Mr. Pickles!” She lunged toward the school.

  But Mr. Jupiter restrained her. “Katrina, you know you can’t go back inside. That’s a violation of the fire code.”

  Ms. Bozzetto slumped, then nodded.

  “Besides,” added Mr. Jupiter, “it’s just a drill. Mr. Pickles is completely safe. Mark my words, we’re going to return to class to find him peacefully dreaming on his pillow.”

  But when the students were finally allowed back into their classroom, they found Mr. Pickles—

  “Missing!” wailed Ms. Bozzetto. She pressed the now catless pillow to her heart, mixing white cat hair with the smears of ultramarine blue.

  “She may be even messier than I am,” Rose said to Missy. Then—“Oops!”—Rose stepped backward into the guinea pig cage, which Mr. Jupiter had just returned to the table. Guinea pig fur mingled with her pudding.

  Still clinging to her pillow, the art teacher cried, “Oh, where, oh, where has my precious pussycat gone?”

  Emberly whipped out his magnifying glass. “This is a case for Emberly Everclass,” he declared.

  “Get serious,” snorted Stanford. “What do you know about detecting?”

  “Plenty,” replied Emberly. He added proudly, “I’ve read all six hundred and thirty-six McFardy Boys books, mysteries featuring Marty and Arty McFardy and their bull terrier, Beans.”

  “Whew,” whistled Ham. “I’m impressed.”

  “I am too,” said Mr. Jupiter, “and as much as I want to encourage the discussion of books, Ms. Bozzetto needs our help.”

  The boys nodded.

  “We will organize ourselves into two search parties, just like the time Colonel Wesley Wimberly-Kemp’s hot-air balloon was lost in the wilds of Patagonia and I—”

  “Focus, Mr. Jupiter,” Ms. Bozzetto said.

  “Of course,” said Mr. Jupiter. “Boys will come with me. Girls will go with Ms. Bozzetto.”

  “But that’s not how it’s done,” argued Emberly. “This is a mystery. You don’t just go searching willy-nilly when you’re investigating a mystery. You’re supposed to follow clues. You’re supposed to use your powers of deductive reasoning. You’re supposed to look through a magnifying glass.”

  “I appreciate your enthusiasm for the detectival arts, Emberly, but Mr. Pickles has gotten a head start.” Mr. Jupiter turned to the students. “Class, spread out.”

  Emberly hung back. That was what the McFardy boys always did when investigating a mystery. They hung back so they could look for clues … alone.

  Once his classmates were gone, Emberly began searching—slowly, methodically, and with his magnifying glass pressed to his eye. On the door frame, he uncovered a drip of blue paint. In the hall, on Rose’s locker, he found a faint blue smudge. And then—

  “Aha!”

  Outside Nurse Betadine’s office, he found half a blue paw print.

  “The scoundrel is afoot,” he muttered.

  Emberly rocked back on his heels and jiggled the coins in his pocket, just the way Arty McFardy always did when he was using his powers of deduction. Finally, Emberly said, “I deduce that Mr. Pickles went that way.”

  He walked into Nurse Betadine’s office.

  “Are you feeling sick?” she asked.

  “No, I’m a sleuth,” he replied. “I’m solving the Case of the … ah … the … um …” Emberly snapped his fingers. “The Case of the Fugitive Feline.”

  Nurse Betadine shrugged. “Sorry, there’s no cat here.”

  “Mind if I take a look around?” asked Emberly.

  “Be my guest,” replied the nurse. “But don’t touch anything. I just disinfected the place.”

  Slowly, methodically, and with his magnifying glass pressed to his eye, Emberly searched for yet more clues—on top of the eye chart, inside the Band-Aid box, under the cot.

  “Aha!” he cried. “A hairball.”

  “Impossible,” said the nurse. “I keep my office scrupulously clean.”

  “Impossible indeed,” replied Emberly, “and yet there’s the evidence. It means Mr. Pickles was here. But where is he now? Hmmm?” The boy detective rocked back on his heels and jiggled the coins in his pocket again. Finally, he said, “I deduce that Mr. Pickles, in a fit of gagging, left the comfort of his pillow to seek medical attention here in your office. Unfortunately, you were outside because of the fire drill. Alone, Mr. Pickles gacked up his hairball, and then …”

  “Yes?” said the nurse. “And then?”

  “Then, feeling better, he headed …” Emberly walked back into the hallway. Slowly, methodically, and with his eye pressed to his magnifying glass, he searched for clues. He discovered a single white hair lying in front of the gym’s double doors. “In here,” he concluded.

  “But why?” asked Nurse Betadine, following along.

  “We’re about to find out,” said Emberly.

  Mrs. Gluteal was washing the sports equipment when they entered. “There’s nothing worse than a filthy kickball,” she said, looking up from her sudsy bucket.

  “Stop!” cried Emberly. “You may be destroying evidence.”

  “Evidence of what?” asked Mrs. Gluteal.

  “Of Mr. Pickles,” he said.

  “Who?” she said.

  “The cat,” he said.

  “We’re on a case,” put in Nurse Betadine.

  “The Case of the Fugitive Feline,” said Emberly.

  Mrs. Gluteal rolled her eyes. “Cats would never come in here,” she said. “They don’t like all the kicking, the screaming, the hurtling balls.” She dropped a cricket bat into the bucket.

  “I know it appears improbable, but we must let the evidence decide,” replied Emberly.

  Slowly, methodically, and with his magnifying glass pressed to his eye, he searched for even more clues. He searched through a basket of volleyballs and behind the bowling pins.

  “Aha!” cried Emberly. “A mouse toy.”

  “I’ve never seen that before in my life,” Mrs. Gluteal said defensively. “I swear.”

  Emberly picked up the toy. “It’s still wet with drool,” he said.

&nb
sp; “How unsanitary!” said Nurse Betadine.

  Emberly nodded. “Mr. Pickles was definitely here.”

  “How do you know it was Mr. Pickles?” asked Mrs. Gluteal. “That toy could belong to any cat.”

  “It’s elementary,” replied Emberly, holding the cat toy with just two fingers. “When I last saw Mr. Pickles, he was drooling like a Saint Bernard. Only a hyper-salivating cat could leave a toy this wet.”

  Once again, Emberly rocked back on his heels and jiggled the coins in his pocket. “I deduce that after gacking up the hairball, Mr. Pickles suddenly felt frisky, so he came into the empty gym to play.” Emberly rubbed his chin. “But then why leave?”

  Emberly walked to the door and looked at the room directly across the hall.

  “I think I know,” he concluded. “Follow me.”

  He and Nurse Betadine hurried into the school kitchen.

  “You’ll never believe what happened!” cried Cook when she saw them. “While I was outside for the fire drill, someone ate—”

  Emberly finished her sentence. “The tuna-waffle casserole left over from lunch.”

  “How did you know?” gasped Cook.

  Emberly tapped his head. “Powers of deduction.”

  “Ah,” said Cook.

  “Obviously, playing in the gym made Mr. Pickles hungry, so he came in here for a bite of lunch.”

  Nurse Betadine looked around. “But where is he now?”

  “Kindergarten room A,” said Emberly confidently.

  “K room A?” both women exclaimed.

  “But why?” asked Nurse Betadine.

  “I’d rather not say,” said Emberly.

  Both women followed him to the kindergarten room.

  Seventeen little faces looked up from circle time.

  “Can we help you?” chirped Miss Fairchild.

  “I just want to check your sandbox,” said Emberly.

  “Certainly,” replied Miss Fairchild. She turned back to her students.

  Slowly, methodically, and with his magnifying glass pressed to his eye, Emberly pushed aside the plastic molds and shovels until he found the very clue he’d been searching for. “Just as I suspected,” he said, pointing. “Mr. Pickles was definitely here.”

  “Is that what I think it is?” asked Cook.

  Emberly nodded.

  Nurse Betadine blanched, then shouted, “This sandbox is quarantined. Absolutely no one is allowed to play in it until the sand has been replaced.”

  Miss Fairchild sighed and looked at a little boy in a dinosaur shirt. “Oh, Aidan, not again.”

  “It wasn’t me,” protested Aidan. “Really! It wasn’t me.”

  Emberly rocked back on his heels and jiggled the coins in his pocket yet again.

  He wiggled the clues around in his mind, trying to fit all the pieces together. Mr. Pickles had coughed up a hairball, played with his mouse, eaten a bellyful of tuna, and used the litter … uh … sandbox. What else was there for a cat to do? He thought back to what Ms. Bozzetto had said earlier: Mr. Pickles is a particularly heavy sleeper. In his mind’s eye he saw the hair-covered pillow.

  “Eureka!” exclaimed Emberly. “My powers of deductive reasoning tell me there’s only one logical place for him to go. All evidence points to it.”

  Dashing from the kindergarten room, he raced down the hall, pushed his way into the fifth-grade classroom, and—

  Skittered to a dead stop.

  “What the … !” gasped Emberly.

  At the same moment, the others slumped into the classroom.

  “That cat’s long gone.”

  “We couldn’t find him.”

  “Poor Ms. Bozzetto. No more Mr. Pickles.”

  That was when they saw Emberly standing stock-still and clutching his magnifying glass.

  “Emberly, what is it?” asked Mr. Jupiter. “You look as if you’ve seen a ghost.”

  Struck speechless, Emberly pointed to the guinea pig cage.

  Everyone looked.

  “I don’t believe it!”

  “How can it be?”

  Inside the guinea pig cage, squeezed between the exercise wheel and a bowl of sunflower seeds, the cat slept peacefully.

  “You found my Mr. Pickles!” squealed Ms. Bozzetto.

  Mr. Jupiter clapped Emberly on the back. “An excellent bit of detectival investigation, Emberly,” he said. “Congratulations.”

  Emberly blushed modestly.

  “Yeah,” said Lenny. “But how did Mr. Pickles get in there?”

  “And what are they doing?” asked Rose, pointing to the guinea pigs.

  Just outside the cage, the guinea pigs lolled happily on the purple pillow. “Eeek, eeek, eeek,” they trilled.

  “I believe they’re singing a song from the musical Cats,” replied Mr. Jupiter.

  Stanford turned to Emberly. “You may have solved the mystery of Mr. Pickles’s disappearance,” he said. “But tell me, supersleuth, how do you explain the whole guinea pig–cat mix-up?”

  Slowly, methodically, and with his magnifying glass pressed to his eye, Emberly searched for clues. After a few moments’ investigation, he shrugged and scratched his head.

  “Impossible,” he deduced. “Improbable. My powers of deductive reasoning tell me this is completely illogical.”

  The guinea pigs smiled up at him.

  MORAL: Many of life’s mysteries remain unexplained.

  ALL TANGLED UP IN MISS TURNER’S CHARMS

  MR. JUPITER LOVED SATURDAYS. Sometimes he went away for the weekend—kayaking in the Bermuda Triangle or attending a scientific conference like the one held the previous week at the Windpassing Institute for Exotic Gases. But on most weekends, he liked to stay home and relax.

  One sunny Saturday in April, he rose late, puttered about with his trilobite collection, played a few tunes on his didgeridoo, then sauntered downtown to the Taste of Greece for a bite of lunch. But as he stepped from the restaurant—a trace of stuffed fig leaves still lingering on his lips—he bumped into Miss Turner.

  “Paige!” he exclaimed. “I didn’t expect to see you this afternoon. What a marvelous surprise!”

  Miss Turner grinned. “I was just at the jeweler’s having the pachycephalosaurus molar you brought me from your dinosaur dig added to my charm bracelet.” She held out her hand so Mr. Jupiter could see. “Isn’t it lovely?”

  “Almost as lovely as you,” he replied gallantly. And bending low at the waist, he kissed her hand with a flourish. SMOOCH!

  In a heartbeat, the straps of Mr. Jupiter’s pith helmet tangled in Miss Turner’s charms.

  “Harry,” said Miss Turner after a few moments. “You can let go now.”

  “No, Paige, I can’t,” he replied. “I’m stuck.”

  “Stuck?” she cried. She yanked her hand away.

  Oomph—Mr. Jupiter came along with it—smash—into the full book bag slung over the librarian’s shoulder.

  “And people wonder why I persist in wearing this helmet,” muttered Mr. Jupiter.

  Miss Turner didn’t hear him. In an effort to get free, she pushed against Mr. Jupiter’s shoulder.

  “Easy does it, Paige,” he croaked as the straps under his chin tightened. He fell to his knees.

  She shoved at his pith-helmeted forehead.

  “No … no … ack!” gagged Mr. Jupiter.

  She braced her knee against his chest and—

  “STOP!”

  Miss Turner lowered her knee. “Sorry, Harry.”

  Down the block at Bubba’s Yarn Barn, Ernest Moomaday looked out the front window and rubbed his eyes. “I don’t believe it,” he gasped.

  Neither did Rose Clutterdorf. She stood open-mouthed on the corner. “I’m flabbergasted,” she said, using one of last week’s vocabulary words.

  “Paige,” begged Mr. Jupiter, who was now a bit breathless from being bent over so long. “Please, please unlatch your bracelet.”

  “Of course! How silly of me!” exclaimed Miss Turner. She slapped her forehead, or at l
east tried to.

  Oomph—smash!

  “Sorry, Harry,” she said again. Awkwardly, with her free hand, she fumbled with the clasp, but—

  “It seems to be stuck,” she said.

  “Jeweler,” said Mr. Jupiter, whose face was turning blotchy from all the blood running to his head. “Jeweler.”

  “It’s just a few doors down,” said Miss Turner. “This way.” Carefully, she inched forward a few steps.

  Still bowing before her, Mr. Jupiter took a few careful steps backward.

  Miss Turner inched forward.

  Mr. Jupiter inched backward.

  Miss Turner giggled.

  “What’s so funny?” panted Mr. Jupiter.

  “It’s like we’re dancing!” the librarian exclaimed giddily. And she hummed, “Step-one, step-two …”

  Mr. Jupiter was feeling a bit light-headed himself. “Have you ever done the cha-cha-cha?” he asked. “I learned it during the season I appeared on Dancing with the Sort-of-Celebrities. Watch.” And with a wiggle of his hips, he counted off, “One-two-cha-cha-cha.”

  Miss Turner picked up the Latin beat. “Three-four-cha-cha-cha.”

  “You’re a fleet-footed dancer, Paige,” said Mr. Jupiter.

  “You should see my tango,” she replied.

  He laughed. “I’m looking forward to it.”

  Then, wiggling and giggling, they cha-cha-chaed their way down the sidewalk and into the jewelry shop.

  In the Yarn Barn, Ernest said, “I can’t wait to tell the guys about this.”

  On the corner, Rose said, “I can’t wait to tell the girls about this.”

  And they both shivered with anticipation.

  * * *

  On Monday morning, before the bell rang, Ernest raced to where the fifth-grade boys had gathered on the tetherball court.

  “Guys, you’ll never guess what I saw this weekend!” he cried.

  “A zebra wearing a mink?” asked Lenny.

  “Ze mink wearing ze bra?” asked Bruce.

  Ernest shook his head. “Mr. Jupiter and Miss Turner, and they were”—he lowered his voice—“wrestling.”

  “Wrestling?” repeated Humphrey. “Like arm wrestling?”

  Ernest shook his head again. “Like wrestling wrestling,” he whispered.

  He waved the boys closer, then glanced around to make sure no teachers were within earshot. “Miss Turner had Mr. Jupiter in a chin lock and wouldn’t let go.”