The Crown of the Bandit King

by Matti Lena Harris

  The map was destroyed.

  Chapter 7

  The Book of All Words

  Of all the things on my to-do list, suffering the agony of a fiery death in a crazy library wasn’t among them.

  The map had said to run. Sweet Pea had said to trust my instincts, and my instincts said run, too. Right in front of me was a long aisle with a line of bookshelves on my left side and a blank wall on my right. Behind me, the smoke was getting thicker, but that aisle in front of me was clearer than the rest.

  So I ran.

  Way off in the distance, the Librarian was shouting, “Someone call the Firefighter! Call the Firefighter!” And the smoke kept getting worse and worse. My eyes stung so much that tears ran down my cheeks. My throat constricted until I couldn’t keep from coughing.

  But still, I ran.

  The floor in this section of the library was marble, and the sprinklers made it slick like black ice. My feet slipped, and I fell. Hard. I smacked my head against the floor, and when I opened my eyes, the bookshelves spun around me. Which way was forward and which way was back?

  I blinked a few times while my vision focused. Down at the end of the aisle was a door.

  A way out.

  I hauled myself to my feet and raced for that door. Just a little farther, and I’d be safe. With a final lunge, I reached the door, yanked it open, and dashed over the threshold.

  Right into a big stack of metal buckets.

  Took me a minute to figure out what happened. The darkness made my surroundings hard to see, but as my eyes adjusted, the shadows became shapes. Brooms. Mops. Sponges. Feather dusters and window cleaner. Plus a sweet, pine-fresh smell. I’d found a janitor’s closet.

  So much for instinct.

  As I wiggled my way free of the buckets and mops, I heard the sound of a little clink on the floor, like something metal had fallen from my pocket. The Ragman’s house key. I’d forgotten about it until now. I scrambled to the door and checked the knob to see if it had a lock.

  I was in luck.

  If I could just find the key where it had fallen…but the closet was dark, and the key must have bounced when it landed. Besides, it wasn’t a Collectible. I couldn’t sense it at all.

  I crouched down on my knees and patted the floor with my hands.

  “Come on, come on!” I said.

  A bucket handle, a wet rag, a rubber glove. Still no key. I coughed again, my chest tight and my breaths ragged. The smoke was thickening, and I was starting to feel dizzy. There. I touched the small metal key with my fingers, then snatched it up. But when I ran to the door and fitted it in the lock, nothing happened.

  What was wrong?

  Had Sweet Pea lied about the key? I pictured her with Deeter, sitting on the shabby sofa in the Ragman’s living room, laughing at the great joke they’d played on me. Maybe they’d set me up on purpose. Deeter was certainly twisted enough to do it, but Sweet Pea?

  No. Sweet Pea wasn’t like that.

  I stared at the doorknob and tried to think. I was standing on the outside of the door when I put the key in the lock and turned it….

  But the door had been open.

  My knees were growing shaky and weak as if I was about to collapse and pass out. If I couldn’t get this key to work, I was pretty much doomed. There was only one last thing to try. This time, I shut the door first. Then I slipped the key into the lock and turned it. The key made a tiny click, so I pulled it out of the lock and opened the door again.

  The brooms were gone. The mops were gone. The buckets and sponges and feather dusters, too. The whole closet had been replaced with the front hallway of the Ragman’s house, complete with its antique umbrella stand and those crazy mismatched clocks.

  Unbelievable.

  There wasn’t much time to marvel at the magical transformation, though. I bolted over the threshold, swinging the door closed behind me, and landed on the Ragman’s floor with a crash. Sweet Pea and Deeter came running into the hallway, where I lay soaking wet and coughing like I’d almost drowned.

  “Oh, my gosh! What happened!” Sweet Pea asked, kneeling beside me.

  “Wow, Rookie. You’re a mess!” Deeter said.

  I coughed harder, gasped for breath. “Book…library…fire!”

  Probably I sounded like I was dying. Sounded like an idiot, too. The Ragman must have heard the noise since he rushed into the hallway, then started prancing around like a kid at Christmas.

  “Ah, you’re back! Did you get it? Did you find it!”

  I wrestled the encyclopedia out of my pack and handed it to him.

  “Well done!” he said. “I knew you were a lad of talent!”

  He immediately opened the book and started flipping through the pages. As he walked back to his study, I could hear him mumbling.

  “So the Baseball Hat was indeed a counterfeit! See if I buy anything more from that seller!”

  Sweet Pea sighed, then fetched me a glass of water to help clear my throat. I gulped the whole thing down in a few quick swallows.

  “The Ragman may not have cared much,” she said, “but Deeter and I were starting to worry about you.”

  Deeter gave her a look like she was insane. She nudged him hard.

  “Uh, yeah, Rookie. Real worried,” he said.

  He darted back a few steps where Sweet Pea couldn’t reach him again.

  “Why?” I asked. “I’ve only been gone a few hours.”

  Sweet Pea and Deeter exchanged looks.

  “What?” I asked.

  “You’ve been gone for almost a week,” Sweet Pea said.

  A week? No way.

  “Nice try, Sweet Pea,” I said. “But I left this morning.”

  Sweet Pea and Deeter exchanged looks again. It was getting annoying.

  “We should dry you off first,” Sweet Pea said, “and then we can figure it out.”

  She offered me a hand and helped me up while Deeter went and found me a towel. After I’d dried off, I met up with them at the lumpy green sofa in the living room.

  The place had gotten much messier since I’d been away. Now there was an empty fish tank on the floor. Beside that was a cardboard box filled with animal bobble-head dolls. And it looked like a stack of old board games had been crammed onto one of the shelves. Why did the Ragman want those?

  Maybe breathing so much smoke in the library had made me a little mental because suddenly I pictured the Ragman playing a game of magical Snakes and Ladders, where real snakes slithered out of the box and tried to bite the players.

  Weird.

  Sweet Pea sat next to me on the sofa and folded her hands across her lap.

  “Let’s start at the beginning,” she said. “Where exactly did you find the encyclopedia?”

  “In a library,” I said.

  “Which library?”

  “I don’t exactly know if it had a name. It was the Librarian’s library.”

  Deeter let out a low whistle.

  “That explains the lost time,” Sweet Pea said. “Everyone knows it’s easy to lose track of time in libraries, but in the Librarian’s library, they say time actually does pass more slowly. Outside her library, a week passed, and you didn’t even feel it.”

  “Never mind that.” Deeter leaned closer. “Tell us about the Librarian. Did she catch you? Did she try to kill you?”

  “Actually, she was sort of nice,” I said, “at first.”

  “At first?” Sweet Pea tilted her head at me.

  So I told them everything that happened. When I got to the part with the little white dog, Deeter started laughing hysterically.

  “What?” I said. “What’s so funny?”

  “A little white dog? You’ve gotta be kidding me!”

  “I’m not! I swear it’s the truth. Sweet Pea, you believe me, right?”

  “Well….” She looked over at Deeter, who was laughing so hard he was about to fall off the sofa. She grinned. “It does sound a bit fantastic.”

  “I know it sounds ridiculous, but i
t’s the truth! I swear!”

  “If it’s the truth,” Deeter said between gasps, “then I’m glad that dog bit her on the ankle. Man, I wish I could have seen that!”

  But when I finished the story, Sweet Pea frowned. “That doesn’t make sense.”

  “What doesn’t?” I asked.

  “Any of it. All of it!”

  “You know what makes sense to me?” Deeter asked. “Lunch. You want anything, Rookie? I’ll make you something special since you survived the Librarian. How ’bout a quesadilla pancake with a side of peanut butter salsa?”

  I hadn’t felt hungry in the library, but now that I was back at the Ragman’s house, I was so starving that even one of Deeter’s strange culinary experiments sounded tempting. I followed Deeter over to the table while Sweet Pea started to unpack my bag.

  “What’s that?” She pointed at a big leather book on the floor.

  “Huh? Oh, that’s the book I used to try to keep the map dry.”

  “The one you grabbed off the Librarian’s cart?” Sweet Pea examined the book more closely. “It doesn’t have a title on the spine. That’s strange.”

  She held the book up, and a slip of paper fell out of it.

  “Wait a minute. Look at this!”

  “Gee, wow, the book’s got a bookmark,” Deeter said.

  “I don’t think it is,” Sweet Pea said. “It’s some sort of letter!”

  She picked up the note and read it aloud.

  “Dear Librarian, I’ve found it at last! I strongly suspect someone else was trying to get their hands on it before I did. The Book of All Words is dangerous enough even on a good day, but now with John Ketter’s journal destroyed, it’s the only way to find the Bronze Crown. And I know I don’t need to tell you what a catastrophe that would be. Keep this safe! Regards, the Detective.”

  “The Bronze Crown?” I asked. “What’s that?”

  Sweet Pea shrugged. “I have no idea, but I think I know what this book is. It’s The Book of All Words. Every word that’s ever been written gets recorded in this book.”

  “Like a whole library in a book? Cool,” Deeter said.

  “Dangerous is more like it.”

  “Let’s try it out!”

  Deeter left his seat and made a grab for the book, but Sweet Pea slapped his hand away.

  “It’s too risky. We should return it immediately,” she said.

  “Aw, you’re only saying that because you don’t know how it works.”

  “I do too…well, sort of.”

  “Then prove it!” Deeter grinned. “Come on, Sweet Pea. Let’s look something up in the book first. Just something small. Then we’ll return it. We’ll never have this chance again!”

  Sweet Pea seemed uncertain. Her eyes shifted from Deeter’s face to mine. The memory of all those basketballs bouncing around the library popped into my head.

  “Nothing is going to come out of the book, is it?” I asked.

  “Not if we look up the right thing,” Sweet Pea said. She glanced at Deeter, who was hopping up and down. He reminded me of the Ragman. Deeter had the same eager look in his eyes.

  “All right,” she said. “Only once. I know just what to use it for.” She placed her hand on the book’s cover. “Book of All Words, please show me the latest edition of The Artisan Times.”

  “What!” Deeter shouted. “You can have any book in the world, and you ask for a boring newspaper?”

  “Quiet, Deeter!”

  Sweet Pea opened the book. At the top of the first page was the title The Artisan Times, and below that was a huge headline.

  Finder Sets Fire To Librarian’s Library!

  “Uh-oh,” Deeter said. “Knew the rookie would mess up somehow.”

  Deeter and Sweet Pea both stared at me.

  “I didn’t do it!” I said. “I swear!”

  “It says here that everyone thinks you did,” Sweet Pea said. “They think you set fire to the library so you could steal a book. The Librarian has offered a huge reward to anyone who turns you in. And the Detective has been called in on the case to solve the crime. He’s hunting you.”

  Chapter 8

  The Magic Eight Ball

  “What’s the reward?” Deeter asked.

  “Quiet, Deeter. This isn’t the time,” Sweet Pea said.

  Great. As if my life didn’t have enough trouble in it lately, now everyone thought I’d torched a crazy magical library too? Well hey, after everything I’d been through so far, why not add another item to my list of misfortunes and crushing disasters?

  I left the living room table since suddenly I wasn’t hungry anymore, and I walked over to Sweet Pea.

  “What does the article say about me?” I asked. “Does it mention The Book of All Words?”

  “Not by name, no. It only says, ‘a forbidden book of great importance.’ It mentions you’re one of the Ragman’s Finders, though. It says you used a cunning mix of distractions, including a bunch of runaway basketballs and a little white dog, to distract the Librarian while you set fire to the aisle of forbidden books.”

  “What! But I didn’t!”

  “Can you prove it?”

  “Um…no.”

  This was bad. Even if I returned the book and explained what happened, I had no proof. And with no proof, who would believe me? They’d probably think I’d stolen the book, then chickened out and tried to return it with some pathetic story about out-of-control basketballs and a poodle.

  I closed my eyes. “Was the library destroyed? Was anyone hurt?”

  “The article says the Firefighter arrived before any injury or serious damage occurred.”

  At least it wasn’t all bad news.

  “There’s one thing I don’t understand,” Sweet Pea said.

  “Just one?” Deeter shook his head.

  She glared at him. “Any number of things could have started the fire. I guess it could have been a coincidence that the library happened to burn while you were there. But what about the dog? Dogs don’t just happen in libraries.”

  “Especially at the Librarian’s library,” Deeter added. “You’d have to be suicidal to bring a dog there.”

  “Or you’d have to have a very good reason,” I said.

  “Like what?” Sweet Pea asked.

  I shrugged, but I was starting to get an idea. This whole time, I’d been thinking that the dog was a random occurrence. What if it wasn’t?

  “Maybe the dog was a joke,” Deeter said. “After all, it was pretty funny. The look on the Librarian’s face must’ve been classic.”

  Sweet Pea frowned. “Dogs in libraries might be funny, but fires aren’t. Somebody could have been killed. Someone must have a really sick sense of humor.”

  “Or,” I said, “someone was at the library to steal the book while I was there. Remember the Detective’s note? How he suspected someone else was trying to find The Book of All Words before he did?”

  “So the would-be thief released the dog to get the Librarian away from the cart with the book on it,” Sweet Pea said.

  I nodded. “And set the fire in an attempt to conceal the theft.”

  “Right, but you got to the cart and grabbed the book first.”

  Sounded possible enough.

  “It must have been the Professor’s student who set the fire,” I said. “I saw him smoking a cigarette in that aisle, remember?”

  “That’s strange.” Sweet Pea shook her head. “I’ve never heard of the Professor having a student.”

  “He’s a teacher, right? Teachers have students.”

  “I guess. But I can’t believe the Professor would want to steal any book, and I can’t imagine one of his students would either.”

  “So who would?”

  Right then, there was the sound of footsteps in the hallway.

  “Ragman’s comin’,” Deeter said.

  Sweet Pea slammed the book shut. “He can’t know about The Book of All Words! Can you imagine if he got his hands on it? If any Collector did?”

>   The footsteps stopped at the door.

  “Here!” I grabbed the book from her and shoved it under a sofa cushion. Then we all dog-piled on top as the door opened. The Ragman, standing in the doorway, cleared his throat.

  “Ahem!”

  He looked like he’d eaten too many quesadilla pancakes, with way too much peanut butter salsa on the side.

  “Are you all right, sir?” Sweet Pea asked.

  “All right!” The Ragman pointed to his reddening face. “Does this look like the face of a man who is all right? I’ve learned some very distressing news!”

  Deeter, Sweet Pea and I glanced at each other, and I could tell we were all thinking the same thing—that somehow, the Ragman had found out about the library fiasco.

  Which meant he was here to make me his new housekeeper. And I could kiss my memories goodbye.

  “I know it’s a huge mess right now,” I said, “but I’ll fix it. I promise.”

  “Oh.” The Ragman seemed surprised. “Well, if you like. I’d thought Deeter or Sweet Pea might be best suited for the job. After all, you only just got back, and it’s not an easy Collectible to find. But, if you really want to go, then as you wish.”

  “Um….”

  Somehow, I had the feeling I’d volunteered for trouble.

  “Sir?” Sweet Pea asked. “What exactly was that distressing news you mentioned?”

  “LuckySmith has outbid me. Again!”

  The Ragman paced back and forth between the crates and boxes that cluttered the floor, his arms gesturing wildly in the air.

  “This time, it was the Rose Teacup that I lost!” he continued. “Can you believe it? Last week it was the Rose Teapot. Now the teacup. He’ll be after the matching Rose Tea Cozy next! And that simply must not happen!”

  He stopped pacing and took a deep breath. Then he pointed at me.

  “That is where you come into it, my boy. I want you to find the Magic Eight Ball!”

  Deeter’s mouth dropped open while Sweet Pea gasped. But the Ragman stood there grinning at me like he’d given me a sacred quest.