Hopping Mad (3 page)

“All right, Joe. What do we know?”

Fenton Hardy, Frank and Joe's dad, was a private investigator who used to work with the local Bayport police force. He'd been a cop in New York City for years. The boys had been watching him solve crimes since they were old enough to crawl after him. Over the years they'd learned more than a few things about figuring out unexplained events.

And the first was to start with the six
W
s of crime solving—What, When, Why, Who, How,
and Where. Frank and Joe found a quiet corner of the auditorium to sit down and think. Everyone else had gone out to recess, so they had the room to themselves.

Frank wrote down in his notebook:
What.

“That part is easy,” said Joe. “A rain of frogs!”

Frank wrote down
frogs
in the notebook. Then he kept going.

“What else are you writing?” asked Joe, curious.

Frank continued writing for a moment, then looked up and read from the notebook. “‘Frogs. Falling from all around at the Bayport Elementary annual talent show. All specimens looked to be around the same age, size, species.'”

If there was one thing their father had specifically told them, it was that it paid to be as precise as possible. Solving a crime often rested on the details.

Frank wrote
When
next, under
What.

Joe looked at his watch. “It happened about twenty minutes after the talent show started, so around 11:20 a.m.” Frank recorded the time in the notebook. After it he added
right at the beginning of Melissa & Todd's act
.

Joe scratched his head—a sure sign he was thinking about something.

“That means that the frogs must
have gotten into the auditorium earlier today. It couldn't have been last night, or they probably would have starved. And it couldn't have been that much earlier than the show itself, or they wouldn't have escaped at the right time.”

“So whoever did this did it recently!” said Frank, excited. If the trail was still “warm,” as their dad would say, they had a much better chance of catching the culprit.

“Okay,” said Frank. “Next up is
Why
.”

This one was tougher. In police investigations, this was known as the criminal's “motive.” The boys took a few minutes to come up with as many reasons as they could as to why someone would want to drop frogs on the talent show.

“Someone hates frogs,” said Joe.

“Someone hates Melissa and Todd,” said Frank. He wrote both down. After that the list continued:

• Someone was out to ruin the talent show.
  
• Someone wanted to make Principal Butler angry.
  
• It was a prank directed at the school.
  
• It was an accident.
  
• They were a new species of frog that lived in the ceilings of public elementary schools. (Frank knew this was unlikely, but he'd always wanted to discover a new species of animal.)
  

“This isn't getting us anywhere,” said Joe. Frank agreed. They had no way of knowing why someone would want to rain frogs down on the talent show. It was time to move on to the next piece of the puzzle:
Who
.

Who would want to sabotage the talent show?

“Well, Adam got pulled off the stage,” said Frank. “And he's always starting fights and pulling pranks on people. Maybe he was angry at Principal Butler.”

Adam was a pretty good suspect. They wrote his name down in the book. They thought for a few more seconds.

“Mina was freaked out about having to perform in front of the whole school,” said Joe. “Maybe she did it so she wouldn't have to go on?”

“That's possible,” said Frank. “But Mina is so nice. It doesn't seem like her. But like Dad says, you never know.” Frank wrote Mina's name down too, even though they didn't think it could be her.

“I didn't see Adam or Mina when the frogs were falling, did you?” asked Joe.

Frank considered it for a second. He'd been pretty distracted. But now that he thought about it, he couldn't remember seeing either of them anywhere.

“So either one of them could be our prankster,” said Joe.

“Or anyone else who wasn't at the show.” Aside
from Melissa, Todd, Cissy, and Principal Butler, it could have been almost anyone. The crowd was so big, no one would have noticed if one person was missing.

Carefully Frank wrote
Where
in the notebook. His hand was starting to get tired. He was glad that they'd be soon done with the writing part of the investigation.

“The first frog hit Melissa in the face,” said Frank.

“But where did it come from?” said Joe.

“If someone was throwing them from the audience, they'd have to be pretty strong,” said Frank. “And have good aim.”

“Maybe they fell from the ceiling?”

Both boys looked up. How would frogs have gotten into the ceiling? Frank wrote it down, then crossed it out. That would be impossible.

“We've got two suspects,” said Frank. “Should we start with them?”

Joe nodded. Frank flipped his notebook shut and the boys headed out to find Adam and Mina. First stop: the playground.

Of the two, Adam seemed like the more likely suspect. It was hard to see Mina touching a frog, let alone throwing it at someone's face—no matter how scared she was to perform. Adam had a history of causing trouble. Frank and Joe had already run up against him once on a case, when they were trying to find the missing money from a video-game competition.

It wasn't hard to guess where Adam would be. If it was recess, he was over by the swings. That's
where he and his friends—all the biggest and meanest kids in school—liked to hang out. They didn't even play on the swings. They just knew other kids wanted to use them, and liked standing next to them so everyone else would stay away.

The whole school was talking about the frogs. No one had any idea how it could have happened. As they walked across the school yard, Frank and Joe heard all different kinds of theories.

“I heard it was Principal Butler herself. She, like, went crazy or something. They took her away in a strait jacket!” That was Madison Tillery, the most popular girl in school. She had a whole circle of girls around her, listening wide eyed. They were all texting the story to friends at other schools while they listened to Madison.

“I'm tellin' you, it was aliens!” That was Chet Morton. He was a good friend of Frank and Joe's. He was talking loudly to a group of kindergartners.
“I saw a whole TV show about it. They pick up frogs, and then they— Oh! Hey, Frank! Hey, Joe! Are you guys going to figure this mystery out?” Chet knew all about their cases, and had even been inside the tree house where they wrote them all up on a big chalkboard.

“We're going to try,” said Frank.

“Nuh-uh,” corrected Joe. “We're going to succeed!”

“Cool,” said Chet. “Here's a lead for you: aliens!”

Frank laughed. Chet
always
thought it was aliens. Frank and Joe continued on their way. Finally, they made it over to the far side of the playground, where the swings were. Sure enough, there was Adam—along with Jeffrey Perkins, Susie Merrell, Joe Stracy, and Ian Williams. The five of them added together would have made ten of Frank or Joe. They towered above all the other kids in the third grade. Adam had his back turned as the boys approached, and was talking loudly to his friends.

“Did you hear me up there?” Adam was saying. “They loved me! If Principal Butler hadn't pulled me off the stage, I would have won the talent show, no questions. I was cheated!”

It sounded like Adam was pretty upset at Principal Butler. That would be reason enough to ruin the show. And if he thought he deserved to win on top of it …

“What do
you
want?” Susie asked. She had
noticed Frank and Joe, listening to Adam. She had a mean look in her eyes. She was probably the smartest of the third-grade bullies. All the other girls went running when she came into the cafeteria.

Joe swallowed loudly. “We, uh, we wanted to talk to Adam about the frogs.” He was trying not to be afraid. Or to be afraid, but still do the right thing. That was what their dad had taught them.

“Did I say you could talk?” asked Susie. She pushed the other kids aside and walked up to Joe. She was a good two inches taller.

“Well, you did ask me—,” Joe began.

“‘Well, you did ask me. Nah, nah, nah,” Susie copied him. Adam and the other kids laughed.

“Look, we just want to know if he had anything to do with the frogs that interrupted the talent show,” said Frank.

“Goody Two-Shoes!” yelled Ian.

“You think I did that?” asked Adam. He walked over to Frank and Joe. The other kids came with him. Quickly, Frank and Joe were surrounded.

“It couldn't have been Adam!” A voice rang out from behind the circle of third-grade bullies. A second later, Mina wormed her way through the wall of kids.

“What do you mean, it couldn't have been Adam?” said Frank. He had pulled out his pen and notebook, eager to get another clue on the case. The bullies had already been forgotten.

“Hey, Mina, be quiet!” Adam looked nervous all of a sudden.

Mina ignored him. “He was with me!” she said.

Adam started waving his hands and trying to cut her off. “Don't listen to her!” he said. Now Frank and Joe were really curious. What was she going to say? All of Adam's friends were staring at Mina as well.

“He was—”

But Mina never got to finish her sentence. Adam
put his hand over her mouth. “Fine!” he said. “You caught me! I did it.”

“What?” said Joe.

“I did it! I threw the frogs onstage. You can go tell Principal Butler. In fact, let's go do that right now.”

Adam still hadn't removed his hand from Mina's mouth. She was staring at Frank and Joe, trying to get their attention. As Adam talked, she shook her head. It seemed like Mina didn't believe Adam. And neither did Frank or Joe. What was he trying to hide?