The Bell Bandit (8 page)

He started to run faster. He thought of calling out, but a voice inside told him not to. Maybe Grandma had forgotten who he was again. Maybe she would be afraid of him. If she heard his voice calling, she might hide, and then he would never find her.

The thought banged against the inside of his skull with every crashing step he took. It was cold, and it was getting dark. She was old and didn't remember things right. People died up here in the mountains. Kids lost in a snowstorm. Grownups when their cars broke down. Hikers who left the trails and became disoriented. Evan had heard the stories. People died up here.

Evan kept running. The driveway was long and curved and stretched for over half a mile before reaching the road. He was breathing hard, and each breath felt like a rusty knife sawing through his lungs. His eyes stung from the cold, and two puddles of snot collected under his nostrils. But he kept running. Running toward the road. How far could she have gotten? As far as the road? She was wearing a dark green coat. No one would be able to see that coat if she was walking on the side of the road after dark. What if a car came around a curve too fast?

When Evan reached the Big Rock, he heard a car—the crunch and grind of its wheels as it turned from the main road onto the driveway. Mom! Evan would have screamed if his throat weren't so dry and raw from running in the cold. He waved his arms wildly, running toward the road.

But it wasn't his mother's car. It was Pete's truck, and Pete rolled down his window to find out why Evan was acting like a crazy person in the middle of the road. Breathing hard, trying to keep from crying, Evan explained.

Pete listened seriously. "Okay, first thing, let's call your mom."

"She doesn't have her cell phone with her—she left it at home! And I don't know exactly where she is. Somewhere in town. Meeting with an insurance agent."

Pete nodded his head slowly, letting this information sink in.

"All right, then. Here's the plan. Someone needs to stay at the house. Can you do that? Can you be the person who answers the phone if anyone calls and who waits there in case your grandmother comes back on her own?"

Evan nodded his head.

"I'll call the police, and they'll put together a search. When's your mom expected back?"

Evan shook his head. "She said by dinnertime."

"I think I better drive into town and track her down," said Pete. "If she gets back before I do, have her call me on my cell, okay?"

"Okay." Evan was glad Pete was here, giving orders. Still, nothing Pete had said so far made Evan feel like Grandma was any closer to being found.

"I'll take you back to the house," said Pete.

"No, I'll walk," said Evan. He wanted Pete to go get his mother as soon as possible. And there was nothing waiting back at the house for him. Evan was sure of that.

Pete backed up the truck to the road and then spun the wheel and roared off. Evan started walking slowly toward the house. With every step he took, he became more convinced that Grandma was out in the woods, out in the falling darkness, out in the cold. And he couldn't help feeling that it was his fault. He should have convinced her not to go for a walk. He should have talked her into waiting with him in the mudroom. He should have found his boot more quickly. Heard her leaving. Figured out which way she'd gone. Not been the one she forgot. The one she didn't like.

When Evan got back to the house, he went first to the barn. No one was there. Then he stood in the front yard, the last place Grandma had been, and stared at the house. No lights were on. Grandma wasn't back. Pete had told him to wait inside. That was his job. And over the last few days, Pete had taught him the importance of each man doing his job and doing it well.

But what if Grandma had gone to the bell? What if the bell had "called to her"? That's what Grandma said. Sometimes things called to her, and she had to follow their voices. A bird. A cluster of irises. The pond. The moon. All these things called to Grandma from time to time. And she always went when she was called.

Evan dove into the woods, finding the path that led through the trees to Lovell's Hill. The sun was dipping below Black Bear Mountain and everything had gone flat and gray, but Evan knew the path. He hurried until he made it to the top of the steep rise where the old oak crossbeam stood.

Evan looked around. Black Bear Mountain rose behind him like a giant tidal wave. The trees looked like soldiers guarding a gate. The snow under his feet seemed to deaden all sound, and the cold was beginning to creep up into his boots and snake its way up his legs.

Evan stared at the crossbeam, empty like an eye socket. Grandma wasn't here. The bell wasn't here. Nothing was the way it was supposed to be. Nothing was ever going to be the way it was supposed to be.

Evan had that feeling that he got sometimes—that out-of-nowhere feeling—of missing his dad. His dad was supposed to be here in an emergency. But his dad wasn't here and hadn't been for a long time. Sometimes he sent e-mails with pictures attached of all the places he traveled for work, and sometimes he sent gifts—a felt hat from Pakistan or a tiny bottle made out of blue glass from Afghanistan. But Evan hadn't seen his dad in almost a year.

And suddenly Evan knew who it was he needed to help him find Grandma. It wasn't his father. It wasn't his mother. He needed someone who would treat it like a math problem, who would keep a clear head. Someone who would be able to solve the puzzle. He needed Jessie.

Evan knew the way to Maxwell's house and figured he could be there in ten minutes if he ran the whole way. But as he turned to head down the hill, the air splintered with sound—first a scream and then the noise of shattering glass. The sound came from the direction of the little bridge that crossed Deer Brook. Evan started to run.

Jessie felt as if someone had waved a wand and turned her entire body to stone. Every muscle froze; the air locked in her lungs; even her eyes refused to blink. She pressed her back against the wall of the house and prayed to become invisible.

The two boys, though, never turned around. They raced off the porch without a single backward glance and ran toward the barn. Within ten seconds they were gone, and Jessie and Maxwell were left alone on the wide wooden porch.

"That was a close one," whispered Jessie, surprised her voice was working at all.

But Maxwell didn't say anything. His face had gone sort of grayish white, and his eyes kept staring where the boys had been.

Finally he whispered, "They would have killed us if they found us."

"They would not!" Jessie whispered back. "Maybe they would have yelled and told their mother, and maybe we would have gotten in trouble, but they would not have killed us."

"You don't know them!" said Maxwell, his voice rising dangerously.

"Shhh! You want to get us caught? Jeepers, Maxwell, act like a spy, would you?"

Maxwell stood up and started walking in circles. Jessie stared through her binoculars at the barn.

"They were carrying stuff," she said. "Did you notice?" Jessie had seen that both boys had something in their hands, but she'd been too scared to see what.

"A shoebox and a hammer," said Maxwell, still walking. "Jeff had the shoebox. Mike had the hammer."

"Wow. You
are
a good spy," said Jessie. She wished she'd noticed those things, but it had all happened so fast.

Jessie looked at the barn again. Maxwell started to walk slower and slower, and then he stopped and just stood in one spot, rocking back and forth.

"We need to go see what they're doing in that barn," said Jessie.

Maxwell started shaking his head.

"Yes, we do," she said. "I bet that's where they hide things. I bet they've got a secret compartment in that barn, and that's where they are right now, and if we find that secret compartment, we'll find the bell."

"No," said Maxwell. "No, we won't. We will not find the bell in that barn."

"Well, we're going to find something, that's for sure," said Jessie. "Come on." She scooted off the porch in her low-to-the-ground crouch and hurried across the open front yard to the barn. One quick glance over her shoulder told her that Maxwell was staying behind. She'd have to do this bit of spying alone.
Agent 99 goes solo.

The large sliding door to the barn was open just a foot, but Jessie didn't want to spy from there. If the boys came barreling out the door, she'd get caught for sure, and she could still remember what it felt like to be on the porch, pressed up against the wall of the house, with nowhere to hide. She could hear music coming from inside the barn, a pop song that she recognized.

Nope, this time she was going to be smart. She and Evan had circled this barn a dozen times over the years. She knew there were windows on the sides and back of the barn. She walked to the left until she came to the first of two small windows. The boys had turned on all the overhead lights—rows and rows of them, which lit up the barn like a stage. This was lucky for her, because it made it much easier to see inside the barn, and she knew that with the fading daylight she would be almost invisible if the boys looked up.

She peeked her head around to look in the barn, but all she could see was the usual stuff: a tractor, old tools hanging on the wall, a workbench with piles of magazines all over it, baled hay. It looked like her grandma's barn. Jessie couldn't see the boys anywhere. But she could hear hammering.

She crouched down again and scuttled over to the second window, but she still couldn't see the boys. The hammering stopped, and then it started up again.

Jessie continued to walk around the outside of the barn. She was starting to think she might need to sneak inside the barn itself, when she popped her head up at the single small window on the back of the barn and came practically face-to-face with the older of the two boys. It was as if she was standing just three feet away from him and he was looking right at her.

Jessie was so surprised, she immediately ducked her head back down and waited to hear a shout from the boy. But the hammering continued, and Jessie realized that the bright light inside and the growing darkness outside had turned the window into a one-way mirror. She could peek in without being seen.

Slowly, she inched her head up.

Jeff and Mike were in one of the stalls that ran along the back of the barn. The ceiling here was low, the floor covered in rough wood. Jessie looked around and realized the compartment was used for storing firewood. The split firewood was stacked in racks that jutted out of one of the side walls of the small room. The racks were made of long two-by-fours nailed into the floor and the ceiling. The room looked dirty and creepy to Jessie, but it was a perfect place to hide something.

Both boys were standing in front of the middle rack. Jessie could see that they had pounded a couple of nails into the two-by-fours along with some thin splints of wood that formed an
X.
Two strings dangled from the nails. The boys were pounding something else onto the two-by-fours, but Jessie couldn't see what it was. The younger one—Mike—held the nail steady, while the older one—Jeff—hammered it in. She reached into her backpack and took out her notebook to make a quick diagram. This might be important information she was gathering, and she wanted to get it right.

As she watched, Jessie figured out what the boys were nailing to the board: two large spools of thread, each one set on a nail so that it could turn easily. She added the spools to her diagram.

"What are they doing?" a voice whispered nearby.

Jessie nearly dropped her pencil, she was so startled. In the dim light, she could just see Maxwell peeking around the corner of the barn. He'd snuck up close to her without her even hearing him! He really did have all the skills of a good spy.

She motioned for him to come over, and Maxwell glided noiselessly over the snow. She pointed to her diagram and then pointed at the window and shrugged her shoulders to show that she didn't know what was going on inside. Maxwell poked his head up and looked through the window.

"What's in the box?" Maxwell whispered to Jessie. Jessie had forgotten all about the shoebox that Jeff had been carrying before. It sat on the floor a few feet away from the boys with a rock resting on its lid. Jessie shook her head.

The boys tested the spools by spinning them on their nails. The spools spun wildly, making a whirring, clacking noise that made Jeff and Mike laugh. Jessie was intrigued. The boys didn't seem mean at all! They were building something new, and Jessie liked to do that, too—whether it was making a complicated track for racing marbles or a lemonade stand with hand-painted signs and a canopy.

Next to her, Maxwell started to make his puffing sound. Jessie looked over at him and shook her head sharply. If they blew this stakeout, they weren't going to get a second chance to find the bell before tonight. Maxwell put a hand over his own mouth and started to rock back and forth. His eyes were glued to the window like he was watching a horror movie.

Jessie turned back in time to see Mike pick up the shoebox and reach a hand under the lid. Jeff crowded close to Mike, and for a minute, Jessie couldn't see what they were doing.