The Case of the Missing Deed (16 page)

“See anything?” Sébastien whispered.

“There’s a paper on the counter with writing on it, but I can’t quite see it. Let me just–”

Twisting, Olivia leaned forward, craning her neck, trying to get a better view – and lost her balance. “Whoa …” Feeling herself falling forward, toward the house, she desperately thrust herself backward. “Whoa …” Arms windmilling, she found her balance, then kept tilting backward. “Whoa!” As she fell, Sébastien reached out to grab her, and he toppled backward too. They both landed on the grass beneath the deck.

Whumph!

“Ow!”

They scrambled to their feet, Olivia groping for her glasses in the grass and shoving them back on.

“What was that?” Rachel cried.

Chad was already running across the deck.

“Let’s go!” Olivia hissed.

Sébastien started to get up. “Ow, my ankle!” He started hopping.

“What the –?” Chad said, coming to a stop at the end of the deck.

Rachel caught up. “Who is it – oh! Hi.”

“What are you doing here?” Chad said.

They stood at the railing, staring down at the two children.

Mute, Sébastien waited in dread. He and Olivia were in for it now. Chad and Rachel would not be amused that they were being spied on. They would demand an explanation. They
would call Grandma. And when he and Liv got home, they would no doubt be severely punished. Sébastien envisioned spending the rest of his vacation in his room.

To his amazement, Olivia stepped forward, a smile on her face. “We brought you these,” she said, and pulled the rather crushed violets from her pocket. “Grandma always garnished her
Brown Sugar Spice Cake
with violets. But it wasn’t in her recipe, and she forgot to tell you. So we thought you would want to make the cake just the way Grandma did.”

Picking up the thread, Sébastien nodded. “Yeah, that’s right. But we didn’t want to disturb the party. So we were just going to leave the flowers in the kitchen for you.”

Rachel and Chad gaped. By this time, the rest of the guests had come up behind them, saying “What is it?” and “What’s going on?” and “Who are they?”

“How sweet!” said Rachel, just as Chad said, “Are you okay? Did you fall off the deck or something?”

“It’s nothing,” Sébastien said. “We really should be going.”

“That’s so thoughtful of you,” Rachel said.

“We should check you out, make sure you’re not hurt,” Chad said. “In fact, my brother-in-law is a paramedic. Howie, come here for a minute.”

“No, no, we’re fine,” Olivia said quickly. She darted forward and handed the flowers to Rachel.

“Enjoy the
Brown Sugar Spice Cake!”
she said.

“And happy birthday, Chad!”

o, did you two sleuths find out what those devils Rachel and Chad are up to?” Geneviève asked the next morning.

Olivia turned pink.

Sébastien scowled. “And did you three detectives find the lock that fit the key?”

That shut Geneviève up.

Grandma pulled out all her recipes. She lined up the key, the flashlight, the prism, the paintbrush, and the knitting needle on the counter, then called the grandchildren together. “We’ve got five clues,” she reminded them. “Let’s find some more!”

Claire found a recipe for
Cauliflower au gratin
on which Grandpa had written
Je t’aime, mon petit chou-fleur
.

“Look!” she cried. “That must mean something.”

Grandma only blushed.

Geneviève whispered, “It means, ‘I love you, my little cabbage.’ ”

“Grandma!” Claire hooted. “Gross!”

Everyone laughed.

Suddenly Grandma stabbed her finger at a page. “Here’s one!”

It was her recipe for
Zucchini Pickles
. Beneath the title was one of Grandpa’s notations.

Zucchini Pickles

Magical liquid, magical brew,

Gives pickles their tang – and cleans windows too!

Ingredients:

2 pounds zucchini (5 or 6 medium), sliced 1/8-inch thick

2 medium onions, sliced thin 1/4 cup salt

2 cups apple cider vinegar

1 1/2 cups sugar

2 teaspoons yellow mustard seed 1 teaspoon celery seed

Instructions:

1. Slice zucchini and onions into a large ceramic bowl. Toss with salt, and cover with ice water. Let stand for 2 hours, then drain thoroughly.

2. Combine the remaining ingredients in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Simmer for 5 minutes.

3. Divide the zucchini and onions into 4 sterilized pint jars. Pour the liquid into each jar. Top with sterilized lids.

4. If you’re going to eat them within a month, you can keep them in the fridge. If you want to keep them longer, process in a boiling-water bath for 10 minutes.

“Magical liquid, magical brew?”
Olivia said. “What on earth is he talking about?”

Grandma smiled. “Vinegar, of course.” She rummaged around in a cupboard and pulled out a bottle of apple cider vinegar. Wrapped around the neck was the familiar piece of fishing line. The tag said number 3.

“Grandma, you’re brilliant!” Alex said, hugging her. “Can we make the pickles? Please?”

Grandma ruffled his hair. “I know how much you love pickles, Alex. I remember when you ate a whole jar of them all by yourself. But I don’t think we should stop now. I promise that once we find the deed, we’ll make a great big batch. How’s that?”

Gazing longingly at the recipe, Alex sighed, then nodded.

That afternoon, while Grandma was napping, the cousins went to the beach. Sébastien’s ankle hurt, so he stayed behind. He decided to tackle Ted’s slip of paper again. Maybe, he thought, limping upstairs to Grandpa’s desk, he’d see it with fresh eyes and the solution would leap out at him.

It didn’t. He couldn’t make any sense of the bold and plain letters, although he was still convinced that there was some kind of secret pattern to them.

That gave him an idea. He turned on Grandpa’s computer and typed
SECRET CODES
into the search engine. This led to a series of Web pages describing all kinds of encoding techniques.

First he read about the Winding Road Cipher, where you wrote the real message in a horizontal grid and then wrote the
fake message using another pattern. So if your message was
ATTACK AT DAWN
, you created the secret code by writing:

Then, reading vertically, you presented the fake message as:
ACD TKA TAW ATN
.

Or, reading in a counter-clockwise spiral from the top left:
ACD AWN TAT TKA
.

Which was fun, but there was nothing like that on the slip.

Seb clicked on another secret code called the Rail Fence Cipher. With this code, you wrote your message on alternating lines:

Then, reading across, you combined letters to make an unreadable message:
ATCADW TAKTAN
.

Maybe, Seb thought excitedly, that’s what the writer of the slip of paper had done with the bold letters. He copied them on alternating lines:

Then, reading across, he tried to put them together into words. But what on earth could
tamietbefets
or
IdmgIwgaeole
mean? Nothing!

Sébastien slammed his hand on the desk. He was wasting time, going down dead ends, and meanwhile, Tantalus Mining
was moving ahead with its plans to take over Grandma’s property. He
had
to figure this out.

He couldn’t.

He stabbed the power button and the screen went blank.

he next day, Sébastien and Olivia rode their bikes to the general store, Sébastien to get coffee beans for his mom, Olivia to get paint thinner for Grandma. When they approached the cash register, they saw that Chad and Rachel were at the counter, unloading a basket full of items. Embarrassed, Seb and Olivia ducked behind the fish counter.