Ben Winters: The Mystery of the Missing Everything

Bethesda’s father had been making batches of chili every night for the last two weeks, all in preparation for a charity dinner in mid-October being hosted by the big fancy downtown law firm where Bethesda’s mother worked. Bethesda relented, slurping a small mouthful from the big wooden spoon. “It’s good, Dad.”

“How would you rank it, on a scale of one to ten—one being terrible, ten being the best chili anyone has ever eaten in the history of the universe?”

“It’s really, really good.”

Bethesda’s father frowned. “Would you mind using my scale?”

“Dad! I’m kind of working on a project here.”

“Oh?” he said, plopping down next to her and waggling his eyebrows. Bethesda immediately recognized her mistake—you never said the word “project” around Bethesda’s father, unless you wanted a helper. “What are we working on?”

“I’m trying to solve this mystery. And—”

“A mystery!”

“Dad. Don’t say it…”

“Sounds like a job for Wellington Wolf!”

She knew he was going to say it. Wellington Wolf, Jungle P.I., was the title character of this incredibly cheesy cartoon her dad had loved as a kid. Wellington was a gruff, tough-as-nails detective with a Sherlock Holmes cap, a magnifying glass, and a streak of silver in his bristly gray fur. For the last six months, whenever Bethesda mentioned her newfound obsession with mysteries and detectives, her father insisted that Wellington Wolf was the best of them all. Her dad loved the show primarily for the god-awful puns (“Stop badgering the witness!” “But, your honor, I’m a badger!”), and Bethesda occasionally, grudgingly enjoyed watching Wellington put his big, black sniffer to the ground and crack a case.

“This is serious business, Dad.”

“And what is so un-serious about Wellington Wolf?”

“Are you kidding? He’s a cartoon wolf! His partner is a moose named Sergeant Moose!”

Bethesda’s father waved his wooden spoon animatedly, and Bethesda laid a hand over her notebook to protect it from flying chili particles. “Say what you will about Wellington Wolf, he always gets his man. Or marmoset, or elephant, as the case may be.”

“Okay, Dad. I should really get to work.”

But it was too late. Her dad set down the chili spoon, leaned back in the dining-room chair, and began to recount every detail of his current favorite case, from Episode 49, “A Mole in the Hole!”

Bethesda only half listened, tapping her pen impatiently on the table. Until…

“Wait. Say that part again?”

“What, with the big cats? They’re puns, see? You’re lyin’, lion! You’re a cheater, chee—”

“No. The part about the man on the inside.”

So her dad repeated it—how Wellington had gotten help from a most unlikely source. Someone with special knowledge of the case. Someone with access to the crime scene.

Bethesda grinned and gave her dad an entirely unexpected kiss on the nose. That was just what Bethesda needed—she needed a man on the inside. She needed Jasper Ferrars.

One magnificent trophy. Just one, and that’s all.” Principal Isabel Van Vreeland stood brooding at the window of her office, staring off past the parking lot into busy Friedman Street. “It’s my greatest dream in life, you know.”

“I know, ma’am.”

Assistant Principal Jasper Ferrars stood way over by the door, as far away from his boss as he could get while technically remaining in the room. He could have reminded her that, just last week, she had said that all she ever wanted was for Mary Todd Lincoln to achieve the highest standardized math scores in the county. He also could have mentioned that, two weeks ago, she swore that her greatest dream in life was to be the first woman to solo-kayak across the Bering Strait. But he decided, given her current state of mind, to hold his tongue.

“A golden, gleaming trophy. When I was six, I asked Santa for one, but he brought me a box of plastic pencil sharpeners instead.”

“Really?”

“Just one of the reasons I’ve always hated Christmas.”

Principal Van Vreeland sighed and settled into her big black office chair to eat her lunch of pork chops and applesauce. Jasper lingered, shifting nervously from foot to foot on the plush carpet, until—abruptly and a little too loudly—he said, “Ma’am, I have to tell you something.”

“Yes?” She looked up sharply, smoothing the scarlet bib tucked into her blazer. “What is it?”

“Uh…” Jasper flashed a sickly smile. “Never mind, ma’am. It’s nothing.”

It was not, in fact, nothing. Jasper had a secret to tell the principal, a secret sure to bring the full weight of her anger down upon his head. Once in the safety of the outer office, Jasper loosened his tie and gasped for air. When was he going to tell Principal Van Vreeland the truth? When… and how? Maybe he could just write her a note. And then move to Borneo and live in the jungle, with the parrots. Jasper had always loved parrots.

“Excuse me? Mr. Assistant Principal?”

Standing politely beside Mrs. Gingertee’s desk, wearing a determined and eager expression, was a plucky eighth grader in round glasses and butterfly barrettes.

“Good news, Mr. Ferrars,” Bethesda Fielding announced confidently. “I am going to find that trophy!”

For the first time that day—for the first time in what felt like years—Jasper smiled.

“Well, then. How can I help?”

Exactly six and a half minutes later, Bethesda stood at the Achievement Alcove, her Semi-Official Crime-Solving Notebook clutched to her chest, while Janitor Steve read the note from Mr. Ferrars.

“All right,” he said at last, shrugging. “Looks good to me.”

And just like that, the guardian of the crime scene stepped aside and gestured Bethesda Fielding in. Having the assistant principal as her man on the inside was already working its magic.

Bethesda had been in the Achievement Alcove plenty of times before, of course. It was a nook, five feet by five feet square, recessed off the Front Hall just a few steps from the door to the Main Office. The Achievement Alcove was where the triumphs and successes of the student body, no matter how small, were proudly displayed. The walls of the alcove, as always, were decorated with all sorts of congratulatory posters: there was Marisol’s charcoal drawing of a fruit bowl, which Ms. Pinn-Darvish had given a prize, calling it the best student work she’d ever seen; there was a perfect-attendance citation for a seventh grader named Milo Feldberg; there was a congratulatory note to Coach Vasouvian, for three years and counting of no one getting concussions in gym class.

And there, standing in the center of the alcove, was Mary Todd Lincoln’s first-ever trophy-display case, which had been hastily constructed by Mr. Wolcott’s Industrial Arts class on Monday morning, specifically to house Pamela’s trophy. It was a wobbly wooden stand, topped by a tall, rectangular glass cabinet. The glass case bore a jagged hole where the trophy thief had smashed it.

Bethesda examined the case and narrowed her eyes. Something was wrong.

“Wait. What happened to the glass?” she asked.

“All swept up, kiddo,” answered Janitor Steve. He was leaning against the wall just outside the alcove, for some reason tapping his broom handle insistently against the air duct that ran along the ceiling of the Front Hall. “Principal told me to leave everything how it was, and I did, to a point. Maybe Janitor Mike, over at Grover Cleveland Middle School, would stand for a bunch of glass all over the floor, but not me.”