Voices at Whisper Bend (6 page)

“And you think he took our metal?”

“I'm not sure yet. But he could have. He's always around school. Some kids say he sleeps there. And he's, you know, strange.”

Charlotte shook her head. “He just has trouble getting his words out sometimes. I don't think he'd steal. He's always nice to us.” She frowned. She'd known Mr. Willis ever since she'd started school. A lot of kids made fun of him, but Charlotte thought he was nice.

Once in second grade she'd gotten sick in the hall and he'd cleaned it up. She'd said she was sorry, but Mr. Willis had shaken his head and smiled. “N-n-no, Missy. Can't help getting sick. F-f-feel better.”

And she had. No, Mr. Willis couldn't be the thief. She refused to believe it. “You said you had two good ideas, Robbie. Who else?”

“There's this kid in my class, Tommy Stankowski. I don't like him anyway. He's always dirty and he talks rough.”

“You think a fourth grader took all that stuff? Impossible. It's too heavy.”

“Okay, maybe it's a long shot, but he could have had help. Listen, Charlie, he brought a lunch pail to school that looked exactly like the one we found in old Mrs. Dubner's cellar. It was even busted in the same place.”

“That's ridiculous. Half the kids in school have metal lunch pails. And I bet a lot of them are broken. Nope,
I'm
betting on Paul Rossi, buster. And we're going to set a trap to catch him. Want to help?”

“A trap? Sure.”

As soon as Charlotte had changed clothes, she headed to Betsy's house and knocked on the door. Mrs. Schmidt answered. “She's not feeling too good, Charlotte. And to tell you the truth, neither am I. She'll see you tomorrow.” Betsy's ma looked tired and didn't even try to smile.

Charlotte couldn't blame her. The way those eighth graders had gone after Betsy, it was wicked. She told Robbie about it when she returned home and they started down the steps to their own cellar.

“For real? Some guys said Betsy was the thief? And called her a Kraut? That's dumb.”

“You want more dumbness? Sophie Jaworski thinks one of the teachers did it.”

“Which one? How come?”

“Mr. Costa, because he's got an Italian name.” A shadow of guilt flitted across Charlotte's mind. She'd said the same thing about Paul Rossi. That maybe he and Mr. Costa were in it together because they were Italian. Her cheeks felt hot as she remembered.

Well, that wasn't the real reason she suspected him, she told herself. With all those crime stories, he made himself look guilty. “Come on, Robbie. Let's start in the back room. The more metal we collect, the better trap we can build.”

Instead of hauling the day's collection to school the next morning, Charlotte and Robbie stacked it in the alley behind their house. Bait.

She pointed it out to Betsy on the way to school.

“That's nice, Charlotte,” she said. Her voice was quiet.

“You're still upset, aren't you?”

“Wouldn't you be?”

“Yeah. But you can't let those dumb boys get to you. They don't have one brain between the two of them. Come on, let's get to school fast. So we can talk real loud about our stash of metal in front of you-know-who. If we catch him, that'll take care of Zalenchak and Merkow.”

“Yeah, maybe.” Betsy still didn't sound convinced.

That made Charlotte even more determined. She walked faster. When they got to the school yard, the early bell hadn't even rung and kids were milling around. Charlotte spotted Paul Rossi and headed toward him, dragging Betsy along.

“Hi, Paul,” she said. “Find any pots and pans lately?”

“Some. How about you?”

“Lots. We found so much, we can't carry it,” Charlotte said. “We'll have to wait till Betsy's pa can drive it to school.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. And we'll have even more by tomorrow. If you don't believe me, just take a look in the alley behind our house.”

“Maybe I will and maybe I won't. You know, you've got to watch out for dark alleys. Two guys busted out of jail yesterday down in Pittsburgh. They could be headed this way. Don't say I didn't warn you.” He raised his eyebrows, then walked away.

Charlotte frowned. The early bell rang and Betsy tugged on her sweater, pulling her toward some girls in their class who were stretching out a jump rope. “Come on, you two,” they called. “You want to try double Dutch?”

“Sure,” Betsy said.

Sophie Jaworski turned and stopped them as they got close to the girls with the rope. “Charlotte, Betsy, what's going on? I saw you talking to that Paul Rossi. If I didn't know better, I'd think one of you had a crush on him.”

Betsy shook her head. “Not me.”

“Me either,” Charlotte said. She stuck out her tongue and wrinkled her nose. “He's the worst boy in our class.”

“That's what I've always thought,” Sophie said. “Still, you went over to him. You better watch out, Charlotte. People will talk …”

“Forget it, Sophie. I've got better things to do.” Charlotte and Betsy joined the group of girls and took turns jumping.

When the bell rang again, Charlotte and Betsy shoved through the crowd and up the worn stone steps into the main hallway, where little kids' drawings of spring flowers decorated the walls. Sophie's words still bounced around in Charlotte's mind. A crush on Paul Rossi? She couldn't get far enough away from Sophie and her crazy ideas. As they reached the door to their classroom, Frankie Zalenchak and Danny Merkow practically knocked them down.

“Watch where you're going, you big bullies,” Charlotte called after them.

Betsy turned to Charlotte, a worried look in her eyes. “What are they doing here? The eighth graders use the stairs at the other end of the hall. I don't like this one bit.”

“You can't let them get on your nerves, Bets. If they see you're scared, they'll bother you more. Come on, Mrs. Alexander is waiting for us.”

When she walked into her classroom, Charlotte sniffed. Something smelled funny. The smell grew stronger as she and Betsy moved down the row toward their desks. “Hey, what is that smell, anyway?” she asked.

She was about to slip into her seat when she caught sight of Betsy, pale like somebody had painted her face with flour.

“No! Oh, Charlotte, no!” Betsy dropped her books and covered her eyes.

Charlotte stepped closer and looked into Betsy's opened desk. The smell hit her nose like a stink bomb. Somebody—two somebodies, Charlotte figured—had dumped a big can of sauerkraut all over the inside of Betsy's desk.

The sixth grade got to play dodgeball for an hour that morning while Mr. Willis cleaned up the mess and brought in a new desk for Betsy. Frankie Zalenchak and Danny Merkow got kicked out of school for the rest of the week.

Mrs. Alexander asked Betsy if she'd like to go home, but Betsy refused. “I didn't do anything wrong,” she said. “I'll stay.”

“Good for you,” Charlotte said. “You're not letting those bullies turn you into mush.”

And Betsy didn't. For a soft-looking girl, with rosy cheeks and pale brown hair, Betsy flung the ball that morning like she was training for the dodgeball Olympics. Charlotte felt sorry for the kids in the middle.

By lunchtime, the whole school was buzzing about the sauerkraut incident. The sixth and seventh grades stuck up for the Schmidt family, angry that Betsy and her cousin Pete were being treated like enemies. The eighth grade was split. The boys stuck with Zalenchak and Merkow, but the girls thought they were bullies. Besides, according to Sophie, the eighth-grade girls still believed that Mr. Costa was the thief.

“They're going to get some evidence on him. This week,” Sophie promised. “They have plans, but I couldn't hear what. I'll keep spying on my sister and her friends to see what they're up to.”

Charlotte shook her head. Anybody who thought she had a crush on Paul Rossi couldn't be trusted. She'd keep to her original plan and make sure Paul heard again about the big pile of metal she'd collected. She'd catch him tonight, red-handed, and prove Betsy innocent in the bargain.

Late that night, she sat in the dark and peered out her bedroom window. In the distance, factory lights lit up the riverbanks as the Mon flowed on, a wide black ribbon, smooth and treacherous, broken only by the tiny star-points of buoy lights.

She shifted her attention back to the dark alley below. Among the shadows, she could just make out the heap of scrap she and Robbie had carefully piled up, ready to come crashing down at the slightest touch. Next door, Betsy was awake and watching, too. They were probably the only people awake in the whole neighborhood, Charlotte thought. But they were ready. They each had a flashlight for signaling. Charlotte had borrowed Jim's baseball bat and propped it right next to the window.

At about eleven, Charlotte heard a loud, clattering clank. The thief! She pressed her nose to the glass, but all she could see were black trees, spidery bushes, and the shadowy pile of bait. She flashed her light out the side window twice, toward Betsy's house, and waited. No reply.

Had Betsy fallen asleep? Charlotte signaled again. Nothing. Maybe she should get Robbie. But he slept like a stone. And she didn't dare wake Ma or Pa …

Charlotte's mouth went dry. This couldn't be happening. She and Betsy had made plans to catch the thief together. Now she was all by herself. She peered out the window.

What if Paul wasn't working alone? What if it wasn't even Paul out there? Suddenly his warning popped back into her head. Watch out for dark alleys, he'd said. Hadn't two men just broken out of jail in Pittsburgh? Would they come to Braddock?

No, of course they wouldn't. Besides, if her trap was working, she couldn't give up the chance to catch the thief red-handed. Heart pounding, she tucked the flashlight under her arm, grabbed the baseball bat, and eased open the door to her room. On tiptoe she made it to the top of the stairs, then crept down through the inky blackness and into the kitchen. With shaking fingers, she eased open the back door. The night air chilled her face; as she tiptoed out to the porch her bare feet felt damp. One step at a time, she inched toward the alley.

Something hissed. Then something yowled and brushed her leg. She jumped backward. With a crash, two silvery cats sprang from the scrap pile and bounded over the fence into Mrs. Dubner's backyard.

A light went on there, and Charlotte heard a voice. “Hush, you silly rascals. Hush now. There, that's better.”

Cats! Crazy old Mrs. Dubner's cats. There should be laws to keep people like her from acting so strange and scaring the neighbors, Charlotte thought.

She took deep breaths and tried to make her heart stop racing. Cats, just cats. She flashed her light on the alley, to make sure. All she could see were an old cast-iron sink, a rusty bucket, and a mess of tin cans. She re-piled the metal and crept carefully back to her room to watch. Paul Rossi might still show up tonight, she told herself.

It took half an hour for Charlotte's heart to return to its regular speed. In another half hour, she was yawning. Sometime after midnight, she gave up and crawled into bed.

At first light, she tumbled out of the covers and checked the window. Her scrap pile sat in the alley, undisturbed. Darn it, anyway. Why hadn't that rotten Paul Rossi snapped up her bait? She fell back into bed and tried to make a new plan as she waited for the rest of the family to wake up.

No brilliant ideas came that morning, not in bed, not at breakfast, not on the way to school with Betsy. When she reached the school yard, more bad news waited.

“Somebody came back to the cellar last night,” Marnie Cussick announced. “Teachers are in there now, looking around.”

“Somebody stole our scrap again,” her sister said. “It's wicked and rotten.”

No! Charlotte felt like somebody had set her on fire. She shoved her way through the crowd of kids gathered near the cellar door, to where Paul Rossi stood alone, watching the angry faces. “Now I know why you didn't grab the scrap from my alley. You had other plans last night, didn't you?”

“What are you talking about, Charlotte? You calling me a thief?” He stared at her hard, without blinking.

“What if I am?” She stepped closer to him. “You skip school sometimes. Don't deny it. And you're always getting sent to the principal and bringing in those crime stories.”

“So what? That doesn't mean I'd mess with the war. I'm no traitor. I got two brothers in the Marines.”

Betsy came up behind her and took Charlotte's hand. “You have brothers in the war, too? I didn't know that.”

Charlotte stepped back. She hadn't known it either. She swallowed. “But still … where did you get that bruise on your cheek?”

“Mind your own business.” He swiped his cheek and glared as the bell rang, ending the argument but not Charlotte's suspicions.

Still, to be fair, right after the Pledge of Allegiance she made a complete list of people who might have stolen the metal—Paul Rossi, Mr. Costa, Mr. Willis, even that little kid in Robbie's class. She refused to put Betsy's name on the list. But at the bottom she wrote down Zalenchak and Merkow. Were they smart enough to accuse Betsy so nobody would suspect them? Sure. So maybe they should take Paul's spot at the top of her list. Maybe, and maybe not. Either way, she'd have to set another trap. A better one.

She slipped the list into her history book so Mrs. Alexander wouldn't think it was a note and read it out loud. A good detective couldn't let her suspects know what she was up to, could she?

C
HAPTER
6

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TITCHES