فصل چهل و ششم

chapter-46

“Let’s see what kind of real bonus clues Mr. Lemoncello is serving up today,” Charles said to his empty conference room.

He really didn’t mind flying solo. It meant he wouldn’t have to share his prize when he won it.

Winner won all.

Losers lost all.

That was just the way the world rolled.

And Charles knew he would win.

After all, he was a Chiltington. They never lost.

Even if he had wasted his question about the Mixed-Up Files book. Turned out that Mr. Lemoncello was just a sentimental sap like Kyle Keeley. The book was there because his beloved librarian gave it to the old fool when he was the same age as all the library lock-in contestants. Boo-hoo. Big whoop.

And what was all that nonsense about pine trees?

Preposterous.

Unclasping the sealed envelope, Charles found two silhouette cards. Each of them was numbered, in case Charles couldn’t figure out which books they would’ve been hidden in.

Babied? Charles wondered. No. Crawled!

He examined the second free card.

Three dinners? Three couples? A restaurant?

This one was difficult.

Charles decided to put the two new pieces into the puzzle, to see if their meanings would become clearer: Charles was missing only one clue, but he had everything else.

“You can walk out the way BLANK crawled in in passed restaurant.” No. That didn’t make sense.

In fact, all he was really certain about were the first two lines: “You can walk out the way.” The way what? Past the restaurant? The Book Nook Café?

And what about the image of the football player?

It came from the Johnny Unitas book. Maybe Johnny Unitas, who had played football back when Mr. Lemoncello was Charles’s age, had owned a restaurant? Perhaps a popular national chain?

If so, there might’ve been one in Alexandriaville. Maybe right here in the old Gold Leaf Bank building.

Could the last bit be “In Johnny Unitas’s Restaurant”?

Or what if Andrew Peckleman had been right all along and it was the NINETEEN that was the clue from the football player card? That would make the final line “In nineteen …” WHAT? Diners? Couples?

No.

Anniversaries!

The three couples in the bonus clue were obviously celebrating their anniversaries!

Nineteen anniversaries? Was today the nineteenth anniversary of some major event in Alexandriaville?

Charles shook his head. He knew the phrase would make sense only after he had completed the third line, the only one that still had a blank in it: “BLANK, CRAWLED, INN.” What if the missing image is an eyeball? Then the third line could be “I crawled in.” Hang on, Charles thought. The one book in the Staff Picks display case nobody had found yet was True Crime Ohio: The Buckeye State’s Most Notorious Brigands, Burglars, and Bandits by Clare Taylor-Winters. The last image was going to be a criminal of some sort.

That one, single missing book might tell Charles who had crawled into the bank and, more importantly, where they had crawled in. Was this the nineteenth anniversary of a famous bank robbery?

Charles realized he needed help.

It was time to use his Ask an Expert.

That made him laugh.

Because Charles knew the top library expert in all of America, maybe the world. Someone much more important than Dr. Yanina Zinchenko.

Kyle Keeley and the rest of that bunch didn’t stand a chance.