فصل سی و یک

chapter-31

“Surprise!” cried Mr. Lemoncello.

Marjory was standing on one side of the motel’s swimming pool with the other contestants and their coaches. The blithering buffoon, Mr. Lemoncello, and his head librarian, Dr. Zinchenko, were standing on the other.

“As a library reaches out to the community surrounding it,” said the bizarro billionaire, “so do the games of the first Library Olympiad!” “So we’re, like, gonna be playing game number nine right here?” said the blond boy from California, whom Marjory had already decided was an idiot. “Tonight?” “Absolutamundo,” said Mr. Lemoncello. “And although it’s not easy being bad, this next game is. Easy, not bad. Then again, I already know all the answers, which makes any quiz easier, wouldn’t you agree?” Dr. Zinchenko tapped a switch box with the toe of her red high-heeled shoe. An electric air pump varoomed to life to inflate an enormous movie screen that rose beside her like a giant gorilla balloon outside a used-car lot.

“Our ninth game,” said Dr. Zinchenko, “is inspired by the Dewey decimal classification 510.” “Mathematics!” shouted Marjory a half second before anybody else.

“Correct,” said the librarian. “Solve two of these mathematically inspired picture puzzles before any of the other teams and you will earn our ninth medal, the Rebus!” “Remember,” said Mr. Lemoncello, “you only need two to win, which means we need at least nine puzzles. I think. I’ll have to ask Morris, the moose. He’s good with math. Anyway, here it is, your first puzzle! Dr. Zinchenko?” She read from a stack of yellow note cards. “Name this fortress of intellectual freedom fighters.” Mr. Lemoncello snapped his fingers and the fully inflated video screen displayed an equation made up of pictures: Marjory thought the game was absurd, but her mind went to work anyway. It was like a math equation. LION plus BEAR plus GUY WITH STACK OF BOOKS minus ONE minus CAR equaled what?

No. Wait. The third symbol had to be just one word, like all the others. The guy was carrying the books. CARRY?

Marjory added and subtracted the letters as quickly as she could. She mashed the letters all together: LIONBEARCARRY minus ONECAR.

L I O N B E A R C A R R Y

That left L, I, B, A, R, R, Y.

An extremely easy word jumble.

“A library!” she shouted an instant before Kyle Keeley shouted it, too.

“I heard Miss Muldauer first,” said Mr. Lemoncello. “That’s one for the Midwest, America’s heartland, home of all this great nation’s Valentine’s Day decorations. Well done!” Marjory smirked.

If she could figure out one more puzzle, she’d win this game and, once again, be tied for first place.

She no longer needed to win Mr. Lemoncello’s Library Olympics for the scholarship money.

But since she was already in the game, she wouldn’t mind crushing Kyle Keeley.