Chapter 9
Pink Powder
After the assembly the first-year students were abuzz. A real mystery so soon? It was exciting but a little scary. What was really frightening was the idea of such a long paper amounting to half their grade. An almost palpable wave of anxiety traveled through the group, with virtually all the students expressing doubt that they could ever produce that much, even if they included lots of pictures.
Simon raised an interesting question at lunch. “Do you think those noises and the blood have anything to do with the project?”
Amanda, Ivy, and Amphora stopped eating and looked at him as if he’d just announced the arrival of space aliens.
“That never occurred to me,” said Ivy. “Do you think so?”
“I don’t know,” said Amphora. “Thrillkill said we’d know for sure, and I don’t. I mean for one thing, I never saw any blood.” She played with the condensation on her glass.
“Yeah,” said Amanda. “None of us did except you, Simon.”
“And I never heard any noises,” said Simon.
“I’ll tell you one thing, though,” said Amanda, stabbing some peas. “I did see something else.”
“Oh?” said Ivy. “What was that?”
Amanda proceeded to tell them about the glinting light and the mysterious shape she’d seen while taking Nigel out that second day.
“I don’t think it’s part of the project,” said Amphora, chewing on a piece of wheat bread, which she’d slathered with butter. “No one else saw it.”
“True,” said Simon, eyeing the peas suspiciously. “But consider this. It might have been a test run. Maybe the teachers were practicing to make sure they got it right.”
“Yes,” said Ivy, “but how could they be sure we’d see that stuff from inside the building? They’d have to do it when they knew we were outside.” She stuck her glass next to Nigel’s face and let him drink from it. Amanda was amazed that she would do such a thing in the dining room, even if Nigel was a guide dog. She got up and went for a fresh glass.
“They could do it during breaks,” said Amphora, when Amanda had returned.
“Yes!” said Simon. “They could. We should be on the lookout. Better yet, let’s go look for clues.” He was testing a pea now.
“I don’t think there will be any yet,” said Amanda. “Anyway they said we’d know. We shouldn’t have to go looking.”
“Come on, where’s your spirit?” said Simon. “We’ve got some time right now.” He dropped the pea and pushed away from the table.
“Nah,” said Amanda. “I want to start working on my disguise ideas.”
“Me too,” said Amphora. “That monster makeup was fun, wasn’t it? Maybe we can come up with something just as cool.”
“Nigel and I will go with you, Simon,” said Ivy, leaning down to give her dog a kiss.
“Brilliant! Come on,” Simon said, taking Ivy’s arm and heading off toward the east door.
When they’d gone, Amanda said, “Let’s go to the kitchen and see if we can sneak something delicious. I’m having sugar withdrawal.”
“Me too,” said Amphora. “You’re on.”
You weren’t supposed to go into the kitchen without a good reason. It was a school rule and the cook was very strict about it. But both girls were craving sugar so badly that they didn’t care, so they snuck off to see if there were any easy pickings.
They didn’t have much time. They’d have to be in class in a few minutes. As they approached they saw the cook in the hall talking to her assistant, a petite, dark-haired woman who obviously wasn’t happy about something. Good. The cook wasn’t paying attention to the other people around her. This would be easy. They opened the door quietly and tiptoed in.
The woman certainly was fastidious. The huge kitchen gleamed like the Taj Mahal on a sunny day. Gigantic iron pots were sitting on the stove, steaming, boiling, and sizzling away, and fresh, colorful vegetables that bore faint resemblance to the peas at lunch were laid out on the massive wooden cutting board in the center of the room. At the far end was a refrigerator the size of a semi-trailer.
“There,” said Amphora, pointing. “Let’s try the fridge.”
“You got it,” said Amanda, tippy-toeing toward the behemoth. “Hey, wait a minute. There’s the pantry. Maybe there are some cookies in there.”
“Cookies?” said Amphora. “Oh, biscuits. Right.”
“Biscuits? I don’t want a biscuit. I want something sweet,” said Amanda.
“Biscuits are sweet,” hissed Amphora.
“No they’re not,” said Amanda. “I want cookies.”
Continuing to argue, the two girls entered the gigantic pantry, which was lined with shelves and cubbies of assorted shapes and sizes. It felt very homey, and Amanda thought that if she were stuck there for a week she wouldn’t mind at all.
“There!” they both said at once, running toward a shelf full of cookies of every variety—chocolate, vanilla, coconut, raisin, jam-in-the-center, marshmallow, sprinkle-topped—smashing into each other in the process.
“I thought you said you wanted biscuits,” said Amanda.
“These are biscuits,” said Amphora, grabbing a box.
“No, they’re cookies,” said Amanda, attempting to wrest it away from her.
“Uh uh,” said Amphora, grabbing back. “Biscuits.”
“Wait a minute,” said Amanda, letting her have the box. “You think these are biscuits?”
“They are biscuits.”
“Oooooh, I get it. That’s what you guys call cookies. To us, biscuits are dinner rolls. Or breakfast rolls.”
“Really? How peculiar.” Amanda wasn’t sure if Amphora meant interesting peculiar or get-it-away-from-me peculiar.
“Okay, what do you call that?” said Amanda pointing at some boxes of spaghetti. She was sure English people had some exotic name for the pasta but she couldn’t imagine what.
“Spaghetti. What do you call it?”
“Spaghetti. How about that?” She pointed to another box that said “Tea” on it.
“Tea.”
“Tea. And that?” A brightly colored can.
“Mushy peas.”
“Mushy peas? Eeeeeeew.” Amanda looked at the picture on the can. It was a huge green splat that looked like the creature from the black lagoon.
“Why, what do you call them?”
“I don’t,” said Amanda, sticking her finger down her throat. How could anyone eat something with the word “mushy” in the name?
“They’re really quite good,” said Amphora, admiring the can. “You should try them sometime.”
“Ugh,” said Amanda. “They look like you-know-what.”
The girls burst into laughter.
“Say, look at that,” said Amanda, bending down to examine some pink powder on the floor.
“Hm, that’s weird,” said Amphora, peering down at the stuff.
“It’s pink. It’s nice.”
“Don’t touch it!” yelled Amphora, grabbing at Amanda’s arm. “It’s probably rat poison!”
“Rat poison in a pantry? I don’t think so.” Amanda shook off Amphora’s hand and reached closer.
“No, really. Don’t touch it. Come on, let’s go. We’re going to get into trouble.”
“Oh, all right,” said Amanda. “But I’m coming back later. I want to see what that is. It’s really pretty.” It was. It looked like cotton candy that had dried and shattered into tiny bits of confetti.
“Okay,” said Amphora. “You go back later. Got the biscuits?”
“They’re in my bag,” said Amanda, gripping the place where she’d stuck the cookies. “Let’s roll. Er, biscuit. No, roll.”