His one consolation was that he was sitting here alone, and that Ben was not beside him, about to share his fate. Ditto Pitch, Savannah, Logan, Melissa — even Darren. He could not predict what the future might hold. But he prayed he would have the strength to follow through on his plan to take all the blame.
Detective Sergeant Vizzini was still typing the same page. The man had to be the slowest typist on the planet. Each labored click was a jarring hammerblow to Griffin’s raw nerves. How did I get myself into this?
“Griffin —” came a voice from behind him.
Dad was a mess — pajama top instead of a shirt, sweatpants, slippers, trench coat, bed hair. He had never looked better, not to Griffin. He ran into his father’s arms, blubbering like a two-year-old.
“I’m sorry, Dad! I’m so sorry!”
“It’s okay, son.”
But it wasn’t okay. It might never be okay.
Vizzini pulled the sheet from the typewriter and placed it on the table in front of Griffin. “Sign here at the bottom.”
Griffin backed away from the page like it was a live serpent. A confession? Worse? “What does it say?”
“Take it easy,” the officer soothed. “It’s just a statement that you found the baseball card inside the old Rockford house.”
Griffin was bewildered. “What do you need that for?”
“There’s a lady in Baltimore named Winnifred Rockford-Bates. She’s ninety-seven years old, and she’s the last surviving member of the original Rockford family. The card is really hers. So it might be some consolation to you that your friend Palomino is out of luck.”
“And what happens after I sign?” Griffin quavered.
“Then we go home,” Dad said gently.
What? Go home? Was that even possible?
Griffin wheeled to face the sergeant. “Really?”
Vizzini looked stern. “I hope you know how lucky you are. Mr. Palomino isn’t going to press charges. He wants to avoid an investigation into whether he broke the law when he cheated you. It’s a pretty happy ending all around — probably happier than you deserve.”
“Thanks, Officer. Thanks a lot!”
As he and his father walked to the car, Griffin took note of a slight bite in the early morning air. A hint of the coming winter — or maybe it was just the smell of freedom. He knew full well how close he had come to losing his.
Mr. Bing pulled onto the road. “Funny the way things work out,” he commented. “Even if Palomino hadn’t hoodwinked you into selling that card, it still wouldn’t be yours. In the end, it would always have belonged to that little old lady in Baltimore.”
Griffin nodded, glum despite his relief. “It would have been great, though. A million bucks. Hundreds of thousands, anyway.”
His father sighed. “Maybe it’s a sign. Money isn’t supposed to be easy.”
“I don’t care about easy money,” Griffin mumbled. “I just don’t want to have to sell our house and move away.”
Mr. Bing jammed on the brakes, and the car screeched to a halt in the middle of the deserted street. “We haven’t even had a chance to tell you yet!”
Griffin was alarmed. “Tell me what?”
“All that publicity from the baseball card has generated a storm of interest in the SmartPick! I’ve got investors who are going to back me through the whole process!”
Griffin stared at his father. “You mean —?”
“We’re not selling the house anymore! We’re going to be just fine!”
32
Never thought I’d see you again.”
Logan Kellerman stepped onto the porch at 530 Park Avenue Extension and stood in front of the elderly man in the rocking chair. “How are you, Mr. Mulroney?” he asked.
“Older and wiser. I now know that your sudden interest in backgammon was to keep me from noticing what was going on across the street. I have to admit it — I never took you for a burglar.”
Logan shuffled uncomfortably. “I’m not. I’m an actor.”
“Well, you must be a good one,” Mulroney growled. “You sure fooled me. I thought I had a friend.”
“It wasn’t all acting,” Logan admitted. And when he got no reply, he took out the backgammon board and began to set it up on the rickety table between them.
The retired miner eyed him suspiciously. “Don’t tell me — Pal-o-mine’s got a set of silver candlesticks that you missed on the first go-round.”
Logan pulled up a chair. “What’s the count — seventeen to fourteen?”
Mulroney snorted. “In your dreams, little man. You never won more than twelve games from me.”
Logan threw the dice. “The comeback starts today.”
Mrs. Winnifred Rockford-Bates of Baltimore, Maryland, was an eccentric multimillionaire who thought Babe Ruth was a candy bar. She generously gave her 1920 baseball card to her youngest relative — Darren Vader of Cedarville, New York.
Griffin took it hard. “I always believed that planning was everything. But no plan could ever insulate you from a calamity like this!”
“Darren kept saying he was related to the Rockfords,” Ben reminded him. “We didn’t think he was telling the truth.”
“There’s a first time for everything, I guess.” Griffin moaned. “This is the end of the world.”
It was even less comfort when the card sold for $974,000, making it the second most valuable sports collectible in history.
“He won’t get to enjoy one cent of it,” Ben predicted in an effort to console his friend. “His folks will make him put it in the bank for college or something.”
The reality was even better than that. Darren’s parents didn’t want their son to reap the benefits of a robbery. They forced him to donate most of the money to the Cedarville Museum. The large gift put the building fund over the top and allowed construction to begin.
As the bulldozers roared to life on one side of town, on the other, Palomino’s Emporium of Collectibles and Memorabilia closed its doors for good. The store had never recovered from the scandal that its owner had cheated Griffin out of the Babe Ruth card. S. Wendell Palomino moved to California, leaving only one thing behind: his dog Luthor, who was sent to the town pound. The Doberman spent less than an hour there before being adopted by Savannah Drysdale. It was a match made in heaven.
The Cedarville Museum opened on schedule the next summer on the site where the old Rockford house had once stood. The townspeople turned out in force for the dedication ceremony, and toured the exhibits of artifacts from pioneer times and memorials to war heroes who had grown up in the area.
What everybody knew, but no one was willing to admit, was that the most interesting thing that had ever happened in this sleepy little community was the Great Baseball Card Heist. That was why the biggest crowd lingered in front of a large framed photograph of seven sixth graders.
The plaque mentioned nothing about the famous robbery. It read:
SPECIAL THANKS TO
DARREN VADER, LOGAN KELLERMAN,
MELISSA DUKAKIS, ANTONIA
BENSON, SAVANNAH DRYSDALE,
BENJAMIN SLOVAK, AND GRIFFIN BING
FOR A JOB WELL DONE.
The picture hung opposite a large window overlooking the building’s adjoining skate park, which had been a condition of the museum’s largest single donation.
The idea for the park came from an old proposal that had been found in the file. Its author was one of the seven in the photograph — the ringleader, The Man With The Plan.
Turn the page for a look at Hypnotize Me, an all-new, mesmerizing adventure from the masterful Gordon Korman!
1
There was something evil about the Third Avenue bus. It stood there, almost taunting, as Jackson Opus came tearing along the sidewalk, dodging pedestrians, yelling, “Hey! Hey! Wait!”
He was no more than six feet away when the door folded shut, the air brakes hissed, and the long accordion-style vehicle eased out into traffic.
Jax stopped short, utterly d
efeated. A second later, he was rear-ended by Tommy Cicerelli, who had just enough breath left to shout a few choice words at the zit-cream ad on the back of the disappearing bus.
“We’ll be late,” Jax predicted. “Coach is so going to kill us.”
“We can’t be late for the championship game!” Tommy ranted. “Maybe there’ll be another one soon.”
Sure enough, another M33 crested the rise. The boys rushed to the stop only to watch in despair as the driver went by without so much as a glance at them out of the corner of his eye.
Tommy slammed his gym bag against the pole. “Hey, man, what about us?”
“No way another bus is going to come now,” Jax mourned. “Not after two in a row.”
Yet only a minute or so later, there it was — the route number in the front windshield clearly read M33. Even from down the avenue, Jax and Tommy could tell it was packed to the roof. The driver was concentrating on the horizon, without even looking at the stop where they were waiting.
“He’s blowing us off!” Tommy wailed.
In desperation, Jax stepped out into the road, waving madly until he caught the driver’s attention. Standing there in the lane, he had a brief flash of how he must have looked to someone on the bus — a twelve-year-old kid in the path of tons of roaring machinery. It was more vivid than a daydream. For an instant, he actually saw himself through the glass of the windshield, growing larger and larger as the bus bore down on him.
He held his ground. Not for a regular game; not even for the playoffs. For the championship.
With a screech of metal on metal, the huge vehicle lurched to a halt. Hefting their duffels, Jax and Tommy squeezed aboard.
“Opus, you are the man!” Tommy exclaimed in awe.
“I’m the man, all right. If I can’t get us uptown by seven thirty, I’m the dead man.” As Jax leaned over to swipe his MetroCard, he caught sight of the driver. The man was staring at him, his face expressionless.
“You freaked the guy out,” Tommy whispered. “Even in New York, it’s not every day some idiot steps out in front of a speeding bus.”
Jax flushed. “Sorry, mister. We’re just really late. You have to get us to Ninety-Sixth Street as soon as possible.”
The door hissed shut, and the bus started north, gathering speed. It beat the yellow light at Fourteenth and sailed up the avenue. The stop-request bell rang several times, but the driver kept on going.
“Hey!” came a voice. “You missed my block!”
There was no response from the driver, who hunched over the big wheel, weaving through the evening rush, accelerating to the speed limit and far beyond. Horns sounded and tires squealed as frightened motorists swerved to get out of the way. Pedestrians ran for their lives.
Jax gawked at the driver. Was he nuts? This was an accordion bus, not a race car! City roads were crowded, with stoplights on every corner, and the guy had the pedal to the metal!
“Dude, this is the best bus in New York!” Tommy exclaimed. “We might just make it after all.”
Wordlessly, Jax watched out the window as the blocks flashed by. Lights turned red, but the driver plowed straight through. Cross traffic screeched to a halt. There was a crunch as a taxi tried to reverse out of the path of the hurtling M33 and bashed in the front grille of an SUV.
The passengers’ reactions morphed from surprise to anger to outright panic.
“Are you crazy, mister?”
“You caused an accident back there!”
“You’re a mile and a half past my stop!”
“You’ll get us all killed!”
“I’m calling the cops!”
As they barreled across Fifty-Ninth Street, a slow-moving garbage truck lumbered directly into their path. The driver yanked the wheel so abruptly that his head bumped against the side window. Passengers were tossed from their seats, and standees swayed violently, hanging on for dear life. Screams rang out and cell phones hit the floor. Jax clung to the rail to avoid being thrown down the entrance steps. Tommy was pressed against the door. The whole interior vibrated like a guitar string.
The bus shot the gap between the truck and a row of taxis, rattled over some construction plates, and rocketed on. They were now the undisputed kings of the road. Pedestrians and cars scattered to get out of their way. It took no more than a peek in the rearview mirror to convince a motorist that he or she wanted no quarrel with this speeding juggernaut plowing up the avenue, its accordion-attached back oscillating like the tail of a shark.
Inside was pandemonium — angry shouts, terrified screams, and even prayers. One man was out of his seat, trying to wrestle the wheel away from the driver, who was holding him off with a stiff arm.
Jax’s wide eyes met Tommy’s. At this point, basketball was the last thing on their minds. What was going on here? Exactly how scared should they be? Both were city kids, tough to impress. Yet they’d heard stories of people snapping and doing crazy things. Was that what was happening to the driver? And was it just bad luck that had put them on this bus the very day he chose to flash out in a blaze of demented glory?
The shrieking of brakes was earsplitting. Pocketbooks and loose objects were airborne. Businessmen went down like dominoes. Jax was slammed into a bulkhead. Tommy was tossed on top of him. At the last moment, Jax held up his gym bag, preventing a head-to-head collision that would have knocked both of them unconscious. In a few devastating seconds, the bus had jolted from speeding missile to a shattering, complete stop.
The door hissed open. “Ninety-Sixth Street,” the driver announced pleasantly.
Cries of pain and whimpers of fear filled the long vehicle. Buried under Tommy, his heart pounding in his throat, all Jax could manage was “Huh?”
“Ninety-Sixth,” the man repeated. “Have a nice day.”
Jax and Tommy disembarked, and they weren’t the only ones. Passengers, gasping and wheezing with relief, joined the stampede to the safety of the sidewalk. The fact that most were far from their destinations didn’t bother them anymore. They had fully expected to be dead. Being alive was a definite plus for the day.
His bus completely empty, the driver moved on with a friendly wave. It prompted a chorus of angry shouts from his former riders.
Jax could hear sirens in the distance. He labored to get his breathing under control. “How weird was that?”
But Tommy was looking past him at the clock tower on the corner. “We can still make it! Let’s run!”
Copyright
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 557 Broadway, New York, NY 10012.
Copyright © 2008 by Gordon Korman. All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc. SCHOLASTIC, SCHOLASTIC PRESS, APPLE PAPERBACKS, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.
Book design by Elizabeth B. Parisi and Marilyn Acosta
If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”
This book was originally published in hardcover by Scholastic Press in 2008.
ISBN-13: 978-0-439-90345-5
ISBN-10: 0-439-90345-9
This edition first printing, April 2009
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanic
al, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.
eISBN: 978-0-545-45738-5
Gordon Korman, Swindle
Thank you for reading books on BookFrom.Net Share this book with friends