Ski School Sneak

  Nancy added Eddie’s name to the suspect list. “Should we try searching the shed?” she asked her friends. “Maybe we’ll find more clues, or—”

  Once again she was interrupted, this time by a shout from outside.

  “Avalanche!”

  There was a flurry of shouts and screams. Nancy ran outside with everyone else. An instructor named Henry was out there.

  “I just came from the lodge,” Henry announced. “There was a big slide down at Winding Pass. The highway is blocked!”

  “Oh no!” someone cried.

  “Was anyone hurt?” someone else asked.

  Henry shook his head. “Luckily traffic is light this time of day,” he said. “But they’re not sure when it’ll be safe to get the equipment in to clear the road. The warm weather combined with the high winds makes it too risky right now.”

  Nancy exchanged a glance with her friends. She knew that avalanches were very serious. Tons of snow could come loose and slide down the mountain, wiping out everything in its path.

  “All right, no need to panic.” Mr. Samuels said loudly. “Has anyone headed out to the lifts yet? No? Good. We’re not really in avalanche territory, but we’d better close down the south side trails just in case. Everyone stick to the trails marked in green.”

  Eddie raised his hand. “What about the bunny slope?”

  Mr. Samuels smiled. “That’s perfectly safe,” he said. “I can guarantee there won’t be an avalanche there.”

  “But how are we going to get out of here this afternoon?” an adult asked, sounding anxious.

  “You can’t,” Henry said. “That highway is the only way down the mountain. We’re all stranded until they dig it out. That might not be until tomorrow.”

  “Stranded at Mount Fun!” a teenage boy cried out. “Woo-hoo!”

  Several other kids laughed and cheered too. But others, including most of the parents, still looked worried.

  “Don’t fret,” Mr. Samuels said. “We’ll find room for everyone at the lodge. Nobody will have to sleep out in the snow with the bears.”

  That made everyone laugh. “Come on, people,” Margie yelled cheerfully. “Let’s ski!”

  Bess chewed her lower lip. “This stinks,” she said. “Now we’re stuck here all night with a bunch of people who think I wrecked the shed.”

  “Look at it this way,” Nancy told her. “Now we have all night to solve the mystery.”

  “Still,” Bess said, glancing around. “I wish we could leave today.”

  Gina walked by just in time to hear her. “What’s the big deal?” she complained. “Now you know how I feel being stuck here tonight instead of being home at my friend’s birthday party.”

  She walked on. Nancy looked at her friends. “Did you hear that?” she said. “I think we’d better add Gina to our list.”

  George nodded. “She could have messed up the shed to try to make her parents leave sooner.”

  “And she was gone from lunch for a long time.” Nancy added Gina’s name to her notebook. “Let’s go question her.”

  The friends caught up with Gina. The grumpy girl was putting on her ski boots.

  “Hi,” Nancy said. “Can I ask you something?”

  Gina shrugged. “It’s a free country.” She bent over to adjust her boot.

  “You were gone from lunch for a while,” Nancy said. “Where did you go?”

  “The bathroom,” Gina said. “Just like I said.”

  “But I went to the bathroom a few minutes later,” Bess said. “You weren’t there.”

  Gina sat up and stared at them. “Oh, I get it,” she said. “You guys are trying to frame me!”

  “What?” Nancy said.

  “You want to blame me for messing up the skis and stuff.” Gina waved a hand at the shed. “You know, so your friend won’t get in trouble for what she did.” She stared at Bess.

  “Bess didn’t do anything!” George exclaimed.

  “Whatever.” Gina rolled her eyes. “Just don’t drag me into it.”

  Nancy led her friends away. “This isn’t doing any good,” she said. “Let’s check out some of the other suspects.”

  “Whoops!”

  The girls looked up just in time to see Eddie go sprawling facedown in the snow nearby. Nancy chewed her lower lip. “Maybe we should talk to Eddie next,” she said.

  “Do you really think he could have done it?” Bess asked.

  “I hope not,” Nancy admitted. “But we need to check out every suspect.”

  They reached Eddie as he climbed back to his feet. “Hi,” he greeted them. He brushed snow off his jacket. “Are you guys heading over to the hill?”

  “In a minute,” Nancy said. “First we want to ask you something.”

  “What?” Eddie asked.

  Nancy took a deep breath. “We didn’t see you until lunch was, like, half over,” she said. “Were you in the dining room the whole time?”

  “Huh?” Eddie’s smile faded. Suddenly he looked kind of nervous. “Why would you ask something like that?”

  “We were just wondering,” George said. “It’s kind of weird that we didn’t see you.”

  “That’s because it was crowded,” Eddie said quickly. “I was there the whole time. Really.”

  Uh-oh, Nancy thought, her heart sinking. He definitely seems nervous. Could he be the culprit?

  She couldn’t help feeling disappointed. Eddie seemed so nice. He wouldn’t let Bess get in trouble because of his clumsiness. Would he?

  “Look, Eddie,” she said. “We just want to find out the truth. That’s all.”

  Eddie let out a loud sigh. “Okay,” he said. “But you have to swear not to tell anyone else.”

  Nancy held her breath. Was Eddie about to confess?

  “It’s my backpack,” Eddie said.

  “Huh?” George looked confused.

  Nancy knew how she felt. What did Eddie’s backpack have to do with anything?

  “It’s lost. That’s where I was for the first part of lunch,” Eddie explained. “I came out here to look for it. I checked around the benches and over by the rope pull.” He sighed loudly. “My parents are going to kill me if I come home without it!”

  “Wait a minute.” Nancy was definitely confused by now. “So you’re not telling us you wrecked the equipment shed?”

  “What? No way!” Eddie said. “I thought Mr. S. said it was the wind.”

  “Yeah. But everyone thinks it was me,” Bess mumbled.

  “I don’t think that,” Eddie told her. “But I definitely didn’t do it, either. I didn’t even go in the shed after everyone else left. I was planning to look for my backpack in there, but I stepped in some animal poo near the door and I figured I shouldn’t go in and get the floor dirty. It was really gross poo, too—black and sort of crumbly looking, and …”

  “Yuck! Okay, if we want to know more, we’ll follow Blizzard around until he poops again.” George wrinkled her nose. “So why are you so upset about your backpack, anyway? What’s in it—gold and jewels?”

  “No, just extra socks and some snacks and comic books for the ride here.” Eddie bit his lip. “And my parents’ cell phone. That’s the reason they’ll kill me if I don’t find it.” He shrugged. “I’m glad we’re stuck here overnight. That gives me more time to look.”

  “But you didn’t know about the avalanche before lunch,” Nancy pointed out. “Why didn’t you wipe off your shoe and keep searching if you were so worried?”

  “I was hungry,” Eddie said sheepishly. “I didn’t want to miss lunch—especially if my juice box and cheesy crackers were gone forever!”

  Just then Eddie’s friend Steve came skiing over. Eddie introduced the other boy to the girls. Then the two of them took off to search for Eddie’s backpack behind the shed.

  “So much for that.” Nancy put an X in her notebook next to Eddie’s name.

  “Are you sure?” George looked over her shoulder. “It’s not like he can prove what he just told us.”
>
  “I know,” Nancy said. “But he seems honest. I have a hunch he’s telling the truth.”

  “I think so too,” Bess said. “Some of the other suspects seem way more likely.”

  “Starting with that one.” George was staring off past Nancy and Bess.

  Nancy turned around and saw Jack. He was wearing his ski boots, but carrying his skis.

  “Hey,” Nancy called. “Can we talk to you?”

  “I’m kind of busy right now,” Jack said in a grouchy voice. “My skis got all messed up when someone wrecked the equipment shed.” He glared at Bess. “I need to go trade them in for a pair that works right.”

  His skis did look kind of beat up. One had a chip in one end, and there were several long scratches in the other.

  George stared at the scratches. “Weird,” she whispered to Nancy. “If there was a cat around here, we’d have to add it to our list.”

  Jack was already continuing on his way. “Come on,” Nancy said. “Maybe this is a clue.”

  They followed Jack into the shed. Mr. Samuels, Henry, and a couple of other Mount Fun employees were inside cleaning up the mess. “Howdy, kids,” Mr. Samuels called. “What’s up?”

  “I need new skis,” Jack announced. “These are messed up.”

  “Help yourself.” Mr. Samuels waved toward several sets of kid-size skis lined up against the wall near the door. “We just cleaned up that batch there.”

  Jack dropped his old skis with the messy ones and walked over to pick out another pair. Nancy followed him.

  “Listen,” she said. “I know you think Bess messed up the shed. But I know she didn’t. I’m just trying to figure out the truth.”

  Jack shrugged. “Whatever. If she didn’t do it, I don’t know who did.”

  Nancy didn’t want to make Jack mad. But she had to figure out whether he could have done it. “I saw you at lunch,” she said. “You were sitting near the door. Did you leave the room at all?”

  “No.” Jack glared at her. “And if you don’t believe me, you can ask my dad. Or him.” He pointed over at Henry. “He was sitting across from me. Why don’t you ask him?”

  “Um, that’s okay.” Nancy wandered back to her friends.

  “Well?” George said. “Should we go ask Henry?”

  “Why bother?” Nancy said. “If Jack was lying, he wouldn’t tell us to ask him.” She put an X next to his name too.

  “Hey, I found someone’s bag,” Henry called out. “Does it belong to any of you kids?”

  Nancy glanced over and saw the instructor holding up a black backpack. “Nope,” she said. “Not ours.”

  “I recognize that backpack,” Jack said. “It belongs to that clumsy kid.”

  “You mean Eddie?” Bess asked.

  Jack nodded. “You know what this means,” he exclaimed loudly enough for everyone in the shed to hear. “Eddie’s the one who messed up this place!”

  Eddie appeared in the doorway. “My backpack!” he cried. Henry handed it over, and Eddie started digging through the stuff inside.

  Jack crossed his arms. “You might as well confess,” he said. “You wrecked the shed, didn’t you? What happened, did you trip over your own feet and knock everything over?”

  “What?” Eddie said. “I didn’t do anything. I haven’t seen my backpack in, like, three hours.”

  He sounded distracted. While he talked, he kept pulling things out of the backpack and tossing them aside. First a pair of gloves, then a couple of empty cheesy cracker wrappers, then a juice box, then a single white sock …

  He’s looking for that cell phone, Nancy thought.

  A second later Eddie let out a cry of relief. “It’s still here!” he said, holding up a cell phone. Then his smile faded. “Hey,” he added. “What’s the big idea saying I messed up the shed?”

  “You must have done it,” Jack said. “How else would your stuff get back there?”

  “Kids …,” Mr. Samuels began.

  “I didn’t do it!” Eddie cried. “If you want to know who did it, why don’t you ask her?”

  He pointed at the doorway. Nancy turned and saw Gina standing there.

  “What’s going on?” Gina said. “Ask me what?”

  “I saw you when I was walking to lunch,” Eddie told her. “You were in the hallway near the lobby staring out that big window. If anyone came across the yard to this shed, you would’ve seen them.”

  Nancy’s eyes widened. Could Gina be about to break the case?

  “I didn’t see anything,” Gina said with a frown. “I was so bored that I was just watching some stupid raccoons playing in the stupid snow over near the stupid benches. There were no people outside the whole time I was looking.” She shrugged. “It was probably the stupid wind, like he said.” She waved a hand toward Mr. Samuels.

  Weird, Nancy thought. If Gina is telling the truth, how did someone get in here long enough to make this mess without her seeing them? She was out there for at least half of lunchtime.

  “I just realized Gina couldn’t have done it,” Bess whispered to Nancy. “She didn’t have her coat when she ran out of the room, remember? I doubt she’d go outside without it.”

  Just then George poked Nancy in the arm. “Hey, didn’t Eddie say he had some cheesy crackers in his backpack? He must have forgotten he ate them already. Or at least someone did.” She held up one of the empty wrappers Eddie had tossed out of his bag.

  Nancy shrugged. “Maybe there’s another package still in there.”

  She didn’t really care about Eddie’s cheesy crackers. She was much more interested in what Bess had just remembered about Gina’s coat.

  So maybe Eddie is the one who’s lying, she thought reluctantly. It does seem strange that his backpack turned up in the middle of the mess.

  “Hey Eddie,” George said. “Can I look in your backpack?”

  “Sure,” Eddie said, handing it over. He was too busy glaring at Jack to ask George why she wanted to look.

  George dug into the backpack. She pulled out Eddie’s other sock, some comic books, and three more empty cheesy cracker packages.

  “Aha!” George said. “I solved the mystery!”

  “What do you mean?” Mr. Samuels said.

  George smiled proudly. “It was Blizzard,” she announced. “He was trying to get these cheesy crackers. He probably knocked the skis over when he was dragging Eddie’s backpack around.”

  Bess was already shaking her head. “No way,” she said. “Blizzard would have eaten the packages, too. Remember? We had to stop him from eating the wrapper from your breakfast bar.”

  “Oh yeah.” George’s shoulders slumped. “I thought I had it.”

  “It wasn’t Blizzard. I locked him up during lunch so he wouldn’t make a pest of himself begging for food.” Mr. Samuels rubbed his mustache, looking worried. “Anyway, why don’t you kids let us worry about all this? I just want everyone to have a good time skiing.”

  He shooed all the kids out of the shed. Nancy and her friends walked out with Eddie.

  “That’s weird about my crackers,” Eddie said. “I would’ve sworn I still had, like, three packages left.”

  “Maybe whoever messed up the shed got hungry and ate them,” Nancy said. But she suspected Eddie had eaten the crackers himself and forgotten. Or maybe he’d lost them.

  Eddie spotted his friend and hurried off. Nancy, Bess, and George sat down to put on their skis.

  Bess sighed. “It feels weird to just ski like nothing happened.”

  “I know,” Nancy said. “But we can keep thinking while we ski. We already know it probably wasn’t Jack, or Eddie, or Gina. And it definitely wasn’t Blizzard if he was locked up.”

  “So who else is left?” Bess asked.

  Nancy didn’t have a good answer to that. And by the time they headed inside for dinner, the Clue Crew hadn’t come up with any new suspects. They put their skis away along with everyone else, then met up with George’s parents.

  “We called home to tell e
veryone we’d be staying overnight,” Mrs. Fayne said as they all walked toward the dining room. “It looks like they won’t be able to open the road until tomorrow.”

  Mr. Fayne chuckled. “Nancy, your father seemed to think you arranged this whole avalanche somehow. He said something about getting out of helping him shovel snow tomorrow morning?”

  Nancy smiled weakly. She was distracted by the way at least half the kids in the room turned to stare at them when they stepped into the dining room. Or rather, the way they turned to stare at Bess.

  She could tell Bess noticed too. Bess kept her head down as they walked to their table.

  We have to clear Bess’s name, Nancy thought with new determination. We have all night to work on the mystery. And if we can’t solve it by tomorrow, we don’t deserve to call ourselves the Clue Crew!

  At dinner, Mr. and Mrs. Fayne ended up chatting with their new friends again. That gave the girls plenty of time to talk about the investigation. But talking about it didn’t help much.

  “Nobody on our list is a good suspect,” Nancy pointed out. “Either they don’t have any reason to mess up the shed, like Eddie …”

  “Or they didn’t have the chance to do it, like Jack and Blizzard,” George finished.

  Bess sighed. “So what do we do now?”

  Nancy bit her lip. “Just keep thinking, I guess.”

  “Here you go,” Mr. Samuels said. “The deluxe emergency suite.”

  He showed the girls and George’s parents into one of the lodge’s guest rooms. Three cots were squeezed in there along with a double bed.

  “Wow,” George said. “It’s crowded in here.”

  “Hush,” her mother warned. “We’re lucky Mr. Samuels was able to fit us in at all.”

  “True,” Mr. Fayne agreed with a chuckle. “But I hope you’re giving us the sardine rate, Mr. Samuels.”

  The lodge owner laughed. “On Kids Weekend, stranded kids stay for half price,” he said. “You won’t be charged extra for the pj’s and toothbrushes my staff scraped up for you to borrow, either.”