Swiped Read online

  Swiped

  Michele Martin Bossley

  orca currents

  Copyright © Michele Martin Bossley 2006

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Bossley, Michele Martin

  Swiped / Michele Martin Bossley.

  (Orca currents)

  ISBN 1-55143-652-3 (bound) ISBN 1-55143-646-9 (pbk.)

  I. Title. II. Series.

  PS8553.O7394S95 2006 jC813’.54 C2006-903443-5

  Summary: Trevor and his friends solve the mystery of the missing lunches and the stolen hockey book.

  First published in the United States, 2006

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2006928967

  programs provided by the following agencies: the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program and the Canada Council for the Arts, and the Province of British Columbia through the BC Arts Council and the Book Publishing Tax Credit.

  Cover design: Lynne O’Rourke

  Cover photography: Jupiterimages

  Orca Book Publishers

  PO Box 5626, Station B

  Victoria, BC Canada

  V8R 6S

  Orca Book Publishers

  PO Box 468

  Custer, WA USA

  498240-0468

  www.orcabook.com

  Printed and bound in Canada

  09 08 07 06 • 5 4 3 2

  For my son Ethan, who has brought

  our family so much joy.

  chapter one

  My cousin Nick stomped over to our table. “I don’t believe it. My lunch is gone again!” He scowled and sat down. “This is the second time this week.”

  “You probably just forgot it at home,” Robyn suggested.

  “No chance. I never forget my lunch,” Nick said.

  I could relate. By noon I was so hungry, I was ready to eat the linoleum in the school hallway. I never forget my lunch either.

  “Hey, Nick! You finished unpacking, yet?” I had to shout to make myself heard over the clanging of metal chairs and the loud voices. Lunch hour in our school was like the monkey house at the zoo. And it didn’t smell much better at the moment, either. “Robyn, if you’re gonna bring roadkill sandwiches, you have to sit somewhere else.”

  Robyn flicked her ponytail over her shoulder and took another bite. “It’s not roadkill,” she answered. “It’s liverwurst and onion.”

  “Augh! Same thing!” I made a face.

  Nick grinned hungrily. “At this point, anything looks good.” He stared at Robyn’s sandwich. Robyn sighed and handed him half.

  “Nick, no!” I clutched my hair with both hands. “It’s suicide! I’ll give you some of mine!”

  “I’ll take all offers,” Nick said with his mouth full. “I’m starving.” He took another bite. “And no, we’re not finished unpacking. At least Dad found the boxes with my clothes in them last night. Now I can finally change my socks.”

  Nick had just moved to Calgary a few weeks ago with my aunt and uncle, and was new at my school.

  I rummaged in my backpack for my lunch. It seemed kind of empty. I peered inside, then shook it. A bag of carrots fell out. That was all. “Did anyone see my lunch? I brought a ham-and-cheese sub.”

  Robyn and Nick shook their heads. “Maybe you left it in your locker,” Nick said.

  “No way. I know I had it,” I said. I opened my bag of carrots in disgust and looked at Robyn suspiciously. “If you swiped my lunch because I said your sandwiches smell like roadkill, it’s not funny. I could starve to death.”

  “I never took anything, I swear,” Robyn said. She reached into her lunch bag, and a puzzled look crossed her face. “I don’t believe it! I brought extra chocolate bars to share with you doofs, but they’re missing.”

  “What!” My stomach rumbled with disappointment. My only lifeline until four o’clock was slipping away. “How can they be gone?”

  “You probably ate them already,” Nick said.

  Robyn shot him a sour look. “I think I’d know if I ate three chocolate bars.”

  The three of us stared at each other.

  “Something very weird is going on,” Robyn said.

  “Heads up!” someone yelled. Before any of us could move, something hit Robyn in the head. Pink goo splattered everywhere and slimy red things dripped down her hair.

  Robyn shrieked. “What is this!” she yelled, flicking a red glob onto the table.

  I leaned closer and sniffed. “Yogurt,” I pronounced. “Strawberry, I think.”

  “Yogurt!” Robyn turned around and her gaze landed on Cray Simmons, who was at the table directly behind us.

  Cray is one of those kids who enjoys stirring up trouble. Me, Robyn and some other kids used to play football with him after lunch, but his mouthy, super-jock attitude really bugged Robyn, so she quit. He hasn’t stopped baiting her since.

  Cray’s mouth twitched, and I could tell he was trying not to laugh—Robyn was so obviously furious. She did look pretty funny.

  “Cray! You butt head! I’ll get you for that!” Robyn hollered.

  “I didn’t do it,” he said. “Why would I waste my yogurt on you, rich girl?”

  “You’re such a jerk.” Robyn whipped the remains of her sandwich at Cray. His smirk changed to astonishment as bits of liverwurst clung to his shirt.

  “Hey!” he said, looking angry. “What the—!”

  That’s as far as he got.

  “Food fight!” someone yelled. Within seconds, the air was thick with flying potato chips, cheezies and other odds and ends. Someone shook a pop and opened it. Wet foam sprayed everywhere. Cray stood paralyzed as bubbling drops trickled down his forehead. A tomato slice hit Nick on the cheek and stuck until he shook it off.

  “Ow!” he yelled. He reached for Robyn’s half-empty juice box and prepared to throw it into the fray.

  “Stop!” Cray shouted suddenly, recovering movement at last. “Quit being so stupid!” He dove over his table and grabbed Nick’s wrist, forcing him to drop the juice box.

  Nick shoved him away. “You started it!” He took the remnants of Robyn’s sandwich and squished it into Cray’s face.

  “I did not, butt face!” Cray gasped through the liverwurst. Cray twisted away, a crust of bread dangling from one ear. He tackled Nick. The two of them went down hard and began wrestling under the table. Nick’s skinny arms were no match for Cray, and Cray soon grabbed him in a headlock.

  “All right! That’s enough!” the principal bellowed. Ms. Beaudry marched into the room, and quiet instantly fell, except for the scuffling under our table, where Nick and Cray were still locked in battle.

  “Crawley Simmons! Get up, now!” Ms. Beaudry’s face was bright red. I could almost see the steam coming from her ears. Cray, who hates being called by his full name, scrambled to his feet. Nick followed, banging his head on the table in the process.

  “Fighting again, Cray.” Ms. Beaudry frowned. “How many times are we going to go through this? I am not impressed. I will see you down in my office. And Nick,” she turned to him. “Since this is only your first week here, I’ll assume that you will make yourself familiar with our school rules. Fighting will not be tolerated. Is that clear?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Nick muttered.

  “As for the rest of you....” Ms. Beaudry looked around the room. “This behavior is totally unacceptable. Throwing food is something I would expect of two-year-olds, not junior high students.”

  “Cray started it,
” Robyn muttered loud enough for us to hear.

  “I did not!” Cray shouted.

  “You did so!” Robyn retorted. “He threw an open cup of yogurt at me. Look at my hair!”

  Ms. Beaudry regarded Robyn calmly. “Who started this is not the issue. Who participated is the issue. Each one of you will clean up this mess until this place is spotless. If you are late for your first class after lunch, you will make up the time with me at noon tomorrow. I expect every single one of you to serve a week’s detention in the library during the lunch hour starting Monday. Is that clear?” She barked the last sentence like an army drill sergeant. The room was silent. “I said, is that clear!”

  “Yes,” we all muttered.

  “Get started.” Ms. Beaudry strode out.

  Cray followed her without a word. Robyn fumed as she began picking up stray cheezies and stuffing them into her empty lunch bag.

  “Hey, wait! Those are still good.” Nick stopped her.

  “You’ve got to be kidding! They’ve been on the floor.” Robyn stared at him.

  “I’m still hungry.” Nick complained.

  A look of realization dawned on Robyn’s face. “That’s it!” she said. “Cray stole your lunches for the food fight! He planned the whole thing!”

  “Wait a second, Robyn,” I said. “Why would Cray plan a food fight?”

  “Because he’s a total jerk,” she reasoned.

  “So?” I shook my head. “And what about your chocolate bars?”

  “Well, those are too good to throw around,” she reasoned. “He probably kept them.”

  “Robyn, just because you don’t like the guy, you can’t accuse him of stealing,” I said.

  “Well, somebody’s stealing,” Nick put in. “My stomach will vouch for that.”

  chapter two

  “Robyn, this is dumb,” I complained.

  “Do you want to keep your lunch or not?” Robyn answered, shoving three large jingle bells inside my lunch bag. She stapled it shut. As I took it, the motion set the bells jangling.

  “I feel like Santa Claus,” I said.

  “Look, if you’d leave your lunch in your locker like everyone else, it wouldn’t get stolen so often,” Robyn said. My lunch had disappeared four times now.

  “If I left my lunch in my locker, I couldn’t eat it anyway. Who wants to eat sandwiches that smell like rotten sneakers?” My locker partner must have had the same running shoes since dinosaurs roamed the earth. Anything left in our locker for longer than ten minutes smelled like stinky feet, which was why I carried most of my stuff around with me, including my lunch.

  I had to admit that Robyn’s idea worked. I still had my lunch at noon, although I’d endured a lot of strange looks and a few ho-ho-ho’s.

  We still had two days of detention left. Today was Thursday, and Ms. Beaudry had made us march straight to the library at noon to do homework for the last three days—no talking, no goofing around. We were allowed to go to the cafeteria to eat during the last fifteen minutes of lunch, when everyone else was finished.

  But today our librarian, Mrs. Pringle, was taking over. She’d said yesterday that she had a special project she needed help with. Since our school was a new elementary and junior high, we didn’t have many books in our collection, and we needed a ton—everything from picturebooks to young adult novels. A bunch of books had been donated to the school, and our job was to help Mrs. Pringle sort through the new material during detention. That was fine with me—anything to get away from Ms. Beaudry’s prison-guard stare.

  In the library, I put my binder and lunch bag on a table with the other lunches and took a seat beside Nick and Robyn.

  “All right, kids,” Mrs. Pringle said. “I’m not sure what we have here. A lot of these books are discards from other schools, and some are from schools that have closed. We need to go through them to see what we can use.” She opened the cover of a book and showed us where the copyright date was. “Anything older than fifteen years should go in a separate pile, and I’ll check it.”

  “Does that mean if a book is more than fifteen years old, you won’t keep it?” I asked.

  “No, Trevor,” Mrs. Pringle said. “But I need to see what kind of book it is. If it’s reference, we might need something more current. There are lots of terrific books that are more than fifteen years old!” She held up an old hardcover copy of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe as an example. “For instance, this book was written more than fifty years ago, but it’s always been a favorite. I know our elementary students will love it.” Mrs. Pringle put the book down on the library cart. “Let’s get started.”

  Nick, Robyn and I started working through the nearest box. Most of the books were out-of-date textbooks or encyclopedias from the eighties.

  “Why weren’t these books given away ages ago?” Robyn wanted to know, brushing dust off her hands.

  “Who knows?” I said. “Probably no one got around to it.”

  “This box is hopeless,” Robyn said. “There’s nothing in here we can use.” She flipped the pages of an ancient math text in disgust.

  I reached into the box and pulled out a huge science book, noticing a second book wedged inside the tattered book jacket. “Hey, what’s this?” I said. I pried the jacket loose and released a thin, hardcover book with a color picture of a hockey player on the cover. The book dropped onto my desk, falling open to a well-thumbed photo of a player wearing a blue and orange uniform. My jaw dropped.

  “What is it?” Robyn wanted to know.

  I hesitated. “It’s a hockey book from 1980.”

  “Oh.” Nick looked bored. He’s not big on sports. “That’s pretty old. Mrs. Pringle will probably want to chuck it out.” He slid his chair back and went to grab his lunch.

  “I don’t think so,” I said slowly. I recognized the player and the uniform right away. So did Cray. He stopped stacking books on the table and peered over my shoulder.

  “That’s Wayne Gretzky when he first played with the Oilers,” Cray said with interest.

  “So what? Who asked you to butt in?” Robyn said.

  “It’s a free country, princess,” Cray informed her.

  Robyn gritted her teeth. “And you’re free to leave. Take a hike, Cray.”

  Cray deliberately leaned against my desk and folded his arms across his chest, ignoring Robyn. “Gretzky is one of the best hockey players that ever skated in the NHL.” Cray said. “He won the Hart Memorial Trophy for MVP in his first season in the NHL.”

  “Which makes this even more cool.” I pointed to the signature on the page.

  “He signed it? That’s awesome,” said Cray. “That book must be worth thousands.”

  “How would you know?” Robyn said rudely.

  “I’ve collected sports stuff for years,” Cray told me, still ignoring Robyn. “I’ve bought some hockey stuff on Internet auctions before, and anything to do with Gretzky is worth big money, especially if it’s rare.”

  Mrs. Pringle came to investigate. “Look what we found,” I said. I lifted the photo so she could see. “Cray thinks it’s worth some serious cash.”

  Mrs. Pringle picked the book up as though she were handling diamonds. “It might be,” she said. She checked the copyright date, then the photo. “This was signed after his first season with the Oilers. See the caption under the photo?” She showed us. “That’s more than twenty-five years ago.”

  “Wow.” Cray shook his head. “This is unbelievable.”

  “It’s a real piece of hockey history, all right,” Mrs. Pringle said.

  “Do you think our school will be able to keep it?” Robyn asked.

  “No, I’m sure it will go on display somewhere. But maybe we’ll be allowed to keep it for a little while.” Mrs. Pringle smoothed the cover with her hand and glanced at the clock. “You kids are done. Go have your lunch.”

  I got up in relief. My stomach was so empty, I thought it was going to cave in. A sudden cry erupted from the table where the lunches were piled. Ni
ck’s face was red and his hands were empty. “Someone,” he yelled, “has ripped off my banana and marshmallow-fluff sandwich!”

  Robyn sighed. “Not again!”

  Cray was busy looking through a nearby stack of books. Robyn eyed him suspiciously as we walked out of the library. She took half of her pickle sandwich from her lunch bag and handed it to Nick in the hall. “I wonder,” she said, “why my lunch doesn’t get stolen.”

  “Because you bring such weird stuff,” Nick said, his mouth full. “Not that I’m not grateful,” he added, as Robyn glared at him. “But not many people like pickle sandwiches.”

  chapter three

  “There really isn’t any choice. You’ll have to get rid of most of them,” Mrs. Pringle said.

  Nick stopped to tie his shoelaces in the library doorway, dropping his overdue books on the ground. Robyn stopped so suddenly behind him that I collided with her, sending her stumbling into Nick.

  “Trevor!” she said in a furious whisper.

  “I couldn’t help it. What’s the matter, anyway?” I said. Mr. Kowalski and the rest of our grade eight class should have been right behind us, but the hall was still empty.

  “Shhh. I want to hear.” Robyn cocked her head toward the library interior.

  Mrs. Pringle sighed. “I know. It was nice to get the donation, but most of these books are terribly out-of-date. We need new materials so badly. Building up a library takes time, but these kids need books now.”

  I peered around the doorway and saw her talking to Ms. Thorsen, the new grade nine teacher. Unlike Mrs. Pringle, who was plump and wore her graying hair clipped back, Ms. Thorsen looked trendy with square black-rimmed glasses and short blond hair. I could almost imagine her as a DJ at a rock station.

  Ms. Thorsen glanced into one of the boxes of books that was stacked on the floor. “There’s no budget left?”

  “Not much. A big chunk of it went to buying computer equipment. We’ll need more money if we want books this year.”

  Robyn burst into the library. “Mrs. Pringle, I know! We could have a fundraiser to buy books!”