Read Encyclopedia Brown Solves Them All Online

Authors: Donald J. Sobol

Encyclopedia Brown Solves Them All (6 page)

BOOK: Encyclopedia Brown Solves Them All
13.36Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads
The Case of the Earthenware Pig
“The cops are after me!”
The words came out of a blur. Something that looked like Charlie Stewart in fast motion sped through the Brown Detective Agency and disappeared into the tool closet.
Encyclopedia glanced up and down the street.
“There isn’t a policeman in sight,” he announced. “You gave them the slip.”
The news failed to cheer Charlie. Opening the closet door a crack,“ he moaned, ”I’m a wanted man!”
“Wanted for what?” asked Encyclopedia.
“How should I know?” said Charlie. “Five minutes ago I was walking down Locust Street. I came to the outdoor telephone booth at the comer of Locust and Beech, and there stood Bugs Meany and Officer Carlson. Bugs pointed at me and hollered, ‘Arrest that kid!’ I got scared and ran.”
Charlie tiptoed out of the tool closet.
“I think this has something to do with my tooth collection,” he said.
Charlie’s tooth collection was the pride of Idaville. No boy anywhere in the state had collected more interesting uppers and lowers than Charlie. He kept them in a flowered cookie jar.
“Bugs owns an earthenware teapot shaped like a pig,” Charlie continued thoughtfully. “He wanted to trade it for my tooth collection. I don’t drink tea. So I told him no soap.”
“What could Bugs want with your tooth collection?” asked Encyclopedia.
“Bugs was going to string the teeth behind the Tiger clubhouse,” answered Charlie. “If anybody tried to sneak upon the clubhouse from the rear, he’d trip over the string. The string would shake, and the teeth would start chattering and warn the Tigers.“
“I told you we’d find the little thief here!” sang Bugs.
“Wow, dental detectors!” exclaimed Encyclopedia. “Pretty neat. I have to hand it to Bugs—”
Encyclopedia’s voice trailed off. A police car had pulled into the Brown driveway. Bugs Meany hopped out, followed by Officer Carlson.
“I told you we’d find the little thief here!” sang Bugs. “I always knew this detective business was just a cover for a den of crooks!”
Officer Carlson motioned Bugs to be quiet. Then he said to Charlie, “Why were you walking on Locust Street about five minutes ago?”
“I got a telephone call to come there,” replied Charlie. “A boy’s voice asked me to meet him at the telephone booth right away. He said he had two grizzly bear teeth to sell. He wouldn’t give his name.”
“Yah, yah, yah!” jeered Bugs. “You were on your way to buy grizzly bear teeth! So how come the second you saw Officer Carlson you made like a drum and beat it?”
“B-because y-you hollered for him to arrest me,” Charlie said. “I got plain scared.”
“Stop it, you two,” said Officer Carlson. “Bugs says you stole an earthenware teapot shaped like a pig, Charlie. Did you?”
“I did not!” said Charlie. And looking hard at Bugs he added, “I don’t like pigs!”
As Bugs turned a lovely shade of purple, Officer Carlson held up his hand. “Let’s all go to Bugs’s house and try to find out what really happened.”
Walking toward the police car, Charlie slipped Encyclopedia twenty-five cents. “I’ll need you,” he whispered. “I’ve never been in trouble with the police before.”
At his house, Bugs stopped in the entrance hall.
“My folks have gone for the day,” he said. He pointed to the staircase on his left, “I’d just come home when Charlie raced down the stairs. He had my teapot pig under his arm. I chased him out the front door, but he got away.”
“Why couldn’t you catch him?” inquired Encyclopedia. “You’re bigger, older, and faster.”
“Why?” said Bugs. “I’ll tell you why, Mr. Brains. I obey the law. There was a green light over at Locust Street, and I don’t cross against the green. ”I’m no jaywalker!”
“He’s lying like a tiger skin,” muttered Charlie.
Officer Carlson said, “Let’s say Charlie did cross against the light and got away. What did you do next, Bugs?”
“I went straight to the telephone booth on the corner and called the police station,” said Bugs. “I waited there till you arrived.”
“You told me,” said Officer Carlson, “that the cabinet in which you keep the teapot pig is always locked. You said the thief removed the hinges of the cabinet door to get inside it.”
“Yeah,” said Bugs. “It was a slick job. Charlie sure knew what he was doing.” He led the way upstairs to his room.
The cabinet stood in a comer. The glass door, lifted off its hinges, was leaning against the wall.
“There,” said Bugs. “Just like I said.”
“But Charlie wasn’t carrying the teapot pig when we saw him coming toward the telephone booth,” pointed out Officer Carlson.
“He had plenty of time to hide it,” said Bugs. “Then he tried to bluff you with that nutty story about buying grizzly bear teeth at the telephone booth. He had his alibi all ready!”
Officer Carlson regarded Charlie sternly. “I better call your parents,” he said.
“Aw, I don’t want him sent to prison or nothing,” said Bugs. “I’m the kind that’s always ready to forgive and forget. Charlie’s been after me for weeks to swap my teapot pig for his tooth collection. I’ll tell you what. If he’s so crazy for my teapot, he can keep it. I’ll take his crumby old tooth collection in trade.”
“You won’t take anything of Charlie’s,” said Encyclopedia. “He never stole your teapot pig!”
WHAT MADE ENCYCLOPEDIA SO SURE?
 
 
(Turn to page 95 for the solution to the Case of the Earthenware Pig.)
The Case of the Muscle Maker
Cadmus Turner stopped and glared at the large tree outside the Brown Detective Agency. His lips curled.
“Arrahhrrr!” he snarled.
He crouched, circled to his left, and attacked without warning. He threw both arms about the tree and began wrestling it.
Encyclopedia had never seen Cadmus so full of fight. He hurried out to the sidewalk for a ringside view.
The bout lasted a minute—till Cadmus’s pants fell down. He let go of the tree at once.
“It’s a gyp!” he hollered. “I’ve been robbed.”
“It looked like a fair fight till your pants quit,” said Encyclopedia. “Next time you tussle the timber, tighten your belt first. You’ll win for sure.”
“I can’t tighten my belt,” replied Cadmus. “The ends don’t meet any more. I drank four bottles of Hercules’s Strength Tonic. I’m ready to bust.”
Encyclopedia eyed Cadmus’s- stomach. It was swollen out like the start of a new continent.
“I should have been able to tear that tree off its roots,” said Cadmus.
“Because you drank four bottles of Hercules’s Strength Tonic?” asked Encyclopedia.
“Yep,” said Cadmus. “Only the stuff doesn’t work. I was supposed to feel like Hercules. Instead I feel like a fat slob. And I’m out two dollars!”
“I might get your money back,” said Encyclopedia, “if I can prove the tonic is a fake.”
“You’re hired,” said Cadmus. “But I spent all my cash on those four bottles of wish-water. I’ll have to pay you later.”
Encyclopedia agreed to take the case on faith. Considering the blown-up condition of Cadmus’s stomach, it was more an act of mercy than a business deal.
The boys biked to an unused fruit stand on Pine Drive. Cadmus had bought the bottles there earlier that morning.
“Two big kids were setting out boxes of the tonic,” said Cadmus. “They told me if I became their first customer, I could have four bottles for the price of two.”
“You couldn’t say no to a bargain like that,” commented Encyclopedia with understanding.
At the fruit stand, a large crowd of children was assembled. Bugs Meany and his Tigers had pushed their way to the front.
The two big boys were about to start the sale. Encyclopedia recognized one of them. He was Wilford Wiggins, a high school dropout. Wilford had more get-rich-quick ideas than tail feathers on a turkey farm. The other boy, a husky youth, was a stranger.
“He’s Mike O’Malley,” said Cadmus, “from Homestead.”
“He looks like he’s from Fort Apache,” said Encyclopedia. Mike’s suit, though it fit perfectly, was wrinkled enough to have gone through an Indian war.
“Gather ‘round,” shouted Wilford Wiggins. He waved a bottle of Hercules’s Strength Tonic. “Gather ’round.”
His partner, Mike O’Malley, dropped to the ground and began doing push-ups like a trip-hammer.
“Would you believe Mike weighed only one hundred pounds a year ago?” asked Wilford. “They called him Ribs.”
Mike jumped up and removed his suitcoat and shirt. Bare chested, he made muscles in all directions.
“In one short year,” bellowed Wilford, “Mike gained a hundred pounds of solid muscle! A miracle, you say? Yes, that’s what Hercules’s Strength Tonic is—a miracle. The same secret miracle tonic can build a mighty body for each and every boy here today—if,” he added hastily, noticing Cadmus and his stomach—”if taken as directed.”
Bare chested, Mike made muscles in all directions.
Mike was wriggling his huge chest muscles. The battleship tattooed over his heart rolled and pitched.
“See that battleship?” asked Wilford. “Why, a year ago it was nothing but a rowboat! Ahah, hah, hah!”
Bugs Meany held his nose at the joke. “How come you have to sell this wash on the street?” he demanded. “If it’s so good, you could sell it in stores.”
“A fair question, friend,” said Wilford. “I’ll give you an honest answer. We need money. We’re broke.”
Wilford held up Mike’s wrinkled suit coat.
“Take a look at this suit coat,” Wilford said. “Old and shabby, isn’t it? Mike’s worn it for two years. Why? Because he didn’t think about spending money on himself. He thought only of the powerful body he was going to give every skinny, weak-kneed little shrimp in America!”
Wilford put down the suit coat. He picked up a bottle of Hercules’s Strength Tonic again.
“Every cent we had went into developing Mike’s wonderful tonic,” Wilford continued. “We need money to get the tonic into every store in America! It’s a crusade! So I’m cutting the price. You can have four bottles—that’s all you need-for half the regular price. Four bottles for a measly two dollars!”
“And I thought he was giving me a special price,” Cadmus said angrily.
“Forget it,” said Encyclopedia. “Look at Bugs.”
The Tigers’ leader was pop-eyed watching Mike’s arm muscles lump, jump, and bump.
“How do you take this tonic,” Bugs asked eagerly.
“One teaspoonful a day,” replied Wilford. “Four big bottles like this one will last twelve months. Then you’ll have a build like Mike’s!”
“I couldn’t wait a year,” Cadmus muttered. “So I drank the four bottles one after the other. Maybe the stuff works if you follow the directions.”
“It doesn’t work,” said Encyclopedia. “Mike’s muscles and Wilford’s big sales talk prove it’s a fake!”
HOW DID ENCYCLOPEDIA KNOW?
 
 
BOOK: Encyclopedia Brown Solves Them All
13.36Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

Other books

The Bronze of Eddarta by Randall Garrett
Edin's embrace by Nadine Crenshaw
Assur by Francisco Narla
The Unearthing by Karmazenuk, Steve, Williston, Christine
The Christmas Sweater by Glenn Beck
Tempted by Dr. Morales by Carol Marinelli
For Elise by Sarah M. Eden