The Apple Bandit Page 3

  Bess said she’d do anything for a bushel of those River Heights Reds, Nancy thought worriedly. Of course, I know she didn’t take those apples. But Mr. Helmer doesn’t know that. What if he decides that comment makes her a suspect?

  Nancy decided she’d better solve the mystery before that happened. “Come on,” she murmured to her friends. “I think it’s time to do some investigating.”

  They hurried off and found a quiet spot behind a nearby food booth. Then Nancy pulled her notebook out of her pocket.

  “Okay,” she said, flipping it open. “First things first.”

  She turned to a clean page. At the top, she wrote THE CASE OF THE APPLE BANDIT. Below that, she wrote CLUES.

  Bess looked at the page over Nancy’s shoulder. “What clues?” she asked.

  Nancy chewed on the end of her purple pen. “Well, the apples are missing,” she said. “That’s a clue, right?”

  She wrote:

  1. Apples are missing from hiding place.

  2. Farm dogs scare away the animals, so the apples were probably stolen by a person.

  “That’s all I can think of for now,” she said. “We’ll have to go look for more clues in a minute. First I want to list our suspects.” Under SUSPECTS Nancy wrote “Mrs. Cherry” and “wild animals.”

  George looked doubtful. “I thought we already decided neither one of those suspects could have done it.”

  “I know,” Nancy said. “But until we investigate, we should—”

  Her words were interrupted by a loud, sudden shout from nearby.

  “You there!” Mr. Helmer yelled. “What are you doing here?”

  6

  Climbing for Clues

  Nancy peered out from behind the food booth. She saw Mr. Helmer standing in front of the two teenage boys who were causing trouble the day before.

  “Uh-oh,” she told her friends. “I think we might have just found another suspect. Make that two suspects.”

  She couldn’t hear what the teens were saying to Mr. Helmer. But she heard Mr. Helmer’s voice easily.

  “I told you yesterday,” he said loudly and sternly, “you’re not welcome here. The gate person will refund your money on your way out. And this time, don’t come back!”

  Nancy watched as the two boys slunk back toward the entrance. Mr. Helmer stayed right behind them, making sure they left.

  “Wow,” Nancy said. “I wonder what would have happened if Mr. Helmer wasn’t right there when those guys came in.”

  Bess shrugged. “If it gets as crowded as it was yesterday, probably nothing,” she guessed. “Those boys could have stayed out of his sight all day, I bet.”

  “Probably,” George agreed. “I wonder why they came back, anyway.”

  “Hmm,” Nancy said.

  Bess looked at her with a smile. “I know that look,” she teased. “Are you thinking about the mystery?”

  “You caught me.” Nancy smiled back. Then her face got serious again. “But what if those boys are behind the disappearing apples?”

  George gasped. “Oh! Maybe they sneaked in last night and stole the apples to get back at Mr. H for kicking them out!”

  “But what about the dogs?” Bess said. “They were guarding the apples last night.”

  “True,” Nancy said. “But those boys were playing with the dogs yesterday, remember? So the dogs probably wouldn’t stop them if they sneaked in. They would recognize the boys as friends and let them do whatever they wanted.”

  She opened her notebook and added the teenage boys to the suspect list. Then she looked over the page. So far they didn’t have much to go on.

  She snapped her notebook shut and glanced at her friends. “Come on, I think we’d better go check out the scene of the crime.”

  “You mean climb up that steep hill?” George wrinkled her nose.

  Nancy grinned. “Nope,” she said. “Let’s do it the easy way—climb down that steep hill. We can start up by the pony pen.”

  “All right,” Bess agreed. “But let me get a snack first, okay? All this investigating makes me hungry.”

  “Okay,” Nancy said. “But hurry up. The sooner we investigate, the more likely we are to find some clues!”

  Nancy and George waited while Bess bought a shiny red apple and a cup of warm cider at the nearest food booth.

  “I just wish this was a River Heights Red,” Bess said as she tucked the apple into her jacket pocket. Then she sipped her cider as the girls headed for the hill.

  The whole way up to the ponies, Nancy thought about the case. One of the most important parts of any mystery was figuring out the motive—the reason why someone would do something wrong.

  “Who has the best motive in this case?” she wondered out loud. “Mrs. Cherry, because she wants her orchard to be the only one? Or those boys, to get back at Mr. Helmer for asking them to leave?”

  “How about the raccoons?” George said with a grin. “They have the best motive of all—hunger!”

  Just then the girls reached the flat area where the ponies were penned. Bess, who was in the lead, tripped over a rock.

  “Oof!” she cried, lurching forward. She caught her balance just in time to keep from falling. But her cider sloshed out of the cup and all over her hand.

  “Yuck,” George said. “Now you’re going to be all sticky.”

  “It’s a good thing your cider was cool,” Nancy added.

  Bess wrinkled her nose. She hated being dirty or sticky. “Aha,” she said, pointing toward the ponies’ water tub with her clean hand. “I know where I can wash off.”

  Nancy giggled. “Good idea,” she said. “The ponies will love it—apple-flavored water!”

  All three girls walked toward the tub. There were lots of people already lined up for pony rides. H2O and the other ponies were carrying their riders patiently around the ring. Nancy waved at Marcie, the teenage girl who had been so nice to them yesterday. Marcie waved back and Nancy wished they had time for a ride. But that would have to wait.

  “Hurry up and rinse off, Bess,” she said, glancing down at the cool, clear water of the tub. “We have work to do!”

  Bess reached through the fence and washed off her hand. Then the three friends hurried around the pen to the edge of the drop-off.

  “Wow,” George said, looking over the edge. “This looks really steep.”

  “We’ll have to go slowly and be careful,” Nancy said. “I’ll go first. . . .”

  The girls made their way down the hill. It was a slow trip—they had to slip-slide down the steep path, holding on to branches and saplings to keep their balance. There were roots everywhere trying to trip them up, and lots of slippery patches of mud and slick, wet leaves.

  “Yikes,” Bess panted. “Who would go to all this trouble just to climb down here and snatch some apples?”

  “Or up,” George added. “They might have climbed up.”

  Nancy shook her head as she wriggled between a couple of bushes. “Either way, it’s not an easy trip,” she said. “I mean, Mr. Helmer probably just sent a few of his young workers down here with the apples. But it would take a lot of effort for someone to come down and drag them away.”

  “Not for a raccoon,” George pointed out. “Maybe it’s too hard for Mr. Helmer’s dogs to get down here too. That would mean the wild animals could be the culprits after all.”

  Nancy was about to agree when she heard a bark. Glancing down, she saw two of Mr. Helmer’s dogs leaping up the slope toward them. They moved across the difficult ground as easily as if they were romping in the grassy yard.

  “Wrong,” Bess told her cousin. “Looks like the dogs don’t have any trouble getting here.”

  Nancy finally reached the flat area where they had seen the apple baskets. She stretched her arms, relieved. Then she reached down to pat one of the dogs, who was sniffing curiously at her feet.

  “No, I don’t think we can blame wild animals,” she said. “Not only because of the dogs. But wild animals wouldn’t eat the a
pple baskets.”

  “Oh, yeah.” George flopped onto the ground beside her. “Yuck!” she cried, springing up almost immediately.

  “Ew, your pants are all muddy!” Bess said, helping her brush off.

  Nancy didn’t pay any attention. She was staring at the second dog. He had just picked up a large fallen branch. As she watched, he leaped up the hillside carrying it in his mouth.

  “Hey,” she said. “I have another theory. Bess, do you still have that apple?”

  Bess put a hand over her pocket. “Yes,” she said. “Why?”

  “Can I have it, please? It’s important,” Nancy begged.

  Bess looked reluctant. But she pulled out the apple and handed it over.

  Nancy bent down in front of the first dog. “Here, boy,” she said. “Want this?Yum yum!”

  “Hey!” Bess protested.

  But Nancy ignored her. “Yummy apple!” she cooed, pressing the fruit to the dog’s muzzle.

  The dog sniffed at it. But he didn’t even try to lick or bite it. Meanwhile the second dog returned. Nancy tried to feed the apple to him, too. But he wasn’t interested either.

  “Oh, well,” she said at last. She stood up and handed the apple back to Bess.

  Bess snatched it and shoved it back into her pocket. “Whew!” she said. “What did you do that for?”

  “I thought maybe the farm dogs took the apples,” Nancy explained. “They could have eaten them, and then carried off the baskets somewhere.” She shrugged. “Sort of the way Chip likes to carry off Dad’s socks and my pencils and bury them in the yard.”

  George nodded. “Good thinking,” she said. “But I bet Mr. Helmer trained his dogs not to eat apples. Or else they just don’t like the taste.”

  Bess glanced up the hill. “I know who likes the taste of apples,” she said. “Ponies.”

  “Yeah,” Nancy said. “But there’s no way the ponies could climb down here. Not even if they could break out of their pen.”

  She sighed. So far this mystery wasn’t very easy to solve. She and her friends spent a few more minutes looking around for clues. But there weren’t any. No footprints, no nothing.

  “So I guess our only suspects are still Mrs. Cherry and those boys,” George commented as the girls started the climb back up toward the pony pen. “Even if we can’t prove either one did it.”

  Nancy bit her lip instead of answering. She had just thought of one other suspect: Chip.

  7

  A Hopeless Case?

  Nancy thought about her new idea as she climbed back up the steep hill. Could Chip possibly be the apple bandit?

  George’s mom said she chased Chip around for half an hour, she thought uncertainly. Is that enough time? Could Chip eat or hide that many apples in half an hour? And still have time to drag away the baskets?

  She didn’t think so. But she couldn’t be sure. Chip loved to hide the rolled-up socks when Hannah did the laundry.

  Nancy decided not to say anything to her friends yet. If they didn’t find the real apple bandit soon, she would mention it.

  “Now what?” George asked as she reached the top of the hill, panting.

  “Snack time?” Bess asked hopefully. “I really want to try that apple soup I saw at the food stand. . . .”

  “Not yet,” Nancy said. “First I want to talk to the pony workers. Whoever took those apples would either have to cross the stream and climb up, or climb down from here. Maybe they saw something suspicious last night or this morning.”

  “Good point.” George nodded.

  They walked over to the pony pen. Marcie was taking a break, leaning on the fence near the hay pile while the other teenage girls led the ponies.

  “Hi,” Marcie said when Nancy and her friends came over. “Did you guys come back for another ride?”

  “Not exactly.” Nancy took a deep breath. “Did you hear about the missing apples?”

  “The what?” The older girl looked confused.

  Nancy and her friends quickly explained about the hiding place down the hill. Then they told her what Mr. Helmer had said earlier, and about their own search for clues.

  “Wow!” Marcie said when they were finished. She glanced toward the drop-off. “I didn’t even know there was anything hidden down there in the first place.”

  “So you didn’t see anyone climbing down there last night?” Nancy asked. “Or early this morning, maybe?”

  Marcie shrugged. “The only ones I’ve seen climb down there are you guys.” She laughed. “I thought you were nuts when I saw you doing that earlier! I didn’t realize you were trying to solve a mystery.”

  Nancy nodded. “Um, are you sure you didn’t see anyone else?”

  “Nobody.” Marcie shook her head. “We left last night pretty soon after you guys did. We got here early this morning to feed and water the ponies and clean up the pen. But there was nobody around then.”

  “Okay.” Nancy sighed, disappointed. “Thanks anyway.”

  “Good luck with your mystery.” The older girl waved and headed back to work.

  Nancy and her friends walked back down the hill to the main part of the festival. “This is a tough one,” Nancy admitted. “We don’t really have any clues at all. There are no good suspects, and nobody saw anything suspicious. . . .”

  “It’s like those apples just disappeared into thin air,” Bess said.

  “Or into a raccoon’s stomach,” George added. “I still think that’s probably what happened. The raccoons might have dragged away the baskets, too.”

  “Maybe,” Nancy said. But she didn’t really believe George’s theory. She had a hunch that something else was behind the missing apples. But what?

  “So what do we do now?” George asked. “We already looked for clues and wrote down all the suspects. What more can we do?”

  “Maybe we should just think about it for a while,” Bess suggested hopefully. “You know—while we get some snacks and walk around the festival and stuff.”

  “I guess we might as well try to have fun.” Nancy bit her lower lip. “I can’t think of anything else to do to solve this case. Well, except to watch out for anything suspicious.”

  “We can do that,” Bess said. “Now come on, let’s go have fun!”

  For the next two hours, Nancy did her best to enjoy herself. She joined her friends in tasting some delicious apple fritters and cider. Then they all went on a hayride, explored a maze made out of hay bales, picked themselves a bushel of fresh apples right off the trees in the orchard, and even went dunking for apples in a barrel of cider. There were lots of people at the festival enjoying the sunny fall day, and the girls ran into several people they knew from school.

  The three friends were just finishing up a tasty lunch of hot dogs and apple juice when they heard a loud cheer erupt from over by the farmhouse.

  “What’s going on over there?” Bess wondered.

  “Oh!” George glanced at her watch. “It must be the finals for the applesauce-eating contest. They’re supposed to be starting right now. I saw it on the information board this morning.”

  “Let’s go watch,” Bess said. “I want to see if that skinny kid who won my heat wins the whole thing.”

  The girls hurried over and found spots with a good view of the front of the farmhouse. The long table was still set up on the porch. This time about a dozen people of all ages were seated behind it, from young kids to adults. The skinny kid from Bess’s heat was right in the middle.

  “All right, bring out the applesauce!” Mr. Helmer was saying into the microphone. “Let the games begin!”

  Orchard workers appeared with their loaded trays. But Nancy was barely paying attention as the contest began, even though Bess and George were shouting and cheering beside her. She was too busy thinking about the mystery.

  It just seems impossible to solve, she thought. Could Mrs. Cherry really be mad enough at Mr. Helmer to want to ruin his festival? It seems kind of crazy. Plus I don’t think she could climb up or down that
steep hill with her bad leg.

  Next she thought about the teenage boys. They had seemed pretty angry about being kicked out of the festival.

  But would they really sneak in here last night and do something so mean? she wondered. I guess it’s possible. Maybe they fed all the apples to the ponies and then threw away the baskets. But how did they know where the apples were hidden in the first place?

  She sighed, staring at the contestants on the porch. They were all still busy shoveling applesauce into their mouths.

  I wish Marcie and the other pony workers had stayed overnight with the ponies, she thought. Maybe then they would have seen or heard something. Especially since whoever did it probably climbed down rather than up—that would be a lot easier since the hill was so muddy and slippery. Of course, it would still be awfully hard to climb down there in the dark. . . .

  She noticed a teenage boy standing nearby, cheering loudly for one of the applesauce eaters. But when she looked more closely at him, she realized it wasn’t one of the suspects. That made sense, since Mr. Helmer had kicked them out.

  Maybe we should try to find them, though, Nancy thought. If we could figure out where they live, we could go and check them out. If they’re the culprits, their shoes might still be muddy, unless they stopped to rinse them off in the ponies’ tub or something. . . .

  She was distracted by a sudden extraloud cheer. Then Mr. Helmer’s voice came over the microphone.

  “We have a winner!” he cried. He walked over to the skinny red-haired boy. “Congratulations, young man!”

  “Wow!” Bess exclaimed. “Now I don’t feel so bad—he even beat the grown-ups!”

  Mr. Helmer had the boy stand up and take a bow. “Thank you, thank you!” the kid said happily. “So do I get my prize now? I’m hungry!”

  The audience laughed. But Mr. Helmer looked upset.

  “I’m sorry, son,” he said. “I know I promised you a bushel of River Heights Reds. Unfortunately the apples seem to have disappeared sometime last night, so I’m afraid I won’t be able to—”