The Professor and the Puzzle Read online

  “Got it!” Iris exclaimed in triumph as the door popped open.

  “Shhh!” I warned. I thought I heard the sound of footsteps in the distance. Even though Iris was the president’s daughter, I couldn’t be sure we wouldn’t be tossed out on our ears if we were caught snooping around inside the security office.

  “Oh, sorry,” Iris said, ducking her head. “Got it!” she whispered.

  I rolled my eyes. “You know, Iris—the thing about being a spy is, you don’t want people to notice you!”

  Iris glanced down at her outfit, which today consisted of an attention-grabbing yellow-sequined A-line dress, making her look like the world’s most glamorous hazard sign. Beautiful, but not exactly subtle. “Oh, don’t be such a worrywart, Drew. If someone catches us, I’ll just distract them with my irresistible charms and then you can bop them on the head with a vase or something! Isn’t that what you people do?”

  “There will be no bopping of heads, Iris!” I whispered, exasperated. “Now get inside before someone sees us!”

  The security office was a small, claustrophobic room cluttered with shelves of humming, blinking electronic equipment. The floor was littered with cables snaking from one end of the room to the other, where they converged onto a sleeping computer on an old desk. I quickly took a seat at the desk and tapped at the keyboard until the screen came to life. Lucky for me, the computer wasn’t password protected, so within a few minutes I was deep into the surveillance video files, searching for the right one.

  “Here it is!” I said. “The day of the gala. If we check the recordings for both the front and back doors of the mansion, we should be able to see every person who entered and exited the building that day. The person who sabotaged the balcony would have to be one of those people!” Iris pulled up a chair next to me, and we both perched at the edge of our seats and fast-forwarded through the videos, pausing only when a figure appeared in the video. Most of the people to appear were catering staff carrying in food and supplies for the gala—I felt comfortable eliminating those people as suspects. Other than me and the girls, the only people who came into the building were a couple of professors—Dr. Brown and one of the adjuncts—who Iris said had come to supervise the setup of the guest seating.

  “They do it every year,” Iris added. “Whoever gets the two short straws has to do the job.”

  I nodded, but frustration was building in my chest again. “There’s still a bit more video left to watch,” I said, and we continued fast-forwarding. “Wait!” I said as a dark blur flashed on the screen. I clicked back a few minutes, and sure enough, a figure in a blue hoodie emerged into view. As I clicked forward by the second, the figure moved closer to the camera. Finally, the person looked up at the camera, and in that one frame, I could see his face. A face I recognized.

  “Mr. Wilcox!” I exclaimed. “It’s that boy from Dr. Stone’s philosophy class! The one who was kicked out with his buddy while we were there. He’s certainly got motive. And now it looks like he’s got the opportunity as well.”

  Iris nodded. “Caught him red-handed,” she said with a grin.

  “Well, not quite,” I said. “The mere fact that he entered the building doesn’t prove anything. We need to catch him in the act. But how?”

  We both sat in thoughtful silence for a moment. “Wait a second,” Iris said. “What about that note you pinched from his pocket? We never did figure out if it was just homework—or something more.”

  “Gosh, you’re right!” I exclaimed, rummaging through my bag. “With everything else happening, I’d completely forgotten about it! Aha—here it is.” I unfolded the crumpled paper and looked again at the Greek writing. “Hmm, I wonder if this computer has Internet.” With a few clicks, I’d found a translation website and began carefully transcribing the English translation of each word onto the paper.

  “What does it say?” Iris asked when I was done.

  “Well,” I replied, “it’s certainly not homework. It says: ‘Meet me in the professor’s office. Tuesday at eight.’ ”

  Iris’s eyes widened. “That’s tonight!”

  I refolded the paper and placed it back in my bag. “They could be trying to make another move in Dr. Stone’s office. I have to go. It might be my only chance to catch them in the act and prove their guilt!”

  Iris searched my face. “You’re doing this alone, aren’t you?”

  I nodded. She must have seen that determination in my eyes. “As much as I’d love you to be there, Iris, I think I have a better chance of success if I’m by myself.”

  “Okay, but you better keep your phone with you. Don’t be a hero, Drew!”

  “I won’t,” I promised. “Just don’t say anything to anyone yet. Until I know for sure that our hunch is correct, we don’t want to start making accusations.”

  “Roger,” Iris agreed, saluting.

  After putting the computer back to sleep and locking the door behind us, Iris and I snuck back up to the main level of the mansion. “Well, I’ve got to run to my last class,” Iris said breezily. “Good luck, Sherlock!” She turned away, but then paused and looked back at me. “Seriously, though,” she added, her voice laced with tension. “Be careful, okay?”

  “Don’t worry,” I replied. As I watched her go, I inwardly hoped that I had sounded more confident than I felt.

  It was already dark by the time I found myself standing in front of the classics building once again. I shivered as I looked up at Dr. Stone’s darkened office window, thinking about how close I’d been to falling out of it. The thought of falling made me think of Bash—I wondered how he was doing. He must not have regained consciousness yet, or else I would have heard about it. I made a mental note to ask Iris about him once I got back to the mansion.

  I checked my watch: seven forty-five p.m. I wanted to get inside and find a good hiding place in Dr. Stone’s office before the boys showed up. I started toward the front door but was startled when a figure suddenly arose from the bushes. “Oh!” I exclaimed.

  It was Dr. Brown. He looked about as startled as I was, with a couple of leaves and twigs stuck in his hair. “Nancy!” he said. “My goodness, we just keep running into each other, don’t we?”

  I felt my face redden. “Um, yes, I guess we do,” I answered. Somehow, he looked just as handsome littered with shrubbery as he did normally. Apparently I had a weakness for bookish types! Thank goodness my boyfriend Ned couldn’t see me now. “Did you lose something in the bushes?” I guessed.

  “Actually, yes,” Dr. Brown said. “My dictation machine!” He held up a small recording device, which looked a bit dirty and scuffed. “I noticed it was gone this morning and I’ve been frantic all day! I have all my notes for lectures recorded on it. Luckily, I found it right here in the bushes. Must have fallen out of my bag on the way to class.”

  “That is lucky,” I agreed. Realizing that I needed to get inside quickly, I bade Dr. Brown good night.

  “Good night, my dear,” Dr. Brown replied. “Be careful out there!”

  He walked briskly away, and I walked up to the door. Well, I thought as I entered. Here goes nothing.

  CHAPTER TEN

  On Truth

  A FEW MINUTES LATER I stood before Dr. Stone’s office door—again—hoping both that it would be unlocked and that this would be the last time I’d have to visit it. I reached out to grasp the doorknob when suddenly the door flew open of its own accord.

  “Nancy!” Dr. Stone said when she saw me. She was wearing a khaki overcoat and carrying all her bags. She was obviously on her way out, and from the way her things were hastily thrown together, it looked like she was in a hurry. “What are you doing here?”

  I froze, woefully unprepared for the possibility that she would still be here. Her last class ended hours ago! Why does my target have to be such a workaholic? “I—well,” I stammered, my mind racing. “I came to apologize. For yesterday. I’m sorry for upsetting you. That was never my intention.”

  Dr. Stone’s eyes s
oftened a little. “Well, that’s very kind of you, Nancy. But I’m afraid I can’t linger—I’ve just received an e-mail from someone in the next town over. They’ve found Sophocles!”

  My mouth dropped open. “Really? Are they sure it’s him?”

  Dr. Stone gave me a sidelong look. “How many African gray parrots do you know who can speak fluent Greek?”

  “Not many.”

  “We’re meeting up in the parking lot of the Cornucopia Supermarket in half an hour. It’ll be so good to finally have him home!” She smiled, her eyes sparkling with excitement. “Anyway, I’m sorry to have disappointed you, Nancy. No thrilling kidnapping scheme this time.” The professor pulled out a fist-size bunch of keys, locked the door, and bustled off down the hall and out of sight.

  I stared at the locked door and muttered a curse. Dr. Stone had poked yet another hole in my theory with her story of Sophocles’s imminent homecoming. If I was wrong about him being taken by the culprit, what else was I wrong about?

  My existential crisis was interrupted by the sound of two voices. Male voices. And they were coming my way. I needed to hide before the rest of my plan went up in smoke! I jiggled the knob of the janitor’s closet next to Dr. Stone’s office, but it was locked too. The office to the left? Also locked. The voices were getting louder. I had to move, fast! Desperate, I ran to the opposite side of the hallway and tried that office door—and miracle of miracles, it opened. I glanced at the nameplate before dashing inside—it was Dr. Brown’s office.

  I closed the door almost all the way, keeping it open just a crack so I could have enough light to get an idea of my surroundings. Unlike Dr. Stone’s pristine working space, Dr. Brown’s office was a jumble of papers, textbooks, scholarly journals, and half-empty cups of coffee. The only orderly thing in the room was the wall behind his desk, where the professor’s various degrees and certificates of excellence were artfully hung. Before I could make any further observations, I heard footsteps approaching and peeked cautiously out the door.

  Sure enough, it was the guys from Dr. Stone’s class, right on time. I pulled out my phone and fumbled with it in the dark, trying to get it to start recording. I needed proof, after all.

  “I still can’t believe that old crone took away our phones in front of everybody. She’s got a lot of nerve,” said the blond boy, Wilcox.

  “Someone should really bring her down a notch,” said the other boy. It wasn’t easy to look menacing with freckles, but this kid did his best. I wondered what kind of sabotage they were going to try next—I had to catch them in the act.

  I waited for them to turn to Dr. Stone’s office and try the knob, but instead they turned the other way, right toward me!

  I scrambled back from the door and shuffled, on all fours, across the carpet before diving underneath Dr. Brown’s desk. And not a second too soon. A moment after I’d pulled myself into the darkest corner of the desk, the office lights flicked on. They were inside.

  But why? I thought in confusion. Why are they coming in here?

  To my horror, they were approaching the desk where I was hiding. I pulled myself as far into the dark recesses as possible, willing myself to be invisible and trying not to breathe. Had they seen me? Had I been caught?

  But no. It seemed that Wilcox and Rogers were searching for something—and that something wasn’t a nosy detective. “Where did Dr. Brown say he would leave them?” Wilcox asked.

  “He said he put them in his desk for safekeeping,” Rogers answered. “But then again, he is supposed to be here, I mean he’s always here at this time. And he told me he would hand them off tonight when we talked this morning. I wonder where he is?”

  “Who knows? Anyway, he left his door unlocked, so maybe he meant for us to just come in and find them ourselves.” After rummaging through a couple of the desk drawers, Rogers opened the long middle drawer right above my head. As he did so, I heard a soft peeling sound, after which an object fell right into my lap. I froze, thinking that the sound would cause Rogers to search under the desk for the source—but luckily, he was distracted by whatever they’d found in the drawer.

  “Here they are!” Rogers said. “Man, look at all these texts I got.”

  “Yeah, and about two hundred e-mails,” Wilcox added. “Dr. Brown is the best! I knew running all those little errands for him before the gala would pay off. As soon as Dr. Stone took our phones away, I was sure I could count on him to get them back for us. I scratch his back, he scratches mine.”

  “C’mon, let’s get out of here,” Rogers said, moving back toward the door. “I’ve got so much to catch up on.”

  A few seconds later the lights were switched off and I heard the door click shut.

  In the darkness, I banged my fist against the floor in frustration. That was it? The mysterious meeting was just so they could retrieve their cell phones from Dr. Brown’s office? I found it odd that the strict Dr. Stone would agree to allow their phones to be returned earlier than she planned, but Dr. Brown must have managed it somehow. The man seemed to have a knack for ingratiating himself with people—whether it be with charisma, charm, or even a little favor like this one. It was quite a skill.

  And as for my incriminating footage of Wilcox sneaking into the mansion in his hoodie hours before the gala—that was a bust too. He’d just been running innocuous errands for Dr. Brown, and probably wearing the hoodie because of the bad weather, not because he was trying to hide something. Another dead end.

  After turning off the video on my own phone, I switched on the flashlight feature and crawled back out from under the desk. The object that had fallen into my lap turned out to be a file folder full of papers—not surprising, given the general disorganization of Dr. Brown’s office. I stood up and set the folder on the desk next to a vase of yellow flowers. They smelled so sweet and pungent; I thought they must have been delivered very recently.

  A card lay next to the vase, and, my curiosity getting the best of me, I decided to take a peek. Could it be from a secret admirer? I was certain the professor must have plenty of those. Turns out, it was from an admirer, but not the kind I’d imagined.

  Dear Fletcher, the card read. I thought a little color would brighten up your day—hope you like them. I hardly need to tell you how excited all the editors here at Prometheus are about your paper “The Lost Truth.” New discoveries with lost texts are so rare, and so we expect a big response to your paper in our publication! That said, we were hoping to have it in hand first thing Monday, but we haven’t seen anything from you yet. If we still are looking to include it in next month’s issue of the journal, we will need it ASAP. Here’s hoping you’ll be sending it over soon! All best, Ellen Underwood, Senior Editor.

  I set the card back on the desk, my body tingling all over. Pieces of this puzzle were finally falling into place.

  The lost truth. The answer to this mystery had been staring me right in the face this whole time, but until now, I just hadn’t seen it. But knowing it wasn’t enough—I needed proof. But how could I expect it to just fall into my lap?

  Unless it already had.

  I snatched the file folder back up from the desk where I’d set it. Each of the four sides sported a strip of masking tape. That was the peeling sound I’d heard when Rogers opened the drawer! I thought. The folder hadn’t been stuffed inside the drawer and gotten stuck—it had been taped to the bottom of it.

  The question was: Why would you tape a folder underneath your desk, unless it was something you didn’t want anyone to find?

  Inside the folder, I found a long typewritten paper, covered in handwritten notes and comments. It told me everything I needed to know.

  I looked at my watch—half an hour had already passed since I stood at Dr. Stone’s door. Stuffing the file folder into my bag, I dashed out of the office and the building, taking a shortcut through the open field to the parking lot where I’d left my car. As I threw myself into the driver’s seat, stepped on the gas, and sped off down the road out of campus, I
hoped that I wasn’t already too late.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Too Close to the Sun

  THERE WASN’T A SINGLE OTHER car in sight as I careened down the dark country road. The silent, still world all around me felt at odds with the alarm bells going off inside my head. The parking lot where Dr. Stone had told me she was going to pick up Sophocles was only a mile away now. I should get there in time. . . .

  But then the unthinkable happened.

  My car ran out of gas.

  “No, no, no, no, NO!” I cried as the engine sputtered and died. I leaped out of the car, scanning the horizon for signs of life. But if there was a gas station nearby, I couldn’t see it. And anyway, I didn’t have time for that. There was only one thing to do.

  Run.

  I took off down the road, shining my phone’s flashlight ahead so I could see where I was going. With my bag thumping rhythmically against my back, I sprinted around twisty turns and under thick canopies of trees, where the buzzing of cicadas was almost deafening. After a few minutes, my legs and lungs were screaming at me to stop, but I kept on going. After cresting a hill, I could see the store in the distance, a long, low building with a large parking lot out front. A few streetlamps lit up the lot, which was empty save for a single car.

  No, scratch that. There was something else in the parking lot. Something small. I squinted at the thing, which only came into focus once I got a little closer. It was a cage. And something was moving inside.

  Sophocles!

  Someone was getting out of the car now. Someone wearing a very familiar khaki overcoat. Dr. Stone, leaving her car door wide open, ran toward the cage and knelt down beside it. If I had been nearer, I might have heard her cooing at her bird, telling him how much she missed him and how happy she was to see him. But I was still a hundred yards away, and despite my desperate prayers to Hermes to let me borrow his winged shoes, I was slowing down.