_____________

FROM THE CASE OF THE COUNTERFEIT COIN:

 I heard the phone ringing at the other end. If that gabby Mrs. Ray picked up the receiver, I might be a dead duck before I could get through to Brains.

 But the breaks were with me. It was Brains who answered.

 “Brains! Out there in the yard!” I gabbed. “Someone’s sneaking around! Spying on me! They’re out to get me! You’ve got to do something, I tell you!”

 “Relax, Operative Three’” Brains said. “Try to calm down and give me the facts.”

 “Calm down?” I yelled. “That’s easy for you to say! You’re not being shadowed. Nobody’s sneaking around your house with a gun, trying to finish you off.”

 Brains suddenly sounded anxious. “Did you see anyone with a gun?”

 “Well, no,” sputtered. “But I just know he’s armed and is waiting to finish me off. I’m getting out of here before he breaks in.”

 “Don’t leave the house,” cautioned Brains. “This prowler may be the man behind the counterfeiting scheme. He realizes that you may be an important witness in the case. He may be there to eliminate you.”

 Eliminate me? What a thing to say at a time like this!

 “Now listen,” Brains said urgently. “I’ve just evolved an excellent plan of operations. That tool shed in the back yard of your house, at the end of the driveway, is it locked?”

 “No!” I said. “But if you think I’m going to risk my life to sneak out there and hide—”

 Brains cut me off. “Jimmy, I think we’ve got a chance to trap the prowler!”

 I’d just as soon try to trap an atom bomb! My stomach was in knots just at the thought of it.

 “Leave it all up to me,” Brains was saying excitedly. “Just stay where you are. Keep the light on and pretend to be studying. Act nonchalant. I’ll be over in a matter of minutes.”

 “For Pete’s sake, hurry!” I blurted. “And Brains—if I’m dead when you get here...”

 “Oh, don’t be an idiot,” he snapped.

 There was a click and the line went dead.

 I hung up. Believe me, if I could have crawled through that phone to Brains’ house and safety, I would have done it.

Back in the living room, I got hold of myself. Act nonchalant, Brains had said. All right, I’d try it his way. But I couldn’t keep my eyes away from the window. I kept sneaking looks out into the fog, trying to spot the intruder.

 But when I did, was I sorry! He was hiding behind the hedge and staring right down my throat with a big pair of binoculars! I ducked away and hugged the wall. Brother!

 I sat down and stared into my math book, but my mind was racing like mad.

 What was that prowler doing out there in the fog? Was he closing in?  Where was Brains?

 Maybe I shouldn’t wait for Brains. Maybe I ought to call the police.

 It was right about then that I heard the back door close. I came out of my chair like a bouncing ball.

 This was it! Somebody had come through the back door into the kitchen.

 Well, that did it!

 No big gorilla could barge into my house just like that. I grabbed a small vase from the piano. It wasn’t much, but it would have to do. I gripped it by the neck and tiptoed down the hall.

 Yes! I could hear somebody moving around in the kitchen. The big thug was preparing to ambush me. I hefted the vase. This could be my finish, but I’d go down fighting.

 I shoved through the kitchen door ready for a battle royal. When I saw who was there I nearly collapsed...

  _____________

FROM THE CASE OF THE STOLEN DUMMY:

 We rode for some time before we finally came to the old woods road leading to Boiling Pond. We ditched our bikes. It was so dark in the woods you could taste it.

 “I don’t see any sense in groping around where you can’t see anything,” I said.

 “Criminals sometimes return to the scene of the crime, especially if they’ve hidden something close by,” Brains said.

 In the blackness we somehow got all turned around and we lost our way. We never got to the pond. After pushing through the woods for what seemed like hours, we came out of a clump of bushes and onto a graveled road.  It had hardly been used since the new highway went through. It was the old road to Lake Carmine. I saw something loom up out of the mist ahead and suddenly knew where we were. It was exactly where I didn’t want to be. My teeth started rattling.

 Brains recognized the old chimney, too. It was all that was left of what my folks had told me was the old Gault house.  There’d been a murder committed there and it had burned down over ten years ago. The ruins were partly hidden by weeds and small bushes.

 “I’ve got butterflies doing barrel rolls in my stomach,” I told Brains.

 My heart was beating like bongo drums and I felt as if something was following us.

 Even Brains got chicken. “I’d prefer looking this place over in daylight if it becomes necessary,” he said. “It is a little too foggy for reconnoitering tonight. We’d better postpone our investigation until—”

 Then we heard it.

 It was like a strong wind coming up quick and roaring through the branches overhead. It stopped, and then started again. We flattened out at the side of the road.

 “A plane somewhere overhead,” Brains whispered. “They sound that way on a quiet night. The engines fade out, then become loud again.”

The sound came again. It lasted for only about two seconds. I was sure it didn’t come from overhead. Nor from the woods. It seemed to come from under the ground.

 Brains got up. “Come on, Operative Three. We haven’t got the right to be detectives if we let every noise we hear scare us.”

 “You kiddin’, Brains? You mean you’re going nearer to that house?”

 Yes. There must be an explanation.”

 “Maybe. But I don’t want to find out after I’m dead.”

 We crept nearer. There was a high bank along the edge of the road and we stuck close to it. Our feet sank into soft sand, which made the going quieter. The gravel in the center of the road crunched with every step. 

We were almost opposite the ruins when we came to a big pile of old lumber and broken farm machinery heaped against the bank. Brains started around it and I was right behind him.

 Then, before I could stop, something sticking out of that junk-pile caught on my jacket and clattered on the road. In the stillness it made an awful racket. I stood there, not breathing, not moving, not anything!

 “What are you trying to do, wake the dead?” Brains hissed at me. Leave it to good old X to say the right thing at the right time.

 “Don’t you think this far enough?” I whispered.

 It sure was. I hadn’t taken another step when the terrible sound split through the night. It was an agonizing groan that sent our skin crawling and glued our feet to the ground.

 I never heard anything like it. If we’d been in Ireland I’d swear it was a banshee. It was like a soul in torment and the horrible sound lowered and fell like a March wind.

 I got going first. Brains didn’t catch up with me until half a mile later. Creeps!

_____________

FROM THE CASE OF THE ROVING ROLLS:

 There was a faint light inside the plane. Then we saw one of the window curtains pushed slowly, carefully back, and a man’s face appeared in the window. It wasn’t Uncle Ed, either. It was a man wearing a fez. He also had one of the fiercest pair of mustaches I’d ever seen.

 “What do we do now? That guy’s spying on us. He thinks we’re spying on him.”

 Brains didn’t answer, just kept his eyes glued on Mr. Fez.

 “Let’s get out of here.  We’ll wait for Uncle Ed outside.”

 I started to back away. Brains grabbed my arm.

 “I think we should investigate further,” he said.

 Oh no, I thought to myself. Not again, Brains. I didn’t know what that man was doing on that plane, and I didn’t have any desire to find out. Apparently, Brains did.

 “Here’s what we’ll do, Operative Three. We’ll sneak underneath the belly of this plane and make our way back to the tail. We can go up that ladder, creep across the catwalk until we’re right over the door of the plane. Then we’ll see if we can hear anything.”

 Creeps!

 “But why, Operative X? Maybe that man has a perfect right to be in that plane.”

 “And maybe he’s a Kassabeban spy. Maybe he’s in there sabotaging the plane.”

 Brains was already moving toward the ladder. There was nothing for me to do but follow, unless I wanted to stay there alone. I surely didn’t want to do that. I like crowds at a time like this. Even if it’s only a crowd of two.

 Brains started up the ladder at the tail of the plane, climbing slowly, step by step. I followed. We reached the catwalk and started moving forward on it. It swayed just enough for the butterflies in my stomach to start revving up.

 We reached the spot directly over the open door. We listened. At first we didn’t hear a thing. Then we heard conversation. Very low at first, but getting louder. Whoever was talking was making his way to the front of the plane. In a moment, we could hear two voices quite plainly. There were two men. They were directly beneath us, not more than five feet away.

 We couldn’t make out what they were saying, though. They were talking in a foreign language—Arabic, I guess.

 Next thing we knew, one of the men—the man with the fez, came out of the plane. He stood on the platform just outside the door. He turned around to say something else.

 I held my breath. If he looked up, he’d surely see us.

 He looked up.

 A burst of angry words came from Mr. Fez. He shook his fist at us. Then he shouted to someone inside the plane.

 Brains and I turned around on that catwalk and started for the rear of the plane as fast as we could go. The catwalk really swayed now as we scrambled along it.

 We could hear shouting.  The two men had left the plane and were running along side it toward the rear, trying to head us off.

 We slid down the ladder, our feet just scraping the steps. I started running for the exit. I could hear Brains pounding along right behind me. We were outdistancing our pursuers. I was beginning to feel a little easier when, Wham! I tripped over a cable. I went into a dive and hit the concrete floor. When I stopped skidding, my head was resting on a pair of feet...

_____________

FROM THE CASE OF THE WALTZING MOUSE:

 “We are on a mission of mercy, Operative Three,” he said. “We must make certain the professor is safe. Come.”

 Well, I followed him, still wondering where that spider had gone. Where there’s a spider web, there’s got to be a spider, I insisted. I had the spider web; parts of it were still clinging to my hair. I just hoped the spider had vamoosed.

 We crept through the woods toward the professor’s house. When we came to the edge of the clearing surrounding the cottage, Brains dropped down on his hands and knees.  I did the same.

 The cottage was all lighted up. We could hear the professor singing away at the top of his voice. Now and then the sound was punctuated by a bark from Oscar.

 “He’s okay,” I whispered,” Let’s get out of here.”

 “Not yet. Let’s stay a while.”

 I could hear my heart pounding. I could hear weird noises coming from every side. That woods was full of noises. Not loud ones, but muffled, strange, scary ones.

 How long we stayed there, I don’t want to think about. Seemed like hours to me. I was tingling and itching all over. I felt there must be a million crawling things that had decided my body was a summer camp. I decided that Brains or no Brains, I was getting out of there. I reached out my hand to touch his shoulder. 

“Shsssh,” he hissed at me.

 Then I heard it, too. Somewhere behind us, I heard a twig snap, then another. We were just off the path that led down to the professor’s dock. We were well concealed.

 More twigs snapped. Someone—or something—was coming up that path. If it was an animal, it was a big one. Lake Carmine wild life, I knew, was generally medium- to small-sized.

 One of my hands grasped Brains’ shoulder. I could hear his breath coming in short, excited gasps. He wasn’t any calmer than I was. Just as cared, too, I bet.

 I could hear frogs croaking. There were creeps and beeps from other nocturnal wild life. From off down the lake came the eerie screech of an owl.  A mosquito whined in my ear.

 Brains pulled me closer to him. I saw him staring toward the path. I looked, too.

 A man stood at the edge of the clearing. His body was outlined in the moonlight, his face was in shadow. He just stood there motionless...

_____________

FROM THE CASE OF THE PAINTED DRAGON:

I ducked up the alley that led to the garage at the back of the house. Many years ago, the rooms over that garage had been used as servants' quarters. But now Brains' parents allowed him to use the space for himself.

Most kids might have turned those rooms into a rumpus room or maybe a private gymnasium. But Brains had used them to build a secret research laboratory -- with equipment that would make your eyes pop.

Very few people ever saw the inside of that lab. I was one of the lucky ones who did, because it had become the headquarters for the Benton and Carson International Detective Agency.

Back of the garage, I hid my bike under the tangled bushes that screened the wall on the north end. A quick look at the windows of the main house told me that I hadn't been spotted by Mrs. Ray, the Bentons' housekeeper. With the coast clear, I crouched down against the garage wall and counted along the row of nails on the bottom.

You had to find the right one. Only the third nail on the fourth board would do the trick. I found it and pushed hard with my thumb.

From out of nowhere came a mysterious whisper. "Your name and business?" I'd heard the muffled voice from that hidden loudspeaker a thousand times, but it always gave me gooseflesh.

"Operative Three reporting," I hissed into a masked microphone. "On official business."

In front of me a hidden panel silently slid open. I stepped inside. Behind me the panel slid shut. Ahead in the dark I could see the glow of a blue light. A faint humming should told me the secret staircase had unfolded and was locked in place. As I climbed upward, the humming note changed to a whine and I knew the staircase was folding up right behind me.

When I hit the upper landing I felt a small plate give beneath the pressure of my foot. Suddenly another panel swung open before me. I was in the secret laboratory!

Man! You never saw anything like it.

There were shelves crowded with transformers, resistors, amplifiers, and almost every other kind of electronic equipment. You could look around and see enough power tools to run a small factory. Along the walls were racks of test tubes, vials, and bottles. A small printing press, a telescope, a tape recorder -- you name it, Brains had it!