The Case of the Amazing Zelda Read online

  by Lewis B. Montgomery

  illustrated by Amy Wummer

  The KANE PRESS

  New York

  Text copyright © 2009 by Lewis B. Montgomery

  Illustrations copyright © 2009 by Amy Wummer

  Super Sleuthing Strategies illustrations copyright © 2009 by Kane Press, Inc.

  Super Sleuthing Strategies illustrations by Nadia DiMattia

  All rights reserved. No part of this book 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, without permission in writing from the publisher. For information regarding permission, contact the publisher through its website: www.kanepress.com.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Montgomery, Lewis B.

  The case of the Amazing Zelda / by Lewis B. Montgomery ; illustrated by Amy Wummer.

  p. cm. — (The Milo & Jazz mysteries ; 4)

  Summary: Detectives-in-training Milo and Jazz investigate whether their town’s new pet psychic is a fraud.

  ISBN 978-1-57565-296-2 (pbk.) — ISBN 978-1-57565-298-6 (library binding)

  [1. Mystery and detective stories. 2. Psychics—Fiction. 3. Pets—Fiction.]

  I. Wummer, Amy, ill. II. Title.

  PZ7.M7682Crf 2009

  [Fic]—dc22

  2008050212

  ISBN 978-1-57565-361-7 (e-book)

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  First published in the United States of America in 2009 by Kane Press, Inc.

  Printed in Hong Kong

  Book Design: Edward Miller

  The Milo & Jazz Mysteries is a registered trademark of Kane Press, Inc.

  www.kanepress.com

  eISBN: 978-1-5756-5361-7 (pdf)

  eISBN: 978-1-5756-5740-0 (ePub)

  eISBN: 978-1-5756-5662-5 (mobi)

  For the amazing Reagan, Gwen, and Skyler

  —L.B.M.

  Milo squeezed the rubber lizard. Squeak! Its tongue shot out. He let go, and the lizard’s tongue rolled up again.

  Squeak! Roll. Squeak! Roll. Squeak—

  “Milo!”

  His friend Jazz stood watching him.

  Quickly, he jammed the lizard on the nearest shelf. “Uh . . . I was just . . .”

  “What do you think of this?” Jazz held up a yellow ball. “It comes in purple, too. Maybe Bitsy would like purple better?”

  Bitsy was Jazz’s pet potbellied pig. When Bitsy got her name, she was an itsy-bitsy piglet who kept finding ways to get in great big trouble.

  Now she was bigger, but still causing trouble. Yesterday she’d snitched a tuna sandwich from the table, knocked over a potted plant, and tried to gobble up a tube of lip gloss. That was why Jazz had asked Milo to go with her to Perki Pets.

  “That pig has all the luck,” Milo said. “When I do something bad, my mom doesn’t buy me a toy.”

  Jazz laughed. “Well, the vet said we should keep her busy. Pigs only get into trouble when they’re bored.”

  Milo sighed. He knew how Bitsy felt. Summer vacation had just started, and already he was struggling to think of stuff to do. If only they had a new case!

  Milo and Jazz were detectives in training. With a little help by mail from world-famous private eye Dash Marlowe, they solved real-life mysteries.

  Jazz decided on the purple ball, and they went up to pay for it.

  At the counter, a lady was telling Mr. Perki all about her cat troubles while the other customers tapped their feet and checked their watches. Milo and Jazz got in line behind a tall girl holding an exercise wheel.

  “Hi, guys!” said a voice behind them. It was Spencer, a boy from their class. Milo stared at the big, brightly colored parrot perched on Spencer’s wrist.

  “Wow! Is that yours?” Milo asked.

  Spencer’s face broke into a wide grin. “My dad said if I got a good report card, I could have a pet. So I picked Floyd.”

  Floyd stared at Milo out of one round eye. Then, suddenly, the parrot let out a loud screeeech. Milo jumped.

  “Does your parrot talk?” Jazz asked.

  Spencer’s grin faded. “Not exactly.”

  “You mean, only a word or two?”

  “No,” he admitted. “Nothing. I’ve tried everything: ‘Hello.’ ‘Goodbye.’ ‘Floyd want a cracker?’ Not a peep.”

  “Once I met a parrot just like that,” Mr. Perki said as he rang up the exercise wheel for the girl ahead of them. “I said, ‘Want a cracker?’ Didn’t answer. So I said a little louder, ‘Want a cracker?’ Still no answer.”

  “What did you do?” Milo asked.

  “I gave up.” Mr. Perki spread his arms. “I turned away. And then the parrot said—” His voice squawked. “‘Are you crazy? Birds can’t talk!’”

  The kids laughed.

  “Maybe it’s okay that Floyd won’t talk,” Milo told Spencer. “At least he doesn’t call you crazy.”

  Spencer shook his head. “I don’t care. I want a talking parrot.”

  Jazz paid Mr. Perki for the ball and took her change. “What does your vet say?” she asked Spencer.

  “She just says to keep on trying.”

  “I guess that’s all you can do, huh?” Milo said as they headed for the door.

  “That’s what I thought,” Spencer said. “But now I’ve got a better plan.”

  “Really? What?” asked Milo.

  Spencer stopped short. “I’m taking Floyd to see the Amazing Zelda.”

  “The Amazing Zelda?” Milo asked.

  Spencer pointed to a sign by the door: THE AMAZING ZELDA—PET PSYCHIC.

  Jazz lifted an eyebrow. “Pet psychic?”

  “Yeah! Lucky I saw that, huh?” Spencer said. “Now I can find out why Floyd won’t learn to talk.”

  Milo reached out to touch Floyd’s bright feathers.

  “Ow! He pecked me!” Milo stuck his finger in his mouth.

  Spencer smoothed the parrot’s wings. “You must have scared him.”

  Floyd opened his beak and bobbed his head. He looked as if he were laughing.

  “It’s almost noon now,” Spencer said. “Want to come with me?”

  Jazz said, “You don’t really believe this Zelda can tell you what Floyd is thinking, do you?”

  “Why not?”

  “Well . . . I mean . . . he’s a bird.”

  Spencer looked puzzled. “So, you think it would be easier to read a dog’s mind? Or a gerbil’s?”

  “Forget it.” Jazz smiled. “Actually, I’m kind of curious. Let’s go see this Amazing Zelda.”

  Milo’s finger hurt. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know what Floyd was thinking.

  But reading pets’ minds did sound cool. Maybe he could learn to do it, too. That could be a big help on a case. Like, say a burglar broke into a house when nobody was home—except the cat. . . .

  When they reached the park, a handful of kids with pets were waiting at the fountain. Most had cats and dogs. One boy held a goldfish bowl.

  “Where’s Zelda?” Milo asked.

  “Maybe she’ll pop up in a puff of smoke,” Jazz said.

  Spencer pointed. “Look! It’s her!”

  An older girl walked toward the fountain. She wore a long, flowing robe and had a red scarf wound around her head.

  As she came closer, Milo saw that she had big, dark, spooky eyes.

  The girl stood by the edge of the fountain and arranged her robe around her. Then, in a low voice, she spoke.

  “I am the Amazing Zelda.”

  A hush fell.

  Finally, a boy with a kitten piped up, “Can you really talk to animals?”

  “I read their minds
. I sense their needs, their wants, their hopes and fears,” Zelda said. “It may come to me as a feeling, or a picture of something they’ve seen. . . .”

  Jazz whispered, “I hope Floyd hasn’t seen Spencer in his underwear!”

  Zelda looked around at the pet owners. “Who will be first to test my powers?”

  Everyone eyed each other nervously. Nobody answered. Then a younger girl stepped up. She held a mouse in her open palm.

  “This is Coco,” the girl said.

  Zelda gazed at the mouse. “I sense you are having a problem with Coco.”

  The girl looked impressed. “That’s true! I can’t get her to come when I call.”

  She placed the mouse on the ground, then stepped back.

  “Coco!” she called. “Coco!”

  The mouse sat where she had put it, busily licking its brown fur.

  “See?” the girl said.

  Zelda picked up the mouse. Gently, she touched its head. The mouse looked up at her with bright, beady eyes.

  “Mmm. Mm-hmm.” Zelda nodded.

  “What is it?” the girl asked.

  “It’s simple,” Zelda said. “She won’t come when you call ‘Coco,’ because she doesn’t like that name.”

  “She doesn’t?”

  Zelda shook her head.

  Jazz elbowed Milo. “Give me a break!” she whispered.

  The girl looked at Zelda, baffled. “Well, then, what am I supposed to call her?”

  “She says she likes . . . Annabelle.”

  “Annabelle?”

  Zelda set the mouse back down. “See for yourself.”

  “I guess it’s worth a try,” the girl said. Squatting, she called softly, “Annabelle! Come, Annabelle!”

  The mouse’s nose lifted. Its whiskers twitched.

  Then it ran straight to the girl’s open hand and scampered up her arm.

  Wow! Milo thought. Zelda was right!

  All the kids around Zelda went Ooh and Ahh.

  Spencer said, “Did you see that, Floyd?”

  Zelda took a dollar from the smiling girl and tucked it in her robe. “Who’s next?”

  The boy with the goldfish stepped up. Shyly, he said, “This is Spot.”

  Placing her hand on the goldfish bowl, Zelda closed her eyes. Milo realized they were lined with dark makeup.

  “I sense a bad feeling,” she intoned. “Spot is feeling . . . jealous.”

  “Jealous?” the boy asked. “Why?”

  Zelda’s eyes snapped open. “Maybe someone else is getting more attention. Another . . . pet?”

  The boy shook his head.

  Quickly Zelda added, “Or something like a pet. Maybe a little kid?”

  “My baby sister!”

  The growing crowd murmured.

  The boy wrapped his arms around the fishbowl. “Don’t worry, Spot. You’re still my favorite.”

  Now the other kids pushed forward.

  “Zelda, how come my dog—”

  “Zelda, I want to know—”

  “Zelda, my kitty—”

  The Amazing Zelda flung up a hand. “SILENCE!”

  Pressing her fingers to her forehead, she said, “One of the pets here wants to communicate with me. A pet named . . .” She looked at the parrot perched on Spencer’s wrist. “Floyd.”

  Milo’s jaw dropped. Holy cow. How did she do it?

  Spencer looked excited. “You know his name!”

  The other kids oohed and ahhed again.

  “The Amazing Zelda senses all,” Zelda replied.

  Spencer said, “Can you ask him—”

  Zelda raised her hand. “Floyd has already told me. You are here because you want to know why he won’t talk.”

  Wide-eyed, Spencer nodded.

  Zelda tilted her head as if listening. Floyd cocked his head back at her.

  Finally Zelda said, “He’s bored.”

  “Bored?” Spencer said. “But he has lots of toys. And we keep his cage in the living room, so he won’t feel left out.”

  “Well . . .” Zelda paused. “He says that’s good, but you’re not always there.”

  “Yeah, but then I put on his favorite movie, The Pirate’s Parrot. It’s the one with—”

  “Always the same movie?”

  Spencer nodded.

  “Maybe that’s why he’s bored,” Zelda said. “He must be tired of the same old thing.”

  “But Floyd loves The Pirate’s Parrot. If I turn on something else, he squawks.”

  “Let me try again.” Frowning, Zelda laid her hand on Floyd’s head. She took a deep breath. “Ahh . . . it’s growing clearer.”

  Spencer leaned forward. “What? What is he telling you?”

  “Floyd does love that movie,” Zelda said. “In fact, he loves it so much that he wants to be a pirate’s parrot too.”

  Spencer stared at her. “But . . . but he’s my parrot!”

  Zelda shrugged. “Then maybe you should be a pirate.” With that, she turned away. “Next?”

  Spencer held up Floyd so they were eye-to-eye. “A pirate? Are you sure?”

  The parrot’s head bobbed.

  “Well, if that’s what you really want . . .”

  “Spencer!” Jazz said.

  He gave her a dazed look. “Oh, um . . . Listen, I’ll see you later, guys. I mean—” He deepened his voice. “Hoist the anchor, mateys. I’m shovin’ off!”

  As Milo stared after their classmate, he thought he heard Spencer ask Floyd, “How was that?”

  Milo and Jazz stayed and watched Zelda read the rest of the pets’ minds.

  A girl asked why her cat seemed so happy lately. Zelda told her the cat used to hate it when she went out. “And lately you’ve been home more, haven’t you?” Zelda asked.

  “It’s true!” The girl looked astonished.

  Zelda told a boy who wanted another dog that his old dog would love a friend. The boy walked away beaming.

  As Jazz and Milo left the park together, Milo said, “I can’t believe that Floyd wants Spencer to become a pirate!”

  Jazz rolled her eyes. “I don’t believe it. If you ask me, that Zelda doesn’t have a clue why Floyd won’t talk. So she made something up.”

  “Why would she make something up when she can read his mind?” Milo asked.

  “Maybe she can’t,” Jazz said. “Maybe some of that ‘mind-reading’ was really guessing. Like that boy who had the baby sister. First she said it was a pet.”

  Hmm. “But how did she figure out that the mouse didn’t like its name?” Milo asked. “And how could she tell so much about Floyd?”

  Jazz shook her head. “I don’t know.” Then suddenly, she smiled. “But I know these two detectives who might be able to figure it out. . . .”

  Milo grinned back at her. Their summer wouldn’t be so boring, after all. Not with a new case to solve.

  The Case of the Amazing Zelda.

  The next day, Milo was playing Slapjack with his little brother, Ethan, when the mail came.

  “Here’s a letter for you.” His mom handed him an envelope with DM in the upper left-hand corner.

  A new detective lesson from Dash Marlowe!

  As a sleuth, most of the time you watch and wait. But sometimes you need to shake the tree. Smoke out your suspect. Set a trap!

  That’s how I caught the notorious art forger Philippe Le Faux. I suspected he was painting fakes and pretending they were done by famous artists. But how to prove it?

  I decided I would ask him for a picture I was sure he didn’t have. If Philippe was innocent, he would say no. But if he was guilty, I predicted he would rush to paint a forgery and sell it to me.

  Posing as an art collector, I tested my prediction. I asked Philippe to find a long-lost picture said to have been painted by the famous artist Pablo Picasso in 1974. I told him it was called Three Birds, an Acrobat, or Possibly a Horse.

  The very next day, Philippe brought me the painting, signed and dated. “Here you are, Monsieur. I have found your painti
ng from 1974, just as you asked.”

  “It’s a fake!” I said.

  As the police dragged him away, Philippe cried, “How did you know?”

  I smiled. “Picasso died in 1973.”

  Of course, a prediction may be wrong. Until you test it, you can’t be sure!

  I learned this lesson the hard way—while hunting the safecracker Lefty Lou. I was convinced that the opera singer Lucia Sinistra was really Lefty Lou in disguise. So I leapt onstage during “her” solo and tried to tear off “her” wig.

  It wasn’t a wig.

  Stuffing the lesson in his back pocket, Milo told his mom, “I’m going to Jazz’s, okay?”

  As usual, Ethan insisted on tagging along. He was head-over-heels in love with Jazz’s pet pig, Bitsy.

  Jazz answered the door. “I’ve been expecting you,” she said.

  “You have?” Milo asked.

  Jazz nodded.

  Ethan ran inside to play with Bitsy, and Jazz came out on the porch. She stared into Milo’s eyes.

  “You came here for a reason. . . .”

  Milo’s hand went to the paper in his pocket.

  “You’ve got something to show me,” Jazz said. “Am I right?”

  “Well . . . yeah,” said Milo. “It’s our new—”

  She lifted her hand. “Don’t tell me! Let me sense it.”

  Milo frowned. What in the world was up with her? “You sound like Zelda,” he said.

  Jazz dropped her hand and grinned. “That’s the idea.”

  Huh? “You want to be a psychic, too?” he asked.

  “Of course not,” Jazz said. “I’m just showing how it’s done.”

  She explained that she had been doing some detective work—looking at websites about mind-reading.

  “It’s not so hard to fake,” she said. “You just have to act all mysterious and use a few simple tricks—like fishing.”

  “Fishing?” he asked.

  “That’s when you get people to tell you stuff without realizing it. Like suppose I say to you, ‘There’s somebody important in your life. Someone whose name starts with a T?’”