The Case of the Missing Moose Read online

  Milo couldn’t hold in his excitement. Jazz must have written the letter last night—just after the mascot disappeared.

  Olivia’s mysterious behavior. Strange marks by the lake. The missing moose . . .

  It was all starting to make sense! Well, almost all. And he had a plan that just might work. With Jazz’s help, there was a chance he could still get the blue team’s mascot back and win the color war.

  But he had to hurry.

  Quickly, he scrawled a note to Jazz. Then he rushed to the camp post office, where a counselor from the girls’ camp was picking up the mail.

  Milo pressed the note into her hand. “Please, can you make sure my friend gets this right away?” he pleaded.

  He heard a guffaw behind him. Tony—who else?

  “Aw! A love letter. Isn’t that sweet?”

  Milo ignored him. For once, he couldn’t care less about Tony’s teasing. All he cared about was reaching Jazz.

  The counselor smiled down at him. “I’ll do my best.”

  As he left, Milo glanced at the clock. Less than three hours before the bonfire! What if Jazz didn’t get the note in time? What if his plan fell through?

  He thought of Dash’s lesson and groaned. If only he’d been writing to Jazz all along. What a dope he’d been!

  The hours ticked by slowly. By the time everyone gathered at the fire pit, Milo’s stomach was in knots.

  The two teams sat across from each other. They waved their flags and cheered till they were hoarse.

  Tony marched up and down triumphantly, waving the red team’s cardboard mascot. It was supposed to be a fox, but Milo thought it looked more like a kitten with a toilet brush for a tail.

  Frankie stood up. “Since the blue team’s mascot mysteriously vanished,” he said, “the counselors have decided to award both mascots equal points.”

  Boos and grumbles came from the red team. The blue team clapped half-heartedly.

  Milo jumped to his feet. “NO!”

  Everybody stared at him.

  “Our mascot is way better than theirs,” Milo protested.

  “Oh, yeah?” Tony taunted loudly. “Well, let’s see it, then!”

  Milo crossed his fingers.

  Jazz, please don’t let me down. . . .

  Aloud, he just said, “Follow me.”

  Buzzing with curiosity, the campers and the counselors streamed after him down to the lake.

  Wendell trotted up next to Milo. “You’re going to make the real lake moose come out of the lake! Right? Right?”

  Milo stared out at the empty lake without answering.

  Boys began to murmur restlessly. Tony sneered, “That’s your mascot, huh? A big fat nothing!”

  “Milo wouldn’t bring us all down here for nothing,” Gabe said loyally.

  Then Wendell called out, “Look!”

  A dark shape was moving across the lake. Slowly, it came toward them, closer and closer.

  “It’s the lake moose!” Wendell cried.

  Then somebody else shouted, “No! It’s a canoe!”

  Two figures paddled the canoe to shore. It scraped against the rocks, and the person in front hopped out.

  “Jazz!” Milo yelled. “You made it!”

  She grinned at him. “We made it.” Then she turned and pulled a tarp off the large thing in the middle of the canoe.

  “Our mascot!” Gabe shouted.

  But Milo wasn’t looking at the mascot. He was looking past it.

  Climbing out of the canoe and sloshing forward to face Tony was . . .

  Milo stared.

  Another Tony?

  Milo gaped from one Tony to the other. Same red cap. Same pointy nose. Then the Tony who had come in the canoe took off his cap and shook out his long hair.

  Milo blinked. Her hair.

  The second Tony was a girl!

  “This is Olivia,” Jazz said. She turned to Tony. “And you must be her twin brother. She’s told me a lot about you.”

  Twins, Milo thought. Of course!

  Tony scowled at Olivia. “What are you doing here?”

  “We came to bring the mascot back,” she answered.

  Dan folded his arms. “And how, exactly, did the blue team’s mascot end up at the girls’ camp?”

  Olivia looked down. “I . . . I stole it.”

  “You?” Gabe exclaimed. “How? Why?”

  “Tony made me do it!” Olivia cried.

  A strangled sound from Tony interrupted her. “That’s not—”

  Dan silenced Tony with a look. “Go on, Olivia.”

  “Tony said if I didn’t steal the moose, he’d tell all the girls I didn’t go to camp last year because I wet my bed.”

  A couple of boys snickered.

  She turned pink. “It isn’t true! I didn’t go because I was too shy.”

  Jazz put an arm around her friend.

  Olivia went on. “A little before dark last night, I paddled over—”

  “Alone?” Dan asked.

  She nodded.

  The counselors traded horrified looks, while the boys said, “Wow!” and “Cool!”

  Wendell’s jaw hung open. “Weren’t you scared of the lake moose?”

  Olivia shook her head. “I don’t believe that old story.”

  “But it’s real! I saw its tracks!”

  “Those weren’t lake moose tracks,” Milo told him. “Olivia’s canoe made those marks when she pulled it ashore.” He looked at Jazz. “I guessed it when I saw the yellow paint that had scraped off the underside. The Big Banana, right?”

  Jazz nodded. “I showed Olivia the note you wrote me about what you suspected. She broke down and admitted everything.” Jazz grinned at him. “She was amazed that you figured it out.”

  Milo said, “But there was one thing I couldn’t figure out—how Tony could be at the sunset relays and down at the lake at the same time.” He turned to Olivia. “But it was you Wendell caught on video last night. He thought you were Tony—and I made the same mistake.”

  “Tony knew everyone would notice a girl in the boys’ camp,” Olivia said. “So he told me to tuck my hair under my cap for a disguise.”

  “She’s lying!” Tony burst out. “She made it all up to get me into trouble.” He stared hard at Olivia. “Didn’t you?”

  Olivia shrank under her twin’s glare. She shot a nervous look at Jazz.

  Before Jazz could say anything, Wendell spoke up. “You can’t scare Olivia!” he said. “She’s brave. She crossed the lake alone! At night!”

  Olivia seemed to grow taller.

  “I’m telling the truth,” she said. “And I can prove it. I’ve got Tony’s letters.”

  Something clicked in Milo’s brain. That’s why Tony was always at the camp post office. He was writing to Olivia!

  Tony’s face was as red as his cap. And for once, he had nothing to say.

  Dan had been whispering with the other counselors. Now he stepped forward and cleared his throat.

  “Well,” he said. “Adding in the points for the blue team’s excellent mascot—”

  “Go, Milo!” Gabe called out.

  Dan went on, “And subtracting points from the red team for Tony’s cheating—”

  The red team booed.

  “The winner of this year’s color war is . . . the blue team!”

  The blue team burst into cheers. Glowering, Tony tore off his cap and flung it on the ground. Then he snatched it up and stormed away.

  Dan turned to the girls. “I’ll have to call your counselors to come and get you. I’m guessing they won’t be too pleased.”

  “I’ll explain that it was all my fault,” Olivia promised Jazz. She looked at Milo. “I’m sorry about taking your mascot.”

  “I’m just glad we got it back,” he said. “I hope you won’t get in a lot of trouble.”

  Olivia glanced off in the direction her brother had gone, and she smiled a little. “That’s okay. It’s worth it.”

  Milo asked Dan, “While the girls are w
aiting to be picked up, can they come to the bonfire?”

  Dan rubbed his chin. “Well . . . I don’t see why not.”

  Wendell was still gazing at Olivia. “I’ll toast you a marshmallow!” he said. “I’ll even let you try out my camcorder.”

  Milo grinned at him. “You don’t want to stay and watch for the lake moose?”

  “Lake moose?” Wendell said vaguely as he left with Olivia. “What lake moose?”

  When everyone was gone, Milo turned to Jazz. “Thanks for your help.”

  She smiled. “No problem, partner. That was pretty good detective work.”

  “I could have solved it faster,” he said, “if I’d only known Tony had a twin sister at the girls’ camp. . . .”

  Jazz raised an eyebrow. “I could have told you that—if you’d written to me sooner.”

  “Next time I will,” he promised. “Dash is right—nothing’s more important than communicating with your partner!”

  Jazz looked puzzled. “Dash said that? When? You didn’t get a lesson and not tell me, did you? Milo?”

  But Milo only half heard her. He was staring over her shoulder, out at the lake.

  For an instant, he’d seen something pop out of the water. Something big, with sharp, flashing teeth. He was sure of it.

  Well, almost sure. . . .

  A few days after Milo and Jazz wrote to Dash Marlowe, a letter arrived in the mail. . . .

  Greetings, Milo and Jazz,

  Congratulations on solving another case! It’s great you learned early in your detecting career how important it is to communicate with your partner. (I’m talking to you, Milo.) Things can really go wrong when detectives are in two different places, as I learned during The Case of the Two-Timing Travelers. Don’t remind me to tell you about that one!

  Happy Sleuthing!

  —Dash Marlowe

  Warm Up!

  Here are some Brain Stretchers to work those mental muscles. (But if you make like a tree and get stumped, the answers are at the end of this letter.)

  1. Two eggs are put in the same pot of water at the very same time. One takes 40 minutes to hard-boil, while the other takes only 15 minutes. Why?

  2. A certain five-letter word becomes shorter when you add two letters to it. What is the word?

  3. How was a man who had never seen his own face able to draw a picture that looked exactly like himself?

  4. Three large people try to crowd under one small umbrella, but nobody gets wet. How is this possible?

  Spot the Difference!

  Twins can be tricky. Take Jill and Joy and Brad and Bart, below. Each pair of twins looks just alike—but if you use your detective skills and observe closely, you’ll find seven differences between them!

  Mail Call: A Logic Puzzle

  Three ex-robbers loved getting mail when they were in prison. But what was each guy’s favorite and least favorite kind of mail? Look at the clues and fill in the answer box where you can. Then read the clues again to find the answer.

  1. The ex-robber who dreamed of faraway places was not Rocky.

  2. Louie loved Valentine’s Day cards, especially from his mom.

  3. The robber who couldn’t stand Valentine’s Day was head over heels for lessons by mail.

  4. Louie hated to get travel advertising unless it was for somewhere he didn’t want to go, like Guam.

  5. Rocky thought hearts were stupid.

  The Message: A Mini-Mystery

  Here’s the story of a victim who tried very hard to communicate—and almost failed.

  Dan Lee, the senior partner at Kannalla, Long, and Lee, called me to his office. He seemed groggy and very upset. Working late the night before, he had been drugged and his cash box was stolen. He was found the next day slumped over his computer, unable to remember what had happened but sure that his attacker had been someone he knew.

  Luckily, Lee had left one clue. Before he passed out

  he had typed something on his computer: Iqhhqooq. The police said it was nonsense and meant nothing. “But it does mean something,” Lee told me. “I was trying to type a message—I know it!” I looked at the computer keyboard and smiled. “Of course it means something,” I said. “You typed the name of the man who drugged and robbed you.”

  So how did I draw that conclusion—and solve the mystery?

  Headline Howlers: A Communication Puzzle

  Talk about a failure to communicate! The headlines below (from actual newspapers!) can be read in two totally different ways. See if you can figure out both what the headline was supposed to mean and the funny meaning that sneaked in by accident.

  1. POLICE FOUND SAFE UNDER BED

  2. COW INJURES FARMER WITH AX

  3. KIDS MAKE NUTRITIOUS SNACKS

  4. HOSPITALS ARE SUED BY 7 FOOT DOCTORS

  5. DEALERS WILL HEAR CAR TALK AT NOON

  6. STOLEN PAINTING FOUND BY TREE

  Collect Milo & Jazz’s first five mysteries!

  The Case of the Stinky Socks

  Booklist, starred review

  Book Links’ Best New Books for the Classroom

  Detective duo Milo and Jazz have to find the sock thief—before the big game!

  The Case of the Poisoned Pig

  Can Milo and Jazz catch the mysterious pig poisoner? “Highly recommended.” —Midwest Book Review

  The Case of the Haunted Haunted House

  Milo and Jazz must find out if their class’s “haunted house” is really haunted!“Builds up to an exciting finish.” —Mysterious Reviews

  The Case of the Amazing Zelda

  Is the pet psychic truly as amazing as she seems? Milo and Jazz are on the case! “Fun page-turner.” —Library Media Connection

  The Case the July 4th Jinx

  Is the fair jinxed . . . or is it a case of sabotage? “Excellent summer reading.” —Midwest Book Review

  COMING SOON

  Book 7: The Case of the Purple Pool

  And more mysteries from your favorite detectives (in training)!

  Be sure to check out www.kanepress.com for other series from The Kane Press.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Lewis B. Montgomery is the pen name of a writer whose favorite authors include CSL, EBW, and LMM. Those initials are a clue—but there’s another clue, too. Can you figure out their names?

  Besides writing the Milo & Jazz mysteries, LBM enjoys eating spicy Thai noodles and blueberry ice cream, riding a bike, and reading. Not all at the same time, of course. At least, not anymore. But that’s another story. . . .

  ABOUT THE ILLUSTRATOR

  Amy Wummer has illustrated more than 50 children’s books. She uses pencils, watercolors, and ink—but not the invisible kind.

  Amy and her husband, who is also an artist, live in Pennsylvania . . . in a mysterious old house which has a secret hidden room in the basement!