The Hunt for the Missing Spy (9 page)

“Four o'clock?” M.E. repeated before glancing behind her and to the right.

“Not
your
four o'clcok,” Cody said. “
My
four o'clock.”

M.E. scanned the area. “You mean the hot dog stand?”

Cody nodded.

“Why didn't you just say the hot dog stand?” M.E. said, shaking her head.

Cody sighed. “I wanted to use the clock code.”

“Do you guys see him?” Cody said, without turning around. She didn't want the suspect to know she was talking about him.

Luke frowned. Quinn glanced around. M.E. shrugged. Mika looked bewildered.

Cody turned to see why they weren't concerned.

The man in the hat and coat was gone.

A newspaper lay on the ground where he'd stood moments before.

Cody rushed over to the hot dog stand. The others followed.

“Did you see a man standing here a few minutes ago?” she asked the vendor.

“I see many people,” the man said, shaking his
head. “You want a hot dog?”

“No, thank you,” Cody said, disappointed to hear that the vendor didn't remember seeing the stranger. She stepped over to where the newspaper had been tossed to the ground, knelt down, and picked it up.

“What are you doing?” Quinn asked.

“He was holding this newspaper,” Cody said, unfolding it.

“Are you sure?' Quinn asked.

“Yes, I'm sure.” She felt a little irritated that the others hadn't seen the man, too. They probably thought it was her imagination, like she had thought earlier. But she hadn't imagined this newspaper. She held it up to read it.

“Kids!” Mrs. Takeda called. She was headed their way and did not look happy. “I thought I'd lost you!” she said when she reached them. “Please don't go wandering off. We need to get to the next waypoint. If you're hungry, I have some crackers in my bag, but we'll be having lunch when we get to the end of the hunt.”

Discouraged, Cody was about to toss the newspaper in a nearby trash can, when something caught her eye and she hesitated.

“Wait a second!” she called, as the others began heading toward the second waypoint. “Look at this!”

They turned around.

Cody held up the front page of the newspaper. She hadn't seen it when the paper was folded, but now that it was open, it was so obvious.

There was a hole right in the middle. It went through all of the pages.

The stranger must have torn out small circles about the size of an eyeball so he could spy on the kids while keeping his face covered.

Cody was convinced. They were being followed.

And spied on.

But why?

And by whom?

A
s they continued toward the White House, the kids kept searching for signs of the suspicious man.

“What should we do?” M.E. asked, sticking close to Cody. “Should we tell Mika's mother?”

Cody shook her head. “Not yet. We don't have any real proof. If we see him again, we'll definitely tell her. But be on the lookout. Remember, he's wearing a black baseball cap, a long khaki coat, and black athletic shoes.”

“What does he look like?' Quinn asked. “Is he short or tall? Thin or bulky? Did he have a mustache? Was he wearing glasses?”

Cody tried to envision the man. “I think he's about as tall as Luke, maybe taller.” Luke was already five feet, eight inches in height, and the tallest member of their group. “And he was on the heavier side. I never really saw much of his face so I don't know if he had a mustache or beard, and he was wearing sunglasses so I didn't see his eyes.”

“What color was his hair?” Mika asked. “Black? Brown? Blond?”

“I don't know,” Cody answered. “It was hidden under his hat.”

“I'm scared,” M.E. confessed. “What if he tries to get us? We should tell Mika's mom now before something bad happens.”

“Listen,” Luke said, “there's safety in numbers. That's why the teachers want us in groups. There's five—no, six of us, counting Mrs. Takeda—so we just have to stay together. That's the most important thing. If anyone spots the guy, use a sign to warn the others so he doesn't know we're talking about him. Then we'll tell Mrs. Takeda and see what she thinks we should do.”

“Good idea,” M.E. said. “Cody, what sign should we use?”

Cody turned to Mika. “Do you know sign language?”

Mika nodded. “I know a few Japanese signs, but not American Sign Language.”

“I'll teach you some,” Cody replied.

“First, we should give him a code name, like George Washington and his spies used,” Quinn suggested. “Washington's code name was seven-eleven. Why don't we use the same one?”

Since the other Code Busters already knew the numbers in ASL, Cody showed Mika how to count to ten using the manual alphabet as they continued walking along the mall.

“One and two are easy,” Cody said, holding up her index finger for one, and two fingers for two. “For number three, you use your thumb and two fingers.” She showed Mika the sign by holding up her thumb, index finger, and middle finger. “Four and five are also easy.” She held up four fingers, then four fingers plus the thumb for the number five.

“Now it gets tricky. For six, your thumb and pinkie touch.” Cody showed Mika by connecting the tips of her thumb and baby finger together. “For number seven, your thumb and ring finger touch. Eight, your thumb and middle finger touch, and nine, your thumb and index finger touch. Zero is just the shape of an O.”

“This is fun,” Mika said, practicing the numbers as she walked.

“I forget—what's ten?” Quinn asked, holding up the number nine. The others had been practicing their numbers as they walked.

“Shake the letter A with your thumb pointing up,” Cody explained. She demonstrated the sign.

“Then what's eleven?” M.E. asked, making the number seven with her ring finger and thumb. “We haven't learned past ten, and Washington's code name was seven-eleven.”

Cody held up her index finger and flicked it twice. “Eleven.”

While the kids practiced signing “seven-eleven,” Cody kept an eye out for the mysterious stranger,
aka code “Seven-Eleven.” By the time they reached the next waypoint, Mika had the numbers memorized, and the others could sign “seven-eleven” as fast as Cody.

“Anybody see seven-eleven?” M.E. asked when they stopped in front of the White House.

“Nope,” Cody said. “Maybe he's off spying on someone else for a change. Why would he
want
to spy on us? We're not real spies, or anything.”

“Maybe he works for the Spy Museum, and this is all part of the game to test our powers of observation,” Luke offered.

Cody shrugged. She wasn't so sure about that. It seemed like a lot of trouble for a staff member to go to.

“Come on, let's see if we can find the clue,” Quinn said, changing the subject back to the spy hunt. “We want to keep our lead.” Once again they were the first ones to arrive.

“It's supposed to be right around here somewhere,” Luke said. He waved at the area in front of the gate. Moments later he called out, “There it is!”

Luke was pointing to a coded sign similar to the one they'd found at the Washington Monument. This time the message appeared to be in some kind of number code.

Cody got out her alphanumeric decoder card to see if it might be the key and began translating the message out loud. Moments later she stopped. The decoded message seemed to be a jumble of letters that made no sense. “I don't think this is in Alphanumeric Code,” she said. She tried a couple of other codes that used numbers. Nothing worked.

“Mom,” Mika called to her mother who was standing a few feet away watching the kids. “Do you have the code key for this message too?”

Smiling mysteriously, Mrs. Takeda stepped up and withdrew another envelope from her bag. Mika grinned. “Thanks!” she said, as she took the envelope it and opened it. She pulled out a sheet of paper covered with alphabet letters and showed it to the group.

“This must be the key,” she said, holding up the grid of alphabet letters.

“Read what it says at the bottom,” M.E. said, pointing to the small print. The group huddled together to hear Mika.

“It says,
This is a version of the Confederate Code that was used during the Civil War. Look carefully. The first line shows the alphabet from A to Z. But the second line has shifted over one letter. It begins with the letter B and ends with A. Try to figure out how to crack the code and receive a hint about your next waypoint. Meanwhile, here are the coordinates to the site. Good luck!
It's signed,
E Pluribus Unum
.”

Once again, the waypoint coordinates were written in Japanese number characters.

“I've heard of
E Pluribus Unum
,” Quinn said. “Those are the words written in Latin on a penny. Mr. Pike told us it means ‘Out of many, one.'”

“And what is
that
supposed to mean?” M.E. asked, frowning.

“I think it has something to do with all the American states coming together to form one country—the United States,” Quinn said.

“Kind of like
strength in numbers
,” Luke noted.

“Okay, let's see if we can crack the code,” Cody said. “How about if we match each number to a letter, beginning with the top row.”

Code Busters' Key and Solution found on pp. 149, 156.

“The eighth letter is still an
H
,” Quinn said.

Luke wrote down the letter
H
in his Code Busters notebook.

“Now let's count over fourteen in the second row,” Cody continued. “That gives us the letter
O
.”

Luke kept writing down the letters as Cody translated them. Soon they had decoded all twenty-four letters.

Luke read the completed message he'd written down.

“What does that mean?” M.E. asked.

“Like Luke said, it means there's strength in numbers,” Quinn said. “But that's not much of a clue to our next waypoint.”