The Potato Chip Puzzles: The Puzzling World of Winston Breen (8 page)

Winston nodded. Big kid, born to play sports.

“He told me once about getting revenge on his older brother. They don’t get along too well. Mark wedged a bottle under the wheel of his brother’s car, nice and tight. His brother started the car, tried to back up, and blam. Instant flat tire. He says next time his brother picks on him, he’s giving him
four
flat tires.”

“Or maybe we drove over some broken glass and that’s that,” Mal said.

Jake shrugged. “Maybe. But I think that popping sound we heard was the bottle breaking.”

“So who put it there?” asked Winston. “One of the kids on that math teacher’s team?”

He made the mistake of saying this as they neared Mr. Garvey’s car. Mr. Garvey had just gotten the spare tire into place and was screwing the lug nuts back on. He craned his head around. “What math teacher? You mean Mr. Denham?”

There was an uncomfortable pause, then Winston said, “We think someone might have given us the flat tire.”

Mr. Garvey sat up a little straighter and clenched the lugwrench in his fist. His eyes widened. “Denham,” he growled. “He knows I’m out to beat him. Would he do that? Would he really do that?”

“I don’t know,” Winston said quickly. “It could have been somebody else, too.”

“We just can’t figure out how they did it,” Mal said.

“Come on,” Jake said. “How hard is it to pop a bottle under somebody’s tire?”

“We were all standing right there,” Mal reminded him. “We would have noticed if somebody started crawling around under the car.”

Mr. Garvey lowered the car from the jack and made sure the lug nuts were nice and tight. “Boys, get in,” he said while he did this. “We’ll have to worry about this later. Right now, we don’t have proof that
anybody
gave us this flat tire. That means it’s up to us to make up all the time we lost. This could be a real setback, but it won’t be because we won’t let it. Right?”

The boys stared at him.

“I said,
right
?”

Oh, that wasn’t a rhetorical question. Now the boys all hastily agreed: “Right, absolutely.” But Winston wondered how they could possibly catch up.

 

Mr. Garvey wasn’t driving
recklessly,
exactly, but he was going fast enough that Winston checked his seat belt a couple of times. Winston could see the teacher’s expression in the rearview mirror, and it was one of grim determination. They might not catch the other teams, but it wouldn’t be because Mr. Garvey was afraid to exceed the speed limit.

After a few minutes of driving in silence, Jake turned on the mini computer. “Teedly-teedly-tee!” it said.

“Can I see that thing?” Winston said. Jake handed it to him.

Winston turned the computer around in his hands, examining it. Incredible, when you thought about it. Dmitri Simon must have spent a small fortune having these things made up. You couldn’t just go into a store and buy special puzzle hunt computers.

As Jake had said, there were six numbered buttons on the screen. Right now all but the first of these was useless. A seventh button said STATUS. Winston pushed this. The device mulled it over for a few moments and then informed him, “Please check back later.” Okay, then.

He called up the information about the space museum. Winston had been there a few times—on field trips with school, mostly. He wondered if the puzzle would be right where they could see it, or if they would have to hunt around for it. He wished there was
something
about that puzzle here, something they could begin thinking about. But other than the map and the instructions about how to get in free, there was nothing but the input box for when they had the answer. Glancing up at Mr. Garvey—who probably wouldn’t approve of him fooling around like this—he moved the cursor into the answer box and typed in a made-up word: GLOHONKIN. He hit Enter. The device once again thought for a moment or two and then responded with, “That is not the right answer.” Big surprise.

Winston turned off the computer. “I wish I’d brought a puzzle book for the travel time,” he said.

“You’ll have all the puzzles you can handle in just a while,” Mr. Garvey said. “Don’t tire out your brain.”

Mal said, “Winston’s brain doesn’t get tired. It’s scary. I don’t know how he turns it off long enough to sleep.”

“Well, look on the floor,” Mr. Garvey said. “You might find a math book down there. I’m sure that’ll have something puzzly in it.”

Winston felt around under his seat and, sure enough, came up with an old workbook with various math and number games in it. He flipped through it until he came to something interesting.

 

 

The museum was doing brisk business now that school was out, and the parking lot was crowded. They parked and made their way inside. Mr. Garvey took the computer from Mal and showed it to the woman at the box office. Bored, she waved them in. She was used to this by now—a whole bunch of teams had already arrived, of course.

The four of them walked through the turnstiles, continued another few paces, and stopped.

“Where are we going?” asked Jake.

“Good question,” said Mr. Garvey, looking around. “Does this thing give any instructions on what to do when we get here?” He turned on the computer.

“It didn’t say anything,” Winston said.

Mr. Garvey pressed buttons on the computer, confirmed that Winston was correct, and made a frustrated grunting sound. They stood there, looking for anything that might be helpful. There were lots of interactive exhibits and a model of the solar system hanging from the ceiling.

“Maybe we should split up and try to find what we’re looking for,” Winston suggested.

Mr. Garvey shook his head. “Maybe later, if we really get stuck. I want to stay together for now. I don’t want to lose any more time trying to locate lost kids.”

So they wandered around. The problem was, the puzzle might be anywhere. A multimillionaire who had manufactured special handheld computers could do just about anything he wanted. Dmitri Simon might have had the museum alter one of its exhibits. Perhaps one of the interactive displays had been reprogrammed in some way? They peeked into all of them—“Fly a Rocket!” and “What Is a Moon Rock Made Of ?” and “Gravity on Other Planets.” Nothing jumped out at them as being particularly puzzlelike.

They had been searching fruitlessly for a good ten or fifteen minutes when Jake said, “Hey, look there!”

They whirled around just in time to see the Brookville Brains walking briskly toward the exit. They were easily the most identifiable team, with their blue baseball hats and shirts. They must have found the puzzle and solved it, and they were already moving on to the next location. Winston felt a thrum of frustration course through him. First the flat tire, and now they couldn’t find the first puzzle. Yet other teams were barreling on ahead!

“Come on,” said Mr. Garvey, grimly.

The four of them hustled over to where that other team had just been. The puzzle had to be around here somewhere, right? But this part of the museum looked the same as the rest. Again they stood there, bewildered and helpless, bloodhounds unable to pick up a scent.

“Where did those guys come from?” said Jake. “They came from this direction, right?”

Winston pointed generally. “Yeah. From somewhere over here.”

They walked a few paces, trying to retrace the path of that other team, but it was impossible. They could have come from anywhere.

Winston turned in a slow circle, trying to figure it out. And then suddenly he was almost knocked over. He looked up to see Brendan Root and his team brushing by them.

“Hey, Winston! Fun, isn’t it?” Brendan said, looking back at him as he jogged away. Winston was too stunned to reply.

Brendan’s teacher looked as excited as a kid. Mr. Lester, that was his name. He jumped as he walked and pointed urgently toward the exit, as if his team wasn’t already heading there. “Come on, guys. Let’s go!” he said. He definitely had Mr. Garvey’s competitive spirit. Brendan waved at Winston again and then sped up to join his team.

They watched them round the corner. “I told you he was going to be tough,” said Jake.

“Do you know them?” said Mr. Garvey.

“We met that one kid back at the factory.”

Mal looked around. “So where did they come from? Did anyone see?” No one did. “This is starting to not be funny,” he said.

“Maybe we can run and ask them where the puzzle is,” said Jake.

Mr. Garvey laughed. “They’re not going to help us.”

“Why not?”

“Would you lend a helping hand to your competition?”

Jake looked on the spot. “I wouldn’t tell them the answer, but I might tell them where the puzzle could be found. I mean, if they were really stuck.”

Mr. Garvey shook his head. He patted Jake on the shoulder like a game-show host consoling a foolish contestant. “That’s very admirable,” he said. “You stick close to me, Jake, so I can stop you from doing things like that.”

Jake looked like he had something to say in response to this, but then a voice from behind them said, “Have you found it yet?”

They turned around yet again. This time, one of the Greater Oaks girls was standing there, watching them. She cocked her head. “You’re part of the potato chip thing, right?” she said. “Have you found the puzzle in here?”

Winston shook his head. “No, we haven’t. Have you?”

She shrugged, with an ironic little smile. “If we had, I wouldn’t be asking you about it. Do you want to look together?”

All three boys looked to Mr. Garvey. Winston guessed he would have strong feelings about joining up with other teams.

The math teacher cleared his throat. To Winston’s surprise, he said, “Well, I guess the more eyes, the merrier, right? Where’s the rest of your team, young lady?”

She waved generally. “We split up. They’re all around here somewhere. Where are you guys from?”

They began to walk, and there were introductions all around. The girl was Bethany Seymour. Winston was more than a little aware of how pretty she was, with her shining brown eyes and long, straight hair. He found himself simultaneously trying to walk next to her and
not
walk next to her, and cursed himself for his awkwardness.

Mr. Garvey said as they continued to look around the planetarium, “You’re from Greater Oaks, is that right? That’s rather far away.”

“Yeah, it was a long drive to get here,” said Bethany. “And then getting from the potato chip factory to here, Miss Norris made a wrong turn and we wound up somewhere with railroad tracks and a garbage dump. It took forever.”

“Miss Norris is your teacher?”

“Yeah, my English teacher. There she is, right there.”

Indeed, the nervous woman with the thick sproing of curly red hair was marching over to them. She wore a wide-eyed expression that may as well have been a sign reading, I AM FRAZZLED.

“Bethany,” she said, voice shaking with agitation, “where did you go?”

“We said we were all going to split up, remember?”

“But I said to stay close by! Didn’t I?”

“I’m right
here,
” Bethany said, rolling her eyes.

“Where are the others?”

“I don’t know. They’re somewhere. They didn’t leave.”

Mr. Garvey jumped in. “Miss Norris, is it?” She looked at him, startled. “I’m Greg Garvey. I’m the math teacher at Walter Fredericks Junior High in Glenville. These are my boys.”

Miss Norris recovered. “Nice to meet you. I don’t suppose you know where the puzzle is?”

“No, I’m afraid not. But this young lady suggested we all look together, which sounds like a fine idea.”

So they started moving again. “Where have you looked already?” Miss Norris said.

Jake said, “All over.”

Mal said, “Those machines around the corner there . . . all that interactive stuff.”

“Oh,” said Miss Norris. “It didn’t occur to me that the puzzle might be in there.”

“That’s for the best,” said Mr. Garvey, “since it wasn’t.”

“Well, we already looked around this part,” said Bethany, waving to the exhibits around them. They stood by a gigantic replica of a lunar exchange module. “Where else is there to go in this place?”

“Bethany! Miss Norris!” A voice called out, and a girl came running toward them. She was wearing a floaty pale-blue dress and sandals that flapped loudly. “We found it!”

“Giselle! Where?”

Giselle came up short when she saw Winston and his team standing there. “Uh,” she said.

Miss Norris understood why she had turned mute. “It’s okay, Giselle. We’re all looking together. Right?”