“My dad’s on the way down to meet with him. It’s getting serious.” Mo swallowed. “I’m afraid he…I’m just afraid.”
“Let’s go.”
Skipping the details, they told Da they were headed downtown with Mr. Wren. Da gave Mo an appreciative wink. Mercedes flung open the door, then stopped abruptly.
“What the…”
A bucket brimming with roses sat in the middle of the porch. Red roses, white roses, roses the pink of a baby girl’s blanket. A trail of scattered petals, like Hansel and Gretel’s bread crumbs, led down the front walk and out into the street.
The porch across the street stood empty. But the lace curtain at the front window twitched.
“Rose bubble bath. Rose roses. I guess…” Mo remembered Mrs. Steinbott leaning over her porch railing, yearning to hear that Mercedes had appreciated the bubble bath. “She really did,” Mo had promised. Not to say lied.
That lace curtain quivered. “I guess she thinks you like roses, Merce.”
“Once again proving she doesn’t know the first thing about me! Roses make me sneeze.”
The scent of those roses was a fragrant river. Lift one to your nose and it flooded you, swept you right off your feet. Mo held one out. “Smell! It’s heaven!”
But Mercedes’s ridiculously sensitive nose accordioned up, her eyes shut down, her shoulders heaved, and out flew a deafening sneeze.
On the Case
MR. WREN DROVE ALONG the shore of Lake Erie, beneath a sky heavy with clouds. Far out on the water, whitecaps rolled and broke. Any other time, it would have looked like rain, but this summer, rain was an impossible dream.
He took the long way round, careful not to pass the water-main project. They parked on a side street, in front of a shoe store with a GOING OUT OF BUSINESS sign in the window. Next door was a restaurant plastered with FOR RENT signs. Peering in, you could see tables still set with plates and silverware and plastic flowers in vases.
“Cool,” said Dottie, flattening her nose against the glass. “A ghost restaurant.”
A scrap of paper blew against Mo’s legs.
In the lobby of the building, the elevator wore an OUT OF ORDER sign, so they climbed three flights of stairs. UCKMAN AND BUCKMA read the peeling sign on the door. As they entered, a young woman with a worried, bunched-up face looked up from her desk.
“Mr. Wren, right?”
Mr. Wren grinned his movie-star grin, and Mo could see he was flattered. “How’d you guess?”
“If you ask me,” Mercedes muttered, looking around, “they don’t exactly get hordes of customers up here.”
“Mr. Buckman Senior is expecting you.” The secretary bit her bottom lip. “In fact, I better tell him right this minute that you’re-”
The door behind her swung open, and a large belly barreled out. Behind it came a man with a broad red face, wearing a tie the yellow of caution tape.
“Mr. Wren! Bob Buckman!” He grabbed Mo’s father’s hand and pumped it up and down. “I apologize for my assistant keeping you waiting!”
The secretary reddened. “I’m sorry, I-”
“It’s so hard to get good help these days.” Buckman said this to Mr. Wren as if it were a great joke.
Mr. Wren frowned. “We just got here.”
At the “we,” Mr. Buckman noticed the girls for the first time. He swung back around to his secretary.
“Take good care of these children while we confer.” He gestured toward his inner office. “This way, please!”
Mr. Wren threw Mo an inquiring look, but when she gave him the thumbs-up, he and Mr. Buckman disappeared through the door, which shut behind them with an emphatic click.
The secretary pulled open a drawer and produced a bag of peppermint patties. “He’s mean,” said Dottie, helping herself. “You’re nice.”
Mercedes paced up and down the room-approximately seven paces each way. The carpet was worn, as if lots of people had paced here.
“If you don’t mind my asking,” she said to the secretary, “are there really two of them?”
The woman smiled for the first time, showing dimples in both cheeks.
“They’re clones, only Junior’s even stingier. Whoops, did I say that?”
Mo looked out the window, whose sill was speckled with pigeon poop. The clouds still hung heavy and dark.
“And what’s their business again?” Mercedes kept her voice cool, as if these were just idle questions to while away this boring time they had to wait
“Developers. They buy and sell. Or, as Mr. B Senior likes to say, they turn things around.” She chewed her lip. “Or upside down. Or inside out.”
Dottie helped herself to two more chocolates. “He’s mean. You’re nice.”
The secretary unwrapped a patty for herself. “No comment,” she said.
“Why do you think he’s so interested in a little house on Fox Street?” Mercedes went on.
“It’s not so little,” Mo couldn’t help saying.
The secretary gnawed her bottom lip. Lipstick and chocolate flecked her teeth. “That’s confidential information.”
The phone rang.
“Yes, Mr. Buckman,” said the secretary. “No, Mr. Buckman…today? This afternoon? But you specifically said the deadline was…Yes, yes, I mean no, no…”
Mercedes halted in front of the desk. Time was short. Mr. Wren might be out any minute. She raised her chin, doing her steeple imitation.
“It doesn’t make sense that they’re so eager to buy the Wrens’ house,” she said as soon as the secretary hung up. Her voice was low and calm. Here at last, the Mercedes Mo knew! Loyal. Courageous. Smarter than nine out of ten grown-ups. Mo’s ancient love for her friend came rushing back. “I get the feeling something shady’s going on. But you don’t seem like a shady person to me.”
The secretary looked insulted, then pleased, then confused. “I just work here. Do you have any idea how hard jobs are to find?”
Mercedes clasped her hands to her chest. She nodded toward Mo and Dottie.
“They’re motherless,” she said, and now that calm, cool voice trembled. “A tragedy. They’re half orphans.”
“Shoot,” said the secretary, her face filling with pity. Hey, Mo wanted to burst out. No need to feel sorry for us! Hey! We’re perfectly fine! Hold your tears! But Mercedes shot her a look that made her bite her tongue.
“The way it works, B and B acquire homes at market prices. They develop properties that generate much- needed tax income for municipalities.” The secretary gave Mo an apologetic look. “But don’t worry, they only pursue eminent domain as a last resort.”
“Domain? What’s that?” demanded Mercedes.
“Whoever has domain over something owns it.” She tried to straighten a pile of papers. “In certain extreme situations, the city can exercise ownership over private property.”
