of show business, Jupe was as committed to The Team as ever.
Jupe took a tape recorder out of his desk drawer, inserted a blank cassette, and handed it to Pete with his own completed puzzle.
“You go first,” he said. “Start with the horizontal words.”
Pete glanced at the crossword before switching on the recorder. He made a disgusted sound.
“
An hour later the Three Investigators had three correct, recorded tapes packed into manila envelopes made out to the Santa Monica address printed on the leaflets. They had also included their names and addresses as mentioned in the instructions.
The sound of raindrops on the roof had stopped.
“Might as well go out and mail them,” Bob said, “before it starts pouring again.” He had taken out his contact lenses and was busy cleaning them with his special kit.
“Or we could drive into Santa Monica,” Jupe suggested, “and deliver them by hand.”
“What’s in Santa Monica?” Pete wanted to know. “Besides a lot of wet beach.”
“We could ride around for a while,” Bob told him. “Maybe stop for a pizza. Check out the action. See what shows up.” He put his lenses back into his eyes. Pete nodded. He was hungry. Jupe didn’t say anything. He had sworn off fast food. It was fattening. And he knew what would show up: girls.
Not that Jupe had anything against girls. He was as interested in them as either of his two friends. The trouble was, they didn’t seem interested in him. Especially when Bob was around.
But Jupe did want to go into Santa Monica. He wanted to scout out the address on the crossword puzzle leaflet. A sign on the door might give him some lead as to what the contest was all about. “Okay, let’s go,” he said.
“Whose car do we take?” Pete wanted to know. “The roof of my MG leaks and I haven’t had time to fix it.”
“Well, we definitely can’t take my car,” Jupiter said darkly. His Honda Civic had been totaled while the Three Investigators were working on a case. And his savings were still too meager to pay for another car.
“Ugh,” Pete groaned, “squashed in the bug again.”
Bob socked him in the arm as the three guys headed for Bob’s red Volkswagen. Jupe sat in front while Bob drove. Pete slumped in the back with his feet up on the seat. At seventeen, Pete was six foot one with legs to match. There was no way he could sit in the front of the VW without bruising his knees on the dashboard.
It was drizzling again as they drove down the Coast Highway.
“It’s abnormal,” Pete complained, looking out at the rain-washed shore.
“Yeah.” Bob knew what Pete meant. “Not like San Francisco. You expect it to rain there.” His job had taken him up there a few times. His boss, Sax Sendler, had used Bob as a roadie for groups he booked in that city.
Once in Santa Monica the Three Investigators soon found the street they were looking for in the downtown shopping area. Jupe watched the numbers go by.
“There,” he said suddenly, touching Bob’s arm. “Just up ahead where all those people.
He didn’t need to say any more. A crowd had gathered outside one of the stores on the street. Two police cars with circling lights were drawn up at the curb.
“Come on.” Jupe opened his door as Bob brought the VW to a stop.
“That’s it!” Jupe told them. “The address we’re supposed to mail our entries to. Let’s find out what’s going on.”
The three friends edged their way into the crowd. Two policemen were rattling the glass-topped door, peering inside. They were evidently preparing to break in if they saw anything suspicious.
Jupe studied the building in his usual methodical way. It was impossible to tell what the store had once sold. It didn’t sell anything now. The plate glass display windows had all been whitewashed on the inside. FOR sale signs were plastered all over them.
None of the people Jupe asked seemed to know what was happening. But he could tell one thing. If anyone had been trying to break into the shop, they hadn’t succeeded in opening the door. Maybe the burglar alarm had gone off before they could get inside.
He walked across the street to a drugstore and bought some stamps from a machine. He dropped the three manila envelopes holding the tapes into a nearby mailbox. Then he rejoined the crowd outside the empty store, looking for his two friends.
He saw Bob at once. The tall, blond guy was talking to a pretty, dark- haired girl about his own age near the police car. She was a nose wrinkler, Jupe noticed. She couldn’t say ten words without wrinkling her nose. But he had to admit that she was also very cute.
Pete reappeared, and waited impatiently with Jupe for Bob to finish. Finally the third Investigator touched the girl’s arm in a friendly way and left her. All three guys climbed back into the VW.
“She give you her phone number?” Jupe asked a little enviously as they drove away.
Bob shook his head.
“She collects early Judy Garland records,” he explained. “She’s not my type.”
Maybe that explained the nose wrinkling, Jupe thought. The girl had copied it from late-night Judy Garland movies on TV.
“How come it took you ten minutes to find out she didn’t like rock?” Pete asked as they, headed back to the Coast Highway. “I thought you were a fast worker.”
“That was just for openers,” Bob told him. “The rest of the time she was talking about the burglary. Attempted burglary, anyway.”
“So give,” Jupe said. They were supposed to be investigating the puzzles, not picking up girls.
“The way she told it,” Bob went on, “she was coming out of the coffee shop across the street when the burglar alarm outside that store went off. Then she saw a woman run away from the store, jump into a blue car, and burn rubber driving away.”
“Did she see the woman’s face?” Jupe asked.
“Blond hair. Slender build. About forty years old,” Bob said. “Color of eyes — unknown. The woman was wearing shades.”
“Shades!” Pete exclaimed. “On a day like this you’d need windshield wipers on ’em!”
“Yeah,” Jupe agreed. “Our forty-year-old blonde sounds like a bit of a mystery.”
He was silent for a moment, thinking it over.
“She tries to break into an empty store — to find what?”
Silence.
Jupe couldn’t let it go. “Something so valuable that she risked arrest to get it. Guys, there’s more to this contest than barbecued steaks!”
