“Okay, okay,” he stammered. “Answer me this: Why did they bring you those printed-out pages? Huh? I’ll tell you. They were trying to beat me here and get themselves off the hook, that’s why.”
“No,” said Hirsch patiently. “They came here to report their handwritten pages had been stolen. They brought the typed pages to prove the story was theirs. Quite frankly, I never thought the stolen pages would turn up, but then you walked in out of the blue. How very convenient!”
“No!” shouted Mitchell in anguish. He was losing badly.
Hirsch looked at Mark and Courtney and said, “Do you want to press charges against Mr. Mitchell?”
Mark and Courtney looked at each other, then Courtney said, “No, just getting the pages back is enough.” ”Yeah, in a way we feel kind of bad for him,” said Mark sympathetically. “We never thought somebody would believe our story was good enough to be true!”
“Really!” added Courtney with a laugh.
“But itistrue!” shouted Mitchell, on the verge of tears. “Isn’t it?”
“You’re free to go, Mr. Mitchell,” said Hirsch. “But I first want you to apologize to these two for what you did.”
Mitchell flashed a look of anger and hatred at Mark that rocked him back in his chair. It didn’t seem to bother Courtney, though. Mitchell didn’t scare her. Mitchell got all red in the face, like he was in horrible pain, then he squeezed out a weak, “I’m… sorry.”
“It’s okay, Andy,” Courtney said sympathetically. “Let’s forget this ever happened.”
“Yeah,” added Mark.
“Thank you, Mr. Mitchell. Now go away,” ordered Hirsch.
Mitchell stood there for a second, desperately thinking of something he could say to turn this around. But he wasn’t smart enough to do that. He looked at Courtney. Courtney gave him a tiny little smile and a wink. That was it. Mitchell couldn’t take it anymore.
“Ahhhh!” he shouted, and stormed out of the conference room.
Hirsch said, “You’re right. Heisan obnoxious slug.”
“Thank you, Captain,” said Courtney in her most polite voice. “I knew you would be the right person to come to for help.”
“No problem, that’s my job. I do have a favor to ask though.”
“Anything,” said Courtney quickly.
“Would you let me read this story? It’s really pretty good!”
Mark and Courtney exchanged glances, then Mark said, “Sure, but could you read the printed pages? We’d like to hold on to the handwritten ones.”
Hirsch quickly slid the folder with Bobby’s journals over to Mark.
“Of course, here you go,” he said. “That Mitchell guy’s a piece of work. Did he really think this story was true?”
All Mark and Courtney could do was shrug innocently.
A few minutes later Mark and Courtney were out of the police station and walking down the Ave. Bobby’s first journals were safely tucked into Mark’s backpack. They had politely turned down a ride home from Officer Wilson, saying they’d like to walk. They said the whole ordeal was pretty stressful and they needed to cool down.
They went right to Garden Poultry and bought two boxes of French fries, along with a Coke and a Mountain Dew. Mark did the Dew. They brought the food to the pocket park and sat on a bench to enjoy their feast. Neither one had said anything from the time they left the police station. They just kind of drifted toward Garden Poultry without even discussing it.
Finally, as he finished his last crispy golden fry, Mark said, “I’m sorry, Courtney.”
Courtney gulped down the rest of her Coke, then said, “Losing that page from the journal was an accident. It was as much my fault as yours. But not telling me right away that Mitchell found out about the journals… Mark, that was bad.”
“I know, I know,” was all Mark could say. “I thought I could handle the guy. I… I was embarrassed to tell you how bad I screwed up. But man, when he wanted to see all the journals and started talking about how we were going to be famous when we showed the whole world what we had — I didn’t know what to do.”
“You should have come to me before it got that bad,” said Courtney. Mark could tell she was angry.
“Yeah,” said Mark guiltily. “But your plan was awesome.” He thought back to the moment when he finally fessed up to Courtney about what had happened. It was right after Mitchell demanded to see all of the journals. Courtney didn’t get angry. Instead she came up with the idea to turn the tables on Mitchell. She knew he would tell the police about the journals to claim the reward. That was a no-brainer. But they figured they could beat him to the punch by pretending they wrote the story themselves. It took Courtney three late nights of grueling typing to get Bobby’s first journals into her computer. Then they printed out the pages and took them right to Captain Hirsch. That’s when they told him the bogus story about their handwritten version being stolen. The key to the whole thing was showing the story to the policebeforeMitchell did. Neither of them liked to lie, but the situation was desperate. Mitchell had to be stopped from exposing Bobby’s story to the world.
As it turned out, it became only half a lie when Mitchell came to Mark’s house and ended up stealing the journals after all. Still, if Mitchell had just read the journals and returned them, that would have been the end. But they knew Mitchell wouldn’t do that. He was too greedy. They knew he’d take the journals to the police — and walk right into their trap. The sting worked beautifully. They got Bobby’s journals back and Mitchell couldn’t demand to see them anymore by threatening to go to the police.
It was a beautiful thing, but Mark still felt bad for not having been totally honest with Courtney.
“You brought me into this when you showed me the first journal,” Courtney said. “If you want me to stay in, you’ve got to be honest with me, always.”
“I will, I promise,” Mark whined.
The two were silent for a second, then slowly, Courtney smiled a devilish smile. “But it sure was sweet seeing Mitchell squirm!”
Mark laughed too and they slapped high-fives. Mark then reached around his neck and pulled out the chain that held the key to his secret desk. Dangling next to it was Mark’s ring. He took it off and put it right back on his finger, where it belonged.
There was nothing left to do now but go home. They walked together until Courtney reached her street.
“So, you’ll call me?” asked Courtney.
“Soon as the next journal shows,” answered Mark, as he always did.
The two then gave each other a hug and separated.
They wouldn’t get back together for another five months.
Both went back to their normal lives at home and at school. Since the only friend they had in common was Bobby, that meant neither of them saw much of each other. Occasionally they’d pass in the hallway. Courtney would look at him as if to ask: “Well?” Mark would just shake his head. Nothing yet.
Courtney played softball for the Stony Brook team. It was fast-pitch and she was the pitcher. The team went undefeated that spring, and Courtney was MVP of course.
Mark’s big project was to build a battling robot for a county science fair. He had a real knack for mechanics and physics. The robot was killer. It destroyed the competition with a combination hook, buzz saw, sledgehammer package. He took first prize and started to investigate how to get on the TV with his battling robotic baby.
Courtney had a birthday on March 6. She turned fifteen. Mark sent her a card with the greeting: “Happy Birthday, Hobey-ho!”
The two did get together once, on March 11. Bobby’s birthday. They went back to Garden Poultry on the Ave, got some fries, and toasted Bobby in the pocket park with Coke and Dew.
Both wondered if Bobby had any idea that he had just turned fifteen.
The next big event was graduation from Stony Brook Junior High in June. Mark was valedictorian and was supposed to give a speech. But he was too nervous and let the runner-up take his place on the podium. He was still the valedictorian, though, and got a huge dictionary as a prize. The next stop for these two was high school — a big, scary step. They would soon be going to Davis Gregory High, the big public high school in Stony Brook. Nobody knew who Davis Gregory was, but they figured he must have been somebody important. Mark wondered if someday there’d be a school called Bobby Pendragon High.