Ann laughed. “That sounds like Maddy.”
“She could have been kidnapped!” Madison said, offended to be the butt of a joke when she thought her theory was perfectly logical.
“I would rather be tied up in a basement in Lithuania than go to Prescott-Mather.” Lacey laughed.
“Hey! It really isn’t that bad. Some of the millionaires talk to me and the billionaires have stopped asking me to carry their books,” Ann said. “All joking aside, though, the kids at Prescott aren’t that different from the kids at The Grove. There are some mean kids and some extra-nice kids and the rest are okay.”
Madison picked a slice of pizza from the metal tray and ate it while the girls asked Ann about boarding school.
“Is it fun living in the dorms? No parents sounds like fun to me!” said Becca.
“It’s a toss-up. There are even more rules than I had at home! Lights out, and curfews. And one TV for twenty girls!”
“Aargh!” Becca growled. “I’d never make it if I couldn’t watch my shows.”
“How did you find Ann?” Lacey asked Madison.
The girls ate pizza and drank Cokes while Madison told them why she’d tripped over the soccer ball during the scrimmage and about her trip to Prescott-Mather.
“Now that you’ve solved ‘The Case of the Missing Best Friend,’ how are you going to spend your free time?” Becca joked.
“I’m still working on the Shelby case,” Madison said, suddenly serious.
“What’s that?” Ann asked.
“My dad is defending Mark Shelby. He’s accused of murdering Mrs. Shelby—our second grade teacher.”
“Oh, my God, she’s dead?”
“We don’t know that. There’s no body,” Madison said.
Madison was about to continue when she thought of something so obvious that she felt like a dummy for not thinking of it before. When Ann went missing, Madison had jumped to the conclusion that she’d been kidnapped or murdered, but Ann had been hiding.
After they finished their pizza, the girls decided to go to the mall. It was great having the whole gang together, and it was especially great for Madison to see Ann be the same old Ann now that everyone knew her secret. Ann had told Madison she felt like someone had lifted a big weight from her shoulders as soon as she’d told Madison why she was at Prescott-Mather. The girls shopped a while before catching a chick flick at the cinema in the mall. Then Ann had to get back to Prescott-Mather. Only one thing spoiled the day for Madison. With the girls around, she didn’t have a chance to tell Jake about her plan to solve the Shelby case.
Madison got home at ten and went straight to her room. As soon as she shut the door, she phoned Jake.
“I think I know what happened to Mrs. Shelby,” she said excitedly.
“Spill,” said Jake, who sounded instantly intrigued.
“What if Mrs. Shelby did the same thing Ann did?”
“You mean she’s hiding?”
“Her car is missing, and so is her hairbrush and the other things I’d take with me if I was going on a trip. Miss Bauer was on the other side of her house making the call to see if Mrs. Shelby was okay. Then she called 911. Mrs. Shelby could have left without Miss Bauer seeing her!”
“What about the blood and the knife?” Jake asked.
“Remember the onion, the green pepper, the eggs, and the ham mentioned in the police report? I think Mrs. Shelby was making a Western omelet. Something Dad said at the bail hearing got me thinking. He made a joke about cutting his finger when he slices bagels. I bet Mrs. Shelby was so upset because she and Mr. Shelby argued that she gashed her finger while slicing the onion. That would explain the blood on the onion in the garbage and on the kitchen counter.”
“And if they were arguing, Mrs. Shelby might have waved her hand around and sprayed blood on the refrigerator,” Jake added excitedly. “And Mr. Shelby was too angry to notice.”
“Then Mr. Shelby put his clubs in his car . . .”
“Which Miss Bauer thought was him moving the body to the car.”
“. . . and left on his golf trip.”
“Which Miss Bauer interpreted as fleeing the scene of the crime.”
“Exactly. When Mrs. Shelby ran upstairs to get a bandage and to pack, she was too busy to answer Miss Bauer’s call. Then she drove off while Miss Bauer was on the other side of the house making the 911 call!”
Jake was quiet for a minute. “We still have a problem. If Mrs. Shelby ran away, why didn’t she call the police after her husband was arrested? I can see someone getting mad after an argument and leaving the house, but why wouldn’t Mrs. Shelby let the police know that she was alive when she learned that Mr. Shelby was facing life in prison for a murder charge?”
“That’s something I can’t answer, but Mrs. Shelby can tell us when we find her. That’s the last piece of this puzzle. We have to figure out where she’s hiding and convince her to come home and clear her husband. And I think I know how we can do that.”
Chapter 19
Back from the Dead
During the ride to school on Monday, Hamilton mentioned that Judge Young had scheduled a hearing on his pretrial motions in the Shelby case for the next afternoon at three p.m. Madison was certain that she could solve the case if she was in the courtroom before the hearing ended. Soccer practice was over by four thirty. If she didn’t shower and she sprinted to the courthouse, Madison thought she could make it.
Jake asked if he could go along after Madison told him her plan. The chance to solve a real murder case was too good to pass up.
Jake and Madison were out of breath when they skidded to a stop in front of the courthouse on Tuesday afternoon.
“So, what’s this hearing about?” Jake asked as they took the courthouse elevator to the fifth floor.
“You know that a person accused of committing a crime has a right to have a lawyer defend them.”
“Sure.”
“One way my dad makes certain that his client is getting a fair trial is by challenging evidence that the prosecutor wants to present to the jury if he thinks that the police got the evidence in a way that is forbidden by law or he believes that the rules of evidence forbid the DA from introducing the evidence. He can object to the evidence during the trial, but defense lawyers can also ask a judge to decide what evidence can be introduced before the trial starts. This saves time during the trial and avoids the risk that the jury will hear or see something they shouldn’t. My dad filed a motion in Mark Shelby’s case to keep out some of the evidence the DA wants to show the jury.”
Madison was interested in the legal motion Hamilton had filed, but she had a more important reason for being in court. As soon as she and Jake walked into the courtroom, Madison gave a silent fist pump. The woman she’d seen at the bail hearing and in the photo on the Shelbys’ mantel was sitting in the last bench near the window.
Madison led Jake to seats on the other side of the courtroom from the mystery woman. Judge Young looked as mean as ever and appeared to be giving Hamilton a hard time. This was a good thing, because it meant her father would be concentrating on the judge and not looking around the courtroom.
Madison was certain that the mystery woman would lead her to Mrs. Shelby. When it looked like the hearing was winding down, Madison signaled to Jake and they slipped out of court.
The one part of her plan that Madison had not figured out was how she and Jake were going to follow the woman after she left the courthouse. If she walked it would be easy, but what if she had a car? Madison had money for a taxi, but taxis didn’t cruise around the streets of Portland like they did in some big cities. Some parked at the big hotels near the courthouse, but Madison knew she would lose sight of her quarry in the time it would take to get to a taxi.