Vanishing Passenger Read online

  “Alice Blake?” Henry said. “Why does that name sound familiar?”

  “She lives two blocks from us,” Violet replied. “Remember? She’s that nice woman who always gives out great candy on Halloween.”

  “I remember her!” Benny said quickly.

  Jessie shook her head. “Of course you do. When there’s food involved, you never forget, do you?”

  “Never!” Benny said proudly.

  “I’ve heard that a lot of adults like Mr. Finch’s books, too,” Henry said. “That must be why she was reading this.”

  Jessie sighed. “So I guess this isn’t much of a clue after all.”

  “No, I guess not,” Henry told her. “But we should return it to Mrs. Blake.”

  “Okay, we’ll stop by her house later.” She slipped the book into the back pocket of her jeans. “Let’s go to the next car.”

  They opened the door to the fourth car, which was also the last. Unlike the other cars, this one was very dark because the shades were drawn. And there was an unusual odor in the air.

  “What’s that smell?” Violet said. “It’s like some kind of medicine …”

  Jessie sniffed. “Hmm … you know something? It’s kind of familiar.”

  “It is?” Violet replied.

  “Uh-huh. It’s …” She sniffed again. “Oh, I can’t remember! But I’m sure I’ve smelled it before.”

  Henry said, “I was thinking the same thing, Jessie. Let’s search the car and see if we can find out where the smell is coming from.”

  Violet slid a few of the shades back to let in more light. As she did, the children noticed something else unusual.

  “Hey, there’s no trash in here,” Benny said. “It looks as if someone already cleaned this car.”

  “Could Pete have done it?” Violet wondered. “Maybe he was in here before.”

  “We’ll ask when we’re done.” Jessie said.

  Henry saw something lying in the first seat. He reached over and grabbed it.

  “If someone did clean out this car already, they missed this.” He held up a shiny silver wrapper. “It’s from a granola bar.” He slipped it into his trash bag.

  The Aldens went through the rest of the seats one by one, but the remainder of the car was just as Benny had suggested—spotlessly clean. They did notice, however, that the peculiar odor they smelled earlier became a little bit stronger as they moved towards the back.

  “I don’t see anything else in here,” Jessie said, “We should go.”

  They stepped back outside and found Pete again. He had moved to another train and was giving it a good wash. The children set down their trash bags. Each was about half full and neatly knotted.

  “Thanks so much,” said Pete. “Did you find any clues?”

  Jessie took the book from her pocket and held it up. “We found one of Mr. Finch’s books. But it looks as though it belongs to one of our neighbors. Her name is written inside.”

  “That doesn’t sound like much of a clue,” Pete commented.

  “No,” Henry said, “that’s what we thought. And there wasn’t even any litter in the fourth car.”

  “That’s because it was closed during the trip,” Pete told him.

  “Closed?” Jessie asked.

  “There weren’t enough passengers. Sometimes the conductors will do that—if they don’t have enough passengers to fill all the cars, they’ll close some of them. It’s easier for them. It also makes it easier for me because I have fewer cars to clean afterwards!”

  “Is there any reason there’d be an odd smell in the fourth car?” Henry asked. Then he described the strange odor.

  Pete thought for a moment before shaking his head. “Nope. But I’ll have to check it out if it’s that bad.”

  Henry looked at the others, then said, “Okay, well, thanks very much for your help, Pete.”

  “And for letting us search the train,” Jessie added.

  “No problem,” Pete said, shaking all their hands again. “If I can do anything else, just let me know.”

  As they began walking back to the library, Jessie said, “Based on what we found, it doesn’t seem as though Mr. Finch was on the train.”

  “But we know he was on it.” Violet pointed out. “Remember he called the library to say he was getting on the train?”

  “So where’d he go?” Benny wondered.

  No one had an answer.

  CHAPTER 4

  A Quiet Place to Read

  “This is just terrible,” Ms. Connally said when the Aldens gave her the bad news. “I’ve never had this happen before. An author no-show! I hope he’s okay.”

  “We’ll find out what happened to him,” Jessie said confidently.

  “If you can’t, I’ll have to call Mr. Van Buren,” Ms. Connally said.

  “He’s the man who was here before, right?” Violet asked.

  Ms. Connally nodded. “Right. He was the one yelling by the front desk before he stomped out. He doesn’t seem to like Gilbert Finch or his books.”

  Henry said, “You should’ve seen what he did to that display of Mr. Finch’s books we put together yesterday.” He told her the story.

  “Why would he do something like that?” Benny asked.

  Ms. Connally shrugged. “I have no idea, Benny.”

  “I’ve never heard of any of Mr. Van Buren’s books,” Violet said.

  “They’re very good, actually,” Ms. Connally said. “But they’re for older children. Henry, you might like them.”

  “Maybe he had something to do with Mr. Finch’s disappearance,” Jessie said.

  “We should keep him in mind,” Violet said.

  Jessie checked her watch again. “Okay, let’s finish eating and get back to this mystery.”

  “Right,” Henry said. “We don’t have much time.”

  “Thanks very much for looking into this, kids,” Ms. Connally told them. “I appreciate your efforts, but if Mr. Finch doesn’t show up by, say, tomorrow morning, I’m going to have to plan for Mr. Van Buren to be here instead.”

  “A lot of people will be disappointed if Mr. Finch doesn’t make it,” Jessie said as they walked along one of Greenfield’s sunny sidewalks. There were big, beautiful homes on either side of the street. “And I don’t think Mr. Van Buren will draw as big of a crowd. He’s such a grouch.”

  The Aldens stopped at the house of Mrs. Blake, the woman who left behind the copy of The Secret of the Pyramids they had found on the train. There was a swing on the porch that could hold two people, and a sign by the front door that read, “All Friends Welcome.”

  The Aldens rang the bell and waited. The door swung back to reveal an elderly woman in a floral dress. The Aldens smiled, and Mrs. Blake smiled back.

  “Well, it’s so nice of you to visit me on this lovely day. Is your grandfather with you?” Mrs. Blake said.

  “No, ma’am,” Jessie said. “Not today.”

  “Probably snoozing in his easy chair,” she said with a playful look in her eye, “when he should be in the backyard cutting the lawn or something.”

  The children laughed. They always loved the way Mrs. Blake joked about their grandfather.

  Jessie took Finch’s book out of her back pocket. “Mrs. Blake, I think you left this on the train this morning.”

  Her face changed from happy to surprised. “Yes, I did! I was wondering where it went!” She opened the screen door and motioned for them to come inside. As they stepped in, Jessie handed her the book. “I was reading it during my trip, and then I thought I put it in my bag. I didn’t realize I’d lost it until I got home.” She looked at it fondly. “Oh, thank you so much.”

  “You really like his stories?” Benny asked.

  “I sure do!” she replied. “Hey, if you kids can enjoy them, I can too! And I can’t wait to meet him at the library tomorrow night!”

  “Well … there might be a problem with that,” Jessie told her reluctantly. “It seems as though Mr. Finch has disappeared.”

 
Mrs. Blake looked stunned. “Disappeared?”

  “That’s right.” Henry told her what they knew so far—that Mr. Finch definitely got on the train in Clairmont but wasn’t there when it arrived in Greenfield.

  “Oh my goodness!” Mrs. Blake said.

  “That’s why we came over,” Jessie told her. “To return your book, and to ask if you saw him.”

  “No, I didn’t,” Mrs. Blake said right away. “I would’ve recognized him.”

  “That’s what we figured,” Violet said with a long sigh.

  “Did you notice anything unusual?” Henry asked. “Anything that might be a clue?”

  She thought for a moment. “No, I don’t think so … Let’s see. I got on at Briarwood. I decided to read his book on the trip, to pass the time. I bought it at a little store up there. I remember getting on the train and trying to read it, but it was too noisy. There was a dog barking somewhere. Can you believe that? A dog on the train? So anyway, I went to the very back, where it was quiet.”

  “The third car,” Jessie said.

  “Right, the third car. And then I started reading—” She stopped, and her eyes widened. “I managed to read in peace for a little while. And then … you know what? I do remember something unusual.”

  “Really? What was that?” said Violet.

  “We went into a very bad thunderstorm …”

  “Yes,” Jessie said. The children remembered the conductors’ wet uniforms.

  “We stopped at one of the stations,” Mrs. Blake continued, “and I heard someone yell ‘Hey!’ behind me. I was surprised because it sounded like it was coming from the very last car, and no one was supposed to be in that one.”

  “Because it was closed,” Violet said.

  “Right,” Mrs. Blake told her. “They didn’t have enough people to fill it. Anyway, I heard this person yell, and I got up to see who it was. I looked through the window and I saw someone jump off just as the train was pulling away!”

  “Wow, just like that police detective did in Diamonds in the Dungeon,” Benny said.

  “That’s right,” Mrs. Blake said. “I was thinking the same thing when I saw it.”

  “Which station stop was it, Mrs. Blake?” Henry asked. “What town?”

  “I’m not sure,” she said. “It was one or two stops before Greenfield.”

  “What did this person look like?” Jessie asked. “Did you get a good look at them?”

  “No, it was raining too hard. But whoever it was, he or she was definitely in that fourth car.”

  “So there was someone back there!” Benny said.

  “It looks that way,” Henry said.

  But if it was Finch, why would he jump off a moving train in the middle of a thunderstorm?

  CHAPTER 5

  A Very Strange Message

  The children met their grandfather at the Greenfield Diner for dinner. The place was bustling with customers. The air was filled with the hum of conversation, the clinking of silverware, and the wonderful scent of many different meals.

  Sitting in their favorite booth, the Alden children gave their grandfather the details of this latest mystery. Meanwhile, they only picked at their dinners. Grandfather soon gave up hope that his grandchildren would show much interest in food while they were working on this case. Benny didn’t even order dessert!

  “Too bad we don’t have Mr. Finch’s cell phone number,” Henry said. “I’m sure he carries it with him wherever he goes.”

  “We’ll have to tell Ms. Connally what’s happening,” Jessie said. “We should stop over there before we go home tonight to give her an update.”

  “And then what?” Violet asked.

  No one had an answer to that. They all fell silent.

  Benny had been listening quietly, munching on his chicken strips and sipping his milk. But then something caught his attention from the other side of the room.

  “Hey,” he said in a whisper, “look over there!”

  He pointed to a man sitting in a small booth by himself, drinking coffee.

  “What?” Henry asked. “That man?”

  “No, the bag!”

  There was a brown leather bag on the other seat. It was very handsome and looked expensive.

  “What about it?”

  “Look at the initials, near the top!”

  Sure enough, embroidered right into the leather just under the zipper, were the initials ‘GXF.’ All at once, the Aldens remembered Mr. Finch’s full name: Gilbert Xavier Finch!

  “Oh my goodness!” Violet gasped. “Do you really think …?”

  “How many other people have those initials?” Jessie said. “A middle name that begins with X?”

  The children studied the man carefully. He was dressed in a navy blue T-shirt with long sleeves, plus blue jeans and a pair of well-worn work boots. He had dark hair with flecks of silver, and he looked as though he hadn’t shaved in a few days.

  As he took another sip from his coffee, the waitress came over and asked if he wanted anything else. He shook his head and took his wallet from his pocket. The waitress left the bill on the table, and the man set a five-dollar bill on top of it. Then he got up, taking the bag with him.

  “Well, if we want to find out, we’d better move fast,” Henry said.

  The children filed out of the booth, followed by their grandfather.

  Outside, the man paused for a moment to put on a pair of glasses.

  “Excuse me, sir?” called Jessie.

  The man turned suddenly, surprised to see the Aldens. “Yes?”

  “I know this is going to sound like a strange question,” Henry said, smiling, “but may I ask if that’s your bag?”

  Now the man smiled back. “No, it isn’t. Er … how did you know that?”

  “We think it may belong to a friend of ours,” Violet said. “Did you find it on a train, by any chance?”

  The man looked even more surprised, and also a little bit impressed. “Yes, as a matter of fact I did.”

  “On train number sixteen?” Jessie added.

  Now the man laughed. “Yes, that’s exactly right. It just so happens that I’m the engineer!”

  The children looked at each other. Now they were getting somewhere!

  “And was the bag … on the fourth car?” Benny asked him. “The one that was supposed to be closed?”

  The man nodded. “Indeed it was, young man.”

  “So Gilbert Finch was there,” Violet said. “He must’ve been the person who jumped off!”

  Henry explained the rest of the story. “And we thought Mr. Finch might’ve been in that fourth car.”

  “I guess he was,” the engineer commented. He slid the bag off his shoulder and handed it over to Henry. “I found this in the overhead luggage rack of the fourth car. When I do find something valuable and I can’t find the owner, I then have to report it. That means I have to fill out all these boring forms and stuff.” He rolled his eyes. “Not much fun at all. So if you can return the bag to Mr. Finch, that would be great.”

  “We sure will,” Jessie said. “Thanks.”

  Back at the library, the children told Ms. Connally everything they knew so far. Then they set Mr. Finch’s bag on a table in one of the back rooms and unzipped it.

  “I feel weird going through it,” Violet said. “I’m sure it has some of Mr. Finch’s personal things in here.”

  “But there might also be something that helps us find him,” Jessie pointed out.

  On the top layer, the children found several copies of his books, mostly his new one. Underneath that, a cell phone charger, some clothes, and a leather bag with a toothbrush, shampoo, and other toiletries inside. And under that was a small notepad.

  Jessie opened the notepad and began reading.

  “Anything important?” Henry added. “Any clues?”

  “Hmm—Food shopping on Thursday … Do laundry on Friday … Booksigning up in Clearwater on the fifth of June … Fix that broken window on the second floor …” Jessie sighe
d. “Not very interesting.”

  “That’s it?” Violet asked.

  “There’s one more page,” She said, flipping to it. “Might need new dining room table … Have someone mow the back lawn … What should I do about …”

  “What is it?” Henry said.

  “Okay, this might be a clue—it says, What should I do about Van Buren?”

  “So we’re back to him again,” Violet said.

  “You know what?” Henry said. “We should go through the library’s catalog to see if we can find any information on Mr. Van Buren and Mr. Finch. You know—newspaper or magazine articles, maybe something on the Internet. We need to know more about this strange connection.”

  “Good idea,” Jessie agreed. “Maybe we can figure out why Mr. Van Buren’s name keeps coming up.”

  The children began to look through the library for any information they could find. After about an hour, they had gathered a small stack of newspapers and magazines. They each took a few and began going through them.

  “According to this article,” Violet said,” Mr. Finch loves animals. It says he has given lots of time and money to various animal charities, and that he has kept dozens of pets through the years. It also says he refuses to eat any kind of meat. Only fruits, vegetables, and—listen to this—granola bars!”

  Jessie nodded. “It had to be him in the fourth car of the train.”

  “In this magazine,” Henry told them, “it says he sometimes likes to write in what he calls a ‘secret country hideaway’. But he refused to tell the writer of the article where it was. He would only say that ‘… it used to be a big old barn, painted red. It has since been repainted white with black shutters and now looks quite lovely. I go there every now and then because it’s so quiet and peaceful out there in the country?’”

  “What about his relationship with Mr. Van Buren?” Violet asked. “Anything about that?”

  “Yes,” Jessie said, “I think I found something. In this article, Mr. Finch said, ‘I’m thrilled my books are doing so well. As long as they do better than Daniel Van Buren’s, I’ll be happy.’”

  “In this interview,” Henry added, picking up a printout of an Internet article he’d found, “Mr. Van Buren said, ‘I’m glad my readers enjoy what I write so much. As long as they stay away from that silly stuff Gilbert Finch comes up with, they’ll be okay.’ ”